Professor Murray Saunders

PhD Supervision Interests

Educational policy implementation and change; Work and the curriculum; National and international policy evaluation, evaluation theory and method, evaluation of complex change processes e.g. e-learning. Informal learning in communities,

Research Interests

Co Director of HERE@lancaster , and Professor of Evaluation in Education and Work. I have acted as a consultant to, and undertaken a wide range of evaluation projects for, the British Council, DfES [Department for Education and Skills], DFID [Department for International Development], UN, UNRWA, ESRC [The Education and Social Research Council], HEFCE [Higher Education Funding Council], SFC (the Scottish Funding Council) and a variety of regional agencies. I have carried out evaluation and research projects in a wide range of cultural contexts, including in Asia: China, Japan, Singapore and India; in Africa: Tanzania, Kenya, Nigeria, Ghana and Ethiopia; in Latin America: Mexico and Chile: In the Middle East: Jordan as well as other member states of the EU and Russia.

I enjoy promoting and developing evaluation practice as past president and Council member of the UK Evaluation Society, Board member and past President of the European Evaluation Society, chair of the co-ordinating committee for the establishment of the IOCE (International Organisation for Cooperation in Evaluation) and current vice president [ and I am associate editor of the only international multidisciplinary academic journal in the field - Evaluation. I wasCo-Director of the SFC [Scottish Funding Council] funded evaluation of the new Scottish HE Quality Enhancement Policy which finished in December 2010.I continue to have research interests in the nature of evaluative practices, the relationship between education and the workplace and the connection between social change and development and evaluative practice.

Current Research

I am currently undertaking a collaborative project under the auspices of the IOCE and UNICEF to enhance the role of evaluation asociations' participation in civil society world-wide. The web link for this initiative is will be launched in March 2012. Work for the British Council currently involves the review and evaluation of higher education partnerships.

I am also interested in the way School Farms are used as a learning process and have been awarded (March 2012), along with Mason Minnitt (honorary research fellow of the Department of Educational Research) a Knowledge Exchange Fellowship to further this work.

I am currently evaluating the use of the Indicator of Enhancement in Scottish Higher Education for the QAA Scotland.

Profile

I have directed or co-directed some 40 separate evaluation and research projects over the last 20 years in areas of change, policy and strategic development and vocational education. In the HE environment I have worked (as both evaluator and developer) on six R&D projects which have tested various types of learning support in international consortia of HEIs [Higher Education Institutions].

I was Head of the Department of Educational Research, Lancaster University from 1997-2000. I currently hold visiting professorship in Evaluation at Freibourg University, Switzerland.

Additional Information

Research programme during the last 6 years

Director of the British Council Evaluation Development Project [Case studies of Hong Kong, Ghana and Poland] funded by the British Council £19,000 1997

Also for BC -

Evaluation of Designing, shopping Eating Project Hong Kong 1998.

Evaluation design and planning, Ghana, Poland and Hong Kong 1999.

Evaluation of Creative Industries Export Promotion, Singapore, Japan 2000.

Evaluation Capacity Building in HE, Ethiopia 2000.

Evaluation Children's Rights Mexico 2001.

Evaluation Governance Interventions Chile, 2001.

Evaluation Design for the Education Support Project UNWRA, Jordan 2001-on-going.

Evaluation capacity building English Peace Keeping Project 2001

Director of the King's Fund Management Development Evaluation ProgrammeFunded by the King's Fund £29,000 1997

Co Director of the HEINE Project: Government intervention in Higher EducationFunded by TSER [EU] £120,000 1997

Co-Director of the Cumbrian Small Schools Research Support Project Cumbrian LEA £6000 1998

Director of the Equam Project [Quality and Environmental Management Project] under the Leonardo Initiative Funded by the EU £12000 1998

Director of the Learnett Project under the Socrates InitiativeFunded by the EU £12000 1998

Director of the Evaluation of Education Action Zone: Barrow2000-2005 £100,000

Director of the World Challenge Evaluation 2000-2002 Funded by World Challenge £25000

Director of the RECRE@SUP project on innovations in HE2001-2002 Funded by Socrates [EU] £12000

Director of the Evaluation of the EQUEL project 2002-2004 Funded by the EU

Co proposer and manager of the LTSN National Evaluation 2001-2002 Funded by HEFC £200,000

Co-director of the LTSN second phase evaluation 2004 Funded by HEFC £50000

Consultant to the Subject Centre Review Committee 2004 Funded by HEFC

Co-Director of the SHEFC Quality Enhancement Framework Evaluation 2003-2006 £300,000

Co-Director of the Skills for Life evaluation of the Learner's Experience, 2003-2006, £391,000

Co-Director of the ELAC project: evaluation capacity building 2004-2006, £40000

Director of the KTP project on partnership learning 2004-2007, £135000

Director of the evaluation of the national CETL programme in England, Wales and Northern Ireland 2007 -2008

£130,000

Director of the evaluation of the London Refugee Policy 2008 -2009

£50,000 

Director of the Widening Participation Evaluation  programme, HEFCE, 2008

£114.281.00 

Director of the Scottish Funding Council Quality Enhancement Strategy 2008-2012:  £495,000

• HEFCE Enhancement Review Project: Future directions for Learning and Teaching Enhancement in England: institutional roles and interventions

  06/05/2013 → 01/11/2013
  This 7-month project (May to December 2013) funded by the Higher Education Academy uses primary and secondary data to review the strategies used by HEFCE to enhance learning and teaching in universiti ... Read more»

• Leadership Foundation for Higher Education (LFHE) Baseline Leadership Development Research Project

  01/12/2007 →
  Leadership Foundation for Higher Education (LFHE) Baseline Leadership Development Research Project Subtitle: A study of the higher education sector's level of engagement in leadership and managemen ... Read more»

• Evaluation Capacity Building for HEI widening participation teams

  01/04/2007 → 31/12/2009
  This HEFCE funded project provided evaluation capacity building for HEI widening participation teams (WPTs) in the form of a development initiative involving regional capacity building workshops, inte ... Read more»

• Islington Integrated Refugee Strategy Evaluation Project

  01/02/2007 → 31/03/2008
  The project is an external independent evaluation the Islington Refugee Integration strategy. It provides a framework for how the evaluation of IRIS is undertaken.The key evaluation objectives have th ... Read more»

• Evaluating Education Action Zones

  25/01/2007 →
  CSET is trialing an innovative approach to evaluation in one of the UK's Education Action Zones. This five year project collaborative project involving Paul Davies and Murray Saunders in C ... Read more»

• National Evaluation of the CETL Programme

  01/01/2007 → 31/12/2007
  The Centres for Excellence in Teaching and Learning (CETL) initiative has two main aims: to reward excellent teaching practice, and to further invest in that practice so that CETLs funding delivers su ... Read more»

• Adult Learning, Basic Skills and Literacy

  01/11/2006 →
  Adult Learning, Basic Skills and Literacy and the evaluation of Skills for Life CSET has strong links to the Lancaster Literacy Research Centre. It is currently undertaking the initial evaluating the ... Read more»

• KTP The Knowledge Transfer Partnership

  01/11/2004 →
  KTP The Knowledge Transfer Partnership Learning through partnership in South Lakes area of Barrow. This three year project is funded by the ESRC through the KTP scheme. It is a three year project tha ... Read more»

• European and Latin America Collaboration

  01/10/2003 → 30/09/2006
  ELAC aimed to use ICT as a mechanism to support learning in environmental management in Costa Rica, Mexcio and Nicaragua. CSET's roles was to provide evaluation support and underake evalutative resear ... Read more»

• Evaluating the Scottish HE policy on quality (QEF)

  01/08/2003 → 30/06/2007
  This project is evaluating the enhancement led approach to the development of quality within the HE sector in Scotland. The project is running from 2003-2006 and is funded by the Scottish Higher Educa ... Read more»

• HE and FE

  01/11/1994 → 01/11/2001
  Members of CSET have developed a series of courses for Lancaster University undergraduates on Education and Work, Educational Policy Making and Universities and Society; MA/MSc modules on Evaluation a ... Read more»

• GNVQs

  01/11/1993 → 01/11/1994
  The two main aims of this report were to identify the factors which influence and motivate individuals to take-up NVQs and to identify how TECs can help to increase individual take-up. Researchers car ... Read more»

• Training Strategies and Management Development

  01/11/1992 → 01/11/1997
  A list of Training Strategies and Management Development related projects, dating from 1992 - 1997. ... Read more»

• Evaluation and Quality

  01/11/1990 → 01/11/2001
  A list of projects related to Evaluation and Quality, which took place between 1990 - 2001. ... Read more»

• Teaching & Learning Strategies

  01/11/1989 → 01/11/1997
  A list of Teaching and Learning Strategies related projects, dating from 1989 - 2001. ... Read more»

• Article in University World News: 'Rethinking academic tribes and territories'

  20/11/2011
  In advance of the new book on academic cultures and disciplinary differences, edited by Paul Trowler, Murray Saunders and Veronica Bamber, this article discusses the changes in disciplinary cultures o ... Read more»

• New Evaluative Research in CSET

  20/11/2008
  New Evaluative Research in CSET: the Scottish Funding Council's Teaching and Learning Enhancement Strategy for Higher Education. A team from CSET (Centre for the Study of Education and Training in the ... Read more»