Alan Smithers

Prof Alan George Smithers (born 20 May 1938) is a British educationalist.

Method of research and information dissemination

He is best known for his distinctive style of research, which leads to him often being called upon to comment on the issues of the day. His early experience in science led him to the view that educational researchers are wrong in aping the scientific paradigm. While science studies a relatively enduring reality, educational research often aims to capture a fast changing scene when accurate information needs to be got to policy-makers and practitioners as quickly as possible. Having published over a hundred papers he came to the view that peer-reviewed journals are not the most appropriate medium for disseminating findings since they are too slow and directed at the wrong audience. He has concentrated on getting out results as quickly as possible through reports and the media. He guards against the bias from prior value positions to which educational research is vulnerable by drawing financial support from a plurality of funders.

Early life

Smithers was born in the East End of London, the son of a Billingsgate fish porter. His mother worked in a sweet factory, and he claims he lived on fish and Turkish Delight during the war. He was educated at a grammar school then King's College London, gaining a first class honours degree BSc and then a PhD in Plant Physiology in 1966. From the University of Bradford he gained a degree in the psychology and sociology of education MSc and a PhD in Education in 1974. All professors at the University of Manchester are required to be graduates of the University and in 1981 a master of education MEd was conferred. He became a Chartered Psychologist in 1988.

Career

Plant Physiology

He was originally a research scientist in plant physiology. From 1962-4 he lectured in biology at the College of St Mark and St John in Chelsea, then botany at Birkbeck College from 1964-7.

Education

He became actively involved in education as a subject when in 1960s the University of London, where he lectured, began introducing modular degrees. This led to a secondment at the newly-elevated University of Bradford. There he re-qualified as a psychologist and progressed rapidly to become Senior Lecturer in Education in 1969. He became a professor at the University of Manchester at the age of 37. He has successively occupied four chairs: Professor of Education at the University of Manchester (1976-96); Professor of Policy Research at Brunel University (1996-8); Sydney Jones Professor of Education at the University of Liverpool (1998-2004); and currently as Director of the Centre for Education and Employment Research at the University of Buckingham (2004 to present).

Educational research

Smithers’ applied approach and funding base has meant he is regularly directed to the educational issues that are uppermost in people’s minds. Among the areas with which his team have been associated have been choice and selection in education, social variation between schools, qualifications and assessment, physics education, international comparisons of educational achievement, headship, teacher training, recruitment and retention, technical and further education, the independent/state divide, single-sex and coeducation, and higher education.

Publications

He has published many influential books and reports, often in collaboration with Dr Pamela Robinson, including:

• Choice and Selection in Education: the experience of other countries (2010)
• The Good Teacher Training Guide 2010 (2010)
• Worlds Apart: social variation among schools (2010)
• Physics Particpation and Policies: lessons from abroad (2009)
• Specialist Science Schools (2009)
• The Diploma: a disaster waiting to happen? (2008)
• Blair's Education: an international perspective (2007)
• Physics in Schools and Colleges (2007)
• School Headship (2007)
• The Paradox of Single Sex and Coeducational Schooling (2006)
• England’s Education (2004)
• Attracting Teachers (2000)
• Further Education Reformed (2000)
• The Impact of Double Science (1994)
• General Studies (1993)
• Graduates in the Police Service (1990)
• Increasing Participation in Higher Education (1989)
• The Growth of Mixed A-Levels (1988)
• The Progress of Mature Students (1986)
• Sandwich Courses: an Integrated Education? (1976).

Two of his reports were featured as Dispatches programmes on Channel 4, Every Child in Britain (1991) and All Our Futures: Britain’s Education Revolution (1993). He been a frequent commentator on the policies of successive governments. His reviews of Blair’s education have appeared in Anthony Seldon’s books, The Blair Effect: The Blair Government 1997-2001 (2001) and The Blair Effect 2001-2005 (2005).

Educational advisor at a national level

While mainly a hands-on researcher he has served in a number of national roles including advising all three political parties, and the Commons Education Select Committee since 1997. He is determinedly apolitical believing that close association with any one party compromises the objectivity of the research. Among others he has been a member of the National Curriculum Council, the Beaumont Review of National Vocational Qualifications and the Royal Society Committee on Teacher Supply.

Personal life

He married Angela Wykes in 1962. They have two daughters. They divorced in 2003.

References

• Debretts People of Today
• Who's Who

External links

• CEER
• University of Buckingham

News items

• Advocating science colleges to select their pupils in December 2009
• Not enough teacher trainees with Maths and Science A levels in August 2009
• Class sizes to soar in May 2009
• State monopoly of universities must be broken Times March 2009
• Success of specialist schools ia an illusion in February 2009
• Independent schools succeed due to tailoring teaching to pupils' needs in September 2008
• Economics teaching dying out in UK schools in July 2008
• 1 in 4 secondary schools with no physics teachers in June 2008
• Diplomas could be a disaster in June 2008
• Schools are exam factories in May 2007
• Teaching physics as physics not biology in March 2007
• Physics A level entries halving over 20 years in August 2006
• Physics entries declining by 38% since 1990 in November 2005
• Universities illegally discriminating against private school applicants in October 2004
• Guardian September 2004
• Double the number of teachers leaving education in June 2003
• Not enough male teachers in July 2002
• 'Set free to do the job' Article explaining decision to move the from the University of Liverpool to the independent University of Buckingham