Context, Agency, Place and Education

CAPE Research and Knowledge Exchange Group

The Context Agency Place and Education (CAPE) Research and Knowledge Exchange Group is grounded in Plymouth Marjon University’s coastal-rural and coastal-urban place, positioning its focus firmly on context and the way this relates to agency in both formal and informal education settings.

Key themes explored by CAPE

Enhancing Education & Practice:

1. Innovative Learning

Focus on inventive teaching methods for all ages, e.g., outdoor learning and inclusive curriculum.

2. Professional Development

Advancing transformative practices and policies across formal and informal settings like Youth Work, schools, and higher education. Examples: transformative evaluation in Youth Work, tackling educational inequity, and supporting early career teachers.

CAPE organisation and leadership team

Director: Professor (Dr) Tanya Ovenden-Hope

tovenden-hope@marjon.ac.uk

Co-Convenor: Dr Jon Ord

jord@marjon.ac.uk

Co-Convenor (ECR): Lee Ballard

lballard@marjon.ac.uk

Our vision

CAPE focuses on professional practice nationally and globally, fostering impactful networks and partnerships. Our commitment includes:

Creating an inclusive research culture centered on professional practice.
Developing research capacity for impactful education-related work.
Conducting focused interdisciplinary research across various levels.

Our diverse membership, spanning academics, practitioner researchers, and education professionals, fosters expertise. We nurture a thriving Teacher Education Partnership and engage Visiting Professors of international repute for developmental activities like seminars, mentoring, and lectures. Our robust educational background enables us to offer PhD supervision across our thematic areas.

CAPE Projects – A Snapshot

Coastal Schools

Research into the challenges faced by schools in coastal regions and how they have sought to overcome them.

Educational Isolation: A challenge for schools in England

Educational isolation is complex, grounded in location, situated in access to resources and results in reduced agency for schools.

The impact of Youth Work in Europe

This project aimed to independently identify the impact of open access youth work in the UK (England), Finland, Estonia, Italy and France.

Transformative Youth Work International Conference

The first ever international conference focusing on the impact of youth work.

Want to join us?

We welcome approaches from any educational organisations, bodies or individuals that would like to discuss working with academic researchers that understand and have experience in both formal and informal education contexts. Please contact the CAPE Director Professor (Dr) Tanya Ovenden-Hope by emailing tovenden-hope@marjon.ac.uk to enquire about joining.

You can also get in touch through twitter @CAPE_Marjon

We would love to hear from you and work together to make a difference in and for education.

CAPE Quarterly Updates

Coming soon

More CAPE Projects

Coming soon

CAPE Key Documents

Link to Sharepoint