One of our Irish members from the Anna Lindh Network, Prof Aislinn O'Donnell, Maynooth University, is currently researching issues concerning gender, youth, climate change, migration both in educational settings and in wider society among other topics. Educational leaders, teachers, youth workers and wider communities have also discussed the challenges of facilitating these kinds of conversations.
They have put a call out for members to fill in a survey, and would like to hear member's perspectives, experiences, and the kinds of practices and ideas members think are helpful or unhelpful as well as those that create connection and even joy. Their hope is that this will shape some practical resources that will be useful for us all, and also provide an opportunity to share existing resources and ideas more widely.
As part of the research initiative, they would like to understand the kinds of issues that members think are difficult to address, why they are difficult, and whether there are any issues that members think are not being addressed because of concerns such as: fear of being "cancelled", being silenced, getting it wrong, not knowing enough, the organisational culture in which members work/study, etc. The would also like to learn about how members open up dialogues and activities in educational spaces (and beyond) and how they foster democratic life and active listening in education, including learning to disagree.
The aim of the survey is to inform the next stages of the research project, including: 1. further conversations in focus groups and/or interviews, 2. events that they will organise in Maynooth University, 3. a website, 4. workshops with young people on their Youth Advisory Group (still recruiting), and 5. a series of podcasts with invited speakers on topics identified by this survey and subsequent research. They are very keen that this project is responsive to members needs, that they create events that are of interest to members, and also that it provides a framework to share some of member's expertise more widely, including collaborative research.
They plan to have a conference in January 2025 and anticipate hosting two workshops (with Anthony Malone). The provisional dates are November 8th 2024 and March/April 2025.
Please be assured that this MSForms is entirely anonymous so identities will not be disclosed. If there are any more questions, would like to be involved in subsequent stages of the research (interviews and/or focus groups), or come to events next year, please contact aislinn.odonnell@mu.ie (please add Sharing the World in the title line) and/or to sharingtheworld@mu.ie.
The survey should take 10-15 minutes to complete. Here is the link Sharing the World Survey and QR code below
Thanks so much! This is really appreciated and of course they will keep sharing the learning throughout the project.