CIIE - Centro de Investigação e Intervenção Educativas
Strategic Plan 2020-2024
In 2020-2024, CIIE is developing research considering European policy guidelines and orientations for expanding new opportunities for cultural and social development, ensuring "innovation, social fairness, active citizenship", as well as "[strengthening] European identity in all its diversity" (EU, 2017, p. 2). The persistence of social inequalities and the promise that education and training can contribute to creating pivotal changes guide CIIE’s action.
CIIE’s strategic aims for 2020-2024 are:
1. Contribute to the development of knowledge by producing state-of-the-art research that addresses emerging educational challenges and draws implications for significant in- and out-of-school educational problems.
2. Promote inclusive forms of enhancing respect towards diversity as the motto of the European identity, by creating and assessing pedagogical devices that involve schooland-community-partnerships, digital education, and the arts.
3. Train young researchers and foster emerging researchers' careers by investing in a close connection with a high-quality doctoral program (DPE-UP) and the continued development of a supportive and challenging research environment.
4. Encourage a public, reasoned debate on educational issues by intentionally engaging inter/national researchers from diverse scientific areas, education professionals, and policymakers in the discussion of research results and their implications for educational policy and practice.
5. Broaden its internationalization strategy, balancing the European focus that has been central in the last years with renewed attention to CPLP countries by investing in more sustainable networks that interweave the Global North and the Global South.
Three main axes are guiding CIIE research and intervention activities:
- vulnerable groups, equity and social justice
- innovation, knowledge sharing, science with and for people
- participation, democracy and social change.
These axes infuse the Centre's initiatives in research, advanced training, and knowledge transfer, advocating a close and strong connection with educational professionals, lay audiences and researchers in inter/national contexts. A major asset is the existing strong networks with African and South American countries.
Internally, CIIE is organised as a rhizomatic structure where researchers meet in multiple niches shaped by strategic areas guiding research efforts. These areas build on existing research strengths that result from previous projects and garner expertise from diverse sub-disciplinary areas of the educational sciences. The strategic areas for the 2020-2024 period are:
1. Engagement of Vulnerable Young People in Education and Training
Concerns with inequalities, diversities, citizenship, and social, political and cultural rights have been central in CIIE research projects. Such themes continue to be developed through projects that combine research, educational interventions, the development of digital tools and teacher training. A proper understanding of the engagement of vulnerable young people in education and training requires considering both quantitative indicators and qualitative dimensions, as well as the viewpoints of different actors, namely policy-makers, school managers and teachers, youngsters, and their families.
2. Contemporary Educational Challenges for Migrants and Refugees
Education plays a key role in the integration of migrants and refugees and, as both phenomena increased in the context of the European Union, so did the emphasis on creating educational shelters for these groups of children, young people, and adults. As in other areas of multicultural research, the recognition of 'diversity within diversity' seems to be essential. CIIE has a tradition of studies in this area and is committed to continuing to develop research that takes claims for the recognition of diverse cultural groups as opportunities to improve the quality of formal and non-formal education, as the creation of diverse educational environments where one learns to interact with (inevitably) different others has significant benefits for the inclusion of all.
3. Empowerment and Inclusion Through Digital Education and Arts
In our increasingly complex, diverse and progressively digitalised societies, the empowerment and autonomy of individuals and groups are of core relevance as they involve individual and organisational elements. This includes cooperation and social and political participation, and a critical, interdisciplinary, broad and multifaceted understanding of the world and how it works. CIIE focuses on the theoretical and empirical production of empowerment and on how digital education and the arts can contribute to promoting it, particularly in what concerns vulnerable groups most at risk of exclusion and with institutions willing to improve their educational practices. CIIE has created the Laboratory for Digital Experimentation and Research in Education (LabDERE), a space dedicated to the development of research and innovation in this strategic area, which aims to support the creation of innovative pedagogical devices in the context of the Northern Region, but also new forms of communication and dissemination of scientific knowledge with a focus on digital technologies in conjunction with the areas of social intervention and the arts.
4. Citizenship, Communication and Literacy in Health and Wellbeing
This area is based on collaborative partnerships with the Faculty of Medicine, health institutions, schools, NGOs, and municipalities. CIIE is part of LACLIS (Health Literacy Creation Lab) and co-coordinates the Master in Health Education (jointly with the Faculty of Medicine). The most important aim is to deepen knowledge and communication competencies related to health literacy through public debates between faculty from different scientific fields, teachers, and other health professionals and multidisciplinary networks involving national and international researchers and professionals. It is also relevant the deepening of collaborations through mobility programmes, research projects focusing on health education, health professionals training, and active ageing promotion.
5. Higher Education, Innovation and Diversity
Higher education has been a locus of research and intervention of CIIE teams. In its relationship with university pedagogy, several projects have been developed before the Bologna Process reforms. CIIE has been giving particular attention to the curricular and pedagogical dimensions, which have been critically approached to counterbalance technocratic approaches and to contribute to the professional development of academics. Additionally, to promote the quality of higher education and research processes seeking innovation, projects involve students in the production of knowledge and the exercise of social responsibility. Under the framework of CIIE’s action plan, diversity has been dealt with in research and intervention activities to increase the range of choices available to learners, to match the education needs and abilities of individual students.
6. Community Education, Participation, and Social Change
One of the distinctive marks of CIIE is its commitment to social and educational intervention, valuing collaborative and participatory strategies to promote educational innovation and social change. This tradition rests on the assumption that education is inevitably ‘in-context‘, and that situated and ecological perspectives are better ways to understand and foster change through the cooperation between researchers, policy-makers, other stakeholders, and lay citizens. The educational implications of existing inequalities based on tensions between globalisation and territorialisation, belonging and distrust, identities and diversity … are essential in contemporary Europe, and must be openly addressed by research that aims to promote critical and reflective links between the EU and its citizens. Issues of discrimination, racism, and other forms of radicalisation are foci of ongoing projects.
7. Training, Equity and the Teaching Profession
The professionalisation of teaching continues to be the greatest challenge for the development of educational systems. It is also, given the relations it establishes with teacher education and teacher identity, an area with a strong tradition in CIIE. Several funded research projects have been developed articulating teachers’ CPD (continuous professional development) and intercultural education, creativity, and social justice and equity. The importance given to the subjective and communicational dimension of educational change inspires important research on the relationship between pre- and in-service teacher education and the identities of teachers and educators. With a strong internationalisation, the area integrates three networks involving several countries, mostly in Europe and Latin America.
8. Evaluation and Public Policies in Education
Assessment as a device to improve learning is pursued by CIIE’s projects and actions. There is also a strong tradition of collaboration with schools, educational agencies, and international organisations and researchers. Additionally, CIIE is developing studies enabling the development of an institutional self-assessment culture guided by curricular justice and promoting social justice. Contributing to the debate and the definition of public policies in education is part of CIIE’s mission statement. This can be attained through a careful selection of the research topics, considering both their theoretical and socio-political relevance; studies focused on improving learning and reducing socio-educational inequalities are particularly welcome.
9. Pedagogical Management and Democratic Participation
This area focuses on the transformation of the pedagogical relationship at the micro, meso, and macro levels, which requires the invention of new processes of management of school relations, mediation of knowledge, and participation. It is structured in three fundamental axes: curricular studies and innovation; didactic mediation and pedagogical differentiation; and school administration and management. The impact of CIIE’s research on national decisions in this area is also strong, as is the case with the current project of autonomy and curricular flexibility of the Ministry of Education – an initiative that encourages Portuguese schools and teachers to contribute to a more meaningful and inclusive education. This investment strengthened CIIE's relationship with TEIP schools, namely through CIIE’s Observatory of Schools’ Life (OBVIE), and a consultancy service was created that currently integrates several school clusters. Studies on school administration and management have been developed in CIIE for more than two decades, in their relations with autonomy and school leadership.
CIIE’s strategic aims for 2020-2024 are:
1. Contribute to the development of knowledge by producing state-of-the-art research that addresses emerging educational challenges and draws implications for significant in- and out-of-school educational problems.
2. Promote inclusive forms of enhancing respect towards diversity as the motto of the European identity, by creating and assessing pedagogical devices that involve schooland-community-partnerships, digital education, and the arts.
3. Train young researchers and foster emerging researchers' careers by investing in a close connection with a high-quality doctoral program (DPE-UP) and the continued development of a supportive and challenging research environment.
4. Encourage a public, reasoned debate on educational issues by intentionally engaging inter/national researchers from diverse scientific areas, education professionals, and policymakers in the discussion of research results and their implications for educational policy and practice.
5. Broaden its internationalization strategy, balancing the European focus that has been central in the last years with renewed attention to CPLP countries by investing in more sustainable networks that interweave the Global North and the Global South.
Three main axes are guiding CIIE research and intervention activities:
- vulnerable groups, equity and social justice
- innovation, knowledge sharing, science with and for people
- participation, democracy and social change.
These axes infuse the Centre's initiatives in research, advanced training, and knowledge transfer, advocating a close and strong connection with educational professionals, lay audiences and researchers in inter/national contexts. A major asset is the existing strong networks with African and South American countries.
Internally, CIIE is organised as a rhizomatic structure where researchers meet in multiple niches shaped by strategic areas guiding research efforts. These areas build on existing research strengths that result from previous projects and garner expertise from diverse sub-disciplinary areas of the educational sciences. The strategic areas for the 2020-2024 period are:
1. Engagement of Vulnerable Young People in Education and Training
Concerns with inequalities, diversities, citizenship, and social, political and cultural rights have been central in CIIE research projects. Such themes continue to be developed through projects that combine research, educational interventions, the development of digital tools and teacher training. A proper understanding of the engagement of vulnerable young people in education and training requires considering both quantitative indicators and qualitative dimensions, as well as the viewpoints of different actors, namely policy-makers, school managers and teachers, youngsters, and their families.
2. Contemporary Educational Challenges for Migrants and Refugees
Education plays a key role in the integration of migrants and refugees and, as both phenomena increased in the context of the European Union, so did the emphasis on creating educational shelters for these groups of children, young people, and adults. As in other areas of multicultural research, the recognition of 'diversity within diversity' seems to be essential. CIIE has a tradition of studies in this area and is committed to continuing to develop research that takes claims for the recognition of diverse cultural groups as opportunities to improve the quality of formal and non-formal education, as the creation of diverse educational environments where one learns to interact with (inevitably) different others has significant benefits for the inclusion of all.
3. Empowerment and Inclusion Through Digital Education and Arts
In our increasingly complex, diverse and progressively digitalised societies, the empowerment and autonomy of individuals and groups are of core relevance as they involve individual and organisational elements. This includes cooperation and social and political participation, and a critical, interdisciplinary, broad and multifaceted understanding of the world and how it works. CIIE focuses on the theoretical and empirical production of empowerment and on how digital education and the arts can contribute to promoting it, particularly in what concerns vulnerable groups most at risk of exclusion and with institutions willing to improve their educational practices. CIIE has created the Laboratory for Digital Experimentation and Research in Education (LabDERE), a space dedicated to the development of research and innovation in this strategic area, which aims to support the creation of innovative pedagogical devices in the context of the Northern Region, but also new forms of communication and dissemination of scientific knowledge with a focus on digital technologies in conjunction with the areas of social intervention and the arts.
4. Citizenship, Communication and Literacy in Health and Wellbeing
This area is based on collaborative partnerships with the Faculty of Medicine, health institutions, schools, NGOs, and municipalities. CIIE is part of LACLIS (Health Literacy Creation Lab) and co-coordinates the Master in Health Education (jointly with the Faculty of Medicine). The most important aim is to deepen knowledge and communication competencies related to health literacy through public debates between faculty from different scientific fields, teachers, and other health professionals and multidisciplinary networks involving national and international researchers and professionals. It is also relevant the deepening of collaborations through mobility programmes, research projects focusing on health education, health professionals training, and active ageing promotion.
5. Higher Education, Innovation and Diversity
Higher education has been a locus of research and intervention of CIIE teams. In its relationship with university pedagogy, several projects have been developed before the Bologna Process reforms. CIIE has been giving particular attention to the curricular and pedagogical dimensions, which have been critically approached to counterbalance technocratic approaches and to contribute to the professional development of academics. Additionally, to promote the quality of higher education and research processes seeking innovation, projects involve students in the production of knowledge and the exercise of social responsibility. Under the framework of CIIE’s action plan, diversity has been dealt with in research and intervention activities to increase the range of choices available to learners, to match the education needs and abilities of individual students.
6. Community Education, Participation, and Social Change
One of the distinctive marks of CIIE is its commitment to social and educational intervention, valuing collaborative and participatory strategies to promote educational innovation and social change. This tradition rests on the assumption that education is inevitably ‘in-context‘, and that situated and ecological perspectives are better ways to understand and foster change through the cooperation between researchers, policy-makers, other stakeholders, and lay citizens. The educational implications of existing inequalities based on tensions between globalisation and territorialisation, belonging and distrust, identities and diversity … are essential in contemporary Europe, and must be openly addressed by research that aims to promote critical and reflective links between the EU and its citizens. Issues of discrimination, racism, and other forms of radicalisation are foci of ongoing projects.
7. Training, Equity and the Teaching Profession
The professionalisation of teaching continues to be the greatest challenge for the development of educational systems. It is also, given the relations it establishes with teacher education and teacher identity, an area with a strong tradition in CIIE. Several funded research projects have been developed articulating teachers’ CPD (continuous professional development) and intercultural education, creativity, and social justice and equity. The importance given to the subjective and communicational dimension of educational change inspires important research on the relationship between pre- and in-service teacher education and the identities of teachers and educators. With a strong internationalisation, the area integrates three networks involving several countries, mostly in Europe and Latin America.
8. Evaluation and Public Policies in Education
Assessment as a device to improve learning is pursued by CIIE’s projects and actions. There is also a strong tradition of collaboration with schools, educational agencies, and international organisations and researchers. Additionally, CIIE is developing studies enabling the development of an institutional self-assessment culture guided by curricular justice and promoting social justice. Contributing to the debate and the definition of public policies in education is part of CIIE’s mission statement. This can be attained through a careful selection of the research topics, considering both their theoretical and socio-political relevance; studies focused on improving learning and reducing socio-educational inequalities are particularly welcome.
9. Pedagogical Management and Democratic Participation
This area focuses on the transformation of the pedagogical relationship at the micro, meso, and macro levels, which requires the invention of new processes of management of school relations, mediation of knowledge, and participation. It is structured in three fundamental axes: curricular studies and innovation; didactic mediation and pedagogical differentiation; and school administration and management. The impact of CIIE’s research on national decisions in this area is also strong, as is the case with the current project of autonomy and curricular flexibility of the Ministry of Education – an initiative that encourages Portuguese schools and teachers to contribute to a more meaningful and inclusive education. This investment strengthened CIIE's relationship with TEIP schools, namely through CIIE’s Observatory of Schools’ Life (OBVIE), and a consultancy service was created that currently integrates several school clusters. Studies on school administration and management have been developed in CIIE for more than two decades, in their relations with autonomy and school leadership.