Making a start: the origins of a research programme

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Abstract
The authors are conducting an independent policy evaluation of the ESRC‐funded ‘Information Technology in Education Research Programme’ (InTER). The four‐year evaluation (1988‐92) in the first instance addressed the origins of the Programme and the processes of selection that led to the setting up of four consortia. The consortia projects are ‘Groupwork with Computers’ (Co‐directors: Michael Eraut and Celia Hoyles), ‘Tools for Exploratory Learning’ (Co‐directors Joan Bliss and Jon Ogborn), and ‘Conceptual Change in Science’ (Co‐ordinators Ros Driver and Eileen Scanlon). The Programme costs £1.1 million. The first report of the evaluation considers the circumstances in which these consortia emerged as winners from the 99 applicants for InTER funding. It also seeks to understand how the Programme emerged from the policy‐forming deliberations and committee structures of the ESRC. The study (which was fully negotiated with the participants) tries to combine a series of narratives that tell personal, institutional and political stories, with a parallel series of analyses. To this extent, the approach is deliberately eclectic, contrasting naturalistic and ethnographic understandings, and giving at least a passing nod to postmodernism. The report ends with a consideration of how the original report — which was distributed mainly to InTER bidders, ESRC members and officials — was received.

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