Importance and impotence? Learning, outcomes and research in further education

One of the defining features of the Teaching and Learning Research Programme is that it ‘aims to improve outcomes for learners of all ages in teaching and learning contexts across the UK’. This article argues that, although it is possible to use the terms outcomes for learners and learning outcomes interchangeably, they have an important difference in connotation. Particular meanings of the latter term are dominant within the Further Education sector. Some insight from analysis in the TLRP project Transforming Learning Cultures in Further Education is presented to illustrate this difference and to underline the necessity for educational research to engage critically with both outcomes for learners and learning outcomes if it is to provide knowledge with a practical application.

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