The Role of the Programme Team in the Implementation of Policy at Institutional Level - a Case Study in the UHI Millennium Institute

Abstract

This thesis reports an insider case study conducted by an active participant in the setting which is the UHI Millennium Institute. UHI is a federal, collegial partnership of 13 academic partner colleges. This partnership is made up of Further Education Colleges and smaller and specialised institutions. The case study focuses on one programme team, the BA Social Sciences team and at its role in the implementation of the institutional learning and teaching policy and its related strategies. The case study uses literature on policy implementation and of Further/Higher Education links. It makes use of social practice theory and the notion of the teaching and learning regime to analyse the cultural characteristics of the team and a typolgy of responses to change, to review the response of the team to policy objectives. In doing so the case study is a response to calls for more 'close-up' research at the meso-level of analysis. The study reviews the response of the team over a 10-year trajectory from the initial validation of the programme to 2009. The study takes an interpretive, participant-obervation based approach to examine the cultural characteristics and response of the programme team. The methods used to gather data include examination of comprehensive documentation relating to the programme over this time frame and semi-structured interviews with team members. The findings are that the cultural character of the team is dominated by its origins in Further Education and by the social relationships involved in a team which spans three colleges and deals with three sets of college managers and UHI. The response of the team to institutional policy is to embrace its objectives but also to reconstruct policy in ways possible within constraints. The team can make certain choices but is also constrained by policy from 'the top'. The study discusses implications for the notion of the teaching and learning regime and for the typology of responses used and proposes ways in which these might be modified. Proposals for further research in this field are made, particularly involving the implications for policy making of the relationship between college management and UHI.