Profile summary
Alan Bainbridge is a Chartered Psychologist, Doctor of Clinical Science and Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy and began working in Higher Education in 2001 having previously taught in secondary schools for 18 years. He is interested in the contested space between psychoanalytic thought and practices to education in its widest sense. He has written on how educational professionals develop their professional practice, the nature of academic understanding and is currently exploring the fetish in education and how learning and the ‘natural world’ are interconnected. Alan has recently used narrative and biographical techniques to research the motivators and barriers towards a community engagement project and the attitude of individuals towards the re-introduction of native wild carnivores. He uses his experience as a UKCP registered psychoanalytic psychotherapist to inform his research and as such works qualitatively to seek to provide opportunities and spaces where participants can provide rich contextual data of their life experiences. He coordinates the Auto/biography and Narrative Research and Knowledge Exchange Theme Group for the Faculty of Education and is a co-coordinator of the European Society for Research on the Education of Adults Life History and Biography Network.
Research and knowledge exchange
Current Research and Knowledge Exchange Projects:
Erasmus+ 2 Year project ‘Curricular Reform For Democratic Principles and Civic Education (CURE) in Teacher-Training Programs in Israel and in Georgia – Evaluation partner. £49,425
Supervision: A business and community service for colleagues in schools project– Canterbury Diocese funded. . Currently looking at expanding this alongside the development of a Certificate in Supervision to increase capacity,
Understanding attitudes towards native wildlife and biodiversity in the UK: the role of zoos. Inter-disciplinary CCCU group already received Futures Initiative Funding.
Previous Research and Knowledge Exchange Projects:
Academic supervisor. Evaluation of Kent Safe Schools Programme. Knowledge Transfer Partnership. (£120,000). Completed 2011 and graded ‘Outstanding’.
CCCU Research Intern: Exploring the motivators and Inhibitors of a community sustainability action project. Completed 2014. Intern then appointed as KTP Associate and soon to submit PhD.
CCCU Research Intern: Evaluation of Forest Schools in Thanet.
Using biography with ‘new professionals in educational settings’ to provide insight into the psychodynamic aspects of teaching and learning relationships. Funded- CCCU (£800). Completed 2008
Exploring the use of an on-line environment to develop the learning biographies of mature students on a foundation degree programme. ESCalate Small Grant (£5000). Completed 2006.
Invited Activities
Bainbridge, A. (2017). In praise of human learning. Learning First Conference Keynote – CCCU January 28th 2017
Bainbridge, A. (2016) Building a world unfit to live in: the deception, distraction and disavowal of the fetish. Pedagogia Oggi, 1/2016, 62-72.
http://www.siped.it/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/pedagogiaOggi_1-2016_Parte7.pdf
Bainbridge, A. (2016) Becoming and Education Professional: an exploration of professional identity at an unconscious, individual and social level. Invited paper presentation 5th International Conference on Culture, Biography and Lifelong Learning. Pusan National University, Busan, South Korea. 17-19th March
Teaching and subject expertise
British Psychological Society:
Chartered member – Division of Academics, Researchers and Teachers in Psychology
Section member –Psychology of Education, and Psychotherapy
European Society for Research on the Education of Adults:
Co-coordinator of the Life History and Biography Network
Higher Education Academy:
Senior Fellow (January 2014)
United Kingdom Council for Psychotherapy:
Member
External activities
Bainbridge, A. (2017) Ecologagical understanding of transformative experience. For the European Society for Research on the Education of Adults – Life History and Biography Network conference, Aarhus University, Copenhagen, 2-5th March, 2017
Bainbridge, A. (2016). Rewilding Universities: finding a place for debate, dissent and difficult knowledge. Paper presented at the Sustainability in Higher Education: Challenges and Opportunities. Canterbury Christ Church University 6-7th July 2016
Bainbridge, A. (2016). Understanding attitudes towards native wildlife and biodiversity in the UK: the role of zoos. Symposium on Sustainable Development Research at Universities in the United Kingdom. Manchester Metropolitan University 5-6th April, 2016.
Bainbridge, A. (2016) Becoming and Education Professional: an exploration of professional identity at an unconscious, individual and social level. Invited paper presentation 5th International Conference on Culture, Biography and Lifelong Learning. Pusan National University, Busan, South Korea. 17-19th March
Bainbridge, A. (2016). The ‘Natural World’ as a Resource of Hope: human and non-human living together apart. Paper presented at the European Society for Research on the Education of Adults – Life History and Biography Network conference, Canterbury Christ Church University, 3-6th March, 2016.,
Bainbridge A. and Stirrup V. (2015) ‘Narratives beyond the backyard: A case study on support for a community pro-environmental and sustainability project’. Paper presented at the European Society for Research on the Education of Adults - Life History and Biography Network conference, Università di Milano Bicocca, Italy.
Consorte-McCrea, A., Bainbridge, A., Fernandez, A., Nigbur, D. and McDonnell, S. (2015) The role of zoos in attitudes towards biodiversity and the reintroduction of native wild carnivores to the UK: results from a pilot study. In: ICCB: 27th International Congress for Conservation Biology 4th European Congress for Conservation Biology, 2nd-6th August, Montpellier, France.
Bainbridge, A. (2015). Building a World Unfit to Live in: the deception and seduction of the commodity fetish. Paper presented at the European Society for Research on the Education of Adults – Network on Between Local and Global: Adult Learning and Development Conference, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia. 18-20 July.,
Publications and research outputs
Books
Bainbridge, A., Formenti, L. and West, L. (Ed.) (2021). Discourses, dialogue and diversity in biographical research: An ecology of life and learning. Brill Publishers: Leiden
Bainbridge, A. (2015) Becoming an Education Professional: A Psychosocial Exploration of Developing an Education Professional Practice. Palgrave: London
Bainbridge, A. and West, L. (Ed.) (2012). Psychoanalysis and Education: minding a gap. London: Karnac Books.
Book Chapters
Bainbridge, A. and West, L. (2021). A Key? Conflict, and the Struggle for an Ecology of Dialogue, Learning and Peace among Israeli Jewish and Palestinian Educators. In: Bainbridge, A., Formenti, L. and West, L. (Ed) Discourses, dialogue and diversity in biographical research: An ecology of life and learning. Brill Publishers: Leiden
Bainbridge, A. (2021). Deceptively Difficult Education: A Case for a Lifetime of Impact. In: Howard, P., Saevi, T., Foran, A. and G. Biesta, ed. Phenomenology and Educational Theory in Conversation: Back to Education Itself. Routledge: Oxon.
Journal Articles
Bainbridge, A. (2020) Digging our own grave: A Marxian consideration of formal education as a destructive enterprise. International Review of Education, 66, 737-753
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11159-020-09866-7
Bainbridge, A., & Del Negro, G. (2020). An Ecology of Transformative Learning: A Shift From the Ego to the Eco. Journal of Transformative Education, 18(1), 41–58. https://doi.org/10.1177/1541344619864670
Bainbridge, A., Reid, H. & Del Negro, G. (2019) Towards a Virtuosity of School Leadership: clinical support and supervision as professional learning, Professional Development in Education, DOI: 10.1080/19415257.2019.1700152
Bainbridge, A. (2019) Education then and now: making the case for ecol-agogy, Pedagogy, Culture & Society, 27(3), 4232-440
https://doi.org/10.1080/14681366.2018.1517130
Bainbridge, A., Gaitanidis, A & Hoult, EC. (2018): When learning becomes a fetish: the pledge, turn and prestige of magic tricks, Pedagogy, Culture & Society, 26 (3), 345-361