What role might research play in supporting future-oriented community engagement with education?

This working paper was written as part of a 2010-11 project called Changing Minds, which was funded by NZCER's purchase agreement. The paper discusses NZCER’s research in the broad area of future-focused public and community engagement with education. It questions our role as researchers, asking whether we should be in the business of knowledge building, or using our research knowledge to actively support and sustain change. In the past we have done a bit of both, with varying degrees of success. The author proposes that future research in this area should be prefaced with further development work and relationship building with a broad collective of stakeholders with a commitment to long-term iterative change processes.