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Knowledge mobilisation (KMb) attempts to address research-policy-practice gaps in education. Research brokering organisations (RBOs) are third party, intermediary organisations whose active role between research producers and users is a catalyst for research use in education. Sample: 44 Canadian RBOs in the education sector. Methodology: employed a new tool to measure KMb efforts of organisations using data from websites. Findings: typology of RBOs (governmental, notfor- profit, for-profit and membership), organisational features of RBOs (mission statements, target audiences, size, scope, operating expenses, KMb efforts), and eight brokering functions (linkage and partnerships, awareness, accessibility, engagement, capacity building, implementation support, organisational development and policy influence).
Arts-based knowledge translation (ABKT) is a process that uses diverse art genres (visual arts, performing arts, creative writing, multimedia including video and photography) to communicate research with the goal of catalysing dialogue, awareness, engagement, and advocacy to provide a foundation for social change on important societal issues. We propose a four-stage ABKT planning framework for researchers: (1) setting goals of ABKT by target audiences; (2) choosing art form, medium, dissemination strategies, and methods for collecting impact data; (3) building partnerships for co-production; and (4) assessing impact. The framework is derived from examples across sectors of the different art forms currently being used in ABKT, and discusses how researchers have attempted to evaluate the impact of their ABKT efforts. Ultimately, our goal is to provide a practical ABKT framework to assist researchers, but more work is needed to explore the four dimensions in practice.
Knowledge mobilisation (KM) is our label for the emerging field of inquiry that seeks to strengthen connections between research, policy and practice across sectors, disciplines and countries. This paper first outlines the challenges associated with improving KM across public services. Next, it examines contributions from the health sector (findings and implications of empirical work on KM being conducted by two teams of Canadian scholars) in relation to the education sector and the broader field. Then, it outlines the Research Supporting Practice in Education (RSPE) programme (including products, events, networks and empirical studies), which attempts to increase KM in education. The paper concludes with some ideas and strategies that can be done quickly and easily to improve KM almost immediately in any organisation as well as with suggestions for further research.
Background:
Interest in using arts-informed approaches within research to increase stakeholder engagement is growing; however, there is little work describing how these approaches are operationalised across contexts. This article addresses that gap by exploring the use of arts-informed approaches across three projects.
Aims and objectives:
We explore how conceptualising research and evaluation as creative endeavours, particularly in arts-informed approaches to co-production, create opportunities to move knowledge into action (knowledge mobilisation). We propose an actionable configuration of context + mechanism = outcome (CMO) to understand the influence of arts-informed approaches to co-production.
Methods:
Multi-case design and cross-case synthesis was conducted of three studies that used arts-informed approaches. A common focus across our cases was evidence use in the K-12 education sector; however, each engaged with this focus by involving different types of evidence and sets of education stakeholders.
Findings:
Arts-informed approaches and co-production were influenced by a variety of contextual factors such as relationships between researchers and stakeholders, ethical issues of collaborative research activities, approaches to meaningful stakeholder engagement, co-production of knowledge, capacity-building support and resources, and communication between multi-stakeholder partners. Outcomes included new ways of thinking about research topics based on arts-informed approaches, more positive attitudes about co-production, more relevant and useful research and evaluation findings, and increased openness to future co-productive work.
Discussion and conclusions:
Four propositions arising from this article include: (1) arts-informed approaches address context specificity and sensitivity; (2) arts-informed approaches promote engagement; (3) arts-informed approaches enhance and intertwine skills; (4) arts-informed approaches broaden thinking about impact.
This chapter provides insights into what is meant by ‘knowledge mobilisation’ (KM) in the field of research and how we might think about the work and role of universities in sharing research knowledge. It discusses ideas about mobilising research knowledge generally and then reports on a study that explored the KM efforts of education faculties, showing how the findings illuminate the way that universities approach this work.
