The purpose of this research was to learn more about the ways that school and system leaders, access, engage with, share, and use research in their work. This research began with a framework developed by Levin (2004) and similar framing by Nutley et al (2007) suggesting that knowledge and use of research in schools depends on characteristics of the research itself (such as accessibility and perceived quality), characteristics of the educators and context (research background, interest level, supporting processes and structures) and the role of third party facilitators (such as professional media, experts, professional development providers) as distributors of knowledge. This study is meant to add to our understanding of the way research is taken up in secondary schools and districts by replicating and extending the recent work by Levin et al (2009) in a research study conducted with the Canadian Education Association (CEA) and the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE) entitled, “Research Use and its Impact in Secondary Education”. In general, educators, like other professionals, have relatively limited direct knowledge of current research and rely on versions of research findings that they encounter in their daily work or from colleagues (Levin et al, 2009). This study examined the processes and practices in place within secondary schools and across a district school board to determine the facilitators and barriers to research use. The study addressed the following research questions: 1. How do secondary school leaders access and use relevant research findings? 2. What are the main perceived barriers to the use of research by secondary school leaders? 3. In what ways does the school district support or hinder the use of research? These questions were designed to focus on the dynamics at the district level and the organizational capacity for knowledge mobilization. Data were collected through an online anonymous survey and semi-structured interviews. The online survey suggests that educators have a high regard for research in their professional practice, and that there is an array of opportunities for teachers and school administrators to engage with research. And, according to the respondents, the greatest challenge is finding the time to access the research. The findings also reveal that the although there is a high regard for research, research is generally not a priority in secondary schools and practice is based more on knowledge gained from colleagues or personal experience than from evidence-based research. The thesis concluded that there are many factors that both enable and hinder engagement with research and research use. Findings include the importance of culture and context of the school, the relationship between leaders’ actions and expectations and practice, relevancy of research to practice, the role of facilitation, the use of technology, and starting small to build a critical mass of teachers engaging with and using research in their practice.

The purpose of this research was to learn more about the ways that school and system leaders, access, engage with, share, and use research in their work. This research began with a framework developed by Levin (2004) and similar framing by Nutley et al (2007) suggesting that knowledge and use of research in schools depends on characteristics of the research itself (such as accessibility and perceived quality), characteristics of the educators and context (research background, interest level, supporting processes and structures) and the role of third party facilitators (such as professional media, experts, professional development providers) as distributors of knowledge. This study is meant to add to our understanding of the way research is taken up in secondary schools and districts by replicating and extending the recent work by Levin et al (2009) in a research study conducted with the Canadian Education Association (CEA) and the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE) entitled, “Research Use and its Impact in Secondary Education”. In general, educators, like other professionals, have relatively limited direct knowledge of current research and rely on versions of research findings that they encounter in their daily work or from colleagues (Levin et al, 2009). This study examined the processes and practices in place within secondary schools and across a district school board to determine the facilitators and barriers to research use. The study addressed the following research questions: 1. How do secondary school leaders access and use relevant research findings? 2. What are the main perceived barriers to the use of research by secondary school leaders? 3. In what ways does the school district support or hinder the use of research? These questions were designed to focus on the dynamics at the district level and the organizational capacity for knowledge mobilization. Data were collected through an online anonymous survey and semi-structured interviews. The online survey suggests that educators have a high regard for research in their professional practice, and that there is an array of opportunities for teachers and school administrators to engage with research. And, according to the respondents, the greatest challenge is finding the time to access the research. The findings also reveal that the although there is a high regard for research, research is generally not a priority in secondary schools and practice is based more on knowledge gained from colleagues or personal experience than from evidence-based research. The thesis concluded that there are many factors that both enable and hinder engagement with research and research use. Findings include the importance of culture and context of the school, the relationship between leaders’ actions and expectations and practice, relevancy of research to practice, the role of facilitation, the use of technology, and starting small to build a critical mass of teachers engaging with and using research in their practice.

In this thesis we study the impact of time in the analysis of social networks. To do that we represent a knowledge mobilization network, Knowledge-Net, both as a standard static graph and a time-varying graph and study both graphs to see their differences. For our study, we implemented some temporal metrics and added them to Gephi, an open source software for graph and network analysis which already contains some static metrics. Then we used that software to obtain our results. Knowledge-Net is a network built using the knowledge mobilization concept. In social science, knowledge mobilization is defined as the use of knowledge towards the achievement of goals. The networks which are built using the knowledge mobilization concept make more visible the relations among heterogeneous human and non-human individuals, organizational actors and non-human mobilization actors. A time-varying graph is a graph with nodes and edges appearing and disappearing over time. A journey in a time-varying graph is equivalent to a path in a static graph. The notion of shortest path in a static graph has three variations in a time-varying graph: the shortest journey is the journey with the least number of temporal hops, the fastest journey is the journey that takes the least amount of time and the foremost journey is the journey that arrives the soonest. Out of those three, we focus on the foremost journey for our analysis.

This project is based on a study supported by the Canadian Education Association. The project examines how research activities have been implemented and carried out in nine secondary school districts across Canada. The main research questions are to understand how school districts organize to embed knowledge from external research in their secondary schools and to understand the impacts of small-scale interventions intended to increase the use of research in secondary schools and districts. This thesis documents a part of the greater project with a focus on educators’ knowledge about two main areas related to secondary school improvement: success factors for students and student pathways/trajectories. Data were collected through questionnaires, teleconference calls and individual communication with district leaders. The study concludes that it is difficult to know the impact of the interventions; impact seems modest but a few key elements have been identified that facilitate take-up of the research activities.

This study examines the ways that knowledge on public-private partnerships in education (PPPE) spreads due to the knowledge mobilization (efforts to incorporate research into policy and practice in education) work of World Bank Education Sector. Specifically, this study looks at the role of the World Bank in research mediation between research producing contexts and research using contexts. Using bibliometric analysis this study a) traces the citations in five World Bank publications on PPPE in order to clarify the origins of the evidence used; and b) maps the spread of this research through its online take-up by other organizations. This study provides baseline data about the knowledge mobilization efforts of the World Bank around PPPE, and illuminates the broader discussion in the literature on who is included (and excluded) from this research enterprise.

This project is based on a study supported by the Canadian Education Association. The project examines how research activities have been implemented and carried out in nine secondary school districts across Canada. The main research questions are to understand how school districts organize to embed knowledge from external research in their secondary schools and to understand the impacts of small-scale interventions intended to increase the use of research in secondary schools and districts. This thesis documents a part of the greater project with a focus on educators’ knowledge about two main areas related to secondary school improvement: success factors for students and student pathways/trajectories. Data were collected through questionnaires, teleconference calls and individual communication with district leaders. The study concludes that it is difficult to know the impact of the interventions; impact seems modest but a few key elements have been identified that facilitate take-up of the research activities.

This study examines the ways that knowledge on public-private partnerships in education (PPPE) spreads due to the knowledge mobilization (efforts to incorporate research into policy and practice in education) work of World Bank Education Sector. Specifically, this study looks at the role of the World Bank in research mediation between research producing contexts and research using contexts. Using bibliometric analysis this study a) traces the citations in five World Bank publications on PPPE in order to clarify the origins of the evidence used; and b) maps the spread of this research through its online take-up by other organizations. This study provides baseline data about the knowledge mobilization efforts of the World Bank around PPPE, and illuminates the broader discussion in the literature on who is included (and excluded) from this research enterprise.

This study examines the elements of collaborative research partnerships (CRPs) between university researchers and other organizations or individuals in the education sector whose mandate is to conduct and disseminate research for service delivery. Studying these partnerships for knowledge mobilization(KMb)includes understanding the roles partners take on; the tensions or facilitators they face when bringing research into practice; the structures to maintain the partnership; and the knowledge mobilization activities. Phase 1 takes an in-depth look at one partnership using key informant interviews and document analysis, while phase 2 utilizes a survey between four overarching university-community organization partnerships across Canada. Findings suggest that although difficult, when research producers and users work together, capacity is built at the organizational level to view research evidence as an important part of the organizational service delivery, with small impacts on individual knowledge development; that partnerships remain informal in their practice; that the mechanisms by which partners use to communicate within the partnership and the frequency of communication helps to build relationships between partners; and the ideal type of CRP, where they ought to always be an equal endeavour, is overstated in the literature. Not all useful partnerships are exact equal contributions from research producers and their user-based partners. Implications include that researchers gain access to practice expertise and insights into practice-based research rather than engaging in only theoretical research while community partners gain access to greater capacity for understanding and using research through exchanges with academics.

This study examines the elements of collaborative research partnerships (CRPs) between university researchers and other organizations or individuals in the education sector whose mandate is to conduct and disseminate research for service delivery. Studying these partnerships for knowledge mobilization(KMb)includes understanding the roles partners take on; the tensions or facilitators they face when bringing research into practice; the structures to maintain the partnership; and the knowledge mobilization activities. Phase 1 takes an in-depth look at one partnership using key informant interviews and document analysis, while phase 2 utilizes a survey between four overarching university-community organization partnerships across Canada. Findings suggest that although difficult, when research producers and users work together, capacity is built at the organizational level to view research evidence as an important part of the organizational service delivery, with small impacts on individual knowledge development; that partnerships remain informal in their practice; that the mechanisms by which partners use to communicate within the partnership and the frequency of communication helps to build relationships between partners; and the ideal type of CRP, where they ought to always be an equal endeavour, is overstated in the literature. Not all useful partnerships are exact equal contributions from research producers and their user-based partners. Implications include that researchers gain access to practice expertise and insights into practice-based research rather than engaging in only theoretical research while community partners gain access to greater capacity for understanding and using research through exchanges with academics.

The objective of this dissertation was to evaluate an integrated knowledge translation intervention in a community-based service agency providing services to adults with intellectual disabilities. The dissertation had two objectives: 1) to understand how stakeholders create knowledge, collaborate, and make decisions to implement knowledge on supporting sexuality, and 2) to examine the underlying processes of integrated knowledge translation and how these interplay in the context of community and intellectual disability research. First, we conducted a scoping review to identify strategies to support the sexuality of persons with intellectual disabilities. This knowledge was made available and discussed with stakeholders of the participating agency (i.e., persons with intellectual disabilities, front-line staff, caregivers, supervisors, and senior management) using various methods such as focus groups, an evidence brief and a stakeholder dialogue. Data collection included transcripts of discussions with stakeholders, facilitator notes, notes from the primary researcher, and two self-report questionnaires. The intervention resulted in two in-person workshops and an online program on sexual health for persons with intellectual disabilities and front-line staff. Second, we identified barriers and facilitators to conducting an integrated knowledge translation intervention in a community and disability setting. These included power dynamics and the accessibility of the integrated knowledge translation intervention to knowledge users. The findings from these two aims presented in this dissertation inform changes that may further increase the relevance and applicability of knowledge translation interventions in the community and disability setting.