The feedback on my initial plan was very helpful, however I found the feedback confusing at first as it seemed contradictory to say ‘the missing part is the self, the researcher’ and to ‘depersonalise it’. During a follow up tutorial I understood this meant to consider the scope of the project in relationship to myself, what I was expecting of myself to research for the students and to shift this responsibility onto the students to initiate the change. I also understood the feedback to minimise the scope of the actual project being a small-scale action, and to consider the larger scale of impact it might have. This enabled me to adapt the initial plan ever so slightly to refine it and have more focus.
The 3 documents below show:
1. Final Ethical Action Plan
2. Feedback
3. Initial Ethical Action Plan
ARP 2024-5
- Ethical Action Plan (Final)
Name of practitioner-researcher: Michelle Ussher
| What is your project focus? How can I reframe the Fine Art & Crafts programme at West Dean College in a small way, which has a 100% white heteronormative mature aged student intake and teaching team.To nurture the use of diverse references for developing student creative projects beyond the Eurocentricity of West Dean College To build a resource of diverse references through the accumulation of student findings that can be used by tutors or future students.To introduce an awareness of student positionality through exposure to plural knowledges and methodologies, which have the potential of informing their project outcomes. |
| What are you going to read about? Articles related to methods of decolonising pedagogy and anti-colonisation strategies. For example, focusing on methodologies that strategise how to increase diverse references for art works, as well as evaluative research on decolonising pedagogy and ethical approaches to decolonising creative research projects. From the course reading lists as a starting point, I have identified the following: Peterson. F, Ka’ai. T, Smith. V, McPherson. K. (2022) Re-imagining student success: Integrating strategy and action through an Indigenous lens. Auckland Art, Design & Communication in Higher Education Volume 22 Number 2 University of Technology © 2023 Intellect Ltd Article. Warmington, P (2014).Black British cultural studies. Black British Intellectuals and Education : Multiculturalism’s Hidden History, Taylor & Francis Group, London. Available from: ProQuest Ebook Central. [11 December 2023]. Hooks. b (1995). Talking Art as the Spirit Moves Us, Art on My Mind. Dall’Alb. G, Barnacle, R. (2007) An ontological turn for higher education Ontology in higher education. University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia; RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia, Studies in Higher Education Vol. 32, No. 6, December 2007, pp. 679–691, Society for Research into Higher Education. Crilly. J. Spark: (2019) Decolonising the library: a theoretical exploration. UAL Creative Teaching and Learning Journal., Content and Discovery, Library Services, University of the Arts London Vol 4 / Issue 1 (2019) pp.6-15 Arao. B, Clemens. K. From Safe Spaces to Brave Spaces, A New Way to Frame Dialogue around diversity and social justice. Savage. P (2023) ‘The New Life’: Mozambican Art Students in the USSR, and the Aesthetic Epistemologies of Anti-Colonial Solidarity. John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of the Association for Art History. Tjora. H Arsel (2006) Writing small discoveries: an exploration of fresh observers’ observations |
| What action are you going to take in your teaching practice? As the critical studies lead across all BA levels of Fine Art, Contemporary Craft and Craft Practices, I am well positioned to set a research task that focus’ students references to include non-eurocentric artists/makers/thinkers. At the beginning of each year, to kickstart the research for their studio practice and written assessments I will introduce a non-assessed research activity called Find 30 that specifies finding different artworks and articles from specific areas by category such as; Eurocentric (white), Non-Eurocentric (not white), Contemporary (Living), Everyday, and Political/Social. Find 30 will be introduced in a brief using the online free Padlet platform. Find 30 asks the student to build a Padlet page themselves and add columns with the specific categories. In addition, I will ask them to add a column for Reflective Writing to keep their notes on the research in one place. These notes can be used towards writing their essays and will enable me to check student temperature towards the activity. As the course is block delivered, the students have 3 weeks to upload research and personalise their padlets, and in the following study blocks I will ask the students to share their padlets with each other to make comments and add any suggestions. This will encourage sharing their reference findings and supporting one another with finding less visible artists/writers/designers.At a key point (Block 3) I will share the padlets with other tutors and ask them to comment and make any suggestions, which will broaden the scope of diverse references beyond the student cohort and myself.To set the tone of positionality and offer an example of how a white person can acknowledge colonisation in England I will draw attention to my positionality by adjusting my introduction at the start of the module (Block 1) to introduce myself in the following way (noting First Nations people refer to Australia as “Country” owing to this name referring to their bodies, history, ancestors and nations they are collectively of): ‘Firstly I would like to acknowledge County. I am an immigrant and originally a settler artist of the Moree, Nulla Nulla, Mulubinba, and Narrm lands where I was born, lived and worked as an uninvited guest. Sovereignty was never ceded. There was no consent, no treaty and no compensation. I acknowledge the benefits I have accrued through colonisation and the ongoing dispossession of First Nations people. This includes my position as an academic where I am often complicit in the operations of academia as a privileged centre of Eurocentric power. The structures I have benefited from have impoverished society, research, methodologies and knowledge production. I want to extend my respect to anyone who is a First Nations person in the group or has been directly or indirectly impacted upon by colonisation.’ Students regularly ask where I am from and this can be supported by using an image that presents the country by indigenous nations, where I can highlight the lands I lived on.To evaluate the impact of the Find 30 activity I will compare the subject focus and references used in their written and studio assessments. Unit 3 completes before assessment however I will be able to use preliminary preparations in the form of presentations and draft submissions to gauge the effectiveness of activity. To further evaluate the impact longer term I can compare previous written and studio assessments from (2022-23) with those of this year (2024-25) and each future year, to gauge the qualitative and quantitate results.At the end of the academic year I will ask students to complete a voluntary survey to gauge feedback and effectiveness through questions such as: Where 1 is not at all and 10 is excellent 1. From a range of 1 to 10 how would you describe your level of knowledge about non-white artists, makers and thinkers before the Find 30 activity? 2. From a range of 1 to 10 how would you describe your level of knowledge about non-white artists, makers and thinkers after the Find 30 activity? 3. From a range of 1 to 10 how would you describe the difficulty of finding non-white artists, makers, and thinkers for your research? 4. From a range of 1 to 10 how would you describe the level of impact your research of non-white artists, makers and thinkers had on your written assessment? 5. From a range of 1 to 10 how would you describe the level of impact your research of non-white artists, makers and thinkers had on your studio assessment? 6. Please add any further comments or feedback. This could be done anonymously electronically through Moodle or manually on paper. |
| Who will be involved and how? Mature students studying Level 4, 5 and 6 Fine Art and Contemporary Craft, and Level 6 Craft Practices (Furniture, Musical Instruments, Clocks). They will be participants in my sessions on Research Methods and Methodologies supporting their dissertations and regular Contextual / Theory sessions supporting their studio practices.They will be participants in my introduction and the Find 30 activity that kickstarts their research for their projects, essays and dissertation in the first session of the academic year. |
| What are the health & safety concerns, and how will you prepare for them? No significant physical risks are identified however there may be mental discomfort. around my introduction owing to it acknowledging the racial positionality of white people and the ongoing complicit colonisation that impoverishes knowledge, methods and society. I will prepare them by acknowledging beforehand that my introduction of acknowledgement to Country may be new to them, or they may have experienced it before when exposed to cultural practices outside of Britian. I will highlight that as students embarking on artistic research, they will encounter non-neutral voices in articles and my aim of drawing attention to my own positionality is for them to consider the positionality of all the writers and makers they find, and also to consider their unique positionality. Within the lectures across the different levels I will sign post the relationship between positionality and understanding. For example, in Level 4 the first lecture introduces Aesthetic Colonisation, which examines the connection between the East India Company and Eurocentric styles such as the Arts & Crafts and Art Nouveau. Level 5 includes a lecture on Art & Ethics, which examines the connection between Kant’s Copernican Turn and the historical perspective of art “Movements” in relation to the decentring of Eurocentricity seen in Francis Morris’ restructuring of the Tate collection rooms. Level 6 begins with a research methodologies lecture that uses Haraway’s notion of paying attention to what one is not paying attention to, and Anna Tsing’s contamination concept that acknowledges research is a situation where the researcher is affected by relations, which transform our existing positions. There is also the possible concern for cultural safety regarding students interacting with sensitive cultural material eg images of the deceased, use of deadnames etc which they are not sensitively culturally aware of. This may result in an offence and mistreatment of cultural integrity for example, student mimicry of museum/gallery display practices of a First Nations ritualistic object/image.I will inform students to regularly share their research (via Padlet) in classes and tutorials for the monitoring of cultural uses, and if in any doubt with using imagery or terminology to reach out and ask tutors, or research best practices related to their object/image. |
| How will you protect the data of those involved? I will inform all students sharing their padlets that their names will be visible and to redact them if they wish for other students not to identify them.I will protect cultural data of references through monitoring of student research regularly in classes and tutorials. Planning time in lectures and seminars to share and oversee progress and uploads of research material. If using the students research in the future to show as examples for research projects I will redact names (unless given consent). Manual and digital surveys can be anonymous (unless given consent). |
| How will you work with your participants in an ethical way? I will be transparent about my intervention and its aim by disclosing my intentions at the beginning of the module and the purpose of the Find 30 activity (which is not assessed). I will ask students for participatory consent in my using their progress for qualitive evaluation, offering the option for their right not to participate. |
2. Ethical Action Plan Feedback
Dear Michelle, this is a very sophisticated and comprehensive form already. It includes lots of relevant material, some great thinking and feeling, appropriate actions and a very specific field of research; a specific adult education context. The only missing part is perhaps the self of the researcher! Let’s depersonalise it, what should or could the researcher do to support themselves or get support for the task without all of the work being done, effectively, by them. That is, without overwhelm.
Possibility 1
What would best benefit the researcher in this context in terms of time, resources, energy or space in order to be productive or move towards an intervention. Perhaps this is an opportunity for the researcher to develop something themselves, which they may, or may not, have the time – within this project – to implement and evaluate, as such. They may get feedback from another practitioner, colleague, friend or ally on what they have produced and then research how best they might share it in the research field.
Possibility 2
What could the researcher reasonably ask of the participants, the results or affect of which could be reflected on and evaluated.
Possibility 3
Where is the centre of focus of this project? Researcher, teaching resource, activity, participant, College or systemic context, the ‘curriculum’, other, e.g. a social situation in the world, another artist or practitioner or a cultural tradition. Because of the breadth of the proposal it could be possibly any of these and that would be quite legitimate. This might mean, firstly, You are excellent at holistic thinking!:) Secondly, in a project of this small scale, you may need to hold one aspect more tightly, or follow one thread. Or, you have a situation/question; How do I change/reframe the whole system in a small way.
I hope this helps, have a go at adding a couple more sentences, here or there, that could add to this wonderful start of a document, and give you the guiderails you need in doing the project with joy and ease:) Ideally?!
There is very little to do, and its mainly conceptual, around the research design. Make sense? If not, do send an email to your tutor! 🙂
ARP 2024-5
3. Ethical Action Plan (First Submission that was revised above following feedback)
Name of practitioner-researcher: Michelle Ussher
| What is your project focus? To nurture the inclusivity of diverse student references beyond the Eurocentricity of the college (West Dean College Sussex University)To develop awareness of student positionality through exposure to plural knowledges and methodologies, which have the potential of informing their project outcomes. |
| What are you going to read about? Articles related to methods of decolonising pedagogy and anti-colonisation strategies. For example, focusing on methodologies that strategise how to increase diverse references for art works, as well as evaluative research on decolonising pedagogy and ethical approaches to decolonising creative research projects. From the course reading lists as a starting point, I have identified the following: Peterson. F, Ka’ai. T, Smith. V, McPherson. K. (2022) Re-imagining student success: Integrating strategy and action through an Indigenous lens. Auckland Art, Design & Communication in Higher Education Volume 22 Number 2 University of Technology © 2023 Intellect Ltd Article. Warmington, P (2014).Black British cultural studies. Black British Intellectuals and Education : Multiculturalism’s Hidden History, Taylor & Francis Group, London. Available from: ProQuest Ebook Central. [11 December 2023]. Hooks. b (1995). Talking Art as the Spirit Moves Us, Art on My Mind. Dall’Alb. G, Barnacle, R. (2007) An ontological turn for higher education Ontology in higher education. University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia; RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia, Studies in Higher Education Vol. 32, No. 6, December 2007, pp. 679–691, Society for Research into Higher Education. Crilly. J. Spark: (2019) Decolonising the library: a theoretical exploration. UAL Creative Teaching and Learning Journal., Content and Discovery, Library Services, University of the Arts London Vol 4 / Issue 1 (2019) pp.6-15 Arao. B, Clemens. K. From Safe Spaces to Brave Spaces, A New Way to Frame Dialogue around diversity and social justice. Savage. P (2023) ‘The New Life’: Mozambican Art Students in the USSR, and the Aesthetic Epistemologies of Anti-Colonial Solidarity. John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of the Association for Art History. |
| What action are you going to take in your teaching practice? As the critical studies lead across all BA levels of Fine Art, Contemporary Craft and Craft Practices, I am well positioned to set research tasks that focus students on diversifying references. At the beginning of each year, to kickstart the research for their studio practice and written assessments I will introduce a non-assessed research activity called Find 30 that specifies finding different artworks and articles from specific areas such as; European (white), Non-European (not white), Living, Everyday, and Political/Social. To set the tone of positionality and offer an example of how a white person can acknowledge colonisation in England I will draw attention to my positionality by adjusting my module introduction to include my positionality. I intend to introduce myself in the following way: Firstly I would like to acknowledge County. I am an immigrant and originally a settler artist of the Moree, Nulla Nulla, Mulubinba, and Narrm lands where I was born, lived and worked as an uninvited guest. Sovereignty was never ceded. There was no consent, no treaty and no compensation. I acknowledge the benefits I have accrued through colonisation and the ongoing dispossession of First Nations people. This includes my position as an academic where I am often complicit in the operations of academia as a privileged centre of Eurocentric power. The structures I have benefited from have impoverished society, research, methodologies and knowledge production. I want to extend my respect to anyone who is a First Nations person in the group or has been directly or indirectly impacted upon by colonisation.To evaluate the impact of the Find 30 activity I will compare the subject focus and references of previous written and studio assessments from (2022-23) with those of this year (2024-25), to gauge the qualitative and quantitate results.There is a possibility at the end of the year asking students to complete a voluntary survey with questions such as: Where 1 is not at all and 10 is excellent 1. From a range of 1 to 10 how would you describe your level of knowledge about non-white artists, makers and thinkers before the Find 30 activity? 2. From a range of 1 to 10 how would you describe your level of knowledge about non-white artists, makers and thinkers after the Find 30 activity? 3. From a range of 1 to 10 how would you describe the level of impact your research of non-white artists, makers and thinkers had on your written assessment? 4. From a range of 1 to 10 how would you describe the level of impact your research of non-white artists, makers and thinkers had on your studio assessment? This could be done anonymously electronically through Moodle or manually on paper. |
| Who will be involved and how? Mature students studying Level 4, 5 and 6 Fine Art and Contemporary Craft, and Level 6 Craft Practices. They will be participants in my introduction and the Find 30 activity that kickstarts their research for their projects, essays and dissertation. N.B. If any of your participants/co-researchers will be under 18, please seek advice from your tutor. |
| What are the health & safety concerns, and how will you prepare for them? No significant physical risks are identified however there may be mental discomfort. around my introduction owing to it acknowledging the racial positionality of white people and the ongoing complicit colonisation that impoverishes knowledge, methods and society. I will prepare them by acknowledging beforehand that my introduction of acknowledgement to Country may be new to them, or they may have experienced it before when exposed to cultural practices outside of Britian. I will highlight that as students embarking on artistic research, they will approach this with a unique positionality and my aim of drawing attention to my own positionality is for them to consider theirs. Within the lectures across the different levels I will sign post the relationship between positionality and understanding. For example, in Level 4 the first lecture introduces Aesthetic Colonisation, which examines the connection between the East India Company and Eurocentric styles such as the Arts & Crafts and Art Nouveau. Level 5 includes a lecture on Art & Ethics, which examines the connection between Kant’s Copernican Turn and the historical perspective of art “Movements” in relation to the decentring of Eurocentricity seen in Francis Morris’ restructuring of the Tate collection rooms. Level 6 begins with a research methodologies lecture that uses Haraway’s notion of paying attention to what one is not paying attention to, and Anna Tsing’s contamination concept that acknowledges research is a situation where the researcher is affected by relations, which transform our existing positions. There is also the possible concern for cultural safety regarding students interacting with sensitive cultural material eg images of the deceased, use of deadnames etc which they are not sensitively culturally aware of. This may result in an offence and mistreatment of cultural integrity for example, student mimicry of museum/gallery display practices of a First Nations ritualistic object/image.I will inform students to regularly share their research (via Padlet) in classes and tutorials for the monitoring of cultural uses, and if in any doubt with using imagery or terminology to reach out and ask tutors, or research best practices related to their object/image. |
| How will you protect the data of those involved? Through monitoring of research regularly in classes and tutorials. Planning time in lectures and seminars to share and oversee progress and uploads of research material. If using the students research in the future to show as examples for research projects I will redact names (unless given consent). Manual and digital surveys can be anonymous. |
| How will you work with your participants in an ethical way? I will be transparent about my intervention and its aim by disclosing my intentions at the beginning of the module and the purpose of the Find 30 activity (which is not assessed). I will ask students for participatory consent in my using their progress for qualitive evaluation, offering the option for their right not to participate. |