Grown up - children from military families

‘Grown Up’ Children from Military Families: reflections on experiences of childhood and education

This pilot project is exploring the childhood and educational experiences of ‘grown up’ children from military families. These ‘grown-up’ children are currently overlooked in research, policy and practice, as the focus continues to be on serving members of the military, veterans, and their families, including school-aged children.

The Office for Students recently noted that children from military families face ‘very specific and complex barriers’ and this has been recognised in the government’s Service Pupil Premium funding, provided to schools since 2011.

Although research has been undertaken with school-aged children, we know very little about the childhood and educational experiences from those now grown up.

This pilot project will provide additional knowledge about how childhood and education are experienced and understood on reflection and the implications of this. The stories from this unique group of adults can be used to provide support for school-aged children that cannot be elicited from anywhere else.

This project will start to provide knowledge about this group that can be used to support an external funding application, as well as to begin to influence policy. The stories elicited will be used to create resources to be used in practice, most specifically to support current school-aged children and their families, as well as offering guidance about the support that can be provided to ‘children’ as they move to university and other contexts, making their transitions into adulthood. 

Meet the Principal Investigator(s) for the project

Dr Anne Chappell - Anne Chappell is the Head of Department and Reader in the Department of Education. Anne has been at Brunel University London in the Department since 2004 and teaches on undergraduate and postgraduate education programmes, including Initial Teacher Education. Prior to this she worked in several secondary schools in London and the South-East of England with roles including Head of Year and Head of Physical Education. She studied Education, Physical Education and Science at West Sussex Institute of Higher Education, before completing a Master’s in Education at the University of Southampton and a PhD at Brunel University London. Anne is a Senior Fellow of Advance Higher Education (previously HIgher Education Academy). Anne's research focuses on auto/biographical experiences and her particular interests are in education, policy, professionals, narrative methodologies and ethical exploration and representation. Anne is the co-editor of The Palgrave Handbook of Auto/Biography with Dr Julie Parsons, University of Plymouth. She has undertaken funded research with university students from widening participation backgrounds, commuting students and students from military families. She has also undertaken research with teachers at different career stages. She was Brunel's coordinator for the EU funded “Universities Supporting Victims of Sexual Violence: Training for Sustainable Student Services (USVSV)” project. Anne co-convenes the BSA's Auto/Biography Study Group: Auto/Biography Study Group (britsoc.co.uk) with Dr Carly Stewart, Bournemouth University.

Dr Christopher Ince - I lead Secondary Science PGCE programme, delivering the science sessions of the PGCE programme as well as aspects of the GPE (General Professional Education) sessions. Prior to joining Brunel I taught science for ten years in the English education system of which I spent six years as the Head of Physics at a large state school and sixth-form college in Sheffield. In addition to my work within science I led on Teaching and Learning across the school for three years and was the 'lead' Curriculum Leader, designing and implementing initiatives to improve the quality of teaching and learning across all subjects and key stages. My work draws on many areas of expertise from STEM Education to Policy Analysis and Curriculum Reform, and is currently focused on examining the power structures and discourses that are revealed during educational 'turning points'.

Dr Ellen McHugh - Ellen is a Senior Lecturer in Education. Her research interests lie in transnationalism, migration, belonging, welfare and young people. She has extensive experience of working with hard-to-reach groups, with a particular focus on student experience and retention.

Related Research Group(s)

Education, Identities and Society - Research at the intersection of Education, Sociology, Human Geography, Youth Studies and Digital Presence.

Pedagogy, Policy and Professional Education - Focusing on pedagogy, policy and professional education, including the education of teachers.

Global Lives - Research conducted in the Centre addresses the challenges facing society, helping to change the lives of people around the world by bringing economic, social and cultural benefits.

Partnering with confidence

Organisations interested in our research can partner with us with confidence backed by an external and independent benchmark: The Knowledge Exchange Framework. Read more.

Project last modified 27/10/2021