Doctor of Education (EdD)
The Exeter EdD was one of the first professional doctorate programmes to be established in the UK and is organised to fit around you and your work schedule. It recognises the particular needs, interests and policy contexts of students who are also professionals in their own right.
The programme gives you the opportunity to reflect on, and experiment with, new concepts and ideas, professional understandings of practice, and research skills - all within a safe but challenging environment amongst a supportive community of peers.
The quality of our research degrees is greatly influenced by the quality of our overall research activity; the Graduate School of Education is ranked 5th in the UK for world leading and internationally excellent research in Education (RAE 2008)*.
Why study for an EdD?
The Exeter EdD programme will enable you to:
- review and evaluate research, theory, policy and practice; examine and challenge your own professional practice and its relationship with theory and policy;
- integrate recent and applicable theory with the latest developments in professional practice;
- make strong links between your assignments/research thesis and professional practice and service needs;
- design and carry out your own ethically-informed research;
- network and share experiences with a worldwide community of professionals and policy-makers practising in a broad range of educational contexts and fields related to education;
- increase your knowledge about other professionals and their organisations and thereby gain a wider perspective on the environment in which you work.
EdD or PhD?
The distinction made between the two has usually been that an EdD includes a ‘taught’ element as well as a research based thesis. However, since most PhDs now also incorporate a research training programme (RTP) as an essential preliminary to the thesis, is there anything else which makes the EdD distinctive? We think so.
At Exeter, the taught element of our EdD programme, like the RTP, introduces you to different understandings of, and approaches to, educational research, including distinctive methodologies and methods.
But, in addition, the EdD includes taught modules which enable you to explore, in depth, a particular field of study, together with its implications for your own professional practice. This exploration is enhanced by being undertaken in the company of a group of other professionals who embark on, and move through, the programme with you, thereby creating an invaluable peer-support network which often lasts well beyond the end of the programme.
I chose the University of Exeter’s EdD programme instead of a PhD because the modules reflected the areas I wanted to explore more deeply to inform my role as programme manager of post-compulsory initial teacher education. I also wanted support from tutors and peers on a taught doctorate and to focus on a range of topics, using my learning from these to inform my thesis.
It has become a cliché to suggest that undertaking a PhD provides a good grounding for those who wish to become professional researchers while an EdD does the same for those who wish to become researching professionals – but it remains a useful distinction.
We offer the following pathways within the EdD programme:
- EdD (Generic Route)
- EdD in Educational Psychology
- EdD in Special Educational Needs
- EdD in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL)
- EdD in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) in Dubai
* RAE 2008 based on percentage of research categorised as 4* and 3*