EdD in Children, Schools and Families

This is a distance-learning, taught programme based around residential weekend study schools. The weekends are held in Sheffield and run from 4pm Friday through to Sunday lunchtime (October, February and May each year) with an Induction Day for new students on the Friday of the first October weekend.

The programme incorporates six structured modules with a substantial thesis involving sustained research on a particular issue or topic related to work with children, schools and families. This is a broad and flexible research based programme that will be relevant to a range of professional and managerial careers and is especially suited to part-time study.


The EdD CSF examines a variety of aspects of research and is for those who wish to research their practice with children, schools and families in more depth, for example, whether in youth or family support work, home-school liaison or extended schools. The course aims to provide students with both a thorough grounding in the philosophy, principles and practice of educational research, and a critical understanding of key contemporary issues in relation to work with children, schools and their families.

Members of the course team are known internationally and we thus also embrace global issues alongside a commitment to inter-disciplinarity within our learning community. Indeed much of our work is conducted within the Centre for the Study of Children, Families and Learning Communities.
The course aims to enable students to:

• Conduct high quality research into work with children, schools and their families in a supportive environment, with leading scholars in the field
• Explore practice, policies, theories and new ideas relating to children, schools and families
• Acquire theoretical and applied knowledge of contemporary issues in work with children, schools and families and develop a critical perspective to look at specific issues
• Gain a doctorate in a supported manner, while still working full-time