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General rightsIt is not permitted to download or to forward/distribute the text or part of it without the consent of the author(s) and/or copyright holder(s), other than for strictly personal, individual use, unless the work is under an open content license (like Creative Commons). Disclaimer/Complaints regulationsIf you believe that digital publication of certain material infringes any of your rights or (privacy) interests, please let the Library know, stating your reasons. In case of a legitimate complaint, the Library will make the material inaccessible and/or remove it from the website. Please Ask the Library: http://uba.uva.nl/en/contact, or a letter to: Library of the University of Amsterdam, Secretariat, Singel 425, 1012 WP Amsterdam, The Netherlands. You will be contacted as soon as possible. This article describes experiences with a qualitative research project into teachers' learning from innovating their own educational practices. Decades of New Public Management (NPM) in the Netherlands, with its top-down and businesslike approach to areas of public interest, obscured the learning and innovating capacity of teachers, teams, and schools. Merely studying the learning processes which take place at a teacher level would present insufficient insight into the deeper mechanisms which hinder or stimulate learning from innovation in a bottom-up manner. We, therefore, focused on the relations between different layers (individual, systemic) within schools. A high-quality design was required for answering the research question: How and what do teachers learn from innovating their own educational practices? This article elaborates upon this design and discusses the methodological findings and complications of this type of research.

Purpose: Self-managed institutional homeless programmes started as an alternative to regular shelters. Using institutional theory as a lens, we aim to explore the experiences of stakeholders with the institutional aspects of a self-managed programs. Method: The data we analysed (56 interviews, both open and semi-structured) were generated in a longitudinal participatory case-study into JES, a self-managed homeless shelter. In our analysis we went back and forth between our empirical data and theory, using a combination of systematic coding and interpretation. Participants were involved in all stages of the research. Results: Our analysis revealed similarities between JES and regular shelters, stemming from institutional similarities. Participants shared space and facilities with sixteen people, which caused an ongoing discussion on (enforcement of) rules. Participants loathed lack of private space. However, participants experienced freedom of choice over both their own life and management of JES and structures were experienced more fluid than in regular care. Some structures also appeared stimulated self-management. Conclusion: Our analysis showed how an institutional context influences self-management and suggested opportunities for introducing freedom and fluidity in institutional care.

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Summary Self-managed shelters claim that participants who have been homeless are better able to run a shelter than regular providers. Little research has investigated self-managed shelters. In this article, we have described the experiences of participants and peer workers with empowerment processes in Je Eigen Stek (Your own place, JES), a self-managed shelter, based on an eight-year qualitative responsive evaluation. Findings We distinguish three clusters of individual experiences: (1) enthusiastic, (2) moderate to critical, and (3) negative, respectively, associated with decreasing engagement with social life in and management of JES. Those not engaged can still benefit materially and from the freedom of choice JES offers, which is generally appreciated. Empowerment provides a useful framework and JES in turn offers new insights into the dialectical nature of empowerment. Empowerment consists of freedom of choice and capacity development and neither should be emphasized over the other. The emphasis in JES is on freedom of choice, which does not automatically lead to developing capacities. Social workers try to balance both aspects of empowerment. Applications Our analysis shows how offering freedom of choice can contribute to empowerment, although social workers need to be aware that participants might opt not to work on capacity development.