Practice-oriented educational research is increasingly gaining traction in educational research due to its intention to contribute to both educational research and educational practice. Educational researchers have established quality concerns that practice-oriented educational research should meet in order to realise this intention. We argue that teachers' quality concerns probably differ from researchers' concerns. This may explain why practice-oriented educational research faces challenges concerning its contribution to educational practice. The aim of this study is to identify teacher-researchers' perspectives on the quality of practice-oriented educational research and to analyse how these differ from the research perspective. In a qualitative empirical study, individual reflections, small-group discussions and semistructured interviews of ten purposefully selected teacher-researchers are analysed following a so-called informed grounded theory approach. The results of this study show that the teacher-researchers' quality concerns overlap with the quality concerns commonly held by researchers, but they broaden the meaning of some quality concerns, add new concerns and exclude others. Taking their common quality concerns as a starting point, close collaboration between researchers and teachers could decrease researchers' challenges concerning legitimacy and relevance of their work and increase teachers' use of research in educational practice.

The aim of this study is to establish an empirically substantiated professional development programme for teachers to become lead teachers who are able to support professional development of peers in times of curriculum innovation. The design of a professional development programme, participants' learning outcomes and their interrelatedness are described. The three main interventions in the professional development programme are: (A) a national learning community of lead teachers-in-training to participate in formal training and peer intervision; (B) regional learning communities of teachers where lead teachers-in-training practice their leadership qualities and receive feedback on their functioning as lead teachers; and (C) selfreflection to stimulate awareness of learning progress among participants. This qualitative case study reports the results of the designed programme embedded in the implementation process of a context-based chemistry curriculum in secondary education in the Netherlands. Results show that participants acquire intended learning outcomes in terms of knowledge, skills and dispositions. These learning outcomes are invoked by the combination of interventions in the professional development programme. From the results it can be concluded that the designed professional development programme has potential to train teachers to become lead teachers to support curriculum innovation.

Practice-oriented educational research is renowned for its impact, both in educational practice and research. Yet, existing studies on the impact of practice-oriented educational research reflect a proliferation of ideas on what impact is, can or should be. This study aims to contribute to an in-depth understanding by establishing a theoretically informed and empirically substantiated conceptualisation of the impact of practice-oriented educational research. Based on current literature, a tentative conceptualisation in the dimensions scope, nature and progress, representing the who, what and when of change, is proposed. The tenability and completeness of this conceptualisation is subsequently investigated in a qualitative empirical study. Based on interviews, individual reflections and small-group discussions, the impact of 10 purposefully selected practice-oriented studies in secondary STEM-education in the Netherlands is compared to the tentative conceptualisation of impact. This results in an empirical substantiation and extension of the tentative conceptualisation. The presented conceptualisation of impact of practice-oriented educational research in terms of scope, covering educational practice and research within the context of a study or beyond, nature, including conceptual, instrumental and symbolic change, and progress, comprising sustainability, timeframe, and stability of change, can facilitate and focus discussions, considerations and analyses of the impact of practice-oriented educational research.

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