Boyd, Pete and Smith, Caroline (2016) The contemporary academic: orientation towards research work and researcher identity of higher education lecturers in the health professions. Studies in Higher Education, 41 (4). pp. 678-695.Downloaded from: http://insight.cumbria.ac.uk/id/eprint/1671/ Usage of any items from the University of Cumbria's institutional repository 'Insight' must conform to the following fair usage guidelines.Any item and its associated metadata held in the University of Cumbria's institutional repository Insight (unless stated otherwise on the metadata record) may be copied, displayed or performed, and stored in line with the JISC fair dealing guidelines (available here) for educational and not-for-profit activities provided that• the authors, title and full bibliographic details of the item are cited clearly when any part of the work is referred to verbally or in the written form
AbstractInternationally, the increasing emphasis in universities on the quality of teaching, on student employability and on a corporate approach to entrepreneurial income generation, has created a tension around the primacy afforded to published research outputs as a focus for academic work and status. In this study a framework for academic socialisation is developed and used to understand how lecturers in health professional fields attempt to 'juggle' four areas of work -teaching, leadership, knowledge exchange and research activity. Studying academics in professional fields, with a well-developed focus on employability and strong partnerships with employers, provides useful insight into contemporary academic work and identity. A significant proportion of lecturers in health professional fields, even of those working in research intensive universities, appear to 'subvert' the paradigmatic primacy afforded across the higher education sector to research outputs and identity as a researcher.