In the EPI•STEM PODCAST Episode 21, co-hosts Geraldine Simmie PhD and Michelle Starr PhD reflect on the variety of voices in the podcasts to date. They then continue where they left off in Episode 7 in relation to selecting and justifying a variety of theoretical and methodological approaches to doctoral studies in STEM and STEAM Education.

Michelle Starr PhD shares her research specialism in the criticalsociology of the French intellectual Pierre Bourdieu and shows how thinking with the big ideas and concepts of Bourdieu offers a powerful explanatory framework for education research studies framed as cultural problems. Michellespeaks to the interplay between the individual and structure and the relations between what Bourdieu called ‘habitus’, ‘field’ and cultural, social and economic ‘capital’.

Geraldine Simmie PhD shares her research specialism in Critical Policy Studies, her understanding of the complexity of this social scientific problem, not only interrogating the gap between policy and practice but justifying the need to offer an affirmative critique of the framing of education policies.Geraldine shares her approach to doing this policy research, drawing from philosophical, critical and feminist theorists and educational thinkers. 

We restart the podcast again in the autumn. In the meantime, thank you to all our listeners, the team and Affiliates in EPI•STEM, School of Education colleagues and students from the Irish World Academy of Music and Dance. Thanksto Professor Sara Tolbert at the University of Melbourne at Monash, Australia, local schools, teachers and pupils, OIDE chemistry support team, Limerick Education Support Centre, Hunt Museum and local enterprises {Analog, Boston Scientific, Elly Lilly, ESB, SEROSEP}. A word of thanks for the endorsement of our eco-village project from the President of Ireland Michael D. Higgins, the Cloughjordan Eco-Village project and RTEs David Bannon. Finally, a special thank you to the Digital Hub in UL especially our producer Greg Rogala.

The musical selection is Gan Anam Jig, a lively traditional tune played on keyboard by Ciara Geaney from Dingle, an accomplished piano player and a student in the BA in Irish Music in The Irish World Academy of Music and Dance,Faculty of Arts and Humanities, UL.