Common Themes in Action Research on Girls’ Education
Confidence and Academic Risk Taking
GARC research points to the importance of building confidence in students, which directly leads to greater academic risk-taking. Structured collaborative activities and reflective practices encouraged students to engage with challenging material and take risks in their learning.
Self-Reflection and Perspective-Taking
Encouraging students to reflect on their learning processes and consider multiple perspectives led to greater empathy, self-awareness, and improved problem-solving abilities, allowing students to navigate academic and personal challenges more effectively.
Student Agency and Voice
Across many of the research reports, students co-designed rubrics, took part in creating success criteria, or had more autonomy in their learning choices. By increasing their ownership of the learning process, students became more engaged, motivated, and self-directed.
Become a GARC Fellow
The Global Action Research Collaborative on Girls’ Education is the world’s first action research program that engages girls’ school educators from around the world in informed, collaborative, and disciplined, action research. The program builds both a network of girls’ school educators from around the world and a library of valuable and relevant research on girls’ education.
“Action research allows teachers to study their own classrooms—for example, their own instructional methods, their own students, and their own assessments—in order to better understand them and to be able to improve their quality or effectiveness.”