Staff profile

Feyisa Demie

Professor Feyisa Demie is an Honorary Professor at the School of Education and also head of research at Lambeth LA. He is a Fellow of the British Academies of Social Science (FAcSS). Previously he was a University Lecturer and Head of Research and Statistics. Feyisa has worked extensively with local authorities, government departments, the London Challenge, individual schools, and school governors on the use of data and research to drive school improvement. As an education adviser, he works with schools covering all phases of assessment, from the foundation stage, KS1, and KS2 to GCSE. In these roles, he was responsible for pioneering work on ‘value added’ analyses of school effectiveness and developing a comprehensive data service for schools, comprising individual school profiles and contextual reports as a means of providing confidential data to help schools monitor performance and improve their processes and outcomes. He also runs school-focussed training programmes and the annual national school improvement conference for headteachers, teachers, school governors, and policymakers to support school self-evaluation. With longstanding research interests in what works in raising achievement in schools and equity issues in education, he has written a number of research reports and articles on school improvement, ethnicity, social class, English as an additional language and disadvantage, and its impact on educational achievement and pupil progress in schools. He is the author of over 100 articles, book chapters, and research reports on education and has published articles in peer-reviewed journals. Recent research projects include diversity in the school teaching workforce, barriers in retention and recruitment of ethnic minority teachers, school exclusions, tackling educational inequality, and the underachievement of Black Caribbean heritage pupils in schools in England and Good practice to drive school improvement. Prior to this, he has also carried out what works research into the achievement of Black Caribbean, Black African, Mixed race, Portuguese, Polish, Somali, English as an Additional Language, White Working Class pupils, East European children and pupil mobility. A selected list of publications in peer-reviewed journals is given below. For further details of other research reports see https://www.durham.ac.uk/staff/feyisa-demie/

• Recruitment and Retention of ethnic minority teachers/leaders
• What works in driving school improvement?
• Educational inequality and social justice
• Value added in education
• Ethnicity and educational achievement
• English as an additional language achievement
• Disadvantage pupils achievement
• School effectiveness
• Pupil mobility
• School exclusions