Staff profile

Vic Menzies joined Durham University in 2012 as a Research Trial Officer where she worked at the Centre for Evaluation and Monitoring (CEM) before moving to her current role at the School of Education in 2017. Vic has expertise in developing maths educational interventions ready for evaluation and in conducting education evaluations over a variety of settings. Her specific focus has been the evaluation of interventions using randomised controlled trial (RCT) methodology. She is currently Principal Investigator on a £450k grant from the Education Endowment Foundation delivering a large scale RCT of the ICCAMS Maths intervention where she has been involved in developing a roll out model of professional development for ICCAMS Maths and running a trial with more than 100 secondary schools across England. She is or has been PI or Co-I on a number of other grants to conduct large scale evaluations of educational interventions including two early years RCTs, an evaluation of Project Based Learning in secondary schools and two evaluations of Saturday School Programmes. 

She has previously conducted research on the development of number skills on starting school and has worked on a variety of research projects looking at different methods of peer tutoring to support maths attainment.

Vic has a BSc. in Psychology from the University of York and a Masters in Research from Strathclyde University. 

• Educational Evaluation
• Experimental Methodology
• Pilot Trials
• Development and Evaluation of Mathematical Interventions

• Durham University Evidence Centre for Education (DECE)

• Cross Age Peer Tutoring
• EasyPeasy Evaluation
• Evaluation of the Impact of the Creativity Commission Report
• ICCAMS2: Increasing Mathematical Competence and Confidence at Key Stage 3
• Independent evaluation of SHINE on Manchester schools
• Independent Evaluation Of The Maths Champions Programme
• PACT Evaluation
• Project Based Learning
• SHINE

• 2018: PACT Evaluation(£200777.00 from Education Endowment Foundation)
• 2015: Evaluation of Maths Champions(£185602.00 from Education Endowment Foundation)
• 2015: ICCAMS2: Increasing Mathematical Competence and Confidence at Key Stage 3(£509479.00 from Education Endowment Foundation)

• 0000: Invited speaker at Royal Statistical Society’s event: The Rise of RCTs in Education: Statistical and Practical Challenges – 4th November 2018
• 0000: Member of the School of Education’s Ethics and Data Protection Committee:
• 0000: Nominated for Research Staff Award at Durham University 2017:

Conference Paper

• Torgerson, C. & Menzies, V. (2016), Four randomised controlled trials and one quasi experiment evaluating a Saturday School intervention for disadvantaged primary school pupils: the Halle SHINE on Manchester and SHINE on Secondaries interventions, 11th Annual Conference of Randomised Controlled Trials in the Social Sciences. York, England.
• Menzies, V. & Raine, S. (2016), A Large Scale RCT of the ICCAMS Maths Intervention. The Successful Recruiting of 109 Secondary Schools, 11th Annual Conference of Randomised Controlled Trials in the Social Sciences. York, England.
• Menzies, V. (2015), Pilot randomised controlled trials in education: A systematic review of current practice, 10th Annual Conference of Conference of Randomised Controlled Trials in the Social Sciences. York, England.
• Menzies, V., Torgerson, C., Hewitt, C., Wiggins, A. & Younger, K. (2015), Piloting a prospective regression discontinuity design (with tie breaker randomisation) in the evaluation of a Saturday school programme for pupils starting secondary school, 10th Annual Conference of Randomised Controlled Trials in the Social Sciences. York, England.
• Torgerson, C, Wiggins, A, Menzies, V & Younger, K (2013), Piloting regression discontinuity design (RDD) to evaluate the effectiveness of a Saturday School transition programme, 8th Annual Conference of Randomised Controlled Trials in the Social Sciences. Durham, England, Durham.
• Merrell, C, Wiggins, A, Thurston, A, Menzies, V & Younger, K (2012), The use of local authority partnerships in school recruitment to a randomised controlled trial, 7th Annual Conference of Randomised Controlled Trials in the Social Sciences. York, England, York.
• Torgerson, C, Wiggins, A, Menzies, V, Kasim, A, Hewitt, C & Younger, K (2012), Using an innovative randomised controlled trial design in an educational evaluation, 7th Annual Conference of Randomised Controlled Trials in the Social Sciences. York, York.
• Thurston, A, Burns, V & Topping, K (2011), Using peer tutor-mediated metacognitive strategy to enhance mathematics attainment in elementary schools, American Educational Research Association Annual Meeting. New Orleans, USA, New Orleans LA.

Journal Article

• Younger, K., Gascoine, L., Menzies, V. & Torgerson, C. (2019). A systematic review of evidence on the effectiveness of interventions and strategies for widening participation in higher education. Journal of Further and Higher Education 43(6): 742-773.
• Kokotsaki, D., Menzies, V. & Wiggins, A. (2016). Project-based learning: a review of the literature. Improving Schools 19(3): 267-277.
• Muldoon, K, Towse, J, Simms, V, Perra, O & Menzies, V (2013). A longitudinal analysis of estimation, counting skills, and mathematical ability across the first school year. Developmental Psychology 49(2): 250-257.
• Muldoon, K, Simms, V, Towse, J, Menzies, V & Yue, G (2011). Cross-cultural comparisons of 5-year-olds’ estimating and mathematical ability. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology 42(4): 669-681.
• Wiggins, S & Burns, V (2009). Research methods in practice: The development of problem-based learning materials for teaching qualitative research methods to undergraduate students. Psychology Learning & Teaching 8(1): 29-33.

Presentation

• Robinson, L. & Menzies, V. (2016), Evaluation in the Early Years. The Maths Champions Programme: Challenges and Practical Considerations, Education Endowment Foundation’s Evaluator Conference. London.
• Menzies, V. (2015), The Durham Shared Maths Project: Challenges encountered during a real large-scale randomised controlled trial, Royal Statistical Society’s: The Rise of RCTs in Education: Statistical and Practical Challenges. London.

Report

• Menzies, Victoria, Cramman, Helen, Eerola, Paivi, Hugill-Jones, Jessica, Akhter, Nasima & Einbeck, Jochen (2022). Parents and Children Together (PACT) Evaluation Report. Education Endowment Foundation.
• Robinson-Smith,Lyn, Whiteside, Katie, Torgerson, Carole, Qi, Xiaofei, Fairhurst, Caroline, Elliott, Louise Hewitt, Catherine, Joshi, Kalpita, Menzies, Victoria, Torgerson, David & Ainsworth, Hannah (2020). Independent evaluation of Maths Champions in nursery settings to develop children’s early numeracy: A two-armed cluster randomised controlled trial Evaluation Protocol. Education Endowment Foundation.
• Robinson-Smith, Lyn, Menzies, Victoria, Cramman, Helen, Wang, Yuqian (Linda), Fairhurst, Caroline, Hallett, Sarah, Beckmann, Nadin, Merrell, Christine, Torgerson, Carole, Stothard, Sue & Siddiqui, Nadia (2019). EasyPeasy: Learning through play. Evaluation Report. Education Endowment Foundation.
• Robinson-Smith,L., Fairhurst,C., Stone,G., Bell,K., Elliott, L., Gascoine,L., Hallett,S., Hewitt,C., Hugill,J., Torgerson,C., Torgerson,D., Menzies,V. & Ainsworth,H. (2018). Maths Champions: Evaluation Report and Executive Summary. Education Endowment Foundation.
• Menzies, V., Hewitt, C., Kokotsaki, D., Collyer, C. & Wiggins, A. (2016). Project Based Learning: Evaluation report and executive summary. School of Education. London, Education Endowment Foundation.
• Menzies, V., Kasim, A., Kokotsaki, D., Hewitt, C., Akhter, N., Collyer, C., Younger, K., Wiggins, A. & Torgerson, C. (2016). Hallé SHINE on Manchester: Evaluation report and executive summary. Education Endowment Foundation.
• Menzies, V., Collyer, C., Kokotsaki, D., Hewitt, C., Younger, K., Wiggins, A. & Torgerson, C. (2015). SHINE in Secondaries: Evaluation report and Executive summary. Education Endowment Foundation.
• Torgerson, C., Gascoine, L., Heaps, C., Menzies, V. & Younger, Kirsty (2014). Higher Education access: Evidence of effectiveness of university access strategies and approaches. Sutton Trust.