Research Impact: All health and physical education (HPE) professionals, including teacher educators, have a collective responsibility to engage with policy but existing research tells us little about how HPE teacher educators (H/PETEs) understand policy. Drawing on figurational sociology, and the concept of assemblage, this paper offers insights into the nature and development – or sociogenesis – of teacher educators’ conceptualisations of policy. The data shared in this paper was generated through semi-structured interviews with 12 H/PETE from 7 countries. Inductive-deductive analysis – drawing largely on figurational concepts such as interdependence, power, habitus and sociogenesis – revealed that H/PETEs conceptualised policy as: (i) informing intended action and change; (ii) a way to govern practice; (iii) imposition and possibility. In terms of how these conceptualisations came to be, key features of the H/PETE figuration that were identified as influential include: (i) interdependence with human and non-human elements; (ii) balances of power and (iii) social and individual habitus. It is concluded that capitalising on these elements through professional learning, for example, could support H/PETEs in engaging with policy in productive and meaningful ways. Given that engaging with policy is viewed as a collective responsibility of H/PETEs, and many – if not all – of the H/PETEs felt they needed support in this regard, this should be a key focus for the field.
Alfrey, L., Scanlon, D., Aldous, D., Lorusso, J., Baker, K., Clark, C., & Jafar, M. (2024). A figurational analysis of Health and/or Physical Education teacher educators’ conceptualisations of policy, and their sociogenesis. Sport, Education and Society, 1–15. https://doi.org/10.1080/13573322.2024.2408561
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