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Two recent events occurred in the academic life of one of the editors of this journal. The first was a seminar presented at the University of Sydney by the Director of the Centre for Refugee Research at the University of New South Wales. The Director focused upon the ethics of research with extremely vulnerable populations such as refugees; in particular, refugee women who frequently experience systematised sexual torture and rape. She saw her work as a form of action research whose political intent was to change the appalling situation in which the women and young girls found themselves. She travelled to camps situated as far afield as the borders of Thailand and Burma, and the Kakuma refugee camp in Kenya. The refugees with whom she worked sought to develop skills that would enable them to tell and publish their stories as a means of shattering the silences surrounding the abuse of women such as themselves.The second event was an advisory session with a young academic who was crossing boundaries in his work between medical anthropology and adult education. He quickly strayed from the path of his formal doctoral candidature to discuss his passion, which was coaching a group of women as a ''barbershop'' choir. His desire was to write about the study as an action research project that embodied his development as he unravelled not only the management problems that he encountered along the way, but those related to his inclusion as the sole male in the enterprise.Two events manifestly different in substance, but each claiming an engagement with action research. Kemmis & Brennan (2003) characterise what they have termed participatory action research as that where:people aim to improve three things: their own practices, their understanding of their practices and the social realities in which they live and work. They do their research in a spiral of cycles of self-reflection. They make an initial reconnaissance of their situation, then work out what they could do to improve things. (p. 3)Whether considering the transformation and emancipation of cruelly abused refugee women or the increased enlightenment of a musical impresario, action research as a modus operandi acted to open up the communicative space that each required in ways that were neither oppressive nor exploitative. Such is the case with this edition of the journal. Each contribution, in one way or another, serves to open up a communicative space that will allow debate and discussion about practice, whether at a systems, local or individual level. A number of the studies have been undertaken in widely differing national contexts and serve to illustrate how action research has had its impact upon practice in a number of different countries.ngel Prez Gmez outlines the contradictions and challenges of introducing comprehensive, compulsory education in Andalusia for students up to the age of 16. Following documentation of the developments, he argues that, while the intention was for a significant, planned reform, it may be better characterised as one that is, at best, an improvisation. The work of John Elliott has been acknowledged as an important influence upon the inquiry that was undertaken and the subsequent analysis of its results. Therefore, not only are the results of an action-orientated study reported here, but also there is an extensive set of guiding principles that could enable the reform to be truly actualised. Working in the Thai context, Kirin Sahasewiyon investigates the development of local curriculum in the Fang District, Chiang Mai Province. She discusses the factors that have consequences for the development of the curriculum, in the face of some initial resistance, through the action research of the teachers.Anjum Halai takes us to a consideration of the impact of action research upon classroom practices in the teaching of mathematics in Karachi, Pakistan. His study is viewed through the lens of teacher professional learning. Judy Peters challenges some cherished beliefs about the ways in which action research might be truly emancipatory in the State of South Australia with particular reference to assumptions that might be being made about the conditions under which teachers work. Thus, the communicative space that is opened up is not only with respect to a specific study, but also with regard to more broadly based teacher education practices.Partnerships and their rewards and challenges are the focus of many of the papers that are published in this edition. A collaborative piece of writing comes to us from Cincinnati in the USA, where two university academics work in collaboration with three classroom teachers (see Helen Meyer, Bennyce Hamilton, Steve Kroeger, Stephanie Stewart and Mary Brydon-Miller) to develop insight about daily classroom practice. From the United Kingdom, we read about the challenge to beginning teachers'' beliefs as they seek to straddle the world of the university and the world of the school. Adopting action research procedures has enabled the beginning teachers to extract principles that will assist them in new contexts in the future. Chris Day and Mark Hadfield''s piece looks at the corporate learning of schools in a network partnership, where self-selected primary schools in England have sought to work together, through action research, to enhance their understanding of their operational principles.New understandings emerge from Elaine Wilson''s work in which she uses activity theory as a tool to design an intervention program intended to equip beginning teachers with strategies to enhance their professional learning by extracting sound principles of practice. As an action learning project the process enlarged the communicative space available to all stakeholders: the university partner; the schools and the beginning teachers who were faced with often difficult and challenging circumstances in the context of high stakes assessment in the United Kingdom.Valerie Dagley''s article takes us more directly into the lived life of the classroom. She discusses the issue of ''making the invisible visible'' from a methodological and a substantive viewpoint. The ideas emerged from a doctoral research study into individual target setting with middle ability students in an English secondary school. The students involved had been identified by assessments as ''average'' and by their teachers as quiet, un-noticed children. It is suggested that the methods used by the researcher to elicit the students'' perceptions could also be used by teachers in order to engage these quiet students in a learning discourse, yet another communicative space.Finally, the theoretical resource, by Gaby Weiner ''tumbles us into the big ideas'' that Somekh (2003) wrote about in her review of a decade of such pieces. The article plots recent developments in feminist ideas and their relevance for critical action research. Recreating and reliving the ways in which we might consider our work is constructed for us by Weiner as she finds those things in common between feminism and action enquiry. Among other things she identifies:a critique of positivist research paradigms;a recognition of the place of values that are embedded in practice and lived experience;an understanding of historical and cultural roots;a view that such enquiry should aim to be transformative.This argument returns us to the beginning of this editorial. Whether the mission is to transform a global understanding of the oppression of women in refugee camps or the transformation of the self in new and unfamiliar circumstances it is possible to see from this edition of Educational Action Research, and of course those that preceded it, that we are in a serious and universalistic enterprise.The EditorsReferencesKemmis, S. & Brennan, R. (2003) Making and Writing the History of the Future Together: exploratory action in participatory action research, invited address to the Congreso Internacional de Educacion, Cordoba, Argentine Republic, 9-11 October.Somekh, B. (2003) Theory and Passion in Action Research, Educational Action Research, 11(2), pp. 247-264.

an: 19623049; source: Educational Action Research; docTypes: Article; pubTypes: Academic Journal;