Educational Research in Cyprus: towards collaborative models of inquiry to make sense of schools and their cultures PANAYIOTIS ANGELIDES Introduction Schools, like all organisations, are complex places (Handy & Aitken, 1986; Weick, 1985) and people working in them have similar bonds and are in continual interaction. They develop their behaviour under the same conditions, rules and regulations and, therefore, share the same meanings, norms, and understandings. Educational problems are constructed within the workplaces through the interaction of people working in them. Educational research in Cyprus, however, does not seem to respond to the widely recognised complexities of schools. The focus of many researchers seems to be on how to come up with predictions across people, time and contexts and a plethora of suggestions that are applicable to the entire educational context of Cyprus, paying little attention to the socially constructed structures and cultures of schools (Papanastasiou, 2000; Valanides, 1997). The Ministry of Education, adopting outcomes of educational research which is mainly based on quantitative criteria, has attempted innovations, introduced new approaches to teaching and changed the curriculum for the purpose of improvement and development. But there still remains widespread dissatisfaction with the effectiveness of our schools (UNESCO, 1997). I shall argue that important factors behind our unsuccessful attempts for change are the little attention given to the complexities of schools and the way we approach educational research, creating a gap between researchers and practitioners. Over the years and across the world, the debate on the role of educational research in successfully informing professional practice for the purpose of improvement has produced an immense body of literature. It has also raised a number of complex practical and theoretical problems. For instance, David Hargreaves' (1996) TTA lecture `Teaching as a research based profession: prospects and possibilities' became the centre of a controversy as to whether educational research could and should have much more relevance for, and impact on, the professional practice of teachers than it has now (Hammersley, 1997; Hargreaves, 1997; Huberman, 1999; Mortimore, 2000; Lampert, 2000). In addition, there is strong evidence that life patterns within a school do have a considerable influence on the quality of schooling (McLaughlin, 1993; Rosenholtz, 1989; Keddie, 1971). Furthermore, the research draws attention to the significance of school culture in European Journal of Education, Vol. 36, No. 1, 2001 ß Blackwell Publishers Ltd 2001. Published by Blackwell Publishers Ltd, 108 Cowley Road, Oxford OX4 1JF, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA.