La Structure Fédérative d’Études et de Recherches en Éducation de Provence (SFERE-Provence, FED4238) was created in 2012. It is under the administrative supervision of the Aix-Marseille University and is a partner of the University of Nice-Sophia Antipolis. It houses 17 research units and researchers in the teaching, education and training sectors. The federation's scientific policy caters to the specific needs of each research unit, while working in a collaborative approach to align and make use of its intellectual and material resources to its best advantage. It aims to strengthen complementary aspects of research methodology and research approaches, but also to increase the federation's regional, national and international visibility.
Teaching, education and training make up a domain of empirical research. It presents us with a variety of complex subjects and problems for scientific analysis requiring the cooperation of many different disciplines. Today, this complexity continues to grow: the evolution of practices through the widespread use of new tools and technology and rapid innovations; epistemological diversity with the development of the humanities and social science which is becoming increasingly specialised and with the multiplication of specific theoretical and methodological approaches; the diversity of learning groups; development of ideological sociological and economic problems on a global scale.
In order to achieve this the federation targets interdisciplinary approaches which can help build knowledge in the teaching, education and training sectors, whether it is for academic organisations or institutional training systems. These questions which are being given a lot of thought by our educational corporations: the discussion may focus on lines of development, organisational structure, efficiency, performance, adaptation, adequacy, coherence or pertinence. The federation has committed itself to improving the visibility of its research policies, and consequently, improving policy coordination and the social and scientific impacts of its research
Objectives
The Structure Fédérative d’Études et de Recherches en Éducation de Provence aims to
- encourage the success of wide-reaching, multidisciplinary scientific programmes that have at their disposal far greater resources than individual entities working in isolation; set up support tools that may be either regular or periodic (scientific monitoring, project support and set-up, personal follow-up with external partners, etc.);
- develop aspects of communication (between the federation's research units); endorse scientific research internally and externally; economic development (in partnership with enterprises) and the development of training in collaboration with institutional partners of SFERE-Provence,
- assist in the elaboration of a research development policy for education and training in the PACA region.