attempt to replicate practices that are occurring in
English-speaking countries. There were also some
teachers who worked in the private sector of education
but additionally had a variety of experiences within
the public sector. In some cases their own children
had attended public schools. In other cases they had
been involved in philanthropic activities with public
sector schools.
We followed the British Educational Research
Association’s guidelines for obtaining informed
consent and we submitted an application to
conduct this research to the Queen’s University
Belfast Ethics Committee at the School of Education,
which granted us permission to conduct the
research. In addition, we felt compelled to follow
the spirit of ethical practices, taking the following
issues into consideration:
1) Respect the research participants and allow
them to shape the research. Some of the participants
requested to see the interview questions before we
conducted the interviews. We did not anticipate any
threats to validity in this regard and were happy to
comply with the participants’ requests. Although all
the participants – with one exception – were currently
or had been English teachers, we allowed them to
select whichever language they wanted the interview
to take place in, as long as we spoke that language.
We could not see any threats to validity by letting
the participants choose the language of the interview
and we felt that it was important for them to be
respected and viewed as the experts they are. In one
context, individuals invited for interviews asked if
their friends could also attend the interview and take
part in it. Once again, the nature of the research was
such that we did not anticipate any threat to validity
for letting other participants take part in the interview.