AIAS Seminar: 'Calibrating challenge: Studying academic middle managers role in the context of widening participation'

Abstract

Academic middle managers occupy a critical but underexplored position in the landscape of widening participation in higher education: the meso-level where institutional policies meet everyday pedagogical and relational practice. While existing scholarship addresses student experiences, support staff roles, and institutional policy frameworks, little attention has been paid to how middle managers navigate and calibrate widening participation agendas in their departments. This session includes concrete methodological challenges of an ongoing study based on qualitative case studies at public higher education institutions.

Short Bio

Kateřina Machovcová, Ph.D., is a Senior Researcher at the Institute of Psychology, Czech Academy of Sciences. She received her PhD in Social Psychology from Masaryk University. Her research focuses on leadership, diversity and inclusion, with a particular emphasis on higher education. During her fellowship, she will be developing a study examining how academic middle managers navigate widening participation agendas and shape departmental conditions for student belonging and academic challenge.

What is an AIAS Seminar?

The AIAS Seminar Series is a session of seminars held by the AIAS fellows, AIAS Visiting or Tandem Fellows or by other speakers proposed by the fellows. In each seminar, a fellow will present and discuss her/his current research and work-in-progress to an interdisciplinary audience for 30 minutes, closing off with 30 minutes for questions, comments and discussion.

All seminars are in-person and held in English. To attend online, please contact us at info@aias.au.dk by 9:00am on the day of the seminar as the latest to request a link.