Tam Dibley

PhD:  Thinking with Things: An ecological and immanent perspective on emerging ‘maker’ pedagogies

Research centre: Education and Social Research Institute (ESRI)

Faculty: Education

My research is looking at making within education. This has been a growth area in recent decades, with maker spaces being created in schools and museums. My research builds on this, bringing in different spheres of thought and relating this to mathematics. I am thinking about the design of educational environments and events and how the making process and interacting with materials can trigger ideas in a creative, open and exploratory way.

I am in the first year of my PhD at Manchester Met, within ESRI. I am a full-time student funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council.

Why did you choose Manchester Met?

I studied architecture at undergraduate and masters level. I was working as an architect when I met my PhD supervisor Ricardo Nemirovsky, whose work is focused on mathematics, art and making, and we started doing some work together. I have always enjoyed the making aspect of architecture, especially model-making and physical drawing and I was interested in the way ideas and concepts were integrated into physical making and drawing processes. I had been considering a PhD, and when the opportunity arose to continue and progress the work I’d been doing with Ricardo at Manchester Met, it seemed like the ideal direction.

What are the best things about doing your PhD at Manchester Met?

I have really enjoyed my PhD so far. I have been able to focus on my ideas, read interesting things and continue developing the creative educational events that had led into this. We have run workshops with undergraduates in the Faculty of Education and Manchester School of Art and are now looking at working with family groups with The Architecture School for Children (TASC) and students at the School of Architecture. Being able to run these workshops and think about the new and different ways this can be developed academically is really interesting.

What is the research community like?

I have found the research community to be good, both in my research centre and the wider University.   I have met lots of interesting people and am involved in reading groups and writing groups. I have enjoyed the chance to meet PGRs from different subject areas and find out more about what they are working on.

What are your aspirations for your PhD?

There are multiple directions I could be interested in taking my PhD. These include continuing in research and academia, University teaching and continuing to develop and run workshops.

What advice would you give to someone thinking of doing a PhD?

I would advise them to get in touch with potential supervisors, reach out to them in an open way and tell them what they are interested in. You can get so much from talking to someone who is really integrated here at the University that would be difficult to find when researching on your own. Even if they can’t directly develop your project, they will probably be the best placed to point you in the right direction.

Would you recommend Manchester Met as a good place to do a PhD?

I think Manchester Met is a good place to do a PhD. The PhD process here offers a flexibility that you might not find elsewhere, and you can be creative in exploring ways of developing your research. There is an emphasis on taking ideas from different places, especially philosophical and methodological ideas. It’s great to be in a community dealing with those ideas and to relate them to the educational spaces and events that we’re observing.