Department of Educational Studies

The Department of Educational Studies focuses on analyzing the conditions of the course of various educational practices, along with designing possibilities of changes and attempts at their implementation.

The main research directions are as follows:

1.Research methodology in education - methods of data collection and analysis, using various philosophical-theoretical premises (objective hermeneutics, narrative and biographical research, autoethnography, communication-linguistic method, measurement theory, statistical methods). Education in the field of research methodology. Educational transdisciplinary research - connections between pedagogy and cultural anthropology, philosophy, and literary studies.

2.Analysis of conditions and activities - as well as designing – of support of the development and social inclusion of children, youth, and adults with different educational needs, using the perspective of social pedagogy and special pedagogy. This includes: learning in social participation processes; multiculturalism in experience; conditions for participatory work with youth from impoverished neighbourhoods; memory on the Holocaust memory in teachers’ educational practice; inclusive education conditions; emancipation and relational autonomy of people with disabilities.

3.Professionalization of professional activities of educators. Aspects of professionalism in social work with people with mental disorders.

Main publications

Krawczyk A., (2023). Doświadczanie międzykulturowości. Na podstawie narracji młodych osób dorosłych żydowskiego [Experiencing Interculturality: Based on Narratives of Young Jewish Adults]. Łódź: University of Łódź Publishing House.

Urbaniak-Zając D., Piekarski J. (2022). Metodologiczna rekonstrukcja warunków tworzenia wiedzy. Wybrane zagadnienia [Methodological Reconstruction of Knowledge Creation Conditions: Selected Issues]. Łódź: University of Łódź Publishing House.

Kafar M., A. Kacperczyk (eds.) (2020). Autoetnograficzne "zbliżenia" i "oddalenia". O autoetnografii [Autoethnographic "Proximities" and "Distances": On Autoethnography]. Łódź: University of Łódź Publishing House.

Pasikowski, S. (2019). Individual Methodological Orientations – Theoretical Background and a Model of the Phenomenon. Przegląd Badań Edukacyjnych/Educational Studies Review, 28(1), 111-147.

Piekarski J., D. Urbaniak-Zając, S. Pasikowski (eds.) (2019). Krytyka metodologiczna w praktyce tworzenia wiedzy [Methodological Critique in Knowledge Creation Practice]. Łódź: University of Łódź Publishing House.

Pasikowski S., (2019). Pomiar pośredni cech modelowanych w strukturze opozycji. Formuły integracji danych. Podręcznik Pracowni Narzędzi Badawczych Komitetu Nauk Pedagogicznych PAN [Indirect Measurement of Modeled Traits in the Structure of Opposition. Data Integration Formulas. Handbook of Research Tools Laboratory, Committee on Pedagogical Sciences, Polish Academy of Sciences]. Toruń: Nicolaus Copernicus University Press.

Kijak R., Podgórska-Jachnik D., Stec J. (2019). Niepełnosprawność. Wyzwania. Praca socjalna [Disability: Challenges. Social Work]. Difin Publishing House.

Kos E.A. (2018). Doświadczenia biograficzne kobiet odnoszących sukcesy zawodowe. Warunki uczestnictwa społecznego [Biographical Experiences of Successful Women: Conditions of Social Participation]. Łódź: University of Łódź Publishing House.

Urbaniak-Zając D. (2016). W poszukiwaniu teorii działania profesjonalnego pedagogów [In Search of the Theory of Professional Educators' Action]. Kraków: Impuls Publishing House.

Kafar M. (ed.) (2013). Scientific Biographies: Between the 'Professional' and 'Non-Professional' Dimensions of Humanistic Experience, Łódź University Press, Kraków: University Press.

Urbaniak-Zając D., Kos E. (2013). Badania jakościowe w pedagogice. Wywiad narracyjny i obiektywna hermeneutyka [Qualitative Research in Pedagogy: Narrative Interview and Objective Hermeneutics]. Warsaw: Polish Scientific Publishers PWN.

Main research projects

-Research project NCN No. 3652/B/H03/2011/40 entitled "Academic Education of Pedagogues from the Perspective of Professional Experiences of Graduates and Practice Requirements. In Search of the Theory of Professional Action," a team project led by Danuta Urbaniak-Zając, 2011-2015.

-The dynamics of adolescent couple relationships in the face of social constraints caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, NAWA Intervention Grants, project leader S. Pasikowski, 2021.

-Models of research practice and academic education in the field of empirical research methodologies and statistics, NAWA Prom, 2019, substantive supervisor S. Pasikowski.

-Formative idioms in scientific biographies - the American context, NCN grant, led by M. Kafar, 2017-2018. Grant within the framework of the long-term project "Biographical Perspectives."

-Study of inclusive education in the Polish education system (2020, commissioned by ORE and MEIN) D. Podgórska-Jachnik.

Interuniversity collaboration

-Autonomous University of Madrid (Spain), University of Alcala de Henares (Spain), University of Bari (Italy), Catholic University of Leuven (Belgium) - research related to measuring the quality of close interpersonal relationships among adolescents (S. Pasikowski).

-University of Alcala de Henares (Spain) - academic training in the field of social research methodology (S. Pasikowski).

-Department of Communication, University of South Florida (USA) - biographical-narrative research in the area of autoethnography (M. Kafar).

-West Kazakhstan State University Mahambata Utemisov in Uralsk - development of a textbook on inclusive education (D. Podgórska-Jachnik).