About
After a career as a science lecturer in further education in East London, Mark came to the University of Liverpool in 2000 to begin his doctoral research in labour internationalism at the Department of Sociology and Social Policy.
He was appointed as a researcher the following year at the Centre for the Study of the Child the Family and the Law. He became Associate Director of the centre in 2002. There he managed major evaluations of the Liverpool, Sefton and Knowsley Children’s Funds, reporting to local authority commissioners and to the Government Home Office. He was also a member of the national Children's Fund evaluation team, providing guidance on local evaluations.
In 2005 he moved to the Centre of Lifelong Learning as a Senior Research Fellow, where he remained until the disestablishment of the Centre in 2016. He conducted primary research that focused upon the experience of mothers who were participating in an experimental social and educational inclusion intervention in Liverpool schools. He also became the lead widening participation evaluation researcher for the University of Liverpool. In this role Mark shaped the University’s approach to the evaluation of widening participation, and was also central to the design of the institutional Access and Participation Plans, under the Office for Fair Access and later the Office for Students. Other projects for which he played a primary research role included the Liverpool Fairness Commission investigating social inequality in Liverpool, and 'Transformations', a Unison funded study of women's trade union activism.
From 2016 he was Director of Evaluation and Education Policy, publishing widely on educational policy and practice, and continuing to drive the evaluation of access for disadvantaged students and student success. At this time he was also vice-president of the UK Evaluation Society.
At the beginning of 2024 Mark changed roles once more. He is now responsible for the development of strategies of Educational Quality Enhancement. He is currently exploring the educational potential of University assets such as Ness Botanical Gardens, and also reinstituting the annual John Hamilton Lifelong Learning Lectures.
Mark’s research interests are varied. He has published in the areas of research methodology, education theory and practice, mental health, policy analysis, social movement analysis and trade union theory.
Presently he is working on a book about Marxism and the mind, called The Historical Mind (working title).
He is also the current President of the University of Liverpool and Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine UCU.