Jean came to York St John in November 2008 as Professor of Educational Research in the Faculty of Education and Theology, on a part-time basis. Of Scottish/Irish heritage, she lives in Dorset as her base for travel to different countries. She works with practitioners internationally in a range of educational settings, including higher education, supporting their workplace and higher degree programmes that are grounded in the descriptions and explanations they offer for their practices in the form of their personal theories of practice. She took (very) early retirement from her position as Deputy Head Teacher in a large secondary school, and began to develop her independent consultancy business and her writing. She has written a range of articles and textbooks on different aspects of practice-based action research, independently and collaboratively.