My friend Colin Lacey, who has died aged 87, was professor of education at the University of Sussex from 1978 until his retirement in 1998.
His academic output reflected his wide-ranging interests, including education, research methodology, the press and the environment. The common thread was his belief in the power of education to challenge inequality and ignorance, and address social problems.
He published six influential books: Hightown Grammar (1970), The Socialization of Teachers (1977), Issues in Evaluation and Accountability (1981), Education, Ecology and Development (1987), Deception, Demonstration and Debate (1990) and The Press as a Public Educator (1997). Additionally, he produced more than 200 papers in academic journals.
Towards the end of his career, he worked with the Overseas Development Agency, leading a major initiative in Andhra Pradesh, southern India, and Seychelles to establish and evaluate school systems.
Colin was born in Dagenham, Essex. His father, Richard Lacey, organised transport logistics at London Docks, and his mother, Phoebe (nee Moore), worked variously as a seamstress, dinner lady, care assistant and housewife. He was educated at Chingford grammar school, Birmingham University, where he studied geophysics, and Manchester University, where he gained a PhD in education.
His first academic post was a fellowship in the US at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. He returned in 1969 to the then newly built University of Sussex in Brighton, where he became professor of education in 1978, a post he held for the next 20 years. He was also a director at the Schools Council, the public body that co-ordinated secondary school exams, until its abolition by the then Conservative administration in 1984.
Colin was a regular peer reviewer – for academic journals, but also in public commentaries. His fair but uncompromising analyses sometimes provoked his opponents. A critique he wrote for the Times Higher Education Supplement (THES) of the so-called Black Papers on the British education system (published in the 1960s and 70s by the Critical Quarterly magazine) attracted a threat of legal action – swiftly withdrawn when the THES stood by his work.
A lifelong socialist and a Labour party member, though he was often highly critical of its leaders, Colin never lost the belief in the value of collectivism and social justice. In retirement he wrote stories for his grandchildren, restored old motorcycles and enjoyed gardening.
He is survived by his wife, Jeanne (nee Marfleet), whom he met at secondary school and married in 1960, their children, Katherine, Sarah, Richard and Stephen, and his sister, Louise.
