EduResearch Matters

EduResearch Matters is a blog for educational researchers in Australia to get their work and opinions out to the general public. Please join us here. We would love to get your comments and feedback about our work.

We Found Education Schools Across The Nation Are Victims Of Targeted Cuts But More Threats Are Looming

July 19, 2021academic workforce, Changes to higher education, Educational research, precarious employment in universities, Teacher education, teacher recruitment, Universities futures, Universities in Australia, university fundingGriffith University, Jo-Anne Reid, Macquarie University, University of Melbourne, University of Newcastle, University of Sydney, UTS

At every university around the country, academics in schools and faculties of Education have been hit hard. Hundreds, maybe thousands, have lost their jobs. Many of them are people we know. Yet it is not easy to identify the particular staff who have ‘disappeared’ from classes, courses and schools of Education among the seventeen and a half thousand other university staff who lost jobs around Australia during the initial COVID response alone. These losses continue: we read about them daily. And higher education job losses affect far more than individuals and their personal aspirations. They also affect their families, their health, their mortgages, and the families and welfare of the communities in which they live, work and shop. The fall-out is being felt everywhere, although it is most obvious in those regional cities highly dependent on the local university for their economic prosperity.

But what we are failing to notice is that these effects are particularly important in our Education faculties, at a time when states are facing a looming teacher shortage and the Federal Minister for Education and Youth is reviewing the capacity of our universities to attract high-quality candidates into teaching and to supply highly effective teachers. If education is crucial to nation-building, there could not be a greater need for high-quality graduates to staff schools around the country.

But the academics who have survived in our schools of Education, either scraping a career together as short-term casuals, or scrabbling to remain as full-timers, are doing it tough.

The climate of anxiety and insecurity in which these people (our neighbours, relatives, friends, clients and colleagues) are living is reminiscent of accounts of totalitarian regimes. In every capital city and university town around Australia, people are living in fear – afraid to say no when they are asked to do things that do not sit well on their consciences; afraid not to agree with the rationalisation to course content and assessment review needed to cope with increased workload; afraid to admit that they haven’t had time to properly read and consider the implications of the policy changes they are being asked to approve in governance committees. Heads down, they are keeping under the radar as much as they can in order to survive. They are not proud of what they are doing at work, and they know the quality of what students are being offered is suffering too. Headlines this week such as Murdoch Uni gags staff as students disillusioned over education quality are beginning to reflect one reason why departing staff are often silenced by the non-disclosure clauses in their redundancy agreements.

She fears for her career if she names this place. In another university, a key professional staff member, whose knowledge and expertise in supporting the faculty’s upcoming course accreditation renewal are literally irreplaceable in the short term, has chosen to move on because he can no longer live with the moral disappointments of his daily work. He needs to keep referees on side. And in a third institution another casual staff member, studying for the PhD that may now, ironically, lessen her chances of future employment, has been given three new subjects to teach with less than a fortnight’s notice. Only one of these subjects is in her area of expertise. She knows she hasn’t got time to read the material she will be teaching, but she needs the work. She will do her best, based on years of classroom teaching experience. While she knows it isn’t, her generalist knowledge is deemed adequate to teach the specialist knowledge that the Course Team, the Academic Board, AITSL, the profession, and Education Minister Tudge all see as necessary for her students to meet Australia’s Graduate Teacher standards. A staffer at QUT, ‘safe’ for the moment, describes effects that are also experienced by peers in other places: “Everything that gets done is being pushed back to academic staff – everything. Academics who are not experts in professional tasks are doing professional tasks, which takes incredible amounts of time. There is a training video or a pdf training note for everything – and you get sent hyperlinks for these if you ask for help”. The loss of professional staff, or their relocation to central service areas, also affects the quality of what can be done across the board. For Education, this is not good enough.

A long-term casual staff-member at one NSW university has been told that she is no longer being offered teaching or marking work because she has a PhD, and “people without doctoral qualifications are cheaper”.

Schools and faculties of Education have been particularly hard-hit by longer-term structural change and stringency in universities, beginning before COVID. More recent reports of stress, overwork, anxiety are not limited to Education staff of course, highlighting the bleak picture across institutions. Staff who are still employed must pick up the work of lost colleagues, and they are increasingly worried about what they are offering their students. This is a sector in crisis. A WHS survey conducted earlier this year at the University of Wollongong indicated that, there, 90% of respondents believe there are not enough staff to get the work done, and 66% have considered leaving because of workplace stress (NTEU 2021p. 3). And alongside the serious problem of human and workforce costs, there is a pressing long-term issue for the nation in terms of the quality of what faculties of Education can offer their students ‘on the cheap’.

It is obvious that the people who are being made ‘redundant’, or who are ‘separating’ from the institutions where they work are workers – the people who get things done. They are not the managers, the highly paid senior executive staff, outside of Faculties, who direct and should govern what goes on. Mostly it is more senior academics – the more experienced workers – who are targeted for redundancy, because they are by definition not at the lowest pay rate.

In some institutions, such as the University of New South Wales, Canberra, QUT, and UniSA, the impact of staff losses is not visible in current numbers. At UNSW, four senior Education staff took Voluntary Redundancies at the end of 2020, but as a staff member there says, these are being replaced by three new appointments this term. Staff at UniSA say the situation is similar there. At UNSW, there are still hidden impacts – the increase in workload due to online and dual mode delivery, an increase in class sizes and what colleagues see as the exploitation of casual academics who are pressured by students to spend more time working with them online – and are afraid to refuse. At Macquarie, while education staff are hopeful that after losing six staff in 2020, they should avoid further redundancies in 2021 because they have made “sufficient internal savings”, yet staff cuts within the faculty will again be considered at the beginning of 2022.

Other places are already in real trouble. At the University of Newcastle, which has earned a strong reputation for its educational research in NSW, staff say their numbers in 2020 were already down more than 10 in recent years, and they will have lost at least another 10 FTE staff members by the end of this year. Unlike other areas of that university, it seems, these education positions do not seem to merit replacement.

Similarly, staff at the University of Melbourne report the loss of at least 13 FTE academic staff who have left Education, either taking redundancy packages or losing fixed-term contracts – half of these positions were at senior levels. While this has also been effective as a cost-saving strategy for the University, staff who are left report that they now find it hard to contract sessional staff, who are getting much more secure and rewarding work as casual teachers in schools (and who are being targeted by some state departments as potential ‘career-changers’ for more permanent roles). Staff at Griffith University say they had around 55 full time academics in 2020, but this is down to around 44. And at UTS, over recent years, education has been steadily decreasing in size. What was a Faculty of Education was reduced to a School of Education, and then most recently to a merged School of International Studies and Education. As one staff member reports, “We started to feel more and more invisible, despite being told by the University leadership that commitment to Education was a part of the University’s social justice mission”.

But they don’t have relationships with experienced professional staff, and they often don’t know the reasons why they need to adhere to policies. They don’t know who to talk to when they need to understand something to give good advice to a student; and they can’t see why they should not ‘improve’ the assessment task that has been carefully designed by a course team and approved by an Academic Board.

When experienced people disappear, so does the corporate knowledge that oils the gears of any institution, and is essential for it to run smoothly and efficiently. When they are replaced, it is almost always now by new ‘teaching-only’ staff who are doing the very best they can.

In some cases, the disappearing staff are also taking the higher-level disciplinary expertise that the faculty relies on to meet TEQSA’s HE standards for staff qualifications. As a staff member at one institution says regretfully: “It is now even more possible that a student undertaking their Master of Teaching course at this university may get through their whole degree and have only been taught by sessional teaching staff. This is in a faculty that is supposed to be ranked 1 or 2 in Australia for Education!”

Worse, universities are disguising this information in their reports to government. James Guthrie and Brendan O’Connell’s analysis of data from the Department of Education, Skills and Employment shows that changes have been made by universities in how they are accounting for their employees in 2020. This means that official government reports can not be reconciled with the numbers for staffing presented in the same universities’ 2020 annual reports. In his account of the obfuscation of numbers currently reported at the University of Wollongong, Guthrie has also pointed to the unacceptable variation of reported figures to the public and government of staff losses – estimating that this accounts for up to 500 positions in this university alone.

And even worse still, at a time when the Morrison government has indicated that Australia’s 39 comprehensive universities may not be offering Australia an “optimal model for the quality of teaching or research”, the scene is being set for a possible return to a binary system in higher education. After the 2019 Coaldrake Report’s insistence that (real) universities should be involved in both research and teaching, these impacts on the quality of teaching in Education schools are indeed alarming. Regulations that institutions are required to meet in the HES are simply not being met. While some universities clearly consider that this can be disguised for a short time, the academic risks are enormous, and some universities are clearly making no effort to sustain the quality of their Education faculties.

This is particularly noticeable in relation to the Coaldrake requirements for universities to be producing high-quality, world standard research in the disciplines they wish to teach – and it is now a matter of urgency for Education faculties around the country. A recent report into the critical need for addressing research with education faculties cites Coaldrake to argue that these events are not just bad luck or bad timing for Education. The university ideal of retaining both teaching and research in one academic position is fundamental to the teaching-research nexus in academic work. It seems “more than a minor oversight that the move to increase teaching-only positions in many universities also prevents them from doing research” (pp.52-53).

But while teaching is suffering, research is in dire straits.

In many institutions, even those that have not yet had academic job losses, staff report that this is happening. At UTS, at Flinders, at QUT, “People are stretched, and time for research for most is limited. Some struggle to find time even for service or HDR supervision because they are doing so much teaching and have so many students to mark for.”

As the AARE national survey of staff in Education schools and faculties has found, education research is becoming a luxury. Their data shows that “education research is now not only being subsidized by significant amounts of unpaid labour but also the direct financial contributions of individual academics trying to keep their main form of research development available” (Brennan et al., 2020, p. 36). One academic in one of the few Faculties of Education left in Australia speaks of how her research profile is only being sustained by “the generosity of colleagues in other institutions”, as her teaching workload allows no time to contribute to the writing up of their research.

The example of the decline of Education at UTS shows the inevitable result of these circumstances. As staffing cuts led to the structural changes noted above, staff tell how in the new Faculty they were presented with data about the ‘viability’ of Education as a discipline. It is not surprising that fewer staff produce less research income and fewer high impact publications. As one staff member says: “We’d lost so many of our Level D and E academics over time, and Level Cs were expected to demonstrate research leadership beyond their experience.

It is clear that both education research and teaching are under threat in our universities as well as in our university system. Education is the key to any sort of future for Australia, and while every state appears to be facing imminent teacher shortages, the complicity of universities in allowing the quality of education research and teaching, at the present time, is a serious concern that should be worrying TEQSA as well as our politicians.

Jo-Anne Reid is Professor Emeritus in the Faculty of Arts and Education at Charles Sturt University. She has collaborated on a range of national competitive grants over her career, focussing on primary/secondary literacy and English teaching, teacher education, minority-group and Indigenous teachers, literacy and the environment, and rural teacher education.

How to really engage students online

July 15, 202121st century teaching, belonging, creativity and innovation, Critical thinking, Instructional design, online learning, student engagementAlison Torn, Ameena Payne, deep learning, discussion forums, teacher presence

From engaging on social media to attending virtual conferences, across the globe, academia has experienced how digital spaces have allowed us to connect and become more fully human in solidarity with others. In a similar light, discussion forums offer the opportunity for students to socialise, give help and get help – as a community of practice:

Forums are also a place for reassurance and encouragement:

A discussion forum is an online communication tool that can support structured and semi-structured learning as well as social connectedness. They’re more important and easier to effectively use than you might think. They’ve been shown to increase critical thinking skills, encourage greater reflection and inspire deeper responses. Forums are fulfilling for us as instructors too! With them, we’re afforded an opportunity to build longer-term knowledge of and relationships with our students. Discussion boards allow us to defy the constraints of rote and disembodied digitised environments.

Discussion forums work well even with large cohorts. The great thing about forums is that once you set the stage, momentum is harnessed, and they become self-sustaining learning communities (with occasional check-ins and guidance from you, the instructor). Our strategies return the focus onto more personable interactions within digital spaces.

Students say a critical issue in online higher education has been a lack of adequate support, interaction and engagement with academic staff and peers. The data tells us that students over the age of 25, those who study fully online, Indigenous students, low SES, regional students and those with reported disability share the lowest ratings of engagement. We pursue intersectionality in our teaching practice and believe that education can only act as the great social equaliser if all students are engaged and supported to reach their academic goals.

Seven definitions of engagement were discussed at the AdvanceHE 2021 Student Engagement Conference. During the conference, Dr. Emma Taylor described various levels of student engagement. We aim to encourage the use of discussion forums as a means of ‘nudging them toward the final category [present, participatory and engaged].’

Incorporate multimedia messages designed with consideration of how the human mind works

The theory of multimedia learning assumes that the way that we grasp and use information includes dual channels for visual/pictorial and auditory/verbal processing. Each channel has a limit on what it can handle. The goal is to find the right balance of words (e.g. electronic text and/or spoken narration) and pictures (or video) while allowing students to draw upon their experiences, opinions and values to foster deep, active learning.

Source: https://www.mheducation.ca/blog/richard-mayers-cognitive-theory-of-multimedia-learning

What students said

The case for multimedia learning rests on the idea that we can better understand an explanation when it’s presented in words and pictures than when it’s presented in words alone.

Conversation and play are crucial to the student experience

When communicators view themselves as similar, they’re more likely to empathise and engage.

Students often share their family backgrounds, nervousness, excitement and responsibilities they’re juggling as they begin uni. In sharing, they ‘feel a sense of solidarity seeing others post about their concerns’, as one student put it.

Stories connect us. Instructors who, through storytelling, display ‘intellectual candour’ balance vulnerability and credibility. This may build trust and rapport.

Encourage student agency and self-regulated learning

The use of the Socratic technique isn’t used to intimidate or to patronise students. We use it for the reason Socrates developed it: to develop reasoning skills in students and empower them to approach their learning academically and democratically.

What students said

Motivate students to connect with the discussion activity

Discussion forum participation shouldn’t be busy work; participation should allow students to work together toward their assignment(s) too. Reframes, or forum introductory posts, provide an opportunity to emphasise the importance of engaging with the discussion board activity.

Look forward and use gaps in discussion to generate more exchanges that fill those gaps

A summary is a discussion board post that acknowledges students and wraps the discussion. Weaving expands upon the conversation, through Socratic questioning, and encourages students to engage with their peers to deepen learning and establish a sense of community.

What students said

Community of Inquiry

We embed the community of inquiry framework into the discussion board experience. The optimised experience is made up of all 3 types of presence: social, teaching and cognitive.

Social Presence

Social presence is defined and centres around developing a shared social identity. The key is allowing the relationships to develop naturally.

Social presence helps students form a sense of belonging in online communities.

Teaching Presence

Teaching presence is strongly linked to student satisfaction.

It also centres around instructional design and student support.

Cognitive Presence

Cognitive presence contains four phases – triggering, exploration, integration, and resolution:

Triggering – defining and recognising problems; questioning
Exploration – a search for explanations/ideas/solutions
Integration – building and generating meaning
Resolution – applying new knowledge and understandings

Closing

For many reasons, academia can be resistant to trying things a different way. ‘There is a need for a shared rethinking of education on the part of practitioners and leaders.’ Sometimes, we must have the courage to teach to transgress and lead the way.

What do you think about the Community of Inquiry framework? What will you implement in future?

Ameena Payne teaches within the disciplines of social science and business in both higher education and vocational education at Swinburne Online. She is a fellow of Advance Higher Education Academy (AdvanceHE) and the Higher Education Research and Development Society of Australasia (HERDSA). For any further discussion, Ameena can be contacted at info@ameenapayne.com or on Twitter – @ameenalpayne

Dr Alison Torn is Senior Teaching Fellow at Leeds Trinity University, where she teaches social psychology and critical mental health, and leads on blended learning delivery. She is a Senior Fellow of Advance Higher Education Academy (AdvanceHE). For any further discussion, Alison can be contacted at a.torn@leedstrinity.ac.uk or on Twitter @AlisonTorn

Dr Alison Torn

These two teachers left tenured uni jobs to return to the classroom. You’ll never believe what happened next.

July 12, 202121st century teaching, education leadership, Educational researchAnge Fitzgerald, Classroom ready teachers, Kimberley Pressick-Kilborn, pracademics, primary teaching, rural and remote education

Kimberley and Ange shared their back-to-school story in January this year. So, what’s it been like? How is it working out for them?

An introduction from Ange

As Term 1 ended, a student soiled his pants in my office. When the end of Term 2 rolled around, I was laughing with colleagues about my (in)appropriate response to being told, ‘That wasn’t a fart, Miss’.

How did I respond? “Oh s**t.”

This wasn’t exactly how I had envisaged my re-entry to secondary school! However, before the school year had started, I found myself acting as Assistant Principal (AP) rather than being classroom-based as originally planned and detailed in our original AARE blog post. As someone pointed out early on in my new gig, they hoped I realised that being an AP was all about the three Ds – dickheads, dunnies and disasters. At that point, I thought they’d missed the elusive 4^th D: dogs. I had spent significant time in my first few weeks coaxing two wayward dogs (whom I came to know by name) off-site. Humour aside, I hadn’t previously thought much about the AP position in a secondary school. I have been struck by the humility that being the ‘wing-woman’ has brought me, alongside a much-needed reality check of what life in my community can be like for students and their families. It is with a new-found respect that I work to pave the way for more productive learning experiences and improved school engagement for students and teachers alike. Despite this unplanned re-routing of my return-to-school journey, I am grateful for this twist in the road and all that it is teaching me. Kimberley’s return to the classroom has also revealed some unforeseen surprises, one of these being that she now wears a red whistle on her lanyard in addition to her staff ID card and knows the right ‘pattern’ to whistle to signal the end of playtime when she does her weekly Kindergarten lunch duty!

In this second blog post, we reconsider and expand upon four tensions in our return to schools, after resigning our tenured positions in teacher education.

Tension 1: Positioning ourselves as ‘Pracademics’

Ahead of the school year starting, Kimberley received a phone call from one of her new colleagues, just confirming what she’d like the students to call her. It made Kimberley pause. Was the question in relation to whether she intended to use both of her surnames – admittedly, long – or her title as ‘Dr’? Other staff in the school holding doctorates, including the previous principal, used the title ‘Dr’ so as a primary classroom teacher who had earned the qualification, she reflected … why shouldn’t she? In seeking to occupy a ‘pracademic’ role, perhaps using the title would also signal her intention to ‘operate as a bridge betwixt and between research and practice’ (Netolicky, 2020, https://theeduflaneuse.com/2020/01/09/in-education-to-whom-should-we-listen/ ) to her new colleagues and others in the wider school community. Certainly, using the title ‘Dr’ has led to many curious questions from students as well as opening up a range of conversations with colleagues and parents, including those with or undertaking doctorates themselves. But perhaps in other schools, this could have created a barrier rather than a bridge?

Tension 2: The challenge of maintaining currency in teacher education

In the first few weeks, it was hard for Ange to not run her learning through the lens of ‘What does this mean for initial teacher education?’ She had sharp pangs of guilt upon realising that she had not been preparing her pre-service teachers for the reality of the contemporary classroom. While Ange had maintained strong partnerships with schools, her dawning realisation has been that this is not enough and not the same as being embedded in a school context. Even then, the pace of change is fast. Within this six-month period, for example, a greater awareness of consent education has emerged as an area for teacher expertise. As required through the national accreditation process (see: Program Standard 5.5 – hyperlink – https://www.aitsl.edu.au/deliver-ite-programs/standards-and-procedures), currency in schools is critical. Our experience raises questions, however, about what actually constitutes ‘currency’ and how this might be practicably achieved.

Tension 3: Recalibrating our professional identities

Returning to a classroom position for Kimberley has brought the anticipated joys of getting to know and connecting with the 10, 11 and 12 year old boys in her Year 6 class, to be able to create possibilities for engaging learning. But recognising opportunities to make teaching engaging and satisfying for herself as well has been vital in this process, and she’s been fortunate to be working alongside a supportive team of colleagues. How we’ve grown to see ourselves as educators over these first 6 months back in schools has been shaped not only by our own images or expressions of ourselves as teachers, but how others – our new and former colleagues, students and parents – have perceived and constructed us. As we’ve made sense of and enacted our new roles, Beijaard and Meijer’s (2017, p. 177), the notion of teacher identity as ‘a complex configuration of personal and professional factors that more or less influence each other’ has been reinforced for each of us. Kimberley’s decision to move into a generalist primary teaching role was deliberate; she wanted to again experience the daily realities of being a teacher. But her own personal and professional growth has also been fostered by opportunities to coach and mentor colleagues and lead professional learning initiatives within her school, contributing to maintaining her identity as a teacher educator.

Tension 4: Walking the ‘knowledgeable rookie’ tightrope

In the lead up to starting, Ange lost some sleep about her distinct lack of knowledge about process and procedure in schools. While she was intimately familiar with HR requirements in higher education, she had no idea about this new context. What about if she ‘broke a rule’? In working with students and their families, the stakes seemed somewhat higher. While this concern quickly paled into insignificance – it turns out process is process in most situations – there was still a sense from others that with our academic backgrounds, we would have all the answers. This was evident when a term in, Ange’s principal quizzed her on which pedagogical model she subscribed to and she froze. She doesn’t believe in one specific pedagogical model. Ange felt revealed as a fraud! It was a pivotal probing question, which caused her to consider her authentic voice and find strength in being vulnerable.

A conclusion from Kimberley

At the start of Term 1, in conversation with my principal, he commented that I’d successfully jumped off the academic cliff, and I replied that I believed that my parachute had opened! So what are we each anticipating next? Ange and I can see many possibilities for our own continued growth as educators in our respective schools. Perhaps most importantly, we believe that we can meaningfully contribute both personally and professionally in our school communities. But the realities of being a teacher in 2021, with constant and seemingly growing pedagogical as well as administrative and compliance pressures, have made me question these relentless demands on teachers. Time is a precious commodity in schools, as researchers have highlighted. I now am experiencing first hand the extended time beyond the regular working day that is necessary for me to fulfil my role. As ‘pracademics’, a future challenge for us appears to be to continue to contribute our expertise, and conduct collaborative research from within schools to support sustainable models for change.

Dr. Kimberley Pressick-Kilborn (University of Technology Sydney and Newington College) started her career as a primary teacher, and after time working as a casual academic and research assistant, took up a tenured academic position at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) in 2004. She completed her PhD in 2010. Highlights in Kimberley’s time at UTS have included opportunities to collaborate in leading externally funded research evaluations of science education initiatives, as well as accompanying preservice teachers on international professional experiences to Samoa and Bhutan. This year, she joined the staff at Wyvern House, Newington College as a Year 6 classroom teacher. Kimberley wears glasses in the photo.

Dr Ange Fitzgerald (University of Southern Queensland and Mirboo North Secondary College) is recognised for her experience and expertise in science education, particularly through her explorations of quality learning and teaching practices in primary science education from a number of angles. While she entered higher education as a teacher educator and PhD student in 2007, she has previously spent time away from higher education as an Australian Government-sponsored volunteer in the Middle East. In 2021, Ange was meant to return to the classroom as a mathematics and digital technologies teacher but that’s not quite how it worked out. Ange is not wearing glasses in the photo.

The school just didn’t like the way I behaved

July 5, 2021classroom behaviour management, Inclusive EducationFiona Longmuir, inclusive education, Kristin Reimer, mainstream schools

Caleb had trouble sitting still and was first suspended from his school in grade 4. From then on he was “suspended every week from that school and it just kept going from there.”

Michael recalled when he was placed in “what was called the naughty class”.

“They just grabbed all the troublemakers in school and then put them in one class. We had a different recess time and lunchtime to everyone else. So, we couldn’t actually associate with all the actual good kids. Yeah, so it was just a bunch of naughty kids, you know?”

Amber remembered that, “If I asked for help in class, they’d explain it but they didn’t really care. I’d put my hand up and ask for help and they just kind of like pointed at the board and explained again what was on the board.” Eventually the school counsellor told her that “mainstream school was not good for her”.

Microaggressions are social interactions that transmit messages of privilege and oppression in everyday spaces. They are experienced as brief and commonplace verbal, behavioural, or environmental slights and insults.Those who commit microaggressions are often unaware that their communications and actions are received as hostile and derogatory by those from marginalised groups. Three forms of microaggressions have been identified: 1) microassault – a hurtful verbal or non-verbal attack, for example name-calling, 2) microinsult – demeaning communications that convey rudeness and insensitivity, and 3) microinvalidation – communications and actions that exclude or negate the experiences and feelings of others.

Mainstream schools are places where students are expected to comply with conventional educational practices, policies and relationships. When students do not easily fit educational norms, they can encounter microaggressions from teachers, school leaders and peers – being put in the ‘naughty’ class or having requests for help in class ignored. These send daily messages to students that they do not belong in this school. The impact of these microaggressions include limiting students’ ability to learn and creating feelings of isolation and invisibility.

In a new study we outline the microaggressions imposed on a group of students who simply do not fit into mainstream schools, students who are often identified as exhibiting challenging behaviours. These behaviours stem from an array of social, economic, health, cultural and trauma-induced roots, and indicate complex needs. These students are, even from a young age treated as disposable and are often made to feel like they are responsible for their inability to comply with expectations., They endure microaggressions at school that devalue and demoralize them and, eventually – by force or choice or both – they leave mainstream settings and turn to alternative and/or flexible learning options.

There are a range of alternative options. Flexible and Inclusive Learning programs cater for tens of thousands of young people across the country. As the name suggests, these programs come in many formats and share an interest in providing for students in ways that meet their individual needs for re-engagement with learning.

We explored student experiences of two different Australian Flexible and Inclusive Learning programs. In these settings we found that the opposite occurs: educators use micro-resistance to insist all students are worthy, valued, and human.

Case One: Save the Children’s Out Teach Mobile Education program

Out Teach is an individualised educational initiative aimed at young people living in Tasmania, Australia, who have been involved with the criminal justice system. The classes are mobile, taking place in the back of a van, with the frequency of classes depending upon the needs of the young person. 20 young people were engaged in the program at the time of the research.

Case Two: Aspire College*

Co-located within a community centre that provides a range of vocational education and community services, Aspire College caters for up to 60 young people in outer Melbourne. Students participate in individualised and flexible programs that cater for their learning and wellbeing needs and are based on the Victorian Certificate of Applied Learning (VCAL).

Student experiences of mainstream schooling

Young people who participated in our research offered insights into how their interactions with mainstream schooling had damaged them. They explained that their diverse needs were not supported in busy, inflexible, mainstream classrooms. Caleb, a student in the Out Teach program, shared an example that might seem inconsequential but demonstrates the ‘micro’ level of marginalisation,

“They’d want me to sit there and do what I had to do… I always play with pens…I’m always doing something with my hands to keep me occupied and the school just didn’t like it”

This is an important detail that Caleb recalls from his mainstream school experiences. To educators, asking a student to stop fidgeting would likely be inconsequential, but for Caleb, it contributed to him feeling out of place in the classroom, like he didn’t, or couldn’t, fit in like other students could. This led to regular suspensions and he eventually left his mainstream school.

Our participants also explained how they often felt less important than the rules that were in place. Complex organisations, such as large secondary schools, traditionally have many rules, both those that are explicit, and those that are hidden as social norms and expectations..

One example is uniform requirements. Some of our participants related that the requirement to be wearing, for example, the right socks, was made to seem more important than their own personal, often challenging, circumstances.

These examples illustrate how these students endured subtle but invasive microaggressions and microinvalidations that were couched within daily practices. These not only marginalised the students but also caused them to internalise responsibility for their inability to conform.

Student experiences of alternative education

In sharp contrast, in the alternative education settings, students felt there was uncomplicated acceptance. Sofia explained that you could talk with the teacher “and not have to worry that you were being judged by him or anything; you don’t have to talk to him in a certain way.” Students described feeling relaxed, comfortable and encouraged in their classrooms. The smaller classes, flexibility, and focus on strong relationships were important as students reconnected with learning that was meaningful.

Different from students’ portrayal of learning in mainstream schools, learning in the alternative setting was positioned as accessible. The students could make choices and tailor experiences to their needs.

And, importantly, learning was seen to be fun. Zali reflected that “We all just get along and have a laugh or whatever. I think that the attitude of everyone around here contributes to the success of it.” The joy of learning and joy in being a learner was often new for these young people.

Micro-resistance in alternative education

Our study found that in these two cases, the invalidation, marginalisation and disenfranchisement that students had experienced in mainstream schooling were countered by the affirming micro-level, everyday practices in the alternative settings. The practices of educators and the arrangements in these settings re-humanised students. Small, regular acts countered the prior negative associations with schools. Such messages re-built the worth and value of the young people and powerfully contributed to their re-engagement with learning. Although we are confident that such humanising acts occur regularly in mainstream settings, the difference in these alternative settings is that micro-affirmations are intentional, prioritised and consistent. In this way, these practices constitute micro-resistance that works to question the accepted practices which in mainstream contexts suggest that rules are valued above relationships and that performance is valued over compassion.

Lessons for mainstream

By listening to the experiences of these students, the pervasive nature of microaggression in busy, often impersonal, classrooms become more visible. We saw that he insidious institutional and interpersonal microaggressions lead to internalised microaggressions, where students started to believe that their own learning and social needs did not matter.

The small acts that young people identified as occurring in the alternative settings provided a counter-message: you are worthy. The small acts students flagged are noteworthy because in other environments, they would likely go unnoticed: the Out Teach teacher was always on time; the teachers at Aspire ate lunch with their students and played footy during breaks; the students were viewed and treated “like normal people”.

To those educators in mainstream schools who are concerned about the long-term effects of microaggressions on students such as those in our studies: keep on doing the ‘small things’. Every small act that convinces a student they are worthy reduces the level of dehumanisation that they experience. Be on time. Keep your promises. Build relationships with students by asking genuine questions. Check in to see if students are truly understanding. Introduce material through student interests. Connect learning to life. Provide space for choice and voice. See students as multi-dimensional humans.

As much as you can, in all educational practices, seek to facilitate students’ – and your own – full embodiment of being human.

*Aspire College is a pseudonym used to preserve anonymity.

This piece is drawn from a recently released chapter: Reimer, K., & Longmuir, F. (2021). Humanising students as a micro-resistance practice in Australian alternative education settings. In J. K. Corkett, C. L. Cho, & A. Steele (Eds.), Global Perspectives on Microaggressions in Schools: Understanding and combating covert violence. Routledge.

Fiona Longmuir lectures in Educational Leadership at Monash University and has over 20 years’ experience as a researcher and practising school leader. Her research interests include intersections between educational leadership and educational change with a particular focus on student voice and agency. She is working on projects investigating school leadership for social cohesion; leadership for unprecedented times; and student voice and agency in alternative educational settings. Find her on Twitter @LongmuirFiona and LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/fionalongmuir/

Kristin E. Reimer lectures in education at Monash University and works to advance the idea of education as a humanising practice. Her main focus is Restorative Justice Education (RJE), where educators build strong relationships in schools and rigorous, healthy learning environments. Kristin’s research and practice reinforces education as a connective practice: alternative education for justice-involved youth; access to higher education for non-traditional students; experiences of refugee and asylum-seeking university students; and global citizenship education. She’s on Twitter: @ReimerKristin

Sure, follow the money but think first

June 28, 2021financial literacy in schoolsASIC, Commonwealth Bank, Scott Pape, The Barefoot Investor

There’s nothing like a financial crisis to remind us of the importance of quality financial education at school. But is that what Australian school students get?

NewsCorp columnist and financial self-help author of The Barefoot Investor Scott Pape has launched a TV show and online petition calling for a “Money Movement” focused on teaching young people the importance of working, saving, spending and giving. He’s calling on governments to implement an annual “Money Challenge”, kick the banks out of schools and commit to helping teachers become financially fit.

Are these good ideas?

Academics and consumer groups also argue that bank-led financial education is problematic and these programs have already been banned in Victoria, Canberra and Queensland.

But while the banks are being shown the door, new players are climbing through the window with flashy websites and workshops. They’ve learned from the Commonwealth Bank that this space can be fun and lucrative.

So while school-led initiatives free from commercial motivations are the change that’s needed, “finfluencers” like The Barefoot Investor have their sights set on schools. Their solutions are not always aligned with the curriculum, informed by educational research, or independently evaluated.

If we want to fix the financial education problem, these things matter.

The federal government flagged financial education as a priority following the 2008 global financial crisis. It invested heavily in the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) to strengthen financial literacy policy, strategy, curriculum, and education initiatives.

ASIC’s early policies and strategies were used to influence aspects of the current Australian Curriculum, which frames significant opportunities for teaching about work, resource allocation, consumer rights and protections, and financial mathematics. The Australian Curriculum links to Scootle resources to help teachers plan for learning. Many of the consumer and financial literacy resources were produced by ASIC under the MoneySmart Teaching brand. However, nothing was done to regulate the presence of the Commonwealth Bank in schools, and it has continued to promote its Dollarmites and StartSmart programs in schools, cultivating children’s trust in its brand.

Generations of students have completed schooling while we have relied on finance industry expertise to guide money-related education. Yet research shows that schools still vary in how they represent the curriculum in their programs. All address the content as it features within learning areas like mathematics. Others make connections between mathematics and economics through thematic programs, although after Year 8 these tend to be elective studies and not all students choose them.

OECD PISA financial literacy assessment results confirm that little has been gained in terms of student learning over this period.

Policy and curriculum initiatives led by the finance industry simply haven’t delivered.

What do we know from research?

Research suggests that financial problem-solving and decision-making can rely as much on psychological, social and cultural factors as information taught at school.

A recent study found there to be little research on the impact of school financial education programs on actual financial behaviour long-term. Another study concluded that the impact of even large educational interventions decays over time with negligible impact beyond 20 months.

Still, research offers guidance for targeted approaches. For example, OECD PISA Reports highlight a strong correlation between Australian 15-year-olds’ financial and mathematical literacies. Classroom research in Australia and New Zealand has demonstrated the importance of respecting the cultural aspects of students’ financial values and practices, situating mathematics learning in financial contexts that matter to them, and taking an explicit focus on financial language. And a research review commissioned by the Australian Taxation Office recommended that it would be helpful to schools if the possibilities for teaching about taxation and superannuation were more extensively and explicitly signposted.

There is no “magic bullet” – but at every level within the education system, professional educators continue working hard to improve the conditions for young people to develop financial capability at school.

At the national level, government agencies are engaging with research evidence to inform proposed changes to the Australian Curriculum.

The review of the Australian Curriculum: Mathematics seems to draw on the above insights, with proposed changes emphasising the need for meaningful connections between mathematical concepts and real-world financial contexts at each year level. The achievement standards have also been strengthened, which means teachers would be required to report on student learning taking place within financial contexts. The effect would be more routine opportunities to learn about financial trends, problems and issues each year and over the course of one’s schooling.

Money matters are only getting harder

The Barefoot Investor says he wants to “teach kids the rules of the game”.

In the wake of the Banking Royal Commission and pandemic, we know the game needs to change.

Students are being raised and educated through a crisis that will shape their economic and financial perspectives and prospects well into the future.

Quality financial education can prepare young people to participate in the system in informed ways, but also to question how the system works and whose interests it serves. This means teaching them to ask good questions about financial innovations like tap ‘n go, buy-now-pay-later and virtual currency. It means teaching them to consider actions they can take that will be good for their bank balance, the economy and the planet, like reducing, repairing, recycling and upcycling. And it means teaching them to critique the role of governments and powerful organisations in shaping their financial realities.

Ecstra Foundation, a not-for-profit organisation, is funding important work in this area. For example, Deakin University has been funded to develop a professional learning series that will boost teachers’ knowledge and skills to develop student financial capability in ways that are sensitive to socioeconomic circumstance. This program includes a suite of new resources that teachers can draw on to innovate and influence change within their schools. Colleagues at Monash University are designing and testing a financial literacy program for young adults with intellectual disability. The impact of these programs will be measured and the research findings used to establish best practice principles.

What should happen next?

Scott Pape, The Barefoot Investor, is using his media profile to start conversations within families and draw attention to an important educational issue – these are good things. But financial education at school is too important to leave to finfluencers.

Since the financial landscape is complex and dynamically changing, ongoing resource development and teacher professional learning is needed. Universities, teacher associations and school communities are best-placed to drive this work.

We can learn from success stories in STEM and early years education, where competitive tenders have seen expert teams lead the development of independent, inclusive, educationally sound and rigorously evaluated programs. This approach has shown that with the right professional learning opportunities, school leaders and teachers have the know-how necessary to innovate.

The authors have been funded by the Ecstra Foundation to research what education professionals, teachers and students think about financial education in Australian secondary schools, including what professional learning opportunities and resources are most useful.

Jill Brown (left) and Carly Sawatzki (right) are teacher educators and educational researchers at Deakin University. They are internationally recognised for their mathematics learning task design and approach to creating quality opportunities for teachers and students to learn. They have extensive experience educating preservice and practising teachers and leading curriculum and research consultancies for government agencies, teacher associations and schools.

The government must know how to fix the teacher shortage. Why won’t it act now?

June 24, 202121st century teaching, initial teacher education, teacher attrition, Teacher education, teacher recruitmentinitial teacher education, Rachel Wilson, teacher attrition, teacher recruitment

Schools are struggling with major teacher shortages and the reason is clear.

Australia’s education system is missing one fundamental part – a national teacher recruitment and retention strategy.

Every other country I have reviewed has one; here’s England’s, here is Bulgaria’s, Zimbabwe’s is recently announced. I’m not emphasising this because we should copy other countries. There is a much stronger argument – internationally the importance of the teaching profession is widely understood, with appropriately weighty policy attention.

Australia’s current Quality Initial Teacher Education Review will make a contribution in this regard and it has broadened terms of reference to include “attracting and selecting high-quality candidates into the teaching profession“. However, the scope does not include retaining teachers nor effective allocation of them to areas of need. This is an area of pressing need and one of the structural systemic failings of our education system.

It will not be addressed with piecemeal policy shots.

Policy gaps

The fact that we don’t have a national strategy on this speaks volumes about how teachers are undervalued in Australia; and how few with political power recognise the foundational role teachers hold in our economy, social fabric and democracy.

The difficulties arising from this neglect, and there are many, include: the current crisis in recruitment of teachers (shockingly evident in NSW where every week another school has to take action because they are so understaffed), shifts to a less secure workforce, declining academic standards in admission to teaching degree, deteriorating work conditions and workload.

We desperately need a teacher recruitment and retention strategy – as a tool to redress this neglect, provide due respect to teachers and contribute to broader systemic reforms to reverse the declines we are seeing in many educational indicators (and no, I don’t just mean PISA scores). Piecemeal initiatives here and there are not enough, and those initiatives sometimes appear to willfully neglect the evidence base for what works in attracting and retaining teachers.

NSW’s recent announcement to provide what amounts to a cash incentive to attract mid-career professionals over to teaching, with six months of coursework and a six-month paid internship is yet another example of foolish policy.

This approach has already failed once, as demonstrated by the Commonwealth Government response to the Action now, classroom ready teachers report some years ago.

Attracting, recruiting and retaining candidates to a profession is a complex, multifactorial and lengthy process that will not be solved with a single incentive. It needs coordinated, comprehensive strategic response, with a long-term plan and system wide reform. This is not the same as the National teacher Workforce Strategy which does not lay out a plan to adress problems, but suggests monitoring via the Australian Teacher Workforce Data project which is still not fully operational after more than a decade in development.

We need a strategic plan built on evidence.

What the evidence says

A systematic review published earlier this year by See, Morris, Gorard and El Soufi provides an up-to-date analysis of the relevant literature. As a systematic review, which excludes research that does not meet research quality benchmarks, it provides a quality-assured evidence base. What does it say?

I am guessing this will not be news to the teachers out there:

“The only approach that seems to work at all is the offer of monetary inducements, but there are caveats” (See, Morris, Gorard and El Soufi, 2021, p.2.)

The caveats include that monetary inducements work only in attracting those already interested in teaching. The monetary inducements must also be large enough to compensate for challenging work conditions – and provide some offset for teachers who could be attracted to better paying jobs. Reforming both working conditions and financial incentives is important to attract high quality candidates to the profession. The recent Gallop review Valuing the Teaching Profession made it clear current teacher salaries are not competitive with those of similarly qualified professions – addressing this would require a 10 to 15 percent rise in teacher salaries.

The systematic review also suggests that financial incentives also work better for attracting young females to teaching. They are less likely to work on older and male teachers. It is unclear how they would work in attracting diverse candidates to work in diverse Australian schools. Importantly, the monetary incentives are also only temporary, with no residual benefit. Once the incentive is finished, its power is gone. However monetary inducements do also work in retaining teachers, especially in changing school contexts. Thus, effective policies are more likely those with incentives for entering initial teacher education, and satisfactory pay across the full career span with special incentives for those working in challenging schools.

The review found no evidence for locally recruiting and training teacher education programs intended to supply hard-to-staff schools. Nor that teachers trained via alternative routes are more likely to stay in teaching – why would we keep investing money there then? It also found no good evidence that “pathways” improve recruitment into programs, with only one program shown to be effective in that regard.

There were some, complex findings regarding the effect of professional support for all teachers and mentoring for beginning teachers. Such effects impact on working conditions and workload, which are important considerations.

Uniquely Australian

Australia faces some unique challenges in regard to teacher recruitment and retention. In the 2020 report The Profession At Risk I had the unsavory task of analysing Australia’s declining trends in Initial Teacher Education admission standards, and degree completion rates.There are clear and disturbing trends in ATAR scores, but limited transparency on standards overall. Despite more and more students entering teaching degrees, less than 60 per cent of education students complete their degree within six years. I argue that the poor transparency and low standard for entry in Australia, far below international benchmarks, may be contributing to ( not a result of) the dwindling esteem of the profession- adding a unique element to the Australian teacher recruitment landscape.

Other analyses suggest Australia also has specific problems with allocation of our teaching workforce.The OECD report Effective Teacher Policies shows that, uniquely, Australian schools have more teachers, and better qualified and more experienced teachers, in advantaged schools than in disadvantaged schools.

But we also have a notably low share of top performing students who go on to be teachers; and those students are also more likely to teach in advantaged schools. This stands in contrast to the majority of OECD country who allocate the most high achieving, qualified and experienced teachers to the most disadvantaged schools. This is another reason why we need a comprehensive and coordinated national strategy.

Like waiting for Godot

Teacher recruitment and retention isn’t a new issue for Australia. There have been periodic crises and reviews over that last four decades. A review way back in 1986 suggested a more coordinated, and politically neutral approach was needed. Recommendations have rarely been acted upon. A 2014 Australian DFAT report Teacher Quality Evidence review, exploring suitable policies for international development recipient countries found

“The systemic development of teacher quality is dependent, first and foremost, on effective teacher recruitment strategies…Supporting effective teacher workforce management by donors can and should include strategies and interventions to deploy teachers in hard–to-reach areas as well as supporting national governments to develop rewarding conditions of service for teachers, ensuring that they are adequately remunerated”

If this is the advice we are providing for international aid programs a decade ago, why are we yet to address it for our own precious education system?

Rachel Wilson is associate professor at The Sydney School of Education and Social Work at the University of Sydney. She has expertise in educational assessment, research methods and programme evaluation, with broad interests across educational evidence, policy and practice. She is interested in system-level reform and has been involved in designing, implementing and researching many university and school education reforms. Rachel is on Twitter @RachelWilson100

Decodable or predictable: why reading curriculum developers must seize one

June 21, 2021ACARA, Reading, teaching readingACARA, phonics and reading, teaching reading

Despite the promise to ‘improve clarity’, ‘declutter’, and remove ‘ambiguous’ content, the new draft curriculum has left teachers guessing when it comes to when, and how, to use texts in the first two years of school. The requirement for teachers to choose between two types of texts remains in the proposed new curriculum, revealing a lack of understanding by the curriculum developers about the purpose and structure of each text.

In the first two years of school, children require many opportunities to practise their phonics skills, which is achieved by reading decodable texts. Predictable texts, in comparison, are incompatible with phonics instruction and do not support beginning readers to master the written code for reading. Once the code has been established, children can move on to a broader range of reading material. If ACARA’s objective for the proposed curriculum is to provide ‘a clear and precise developmental pathway’ for reading, then references to predictable texts, and any reading strategies that require children to guess words from pictures and context, need to be removed from the current content descriptions where learning to read is the focus.

Research we recently conducted revealed that there is confusion among teachers on how to use different types of texts in beginning reading instruction, which the current review of the national curriculum does little to address. While the draft curriculum signals a win for those advocating for more emphasis on systematic phonics instruction, the continued reference to predictable texts, and the associated whole language strategies known as the three-cueing system, is seen as a missed opportunity to align all reading related content to an established body of scientific knowledge.

The Australian Curriculum National Reporting Authority’s (ACARA) chief, David de Carvalho claims that the draft curriculum English “allows teachers to choose a range of texts” to support the development of critical reading skills while also promoting the broader motivational and literary aspects of reading. However, rather than providing choice, the continued lack of guidance and clarification about when and how to use each text serves only to keep teachers guessing. Ironically, ‘guessing’ is one of the strategies that beginning readers must default to when trying to read words from texts that are not instructionally matched to the classroom phonics program. The features and structure of predictable texts, the earliest readers in many levelled reading systems currently used in Australian classrooms, promote memorisation rather than decoding and encourage beginning readers to guess words from pictures and context. Research has repeatedly shown that these strategies are not sustainable in the long term and that it is poor readers who are most disadvantaged when pictures are removed from the text and the capacity to memorise words reaches its limits.

Text types

It is not so much choice that teachers require to meet the instructional needs of children, but the knowledge about how to use different texts for different purposes. Research has identified two sets of processes involved in reading proficiency: language comprehension and decoding. While literature facilitates the development of language related skills such as vocabulary and comprehension, and decodable texts scaffold children’s mastery of the alphabetic code, predictable texts contribute very little once children commence formal reading instruction. A clearly articulated curriculum would facilitate teachers’ ability to determine when to use a particular text for a particular purpose.

Survey on teachers use of texts

The results of our research draw attention to this issue of how teachers use different types of texts to support beginning reading development. We surveyed 138 Western Australian Pre-primary and Year 1 teachers because we were concerned that the guidance on approaches to reading instruction and text types in the current curriculum was ambiguous and confusing.

Teachers were asked about the approach they used to teach phonics, the type of texts and the strategies they used when teaching reading, and their beliefs about decodable and predictable texts. In Western Australia, teachers are directed by the Department of Education (DoE) to use systematic synthetic phonics (SSP) and, in our study, 93% of the teachers reported that they taught phonics using a SSP approach.

On the basis of this approach to reading, we expected an equivalent number of teachers to use decodable texts. Surprisingly, a majority of teachers (56%) reported using both predictable and decodable texts to support children’s reading development. Of the teachers who only used decodable texts (25%), all but two used a range of strategies more suited to predictable texts.

As expected, teachers who only used predictable texts (18%) used prompts associated with these texts, but they also used strategies more suitable for decodable text such as asking children to ‘sound out each letter’. This could be confusing for children when reading a text that doesn’t include words that can be read using current alphabetic knowledge. Predictable texts feature high frequency (e.g., girl, where, as) and multisyllabic words (e.g., doctor, balloon, helicopter) that reflect common and relatable themes for young children, rather than words that align with a phonics teaching sequence.

Fluency and texts

Two-thirds of the teachers in our research agreed with the statement that predictable texts promote fluency. This belief possibly accounts for the fact that so many teachers used predictable texts despite using a systematic synthetic phonics approach. While there is some evidence to suggest that predictable texts facilitate the development of fluency, the relationship is not well understood.

When children first apply their knowledge of phonics to decodable texts, fluency does initially appear to be compromised. Learning to read is hard work, and it takes at least two years of reading instruction before children reach a level of proficiency where they are able to apply their skills to the broader curriculum, or to what is commonly known as ‘reading to learn’.

In contrast, the repetition of high frequency words and the predictive nature of words and sentences in predictable texts gives the impression that children are reading fluently as they memorise sentences that can be recited both while reading, and in the absence of the text. While alluring to teachers, the promotion of these strategies compromises the development of the alphabetic knowledge required for reading a complex orthography such as English, and as such should not be prioritised over careful and accurate decoding, despite the temptation to do so!

A lack of fluency when learning a new skill is evident in many areas of learning, yet it seems to be less well tolerated in beginning reading instruction. One possible explanation for this is the dominance of whole language reading theories, upon which the idea that learning to read is as natural as learning to speak has been promoted. This has resulted in the proliferation of a range of instructional reading strategies that are no longer supported by research, but as our research showed, continued to be used by classroom teachers. It is our contention that the continued use of these strategies is a direct result of the ambiguity evident in the curriculum documents. It has simply not kept up with the research and will continue to act as a barrier to effective implementation unless clarity around the use of texts is provided.

Which books, and when?

Children learn about the correspondence between speech and print by being exposed to books from an early age. At the pre-reading stage, prior to knowing that letters can also represent print, and that there is a predictable relationship between them, children benefit from being read to from a wide range of books, including children’s literature that features predictable text. There are many great examples to choose from, including well known classics such as Brown Bear, Brown Bear, and We Went Walking.

When teachers read books with rhythmic patterned language, children begin to understand that each printed word on the page represents a spoken word. This helps children to understand the segmental nature of speech, a valuable first step in their reading journey. The predictable texts currently used by teachers to meet Foundation and Year one curriculum objectives, while far less engaging than children’s literature, are more appropriate for children who are at this stage of their reading development because they do not require children to actually use their knowledge of the alphabet to read. While teachers can, and should, continue to read children’s literature, including books with predictable text and rhyming patterns to children beyond the preschool years, there is no instructional value in using ‘levelled’ predictable readers to support children’s development once formal reading instruction has commenced.

When children enter the alphabetic stage of reading, they must transition from being read to, and joining in, to becoming the reader of the text. During this stage, children benefit from text that supports decoding as a primary strategy for reading. Decodable texts have a specific purpose: to scaffold children’s mastery and application of the alphabetic code in reading. Once children have mastered the alphabetic code, the reading of natural language texts, with more diverse vocabulary and complex language structures, should be encouraged. It is crucial from this point that motivation for reading is maintained.

The disconnect between the use of text and the teaching approach being employed as well as the inconsistent use of strategies to support children when reading evident in our research can be seen as a direct result of the requirement in the curriculum to use both decodable and predictable texts. It is likely that without a change to the current curriculum, this will continue to be the case.

DISCLOSURE: Simmone Pogorzelski is a product developer for MultiLit Pty Ltd which develops decodable readers, and other reading materials.

References

Cheatham, J. P., & Allor, J. H. (2012). The influence of decodability in early reading text on reading achievement: a review of the evidence. Reading and Writing, 25(9), 2223-2246. doi:10.1007/s11145-011-9355-2

Ehri, L. C. (2005). Learning to read words: Theory, Findings, and Issues. Scientific Studies of Reading, 9(2), 167-188. doi:10.1207/s1532799xssr0902_4

Hempenstall, K. (2003). The three-cueing system : trojan horse? Australian Journal of Learning Disabilities, 8(2), 15–23.

Mesmer, H. A. (2005). Text decodability and the first-grade reader. Reading & Writing Quarterly, 21(1), 61-86. doi:10.1080/10573560590523667

Pogorzelski, S., Main, S. & Hill, S. (2021). A survey of Western Australian teachers’ use of texts in supporting beginning readers. Issues in Educational Research, 31(1), 204-223. http://www.iier.org.au/iier31/pogorzelski.pdf

From left to right:

Simmone Pogorzelski is currently completing a PhD on the role of decodable texts in early reading development at Edith Cowan University (ECU). Simmone is a sessional academic in the School of Education at ECU and works as a product developer for MultiLit. Susan Main, PhD, is a Senior Lecturer in Education at Edith Cowan University in Western Australia. Her teaching and research interests include preparing pre-service and in-service teachers to teach children with diverse abilities, including evidence-based approaches to literacy instruction, managing challenging behaviour, and using technology to facilitate learning. Janet Hunter, PhD, teaches and researches in the area of literacy education at Edith Cowan University in Perth, Western Australia. Currently, she teaches both in-service and pre-service teachers. Research interests focus on the development of teacher professional knowledge and how teachers can support students who are failing to make adequate progress in literacy development.

No way to study with kids at home. Here’s how a unique program helped

June 17, 2021mature-age students, rural and regional education, rural and regional studentsChris Ronan, Country University Centres, Regional University Centres

For mature-aged students in regional areas, studying a university degree online can be challenging at the best of times. Add in the pressures that school holidays bring for students who are also parents or carers and continuing university study across this period can be incredibly difficult.

During the April school holidays, the Country Universities Centre (CUC) Snowy Monaro invited parents to bring their children into the Centre to participate in outreach activities facilitated by a university partner, while they were given the time, space, and academic support to maintain their study patterns.

The Centre was buzzing. Across five days, kids were constructing bridges, learning about the environment, talking about what university is and why their parents were working on obtaining a university degree in one room, while their parents and carers were studying with the CUC resources in another.

Recent research has highlighted the need to recognise that older students – particularly women – are likely to be combining study with family caring responsibilities. For those who are mature-aged, their identity as a student is likely to take second, third, or even fourth place, to other more pressing identities – such as those of parent, carer, financial supporter, and paid employee.

In regional communities, these caring responsibilities that mature-aged students face are often compounded by other forms of inequalities when accessing higher education – such as being first in family, low-SES, or studying part-time. Additionally, students over 25 and studying part-time have high levels of attrition.

These compounding challenges are felt significantly by regional students across the Country Universities Centre (CUC) network, which offer campus-like facilities to any student studying at any Australian University. Each centre is equipped with high-speed internet, computers, workstations, and video conferencing facilities. Additionally, students can engage with academic, administrative and wellbeing support from staff within the Centre. The CUC is part of the larger Regional Universities Centre program, funded by the Commonwealth Government, to improve access to higher education for regional and remote students.

Of the students currently registered with CUC, 76% are female, 59% are older than 25 years, 51% study part-time, 45% are first in family and 63% are from a low-SES background. Regional students are also significantly more likely to be mature-age and studying part-time than their metropolitan counterparts.

Research by Stone and O’Shea on supporting women with caring responsibilities who study online has illuminated several challenges for this cohort of students. While online study makes it possible for them to participate in higher education and balance caring commitments, a significant amount of planning, good time management, multitasking, and dealing with family resistance is required for them to be able to persist.

One challenge that was identified in Nicole Crawford’s recent NCSEHE Equity Fellowship research, and across the CUC network, was that the school holiday period causes high levels of stress for mature-aged students. It increases the caring responsibilities and creates significant difficulty for mature-age students with children to maintain consistent study patterns.

In response, the CUC developed a pilot program that aimed to provide consistent, uninterrupted study time across the school holiday period for parents in the Centre, while simultaneously nurturing the aspirations and understanding of university for their children.

The program consisted of five days of outreach activities for primary school aged children delivered at CUC Snowy Monaro. These were facilitated by an outreach team from a partner university and were grouped into themes of science, engineering technology, performing arts, and environmental conservation. There was complete flexibility in which sessions parents and children could attend, with some parents utilising the entire week, while others only attended one session.

While children were engaged with the university outreach program, parents were provided the opportunity to study onsite at the CUC with the support of the local Learning Skills Advisor (LSA). Across the week, the LSA provided a combination of 1:1 support for students, academic workshop activities, and “Shut Up & Write” sessions.

Many students reported that having this peer accountability and allocated study time and at the CUC without the distractions of their school-aged children was the most valuable element to the program:

“There is no way I could study with my daughter at home, the [school holiday] program has meant I can come in for a few hours, get work done, and then go home for time with the kids” – Parent

For these students, simply having the time and space to study without the distractions of their children was invaluable. Additionally, the outreach activities enhanced what the children understood about university.

“I felt less guilty knowing that [name removed] got to learn about university and do some fun engineering activities while I could focus on my assignment” – Parent

After participating in the outreach program many children had an increased understanding of why their parent came to the CUC to study.

“This is mum’s uni and this is where she comes to learn things for her job” – Child

The outreach program not only nurtured aspiration for university within the children but helped them understand why their parents were studying. At the end of each session, some of the children were asked about what they had learned or experienced. One session was focused on developing career aspirations:

“I learned about uni and jobs and when I grow-up I want to do uni to be a teacher like my mum is going to be” – Child

Bringing kids and parents into the CUC together helps normalise expectations of studying at university – especially for first in family students. This shared experience helps families to be included in the process of university study, while developing a shared sense of belonging and ownership of their local CUC. The program helped children to understand that the CUC is a place of higher education, and that university study is a ‘normal’ thing for people in their community to do.

The school holiday program is a simple idea that generates a shared experience of university between parents and their children. It highlights that we need to do more than focus on supporting the individual student, we must also support their families to share the university experience.

It is early days, but programs like this are the start of creative ways to include the entire family of a mature-aged student in their learning journey. Increased understanding of university at the family level further normalises study and develops deeper support structures for mature-aged students to succeed.

Chris is the director of equity and engagement at the Country Universities Centre and has worked on national research projects as part of the National Centre for Student Equity in Higher Education (NCSEHE) and with the University of South Australia in Regional, Rural and Remote higher education policy, student equity, widening participation and rural student transitions. Chris is on the National Executive team for the Society for the Provision of Education in Rural Australia (SPERA) and is the Director of the National Conference for Regional, Rural, and Remote Education.

The White Paper: old, tired and lacking evidence

June 15, 2021COVID-19 and schools, education leadership, Education policy, educational reform, evidence-based policyDebra Hayes, NSW Productivity Commission, White Paper

In the months before the pandemic gripped the world, the NSW Productivity Commission released a presciently titled discussion paper, Kickstarting the Productivity Conversation. Its recently released followup White Paper sets out its plan for rebooting the economy.

Lifting school results is part of the plan. The Commission acknowledges the ‘pandemic has shown how quickly schools, teachers and students can innovate and adapt to new ways of teaching and learning’. These responses were rapid, mostly impressive and sustained. The impact of inequality on learning was also laid bare.

However, beyond this brief quote, these and other insights generated during these epoch-making times hardly rate a mention in the White Paper. The flickers of optimism in the earlier discussion paper due to improved performance on some measures have been replaced by a very gloomy picture of decline and stagnation.

To be fair, the task of assessing whether education has become better or worse is extremely difficult at the best of times because education systems are complex, with multiple attributes, institutions and actors. They can be better in some respects and worse in others. For example, they can be better resourced but less efficient and better in terms of overall outcomes but worse in terms of inequalities between students. It also depends on your view of what education should be for and about.

The Productivity Commission’s view is squarely aligned to the economic purposes of education but even within this economic framing, tensions can exist between those who argue for systems that, variously: promote basic skills in English and mathematics and those who promote skills and attributes for networked, flexible and changing labour markets and ‘portfolio’ careers, and so on.

These disputes are not the only reason it is difficult to work out what is going on.

The volume of research in education has expanded rapidly and policy makers are faced with a cacophony of policy-relevant information. While there is widespread agreement about the importance of research and evidence in education, battles have been fought about what kind of evidence matters, and who is considered an expert. It’s sometimes difficult to get past the problem of ‘not being able to see the wood for the trees’ but I believe that it is possible to present a clear and concise view of what’s gone wrong in the past, and what needs to change.

Educational research is incredibly diverse. What’s needed is the assembly of a wide range of research evidence, qualitative and quantitative, and a balanced review and synopsis. What does not help is the misuse and over-claiming that often follows the phrase, ‘research has shown’. Although there are still many unknowns, there are issues where the evidence is clear and which can be agreed upon.

So, what research evidence does the Productivity Commission draw upon? How does it respond to its own claim: ‘if we want to turn things around, we need to keep following the best available evidence? On what basis does it assert: ‘the evidence is that school results will be most affected by teaching quality’?

The chapter in the White Paper dedicated to schooling, Best practice teaching to lift school results, contains close to 80 references including reports by policy and research institutes (about 24); government reports (about 15); commissioned research (about 9), and; reports by organisations such as the OECD (about 6). While some of these references might be considered scholarly, the most trustworthy source of research evidence is derived from peer reviewed journals and some academic books.

Less than 27% of all references in the White Paper’s chapter on best practice teaching are peer reviewed, and about 38% of these are more than 10 years old. In addition, 19% of the total number of peer reviewed papers draw upon Australian data. To be clear, the Productivity Commission’s chapter on lifting school results in NSW includes a total of four peer reviewed papers that contain data specifically related to the Australian context.
This collection of references sets a very low benchmark for evidence-based policy advice, and falls well short of the Productivity Commission’s stated aspiration of ‘following the best available evidence’.

Educational researchers are keen to work with policy makers who, like us, want to improve the educational outcomes of young people, respect the commitment and professionalism of teachers, and ensure that public money is well spent. We also share a commitment to evidence-based practice because the quality of decision making is most likely to improve when we make use of trustworthy evidence.

There are some clear and practical things we could do now to support these shared aspirations.

Establish mechanisms for policy makers to draw on a wider range of educational expertise and knowledge. Rather than relying on ‘what works’ research and poorly curated reviews of the academic literature, governments could co-fund broad-based education research institutes, with a mandate and resources to conduct, synthesise and disseminate education research. The national evidence institute is a step in the right direction.
Promote teacher and expert research further up the evidence hierarchy. Initial teacher education and professional development could be recast as research-informed processes aimed at developing teachers who have the capacity to conduct research into their own practice, and to utilise educational research to inform their practice. Teachers are not just end-users of research. Research production and consumption should be part of the professional work of teachers, with sufficient time allocated to such tasks.

As we edge towards the post-pandemic epoch, we must leverage this period of rapid and unprecedented change and disruption. Let’s not waste the opportunity to build a new consensus for change and improvement in education that recognises the capacity of teachers and students to innovate, adapt and learn. We are obligated to draw upon the best available evidence to support and resource them. The NSW Government would be well advised to set aside the Productivity Commission’s White Paper, at least as it relates to schools, and start afresh to build a new, broad, and evidence-based consensus for change in education that draws upon the best available evidence.

Debra Hayes is professor of education and equity, and head of the Sydney School of Education and Social Work. Formerly a secondary science teacher, she researches, writes and teaches about inequality in education. Material in this blog is drawn from her new book with Ruth Lupton titled Great Mistakes in Education Policy: How to avoid them in the Future (Policy Press, 2021)

There are direct actions we can take now to make university access fair

June 7, 2021equity in higher education, First in family to attend university, higher education, higher education policy, university entrance for disadvantaged studentsFirst in family to attend university, first-in-family university students, higher education policy, Sally Patfield

While in recent decades there has been a focus on improving equitable access to higher education, inequalities cannot be overcome by simply exhorting more young people to go to university. Policies must also address the disparities between students that affect their capacity to ‘choose’ higher education.

Australia has seen substantial growth in university enrolments since the 1960s, as the sector has moved from ‘elite’ education to one that has been described as ‘university for the masses’. More recently, policies designed to ‘widen participation’ have aimed to increase representation of groups who have not traditionally enrolled in higher education in large numbers, particularly Indigenous Australians, those from low socioeconomic status backgrounds, and Australians living in regional and remote areas.

However, widening participation has not led to a fair or socially just university system. Not only do students from socially disadvantaged groups remain less likely to go to university than their more advantaged peers but, if they do go to university, they are more likely to enrol in less prestigious institutions and degrees.

Equitable access is often seen as overcoming ‘crude’ barriers such as money, distance, and achievement. But it is much more complicated than that.

In recent years, market-based reforms to the higher education sector have cast prospective university students as ‘customers’ who are empowered to shop around for the ‘right’ institution and the ‘right’ course. And while outreach initiatives have been implemented by universities to reach under-represented groups, it is the less prestigious universities that are frequently promoted to these students and, if students do not take them up, they are judged as being ‘not aspirational enough’ and in need of fixing.

But what leads young people to make different kinds of higher education ‘choices’?

Our research draws on data collected as part of a four-year project (2012-2015) involving students in Years 3 to 12 (aged 8 to 18) enrolled in 64 NSW government schools, with a focus on the formation of their post-school educational and occupational aspirations.

From that data, we made a comparative study of two schools, a metropolitan high school ‘Harbour View’ (pseudonym) where students are more ‘traditional’ entrants to higher education, and a regional central school ‘Mountainside’ (pseudonym), where students are often seen to be the targets of widening participation initiatives.

In Harbour View, the median income is twice the state average and half of adults hold a university degree. In Mountainside, the median income is half the state average and one in 15 adults hold a university degree.

Our research showed that students of Harbour View, a wealthy suburb in the state’s capital, see no choice but to go to university; it is a long-term expectation that they take for granted and not to go to university is inconceivable. They have at least one parent and many relatives and friends who have been to university, and these people provide students with important first-hand information and stories. The decision to go to university is well-established, so much so that students’ talk of their aspirations centres on where to go, rather than if they should go to university, which often includes prestigious institutions where family members have gone, and even overseas universities. These students also have access to international travel opportunities and take part in high-status cultural activities which they can ‘trade in’ when competing for entry into high-status institutions.

For the students of Mountainside, in a regional area with a history of mining and logging, their talk about university is based around language of hesitation and doubt; they will ‘wait and see’ what the future brings and believe that university is ‘not for everyone’. Financial concerns are prevalent when they speak about higher education; for instance, one student said they would go only if they got a scholarship. Some said the ‘real world’ is one of work, not study, and they had already excluded the very idea of higher education from a young age. Most do not have a parent or relative with a degree and have not visited a university campus; their information about higher education therefore comes from school. While these students rarely mentioned a specific institution to attend, Mountainside is an hour’s drive from a metropolitan university, and that university was perceived as the best choice for those who might go because of proximity to family, cost, and perceived ‘fit’.

Through our analysis, we argue that the idea of equitable choice in accessing higher education is an illusion. While the widening participation agenda aims to open up higher education to the masses, it is unlikely the young people in our two case studies will end up at the same university, or even the same kind of institution.

Despite its social justice motives, widening participation has an unintended consequence – it is entwined with social sorting. Those who are already privileged tend to amass the benefits that come with attending prestigious universities. For their less advantaged peers, simply ‘having a degree’ is often not enough to compete in the competitive graduate marketplace.

Our research shows that the capacity to ‘choose’ university is vastly different for young Australians. If equity in the contemporary higher education sector is to be addressed in any depth, fair access inside the system – not just to the system – must be part of the policy agenda.

It is clear that widening participation initiatives must be implemented early, long before senior secondary school, and must expose students to a range of institutions and degrees.

And individual institutions must rethink their approach; allocating places for students from under-represented groups in prestigious degrees, offering targeted early entry schemes which do not rely solely on academic measures, and providing financial support through scholarships and fellowships for disadvantaged students.

Sally Patfield is a postdoctoral research fellow with the Teachers and Teaching Research Centre at the University of Newcastle, with over 15 years’ experience working in various educational contexts, including as a primary teacher in NSW public schools and across professional and academic roles in higher education. Sally’s doctoral research investigated school students who would be the first in their families to enter higher education. Her thesis was awarded the prestigious Ray Debus Award for Doctoral Research in Education by the Australian Association for Research in Education (2019). Sally’s research focuses on the sociology of higher education, social inequalities, widening participation, and educational transitions.