Making sense of mass education

Making Sense of Mass Education provides a comprehensive analysis of the field of mass education. The book presents new assessment of traditional issues associated with education – class, race, gender, discrimination and equity –to dispel myths and assumptions about the classroom. It examines the complex relationship between the media, popular culture and schooling, and places the expectations surrounding the modern teacher within ethical, legal and historical contexts. The book blurs some of the disciplinary boundaries within the field of education, drawing upon sociology, cultural studies, history, philosophy, ethics and jurisprudence to provide stronger analyses. The book reframes the sociology of education as a complex mosaic of cultural practices, forces and innovations. Engaging and contemporary, it is an invaluable resource for teacher education students, and anyone interested in a better understanding of mass education.

Ageing out of place: health and well-being needs and access to home and aged care services for recently arrived older refugees in Melbourne, Australia

Recently arrived older refugees in resettlement countries are a particularly vulnerable population who face many risks to their health and well-being, and many challenges in accessing services.This paper reports on a project undertaken in Victoria,Australia to explore the needs of older people from 14 recently arrived refugee communities, and the barriers to their receiving health and aged care. Findings from consultations with community workers and service providers highlight the key issues of isolation, family conflict and mental illness affecting older refugees, and point to ways in which policy-makers and service providers can better respond to these small but deserving communities.

Making sense of mental illness as a full human experience : Perspective of illness and recovery held by people with a mental illness living in the community.

Recovery is a highly contextualized concept amid divergent interpretations and unique experiences. There is substantial current interest in building evidence about recovery from mental illness in order to inform best practice founded in the ways people find to live productive and meaningful lives. This paper presents some accounts related to recovery and illness expressed by eight people through a Participatory Action Research project. The research facilitated entry to the subjective experiences of living in the community as an artist with a mental illness. The people in the research shared an integrated understanding of illness, recovery and identity. Their understanding provided insight into mental illness as an inseparable aspect of who they were. Further, specific issue was raised of recovery as a clinical term with a requirement to meet distinct conventions of recovery. This paper emphasizes that being ill and being well, for the person with a mental illness, is a dynamic and complex development not easily explained or transformed into uniform process or outcomes. Attempts to establish an integral or consensual approach to recovery has, to date, disregarded mental illness as a full human experience. This paper argues that broader frameworks for thinking and responding to the dynamic processes of mental illness and recovery are needed and require acknowledgment of competing and contradictory ideas.

Urban renewal, migration and memories : the affordances of place-based pedagogies for developing immigrant students’ literate repertoires

This paper reports on the new literacy demands in the middle years of schooling project in which the affordances of placed-based pedagogy are being explored through teacher inquiries and classroom-based design experiments. The school is located within a large-scale urban renewal project in which houses are being demolished and families relocated. The original school buildings have recently been demolished and replaced by a large ‘superschool’ which serves a bigger student population from a wider area. Drawing on both quantitative and qualitative data, the teachers reported that the language literacy learning of students (including a majority of students learning English as a second language) involved in the project exceeded their expectations. The project provided the motivation for them to develop their oral language repertoires, by involving them in processes such as conducting interviews with adults for their oral histories, through questioning the project manager in regular meetings, and through reporting to their peers and the wider community at school assemblies. At the same time students’ written and multimodal documentation of changes in the neighbourhood and the school grounds extended their literate and semiotic repertoires as they produced books, reports, films, powerpoints, visual designs and models of structures.

Collaborative research into the affordances of place for primary school children’s literacy learning

In the context of culturally diverse high poverty areas of Australia, we have conducted collaborative research with teachers and students in a primary school for more than a decade. Teachers have been exploring the affordances of place‐based pedagogies (Gruenewald & Smith, 2008) for the development of students’ spatial literacies and their understandings of the politics of places and built environments (Comber, Nixon, Ashmore, Loo & Cook, 2006; Comber, Thomson and Wells, 2001). This paper reports on a project in which the affordances of placedbased pedagogy are being explored through teacher inquiries and classroom‐based design experiments (Cobb, Confrey, di Sessa, Lehrer & Schauble, 2003). Located within a large‐scale urban renewal project in which houses are being demolished and families relocated, the original school has been replaced by a larger school that serves a population from a wider area. In this paper we draw on the study to consider the challenges of working with teachers and primary school students to study innovative ideas and practices in educational research. Specifically we consider issues raised by collaborative studies of the affordances of cross curricular projects focusing on social and environmental change to engage students in academic learning and expand their literate repertoires in a changing policy climate.

Determinants of place identity and dependence : the case of international tourism in Tanzania

This research examines the effects of expectation (perceived attractiveness) on satisfaction, place identity, and place dependence. Place identity and place dependence are viewed as relational components of choice and relate to deeper needs. This study proposes that these two relational components depend on transactional expectations, which are emergent and determined by past experiences and visitor goals. In a theoretically elaborated and tested Structural Equation Model (SEM) this study assumes that these relationships vary according to intentions to return. The study addresses the conditions under which loyalty intentions influence the deeper place attachments (place identity and place dependence) that visitors associate with attractive cultural and natural destinations. The model is tested on a sample of 504 international tourists visiting Tanzania during fall 2010, and explains 59% of variance in the predicted dependent variables. The results are linked to a discussion on loyalty programs.

The first year experience of social work students : developing a “sense of fit” and engagement with the profession : a practice report

Engagement is believed to be critical to a successful first year experience. This paper examines a range of strategies introduced into a first year Social Work and Human Services unit at Queensland University of Technology. The focus of these strategies was to enhance student engagement through building connections with peers, lecturers and the Social Work and Human Services professions. It is argued in this paper that students are more likely to continue with their studies if they are supported in building an emerging identity as both a university student and as a Social Work or Human Services practitioner. A range of strategies was introduced, including restructuring the unit to include an early intensive teaching block; inviting current practitioners to speak with students about the realities of practice; and embedding an academic skills component into the unit. Feedback from students highlighted the success of these strategies in developing their academic skills, building connections and embedding a sense of fit with the profession.

Let the journey begin : cultivating student identity and a sense of belonging through a formal academic welcome

Queensland University of Technology [QUT] Caboolture campus is a satellite campus co-located with Brisbane North Institute of TAFE. Building a sense of belonging on-campus continues to be challenging, with anecdotal evidence suggesting that QUT Caboolture students feel like second-class students, isolated from the prestige and excitement of the city campuses. A student identity and fostering a sense of belonging are fundamental to on-campus engagement and have been linked to retention (Field & Morgan-Klein, 2010). A formal welcome ceremony, including an academic procession in full regalia, was a new inclusion for QUT Caboolture’s 2013 Orientation Day. The ritual was intended to be a temporal mark for students to recognise their personal transition and emerging identity as a university student. Cultural capital is one ingredient in a complex mix of interactions and relationships to build a sense of identity. (Ecclestone, Biesta & Hughes, 2010). Fostering a sense of belonging and a connection to the campus and its staff was also anticipated. Students responded positively to the event, reporting feelings of excitement, inspiration and being welcomed into the university culture. The ceremony marked the beginning of the students’ journey together as QUT Caboolture students.

Making sense of purpose, direction and innovation : an embedded design led innovation case study in the Australian mining industry

The mining equipment technology services sector is driven by a reactive and user-centered design approach, with a technological focus on incremental new product development. As Australia moves out of its sustained mining boom, companies need to rethink their strategic position, to become agile to stay relevant in an enigmatic market. This paper reports on the first five months on an embedded case study within an Australian, family-owned mining manufacturer. The first author is currently engaged in a longitudinal design led innovation project, as a catalyst to guide the company’s journey to design integration. The results find that design led innovation could act as a channel for highlighting and exploring company disconnections with the marketplace and offer a customer-centric catalyst for internal change. Data collected for this study is from 12 analysed semistructured interviews, a focus group and a reflective journal, over a five-month period. This paper explores limitations to design integration, and highlights opportunities to explore and leverage entrepreneurial characteristics to stay agile, broaden innovation and future-proof through the next commodity cycle in the mining industry.

Searching for value : the influence of policy and reform on nurses’ sense of value in long-term aged care in Australia.

Contemporary literature on long-term aged care focuses heavily on issues associated with the recruitment and retention of nursing staff, such as job satisfaction and attitudes towards caring for older people. This paper aims to highlight one aspect of a larger study of registered nurses' experiences in long-term aged care in Australia and the influence that government policy and reform has in shaping that experience. This insight into aspects of nurses' everyday experience also contributes to a broader understanding of job satisfaction in long-term care. Findings from this study suggest that registered nurses experience tension in their search for value in their practice, which incorporates professional, political and social mediators of value and worth. These issues are discussed in relation to the impact of policy and reform on nurses' sense of value in long-term aged care and highlight the need for sensitive policy initiatives that support issues of value in nursing practice.

The social meaning of Brisbane City Hall

Three major periods of Brisbane's history were selected for examination of the social meaning of Brisbane City Hall: 1908 to 1920 – during which many debates about a 'new town hall' occurred, 1921 to 1930 – the construction phase, and the 1930s – City Hall's first decade of public use. This study shows that Brisbane City Hall is a central place where multiple social meanings have been made by residents and visitors. A broad range of views about City Hall existed during the periods studied; views and meanings that are not captured by its epithets or covered adequately by the existing literature. This thesis is an introductory study of the social meaning of Brisbane City Hall – what was said about it, how it was used and its significance to Brisbane's residents and visitors.

A case presenting diagnostic difficulties : making sense of flavivirus serology in the Top End of the Northern Territory

In early April 1998 the Centre for Disease Control (CDC) in Darwin was notified of a case with positive dengue serology. The illness appeared to have been acquired in the Northern Territory (NT). Because dengue is not endemic to the NT, locally acquired infection has significant public health implications, particularly for vector identification and control to limit the spread of infection. Dengue IgM serology was positive on two occasions but the illness was eventually presumptively identified as Kokobera infection. This case illustrates some important points about serology. The interpretation of flavivirus serology is complex and can be misleading, despite recent improvements. The best method of determining the cause of infection is still attempting to reconcile clinical illness details with incubation times and vector presence, as well as laboratory results. This approach ultimately justified the initial period of waiting for confirmatory results in this case, before the institution of public health measures necessary for a true case of dengue.

Citizenship, community, public space and the marginalisation of children and young people

Throughout Australia (and in comparable urban contexts around the world) public spaces may be said to be under attack by developers and also attempts by civic authorities to regulate, restrict, rebrand and reframe them. A consequence of the increasingly security driven, privatised and surveilled nature of public space is the exclusion and displacement of those considered flawed and unwelcome in the ‘spectacular’ consumption spaces of many major urban centres. In the name of urban regeneration, processes of securitisation, ‘gentrification’ and creative cities discourses can refashion public space as sites of selective inclusion and exclusion. In this context of monitoring and control procedures, children and young people’s use of space in parks, neighbourhoods, shopping malls and streets is often viewed as a threat to the social order, requiring various forms of punitive and/or remedial action. This paper discusses developments in the surveillance, governance and control of public space used by children and young people in particular and the capacity for their displacement and marginality, diminishing their sense of place and belonging, and right to public space as an expression of their civil, political and social citizenship(s).

A place in the sun : the politics of place, identity and branding

There is no doubt that place branding is a powerful and ubiquitous practice deployed around the globe. Parallel to its acceptance and development as a distinct discipline is an understanding that place branding as responsible practice offers the means to achieve widespread economic, social and cultural benefits. Drawing on work around place and identity in cultural geography and cultural studies, this paper engages critically with this vision. Specifically, it challenges the widely-held assumption that the relationship between place branding and place identity is fundamentally reflective, arguing instead that this relationship is inherently generative. This shift in perspective, explored in relation to current responsible place branding practice, is central to the realisation of place branding as a force for good.