Reflections from early career graduates of the exceptional teachers for disadvantaged schools project

This paper aims to explore the experiences of newly qualified teachers and their supervising principals who work in schools situated in various high-poverty areas of Queensland, Australia. It is informed by data collected in the context of an Australian teacher education program, Exceptional Teachers for Disadvantaged Schools (ETDS). Now in its third year, this program was designed to prepare highly skilled pre-service teachers to work in schools that have large numbers of students from disadvantaged or low socio-economic status (SES) backgrounds. Addressing the oft-stated need to prepare high-quality teachers for low SES schools, high-achieving undergraduate education students were invited to participate in two years of specialised curriculum to prepare them for the schools that need them the most, which are also the schools that are often difficult to staff. Pre-service teachers in this program do all their teaching practicum placements in challenging or complex schools. In 2011, some of this cohort did their practicum teaching in schools with large numbers of Indigenous students and several went on to teach in remote communities after graduation. These graduates and the leaders of the schools they work in are the primary informants for this paper.

Taboo Texts and Troubling Silences: How Textual Choices Coconstruct a Positive School Climate for Same-Sex- Attracted Students

This paper offers insights into the relationship between curriculum decision making, positive school climate, and academic achievement for same-sex attracted (SSA) students. The authors use critical discourse analysis to present a ‘conversation’ between six same-sex attracted young people, aged 14-19, and three pop-culture texts currently popular with both teachers and school-aged peers: The Hunger Games, Tomorrow When the War Began, and Neighbours. Analysis starts from the perspective that schools are empowered agents in the production of students’ sexualised identities and seeks to understand how textual choices function as active discourse in that production. Through this analysis, an argument is made for expanding notions of what it means to ‘attend to’ gender and sexuality through textual choice and critical pedagogy.

Associations between physical activity and other health behaviors in a representative sample of US adolescents

OBJECTIVES This study examined the associations between physical activity and other health behaviors in a representative sample of US adolescents. METHODS In the 1990 Youth Risk Behavior Survey, 11631 high school students provided information on physical activity; diet; substance use; and other negative health behaviors. Logistic regression analyses examined associations between physical activity and other health behaviors in a subset of 2652 high-active and 1641 low-active students. RESULTS Low activity was associated with cigarette smoking, marijuana use, lower fruit and vegetable consumption, greater television watching, failure to wear a seat belt, and low perception of academic performance. For consumption of fruit, television watching, and alcohol consumption, significant interactions were found with race/ethnicity or sex, suggesting that sociocultural factors may affect the relationships between physical activity and some health behaviors. CONCLUSIONS Low physical activity was associated with several other negative health behaviors in teenagers. Future studies should examine whether interventions for increasing physical activity in youth can be effective in reducing negative health behaviors.

Teacher education targeting high-poverty schools : the National Exceptional Teachers for Disadvantaged Schools program

This paper examines the Exceptional Teachers for Disadvantaged Schools (ETDS) program and demonstrates how the outcomes from this teacher education model targeting high-poverty schools have been used to expand the model across other Australian universities. The paper outlines the parameters of ETDS and stresses the importance to the program of academic excellence, a modified teacher education curriculum, targeted practicums and a network of jurisdictional and school-based partnerships. The paper presents data from ETDS that demonstrates 90% of graduates have secured employed as teachers within high-poverty Australian schools. The paper concludes by outlining the impact of philanthropic funding (2 million dollars AUD) that will allow the expansion of the ETDS model into other teacher education universities across Australia.

Development and validation of the ankle fracture outcome of rehabilitation measure (A-FORM)

Study Design Delphi panel and cohort study. Objective To develop and refine a condition-specific, patient-reported outcome measure, the Ankle Fracture Outcome of Rehabilitation Measure (A-FORM), and to examine its psychometric properties, including factor structure, reliability, and validity, by assessing item fit with the Rasch model. Background To our knowledge, there is no patient-reported outcome measure specific to ankle fracture with a robust content foundation. Methods A 2-stage research design was implemented. First, a Delphi panel that included patients and health professionals developed the items and refined the item wording. Second, a cohort study (n = 45) with 2 assessment points was conducted to permit preliminary maximum-likelihood exploratory factor analysis and Rasch analysis. Results The Delphi panel reached consensus on 53 potential items that were carried forward to the cohort phase. From the 2 time points, 81 questionnaires were completed and analyzed; 38 potential items were eliminated on account of greater than 10% missing data, factor loadings, and uniqueness. The 15 unidimensional items retained in the scale demonstrated appropriate person and item reliability after (and before) removal of 1 item (anxious about footwear) that had a higher-than-ideal outfit statistic (1.75). The “anxious about footwear” item was retained in the instrument, but only the 14 items with acceptable infit and outfit statistics (range, 0.5–1.5) were included in the summary score. Conclusion This investigation developed and refined the A-FORM (Version 1.0). The A-FORM items demonstrated favorable psychometric properties and are suitable for conversion to a single summary score. Further studies utilizing the A-FORM instrument are warranted. J Orthop Sports Phys Ther 2014;44(7):488–499. Epub 22 May 2014. doi:10.2519/jospt.2014.4980

Pressure distribution beneath the human foot

A descriptive study was undertaken to establish the 95 percentile limits (proposed normal reference range) for pressure beneath the hallux, metatarsal heads, and heel in a group of healthy adult subjects. A new force plate device capable of accurately measuring discrete areas of pressure beneath the human foot with high temporal and spatial resolution was used. The system is capable of accurately measuring plantar foot pressure during dynamic and static foot function. The results of this research are in close agreement with other published studies of plantar foot pressure measurement with comparable systems.

Revisiting borehole stresses in anisotropic elastic media : comparison of analytical versus numerical solutions

We present a rigorous validation of the analyticalAmadei solution for the stress concentration around arbitrarily orientated borehole in general anisotropic elastic media. First, we revisit the theoretical framework of the Amadei solution and present analytical insights that show that the solution does indeed contain all special cases of symmetry, contrary to previous understanding, provided that the reduced strain coefficients β11 and β55 are not equal. It is shown from theoretical considerations and published experimental data that the β11 and β55 are not equal for realistic rocks. Second, we develop a 3D finite-element elastic model within a hybrid analyticalnumerical workflow that circumvents the need to rebuild and remesh the model for every borehole and material orientation. Third, we show that the borehole stresses computed from the numerical model and the analytical solution match almost perfectly for different borehole orientations (vertical, deviated and horizontal) and for several cases involving isotropic and transverse isotropic symmetries. It is concluded that the analytical Amadei solution is valid with no restrictions on the borehole orientation or elastic anisotropy symmetry.

Lead the change series: Q & A with Allan Luke

An overview of current issues in school and system reform.

“Heroic victims”: Discursive constructions of early childhood teacher professional identities

Significant changes to qualification requirements for staff working in early childhood contexts are occurring globally. A key reform in Australia is a call for teachers in prior to school early childhood contexts to be university-qualified. The “universal access” strategy (Department of Education, Employment of Workplace Relations [DEEWR], 2009a, 2009b; Rudd & Macklin, 2007b) requires four-year qualified early childhood teachers who are prepared to work in child care contexts. Yet studies in identify that cohorts of preservice teachers resist child care as a career option (see Ailwood & Boyd, 2006; Gibson, 2013a; Vadja, 2005a, 2005b). It is this point of tension that has prompted further inquiry into child care and work in child care, and forms the basis for this paper.

Literacy, place, and pedagogies of possibility: Working against residualization effects and deficit discourses in poor school communities

Australia has a long history of policy attention to the education of poor and working-class youth (Connell, 1994), yet currently on standardized educational outcomes measures the gaps are widening in ways that relate to social background, including race, location and class. An economic analysis of school choice in Australia reveals that a high proportion of government school students now come from lower Socio-Economic Status (SES) backgrounds (Ryan & Watson, 2004), indicating a trend towards a gradual residualisation of the poor in government schools, with increased private school enrolments as a confirmed national trend. The spatial distribution of poverty and the effects on school populations are not unique to Australia (Lupton, 2003; Lipman, 2011; Ryan, 2010). Raffo and colleagues (2010) recently provided a synthesis of socially critical approaches towards schooling and poverty arguing that what is needed are shifts in the balances of power to reposition those within the educational system as having some say in the ways schooling is organized. ‘Disadvantaged’ primary schools are not a marginal concern for education systems, but now account for a large and growing number of schools that serve an ever increasing population being made redundant, in part-time precarious work, under-employed or unemployed (Thomson 2002; Smyth, Down et al 2010). In Australia, the notion of the ‘disadvantaged’ school now refers to those, mostly public schools, being residualised by a politics of parental choice that drives neoliberalising policy logic (Bonner & Caro 2007; Hattam & Comber, forthcoming 2014; Thomson & Reid, 2003)...

"Doing” social justice in early childhood: The potential of leadership

Early childhood education and care (ECEC) has long been connected with objectives related to social justice. ECEC in Australia has its roots in philanthropic and educational reform movements, and more recently with the National Early Childhood Reform Agenda, ECEC has once more been linked to the redressing inequality and disadvantage. Drawing on extant literature, including data from two previously reported Australian studies in which leadership emerged as having a transformational impact on service delivery, this paper examines the potential of early childhood leadership to generate ‘socially just’ educational communities. With reference to critical theory, we argue that critically informed, intentional and strategic organisational leadership can play a pivotal role in creating changed circumstances and opportunities for children and families.

A randomized controlled trial of a program to reduce adolescent road-related medically-treated injuries

Background Injury is the leading cause of adolescent death and injury around the road is a common source of adolescent injuries. Skills for Preventing Injury in Youth (SPIY) is a comprehensive program developed in Australia for early adolescents (term-long curriculum, including looking out for friends, first-aid training coupled with teacher school-connectedness professional development). Jessors’ Protection-Risk Framework guided the program approach focusing on building protective relationships. Method A randomized controlled trial with 35 schools was undertaken. Students completed surveys at baseline, six-months post-intervention and twelve-months post intervention. There were 1686 students (56% female) who completed the twelve-month survey, including the Extended-Adolescent Injury Checklist whereby students self-report on medically-treated injuries over the previous three-months (only road-related items are reported in this study; cycling, motorcycle riding, pedestrian, and riding as a passenger). Randomly selected SPIY classes also participated in focus groups and reported on perceptions of SPIY and injury risk behavior. Results As a check of randomization baseline differences of the variables were examined, with no significant differences between intervention and control groups. At the 12-month follow-up, there were fewer medically-treated injuries among the intervention students compared with the control group, particularly associated with being a passenger. The process evaluation revealed students perceived change in injury risk and risk behaviors. Conclusions While data analyses are continuing, the results indicate that the program seeking to encourage adolescents to look out for their friends, build connections to school and provide first aid skills training goes some way to reducing self-reported medically-treated injuries around the road.