Teachers as advocates for widening participation

In England and Australia, higher education institutions (HEIs) are expected to widen participation (WP) in higher education (HE) to enhance social justice and improve individual and national economic returns. Furthermore, HEIs are the major providers of initial and in-service teacher education. This article surveys international literature to explore ways in which teacher education programmes could and do contribute to preparing teachers to advocate for WP, including drawing on learning from WP research that demonstrates the value of current HE students engaging young people in schools and colleges to support them in seriously considering progressing to HE. We conclude that teachers and pre-service teachers are well placed to be advocates for WP. In the majority of higher education institutions, however, WP and teacher education functions are not working collaboratively to embed advocacy for WP into teacher education programmes.

Connection without caution? The role of mobile phone involvement in predicting young people’s intentions to use a mobile phone while driving

The present study examined the predictors of the intentions of young people aged between 17 and 24 years (N = 196) to use their mobile phone while driving. Using convenience sampling, drivers were recruited at petrol station travel centres to complete a cross-sectional survey. The Theory of Planned Behaviour constructs of attitude, subjective norm, and perceived behavioural control (PBC) were measured, as well as mobile phone involvement - a construct based on behavioural addiction components to reflect people’s cognitive and behavioural interaction with their mobile phone. Attitudes, PBC, and mobile phone involvement predicted young people’s intentions to use their mobile phone while driving, highlighting the need for interventions to address the perceived rewards and costs of the behaviour and to challenge the potentially powerful need to be constantly connected with others by technology irrespective of the associated dangers.

Heterosexual and nonheterosexual young university students’ involvement in traditional and cyber forms of bullying

Research has consistently found that school students who do not identify as self-declared completely heterosexual are at increased risk of victimization by bullying from peers. This study examined heterosexual and nonheterosexual university students’ involvement in both traditional and cyber forms of bullying, as either bullies or victims. Five hundred twenty-eight first-year university students (M= 19.52 years old) were surveyed about their sexual orientation and their bullying experiences over the previous 12 months. The results showed that nonheterosexual young people reported higher levels of involvement in traditional bullying, both as victims and perpetrators, in comparison to heterosexual students. In contrast, cyberbullying trends were generally found to be similar for heterosexual and nonheterosexual young people. Gender differences were also found. The implications of these results are discussed in terms of intervention and prevention of the victimization of nonheterosexual university students.

School-aged workers : industrial citizens in waiting?

While the literature points to significant shifts in young peoples’ labour market participation and the social, economic and political context in which this has occurred, it tells us little about whether and in what sense young people can be considered as industrial citizens. We explored the notion of youth citizenship using data derived from 48 focus groups conducted with 216 young people (13-16 years of age) at 19 high schools in Australia. The findings reveal the ways in which several key dimensions of industrial citizenship come to be shaped and have implications for addressing the vulnerability of youth in employment and informing policy and action.

What would it take to optimise young people’s sexual health? A conversational journey with youth workers

Marginalised young people have been consistently identified as a high risk group in relation to sexual health. This research, undertaken through the Youth Affairs Network of Queensland, seeks to explore impacts on youth workers’ ability to provide effective interventions around sexual health? What knowledge,skills, resources, value and ethics, training and support is available to youth workers? What do youth workers identify that they need and what workforce development strategies are recommended to enable the youth sector to respond more effectively? This project report provides a snapshot and introduction to the key themes raised by youth workers and other key stakeholders in Queensland Australia.

Developing guidelines for intervention to reduce risk of low-speed vehicle run-overs of young children

In Australia, research suggests that up to one quarter of child pedestrian hospitalisations result from driveway run-over incidents (Pinkney et al., 2006). In Queensland, these numbers equate to an average of four child fatalities and 81 children presenting at hospital emergency departments every year (The Commission for Children, Young People and Child Guardian). National comparison shows that these numbers represent a slightly higher per capita rate (23.5% of all deaths). To address this issue, the current research was undertaken with the aim to develop an educative intervention based on data collected from parents and caregivers of young children. Thus, the current project did not seek to use available intervention or educational material, but to develop a new evidence-based intervention specifically targeting driveway run-overs involving young children. To this end, general behavioural and environmental changes that caregivers had undertaken in order to reduce the risk of injury to any child in their care were investigated. Broadly, the first part of this report sought to: • develop a conceptual model of established domestic safety behaviours, and to investigate whether this model could be successfully applied to the driveway setting; • explore and compare sources of knowledge regarding domestic and driveway child safety; and • examine the theoretical implications of current domestic and driveway related behaviour and knowledge among caregivers. The aim of the second part of this research was to develop and test the efficacy of an intervention based on the findings in the first part of the research project. Specifically, it sought to: • develop an educational driveway intervention that is based on current safety behaviours in the domestic setting and informed by existing knowledge of driveway safety and behaviour change theory; and • evaluate its efficacy in a sample of parents and caregivers.

Regulating precarious employment : the case of young Australian retail workers

Young workers are highly susceptible to the precarities of external labour markets. They are more likely to be employed in precarious, part-time and insecure work and to lose their jobs in an economic downturn. For young people, the process of transitioning between education and employment includes periods in and out of further education and in and out of employment, and in underemployment. The underemployment of youth is the global norm (Roberts 2009). The policy orthodoxy in industrialised nations normalises these transitions as ‘natural’ and as a ‘stage’ through which young people must pass. Here, the state plays a vital role in providing both welfare support and regulatory protection for young people in precarious work and transitioning from it.

Personalised electronic messages to improve sun protection in young adults

The incidence of all skin cancers, including melanoma, continues to rise. It is well known that ultraviolet (UV) radiation is the main environmental risk factor for skin cancer, and excessive exposure at a young age increases the risk of developing skin cancer. The aim of this study was to determine the acceptability and feasibility of delivering sun protection messages via electronic media such as short message services (SMS) to people 18-40 years, and explore factors associated with their acceptability. Overall, 80% of participants agreed that they would like to receive some form of sun protection advice; of these, 20% prefer to receive it via SMS and 42% via email. Willingness to receive electronic messages about the UV index was associated with being unsure about whether a suntanned person would look healthy and greater use of sun protection in the past. Careful attention to message framing and timing of message delivery and focus on short-term effects of sun exposure such as sunburn and skin ageing should increase the acceptability of such messages to young people. We conclude that sun protection messages delivered to young adults via electronic media appear feasible and acceptable.

Reducing road related injuries for young adolescents : an investigation of truancy as a risk factor

Truancy is recognised as an indicator of engagement in high-risk behaviours for adolescents. Injuries from road related risk behaviours continue to be a leading cause of death and disability for early adolescents (13-14 years). The aim of this research is to determine the extent to which truancy relates to increased risk of road related injuries for early adolescents. Four hundred and twenty-seven Year 9 students (13-14 years) from five high schools in Queensland, Australia, completed a questionnaire about their perceptions of risk and recent injury experience. Self-reported injuries were assessed by the Extended Adolescent Injury Checklist (E-AIC). Injuries resulting from motorcycle use, bicycle use, vehicle use (as passenger or driver), and as a pedestrian were measured for the preceding three months. Students were also asked to indicate whether they sought medical attention for their injuries. Truancy rates were assessed from self-reported skipping class or wagging school over the same three month period. The findings explore the relationship between early adolescent truancy and road related injuries. The relationship between road related injuries and truancy was analysed separately for males and females. Results of this study revealed that road related injuries and reports of associated medical treatment are higher for young people who engage in truancy when compared with non-truant adolescents. The results of this study contribute knowledge about truancy as a risk factor for engagement in road related risks. The findings have the potential to enhance school policies and injury prevention programs if emphasis is placed on increasing school attendance as a safety measure to decrease road related injuries for young adolescents.

Young citizens, values and new/s media

The adaptation of market segmentation to political communication is identified here as a neglected explanation for why young people often figure in popular political debates as both the cause and symptom of declining social values and civic participation. New media also contribute to public anxiety because they enable new forms of mediated civic engagement and disrupt the capacity of transmission media to bind nations. Declining engagement with news media is used as an index of young peoples' lack of civic-mindedness but, as research surveyed and reported here shows, this trend away from orthodox news forms is apparent across all age groups, not just youth. This article makes the case for public debate, informed by research that addresses the substantive problems of transforming democracy.

Paranoid prizing : mapping Australia’s Eve Pownall Award for information books, 2001-2010

Each year, the Children’s Book Council of Australia (CBCA) administers a number of Book of the Year Awards, including the Eve Pownall Award for Information Books. The books chosen by the CBCA constitute a contemporary canon of Australian children’s literature, and serve to both shape and reflect current educational policies and practices as well as young Australians’ sense of themselves and their nation. This paper reads a selection of award-winning Australian non-fiction children’s literature in the context of colonialism, curriculum, military myths, and Aboriginal perspectives on national history and identity.

Heritage language for young Chinese Australian adults in urban Australia : Capital and habitus in fields

Studies of Heritage Language learners‟ commitment and their ethnic identity are increasing, yet there is scant sociological research addressing topics relating to Chinese Heritage Language learners. Drawing on Bourdieu‟s signature notions of „habitus‟, „capital‟, and „field‟, this mixed methods study investigates two problems: (1) impacts of “Chineseness” and accessible resources on Chinese Heritage Language proficiency of young Chinese Australian adults in urban Australia; and (2) the meanings of Chinese Heritage Language to these young people.

Disproportionate over-representation of Indigenous students in New South Wales government special schools

A significant gap exists in the Australian research literature on the disproportionate over-representation of minority groups in special education. The aim of this paper is to make a contribution to the research evidence-base by sketching an outline of the issue as it presents in Australia’s largest education system in the state of New South Wales. Findings from this research show that Indigenous students are equally represented in special schools enrolling students with autism, physical, sensory, and intellectual disabilities, but significantly over-represented in special schools enrolling students under the categories of emotional disturbance, behaviour disorder and juvenile detention. Factors that might influence the disproportionate over-representation of Indigenous children and young people are discussed, and based on these observations, some practical implications for policy and practice are provided.

Exploring representations of Asian identities in films for the Australian Curriculum

In this paper we focus on one facet of Asia literacy and examine the potential of intercultural understanding through two films about Asians in Australia, as the basis for exploring Asia and Australia’s engagement with Asia 'inside' and not through the more accepted mode of 'outside' the nation. In doing so we foreground how teachers’ critical and imaginative curriculum work can realise some of the promises of the framing document for the current national curriculum project, the Melbourne Declaration (MCEECDYA, 2008). In particular, we focus on opportunities for young people to develop an Asia-related cultural literacy that goes beyond instrumental notions of engagement with Asia and explore the evolving nature of contemporary Australian society; a society that continues to develop in response to regional flows and interactions with people and cultures. To this end we engage with the notion of “diasporic hybridity” as a dynamic cultural space through selected films and literature, about Asia in Australia, in particular, Bondi Tsunami (Lucas, 2004) and Footy Legends (Do, 2006) and selected prose works. Our paper introduces the policy background of the Australian Curriculum and suggests multimodal, English classroom applications for the films and literature under study.

Social and mobile interaction design to increase the loyalty rates of young blood donors

Young adults represent the largest group of first time donors to the Australian Red Cross Blood Service, but they are also the least loyal group and often do not return after their first donation. At the same time, many young people use the internet and various forms of social media on a daily basis. Web and mobile based technological practices and communication patterns change the way that young people interact with one another, with their families, and communities. Combining these two points of departure, this study seeks to identify best practices of employing mobile apps and social media in order to enhance the loyalty rates of young blood donors. The findings reported in this paper are based on a qualitative approach presenting a nuanced understanding of the different factors that motivate young people to donate blood in the first place, as well as the obstacles or issues that prevent them from returning. The paper discusses work in progress with a view to inform the development of interactive prototypes trialling three categories of features: personal services (such as scheduling); social media (such as sharing the donation experience with friends to raise awareness); and data visualisations (such as local blood inventory levels). We discuss our translation of research findings into design implications.