Search

This article explores how artist-researchers navigate the "uncertain" space between theory and practice in a new Doctor of Creative Arts (DCA) program in an Australian regional university. The trickster is deployed as a metaphorical device to provide insights into how the first DCA's candidates, their supervisors, and the university's leadership make sense of their own experiences "within" and "about" the practice-led research program under a neoliberal climate. Tricksters' cross boundaries between critical and imaginary spaces; yet they also "create" boundaries, by extending collective knowledge into the unknown. This process is entirely consistent with the critical and creative work required by doctoral candidates to produce innovative research. Narrative inquiry is applied in accordance with the artist-trickster's subjective agency within practice-led doctoral study. The article charts the DCA's emerging identity as a doctoral qualification equal to the traditional PhD but different from it, during its implementation in 2016 to the first successful completion in 2019. The findings reveal the benefits of the program's innovative design, grounded in the creation of its distinctive community of practice that supports practice-led research, local and international connections, and regional resilience.

Male teachers are a minority in both primary teacher training courses and in primary schools around the world. Education research has identified numerous gender-related challenges faced by male primary teachers during their initial teacher training and later when teaching in schools. Despite noting that many males leave teacher training because of these challenges, researchers have spent much less time investigating strategies to assist men cope with them and persist in the profession. This paper aims to help address this gap through an investigation of the challenges pre-service male primary teachers face during their teacher training and identifying practical coping strategies. Findings revealed that the most difficult challenges faced by participants were those concerning physical contact and social isolation. Participants appeared to use a range of functional and dysfunctional coping strategies to deal with these challenges.

Effective assessment design and subsequent assessment practices are essential for student success in the higher education sector. A plethora of research on assessment in higher education exists which tends to focus primarily on the student experience. This paper shares results from a 3 phased study that explored staff perceptions related to assessment practices in an undergraduate Initial Teacher Education program within an Australian metropolitan university. First, course learning objectives, activities and assessment items were mapped to identify the presence of constructive alignment. Second, staff were invited to complete a survey and a follow-up interview in relation to understanding of assessment knowledge and skills. Fink's Taxonomy of Significant Learning (2013) was used to analyse the qualitative data and findings suggest that staff are highly committed to quality assessment practices but often work in silos rather than teams. Additionally, a lack of professional development and learning was available at the school level, particularly for casual staff. Further research about assessment practices in higher education in relation to staff rather than student experience is warranted.

In the years either side of Federation in 1901, Australia's Irish Catholics balanced two often contradictory impulses: their determination to retain their cultural and religious links with Ireland in the face of an often unsympathetic Protestant majority, and the desire to become 'good' Australians in order to make 'a go' of their lives in the new land. This paper explores how this process played out at St Joseph's Nudgee College, a Christian Brothers' day and boarding school in Brisbane, the capital of the Australian state of Queensland, and how sport played a central role in satisfying both imperatives. This discussion will be framed by the intersection of the social/political/economic context of Queensland during the period 1891-1914. It will focus on the educational context in which the Irish Christian Brothers operated as they struggled to make the College a bastion of Irish Catholicism and a vehicle for the socio-economic advancement of their community.

Young children often look to their teachers for affection and acceptance, particularly if they are injured or upset. Yet, many male primary teachers experience substantial fear and uncertainty about making physical contact with their students. This study used 53 open ended survey responses and semi-structured interviews with five experienced male primary teachers in Tasmania, Australia to investigate the coping strategies and supports these men use to deal with this challenge. Findings revealed a variety of coping strategies and supports, and that the fear and uncertainty surrounding physical contact and false accusations needs to be reduced if more male primary teachers are to feel confident interacting with their students in the same ways their female colleagues do.

This paper explores the role of the Senior Project Officer: The Arts for the Australian Curriculum Assessment Reporting Authority (ACARA) in facilitating the writing of the foundation "Shape of the Australian Curriculum: The Arts" (2011) paper for the national curriculum, with a particular focus on the discipline area of music. The collaboration between the five arts specialists was underpinned by an acknowledgement that each Australian student was entitled to a high-quality arts education involving each of the five arts forms of Dance, Drama, Media Arts, Music and Visual Arts. As it was for the other arts forms, the music curriculum needed to cater simultaneously for music specialists, primary generalist teachers and secondary teachers across a variety of school contexts. This balancing act was further problematised by that fact that each of the States and Territories adhered to particular approaches to music education that were often incompatible. The researchers have used a Collaborative Autoethnography approach (CAE) to explore the Senior Project Officer's experiences with the arts, particularly music at school, and her later involvement in the arts through her professional career with a focus on the role of the Senior Project Officer: The Arts. Two major themes emerged from the CAE: the impact of schooling experiences and diversity in pedagogical approaches. These themes highlighted the social justice principles of equity and accessibility which underpin the "Australian Curriculum: The Arts."

This paper examines the personal and professional experiences of the five arts leaders who co-wrote the foundation document for Australia's first national curriculum in the Arts. Their personal and professional backgrounds, which were explored during in depth interviews, drove the complex collaborative process that informed the first iteration of the "Australian Curriculum: The Arts." Though each couched their responses in the context of their background and arts discipline, they shared an awareness of the important role of the Arts in providing the analytical tools for children and young people to identify and subsequently challenge social injustice. The findings, which are presented as a group narrative using a Narrative Inquiry approach, reveal how the five arts leaders' individual lived experience, disciplinary experience and expertise, and commitment to collaborative leadership informed their approach. It was one driven by their shared belief that all Australian students, regardless of their background, are entitled to a quality arts education.

This paper will explore the key findings identified in the five arts discipline-specific papers which comprise this special theme issue. Each of the participant researchers have situated Dance, Drama, Media Arts, Music and Visual Arts within the context of the "Australian Curriculum: The Arts" and what they characterise as its social justice imperatives. A narrative phenomenological approach has been adopted to enable the participant researchers to socially co-construct an analysis of their experiences working with the "Australian Curriculum: The Arts" including challenges, implications and the future for their respective discipline areas and the Arts overall. The three key themes from these collective voices revealed a quality arts education is an entitlement for every child and young person; the Arts provide important opportunities for children and young people from diverse backgrounds and cultures to demonstrate their learning, express themselves and participate; and arts educators and the Arts industry need to work together to strengthen community understanding about the value of the Arts in education. This process provided important insights into how exposure and engagement with the Arts shape the ways in which children and young people make meaning in their lives, enhance their overall wellbeing, increase their sense of social responsibility and contribute to a socially-just society.

This article explores the experience of three research teams operating across a variety of educational contexts. As members of these teams, the authors were privy to a range of opportunities and challenges that emphasised how political collaboration can be, even when the team formation is an outgrowth of previous personal and professional relationships. There are a range of inhibitors and enablers that impact on the success of a collaborative team, which can be further exacerbated by increasingly performative requirements and expectations in the university sector. In response, university academics seek collaborative opportunities in order to enhance research productivity and to establish networks capable of attracting competitive grant funding. However, little attention has been given to the experiences, attitudes and values of research team members, particularly those undertaking leadership responsibilities. Using the premise of Hitchcock's (Strangers on a train [Motion picture], Warner Brothers, Hollywood, 1951) film noir "Strangers on a Train" as a metaphoric device, three collaborative teams are investigated using a narrative approach. The narrative account draws upon the authors' reflections of their participation in the teams which are fused in a single imaginative vignette in order to identify the key factors that contributed to the success or demise of the teams. The findings revealed the critical importance of established relationships, clear vision and communication, and institutional rewards.

Over the past two decades children's picture books dealing with the Australian experience during the First World War have sought to balance a number of thematic imperatives. The increasingly sentimentalised construct of the Australian soldier as a victim of trauma, the challenge of providing a moral lesson that reflects both modern ideological assumptions and the historical record, and the traditional use of Australian war literature as an exercise in nation building have all exerted an influence on the literary output of a range of authors and illustrators. The number of publications over this period is proof of the enduring fascination with war as a topic as well as the widespread acceptance that this conflict has been profoundly significant in shaping Australian public and political culture and perceptions about national character and identity (Beaumont, 1995, p. xvii). As MacCallum-Stewart (2007, p. 177) argues, authors and illustrators must therefore balance notions of 'respect' for a national foundation myth with a 'pity of war' approach that reflects modern attitudes to conflict. Whatever their ideological commitment, many authors and illustrators respond to this challenge by adopting an approach that serves to indoctrinate readers into the Anzac tradition (Anzac refers to the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps raised for war in 1914. It has become a generic term for Australian and New Zealand soldiers. The Anzac tradition established at Gallipoli, Australia's first major military campaign, has been traditionally viewed as the nation's founding moment.).

This article explores the development and implementation of a new Doctor of Creative Arts program in a regional university. The experiences of key leadership staff and Doctor of Creative Arts candidates enrolled in the foundation year of the program are contextualised within the current landscape of practice-based arts research in the higher education sector. The process was shaped by the tension between financial imperatives and the possibilities, ambiguity and ambivalence inherent in the arts. The implementation of the Doctor of Creative Arts in 2016, the Chinese Year of the Fire Monkey with its emphasis on intelligent, flexible and creative leadership, was one that offered the most relevant metaphorical framework within which the challenges were best articulated and explored. The findings revealed significant institutional awareness of the new program's potential to facilitate innovative, creative and traditional research outputs, the importance of communicating the value of creative practice-led research for artists and the university, and leadership and support throughout planning and implementation.