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Objective: To assess differences between traditional paper bag ordering and online ordering from primary school canteens in terms of menu, usage and lunch order characteristics.Design: A cross-sectional study.Setting: New South Wales (NSW) primary schools that offered both paper bag and online canteen ordering.Participants: Students (aged 5-12 years) with a lunch order on the day of the observation.Results: Across the six school canteens, 59-90 % of all available items were listed on both the online and paper menus, with no significant differences in the nutritional quality ('Everyday'/'Occasional') or nutritional content (kJ/saturated fat/sugar/sodium) of menu items. In total, 387 student lunch orders were placed, containing 776 menu items. Most orders (68 %) were placed online. There were no significant differences between order modality in the quantity of items ordered or the cost of orders, or the nutritional quality of orders based on the classification system of the NSW Healthy School Canteen Strategy ('Everyday'/'Occasional'). However, nutritional analysis revealed that paper bag orders contained 222 fewer kJ than online orders (P = 0·001), 0·65 g less saturated fat (P = 0·04) and 4·7 g less sugar (P < 0·001).Conclusions: Online canteens are commonly used to order canteen lunches for primary school children. This is the first study to investigate differences between traditional paper bag ordering and online ordering in this setting. Given the rapid increase in the use of online ordering systems in schools and other food settings and their potential to deliver public health nutrition interventions, additional research is warranted to further investigate differences in ordering modalities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Heritage visualizations are works of the cultural imaginary and this paper examines the artwork Artistic License: VR Sydney Cove circa 1800, which foregrounds the interpretive nature of heritage visualization. It is a reimagining in VR of A View of Sydney Cove, New South Wales, 1804, a contemporaneous print of Sydney Cove. Existing in the liminal space between accuracy and authenticity it is both art object and heritage visualization. The dual nature of this work supports engagement with wider audiences, fostering and broadening debate at individual, institutional, academic and societal levels about the nature and role of heritage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: To provide the first document map of sustainability and decarbonisation actions across the Australian healthcare sector, as reported in publicly available documents online, and to identify gaps in actions. Methods: Healthcare providers were identified across all state and territories. Structured Google searches between August and December 2022 were followed by document searches. Updates were undertaken, most recently in December 2023. Targeted documents included position statements, strategies, and reports. Key points from these documents pertaining to sustainability and/or decarbonisation were extracted and descriptively analysed. Results: A total of 294 documents were included, mostly focused on power generation, transport, building design, and circular procurement/waste pathways. In contrast, relatively few plans for decarbonisation of clinical care were identified (n = 42). National and two state governments (New South Wales, Western Australia) have established healthcare sustainability and decarbonisation units, and two further states have publicly committed to doing so (Queensland, Tasmania). However, these documents generally reported separate, siloed actions. While attempts were made to make this review comprehensive, some documents may have been missed or are only available inside an organisation, and new actions will continue to emerge. Conclusion: Broad sustainability plans have been developed by many healthcare providers; however, to achieve net zero, decarbonising of clinical practices is also needed, and this is where the least action is currently occurring. To decarbonise clinical care, the sector needs to come together in a more coordinated way. What is known about the topic? Little is known about what actions are occurring to make healthcare more sustainable and to reduce the carbon footprint of healthcare in Australia. What does this paper add? This paper provides a snapshot of publicly available documents from healthcare providers and professional organisations as they relate to healthcare sustainability and helps reveal the gaps and siloed nature of current actions. What are the implications for practitioners? This paper can help jurisdictions identify gaps or areas for improvement and may aid in targeted and coordinated interventions, especially as they relate to decarbonised clinical care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: To describe the implementation of a trauma‐informed model of care in the Post COVID Respiratory Clinic of a large tertiary referral centre in NSW. Design: Discussion paper. Data Sources: Evidence gathered from a literature search (2008–2022) was used to develop a framework for management of patients presenting to this Post COVID Respiratory Clinic. This paper outlines the personal reflections of the clinic staff as they developed and implemented this framework. Ethical approval was obtained to report the data collected from patient reviews. Discussion: The literature highlights the high prevalence of trauma in patients following COVID‐19 infection, as well as the larger population both during and after the pandemic. This experience of trauma was observed in patients seen within the clinic, indicating a need for specialized care. In response, a trauma‐informed model of care was implemented. Conclusion: Reconceptualizing COVID‐19 as a 'collective trauma' can help healthcare workers understand the needs of post‐COVID patients and enable them to respond empathetically. A trauma‐informed model is complementary to this cohort as it specifically addresses vulnerable populations, many of whom have been further marginalized by the pandemic. Implications for Nursing and Patient Care: Frontline healthcare workers, particularly nurses, are well positioned to implement trauma‐informed care due to their high‐level of patient contact. Adequate allocation of resources and investment in staff is essential to ensure such care can be provided. Impact: The COVID‐19 pandemic has led to adverse physical and mental health outcomes for many.Trauma‐informed care is a way to promote reengagement with the healthcare system in this group.Post COVID patients globally may benefit from this approach, as it aims to build trust and independence. Patient or Public Contribution: Feedback was sought from a patient representative to ensure this paper adequately reflected the experience of the post‐COVID patient. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2018, the World Health Organization set a goal to increase the proportion of breast cancers identified at an early stage. Early detection allows for more effective treatment and a reduction in the risk of death from breast cancer. Poor access may restrict participation in screening, diagnostic and treatment services, with flow-on effects on stage at diagnosis and survival. This paper presents spatial analysis of travel time to breast screening services in New South Wales, Australia to measure the geographic accessibility of services to the population they serve. The travel time surface was created using a friction surface that estimates the time required to traverse each pixel within a global grid, and a least cost path algorithm to find the optimised route from each output pixel to the breast screen services. The friction surface was derived using a set of input layers, with the roads layer being the most critical for defining travel times. The generated surface of travel time to breast screen services in New South Wales has shown that over 90% of the population are within 20 min' drive time of either a fixed or mobile breast screen service and that 100% of the population are within 100 min' drive time of a breast screen service. The ability to identify and measure spatial variations in geographic accessibility via travel time is vital to plan breast screening services and reduce inequalities in health outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aiming at the problems of high stochasticity and volatility of power loads as well as the difficulty of accurate load forecasting, this paper proposes a power load forecasting method based on CEEMDAN (Completely Integrated Empirical Modal Decomposition) and TCN-LSTM (Temporal Convolutional Networks and Long-Short-Term Memory Networks). The method combines the decomposition of raw load data by CEEMDAN and the spatio-temporal modeling capability of TCN-LSTM model, aiming to improve the accuracy and stability of forecasting. First, the raw load data are decomposed into multiple linearly stable subsequences by CEEMDAN, and then the sample entropy is introduced to reorganize each subsequence. Then the reorganized sequences are used as inputs to the TCN-LSTM model to extract sequence features and perform training and prediction. The modeling prediction is carried out by selecting the electricity compliance data of New South Wales, Australia, and compared with the traditional prediction methods. The experimental results show that the algorithm proposed in this paper has higher accuracy and better prediction effect on load forecasting, which can provide a partial reference for electricity load forecasting methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: This study aimed to evaluate patient outcomes from a 12-month pilot program establishing specialist surgical services in a small rural (Modified Monash Model, MM4) hospital on the south coast of NSW. Methods: Suitable patients for ambulatory surgery were selected based on strict anaesthetic, surgical and social criteria. Skills shortfalls among nursing staff, usually with emergency or inpatient experience, were addressed by appropriate re-training and in-service training in scrub, scout and anaesthetic duties. An anonymous post-operative patient survey was administered during the pilot program, which assessed patient experiences and outcomes. Of 162 patients undergoing surgery during the pilot, 50 consecutive participants completed the survey. Results: Of the 161 procedures during the pilot program, 100 were performed under sedation and locoregional anaesthesia and 62 under general anaesthesia. Half (n = 86, 53.4%) were complex excisions of malignant skin lesions, and of these 63% also required either a skin graft or local flap repair. Survey respondents reported adequate information and pain relief upon discharge (n = 45, 96%) and 100% were satisfied with the care received. No respondents needed to see a doctor following discharge. There were no mortality events or major issues of morbidity during the study period or subsequently, no further overnight admissions or return to theatre and no re-presentations within 48 h of operating. Two superficial surgical site infections were reported. Conclusions: There is merit in drawing on underutilised resources in small rural hospitals in support of initiatives to reduce surgical waitlists. Appropriate outpatient surgeries can be safely performed with high levels of patient satisfaction. What is known about the topic? Waitlist reduction strategies are required to deal with long surgical waitlists. Rural surgical services are declining due to centralisation of these services in larger hospitals. What does this paper add? Significant positive benefits arise from providing an ambulatory, rural surgical service. This paper provides an evidence base for rural hospitals to explore the benefits of re-activating, or increasing utilisation of, existing operating theatre facilities. What are the implications for practitioners? Significant reductions in surgical waitlists within health services can be safely achieved by servicing rural patients at their local hospital for some ambulatory procedures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: HealthPathways is a web-based platform designed for use during a consultation to offer health professionals locally agreed information to support clinical and referral decision making. This study aimed to investigate whether access to specific HealthPathways pages in the North Coast New South Wales (NSW) region increased during specific critical events. High pageviews is used as a proxy for platform usefulness, and/or trust as a source of up-to-date information. Methods: Data were extracted from Google Analytics from December 2015 to December 2021. Descriptive statistics were generated for the total number of pageviews for all pages by month and year (2015–2021); for the top 15 most viewed pages in 2019, February–March 2020 inclusive (early COVID-19 pandemic period), 10–24 March 2021 (North Coast NSW region local disaster declaration period) and 26 June–11 October 2021 (NSW COVID-19 lockdown period); and for monthly pageviews for the Influenza Immunisation pathway (2016–2021). Results: Access to specific pages in HealthPathways increased alongside the occurrence of critical events affecting the region. Spikes in access to specific pages were seen during COVID-19 lockdown periods, during natural disasters, as well as during the annual influenza season. Conclusions: HealthPathways is viewed as a useful and trusted source of information for health professionals in the North Coast NSW region. HealthPathways provides an opportunity for timely dissemination of information during critical events, including natural disasters and emergencies. What is known about the topic? Evidence from New Zealand suggests that HealthPathways is viewed as a useful and trusted source of information by health professionals during critical and emergency events, and when information needs are subject to frequent change. What does this paper add? This paper provides evidence in the Australian context that health professionals access specific pages in HealthPathways at higher rates during critical and emergency events. What are the implications for practitioners? HealthPathways has the capacity to provide timely and accurate information to health professionals during critical and emergency events, as well as to identify their emerging information needs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Upper Hunter Valley is a major coal mining area in New South Wales (NSW), Australia. Due to the ongoing increase in mining activities, PM10 (air-borne particles with an aerodynamic diameter less than 10 micrometres) pollution has become a major air quality concern in local communities. The present study was initiated to quantitatively examine the spatial and temporal variability of PM10 pollution in the region. An earlier paper of this study identified two air quality subregions in the valley. This paper aims to provide a holistic summarisation of the relationships between elevated PM10 pollution in two subregions and the local- and synoptic-scale meteorological conditions for spring and summer, when PM10 pollution is relatively high. A catalogue of twelve synoptic types and a set of six local meteorological patterns were quantitatively derived and linked to each other using the self-organising map (SOM) technique. The complex meteorology–air pollution relationships were visualised and interpreted on the SOM planes for two representative locations. It was found that the influence of local meteorological patterns differed significantly for mean PM10 levels vs. the occurrence of elevated pollution events and between air quality subregions. In contrast, synoptic types showed generally similar relationships with mean vs. elevated PM10 pollution in the valley. Two local meteorological patterns, the hot–dry–northwesterly wind conditions and the hot–dry–calm conditions, were found to be the most PM10 pollution conducive in the valley when combined with a set of synoptic counterparts. These synoptic types are featured with the influence of an eastward migrating continental high-pressure system and westerly troughs, or a ridge extending northwest towards coastal northern NSW or southern Queensland from the Tasman Sea. The method and results can be used in air quality research for other locations of NSW, or similar regions elsewhere. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a trending mobility choice, e-scooters have become popular in many cities. A number of authorities have initiated shared e-scooter trial schemes to assess the feasibility of the vehicles prior to enacting official legalisation. This paper aims to provide an evidence review of shared e-scooters and investigate how existing evidence may inform long-term policies. This carries significant relevance for jurisdictions that are in a conflicting position with e-scooters, such as New South Wales (NSW), Australia whose context motivates this study. The evidence review focuses on three themes derived from experience with shared e-scooters within the broader micromobility landscape, namely: safety; where shared e-scooters fit into the modal landscape; and the environmental impacts. Findings confirm that ensuring the safety of shared e-scooters requires complex solutions, which may include a clear regulatory framework for e-scooters, safety education and skill training, innovative data collection and analysis methods, and an approach to safety management that is user-based, location-based, and time-based. In terms of modal fit policymakers should encourage first and last-mile combinations with public transport, with consideration of user characteristics; while climate impact is strongly correlated to the mode replaced by e-scooter trips. The paper provides insights for policymakers on the regulation and positioning of shared e-scooters. • Many jurisdictions are struggling to determine policies for e-scooters. • Existing e-scooter evidence sheds light on possible long-term policies. • Safety management should consider different users, locations, and times. • First and last-mile combinations with public transport should be encouraged. • Climate impact is strongly correlated to the mode replaced by e-scooter trips. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses embodied geographies of power assisted devices (powered wheelchairs and motorised scooters) for disabled people in Australia to augment understandings of mobile disability politics. Deleuze and Guattari's notion of 'lines' is used to reimagine spatial thinking about mobile disability politics. Disability in this paper is understood as an emplaced, emergent, relational and embodied process that arises in the interaction between ideas, materials and bodies. A focus on the shifting affective capacities of everyday journeys can deepen an understanding of mobile disability politics through attention to sensations. To illustrate the notion of lines we draw on three 'portraits' from a qualitative project on power assisted devices in Ballina Shire, New South Wales, Australia. Each portrait provides an illustration of how mobility experiences of power assisted devices may reinforce and/or challenge normative ideologies and identities, alongside deepening understandings of how ideas and materials come together to produce enabling and/or exclusionary arrangements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: The causal effect of successive population-wide lockdowns in response to increased COVID-19 cases on mental health has yet to be examined using robust methods. A natural experiment design underpinned by objective data can improve our understanding surrounding the definitive impact of social distancing restrictions. Methods: The study employed a natural experiment design underpinned by objective data. Health service cost for visits to general practitioners and psychologists and medication dispensing costs served as objective measures of mental health. Difference-in-difference (DID) estimators, which in this study quantify differences in spending changes between groups over time, were produced based on three comparisons: Victoria 2020 lockdown comparison, Victoria 2021 lockdown comparison, and New South Wales (NSW) 2021 lockdown comparison. Specifically, differences in public health service spending during lockdown periods and the same timeframe in 2019 for Victoria and NSW, and control groups (remaining states and territories), were compared. Results: Positive estimator values indicate that public health service spending for Victoria and NSW increased more during lockdown periods compared to control states and territories. The Victorian lockdowns of 2020 and 2021, but not the NSW lockdown of 2021, resulted in increased public spending for general practitioner mental health consults (2020 DID estimator: $8498.96 [95% CI $4012.84, $12,373.57], 2021 DID estimator: $6630.06 [95% CI $41.27, $13,267.20], all monetary values in AUD$) and short visits to psychologists (2020 DID estimator: $628.82 [95% CI $466.25, $796.00], 2021 DID estimator: $230.11 [95% CI $47.52, $373.98]). The first Victorian lockdown in 2020 and the NSW lockdown in 2021 resulted in greater spending on short visits to clinical psychologists. Spending on long visits to psychologists and clinical psychologists and medication spending did not change. Conclusions: Strict lockdowns can have an adverse impact on population mental health. The impact is particularly evident in those who have a history of previous mental health concerns but does not necessitate extra use of medications, suggesting that psychological care can address the adverse impact of the lockdowns. What is known about the topic? Previous research varied in methodology, using self-reports and healthcare data to understand COVID-19 social distancing public health measures' effects on mental health. What does this paper add? This study introduces robust, objective data via a natural experiment design, examining the impact of successive lockdowns on mental health service usage and medication expenditures in specific Australian regions. What are the implications for practitioners? Findings highlight the need for flexible mental health services that can swiftly respond to increased demands during prolonged restrictions, without necessarily increasing medication use, guiding future policy and resource allocation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Participatory approaches are important to ensuring that the involvement of children in decision‐making is normalised in service provision. Participation work requires that professionals have well‐developed engagement skills, and a commitment to the right of the child or young person to participate. Effective participatory approaches also require that organisations provide active support for child‐centred practice. The Reconceptualising Services from the Perspectives of Experienced Children and Teens (ReSPECT) approach is an Australian professional development (PD) program that addresses these key aspects of participation work. It offers professionals a way to:(1) increase their awareness of the complex issues, challenges and benefits surrounding participation; and (2) develop a sense of empowerment and competence in the 'doing' of participation work. The PD program encourages professionals to understand their own position in relation to participation work with children, develop bespoke strategies that account for their unique practice context and assemble support structures that can maintain their participation strategies beyond the training. The principles and practices of the ReSPECT PD program are outlined and positioned within the existing literature on theoretical and practice approaches. The paper contributes to critical debate on the mechanisms that can lead to changes in professional practice and organisational culture, for the meaningful engagement of children as stakeholders in decision‐making. It is shared as a way of supporting others designing professional development approaches for child and youth decision‐making. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the impact on Culturally and Linguistically Diverse (CALD) communities in Australia of government and community responses to the coronavirus pandemic of 2019 in the domains of education, employment, housing, social connectedness, and public health communication. Most of the examples are drawn from the state of New South Wales. In Australia, CALD refers to people from countries not classified as main English speaking. Most CALD communities reported in this article are from refugee backgrounds, are recently arrived migrants or do not use English in most of their communication. Inadequate, and in some instances, inappropriate or absent support, adversely impacts CALD communities. We used a multidisciplinary bricolage approach that draws on media, government, and community support publications and concluded that CALD communities experienced heightened pressures due to lower resource availability and poor communication. This led to disruption of support services, exposing gaps and vulnerability. The results reported here challenge Australian government, schools, community agencies, researchers to include proactively CALD community perspectives when planning and responding to such crises in future. Improving communication, pandemic response planning, addressing needs and ensuring participation are key considerations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: Clinician's experiences of providing care are identified as a key outcome associated with value-based healthcare (VBHC). In contrast to patient-reported experience measures, measurement tools to capture clinician's experiences in relation to VBHC initiatives have received limited attention to date. Progressing from an initial 18-item clinician experience measure (CEM), we sought to develop and evaluate the reliability of a set of 10 core clinician experience measure items in the CEM-10. Methods: A multi-method project was conducted using a consensus workshop with clinicians from a range of NSW Health local health districts to reduce the 18-item CEM to a short form 10-item core clinician experience measure (CEM-10). The CEM-10 was deployed with clinicians providing diabetes care, care for older adults and virtual care across all districts and care settings of New South Wales, Australia. Psychometric analysis was used to determine the internal consistency of the tool and its suitability for diverse clinical contexts. Results: Consensus building sessions led to a rationalised 10-item tool, retaining the four domains of psychological safety (two items), quality of care (three items), clinician engagement (three items) and interprofessional collaboration (two items). Data from four clinician cohorts (n = 1029) demonstrated that the CEM-10 four-factor model produced a good fit to the data and high levels of reliability, with factor loadings ranging from 0.77 to 0.92, with Cronbach's alpha (range: 0.79–0.90) and composite reliability (range: 0.80–0.92). Conclusions: The CEM-10 provides a core set of common clinician experience measurement items that can be used to compare clinician's experiences of providing care between and within cohorts. The CEM-10 may be supported by additional items relevant to particular initiatives when evaluating VBHC outcomes. What is known about the topic? Clinician experience of providing care is an outcome of interest for health systems and services internationally who are implementing value-based care initiatives. Review evidence indicates that measurement of clinician's experience of providing care should address experiences of being able to deliver quality care, collaborate with colleagues, experience psychological safety and engagement in decision-making in the workplace. What does this paper add? The paper reports the development of the short form clinician experience measure (CEM-10) and its initial validation in four value-based healthcare initiatives of NSW Health. What are the practical implications for practitioners? The CEM-10 can be used as a core set of items embedded within evaluations of value-based care initiatives to benchmark and examine experiences across clinician cohorts. This article belongs to the Special Issue: Value-based Healthcare. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: The COVID-19 pandemic disproportionally impacted people experiencing homelessness, including people sleeping rough, people in temporary accommodation and those living in boarding houses. This paper reports on intersectoral responses across six health and social care agencies in Inner Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. Prior to the pandemic the six agencies had established an Intersectoral Homelessness Health Strategy (IHHS), in recognition of the need for intersectoral collaboration to address the complex health needs of people experiencing homelessness. Description: The governance structure of the IHHS provided a platform for several innovative intersectoral responses to the pandemic. A realist informed framework was used to select, describe, and analyse case studies of intersectoral collaboration. Discussion: The resultant six critical success factors (trust, shared ways of working, agile collaboration, communication mechanisms, authorising environment, and sustained momentum), align with the existing literature that explores effective intersectoral collaboration in complex health or social care settings. This paper goes further by describing intersectoral collaboration 'in action', setting a strong foundation for future collaborative initiatives. Conclusion: While there is no single right approach to undertaking intersectoral collaboration, which is highly context specific, the six critical success factors identified could be applied to other health issues where dynamic collaboration and integration of healthcare is needed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The recent passage of the Offshore Electricity Infrastructure Act (2021) (Cth) opened up the potential for Australia to produce renewable energy at unprecedented scale. Six regions have been identified as potential locations for developing offshore wind projects, promising thousands of new local jobs to legacy industrial regions. This paper charts the regulatory framework for Australia's offshore wind industry and how it positions local economic benefits in the licencing of projects. It then draws on interviews with key stakeholders supported by media and policy analysis to examine the early development of offshore wind capability in one of the proposed regions, the Illawarra, in NSW. Here existing steelmaking capacity positions the region to play a key role in supply chains for local and potentially national projects, but considerable structural and geographical constraints in the labour market will need to be addressed. In light of overseas experience indicating that economic benefits often fall short of promises, greater attention by policy makers is required to ensure hosting communities can develop local skills in the industry and facilitate their relative supply chain capabilities. This paper also calls for careful evaluation of early projects to allow for adjustments to policy settings as the industry matures domestically. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background There are repeated calls to build better cycling paths in Australian cities if the proportion of people cycling is to increase. Yet the full range of transport, health, environmental and economic impacts of new cycling infrastructure and the extent to which observed changes are sustained is not well understood. The City of Sydney is currently building a new bicycle network, which includes a new bicycle path separated from road traffic in the south Sydney area. This protocol paper describes a comprehensive method to evaluate this new cycling infrastructure. Method A cohort of residents within two kilometres of the new bicycle path will be surveyed at baseline before a new section of bicycle path is built, and again 12 and 24 months later to assess changes in travel behaviour, sense of community, quality of life and health behaviours. Residents in a comparable area of Sydney that will not get a new separated bike path will act as a comparison group. At baseline a sub-set of residents who volunteer will also take a small GPS device with them for one week to assess travel behaviour. Discussion This research should contribute to the advancement in evaluation and appraisal methods for cycling projects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores young people's understandings of gender and investigates their gender-based experiences in high schools in Australia. The discussion is based on qualitative research including focus groups and interviews with 47 recent high school leavers from diverse linguistic, socioeconomic, religious, ethnic, gender and sexuality backgrounds, who attended a broad range of high school types in New South Wales (NSW). We found that young people are critically engaging in gender issues and are often challenging binary gender and associated inequitable practices in schools and beyond. They are taking a leading role in educating adults about gender—that is, they are 'teaching up', as young people conceptualised it, to their families and teachers about gender, gender-related issues and doing gender differently in contemporary times. Their views on gender are often in contrast to those institutional views that currently prevail in NSW schools, which often still reflect stereotypes that perpetuate gender inequalities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although gender expansive views are increasingly evident amongst young people, segregation according to binary notions of gender underpins the organisational structures of single-sex secondary schools. While claims of educational benefits are common, particularly for girls, gender is difficult to disentangle from socioeconomic advantage and other factors. Evidence suggests that such schools contribute to homogenised and limiting notions of gender. While some schools are moving towards desegregation in response to parental demand, little is known from the perspectives of young people in non-elite schools who have experienced segregated schooling. This paper turns to the accounts of 14 recent school leavers in NSW to consider the underpinning logics of segregated schooling, including the imbrication and erasure of socioeconomic dis/advantage, cultural, social, and locational factors that complicate claims about segregated schooling. Affective intensities of single-sex schooling are traced through micronarratives that touch on relations with peers, teachers, school spaces and practices, learning experiences, and their implications for gendered subjectivities and gender justice. Their accounts suggest that student experiences of segregated schooling are ambivalent and do not support claims of educational advantage and that configurations of single-sex schooling may be anachronistic for these times. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Of all the plant diseases that occur in Australia, banana bunchy top disease would rank high on any list of those that have had the greatest impact on society. Bunchy top first became a major problem in Australia during World War 1 in the Tweed Valley in New South Wales, close to the border of Queensland. The Soldier Settlement Scheme was initiated to provide a livelihood for returned soldiers, and the Northern Rivers region of New South Wales was chosen as the site for a new subtropical fruit industry. Physically and psychologically damaged men were encouraged to settle on the land to grow bananas, only to be left in ruins within two years because bunchy top had destroyed their plantations. Bunchy top did not discriminate, and many other well-established growers also 'went broke'. The cries for assistance from the banana growers made it to the federal Parliament in Melbourne, and a Bunchy Top Investigation Committee was formed in 1924 with funding equally contributed by the New South Wales, Queensland, and Australian Governments. Charles Magee was the full-time plant pathologist appointed to the investigation, and he did most of the research. Most histories of the bunchy top research program follow the written accounts of Magee, but he only provided a narrow perspective. Several of the major hypotheses about the epidemiology of bunchy top disease, such as that it was spread in the plant's suckers and was vectored by the banana aphid Pentalonia nigronervosa , were established by growers such as William John (aka Jack) Burton Marks well before the Bunchy Top Investigation Committee began. This paper describes the beginnings of the subtropical banana industry, the introduction of bunchy top disease, and efforts by the scientific and farming communities to find a preventative treatment or cure for the disease. Banana bunchy top disease is the most serious viral disease of bananas in the world, and nearly wiped out the Australian banana industry in the early twentieth century. The impacts of the disease epidemic were hardest felt by veterans of World War 1, who moved to the Northern Rivers region of New South Wales to create a subtropical fruit industry as part of the Soldier Settlement Scheme. This article describes the early history of the Australian banana industry, the introduction and spread of bunchy top disease, and efforts to develop a disease management plan. Photograph by Scot C. Nelson, University of Hawaiʻi. This article belongs to the Special Issue: History of Plant Pathology in Australasia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim Design Methods Results Conclusion Impact Reporting Method No Patient or Public Contribution The focus of this paper is to provide a detailed ethnographic exploration of rural nurses' experiences of their resuscitation preparedness and the subsequent post‐resuscitation period.An ethnographic study across two small rural hospital sites in New South Wales, Australia.Fieldwork was undertaken between December 2020 and March 2022 and included over 240 h of nonparticipant observation, journalling and interviews. Data were analysed using reflexive thematic analysis.The first key theme—‘Sense of Preparedness’—included three subthemes: ‘Gaining experience’, ‘Issues with training and education’ and ‘Lack of warning’. The second key theme ‘Aftermath’ comprised two subthemes: ‘Getting on with it’ and ‘Making sense of the resus’.This study has highlighted the intricate relationship between resuscitative preparedness and the post‐resuscitation period in shaping rural nurse's experiences and their well‐being. Rural nurses are asking for an authentic and contextually relevant training experience that mirrors the unique rural challenges they experience. In the absence of frequent resuscitation presentations, the post‐resuscitation period should be viewed as a crucible moment that can be leveraged as a valuable learning opportunity enhancing rural nurses' sense of preparedness and the provision of quality resuscitation care.Having a greater level of insight into the challenges that rural nurses experience in the pre‐ and post‐resuscitation period is critical. This insight opens the door for fortifying policies and work processes that will better support rural nurses in the resuscitation environment.Reporting complied with COREQ criteria for qualitative research.This study explored the experiences of rural nurses. No patient data were collected. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Young people form the primary target demographic of new 'buy now pay later' (BNPL) and digital credit services. Despite consistent data showing young people as a cohort are particularly vulnerable to unsustainable levels of indebtedness, little is known about how young people define and make sense of the experience of being in debt through consumer credit services. This paper explores how indebtedness is experienced and understood in relation to wellbeing through a qualitative study using interviews alongside arts-based participatory methods of bodymapping and sandboxing with 24 young people in the Hunter region of NSW, Australia. These methods enabled particular attention to the embodied and affective elements related to the experience of indebtedness to understand debt's significance for wellbeing for young people. The embodied and affective registers of indebtedness are integral for understanding the conditions informing how wellbeing is negotiated and felt in this context. This study considers the role of BNPL services in young people's economic lives as part of broader processes of financialisation, and the significance of extended and ubiquitous forms of credit for young people's wellbeing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An appreciation of Aboriginal land rights in New South Wales (NSW) is characterised by two dominant narratives. One is that land rights are central to achieving and advancing recognition and support for the existence and survival of Aboriginal peoples in the settled spaces of south‐eastern Australia. In this view, Aboriginal land rights realise intrinsic political power. The second dominant narrative is that the land estate restituted to Aboriginal people's Local Aboriginal Land Councils (LALCs) is to be "activated" and "leveraged" for economic prosperity of collectively defined groups and shared to support and sustain individuals and families. This perspective holds that land enables realisation of wealth and prosperity. Although these narratives are based in truth, they have served to make some important work and values held by Aboriginal people less visible in any evaluation of the benefits of land rights. It is this less visible work, the work of care that is unique to Aboriginal worlds and made possible by the resources and structures of LALCs realised through the Aboriginal Land Rights Act, 1983, that is the focus of this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: To investigate clinicoradiological features associated with epilepsy, its resolution, and drug resistance in children with cerebral palsy (CP). Method: Data were gathered from the New South Wales/Australian Capital Territory CP Register, encompassing children with CP born between 2003 and 2015 (n = 1916). Clinical features and the severity of impairments were compared among three groups: children with current epilepsy (n = 604), those with resolved epilepsy by age 5 years (n = 109), and those without epilepsy (n = 1203). Additionally, a subset of the registry cohort attending Children's Hospital Westmead (n = 256) was analysed to compare epilepsy and treatment characteristics between drug‐responsive (n = 83) and drug‐resistant groups (n = 147) using logistic regression and hierarchical cluster analysis. Results: Manual Ability Classification System levels IV and V, intellectual impairment, and vision impairment were found to be associated with epilepsy in children with CP on multivariable analysis (p < 0.01). Moderate to severe intellectual impairment and bilateral spastic CP were independent positive and negative predictors of epilepsy persistence at the age of 5 years respectively (p < 0.05). Microcephaly and multiple seizure types were predictors of drug‐resistant epilepsy (area under the receiver operating characteristic curve of 0.83; 95% confidence interval 0.77–0.9). Children with a known genetic cause (14%) and CP epilepsy surgery group (4.3%) formed specific clinical subgroups in CP epilepsy. Interpretation: Our study highlights important clinical associations of epilepsy, its resolution, and treatment response in children with CP, providing valuable knowledge to aid in counselling families and identifying distinct prognostic groups for effective medical surveillance and optimal treatment. What this paper adds: Severe motor and non‐motor impairments in cerebral palsy (CP) increase epilepsy risk.Epilepsy more likely resolves in bilateral spastic and milder CP impairments.Epilepsy in CP often manifests at an early age with multiple seizure types and high drug resistance.Children with a known genetic cause and CP epilepsy surgery group represent distinct clinical subgroups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: To describe the relationships between outpatient encounters, continuity of care, and unplanned hospital care in children/young people with cerebral palsy (CP). Method: In this population‐based data‐linkage cohort study we included children/young people with CP identified in the New South Wales/Australian Capital Territory CP Register (birth years 1994–2018). We measured the frequency of outpatient encounters and unplanned hospital care, defined as presentations to emergency departments and/or urgent hospital admissions (2015–2020). Continuity of outpatient care was measured using the Usual Provider of Care Index (UPCI). Results: Of 3267 children/young people with CP, most (n = 2738, 83.8%, 57.6% male) had one or more outpatient encounters (123 463 total encounters, median six outpatient encounters per year during childhood). High UPCI was more common in children/young people with mild CP (Gross Motor Function Classification System levels I–III, with no epilepsy or no intellectual disability), residing in metropolitan and areas of least socioeconomic disadvantage. Low UPCI was associated with four or more emergency department presentations (adjusted odds ratio [aOR] 2.34; 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.71–3.19) and one or more urgent hospital admissions (aOR 2.02; 95% CI 1.57–2.61). Interpretation: Children/young people with CP require frequent outpatient services. Improving continuity of care, particularly for those residing in regional/remote areas, may decrease need for unplanned hospital care. What this paper adds: Many children with cerebral palsy use multiple and frequent outpatient services.Better continuity of care is associated with living in metropolitan and less socioeconomically disadvantaged areas.Outpatient service utilization reduces at the time of transition to adult services.High outpatient utilization is associated with unplanned hospital care.Decreased continuity of care is associated with unplanned hospital care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 1894, three Sydney members of the British Astronomical Association - John Tebbutt, Walter Gale and Robert Innes, all well-known astronomers-recruited 10 others to join them in appealing to the Council in London to form a local branch. This was granted on 1894 November 28, and the New South Wales Branch held its inaugural meeting on 1895 ]anuary 30. This paper looks at the 18 people from Sydney who were members of the BAA prior to the first meeting. That meeting created much local interest and many people joined immediately afterwards. The next cohort of 48 members admitted on 1895 March 1 is also discussed, with three people of note emphasised. A wide range of knowledge and expertise is found among the early members of the Branch, ranging from highly capable amateurs like the three founders, augmented by a small number of professionals, to those who made little or no contribution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Australia has a hidden but growing problem with household food insecurity, revealing the failure of conventional food infrastructures to support human flourishing. Disruptions to employment and livelihoods due to pandemic lockdowns have exacerbated household food insecurity, evincing the uneven geography of food access in countries globally, including Australia. Increasing demand for food relief had been observed prior to the COVID‐19 pandemic and has been met by food relief providers, which we consider as infrastructures of care addressing growing levels of hunger. This paper reveals COVID‐19's many impacts on the food relief sector across Metropolitan Sydney, New South Wales. It analyses both a questionnaire of food relief providers in 2022 and media articles, social media posts, reports, and websites. It provides much‐needed insights into the impacts of pandemic lockdowns on the demand for food, interruptions to food provisioning, changes to food supply, and alterations made to suppliers' ways of operating. Those insights show how infrastructures of care are place‐based, responsive, dynamic, and constrained by caring capacities. Such insights are increasingly important for understanding infrastructural failures, documenting the real extent of household food insecurity, and challenging dominant discourses of Australia as a food‐secure nation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Upper Hunter Valley is a major coal mining area containing approximately 40% of the currently identified total coal reserves in New South Wales (NSW), Australia. Due to the ongoing increase in mining activities, PM10 (airborne particles with an aerodynamic diameter of less than 10 micrometres) pollution has become a major air quality concern in local communities. This paper summarises the spatial and temporal variability modes of PM10 pollution in the region, based on long-term multi-site monitoring data and the application of the rotated principal component analysis (RPCA) and wavelet analysis techniques. RPCA identified two distinct air quality clusters/subregions in the valley: one in the west/northwest and the other in the southeast. Wavelet analysis revealed the annual cycle to be the most persistent temporal mode of PM10 variability in both subregions, with intermittent signals also observed at time scales of around 120, 30~90, and under 30 days. How these variation modes are related to the effects of local PM10 emissions and the influence of meteorology at different time scales deserves further attention in future work. The findings will be used in air quality reporting and forecasting in NSW. The methodology and results can also be useful for air quality research in similar regions elsewhere. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While sustained public attention is often associated with the politicization of an issue, this paper argues that certain dominant strands of public discourse in relation to animal advocacy in fact serve to depoliticize the movement. Public discussion often equates animal advocacy with veganism, with the latter typically framed or understood as an individual's dietary or lifestyle choice. Furthermore, animal activists are often associated with criminal, or even terrorist, behavior—as was highlighted when the Australian Prime Minister labelled animal activists as "green-collared criminals" in the wake of a public protest. In this paper, the implications of these two public narratives about animal activism is discussed with reference to two examples from Australia: the media coverage of a day of coordinated protests that took place on April 8, 2019, and the New South Wales state parliamentary debates surrounding the Right to Farm Bill 2019. By developing a multi-dimensional conceptual analysis of (de)politicization, this paper argues that the "veganization" (as a form of "issue-privatization") and criminalization of animal activists in public discourse are both forms of depoliticization, in that they frame activists' messages as, respectively, either more appropriately belonging within the private sphere of personal choice, or as not related to the public good at all. I conclude that to avoid the delegitimization that these discursive processes may entail, animal advocates need to develop counter-narratives that emphasize how their claims can support the strengthening of existing democratic institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Bushfires are classified as catastrophic disasters capable of inflicting significant destruction. The key detrimental consequences of bushfires include the loss of human lives, trauma within communities, economic losses and environmental damage. For example, the estimated economic loss from the September 2019 to March 2020 bushfires in New South Wales (Australia) was about AUD 110 billion, including more than 3000 burned houses. There has been a notable increase in both the frequency and intensity of bushfires, as clearly demonstrated by recent bushfire events. Bushfires are an intricate phenomenon that transpires across various spatial and temporal scales. Further, the changing circumstances of landscapes, vegetation patterns, weather conditions and ecosystems account for the complexity. Therefore, continual attention is essential for the development of bushfire management strategies. In this context, this paper undertakes a comprehensive literature review of bushfire management strategies, encompassing aspects such as bushfire prediction, detection, suppression and prevention. Based on the review, a bushfire management framework is proposed that can eliminate or successfully mitigate the consequences of bushfires. Further, the paper delves into the domains of fire weather conditions, the initiation of bushfires and the adverse consequences stemming from these fires. Both terrestrial and aerial remote sensing methods have proven to be effective in predicting and detecting bushfires. Nevertheless, a simple unique solution cannot be proposed for bushfire management. Changing weather conditions, topography and the geographic mix of asset types need to be considered when deciding on bushfire management strategies and their breadth and depth of application. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Lack of service data for cardiac rehabilitation limits understanding of program delivery, benchmarking and quality improvement. This study aimed to describe current practices, management, utilisation and engagement with quality indicators in Australian programs. Cardiac rehabilitation programs (n=396) were identified from national directories and networks. Program coordinators were surveyed on service data capture, management systems and adoption of published national quality indicators. Text responses were coded and classified. Logistic regression determined independent associates of the use of data for quality improvement. A total of 319 (81%) coordinators completed the survey. Annual patient enrolments/programs were >200 (31.0%), 51−200 (46%) and ≤50 (23%). Most (79%) programs used an electronic system, alongside paper (63%) and/or another electronic system (19%), with 21% completely paper. While 84% knew of the national quality indicators, only 52% used them. Supplementary to patient care, data were used for reports to managers (57%) and funders (41%), to improve quality (56%), support funding (43%) and research (31%). Using data for quality improvement was more likely when enrolments where >200 (Odds ratio [OR] 3.83, 95% Confidence Interval [CI] 1.76−8.34) and less likely in Victoria (OR 0.24 95%, CI 0.08−0.77), New South Wales (OR 0.25 95%, CI 0.08−0.76) and Western Australia (OR 0.16 95%, CI 0.05−0.57). The collection of service data for cardiac rehabilitation patient data and its justification is diverse, limiting our capacity to benchmark and drive clinical practice. The findings strengthen the case for a national low-burden approach to data capture for quality care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There are research requirements for trainees to be eligible to present for their final examinations (Fellowship of Royal Australasian College of Surgeons, FRACS). One option is the presentation of a paper or poster at a meeting of which abstracts are subject to review and selection. This includes presentation at the annual Registrars’ Papers Day (RPD) in New South Wales. There has been some debate surrounding whether research requirements are fulfilled by presentation at such meetings. Publication in a peer-reviewed journal should be the ultimate aim. A high publication rate will validate the quality of the meeting. All abstracts submitted to the RPD in 1998 and 1999 were analysed. A Medline search was performed in 2005 to identify publication of these presentations in a peer-reviewed journal. Variables of the study that were potentially predictive of subsequent publication were analysed. This included type of presentation, surgical specialty, clinical or laboratory-based study, study design (prospective or retrospective) and sample size. Chi-squared test with Yates’ continuity correction was used to compare two independent proportions and significance was set at P < 0.05. The publication rates were: oral presentations 50% (17/34), poster presentations 39% (9/23) and rejected presentations 20% (2/10). The mean and median time to publication was 23.8 and 21.0 months. Prospective design was the only variable identified to have a statistically significant effect on the publication rate ( P < 0.002). The most common publishing journal was the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Surgery (12 of 26). Overall consistency (author and study sample consistency) from presentation to publication was 32%. The overall 46% publication rate of this state-based trainees-organized meeting compares favourably with international meetings. The research requirement of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons (RACS), which includes presentation at the RPD in New South Wales, produces good quality papers for publication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents several of the major findings from an experimental evaluation of a new problem-oriented policing practice. First-time moderately serious juvenile offenders were randomly assigned either to formal adjudication or to a diversionary 'restorative policing' process called family group conferencing. Police-based conferencing employs trained police officers to facilitate a meeting attended by juvenile offenders, their victims, and their respective family and friends, to discuss the harm caused by the offender's actions and to develop an agreement to repair the harm. The impact of the program reported in this paper was measured through surveys of victims, offenders, offender's parents and police officers and by examining outcomes of conferences and formal adjudication. Results are related to five concerns raised about restorative policing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using historical and contemporary resources, this paper provides a critical account of the contemporary governance of prostitution in New South Wales. A Foucauldian approach is used to analyse the ways in which prostitution has been problematized as a health issue and managed as a public health problem. The analysis differs from other critical studies of prostitution in that it examines specific techniques of power, the operations of which have not been confined to the workings of a repressive criminal justice system. It is shown that there currently co-exists two broad understandings of prostitution in New South Wales, Australia, which have informed current initiatives to manage prostitution. Prostitutes working in public spaces have been presented as sexual agents wilfully engaged in criminal conduct and the spread of contagion. They have been subject to intense official scrutiny and regulated through criminal sanctions. In contrast, prostitutes working in private spaces have been presented as victims of adverse circumstance, deserving of protection and compassion. They have been made subject to strategic interventions that have attempted to normalize prostitution and render the prostitute a hygienic subject. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Deadly Liver Mob (DLM) is a peer-delivered incentivised health promotion program by and for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians, and was introduced in response to the disproportionate number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians who are impacted by blood borne viruses (BBVs) and sexually transmitted infections (STIs). The goal of the program is to increase access to BBV and STI education, screening, treatment, and vaccination in recognition and response to the systemic barriers that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples face in accessing health care. This commentary introduces a series of papers that report on various aspects of the evaluation of the Deadly Liver Mob (DLM) program. In this paper, we explain what DLM is and how we constructed an evaluation framework for this complex health promotion intervention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using rock art conservation as a focus, this paper outlines the levels of legislated protection afforded to designated natural and cultural areas/sites in Australia and describes the co-management approach adopted in 1998 in relation to Mutawintji National Park in western New South Wales. The park encompasses four different protection categories: a Historic Site, a Nature Reserve, a National Park, and a State Conservation Area. Known for more than a century, the Historic Site is a major area of rock art containing Aboriginal engravings, paintings and stencils. Management of the Historic Site is a key concern, given the tourist interest and associated potential for accelerated deterioration of cultural heritage. The Mutawintji Plan of Management pointed to the importance of Mutawintji for Aboriginal people to connect with the country, and the co-management model encouraged tourism development as a means of providing employment opportunities as Aboriginal guides. No special legislative requirements in relation to rock art conservation, beyond those already in existence, were applied to the co-management system. Using field knowledge involving rock art research and early guide training programs at Mutawintji and literature sources, this paper suggests possible future approaches to rock art conservation in the Mutawintji Lands. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While Australian governments generally acknowledge that First Nations organisations (FNOs) have better reach into First Nations communities than mainstream not‐for‐profit (NFP) organisations and governments, as we document in this paper, a survey of community‐controlled FNOs in significant urban areas in New South Wales (NSW) suggests that funding and administrative arrangements in the era of New Public Management (NPM) are at odds, and in some instances, actually undermine the effectiveness of FNOs. To explore and gain an explicit insight into the potential tensions in, contradictions with and constraints of NPM on governments supporting and realising the full potential of FNOs in achieving community outcomes, this paper turns its attention to the results of a survey designed by senior position holders from six community‐controlled FNOs in the Greater Sydney region and three academics. The survey was designed to examine the relationship of the ability of FNOs to act in the interests of their community members with the normalisation of NPM as policy discourse and practice across all layers of government (Federal, State and Local). Urban areas within the state of NSW as its focus, the core findings from the survey suggest that in the NPM era, urban FNOs face numerous difficulties in realising their community mandates and simultaneously guaranteeing their sustainability for the future. The findings suggest that rather than extending the capacity of FNOs and their reach into their communities, NPM policy structures and mandates create increased administrative burdens, precarity and fragility, as well as decreased organisational autonomy and self‐determination. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A dedicated grid-tied offshore hybrid energy system for hydrogen production is a promising solution to unlock the full benefit of offshore wind and solar energy and realize decarbonization and sustainable energy security targets in electricity and other sectors. Current knowledge of these offshore hybrid systems is limited, particularly in the integration, component control, and allocation aspects. Therefore, a grid-integrated analytical model with a power dispatch allocation strategy between the grid and electrolyzer for the co-production of hydrogen from the offshore hybrid energy system is developed in this paper. While producing hydrogen, the proposed offshore hybrid energy system supplies a percentage of its capacity to the onshore grid facility, and the amount of the electricity is quantified based on the electricity market price and available total offshore generation. The detailed controls of each component are discussed. A case study considers a hypothetical hybrid offshore energy system of 10 MW situated in a potential offshore off the NSW of Australia based on realistic metrological data. A grid-scale proton-exchange membrane electrolyzer stack is used and a model predictive power controller is implemented on the distributed hydrogen generation scheme. The model is helpful for the assessment or optimization of both the economics and feasibility of the dedicated offshore hybrid energy farm for hydrogen production systems. • Modeling of a grid-integrated analytical model of an OHES for hydrogen co-production. • Development of a power dispatch allocation strategy for the proposed OHES. • Development of detailed controls of each component used in the proposed OHES. • Demonstrations of a case study considering 10 MW OHES situated in offshore off the NSW of Australia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Legal attendance requirements and national declarations establish a social contract between the State and its citizens for the provision of schooling. Any shortage of teachers compromises the ability of the State to meet its contractable obligations. The sovereignty of the social contract is complex as no single body has ultimate responsibility for housing the teaching workforce, but everyone has a stake in it. Empirically focused on the largest school system in the southern hemisphere, the New South Wales public education system (Australia), this paper demonstrates that 90.8% of teaching positions, over 50,000 full-time equivalent posts, are in Local Government Areas where the median rent and house sales price are severely unaffordable on a top-of-the-scale teacher salary. With the system requiring additional teachers to meet increasing enrolments, and housing costs outstripping salaries, many schools not traditionally considered difficult to staff are becoming, if not already, inaccessible for teachers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

By the end of 2021, more than 168 million students across the globe had missed a year of face-to-face schooling due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In NSW, Australia, most students engaged in learning from home for eight weeks during 2020 and a further 14 weeks during 2021. This study provides robust empirical evidence on how two years of disruptions to schooling affected student learning. Drawing on matched data for 3,827 Year 3 and 4 students from 101 NSW government schools, this paper compares student achievement growth in mathematics and reading for 2019 (pre-pandemic) and 2021 (second year of the pandemic) student cohorts. While overall there was no significant difference between cohorts, when analysed by socio-educational advantage, we were surprised to find that students in the lowest band achieved approximately three months' additional growth in mathematics. Arguably, grave concerns about the potentially dire impact of COVID-19 on the learning of disadvantaged students were met by investments that made a difference. We argue that targeted funding and system-wide initiatives to support more equitable outcomes should remain a priority after the pandemic if Australia is to meet its aspirations for excellence and equity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The January 2011 flood event that impacted southeast Queensland is amongst the most extensive and severe floods in terms of loss of life and property damage that the region has experienced, despite it being only the eighth highest flood on record at the Brisbane City Gauge. The spring of 2010 was the wettest on record for Queensland, New South Wales, and the Murray-Darling Basin (Bureau of Meteorology 2011a) at that time. The flood mitigation dams in the region, Somerset Dam and Wivenhoe Dam, had to be operated for flood mitigation purposes during October 2010, which was the first occasion since February 2001 that Wivenhoe Dam had been called into action due to the Millennium Drought. The wet October was followed by a very dry November which, in turn, was followed by the wettest December on record for Brisbane. Somerset Dam and Wivenhoe Dam were again pressed into action on three separate occasions during December 2010. The resultant releases ensured that only minor flooding resulted in the Lower Brisbane River during these events. However, on the 5th of January 2011, another rainfall event started to unfold across the catchments of the dams. By the 10th of January 2011, an upper-level low combined with a humid easterly flow to bring very heavy rainfall and flash flooding to southeast Queensland and northeast New South Wales. The heaviest falls were in the areas north and west of Brisbane, with three-day totals exceeding 200 mm over most of the Brisbane River catchment. This rainfall event resulted in a flood of record in the Upper Brisbane River and Upper Lockyer Creek catchments that sadly resulted in a substantial loss of life in Toowoomba and the Lockyer Valley, and which required record releases from Wivenhoe Dam. The resultant downstream flooding saw some 14,000 properties impacted, principally in the Lockyer Valley Regional Council, Somerset Regional Council, Brisbane City Council, and Ipswich City Council local government regions. Flood damage was estimated to be around $2.53 billion. This paper discusses the event as it unfolded and the subsequent judicial inquiries, engineering reviews, and legal proceedings that resulted from the consequences of the operation of Somerset Dam and Wivenhoe Dam. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Australia has a high prevalence of asthma amongst its population. Literature shows rural asthma patients have a higher need to access emergency healthcare due to asthma-related emergencies than those living in metropolitan areas, and that underutilisation of ambulance resources is evident in rural areas. This study aims to explore the barriers preventing patients from accessing emergency healthcare resources during an asthma-related emergency in rural New South Wales (NSW). A qualitative interpretative design comprising 12 semi-structured interviews was conducted between May and July 2021. Participants had accessed emergency healthcare in rural NSW during a moderate to severe asthma exacerbation in NSW within the last five years. Interviews were recorded and transcribed verbatim to allow thematic analysis, which produced four overarching themes. This paper explores two of those themes due to the depth and range of the data. The impact of healthcare logistics, including access and availability of emergency healthcare resources, response times, environmental concerns, and issues with transport home from the hospital, were identified as barriers. Additionally, financial cost, the presumed cost to healthcare workers and societal cost were also found to influence participants’ decisions to access emergency healthcare. Overall, multiple factors were identified as potential barriers to asthma patients in rural NSW accessing emergency healthcare. Introducing improved mapping systems and mobile/radio reception, in addition to better staff resourcing in rural locations may help reduce the reluctance of asthma patients to access healthcare due to logistical concerns and fear of being a burden on the emergency healthcare system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Anxiety and depressive disorders typically emerge in adolescence and can be chronic and disabling if not identified and treated early. School-based universal mental health screening may identify young people in need of mental health support and facilitate access to treatment. However, few studies have assessed the potential harms of this approach. This paper examines some of the potential mental health-related harms associated with the universal screening of anxiety and depression administered in Australian secondary schools. Methods: A total of 1802 adolescent students from 22 secondary schools in New South Wales, Australia, were cluster randomised (at the school level) to receive either an intensive screening procedure (intervention) or a light touch screening procedure (control). Participants in the intensive screening condition received supervised self-report web-based screening questionnaires for anxiety, depression and suicidality with the follow-up care matched to their symptom severity. Participants in the light touch condition received unsupervised web-based screening for anxiety and depression only, followed by generalised advice on help-seeking. No other care was provided in this condition. Study outcomes included the increased risk of anxiety, depression, psychological distress, decreased risk of help-seeking, increased risk of mental health stigma, determined from measures assessed at baseline, 6 weeks post-baseline, and 12 weeks post-baseline. Differences between groups were analysed using mixed effect models. Results: Participants in the intensive screening group were not adversely affected when compared to the light touch screening condition across a range of potential harms. Rather, participants in the intensive screening group were found to have a decreased risk of inhibited help-seeking behaviour compared to the light touch screening condition. Conclusions: The intensive screening procedure did not appear to adversely impact adolescents' mental health relative to the light touch procedure. Future studies should examine other school-based approaches that may be more effective and efficient than universal screening for reducing mental health burden among students. Trial registration Australian and New Zealand Clinical Trials Registry (ACTRN12618001539224) https://anzctr.org.au/Trial/Registration/TrialReview.aspx?id=375821. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Embedded within large-scale resource extraction projects is a tension between the immobility of the resource and the mobility of the people who inhabit the surface over which the resource is found. The limited ability to negotiate the place of extraction, and the destruction of prior ecologies, can generate significant hardship to local populations and pose particular ethical dilemmas, as in the small village of Wollar located at the New South Wales coal frontier. Here, the supposed ethical imperatives of coalbased power and energy have dismantled and sacrificed communities as the coal mining industry has advanced and intensified its operations. Looking at both social and environmental ecologies, the paper analyses how imagined coal-centred futures, and progress, is phrased (or not phrased) as an ethical and political issue, and the consequences of that coal-based future, psychologically, emotionally, imaginally and cosmologically on those who live near the mines. What once carried a felt ambience of being home has, through technological and political deployment, become a non-place of transience, anonymity, and change. In this unbalanced political conflict, a natural environment and lived ecology are subject to developmentalist and technological ecologies in ethical-political dispute with a diminishing sense of home, and produce suffering because of unequal power relations which derive from the success of the destructive technologies. Searching for a language to capture the sense of sacrifice and suffering that happens in the shadow of large-scale mining, I propose a new concept: 'eritalgia'. Eritalgia expands the existing duad of nostalgia and solastalgia, capturing the sense of lost future self in place, emphasising the role of power and discursive hegemony in shaping experiences of and well-being in place. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present investigation is part of the Social Networks and Agency Project (SNAP), an 18-month longitudinal mixed methods study following adolescents located in New South Wales, Australia. The SNAP study aims to understand how online and offline social networks impact the development of sexual agency over time. This paper presents an analysis of the second interview time point in the SNAP study. Fifty adolescents (aged 14–17) completed a semi-structured interview either face-to-face or via Skype about their romantic relationships, including where they get their sexual health information and how they flirt (both online and offline). Interviews were transcribed and analyzed using a grounded theory approach. The core theme was: Young people clearly demonstrate emerging sexual agency. The three characterizing themes were: (1) Young people have complex schemas about flirting, dating, and entering romantic and sexual relationships; (2) Young people have high literacy in social media, traditional media and pornography; and (3) Peers influence most aspects of developing sexual agency, including sex and relationship attitudes. We discuss possible methods to utilize adolescents' social networks in facilitating the development of sexual agency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper introduces an innovative framework for wind power prediction that focuses on the future of energy forecasting utilizing intelligent deep learning and strategic feature engineering. This research investigates the application of a state-of-the-art deep learning model for wind energy prediction to make extremely short-term forecasts using real-time data on wind generation from New South Wales, Australia. In contrast with typical approaches to wind energy forecasting, this model relies entirely on historical data and strategic feature engineering to make predictions, rather than relying on meteorological parameters. A hybrid feature engineering strategy that integrates features from several feature generation techniques to obtain the optimal input parameters is a significant contribution to this work. The model's performance is assessed using key metrics, yielding optimal results with a Mean Absolute Error (MAE) of 8.76, Mean Squared Error (MSE) of 139.49, Root Mean Squared Error (RMSE) of 11.81, R-squared score of 0.997, and Mean Absolute Percentage Error (MAPE) of 4.85%. Additionally, the proposed framework outperforms six other deep learning and hybrid deep learning models in terms of wind energy prediction accuracy. These findings highlight the importance of advanced data analysis for feature generation in data processing, pointing to its key role in boosting the precision of forecasting applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The transition required to remove coal from the global energy mix will have major implications across coal producing regions. There is limited work, however, that explores how this transition is being received by communities with multi-generational connections to the industry. This paper explores understandings and responses to transition in the Australian community of Singleton. Located 145 km north of Sydney in the Upper Hunter Valley, the local area has been a site of coal mining activity since the 1850s – helping foster a strong connection between industry and place. Using an emotional geographies framework, we uncover various local feelings associated with the prospect of a future without coal. While these emotional responses can stem from the anticipated material losses of mines and jobs, they have also been found to stem from the mutually imbricated threats posed by a 'hidden dimension of loss'. This dimension of loss positions mining as much more than an emotionless economic activity. Instead, it is uncovered as an activity – a tradition – that can define understandings of place. Whilst set in Australia, this study holds relevance for mining communities internationally faced with the disruption of existing ways of life, identities, and understandings of place as the energy transition unfolds. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we look to compare the differential responses of metropolitan and regional rental markets in the first 12 months post-pandemic in New South Wales, Australia's most populous state. We employ descriptive statistics to analyse broad trends in both rental prices and transfers in and out of long-term rental supply through the short-term letting and property buyer markets. Moreover, we examine how these dynamics have played out at the local level using the contrasting case studies of Bondi in the eastern suburbs of Sydney and Byron Bay in the northern rivers of NSW. The results demonstrate that there have been distinctly separate responses to the pandemic across different geographical profiles, displaying cohort-level behaviours ranging from rental declines in inner-city areas to significant increases in high-price regional areas. Furthermore, a comparison of metro and regional markets highlights a strong and symmetrical association between short-term lettings activity and changes in long-term rental prices over the initial COVID-19 period. Finally, analysis of investor activity exhibits a highly reactive and geographically differentiated response to changes in rental yields. Ultimately, the findings of this study further the understanding of the contrasting responses at the local scale to the COVID-19 pandemic, the complex interplay between long- and short-term rental markets and help shed light on necessary future policy directions for NSW's, and Australia's, housing market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]