Search

Play, which is both a context and process for children's learning, has become a pivotal pedagogical component in global early childhood education. The uptake of intentional teaching has contributed to the shift in understandings of play, from viewing play as a means of recreation and entertainment to a more socio-cultural perspective that advocates for educators' proactive and engaged roles in play. The recent update of the Early Years Learning Framework (2023) in Australia has included an emphasis on intentionality in play-based learning. However, there is little academic work on intentionality, and recent studies demonstrate educators' struggles in conceptualising their roles as intentional teachers. Drawing on the findings of a literature review, this discussion paper aims to conceptualise intentional teaching from two aspects: intentionality and decision-making. This paper argues that while educator and child intentionality are the starting point of intentional actions, the decision-making process enables educators to have ongoing intentionality behind their teaching practices. It concludes by advocating for a broader understanding of intentional teaching that focusses on the underlying thought processes behind educators' decisions and actions.

Vocational decisions made at school have significant long term impacts on young people's life chances, their opportunities for securing decent jobs and economic growth for themselves, their families and communities. In the short term, their aspirations dictate the decisions they make about educational pathways in post-compulsory years of schooling and vocational and higher education. For young people from already marginalised backgrounds, the quality of support they have in making these decisions is crucially important. This paper examines a rapidly expanding vocational education program specifically designed for students with refugee backgrounds that was codeveloped between a state education authority and a community service provider in Sydney, Australia. Through an ecological understanding of individuals as nested within interrelated networks, this paper explores the perspectives of stakeholders ranging from the educators, careers teachers, employers, civic partners, and, crucially, the young people themselves in order to determine whether and through what means key program elements meet the needs of students from a refugee background and where gaps in the program ecology need to be addressed.

Purpose: This paper presents a case study of successful rural school leadership in Victoria, Australia. The purpose of the paper is to identify how particular leadership practices were adapted to secure rural school success. Design/methodology/approach: The author used the International Successful School Principalship Project research protocols to develop a multiple-perspective, mixed-method case study that investigated the principal's leadership at the school. Findings: The findings illustrate how the leadership practices of the principal healed the fractured school-community relationships, which allowed the school community to work together towards a common school vision. A key factor in the school's success was the principal's personal connection to the local rural community of which he was a part. This notion of native connection could have practical implications for the recruitment and retention of rural principals in the future. Originality/value: Whilst it is widely acknowledged that principals need to consider their school and community contexts when making leadership decisions, there have been few studies that have focussed on understanding how this can be achieved in the context of rural schools. This case provides a rich account of a principal's leadership practices in one successful school in rural Australia.

Chinese students studying abroad have been increasing rapidly in the past decades and become a significant financial contribution to receiving countries. Accordingly, understanding their enrollment choice is essential to facilitate college marketing and admission strategies. Though the decision process is believed to be different from domestic students, empirical analysis of Chinese students' enrollment choices is still lacking. This paper fills the void by examining the influential factors of Chinese students' enrollment choice with novel student-level data. We find that in addition to factors domestic students typically consider, such as financial aid and academic quality, Chinese students particularly emphasize college ranking, reputation, and location in their decision process. Furthermore, unlike domestic students who usually prefer colleges with proximity to home, Chinese students' location preference is linked to job prosperity. We also find that the impact of the factors varies for students from different regions of China, which can be attributable to uneven economic development within the country.

This paper presents an analysis of the prescribed text list for senior school English (including English as an Additional Language or Dialect, EAL/D) in Queensland, Australia. Queer understandings about the normalization of cisgender and heterosexuality provide a framework to analyze prescribed texts for adolescent learners. Hetero-cisgender norms are perpetuated through overrepresentation in endorsed texts. Representations of queer subjectivities or themes in the most highly promoted texts, those appearing on the examination list, are infrequent and minor. Reflexive justice thinking acknowledges the critique of merely identifying "who is missing" in the literature and extends the discussion to consider the complexities of the social, cultural, and political contexts that influence who gets to decide.

The use of algorithms and automation of public services is not new, but in recent years there has been a step change in processing power and a decrease in the price of these technologies, which means we are seeing more widespread use. These advances are reframing our perception of what matters in ways that impact the ethical dimensions of day-to-day life. In turn, these changes challenge long-standing assumptions about public service ethics and how it is taught. In this multidisciplinary authored paper, we argue that public service leaders must be attentive to ethical questions that converge around adopting "data-driven" techniques, including algorithmic decision-making. Algorithmic and technology focused ethics question assumptions about the current deficits within public service ethics pedagogy in public service programs and university programs and the future direction of the discipline. To do so raises longstanding but neglected questions about the public services' role in the state and recovering what Rohr refers to as the 'ethics of the office.' This, we argue, will have implications for teaching public service ethics.

In Victoria, Australia, senior secondary mathematics students are expected to use technology and thus need to make decisions about using pen-and-paper (P&P) or technology when solving mathematics problems. The predominant technology is a Computer Algebra System (CAS). This study investigated the beliefs about CAS held by twelve Year 11 students as they learnt to use CAS and whether these beliefs were stable over time. These students held a range of beliefs related to the usefulness of CAS, speed of CAS compared to P&P, whether CAS is proper mathematics, choice of CAS or P&P, ease of use, the correctness of answers and solving problems in Mathematical Methods (i.e. the mathematics subject studied). Beliefs are often described as being stable (e.g. McLeod, 1992), but some researchers stress stability needs to be determined empirically rather than being seen as a characteristic of beliefs (e.g. Liljedahl et al., 2012). For this sample of students, stability (rather than instability) is a feature of students' beliefs about CAS.

This discussion paper highlights the importance of Australian nursing and midwifery students' lack of exposure to electronic medical records during their undergraduate programs. There is pressure on universities offering nursing and midwifery programs to provide students with opportunities to learn to use patient electronic medical records. This will provide authentic rehearsal with the digital technology prior to clinical placements and increase graduate work readiness. Informed by contemporary literature, we describe the benefits of implementing electronic medical records (eMR) in health organisations and identify the challenges and barriers to implementing and integrating the education of electronic records into undergraduate nursing and midwifery programs. Undergraduate students who had not experienced eMR as part of on-campus learning felt unprepared and lacked confidence when commencing clinical practice. Some international nursing and midwifery programs have found that student's skills improve in decision-making and documenting patient observations when eMR is integrated into their university education program. Successful integration of an eMR program should consider academic/teaching staff skills and confidence in technology use, initial and ongoing costs and technical support required to deliver the program. In conclusion, Australian universities need to embed eMR learning experiences into the nursing and midwifery undergraduate curricula to increase students work-readiness with a focus on patient safety. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Schools now face considerable pressure to be using educational data to inform decision-making and become more efficient. Key to this rise of the 'data-driven' school is the increased use of digital technologies -- with computer-based data processing fuelling hopes for the technology-driven 'smart schooling' and a general 'datafication' of education. Against this background, the present paper explores the realities how data-work is taking place within individual schools with the aid of digital technologies. In particular, it draws on empirical data generated from in-depth ethnographic studies of digital data practices within three secondary schools in the Australian state of Victoria. Using concepts from the sociology of numbers, the paper takers these empirical findings to develop productive and relational accounts of the predominant ways that data work was being carried out within these schools. In contrast to the idea of 'Big Data', schools were most often found to be engaging in small-scale, improvised forms of spreadsheet work. The paper considers the social, cultural and political reasons underpinning schools' reliance on such forms of 'small data' -- particularly in contrast to the more sophisticated, automated and continuous forms of data analysis that are now available.

The characteristics of optimal developmental experiences are examined in a group of international Sea Kayaking Guides. This paper considers how these experiences contributed to the development of decision-making. A mixed approach was utilised that included a survey followed by a series of semi-structured interviews that are thematically analysed. An optimal developmental experience is identified as one with authenticity, diversity, transferability, and reflective value. The Guides developed their judgment and decision-making processes as an aspect of their 'seamanship' via experiences they described as 'epics'. The paper concludes that training for Guides must involve individualised, optimal developmental experiences.

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused major disruption to education and highlighted the importance of effective leadership during times of crisis. This paper considers the impact of the pandemic on school leaders in Australia, Fiji, and New Zealand. A secondary analysis of data from five interpretivist, qualitative studies was conducted. The aim of the study was to investigate the similarities and differences between the leaders' experiences across school settings, states/provinces, and countries. Our findings place renewed importance on understanding the role of schools within the community and the vital role school leaders play in helping schools respond to volatile and dynamic circumstances. The findings show how leaders' roles and responsibilities adapted to respond quickly and effectively to the urgency of the crisis, regardless of the context. Furthermore, common practices such as attending to wellbeing and providing clear and timely communication were revealed. The analysis also revealed some interesting nuances in the leaders' responses because of the duration of the crisis, the particular needs of the community, and government requirements. Papers like this provide insights into what leaders do and how schools and systems might prepare and support leaders to lead during times of crisis.

This paper examines the PhD by publication in the humanities and social sciences in US, UK, Canadian and Australian universities. A set of PhDs by publication from each of these countries were collected for the study. The theses were analysed to see to what extent they fitted, or not, with discussions of thesis types described in previous research into the PhD by publication. Interviews with students and supervisors were carried out to investigate the choices that students made in their writing. University rules for the submission of PhDs by publication and related policy documents are also examined. The study found that there seems to be a preference for different types of PhD by publication in each of the countries. In the US they were all prospective PhDs with the work being especially written for the thesis. In the UK, by contrast, retrospective PhDs, the PhD by published work, largely dominate. Canada was similar to the US, at least in the area of study where the data were collected for the paper, Education. In Australia, both prospective and retrospective PhDs were found, although it was the former, the prospective PhD, which dominated.

Purpose: Steiner schools represent a natural experiment in the provision of schooling. With a history dating back more than 100 years, leadership, leaders and the principal do not sit easily with Steiner educators. The contemporary regulatory environment requires a "principal" or legal authority at the school-building level, creating a tension for Steiner schools. This makes Steiner schools an ideal case study for understanding the contemporary role of the principal. Design/methodology/approach: This paper is based on an interview-based study with 24 heads of Australian Steiner schools. Conducted on Microsoft Teams, all by the principal investigator, the interviews generated a 171,742-word corpus subjected to an inductive analytical approach. Data reduction led to four themes, and this paper focuses on one (principles not prescription) and its implications for the principalship and school governance. Findings: Embedding the principalship in a philosophy (or theory) of education re-couples school administration with schooling and bases decision-making in principles rather than individuals. It also alters the role of data and evidence from accountability to justifying principles. Research limitations/implications: Rather than a focus on individuals or roles, this paper argues that the underlying principles of organisational decision-making should be the central focus of research. Practical implications: Ensuring organisational coherence, by balancing the diversity of positions on core principles is the core task of the contemporary principal. Originality/value: Exploiting natural experiments in the provision of schooling makes it possible to argue for how schooling, and specifically the principalship, can be different.

In the recent Australian 2021 census, the socio-technical construct of algorithmically driven decision-making processes made LGBTQI+ data as a category of diversity, inclusion and belonging an absent presence. In this paper, we position the notion of 'data justice' in relation to the entrenchment of inequalities and exclusion of LGBTQI+ lives and consider the implications of LGBTQI+ data being missing in action. As we look at the notion of 'data justice', we consider five critical socio-technical imaginaries with different kinds of data to think through the implications of technical democracy, data justice and post-automation. Finally, we consider the imaginary of citizenship when LGBTQI+ data is habitually missing in action from systematic power integrated into forms of governance. This paper positions 'data' not as a static 'object or process' but as a dynamic ecology that carries with it a multi-faceted set of coded meanings requiring constant review and reconsideration.

Purpose: This article examines the educational decision-making of hearing parents for their deaf children born during a period (1970-1990s) before the introduction of new-born hearing screening in New South Wales, where the study was conducted, and prior to the now near-universal adoption of cochlear implants in Australia. Design/methodology/approach: We present findings from an oral history study in which parents were invited to recall how they planned for the education of their deaf children. Findings: We propose that these oral histories shed light on how the concept, early intervention--a child development principle that became axiomatic from about the 1960s--significantly shaped the conduct of parents of deaf children, constituting both hope and burden, and intensifying a focus on early decision-making. They also illustrate ways in which parenting was shaped by two key structural shifts, one, being the increasing enrolment of deaf children in mainstream rather than separate classrooms and the other being the transformation of deafness itself by developments in hearing assistance technology. Originality/value: The paper contributes to a sociological/historical literature of "parenting for education" that almost entirely lacks deaf perspectives and a specialist literature of parental decision-making for deaf children that is almost entirely focussed on the post cochlear implant generation. The paper is distinctive in its treatment of the concept of "early intervention" as a historical phenomenon rather than a "common sense" truth, and proposes that parents of deaf children were at the leading edge of late-20th and early-21st century parenting intensification.

This paper reports on three Victorian early career Foundation to Year Two (F-2) teachers and the impact of leadership on their daily pedagogic decision-making about the teaching of reading. Data sets from each teacher drew on observations of three of their reading lessons and researcher-generated field notes, a semi-structured teacher interview, an online survey of reported teacher practice, teacher planning documents of the observed lessons and classroom artefacts related to reading. Selected from a wider qualitative case study undertaken with 16 F-2 teachers across six government primary sites in metropolitan Melbourne, the teachers in this paper reported on how mandated and non-negotiable principles and practices of reading affected their ability to make daily pedagogic decisions for their students. As a result of leadership directives, the three teachers expressed frustration at the lack of opportunity for teacher voice and autonomy in their craft of teaching. If the teaching profession wishes to continue to renew its numbers and promote the teaching profession as an ongoing career of choice, the focus on the professional development of early career teachers is timely and necessary. Therefore, this paper aims to shine a light on the importance of instructional leadership models which support the development of teacher knowledge, teacher efficacy and teacher satisfaction, ultimately resulting in more targeted outcomes for students and more teachers likely to remain in the profession.

Introduction: This paper reports the findings of a study of risk management in public libraries. The focus of the research was to determine whether the libraries had a risk management and disaster plan for major disasters. Method: A qualitative study was done to investigate risk management and disaster recovery in public libraries in South Australia. Seven personal interviews were conducted with library managers and librarians at four public libraries. Analysis: The qualitative results emerging from the interviews were analysed through hand coding using grounded theory. Results: Participants confused risk management and disaster recovery with the practice of work (occupational) health and safety. None of the participating libraries have a risk management or disaster plan. Conclusions: The library managers do not rate the risk of disaster as high, believing that their library is located in a low-risk disaster area. They also do not regard any part of their collections to be of great value. Loss of a collection is perceived as an opportunity to refresh that collection. The participants do not consider risk management and disaster recovery as an important part of their business. [Paper presented at the Information Seeking in Context (ISIC): The Information Behaviour Conference, Part 1 (11th, Zadar, Croatia, September 20-23, 2016).]

Improving schooling outcomes is a preoccupation facing school leaders globally. At the heart of such an agenda is the school leader's capacity to make professional learning decisions that best support the professional learning needs of their teachers. Thus, this paper investigates the extent to which principals' control to make professional learning decisions for the teachers in their schools is influenced by confidence in their understanding of professional learning and by four decision-making influences. To achieve such ends, 73 principals who were members of a large state-based cross-sectorial professional association for school leaders accepted an invitation to be surveyed concerning professional learning for teachers in their school regarding control, confidence in understanding professional learning, accountability, organisational constraints and school system influences. Key among the findings were that principals' sense of control to provide their teachers with effective professional learning was positively predicted by three factors: their own engagement in ongoing professional learning; the experience of fewer organisational constraints; and confidence in their understanding of what constitutes efficacious professional learning. School system influences such as regional office priorities were found to predict a negative impact on control. The article concludes by offering three recommendations to improve principals' control regarding the provision of professional learning for their teachers.

Drawing upon a long-term study of venture philanthropy and public schools in Australia, this paper focuses on Teach For Australia (TFA) as a major component of a venture philanthropic network, one that builds critical infrastructures and connections between non-government organisations and the state, creating a product pipeline into public schools. Utilising interviews with staff from Teach For Australia and venture philanthropic organisations, comprehensive and rigorous financial data, reviews, reports and website data, the analysis aims to identify the major philanthropic funders, individual actors and private foundations that leverage Teach For Australia, illustrating how this network develops for-profit pathways into public schools. In pushing a deficit framing of public schools, these networks incur privatisation effects, including flows of money, resources and key decision-making. They compromise the democratic principles upon which public schools are ideally based, in that the most disadvantaged public schools are opened up to 'entrepreneurial' and risk-taking corporate behaviour to test out teachers, products and services. By examining streams of revenue, partnerships and networks, we show how the purportedly non-profit Teach For Australia develops for-profit opportunities and business partnerships nested in corporate philanthropy, resulting in a privatisation effect on public schools.

This paper examines the psychometric properties of an existing school-based Parent Opinion Survey (POS) in order to investigate its validity as a measure of parent sentiments which may (eventually) be used to better inform the decision making of school leaders. The study focusses on the POS administered by all Victorian public schools at the time of this study, and uses Rasch analysis to identify a subset of items which form a psychometrically robust, unidimensional measure of parent sentiment. We propose that 13 items identified through this analysis could lay the foundation for providing policy makers who currently manage the distribution and collation of this survey, as well as school leaders, with a more reliable and valid overarching POS Scale score. Such an approach could better inform and support the home-school partnership that forms a crucial part of the Victorian Framework for Improving Student Outcomes (FISO) school improvement continuum.

Narrative Career Therapy (NCT) is recognised in this paper as having relevance for career practitioners who are working to create meaning for their clients in complex work life situations. Re-authoring Career Narratives is described as a practice that involves principles of NCT and these principles contribute to the exploration of agentive development. Re-authoring Career Narratives is demonstrated to support clients to navigate the reality that career learning is lifelong and evolving. We propose that a NCT requires practitioners to place emphasis on the contexts in which discourse is developed which can facilitate greater awareness of a client's career identity and capacity to navigate uncertainty. We use a narrative research approach to explore how re-authoring practices assist clients to make career decisions. We recommend that re-authoring practices assist clients to reconstruct their stories and to gain insight into career identity as an evolving contextual phenomenon responsive to changing career and work landscapes.

Upon enrolling in a university course, students typically commit to a predetermined study mode: on-campus, online, or a hybrid/blended study mode. The education provider typically predetermines which study mode/ s are available for each course. In this paper, the authors address the challenges of designing and trialling a new "StudyFlex" student-centred study mode at La Trobe University. By re-imagining the concept of flexibility in study mode selection, StudyFlex does away with bright line distinctions between online, blended and on-campus offerings and empowers students to self-select and adjust their preferred study mode pathway within their subject and throughout their course. This paper exposes and acts as a primer for discussing the many challenges of designing, developing, and implementing such student-centred study mode innovations. Specifically, it outlines and expands upon the StudyFlex trial conducted across several subjects, its genesis and justification, with its central tenet of designing subjects which allow students freedom to move between on-campus and online modes of learning within a single offering. Discussion extends to similar trial findings, including the recent pilot by Southern Cross University of a "converged delivery" model which attempted to merge on-campus and online study modes into a single converged mode. Attention then turns to curriculum development and design challenges inherent in the StudyFlex proof of concept. Particular emphasis is placed upon the imperative and significant challenge of ensuring equivalence of learning experience, in terms of learning value and quality, irrespective of the bespoke study mode pathway chosen by students in the StudyFlex trial subjects. The discussion culminates in identifying and highlighting the need for further research to address the challenges posed by innovations like the StudyFlex pilot and its predecessors such as the Southern Cross University converged delivery pilot. These extend to administrative challenges posed for universities seeking to accommodate student-centred study mode flexibility and potential and current practical regulatory constraints affecting such innovations. Fundamental questions emerge concerning the gap between the vision of allowing students to complete self-determination insofar as selection of study mode and the pragmatic realities of the various constraints facing higher education providers in seeking to push the boundaries of curriculum development and design to realise that vision. At a local level, and as the model becomes more widely adopted, La Trobe University teachers will need to be well supported to ensure their practices adapt to a new teaching model, while the model itself will need ongoing concerted design attention to ensure that students experience quality learning regardless of their study mode choices.

This paper, presented in three parts, overviews the current understandings of the Earth System and the relatively recent interdisciplinary field of Earth System Science (ESS) from a school education perspective. The representation of ESS in the Australian Curriculum is explored through the Cross Curriculum Priority area of Sustainability and the Australian Curriculum: Science (F-12), although the focus is up to Year 10. Initially the most current ESS framework and concepts (Steffen et al. 2020) are introduced (Part I). In the first of two follow-up journal articles an analysis of the Sustainability Cross Curriculum Priority area and the Australian Curriculum: Science indicated that several key ESS understandings and system-thinking skills were present. How the most current ESS understandings and abilities could lead to a far deeper understanding of the Earth System are then considered and those that may need more attention from students and teachers are highlighted (Part II). The final article outlines several research-informed pedagogies to help learners develop more scientific understandings of the Earth System, and appropriate related abilities (Part III). These Earth System goals and pedagogies needed to be considered in the ACARA review of the Australian Curriculum: Science and the Sustainability Cross Curriculum Priority area -- to that end, this paper was submitted to the appropriate committees. We believe the suggested ESS additions and emphases could comprise one pathway toward a more comprehensive and confident Earth System literacy and a stronger engagement in the Earth and other sciences at every school level, and to the curriculum as a whole. Better-informed, sustainability decision-making and actions by students as today's, and tomorrow's, citizens is the hoped-for outcome.

Secondary mathematics teaching is often characterised by teacher-led pedagogies centred on practice and memorising formula which can dominate incoming pre-service teachers' perceptions of mathematics teaching. Hence, creating opportunities for pre-service teachers (PSTs) - particularly those who have not experienced student-centered pedagogies -- to see the power of alternative pedagogical approaches is crucial in the early experiences of their teacher training. This paper explores the potential of 360degree video recordings of micro teaching of PSTs to enhance initial reflections using the Knowledge Quartet. Drawing on four PSTs' 360degree video reflections using the Knowledge Quartet framework we unpack the different ways that 360degree video provides additional opportunities for understanding the wider classroom impact of PST pedagogical decision making. The findings suggest that together these two tools offer an effective platform for PSTs to trial teaching approaches and reflect on their practice in a structured way.

This paper explores how trust in teacher professional judgment has been reconstituted through the globalised trends of performative accountability and reductive data-driven logics. The article draws upon empirical research from interviews with teachers and school leaders as well as observations of teacher preparation days, classroom and staff professional learning communities (PLCs), as part of a larger study of schooling practices in two geographically and contextually bound Queensland public schools. The paper focuses attention upon the socio-political, material-economic and cultural-discursive conditions inscribed in how data are currently understood and deployed, and how these conditions constrain trust in teachers, devaluing teachers' own professional judgment. Specifically, we flag how the practices and conditions that constrained trust were manifest in (a) pressures to ensure teachers generated and collected data on an ongoing basis to substantiate their claims about student learning, and (b) a perceived mistrust amongst parents and a subsequent need to justify decision-making on the basis of 'hard evidence'.

This paper explores the language planning strategies employed by Australian transnational families of Arabic-speaking backgrounds to develop their children's bilingualism in English and Arabic. The paper concludes that the families' transnationalism and strong links with their countries of origin played a significant role in their language planning decisions. The study revealed that the mothers consciously developed their children's bilingualism by means of both planned and spontaneous language management strategies. Semi-structured interviews and a focus group discussion revealed that the mothers used five main strategies, which comprised using the minority language at home, language mixing, reading stories, taking advantage of television shows and travelling to their hometowns. This paper discusses the validity and success of each strategy by comparing them with research findings on other transnational and migrant families around the world.

Purpose: This paper establishes the attitude of Australian livestock farmers toward the use of mobile applications (apps) in farmer extension, training and on-farm decision making. It also determines levels of technology adoption of smartphones and agriculture app use, as well as identifies factors that may influence app adoption. Methodology: A quantitative approach was utilised in the analysis of data from four online surveys conducted in 2017 that were completed by a total 542 respondents. Findings: Respondents had high levels of smartphone ownership and general app use but significantly lower agricultural app use. Surveys revealed a strong positive attitude and keenness to use apps. Making more informed decisions, increasing efficiency, and accessing and recording important information were the most important reasons for agricultural app use. Practical Implications: Findings suggest a lack of relevant, useful, and easy to use apps for agriculture, or an issue with their value proposition. Theoretical Implications: The perceived technology adoption gap amongst Australian livestock farmers could not be substantiated. Established fundamental factors influencing technology adoption are relevant for agricultural app adoption, but other factors appear to be less relevant and there are new motivators to consider. Originality/Value: There is little peer-reviewed information on the adoption and use of agricultural apps by Australian farmers and a perception that farmers have lower levels of smartphone and app use. This paper assesses technology adoption levels and considers the farmer perspective in identifying factors influencing adoption.

This specially themed ""Getting of Wisdom," Learning in Later Life" Edition of the "Australian Journal of Adult Learning" ("AJAL") is not so much concerned with the issue of ageing itself, but more about quality of life regardless of age. It is about taking, but also giving back as best as possible at any age. This special issue is a result of the one week "The Getting of Wisdom Exchange", a collaboration between around 100 adult education practitioners and researchers from ten countries from Australia, New Zealand, Asia and Europe. In this issue, papers are presented from Sweden, Ireland, Aotearoa/New Zealand, Australia, Slovenia, Poland, Germany, Portugal and the United Kingdom. Papers cover different topics and open questions about various issues in older people's learning.

Numbers coming out of education departments in Australia suggest that, even though most Australian schools are open, and families are able to send their children to them, increasing numbers of parents are deciding to keep their children at home for their education (Queensland Government: Department of Education, 2020). It may be that, as the president of Australia's home education representative body stated during the pandemic, Covid school closures offered a "risk-free trial" of home education (Lever, 2020) by providing an a-posteriori experience of education outside of schools. Building on the Covid experiences, this paper suggests that 'accidentally falling into' home education may be significant in understanding parents' home education choices. Using numbers of home educators from Australia, and the associated data on their location and ages, this paper argues responsibilisation (see Doherty & Dooley, 2018) provides a suitable lens to examine how parents may decide, after an a-posteriori experience such as Covid school closures and previous, often negative, experiences of schooling, to home educate in the medium to long term. This paper proposes that increasing numbers of home educators will be seen in various jurisdictions where families perceive themselves responsibilised to home educate due to Covid as an a-posteriori experiences of home education. The paper proposes these families are 'accidental' home educators (English, 2021). By contrast, much more stable is the 'deliberate' home education population, those whose choices are based in a-priori beliefs about schooling. The paper proposes that the accidental home education category may be better able to explain the growing numbers of home educators in Australia and across the world, providing a means for governments to respond to the needs of this cohort, and the policies required to manage this population.

Within discourses on education and transnationalism, much importance has been given to language, both for the educational success of migrants and their transition into the labor market. Among the many perspectives on multilingualism, there is a growing body of research on language brokering. In contrast to professional interpreting, this is often associated with interpreting without formal qualifications or payment in mostly informal settings. However, language brokering is embedded in complex social structures, and students who interpret often act within complex power relations. In our article, we address experiences with education-related language brokering. While focusing on the perspectives of the students, we will address the roles they take during language brokering activities between different actors and the power relations they experience. Our data were collected as part of an ethnographic research project which aimed to explore the experiences of refugee students following their arrival in Austria and during the adjustment period in their new sociolinguistic and educational context. Empirically, the article is based on a data set of small stories and reflections about language brokering. The analysis was carried out through contrastive comparisons between different cases. The paper will conclude with suggestions on the introduction of critical language brokering practices and policies in educational institutions.

The notion of employability is gaining importance as an essential outcome of many degrees in institutions of higher education throughout Australia. This paper aims to determine the effects of an Exercise Science course, which includes elements of both career development learning and work-integrated learning, on six dimensions of employability - commencement readiness; collaboration; informed decision-making; lifelong learning; professional practices and standards; and integration of knowledge/ theory and practice. The course components examined by the presented study included fieldwork placements, workshops and related career development assignments. Work Readiness Scales were administered prior to and on completion of the course. Students also rated the extent to which they considered any changes in their abilities were the result of each of the course components. Furthermore, responses to an openended questionnaire were analyzed to determine common themes affecting student development of each of the six dimensions. Comparison of pre- and post-work placement scores on the Work Readiness Scales demonstrated statistically significant differences in all the dimensions of employability except informed decision-making. Student ratings suggested that placements had a more significant effect on the changes in their abilities than the course workshops and assignments, however all three course components contributed to the development of workplace competencies. Student responses indicated that the course increased their awareness of personal strengths and weaknesses in relation to employability, as well as their knowledge of specific occupations relevant to exercise science. [This paper was first published in the WACE 19th Conference on Cooperative and Work-Integrated Education, 2015, refereed proceedings held in Kyoto, Japan.]

Improving Indigenous students' literacy is a major priority area for the Australian Government, receiving significant funding to address below benchmark English literacy standardised test results. Despite this, recent benchmark tests suggest Indigenous students continue to achieve well below the national average. This systematic review discusses peer-reviewed and evidence-based publications that report on significant literacy programmes to investigate which aspects of literacy are their focus, which are identified as successful, conditions needed for success, barriers to success and measures of success. While most programs reported significant literacy improvements, all identified barriers to success and/or sustainability as outlined in this paper. This review also utilises the four resources literacy model and multiliteracies theories to map literacy gaps. When considering decades of literacy research, there were significant gaps in the represented literacy skills, with the dominant focus on codebreaking, and very few programs addressing critical literacies, multiliteracies or creativity skills. The review of the papers highlighted the need for consideration of ways to design balanced and place-based literacy programs; school-community literacy partnerships; access to training and resources for schools and communities around literacy and school/community research projects and agency for teacher and school leaders to be professional context-based decision-makers.

Purpose: This study aims to explain the primacy that rapid, centralised decision-making gained in higher education institutions during the COVID-19 pandemic, with a particular focus on Australian universities. Design/methodology/approach: This paper draws on discussions regarding policy problems of an international, purpose-convened on-line policy network involving over 100 registrations from multiple countries. It analyses emerging institutional policy governance texts and documents shared between network participants, applies policy science literature regarding traditional institutional policy-making routines and rapid decision-making, and references media reportage from 2020. The paper traces how higher education institutions rapidly adjusted to pandemic conditions and largely on-line operations. Findings: The study finds that higher education institutions responded to the COVID-19 crisis by operationalising emergency management plans and introducing rapid, centralised decision-making to transition to remote modes of operation, learning and research under state-imposed emergency conditions. It highlights the need to ensure robust governance models recognising the ascendance of emergency decision-making and small-p policies in such circumstances, notwithstanding longstanding traditions of extended collegial policy-making routines for big-P (institutional) Policy. The pandemic highlighted practice and policy problems subject to rapid reform and forced institutions to clarify the relationship between emergency planning and decision-making, quality and institutional policy. Practical implications: In covering a range of institutional responses, the study advances the possibility of institutions planning better for unexpected, punctuated policy shifts during an emergency through the incorporation of rapid decision-making in traditionally collegial environments. At the same time, the paper cautions against the normalisation of such processes. The study also highlights key practices and policies that require urgent reconsideration in an emergency. The study is designed as a self-contained and freestanding narrative to inform responses to future emergencies by roundly addressing the particularities of the 2020 phase of the COVID-19 pandemic as it affected higher education. Originality/value: There is only limited research on policy-making in higher education institutions. This research offers an original contribution on institutional policy-making during a prolonged emergency that deeply changed higher education institution's governance, operations and outlook. Particularly significant is the synthesis of experiences from a wide range of sector personnel, documenting punctuated policy shifts in policy governance (meta-policy), institutional policy-making routines and quality assurance actions under great pressure. This paper is substantially developed from a paper given at the Association for Tertiary Education Management Institutional Policy Seminar, 26th October 2020.