Category: Refereed article

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Willing and enabled: The academic outcomes of a tertiary enabling program in regional Australia

Authors: Lisa Andrewartha and Andrew Harvey, LaTrobe University

Summary:  This paper examines the achievement levels of students undertaking the Tertiary Enabling Program (TEP) at La Trobe University. The TEP is an alternative pathway program that traverses multiple institutions, campuses, and disciplinary areas, and is designed to prepare a diverse student cohort for tertiary study. The Program integrates several sources of support, including tutorials, mentoring, and counselling. We found high overall achievement levels, indicating success in teaching and supporting students with variant needs. Nevertheless, there was substantial variation in achievement between subjects, campuses, and student groups. Variable achievement is likely to reflect differing levels of prior educational attainment and preparedness among students. However, results also highlight the complexity in managing a Program across multiple sites, subjects, and institutions. We suggest further comparative research into curriculum and teaching practice of enabling programs nationwide to enable more effective benchmarking and expansion of these pathways.

Keywords: under-represented students, widening participation, enabling program, tertiary preparation, alternate pathway

 

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 54_1. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

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Learning and leadership: Evaluation of an Australian rural leadership program

Authors: Wendy Madsen, Cathy O’Mullan and Helen Keen-Dyer, Central Queensland University

Summary:  Leadership programs have been extensively promoted in rural communities in Australia. However, few have been evaluated. The results of the evaluation of a rural leadership program provided in this paper highlight the need for adult learning theories to be more overtly identified and utilised as the basis of planning and implementing leadership programs. Transformative learning theory and social learning theory were used to explain the impact the program had for participants and to provide insight into how similar programs could be enhanced.

Keywords: rural leadership; adult learning; non-formal learning

 

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 54_1. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

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What’s politics got to do with it? ‘Power’ as a ‘threshold’ concept for undergraduate business students

Author: Paul D. Williams, Griffith University

Summary:  Politics courses embedded in business and commerce degree programs have soared in number in recent years. Yet how business students, often compulsorily enrolled in politics courses, learn key politics concepts is an under-researched area. The purpose of this article is to determine where the teaching and learning of political science and business intersects. This research reviews the place of the “threshold concept” in student learning, with particular reference to “power” as a political concept. This article advances three arguments: that the study of political institutions involves a series of “threshold” concepts that students must pass over before moving onto a higher plane of understanding; that the teaching of political institutions should span the three key areas of knowledge, attitudes and skills; and that a real understanding of political institutions allows students to regard business figures, in pursuing self-interest, as “political” actors like any other.  

Keywords: Politics, power, business, threshold concept

 

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 54_1. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

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Exploring how short-term overseas study programs impact students’ personal growth

Authors: Jean-Pierre Fenech, Monash University; Sylvana Fenech, RMIT University; Jacqueline Birt, University of Queensland

Edition: Volume 53, Number 3, November 2013

Summary:  This paper is an exploratory study of the impact of short-term overseas study programs on participants’ personal growth in business school environments. We interviewed students participating in such a program organised by an Australian university. Guided by the literature, we used three factors — pre-academic work, a three-week sojourn, and the participants themselves — in order to understand the association between the program and the participants’ personal growth. We noted several idiosyncrasies amongst the participants that affected their level of personal growth, including language ability, age, gender, extent of previous travel and ethnic background. Overall, all students experienced different levels of growth as a result of the program.

Keywords: study abroad, short-term programs, personal development,

 

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 53_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

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Tertiary study: Barriers and benefits for health and human services professionals

Author: Amy Gibbons, University of Tasmania

Edition: Volume 53, Number 3, November 2013

Summary:   Results from two 2012 surveys exploring the barriers and benefits of tertiary study for staff within the Tasmanian Department of Health and Human Services suggest that encouraging staff engagement with further study benefits both the individual and the organisation. Respondents reported improved job performance, increased self-esteem and motivation to learn. Barriers associated with limited time and competing demands impacted on staff ability to access information about study options. In this context, workplace and management support for study was identified as a crucial enabler. The investigative process of this study has been made explicit in order to encourage replication by other researchers. This mixed-methods research was informed by the ‘three capitals’ approach in order to examine the personal, social and economic benefits of learning. The relative weakness of benefits associated with social capital in the results reflects the experience of these part-time mature-age students employed in a professionally demanding sector.

Keywords: adult learners, three capitals, tertiary study, health and human services,Tasmania

 

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 53_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

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Literacy strategies used by adults with intellectual disability in negotiating their everyday community environments

Authors: Michelle F. Morgan, Karen B. Moni and Monica Cuskelly; University of Queensland

Edition: Volume 53, Number 3, November 2013

Summary:    This paper presents the findings from one part of a participatory research investigation about the literacy strategies used by three young adults with intellectual disability in their everyday community environments. Using data collected through video recording, prompting and think-alouds, information was collected about the range of literacy events that the research partners engaged with and the strategies that they used to negotiate these events. Findings revealed that these young adults engage in literacy in their everyday lives using literacy strategies that are multiple and varied and which draw on learned school-based and context specific strategies. Visual texts enabled more effective construction of meaning. Multiple context specific examples are provided to create a snapshot of how these young adults use literacy in their everyday community environments that broadens our knowledge and understanding of the types of literacy events and strategies that they engage with.

Keywords: literacy, intellectual disability, community, strategies

 

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 53_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

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Learning a new lifestyle

Author: Christina Kargillis, University of Technology Sydney & Flinders University.

Edition: Volume 53, Number 3, November 2013

Summary:  This paper explores the role of innovation in overcoming the challenges and negotiations within the ‘lifestyle migration’ or sea/tree change of working people, to places rich in nature but ‘lean’ in industry. It focusses on how they overcome primarily economic challenges in the process of negotiating a new life. The paper is founded upon a qualitative study in conjunction with relevant literature and theoretical analysis. Participants stemmed from diverse socio-economic positions and represented both the coastal and hinterland townships within the study site. The study stems from the need to understand the difficulties within the lifestyle migration phenomenon, where anecdotally approximately two thirds of working aged migrants within the study site ‘fail’ to sustain their relocation for at least five years. This paper attempts to expose how the minority of those who attempt the transition have managed to survive. The research employs a unique approach in exploring the relationship between adult education theories of reflexive identity and innovation, as well as educational perspectives of self-efficacy and emotional intelligence. The paper suggests that reflexivity with external factors positions the process of seachange among working people as a creative act where lifestyle migrants need to demonstrate creativity in order to survive.

Keywords: innovation, lifestyle migration, identity, regional Australia

 

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 53_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

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Ready for action and civic engagement: Resilient third age women learners in rural Australia

Author: Glenna Lear, University of South Australia

Edition: Volume 53, Number 3, November 2013

Summary: This paper discusses the power of local and experiential knowledge, civic engagement and social transformation on rural third age women’s learning. My passion for learning reflects the methodological stance of heuristic inquiry, which requires the researcher to have a passionate interest in the phenomena under investigation and in this case, includes my tacit knowledge as a third age learner, a former farming partner and a long term resident of the region. Our two informal conversations about their midlife learning gave the six purposively selected women aged 58 – 70 the opportunity to reflect on their learning autobiographies as co-researchers. In their midlife, the women had the freedom and determination to change directions and the generative passions to remain useful, to give something back to their communities and to make them a better place for their retirement years and future generations. They emerged from the relative obscurity of the backrooms, kitchens and traditional supportive roles as farmer’s wives and mothers to become community activists, leaders and change agents who transformed their small service communities into thriving, vibrant, ‘can do’ societies better able to cope with the political, social, economic and environmental changes prevailing in regional Australia since the 1990s. They built new networks within the community and with the wider world and used their local knowledge and personal experiences to develop appropriate strategies for community renewal, which exposed them to diverse experiences, new knowledge and different ways of doing things. Unexpectedly they flourished and experienced personal development, growth and a transformation of the self as a blooming and fruition with the maturation of their potential.

Keywords: third age learning, community engagement, rural women, informal learning, personal transformation

 

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 53_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

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Older undergraduate students bringing years of experience to university studies: Highlights, challenges and contributions

Author: Bronwyn J. Ellis, University of South Australia 

Edition: Volume 53, Number 3, November 2013

Summary: Undergraduate students enrolled through two regional locations were surveyed on their experience of being university students in later life. Students aged 55 and over were invited to complete an anonymous online questionnaire. This collected demographic information, and sought, through open-ended questions, information on their study motivations and university experience. Participants had the opportunity to describe the highlights and challenges of their study experience, including any needs for additional support and facilities. They were also asked to identify the contributions made possible by their greater life experience, and to comment on their relationship with academic and administrative staff and other students.

Most respondents (70%) aimed to use their new knowledge, skills, and targetted qualification in a vocational context; self actualisation goals also played a part for some. They reported generally relating well to others at university. Challenges arose from conflicting priorities and some technological issues. Their accumulated experiences helped them contribute significantly to class discussions as they understood the context for the theory they were learning.

Keywords: lifelong learning, older learners, motivation, higher education, equity, diversity

 

 

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 53_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

 

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An evaluation of resilience and employability in disadvantaged adults

Author: Linda Rainey, Centre for Research in Education, Equity and Work, University of South Australia

Edition: Volume 46, Number 3, November 2006

Summary: This article analyses the evaluation of a pilot program for long-term, unemployed people conducted at a TAFE institute, and designed to improve their employment prospects. The process undertaken for measuring inferred resilience and employability is described. Tracking of 49 program participants’ perceptions of relevant skills, attitudes and learning, together with objective observation, assessment and program outcomes, were employed to obtain a measure of enhanced resilience and employability. The study will be used to assist in the design of future programs for this target population.

Keywords: inferred resilience,

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