Wellbeing is an emerging priority that poses a "wicked" problem. Current directives from policy makers are that schools address student wellbeing. However, the lack of a clear definition, simple solution or process for ensuring wellbeing creates a difficult task for schools. This article seeks to add to the current understanding of…

The world needs great individual educational changemakers capable of identifying problems and creating bold, scalable solutions. But the world also needs Dream Teams--groups of talented administrators, teachers, staff, students, and community members who are passionate about making things better for kids, believe that school-based change is the…

Coordinated systems are required to ensure evidence-informed practice and evaluation of community-based interventions (CBIs). Knowledge translation and exchange (KTE) strategies show promise, but these require evaluation. This paper describes implementation and evaluation of COOPS, a national KTE platform to support best practice in obesity…

Although there is a recognised need for effective practices to support students on the autism spectrum in mainstream schools, there is a research to practice gap in the area of autism and education, whereby evidence-based intervention may take decades to translate into mainstream classroom practice. Thus, current recommendations are that, rather…

Purpose: In the higher education sector, the evaluation of learning and teaching projects is assuming a role as a quality and accountability indicator. The purpose of this paper is to investigate how learning and teaching project evaluation is approached and critiques alignment between evaluation theory and practice. Design/Methodology/Approach:…

This paper reports on some of the factors that contribute to an effective partnership between an urban Australian university and a State Department of Education. The partnership, currently in its third year of implementation, entails as a key purpose the development of school Centres of Excellence which contribute to the preparation of pre-service…

Information technology has been transforming various disciplines of life sciences and physical sciences as a tool (for "doing" science) and a technique (for conducting experiments and creating models). This evolution in the application of IT in science demands that science students be equipped with appropriate IT skills and that the…

Teacher education in universities is under pressure. In many new education policies there is a renewed focus on teacher quality, and therefore quality initial teacher education. In some countries this renewed focus has led to a resurgence of "alternative approaches" to teacher education such as Teach for America / Australia. One of the…

Educational technology research has been characterised as lacking theoretical frameworks that can enable cumulative knowledge-building across the field. This article explores the value of Legitimation Code Theory (LCT) for addressing these issues by discussing research into the key of integration of information and communication technologies in…

Federal, State and school-based professional development has become a multi-million dollar educational enterprise in Australia. Yet there are no published models for the making of systems-level professional development policy. Reviewing the literature on the characteristics of effective professional development programs, this paper proposes a…

Evaluation theory and practice in Australia are described. In Australia, evaluation is linked closely with government programs. Australia has benefited from the opportunity to observe evaluation in the rest of the world. However, development of a uniquely Australian perspective has been hampered by the imposition of cultural values of other…

This paper addresses the issue of service quality evaluation within the higher education sector and stresses the need to develop measures that are both psychometrically and practically sound. The paper argues that recent debate surrounding the development of such measures has been too strongly geared toward their psychometric performance, with…

The papers contained in this document represent the keynote addresses, refereed and non-refereed conference papers from the 22nd National Conference of Society for the Provision of Education in Rural Australia (SPERA). The theme for this national conference was: Community Diversity and Innovation in Rural and Remote Education and Training. Keynote…

Significant developments have occurred in the field of professional development (PD) in Australia's vocational education and training (VET) sector in the past 10 years. During the early 1990s, work-based learning (WBL) became the preferred model for PD in the VET sector. Research sponsored by the National Staff Development Committee of the…

This book provides a comprehensive survey of literature regarding the theory and practice of distance education (DE). Among the aspects of DE discussed are the following; overall picture of DE today (concept/evolution, DE and open learning, modes of teaching/learning); background (basic questions concerning education/teaching/learning and impact…