The primary purpose of Flexi schools in Australia is to serve students for whom traditional school has not been a good fit and are largely comprised of students who have disengaged and disconnected from traditional education. The reasons behind disengagement are diverse, but young people in Flexis typically have in common a negative prior…

Flexible learning options (FLOs) provide individualised learning pathways for disengaged young people with strong emphasis on inclusivity and wellbeing support. Amidst a rapid expansion of Australia's flexible learning sector, service providers are under increasing pressure to substantiate participant outcomes. This paper stems from a national…

This paper expounds a dynamic understanding of interest, including cognitive and affective dimensions. This conceptualization of interest is applied to findings from research in two flexible learning settings that provided access to foundation-level credentials for young people who, for whatever reason, had disengaged from or sought alternatives…

Opportunities for students to speak and to be heard are important elements of democratic schooling processes but research into student voice has shown that a culture of silence is a more common feature of schooling. Efforts to re-engage young people in learning often recognise the importance of schooling processes that provide them with…

Flexible Learning Options (FLOs) are common across many countries to enable secondary school completion by young people for whom mainstream schooling has not worked well. Access to high-quality education through FLOs is a social justice issue. In the context of an inclination among governments for accountability and evidence-based policy, as well…

The affective dimension of teachers' work is a vital element in shaping inclusive, child-centred classrooms. It is particularly important for students who lack certain aspects of care and support within their personal lives. Recently, neoliberal educational paradigms of data gathering, external testing and competition have increased pressure upon…

In this paper, we draw upon the experiences of a group of young people who have been excluded from mainstream schools in two Australian states to provide an account of the ways in which they have found their way to education in educational sites that are variously referred to as "flexible learning centres", "second chance…

In the context of pressure to increase retention rates a wide variety of alternative educational programs has developed in Australia over the past few decades. The purpose of this paper is to provide a map of the alternative education landscape for marginalised youth in New South Wales, in order to reduce confusion and enable communication between…

Efforts to increase senior secondary retention rates and improve schooling for marginalized students have been influenced by the school effectiveness perspective. This paper outlines several problematic aspects of this perspective and proposes an alternative orientation centred around "care". Drawing on research with students and…