Teacher unions are working in challenging times. Building power is important for teacher unions to resist neoliberal reforms that have aimed to restructure school education and weaken collective organisation. Yet we have few understandings of the democratisation project that teacher unions have engaged in to build and renew internal power in this…

Purpose: School climate strikes are opening spaces of appearance, becoming differently active forms of public pedagogy where new and previously unthought collective climate action is possible. This inquiry contributes to understanding school climate strikes as important forms of climate justice activism by exploring how they work as public…

The School Strike for Climate campaign led to public discussion about children's political participation. Children are generally excluded from formal political systems, however this campaign challenges mainstream attitudes that children are not sufficiently competent to participate in politics. This paper presents an analysis of Australian…

News coverage of the Thunberg-inspired student climate strikes in Australia in 2019 and 2020 framed school leaders 'in conversation' with politicians, education system spokespeople, political pundits, the public and student activists. While previous scholarly interest has mainly focused on the student protestors, we examine the intertextual…

Since November 2018, Australian high school climate strikers have become leaders in the movement for climate action, giving rise to a new generation of young people who have learnt how to lead change. This article focuses on the question of leadership across social movements and in global youth movements. It then investigates the different forms…

Teachers are working in disturbing and challenging times, characterised by coterminous crises, the COVID-19 pandemic and human induced climate change; these are transforming our working conditions and the lives of students and teachers. In this research, we looked to our own pedagogical practices as teacher educators to collaboratively explore…

Since 2018, school students around the world have gone on strike from school to call on leaders to take decisive action on climate change. Prominent in the resultant rallies are placards created by participants -- from small children to their adult allies. This paper explores how students in the movement enact and activate visual approaches to…

Vice-chancellor salaries have been a topic of media interest and scholarly research for decades. In recent years, however, the media's interest and criticism of vice-chancellors' salaries has escalated, as negativity surrounding university performance and administration has led to a significant increase in articles concerning these matters. This…

This paper focuses on issues of embodiment specific to the experiences of an asylum seeker represented in the play "Refugitive" (2003). The play was written and performed by Shahin Shafaei, an Iranian asylum seeker who spent a period of 22 months in an Australian detention centre. The narrative of the play emerges through a conversation…

Shows that compulsory arbitration does not prevent strikes, even when nine out of ten workers are covered. (BH)

Sheds light on labor relations in Australia through an examination of its governance of education, Australian teachers and unions, the history of compulsory arbitration, some contrasts between compulsory arbitration and collective bargaining, some contemplated changes in the governance of education in Australia, and some speculation about the…

The responsibility for education in Australia rests with the states. Teachers in the state of New South Wales, as in other Australian states, are employed by the Public Service Board, which determines working conditions. Teachers are administered, however, under the Department of Education. Labor disputes in Australia are settled not by formal…

This monograph by four authors examines the structure and role of teacher unions in the three Australian states of New South Wales, Victoria, and South Australia, and analyzes the rapidly changing shape of teacher unionism at the federal level. After an introduction by Andrew Spaull, Robert White, in chapter 2, examines developments within the…

An analysis is presented of the media and public reaction to a strike by state school teachers in New South Wales in 1981. It is pointed out that the media, intentionally and/or unintentionally, provided a biased view of teacher-related issues, which operated at an ideological level against the immediate and long-term interests of teachers.…

This paper explores the perceptions of three rural secondary school teachers in the Riverina area of New South Wales, Australia. In-depth interviews were conducted with three secondary teachers: three male teachers aged 25, 32, and 60. The original objective of the grounded theory study was to examine the teachers' perceptions about the state's…