Since 2011 the School of Media and Communication at RMIT University has been actively supporting an ethos of belonging throughout their learning and teaching. In 2017 'belonging' became a formal university priority, embedded in the institution's strategy and dispersed across Colleges and Schools through a range of activities and interventions.…

This expository paper critically examines the value of school geography in social debates that have a direct significance for the lives of young people. Migration is chosen as a focus, both because it is a defining feature of everyday life and the world we live in, and an area of research and debate in the discipline of geography. We draw on two…

Discrimination against LGBT individuals remains widespread across Australia. Since schools continue to promote regimes of heterosexuality and cis-normativity, teachers have a crucial role in creating contexts in which LGBT young people feel accepted and safe. Drawing on North's (2006) work on social justice and Connell's (2012) discussion of…

As schools become living sites of evidence-based practice, teachers increasingly accumulate large quantities of observations and records. In these times of an overabundance of documentation, there is a need to find the "unit of analysis" that determines the essence of what matters for assessment. In drawing upon cultural-historical…

We know little about how internationalisation processes are understood, rationalised and prioritised in different parts of the world. A global survey of internationalisation in universities was undertaken at the University of Southampton to fill this gap. Its purpose was to discover how strategic leaders in universities in different parts of the…

This article explores Earth Charter education as a form of values education that is integral to education for sustainable development. Initially, it outlines how Earth Charter education rests on an ecocentric worldview and a social analysis of ecojustice--terms that are defined and explained. Moving from this rationale, the article explores issues…

The period from the late 1970s to the late 1980s were transition years for most public(government) school systems in Australia. A reaction was developing against the neo-progressive and radical (neo-Marxist) innovations of the late 1960s and 1970s such as school-based curricula, activity methods, and "open education". By the early 1980s…

Traces the role of Geoffrey Cochrane Remington, Sydney solicitor and businessman, in free public library development in Australia. Describes how the Munn Pitt Report on Australian libraries and Remington's acquaintance with John Wallace Metcalfe of the Public Library of New South Wales led to the birth of the Free Library Movement in 1935, and…

Proposals for a university of Western Sydney (Australia) are examined as examples of policy-making in postsecondary education. The state and federal framework of postsecondary education is sketched, some features of Western Sydney's society are noted, and the university movement and options are discussed. (MSE)

This monograph on international disability issues offers three main papers giving English, Australian, and New Zealand viewpoints. The first paper is by Len Barton from England and is titled "Disability and the Necessity for a Socio-Political Perspective." Barton attacks the medical model of disability and argues that people with…

There are severe structural barriers to improving access to higher education in Australia. Free public higher education and increased funding to improve public schools, increase higher education's capacity, and augment financial aid are recommended. (MSE)

This paper reports on a study of the perceptions of 10 teachers as they sought to gain acceptance for curriculum practices considered to be child-responsive. The teachers worked with 5- and 6-year-old children in schools where some perceived their child-responsive practices as innovative, introducing practices which differed from those already…

Case studies showed that inequality between women and men is a very general feature of the Australian secondary school system. New approaches to the reform of sex inequalities in education are proposed. (RM)