Youth Research News Vol 9 No 1 February 1999
In this Issue:
Visitors at the Centre
Professor Linda Eyre
Linda Eyre, Professor in Education at the University of New
Brunswick, Canada, is a visiting scholar at the Youth Research
Centre this semester. Linda teaches and researches in feminism,
education and health education. She is co-editor with Leslie G.
Roman of Dangerous Territories: Struggles for Difference and
Equality in Education (Routledge, 1997). She has published on
gender and sexuality issues, and in 1992 earned the Canadian
Association of Curriculum Studies Dissertation Award for her
ethnographic work on the social construction of gender and
schooling. Prior to doctoral work she was a high school teacher
for 20 years.
While at the Centre Linda will be working on three projects:
one has to do with student teachers' experiences engaging with
critical and feminist pedagogies during the school practicum, the
second concerns an analysis of her own experiences working on a
public/private partnership in school health education and the
third concerns discourses of sexual harassment at the Millennium
Critical Psychology Conference, which is to be held in Sydney in
May. Linda is looking forward to discussing her work with
scholars in the Faculty of Education.
Professor Fazal Rizvi
Professor Rizvi has not had to travel far to be a visiting
scholar at the Youth Research Centre this semester. He has come
from the Education Faculty at Monash University where, among
other things, he is Director of the Monash Centre for Research in
International Education (MCRIE). His research interests are
extensive and include theories of globalisation and international
education, racism and the politics of difference, problems of
democratic reform in education and education and cultural policy.
His most recent book, co-authored with Bob Lingard, Miriam Henry
and Sandra Taylor, is Education Policy and the Politics of
Change (Routledge, 1997). The same team is currently writing
another book, Globalisation the OECD and Education, for
Pergamon. The book examines the way in which the OECD's policy
research has helped shape recent educational policies in
Australia. The book is in the final stages of preparation, and
should be ready for publication in July 1999. Some of Fazal's
time at the YRC will be spent on completing this book.
While at the YRC, Fazal will also be working on his current
ARC project with Simon Marginson and Roger Woock. This project is
attempting to map recent developments in the internationalisation
of Australian higher education. It involves case-studies of six
Australian universities and is concerned with exploring the
effects of internationalisation on changes in their
organisational culture. Beyond this, Fazal is simply looking
forward to being at the YRC, reading as widely as he can and
talking about ideas with the members of the Centre. He feels that
the potential for collaboration between Melbourne and Monash
faculties of education is considerable, and will be seeking to
establish a joint project or two with the YRC.
YRC Prices to Increase as of March 1,
1999
As was mentioned in the last Youth Research Centre Newsletter
(Vol 8 No 5, Dec 1998), there will be an increase in the cost of
YRC membership and publications. In the ten years that the YRC
has been around, there have been no increases in price.
Unfortunately, costs have caught up with us and it has therefore
been necessary to increase the cost of our membership and
publications. The new prices are outlined below:
Cost of Membership as of 1 March 1999:
• Organisation: $50 per annum
• Individual: $30 per annum
• Student/Unemployed: $10 per annum
Cost of Publications as of 1 March 1999:
• Research Reports: $15* each (non members), $10*
(members)
• Working Papers: $10* each (Working Papers will continue
to be supplied free to members as they are published)
* Prices include postage, however there will be an
additional flat rate charge of $3 per order
to cover handling costs.
For more details on prices, please
refer to our latest Catalogue of Publications March 1999, now
available from the Centre.
For a copy please call: 9344-9633
Publication Packages
Buying Youth Research Centre publications in thematically
linked packages makes financial sense. These packages are
available for approximately half the cost of the separate
reports: in each case $30 or $20 for YRC members. In addition to
the three packages which have previously been available, the
Centre is now offering three new packages:
PP1: Young Women's Health Package:
- RR3: Lifelong Incurable and Fatal
- RR7: Health Services for Young Women
- RR8: The Challange of Sexually Transmitted Diseases
- WP7: Young Women and Sexually Transmitted Diseases
PP2: Pathways Package:
- RR1: Pathways, Personal Issues, Public Participation
- RR6: The Transition Factor: A Survey at Seventeen Schools
- RR9: Preparing Students for Future Pathways
- WP6: Structured Pathways for Young People
PP3: Early School Leavers Package:
- RR4: Early School Leavers
- RR11: Young Women and Girls At Risk
- WP8: Making the Break - Leaving School Early
- WP9: Getting a Life - Pathways and Early School Leavers
- WP10: Services and Early School Leavers
PP4: Education Program Package:
- RR10: Health Education in Secondary Schools: A Focus on
Alcohol
- RR13: Young Mothers
- RR15: Creating New Choices
- WP16: ReThinking Drinking: You're in Control - Evaluation
- OP11: Mental Health Education in Australian Secondary
Schools
PP5: Life Patterns Package:
- RR14: Participant Pathways and Outcomes in VET
- RR16: Young People Living in Rural Australia
- RR17: Life Patterns, Choices, Careers
- WP18: Vocational Education
PP6: Young People and the Justice System Package:
- WP11: The Thinking Skills Project
- WP13: Youth Unemployment and Crime
- WP14: Young People and the Underground Economy
- WP15: Another Hole in the Wall
Order these packages on the form in the Publications
Catalogue, or simply contact the Centre and quote the package
number.
New Projects
Student Action Teams
Twenty Victorian secondary schools have been selected to take
part in a project funded by VicSafe through the Department of
Education. Student action teams will be established in these
schools to work with community members in the investigation,
identification and implementation of strategies for improving
community safety.
Leadership training for members of these student teams and for
their teacher advisers, is being provided by Red Cross Victoria.
The Youth Research Centre has been employed to conduct an
evaluation of the project through 1999. This will have both
formative and summative aspects; we will assist the operation of
the teams and the project overall by highlighting issues that
emerge and feed advice back to participants; we will also
document project achievements through Issue Papers, Project
Descriptions (Case Studies) and a Final Report.
Working on the project will be Roger Holdsworth, Helen Stokes,
John Stafford and Debra Tyler.
Project Updates
The ACEE Project
Helen Stokes and John Mcleod are continuing with the support
and evaluation of the five projects of which three are involved
in the research circle. They are completing their final visits to
the five sites over the next six weeks. A series of issues papers
on particular aspects of full service schooling and
school/community links will be given to the schools and ACEE at
the beginning of March. These papers will inform the basis of the
final report to be completed by May this year.
Civics and Citizenship Education Project
The 25 metropolitan and rural schools attended their first
professional development day on December 4th at Rydges in
Carlton. The day was spent introducing the different projects and
establishing their support needs. The next stage involves a visit
by support staff to the schools to discuss the direction and
implementation of the particular projects. There is a second
professional development day organised for late April which will
concentrate on process tools for implementing projects such as
case writing.
There are a wide range of projects being implemented by
government, independent and catholic primary and secondary
schools across the state. The projects range from curriculum
development of civics and citizenship to students participating
in action based civic's projects such as Junior School Council.
While two of the projects are cluster based the majority are
working as single schools.
Our role as support staff is to facilitate the range of
schools to share resources and project findings with regional
networks and across the Civics and Citizenship Project.
Linking Schools and Communities Project
-ACEE/NSN
The Research Circle
As part of the Linking Schools and Communities project, some
of the project schools have joined with other schools with an
interest in Full Service Schooling to participate in a
research circle. The research circle has been going for the last
18 months with each of the schools conducting the circle at their
schools to showcase their involvement in full service schooling.
The circle has facilitated discussion around the issues of
school/community links. As a result of these discussions some of
the schools in the ACEE project have refocussed their projects to
include a broader view of full service schooling and
school/community links.
Each of the schools in the circle will write a report of their
projects by the end of March. This report involves telling a
story of the project with many of the participants contributing
to the writing. This process is being facilitated by the academic
associates of the circle and the National Schools Network.
Around the Centre...
Helen Cahill recently returned from a
consultancy to the Hong Kong Life Education Program where she
worked with the drug education team, training facilitators in the
use of roleplay techniques and contributing to the design of an
appropriate classroom program. Helen visited a number of schools
to watch classes in action in both Cantonese and English and will
return to Hong Kong later this year to conduct focus group
interviews and drama workshops with young people prior to
developing a series of trigger videos for use in the Hong Kong
Life Education Program. The videos will be made in association
with Ruby Pictures.
Debra Tyler and Helen Stokes have been invited to teach in the
post Graduate Diploma in Educational Studies (Student welfare).
The Catholic Education Office has chosen to use its Youth suicide
Prevention funding allocation in the professional development of
its teaching staff to complete the diploma over a two year
period. This will involve an extra intake of 150 students in
addition to the normal intake for the course.
Debra and Helen will be teaching the 1st year subject, Socio
and Political Context of Student Welfare in the first semester.
The research Debra and Helen have completed on the Youth
allowance is particularly relevant here. In second semester Debra
and Helen will teach School/Community Partnerships which will
draw on their depth of knowledge in the inter-agency area. Debra
and Helen will be working closely with Robin Betts who is the
co-ordinator of the course.
Seminar Presentation by Dr. Linda Eyre The
Privatisation of Curriculum: A Canadian Testimonial. On 25
February, Dr Eyre discussed how education restructuring following
a corporate model is making in-roads in most provinces in Canada,
and the privatisation of curriculum is not far behind. There is
evidence that impoverished schools are turning to public/private
partnerships with the corporate sector. Dr Eyre presented a
critical feminist analysis of her experience as an academic in
developing a curriculum resource on alcohol education for the New
Brunswick Department of Education, funded by the corporate sector
— The Brewers Association of Canada. The presentation raised
questions about the future of curriculum under corporate rule,
specifically the limits and possibilities for critical and
feminist pedagogy when corporatism and marketism take hold in
schools. Is it possible for critical feminist educators to work
with the corporate sector - if so - how? What guidelines would be
needed? How does this happen?
1998
YRC Annual Report
The Centre's 1998 Annual Report is now available. A copy is
enclosed with this newsletter for all financial members. Anyone
else wishing to purchase a copy can call the Centre on 9344 9633. Copies are $5 each
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