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Employability of international students: Strategies to enhance their experience on work-integrated learning (WIL) programs
Get PDFThis paper presents a systematic qualitative review of relevant literature, documents and reports, and critically discusses issues facing international students undertaking work-integrated learning (WIL) activities as part of their higher education in Australia. Initiatives utilised to better support international students on these WIL placements are described. Based on an evaluation of the data reviewed, the discussion highlights two main challenges to international students’ employment experiences: a limited competence in English communication, and a limited understanding of the local working context. In seeking explanations for the above, the authors identified factors such as inadequate student-entry procedures, limited opportunities for socialisation, limited input in cultural protocols, and the lack of soft-skills training. The recommended solutions include more uniformity between government and employer sectors, increased acceptance and support for multicultural diversity, an openness towards diverse ways of thinking, and an enhancement of training in diverse communication styles
Collective Responsibility and the Limits of Disclosure in Regulating Global Supply Chains
Get PDFGlobal supply chains present major challenges for company law and corporate governance, nationally and internationally. Their increasing relevance in international business has led to a serious regulatory gap, especially in light of corporate involvement in human rights abuses, labour exploitation and environmental degradation. Alongside a number of international norms such as those expressed in the UN’s Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, there has been a proliferation in domestic and international law of disclosure provisions, mandating greater transparency by companies in response to the problems caused by global supply chains. In this paper, however, it is argued that disclosure is not a sufficient answer to such problems. It is suggested that we should approach the problems with a different conceptualisation of supply chain structures. If we regard them as ‘global poverty chains’, such a perspective brings about a moral response — a recognition that we have a collective responsibility to eradicate the poverty and suffering caused by the chains. This response necessitates that transparency requirements be altered and accompanied by a regulatory framework that empowers victims of poverty to be able to escape it
(UN)MASKING AUTHENTICITY: CREATIVE WRITING AND THE MASK
Get PDFIn the realms of literature and creative writing, there is a unique legitimacy conferred upon works which are seen as ‘authentic’. This results in a hierarchical organisation of styles and genres which exists external and prior to any individual text. This paper explores the claim to authenticity of ‘realist’ literary fiction in Australia and attempts to challenge that hierarchy from the perspective of Nietzsche’s work on the concept of the mask. Central to this argument is an analysis of Kurt Vonnegut’s novel Cat’s Cradle and its awareness of the relationship between truth and illusion.
 
Localizing Seismic Resilience: An ultimate Journey across Bureaucratic Ambiguities
Get PDFTearfund Nepal designed and piloted an integrated and comprehensive capacity development package for safer housing construction to address the National Building Code (NBC) implementation gaps at local level in a more pragmatic and collaborative way.Through a genuine localized approach and excellent demonstration of the outcome, the approach not only demonstrated its excellence, but also persuaded the government to adopt the whole approach. The whole process was an illustration of the struggles of humanitarian leadership in engaging with authorities to explore possible alternative approaches in localizing pre-existing building standards more efficiently and effectively. This has also outlined an innovative advocacy approach in wisely handling policy level strategic ambiguities in the middle of a disaster response
“Un Geste Suffit”? Unpacking the Inconvenient Truths about Al Gore’s Celebrity Activism
Get PDFThe present work interrogates Al Gore’s persona as a climate change activist with reference to a process we describe with the neologism “personafication”: the act of constructing/presenting a public persona in order to cultivate impressions that enable public figures to consolidate authoritative reputations. The formation of such a commanding persona requires the circulation of three forms of symbolic capital: cultural, celebrity, and reputational capital as well as the performance of overtly theatrical strategies calculated to establish an empathetic relationship between performer and audience. In 2006, former Vice President Al Gore released the award-winning documentary, An Inconvenient Truth. This film subsequently functioned as a catalyst for various forms of climate change activism. This paper unpacks the contradictory ideological and cultural work performed by the film with reference to what we describe as un geste suffit; that is, those gestures that merely perform individual agency in order to connect the formulation of personal ethical identity to communal forms of political activism like environmentalism. Through a close reading of the presentation of Gore’s persona in the film itself, and research which tracks the reception and political efficacy of the film, the paper contributes to the growing body of scholarship on the politics of environmental/scientific communication. Finally, we locate our reading of Gore’s film within a contemporary context by making reference to the way An Inconvenient Truth is both resistant to and complicit with the environmental policies of the Trump administration
The question of professional ethics in TESOL: Hospitality as an (im)possible demand?
Get PDF25 years ago, TESOL in Context published a paper on the ethics of TESOL. In this paper, Alan Williams, who was the ACTA Councillor and Policy Committee Convenor at that time, reminded the professional community of some moral predicaments in teaching English to others. On the one hand, he recognised the “productive and socially worthwhile” work that most TESOL educators do in providing access to the dominant variety of English language (e.g., SAE), thereby empowering the speakers of other languages and dialects to become socially mobile. On the other hand, Williams argued that the effective teaching of English to others can also lead to their disempowerment due to the alienating effect of assimilation on cultural and linguistic identities of learners. Over the years, this dilemma has received due attention from some leading educators and researchers in the field who have attempted to address the access paradox from a critical-pragmatic perspective (Janks, 2004, 2010). This article returns to the question of access paradox in TESOL, arguing the primacy of the ethical in professional practice. In particular, it draws on ethics as hospitality in thinking about the ethicality of professional ethics to problematise the possibility of socially-just language and literacy education in multicultural conditions
About TESOL in Context
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More than just laboratories - The humanitarian innovation agenda and four decisive challenges confronting the sector
Get PDFThis paper frames humanitarian innovation as a series of critical challenges for the sector to confront, overcome and advance. The first relates to the meaning of innovation itself and the way in which the sector interprets and applies the action of innovating. The second challenge concerns the changing nature of humanitarian assistance. This paper posits, that current humanitarian policy and practice forged by historical events, is losing efficacy not because of poor design or implementation, but rather, because of the change in nature, environment and context in which humanitarian assistance is required. The third challenge concerns the effect and influence of the donor funding community. The growth and volume in major donor funding is acting both as “push and pull” variants across the sector. The final challenge presented is described as a structural challenge. Unless the industry resolves the practice of “top down” innovation, experimentation and trial and the donor silo effect, then real transformational change will be continue to elude the sector to the cost of the most vulnerable people