104 research outputs found
Reflections: The relational practice of teaching and learning
No full textIn this essay, Meaghan Dougherty reflects upon how research she conducted on social service workers’ transition from post-secondary education to work has influenced her approach to teaching and learning. Drawing parallels to her own transition experiences, she examines how key findings from the research—including transition being a continual process, “not knowing” being an asset, and the importance of truly “being with” others—have important implications for relational practice and pedagogy. Reflecting on her developing approach to teaching and learning, the author encourage educators to rethink the importance of relational processes in educational encounters. Critically questioning our role as educators generates possibilities for social change; we can disrupt ideas about education which are taken for granted and transgress dominant ways of “being” in the classroom.Peer reviewe
Identity, integration, adult migrant English as a Second Language (ESL) programmes and Melbourne Institute Language Centre
No full text© 2012 Dr. Meaghan LeithThis case study used a qualitative dominant mixed methods research (MMR) design to examine the integration of adult migrants in Australia. In adopting a socio-cultural theory (SCT) framework, it examines wider policies, such as immigration and citizenship, but it particularly focuses on government-funded English as a second language (ESL) policy and programmes. In so doing, it seeks to describe the context in which this ESL delivery occurred – a multi-campus language centre in a large and entrepreneurial Technical and Further Education (TAFE) institute in the State of Victoria – and the ways in which migrant students and language centre personnel perceived and experienced ESL programmes delivered at this centre. It also seeks to locate this study within its historical and socio-political context and, as a result, discourses regarding issues related to integration, such as national identity, social cohesion, ‘Australian values’ and multiculturalism, are considered. In recognising that integration is a process that takes time, this study is longitudinal in design, and a core group of migrants (N=14) was researched over a two-and-a-half-year period. The views of some of the language centre’s staff members were also examined over time.
The findings from this study suggest that English was perceived by stakeholders – and experienced by migrants – as a significant facilitator of integration, and the language centre’s ESL programmes were seen to provide both psycho-social and economic integrative benefits for migrants and Australian society. Suggestions and recommendations are made regarding possible avenues for future research into integration and adult host language programming, as well as broader, related policy
How learning English facilitates integration for adult migrants: the Jarrah Language Centre experience. Occasional paper
No full textThis is an open-access report distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.Using interviews with adult migrants over a period of two years, the author looked at how undertaking an English as a second language (ESL) class helps to facilitate integration into Australian society. Overall, not being competent and confident in speaking English was seen by all (migrants and ESL teachers) as the biggest barrier to integration. If migrants were confident in speaking English they were able to find employment, move into mainstream study and engage more in social activities. This paper was funded through an academic scholarship as part of NCVER's Building Researcher Capacity Program.Holmesglen English Language CentreHolmesglen Institut
How learning English facilitates integration for adult migrants
No full textUsing interviews with adult migrants over a period of two years, the authors look at how undertaking an English as a second language (ESL) class helps to facilitate integration into Australian society. Overall, not being competent and confident in speaking English was seen by all (migrants and ESL teachers) as the biggest barrier to integration. If migrants were confident in speaking English they were able to find employment, move into mainstream study and engage more in social activities. This paper was funded through an academic scholarship as part of NCVER\u27s Building Researcher Capacity Program.
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Reconceptualizing the school-to-work transition
No full textPresented at the Douglas College Research Cafe, March 24, 2022
Voice and affect in entangled phenomena: Experimenting with writing voice to promote responsibility
No full textPresented at the 15th International Congress of Qualitative Inquiry, 2019, University of Illinois.
This presentation experiments with writing voice as it's been retheorized as emerging from entanglement. Dougherty is interested in how writing this entangled voice may help promote understanding of inseparability, intra-action, and responsibility. Not peer reviewe
Need to get somewhere fast: A critical examination of the transition from post-secondary education to work
No full textNeed to Get Somewhere Fast critically explores the transition from post-secondary education to work - it seeks to complexify the dominant view of the transition from post-secondary education to work as a linear, distinct event that can be assessed through primarily financial indicators. Complexifying our understanding of transition, as critical scholars/educators and critical practitioners, allows us to move beyond deficit-focused interventions and offers a more comprehensive understanding of how factors beyond the individual student constitute and constrain the transition experience. With a more complex understanding of transition, post-secondary educators, students, employers, and researchers can consider the pressures on students to “get somewhere fast” and support transition processes that involve complex and interrelated factors.
Need to Get Somewhere Fast is grounded in the narratives of social service workers. Social service workers, practitioners who work with marginalized people in community-based, not-for-profit agencies, are a liminal group who face significant challenges, including tenuous work, vicarious trauma, and precarity. Their narratives of navigating the neoliberal institutions of school and work highlight power relations, idealized expectations, and the experience of transition as an ongoing process. Their narratives illustrate the importance of resistance, criticality, and exploring alternate discourses of what it means to successfully transition into a professional role. Need to Get Somewhere Fast puts more-than-human, relational, and performative ontologies to work to see what is possible, from a practical, ethical perspective, for educators and educational institutions. -- From publisher website
Reconceptualising the transition from post-secondary education to work
No full textEducational researchers identify the transition from post-secondary education to the labour market as a critical point for the success of the student, and for society more broadly. This transition is often explored as a distinct phase between education and work that can be assessed based on pre-determined outcomes (i.e. employment, income). From this perspective, it is the responsibility of individual students to effectively commodify themselves and navigate their transition into employment. This focus on individual responsibility fails to question social mobility discourse and current labour market realities that significantly influence transition. In order to re-conceptualise transition, I deconstruct social mobility discourse as the foundation of transition research. Then, I draw on narratives of social service workers in British Columbia, Canada, to complexify transition and allow for more nuanced research. The narratives contradict dominant conceptualisations of transition, critiquing transition as a linear process that can be assessed through economic indicators. Recognising transition as a continual process that is influenced by a multiplicity of factors opens new ways to research. Research exploring the nuance of transition moves away from a deficit-focused, intervention approach focused on students, to critically exploring education, the labour market, and the relationship between school and work. -- PublisherPeer reviewedEmployabilitySchool-to-work transitionCritical narrative inquiryLabour marke
Re-imagining school to work transition through a relational ontology
No full textThe paper was presented at the 44 annual Association for the Study of Higher Education (ASHE) Conference, Portland, OR (November 16, 2019).Not peer reviewedConference Pape
The messiness of becoming - researcher: the importance of qualitative inquiry in understanding the "posts"
No full textPresented at the ICQI (International Congress of Qualitative Inquiry), May 2018 at University of Illinois (Urbana-Champaign). Drawing on autobiographical narratives from my research process, I examine the necessity of messiness in becoming-researcher. Specifically, I argue that struggling and stumbling through conventional humanist qualitative inquiry allows new scholars to think their way through tensions, through various theoretical ideas and concepts. I believe we, as scholars, cannot know first; it is through this process of messy sense-making that the theoretical concepts collectively known as the “posts” (e.g., deconstruction, post-structuralism, post-qualitative, etc.) take shape. I explore how my own messy experience with conventional humanist qualitative inquiry allowed me to experience “post” philosophies and altered my way of being in the world.Not peer reviewedConference presentationauto-biographical narrativeQualitative inquirypost-qualitativepost-structuralis
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