Faculty of Education - Theses
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ItemParent professional partnerships in IEP development : a case study of a MAPS process( 2007)The practices, language and behaviours which professionals adopt when they meet with parents prior to Individual Education Program (IEP) planning may have a significant effect on the attitudes and capabilities families bring to the educational setting. During this case study the adult family members of a child with additional needs were observed as they addressed the developmental and programming needs of their child by participating in the McGill Action Planning System (MAPS) and a subsequent Program Support Group (PSG) meeting. Themes indicating attitudes or perceptions that empowered the family towards continued participation in collaborative teams for IEP development emerged in the observational data and were defined through the methods of informant diaries and semi-structured interviews. Less dominant quantitative methods were used to verify that the participant's ongoing attitudes towards parent professional collaboration corroborated with the final themes of flexibility, unification, satisfaction and function.
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ItemDifficulties in maintenance of ethnic language and culture in a multicultural society: with particular reference to Italian families in Melbourne( 1981)The growing political awareness and acknowledgment of Australia's multicultural society produced in the seventies an increasing number of reports on the needs of the ethnic communities. The Government acknowledges that it is now essential to encourage the development of a multicultural attitude in Australian society to foster the maintenance of cultural heritage and promote intercultural understanding. The long-awaited signs of widespread implementation of stated policies and recommendations have been disappointingly slow in emerging. This is attributed to the slowness of a change in attitude throughout the community. Because the Australian school system is not in tune with the multicultural society of today, children of ethnic parents are not receiving equal education opportunities with their Australian peers. Through lack of recognition of their ethnic language and culture by schools, children of ethnic parents are rejecting their mother tongue. In a series of case studies of Italian families in Melbourne, the mother's attitude was seen as the most important factor in language maintenance at the present time. Attitudes were seen to differ, not according to social class, educational level or region of origin, but according to individual values and beliefs. The importance of maintenance of ethnic language and culture for the traditional cohesiveness of the Italian family ethos is stressed, but is seen as resting on a tenuous thread.
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ItemAustralian Vocational Certificate Training System in secondary schools: a qualitative analysis of the implementation of a vocational education program in a secondary college( 1994)This study focuses on the implementation experience of a Victorian secondary college during the first year of participation in the Australia Vocational Certificate Training in Secondary Schools Pilot Project - an initiative arising from recent reports, at both a State and Federal level, recommending a convergence between general and vocational education. The Pilot Project was established to test the feasibility of the provision of vocational education and training in secondary colleges. The literature review presents a synopsis of the Australian Vocational Certificate Training System, national vocational education and training initiatives and the literature relating to the evaluation of educational change. Using qualitative methods, the study provides a systematic description of the first year of implementation, evaluates the processes used for the implementation of educational change and examines the policies which impact on the implementation process. The analysis highlights the importance of the internal perceptions of the need for the change and the 'state of readiness' as key considerations in the implementation of change in schools. The relationship between the processes adopted for initiation, including bureaucratic influences, and implementation within the school context is also discussed. The study concludes with cautionary notes. Firstly, the difficulties experienced by schools in implementing policy initiatives within a federal political structure. Secondly, the uncertainty which results when the motivations for change are linked to key bureaucratic personalities. Thirdly, key policies which inhibit the fusion of general and vocational education by forcing schools to differentiate between these roles are discussed. The author also questions the proposition that the fidelity and evolutionary perspectives of the implementation of educational change are extremes of the same continuum. The study provides specific advice for the administration of vocational courses within schools and stresses that further development is limited by the lagging development of policies to provide full recognition of training programs within the senior secondary curriculum.