ABRA: improving foundational literacy through technology in regional and remote schools through a randomized controlled trial. Education outcomes in regional and remote Australia, particularly for Indigenous students, are worsening, to the point of constituting a national crisis. Skilled educators are not consistently available in sufficient numbers to arrest this trend in the early years by giving the intensive, continuous expert instruction required. Under limited pilot conditions, a web-base ....ABRA: improving foundational literacy through technology in regional and remote schools through a randomized controlled trial. Education outcomes in regional and remote Australia, particularly for Indigenous students, are worsening, to the point of constituting a national crisis. Skilled educators are not consistently available in sufficient numbers to arrest this trend in the early years by giving the intensive, continuous expert instruction required. Under limited pilot conditions, a web-based instructional tool known as ABRACADABRA has shown considerable promise as a means of conferring the foundational skills in literacy for emerging learners, despite high workforce turnover. Testing the effectiveness of ABRACADABRA under more stringent experimental conditions is an essential precursor to offering tested solutions based on evidence, not advocacy.Read moreRead less
Building the future for Indigenous students. The relationship of future vision, learning, and motivational profiles to school success. Indigenous students are the most severely disadvantaged group in Australia. Education as currently provided is failing them in the NT. Future Directions for Secondary Education in the NT states that 20% of secondary-aged Indigenous students are not enrolled in school, with only 6% completing the NTCE in 2002. Education is the corner stone of social justice becaus ....Building the future for Indigenous students. The relationship of future vision, learning, and motivational profiles to school success. Indigenous students are the most severely disadvantaged group in Australia. Education as currently provided is failing them in the NT. Future Directions for Secondary Education in the NT states that 20% of secondary-aged Indigenous students are not enrolled in school, with only 6% completing the NTCE in 2002. Education is the corner stone of social justice because it is the basis of opportunity (Burney 03). This research will provide critical hard data on the relationship of Indigenous students' future vision and aspirations, motivation, self-concept and self-regulation, language and culture to school achievement in order to design and provide culturally relevant education to maximise Indigenous opportunities and futures.Read moreRead less
Determining implementation drivers in resilience education. Determining implementation drivers in resilience education. This project aims to develop implementation frameworks to help the education sector universally provide resilience education programmes. More young people have mental health problems. Although evidence-based resilience education reduces these problems, education sectors do not know how to address barriers to school provision. The solution is implementation research. This projec ....Determining implementation drivers in resilience education. Determining implementation drivers in resilience education. This project aims to develop implementation frameworks to help the education sector universally provide resilience education programmes. More young people have mental health problems. Although evidence-based resilience education reduces these problems, education sectors do not know how to address barriers to school provision. The solution is implementation research. This project will study system and school-level factors influencing primary and high school uptake of social and emotional learning curricula that enhance resilience; and implementation drivers at both system and school levels, and influences on uptake and student and staff resilience. The outcome is universal provision of resilience education programs that benefit young people.Read moreRead less
The ABC’s of listening and learning: a study in the Northern Territory. Indigenous Australian children experience middle ear disorders earlier in life and for longer periods than their non-Indigenous counterparts. The resulting listening challenges can have implications for academic achievement and future health and well-being, despite normal hearing thresholds. The current project aims to determine the effects of pervasive otitis media and related hearing loss on Indigenous children’s listening ....The ABC’s of listening and learning: a study in the Northern Territory. Indigenous Australian children experience middle ear disorders earlier in life and for longer periods than their non-Indigenous counterparts. The resulting listening challenges can have implications for academic achievement and future health and well-being, despite normal hearing thresholds. The current project aims to determine the effects of pervasive otitis media and related hearing loss on Indigenous children’s listening and pre-literacy skills in the Northern Territory, and how to better identify those at most risk for poor educational outcomes. The findings will lead to policy recommendations to help improve these children’s learning potential.Read moreRead less
The invisible parents project - exploring the barriers to effective parental and community involvement in three Northern Territory Schools. Education outcomes in the Northern Territory, particularly for Indigenous students, lag far behind those of other Australians, to the point that the situation can be considered a national emergency. This research program will explore ways to improve parental involvement. This will inform the Smith Family's efforts to undertake early intervention for children ....The invisible parents project - exploring the barriers to effective parental and community involvement in three Northern Territory Schools. Education outcomes in the Northern Territory, particularly for Indigenous students, lag far behind those of other Australians, to the point that the situation can be considered a national emergency. This research program will explore ways to improve parental involvement. This will inform the Smith Family's efforts to undertake early intervention for children who are at risk of education failure. It will provide benefits to the rural and regional communities who feed schools in Darwin and Katherine and provide national benefits through making a significant contribution of anthropologically-informed knowledge on the determinants of successful school outcomes.Read moreRead less
Testing for scale up: An Indigenous social and emotional learning program . This project takes key learnings from prior research that conceptualised, set up, and tested a social and emotional learning program, Skills for Life (SFL), with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students in grades 7-9 in remote Northern Territory and Queensland schools. It aims to: establish the process and necessary conditions for scaling up SFL to diverse remote schools with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander s ....Testing for scale up: An Indigenous social and emotional learning program . This project takes key learnings from prior research that conceptualised, set up, and tested a social and emotional learning program, Skills for Life (SFL), with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students in grades 7-9 in remote Northern Territory and Queensland schools. It aims to: establish the process and necessary conditions for scaling up SFL to diverse remote schools with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students across Australia's top end. Further evidence for the program’s effectiveness will also be built by measuring students’ resilience, help seeking, and psychological distress; and teachers’ cultural awareness; quality of teacher-student relationships, and perceptions of students’ emotional and behavioural difficulties. Read moreRead less
Transforming Cultural & Natural Resource Management workforce capabilities. This project aims to implement a transformative program of transdisciplinary cultural and natural resource management and workforce development research in Northern Australia’s Arnhem Plateau region. This project expects to create new knowledge in the areas of cultural knowledges, wildfire, feral animal, invasive plants, mine-site rehabilitation, and climate change, as well as Indigenous training effectiveness. Expected ....Transforming Cultural & Natural Resource Management workforce capabilities. This project aims to implement a transformative program of transdisciplinary cultural and natural resource management and workforce development research in Northern Australia’s Arnhem Plateau region. This project expects to create new knowledge in the areas of cultural knowledges, wildfire, feral animal, invasive plants, mine-site rehabilitation, and climate change, as well as Indigenous training effectiveness. Expected outcomes of the project include practical learnings for application in broader Indigenous community/First Nations capability and supportive policy development contexts. The expected benefits are a long-term platform for enhancing cultural and environmental landscape management and sustainable employment opportunities.Read moreRead less
Movement ecology of granivores: informing fire management of savannas. This project aims to examine the decline in granivorous finches across north Australia and test the hypothesis that an increasingly nomadic lifestyle, associated with tracking grass seed availability over larger spatial scales, is the cause. The project also aims to evaluate how fire affects rangeland functioning, particularly grass diversity, to improve fire management of tropical savannas in northern Australia. This project ....Movement ecology of granivores: informing fire management of savannas. This project aims to examine the decline in granivorous finches across north Australia and test the hypothesis that an increasingly nomadic lifestyle, associated with tracking grass seed availability over larger spatial scales, is the cause. The project also aims to evaluate how fire affects rangeland functioning, particularly grass diversity, to improve fire management of tropical savannas in northern Australia. This project will provide new tools and technologies that will monitor mobile small vertebrates. Expected outcomes will improve the understanding of tropical savanna functioning and fire management. The research aligns with ‘savanna burning’ methodologies and carbon sequestration goals in north Australia.
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