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The purpose of this paper is to investigate those teaching and learning factors that either hindered or encouraged preservice teacher participants to succeed in their first year of study. The impact of administrative support alongside pedagogical styles that facilitated a sense of engagement for first year preservice teachers is also discussed.

This research builds on the work of Sarah Lawrence-Lightfoot’s use of “portraiture” to “capture the complexity and aesthetic of human experience” (Lawrence-Lightfoot & Hoffmann Davis, 1997, p. 4). The use of portraits as a tool for creating a first year student narrative, rich in its canvas of human emotions, is central to the work that follows. Qualitative data that were gathered in this research project are presented.

The portraiture methodology in this paper enabled the researchers to capture a sense of belonging for first year university students that involved more than procedural matters, orientation events and attendance at information sessions.

These portraits draw wider attention to transition and retention matters beyond considerations of “who our students are” and illustrate how engagement and belonging are enhanced by how these students are engaged by skilful and knowledgeable tutors and group work and collegial approaches to the course.

Portraiture methodology enabled a more nuanced form of viewing “belonging” and “engagement” of these preservice teachers through more personalised forms of engagement with tutors, the development of groups and the practicum placement.

Career programmes within secondary school curriculum can impact on a young person's sense of direction and meaning in life. The purpose of this paper is to report on an evaluation that was conducted in 2009 of the careers programmes in one secondary college in the western suburbs of Melbourne.

The research team utilised a multi‐method approach collecting 273 surveys and undertaking both focus groups and interviews, ensuring the voices of young people were at the centre of the work.

Innovative careers and transition programmes create opportunities for young people to plan for their future. Similarly the absence of established careers programmes can compound the disadvantage that some students experience. The findings evidence how important it is for schools to support inclusive classrooms that enable young people to make informed decisions about their career pathways.

The research findings were used to form a model of good practice and highlight the transformational impact of career and transition programmes for young people. The current research explores student knowledge, confidence, attitudes and perceptions while they are still at school. A longitudinal study, tracking these same young people as they progress to tertiary education and/or employment, would enable more definitive evidence on actual transitions and the actual outcomes experienced by young people.

This paper is of value to the education sector as it looks to respond to the need to develop a more seamless approach to young people making successful transitions to further education and/or employment.

The Ethical Borgs are a fictional panel of a set of people who have the task of attending to the manner in which research “should” occur. The scenario is a series of “fictionalised encounters” between two researchers presenting their research proposals to the panel for approval. The purpose of this paper is to revisit and play out two researchers’ individual and collective experiences of gaining ethical clearance as emergent researchers. The tension of their place and status in academia drives their identity.

This paper is presented in the form of a short play. The focus is on the manner in which the performance of the academic self as researcher can be impeded or assisted by the deliberations of the “Ethical Borgs”. These fictional encounters demonstrate the tension of being located in the in-between worlds of researchers in-waiting who need to negotiate their roles and whose ethical anxieties are critiqued through the lens of the “naive inquirer” the “too hard don’t touch inquirer” and the “medicalised” lens inquirer.

The major themes examined in this paper address how the Ethical Borgs increasingly exercise power and have authority to authorise social inquiry.

Questions that are also raised include what academic approval is required to inquire? How does a naive inquirer manoeuvre his or her way through institutionalised and bureaucratic procedures?

The purpose of this paper is to discuss that in 2012, a small group of teaching staff in a new diploma of Education Studies program came together to critically reflect on teaching approaches that either hindered or encouraged learners to thrive in the transition environment in higher education (HE).

This paper reports on the use of case writing as a methodological tool for engaging in reflexive inquiry in a HE cross-faculty setting; it also adds a further dimension to the work of (Burridge et al., 2010). The team used a systematic coding activity, known as “threading,” to unpack over-arching themes that were embedded in each other’s narratives.

Throughout the two years of the project, 12 cases were presented on key critical teaching moments that the researchers had experienced. The themes varied and included topics like student reflections on why they found learning challenging, teachers’ mixed emotions about failing students, difficulties for teachers in having to persuade students to read academic texts, teacher/student confrontations and student resilience amidst challenges linked to their personal and student lives.

A central theme to emerge from the research was that complexities arise for teachers when they are faced with learners who are apparently not suited to the career pathway they have signed up for.

Through using a collaborative practitioner research framework, enunciating concerns were raised and different interpretations of the same incident were shared. The paper concludes that case writing can assist academics to be more informed of teaching approaches that lead to successful learning outcomes.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how automation in the ever-changing technological landscape is increasing integrated into, and has become a significant presence in, our personal lives.

Through post qualitative inquiry, the authors provide a contemplation of automation and its effect on creativity, as a contemporary expression of dis/locations, the simulacrum, performative work and a toxic digital presence in socio-cultural-technical spaces.

The authors discuss how we behave, contribute, explore, interact and communicate within and across automated digital platforms, has salience for understanding and questioning the ways that dominant discourses in the contemporary construction and enactment of subjectivity, creativity and agency are being modulated by the machine.

This paper offers a nuanced consideration of creativity, by considering the way creativity is being performed and situated within the effects of automation and its role in dis/locations, performative work and its potential as a the simulacrum in socio-cultural-technical spaces.