Thesis
Innovation and reform in Queensland Indigenous educational policy : a critical analysis
Southern Cross University
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Southern Cross University
2018
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.25918/thesis.120
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Abstract
In this thesis, I essay a critical and analytical reflection on my time as Assistant Director General responsible for the Indigenous Education and Training Futures Division of Department of Education and Training Qld, Australia, from 2010-2012. In methodological terms the thesis takes the form of a post hoc case study. The significance of the study lies in the fact that this is one of the few academic studies of policy in the domain of Indigenous education that has been undertaken by an insider.
My work as an ADG was influenced by many contextual factors. Of these, I have chosen to highlight the demography that was driving policy concerns, the national debates about the direction Indigenous education should take and the international debates that were impacting on thinking around education in Australia. The work is explicitly grounded in a historical context for two specific reasons. We literally live in the past, and yet the past is unknown to us. My argument is that only when the past is known can a strong and alternative present be possible. The thesis also covers methodological questions in some depth. Here, I endeavour to both explicate and justify my choice of Bhaskarian critical realism as an underpinning conceptual framework. The thesis then moves to a consideration of an alternative approach to Indigenous education called the “Five Pillars”. The pillars of High Expectations (Chapter Five), Recognition and Identity (Chapter Six), Persuasion (Chapter Six), Connectedness (Chapter Seven) and a Service (Job) Guarantee (Chapter Eight) are foundational to emancipatory education for Indigenous students. The original contribution of the thesis consists of the application of critical realist theory to Indigenous policy; the setting of the discussion within a geo-historical framework; the provision of an academic critique of the international and national discourses that impacted on policy formation, and the outlining of 5 pillars of innovation.
Details
- Title
- Innovation and reform in Queensland Indigenous educational policy : a critical analysis
- Creators
- Ian Fraser Mackie
- Contributors
- Brad Shipway (Supervisor) - Southern Cross University, Faculty of EducationAngela Frances Turner (Supervisor) - Southern Cross University, Faculty of Education
- Awarding Institution
- Southern Cross University; Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
- Theses
- Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Southern Cross University
- Publisher
- Southern Cross University
- Number of pages
- 344
- Identifiers
- 991012923300502368
- Copyright
- © IF Mackie 2018
- Academic Unit
- Faculty of Education; School of Education
- Resource Type
- Thesis