Associate Professor Kim Snepvangers

Student as Partners (SaP) projects that utilise animation as digital learning tools are presented as propositional evocations for working with International students in an Australian tertiary art and design context. Rather than purporting a singular progress narrative in the formation of international students’ stories, identities and perspectives, the role of making practices for promoting communication, collaboration and social interaction is discussed. A ‘more-than-representational’ approach has been devised to show how visually layered images provide a powerful ‘voice’ for working with international students. The concept of ‘more than representation’ noted by contemporary authors (Lorimer, 2005; Thrift & Dewsbury, 2000) and Connell’s (2017) sense of the significance of alternative spaces informs the design of visual artefacts within a new university wide initiative: Teaching International Students (TIS). TIS is an educator-initiated space focused on developing teachers’ case base knowledge, providing a non-threatening series of events, activities and online visual artefacts for discussing contested cultural issues. A Distributed Facilitator Framework (DFF) for working with visual artefacts, people and relationships using iceberg models of surface and deep culture (Ting-Toomey & Chung, 2005; Weaver, 1993) and ‘ecologies of practice’ theories of Kemmis and Heikkinen (2011) will be outlined. The aim is to provide a non-hierarchical, authentic, inclusive and generative space for academics and students to work together to holistically improve the International student educational experience and impact identity formation. This system provides bite size, online and on demand accessibility that promotes ongoing opportunities for all year-round interaction. Connections to the “Australian International Education Strategy 2025” (2016), as well as how this model utilises visually connected data gathering practices to build scaffolded architecture, will be explained. Future research will focus on creating digital artefacts that showcase best practice case studies that are authored and designed by educators’ worldwide, evolving a living ecology of practice.

This paper discusses a project where students and educators worked iteratively in collaborative reciprocal relationships to enhance International student experiences in higher education. Here disciplinary knowledge and appropriate pedagogies are inextricably linked, emergent and meaningful, demonstrated through carefully articulated creative encounters. The Teaching International Student (TIS) Project was planned within in a Distributed Facilitator Framework (DFF) that encompasses activities, events, resources, ‘Student as partners’ projects and a growing independent Community of Practice (CoP). The theories that underpin the DFF model, includes the Iceberg Model of surface and deep culture (Kruger, 2013) and the ‘Ecologies of Practice’ concepts of Kemmis and Heikkinen (2011) and Snepvangers & Rourke (2017). The DFF was created to visually capture an interconnected series of processes and events that utilised the Kemmis et al’s (2011) characteristics of ‘sayings, doings and relatings’. An Action Practitioner Research methodology was developed over a one-year cycle that includes follow-up reflective practice activities. The project has been evaluated utilising high-level positive educator-led evidence that does not rely on one-off surveys and instead explores other ways of longitudinally capturing qualitative data that takes into account the iterative nature of learning and teaching. Evidence of shifts in practice through pre and post reflection survey data within and outside each activity and event is a key focus of the evaluative process. The outcome demonstrates ways of capturing and disseminating holistically new Career Development Learning (CDL) in professional educator practice through showcasing, evaluating and the adaption of good practice in a variety of disciplinary contexts.

This paper anticipates the launch of an inaugural “Curated Series” within the Common Ground Research Network: Transformative Pedagogies inthe Visual Domain and contains eight books with visual propositions for learning driving innovation and a substantial Community of Practice. Theseries statistics required a visually intelligent way to see the big data implications of this new publication comprising: 2 Series Curators, 18 Editors, 163 Authors, 21 Countries and 98 Educational Institution. The series is a salient example of internationally inclusive mentoring across countriesand institutions. The Series Curators and a co-editor will present this global contribution of so many authors and editors, through data visualisation.The curators, editors and authors geographical location and associated institutions offered the opportunity to present visually the numerical andlocality data generated by the authorship of this book series. Graphic designers working with the Series’ Curators, visually mapped the global reachand the critical mass of the authorship. A graphic language of colour saturation and intensity, organic and mechanical shapes, structuring andfocusing lines and the relationship between these elements (influenced by Russian artist Wassily Kandinsky 1866-1944, 1923 painting, Circles in aCircle) present the visual overview and acts as a basis for the various coloured and cropped versions that are printed on the covers of the eightbooks. Visualisation is the premise underlying the series and so the significance of the cover design and related design identities is that it seeks to overcome barriers to connectivity and the complex nature of collaboration.

Text and Image are frequently brought into conversation in tertiary art & design contexts. Specifically, this paper sets forth some visual exemplarsthat challenge traditional formats for dissemination of scholarly artwork and images. For example, Higher Degree Research submission oftenmeans adapting creative works into text-based documents for assessment purposes. Complexity in such spaces of representation frequently resultsin unsatisfying outcomes. The concept of "more than representation" Lorimer (2005); Thrift & Dewsbury (2000) and Connell’s (2017) sense of thesignificance of alternative spaces is used to contextualise a range of visual encounters. Encounters are conceived as a way to interrupt stability ofpast recording platforms and to enable interventions in everyday routines. The focus is on visually emergent and unremarkable actions, sharedexperiences and serendipitous dispositions. Rather than traditional representational traits such as uncovering meanings and linear progressnarratives, case studies of image/text seek to pay attention to the fleeting and the unexceptional. Each case presents a diverse visual format(artworks, animations and multichannel video) using performative conversions of text and image. In the age of big data, visual intelligence and"readings" that interrogate representational formats are crucial in uncovering the situated mechanics of production. Speech and text conceived asartistic devices open novel opportunities for change. Each case recognises constrained acts of speaking/voice within cultural displacement forexample in working with International students in Higher Education. How artists devise altered encounters to countermand prior invisibility ordisparagement is highlighted, challenging contested ideas across geographies of place and time.