Decolonising the Law Curriculum
Dr Jessica Russ-Smith
Embedding Indigenous Knowings and Perspectives in the curriculum of university contexts is an ongoing and iterative project with twofold aims of improving opportunities and outcomes for Indigenous Australians and educating all students and staff to develop their cultural capability and contribute towards social justice. Decolonising curriculum requires critical listening and engagement of Indigenous and decolonial scholarship (Galloway, 2018; Russ-Smith 2019).
This presentation outlines the eight key themes found as a part of a literature review and Teaching Development Grant project and seeks to highlight the wider transformative and relational process of decolonising curriculum. The presenters will reflect on how the process of the literature review itself called for decolonial transformation of educators, not just curriculum, to offer other educators an insight into the process of decolonising curriculum across the academy and how this can be embedded into teaching and learning practice.
Galloway, K. (2018). Indigenous Contexts in the Law Curriculum : Process and Structure. Legal education review, 28(2), 1. https://doi.org/10.53300/001c.6469
Russ-Smith, J. (2019). Indigenous social work and a Wiradyuri framework to practice, in B Bennett and S Green Our Voices: Aboriginal Social Work (2nd Edition). London: Red Globe Press: 103-116.
Restarting the heart: paramedic student views on integrating gender identity and sexuality in health curricula at ACU
Assoc Professor Georgia Clarkson
Stakeholders influence decisions around program content. Mirroring population trends, stakeholders are predominately cisgender and heterosexual. Resulting curriculum is produced though predominantly heteronormative and cisnormative lenses. This may not include perspectives and experiences of LGBTQI+ people. This can mean student clinical practice needs in relation to interactions with the LGBTQI+ community are overlooked. Specific learning needs of LGBTQI+ students may also be neglected. Student views on how LGBTQI+ people and perspectives might be integrated in curriculum, benefits of such inclusion and the risks involved in maintaining the prevailing silence on the needs of this community are important, especially the perspectives of students within the LGBTQI+ community. This study aimed to examine student perspectives on LGBTQI+ content in paramedicine curriculum.
This research reports qualitative data within a broader mixed methods research project exploring LGBTQI+ presence in ACU paramedicine curriculum. An initial survey of students indicated that questions around LGBTQI+ student inclusion in curriculum and student or practitioner safety were questions that required further exploration. From the survey pool of 187 respondents, fourteen students were interviewed.
Students responded to five questions and four key themes were identified through a process of inductive and deductive analyses. These themes were: silence is unsafe, there is a need to ‘normalise’ the LGBTQI+ community through representation in curricula, developing knowledge and skills in communication protocols for engaging respectfully with LGBTQI+ people and community, inclusion of LGBTQI+ content in a safe and open learning context is the responsibility of all teachers.
Leonard, W., Lyons, A., & Bariola, E. (2015). A closer look at private lives 2: Addressing the mental health and well-being of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) Australians. https://apo.org.au/node/53996
Student Panel: Student perspectives of learning at ACU
Elouise Rabbets, Sienna Pitt and Oliver Peppermint
A panel of students studying at the Canberra campus, representing a range of disciplines at various points of their academic journey will participate in a session facilitated by the MC. Each student will speak to the reasons for their program selection, their professional goals and aspirations, their experience at ACU, what has and has not worked well for them on their learning journey, and suggestions for what could be done to improve the learning experience. To conclude, there will be a Q&A session in which showcase attendees are encouraged to participate.
Quality Simulation Assurance Framework (QSAFe) for the enhancement of simulation-based health curriculum
Dr Jessica Russ-Smith
The aim of the project is to deliver a Quality Simulation Assurance Framework (QSAFe) which comprises of an audit tool aligning simulation activities to healthcare simulation standards of best practice (HSSOBP) (Watts et al., 2021), national professional and accreditation standards and First Nations perspectives. Particularly, there are no Australian or New Zealand (NZ) tools aligning simulation pedagogy with national health accreditation standards or First Nations perspectives.
This multi-phase project is being undertaken by a small group of Australian and NZ simulation providers working at different higher education and health service organisations. QSAFe development has occurred through robust analysis of the literature and through a modified nominal group technique with in-depth qualitative analysis. The QSAFe will be piloted in late 2023, early 2024 initially in nursing, across Australian metropolitan and regional areas, with the aim to pilot in NZ and other health disciplines later in 2024.
QSAFe will ensure curriculum and industry simulation activities are culturally appropriate and aligned to recognised professional and simulation standards to assist simulation facilitators of differing levels of expertise to design and implement quality simulation-based experiences. Developing QSAFe is an imperative next step in advancing simulation-based learning in Australian and NZ health curricula, addressing program accreditors concerns regarding the inconsistent quality of simulation, and enhancing the learner experience.
The purpose of the presentation is to report the results of the initial scoping reviews highlighting the national and global need for not only assurance of simulation quality, but also the need to help tangibly include First Nations perspectives in simulation-based health curriculum.
Watts, P. I., Rossler, K., Bowler, F., Miller, C., Charnetski, M., Decker, S., Molloy, M. A., Persico, L., McMahon, E., & McDermott, D. (2021). Onward and upward: introducing the healthcare simulation standards of best PracticeTM. Clinical Simulation in Nursing, 58, 1-4. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecns.2021.08.006