PROJECTS

 

UNDERSTANDING AND TRANSFORMING GENDERED SCHOOL CULTURES (2023 – present)

Lead researcher: Dr Leanne Higham, La Trobe University

Researchers: Dr Kate O’Connor, La Trobe University; Dr Troy Potter, The University of Melbourne; Dr Kellie Sanders, La Trobe University; Dr Clare Southerton, Monash University; Assoc Prof Melissa Wolfe, University of Wollongong; Dr Rachel Finneran, Deakin University

We have been invited by a Melbourne Catholic school to investigate and examine their existing and historical gendered cultures as they transition from over a century of single-sex to co-educational schooling, and to collaborate with them in developing their new, co-educational school culture of belonging. It aims to critically examine school culture and cultural change, and to explore participatory research methodologies.

 
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AFFECTIVE ECOLOGIES OF SCHOOL CLIMATE (2019 – present)

Co-researchers: Assoc Prof Melissa Wolfe, University of Wollongong, Dr Eve Mayes, Deakin University

This study is a cartography of school climate in a Melbourne government school. It aims to examine cultural change, and explore participatory and creative research methodologies.

Funding source: Southern Cross University

 
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SLOW VIOLENCE AND EVERYDAY SCHOOLING (2016 – 2024)

PhD project, The University of Melbourne. Supervised by Dr Dianne Mulcahy and Prof Jane Kenway.

This study is an ethological ethography of slow violence in two Melbourne government schools. It aims to examine un/ethical practices in everyday schooling. It is concerned with how slow violence and ethics of nonviolence are socially, materially and discursively enacted.

Funding source: Australian Government Research Training Program scholarship; MGSE Travelling Scholarship

 
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The Catholic Closet: An International Comparative Study of Homophobia and Transphobia in Catholic Schools (2018 – present)

Lead researcher: Assoc Prof Tonya Callaghan, University of Calgary

This study is a comparative cross-case analysis of Catholic school systems in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom vis-à-vis sexual minority groups. It aims to uncover the causes and effects of clashes between Catholic canon law and the common laws of the aforementioned nations regarding sexual minorities – clashes which are increasingly being played out in Catholic schools.

Funding source: Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC)