title: The tale of two virtual teacher professional development modules

authors: Keown, Paul Ashley

subjects: teacher professional development

abstract: Virtual communities of practice (VCoP) have been advocated for some time as a promising means of taking professional development to teachers in widely distributed locations. However, geography, and indeed education literature as a whole, contains very few examples where this has been achieved. This paper reports on two VCoP professional development modules for New Zealand geography and social studies teachers. The first module focused on perspectives in geography and the second on values in social studies. The paper describes the design of the modules and tells the story of each module in practice as two “tales” or narratives. The second tale tells a much happier story than the first, and the reasons for this are explored. The paper concludes by discussing what can be learned about implementing successful professional development for geography teachers through VCoPs as indicated by the results reported through the two tales.

text: The tale of two virtual teacher professional development modules Virtual communities of practice (VCoP) have been advocated for some time as a promising means of taking professional development to teachers in widely distributed locations. However, geography, and indeed education literature as a whole, contains very few examples where this has been achieved. This paper reports on two VCoP professional development modules for New Zealand geography and social studies teachers. The first module focused on perspectives in geography and the second on values in social studies. The paper describes the design of the modules and tells the story of each module in practice as two “tales” or narratives. The second tale tells a much happier story than the first, and the reasons for this are explored. The paper concludes by discussing what can be learned about implementing successful professional development for geography teachers through VCoPs as indicated by the results reported through the two tales.

year: 2009

title: Introduction to papers in this issue

authors: Mills, Judith Patricia

abstract: The overall theme for this issue is the sharing of good ideas and support to look at alternatives - look at what might be familiar in alternative ways, and from alternative perspectives. This issue has three sections offering our professional learning community opportunities to explore pedagogy from early childhood to tertiary, from New Zealand and international authors. One thread in this issue is mathematics education. Another is tertiary education, with articles from the perspectives of the teachers and learners. The four think pieces are designed to provoke and challenge your thinking while providing something useful.

text: Introduction to papers in this issue The overall theme for this issue is the sharing of good ideas and support to look at alternatives - look at what might be familiar in alternative ways, and from alternative perspectives. This issue has three sections offering our professional learning community opportunities to explore pedagogy from early childhood to tertiary, from New Zealand and international authors. One thread in this issue is mathematics education. Another is tertiary education, with articles from the perspectives of the teachers and learners. The four think pieces are designed to provoke and challenge your thinking while providing something useful.

year: 2018

title: Keynote Address: Barriers and incentives to Māori participation in the profession of psychology

authors: Levy, Michelle Patricia

subjects: Maori

abstract: It is well known that Māori are overrepresented
within the client group of
psychologists. Despite ongoing attempts to
recruit and retain more Māori within the
discipline of psychology, the numbers of
Māori psychologists continues to remain
low, raising serious concerns about the
ability of the profession to effectively meet
the needs of its clientele. The objectives of this study were to
identify the, barriers to, and incentives for improving the recruitment and retention
of Māori in the profession of
psychology and Māori to gain and maintain registration
as psychologists. This paper is
based on the full report provided to the
New Zealand Psychologists’ Board. The findings in this study
clearly demonstrate that in order to attract
Māori to participate in psychology, the
majority of environments need to change
substantially. It is simply not enough for
organisations, whether they are educational, professional, or service delivery agencies,
to identify the need for more Māori
psychologists, yet still fail to commit to,
and actively engage in, altering long
identified environmental factors that are
barriers to Māori participation.

text: Keynote Address: Barriers and incentives to Māori participation in the profession of psychology It is well known that Māori are overrepresented
within the client group of
psychologists. Despite ongoing attempts to
recruit and retain more Māori within the
discipline of psychology, the numbers of
Māori psychologists continues to remain
low, raising serious concerns about the
ability of the profession to effectively meet
the needs of its clientele. The objectives of this study were to
identify the, barriers to, and incentives for improving the recruitment and retention
of Māori in the profession of
psychology and Māori to gain and maintain registration
as psychologists. This paper is
based on the full report provided to the
New Zealand Psychologists’ Board. The findings in this study
clearly demonstrate that in order to attract
Māori to participate in psychology, the
majority of environments need to change
substantially. It is simply not enough for
organisations, whether they are educational, professional, or service delivery agencies,
to identify the need for more Māori
psychologists, yet still fail to commit to,
and actively engage in, altering long
identified environmental factors that are
barriers to Māori participation.

year: 2003