This seed project aimed to enhance Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander university student engagement and retention. Specifically, this project attended to the notion of the 'university place' and provides information and two tools that universities can use to help optimise the persistence and educational outcomes of Indigenous Australians. This project has produced meaningful, useful and novel contributions that are relevant to the sector. Central to this seed project is the notion of place. Place is broadly defined as 'space + meaning' (Harrison & Dourish 1996). People's identity is intertwined with places and, as such, people and places are knitted together (Sack 1997). Even so, the relationship between people's identity and place is often overlooked (Malpas 1999). Place is defined as the experiential setting that consists of a specific location and the cognitive, emotional, behavioural and social activities that occur within (Relph 1976). People alter their identity to help them navigate places (Baumeiser & Muraven 1996). Thus, the 'university place' comprises cognitive, emotional, behavioural and social activities in a locale that transpires across students' university experience and with which their identity is intertwined. For this project, a case study approach comprisedof two universities and employed mixed methods that were organised into three stages. Stage 1 included the collation of baseline data from the participating universities (e.g. Indigenous student enrolment numbers) and beginning-project presentations. Stage 2 comprised interviews and focus groups from which qualitative data was collected from: a) undergraduate and postgraduate Indigenous university students; b) academic teaching staff; and c) relevant administrative, professional and technical (APT) staff. From this qualitative data, a framework was developed and was discussed at mid-project presentations and disseminated in the mid-project report. Finally, in Stage 3 quantitative data was collected via surveys of: a) undergraduate and postgraduate Indigenous students; and b) academic teaching staff. Stage 3 served to evolve the framework and develop the two project tools. End-project presentations, workshops, publications and an e-booklet served to widely disseminate the findings. [Executive summary, ed]
Research Background
This project examined how ‘university places’ influence Indigenous students’ success. It was aligned with the Australian Government’s ‘closing the gap’ agenda. Optimising persistence at university is vital to improving Indigenous student completion and quality of life. Indigenous university student enrolments remain below parity with drop-out rates that are twice that of non-Indigenous students. Yet, for Indigenous Australians who complete university, the benefits are considerable in that they typically find work faster and have a higher commencing salary than their non-Indigenous counterparts (Turnbull 2017). Little is known of the factors that support persistence, such as the university environment or ‘university place’ (Behrendt et al. 2012). Identity is intertwined with place (Sack 1997). The research question examined was ‘How and why does place influence the engagement and retention of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander university students?’
Research Contribution
It was found that ‘university places’ reflect the maturity of the Indigenous agenda of institutions and are an intersection of Indigenous peoples’ social identities (as a student, as Indigenous, and as emerging professionals). This project produced two novel tools—The iPlace New Thinking Prompts and The iPlace Ecology. Both tools are scalable, portable and non-prescriptive, designed to seed re-thinking about ‘university place’ praxis, and they may be adapted either in part or holistically to assist with strategic imperatives of Australian universities.
Research Significance
This project was funded by the then Australian Government Department of Education and Training under the Office for Learning and Teaching Seed Grant Programme (HERDC-Category 1). The project generated recommendations for future research, as well as policy and practice recommendations directed to government and higher educational institutions. The accompanying e-booklet has been downloaded 2744 times.
- The ‘university place’: how and why place influences the engagement and retention of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander university students: Final Report 2017
- Maria Raciti (Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast - Faculty of Arts, Business and LawJennifer Carter (Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast - Faculty of Arts, Business and LawK Gilbey (Author) - University of Southern QueenslandDavid Hollinsworth (Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast - Faculty of Arts, Business and Law
- 58 pages
- Department of Education and Training
- 2018
- 9781760511098
- Copyright © 2018. With the exception of the Commonwealth Coat of Arms, and where otherwise noted, all material presented in this document is provided under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License creativecommons/4.0/license
- School of Business and Creative Industries; Indigenous and Transcultural Research Centre; School of Social Sciences - Legacy; USC Business School - Legacy; School of Law and Society; Sustainability Research Cluster
- English
- 99451225002621
- Report
- NT2
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