Exemplary early childhood educators at work: A multi-level investigation. Exemplary early childhood educators at work: A multi-level investigation. This project aims to inform strategies to better attract, prepare, recognise, support and retain a high quality workforce, by investigating the complexity of early childhood educators’ work. Seemingly entrenched workforce shortages threaten the objectives that governments and families seek through investment in early childhood education. Popular imag ....Exemplary early childhood educators at work: A multi-level investigation. Exemplary early childhood educators at work: A multi-level investigation. This project aims to inform strategies to better attract, prepare, recognise, support and retain a high quality workforce, by investigating the complexity of early childhood educators’ work. Seemingly entrenched workforce shortages threaten the objectives that governments and families seek through investment in early childhood education. Popular images of work with young children as easy and instinctual, or of teaching as only school based, mislead potential workforce entrants and erode the status of educators, leading to attrition. This project’s audit and description of exemplary educators’ work, across each level of mandated qualification, will inform strategies to sustain a high quality early childhood workforce into the future.Read moreRead less
Time-Use, Time Poverty and Teachers’ Work. Education systems and teacher unions have long expressed concern regarding the intensification of the demands of teaching and school leadership. Challenges with retaining early career teachers and recruiting new teachers are often blamed on increasing teacher workload and associated burnout. The primary aim of this study is to investigate teachers’ work intensification. This will provide important information for systems, unions and schools and suggest ....Time-Use, Time Poverty and Teachers’ Work. Education systems and teacher unions have long expressed concern regarding the intensification of the demands of teaching and school leadership. Challenges with retaining early career teachers and recruiting new teachers are often blamed on increasing teacher workload and associated burnout. The primary aim of this study is to investigate teachers’ work intensification. This will provide important information for systems, unions and schools and suggest areas for intervention at the school and system level. The secondary aim of this study is to examine how teachers manage the intensification of their work, with a particular emphasis on commercial digital tools marketed to them as time saving devices.Read moreRead less
Promoting engagement with life in older adulthood. This project aims to examine engagement in meaningful activities among older adults. Increasing older adults' engagement could promote direct benefits for social integration, well-being and better quality of life. The project is expected to generate new knowledge on programs that effectively promote engagement, as well as evaluating a new tailored approach to promoting engagement that aligns with individuals' unique strengths, capabilities and ....Promoting engagement with life in older adulthood. This project aims to examine engagement in meaningful activities among older adults. Increasing older adults' engagement could promote direct benefits for social integration, well-being and better quality of life. The project is expected to generate new knowledge on programs that effectively promote engagement, as well as evaluating a new tailored approach to promoting engagement that aligns with individuals' unique strengths, capabilities and values. The findings aim to provide benefits for community organisations and aged care service providers adopting innovative approaches to promoting ageing well.
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Preventing railway suicide: An open-systems perspective. Preventing railway suicide: An open-systems perspective. This project aims to develop an automated suicide risk detection system to reduce the incidence and impact of railway suicide, which has a devastating effect on victims’ families, station staff, train drivers, emergency workers, and bystanders. This project will use open-systems theory to develop two complementary information systems for more effective detection and reporting of suic ....Preventing railway suicide: An open-systems perspective. Preventing railway suicide: An open-systems perspective. This project aims to develop an automated suicide risk detection system to reduce the incidence and impact of railway suicide, which has a devastating effect on victims’ families, station staff, train drivers, emergency workers, and bystanders. This project will use open-systems theory to develop two complementary information systems for more effective detection and reporting of suicide risk; use these systems to investigate how different situational factors interact with different combinations of service interventions to influence suicide risk; and share the findings to reduce railway suicide in Australia and overseas.Read moreRead less
New digital deep-time exploration tools for a low-emissions economy. Demand for critical minerals will soar as renewable energy generation increases, but exploration companies currently cannot take full advantage of available exploration data in an Earth evolution context. This project will generate new knowledge in big and complex geodata analysis using an innovative data mining approach. It will enable Lithodat, a small enterprise, to perform cloud-based plate tectonic reconstruction, visualis ....New digital deep-time exploration tools for a low-emissions economy. Demand for critical minerals will soar as renewable energy generation increases, but exploration companies currently cannot take full advantage of available exploration data in an Earth evolution context. This project will generate new knowledge in big and complex geodata analysis using an innovative data mining approach. It will enable Lithodat, a small enterprise, to perform cloud-based plate tectonic reconstruction, visualisation and spatio-temporal analysis of geodata for resource exploration. The outcomes include an enhanced capacity to generate ore prospectivity maps and an improved understanding of their tectonic, geochemical, and geophysical signatures, benefiting Lithodat and their clients in the search for new mineral deposits.Read moreRead less
Control systems for irrigation networks in storage critical operations. The aim of the project is to further develop automatic control technologies for irrigation channels, with particular focus on supply mode operations for channels with critical limits on storage and inflow. The significance relates to the role of irrigation channels in food and fibre production. New knowledge generated will help Rubicon Water expand its Total Channel Control product, already used extensively in Australia, to ....Control systems for irrigation networks in storage critical operations. The aim of the project is to further develop automatic control technologies for irrigation channels, with particular focus on supply mode operations for channels with critical limits on storage and inflow. The significance relates to the role of irrigation channels in food and fibre production. New knowledge generated will help Rubicon Water expand its Total Channel Control product, already used extensively in Australia, to suit emerging markets with significant export potential. Beyond the commercial impact, expected benefits include improved service, reduced environmental footprint, the safeguarding of assets in extreme events, and the training of engineers in the important areas of modelling and control for infrastructure management.
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Observe, Reflect, Improve: a tool to enrich Children’s Learning (ORICL). This project aims to address long-standing concerns about the quality of education and care for children during their critical first two years. It will introduce a promising, future-focused digital tool, co-designed with practitioners and providers of early childhood services, to support infant-toddler educators’ planning and practice. Building on ground-breaking pilot work, we will undertake a national implementation and e ....Observe, Reflect, Improve: a tool to enrich Children’s Learning (ORICL). This project aims to address long-standing concerns about the quality of education and care for children during their critical first two years. It will introduce a promising, future-focused digital tool, co-designed with practitioners and providers of early childhood services, to support infant-toddler educators’ planning and practice. Building on ground-breaking pilot work, we will undertake a national implementation and evaluation of the Observe, Reflect and Improve Children’s Learning (ORICL) tool. Expected outcomes include: enhanced pedagogical practices; enriched learning experiences for children birth-two; effective communication with families; and improved resourcing for providers of early childhood education and care services. Read moreRead less
Development of genetic technology for rodent population suppression. Vertebrate pests cost Australia over $1 billion each year in agricultural losses and environmental damage and novel strategies are urgently required to tackle this massive challenge. Newly proposed “gene drives”, which might rapidly spread through populations, have enormous potential for the sustained management and even eradication of pests. Through innovative application of cutting-edge genome editing approaches, this proposa ....Development of genetic technology for rodent population suppression. Vertebrate pests cost Australia over $1 billion each year in agricultural losses and environmental damage and novel strategies are urgently required to tackle this massive challenge. Newly proposed “gene drives”, which might rapidly spread through populations, have enormous potential for the sustained management and even eradication of pests. Through innovative application of cutting-edge genome editing approaches, this proposal aims to develop gene drive technology in mice as a prototypical vertebrate pest species. We will also develop cutting-edge mathematical models of rodent gene drives to identify crucial parameters for efficacious employment and investigate potential for impact on non-target populations.Read moreRead less
Can coastal floodplains of north Australia survive ferals and rising seas? Tropical Coastal Floodplains are an iconic feature of northern Australia; however, they are experiencing widespread degradation due to complex interactions between feral ungulates and relative sea level rise. Using cross-cultural multidisciplinary methods, this project will discover if feral ungulate control by the Aboriginal Yirralka Rangers will reduce vegetation decline and erosion and enhance floodplain resilience to ....Can coastal floodplains of north Australia survive ferals and rising seas? Tropical Coastal Floodplains are an iconic feature of northern Australia; however, they are experiencing widespread degradation due to complex interactions between feral ungulates and relative sea level rise. Using cross-cultural multidisciplinary methods, this project will discover if feral ungulate control by the Aboriginal Yirralka Rangers will reduce vegetation decline and erosion and enhance floodplain resilience to sea level rise. This project will provide significant new data to inform feral ungulate management strategies as well as coastal carbon models as these processes are likely to create a carbon source rather than sink. Our collaborative science will have local to national benefits for natural and cultural resource management.Read moreRead less
Reconciliation strategies for continuous variable quantum key distribution. This project aims to advance a novel key distribution method, called quantum key distribution, which distributes secure keys using the quantum state of optical channels. Key distribution is a foundational part of data security, allowing digital keys to be securely exchanged between two or more parties, before they are used to protect and share information. The expected outcome is new rateless error correction codes desi ....Reconciliation strategies for continuous variable quantum key distribution. This project aims to advance a novel key distribution method, called quantum key distribution, which distributes secure keys using the quantum state of optical channels. Key distribution is a foundational part of data security, allowing digital keys to be securely exchanged between two or more parties, before they are used to protect and share information. The expected outcome is new rateless error correction codes designed specifically to implement quantum key distribution over long distances. Quantum key distribution is beneficial for ultra-secure communications as it avoids the vulnerability to weak random numbers and quantum-computing brute force attacks that currently threated the security of data protected by existing methods. Read moreRead less