Browsing by Author "Williams, Peter"

Email has extended its reach beyond the traditional workplace into the non-work hours of employees, disrupting the work-life balance. What was once ‘anywhere any time’ has become ‘everywhere all the time’ (Mazmanian, Orlikowski, & Yates, 2013).

This study examines the effects of email intrusion on work-life balance from the perspective of a Christian faith-based organisation, which has the additional dimension of espousing a ‘healthy’ balance between work and life. A survey of 500 employees of such an organisation, attracting 208 respondents, found that nearly all employees owned mobile devices that enable them to access work email outside work time,and that they frequently use these devices when not at work to access work emails.

The employees perceived that anytime work emails have provided them with increased flexibility, but at the same time generated greater and frequently unrealistic expectations of them, by parents, students and to a minor degree school administrators. These employees also often felt that these anytime emails led them to working longer hours, generated a sense of being overloaded, contrary to the espoused values of a work and life balance and the importance of family.

For these employees the solution to the anytime work email intrusion and resulting stress is not some external control. To most of these employees external control would be much too restrictive and teaching was perceived to be and has always been more than just an 8.30am to 3.30pm responsibility.

This article discusses performance appraisal in an education system context. With teacher quality key to improving student performance, school education systems must consider the role of performance appraisal on both teacher and principal development and improvement. This article describes the perceptions of employees within a faith-based education system as to current and suggested improvements in performance appraisal processes. This study utilised a qualitative approach for research design, adopting semi-structured interviews to collect employee perceptions. The employees indicated mistrust in the present performance appraisal processes, noted inconsistent use of performance appraisal, identified a need for evaluator training, and suggested the use of both an internal and external person in the evaluation and development space. These faithbased education system employees indicated that a district wide approach to the performance appraisal process, with flexibility at the local school level, would be beneficial for both the respective schools and the education system.

This research aims to contribute to the literature on embedding financial literacies in a school market garden programme. It seeks to do this by using one school market gardening programme in an Australian primary education setting as a case study, exploring its role and perceived benefits in developing financial literacies in students. This research utilised a qualitative research design, adopting semi-structured interviews to allow for emerging ideas, focus groups involving parents, student cohorts and garden volunteers, and participant observation to enhance data collection for triangulation. The results show that students involved in the market garden programme had positive experiences relating to their learning of financial literacies. This article proposes several recommendations that may further develop the financial literacy learning outcomes of students. These recommendations are grouped into two main themes: (1) involving students more in the management of the programme, and (2) improved record keeping.

Educational systems are experiencing a global leadership crisis. The literature around school leadership paints a clear picture: school leaders are an ageing population and there is a lack of willingness from classroom teachers to take on school leadership roles. Anecdotal evidence would suggest this is also the case within Adventist Schools Australia (ASA), however, there is a lack of research that has explored the leadership intentions of current employees within this education system. Through a review of school leadership literature, and ASA employee survey responses on the topic of school leadership, this study explores the views of these respondents to taking on school leadership positions, including the influences on their decision to further explore school leadership roles.

Episode 12 of the Here For Good podcast series, which features researchers at Avondale in conversation with Associate Dean (Research) Associate Professor Carolyn Rickett and guest presenters. This episode: Dr Peter Williams from Avondale Business School. The subject: Educational leadership and organisational change.

Internationalisation of the curriculum is a key research area at the intersection of teaching and learning. Increasing numbers of international students in Australian schools and tertiary institutions necessitate the reconceptualisation of curriculum to incorporate global perspectives and develop intercultural competencies of both students and teachers. Accordingly, this research project identified key discipline areas at Avondale College of Higher Education in which to perform pedagogical intervention with an internationalisation focus. Three lecturers undertook action research in the areas of Primary Education, Business and Theology, resulting in the production of culturallyinformed perspectives, increased cross-cultural awareness and the identification of areas for future research and innovation.

Three tertiary business educators transitioned their teaching from a just face-to-face mode of content delivery into online/blended content delivery formats. It was found there were three dominant domains of learning thresholds for these educators, which involved the course, student engagement and the teacher. The course domain considered alternative approaches to teaching and course design. The student domain focussed on student engagement and feedback. The teacher domain addressed teacher identity and interactions. Challenges faced by the educators included adopting a new paradigm of teaching, benchmarking efforts, and adequate resourcing. The positive transformative experience involved the educators gaining increased self-assurance in becoming effective online educators.

Meaningful and enjoyable experiences are important in the education of children. In this qualitative case study, the garden program (incl. market garden shop, garden care, Kid’s Kitchen, and chicken coop) in one Australian primary school was explored to determine its impact on the mathematical learning of children. Data were collected using focus groups (four student, three parent and three volunteer groups), three teacher interviews, weekly garden journal entries and, when possible, through observation. This program provided opportunities for enriched mathematical learning facilitated by: early exposure to mathematical applications through mixed-age groups at different stations; an authentic, real-life setting to apply mathematical learning; and the consolidation of mathematical experiences through weekly engagement. These program features were found to positively impact the mathematical readiness, attitudes and competence of students.

With the pandemic of COVID-19 came a time of significant business disruption, particularly in relation to social distancing rules that effectively shut down organisations physical office spaces, and moved employees to work from home (WFH) in a very short space of time. This research looks at the current office space that employees use in a Higher Education Provider, and compares it to the WFH space, while discussing the challenges and opportunities of WFH. The question of the ability to collaborate with colleagues was also researched prior to and during the lock down. The results showed that employees valued their physical office space, but that open plan or shared offices were often noisy and lacked privacy. Most described their office space as personal, comfortable and conducive to productivity. The move to WFH was both swift and unplanned, but most employees felt that they had a good space, were comfortable, had the equipment they needed to do their job and used technology such as Zoom to keep in contact with colleagues and students.

The challenges of WFH included the lack of collegiality, communication issues, equipment/connectivity, community, mental health, work-life-balance and increased workload. Interestingly, of the seven challenges identified, six were also listed as opportunities, these included: collegiality, communication issues, equipment/connectivity, community, mental health and work-life-balance. Three additional opportunities were identified as flexibility, productivity and innovation.

In relation to the ability to work collaboratively with others, the majority of respondents stated this happened in their current office space (87%), and with the move to WFH, 76% stated that they were still able to work collaboratively. The results demonstrate that although there can be challenges in WFH, that there can be advantages to both employees and employers. Employees will no longer need to commute to work, can spend more time perusing personal plans and feel more productive when WFH. For employers, they now have access to a wider pool of talent, can enjoy cost savings and decrease their carbon footprint. The office of the future will be a hybrid model, a combination of people WFH, working in the office and doing both, otherwise known as the Hybrid Office Model (HOM).

This book is the fourth in the series ‘Revealing Jesus in the Learning Environment’. Spanning Christian Early Childhood, Primary, Secondary, and Tertiary learning environments, it explores and celebrates how these environments, and in particular the teachers who create them, reveal Jesus to their students.
The chapters in this volume range from literature supported narratives, to research-based papers, to original research in schools. This book also investigates a variety of topics, including parent perceptions of Adventist education, graduate attributes, celebrating teaching over instruction, and case studies from the teachers at Fulton Adventist University College. Varying between the practical and the philosophical, each chapter contributes to a celebration of what Christian teachers have done, are doing, and can do in the future to best reveal Jesus in their learning environments.

This article aims to contribute to the literature on school leadership identification. It adopts an Australian faith-based education system case study to explore classroom teacher and school-based administrator perceptions of both current and future school leadership identification practices. This research utilised a qualitative research design, adopting semi-structured interviews to collect employee perceptions. The respondents identify six areas of importance for school leadership identification. These include:1) defining what constitutes excellence at the classroom, school, and system levels of leadership; 2) formalising school leadership identification processes; 3) conversing with early career teachers around school leadership aspirations; 4) improving processes to communicate interest in school leadership roles; 5) heightened levels of communication between school principals and system administrators regarding high potential teacher leaders; and 6) providing school-based opportunities for school leadership development.

This article aims to contribute to the literature

on school leader preparation and development

programs. It seeks to do this by identifying and

discussing elements that current faith-based

education system teachers would like to see

embedded in the creation of aspirant and novice

school leader preparation and development

programs. This research utilised a qualitative

research design, adopting semi-structured

interviews to collect employee perceptions. These

teachers identified a five-element framework for

leadership programs: School and Community;

Working With and Through Others; System

Understandings and Practice; Leadership

Wellbeing; and Special Character. This paper

proposes a number of recommendations that may

assist in the development of aspiring and novice

school leadership preparation and development

programs within this faith-based education

system.

This article discusses the leadership crisis

looming in schools. With fewer people aspiring

to take on school leadership, school education

systems must consider the drivers and barriers

of school leadership aspiration. This article

describes the perceptions of respondents

from three hierarchical levels within a faithbased

education system as to the factors

influencing their willingness or unwillingness

to consider school leadership positions. This

research explored survey data, both quantitative

and qualitative, relating to school leadership

aspirations and influences with regard to

applying for school leadership positions.

Five factors were found to influence the

unwillingness of respondents to consider school

leadership positions, while seven factors were

identified to influence willingness to consider

school leadership positions. Additionally,

four influence factors were identified which, if

significantly improved, would act to increase

respondent aspiration and thus influence their

willingness to consider school leadership

positions in the future.

Educational research literature indicates that minimal time is spent planning for future school leadership, but unplanned school leadership succession can have significant repercussions on school improvement initiatives. The role and expectations of school leaders, and the school principal in particular, have been increasing in intensity and complexity, causing many to question why they should continue in their roles, and reducing the number of potential applicants who aspire to such positions. This lack of school leadership aspiration is exacerbated by the increasing number of retirements experienced both nationally and globally in educational leadership. The overwhelming majority of educational leadership succession research is explored from a systemic viewpoint, focusing on the administrators’ involvement in the process. To add to the educational succession literature, this study will add the teacher’s voice, which remains essentially unexplored. It draws on the experience and perceptions of employees within the faith-based Adventist Schools Australia (ASA) education system at three different hierarchical levels: classroom teachers, school-based administrators, and system-based administrators. This study made use of both quantitative and qualitative research methods. Particular emphasis was given to exploring the perceptions of drivers and barriers to aspire to ASA school leadership positions, and the perceptions of current and ideal succession practices within ASA. Very low levels of active aspirants existed amongst ASA employees, indicating future risks to ASA leadership sustainability exist. Even though hierarchical level perceptions differed in magnitude, results indicated that a perceived lack of work-life balance was the predominant barrier to applying for school leadership positions, while ‘calling’ and the opportunity to positively contribute to the school and community were the predominant drivers in the decision to apply for school leadership positions. All hierarchical levels perceived that current succession practices need improving but had different emphases for this improvement. For the classroom teachers, their ideal succession model would be a formalised and communicated model, for the school-based administrators it would include input from all hierarchical levels, while the system-based administrators saw the ideal as a consistent and nationally implemented succession model. These results indicate ASA can improve current succession practices, and in doing so, ensure educational system sustainability by involving all hierarchical levels in succession practice design and development, and importantly younger generation classroom teachers, which will assist in the attraction, development and retention of high-quality future educational leaders.

The rising tide of aged citizens globally suggests a compelling argument for increased understanding of factors impacting aging and retirement. Extended insight into the well-being of lesser studied groups offer suggestions to potentially enhance future planning for aging citizens. A study exploring the experience of clergy in Australia and New Zealand suggests a substantive theory on retirement in this context. A grounded study approach was adopted as best fit. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 42 retired clergy and their wives. Findings suggest the underpinning role of spirituality in the primary elements of; choice, flexibility and connectivity as factors impacting the well-being of faith-based retirees in this context.

New technology in the form of 24/7 email brings with it increased expectations of begin available, adding to the pressures of work-life balance for employees. Few studies have explored this from the perspective of the Christian pastor, and none within the Seventh-day Adventist Church (SDA) pastoral context. We extend the literature in this area by examining the impact of increased work-email on the work-life balance of SDA local church pastors. Based on responses from Australian SDA local church pastors we find that while pastors find there are some advantages in the flexibility offered by 24/7 work email, it also increases the work pressures on them, impacting on stress and relationships. Effective work-life balance is becoming more difficult for the SDA local church pastor to achieve.

Employers of Christian-based organisations have expectations of the attributes of business school graduates, and of particular interest is whether there are different and/or additional skills for graduates from a Christian Business School. The purpose of this study is to engage with various Christian-based employers of business school graduates to discover views, requirements and expectations of graduates from a Christian Business School. An initial review of the literature reveals no published works on the graduate attributes expected by Christian employers of Christian business school graduates. This study seeks to add knowledge given the gap that exists in this literature.

The needs of employers change over time, and academics are well advised to ensure the curricula of the courses they teach keep pace with these changing needs. This research was completed during 2019 by staff at the Avondale Business School, part of Avondale University College. Avondale was established in 1897, by the Seventh-day Adventist Church, and is a Christian based University College. One way that Christian business school academics can maintain awareness of employers’ preferred graduate attributes is to consult with a range of employers. This study will utilise both qualitative and quantitative approaches to address the research aims of finding out if there are different and/or additional requirements by Christian-based organisations, from graduates who attend a Christian business school. The participants are employees from Christian organisations, who commonly employ these new graduates.