Sue Kilpatrick

• PhD
• Professor at University of Tasmania

Purpose This paper explores how users and providers cocreate value through interacting with online peer support mental health forum technology and offers insights into service ecosystem innovation. Design/methodology/approach The authors employed digital ethnography and interviews and analysed data to identify themes about user practices, provider...

Agriculture and food processing are becoming increasingly knowledge intensive as imperatives to innovate in the face of climate, market and other changes accelerate. The Agri-food Knowledge Matrix attempts to 'make sense' of the vast, complex array of information and support available to North West Tasmanian agri-food producers that is difficult fo...

Australian and international research has consistently revealed that children residing in Out of Home Care (OOHC) experience low academic achievement, high rates of suspension, high rates of early school drop‐out and poor representation in post school study. To address the issues experienced by many students in OOHC, trauma informed policies have b...

Introduction: Prevention and early intervention are crucial strategies for improving young people’s mental health and well-being. Building resilience is a key component of these strategies, especially among young individuals in rural areas who face well-documented mental health disparities. This study aimed to investigate how online mental health f...

Rural communities and partnerships are critical in career education, promoting pathways into work and further education and training. Families, teachers, and employers all may influence young people and adults who are considering pathway choices. This research aimed to equip these ‘key influencers’ with the knowledge and confidence to have supporti...

This report is about the role of online mental health peer support forums in supporting rural resilience.

Research has shown that employers and industry are key partners in work-based learning and can hinder or enhance access to vocational education training (VET). Our capabilities approach focus concerns increasing employer understanding of what is involved in engaging in the work-based component of school-based VET for students with disability. It se...

Background Medical education is a multifarious endeavour integrating a range of pedagogies and philosophies. Complexity as a science or theory (‘complexity’) signals a move away from a reductionist paradigm to one which appreciates that interactions in multi-component systems, such as healthcare systems, can result in adaptive and emergent outcomes...

In this study, the five capitals framework (natural, financial, human, physical, and social) are used to compare and understand the attitudes of dairy extension workers towards the use of information communication tools (ICTs) for extension services termed e-extension in Tasmania, Australia, and Punjab, Pakistan. Dairy extension workers were interv...

Higher education worldwide has expanded its intake to attract a more diverse student enrolment in order to achieve both social equity and the economic imperatives driving an innovative knowledge-based economy. In Australia, since 1985, numerous government reviews and reports have provided a strong mandate to expand access to higher education. As su...

This chapter reviews literature on higher education student support services to distil characteristics of service design and practice that act to enhance disadvantaged and non-traditional student retention and success and successful outcomes in transition from higher education. Relatively little is understood about factors affecting the success of...

This chapter tells the story of education in Australia’s island state of Tasmania with a focus on educational performance, engagement, and rates of youth criminal offences. It begins by presenting evidence of low educational participation rate in Tasmania, particularly at the levels of Years 11 and 12 and for tertiary education. The chapter then re...

This chapter examines the influence of universities’ admission practices, and support services and practices, on the retention and success of a diverse cohort of students. It maps the structure of four case study universities’ services, drawing on their websites, documents and interviews with admissions and support representatives. The chapter cons...

Since the onset of COVID-19, the benefits of online platforms to enhance rural service accessibility are more acknowledged. However, questions remain about the interconnected roles of geographical community and online digital communities in enhancing rural life – particularly for marginalised groups. In this study, we examine one Australian non-pro...

UNSTRUCTURED This paper identifies and examines pathways by which online peer support mental health forums assist in building the resilience of rural residents by addressing individual challenges with mental health. We accomplish this by using a resilience theory, developing a Theoretical Resilience Framework and applying it to empirical qualitativ...

Background: Rural mental health is a growing area of concern internationally, and online mental health forums offer a potential response to addressing service gaps in rural communities. Objective: The objective of this study was to explore and identify pathways by which online peer support mental health forums help to build resilience for rural...

Background: Medical education is a multifarious endeavour integrating a range of pedagogies and philosophies. Complexity as a science or theory (‘complexity’) signals a move away from a reductionist paradigm to one which appreciates that interactions in multi-component systems, such as healthcare systems, can result in adaptive and emergent outcome...

The study reported in this paper sought to explore whether and how social capital resources were generated on online peer support mental health forums, and how they were used by rural users to influence mental health outcomes. Interviews with rural users of three Australian online peer support mental health forums were analysed to identify interact...

Partnerships which work to inform career development learning (CDL) have a range of potential social benefits including social equity, increased social mobility and the development of human capital (Smith et al., Career development learning: maximising the contribution of work-integrated learning to the student experience, Final project report. Uni...

The Tasmanian dairy industry is one of the major contributors to the Tasmanian economy and Australia’s export portfolio. The Tasmanian Government funding plan (2018–2023) for RD&E focuses on sustainable dairy farm production with an impact pathway incorporating provisions for extension services. Considering the need for an effective extension syste...

The benefits of positive education initiatives are well understood in educational settings but less is known about how positive education can support remote communities to embrace change and become more resilient. This paper draws on the findings from an evaluative study of the Foundations to Flourish (F2F), a positive education programme, delivere...

Background Medical education should ensure graduates are equipped for practice in modern health-care systems. Practicing effectively in complex health-care systems requires contemporary attributes and competencies, complementing core clinical competencies. These need to be made overt and opportunities to develop and practice them provided. This stu...

Rural, regional and remote (RRR) communities and industries in Australia cannot currently produce or attract the workforce needed to survive, making skills and qualifications in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) increasingly important. Yet student engagement in STEM education in RRR schools remains low, with limited numbers of...

This chapter draws on experience of rural education research projects from early childhood to adult learning to explore how rural places can promote aspiration and participation in learning. It considers research about non-classroom learning environments offered by rural places and discusses the utility of social capital in both research design and...

Commercial fishers face a range of stressors that impact physical and mental health. However, there is limited research on the level of mental ill‐health among fishers and on the nature of stressors that contribute to their psychological distress. This paper focuses on the experiences of commercial wild‐catch fishers and analyses the results of an...

The research, focused on parents with children in years 5-10 in three low-socioeconomic rural and regional communities, drew on an understanding of educational aspiration as culturally and socio-spatially embedded to develop practical strategies for parents to engage with their children as they made education and career pathways choices. It draws f...

Background: Health professionals’ education should ensure graduates are equipped for practice in modern health-care systems. One hundred years after the Flexner Report on medical education, transformation in health-care systems has warranted reflection on priorities for medical education. Practicing effectively in modern health-care systems require...

Many social enterprises aim to transition disadvantaged people into mainstream employment; they are engaged in commercial activity underpinned by a social mission. They provide training in life and work skills to develop capability, defined as ability to achieve. They are spaces apparently available not only to develop socially and economically use...

This chapter reports on findings from a qualitative case study conducted in four rural Ugandan public secondary schools in two districts from March to October 2018. The study explored why some teachers stay while others leave rural teaching positions. Data collection methods included interviews, policy document analysis and researcher’s journal ref...

Social enterprises are promoted as a method of welfare reform, to transition people out of disadvantage by addressing poverty, unfulfilled capabilities and social exclusion. This study explores how three Work Integration Social Enterprises (WISEs) in Australia help to realise wellbeing for their employees by mapping their micro-geographical experie...

Work Integration Social Enterprises (WISEs) are a response to reconfiguring social support for disadvantaged people. Here, theory and methodology from social geography were applied, to consider capability realized in/by three Australian regional city WISEs. Data were gathered using observation and interviews with supervisors and employees. Coding i...

The practice of internationalisation is not new; scholars have been exchanging ideas across political borders for centuries. However, globalisation is causing a rapid increase in the pace and expansion of the practice. This is shaping the policies and programs higher education institutions are developing in response. Because of this, it is more imp...

Purpose: To identify and understand factors influencing farmers’ decisions to engage with extension activities. To understand farmer segments and how these factors vary in order to develop recommendations for future extension delivery. Methodology: Qualitative data was obtained through semi-structured interviews with 30 Tasmanian dairy farmers. The...

Widening higher education participation can deliver benefits to individuals, societies and economies but rural populations experience factors which inhibit their aspiration for and participation in higher education. When designing outreach programs, universities need to consider this landscape of factors, many of which are socio-cultural. This arti...

The Ian Potter Foundation funded the Peter Underwood Centre at the University of Tasmania’s (2016-2018) project ‘Facilitating school-parent-community partnerships throughout Tasmania to help children realise their educational potential’. The project delivered capacity building workshops for school leaders, community and families designed to facilit...

There is a strong link between educational attainment and health, wellbeing, community participation and productivity. In communities where educational attainment is particularity low, many parents have limited and poor educational experience, and while they 'want the best' for their child, are hesitant to engage with schools. This is particularly...

Pathways to higher education can appear opaque and unattainable to rural adults, despite the affordances provided by modern broadband and increasing provision of university online learning options. This paper describes an innovative partnership model that connects rural adults to university and technical and further education pathways through ‘warm...

The paper explores the processes by which two Australian rural communities established Community Learning Plans (CLPs). It acknowledges the role of CLPs as contributors to social and economic change through influencing employment rates, income equity, social cohesion and reduction in poverty. In addressing the research question: What factors contri...

The language of "impact" has been foregrounded in the recent lexicon of Australian initial teacher education (ITE). How teacher education programmes and supervising teachers identify and assess the impact of pre-service teachers' work with learners across a professional placement is a pressing issue for ITE providers. This paper reports on qualitat...

What is an appropriate structure for reporting a study of equity in Vocational Education and Training (VET) for adult learners experiencing disadvantage, using qualitative research and constructivist grounded theory as methodology.

Effective professional learning communities are crucial for supporting and developing the practice and identity formation of beginning teachers. Professional networks facilitate collegial learning and continuous improvement of professional practice of all teachers, and are especially important for out of field teachers. Rural practice is characteri...

Small places are not devoid of opportunities nor of successful programs to equip them for the future, despite perception to the contrary (West, 2013). This paper considers career education in the context of rural places in the modern globalised world. Â The paper introduces the Pathways to Success project, involving more than eighty initiatives map...

This paper reviews the literature on best practices to engage parents in order to equip them to support their children’s higher education aspirations. Parents from low socio-economic status (SES) backgrounds, in common with other parents, report that they want “the best” for their children’s future. Getting a good education is a part of the aspirat...

Australia needs a stronger workforce over the next three to five years with more qualified engineers and associated professionals with the high-level skills capable of delivering the needs of the advanced manufacturing and maritime industries. Australia’s graduation rates in science, technology, engineering and mathematics fields are low by interna...

The project, Towards Educating Mathematics Professionals Encompassing Science and Technology (TEMPEST), examines the extent and quality of professional learning (PL) opportunities for teachers of mathematics. Teaching of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) has become a focus of the Australian Government as these subjects are see...

There are challenges in obtaining robust, valid evidence that identifies the impact of pre-service teachers upon learners. The University of Tasmania is taking a research-based approach to determine the evidence needed to showcase the impact of its pre-service and graduate teachers on student learning. This paper offers a reflection upon thinking a...

The proportion of higher education students with disability is increasing. We know there is institutional variation in retention and performance of higher education students with disability, and there is a need to understand the reasons for this. This exploratory national study examines supports and adjustments provided by universities, including t...

Equipping Parents to support their children's aspiration: What works? A partnership between the University of Tasmania and the University of Wollongong and funded by the Higher Education Participation and Partnerships Program, this project examines best practices to engage parents in order to equip them to their children's higher education aspirati...

Objective: The objective of this present study was to describe the initial destination hospital of paediatric patients transported by Ambulance Victoria paramedics within the South Western area of Victoria to determine the proportion of patients that bypassed their closest hospital. Methods: All Ambulance Victoria primary ambulance transports fo...

Objective: This study aims to determine the likelihood that rural nurses perceive a hypothetical medication error would be reported in their workplace. Design: This employs cross-sectional survey using hypothetical error scenario with varying levels of harm. Setting: Clinical settings in rural Tasmania. Participants: Participants were 116 el...

There is increasing pressure to make pathways to higher education more accessible to students from a wide range of backgrounds, including those from lower socioeconomic circumstances. Often, those students gain vocational qualifications but those qualifications do not always support them fully to articulate to higher education. This is due often to...

Australia needs more qualified professionals in engineering, mathematics/science education, health and other sciences. The national focus on widening participation in higher education (HE) includes strengthening pathways from vocational education and training (VET). VET students often lack the mathematics skills necessary to articulate successfully...

To explore the role of women in fishing industry organisations and communities in promoting best-practice health behaviours among fishers in Australia. This paper reports aspects of research that examined how the fishing industry can best support physical health and mental well-being of fishers. The study employed a mixed-methods, multisite case st...

Australia needs more qualified professionals in the Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) areas. The national focus on widening participation in higher education (HE) includes strengthening pathways from vocational education and training (VET). VET students often lack the mathematics skills necessary to articulate successfully to...

This paper reports some of the main lessons learnt from a collaborative project titled Generating jobs in regional Tasmania: a social capital approach investigating how two small rural Tasmanian communities could better match local training needs with training provision. The project was conducted within the context of the wider social, economic and...

This paper reports findings from a study in two small Tasmanian rural communities that examined the process of developing and sustaining partnerships between health services and their communities. It identifies a generic framework for partnership development that appears to be common to partnerships, regardless of their purpose or of partners invol...

While links between rurality and health are clearly established, there continues to be interest in the resources that can make a difference to rural, often underserved, small communities. This research investigated how collective features of communities of place and industry communities of common purpose, influence farmer and fisher strategies to m...

This paper reports findings from a survey of former students from six Australian rural school clusters. It compares the experiences and outcomes of students who had participated in a school vocational education and training (VET) program with those who had not. School VET courses intended to provide a pathway to local employment appear to be succes...

This paper reports findings of the first phase of a study conducted to investigate the factors that contribute to the success of partnerships between vocational education and training (VET) providers and community/industry, and the processes partnerships employ to produce quality learning outcomes for individuals and other stakeholders, including e...

Background: This study was designed to identify the appropriateness of the rural multi- level general practice learning environment for mental health education. Methods: Individual semi-structured interviews were conducted with a purposive sample of 56 practice personnel at five practices in Victoria and South Australia. Interviews were transcribed...

This chapter explores how communities come together in the face of externally imposed challenges and the social processes and resources that shape community action in response to these challenges. Collectively described as ‘difficult times’, prolonged drought, floods, increasing financial and occupational stress, labour intensification, government...

Introduction This chapter is concerned with the contexts and drivers of community action: it explores how communities come together in the face of externally imposed challenges, and the social processes and resources that shape community action in response to these challenges. Collectively labelled ‘difficult times’, prolonged drought, floods, incr...

With trust in top-down government faltering, community-based groups around the world are displaying an ever-greater appetite to take control of their own lives and neighbourhoods. Government, for its part, is keen to embrace the projects and the planning undertaken at this level, attempting to regularise it and use it as a means of reconnecting to...

Participation in higher education has widened in recent years, to include groups who are at risk of social exclusion. Public policy in many countries has promoted increased enrolments for non-traditional student groups. Social inclusion policy and practice is underpinned by differing ideological frameworks relating to the degree of social inclusion...

This review provides a critical appraisal of the measurement of students’ social class and socioeconomic status (SES) in the context of widening higher education participation. Most assessments of social class and SES in higher education have focused on objective measurements based on the income, occupation, and education of students' parents, and...

Why would an entrepreneur leave a secure position or business, with all their creature comforts, and move to a regional area of Australia to take on a new business venture? The statistics on regional populations have indicated that these areas are aging; the young have no interest in staying in regional areas and are moving to the cities for educat...

Many countries have developed, or are in the process of developing, climate change adaptation policy statements, including for health. What knowledge do these policy statements value? How are rural community and Indigenous knowledges included? What are the implications of the answers to these questions for effective adaptation policy for health, pa...

Along with the massification of higher education comes a need for new models to support the success of greater numbers of diverse students. A greater proportion of these students are ‘non-traditional’ in terms of preparedness, socioeconomic status and geography. This paper introduces an Associate Degree model designed to support this new higher edu...

Government policy in many countries encourages migration to regional centres to relieve pressure on major cities and to boost economic development. Migrants are more likely to remain in a new location if they have meaningful work and establish social connections there. This article explores how organisations and groups in a regional city provide ne...

This study investigates Tasmanian maternity health providers' and

Innovation policy in many countries recognizes the significance of place-based innovation systems. Australia's innovation policy has incentives to bring universities and businesses together, but lacks place-based mechanisms to achieve this. Four case studies of regional intermediary organizations in Melbourne, Australia are examined to understand t...

In Australia, over 50% of small rural maternity units have been closed in the past two decades. Workforce shortages, safety and quality concerns and cost considerations are the three interrelated reasons that have led to these closures. Women and families face many challenges when these critical services are absent from their local communities. In...

Objectives: Home birth has attracted great controversy in the current context. There is a need for the public and health professionals to understand why maternity care providers have such different views on home birth, why they debate, what divides them into two opposite sides and if they have anything in common. Method: A qualitative study invo...

The beginning of the twenty-first century heralds a shift in emphasis from learning with the focus on the individual to learning as part of a community. The concept of “learning communities ” is currently one that is to the fore of much educational and organisational literature and discussion. In the literature, however, the term “learning communit...

This article reports findings of a project funded by the Australian National Council for Vocational Education Research. The project explores solutions to current and projected skills shortages within the health and community services sector, from a vocational education and training perspective. Its purpose is to locate, analyse and disseminate info...

In this paper we report on some results from a project which sought to uncover the complex relationships between "integrated" numeracy and literacy skills, self- confidence, and the place of skills knowledge and values in the learning process. The case of beef producers undertaking training in Quality Assurance (QA) is examined. Like all industry s...

Social capital (networks, values, trust and commitment) facilitates learning and change in communities by 'oiling' the processes of accessing and acquiring new knowledge, skills and values. The literature on social capital argues that high levels of social capital lead to strong economic performance (Putnam, 1993). Development and maintenance of a...

This study examines the question of how a non-metropolitan community consolidates and develops sustainable economic and social activity through the learning of community members. It includes an examination of the respective contributions of schooling, post-school education and training, and learning at work as well as learning at home.

The process of establishing a technical and vocational education and training (TVET) ‘solution’ to address a skill shortage is key to the quality of the outcome for learners, workplaces, communities and the industry. The creative ‘solutions’ are often about job redesign, others about tapping into new student cohorts, while some take a skill ecosyst...

This study applies the concept of the psychological contract to the relationship between management practices and volunteers. Formalization of the voluntary sector is impacting on volunteers' experiences and may breach the psychological contract from the volunteers' perspective. This mixed method study interviewed 67 volunteers and volunteer coordi...

Many small rural communities have a flow of skilled people through the community, including employees from the government, non government and private sectors on fixed-term contracts, and a range of professionals, often attracted by amenity and seeking a sea change or tree change. The aim of the study reported in this paper was to investigate how ru...

1. Abstract This paper reports some of the findings from a project that aimed to identify effective processes for ensuring that the content of learning activities is relevant to the changing needs of clients, and evolves so as to always incorporate the best available knowledge and science. This paper focuses on findings relating to the drivers for...

When migrating to Australia Asian women bring with them birthing

Farmers and fishers have always been exposed to the vagaries of climate and global economic forces. However, in recent years there has been an accumulation of factors which are having a particularly severe impact upon rural Australia. The global financial crisis has negatively affected commodity prices and the viability of some rural communities is...

Social capital refers to the norms and networks that enable people to act collectively. It is a set of resources that reside in the relationships among people that allow them to share their knowledge and skills. Social capital is built and accessed through interactions between people and groups. Educational institutions and their community benefit...

This paper examines the skills required of volunteers in the voluntary sector organisations that operate in three rural Tasmanian communities. It reports how volunteers acquire those skills and reveals the challenges faced by voluntary sector organisations in rural communities whose industries and, following from this, community members have a low‐...