Dr Stephen Kelly, Secondary Literacy Consultant at the Catholic Education Office, was recently awarded the degree Doctor of Philosophy from the Queensland University of Technology. Stephen’s graduation ceremony was on 22 July at the Performing Arts Centre in Brisbane. As a member of the literacy team Stephen takes a special interest in supporting schools to research the place of questioning and dialogue between learners -leaders, teachers and students- when reading texts and preparing to write. In this work Stephen is interested in supporting learning as a democratic process that enables critically discerning citizens.
Stephen’s thesis, Governing civil society: How literacy, education and security were brought together, throws light on our contemporary experience of the relationship between government policy and the function of education. The study takes an historical approach to examine how the questions posed by the problem of security plays a role in determining the uses of literacy and education to help secure the interests of the nation. Stephen has presented papers related to his thesis at educational research conferences in Melbourne, London and Berlin and later this year will present at the Australian Association of Research Educators conference in Fremantle.
The examiners congratulated Stephen on presenting a “thoroughly timely…excellent, engaging, and thought provoking thesis”, that addressed the enduring “question of whose citizenship ‘counts’ and whose does not”. Stephen is still musing on the examiner’s recommendations to pursue further publications out of this work. “The house needs a coat of paint”, Stephen said, “and the garden could do with some love and care, so I will need to negotiate the step towards publication. In any case being in the garden is a great place for meditating and coming up with new thoughts”, he said.
Twenty students from Catholic schools in South Australia have been named among the winners in two major state-wide Humanities competitions.
Earlier this year, senior school students from across South Australia were invited to enter the 2024 Premier’s Anzac Spirit School Prize and the Muriel Matters Awards.
