Contemporary Issues in Educational Settings

Overview

This unit prepares students to use best-practice evidence to approach a range of contemporary issues relevant to the practice of educational and developmental psychologists. Topics will span across psychological practice with a diverse range of clients in rural, remote, and metropolitan areas, as well as pre-school, primary, secondary, and tertiary education settings. The unit prepares students to provide equitable support to all members within an educational community to promote whole educational-setting wellbeing and positive student learning outcomes. Supporting educational communities after a crisis and in an emergency, to implement the key principles of effective critical incident management, is an important skill learnt in this unit. This unit features on-campus opportunities for students to practice their skills in responding to contemporary issues in educational settings, and to hear from guest lecturers and experts working in the field.

Unit learning outcomes

Students who successfully complete this unit will be able to:

1. Apply and evaluate evidence-based individual and group psychological interventions to support students, families and the broader educational community
2. Implement evidence-based critical incident management processes following a crisis or disaster.
3. Collaborate effectively with professionals from other disciplines to support educational communities.
4. Critique contemporary issues in educational settings related to individual and systemic issues and apply culturally competent and ethical practices to address these challenges

Teaching methods

All applicable locations

Assessment

Content

• Contemporary student issues in pre-school, primary, secondary, and tertiary educational settings
• The Mental Status Examination
• Risk assessment of suicide, self-harm, and harm to others (acute and chronic)
• Working with marginalised students, with a particular focus on systemic issues and advocacy
• Evidence-based approaches to addressing a range of contemporary individual and systemic issues in schools
• Capacity-building with schools, education professionals, communities, and families
• Effective critical incident management
• Graduate Attribute 1 (Communication 1 - Verbal Communication)
• Graduate Attribute 2 (Communication 2 - Communicating using different media)
• Graduate Attribute 5 (Digital Literacies 1 - Information literacy)