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Research Centre for Digital Data and Assessment in Education
Our research examines digital disruption, assessment and data analytics as subjects of research, policy and practice in schooling reform and teacher education. Drawing on international, national, and state-based partnerships, the centre addresses a global knowledge gap in how new and emerging technologies are transforming the practices and experience of education inside and outside schooling.
The centre has three research programs:
This program examines digital disruption in schooling. It will focus on the digitalisation and expansion of large-scale standardised assessments (both international and national) and their usage and effects in systems and schools. It also focuses on the necessary data infrastructures that facilitate such digital disruption and the impact of edu-business involvement in this domain. It seeks to understand the extent of the usage of apps in schools and classrooms, costs and effects on teachers’ work and professionalism, and student privacy. Finally, it explores the interaction between technology and humans in assessment practices, including judgement making and the consistency of judgement decisions.
This program investigates longitudinal data resources, collected by schools and government, to model growth in students’ academic achievements and to develop methodology for measuring individual learning progression in disadvantaged student groups. It looks at processes for collecting assessment data within schools using digital technology in order to identify the impact of digital procedures on analysis and interpretation of results. Findings from the investigations will lead to development of a data analytic infrastructure for use in enhancing student learning progression, adding value in the school and community contexts.
This program investigates the foundational knowledge required of young children in the early years (birth to age eight) for their safe and productive participation in a digitally networked society. New knowledge is needed concerning the development of young children’s concept of digital, alongside those of living and non-living to provide a foundation for young children’s developing understanding of networked technologies for young children, and in later years of schooling and well into adulthood.
The centre welcomes enquiries about research projects and opportunities within the program areas to collaborate with a multidisciplinary team of researchers who aim to generate new knowledge about schooling reform and teacher education, with respect to research, policy and practice.
Centre Director
Professor Claire Wyatt-Smith is the Director of the Institute for Learning Sciences and Teacher Education and Professor of Educational Assessment and Literacy. Her research addresses standards, professional judgement, and the implications of digital disruption for teacher professionalism.
Program Lead, Data and Digital Practices at System and School Level
Professor Bob Lingard is a Professorial Fellow at the Institute for Learning Sciences and Teacher Education and Emeritus Professor at The University of Queensland. A Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences in Australia and a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences in the UK, he was also co-director of a government-commissioned research project in Australia that developed the influential concept of ‘productive pedagogies’, which has impacted policy and practice around the globe.
Program Lead, Digital Foundations in the Early Years
Professor Susan Edwards is Director of the Early Childhood Futures research program in the Institute for Learning Sciences and Teacher Education. Her group investigates the role of play-based learning in the early childhood curriculum for the 21st century.
Email: ilste@acu.edu.au
Phone: +61 7 3623 7858
Street address
Cathedral House
Level 4, 229 Elizabeth Street
Brisbane Qld 4000
Postal address
Institute for Learning Sciences and Teacher Education
GPO Box 2587
Brisbane Qld 4001