Research Articles - Peer Reviewed Research by Katya (Ekaterina) Pechenkina
The rates of Australian Indigenous participation in higher education (HE) are significantly lower... more The rates of Australian Indigenous participation in higher education (HE) are significantly lower than those of non-Indigenous students, with Indigenous students less likely than their non-Indigenous peers to complete Year 12. As a result, they are less likely to obtain an Australian Tertiary Admission Rank (ATAR) needed for university admission. Statistically, far more Indigenous students enrol in Vocational Education and Training (VET) than in HE. With VET to HE transition pathways remaining convoluted, it is critical to streamline those in order to increase Indigenous HE participation. This is of particular importance for rural and remote Indigenous students who have completed a VET qualification and are considering HE study. Unfortunately, only 4.9% of Indigenous students currently make this transition from VET to HE. While, as the scoping review undertaken will show, Indigenous enabling programs have received significant attention in the recent past, the potential of the VET to HE pathway to increase Indigenous HE participation remains largely unexplored. This review updates the current evidence base on trends associated with, and strategies used to support, Indigenous students transitioning from VET to HE in Australia, and identifies research gaps in relation to pathways and transitions, especially within the Indigenous experience. Some international comparisons are also undertaken.
This study investigated whether the use of a gamified mobile learning app influenced students' ac... more This study investigated whether the use of a gamified mobile learning app influenced students' academic performance and boosted their engagement in the subject. Created to better engage students in lecture content, the app was used to deliver multiple-choice content-based quizzes directly to students' personal mobile devices post-lecture and pre-tutorial. After measuring the relationships between students' app usage and their engagement, retention and academic achievement in the subject, it is suggested that following the app's introduction, student retention rates and academic performance increased, and there was a positive correlation between students' scoring highly on the app and achieving higher academic grades. While the app's affordances for learning are promising, the causal relationship between the app usage and improved student outcomes requires further investigation. Conclusions made in the context of the wider scholarship of mobile app enhanced learning and applied game principles in HE.
Mobile applications (apps) are used in higher education (HE) in a variety of ways, including as l... more Mobile applications (apps) are used in higher education (HE) in a variety of ways, including as learning tools, study organisers, for marketing, and recruitment of new students. Purposed with easing student transition into university life, organiser apps have a capacity to assist students with various aspects of university experience, freeing up time and energy for study, while apps used as learning tools can help students solidify the content of lectures, self-test their knowledge of the subject, and collaborate with peers. Despite the proliferation of HE apps, there is still no systematic understanding of this field, with a number of important questions remaining unanswered, such as what types of apps are most commonly found in HE, what their complex uses are, and how their affordances and functionalities are deployed by universities and students. This study addresses this gap. After analysing 177 apps affiliated with Australian universities, a typology of HE apps is proposed. Study management and navigation apps emerge as the most common types of apps offered to students, with augmented and/or virtual reality apps forming another key category. New insights are offered pertaining to the complex terrain of HE mobile apps, and problematic areas arising from this research, such as safety, student support, privacy, and equity, are discussed.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students’ experiences in Australian higher education contin... more Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students’ experiences in Australian higher education continue to be influenced by the sociopolitical narratives of alterity which locate the students as 10 more likely than their nonIndigenous peers to struggle academically and need support. These western-centric perceptions of indigeneities not only affect Indigenous students’ everyday university experiences but can even influence their decision whether to persist with their studies or not. Drawing on data collected in a large, metropolitan Australian university, this article presents a case study of Indigenous students’ ways of perceiving and resisting their positioning by the dominant university systems as ‘problematic’, at risk of failure and needing support. Specifically, the article explores educational pathways of three Indigenous students, their narratives exemplifying primary strategies of enacting and articulating resistances to the dominant education structures in order to fuel academic success.
Indigenous Australian underrepresentation in higher education remains a topical issue for social ... more Indigenous Australian underrepresentation in higher education remains a topical issue for social scientists, educationalists and policy-makers alike, with the concept of Indigenous academic success highly contested. This paper is based on findings of a doctoral study investigating the drivers of Indigenous Australian academic success in a large, public, research-intensive and metropolitan Australian university. It draws on the concept of transformational resistance to illuminate the forms that Indigenous resistance takes and how identities of resistance performed by Indigenous students complicate and speak to the students’ notions of academic success. By drawing on ethnographic data, this paper demonstrates how Indigenous academic success is fuelled by the idea of resistance to the western dominance, where resistance becomes the very cornerstone of Indigenous achievement.
This article, with its focus on university students as intended recipients and users of technolog... more This article, with its focus on university students as intended recipients and users of technological innovations in education, explores student preferences across three dimensions of technology-enhanced learning: mode of instruction; communication; and educational technology tools embedded in learning and teaching activities. The article draws on results of an exploratory case study, where mixed (quantitative and qualitative) data was collected from a randomized student sample generated through the institutional learning management system. An online survey (N=66) gaged students' engagement with educational technologies, online and blended learning and social media as a learning tool. The findings confirmed previous research arguing that students generally use educational technology in a narrow way, rarely engaging with technological tools, unless it is presented to them as integral to their learning or if they are already familiar with a particular tool and/or perceive it as useful. Despite a well-cited characteristic by proponents of 'digital natives' that students need constant entertainment, this study found no evidence that this was the case.
We report on a study conducted on a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) to explore and improve unde... more We report on a study conducted on a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) to explore and improve understanding and practice about MOOC learning design and participant motivations and expectations. The ‘Carpe Diem’ MOOC was designed, developed and delivered in 2014. The MOOC participants’ experiences were studied through surveys and interviews, and the analysis was triangulated. Three dominant motivations to complete the MOOC were found: to further existing knowledge, to acquire skills in the learning design process and to apply the learning design methodology in practice. We describe the relationship between participant motivations and expectations in this MOOC, which was undertaken mainly by participants who were themselves educators, and make recommendations for pedagogical design in MOOCs to promote and enable participant engagement and completion.
This paper presents findings of an institutional case study investigating how students and lectur... more This paper presents findings of an institutional case study investigating how students and lecturers experienced a new opt-out, fully integrated lecture-recording system which enabled audio and presentation screen capture. The study’s focus is on how ‘traditional’ students (generally characterised as young, enrolled full-time and attending classes on campus) engaged with lecture-recording and how lecturers’ experiences with, and attitudes towards, lecture-recording differed depending on their discipline. Students were generally positive about the affordances of the lecture-recording system, whilst lecturers remained undecided on its value. Discipline-based differences in lecturer engagement with the system were noted between lecturers teaching engineering and sciences subjects and those teaching business and social sciences, the latter being more positive towards the system. The paper raises questions about the efficacy of a one-size-fits-all lecture-recording system given differences in disciplinary activities, lecturer styles and approaches to teaching.
Staying quiet or rocking the boat? An autoethnography of organisational visual white supremacy (2016)
The purpose of this paper is to reflect on critical race theory’s application in organisational v... more The purpose of this paper is to reflect on critical race theory’s application in organisational visuals research with a focus on forms of visual white supremacy in the workplace. Drawing on the authors’ personal experiences as racialised “Others” with organisational white supremacy, this paper employs reflective autoethnography to elucidate how whiteness is positioned in the academic workplace through the use of visual imagery. The university, departments and colleagues appearing in this study have been de-identified to ensure their anonymity and protect their privacy. The authors’ autoethnographic accounts discuss how people of colour are appropriated, commodified and subordinated in the ongoing practice of whiteness. Illuminating the subtle ways through which white supremacy is embedded in the visual and aesthetic dimensions of the organisation provides a more critical awareness of workplace racism. This paper advances the critical project of organisational visual studies by interrogating the ways by which white dominance is enacted and reinforced via the everyday visual and aesthetic dimensions of the workplace. An added contribution of this paper is in demonstrating that visual racism extends beyond misrepresentations of people of colour, but can also manifest in what the authors conceptualise as “visual white supremacy”.
UNESCO Observatory Multi-Disciplinary Journal in the Arts 4(1)
Reporting on the findings of my doctoral research project, which explored facilitators of Indigen... more Reporting on the findings of my doctoral research project, which explored facilitators of Indigenous academic success in a de-identified Australian university (‘The University’), this paper focuses on one of the (perceived) key facilitators of Indigenous success – institutional support for Indigenous students. This paper draws on the data collected during the ethnography of Indigenous students (as well as Indigenous and non-Indigenous staff involved in Indigenous education) at The University, consisting of 27 interviews and 12 months of part-time participant-observation with students and staff. I argue that while support is indeed a significant factor influencing student success, the way it is perceived and interpreted by Indigenous students differ greatly depending on the way support is offered and delivered to the students and also on the students’ backgrounds and previous interactions with the support structures. Departing from the Bourdieuian ideas of cultural capital and its role in student achievement and bringing in Critical Race Theory-centered critique of the traditional interpretation of cultural capital, I propose a typology of Indigenous students’ perceptions of support. The typology offers a new perspective on the role Indigenous support in student achievement and feeds into a larger conceptual framework of my doctoral research explaining how Indigenous academic success is constructed.
In this paper, we explore the benefits of using social media in an online educational setting, wi... more In this paper, we explore the benefits of using social media in an online educational setting, with a particular focus on the use of Facebook and Twitter by participants in a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) developed to enable educators to learn about the Carpe Diem learning design process. We define social media as digital social tools and environments located outside of the provision of a formal university-provided Learning Management System. We use data collected via interviews and surveys with the MOOC participants as well as social media postings made by the participants throughout the MOOC to offer insights into how participants’ usage and perception of social media in their online learning experiences differed and why. We identified that, although some participants benefitted from social media by crediting it, for example, with networking and knowledge-sharing opportunities, others objected or refused to engage with social media, perceiving it as a waste of their time. We make recommendations for the usage of social media for educational purposes within MOOCs and formal digital learning environments.
Advanced Research in Economics and Management No. 1 (1), June, Jun 2014
This paper evaluates the role of universities in the formation of technological competences and e... more This paper evaluates the role of universities in the formation of technological competences and entrepreneurship centres. Australia, Russia and Peru, which possess different resources to adapt their university systems to the globalized world’s conditions,
are compared along the lines of innovation, competitiveness, accessibility and attractiveness to international students. Through statistical analysis we test the connection between the innovative capacity of these countries’ economies and their educational
policies.
The Australian Journal of Indigenous Education, Vol 40, pp.59-68 , Jan 2011
Indigenous Australians are underrepresented and considerably disadvantaged within the Australian ... more Indigenous Australians are underrepresented and considerably disadvantaged within the Australian system of higher education. The various measures taken by Australian universities over the past decades have produced varying levels of success in increasing Indigenous participation and completion rates. In order to continue improving Australian Indigenous participation in higher education it is important to understand the current patterns of participation and factors within universities that are associated with participation and success. In this paper we analyse higher education student and staff statistics available from the Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations (DEEWR) and information sourced from the websites of forty Australian universities to examine correlations between various Indigenous student support mechanisms and Indigenous students’ higher education participation rates. Our results indicate that there is a dual system of Indigenous higher education, with one group of universities excelling at attracting Indigenous students and a different group of universities demonstrating high Indigenous student completion rates. We argue that challenges remain in determining how to increase commencements at universities with high Indigenous completion rates without compromising entrance requirements or further diluting the level of student support, and how to increase completion rates at universities with higher numbers of Indigenous students.
In this article we present the results of comparative analysis of international students’ integra... more In this article we present the results of comparative analysis of international students’ integration using various countries’ educational systems as examples. Conducting comparative analysis we use the results of a case-study done in Wollongong University in 2006 and statistical data on international students who study in Europe, Russia and other countries. Based on the research, the article identifies the key factors of international students’ successful integration.
Thesis by Katya (Ekaterina) Pechenkina
This thesis, positioned at the disciplinary intersection of cultural anthropology and higher educ... more This thesis, positioned at the disciplinary intersection of cultural anthropology and higher education, investigates the drivers of Indigenous Australian academic success, drawing on participant-observation and interviews with Indigenous students and Indigenous and non-Indigenous staff in a de-identified Australian university ('The University'). Each year The University demonstrates some of the highest Indigenous completion rates nation-wide. This trend applies to The University’s Indigenous students who are already successful and well-prepared for higher education when they start their degrees and those who are not but who eventually learn how to succeed in The University’s high-achieving environment. As The University is shaped by and operates within a system of Western higher education, students who are more equipped to function within this value system (e.g. possess ‘Western’ academic capital) are perceived as more likely to succeed. The students who are not equipped with the ‘right’ kind of capital (or who are perceived as such) are expected to encounter challenges during their academic experiences and require help. While cultural capital is indeed a factor in Indigenous student academic achievement, I demonstrate that The University’s Indigenous students have found a way to overcome such capital-centred issues. In particular, they do it by employing their identities and differences as strengths to persevere academically and in the process create a new form of cultural capital. By reasserting their Indigeneity and resisting what is perceived as Western dominance, Indigenous students shift power away from the agents of mainstream education and internalise this power by becoming academically successful. This identity-based process contributes to the culture of Indigenous academic success that I propose as an explanatory framework for how The University’s Indigenous academic success is generated and maintained.
Book Chapters by Katya (Ekaterina) Pechenkina
Digital literacy and other factors influencing the success of online courses in remote Indigenous communities (Forthcoming; in Indigenous Pathways and Transitions into Higher Education, (Eds) Larkin, Smith, & Frawley)
Uneven distribution of resources and services based on geographical location (commonly referred t... more Uneven distribution of resources and services based on geographical location (commonly referred to as spatial inequality) is likely to influence Indigenous Australian higher education outcomes. Online education could potentially resolve access to education where distance is the primary barrier by mitigating some of the impediments to In-digenous education such as travelling long distances or living away from home. Recent Indigenous higher education trends suggest that online courses are in fact succeeding in attracting and retaining Indigenous students, particularly in regional areas. However, little is known of how socio-technological barriers (such as internet connectivity, owner-ship/sharing of devices, and digital literacy) relate to and in-teract with other social and educational barriers.
In this chapter we discuss online education in relation to digital literacy and related factors. We draw on evidence from Swinburne University of Technology’s Indigenous Futures Program, which is developing pathway programs for regional and remote Indigenous communities. The project is being conducted in partnership with not-for-profit organisations working with Indigenous individuals and communities in regional and remote areas.
Digital badges as motivator in MOOCs - the Carpe Diem MOOC experience (2016; in Digital Badges in Education: Trends, Issues and Cases, (Eds) Muilenburg & Berge)
The Carpe Diem MOOC (CD MOOC) was designed and delivered via the Blackboard CourseSites platform ... more The Carpe Diem MOOC (CD MOOC) was designed and delivered via the Blackboard CourseSites platform (coursesites.com) by a team from the Learning Transformations Unit, Swinburne University of Technology (Melbourne, Australia) March-April 2014. The CD MOOC, which attracted 1029 commencements and demonstrated 17 percent completion rate, provided participants with the opportunity to learn about the Carpe Diem learning design process and to experience digital badges deployed within a course for reward, recognition and motivation of participants. In this Case Study we discuss the challenges and opportunities faced by the CD MOOC team in designing digital badges with CourseSites and Mozilla Open Badge platforms. Badges were implemented to encourage participants’ mastery of key elements of the Carpe Diem process and to boost assignment submission, with intermediary badges building up to the completion badge. Relevant findings on how the CD MOOC participants perceived badges and what lessons we have learnt from the experience of using digital badges for motivation are discussed; recommendations for the future are drawn.
The authors investigated key paradigms driving contemporary SoTL research by analysing a sample o... more The authors investigated key paradigms driving contemporary SoTL research by analysing a sample of 84 SoTL articles published in two, highly ranked education journals. The authors identified the paradigm underpinning each article by looking at the stated or implied intent of the article’s authors, the drivers of their research (axiology), the nature of the knowledge/understanding developed from their research (epistemology), the literature and methods used, and the outcomes of their work. As a result of this exercise, the Neo-Positivist Inductive Mode emerged as the dominant paradigm in both journals, accounting for 60 percent of the papers in the combined sample. These findings are discussed in terms of their application to future SoTL research.
Conference Papers by Katya (Ekaterina) Pechenkina
Drawing on data from three collaborative SoTL projects evaluating the impact of teaching innovati... more Drawing on data from three collaborative SoTL projects evaluating the impact of teaching innovation on student learning, this paper investigates the complexities of evaluation research and offers some practical considerations on how to go beyond the 'local' impact of SoTL and towards 'global' implications of findings. While the three projects in question differed by their intended level of impact (ranging from a unit to a course level, to the university level and potentially transcending the confines of one institution) and the types of teaching innovations introduced, they shared an aim of improved student outcomes and experiences. Guided by the framework positioning SoTL as a transformative education practice, potential global implications of these projects are discussed in regards to three main groups of intended stakeholders: students, educators and universities.
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Research Articles - Peer Reviewed Research by Katya (Ekaterina) Pechenkina
are compared along the lines of innovation, competitiveness, accessibility and attractiveness to international students. Through statistical analysis we test the connection between the innovative capacity of these countries’ economies and their educational
policies.
Thesis by Katya (Ekaterina) Pechenkina
Book Chapters by Katya (Ekaterina) Pechenkina
In this chapter we discuss online education in relation to digital literacy and related factors. We draw on evidence from Swinburne University of Technology’s Indigenous Futures Program, which is developing pathway programs for regional and remote Indigenous communities. The project is being conducted in partnership with not-for-profit organisations working with Indigenous individuals and communities in regional and remote areas.
Conference Papers by Katya (Ekaterina) Pechenkina