Higher Education Funding Council for England (UK)
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Clair is a Senior Higher Education Adviser in the Widening Participation team at HEFCE and managed the Aimhigher Programme from March 2009 until its close in 2011. Working with the Government’s Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, Clair was closely involved in the development of the Aimhigher Associates scheme, as well as aspects of evaluation of the programme as a whole.
Clair’s role in the Widening Participation team covers areas of research into inclusion in higher education and she works closely with the Council’s Analytical Services Group which offers statistical analysis of a range of national data sets.
Prior to working in the Widening Participation team, Clair worked in the Council’s Institutional Team covering London’s higher education institutions. As part of this role she was involved in developing five lifelong learning networks across London.
Before joining the Council in December 2003, Clair worked in senior planning roles at the University College of the Arts (now University for the Creative Arts) and the University of Southampton.
Speaking On:
Tracking & monitoring data for effective outcomes analysis
Workshops:
Measuring outcomes in successful progression to higher education
Within this role she is responsible for Equity and Diversity; for outreach programs in indigenous, refugee and disadvantaged communities; indigenous education and also oversees international development projects. She has been an invited facilitator on two EU programs respectively in Bulgaria and Turkey with marginalized populations, and has given keynote and invited presentations in 13 countries. She was honored by the Canadian Association of Occupational Therapists in 2009 with an award for outstanding international contribution.
Last year she gave a national lecture on social inclusion and has established the inaugural Building Inclusive Communities Awards in conjunction with the Ethnic Communities Council of Australia. She has numerous publications to her credit and has a new book due out early next year. Gail appeared in the first – and all subsequent – editions of the Who’s Who of Australian Women.
Speaking On:
Inter-institutional collaboration in order to maximise the funding & project potential
Professor Trevor Gale holds a chair in education policy and social justice at Deakin University. He is author of 6 books and over 150 chapters, journal articles and other scholarly publications. His views on education policy and social justice are regularly sought by government and the media. From 2008-2011, Trevor was the founding director of Australia’s National Centre for Student Equity in Higher Education, a research centre funded by the Australian Government. While there he led the government-commissioned national review of university outreach programs, reported in Interventions Early in School (2010), which now informs inter/national policy and practice in the field. His recent conception of student equity in terms of ‘mobility’, ‘aspiration’ and ‘voice’ (with Sam Sellar) and his typology of student transition (with Stephen Parker), are now reframing the problem of social inclusion in higher education. In 2009 the Australian Government appointed Trevor as a founding member of its National VET Equity Advisory Council.
Speaking On:
Opening remarks from the chair
Towards new ways of thinking about student transition in higher education
Kwong Lee Dow is the former Vice-Chancellor of the University of Melbourne. He retired from this role at the end of 2004 having earlier been Deputy Vice-Chancellor, and before that, Dean of Education. Beginning working life as a science and mathematics teacher, Kwong became a College Lecturer in Chemistry, and then Senior Lecturer in Education at Melbourne University. He was appointed Professor in 1973. Over the years he has held Victorian and Commonwealth government appointments, including chairing a number of both state and federal reviews. He was appointed Member of the Order of Australia in 1984, received the Sir James Darling Medal of the Australian College of Education in 1994, an honorary degree of Doctor of Laws from the University of Melbourne in 2004, and in 2005 was awarded the Gold Medal of the Australian Council for Educational Leaders.
Since retirement in 2005 Kwong has had specific involvements with Victoria University, Ballarat University, Bond University, the University of New England, the Melbourne campus of Central Queensland University ( for the Victorian Government), Deakin University and the Hong Kong Institute of Education, St.Paul’s College (HK), and Hong Kong Central College.
Speaking On:
Opening remarks from the chair
Student income support measures to widen participation
Providing access & pathways for the under-represented groups
The federal government has requested for 20% of the Australian domestic undergraduate student body to be represented by students from low SES and other under-represented groups by 2020.
One of the biggest challenge facing tertiary institutions is the identification and target of these under-represented groups. Now is a time for the evaluation of definitions in social inclusion and of programme success.
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