METODOLOGÍA BLACIÓN DE ESTUDIO

This ‘Global Connections operations’ section concerns aspects of the program that were needed to support classroom activity but which were outside the immediate control of the classroom

participants – the teacher, facilitators and the students. The direct and indirect influence of factors originating beyond classroom control had arguably the biggest impact on Global Connections’

outcomes and the teachers’ perceptions of both the program’s and the partnerships’ effectiveness.

7.2.1.1 Activity outside the school

Global Connections was a complex logistical exercise with multiple groups in two countries contributing to the mix of operational activities that were required to bring about interaction between groups of young people in Australia and Indonesia. In 2008, the communication pieces could not be produced and exchanged in a timely manner within the limitations of the Australian school year. The first communication piece from Indonesiawas significantly delayed and only arrived once Global Connections had been operating for a full school term. It further eventuated that the first communication piece was the only one that the school students were able to receive⁷³. The communication difficulty was the single most significant unintended impact on classroom activity and as such it strongly influenced the teachers’ reactions to the program.

The teachers took no active part in the organisational connection to Indonesia and therefore had no channel to directly understand the difficulties that were occurring. By the end of the program, they had a complete lack of knowledge about what the Indonesians were doing and when if ever there would be more communication. Although they completely endorsed the value of the physical

73 The other Indonesian communications did arrive but only after the school students had finished their year and ended their involvement with Global Connections.

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communication pieces and thought they should be retained, the teachers all felt that something was needed to supplement those communications. The unanimous conclusion was that a format

dependent only on physical mail was untenable. This was not only because of the unreliability involved in 2008 but because IT communications were so much a part of how their students communicate. The following extract is one example of what was said by everyone:

Is there a way of using ICT more to do it? I mean… having the ability to communicate online somehow...And I guess, in Australia, that’s what these kids are used to...You know, short grabs of stuff… Even email. Basic level, just email.

Although the teachers became reconciled to the reality of the connection difficulties they were clearly frustrated and felt that operationally Global Connections did not function in the one key way that was most important to them. The teachers were all able to identify other positive outcomes for their students but at the end of the program they came back to issue of the program’s failure to establish a ‘real’ connection:

I was more interested in seeing the kids engaged in another community that wasn’t their own and that didn’t really happen – I mean, it wasn’t really a true, engaging interaction where they felt connected to that group and it was reciprocated and they felt that they were connected, that’s why I said superficial, because it felt like it was set up that the connection is going to be there and global connections and how do you connect with Indonesia and all of these things, but then it wasn’t really actually there. So it was like, for kids, probably a bit disheartening…Not disheartening maybe is not the right word but illusionary, made to think that it is this connection and then it’s not, which is almost…defeats its purpose.

I don’t think (the connection) was as relevant to students as it could have been. Given there wasn’t many opportunities for communication between groups.

If somehow communication could be improved so that it’s not just that one few pieces of paper that came after many weeks, and that’s where maybe blogs or websites or whatever could perform a role.

It seemed very clear to me that the teachers’ specific responses to program and partnership characteristics which are reported in following sections were all overlayed with a sense that Global

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Connections did not really deliver on its promise because the ‘connection’ to Indonesia did not develop as they had anticipated.

7.2.1.2 School-based activity

The delay of the first communication piece from Indonesia threatened the completion of Global Connections in the schools. The school-based component of the program necessarily needed to fit within the school year. The problem of time was compounded for the three schools that had Year 10 students involved in the program. Year 10 students had a shortened school year (compared with Year 9s) because they finished normal classes to allow time for study and examinations. The Year 10 teachers anticipated that there were only six or seven weeks left to engage with the last two stages of the program by the time the first communication from Indonesia arrived.

There was a strong feeling mid-program that the time spent waiting for the Indonesian communication had compromised the ability to complete the program:

So my concern is, are we going to get up to the action part and actually make it happen? I think that’s what the kids are itching to do. I think they’re a bit sick of talking about it and whatever. They want to actually do it.

In order to mitigate the time pressure, the teachers attempted to make changes to the school operations. The teacher at the school which was incorporating Global Connections as part of the Learning Centre’s all-day program negotiated with the facilitators to do lengthened sessions in the last weeks. In contrast however, the two schools incorporating the program as part of a Year 10 Geography elective had no flexibility to increase time spent on the program. In those schools the existing situation, which involved the loss of a lesson each week from the Geography component, meant that the teachers were already feeling significantly pressured with regard to finishing their own course content.

School operations impacted in other ways on the time available for Global Connections. All of teachers indicated that sessions with the program had been lost or disrupted because students had clashes with other commitments such as school sports and fieldtrips. The teachers also missed a number of sessions for similar reasons. The school most affected was School D which had students coming out of other classes to do Global Connections. In most sessions there were students missing because of commitments they had in other classes:

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The kids are coming out of classes to do it. They were aware of that initially but they’ve come under some pressure from class teachers that they’re missing a lot of class and… I think there’s been a little bit of pressure from some parents in relation to that too. So that’s compromised things a little and it’s unfortunate.

Therefore, although the operational factor that most affected the program was the problem with connecting to Indonesia which was beyond the schools’ influence (and beyond Plan Australia’s control as well) there were definite structural problems with the way the program was integrated into the schools’ activity. The timing problems and the way that the activity was compressed

compromised the outcomes. The teachers all felt that this aspect of the program was partly in Plan’s control because the school timetable term by term was available from the start of the year -

including examinations and sports trips. However, the teachers also acknowledged that although the examination period was timetabled, the fact that teachers stopped normal lessons to focus on revision two weeks before the examinations was not something that Plan knew at the start of the program. Nevertheless, the teachers considered that Plan should have managed the weeks available differently and curtailed the time spent on the first communication piece. The final action-oriented phase could have been started five or six weeks earlier. In the most extreme case, the teacher thought the introductory communication could have been very brief:

I think the first communication piece really could be done in one period. Just a quick thing...and then I guess go straight into issues and issues that affect you, issues over there.

At the end of the program, the teachers were very willing to discuss program development and ways that future versions of Global Connections might fit more appropriately with school operations despite the fact that three of the four schools and all of the teachers were not going to be involved in 2009. The discussions about school operations were wide ranging and included timetabling, teachers’

commitments, and the most suitable Year level to target. These discussions all emphasised that Global Connections remained essentially unknown within the school beyond the immediate participants. The program was not generally acknowledged or celebrated at assemblies, was not profiled in the school newsletters, nor promoted on the school website, and was largely invisible to the other staff. There was a strong emphasis placed on the desirability of acknowledging and integrating programs into the wider school culture if such programs were to become embedded as part of the ‘normal’ school activity. Global Connections in 2008 took place in schools but was largely outside of the school system.

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The most significant discussions on school structure took place in the school which was expecting to continue the program in 2009. The teacher involved had arranged for the Assistant Principal

responsible for the relevant Year level to join our interview and for over an hour the promise and possibilities of the program, its aims and how it could be integrated into the school were discussed. A key component of this discussion was that the school itself was in the process of a major

restructuring of the way that the Year level used the Learning Centre. In this respect, it was known that a new manager was going to be running the centre and new ways of working would be involved but the details had not been finalised. The conversation ended with the Assistant Principal

acknowledging the necessity of involving other people in discussions with regard to Global Connections and the importance of early planning with Plan at the start of 2009.