Dr Julie Rimes, from The Collegiate Institute for Professional Learning, Research and Innovation at St Michael’s Collegiate School and Dr Bernardo A. León de la Barra from the School of Engineering have had a book chapter accepted for publication in Engagement Australia’s monograph “Engaging Australia: Case studies of university-community engagement”. This book is expected to be published in 2014 and the chapter in question will focus on exploring the challenges of embedding hands-on STEM programs into the core curriculum of an all-girls school.
In a nutshell, the chapter will describe how knowledge driven partnerships are understood and approached by a K-12 school and a University and how a community engagement focus assists in this process to benefit both partners. The practice of engagement is complex and involves differing pressures, forces, agendas and indeed goals. The chapter will then explore these different pressures and dissect these competing forces to expose how, based on actual experiences and models, to achieve optimum and compatible models of engagement. The chapter will also explore the roadblocks to engagement and how these can be overcome.