Countdown to Symposium!
Capabilities and capitals: Implications for students’ persistence and success at university
University of Wollongong
21–22 November 2019
Registrations are still open
This FREE event will bring together key thinkers and scholars who have applied the capability theory (Sen 1992, 1993) and capital theory (Bourdieu, 1986, 1993) across disciplines to consider how this framing may assist us to reconceptualise student persistence.
We know little about how learners draw on ‘internal capabilities’ (Nussbaum, 2011) when persisting in university; these capabilities are not innate but develop in interaction with the individual’s environment (social, cultural, familial and political). To contribute alternative perspectives on the issue of student participation and retention, this symposium deliberately shifts attention away from deficit views of student cohorts and instead utilises the Capability Approach and Capital Theories to understand the ways in which students successfully navigate higher education and reach graduation.
Held over two days 21 and 22 November 2019, the symposium will be of interest to higher education researchers/scholars, equity/widening participation stakeholders, academic staff, policymakers, and not-for-profit/community organisations.
The symposium is being funded as part of an Australian Research Council (ARC) Discovery project entitled Higher education participation and success: Investigating the persistence strategies of students who are the first in their family to attend university.
Invited Speakers
- Dr Dina Bowman — Principal Fellow, Work and Economic Security, University of Melbourne
- Professor Penny Jane Burke — Director, Centre of Excellence for Equity in Higher Education, the University of Newcastle
- Dr Tamsin Hinton-Smith — Senior Lecturer in higher education, University of Sussex, UK
- Dr Tebeje Molla — Australian Research Council (ARC) Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA), Deakin University
- Dr Lien Pham — Lecturer in the Graduate Research School University of Technology Sydney
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