I began my career as an English & Humanities teacher in secondary settings across Melbourne and was fortunate enough to be part of a number of innovative projects during this time, including the Victorian Department of Education & Training’s (DET) Leading Schools Fund project at Mentone Girls’ Secondary College and later in leading the development of the Year Nine Immersion program at Our Lady of the Sacred Heart (OLSH) College. These formative professional experiences drew me towards the Visible Learning research (Hattie), which at the time was the new vanguard in identifying the highest impact strategies for improving student learning.

Out of the work at OLSH College, an opportunity arose to move into part-time consultancy work with Intuyu Consulting, where I developed and led workshops for graduate teachers and around building frameworks for effective learning, drawing further on the research of Hattie, Timperley and others.

I was interested in better understanding primary settings so in 2012 took on a part-time Leading Teacher role at Heatherhill Primary School, where my portfolio included supporting the development of robust inquiry units across the school, leading the implementation of Professional Learning Teams and instructional coaching for teachers. During this time, I was fortunate enough to receive a scholarship through the Bastow Institute for Educational Leadership (now the Victorian Academy for Teaching & Leadership) to complete a Master of Instructional Leadership at the University of Melbourne, during 2013-14. I was able to use this learning to trial an action research approach at my school, working with a team of teachers and the speech pathologist to improve students’ writing skills at Year Three and Four. When presenting this work to local Department staff, I was invited to apply for a newly created position within the DET in 2016; the early days of the Education State reforms. This role allowed me to expand my commitment to working in disadvantaged communities across Southern Melbourne and to further apply the knowledge and skills acquired during my Masters coursework.

The networks I was able to form at this time were also critical to my leadership development as I was exposed to exemplary researchers and leaders in schools and the sector more broadly. Some beliefs were reinforced and others challenged and my introduction to the Science of Learning was a significant moment which led me to working on a range of projects including on early language and literacy development – a key area of interest.

I took on a range of different school improvement roles in the Department, including coordinating the rollout of the Differentiated Support for School Improvement (DSSI) Initiative across 2018. This experience gave me insights into the different challenges faced by rural and remote schools as well as those in our metro areas. Following this, I returned to my new substantive role of Professional Learning Communities (PLC) Manager, where I oversaw the expansion of the Initiative across Southern Melbourne from three pilot schools in 2016 to 75 schools today. In late 2019, I was seconded into the Central PLC Unit to lead the revision and differentiation of the PLC Core professional learning into distinct primary and secondary offerings.

Working closely with teacher educators such as Bronwyn Ryrie Jones, I led work to increase the emphasis on effective assessment practices within the PLC course content, as this was a clear need that had been identified both by schools and by the regional school improvement workforce. The redeveloped modules were very well-received by schools, despite the challenges of the professional learning being remote due to COVID-19, and the conversation around the use of formative assessment within an improvement/inquiry cycle has evolved across the system as a consequence.

In 2021 I joined a partnership between the DET and Schools Plus to undertake work with four schools that have kindergartens co-located in Greater Dandenong. The goal of this project is to improve continuity of early literacy learning, using evidence-informed strategies supported by regular collaboration between early childhood and Foundation educators. It is this type of work that most excites and engages me - highly collaborative with opportunities to share and apply new knowledge to complex problems.

My current role, Professional Learning Communities Manager for Southern Melbourne Area enables me to work with school and middle leaders to maximise the impact of collaborative processes and create cycles of inquiry that enable teachers to measurably improve their classroom practice and I am constantly adjusting my approach to ensure that I remain relevant, responsive and forward thinking in my leadership.

I have presented at previous ACEL National Conferences on the Professional Learning Communities Initiative in secondary settings (2019) and on the implementation of Victoria’s Tutor Learning Initiative in response to the COVID-19 Pandemic, in 2021. I have also written reviews of educational texts (Teaching Sprints: how overloaded educators can keep getting better, 10 Mindframes for Visible Learning) for Australian Educational Leader.