Dr Matthew Hill is an emerging leader in primary and secondary education in Australia promoting growth through conducting and supporting first-hand, close-to-practice, research in schools. As the Director of the Barker Institute he models life-long learning and supports staff, parents and students to become learners together. One application of this is through hosting and presenting at regular public events each school term open to a wide audience dealing with issues from wellbeing, to academics, to personal and physical development, to modern social, political, and scientific issues. Rather than being the sole expert, he through the Barker Institute seeks to use the rich intellectual resources of Barker College to facilitate learning and growth in the school and the wider community.

As a qualified Science and Physics teacher, with a PhD in Physics Education from The University of Sydney, Matthew enjoys the chance to extend and apply the findings of his research in the school context. His thesis demonstrated the importance of “Representational Fluency”, the ability to present, interpret, and think using the various representational modes of a discipline, to be a necessary condition to expertise in a disciple, and therefore explicit teaching of representations to be essential to the leaning process, especially in the Sciences. Matthew’s research experience in science has been particularly beneficial with the recent introduction of Science Extension, a one-unit capstone research course for Year 12 Science students in NSW. He has mentored around 100 students at Barker to produce work of academic quality, published their journal articles, and provided lectures and training for students and staff state-wide.

Since starting teaching, his research and leadership interests have also extended beyond science and science education. Growing research interests were formalised in the publication of the 2022 Barker Institute research agenda describing five key research domains relevant to modern education including coeducation, indigenous education, character and enterprise, intercultural education, and future and innovation. The research that he conducts, and that of the various staff (and students) he supervises and supports, form a body of work demonstrating evidence-based critical thinking in each of these domains, some of which can be found in the Barker institute Journal: “Learning in Practice”.

Matthew firmly believes that teachers are experts who are worthy of student (and parent) emulation, though he challenges the notion that they need to know everything, rather argues that they are to be the expert learners, expert participants, and expert contributors to their own domain. Therefore, through professional learning programs, involvement in research, and public events, he seeks to empower other educators and educational leaders to demonstrate their expertise by positioning themselves as learners and contributors, who can then use their pedagogical skills while modelling this for their students.