The Inclusion Lottery: who's in and who's out? Tracking inclusion and exclusion in New South Wales government schools

The last few decades have witnessed a broad international movement towards the development of inclusive schools through targeted special education funding and resourcing policies. Student placement statistics are often used as a barometer of policy success but they may also be an indication of system change. In this paper, trends in student enrolments from the Australian state of New South Wales are considered in an effort to understand what effect inclusive education has had in this particular region of the world

From neoliberalism to neopopulism: how grassroots faith communities are resisting division and crossing borders

In this article, we argue that those distracted by a continual critique of neoliberalism have missed its transition into a more conservative and sinister form that we term neopopulism. We explore how neopopulism has emerged in recent decades as the neoliberal project has failed. The groups most failed by neoliberalism, capitalism and the meritocracy have been encouraged to blame each other rather than the systems that have failed them. In this context, fear of minority groups, including religious minorities, has grown. We go on to explore how our recent research with faith-based community workers provides evidence for how some faith groups are resisting division and bringing people together in resistance to both neoliberal and neopopulist values. Our research involved interviews with participants from a range of faith traditions, some who were volunteers and some who were paid professionals for faith-based organisations and focuses primarily on their engagement with young people. We conclude that while the practices of these faith-based community workers present a challenge to neopopulism, a more explicit resistance to the fear and suspicion borne out of this context is needed

Computational aerodynamic analysis of a Micro-CT based bio-realistic fruit fly wing

The aerodynamic features of a bio-realistic 3D fruit fly wing in steady state (snapshot) flight conditions were analyzed numerically. The wing geometry was created from high resolution micro-computed tomography (micro-CT) of the fruit fly Drosophila virilis. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) analyses of the wing were conducted at ultra-low Reynolds numbers ranging from 71 to 200, and at angles of attack ranging from -10° to +30°. It was found that in the 3D bio-realistc model, the corrugations of the wing created localized circulation regions in the flow field, most notably at higher angles of attack near the wing tip. Analyses of a simplified flat wing geometry showed higher lift to drag performance values for any given angle of attack at these Reynolds numbers, though very similar performance is noted at -10°. Results have indicated that the simplified flat wing can successfully be used to approximate high-level properties such as aerodynamic coefficients and overall performance trends as well as large flow-field structures. However, local pressure peaks and near-wing flow features induced by the corrugations are unable to be replicated by the simple wing. We therefore recommend that accurate 3D bio-realistic geometries be used when modelling insect wings where such information is useful

'To educate you to be smart': disaffected students and the purpose of school in the (not so clever) 'lucky country'

This paper contributes to conversations about school, post-compulsory and further education policy by reporting findings from a three-year study with disaffected students who have been referred to special “behaviour” schools. Contrary to popular opinion, our research finds that these “ignorant yobs” (Tomlinson, 2012) do value education and know what it is for. They also have aspirations for a secure, productive and fulfilled life, although it may not involve university level study. Importantly, we found that students who responded negatively with regard to the importance of schooling tended to envision future lives and occupations for which they believed school knowledge was unnecessary. The implications of this research for school, post-compulsory and further education policy are discussed

A Blueprint for Semidefinite Relaxations of Binary-Constrained Quadratic Programs Computing tight bounds on NP-hard problems using ADMM

This thesis looks at the solution techniques of two NP-hard, large scale problems, the quadratic assignment problem, QAP, and the side chain positioning, SCP, problem. We summarize existing approaches from and look at the two problems in a unified way using a binary-constrained quadratic program, BCQP. We show how to obtain upper and lower bounds for the BCQP by formulating the semidefinite programming (SDP) relaxation and applying the Alternating Direction Method of Multipliers (ADMM) algorithm to solve it. By unifying the two problems under the umbrella of the BCQP, we better understand why the method is so successful for these two problems and obtain a blueprint for applying ADMM to similar combinatorial optimization problems