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Professor Annette Foley

Professor, Adult and Vocational Education

Pathways, Humanities and Social Sciences

Section/Portfolio:

Location:

Mt Helen Campus, Online

Biography

Associate Professor Annette Foley’s expertise is in the area of adult education, vocational education and training, community and lifelong learning and youth engagement. Dr Foley is also an expert in post-structural theory, critical theory, critical discourse analysis and narrative theory.

Annette’s key research efforts include access and equity, informal learning, gender, lifelong learning, adult education, education for health and wellbeing, youth engagement in adult education and opportunity and pathways. She has researched extensively in the area of lifelong learning, which has included work on Men’s Sheds and community learning. She has published three books, has had in excess of 50 research outputs and received $361,000 in research funding.

Annette is Associate Dean Accreditation in the School of Education. Before this she has held several leadership positions in Federation University from 2013–2018 as Deputy Dean Education and Head of School Education. Annette is the president of Adult Learning Australia.

Respite, renewal, retirement and tensions: Australian Men's Sheds and the impact on significant others

The Reimagining adult learning in community-based contexts: A framework for social justice education in Australia

A gendered therapeutic learning landscape: Responding creatively to a pandemic

  • Journals

Neighbourhood Houses and Men’s Sheds, Adult learning in community spaces. Transforming the Future of Education: The role of research

  • Conference Proceedings

Shedding light: A qualitative study of women's view on Men's Sheds in Ireland and Australia

Ties That Bind or Exclude? Knitting and Craft Groups as Contested Spaces of Inclusion and Exclusion

Choosing VET as a post-school activity: What are some influences on non-metropolitan students?

  • Conference Proceedings

Men's shed research evidence since 2014

  • Book Chapters

Preparation for post-school careers in rural and peri-urban Australia: Connections with employers and labour markets

  • Conference Proceedings

The Mothership: Exploring the anatomy of one New Zealand Men’s Shed

Therapeutic Virtual Landscapes: An exploration of gendered learning spaces during the COVID-19 lockdown

The women’s shed movement: Scoping the field internationally

  • Journals

Community learning through adversity and disaster: An Australian case study of rural adaptation and resilience beyond paid work

Our paper uses a qualitative, case study approach to critically examine the role of community...

  • Journals

Participant Chinese teacher and student perceptions of an international teaching practicum with Australian pre-service teachers

Insights into local Chinese teacher and student views of an international teaching practicum with...

Young people’s decision-making as they leave school in non-metropolitan areas in Australia: Insights from those working with young people

  • Conference Proceedings

Constructing narratives in later life: Autoethnography beyond the academy

Learning through life experiences as distinct from learning through the academy and courses have...

  • Journals

Men and Boys: Sharing the Skills Across Generations

Our paper focuses on intergenerational learning in informal community settings between older men...

Men and Boys: Ages and Stages

  • Book Chapters

Men Learning through life

  • Book Chapters

Men's Learning in Australia

  • Book Chapters

Men's Turn to Learn? Discussion and Conclusion

  • Book Chapters

The case for some men's spaces

  • Book Chapters

Promoting 'learner voice' in VET: developing democratic, transformative possibilities or further entrenching the status quo?

In order to critique the notion of 'learner voice' in vocational education and training (VET)...

Learner Voice in VET and ACE: What do stakeholders say

  • Conference Proceedings

Learner voice in VET: who speaks? Who listens?

  • Conference Proceedings

Listening and responding to learner voice in vocational education and training in Australia

  • Book

All over, red rover? The neglect and potential of Australian adult education in the community

  • Journals

'Do you want VET with that?' Some implications for lifelong and lifewide learning in an era of universal VET

  • Conference Proceedings

VET manager identities: Culture, Philosophy and Professional Practice

Using a post-structural approach this article investigates the working lives of frontline...

Vocational Education and Training Manager Discursive Practices at the Frontline: Alternative Possibilities in a Victorian Setting

This article looks at how the neoliberal reform process is affecting the professional identity of...

Climate Change in the Victorian Alps: Can VET be a change agent?

  • Conference Proceedings

Informal learning: a discussion around defining and researching its breath and importance

Informal learning has often been seen as formal learning's 'poor cousin'. Our paper explores and...

  • Journals

Water, weeds and autumn leaves: learning to be drier in the Alpine region

Our paper explores how and what adults living and working in the Alpine region of Victoria...

  • Journals

Wicked learning: reflecting on Learning to be drier

  • Journals

A long and winding road: autonomous men's learning through participation in community sheds across Australia

  • Conference Proceedings

Alternative Possibilities: social impulses in ACE coordinator practices

  • Conference Proceedings

House and Sheds: an exploration of the genesis and growth or neighbourhood houses and men's sheds in community settings

  • Journals

Houses and sheds in Australia: An exploration of the genesis and growth of neighbourhood houses and men's sheds in community settings

This article reviews research into the genesis and spread of both neighbourhood houses and...

  • Journals

'How men are worked with': gender roles in men's informal learning

  • Conference Proceedings

Let the Men Speak: Health, Friendship, Community and Shed Therapy

  • Conference Proceedings

Out the back: men's sheds and informal learning

  • Journals

Shedding School Early: Insights from School & Community Shed Collaboration in Australia

  • Conference Proceedings

ACE working within/outside VET

  • Conference Proceedings

Men's sheds in Australia: Learning through community contexts

  • Book

Old dogs, new shed tricks: An exploration of innovative, workshop-based learning practice in Australia

  • Conference Proceedings

Shedding some new light on gender: Evidence about men's informal learning preferences from Australian men's sheds in community contexts

  • Conference Proceedings