The Academy’s Teaching Innovation Fellowships provide unique, dedicated pathways for highly skilled Victorian teachers to develop their expertise and capacity to be agents of change in school system improvement through applied and self-directed professional learning.
Through an Academy fellowship, teachers engage in funded, short-term learning opportunities that connect research, theory and practice, and contribute to the Academy’s objectives.
The Academy Fellowships Model
The Academy Fellowships Model describes the key design elements of the fellowships program.
Teachers as agents of change
At the core of the Academy Fellowships Model is a commitment to enabling and supporting teachers as agents of change by deepening their professional expertise and nurturing their capacities to drive evidence-informed improvement.
Domains of action
Teachers will cultivate agency and expertise through the domains of action identified in the model:
- Vision: Develop a vision for alternative futures in practice, driven by a desire to make a difference to the quality of teaching and learning.
- Innovation: Explore, design, implement and evaluate approaches or interventions that enhance teaching and learning.
- Inquiry: Engage in evidence-informed, practitioner-led inquiry to investigate professional challenges in context.
- Leadership: Exercise leadership by building collaborative networks that enhance professional expertise in and across schools.
Support levers
Several support levers, activated through a partnership between the Academy, the teacher fellow and their school, sustain teacher fellows' professional learning and impact, including:
- funding to support scholarship
- engagement with experts and mentors
- Fellowship Learning Communities
- evidence-informed and self-directed learning
- enabling school relationships and structures.
2023 Teaching Innovation Fellows
In May 2023, the Minister for Education, the Hon. Natalie Hutchins MP, announced the 2023 Teaching Innovation Fellows. Thirty teachers from 26 government and non-government schools were awarded Teaching Innovation Fellowships.
Congratulations to our 2023 Teacher Fellows (PDF).
Case studies: Teacher fellows leading innovation
| Teacher fellows leading innovation | |
Quyen Thai
"My teaching innovation project revolves around teaching STEM in a way that also elevates language learning within my school, which has a high proportion of English language learners." |
Darren Thresher
"Our teaching innovation project aims to enhance maths problem-solving accessibility for our upper primary students. The focus is on improving problem access, duration and quality of attempts while fostering positive mathematical mindsets." |
Peta Moore
"The aim of my innovation project is to develop a Framework of Scientific Reading Capabilities based on school-specific quantitative and qualitative data as well as stories-based artefacts and current research about teaching reading." |
Birra-li Ward and Sarah Edwards
"Our teaching innovation project engages students and teachers in exploring the UN sustainability goals through an art and science collaboration, having students develop artworks from biomaterials." |
Gus Humphries
"The intention of my Questions 4 Teachers (Q4T) project is to create non-judgemental partnerships that allow teachers at my school to be supported in investigating and developing an area of practice that they are passionate about." |
Joshua McQuade
"My teaching innovation project is developing and implementing a multidisciplinary STEM course which enables students to apply their learning from various courses to real-world situations." |