Research

CFFS focuses on significant research which directly improves the effectiveness of schools, both in terms of present impact and in longer term social transformation.

Publication News:

2020
Collected volumes remain an important element of how scholars talk to one another, particularly with the 'rat-race' of research metricization driving much that is produced. Two volumes to emerge in 2020 are:

• C. Rocha, M. Hutchinson and K. Openshaw (eds), Australian Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements: Arguments from the Margins, Leiden: Brill, 2020.
• A. Atherstone, M. Hutchinson, and J. Maiden (eds), The Transatlantic Charismatic Movement, 1950-1980, Leiden: Brill, 2020.

In the way of articles and book chapters, the following are being published:

• Hutchinson, M. P.  ... with Cristina Rocha (Western Sydney University), ‘Problematics in the Study of Antipodean Pentecostalism’, in Carole Cusack and Christopher Hartney (eds.), Antipodes of the Soul: Religion and the Study of Religion in Australia and New Zealand (forthcoming). 
• Hutchinson, M. P. Introduction, and Chapters 1-8, plus short biographies of Guthrie Wilson and Graeme A. W. Renney, in H. Chilton, V. Small, et. al., 125th Anniversary History of the Scots College, Bellevue Hill: for the College, 2020.
• Hutchinson, M. P. ‘Reframing Howard Carter: Alternative ‘Routes’ for the emergence of the Australasian Charismatic Renewal.’ In C. Rocha, M. P. Hutchinson and K. Openshaw, Australasian Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements: Arguments from the Margins, Leiden: Brill, 2020.
• Hutchinson, M. P. “Introduction: Australian Charismatic Movements as a Space of Flows’, in C. Rocha, M. P. Hutchinson and K. Openshaw, Australasian Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements: Arguments from the Margins, Leiden: Brill, 2020.
• Hutchinson, M. P. “A bibliography of Christianity in the Middle East” (14,000 words), in Mitri Raheb, Meredith L. D. Riedel & Mark A. Lamport (eds), Christianity in the Middle East: Historical Sketches and Contemporary Practices, 2 vols., Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2020
  
• Hutchinson, M. P. ​“Antonio Andrea Arrighi”, Explorations in Italian Protestantism, and other entries (e.g. Nardi, Michele; Pirazzini, Agide, etc)

2019
Dr Stephen Fyson continues to provide reflective, helpful contributions to School based thinking about Character and Faith Formation.  These include:

• 'Where Grace and Truth almost meet: Suggestions from an initial study on Orthodoxy and Moral Therapeutic Deism', in P. W. Kilgour & B. J. Christian, Revealing Jesus in the Learning Environment: Experiences of Christian Educators, Cooranbong: Avondale Academic, 2019.
• 'Can teachers see Australia’s new caste-ism?', Teach 13.2 (2019), pp. 8-12.
  

Prof. Hutchinson continues his work on global renewal movements, see publication in 2019 of:

• ‘The emergence of Protestant Statecraft and the question of religious liberty in Italian-American relations, in the 1940s’, Memoria e Ricerca 2019.1 (January 2019), pp. 45-62.

Staff & Student Wellbeing

The impact of organizations on human wellbeing is central to the modern condition. Increasingly, governments and societal stakeholders are interested in how schools contribute to solving the key social problems of advanced modern societies. Good pedagogy takes into account the home life of students, their social influences, the pervasive effect of ICTs, maturation and happiness rates, and so the ability of staff and students in schools to create engaging, high performance learning environments.  Christian schools in particular are interested in the life-long impacts of these practices.



Research Focus Leader:
Dr. Rebecca Loundar.

School & Society

In many places (particularly in regional locations) schools are leading economic and social institutions. It is essential, therefore, to think of schools in their context, and how they are influenced by, and can act to influence, key social indicators and lived experience.  In a globalizing setting, what is the best mix of public-private partnerships? How can a school 'change a town' by focusing programs of need on areas catalytic for social mobility and human flourishing? How can alternative pathways to standard matriculation programs broaden options and empower better social outcomes? How can Australian school education contribute to global outcomes? All these and more are a core interest at CFS.

Research Focus Leader:
Dr David Hastie.

Character & Faith Formation

With rapid changes in the global Information Society, education stakeholders have increasingly focused on 'soft' rather than 'hard' skills and content as the differentiator for students. How do resilience, flexibility, inter-personal skills etc., contribute to the short and long term effects of learning? Christian institutions are particularly interested in claims about character formation, and this research focus provides HDR students and school-based researchers with the flexibility to participate in studies ranging from local qualitative approaches to some of the largest quantitative students currently under way around the world. 


Research Focus Leader:
Dr. Stephen Fyson.