JOCELYN WILLIAMS EDUCATOR

My core beliefs and practices around the educational authenticity of "applied learning" have steadily deepened from their basis in my tertiary teaching practice over 20 years and through recent academic leadership roles. These include Head of Academic Partnerships at MIT Te Pūkenga, Academic Director of ICL Graduate Business School, Head of Communication Studies (Unitec Te Pūkenga), and my hands-on work in programme management, research and classroom teaching and supervision. I've remained engaged in active teaching while also being a leader as a deliberate method of  testing out ideas and role modelling innovation - or, "walking the talk". Also I enjoy teaching and its cousins, coaching, mentoring and leading. Since returning to the ITP sector in 2020 I've been fully immersed in the Te Pūkenga journey as it seeks to transform vocational education as a full national network of ITPs and ITOs aspiring to find the best ways to serve all ākonga. In this context, the "real world learning" path I've followed for the past 20 years has brought me home.

An acceleration of complexity and disruption in vocational education has been clear, leading me to integrate teaching, research, and the needs of community and industry so that graduates are well positioned to hit the ground running. You'll see in this portfolio my professional practice is an interconnected whole shown here as four performance areas generally expected of senior academics: Teaching Leadership, Practice Support, Academic Leadership, and Research Excellence. In everyday practice, these areas constitute a single endeavour: readying learners to make a positive contribution as part of the skilled/qualified workforce, to build the lives to which they aspire, and to be lifelong learners.

I recommend that you move "this way and that" across this portfolio - dipping in and out so you can see how the threads of my mahi inform and strengthen the others. The trajectory of my work has been, and continues to be, intentional.