Resilient Academics

Marian Mahat is a Senior Research Fellow at Melbourne Graduate School of Education in The University of Melbourne. She has more than twenty years of professional and academic experience, spanning several universities, the Australian Federal and local governments, as well as the private sector. Her research focuses on student learning and outcomes in various educational contexts, innovative quantitative and qualitative methodologies and interdisciplinary collaboration. She is highly passionate about building capacity and capability of academic staff at universities. She is series editor of the Surviving and Thriving in Academia and book editor of Achieving Academic Promotion and Women Thriving in Academia published by Emerald. 

Caroline Cohrssen completed a PhD in 2013 at The University of Melbourne before accepting a tenured position in the Melbourne Graduate School of Education. Her work focuses on child learning and development in the years prior to formal school education. This encompasses pedagogy in early childhood education and care settings (in particular, the teaching and learning of science, technology, engineering and mathematics), initial teacher education, and in-service teacher professional development. Caroline’s research includes the home learning environment as families are children’s first educators. With a keen interest in the influence of context and culture on early childhood education, she moved to The University of Hong Kong in 2019 where she is an associate professor in the Faculty of Education. She is gaining new insights from living and working in Hong Kong SAR, building relationships with students, and collaborating with colleagues both in Hong Kong and other countries. 

Dr. Joanne Blannin has taught in four countries, in three languages and has developed an in-depth understanding of learning and teaching. Her many education roles have included outdoor education curriculum director, language tutor, bilingual teacher, curriculum leader, leading teacher, teacher trainer, Victorian Department of Education project officer, lecturer, and school leadership coach. Having taught in both the private and public sectors and worked with over 400 schools as a researcher/consultant, Dr Blannin now researches internationally on effective digital pedagogies & change leadership.  Dr Blannin is currently Senior Lecturer in Digital Transformations at Monash University.