Three awesome pieces of news arrived today.
First, my application to undertake a Doctorate with Griffith University School of Education has been accepted and I will start early 2016!! The official offer came through in writing, which means that I will be able to formalise my community development and bicycle research. It is both daunting and exciting to consider the challenges, commitment and workload that this will entail – but I have found two wonderful supervisors and I am highly motivated and ready to uncover the multitudinous ways that bicycles create positive change around the world.
The second amazing news came in the form of an email from the Australian Academy of Business and Social Sciences (AABSS) 2015 Kuala Lumpur Conference, to say that a paper I submitted, has been accepted as a Conference Paper Publication. It was a theory-building paper investigating how to better identify and communicate context-driven considerations for international development projects – see a copy of it here. This will be my first publication and I was delighted to get very positive feedback on the content and writing. I am not going over to present at the Conference, but it looks like the paper will be published as a Conference paper as well as in the Journal of Developing Areas in some form.
The third piece of news was a double header, I received two Excellence in Teaching Commendations – one from Griffith International, where I was nominated in two categories, one as an individual, and also as part of a teaching team (2 nominations) – as I work on the two teaching teams who were nominated in the team category – for the Outstanding Client Service or Initiative by an Individual or Team. It turned out that one of the teaching teams I work on took out the final gong – so I felt like I won the award anyway!! The second teaching commendation came from the Griffith University Academic Provost who congratulated me on being identified by my students for teaching excellence. Both were unexpected and humbling – and a great way to end the teaching year. It was very nice to be recognised for a long year of hard work, sacrifice and commitment.
Having these three stepping stones achieved, it is a solid move forward to getting more serious about researching, reporting and exchanging the valuable stories and experiences of how bicycles can benefit and transform lives; locally, regionally and globally. I feel very excited about the future; what opportunities may eventuate and curious to see where this all leads!
