Rate My Professor Bronwyn Parkin

Dr Bronwyn Parkin is an adjunct lecturer associated with the School of Education within the College of Education, Behavioural and Social Sciences at Adelaide University, holding this position from 2015 to 2024. Her academic background includes a Doctor of Philosophy in Applied Linguistics from the University of Adelaide (2014), titled Scaffolding science with educationally marginalised students, for which she received the Dean’s Commendation for Doctoral Thesis Excellence. She also holds a Master of Education from the University of South Australia (2000), a Bachelor of Arts in Linguistics and Music from the University of Adelaide (1976), a Graduate Certificate in Accelerated Literacy from Charles Darwin University (2006), a Graduate Diploma in Community and School Education from Sturt C.A.E. (1984), and a Graduate Diploma in Early Childhood Education from Murray Park C.A.E. (1978). Parkin’s career history features extensive work as a teacher, literacy consultant since 2014, and researcher in remote Indigenous education contexts and low socio-economic schools in metropolitan and regional South Australia. She served as Literacy Project Officer in the Literacy Secretariat of the South Australian Department of Education for many years, lectured at the University of South Australia from 1989 to 1996, and currently holds an adjunct lecturing role there from 2024 to 2027.

Dr Parkin’s research specializations include Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander curriculum and pedagogy, literacy and numeracy outcomes for Indigenous students, English and literacy curriculum and pedagogy, primary education, sociolinguistics, and scaffolding pedagogy for marginalised learners. She has produced major publications such as Teaching with Intent: Scaffolding Academic Language with Marginalised Students (2018, with Helen Harper), Teaching with Intent 2: A Literature-Based Literacy Teaching and Learning (2019, with Helen Harper), Teaching the Language of Climate Change Science (2021, with Julie Hayes), and the forthcoming Teaching with Intent 3: Grammar, Vocabulary and Literary Techniques in Mentor Texts (2025, with Helen Harper). Selected journal articles are “A subversive pedagogy to empower marginalised students: an Australian study” (2024, Educational Review, with Helen Harper), “What counts as ‘evidence’ in literacy education?” (2024, Australian Journal of Language and Literacy, with Beverly Derewianka et al.), and “The application of three exotropic theories in education” (2020, Mind, Culture, and Activity, with Helen Harper). Her achievements include winning the Teacher Resource category at the Educational Publishing Awards Australia in 2020 and 2021, a $75,000 PETAA Research Grant in 2016, and the Excellence in Leadership in Indigenous Education award in 1998 from the Federal Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations.