What better way to say goodbye to 2023 and hello to 2024 by reflecting on the past 12 months of my PhD journey (with some extra work and life events as well)? Some highlights include:
Confirmation of PhD candidature: A huge milestone this year was being able to present my research proposal to the Charles Sturt School of Allied Health, Exercise and Sport Sciences HDR team, my invited panel members Dr Catherine Easton and Dr Vivian Isaac of Charles Sturt University and Dr Elaine Ballard of the University of Auckland, and everyone who joined.
Conferences: 2023 was my first opportunity to attend two international conferences in person! I had a great time attending the 14th International Symposium on Bilingualism (ISB14), hosted by Macquarie University, Sydney in June. This was an opportunity to present my Honours research on Fijian children’s speech sound acquisiton to a linguistics audience rather than SLPs, spend time with my extended PhD family and meet some wonderful researchers.
This was also the year of my first visit to Aotearoa New Zealand for the 32nd World Congress of International Association of Communication Sciences and Disorders (IALP). One presentation was titled “Listening to children’s voices in the Pacific”, encompassing my proposed child-focused participatory action and Pacific research methodologies, and the second was part of the panel “Children’s speech development across the world” on Fiji English speech sound development, based on the research project I completed for Honours.
I also spent a beautiful ten days exploring some of the North Island and making my inner Lord of the Rings fan go wild.
This also led to the opportunity to attend a fantastic qualitative research workshop organised by Rena Lyons and Lindy McAllister and a presentation titled “Western Pacific Small Island Nations: Speech-Language Therapy Services and Children’s Communication” with Suzanne Hopf for the University of Auckland in October.
Australian Pasifika Educators Network (APEN) Conference at Western Sydney University: It was such an honour to be able to present my planned Pasifika research methodology and child-focused PAR for the attendees at the APEN conference, and meet and chat with many lovely people, most of whom we had only met before online. A beautiful conference to end the year on.
The inaugural in-person conference of the Australian Pasifika Educators Network has set a powerful precedent, demonstrating the incredible mana (energy, spirit) of unity and collaboration our people have in education in Australia. By sharing our diverse stories and working together towards shared objectives, we are creating new narratives, we are writing our own stories, from a place of strength, resilience and alofa (love).
– APEN
Joining Speech Pathology Australia’s Early Career Reference Group: Volunteering with this wonderful group of fellow early career speechies hsa been wonderful, especially my fellow Wellbeing interest group members. Stay tuned for more in 2024!
Charles Sturt Early Childhood Interdisciplinary Research group: Even though with work commitments I’m not able to catch up with the group as often as I’d like, it’s increadibly exciting to be a part of something that has such a focus on supporting children’s rights and participation and was recognised for this in the Charles Sturt Excellence Awards
RESEARCH EXCELLENCE AWARD WINNERS: Early Childhood Interdisciplinary Research Group (ECIR)
Recognises and celebrates outstanding contributions of individuals and teams who engage in research excellence that contributes to the success of Charles Sturt and drives regional outcomes with global impact.
Research Winners: Early Childhood Interdisciplinary Research Group (ECIR)
Names: Sharynne McLeod (Team Lead), Belinda Frieze, Kristen Andrews, Kate Margetson, Belinda Downey, Linda Mahony, Kelly-Ann Tribolet, Laura Delli-Pizzi, Michelle Brown, Olebeng Mahura, Kate Freire, Ben Pham, Carmen Huser, Nicola Ivory, Sheena Elwick, Nicole McGill, Jessamy Davies, Laura Hoffman, Shukla Sikder, Roslyn Cox, Marie Ireland, Lysa Dealtry, Anna Cronin, Jenny Dwyer, Leanne Gibbs, Julian Grant, Sarah Verdon, Audrey Wang, Carolyn Gregoric, Azizur Rahman, Robyn Brunton, Suzanne Hopf, Cheree Dean, Van Tran, Holly McAlister, Andi Salamon, Sarah Stenson, Kate Crowe, Libbey Murray, Cherie Zischke, Graham Daniel
What the nomination was for: This nomination is for excellence in research capacity building. ECIR provides an internship model where early career researchers are well supported by more experienced researchers in a wide range of research activities including organising conferences, editing books, writing book chapters, running research projects, analysing data, writing journal articles, and applying for promotion and grants. Members work collaboratively on projects such as the hosting of the Early Childhood Voices Conference (ECV2022), recent submission of an edited book arising from ECV2020 presentations, and analysis of children’s drawings from across the globe. These joint projects develop knowledge, skills and experience for members to pursue their own research interests.
Why it is Excellence Award worthy: Not only have ECIR members been very research active themselves, but they have created capacity building opportunities for other researchers, within and beyond the team. Members willingly share with each other for the benefit of all and to grow knowledge about early childhood and conducting research, particularly from an interdisciplinary perspective. The group brings together Educators, Speech Pathologists, Psychologists, Computer Scientists, Nurses and Physiotherapists who may not usually research together. Achievements over the past year include journal articles (55 accepted + 16 submitted), conference papers( 59 presented/accepted for presentation +18 conference workshops/seminars etc + 4 submitted), book chapters (29 published/in press + 1 submitted), books (3 published/in press + 1 under contract), and conference proceedings (1 published). They also have a high level of community engagement with 3 events hosted/training delivered, 22 media coverages, 4 media contributions, social media profile, 5 public lectures/presentations, 19 community consultations. Members are well recognised for their achievements with 3 individual and 1 group awards, leadership/membership of professional associations and editorial boards, invited working party and advisory participants. They have had 2 PhD completions and 2 PhD submissions by ECIR members and provide HDR support to 17 students.
Starting a new clinical job: In September I started a new job, moving from working within the disability sector with a mixed caseload to a paediatric community health role. When I finished my undergraduate studies, I didn’t have a strong preference for whether I wanted to work with paediatric or adult populations, so a mixed caseload was perfect. Since then, I have really enjoyed working with children and their families, and while this role has offered it’s own challenges, three-and-a-bit months in I can already say this decision has been a hugely positive one and I can’t wait to continue in this role in 2024.
I look forward to a 2024 in which I will be focusing more on my data collection and analysis for my PhD project, hopefully some new experience as clinical supervisor, and spending more time with family and friends.
Holly McAlister - Speech Pathology 
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