Michelle Ortlipp is an early childhood lecturer at Charles Sturt University. She was the recent recipient of the Early Childhood Australia Doctoral Thesis Award—presented at the Biennial National Conference in Brisbane.
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Can you tell us a little bit about yourself?
I’m a lecturer in the Bachelor of Education (Early Childhood) in the Murray School of Education at Charles Sturt University in Albury/Wodonga. I was a student at the State College of Victoria, Institute of Early Childhood Development and graduated with a Diploma of Teaching in 1978. I taught in kindergartens/preschools in Victoria for 12 years and much of this was part-time while I tried to balance work and family. In 1991, I began teaching child care studies students at Wodonga Institute of TAFE. Several years later, in 1999, I took up a lecturing position at Charles Sturt University teaching subjects that prepare students for professional experience in early childhood settings (birth to five years). Recently, after seven years of part-time study, I completed a PhD.
What do you remember most about your teaching/studying/researching experiences?
I remember how nervous I was submitting my first assignment when I enrolled (for the third time) in a BEd. I hadn’t studied for 16 years and I was filled with apprehension waiting for the assignment to be returned. To my surprise, I did exceptionally well. After 16 years of professional experience and parenting, I found that I actually had something to say, and that my experience in early childhood education was valuable, even though the focus of the degree was adult education.
What are some interesting little-known facts about yourself which you can tell us?
As a teenager in the 1970s I did a lot of babysitting. I ‘loved’ babies and little children and I decided that I would be a mothercraft nurse. My teachers tried hard to talk me out of this career, stating that I would be wasting my academic potential in such a lowly occupation! However, I was determined to work with children and I transferred my career aspirations to kindergarten teaching. Now, almost 30 years on, I hardly recognise myself as the rather romantic young woman who wanted to be a kindergarten teacher because I loved little children. I have learnt that more is required to work well with young children than loving children.
What are some of the obstacles you’ve encountered in your life so far?
The way others understand early childhood education, and the need, therefore, to constantly justify the importance of what I do, has been an obstacle encountered throughout my professional life. Since completing my PhD, one of the key challenges for me has been to stop feeling like an imposter when I say, ‘What I’ve found through my research is …’ When I completed my initial teacher training, research was not something ordinary people like me engaged in. The notion of early childhood professionals as researchers is still not part of the early childhood education culture.
Why are you involved in the child care profession? How does your choice of thesis topic reflect this?
I believe that high quality care and education for all children is the equaliser in an inequitable world. My doctoral thesis reflects my commitment to quality because it explores how tertiary supervisors (those supervising TAFE and/or university early childhood students during the practicum) understand and practise practicum assessment. Assessment of the practicum plays a dual role: helping students to improve their practice and ensuring that appropriate standards for entry to the profession are maintained. Quality care and education depends greatly on the quality of staff working in early childhood services. The assessment of preservice early childhood professionals plays a role in ensuring future early childhood staff are of high quality.
Have you had any strong mentors in your life?
Denise O’Brien is a colleague who has played an important mentoring role in my professional life for over 20 years. I first worked with Denise when she was the kindergarten teacher in a small rural town. Ten years later, we worked together as teachers at Wodonga Institute of TAFE in the child care studies department. Denise encouraged me to apply for my first full-time teaching position and made it seem possible. She said, ‘Go on, you can do it. Driving from Mt Beauty to Wodonga every day won’t be a problem’. Denise was instrumental in my successful return to study for my BEd in 1994. It was her interest and genuine delight in my achievements that inspired me to go further in this area. The importance and impact of a genuine mentor—who can see potential and ability that you yourself can’t; make suggestions; and tell you that you can do it—can’t be underestimated.
What have been some of your most worthwhile moments?
One that stands out was a situation with an experienced parent who had been very uncertain about my approach, particularly the fact that I wanted the children to call me ‘Michelle’, rather than ‘Mrs Ortlipp’. This parent had spent much of the year ‘checking me out’ by putting herself on the morning tea roster every week. I was very aware that I was being judged. At the end of the year, on the last day of kindergarten, she hugged me and said her son had been privileged to have me as a teacher.
In relation to my study, it is the recognition of family, friends and colleagues and their delight in my achievements that has produced my most worthwhile moments. Whilst being presented with the Early Childhood Australia Doctoral Thesis Award at the conference in Brisbane was a memorable moment, it was being sought out afterwards and enthusiastically congratulated by a group of early childhood practitioners from Albury/Wodonga that made it a worthwhile moment.
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What do you see as some of the great things happening in early childhood at the moment?
In my work as an academic, I see a growing interest in early childhood staff to further their qualifications. There is also a growing willingness in many of these individuals to engage with new ideas—often challenging the very foundations of their initial preparation for work in the early childhood field. I see excitement in being faced with multiple and often contradictory ways of understanding early childhood teaching and learning, and a sense that, despite the challenges this produces, these early childhood professionals are willingly taking up the freedom and the burden of making difficult choices and decisions.
What vision do you have for early childhood education?
In articulating my vision I risk repeating what many others have said before me. In my vision, all those working in the early childhood field, in whatever capacity, will have an understanding and appreciation of, and respect for, what each other does. Having worked in TAFE and university preparing early childhood professionals, I want to see an end to the division between care and education. My vision for early childhood care and education is a world in which capable, intelligent individuals are eager to embark on a career in early childhood because it is highly regarded and well paid. High school teachers won’t discourage the most able in pursuing such a career. No longer will I hear comments like, ‘Oh well, she’s not highly academic but she could teach in a preschool’.
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