Empowering Teachers in School and University Partnerships

This paper describes a partnership between a university and a cluster of government and non-government schools. Its purpose was to engage early career scientists (tertiary students) to work in the science classroom as peer tutors/mentors with the aim of improving students' attitudes towards science. Using a self-study approach (Loughran, 2004) the author explored the issues of a collaborative process. Data was sourced and triangulated from teachers and administrators, the early career scientists and students, which revealed that successful partnership was dependent on the empowerment of teachers within their organisational culture.