Dr Lorraine Sim

Biography

Lorraine was awarded her PhD on Virginia Woolf from The University of Western Australia in 2005. She is currently Lecturer in Literature and Film at the University of Ballarat, Victoria, where she teaches in the fields of nineteenth- to twentieth- century literature and culture, world cinema and cultural studies.

Her research interests span the fields of modernism and modernity, postmodernism, everyday life studies and women’s studies. She has published articles on Virginia Woolf, H.D., Frances Partridge, Emily Bronte, contemporary biographical cinema, modernism and the everyday, and the war photography of Lee Miller (forthcoming). Her first book, Virginia Woolf: the Patterns of Ordinary Experience, will be published by Ashgate in 2010.

The Internship has benefited my career as a university lecturer in many different ways. Too often in the higher education sector, postgraduate students and academics are expected to be able to teach effectively at university level without any formal training or structured professional development, as if teaching is a skill that we acquire as undergraduate and postgraduate students through a process of osmosis! The Internship provided me with a foundation in tertiary teaching and learning that I believe all sessional tutors and academics need.

In the first instance, the Internship introduced me to the idea of a teaching philosophy, which I developed during the course of the program and continue to refine and clarify as my experience as a lecturer in the Humanities develops. The Internship made me realise that in order to be an effective teacher, you first have to understand – and really think about – what your central aims and aspirations are as a tutor, a lecturer and a mentor, and how you can achieve them. Teaching for me is much more than the simple transfer of knowledge: it is a process whereby you enable individuals to become independent critical and creative thinkers, and effective communicators. The Internship also made me aware of the various styles of student learning, and the many approaches to teaching and facilitation that tutors and lecturers can adopt to make their teaching adaptable to the range of situations and contexts they encounter in the university setting. So, most importantly, the Internship prompted me to become a reflective educator with a student-centred approach to teaching, who perceives teaching itself as a constant learning process.

The Internship is structured around a series of fortnightly workshops and provides a dialogic setting with peers: this is a very useful practice. I regularly discuss pedagogical issues, approaches and challenges with colleagues (including both full-time and sessional staff), and periodically attend teaching and learning conferences and forums, and these are practices which support and further develop my skills as an educator.

I really enjoy teaching and have acquired extensive experience as a sessional tutor and Associate Lecturer in the discipline of English and Cultural Studies at UWA (2002–2005), and, since 2006, as Lecturer in Literature and Film at the University of Ballarat, Victoria. I have always received very positive student feedback through both formal measures, and informally. I believe that the Internship has been instrumental to my success as an academic, as it prompted me to develop a considered teaching philosophy, a teaching portfolio and a sustained record of professional development and reflective practice as a university educator – skills and practices that are increasingly valued at all Australian universities, and internationally. While I must admit that Tama Leaver, my fellow 2002 Intern and friend, and I used to eagerly anticipate wine and cheese at the end of each session, in retrospect the Internship has been valuable to us in ways we didn’t, at the time, fully anticipate.