Dr Vida Vončina Vodeb joined the The Victoria Institute as a research fellow in February 2014. Prior to joining the Victoria Institute, Vida has been teaching and researching at the University of Ljubljana, Department of Educational Sciences at the Faculty of Arts. Broadly, she is interested in educational practices that aim to support the personal formation of students and that increase their abilities to inquire the world and engage in it in critical and responsible ways, particularly through the literacy practices.
Her PhD research was supported by the Australian government Endeavour Award, which has allowed her to conduct comparative research on literacy in curriculum in QLD New Basics and in Slovenia under the supervision of Professor Allan Luke at Queensland University of Technology and Professor Robi Kroflic at University of Ljubljana. Prior to her academic career she worked for several years at the National Institute for Vocational Education in Slovenia, monitoring and evaluating different aspects of educational reforms. Vida was one of the authors to prepare the first National Literacy Strategy for Slovenia. She is a collaborator in many years of several grassroots projects that strive to bring a democratic change in the world through education.
Awards
2006-2007: Australian Government European Endeavour Award - towards PhD research supervised by Professor Allan Luke at Queensland University of Technology.
1999: Utrecht Network Scholarship, Utrecht University, Netherlands. Intense course work with Professor Gert Biesta on Democracy in Education.
Professional memberships
- Australian Association for Research in Education
Industry experience
2002-2007: Senior counsellor for educational reform implementation, monitoring and evaluation, at the Institute of the Republic of Slovenia for Vocational Education and Training (CPI)
2004-2007: National board for Literacy, commissioned to prepare the National Literacy Strategy (2006)
2004-2013: Youth work educator (Pekarna Magdalenske Mreze, Infopeka)
Areas of expertise
- Curriculum studies
- Literacy education
- Moral and civic education
- Theory of education
