Professor Eleanor Ramsay

Professor Ramsay was appointed as an Adjunct Professor in the University of South Australia’s Hawke Research Institute at the beginning of 2002. The Institute is one of the University’s largest research concentrations, bringing together leading research groups and individuals with national and international research standing across the humanities and social sciences. 

Professor Ramsay originally joined the University as a member of its foundation senior management group, and for almost nine years was the pro vice chancellor with responsibility for equity in the institution as well as a wide range of other changing portfolio responsibilities. Representational responsibilities during this time included being the AVCC's representative on the Ministerial Taskforce on Disability Standards for the education sector; the sector's representative on the National Steering Committee which provided advice to the federal Minister with respect to Advancing the National Framework for Equity in Higher Education; membership of the Advisory Committee to the federal Minister for Science on Women in Science, Engineering and Technology; a member of the working group set up to develop national higher education benchmarks; membership of both the AVCC Credit Transfer Committee and subsequently of the ANTA/AVCC Project Steering Committee; co-founder and co-convenor of the National Colloquium of Senior Women Executives in Higher Education; and deputy chair of the management committee of the ATN's Women's Executive Development Program (ATNWexDev). At the state level, she has been (and is currently) a member of the South Australian Board of Senior Secondary School Studies (SSABSA) since returning from Queensland in 1993, and was previously a member of the Board of Senior Secondary School Studies in that state, as well as representing the State's universities on the VEET Board during 2001-2002. 

Professor Ramsay began her career as a high school teacher in South Australia, and then spent 5 years overseas, teaching English as a Foreign Language in Spain, Italy and at the University of Kent in Canterbury (UKC), as well as completing a Masters degree in Sociology at the same university. Prior to joining the University in May 1993 Professor Ramsay worked for nearly a decade and a half in a range of specialist positions providing leadership in educational equity and social justice, and gender equality in employment and education, in two states and nationally with responsibilities at different times across various sectors and levels of education and training in Australia, most immediately as the Director of Equity in the Queensland Department of Education. During the 1980s she was the Women's Officer in the SA teachers union and then the Equal Opportunity Officer in the South Australian Education Department. She has also worked in the office of the Women's Adviser to the Premier in the area of women and labour market programs. She is recognised nationally as a leader in several areas of educational policy and research and throughout her career has frequently been appointed as a member or the chair of a wide range of specialist government boards, advisory and review committees, and various public inquiries, some by ministerial appointment and all concerned with some aspect of educational policy.  

In recent years her work has been increasingly international including for several years being responsible for international student recruitment, marketing and services for her University. In addition she has four times represented Australia in the discussions of the United States-Australia Education Policy Project, and has been a member or leader of delegations to Europe and throughout the Asia Pacific region on behalf of Australian higher education, the State of South Australia, or the University. Recently she has contributed to international development work in South Africa, to the University’s role in the OECD’s Futures Program and to linkages between Australian and Chinese higher education, continuing to represent the University in the latter two areas.

Professor Ramsay is frequently invited to deliver keynote addresses and papers at national and international educational conferences and other fora, in 2000 giving the opening address at the UNESCO sponsored Forum for Asian Women Leaders in Higher Education, held in Kula Lumpur, and one of the keynote papers at the Second European Conference on Gender Equality in Higher Education, held at Zurich University. Other international representational work includes being a member of the 1998 national prominent persons delegation to China, hosted by the Chinese Peoples’ Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries, in the same year being seconded to the Sydney Organising Committee of the 2000 Olympic Games to give advice on the national Olympic schools program, with the Australian Ambassador to France jointly representing Australia at the opening ceremony of the 2000 Expolangues in Paris, and last year being a member of the delegation to China led of the Lord Mayor of Adelaide.  

Professor Ramsay is currently undertaking EIP funded research into an educational access pilot being conducted by the University in collaboration with an adult re-entry school in one of Adelaide’s (and Australia’s) poorest suburban areas; working with researchers from the Hawke Institute and the University of Technology, Sydney (UTS) to mount an international forum in 2003 to explore the education and social impact of the IC & T industries in India and China, with particular reference to their impact on the position of women; and to organise a national delegation to Australia of Chinese university women presidents and vice presidents, the first such international delegation in China’s history. She has published her analysis and commentary on women and leadership, and equity in higher education, and a range of other educational policy areas.

The Colloquium of Senior Women Executives in Australian Higher Education

Virtual Library for the Sydney 2000 Games

The ATN's Women's Executive Development Program

Master of Arts (Sociology), University of Kent at Canterbury

Diploma of Education, University of Adelaide

Bachelor of Arts (Honours History), University of Adelaide

• Post secondary education and training in general, and with a particular interest in the following areas:
  internationalisation of the curriculum;
  collaboration with industry and between different sectors of education;
  providing access and a successful learning environment for those currently under represented at this level of education; and,
  distance education including on-line delivery and all forms of flexible teaching and learning.

• The impact of technological changes on education at all levels, especially developments in information and communication technologies.

• On-line international communication and learning networks, and their relevance to social, political and educational reform agendas.

• Impact of market forces on educational quality, access and participation.

• The relationship between structural and cultural change in organisations and the achievement of greater equality.

• Public policy agendas and programs to achieve greater equality for women in all areas of public life.

• The impact of the globalisation of educational markets and delivery mechanisms.

• Feminist applied linguistics.

Refereed:

"Gender Employment Equity for Women in Australian Universities-recent research and current strategies" in Sound Changes - an international survey of women's career strategies in higher education, universalle 4, Caroline Weidmer, ed., Universitat Zurich, January 2002

Combined Courses of Study; equity group access and participation at bachelor (honours/pass) level,Batson, C., Sharp, R., Ramsay, E., and Mackinnon, A., Higher Education Division, DETYA, Canberra, 2002

"Gender in the Australian Higher Education System" in From Bottom to Top in Higher Education: Women's Experiences and Visions in Different Parts of the World, special issue of the International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, vol. 21, no. 1/2 2001, Dr. Birgit Blattel-Mink and Dr. Anina Mischau (eds.), Barmerick Publications, UK,2001

"Managing the Malestrom" in Academic Women and the Politics of Restructuring, Mackinnon, A. and Brooks, A. (eds.), Open University Press, 2001

"The National framework for Australian Higher Education Equity: its origins, evolution and current status", in Higher Education Policy. The Quarterly Journal of the International Association of Universities (IAU), in press

"Feminism and the Future, Sisterhood and the State", in Discourse. Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, Volume 18, number 3, 1997

"Management, Gender and Language - or who is hiding behind the glass ceiling, and why can't we see them?", chapter in Gender and Changing Educational Management, Brigid Limerick and Bob Lingard (eds.), Edward Arnold Australia, Sydney, 1995

"Managing Equity in Higher Education', chapter in The Australian Universities' Review, Bob Lingard (guest editor),Volume 37, number 2, 1994

"On Lies and Silence: Cross-cultural Perspectives on the Construction of Women's Oppression through Linguistic Omission", co-author with Efrosini Stefanou-Haag, in Working Papers on Language, Gender and Sexism, Volume 1, number 2, 1991

Other:

Higher Education Access and Equity for Low SES School Leavers, co-author with Tranter, D., Charlton, S. and Sumner, R., Australian Government Publishing Service, Canberra, 1998

Designated Equity Groups in Australian Universities: Performance of Commencing Students 1996 - Undergraduate Award Courses, AVCC, December 1998

Cross-Sectoral Linkages: A Case Study, co-author with Tranter, D., Kain, M. and Sumner, R., Australian Government Publishing Service, Canberra, September 1997

"Women in Education: Past Achievements, Current Realities and Future Challenges", in Redress. Journal of the Association of Women Educators, Volume 6, No. 1, April 1997

Outcomes of a University's Flexible Admission Policies, co-author with Tranter, D., Sumner, R. and Barrett, S., Australian Government Publishing Service, Canberra, 1996

"Women and the Australian Constitution: Time for the 'housewives' of the nation to move into the House", in Refractory Girl, September 1996

"Linguistic Omissions Marginalising Women Managers", in A Gendered Culture: Educational Management in the Nineties, Diana Baker and Madeleine Fogarty (eds.), Victorian University of Technology, 1993

"All Students are Special: an Equity Perspective on Disability in Education", keynote address delivered at the 15th National Conference of the Australian Association of Special Education, published in the Journal of the Australian Association of Special Education, November 1991

"Working Women and the Council", a chapter in To Unite More Closely, a centenary publication of the United Trades and Labour Council (SA), 1984