I am a fourth year part-time Ph.D student, specialising in alternative education, early school leaving and absenteeism. My interest in these areas stems from my twenty-year experience as a teacher. Currently, I am an assistant head of school in a government secondary school. Prior to this, I used work in an Alternative Education provision school, which was opened in Malta. Before this, I used to teach in an area secondary school, where the intake came from socially deprived areas, with many students, even in year 7, being already disenchanted with education. My daily experiences with disenchanted students in these past twenty years have prompted me to ask what can be done for such students. This Ph.D is a fulfilment of my wish to provide a better education for such students. As far as I know, nobody has ever asked the opinions of disenchanted students and their educational leaders what is the best type of alternative education for them and whether on-site is better than off-site education for these particular situations.

In addition, my study falls within the present government's drive to tackle early school leaving and absenteeism. There is a drive in Malta to lower the percentage of early school leavers and absentee students, so that these do not fall on social benefits once they reach adulthood.

I am being guided in my research by Dr. Michael Wyness and Sue Johnston-Wilder.

I am a member of BELMAS, BERA and also EERA. I can be found on Academia. edu and Researchgate under my name. I can be contacted on Twitter: @AntSchembri

 

 

Antoinette Schembri

A.Schembri@warwick.ac.uk