The In and About Story

told by Claudine Neal, Founder of In And About Education

In and About Education is the realisation of my passion to provide people who are working, researching, studying and learning with me; making it a treasured, shared and holistic learning experience. A learning event such as a field study, online learning or "excursion" should not be experienced in isolation. It needs to be in context with the "real world" for the participant. The "real world" for each learning community is unique to them.

Online learning, excursions, field studies, workshops and classroom experiences from larger organisations are generally prepackaged and expensive. Educators, Learning Designers, Content Creators, Training Coordinators and teachers have little or no input into designing the learning to the needs and interests of their cohort. The vision of how learning experiences should be created and implemented to suit the needs of their learning community has to be the foundation of it's design. The deep collaboration between partners designing learning makes the experience more unique, engaging and authentic for each individual participant.

During the COVID lockdown; the traditional face to face learning experiences stopped immediately with many facets of learning turned to being in the virtual space. In and About Education was created during the first COVID lockdown for both personal reasons and to service the immediate need for teaching resources and online infrastructure. In and About Education Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) was originally to be a instant solution for teachers to have online resources. However, the publishing companies, NSW Department of Education and teachers themselves put together many resources for their learners using their own Learning Management Systems. 

Colleagues who are in the Emergency Management sector used my long-service and expertise in emergency management and education to design eduational content for schools that are compliant to the needs of the NSW Education Standards Authority and the Australian Curriculum. This in turn led to working with other emergency management consultants to design e-learning modules for their corporate clients for Australasian Interservice Incident Management Systems, National Government Crisis Management Framework and smaller online projects.

Every person can learn. Many engaged learners are not of school age. The fun of sharing experiences and expertise with like-minded and engaged people gives us life long memories. The stories and places that are experienced from different perspectives or not commonly known make our learning experiences special. I thrive on learning from others. The experiences In and About Education creates are not to transmit knowledge rather to learn with others who are sharing it.

Learners who continue to explore and discover the "real world" after being part of In and About Education makes my "real world" special.