DrKatrina MacDonald

Profile

I am a Senior Lecturer in the School of Education and a member of the Centre for Research for Educational Impact (REDI) at Deakin University, Australia. My teaching, research and engagement focus on socially just education systems across schools and higher education, with particular attention to educational leadership, workforce sustainability, practitioner identity, intersectionality and gender justice.

Across my work, I connect leadership theory, policy, practice and research translation to support more equitable learning and working environments. I bring to this work experience as a primary and secondary teacher in Victoria, a prior research and practice career in anthropology and archaeology, and sustained engagement with education leaders, systems, professional communities and research networks in Australia and internationally.

Research Focus

My research advances socially just educational leadership and public education (schooling and Higher Education) through three strategic themes:

·       Educational leadership for just education systems

·       Higher education, leader and teacher workforce sustainability

·       Identity, intersectionality and gender justice

Teaching and Curriculum Leadership

Research and Innovation

I have contributed to nationally significant education research funded by the Australian Research Council and industry partners. My work examines the conditions that shape educational leadership, public education, teacher and leader workforce sustainability, and the possibilities for social justice within complex policy environments.

Selected Grants and Projects

My current and recent projects include ARC-funded research on culturally diverse teacher workforces, school commutability and workforce planning, housing affordability and the teacher shortage, and school autonomy reform and social justice in Australian public education. I am Chief Investigator on these projects and lead different work packages within them.

• Chief Investigator and Work Package Leader, Australian Research Council Linkage Project, Attracting and retaining a culturally diverse teacher workforce (2024–2027), LP230200802, $469,772. Project team: Associate Professor Ben Arnold, Professor Jill Blackmore, Dr Katrina MacDonald, Associate Professor Tebeje Mekonnen, Professor Linda Hobbs, Dr Marcus Horwood, Dr Mark Rahimi, Dr Al Fricker, Associate Professor Michiko Weinmann and Dr Jonathon Guy.
• Chief Investigator and Work Package Leader, Australian Research Council Discovery Project, Estimating the commutability of Australian schools for improved workforce planning (2026–2028), DP260100457, $673,972. Project team: Professors Scott Eacott, Christopher Pettit and Hoon Han, and Drs Katrina MacDonald and Catherine Gilbert. The project builds on the team’s work mapping teacher workforce and housing affordability through an innovative public dashboard.
• Chief Investigator, Australian Research Council Discovery Project, School Autonomy Reform and Social Justice in Australian Public Education (2019–2022), DP190100190, $340,692. Project team: Professors Amanda Keddie, Jill Blackmore, Jane Wilkinson, Scott Eacott and Richard Niesche, Associate Professor Brad Gobby, and Dr Katrina MacDonald. The project produced the 2026 book School Autonomy Reform and Social Justice in Australian Public Education.

Selected Awards and Recognition

• Team Leadership Award, Australian Council for Educational Leaders NSW Branch, 2025, with Professor Scott Eacott, Dr Catherine Gilbert, Professor Chris Pettit and Professor Hoon Han, for work on Housing Affordability and the Teacher Shortage.
• Ray Debus Award for Doctoral Research in Education, Australian Association for Research in Education, 2020. This award recognises excellence in educational research by one doctoral student each year Australia-wide. This award is seen by the Association as a way of recognising the high-quality contribution made to educational knowledge by a graduate student. 
• Mollie Holman Medal, Monash University, 2020, for the doctoral study Socially just principals in unjust times: Social justice leadership in disadvantaged Victorian primary schools. The Mollie Holman medal is one of the highest academic honours bestowed by Monash University. My thesis, Socially just principals in unjust times: Social justice leadership in disadvantaged Victorian primary schools explored the social justice understandings and practices of principals working in some of the most disadvantaged communities in Victoria. In 2023, this research was published in a book Socially Just Educational Leadership in Unjust Times: A Bourdieusian Study of Social Justice Educational Leadership Practices.

Research Leadership, Service and Networks

I contribute to educational leadership scholarship through editorial, governance, research capacity-building and network leadership roles. These roles support collaboration, mentoring, doctoral and early career researcher development, and research communities committed to socially just educational practice.

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• I completed a five-year term as Assistant Editor of the Q1 journal International Journal of Leadership in Education: Theory and Practice in 2025, and serve on the editorial boards of Q1 journals: International Journal of Leadership in Education and the Journal of Educational Administration and History.
• Co-convenor, Transforming Professional Lives, Learning and Leadership, School of Education, Deakin University
• Co-convenor, Education, Governance and Policy for Sustainable Societies, REDI, School of Education, Deakin University; member of the REDI Executive Committee.
• Co-convenor, Pedagogy, Education and Praxis Network, Tampere University. This research group brings together an international team of researchers (from Australia, New Zealand, Carribean, South America, Sweden, Norway, Finland and the Netherlands) focused investigating the nature, traditions and conditions of pedagogy, education and praxis and how they might be developed in different national contexts across different educational settings. This network had it's foundation in the critical work begun at the School of Education, Deakin University in the 1980s. It draws on the work of Deakin alumni and past Deputy Vice Chancellor, Emeritus Professor Stephen Kemmis, on action research, critical praxis and the theory of practice architectures. The international website is here.
• Co-convenor, Australian and Victorian nodes of the Pedagogy, Education and Praxis Network.

Engagement, Impact and Research Translation

My engagement work is oriented toward research translation, public education, professional learning and sustained relationships with education communities. I work to make research usable for educators, leaders, policy actors, professional associations and community partners, while also supporting colleagues to strengthen the reach and impact of their research.

• Co-developed and co-convene a Leadership and Learning network of past MEd (MEdLLN) students who are leaders in a range of educational settings and sectors. The MEdLLN connects the alumni of the MEd Leadership and Learning, academics engaged in the program and invited contributors from across education and related sectors. The network brings together leaders from schools, early childhood, vocational settings, universities and allied fields to sustain dialogue beyond the Masters and support thoughtful leadership over time. We won a Faculty Research Excellence (Student Alumni and Engagement) Award for this work in 2025.
• Co-convenor, Engagement and Impact Committee, REDI, School of Education, Deakin University. The committee supports School of Education researchers in knowledge translation, meaningful community connection and external partnership development. Our work has developed a series of research snapshots of REDI research, a series of videos focused on our REDI research that focuses on Building Just Futures Through Education and organised and held seminars and conferences such as our Small Grants for Big Impact series.