Email: martin.westwell@flinders.edu.au
Personal Website: http://www.flinders.edu.au/people/martin.westwell
Martin is the Director of the Flinders Centre for Science Education in the 21st Century. The Centre applies an evidence-based approach to teaching and learning, with a focus on mathematics and science education. The Centre works with a number of states and territories, nationally and internationally to support the development of quality teaching and innovation.
After completing his degree and PhD at Cambridge University, Martin moved to Oxford University. He left academia to pursue other interests including acting as midwife for a university start-up company in drug-discovery and target-discovery for neurodegenerative diseases.
He returned to Oxford in 2005 as Deputy Director of the Institute for the Future of the Mind. Here he ran a research program on the influence of modern lifestyles and technology on the minds of the young and the old. Throughout his time at the Institute, Martin worked with the UK government, parliament, teachers, parents, and others, to provide access to scientific evidence and inform decision-making about the learning and education of young people.
He has won a number of awards for communicating science to non-scientists including, in 1999, being named by The Times newspaper as the “Scientist of the New Century”.
Martin moved to South Australia in 2007 and has two boys who attend public schools.
Research Interests:
Martin is interested in the use of evidence-informed practice and decision-making in education and research about the translation of evidence and laboratory science into education in an ecologically valid way. For example, with an education project worth $2M, funded by the Commonwealth Government’s Australian Space Research Program, Martin used evidence from the cognitive sciences to inform the ways in which the processes of research might be effectively incorporated in senior secondary education, using airborne analogues of earth observation satellites technologies.
In early years education and development, Martin has worked with educators to co-construct an understanding of children’s cognitive development particularly focussing on executive functions (a strong predictor of positive outcomes at school and beyond).