hi Jan and others,

many of us now call ourselves 'Academic Language and Learning' (ALL) professionals/advisors/lecturers, etc. As far as classifications are concerned the latest update of the ALL Centres/units is available on the AALL website at http://www.aall.org.au/centres/ALLcentresJul08.pdf and shows that the majority of ALL staff (nearly 60%) are employed as academic staff. Another table, at http://www.aall.org.au/centres/ALLactivitiesJul08.pdf, also shows the range of ALL provisions. If you or others need additional information regarding staff status, please do not hesitate to let me know.
cheers
alex

Jan, Alex and others
I had hoped that we would move towards a name that would be common to all learning support centres. Is that ever going to happen? from Elizabeth

hi Elizabeth,

after years (no joke) of discussions, surveys, compromises, etc., Academic Language & Learning (ALL) was what the vast majority of us were happy with by the time the association was established (Nov. 2005). There is/has been a sense that the name covers fairly much what we do across the post-secondary sector. The qualifiers (eg. 'staff', 'lecturer', 'advisor', 'professional', etc.) depends on the status/context of each institution.

Increasingly the term ALL is accepted and used across the post-secondary/tertiary sector and is becoming part of the identity for our profession, something many of us have put a lot of energy into developing.

I hope this helps.
alex

Alex
Yet AALL doesn't feature in the name of many of the centres. Do you mean AALL is what we are/do but every institution has its own name? There are as many variations on the name as there are institutions. I know I must be going over well trodden ground. Sorry for that. from Elizabeth

no need to apologise, Elizabeth
it's true that there are as many different names for ALL centres as there are institutions with only a handful using the ALL words:
i) the name( of various institution's ALL centres/units pre-ceeds by many years the ALL name
ii) while it would be advantagous to have a common name for centres across institutions, it would also be a little presumptuous to 'dictate' to universities what to call what.

What is important however is that irrespective of the name of the centre we work in (mine is called ELSSA Centre) we can identify ourseleves to each other and the broader community as ALL staff.
ps. where do you work?
alex

Alex
I see. Perhaps we could all have a go at writing ALL under our names. If you were choosing a new name, like Jan, it's something to consider maybe. I like the way the forum works now that I've posted something. Thanks for that. from Elizabeth