| Title | Micro-Credential for Neurodiverse Young People |
| Chief Investigator | Dr. Seth Brown |
| Consultant Researchers | Dr. Scott Phillips Professor Peter Kelly |
What does my participation involve?
1 Introduction
This Micro-Credential for Neurodiverse Young People pilot project is funded by the Hume Whittlesea Local Learning and Employment Network (HWLLEN) and co-sponsoring organisations associated with Whittlesea Youth Commitment and/or Whittlesea Community Partnerships Network and is conducted by the researchers, Dr. Seth Brown, Dr. Scott Phillips, and Professor Peter Kelly.
This pilot project aims to support you in completing a Micro-Credential in Co-Design for Diversity and Inclusion and to evaluate your progress in successfully achieving this. A micro-credential is a small, certification-style course that focuses on a particular area of study. For the purposes of this project, we will focus on co-design. Co-design is about working with other people to achieve shared goals. This pilot project is being run with RMIT University and the HWLLEN.
This Participant Information Sheet tells you about the research project. It explains the processes involved. Knowing this will help you decide if you want to take part in the research.
Please read this information carefully. Ask questions about anything that you don’t understand or want to know more about and feel free to talk it over with your support worker before deciding whether or not to take part.
Participation in this research is voluntary. If you don’t wish to take part, you don’t have to.
If you decide you want to take part, you will be asked to sign the consent section. By clicking the Video-ask link at the bottom of the page you are telling us that you:
• Understand what you have read
• Consent to take part in the research project
You will receive up to *$1000 (*conditions apply) for your participation in recognition of your hard work.
2 What is the purpose of this research?
This research project aims to support you to identify and build your skills for teamwork and collaboration. The project will assist you to demonstrate your teamwork and communication skills.
3 What does participation in this research involve?
You are being invited to participate based on the strengths you bring to this project.
We want you to work with an RMIT research team and HWLLEN organisations that work with young people to collect evidence and information about your learning via VideoAsk (https://www.videoask.com/) and in collaborative meetings.
- We will start by sending you an invite to tell us about yourself via VideoAsk and to participate in a ‘milestone meeting’. In this meeting we will assess what you know about co-design and assist you in collecting evidence of your learning and capability. There will be three milestone meetings like this.
- In between these you will work with your support worker in collecting evidence. Work done in these ‘satellite meetings’ will be brought into each of the second and third milestone meetings. We will work with you in those meetings on providing evidence and developing your strengths in co-design for diversity and inclusion.
In the first milestone meeting you will discuss your experiences of co-design for diversity and inclusion and how it can improve your participation in post-school transitions and consider the principles of co-design. You will be assisted in collecting evidence of your capabilities and uploading this evidence on VideoAsk.
In the second milestone meeting you will be assisted in collecting evidence of your capabilities in co-design and uploading this evidence on VideoAsk.
In the third and final milestone meeting you will describe how success should look for each capability and provide practical evidence of your capabilities to complete the Micro-Credential in Co-Design for Diversity and Inclusion.
4 Other relevant information about the research project
There will be up to 6-15 key support workers, 3-4 employers involved with HWLLEN and 9-15 neurodiverse young people participating in this project.
5 Do I have to take part in this research project?
Participation in any research project is voluntary. If you do not wish to take part, you do not have to. If you decide to take part and later change your mind, you are free to withdraw from the project at any stage.
If you do decide to take part, you will be given a link to the Video-ask platform. If you consent to participate in the project, you must read this form, and click engage with the Video-ask platform to confirm your involvement.
Your decision whether to take part or not to take part, or to take part and then withdraw, will not affect your relationship with the researchers or with RMIT University.
If you take part in the milestone meetings and satellite meetings, you are free to stop participating at any stage or to refuse to answer any questions. However, it will not be possible to withdraw your individual comments from our records once the milestone meetings have started, as it is a group discussion.
If you decide to withdraw from the project, please notify a member of the research team. You have the right to have any unprocessed data withdrawn and destroyed, providing it can be reliably identified.
6 What are the possible benefits of taking part?
You may benefit by contributing to knowledge about supporting neurodiverse young people in obtaining a Micro-credential in Co-Design for Diversity and Inclusion. However, we cannot guarantee or promise that you will receive any personal benefits (meaning a profit or gain pertaining to, directed towards you) from this research.
If you complete the micro-credential, you will receive a digital certificate.
7 What are the possible risks and disadvantages of taking part?
Milestone meeting discussions
During the meetings, please be mindful to not reveal anything too personal or that you may regret later on. Issues may arise from others accessing your responses or contributions.
Psychological distress
We want to support you throughout this project and in doing so we have identified some possible risks. This means that during the meetings if you feel distressed because of your participation in the research project, members of the research team will be able to discuss appropriate support for you.
Social harms
Further, we recognise that participation in social research has the potential damage to social networks or relationships with others, discrimination in accessing services and social stigmatisation. If during this project you have concerns about these sorts of harms, members of the research team will be able to discuss appropriate support for you.
8 What if I withdraw from this research project?
If you do consent to participate, you may withdraw at any time. If you decide to withdraw from the project, please notify a member of the research team. You have the right to have any unprocessed data withdrawn and destroyed, providing it can be reliably identified.
9 What happens when the research project ends?
We may use the data collected for publication and/or presentations in a variety of forums, along with the notes from the Milestone meetings and any documents that you submit to the meetings. You will be identified as a participant in the project as it involves the development of a micro-credential that will be accessible to the public (for example, HWLLEN partners and prospective employers) and an evaluation that will be useful for further research. A publicly available report on the project will be available to you.
How is the research project being conducted?
10 What will happen to information about me?
Information collection
We will collect information about you via VideoAsk such as:
- About you (where you are from, gender, age, etc.),
- About your strengths as demonstrated through activities you undertake
- About evaluating your progress towards the completion of the micro-credential.
Data entry and use of information
You can open VideoAsk on your mobile phone/laptop/computer and answer the questions using video, audio, or text. All the answers from your responses are saved in our VideoAsk account for you to view and reply to at your leisure.
We will also collect information including notes, materials, and resources from the milestone meetings. The milestone meetings will be used to curate/check what evidence you want to make available to the public (for example, employers) on the Young People’s Sustainable Futures Lab (https://young-people-futures-lab.org/) and on Badgr (https://info.badgr.com/), a digital badging system that awards badges and verifies and tracks achievements that connects you to new opportunities (and allows you to connect to Linkedin, Twitter, and Facebook). We will not make the evidence collected for the micro-credential available without your consent. Part of what we will be doing in the milestone meetings and the satellite meetings will be discussing how to select evidence that you want an employer to view.
Safe information storage and publication
All the information will be identifiable but the information about you (where you are from, gender, age, etc.) and about evaluating your progress towards the completion of the micro-credential and the notes, materials, and resources from the milestone meetings may be deidentified by the researchers if the responses are sensitive in nature. In these instances, we will contact you again to ask consent before publishing any deidentified information.
By signing the consent form, you consent to the research team collecting and using information from you for the project. It is anticipated that the results of this research project will be published and/or presented in a variety of forums.
The information will be stored on a password protected RMIT server with standard RMIT security applied and the curated and selected publicly available information/material on the Young People’s Sustainable Futures Lab website, and other social media platforms such as Instagram, YouTube, and on Badgr. That information will be banked (meaning that it will be stored indefinitely) to be used later for future research related to this project.
Please know that you can ask the researchers to delete any of your identifiable information on the Young People’s Sustainable Futures Lab website, Instagram, and other social media platforms such as YouTube, and/or Badgr and that you can drop out of the project at any time.
Privacy Laws
In accordance with relevant Australian and/or Victorian privacy and other relevant laws, you have the right to request access to the information about you that is collected and stored by the research team. You also have the right to request that any information with which you disagree be corrected. Please inform the research team member named at the end of this document if you would like to access your information.
Any information that you provide can be disclosed only if (1) it protects you or others from harm, (2) if specifically allowed by law, (3) you provide the researchers with written permission.
11 Who has reviewed the research project?
All research in Australia involving humans is reviewed by an independent group of people called a Human Research Ethics Committee (HREC). This research project has been approved by the RMIT University HREC.
This project will be carried out according to the National Statement on Ethical Conduct in Human Research (2007). This statement has been developed to protect the interests of people who agree to participate in human research studies.
12 Further information and who to contact
If you want any further information concerning this project, you can contact the researcher on 0428 625 483 or any of the following people:
Research contact person
| Name | Dr. Seth Brown |
| Position | Chief investigator |
| Telephone | 03 9925 7848 |
| seth.brown@rmit.edu.au |
| Name | Professor Peter Kelly |
| Position | Research Consultant |
| Telephone | +61 (0) 428 625 483 |
| peter.kelly@deakin.edu.au |
| Name | Dr. Scott Phillips |
| Position | Research Consultant |
| Telephone | +61 (0) 411 751 755 |
| sphillips@kpcl.com.au |
13 Complaints
Should you have any concerns or questions about this research project, which you do not wish to discuss with the researchers listed in this document, then you may contact:
| Reviewing HREC name | RMIT University |
| HREC Secretary | Vivienne Moyle |
| Telephone | 03 9925 5037 |
| human.ethics@rmit.edu.au | |
| Mailing address | Manager, Research Governance and EthicsRMIT UniversityGPO Box 2476MELBOURNE VIC 3001 |