Constellations of Alternative Education Tutors

This volume highlights the contributions of tutors and their pedagogies to the field of education, focusing on the lived-experiences of tutors in alternative education programs in New Zealand. Tutors' voices were largely absent from education literature, yet, they are charged with providing a holistic education to disenfranchised young people, and they have artfully re-engaged many of their students into learning. This monograph presents the author’s poetic inquiry methodology and methods that are intended to inspire others to take risks using arts-based educational research. Based on in-depth interviews, field work, and a performative workshop with tutor participants, the author created more than 200 poems. Drawing on these poetic findings, 21 constellations of tutor essences were created. From these, the tutor emerges as an holistic educator, whose pedagogies offer a conceptual foundation on which future training and development of tutors can build, and from which conventional schools can learn inclusive ways of working with all students.