“I don’t think I’ll go any further,” the senior teacher from Wavell State High School says with a wry half-laugh.
“I think there are so many amazing stories out there, particularly in Africa and Asia and South America – some of the less developed countries in the world certainly need [the prize] a lot more than I do.”
Dascombe is by no stretch a stranger to the awards stage.
His pioneering teaching in geospatial technologies and efforts to get eyes on his students’ exceptional work has seen the long-time educator chalk up a string of accolades, including a 2023 Schools Plus Teaching Awards Fellowship, a TEACHX Innovation in Teaching award, the Peter Doherty STEM Award, and a Showcase Award for Excellence in Teaching from the Queensland education department.
The Varkey Foundation’s annual award, which comes with a cash prize of US$1 million dollars, is arguably one of the most illustrious on the global circuit. And Dascombe hasn’t completely ruled himself out.
“If I did win, I’d love to be able to do projects with my students; peer learning projects with my students in the Pacific and in First Nations communities in Australia,” he says.
“I think that would be a wonderful legacy to leave, taking the technology and skills out to the Pacific because they are facing problems with climate change.
“But I think top 50, really that’s about as good as I’m going to get…” he laughs.
Harnessing geospatial technologies
Dascombe’s love for geospatial technologies – and the vast learning possibilities they offer – first took hold during his university days as an Arts student.
“I just fell in love with the GIS (geographic information systems) component and the spatial technologies, and just saw how it could be utilised.
“I used it throughout my 20 years of teaching, but it’s only in the last five years that I’ve really sort of dug in and had a look at how it can be really impactful in the classroom, particularly with the new geography syllabus in Queensland,” he shares.
It’s the day before Term 1 kicks off and Dascombe is already relishing being back in the thick of it, busy crafting new projects with a sustainable focus that can tease out his students’ skills and knowledge.
“I’m just designing one on food deserts in Brisbane, so that’s this year’s project for me: getting the students to look at where the food deserts are in our communities and look at community gardens and where they are…”
Dascombe is big on harnessing emerging geospatial technologies in his ‘classroom’, and has just begun using AI to bring students’ various design proposals to life visually.
“We use technology in a really positive way … I go and visit industry and I see what they’re using, but then I try and find something at a low cost to bring it back to the classroom that does the same sort of job.”
Much of the time, however, his classes take on a distinctly real-world flavour.
“We found E.colli on the beach on North Stradbroke Island at 1600 parts per 100 million, it’s supposed to be 40. We traced that to the septic tanks at the top of the sand dunes when they overflow.
“They leach down through the sand dunes and come to the back of the beach, so we used technology to trace those and then the students rang the septic tank company…”
It’s not always what you’d call glamourous geography, Dascombe laughs.
Sharing students’ work with the world
From mapping pollution data, to tracking koala habitat and land cover change on the Gold Coast, to repurposing the local Visy Glass factory after its planned stint as a media hub at the Brisbane 2032 Olympic and Paralympic Games, Dascombe’s students are not left short on inventive learning challenges.
“You see their personality in their work,” he says.
“And prior to this, we used to hide their assignments in the cupboard for seven years, and some of that work is exceptional.
“But it was always a philosophy to put those away and keep them, and never should they see the light of day.”
Around five years ago Dascombe decided this had to change.
“I started asking permissions to share their work when I saw the quality of what they were producing using geospatial technologies.
“And they started winning lots of awards.”
From picking up Australian Geospatial Awards to presenting at state conferences, Wavell geography students are now getting noticed in a big way.
“What really excites me is the project-based nature of geography. It needs to be an outdoor subject, to be quite honest,” Dascombe says.
“You see workforce calling for surveyors, for urban planners, for landscape architects.
“That’s where all our students end up, well not all, but a lot of our students end up going into industry.”
Dascombe notes there’s a widespread assumption that geography equates to simply “mapping stuff”.
“Well, yes and no. You’ve got a design, you’ve got to look at the economics of a project, you’ve got to look at the sustainability of a project, you’ve got to look at the community impact of that project.
“It’s much more holistic now as a subject and that’s what really excites me,” he says.
Get vocal about your wins
In Dascombe’s opinion, teachers ought to get better at sharing their own personal achievements, too.
“I think teachers don’t showcase how amazing they are. And look, there’s plenty more amazing teachers in Australia than myself, but I use LinkedIn – I love LinkedIn.
“I love showcasing what we’re doing at Wavell State High School. If that encourages other teachers to look into what we’re doing [then that’s only a good thing].”
The Global Teacher Prize will be narrowed down to the top 10 finalists in late January, with the winner announced at the World Government Summit in Dubai from February 11 to 13.
