Code of Conduct

MAV Community Code of Conduct

Our community contract is a valuable tool for your interaction within the MAV Community and ensures a good experience for everyone involved. We have established the following agreement to apply to our shared experiences and networks. Joining and using this community means you have read this and agree with our values.

MAV Community Values

We rely on all members to help keep our community safe and respectful for people to share and view information.

Support – Membership in this community means you are here to support one another as best we all can. Support can be practical, such as sharing information or resources, and it can also be connecting with others to work through frustrations and build connections. 

Respect – Above all, our MAV Community is a respectful, diverse, and inclusive space. We trust in the strength of shared conversation to improve our work. Everyone is on a journey, and their experiences are different, so remember, we can always learn from each other. Sometimes we might oppose and debate, but we should always be respectful. Be aware of the words and tone you use in the community. Treat others in the community with the same respect and kindness you expect from them.

Always remember:

  • Listen
  • Be kind
  • Be polite
  • Be thankful
  • Respect other’s views and opinions

Openness – Please contribute where and whenever you’re comfortable, so we can learn and support each other, together. Communities work best when we pose questions, insights, stories, successes, and challenges.

Empower – We encourage our community members to make decisions that support each other’s work and wellbeing. Don’t hold back in sharing your expertise – there is probably someone who will find it valuable or interesting. When you share information, please also provide your sources.

Accessibility When posting content in the community, make sure that it is accessible and consider the diversity of other educators when contributing. We want everyone to be able to take value from the community.

In Summary - In the MAV community, as members, we should all consider all our discussions with thoughtfulness, and friendliness and always assume the best intentions. Welcome new members, share your ideas or help guide them on how to navigate and use the platform. If you are a new member, make sure to introduce yourself – our community is waiting to welcome you.

It will also be helpful if you

Stay on topic:

When creating a new discussion thread, give a clear topic title and put your post in the appropriate category. When contributing to an existing discussion, try to stay 'on the topic'. Start a new thread if something new comes up within a topic that you would like to discuss.

MAV maintains the right to delete posts, threads, and content from the community:

We need to make sure that content, discussion comments and resources posted in the community are not potentially damaging. For this reason, we may revise or choose not to publish some posts. To help everyone enjoy our community, we ask that when you post, you keep in mind the following: 

  • We don’t allow defamatory, indecent, offensive, profane, discriminatory, misleading, unlawful or threatening comments. 
  • We don’t allow racist, sexist, homophobic, sexually explicit or suggestive, abusive or otherwise discriminatory or objectionable material
  • We don’t allow offensive and/or inappropriate language
  • Personal attacks, name-calling, trolling and abuse will not be tolerated
  • Do not promote personal beliefs in a way that is disrespectful of the choices of others
  • Do not violate the privacy of individuals, and/or children under 18
  • Respect that other members in the MAV community have had different life experiences and may have a different perspective to yours. We welcome different viewpoints.
  • We don’t allow material that describes or encourages activity that could endanger the safety or wellbeing of others

Copyright:

You have the opportunity to share resources, such as lesson plans, videos, presentations, podcasts, and other documents and resources in the community.

It is important that you only post content that you have the right to post, and that you do not breach the copyright of any third party who may own the rights to a resource.

For example, you should not post the following without permission from the copyright holder:

  • Copies of commercially published resources, such as practice exams, textbook chapters, workbook pages, BLM worksheets, research papers, etc.
  • Educational video that is copyright to another party
  • News or journal articles that would otherwise be only accessed behind a firewall
  • Images from Google image search or other sites– as these are likely from websites that own copyright and require permission to be used
  • Resources where copyright may be owned by your school or institution
  • Student produced resources

You may for example post:

  • Your own original resources, that you produced and that contain no other third-party images or text
  • Publicly published and available reports such as from a public inquiry or government report on education
  • Resources that are provided as Free for Education or Creative Commons
  • Other resources, if you have the copyright owner’s permission
  • Links to freely available news, podcasts, YouTube videos, reports, teaching resources, etc that take community members to the external webpage.

If unsure whether you can post a resource, ask advice, or seek permission from the copyright owner first. In any post where a resource is included, we ask that you to include the source.

MAV takes its responsibilities for protecting copyright ownership seriously, and reserves that right to remove any content that it believes may potentially breach another party’s copyright.

If you see anything that may breach Australian copyright laws report the matter to us, and we will investigate – you can do so by emailing us under the ‘contact us’ menu within the community.

For more about copyright visit:

Introduction to Copyright

About Copyright

Childsafe Policies:

MAV is committed to the safety and wellbeing of all children and young people. This involves how members relate to children while using the community.

Our ChildSafe Statement of Intent, Policies and Procedures are available on our MAV's Constitution and Policies website.

  • In relation to posting images, you should not post images of students at your school or other events, or anyone under the age of 18 without their parental and school permission.
  • MAV may post images that include students and school logos on uniforms from time to time, we will only do so using images from our student events or when working with schools, and where we have permission to use these images for our purposes.

Equal Opportunity Policy:

MAV is committed to maintaining an environment free from discrimination, bullying, or harassment of any kind. It is a condition of the community that all members comply with the contents of this policy. To the extent that the contents of this policy refer to obligations on MAV, they are guidelines only and are not contractual terms, conditions, or representations on which a member relies or may rely.

Discrimination:

Whilst the legislation varies State by State, MAV does not discriminate on the basis of:

  • Age
  • Sex
  • Career Status
  • Physical or Mental Disability / Impairment
  • Family Responsibility
  • Gender Identity
  • Lawful industrial activity
  • Marital status
  • Race, Colour, National Extraction or Social Origin
  • Lawful sexual activity
  • Parental status
  • Physical features
  • Political belief/activity
  • Religious Belief/activity
  • Pregnancy, actual, assumed or planned and breastfeeding
  • Gender identity
  • HIV, AIDS & Hepatitis C
  • Sexual Orientation
  • Personal association with someone who has, or is assumed to have, one of these attributes.

Unlawful discrimination does not have to be calculated or conscious. It can result from entrenched beliefs and attitudes. The intention of the person discriminating is generally irrelevant. Discrimination can occur both directly and indirectly. Unlawful discrimination is unacceptable and must not occur.

Direct discrimination:

Direct discrimination includes treating or proposing to treat a person less favourably because of one of the attributes listed above or because of their association with someone identified with one of those attributes.

Indirect discrimination:

Indirect discrimination may occur when a rule, policy, condition, or requirement is imposed, and it unreasonably disadvantages a person or group of people because of one of the above attributes.

Moderation:

Our community managers and moderators can and will intervene if these Community Rules are infringed. Due to the dynamic nature and the volume of posts, we can't immediately review everything– so much of the responsibility for preserving our welcoming environment lies with you.

Members can alert a moderator by flagging a post or account they believe isn't in the spirit of these guidelines by emailing us through the 'contact us' menu in the community.

If you wish to query a moderation decision, please contact us privately via email, and we will respond as soon as possible.

We will advise you if we cannot publish your post or edit or delete it from the forums because it breaks our community rules, is considered potentially discriminatory, bullying, in nature or harassment of any type. Being able to provide a safe environment for all community members is something we take seriously.

We retain the right to permanently disable the accounts of members who disregard MAV's community guidelines, or our feedback regarding expected behaviours.

Complaints handling policy:

At MAV our policy is to ensure that MAV handles complaints fairly, efficiently, and effectively.

This policy provides guidance to staff and people who wish to make a complaint on the key principles and concepts of MAV’s complaint management system.

MAV Complaint Handling Policy and Procedure

If you see or experience something you don't like, respectfully ask for it to stop. Our MAV Community Manager will be happy to help if you need support. Contact Claire Embregts if you're uncomfortable with any discussions/moderation: cembregts@mav.edu.au