'And now we have the intervention mob': upholding the principles of ethical research in a complex research environment

Australian schools have undergone enormous changes in recent years, which have impacted on the ways in which schools are led, managed and operated. These changes call for the further enhancing of educational leaders' skills and capacities, not just to cope with their changing roles and responsibilites, but to also deal with tensions created by these changes. Put into a remote Aboriginal context in the Northern Territory (NT), many of these changes have emanated from government policies - not all to do with education, but nevertheless having impact on schooling - as well as philosophies and views, that have ranged, historically, from assimilation to the current federal government's 'Intervention' policy.

'Linking Worlds: Strengthening the leadership capacity of Indigenous educational leaders in remote education settings' is a a four-year research project funded by the Australian research council and awarded in2005. The 'Linking Worlds' project aims to :

"redefine educational leadership as aplied to remote Indigenous communities through the process of identifying and analysing the various dimensions that relate to it ... (and also) ... to establish the role and relationship of the educational leader with respect to constructing Indigenous cultural identity and social well-being (d'Arbon, Frawley and Richardson, p.8)".

The project brings together the concerns for enhancing Aboriginal educational leadership and the research interest of the Flagship for Creative and Authentic Leadership at Australian Catholic University (ACU), and Batchelor Institute of Indigenous Tertiary Education (BIITE) as research partners, and the collaborating organisations of the Australian Principals' Associations Professional Development Council (APAPDC), Catholic Education Darwin CEO NT), and the Northern Territory Department of Education and Training (NT DET).

Research had just begun to collect data in a number of remote NT Aboriginal communities when the then Coalition federal government announced its 'intervention' into a number of these communities. This chapter deals with the research issues faced by the researcher, and their reactions and application to the 'LLinking worlds' project