Dr Darren Powell

PhD (Charles Sturt University); Master of Education with First class honours (University of Auckland); Postgraduate Diploma of Education with distinction (University of Auckland); Diploma of Teaching - Primary (Wellington College of Education); Bachelor of Physical Education (University of Otago)

Lecturer Health Education

In: Curriculum and Pedagogy » Faculty of Education and Social Work

Biography

Darren Powell is a Lecturer in the School of Curriculum and Pedagogy in the Faculty of Education and Social Work.

Darren's previous career was as a primary and intermediate school teacher. Over an eleven year period he taught students across all year levels (Year One - Eight) in schools in Auckland, Glasgow, London and Nottingham. Based on his work with children, Darren developed an interest in children's experiences of health and physical education and conducted research that explored children's understanding of concepts such as 'health', 'fitness' and 'fatness'.

In 2010 Darren joined the University of Auckland 's Faculty of Education as a part-time teaching assistant and was presented with an Outstanding Teaching Award.

More recently, Darren's research has interrogated the role of corporations - mostly food companies - and charities in schools. This includes a critical analysis of the various healthy lifestyles education resources and programmes that are provided free to primary schools and the ways in which certain notions of health are reproduced in ways that align with the private sectors' best interests, but not necessarily the children's.

Darren has published a number of articles, book chapters and videos about these research topics and regularly presents at international and national conferences. He is now writing a book based on his doctoral thesis.

Research | Current

Darren's current research focuses on the childhood obesity 'epidemic' and the ways in which corporations (especially those of the food and drink industry) and charities are now re-inventing themselves as 'part of the solution'. This includes an investigation of how schools, teachers and children are drawn into the global war on obesity, and how corporations are using concerns about children's lifestyles to promote themselves as healthy, philanthropic and educational.

Darren is the Principal Investigator for an FRDF research project: Marketing 'health' to children: an ethnographic study, investigating the ways in which children understand and experience various marketing strategies that attempt to 'teach' children about health. He has also joined an international interdisciplinary research group that is investigating Physical Activity and Nutrition at Sport Mega Events Research - the PHANSMER study - see https://phansmerstudy.com/.

Darren has conducted research on primary school children's understanding of concepts such as fitness, exercise, health and fatness. He is also a co-investigator for the evaluation of the Play.Sport project.

His research interests include:

School health and physical education (primary and secondary)
Childhood obesity (in particular the effects of the war on obesity)
Children's eating, physical activity and bodies
Children as consumers (e.g. advertising and marketing to children)
The corporatisation and privatisation of health and schooling
Corporate philanthropy and corporate social responsibility
Sociology of health, education and the body
Critical ethnography
Visual research methods

Teaching | Current

EDCURRIC 763: Special Topic: Sexuality and Health Education
EDPROF 740: Promoting learning through inquiry: Understanding our communities
HEALTHED101: Food and Education
EDCURRIC 604: Health and Physical Education
EDCURRIC 430: Critical Issues in Health and Physical Education
EDCURRIC 103: Health and Physical Education

Postgraduate supervision

Jean Allen - Doctoral Candidate

Honglu Zhang - Doctoral Candidate

Aimee Simpson - Doctoral Candidate

Ghodsi Izadi - Doctoral Candidate

Jason Nottage - Master of Education

Distinctions/Honours

Outstanding Teaching Award - University of Auckland, Faculty of Education
First class honours in Master of Education: 'Running in circles': Children's lessons in fitness and fatness

Responsibilities

Lecturer in Health Education

Areas of expertise

Childhood obesity research
Corporatisation, privatisation and commercialisation of Health and physical education
Primary school health education curriculum and pedagogy
Primary school physical education curriculum and pedagogy
Corporate philanthropy and social responsibility
Critical ethnography

Committees/Professional groups/Services

Membership of Professional Bodies

Physical Education New Zealand (PENZ)
New Zealand Health Education Association (NZHEA)
New Zealand Association for Research in Education (NZARE)

Selected publications and creative works (Research Outputs)

Dyson, B., Cowan, J., Gordon, B., Powell, D., & Shulruf, B. (2017). Physical education in Aotearoa New Zealand primary schools. European Physical Education Review, 1356336X1769808-1356336X1769808. 10.1177/1356336X17698083
Other University of Auckland co-authors: Ben Dyson
Powell, D. (2017). Darren Powell: Children to become critical consumers. http://www.nzherald.co.nz/hawkes-bay-today/news/article.cfm?c_id=1503462&objectid=11791264. Related URL.
Powell, D. (2017). Darren Powell: Needs of children, not Big Food, must win out. http://www.nzherald.co.nz/lifestyle/news/article.cfm?c_id=6&objectid=11776254. Related URL.
Powell, D. (2016). Governing the (un)healthy child-consumer in the age of the childhood obesity crisis. Sport, Education and Society, 1-14. 10.1080/13573322.2016.1192530
Fitzpatrick, K. J., & Powell, D. (2016). Sexuality Education: Policy in Neoliberal times. Paper presented at American Educational Research iAssociation (AERA) 2016 ; Public Scholarship to Educate Diverse Democracies, Washington, DC. 8 April - 12 April 2016. Related URL.
Other University of Auckland co-authors: Katie Fitzpatrick
McGlashan, H., & Powell, D. (2016). Porn for Beginners: Teaching and learning about pornography. Paper presented at Physical Education New Zealand (PENZ), Palmerston North. 11 July - 13 July 2016. Related URL.
Other University of Auckland co-authors: Hayley McGlashan
Pringle, R., & Powell, D. (2016). Critical pedagogical strategies to disrupt weight bias in schools. In E. Cameron, C. Russell (Eds.) The fat pedagogy reader: challenging weight-based oppression through critical education. Peter Lang. 10.3726/978-1-4539-1784-8
URL: http://hdl.handle.net/2292/29773
Powell, D. (2015). Outsourced: The hidden privatisation of teaching and learning in primary schools. Brisbane, Australia. 26 November - 26 November 2015. HMNS Seminar. Related URL.