STEPS - Library - Central Queensland University

Part One: The history of STEPS
By this time, the STEPS program, after continued government funding, was
in its fifth year, and the benefits of the program were tangibly emerging
within the university context. Many students had graduated from STEPS
and had commenced tertiary study, like Bernadette Stacey pictured below. 53
Former STEPS student Bernadette Stacey gains some practical classroom
experience as a student teacher as part of progress towards her Graduate Diploma in
Teaching.
However, the modest government grants that had funded the program to
date were not enough to continue spreading STEPS to the other campuses,
Bundaberg and Mackay, which had been established a few years earlier. To
enable the STEPS program to be provided in these regions, the University
for the first time provided financial support from its recurrent funds. 54
As the campuses at Bundaberg and Mackay were relatively new, Dr Arthur
Appleton saw the provision of the STEPS program in 1990 as an excellent
opportunity to mark out the University’s territory, that is, to further
establish its reputation as the major provider of tertiary education in those
regions. 55
Bundaberg STEPS banner.
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