About me

I have a PhD in Linguistics and over 25 years of experience as an educator in tertiary contexts. I currently lead the Learning Hub (Academic Language and Learning) at The University of Sydney. In this role, I coordinate, design and deliver academic support offerings to students from all backgrounds throughout their learning journey: from writing an essay to writing a PhD thesis.

My research interests include the intersection of language and ideology, language and education, and academic literacies.

If you’re seeking for a research supervisor and your topic is related to these areas, please send your proposal to alexandra.garcia@sydney.edu.au

Academic Skills

I develop resources to help students develop their academic language skills. One example is the Functional Grammar for Academic Writing 1 course. This resource aims to help learners understand the basic units of language from an SFL perspective with applications for academic writing. Here‘s an article from the conversation with 5 tips to write better university assignments.

Discipline-specific resources

Students learn best when academic language is embedded into their curriculum. These resources aim to develop reading skills in the students’ specific fields of study. Here is one for Architecture and one for Media and Communications.

HDR support

Writing the thesis can be as challenging as doing the research. Here is a playlist for one of the most challenging chapters of a PhD thesis: the literature review.

I am currently investigating how an online doctoral writing group can impact students’ written output and their ability to provide meaningful feedback.