Kaylene Mladenovic
Cleveland Education and Training Centre, QLD
Wulgurukaba, Bindal
Teaching Fellow
Kaylene Mladenovic leads education at the Cleveland Education and Training Centre, based within Cleveland Youth Detention Centre, where 97% of students identify as Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander and most have experienced significant trauma.
When Kaylene began in early 2024, student achievement data was not comparable to other Queensland youth detention centres, so she drove a cultural shift from a passive, therapeutic model to precision learning, introducing individualised curriculum plans and an “every minute matters” ethos reinforced through staff coaching and daily assessment.
She also recruited and upskilled staff to deliver Vocational Education and Training, ensuring every student had access to a qualified trainer. This has resulted in VET units of competency rising 220%, with qualifications increasing 375% over the same period, outperforming every other detention centre in the state in 2025.
Recognising that students leaving detention often returned to school with little support, Kaylene launched Project Next in 2024, a supported re-engagement program that helped pave the way for students to transition to the new statewide Specialised Alternate Learning Programs.
She created a regional Transition Officer model spanning Townsville, Cairns, Mount Isa and Mackay, and established cross-centre information-sharing protocols with Brisbane and West Moreton to improve continuity of care for students moving between facilities.
Kaylene has built strong partnerships with Youth Justice personnel and Queensland Health staff and collaboratively redesigned learning spaces into “flexi-spaces” resembling a mainstream school. She also initiated and hosted principal walkthroughs to build understanding of the detention education setting, learning programs and ways to support students.
To overcome restrictions on accessing practical equipment, she introduced Virtual Reality(VR) and Augmented Reality(AR) programs, including AR welding simulation giving every student hands-on trade exposure regardless of restriction level, and achieved a 1:1 device ratio across all classrooms.