Quality of alternatives,institutional preference,and institutional commitment among first‐year college students

We tested the hypotheses derived from investment theory that quality of alternatives and institutional preference exert additive and interactive effects on institutional commitment in a sample of 1166 first‐year college students at a large state university, who were surveyed within two weeks of the start of their first semester. As predicted, a hierarchical regression analysis revealed: as quality of alternatives increased, institutional commitment decreased; as preference for the university increased, institutional commitment increased; and as institutional preference decreased, the inverse relation between quality of alternatives and institutional commitment increased. The findings of the present study suggest that first‐year college students who do not rank their university as one of their top three choices and who rate the quality of alternatives as high should be classified as at risk of dropping out and targeted for proactive advising.     

Changing lives: improving care leaver access to higher education

ABSTRACT

Australian and international research documents the limited access of young people transitioning from out-of-home care (OOHC) to further and higher education. This paper examines the processes, outcomes, and key findings of the Raising Expectations project, a collaborative university and industry approach to promote higher education among care leavers at two Australian universities. That approach was informed by the co-authors' previous research, including interviews with enrolled care-leaver students. The paper highlights the relevance of that research in the design and implementation of Raising Expectations. Our findings reiterate the importance of policy and practice reforms informed by rigorous research, particularly involving the voices and agency of care leavers. We outline strategies adopted by the participating universities resulting in a fourfold increase in enrolments, growth in school outreach activities, and significantly improved retention rates. The paper also highlights barriers to higher education access and success, through care-leaver student interviews and policy analysis. These interviews revealed the need for better university outreach and information to prospective care-leaver students, improved support for enrolled care-leaver students, and better capturing of data by universities and governments. The paper also highlights policy barriers to the greater expansion of care-leavers at university, especially in the absence of extended state care.     

Academic drift in Danish professional engineering education. Myth or reality? Opportunity or threat?

This article examines whether and, if so, to what extent academic drift can be said to have taken place in Danish professional engineering education. If the answer is affirmative, what were the driving forces behind it and what are the consequences – if any? First, a theoretical and conceptual framework for the discussion is introduced. This is followed by a case study of institutional change in higher education in Denmark, with a particular emphasis on two institutional examples, the two previously independent engineering colleges that recently merged with universities. The two examples are based on data gathered in interviews with teachers and management in these two engineering colleges (now both part of a university). In conclusion, based on the findings the questions posed in the title of this article are addressed and possible benefits and drawbacks of increased academisation of professional engineering education are discussed.     

Diversification in Argentine higher education: Dimensions and impact of private sector growth

Private education is a remarkably dynamic area of change in post-secondary education, particularly in Latin America. Evidence of growth in the number of private institutions and enrollment suggests that higher education is becoming increasingly diversified into two sectors – public and private. While this appears to be true throughout Latin America, and much of the developing world, recent evidence from Argentina casts doubt on the degree to which private sector growth trends may actually translate into a significant increase in the impact of private institutions in higher education, where impact is proxied by the relative share of student enrollment and graduates. This study explores the dimensions and impact of private expansion in Argentina, and places the findings in a comparative (regional) and theoretical framework. The analysis shows that, despite unprecedented growth in the number of private universities, the public sector remains the dominant provider of university education. Private institutions, while certainly more numerous and training a growing number of students, do not account for a larger share of university enrollment. They have, however, developed specific niches (e.g., in graduate level training and in urban areas). Significantly, following a pattern of institutional proliferation found throughout Latin America, some private universities offer elite alternatives to prestigious public institutions. The findings serve to qualify apparent `gains' in private higher education and to underscore the need for further research into the relevant intrasectoral (public and private) dimensions of change in post-secondary education.     

An analysis of mobility in global rankings: making institutional strategic plans and positioning for building world-class universities

Since the start of the twenty-first century, university rankings have become internationalized. Global rankings have a variety of uses, levels of popularity and rationales and they are here to stay. An examination of the results of the current global ranking reveals that well-reputed world-class universities are amongst the top ranked ones. A major concern for university administrators in many parts of the world is how to use the global rankings wisely in their mid-term and long-term strategic planning for building their institutions into world-class universities. Four major global rankings have been developed: the Academic Ranking of World Universities, the World University Rankings, the Webometrics Ranking of World Universities and the Performance Ranking of Scientific Papers for World Universities. The main purpose of this paper is to explore the most influential indicators in these global university rankings that will affect the rank mobility of an institution. Based on an analysis of correlation coefficients and K-means clustering, a model of strategic institutional planning for building a world-class university is proposed.     

Hidden voices in higher education: inclusive policies and practices in social science and law classrooms

This paper pertains to a broader biographical-narrative research project which studies barriers and support as identified by students with disabilities at a Spanish University (Barriers and Support That Disabled Students Identify in the University. Project funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (Dir. Dr Anabel Moriña; Ref. EDU 2010–16264, 2010–2014)). The present study focuses specifically on barriers and support identified by students with disabilities enrolled in undergraduate programmes in the Social Sciences and Law. The purpose of this paper is to analyse, from the point of view of disabled students (applying the biographic-narrative methodology), which barriers and which support this group encounters in Higher Education. To this end, findings are organised in the following categories: general institutional data; infrastructure, architectural and accessibility-related data; faculty and teaching-related data; data relating to fellow students; and suggestions for improving the university and/or university classrooms. In the Conclusions section, we return to our earlier discussion of key findings which shed some light on how the University helps or hinders learning among participants in the study. From this perspective, taking as a reference the social model of disability, we conclude that in order to be inclusive, the University needs to commit itself to adopting proactive measures that eliminate the barriers that do not permit the learning and the full participation of the students in question.     

Effective University Leadership and Management of Learning and Teaching in a Widening Participation Context: Findings from two national Australian studies

Abstract

The paper argues for the need to increase student participation in university governance, especially in relation to high‐level decision‐making concerning the aims and mission of tertiary institutions. The paper examines the arguments in favour of, and against, student participation in university governance. It also provides an overview of the findings of recent empirical studies on the topic. The need for a process of negotiation in the setting of higher education aims is emphasised and several suggestions are offered regarding ways of increasing student involvement in the aims‐setting process.     

Promoting university–industry collaboration in Malaysia: stakeholders’ perspectives on expectations and impediments

University–Industry Collaboration (UIC) has been identified as an essential item on Malaysia’s agenda for transforming itself into knowledge and innovation-based economy. However, despite the efforts, most initiatives have had limited results. This paper reports on an explorative study that sought to understand the contemporary realities of UIC in the Malaysian context. In particular, the study identified the expectations and impediments to UIC, from the perspectives of three groups of stakeholders – the academics, the industry players and policymakers. The findings reveal a number of barriers, including cultural differences, perceived lack of academic expertise and reputation, an inadequacy of institutional policies and regulations, lack of trust, issues of intellectual property rights, and the lack of an appropriate reward system. This paper concludes by proposing policy recommendations and strategies that could be used by the government, university, and the industry to promote further and foster university-industry collaborative opportunities and initiatives.     

Recognition of prior learning (RPL) policy in Australian higher education: the dynamics of position-taking

The Bourdieuian concept of ‘position-taking’ is applied in this analysis of recognition of prior learning (RPL) policy and practice in Australian higher education. Data from institutional documents and participant interviews indicate that, within RPL policy, the universities selectively employ prevailing discourses of ‘quality’ and ‘equity’ to reinforce or potentially improve their reputation and symbolic power in the field of higher education. There is no common consensus about either equity or quality across the sector, as each university interprets the two concepts for its own benefit. The evidence suggests that, despite rhetoric in government policy implying that both are equally important, quality is a far stronger discourse and policy imperative than equity in RPL policy and practice. Also, RPL policies and practices provide an insight into how the key policy priorities of equity and quality are addressed by universities, when applied to a specific educational process or practice.     

我国层级性大学信任的生成：权威文化与制度绩效的共同影响

对我国大学信任不平衡结构的实证考察及理论思考,是大学信任研究和大学内部治理效能提升的应有之义。本文从权威文化和制度绩效两方面考察了我国层级性大学信任的生成机制,深入探讨了两者的共同影响和异质性效应。实证研究发现,当前我国大学信任呈现出随着大学层次的下降而逐级下降的层级性特点,这一特点受到了权威文化和制度绩效的负向建构作用。研究还发现,权威文化和制度绩效对层级性大学信任的影响不是单独起作用的,而是共同产生影响。研究结果表明,高等教育公平可以作为威权主义价值观影响层级性大学信任的替代性变量,应建立基于分类分层的大学信任差别化构建机制,以弥合重点大学信任和非重点大学信任的差距。     

Monitoring the pathways and outcomes of people from disadvantaged backgrounds and graduate groups

The development of a strong and vibrant knowledge economy is linked directly to successful learning outcomes among university graduates. Building evidence‐based insights on graduate outcomes plays a particularly important role in shaping planning and practice. To this end, this paper analyses some key findings from the Graduate Pathways Survey, the first national study in Australia of bachelor degree graduates' outcomes five years after course completion. It focuses on the outcomes of graduates from disadvantaged groups, people of particular significance in an expanding and increasingly important higher education system. After advancing the rational for this analysis, the paper sketches the overall research approach. The paper continues with an analysis of education and employment outcomes for the target groups, and concludes by summarising implications for building further research insights.     

The need for context-sensitive measures of educational quality in transnational higher education

This paper argues that the current approach to educational quality formation in transnational higher education promotes educational imperialism, and that guidelines and practices should be altered to embrace context-sensitive measures of quality. The claims are sustained by findings from a study that investigated how academics understood and pursued educational quality in an Australian university programme delivered in partnership with a Chinese university in China. A key finding was that a home programme functioned as the single reference point for quality in the programme delivered in China. Quality in the China programme was sought through the imposition of practices and philosophies associated with the home programme, which required the suppression of local educational traditions. The paper points out that reliance on a home programme as the single measure of quality is encouraged by governing UNESCO/OECD guidelines on quality in cross-border provision.     

The personal tutor–student relationship: student expectations and experiences of personal tutoring in higher education

The personal tutor plays a key role in the student experience at university, and personal tutoring embodies the student relationship with the university, suggesting that it has the potential to provide insights beyond that specific relationship to the institution and higher education context. A focus session with first year undergraduate students explored expectations and experiences of personal tutoring from the student perspective. Interpretative phenomenological analysis was used to explore students’ lived experiences, and identified superordinate themes of expectations, experiences and relationships, with cluster themes including independence and authenticity. Developing a positive and genuine relationship with the personal tutor was found to ‘buffer’ against some of the first year challenges and contribute towards a sense of belonging. Importantly, this study provides evidence that experiencing poor personal tutoring is worse than not having a personal tutor at all, as this can lead to students experiencing strong negative emotions and re-evaluating their decision to go to university. Implications of these findings in the current higher education context of fee-paying students and competing institutional demands are discussed.     

Tactics or strategies? Exploring everyday conditions to facilitate implementation of an Indigenous graduate attributes project

In 2017 Universities Australia (UA), the peak body representing Australian universities released its Indigenous Strategy 2017–2020. The document unites universities together in common goals for Indigenous achievement, filling a notable gap in the Australian higher education landscape. The Strategy outlines a comprehensive plan for enhanced Indigenous outcomes in critical areas of higher education including student access and success, graduate research, and community engagement. This paper focuses on the implementation of Indigenous curriculum for all Australian university graduates which is a key aspect of the Strategy. The changing Indigenous higher education landscape invites the nuanced analysis that critical examination of universities, as organisations, might elicit. Drawing on de Certeau’s notion of tactics and strategies, the paper examines the policy and cultural climate of an Australian university which supports an Indigenous Graduate Attribute curriculum project.     

Chinese TEFL academics’ perceptions about research: an institutional case study

Research capacity building has become a prominent theme in higher education institutions in China, as across the world. However, Chinese TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) academics’ research capacity has been quite limited. In order to build their research capacity, it is necessary to understand their perceptions about research. This case study focuses on TEFL academics in a Chinese research university with the purpose of describing their motivation to conduct research, the value they accorded to research and their views about the institutional research requirements. Six TEFL academics from the sample university were interviewed. The findings indicate that the Chinese TEFL academics’ research endeavour was driven by external and internal needs. Research was recognised as having a multi‐dimensional value, but various concerns were expressed about the institutional research requirements. The findings suggest several implications for institutional and departmental research administrators to further support TEFL academics’ research capacity building.     

Tracing assessment policy discourses in neoliberalised higher education settings

This article explores assessment policy in two European universities with different political, historical and social backgrounds: the University of Glasgow and Tallinn University. The University of Glasgow is a well-established Russell Group university in the UK; Tallinn University is a relatively new university in post-Soviet Estonia, shaped by very recent neoliberalisation processes. By applying a Foucauldian theorisation and Faircloughian methodology, this article approaches assessment policy as not only relating to institutional contexts but also national and global policy environments. The article argues that the assessment policy in Glasgow relates to globally dominant neoliberal discourses of accountability and excellence. These discourses have turned assessment into a complex technology of government that manages educational processes as well as academic and student subjectivities. While Tallinn University is shaped by neoliberalism at strategic levels, the policy documents in Tallinn still indicate a strong sense of local tradition where regulations have a modest impact on academic freedom and assessors’ disciplinary power over students.     

Taking stock of taking equity: The last frontier of university technology transfer

This paper addresses the question of what potential success factors are relevant when developing and managing higher education–business partnerships. To shed light on this question, the paper presents a review of research literature on the possible success factors in university–industry relations. To shed further light on the factors identified in the literature, this paper reports on an empirical study of cross‐sector collaboration between four regional universities and energy firms in Norway. The empirical study should be seen as a “relevance check” of the factors identified in the extant literature on university–industry collaboration, within the particular context of education‐related partnerships. Based on the review and case studies, implications for management and further research are discussed.     

Permanent uncertainty as normality? Finnish-Russian double degrees in the post-Crimea world

ABSTRACT

EU-Russia higher education cooperation has continued despite global tensions including Crimea incorporation. One example of this cooperation is the development of Finnish-Russian double degree programmes.

This paper focuses on institutional environments where double degrees develop and asks how and why they produce uncertainty from inside Finnish and Russian universities in the period of this unfavourable political situation. The matryoshka model is applied to understand the institutional environment of a university and the institutions around it. The institutional nature of a double degree is determined by comparative analysis of how internal university stakeholders in Finland and Russia perceive a programme’s benchmarks.

The study is based on the analysis of interviews conducted in partner universities. This paper discusses how perceptions of double degrees influence uncertainty in programme provision within and between institutional environments in Finnish and Russian universities. In addition, the level of institutionalisation of the double degrees may be evaluated.     

试论院校研究理论构建

文章将对院校研究理论构建的诸多前提性问题进行初步探讨,结合高等教育理论体系构建、中国特色院校研究实践,论述了院校研究理论构建的必要性,将院校研究实践与理论构建结合起来,有助于在中国文化传统和高校治理环境下,进一步推动院校研究的开展,为高校管理科学化提供决策支持。     

Process-model feminism in the Corporate University

ABSTRACT

In a period characterised by worries over the rise of the corporate university, it is important to ask what role feminism plays in the academy, and whether that role is commensurate with feminist values and ethics. Commercial and political pressures brought to bear on the encounter between instructor and student can rob teaching of its efficacy, and the effects of institutional limitations on research may be equally troublesome. This essay argues that through a process-model approach, feminists can understand and intervene in ongoing shifts in institutional governance and mitigate their effects on teaching and research, and that process-model pedagogy is a form of microactivism existing independent of pedagogical content, making process-model feminism fundamentally materialist, radically strategic, and highly portable. Through a discussion of pedagogical and administrative practices in which process-model feminism can intervene, this essay suggests a way of understanding and inhabiting feminism’s current place in the ‘corporate’ academy.