DEMOGRAPHIC AND JOB SATISFACTION CHARACTERISTICS OF FLORIDA COMMUNITY COLLEGE FACULTY

The demographic and job satisfaction characteristics of Florida community college faculty were studied in Florida's 28 community colleges. A total of 1,116 faculty responded in the fall of 1977 to an instrument developed to measure faculty characteristics and attitudes.

The results showed that the Florida faculty is a satisfied faculty with over 95% reporting that they were satisfied with community college work as a career and with 72% stating that they plan to stay in the community college field until they retire. Second, it was found that faculty participation in in‐service training programs had increased significantly since 1968. In 1977‐1978, 69% of the faculty reported participation in one or more in‐service programs while the 1968 percentage was 37%.

It is concluded that periodic surveys in other community colleges and states similar to this one should provide useful information for the further development and improvement of community colleges.     

Religious tolerance in Oman: addressing religious prejudice through educational intervention

This paper examines the impact of a school‐based intervention entitled ‘Our Brothers and Sisters in Humanity’ on 10th grade female Omani students' religious tolerance. A questionnaire was administered before and after an intervention to a sample of 241 girls, of whom 116 were in the experimental group and 125 in the control group. A semi‐structured interview was conducted before and after the intervention with 16 participants, of whom 8 were from the experimental group and 8 from the control group. Analysis of the quantitative data in the postintervention round reveals that there are statistically significant differences between the experimental group and the control group in favour of the experimental group in religious tolerance. Similarly the experimental group shows greater tolerance when compared to the control group in post‐intervention interviews. The study suggests that religion is one of the most salient components of Omani pupils' ‘identity’. The participants use religion to define their relations with, and determine their tolerance of, those who hold different religious beliefs. However, we conclude that education that capitalises on the perceived similarities between religions can be a means to suppress intolerance.     

Kinetics of acoustic release of doxorubicin from stabilized and unstabilized micelles and the effect of temperature

Ultrasound is being investigated as a trigger mechanism to deliver high concentrations of chemotherapy drugs to cancerous tissues using polymeric micelles. In this paper, we examined the kinetics of acoustic release of doxorubicin using stabilized and non-stabilized micelles. Kinetic models were used to regress release and re-encapsulation time constants for three different compounds, namely non-stabilized Pluronic^® P105 micelles, P105 micelles stabilized using an interpenetrating network of N,N-diethylacrylamide and micelles formed by PEO-b-poly(NIPAAm-co-HEMA-lactate_n). Results showed that the kinetic release constant (k_r) depends on the micellar system under investigation. On the other hand, there is no statistically significant difference between re-encapsulation rate constants for stabilized and unstabilized micelles. We hypothesize that k_r depends on the degree of cross-linking or stabilization.     

Eye movements of university students with and without reading difficulties during naming speed tasks

Although naming speed (NS) has been shown to predict reading into adulthood and differentiate between adult dyslexics and controls, the question remains why NS is related to reading. To address this question, eye movement methodology was combined with three letter NS tasks (the original letter NS task by Denckla & Rudel, Cortex 10:186–202, 1974, and two more developed by Compton, The Journal of Special Education 37:81–94, 2003, with increased phonological or visual similarity of the letters). Twenty undergraduate students with reading difficulties (RD) and 27 without (NRD) were tested on letter NS tasks (eye movements were recorded during the NS tasks), phonological processing, and reading fluency. The results indicated first that the RD group was slower than the NRD group on all NS tasks with no differences between the NS tasks. In addition, the NRD group had shorter fixation durations, longer saccades, and fewer saccades and fixations than the RD group. Fixation duration and fixation count were significant predictors of reading fluency even after controlling for phonological processing measures. Taken together, these findings suggest that the NS–reading relationship is due to two factors: less able readers require more time to acquire stimulus information during fixation and they make more saccades.     

Toward a Hermeneutical Theory of International Human Rights Education

The purpose of this essay is to articulate and defend the epistemological foundations of international human rights education from the perspective of a hermeneutical interpretive methodology. Fuad Al‐Daraweesh and Dale Snauwaert argue here that this methodology potentially alleviates the challenges that face the cross‐cultural implementation of human rights education. While acknowledging the necessity of global human rights awareness, the authors maintain that local cultural conceptualization is imperative to the negotiated, local embrace of human rights. A critical, interpretive pedagogy emerges from grounding human rights education in a hermeneutic methodology. Thus, Al‐Daraweesh and Snauwaert advocate taking a hermeneutical approach in order to enlarge the scope and meaning of international human rights education.     

Cataloguing and Classification Education in Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) Countries

A content analysis approach was adopted to analyze relevant literature and course syllabi for the purpose of examining cataloguing and classification education in Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states. Important findings of this study include: traditional knowledge organization is still at the core of bibliographic control education; there are changes and developments in teaching methods; cooperative cataloguing, and partnerships with major specialized utilities are in the interest of educators; and emphasis on the practical part of cataloguing education is increasing to as much as 50% of the total teaching hours in some courses.     

Research Output from Palestine (1995–2012): A Bibliometric Study

Palestine is a small newly established state in the Middle East. The objective of this study was to assess the quantity and quality of research output from Palestine after Oslo peace accords. The data used for this study were retrieved from Scopus database (officially known as Sciverse Scopus). Bibliometric analysis was used to identify the pattern of publication, relative growth rate, authorship pattern, collaborative measures, author's productivity, most prolific authors, and most prolific journals. A total of 3,585 published documents were retrieved from Palestine. A steady increase was observed after 2001. The h-index of the retrieved documents was 57. Fifty-three (1.48%) documents were published in Eastern Mediterranean Health Journal, whereas 52 (1.45%) and 49 (1.37%) documents were published in Journal of Dispersion Science and Technology and Asian Journal of Chemistry, respectively. Half of the top 20 journals in which Palestinian researchers had published their articles were un-indexed in Institute for Scientific Information (ISI) web of knowledge. The highest number of documents published by a Palestinian researcher was 79. The main subject area of published documents from Palestine was medicine (717; 20.00%), followed by chemistry (551, 15.37%), and engineering (530, 14.78%). The top countries involved in research collaboration with Palestine were the United States (422, 11.70%), followed by Germany (381; 10.71%), and the United Kingdom (208; 5.83%). There was a significant correlation between number of collaborating countries with Palestine in one hand, and quantity and quality of research activity in Palestine on the other hand. The number of collaborating countries with Palestine increased almost ten-fold from 1995 to 2012. Research output from Palestine showed steady growth since the Oslo peace accords. Research output was high from certain scientific disciplines while was lagging from others. Future emphasis on joint research, international collaboration, and publishing in indexed journals is needed.     

Special Education in Arab Countries: Current challenges

Arab countries have undertaken various measures to develop special education programmes and services over the last three decades; nevertheless, major challenges remain regarding the expansion of these programmes and services and improving their quality. This article provides an update on disability and special education in Arab countries. Reflections on the historical development of special education in Arab societies are briefly presented. Major challenges currently faced by Arab countries in the field of special education are described, and some recommendations for action are offered.     

From passive to active: The impact of the flipped classroom through social learning platforms on higher education students' creative thinking

This study aimed to investigate the impact of the flipped classroom on the promotion of students' creative thinking. Students were recruited from the Faculty of Education at King Abdulaziz University in Saudi Arabia during the first semester of 2014. A multiple method research design was used to address the research questions. First, a two‐group quasi‐experimental design was implemented. The first group utilised the lecture‐based strategy (n = 28), while the second group utilised the flipped classroom (n = 27). Second, a survey questionnaire was distributed to assess the students' views about the flipped classroom, its role in the promotion of creativity and the difficulties students experienced with this strategy. The findings suggest that the flipped classroom may promote students' creativity, especially with regard to fluency, flexibility and novelty. Furthermore, the students viewed the flipped classroom as an approach that may significantly facilitate their creativity. However, several difficulties were associated with the flipped classroom, especially the students' limited preparation for this strategy. Accordingly, students must be prepared to utilise the flipped classroom and be provided with adequate e‐learning tools. In addition, it is important to consider students' study load and to provide meaningful in‐class activities.     

FOCUS ON PRACTICE: Teacher nomination of ‘mathematically gifted children with specific learning difficulties’ at three state schools in Jordan

In this article, Anies Al‐Hroub, assistant professor of educational psychology and special educational needs at the American University of Beirut in Lebanon, and David Whitebread, senior lecturer in psychology and education in the University of Cambridge Faculty of Education, discuss the identification, by teachers, of children who are gifted in mathematics and who also experience reading difficulties or specific learning difficulties. The findings reported here are based on research carried out in three state schools in Jordan, and reveal the extent to which teachers accurately nominated the ‘dual‐exceptional’ children studying in their classes. The paper reviews the issues and evidence relating to teacher nomination of these children and examines the quality of teacher nominations by comparing them with identification procedures using psychological and dynamic testing. Anies Al‐Hroub and David Whitebread reveal that the accuracy of the teacher nominations recorded in their research was highly variable and explore a series of factors influencing the processes of teacher nomination. They argue that teacher nomination is an essential first element in the identification process and can be easily improved. The authors call for professional development for teachers in order to raise awareness and to enable them to provide support for children with complex special educational needs more effectively.