Juggling competing activities: academic staff as doctoral candidates

ABSTRACT

This article explores the experiences of a group of established academic staff in New Zealand and the UK, as they undertake a doctorate in their home institutions. Our interest is in how individuals negotiate this dual status from a cultural-historical activity theory (CHAT) stance that explores how rules, tools, community and divisions of labour, and interacting activity systems, shape doctoral experiences. The focus in this article, having analysed their detailed narrative accounts, is on how academics experience three interdependent activity systems: those surrounding the thesis, the institutional context, and the home-life spheres. Issues related to time, workload and supervision issues, variability in collegial support and impact on personal priorities and time emerged. There is a range of particularities – from easy access to resources/supervisors to inflexible institutional regulations – applicable to this group of doctoral candidates. Negotiating life as an academic with concurrent doctoral candidature provides positive outcomes in terms of teaching, research confidence and general personal and professional development. However, a range of difficulties can also be encountered, particularly in relation to personal and professional relationships, and workload management.     

A Campus-Wide Investigation of Clicker Implementation: The Status of Peer Discussion in STEM Classes

At the University of Maine, middle and high school teachers observed more than 250 university science, technology, engineering, and mathematics classes and collected information on the nature of instruction, including how clickers were being used. Comparisons of classes taught with (n = 80) and without (n = 184) clickers show that, while instructional behaviors differ, the use of clickers alone does not significantly impact the time instructors spend lecturing. One possible explanation stems from the observation of three distinct modes of clicker use: peer discussion, in which students had the opportunity to talk with one another during clicker questions; individual thinking, in which no peer discussion was observed; and alternative collaboration, in which students had time for discussion, but it was not paired with clicker questions. Investigation of these modes revealed differences in the range of behaviors, the amount of time instructors lecture, and how challenging the clicker questions were to answer. Because instructors can vary their instructional style from one clicker question to the next, we also explored differences in how individual instructors incorporated peer discussion during clicker questions. These findings provide new insights into the range of clicker implementation at a campus-wide level and how such findings can be used to inform targeted professional development for faculty.     

The entrepreneurial university and academic discourses: The meta‐synthesis of Higher Education articles

The innovative teaching, knowledge and technology production and societal service activities of academics are largely discussed within the entrepreneurial university discourse in Higher Education journals. Therefore, this research focuses on a meta‐synthesis of Higher Education articles to better understand the concepts of the entrepreneurial university and entrepreneurial academic. After the systematic elimination based on keywords and titles, 25 articles have been selected from the top 10 Higher Education journals in the SCImago Journal Rankings. Content analysis was performed on these articles to highlight the common operational areas in entrepreneurial universities and activities of entrepreneurial academics. The meta‐synthesis shows that, both for universities and academics, entrepreneurship is overwhelmingly characterised by the commercialisation of scholarly activities that enrich institutional income revenue as well as academics’ personal income. However, such an approach can distance universities from their mission of public good; so Higher Education administrators should create mechanisms that would allow both to take place in a balanced way.     

Counseling With HEART: A Relationship Violence Prevention Program for College Students

Relationship violence is a salient concern on college campuses today, and psychoeducational groups may be an appropriate prevention format. This article describes a study measuring the impact of college student participation in the HEART (Help End Abusive Relationships Today) program, a series of group sessions designed to increase knowledge and awareness of relationship violence. Findings indicated significant changes for group participants postintervention. Implications and recommendations for college counselors are discussed.     

Strength,Weakness, Opportunity,Threat (SWOT) Analysis of the Adaptations to Anatomical Education in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland in Response to the Covid-19 Pandemic

The Covid-19 pandemic has driven the fastest changes to higher education across the globe, necessitated by social distancing measures preventing face-to-face teaching. This has led to an almost immediate switch to distance learning by higher education institutions. Anatomy faces some unique challenges. Intrinsically, anatomy is a three-dimensional subject that requires a sound understanding of the relationships between structures, often achieved by the study of human cadaveric material, models, and virtual resources. This study sought to identify the approaches taken in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland to deliver anatomical education through online means. Data were collected from 14 different universities in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland and compared adopting a thematic analysis approach. Once themes were generated, they were collectively brought together using a strength, weakness, opportunity, threat (SWOT) analysis. Key themes included the opportunity to develop new online resources and the chance to engage in new academic collaborations. Academics frequently mentioned the challenge that time constrains could place on the quality and effectiveness of these resources; especially as in many cases the aim of these resources was to compensate for a lack of exposure to cadaveric exposure. Comparisons of the actions taken by multiple higher education institutions reveal the ways that academics have tried to balance this demand. Discussions will facilitate decisions being made by higher education institutions regarding adapting the curriculum and assessment methods in anatomy.