Defining rules and roles in instructional contexts: A preliminary assessment of student perceptions

The classroom across the academy suffers from a most unbalanced approach to instructional research. The vast majority of instructional research is grounded squarely in an instructor's point of view. The student perspective is often neglected or ignored. Adding a more robust student perspective to scholarly discourse on the rules and roles, the various procedural and behavioral patterns that emerge over time, appropriate to our understanding of the classroom would move us toward a more balanced understanding of the phenomena. This study employs a triangulated method to examine the views of rules and roles in the classroom held by 155 student participants. Results suggest that students view their own demands for rule‐following and role behavior as far less rigorous than those they perceive for instructors. The findings suggest that an overall re‐orientation of instruction to better facilitate classroom communication may well be in order.     

Special educational needs and competing policy frameworks in England and Scotland

This paper explores a range of policy frameworks in play in the field of special educational needs and their relationship with procedural fairness and substantive justice. Drawing on analysis of post-1993 English and Scottish policy documents, dominant motifs in special educational needs policy are identified. It is argued that in both England and Scotland, there is a shift away from a policy framework based on professional control. Legal and bureaucratic policy frameworks are of growing importance in both countries, but change has been more rapid in England. Finally, the implications of comparative research for special educational needs policy and wider education policy are discussed.     

Cultural Persistence,Political Resistance,and Hope in the Community and School-Based Art of a Puerto Rican Diaspora Neighborhood

The authors describe themes of cultural persistence, political resistance, and hope in the art of one Puerto Rican neighborhood in the Midwestern United States. The themes are described across three contexts: community mural art, poetry from students in an alternative high school, and poetry from seventh grade students in a neighborhood middle school. In describing currents of Puerto Rican identity-making, resistance to gentrification, and struggles against local oppression that are evident in all three contexts, the authors argue that as they name their worlds, students commit acts of social justice through their perpetuation of historical and cultural themes situated within a tradition of community activism.     

Isolated to Integrated: An Evolving Medical Informatics Curriculum

ABSTRACT

A library-led introductory informatics theme has been part of the Albany Medical College undergraduate medical school curriculum as a concurrent theme since 1993. Initially, classes were limited to large group sessions focusing on general searching skills. Over the past several years, course content has been expanded and increasingly integrated into other themes and clerkships. Web-based self-paced tutorials have replaced many classroom sessions, and Web 2.0 technologies have been introduced. Collaborations with clinical and basic science faculty in other themes supplement and strengthen the theme.     

Narrative and social change: A case study of the Wagner act of 1935

The Wagner Act of 1935 (the National Labor Relations Act) transformed unionization and collective bargaining from legally‐acknowledged rights difficult to exercise into federally‐protected rights. The National Labor Relations Board was established as a legal body that could punish employers for violating workers’ rights to organize. A narrative analysis of the competing stories provided by the proponents and opponents of the Act reveals how consequence, context, and values interact in a narrative framework to legitimate social change in policies and to realign value structures.