Longitudinal analysis of the environmental attitudes of university students

This article addresses the important questions that higher education institutions ask concerning their impact on their students’ sustainability-related attributes ‘How do our students’ worldviews change as they experience higher education with us?’ The process of monitoring such a dynamic entity is fraught with statistical complexity but may not be impossible for an institution willing to ask whether or not its educational efforts in ‘education for sustainability’, ‘education for sustainable development’ or ‘environmental education’, and campus sustainability developments, are paralleled by changes in the attitudes of its students. We describe here a longitudinal survey process based on the revised New Ecological Paradigm scale, with two cohorts of students, in three programmes of study, operating over four years, with multiple survey inputs by each student. We implemented the longitudinal analysis using a linear mixed-effects model and describe here the development and testing of this model. We conclude that higher education institutions can benchmark the sustainability attributes of their students and monitor changes, if they are minded to. We invite higher education practitioners worldwide to join us in further developing suitable research instruments, processes and statistical models, and in further analysing the assumptions that link higher education to sustainability and to global citizenship.     

The Challenge of Evaluating Action Learning

The paper examines the benefits claimed for action learning at individual, organisational and inter-organisational levels. It goes on to identify both generic difficulties in evaluating development programmes and action learning specifically. The distinction between formative and summative evaluation is considered and a summative evaluation framework is outlined, based on recent reviews of evaluations of development programmes, while recognising that establishing clear causal links remains problematic.     

Knowledge production in a constructed field: reflections on comparative and international education

Adopting Maria Manzon’s theoretical framework, which draws on Foucault and proposes that comparative education as an academic field is socially constructed, I suggest that the field is neither stable nor well defined. To demonstrate this, I conduct a content analysis of the Comparative Education Review, using Klaus Krippendorff’s methodological framework to study comparative and international education (CIE) researchers’ understanding of the national—and of their related knowledge production in the field. Many comparativists express interests in multiple countries, and their knowledge production takes the form of individual country studies. The countries are habitually studied using a “problem approach” focusing on one specific aspect of the country under investigation and using an associated social science methodology deemed appropriate. Few comparativists are making explicit use of or reference to any methodology that is unique to comparative education. Efforts to catalog and systematize CIE research have demonstrated that the field is becoming so inclusive that it hardly is distinguishable from educational studies as a whole. Hence, I suggest that instead of speaking about unifying features of the field, it may be more relevant to speak about frequent elements, such as a focus on the national, and a knowledge production characterized by the academic practitioner who desires to improve the education systems studied. A third frequent element may be the focus on educational development, thus justifying the label of “comparative, international, and development education.” One challenge of the field is its dependence on Western social science discourses, which may be marginalizing other voices.     

A Classroom Exercise to Examine the Trade‐off between Mission Capacity and Life Cycle Cost

This article presents a classroom exercise, centered on a simulation that has been used for 4 years in an MBA program to help students develop an understanding of the trade‐offs involved in managing capital assets in the public sector. Though often ignored in business schools, mission is a key criterion that must be considered when managing such assets, and acts as a surrogate for profit. The case presents a rich environment in which the impact of cost reductions (or additional investments) on mission can be quantified, and trade‐offs can be assessed and discussed. It gives students a chance to develop creative ideas for process improvement, and provides sufficient data for them to analyze the impact of their suggestions in a rigorous way.     

A defensive mindset: A pattern of social information processing that develops early and predicts life course outcomes

The hypothesis was tested that some children develop a defensive mindset that subsumes individual social information processing (SIP) steps, grows from early experiences, and guides long-term outcomes. In Study 1 (Fast Track [FT]), 463 age-5 children (45% girls; 43% Black) were first assessed in 1991 and followed through age 32 (83% retention). In Study 2 (Child Development Project [CDP]), 585 age-5 children (48% girls, 17% Black) were first assessed in 1987 and followed through age 34 (78% retention). In both studies, measures were collected of early adverse experiences, defensive mindset and SIP, and adult outcomes. Across both studies, a robust latent construct of school-age defensive mindset was validated empirically (comparative fit index = .99 in each study) and found to mediate the impact of early child abuse (38% in FT and 29% in CDP of total effect) and peer social rejection (14% in FT and 7% in CDP of total effect) on adult incarceration.     

Unpacking foreshadowing in mathematics teachers’ planned practices

This paper provides an empirical exploration of mathematics teachers’ planned practices. Specifically, it explores the practice of foreshadowing, which was one of Wasserman’s (2015) four mathematical teaching practices. The study analyzed n?=?16 lessons that were planned by pairs of highly qualified and experienced secondary mathematics teachers, as well as the dialogue that transpired, to identify the considerations the teachers made during this planning process. The paper provides empirical evidence that teachers engage in foreshadowing as they plan lessons, and it exemplifies four ways teachers engaged in this practice: foreshadowing concepts, foreshadowing techniques, foregrounding concepts, and foregrounding techniques. Implications for mathematics teacher education are discussed.

     

Reconceptualizing student ratings of teaching to support quality discourse on student learning: a systems perspective

Higher Education - This paper summarizes the discourse on student ratings of teaching in higher education. It reconceptualizes student ratings within a larger process of promoting quality in...     

Concentrated or Fragmented? The U.S. Market for Online Higher Education

Research in Higher Education - As the financial challenges facing the U.S higher education industry mount, colleges and universities seek new activities that can improve their financial situation....