Post-critical writing praxis as a qualitative researcher

The intention of this paper is to unsettle our habits of scholarly writing and reading, from within the grids of intelligibility of Western, rationalist materiality, so as to make visible what we/I no longer often see: the academic writing and publishing constraints that discipline our assemblages of knowledge. Taking poststructuralist articulations of the ‘critical’ and ‘ethical’ as heuristics for developing a praxis of critical deconstructive authoring, where agency is coterminous with, not external to, the event of writing, it puts to work Foucault’s perspective that the subject is a form, not a substance, (Foucault, 1984 Foucault, M. (1984). The ethics of the concern of the self as a practice of freedom. In P. Rabinow (Ed.), (2000) Essential works of Michel Foucault 1954-1984 – Vol. 1 ethics, subjectivity and truth (pp. 281–302). London: Penguin [Google Scholar], p. 290) to explore one way of crafting ‘an academic subject yet to come’ (Ball, 2016 Ball, S. (2016). Neoliberal education? Confronting the slouching beast. Policy Futures in Education, 14(8), 1046–1059.10.1177/1478210316664259[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar], p. 2). Beginning with a brief consideration of the normative mechanisms that govern scholarly writing, it then uses some of the conceptual tools of Foucault, Derrida and Spivak to unfold and vindicate spaces in the grids of governance for reforming the subject.     

Implementing Basic Education: An African Experience

This paper analyses some of the difficulties involved in implementing the recently approved Basic Education Program for primary and secondary education in Sierra Leone. Among some of the problems and difficulties that are discussed and analysed are funding, training and retention of teachers, curriculum reform, language development, equipment and supplies, and evaluation. To effectively implement the new program, teachers' conditions of service, salary, and allowances need to be carefully examined. This analysis will attempt to examine such issues based on empirical data. The article also makes a critical examination of the new continuous assessment system. The paper concludes that political stability is an important factor in the implementation of basic education.     

Improving science inquiry with elementary students of diverse backgrounds

This study examined the impact of an inquiry‐based instructional intervention on (a) children's ability to conduct science inquiry overall and to use specific skills in inquiry, and (b) narrowing the gaps in children's ability among demographic subgroups of students. The intervention consisted of instructional units, teacher workshops, and classroom practices. The study involved 25 third‐ and fourth‐grade students from six elementary schools representing diverse linguistic and cultural groups. Quantitative results demonstrated that the intervention enhanced the inquiry ability of all students regardless of grade, achievement, gender, ethnicity, socioeconomic status (SES), home language, and English proficiency. Particularly, low‐achieving, low‐SES, and English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) exited students made impressive gains. The study adds to the existing literature on designing learning environments that foster science inquiry of all elementary students. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 42: 337–357, 2005     

An instructional intervention's impact on the science and literacy achievement of culturally and linguistically diverse elementary students

This research examined the impact of the first‐year implementation of an instructional intervention to promote achievement and equity in science and literacy for culturally and linguistically diverse elementary students. The research addressed three areas: (a) overall science and literacy achievement, (b) achievement gaps among demographic subgroups, and (c) comparison with national (NAEP) and international (TIMSS) samples of students. The research involved 1,523 third‐ and fourth‐grade students at six elementary schools in a large urban school district. Significance tests of mean scores between pre‐ and posttests indicate statistically significant increases on all measures of science and literacy at both grade levels. While achievement gaps widened with third graders on some of the measures, the gaps tended to narrow with fourth graders. The results based on item‐by‐item comparisons with NAEP TIMSS samples of students indicated overall positive performance of the students in the research at the end of the school year. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 42: 857–887, 2005     

Rethinking the employability of international graduate migrants: Reflections on the experiences of Zimbabweans with degrees from England

The last decade has seen the rise of literature focused on the rapid expansion of international students in higher education globally and the growing policy discourse around improving graduate employability. However, both, inevitably, have limitations. Together, they tend to homogenise international learners and see them narrowly as simply economic actors. More recently, however, there have been signs of important new developments in both literatures, drawing on interactive employability and capability accounts that stress both agency and structure in more satisfactory ways. We seek to further the development of an account that bridges the new wave of student mobility research and capability–employability research. In doing so, we offer two further elements to the literature. First, we aim to bridge the gap between accounts of international higher education and those of migration and diasporic studies. Second, we deliberately focus on a group that is marginal to the mainstream discourse but who are migrants that have engaged in international higher education in order to improve their labour market prospects, amongst other motivations. We do this through examining the stories of five Zimbabweans who embarked on additional higher educational studies in England after migrating to the country. Through this unique approach, we offer an important new perspective on how the debates on international higher education, employability and migration can be taken forward through closer articulation between these accounts.     

‘They want more of everything’: what university middle managers’ attitudes reveal about support for off-campus doctoral students

Advances in technology and a shifting demographic of post-graduate students have resulted in a larger than ever number of off-campus PhD students. These students tend to be less satisfied than their on-campus counterparts with their candidature experience. Improving the current situation requires effort from multiple university stakeholders, including academic middle managers, who play a role in allocating resources and setting research training agenda. However, with the intensification of academic workload, academic managers might not view the support of off-campus PhD students as a high priority. This study investigates the attitudes of middle managers in a large Australian university concerning the provision of training and support to off-campus PhD students. The findings reveal that a complex interplay of discourses hinder the provision of support to off-campus PhD students. Implications for practice are discussed.     

The public's trust in scientific claims regarding offshore oil drilling

Our study examines how individuals decide which scientific claims and experts to believe when faced with competing claims regarding a policy issue. Using an experiment in a public opinion survey, we test the source content and credibility hypotheses to assess how much confidence people have in reports about scientific studies of the safety of offshore oil drilling along the California coast. The results show that message content has a substantial impact. People tend to accept reports of scientific studies that support their values and prior beliefs, but not studies that contradict them. Previous studies have shown that core values influence message acceptance. We find that core values and prior beliefs have independent effects on message acceptance. We also find that the sources of the claims make little difference. Finally, the public leans toward believing reports that oil drilling is riskier than previously believed.     

Professional development in inquiry‐based science for elementary teachers of diverse student groups

As part of a larger project aimed at promoting science and literacy for culturally and linguistically diverse elementary students, this study has two objectives: (a) to describe teachers' initial beliefs and practices about inquiry‐based science and (b) to examine the impact of the professional development intervention (primarily through instructional units and teacher workshops) on teachers' beliefs and practices related to inquiry‐based science. The research involved 53 third‐ and fourth‐grade teachers at six elementary schools in a large urban school district. At the end of the school year, teachers reported enhanced knowledge of science content and stronger beliefs about the importance of science instruction with diverse student groups, although their actual practices did not change significantly. Based on the results of this first year of implementation as part of a 3‐year longitudinal design, implications for professional development and further research are discussed. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 41: 1021–1043, 2004     

Gender Roles at Home and School

Parents of 116 first‐year pupils at an urban comprehensive school were studied by questionnaire and interview. They were asked about their educational and occupational aspirations for their children, their views on sexual equality and their children's out‐of‐school activities. Educational aspirations were found to be high, with little differentiation between the sexes. Parents were enthusiastic about their daughters studying physical science and neutral about craft subjects. Occupational aspirations were also high and although they tended to be sex‐stereotyped, parents were found to be generally supportive of non‐traditional choices. Class differences were few. Most parents were in favour of working mothers, equal pay and men helping with housework. However these egalitarian attitudes coexisted with more traditional assumptions about male breadwinners and a woman's main responsibility being to her children. Parents’ own domestic labour and that which they required of their children was strongly sex‐stereotyped. The messages which children receive about gender from their homes are contradictory, but not as uniformly traditional as many teachers assume.