Research Experiences of Staff within a Specialist UK Higher Education Institution: Challenges,opportunities and priorities

The study discussed here was based on a collective case approach involving a specialist UK higher education institution. Six individual interviews were carried out with a cross-sectional sample of the institution’s staff members. Additional information was gained through observations and examination of relevant documents. These data were interrogated with the purpose of exploring how the institution had made the transition from a teacher training college to a teaching-led higher education institution with a particular commitment to developing research capacity. This analysis yielded a number of key findings: first, the institution had experienced a cultural shift, with research forming a more noticeable profile; second, practitioner-oriented research was the dominant research endeavour; and third, there appeared to be an incomplete understanding of the potential of research to change a staff member’s career and teaching practice. The article concludes by giving consideration to the implications of the findings.     

The impact of reform policies on teachers' work and professionalism in the Chinese Mainland

This paper examines the impact of reform policies on the work of Chinese teachers. It explores the policy context in which a fragile teaching profession attempts to develop and discusses the dynamics of interacting societal forces that have created the dilemmas for the teachers. The authors argue that while the continual implementation of reform policies has fostered a new outlook in Chinese schools, calls for profound change in schooling have caused much anxiety among teachers. The teachers' anxiety stems from the incongruence between their professional outlook, which is intimately linked to student academic achievement, and the dictates of state reform measures, which seek to broaden the conception of education to include other areas of human development. Throughout the years of reform, teachers have had to stretch their professional capacity in order to satisfy competing demands engendered by reform measures and educational reality. It is in the tensions caused by the implementation of reform policies that the humanism of teacher professionalism is magnified. In this paper, the authors discuss the educational and social issues that surround the teachers' preference for conventional practices.     

Modeling Educational Effectiveness in Classrooms: The Use of Multi-Level Structural Equations to Model Students’ Progress

Long-standing and enduring problems in quantitative studies of educational effectiveness relate to fitting models that adequately reflect the complex inter-relationships among multivariate, multilevel factors affecting students’ educational progress, particularly among those that operate within classrooms. This article illustrates one approach to solving such difficulties by combining the analytic approaches of multilevel analysis and structural equation modeling in a two-stage process. The data used are drawn from a longitudinal study of teacher and school effectiveness for three Grade-level cohorts of 4,558 students clustered within 334 class/teacher groups in 52 elementary schools. The article provides estimates of inter-relationships among achievement and social background factors including ‘critical events’ on students’ progress in mathematics, together with their affective schooling experiences and inattentive behaviors in the classroom. Findings are presented indicating the extent to which progress can be accounted for by the grouping effects of students within classes and schools, highlighting the importance of accounting for the interdependent effects among variables. Both the substantive and methodological implications of the findings are discussed. Résumé De longue date et de manière persistante, les problèmes posés dans les études quantitatives sur l’efficacité de l’enseignement tiennent à la capacité d’élaborer des modèles qui reflètent de manière adéquate la complexité des interrelations parmi les multiples variables, avec leurs multiples niveaux, qui interviennent dans la progression des étudiants, particulièrement en ce qui concerne celles qui opèrent à l’intérieur même des classes dans les écoles. Cet article présente une approche cherchant à résoudre de telles difficultés en combinant les techniques de l’analyse multivariée avec un modèle d'équation structurale impliquant un processus à deux niveaux. Les données utilisées sont tirées d’une étude longitudinale sur l’efficience des écoles et des enseignants portant sur des cohortes de trois degrés scolaires touchant 4558 élèves provenant de 334 groupes classe/enseignant dans 52 écoles élémentaires. L’article fournit des estimations concernant les interrelations entre la réussite scolaire et des facteurs relevant de l’environnement social incluant des “événements critiques” dans la progression des élèves en mathématiques, mis en rapport avec leur expérience scolaire affective et des comportements inattentifs en classe. Les conclusions présentées indiquent la mesure dans laquelle le progrès peut être expliqué par des effets de groupes d’élèves à l’intérieur des classes et des écoles. Elles éclairent l’importance de la prise en compte de l’interdépendance des éléments parmi les variables. La justification et les implications méthodologiques des conclusions sont discutées. (Traduction: Raymond Hutin, Dr ès sciences de l’éducation, Dardagny / Suisse)     

Assessing physicians' intentions to talk about sex when they vaccinate nine-year-old to 15-year-old girls against HPV

The human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine provides physicians with an opportunity to have conversations with girls about sex and sex-related topics. Current research suggests that these conversations are not happening. This study was designed to assess whether physicians would use the HPV vaccination as an opening to communicate with nine-year-old to 15-year-old female patients about sex using the Theory of Planned Behavior as a framework. The study also assessed what sexual health topics physicians were willing to discuss when they vaccinated patients and at what ages they would be willing to discuss each topic. Differences in communication were also examined between older and younger physicians and female and male physicians. A random sample (n = 207) of all family practice and pediatric physicians in a rural, Midwest state in the USA were mailed a survey about the HPV vaccine and their intentions to talk about sex-related topics. Specifically, the survey questions assessed the theoretical constructs: attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived behaviour control. The results point to physicians' intentions to talk about sex when they vaccinate. Most physicians intended to talk about sexually transmitted infections when they vaccinate against HPV (90.3%). A multivariate linear regression reveals that physicians' intentions to talk about sex are influenced by attitudes (β = 0.18, p < 0.05), subjective norms (β = 0.53, p < 0.001), and perceived behavioural control (β = 0.15, p < 0.05). Physicians intended to talk about a variety of sex-related topics when they vaccinate nine-year-old to 15-year-old girls against HPV. The research indicated that physicians' intentions were high, but do not indicate how well physicians are prepared for this communication with nine-year-old to 15-year-old girls about sex.     

Canadian school programs for students with emotional/behavioural disorders: A Decade of programs,policies, and practice

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this project was to examine programs and services for students with emotional/behavioural disorders (E/BD) across Canada. It is a replication of a survey undertaken a decade prior intended to examine similarities and differences in Canada’s provinces and territories, as well as exploring overall changes to policy and process in this period of time. Nine jurisdictions participated in this 2014 iteration of the cross-Canada electronic survey requesting information on services, policies, and practices for students with E/BD in the K-12 school systems from key stakeholders in jurisdictional ministries. Overall themes were captured, as well as unique highlights in each participating jurisdiction. Continued movement away from diagnosis, identification, and categorization is evident; however, little consistency has been attained across the country. Key issues are discussed along with recommendations moving forward.     

We Are All Librarians: Training in the Ever Evolving Information Commons

The University of Arizona Library opened its Information Commons in January of 2002. The University of Arizona Library developed an in-depth training program to ensure that the individuals staffing the Information Commons Reference Desk were able to support the varied and complex questions that can be asked in a resource and technology rich environment. In this article, the authors describe the development and evolution of the training program that was created at the University of Arizona and share examples of training documents.     

Recent Developments in Union Listing and Interlibrary Loan

Union listing of serials on OCLC can bring about an increase in interlibrary loan and turn-around time when implemented at a university library. Formerly accessible as a subsystem of OCLC, union listing is now available on Connexion Browser as MARC 21 holdings data. Immediately following a batch load of OCLC union listing records at medium-sized Louisiana university library, it was found that lending requests sent to the library were up 10% for all materials and up 13% for serials. An increase in borrower requests from patrons at the library was also observed when interlibrary loan request buttons were inserted into citation entries found on EBSCO host university databases.     

Education for broadcasting: 1929–1963

As is implicit in its name, the purpose of the Association for Professional Broadcasting Education is to work to continually improve the quality of education available for college students interested in joining the profession of broadcasting. The Journal of Broadcasting, as an agency of the APBE, has published some six dozen articles dealing with this subject in the eight years of its existence. However, the rapid growth of broadcast education, the normal turnover of teaching personnel, and the more‐than‐one‐generation span of this field of study have combined to make it difficult to see where we have been, and doubly hard to see where our present activities (as educators and broadcasters interested in broadcast education) are leading us. The following article attempts a broad survey of the first thirty‐five years of broadcast education. It is published for the benefit of the students in these curricula, the professors that teach them, the broadcasters who are called upon to test the “end product” and those in each category who recognize that one of the most important criteria for judging whether a body of activities is truly a profession is the quality of the education made available to the would‐be practitioner, and the traditions that lay behind it.     

General Media,Minorities, and Research

Ronald G. Hick A Survey of Mass Communication (Gretna, La.: Pelican Publishing Co., 1977—$7.95, paper)

Everette E. Dennis The Media Society: Evidence About Mass Communication in America (Dubuque, Iowa: Wm. C. Brown, 1978—$6.95, paper)

Leslie J. Friedman Sex Role Stereotyping in the Mass Media: An Annotated Bibliography (New York: Garland Publishing, 1977—$25.00)

Maurine Beasley and Sheila Silver Women in Media: A Documentary Source Book (Women's Institute for Freedom of the Press, 3306 Ross Place, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20008—$5.95, paper)

Preben Sepstrup Consumption of Mass Communication: Construction of a Model on Information Consumption Behavior (Handelsvidenskabelig Boghandel, Fuglesangsalle 4, DK-8210 Aarhus V, Denmark—D. kr . 12, paper)

J. Michael Crabtree and Kenneth E. Moyer Bibliography of Aggresive Behavior: A Reader's Guide to the Research Literature (Alan R. Liss, Inc., 150 Fifth Ave., New York, N.Y. 10011—$35.00).

Marcia Guttentag and Shalom Saar, Evaluation Studies Review Annual, Volume 2: 1977 (Beverly Hills, Calif.: Sage Publications, 1977—$29.95)

Paul C. Cozby Methods in Behavioral Research (Palo Alto, Calif.: Mayfield Publishing, 1977—$6.95, paper)     

Regulation

Marion Davidson and Martha Blues Making it Legal: A Law Primer for. the Craftmaker,Visual Artist and Writer,(New York: McGraw-Hill 1979-$8.95 paper)

An Introduction to the Study of Public Policy by Charles O. Jones (this one is 1917. and a 2nd ed. 258 pp, –price not given. paper)

Policy Analysis for Public Decisions by Duncan MacRae Jr. and James A. Wilde (325 pp..—$9.95, paper)

Essentials of Public Administration: A. Text with Readings by Larry B. Hill and F. Ted Hebert n 432 pp. —price not given, paper)