The challenges of online nursing education

To meet the current critical need for qualified nurses, many colleges have initiated online programs, primarily aimed towards registered nurse (RN) to BS students. Despite the growing number of online nursing programs, there is little research on instructor views of online learning. This study used interviews to investigate nursing instructor experiences in online learning. Results revealed instructor concerns with identifying the most effective assessment methods to judge students' ability to apply their lessons in real-world settings. Online nursing exhibits unique challenges, such as providing nursing students with online authentic learning experiences that relate to real-world nursing situations, which comprise both high-stake medical and interpersonal elements. Results also indicated that providing support and ensuring that the faculty have sufficient time to develop effective courses, with adequate assessment for the students, is necessary to ensure the quality of online nursing education.     

Effects of virtual education on academic culture： Perceived advantages and disadvantages

The perceived advantages and disadvantages of courses taught in online and face-to-face learning environments were explored for students taking an accounting and a data collection and analysis course. Both courses were taught in a face-to-face learning environment at the main or satellite campus. It was hypothesized that there would be statistically significant differences in the perceived advantages and disadvantages of courses taught in online and face-to-face learning environments. Results showed statistically significant differences between perceived advantages and disadvantages for both learning environments. Findings suggest that there are differences between the perception of advantages and disadvantages for online and face-to-face learning environments.     

Swapping documents and terms

Experiments were conducted to explore the impact of combining various components of eight leading information retrieval systems. Each system demonstrated improved effectiveness through the use of blind feedback, also known as pseudo-relevance feedback, a form of query expansion. Blind feedback uses the results of a preliminary retrieval step to augment the efficacy of a secondary retrieval step. The hybrid combination of primary and secondary retrieval steps from different systems in a number of cases yielded better effectiveness than either of the constituent systems alone. This positive combining effect was observed when entire documents were passed between the two retrieval steps, but not when only the expansion terms were passed. Several combinations of primary and secondary retrieval steps were fused using the CombMNZ algorithm; all yielded significant effectiveness improvement over the individual systems, with the best yielding an improvement of 13% (p = 10⁻⁶) over the best individual system and an improvement of 4% (p = 10⁻⁵) over a simple fusion of the eight systems.     

Research Priorities in Performance Technology A Delphi Study

Although a great deal has been written about the need for more research in the HPT field, specific research questions have not recently been identified. This study used a three‐round Delphi approach to identify research questions of interest to experts in the field, resulting in 100 questions that were classified under ten categories. Participants prioritized the research categories and rated each question as to its importance to the field. Summary statistics for all categories and questions are presented.     

Comparability of postgraduate academic qualifications: Some issues, challenges and experiences

In the United Kingdom the topic of the comparability of academicqualifications features prominently on the agenda in higher education. The papersummarises the debate and highlights key issues. It offers specific reflections on theexperience of one university as it seeks to address the topic of postgraduate qualifications,disentangle the many strands of a complex and multi-faceted set of questions and furtherstrengthen internal quality processes in order to meet the growing demands by external bodiesand interest groups.     

A Theory of Practice: Hermeneutical Understanding

Arguments about learning commonly toss the buck back and forth between theory and practice, the pure and applied, the objective and subjective. Most such arguments have tried to find a reliable technical method to explain how we learn. Hermeneutics, with its roots both in sixteenth century theory of linguistic interpretation and modem phenomenological approaches to meaning, denies the claims of method ‐ rationalist or empiricist. It proposes instead to clarify the conditions in which practical understanding can take place. Unlike other approaches to learning, hermeneutics makes human language the core. It is in language that what I call in this paper the four major quadrants of understanding are realised. First, understanding is structured historically in the traditions, prejudices and institutional practices that come down to us. Secondly, understanding depends upon trying to find the unity in all the conditions that pertain to learning, in reconciling the whole with its parts. Third, hermeneutics reconceptualises the nature of practical application to emphasise the constitutive part played by individuals in modifying what is learned, such that to understand is to change as a person. Finally, understanding arises not from a solipsistic encounter between learner and material; it takes the form of a dialogue between a student and all those “others” who constitute the world of learning. In sum, both “cognitive” and “student‐centred” approaches to learning are transcended and fused in a wider horizon of understanding.