The Australian higher education quality assurance framework

The Australian government initiated a review of higher education in 2008. One of the outcomes of the review was the formation of a national regulator, the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency (TEQSA), with responsibilities to: register all higher education providers, accredit the courses of the non self-accrediting providers, assure quality against externally set standards and reduce risk by monitoring institutional performance on various measures. One of the key changes in Australian higher education quality assurance is the shift from a ‘fitness-for-purpose’ approach to quality assurance to a compliance-driven approach using an externally developed set of standards monitored by the national regulator, which has legislated powers to place sanctions on universities and other providers for non-compliance. This article outlines the new framework introduced by the government and analyses its limitations in assuring and improving quality in core and support areas. It cautions universities against being dominated by TEQSA's compliance agenda. Rather, it encourages the development and maintenance of shared governance principles and strong internal quality improvement processes along with the establishment of an outcomes focus, which will stand the test of external compliance auditing while allowing the institution to pursue its own educational objectives. The article is based on the authors’ experience and reflection on external, improvement-led quality audits in Australia over the past decade compared with the present compliance-oriented audits now required for institutional registration and ongoing accreditation.     

Classroom Activities and Areas: Regularity of Use and Perceptions of Adaptability by General Early Educators

This report describes a mail survey of general early educators from Head Start, public school pre-kindergarten, public school kindergarten, and community preschool/child care programs. The purposes were to secure information about the availability of classroom activities and areas, and to obtain the respondents' perceptions of the ease with which activities and areas could be adapted to accommodate children with disabilities. Of the 893 mailed questionnaires, 483 (54.1%) were returned and coded. The respondents reportedly used a wide range of classroom activities and areas, and they rated those activities and areas as moderately easy to adapt. Also, respondents from mainstreamed programs used slightly more activities and perceived the activities as easier to adapt than did respondents from non-mainstreamed programs. The findings appear to indicate that placement of children with disabilities in segregated programs cannot be justified on grounds that integration will restrict the range of activities available to typically developing children, or on the grounds that the adaptations are perceived by program staff as too difficult to be accomplished.     

Anxiety and the Use of Alcohol‐Related Protective Behavioral Strategies

Protective behavioral strategies (PBS) are useful skills for reducing the negative consequences of alcohol. The moderating effects of anxiety on the relationship between 3 different types of PBS and negative consequences were examined among students accessing college counseling services. Results revealed a significant interaction between anxiety and strategies while drinking, suggesting that these simple strategies may be particularly beneficial among students who drink heavily and experience high levels of anxiety. Implications for counseling centers are discussed.     

Identities in/out of physics and the politics of recognition

Framed within intersectionality, this multiple case study explores women's participation in physics through the construct of physics identity and with a focus on recognition. The study is drawn upon an empirical life-history exploration of three women: a native to Northwestern Europe, late-career white woman and two immigrant women to Northwestern Europe, one is an undergraduate student of color, and the other, an early career Muslim woman. The data for this study were collected through multiple, semistructured, interviews in a period of 2 years, which were analyzed using a constant comparative method. Collectively, the three life-histories tell stories of otherness, persistence, hope, and failure and they elucidate the kinds of identities that are deemed “in-place” and “out-of-place” in physics. They showcase how the three women authored multiple identities that simply co-existed for them, while for others were seen as conflicting and caused misrecognition. The findings point to four main insights: (a) recognition is neither linear nor binary and it comes in many different forms that range from explicit encouragement to no opposition; (b) it is drawn upon various sources including ones in the early years of life: family, school teachers, university instructor, students, and social community; (c) it is culture-dependent and as such, it is influenced by factors on multiple levels, including cultural and gender stereotypes, organizational policies, racism, sexism, classicism, and other forms of discrimination. The implications of these findings speak to the need for: (a) systemic programs on how women are recognized by others and which seek to widen and diversify physics environments from the school level to the professional level; (b) research exploration of the politics of recognition and how they perpetuate the underrepresentation of women in physics; and, (c) disrupting monolithic theorizations of recognition and adopting intersectional approaches to exploring physics identity that value women's personal histories, subjectivities, and positionalities.     

II. DEVELOPMENT OF ADOPTED CHILDREN WITH HISTORIES OF EARLY ADVERSITY

This chapter first presents a review of research on the development of adopted children, focusing on meta‐analytic evidence and highlighting comparisons between adopted children with and without histories of early adversity. Some methodological issues arising from this literature are considered as well. Second, 7 longitudinal studies of adopted children's development are described, and the convergence of findings across the longitudinal studies and with the cross‐sectionally based meta‐analytic evidence is discussed. Third, the role of the adoptive family in supporting adopted children's development is explored.     

Project ISLA: A space/time/full-text/format search and retrieval system designed by end users

This article discusses the role of end users in the design of a multi-format digital library project (ISLA) being developed at the University of Southern California Library for the study of the Los Angeles region. ISLA focuses on the specific needs of cross-disciplinary research involving large urban regions.     

Factors influencing adaptation from university to employment in Portugal and Brazil

International Journal for Educational and Vocational Guidance - The career adaptation model helps to explain the process of transitioning from university to employment among college students. This...