The Positive Transitions Model for Sport Retirement

Positive Transitions for Student Athletes is a program designed to address the psychosocial and career‐related issues surrounding the inevitable sport retirement transition faced by the majority of collegiate athletes. A rationale for the development of sport retirement programs is provided, as is the Positive Transitions program and outcome data.     

Caught in the middle: faculty and institutional status and quality in state comprehensive universities

Faculty members at state-related comprehensive universities (SCUs) are ‘caught in the middle,’ caught between the demands of a research university model of higher education and other models such as that of the liberal arts or community colleges. They are caught in the ambiguity of not having determined their own identity. The SCUs are a major for?e in higher education that resulted from historical trends and the demands of parents, students, and state legislators for services. But the emerging form of these institutions has yet to complete its metamorphosis. During their transformation, the SCUs have emulated the high-status research universities as their own low status forced a search for an identity different from their origins, commonly as teachers colleges. The unfortunate consequence of the SCUs' quest for status has been low faculty satisfaction and additional loss of institutional self-esteem. Furthermore, an emphasis on published research has led to a disparagement of scholarship as it is manifested in teaching and service. As faculty members focus more on disciplinary research, their involvement with students and in university governance and other campus affairs diminishes. What can SCUs do? Five alternative approaches that SCUs could use to develop distinct identities appropriate to their constituencies are examined. The concept that connects these different approaches is ‘scholarship,’ in its traditional sense. A broader definition of scholarship could enable the SCUs to achieve excellence in ways not dictated by the research university model. There is some reason to hope that there is increasingly effective internal and external pressures for SCUs to develop and enact such distinctive identities.     

Advancing Elementary and Middle School STEM Education

Navigating the current STEM agendas and debates is complex and challenging. Perspectives on the nature of STEM education and how it should be implemented without losing discipline integrity, approaches to incorporating the arts (STEAM) and how equity in access to STEM education can be increased are just a few of the many issues faced by researchers and educators. There are no straightforward answers. Opinions on how STEM education should be advanced vary across school contexts, curricula and political arenas. This position paper addresses five core issues: (a) perspectives on STEM education, (b) approaches to STEM integration, (c) STEM discipline representation, (d) equity in access to STEM education and (e) extending STEM to STEAM. A number of pedagogical affordances inherent in integrated STEM activities are examined, with the integration of modelling and engineering design presented as an example of how such learning affordances can be capitalized on.     

Analysis of Propagation Plans in NSF-Funded Education Development Projects

Increasing adoption and adaptation of promising instructional strategies and materials has been identified as a critical component needed to improve science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education. This paper examines typical propagation practices and resulting outcomes of proposals written by developers of educational innovations. These proposals were analyzed using the Designing for Sustained Adoption Assessment Instrument (DSAAI), an instrument developed to evaluate propagation plans, and the results used to predict the likelihood that a successful project would result in adoption by others. We found that few education developers propose strong propagation plans. Afterwards, a follow-up analysis was conducted to see which propagation strategies developers actually used to help develop, disseminate, and support their innovations. A web search and interviews with principal investigators were used to determine the degree to which propagation plans were actually implemented and to estimate adoption of the innovations. In this study, we analyzed 71 education development proposals funded by the National Science Foundation and predicted that 80% would be unsuccessful in propagating their innovations. Follow-up data collection with a subset of these suggests that the predictions were reasonably accurate.     

A spatial re-consideration of the early childhood-school relationship

This paper undertakes a spatial examination of the early childhood–school relational space. It theorizes space as a product of interrelationships, moving therefore beyond an understanding of space as fixed and horizontal. Drawing on data from a pilot project with early childhood and junior primary teachers working in an independent (i.e. private, fee-paying) school, the experience of meeting across the early childhood–school divide is examined. We ask how space is produced and what types of relationships emerge in its production. The paper concludes by arguing that the production of open and dynamic spatial arrangements is key to creating new ways of being in relationship across the early childhood–school divide.     

The Impact of a Death Row Exoneration Testimonial on Social Work Students: A Teaching Note

Criminal-justice-involved clients often are a complicated population for students to consider through a lens of oppression. Nevertheless, it is critical that they do so given that many will serve clients with criminal records during their careers. An attempt to challenge students’ prejudice toward criminal-justice-involved people was deployed using a teaching technique derived from intergroup contact theory. The authors invited Juan Melendez to share his story of incarceration on death row for more than 17 years for a crime he did not commit. This article is an examination of the impact of Mr. Melendez’s story and the application of intergroup contact theory.     

Contextual Influences on Integration in Australia: Overview of a Report to the Commonwealth Schools Commission. Part I.

Integration of students with special needs has emerged as a significant challenge to education practice in Australia, as elsewhere in the world community. To date, however, little information is available regarding the implementation of integration policy which, in many cases, is still evolving. This paper presents findings of a study sponsored by the Commonwealth Schools Commission at the request of the Organization for Economic Co‐operation and Development, Centre for Education Research and Innovation (OECD/CERI) and describes the current context within which integration in Australia occurs. Reference is made to the philosophical, legislative, and policy bases, administrative organization, and funding structures from which the implementation of policy is proceeding. Differences between States, as well as issues of common interest are identified.     

Digital disconnect or digital difference? A socio-ecological perspective on young children’s technology use in the home and the early childhood centre

A digital disconnect perspective is founded on an assumption that technology use in the home is frequent, creative and generative, and that technology use in the early childhood centre should be the same as that found in the home. However, such arguments divert our attention from understanding the nature of the setting and thereby from an understanding of the role of technologies in education and at home. This study adopts a socio-ecological approach to explore the influence of setting, in particular the elements of activity, time, place and role on young children’s use of digital technologies. It concludes that technology use is characterised by different imperatives in each setting so that thinking about digital differences may be more productive than continuing to focus on the concept of disconnect.     

Using cogenerative dialogue to address heightened emotions with difficult students

Cultural Studies of Science Education - In “It’s the magic circle”! cogenerative dialogue is used to create a safe environment to address emotional conflicts in a project-based...