Curriculum mapping to embed graduate capabilities

Graduate capabilities are an essential aspect of undergraduate development in higher education. Accordingly, La Trobe University's Design for learning has identified particular university-wide graduate capabilities and required all faculties to explicitly embed these in their curricula. The Faculty of Law and Management developed an approach to map the teaching and assessment of eight graduate capabilities across the first year of the faculty's degree programmes, allowing staff to evaluate the embedding of graduate capabilities and identifying where they might further develop their curricula. This article describes a process designed to collect, analyse and present data on current teaching and assessment of graduate capabilities. The discursive approach supports reflective practice in curriculum design while the resulting heat maps provide diagrammatic accounts of current practices and indicators of where redesign of curriculum should centre.     

More or better student teaching?

Drawing from data on over 1000 prospective teachers in a large urban district including pre and post-student teaching survey data, this study investigates whether lengthening student teaching improves teachers’ perceptions of instructional preparedness, efficacy, and career plans. The findings suggest that the duration of student teaching has little effect on teacher outcomes; however, the quality of student teaching has significant and positive effects. Moreover, the magnitude of the effects of student teaching quality are greater when student teaching is shorter and in schools with more historically underserved racial groups. The authors discuss policy implications and directions for further research.     

Paradise lost? Pacific island archives threatened by climate change

Over the past 10 years, a clear pattern of increasing sea-level rises has been recorded across the Pacific region. As international work progresses on climate change, it is becoming clear that the expected rise of sea levels will have significant impacts upon low-lying islands and nations. Sea-level rises of less than 0.5 m are generally suggested, although some researchers have made more drastic projections. This paper describes the second stage of research into the impacts of climate change upon the national archival collections in low-lying Pacific islands and nations. This article follows on the argument that archival collection relocation will be necessary and sets the boundaries for further research. It will summarize current research into climate change models and predicted sea-level rises, identify Pacific islands and nations that will be the focus of detailed further research by setting a range of research boundaries based on the known geography of nations within the Pacific, arguing for a specific measurement of “low-elevation”, outlining other risk factors likely to affect the survival of threatened national archival collections and naming those islands and nations that are thus deemed to be at greatest risk of flooding and thus likely to need to relocate their archives. The goal is to demonstrate how archivists might inform the governmental policy in threatened islands and nations as well as what other nations might do to offer assistance.     

Teacher behavior,student interest and affective learning: putting theory to practice

Students of Project Adapt (PA), an instructional program for at-risk middle school students in Brooklyn NY, have displayed startling improvement on cognitive outcome measures. Teacher given grades and standardized tests illuminate the progress students have made since entering the program. The current investigation attempts to analyze PA on students' affective responses in a pre/post-test experimental design. Upon entering PA, students completed measures of interest, affect, and their previous teachers' behavior (pre). These ratings were then compared to end of year ratings on the same instruments (post). Results indicate students' perceive PA teachers utilizing different behaviors than their previous teachers. Additionally, student affect and interest increased significantly. Results of this study have implications for both instructional researchers and educational practitioners.     

A post-crisis discourse of renewal: the cases of malden mills and cole hardwoods

This investigation employed two case studies of post-crisis discourse to describe an alternative to apologia as the primary rhetorical stance following organizational crisis. The authors identify three themes of this discourse; strong commitment to stakeholders, an immediate and unequivocal commitment to rebuild, and crisis as an opportunity for renewal. Conclusions are offered regarding the directionality of post-crisis discourse, crisis as a force for organizational renewal, the importance of emphasizing possibilities over issues of cause, blame, and culpability and the role of C.E.O. discourse in framing the meaning of crisis. Implications for enactment, for image restoration theory, and for improved crisis management are offered.     

Dialectical Tensions Underpinning Family Farm Succession Planning

Though succession planning is vital if a farm is to survive, many farm families fail to take necessary succession planning actions. Semi-structured interviews conducted with 20 members of nine small-farm families in Pennsylvania revealed that dialectical tensions surrounding a farm transfer influence succession planning readiness and action. This report identifies five indigenous dialectical tensions that influence succession planning and describes five praxis patterns families use to manage them. Practical applications are outlined for agriculture estate planning professionals and others involved in family inheritance communication services to provide effective assistance to farm families in their succession planning efforts.     

Impact of an Ethics Programme in a Life Sciences Curriculum

Choices in science--allocation of research funds, selection of research topics, interaction with research subjects (animals, environment, other humans), etc.--often, if not always, include some ethical considerations. Future scientists need skills to deal with and discuss ethical problems, and for that reason we have developed and evaluated one approach to including ethics in a life science curriculum. Our aim has been to support the development of students' ethical sensitivity. The key element in our teaching choices has been the importance of nurturing students' personal moral agency, i.e. their individual skills and responsibilities in moral decision-making, with an interactive teaching approach. The ethics programme was evaluated by extensive course evaluation and using three moral development measures: TESS, DIT and Perry questionnaire. The short ethics programme of three discussions was found to support the development of students' ethical sensitivity.     

An exploratory investigation examining the cues that students use to form initial impressions and expectancies of lecturers

The aim of this study was to examine the informational cues that students perceive to be influential when developing initial impressions and expectancies of a lecturer. Undergraduate university students (n = 452) were required to rate the extent to which 30 informational cues (e.g. gender, qualifications) influence their initial perceptions of a lecturer. Following exploratory factor analysis (EFA), a five-factor model (i.e. appearance (APP), accessories (ACC), third party reports (TPR), communication skills (CS), nationality/ethnicity (NE) was extracted. Inspection of mean scores identified that students rated TPR (e.g. teaching experience) and CS (e.g. speed of speech) to be influential factors in forming initial impressions and expectancies of a lecturer. The findings identify the potential for expectancy effects within student–lecturer interactions.     

Learning logs in introductory literature courses

This article explores the beneficial and sometimes unpredictable implications of a daily reflective writing exercise for introductory literature courses: the learning log. Pseudonymous samples of student writing, coupled with instructor commentary, gesture toward ways in which the learning log's continual implementation and modification foster a learning and teaching environment in which students and teachers can experience a greater degree of equality and engagement. The article draws upon in-class experiences, and student data collected between 2001 and 2006, in order to illustrate the learning log's potential to instill introductory literature courses with a sense of participatory innovation and creative democriticization.