Emotional labor in librarianship: A research agenda

Many occupations, including librarianship, require emotional labor, which can be defined as the awareness of the emotional expressions required of a job, and the strategies used to express those emotions. To date, little research has examined emotional labor in library work, even though strong evidence exists to suggest emotional labor is a key component of many library jobs. Research on emotional labor shows that there can be positive and negative effects on individuals such as job satisfaction and job burnout. Research also shows that the negative outcomes from emotional labor may be buffered to some extent by factors such as support from the organization, or job autonomy. Individual differences such as personality traits and attitudes toward customers also impact the effects of emotional labor on employees. Because emotional labor is a critical issue in library work, and because evidence suggests positive outcomes can be fostered, there is a need to study how emotional labor is carried out in libraries, and to identify management techniques for emotional labor that will yield positive outcomes for both employees and organizations. Empirical research on emotional labor is reviewed, and a research agenda for exploration of this important construct in the field of librarianship is presented.     

Haraway's ‘bag lady story-telling’: relocating childhood and learning within a ‘post-human landscape’

In this article, we explore some alternate ways of approaching childhood and learning by taking three short forays into what Donna Haraway calls a ‘post-human landscape’. This exploration takes us beyond the horizons of orthodox educational approaches, in which the individual child is typically seen to be developing and learning within his/her (exclusively human) sociocultural context. The post-human landscape relocates childhood within a world that is much bigger than us (humans) and about more than our (human) concerns. It allows us to reconsider the ways in which children are both constituted by and learn within this more-than-human world. Adopting Haraway's feminist narrative strategy, we offer three very different ‘bag lady’ stories that consider the ethics and politics of child/non-human animal cross-species encounters. Each of these stories gestures towards the ways in which we can learn to live with ‘companion species’ rather than only ever learn about them.     

基于国际大规模学生评估的中国高中毕业生质量研究

在过去的二十年间,国际大规模学生评估主要对教育研究、学校体系和教育政策产生影响.本文着重介绍这些项目的主要结果,并在此基础上,于2003年在中国四个省份展开数学胜任力测试.作为过去几十年国际大规模学生评估的非参与国,中国无疑提供一个特殊视角.因而,本文所报告的中国学生成绩国际比较是一项独特工作.     

Rupture and repair: Episodes of resistance and resilience in teachers’ learning

This action inquiry article examines veteran teachers’ learning in a week-long professional development seminar. We describe moments of disconnection in key learning relationships (teacher, learner, text) and analyze relational–cultural dynamics that contributed to the disconnections. We investigate the dynamics that facilitate repair within the relationships. We argue that disconnections were often acts of resistance which preserve teachers’ sense of self as learner. We aver that moments of reconnection were acts of resilience. This study’s significance demonstrates the inherent links between resistance and resilience. Implications point to the centrality of taking an inquiry stance in the study of professional development experiences.     

Implicit Gender Stereotypes and Essentialist Beliefs Predict Preservice Teachers’ Tracking Recommendations

This study investigated the extent to which differences in implicit and explicit math–language gender stereotypes, and essentialist beliefs among preservice teachers affect tracking recommendations for math/science- versus language-oriented secondary schools. Consistent with expectations, the results suggest that student's gender influences preservice teachers’ school career recommendations: Boys are more likely to be recommended for a math/science-oriented secondary school, whereas girls are more likely recommended for a language-oriented school. Both implicit math–language gender stereotypes and beliefs in genetic determinism (reflecting essentialist beliefs) predicted the stereotypicality of school career recommendations, whereas explicit measures did not. The results suggest that more closely investigating factors contributing to stereotypical behavior in teachers might help to minimize biased actions and decisions in the educational context.     

Preparing Biology Graduate Teaching Assistants for Their Roles as Instructors: An Assessment of Institutional Approaches

The inconsistency of professional development (PD) in teaching for graduate teaching assistants (GTAs) is a widespread problem in higher education. Although GTAs serve an important role in retention of undergraduate science majors and in promotion of scientific literacy in nonmajors, they often lack preparation and ongoing support for teaching. Given the recent national focus on instructional quality in introductory courses, our goal was to use an online survey to identify current practices of teaching PD for biology GTAs and compare these results with the last national survey on this topic. In responses from 71 participant institutions, 96% reported some mandatory teaching preparation for biology GTAs; however, 52% of these programs required 10 or fewer hours per year. Respondents wanted to change their programs to include more pedagogical information and teaching observations with feedback to their GTAs. Programmatic self-ratings of satisfaction with GTA PD were positively correlated with the number of topics discussed during PD. Although more schools are requiring GTA PD for teaching compared with the last national survey, the lack of program breadth at many schools warrants a national conversation with regard to recent calls for improving undergraduate instruction.     

Mapping out the ICT integration terrain in the school context: identifying the challenges in an innovative project

This article discusses the research findings from the start-up phase of an innovative information and communication technology (ICT) project focused on ICT integration as a complex process involving many factors such as leadership, school readiness and organisational culture. Known locally as Hermes, the project's core objective was to provide an improved and ‘trouble-free’ ICT infrastructure for schools using thin client technology and a wireless broadband network, which would be managed centrally rather than locally. It was anticipated that this solution would help remove the barriers associated with ICT integration caused by technical issues. Based on an in-depth study of innovation adoption in eight schools involving a survey (n=119 teachers) and interviews (n=60 teachers), the study portrays a picture of the ICT integration patterns prior to and during the Hermes intervention in terms of schools' ICT readiness, leadership and vision. This small scale study can help us understand first- and second-order barriers to ICT integration in schools. In particular, this study informs us about the ecology of schools and ICT-based innovation, innovation scalability and contributes to a critical study of educational technology via a context-rich account of how educational technology is actually being mediated, rather than an idealised account of how technology could be used.