ACADEMIC DISHONESTY: A Zero Tolerance Professor and Student Registration Choices

College and university faculty and administrators are responsible for constructing academic honesty policies and communicating them to students. This is often attempted through institutional honesty policies and university-wide honor codes. While these approaches have been widely researched, less attention has been given to the role of individual faculty members. That role is examined in this study by addressing student reactions to professors based on their academic honesty policies. In addition to demographic information, data were gathered about student attitudes and beliefs concerning academic dishonesty and their decision to enroll in or avoid a course being taught by a professor with zero tolerance for academic dishonesty. The findings regarding different instructors’ approaches toward academic dishonesty indicate that an intolerant policy will keep dishonest students away, but at a price—it will also detract many honest students.     

On cross‐cultural bridges and gaps: identity transitions among trailblazing Druze women

The emotional conflicts and evolving Identity of the first Druze women who turned to study in Israeli universities is explored in this paper. While the benefits of higher education are widely discussed, this article wishes to focus on the different, more complex effects of education on the lives and identities of women. The study examines the complex identity patterns of these pioneering women after returning to their villages on completing their studies – influenced by their uniqueness as the first women in their community to achieve academic degrees and by the intercultural transitions they experienced along the way. The narrative identity and emotional processes are derived through interview analysis of 34 first Druze women that entered universities. The findings are viewed in light of modern and postmodern psychological theories of identity discussing lacunæs in western identity theories that cannot entirely account for certain aspects of interviewees’ identities.     

A clinical model for treatment of dyslexia

Children with moderate learning disabilities often fail to qualify for special education programs in public schools, but are ill-suited for placement in private schools concerned with the severely disabled. Parents of such children may place their hopes in the promises of private teachers or clinics. Yet the quality of services provided in the private sector varies widely. This paper describes a model program against which parents and private service providers can measure the strengths and weaknesses of the programs they are concerned with. The model places special emphasis on thorough evaluation, frequent reevaluation, staff accountability, program flexibility, and recognition of the parents’ role in the child’s education.     

The Role of Physical and Computer-Based Experiences in Learning Science Using a Complex Systems Approach

Science & Education - How do different components of a learning environment contribute to learning in science? The study examines the contribution of laboratory experiments and computer model...     

Clinical Assessment of Dissociative Identity Disorder Among College Counseling Clients

College counseling professionals address a wide range of complex student mental health concerns. Among these, accurately identifying client presentations of dissociative identity disorder (DID) can be especially challenging because students with DID sometimes present as if they are experiencing another problem, such as a mood, anxiety, or psychotic disorder. This article reviews DID diagnostic criteria, introduces assessment strategies for use during intake and subsequent counseling sessions, and presents case illustrations.     

Interactions between reasoning about complex systems and conceptual understanding in learning chemistry

“Complex systems” is a general-purpose reasoning scheme, used in a wide range of disciplines to make sense of systems with many similar entities. In this paper, we examine the generality of this approach in learning chemistry. Students' reasoning in chemistry in terms of emergent complex systems is explored for two curricula: a normative and a complexity-based one, so that the interaction could be examined under both the conditions. A quasi-experimental pretest-intervention-posttest comparison group design was used to explore student's learning, complemented with interview data. The experimental group (n = 47) studied the topic of gases with a complexity-based curriculum. A comparison group (n = 45) studied with a normative curriculum for the same duration. Students' answers to questionnaires were coded with a complexity-based approach that included levels (distinguishing micro- and macro-levels), stochastic particle behaviors, the emergence of macro-level patterns from micro-level behaviors, and the source of control in the system. It was found that students' reasoning about chemistry concepts in terms of complex systems falls into three distinct and coherent mental models. A sophisticated mental model included most of the above-described complexity features, while the nonsophisticated model included none. The intermediate model is typified by distinguishing between levels, but not by stochastic and emergent behaviors. The nonsophisticated mental model was used mostly in the pretest. In the posttest, the experimental group used the intermediate and sophisticated models; while the comparison group used the nonsophisticated and intermediate models. Discussion approaches the topics of the generality of the complex systems approach; and the unique forms of reasoning that a complexity approach may contribute to learning science.