The degree to which students and teachers are involved in second-level school processes and participation in decision-making: an Irish Case Study

The Education Act (1998 Education Act. 1998. Dublin: Government Publications. [Google Scholar]) is a key policy document in Irish education, emphasising the rights, roles and responsibilities of key stakeholders, including parents, teachers and pupils in schools. Since 1998 the Department of Education and Skills (DES) has stressed the need to introduce an increased role for teachers and pupils in decision-making. It is therefore timely to explore the response of teachers and students to such a collaborative school environment in a rural second-level school of approximately 600 students. Transition year (TY) students (ages about 15–16) and their teachers were surveyed by questionnaire and interviewed. It finds that while the school is proactive in involving students and teachers in decision-making, a source of social, personal and professional empowerment, experienced teachers, and students in particular, want a more substantial voice. For example, most students want more say. They want class discussions or a vote, not just Student Council (SC) representation, on important and not just trivial issues. They want involvement before decisions are taken, with more feedback. Overall, participation is considered important by all stakeholders.     

Urban student affairs data exchange

Urban institutions of higher education have need of a peer group for comparison purposes. This article describes a student affairs database developed specifically for urban institutions of higher education. Such a database enables urban institutions to refer to comparison groups having similar characteristics. Specific examples of how the data can be utilized by chief student affairs officers and others are provided.     

Validating NSSE Against Student Outcomes: Are They Related?

While there exist many examples of institutional use of the results of the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE), there is a relative paucity of research explicitly linking student outcomes to responses on the survey. A major Doctoral-Extensive institution in the Southeast recently conducted a large-scale implementation of the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE). We have linked multiple years of NSSE responses to several student outcomes: freshman retention, GPA, pursuit of graduate education, and employment outcome upon commencement/degree conferral. Our research finds minimal explanatory power in the NSSE benchmarks for these outcomes. A statistically derived model from the individual NSSE items shows greater promise, although there are difficulties in replicating the model for previous student cohorts.

Understanding behavior to understand behavior change: a literature review

One view of environmental education suggests that its goal is to ‘develop a world population that … has the knowledge, skills, attitudes, motivations and commitment to work individually and collectively towards solutions of current problems and the prevention of new ones’ (UNESCO‐UNEP 1976 UNESCO‐UNEP. 1976. The Belgrade charter. Connect: UNESCO‐UNEP Environmental Education Newsletter, 1(1): 1–2.  [Google Scholar]). Embedded within this charge is the teaching of skills and motivations to implement skills, where a skill refers to performance of an act acquired through extended practice and training (Ericsson and Oliver 1995 Ericsson, K.A. and Oliver, W.L. 1995. “Cognitive skills”. In Learning and Skill, Edited by: Mackintosh, N.J. and Colman, A.M. 37–55. London: Longman.  [Google Scholar]). However, it is often difficult to articulate clearly what skills we teach in conservation education and environmental education focusing on behavior change or influence. It can be equally challenging to describe the behaviors we are ultimately seeking, identified in the Tbilisi Declaration as ‘new patterns of behavior’ (UNESCO 1978 UNESCO. 1978. Final report: Intergovernmental conference on environmental education, Paris: UNESCO ED/MD/49. Organized by UNESCO in Cooperation with UNEP, Tbilisi, USSR, 14–26 October, 1977 [Google Scholar]). At a basic level, it is important to explore the grounding for teaching toward behavior – often referred to as behavior change – that supports the work of the field. This literature review attempts to provide a foundation for behavior‐related discussions in environmental and conservation education. A number of the behavior theories, concepts and models discussed in this review have been explored extensively elsewhere; therefore, this review is not exhaustive, but rather is intended to be broadly representative of the literature.