Role of health-promoting behaviours for on-campus and distance education students

University students are likely to experience high rates of stress, which has the potential to negatively affect academic performance and their experience of study. Research with on-campus students has found positive benefits of health-promoting behaviours such as stress reduction and academic achievement; yet no research has examined these relationships with distance education students (and in comparison with on-campus students). Distance education students are a growing cohort in Australia higher education and elsewhere. This paper aims to redress this imbalance by comparing the relationships between stress, strain and coping, academic outcomes, and health-promoting behaviours in tertiary students (on-campus and distance education students). The study involved 242 on-campus and 399 distance education students at a regional Australian university. A path model was developed comparing both cohorts, and relationships were found to be similar, indicating no significant difference. Online interventions for distance education students which could be used to enhance coping are discussed.     

Dilemmas faced when working with learning disabilities in post-secondary education

To explore principles that guide post-secondary professionals who work with students with learning disabilities, vignettes describing typical ethical dilemmas were presented to counselors and other educational professionals. The vignettes addressed issues such as consent, boundaries of competency, accommodation, and release of information. Respondents indicated whether they believed the behavior presented in the vignette was ethical or appropriate. Analyses of variance indicated overall significant differences of opinions between professionals trained in counseling and those trained in education. Chi-square analyses examining responses to individual dilemmas revealed much overlap in opinion, with significant differences of opinion on three of eight dilemmas. Those dilemmas distinguishing the two groups involved issues of confidentiality when providing references, dual relationships between provider and student and release of records.     

Student Attitudes toward Field vs. Didactic Instruction in Career Education

Although many studies have evaluated the gains in knowledge resulting from various programs and models, the affective effects of such interventions have been largely ignored. Positive affect, however, can serve to motivate cognitive learning. This study investigated how students felt about two types of career education instructional models: field exposure and didactic. Students who received field exposure training felt more positive about their training experience than students who received didactic instruction. This difference may be one reason why field exposure training has been found to be effective in producing cognitive gains relative to more traditional, didactic approaches.     

Moral Frameworks for Leaders of Gifted Programs and Services

Given the complexities of being an educational leader and, specifically, an educational leader of a gifted program or school, should there be a moral guide or framework that can inform the daily practices of leaders within an ever-changing educational context of competing demands? Should leaders of gifted programs employ the same ethos as any leader or by virtue of leading a program of a special interest group, be guided by a different, moral approach? This article posits that leaders of gifted programs and schools should operationalize an integrated approach drawing upon a variety of historical and more current theories of moral reasoning and intuition coupled with theories that draw on distributive, transformational, and situational leadership in order to make their advocacy and leadership more effective.     

Perspectives of SENCos and support staff in England on their roles,relationships and capacity to support inclusive practice for students with behavioural emotional and social difficulties

With teachers under pressure to meet curriculum targets, responsibility for including students with behavioural emotional and social difficulties (BESD) in mainstream schools falls heavily on non‐teaching staff. In this article, semi‐structured interviews were conducted with special educational needs coordinators (SENCos) and support staff in a small sample of secondary education settings in England, to examine their perceptions of their role, their relationships with students with BESD and their parents and their ability to facilitate inclusive practice. Despite both SENCo and support staff roles having been regarded as low‐status roles in the past, findings reported here depict a set of highly skilled workers crucial to the inclusion of students with BESD. Through the creation of a nurturing environment combined with caring attitudes and accessibility, these staff were able to form positive relationships with these students and their parents. Implications regarding staffing, resources and inclusion are further discussed.     

Breast pain affects the performance of elite female athletes

ABSTRACT

Although breast pain is problematic for many active women, no published research has investigated breast pain experienced by elite female athletes. This study aimed to examine the extent that mastalgia and exercise-induced breast pain affected the sporting performance of elite female athletes during training and competition. A custom-designed online survey with questions related to sport participation, as well as the frequency, severity and perceived performance effects of mastalgia and exercise-induced breast pain, was distributed to sporting organisations, coaches, medical staff and teams/clubs throughout Australia. Five hundred and forty female athletes competing nationally or internationally across 49 different sports participated in the survey. Sixty-three percent of respondents reported experiencing breast pain associated with their menstrual cycle and 33% reported that this pain worsened during activity. Forty-four percent of athletes reported experiencing exercise-induced breast pain during training or competition. Both types of breast pain were also reported to negatively affect sporting performance (20% and 32%, respectively). Mastalgia associated with the menstrual cycle and exercise-induced breast pain should be acknowledged as potential problems affecting the sporting performance of elite female athletes. Awareness around the impact of breast pain and the development and implementation of breast pain management strategies are essential for this population.