Defining and navigating ‘action’ in a Participatory Action Research project

ABSTRACT

While the ‘action’ portion of a Participatory Action Research (PAR) project is a crucial component of the process, action tends to be challenging to define, achieve, and measure. The current paper both defines and describes action within the context of a particular PAR collaboration and explores the process and challenges of navigating and implementing action in a PAR project. The specific PAR project detailed in this paper was executed within a higher education setting and involves a group of undergraduate women co-researchers studying their experiences in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) fields.     

Peer observations among faculty in a college of education: investigating the summative and formative uses of the Reformed Teaching Observation Protocol (RTOP)

Teacher educators piloted the use of the Reformed Teaching Observation Protocol (RTOP), a peer observation instrument associated with increases in learning in science and mathematics teacher education courses. Faculty participants received a series of trainings in RTOP use and rated each other’s teaching during multiple peer observations. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether the RTOP would prove useful for formative and summative purposes across teacher education courses in general. While participants saw value in the peer observation process and the RTOP instrument, findings suggest that the perceived formative functions of the RTOP outweighed the instrument’s summative value.     

An international discussion about cross-cultural career assessment

Career assessments are a common resource used by career practitioners internationally to help inform individuals’ career decision-making. Research on the topic of cross-cultural career assessment has been mostly limited to the applicability of an established inventory to a different culture. The purpose of this paper is to summarize the existing research on cross-cultural assessment, and to indicate a need for collaboration among career development associations with respect to the value and use of career assessments, using current ethical standards as a springboard for determining common ground and perhaps a joint statement about the value of career assessments.     

Choosing a major in higher education: Profiles of students’ decision-making process

This study identified decision-making profiles of students who make a choice of a major in higher education. These profiles were examined in a sample of Belgian students at the end of Grade 12, when the educational system expects that these adolescents choose a specific major. Using latent class cluster analysis on adolescents’ scores for coping with career decisional tasks (i.e., orientation, exploration, decisional status, and commitment), four clusters were identified. As expected, these profiles paralleled Marcia’s (1966) identity statuses (i.e., the achievement, moratorium, foreclosure, and diffusion status). Results provided support for the external validity of the identified clusters through differential associations with several person variables (i.e., career decision-making self-efficacy, career choice anxiety, and decision-making style) and with academic functioning in higher education (i.e., commitment, academic and social adjustment). Implications for current educational research and research on career decision-making are discussed.     

Intermedia Agenda Setting in Television,Advertising, and Blogs During the 2004 Election

This study examined whether the candidate-controlled public relations tools of political ads and candidate blogs were successful in influencing the issue and news agenda of the major television news networks during the 2004 presidential election. Data showed strong correlations between blogs and the media agenda. Advertisements did not correlate with the media agenda. Cross-lag analyses showed that the media set the candidates' agenda. The authors suggest intermedia agenda setting occurred as the media transferred their agenda to campaign blogs.     

A cognitive approach to threshold concepts

This paper asks a fundamental question: what is happening inside the mind of the undergraduate during teaching and learning experiences, and how should curricula be designed to support it? A number of concepts lend themselves to providing an answer, principle among which is the relatively recent idea of Threshold Concepts. In this paper we attempt to critically evaluate both the ‘product’ and ‘process’ of Threshold Concepts and subject the idea to a stress test by comparing it to the longer established Schema Theory of Learning. This mapping enabled a novel empirical study involving undergraduate civil engineering students to be performed. The methods derived from Schema Theories of learning provide a set of findings that compliment and strengthen certain key areas of Threshold Concepts, as well as leading to the development of some interesting principles of curriculum design.     

Experiences of Counselors‐as‐Clients in Counselor Education

Eight professional counselors who routinely role‐play as clients in 1 counselor education program participated in a focus group investigating their portrayal experiences. Data were analyzed using interpretative phenomenological analysis, which resulted in 3 superordinate themes: missions, influential factors, and repercussions. Findings reinforce instruction of idiographic and person‐centered care in counselor education.