Academic Admission Requirements as Predictors of Counseling Knowledge,Personal Development,and Counseling Skills

The authors investigated whether undergraduates' scores on the Verbal and Quantitative tests of the Graduate Record Examinations and their undergraduate grade point average can be used to predict knowledge, personal development, and skills of graduates of counseling programs. Multiple regression analysis produced significant models predicting total Skilled Counselor Scale (S. Urbani et al., 2002) scores and total Counselor Preparation Comprehensive Examination (Center for Credentialing and Education, 2005) scores. No significant prediction model was found for the Counselor Skills and Personal Development Rating Form (M. P. Wilbur, 1991) Personal Factors scores. It is concluded that educators should recognize the limitations of these admission criteria and assign a weight to them on the basis of what they can and cannot predict.     

Infusing a Diversity Perspective into Human Development Courses

Students of human development must be well versed in issues of diversity if they are to appreciate the importance of developmental contextualism, and comprehend policy and professional issues related to poverty and ethnicity. One difficulty in addressing diversity issues is the minimal empirical foundation, a fact that was confirmed in Study 1 by content analyses of research on child and adolescent development. More problematic, sampling patterns reinforce a deficit perspective on low-income minority adolescents. Study 2 describes evaluation findings from a curriculum enhancement project, in which multicultural content was infused into a sequence of human development courses. Significant changes in attitudes toward poverty and racial minorities were observed in targeted courses, relative to comparison groups. Evidence is presented that this curriculum project decreased ethnocentrism and increased critical thinking skills and awareness of poverty as a developmental risk factor. Implications for pedagogy, research, and the culture of higher education are discussed.     

Investigating the differential effectiveness of a teacher professional development programme for rural and urban classrooms in Indonesia

This article reports on the differential effectiveness of a teacher professional development programme for teachers in urban and rural schools in Indonesia. The study employed an embedded mixed methods design that involved the concurrent collection of both quantitative and qualitative data. The quantitative component involved a pre–post design in which two surveys were administered to a sample of 2417 students drawn from 66 classes in 32 lower secondary schools (960 from urban schools and 1457 from rural schools). The qualitative component involved six case study teachers and two students from each of their classes. Qualitative information was gathered using teacher and student interviews, classroom observations and teacher reflective journals. The quantitative results suggested that there were disparities between the usefulness of the knowledge and skills imparted during the programme for teachers in urban and rural schools. The themes that emerged from the data gathered using qualitative methods helped to make sense of the differences in student scores in urban and rural schools before and after the teacher professional development programme.     

Promoting Critical Thinking in an Online Certificate Program For Faculty in the Health Professions

Organizations governing education in the health professions have recently called for changes in teaching to promote students’ use of critical thinking (CT). Expectations for CT in courses to train educators should be aligned with the expectations of student use of CT. A growing number of certificate and master’s-level programs are being developed to address the needs of educators in the health professions who are unlikely to have experienced training in adult education, curriculum development, and assessment. This study explored the extent to which online course discussion forums in continuing profession education courses on teaching and curriculum design can play a role in the development of participants’ CT skills. It investigated an online pilot program of courses that relied heavily on discussions, with prompts designed to elicit higher-level thinking. The 190 discussion posts made over the four program courses were analyzed for CT. Posts were cross-coded by both authors. Frequency of CT increased substantially over the program. Metacognition use in particular rose sharply and consistently. We found that carefully structured online courses can promote CT among educators in the health professions.     

Stressed and Losing Sleep: Sleep Duration and Perceived Stress Among Affluent Adolescent Females

This study examined the relationship between stress and sleep duration for adolescent females from affluent backgrounds. Participants were 218 students attending two independent single-sex secondary schools. Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) regression models (cross-sectional and longitudinal) were run to examine the association between stress and sleep duration and to determine whether any associations lasted from the beginning to the end of the academic year. In the cross-sectional models, the relationship between perceived stress and sleep duration was reciprocal and negative. Findings from the longitudinal analyses suggested that perceived stress had lingering negative effects on sleep. Implications for future research and practice are discussed.     

An exploration of how learning design and educational technology programs prepare instructional designers to evaluate in practice

Educational technology research and development - The purpose of this qualitative study was to examine how learning design and educational technology degree programs prepare students to evaluate in...     

Associations between school climate and student life satisfaction: resilience and bullying as mediating factors

Learning Environments Research - Because adolescent life satisfaction is associated with important affective, behavioural and health-related outcomes during both adolescence and later life,...     

Technology Today: Inclusive or Exclusionary for Students with Vision Impairment?

The inclusion and equity of mainstream education for Australian students with vision impairment was considered in this phenomenological study of seven students’ experiences. Using Interpretative Phenomenology Analysis, the theme of technology was viewed as significant. Participants revealed a combination of ineffective technology for accessing board-work and worksheets, lack of training in the use of the technology, incompatibility issues, time factors and the lack of teacher expertise limited their use of technology. The provision of appropriate assistive technology for students with vision impairment in this digital age is paramount if equality is to be achieved. Students require training, by experts in technology and vision impairment, in the most current assistive technologies to access instructive technology increasingly used in classrooms and in the wider community. Teachers need an understanding of how imperative assistive technology is for students with vision impairment, and must become skilled practitioners in its use.