Factors impacting the rapid transition of anatomy curricula to an online environment in response to Covid-19

Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, many academic institutions had to rapidly transition education to a remote online environment. While a hurdle for most educators, this transition posed an even greater challenge for anatomy educators, many of whom were forced to depart from the traditional cadaver-based laboratory to a virtual format. Recent publications have discussed the rapid transition to online formats necessitated by Covid-19 and the accompanying difficulties, but none have identified specific factors that influenced the difficulty of this transition. Anatomy educators were surveyed to examine how this transition was accomplished and perceived. Of the 165 educators who responded, the majority utilized cadaver-based laboratory instruction. Educators felt that transitioning the laboratory portion of their courses was significantly more difficult and required more time than converting lecture materials. Factors that impacted the difficulty of the transition included a number of pedagogical aspects of the pre-Covid-19 curricula, including the delivery format of prior content, availability of pre-existing electronic materials, and the laboratory technique previously used. Additionally, the length of time an educator had been teaching prior to Covid-19 impacted their perception of difficulty, with newer and more senior educators finding this much more challenging than mid-tenure educators. Ease of transition may be related to previous exposure to curricular reform, experience with multiple anatomy pedagogies, and educator adaptability. While not surprising that converting a cadaver-based laboratory to an online format was challenging, knowledge of the alignment of this difficulty with prior educator pedagogy can help guide future innovations to anatomy education.     

Restorative Practice in New Zealand Schools: Social development through relational justice

This article proposes that restorative justice practices (RJPs), as used in New Zealand schools, are better understood as an instrument of social development than a behaviour management practice. Concerns about the achievement of Māori students are relocated, from an individualised psychological and pedagogical problem to an interdisciplinary context of historical and social development. Social constructionist theory is suggested as a lens through which RJPs in schools may be seen as the intentional production of respectful social relationships, rather than as behaviour management. A restorative process has the productive capacity to restore healthy relational functioning, both for those who have been offended against and those who have offended. It is argued that the primary function of restorative justice in schools is not about resolving specific conflicts, but rather, about the production and maintenance of respectful relationship, which is the antithesis of colonised relationship. Such a position reflects accountability on a communal, rather than individualised basis, and accords with recent moves in the United Nations Development Programme to look at Human Development as building agentive capacity.     

II. DEVELOPMENT OF ADOPTED CHILDREN WITH HISTORIES OF EARLY ADVERSITY

This chapter first presents a review of research on the development of adopted children, focusing on meta‐analytic evidence and highlighting comparisons between adopted children with and without histories of early adversity. Some methodological issues arising from this literature are considered as well. Second, 7 longitudinal studies of adopted children's development are described, and the convergence of findings across the longitudinal studies and with the cross‐sectionally based meta‐analytic evidence is discussed. Third, the role of the adoptive family in supporting adopted children's development is explored.     

Student perceptions of the information professions and their master's program in information studies

Library and information (LIS) education is undergoing a major transformation. During this time of change, there is a pressing need for data from all stakeholder groups to support strategic decisions within individual schools and across the discipline as a whole; students are a key stakeholder group. This paper reports on a 4-year study of master's students enrolled in an institution undergoing a transition toward an iSchool. The self-administered questionnaire was distributed to students enrolled in the Master of Information Studies program at the University of Toronto eight times: to incoming students in the fall term for 4 years, and to the entire student body in the spring term of those same years. The data collected from approximately 1000 questionnaires indicate that students arrive excited about the information professions and optimistic about employment opportunities. As they progress through the program, however, many are not satisfied with professional aspects of their program. They want courses that prepare them for their first professional position, and opportunities to gain experience, which they believe will increase their employability. The data from the 4-year period revealed fluctuations over the years, which indicates the value of examining longitudinal data.