COMMUNITY COLLEGE MANAGEMENT IN TRANSITION: AN ASSESSMENT OF CHANGE

Community colleges tend to follow an authoritarian type of management, but many educational leaders are attempting to develop and implement a more open and participatory management system in these colleges. This is a study of one college in the process of making the change from an authoritarian system to one that would involve the faculty and staff extensively in the process of goal setting and decision making. In this case study, which relied heavily on semistructured interviews to assess the feelings of administrators and faculty toward organizational changes, it was found that the college was more open. Individuals appeared to be more receptive to change and innovations and to have increased willingness to participate in institutional governance. The faculty and administrators expressed the feeling that they had developed a broader view of the organization and a greater sense of trust. The results of the study suggest that the process might have been assisted by using even more in‐service training and by providing a fuller management structure.     

Developing participation opportunities for young people with disabilities? Policy enactment and social inclusion in Australian junior sport

Abstract

Interventions aimed at increasing the participation of young people with disabilities in recreational sport have had mixed success. The authors draw on in-depth interviews with representatives from State Sporting Associations, local government officers and volunteers within community sports clubs in Victoria, Australia, to examine why some sports clubs are unable or unwilling to translate policy ambitions into practice. The findings indicate how by framing disability provision as ‘too difficult’, ‘not core business’ and antithetical to competitive success, community sports clubs are able to resist policy ambitions to modify existing structures and develop more inclusive practice. Greater priority needs to be given to transformational inclusion objectives and challenging ableism if clubs are to structurally progress the development of participation opportunities for young people with disabilities.     

Transforming communities through sport? critical pedagogy and sport for development

The value of sport as a vehicle for social development and progressive social change has been much debated, yet what tends to get missed in this debate is the way education may foster, enable or impede the transformative action that underpins the social outcomes to which the ‘sport for development and peace’ (SDP) sector aspires. This article draws on the critical pedagogy of Paulo Freire and his contemporaries to examine the nature of transformative action and how it may be fostered within SDP programs. Insights from critical pedagogy are applied to, and illustrated through, qualitative research undertaken with SDP programs located in Cameroon and Kenya. The findings show the complexities of designing and implementing critical pedagogy in a SDP context and, in particular, the challenges of creating and mobilizing for transformative action. Opportunities and lessons for embedding critical pedagogy within SDP programs are also presented.     

Authentic inquiry-based learning in health and physical education: a case study of ‘r/evolutionary’ practice

Background: Greater understandings about how progressive pedagogies are interpreted and practiced within schools will be required if international calls to enhance relevance and meaning in Health and Physical Education (HPE) are to be realised. Little is understood about how inquiry-based units of work connected to real-life issues are enacted, engaged with, and generate deeper knowledge within a HPE context.

Purpose: This study explores learner outcomes and perceptions of engagement with an inquiry-based unit of work, Take Action, that aimed to provide young people with an opportunity to critically reflect on movement, investigate an issue important to them, and enhance their capacity to enact positive change for themselves and others.

Participants and setting: Forty-four students and three teachers from two secondary school settings participated in the research. Both schools were located in relatively low socio-economic status areas in southern metropolitan Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.

Data collection and analysis: An exploratory and evaluative study design that employed naturalistic inquiry, using qualitative semi-structured interview data, observational data, and analysis of learner-produced artefacts were used. Analysis drew upon authentic learning frames to explore elements of knowledge construction through disciplined inquiry and real-life application.

Findings: Take Action provided a unique experience of HPE for the students and teachers who engaged with it. It was a collaborative, learner-centred inquiry-based experience that most learners found to be engaging and authentic. Both teachers and learners lacked the foundational knowledge of the discipline and a sound understanding of a critical-inquiry process that would have allowed them to deconstruct and reconstruct new ideas in deep interconnected ways.

Conclusions: More support for teachers and students is needed to legitimate these types of approaches within broader curriculum contexts to support student learning. Specifically, foundational understandings of: socially critical approaches to critical inquiry that serve to enhance knowledge relating to learner-identified topics; learning intentions and authentic assessment and how these might align with inquiry-based learning; forming connections with external experts to support learners early in an inquiry process; and how to extend explorations and elaborations within the constraints of a congested and contested curriculum.     

Beyond employer engagement and skills supply: building conditions for partnership working and skills co-production in the English context

Education providers and employers working together to prepare young people and adults for employment is internationally accepted as a key factor in effective technical and vocational education. In the English context, however, we argue that two related orthodoxies have prevailed – ‘employer engagement’ and ‘skills supply’ – in which education providers have striven to gain employer involvement in their programmes and meet their skills needs. The effectiveness of these twin orthodoxies has been limited by the ‘New Low Skills Equilibrium’ (NLSE) involving a symbiosis of weaknesses on both the education and employer sides. The article draws on findings of a two-year research and development programme in East London which explored the process of education-employer partnership working to support inclusive growth in key economic sectors. The research suggested that this aim was best supported by processes of ‘co-production’ that actively involved both partners in attempting to address features of the NLSE. The research also pointed to constraining factors. The article concludes by identifying the conditions required for the realisation of co-production approaches that include the development of new collaborative structures – High Progression and Skills Networks (HPSNs) – involving a wide range of social partners at the local and regional levels.     

Sweat lactate response during cycling at 30°C and 18°C WBGT

Sweat lactate reflects eccrine gland metabolism. However, the metabolic tendencies of eccrine glands in a hot versus thermoneutral environment are not well understood. Sixteen male volunteers completed a maximal cycling trial and two 60-min cycling trials [30°C?=?30±1°C and 18°C?=?18±1°C wet bulb globe temperature (WBGT)]. The participants were requested to maintain a cadence of 60 rev?·?min^?1 with the intensity individualized at ～ 90% of the ventilatory threshold. Sweat samples at 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 and 60?min were analysed for lactate concentration. Sweat rate at 30°C (1380±325?ml?·?h^?1) was significantly greater (P<0.05) than at 18°C (632±311?ml?·?h^?1). Sweat lactate concentration was significantly greater (P<0.05) at each time point during the 18°C trial, with values between trials tending to converge across time. During the 30°C trial, both heart rate (20, 30, 40, 50 and 60?min) and rectal temperature (30, 40, 50 and 60?min) were significantly higher than in the 18°C trial. Higher sweat lactate concentrations coupled with lower sweat rates may indicate a greater relative contribution of oxygen-independent metabolism within eccrine glands during exercise at 18°C. Decreases in sweat lactate concentration across time suggest either greater dilution due to greater sweat volume or increased reliance on aerobic metabolism within eccrine glands. The convergence of lactate concentrations between trials may indicate that time-dependent modifications in sweat gland metabolism occur at different rates contingent partially on environmental conditions.     

Teachers as policy actors: co-creating and enacting critical inquiry in secondary health and physical education

Background: Critical inquiry approaches have been presented as one way of enhancing relevance in school-based education, and there have been calls from academia for its systematic use within health and physical education (HPE).

Purpose: This research explored how three Secondary HPE teachers co-constructed and enacted a unit of work (Take Action) that was underpinned by critical inquiry approaches. Drawing on the work of Stephen Ball we focus here on the different ways in which the three teachers interpreted, translated and enacted ‘Take Action’, and negotiated a shift away from the performative pedagogies of traditional HPE. Take Action is a co-constructed, inquiry-based unit of work that sought to provide an alternative to traditional and often exclusive HPE.

Data collection and analysis: A participatory action research approach was undertaken. Data were uncovered from qualitative interviews, classroom observations and field notes before, during and after the enactment of Take Action. Data were analysed using the qualitative data analysis software ‘Dedoose’ which facilitated coding. Data were analysed inductively across all sources utilising a constant comparative method. Analyses consisted of three phases of coding: open, axial and selective. Open coding involved the categorisation of data into themes and axial coding considered connections across the themes. Selective coding involved a refining and development of the previously identified themes, and then bringing the themes/codes together to tell a story about the teachers and their perspectives on the enactment of Take Action.

Findings: Three teachers co-constructed, translated and enacted Take Action, and whilst some challenges were universal, the process and outcomes unfolded quite differently for each. The two contextual factors that emerged as most influential were: (i) the structural support available for teachers and learners and (ii) the time available for the unit to be enacted, and for the teachers’ philosophies to be challenged and transformed. Take Action was one way of supporting teachers in responding to calls from policy-makers for more critical inquiry in HPE. Interpreting, translating and enacting Take Action challenged how teachers viewed their role in the learning process, the nature of HPE, and the breadth of their pedagogical repertoire.

Conclusions: The findings confirm that curriculum and policy are volatile and rarely mobilised as the creator/s intended. They highlight that the ‘fluidity’ of curriculum mobilisation persists, irrespective of whether the teachers have mental ownership over the process and/or are involved in its co-creation. The complexity that accompanies a shift towards ‘alternative’ ways of understanding and teaching HPE, however, means that calls from academia and policy-makers are unlikely to be fruitful unless: (i) there is an appreciation for each teacher's philosophies; (ii) each school culture is fully understood; (iii) the inevitable challenges are viewed as spaces to learn, reflect and move forward; and (iv) support comes in many forms depending on the teacher and the school. The findings confirm that whilst policy creates a particular context, it is the ideologies and histories that permeate teachers’ philosophies and school context that will ultimately dictate the policy process. This is not a problem to be solved but a process which we can learn in, through and about.     

Mechanically braked Wingate powers: agreement between SRM,corrected and conventional methods of measurement

In this study, we assessed the agreement between the powers recorded during a 30?s upper-body Wingate test using three different methods. Fifty-six men completed a single test on a Monark 814E mechanically braked ergometer fitted with a Schoberer Rad Messtechnik (SRM) powermeter. A commercial software package (Wingate test kit version 2.21, Cranlea, UK) was used to calculate conventional and corrected (with accelerative forces) values of power based on a resistive load (5% body mass) and flywheel velocity. The SRM calculated powers based on torque (measured at the crank arm) and crank rate. Values for peak 1 and 5?s power and mean 30?s power were measured. No significant differences (P?>0.05) were found between the three methods for 30?s power values. However, the corrected values for peak 1 and 5?s power were 36 and 23% higher (P?<0.05) respectively than those for the conventional method, and 27 and 16% higher (P?<0.05) respectively than those for the SRM method. The conventional and SRM values for peak 1 and 5?s power were similar (P?>0.05). Power values recorded using each method were influenced by sample time (P?<0.05). Our results suggest that these three measures of power are similar when sampled over 30?s, but discrepancies occur when the sample time is reduced to either 1 or 5?s.     

Participatory research in sport-for-development: Complexities,experiences and (missed) opportunities

In this paper, the authors examine how participatory research can be conceptualized and fostered in sport-for-development (SfD). The authors offer a conceptualization of participatory research that centers on the interplay between three dimensions: participation, power, and reflexivity. Drawing on variegated experiences with SfD research across different geographical locations, the authors scrutinize the conceptual and empirical linkages between these dimensions, and how these linkages are influenced by structures of authority. Findings suggest that most SfD research falls short with regard to the critical challenge of embracing and delivering high degrees of participation, power shifting, and reflexivity. More specifically, SfD researchers typically fail to relinquish power and control over the research process. The SfD research community would likely benefit from greater inclusivity and collaboration when designing creative ways to improve this state of affairs. The authors conclude by reflecting on the implications and by suggesting ways to promote participatory and activist research in SfD contexts.     

Education,pedagogy and sport for development: addressing seldom asked questions

This special issue features the growing field of Sport for Development. Importantly few questions have been raised about the educative quality of sport for development programmes or the pedagogies by which they are delivered. This seems to be something of an oversight since; by definition development infers some sort of learning or educative process. This introductory paper provides an editorial commentary and summary on the papers included in this issue. We also comment on Sport for Development as a growing field of research and identify what might be some fruitful areas of research direction based on the papers included in the issue. Our reading of the papers suggest that there are important concerns related to pedagogy and educational practices in sport for development projects that stem from a dominance of neoliberal agendas, unintended though this may be. At the same time however, it is apparent that this challenge is being met head on by a growing number of researchers, and reports of this progress can be found in this issue.