Comparing different approach and avoidance models of learning and personality in the prediction of work, university, and leadership outcomes

Jackson (2005) developed a hybrid model of personality and learning, known as the learning styles profiler (LSP) which was designed to span biological, socio-cognitive, and experiential research foci of personality and learning research. The hybrid model argues that functional and dysfunctional learning outcomes can be best understood in terms of how cognitions and experiences control, discipline, and re-express the biologically based scale of sensation-seeking. In two studies with part-time workers undertaking tertiary education (N equals 137 and 58), established models of approach and avoidance from each of the three different research foci were compared with Jackson's hybrid model in their predictiveness of leadership, work, and university outcomes using self-report and supervisor ratings. Results showed that the hybrid model was generally optimal and, as hypothesized, that goal orientation was a mediator of sensation-seeking on outcomes (work performance, university performance, leader behaviours, and counterproductive work behaviour). Our studies suggest that the hybrid model has considerable promise as a predictor of work and educational outcomes as well as dysfunctional outcomes.

Dictionary learning and sparse coding on Grassmann manifolds : an extrinsic solution

Recent advances in computer vision and machine learning suggest that a wide range of problems can be addressed more appropriately by considering non-Euclidean geometry. In this paper we explore sparse dictionary learning over the space of linear subspaces, which form Riemannian structures known as Grassmann manifolds. To this end, we propose to embed Grassmann manifolds into the space of symmetric matrices by an isometric mapping, which enables us to devise a closed-form solution for updating a Grassmann dictionary, atom by atom. Furthermore, to handle non-linearity in data, we propose a kernelised version of the dictionary learning algorithm. Experiments on several classification tasks (face recognition, action recognition, dynamic texture classification) show that the proposed approach achieves considerable improvements in discrimination accuracy, in comparison to state-of-the-art methods such as kernelised Affine Hull Method and graph-embedding Grassmann discriminant analysis.

Peer assisted learning and generation Y : a case study

In recent years Australian Law Schools have implemented various forms of peer assisted learning or mentoring, including career mentoring by former students of final year students and orientation mentoring or tutoring by later year students of incoming first year students. The focus of these programs therefore is on the transition into or out of law school. There is not always as great an emphasis however, as part of this transition, on the use of law students belonging to the same unit cohort as a learning resource for each other within their degree. This is despite the claimed preference of Generation Y students for collaborative learning environments, authentic learning experiences and the development of marketable workplace skills. In the workplace, be it professional legal practice or otherwise, colleagues rely heavily on each other for information, support and guidance. In the undergraduate law degree at the Queensland University of Technology (‘QUT’) the Torts Student Peer Mentor Program aims to supplement a student’s understanding of the substantive law of torts with the development of life-long skills. As such it has the primary objective, albeit through discussion facilitated by more senior students, of encouraging first year students to develop for themselves the skills they need to be successful both as law students and as legal practitioners. Examples of such skills include those relevant to: preparation for assessment tasks; group work; problem solving, cognition and critical thinking; independent learning; and communication. Significantly, in this way, not only do the mentees benefit from involvement in the program, but the peer mentors, or program facilitators, themselves also benefit from their participation in the real world learning environment the program provides. This paper outlines the development and implementation of the above program, the pedagogy which influenced it, and its impact on student learning experiences

Contribution of industry-based student learning performance for the STEM education

We hypothesized that Industry based learning and teaching, especially through company assigned student projects or training programs, is an integral part of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) education. In this paper we show that industry-based student training and experience increases students’ academic performances independent to the organizational parameters and contexts. The literature on industry-based student training focuses on employability and the industry dimension, and neglects in many ways the academic dimension. We observed that the association factors between academic attributes and contributions of industry-based student training are central and vital to the technological learning experiences. We explore international initiatives and statistics collected of student projects in two categories: Industry based learning performances and on campus performances. The data collected were correlated to five (5) universities in different industrialized countries, e.g., Australia N=545 projects, Norway N=279, Germany N=74, France N=107 and Spain N=802. We analyzed industry-based student training along with company assigned student projects compared with in comparisons to campus performance. The data that suggests a strong correlation between industry-based student training per se and improved performance profiles or increasing motivation shows that industry-based student training increases student academic performance independent of organizational parameters and contexts. The programs we augmented were orthogonal to each other however, the trend of the students’ academic performances are identical. An isolated cohort for the reported countries that opposed our hypothesis warrants further investigation.

The QUT innovation space : a trans-disciplinary learning environment for entrepreneurship education : final report

In the current climate of global economic volatility, there are increasing calls for training in enterprising skills and entrepreneurship to underpin the systemic innovation required for even medium-term business sustainability. The skills long-recognised as the essential for entrepreneurship now appear on the list of employability skills demanded by industry. The QUT Innovation Space (QIS) was an experiment aimed at delivering entrepreneurship education (EE), as an extra-curricular platform across the university, to the undergraduate students of an Australian higher education institute. It was an ambitious project that built on overseas models of EE studied during an Australian Learning and Teaching Council (ALTC) Teaching Fellowship (Collet, 2011) and implemented those approaches across an institute. Such EE approaches have not been attempted in an Australian university. The project tested resonance not only with the student population, from the perspective of what worked and what didn’t work, but also with every level of university operations. Such information is needed to inform the development of EE in the Australian university landscape. The QIS comprised a physical co-working space, virtual sites (web, Twitter and Facebook) and a network of entrepreneurial mentors, colleagues, and students. All facets of the QIS enabled connection between like-minded individuals that underpins the momentum needed for a project of this nature. The QIS became an innovation community within QUT. This report serves two purposes. First, as an account of the QIS project and its evolution, the report serves to identify the student demand for skills and training as well as barriers and facilitators of the activities that promote EE in an Australian university context. Second, the report serves as a how-to manual, in the tradition of many tomes on EE, outlining the QIS activities that worked as well as those that failed. The activities represent one measure of QIS outcomes and are described herein to facilitate implementation in other institutes. The QIS initially aimed to adopt an incubation model for training in EE. The ‘learning by doing’ model for new venture creation is a highly successful and high profile training approach commonly found in overseas contexts. However, the greatest demand of the QUT student population was not for incubation and progression of a developed entrepreneurial intent, but rather for training that instilled enterprising skills in the individual. These two scenarios require different training approaches (Fayolle and Gailly, 2008). The activities of the QIS evolved to meet that student demand. In addressing enterprising skills, the QIS developed the antecedents of entrepreneurialism (i.e., entrepreneurial attitudes, motivation and behaviours) including high-level skills around risk-taking, effective communication, opportunity recognition and action-orientation. In focusing on the would-be entrepreneur and not on the (initial) idea per se, the QIS also fostered entrepreneurial outcomes that would never have gained entry to the rigid stage-gated incubation model proposed for the original QIS framework. Important lessons learned from the project for development of an innovation community include the need to: 1. Evaluate the context of the type of EE program to be delivered and the student demand for the skills training (as noted above). 2. Create a community that builds on three dimensions: a physical space, a virtual environment and a network of mentors and partners. 3. Supplement the community with external partnerships that aid in delivery of skills training materials. 4. Ensure discovery of the community through the use of external IT services to deliver advertising and networking outlets. 5. Manage unrealistic student expectations of billion dollar products. 6. Continuously renew and rebuild simple activities to maintain student engagement. 7. Accommodate the non-university end-user group within the community. 8. Recognise and address the skills bottlenecks that serve as barriers to concept progression; in this case, externally provided IT and programming skills. 9. Use available on-line and published resources rather than engage in constructing project-specific resources that quickly become obsolete. 10. Avoid perceptions of faculty ownership and operate in an increasingly competitive environment. 11. Recognise that the continuum between creativity/innovation and entrepreneurship is complex, non-linear and requires different training regimes during the different phases of the pipeline. One small entity, such as the QIS, cannot address them all. The QIS successfully designed, implemented and delivered activities that included events, workshops, seminars and services to QUT students in the extra-curricular space. That the QIS project can be considered successful derives directly from the outcomes. First, the QIS project changed the lives of emerging QUT student entrepreneurs. Also, the QIS activities developed enterprising skills in students who did not necessarily have a business proposition, at the time. Second, successful outcomes of the QIS project are evidenced as the embedding of most, perhaps all, of the QIS activities in a new Chancellery-sponsored initiative: the Leadership Development and Innovation Program hosted by QUT Student Support Services. During the course of the QIS project, the Brisbane-based innovation ecosystem underwent substantial change. From a dearth of opportunities for the entrepreneurially inclined, there is now a plethora of entities that cater for a diversity of innovation-related activities. While the QIS evolved with the landscape, the demand endpoint of the QIS activities still highlights a gap in the local and national innovation ecosystems. The freedom to experiment and to fail is not catered for by the many new entities seeking to build viable businesses on the back of the innovation push. The onus of teaching the enterprising skills, which are the employability skills now demanded by industry, remains the domain of the higher education sector.

Entrepreneurship education in non-business schools : best practice for Australian contexts of knowledge and innovation communities (Final Report)

In the current era of global economic instability, business and industry have already identified a widening gap between graduate skills and employability. An important element of this is the lack of entrepreneurial skills in graduates. This Teaching Fellowship investigated two sides of a story about entrepreneurial skills and their teaching. Senior players in the innovation commercialisation industry, a high profile entrepreneurial sector, were surveyed to gauge their needs and experiences of graduates they employ. International contexts of entrepreneurship education were investigated to explore how their teaching programs impart the skills of entrepreneurship. Such knowledge is an essential for the design of education programs that can deliver the entrepreneurial skills deemed important by industry for future sustainability. Two programs of entrepreneurship education are being implemented at QUT that draw on the best practice exemplars investigated during this Fellowship. The QUT Innovation Space (QIS) focuses on capturing the innovation and creativity of students, staff and others. The QIS is a physical and virtual meeting and networking space; a connected community enhancing the engagement of participants. The Q_Hatchery is still embryonic; but it is intended to be an innovation community that brings together nascent entrepreneurial businesses to collaborate, train and support each other. There is a niche between concept product and business incubator where an experiential learning environment for otherwise isolated ‘garage-at-home’ businesses could improve success rates. The QIS and the Q_Hatchery serve as living research laboratories to trial the concepts emerging from the skills survey. The survey of skills requirements of the innovation commercialisation industry has produced a large and high quality data set still being explored. Work experience as an employability factor has already emerged as an industry requirement that provides employee maturity. Exploratory factor analysis of the skills topics surveyed has led to a process-based conceptual model for teaching and learning higher-order entrepreneurial skills. Two foundational skills domains (Knowledge, Awareness) are proposed as prerequisites which allow individuals with a suite of early stage entrepreneurial and behavioural skills (Pre-leadership) to further leverage their careers into a leadership role in industry with development of skills around higher order elements of entrepreneurship, management in new business ventures and progressing winning technologies to market. The next stage of the analysis is to test the proposed model through structured equation modelling. Another factor that emerged quickly from the survey analysis broadens the generic concept of team skills currently voiced in Australian policy documents discussing the employability agenda. While there was recognition of the role of sharing, creating and using knowledge in a team-based interdisciplinary context, the adoption and adaptation of behaviours and attitudes of other team members of different disciplinary backgrounds (interprofessionalism) featured as an issue. Most undergraduates are taught and undertake teamwork in silos and, thus, seldom experience a true real-world interdisciplinary environment. Enhancing the entrepreneurial capacity of Australian industry is essential for the economic health of the country and can only be achieved by addressing the lack of entrepreneurial skills in graduates from the higher education system. This Fellowship has attempted to address this deficiency by identifying the skills requirements and providing frameworks for their teaching.

Issues in Learning and Education for the Ageing

The population is ageing worldwide. This chapter is a discussion of issues in ageing, the importance of learning and education for the elderly, and then the more specific issues of why, how and what elders want to learn.

An intentional class design model to engage first year students with threshold concepts using the academic discourse theories of Vygotsky and Laurillard

In the context of the first-year university classroom, this paper develops Vygotsky’s claim that ‘the relations between the higher mental functions were at one time real relations between people’. By taking the main horizontal and hierarchical levels of classroom discourse and dialogue (student-student, student-teacher, teacher-teacher) and marrying these with the possibilities opened up by Laurillard’s conversational framework, we argue that the learning challenge of a ‘troublesome’ threshold concept might be met by a carefully designed sequence of teaching events and experiences for first year students, and we provide a number of strategies that exploit each level of these ‘hierarchies of discourse’. We suggest that an analytical approach to classroom design that embodies these levels of discourse in sequenced dialogic methods could be used by teachers as a strategy to interrogate and adjust teaching-in-practice especially in the first year of university study.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander university students conceptions of formal learning and experiences of informal learning

This paper describes an investigation of conceptions of learning held by 22 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students from three universities in Queensland, Australia. Other areas investigated were students' experiences of informal learning, their reasons for studying and the strategies they used to learn. Research into conceptions of learning is gaining impetus and current beliefs include the premise that approaches to learning adopted by university students, and hence learning outcomes, are closely related to their conceptions of learning. There is substantial research focused on Aboriginal learning styles in early childhood and primary school which indicates that Aboriginal children prefer to learn in a practical way as well as through observation and imitation and trial and error. Very little research has focused specifically on Aboriginal university students' conceptions of learning. Results of this study found that these students view and approach formal university learning in much the same way as other university students and most hold quantitative conceptions of learning. The most interesting result was the difference between students' conceptions of formal learning and their experiences of informal learning. Many students' experiences of informal learning were grounded in practical activities or exhibited a cultural focus, however, most formal learning is not dependent upon practical or cultural knowledge. It is proposed that formal learning for Indigenous students recognise and include an Indigenous perspective such as integrating, where appropriate, practical strategies for learning. We also suggest that Indigenous students be helped to develop conceptions that will enable them to learn formal, theoretical material successfully.

Conceptions of learning held by Aboriginal students in a tertiary program in Indigenous primary health care

This paper is a description of a pilot investigation into conceptions of learning held by a sample of 10 Aboriginal students in a Bachelors degree courses. Results from this study suggest that this group of students view and approach learning in much the same way as other university students. They mostly hold quantitative conceptions of learning and use repetitive strategies which are potentially at odds with the objectives and procedures of the problems based program in which they are studying.

Enhancing interdisciplinary learning with a learning management system

Interdisciplinary learning is a form of knowledge production that is increasingly being embraced as an educational approach in higher education. A role of information and communication technologies (ICT) is to enhance interdisciplinary learning. Issues surrounding the mix of interdisciplinary pedagogic methodologies and emerging digital technologies are worthy of investigation. In this paper, the authors report the findings of a study that examined student perceptions of an interdisciplinary course on information technology (IT) and visual design that utilized a learning management system. Using questionnaire instrumentation, the authors sought the perceptions of first-year university students enrolled in a newly formed interdisciplinary IT course. Results indicate that ICT-based interdisciplinary learners prefer a self-directed and collaborative instructional modality, as well as teacher presence and interventions in the online environment. The types of student participation can significantly influence how students perceive ICT-based interdisciplinary learning design.

Teachers’ beliefs about the possibilities and limitations of digital games in classrooms

Teachers’ beliefs about what it is (or is not) possible to achieve with digital games in educational contexts will inevitably influence the decisions that they make about how, when, and for what specific purposes they will bring these games into their classrooms. They play a crucial role in both shaping and responding to the complex contextual factors which influence how games are understood and experienced in educational settings. Throughout this article the authors draw upon data collected for a large-scale, mixed-methods research project focusing on literacy, learning and teaching with digital games in Australian classrooms, to focus explicitly on the attitudes,understandings and expectations held about digital games by diverse teachers at the beginning of the project. They seek to identify the beliefs about games that motivated teachers’ participation in a digital games research project while focusing, as well, on concerns that teachers express about risks or limitations of such a project. The authors’ aim is to develop a detailed picture of the mindsets that teachers bring to games-based learning environments, and the relevance of these mindsets to broader debates about the relationship between games, learning and school.

Tales of science and defiance : the case for co-learning and collaboration in bridging the science/emotion divide in water recycling debates

Although science is generally assumed to be well integrated into rational decision-making models, it can be used to destabilise consultative processes, particularly when emotions are involved. Water policies are often seen as debates over technical and engineering issues, but can be highly controversial. Recycled water proposals, in particular, can create highly emotive conflicts. Through a case study regarding the rejection of recycled water proposals in the south-east Queensland, Australia, we explore the influence of science and emotions in contemporary water planning. We highlight the dangers inherent in promoting technical water planning issues at the expense of appropriate consideration of citizen concerns. Combining the science–policy interface and stakeholder engagement literatures, we advocate for collaborative decision-making processes that accommodate emotions and value judgements. A more collaborative stakeholder engagement model, founded on the principles of co-learning, has the potential to broaden the decision-making base and to promote better and more inclusive decision-making.

How small business advisory program delivery methods (collective learning, tailored, and practice-based approaches) affect learning and innovation

Past studies relate small business advisory program effectiveness to advisory characteristics such as advisory intensity and scope. We contribute to existing literature by seeking to identify the impact of different advisory program methods of delivery on learning and subsequent firm innovation behavior. Our research is based on a survey of 257 Australian firms completing small business advisory programs in the three years preceding the research. We explore the range of small business advisory program delivery methods in which our surveyed firms participated and, with reference to the literature on organizational learning and innovation, we analyze predictors of firms' learning ability and innovativeness based on the identified delivery methods. First, we found that business advisory programs that involved high levels of collective learning and tailored approaches enhanced firms' perceptions of their learning of critical skills or capabilities. We also found that small business advisory programs that were delivered by using practice-based approaches enhanced firms' subsequent organizational innovation. We verified this finding by testing whether firms that have participated in small business advisory services subsequently demonstrate improved behavior in terms of organizational innovativeness, when compared with matched firms that have not participated in an advisory program.

Renewing the Sustainable Energy Curriculum : Curriculum Frameworks and Guidance for Course Delivery

This guide is to support institutions in developing and teaching tertiary level programmes for sustainable energy professionals. Ongoing curriculum renewal is more difficult but vital for multidisciplinary courses preparing graduates to work in a specialised rapidly changing field. After more than 15 years of offering tertiary level “sustainable energy” qualifications in Australian Universities there was a clear need to assess how these courses are taught and develop curriculum frameworks to guide Universities designing/redesigning programs and courses to provide graduates with the relevant skills, knowledge and attributes (capabilities) seen by graduates and employers as required to work in this rapidly changing field. This guide presents the sustainable energy curriculum frameworks developed by the “Renewing the sustainable energy curriculum – providing internationally relevant skills for a carbon constrained economy” project, which was conducted over a two-and-a-quarter year period.