"i Went To The Woods Because I Wished To Live Deliberately": How A College-Level Academic Course Can Influence A Lifetime

This study, using the portraiture methodology, provides an analysis of the lifelong significance of an undergraduate program that integrates literature with an outdoor experiential platform. With limited research on long-term effects of an academic outdoor experiential course on one's life, there is space to wonder about the prospect and nature of the long-term significance of an academic course that may offer technical skill, intrapersonal and interpersonal development, and also the delivery of subject matter related to a traditional or mainstream academic area of study. Utilizing an academic skills-oriented lens as well as a character strengths lens, portraits were crafted of four former participants of the University of Michigan's New England Literature Program (NELP) to shed light on the long-term influence of this type of course, crucial participant characteristics that contribute to the program's impact, and specific components of the program that are particularly integral to the course's efficacy. Since 1975, each spring term a small contingent of students and educators has lived in the woods in the New England region as a community of learners, artists and explorers. NELP is an exemplar of a longstanding undergraduate academic English course that integrates the literature of New England writers, exploratory writing and student experiences relating to regional literature and the land. Emergent themes of this course's long-term influence on former participants include increased collaborative skills, increased self-confidence and self-knowledge, a reinforcement of lifelong relationships with the outdoors, and nurtured creativity. For participants to reap benefit from this course, it was important for them to enter with maturity to conduct themselves with openness to new experiences, relationships, and extensive reflection. Findings relating to the integral components of such a program include that of being place-based, oriented towards process, and being an intentional, collaborative community.

Survey of intensive care nurses' knowledge relating to the pulmonary artery catheter

In 2003 there was an increase in the use of pulmonary artery catheters in Australia from 12, 000 to 16, 000 units in intensive care and peri-operative care. This survey of intensive care nurses in five intensive care units in Queensland addressed knowledge of use, safety and complications of the pulmonary artery catheter, using a previously validated 31 question multiple choice survey. One hundred and thirty-nine questionnaires were completed, a response rate of 46%. The mean score was 13.3, standard deviation +/-4.2 out of a total of 31 (42.8% correct). The range was 4 to 25. Scores were significantly higher in those participants with more ICU experience, higher nursing grade, a higher self-assessed level of knowledge and greater frequency of PAC supervision. There was no significant correlation between total score and hospital- or university-based education, or total score and public or private hospital participants. Fifty-one per cent were unable to correctly identify the significant pressure change as the catheter is advanced from the right ventricle to the pulmonary artery.

PERCEPÇÕES DE GANHOS PARA OS EMPREGADOS NA GESTÃO POR COMPETÊNCIAS: UM ESTUDO DE CASO

Tendo como pressuposto de que a Gestão de Pessoas por Competências deve agregar valor econômico para a organização e valor social para os indivíduos, a presente pesquisa investiga com os empregados de uma empresa quais os ganhos trazidos na sua vida, profissional e pessoal, pelo modelo implementado na organização em que trabalham. Para alcançar esse objetivo foi realizado um estudo de caso, de caráter qualitativo numa empresa do setor público, que possui há mais de cinco anos um sistema de gestão por competências, contemplando todos os subsistemas (seleção, treinamento, remuneração, avaliação de desempenho e carreira) para 100,0% dos empregados. Num processo de antes e depois do sistema de gestão por competências, a pesquisa foi realizada por meio de questionário e entrevista. Para medir o ganho dos empregados, foram utilizadas as categorias e subcategorias de ganho social definidas na tese de doutoramento de Amyra Sarsur, 2007. Os resultados dessa pesquisa indicaram que, na percepção do empregado, três subcategorias destacaram-se como ganho social: desenvolvimento, compreensão conceptual da organização e autodesenvolvimento. A importância da pesquisa se faz devido à crescente adoção desse modelo de gestão de pessoas pelas empresas brasileiras e a ausência de pesquisas que investigam os ganhos dos empregados com a Gestão por Competências.(AU)

Models, Techniques and Applications of e-Learning Personalization

In recent years Web has become mainstream medium for communication and information dissemination. This paper presents approaches and methods for adaptive learning implementation, which are used in some contemporary web-interfaced Learning Management Systems (LMSs). The problem is not how to create electronic learning materials, but how to locate and utilize the available information in personalized way. Different attitudes to personalization are briefly described in section 1. The real personalization requires a user profile containing information about preferences, aims, and educational history to be stored and used by the system. These issues are considered in section 2. A method for development and design of adaptive learning content in terms of learning strategy system support is represented in section 3. Section 4 includes a set of innovative personalization services that are suggested by several very important research projects (SeLeNe project, ELENA project, etc.) dated from the last few years. This section also describes a model for role- and competency-based learning customization that uses Web Services approach. The last part presents how personalization techniques are implemented in Learning Grid-driven applications.

Design Standardized Web-Components for e-Learning

In this paper a flexible approach to design LMS with QTI Ready component based on the e-Learning standards AICC and IMS QTI is described. This system and component permits a dynamic learning and assessment process. QTI Ready component can provide these facilities to other real world virtual learning management system.

On a Virtual Learning Environment

Education in the Information Society is based on asynchronism in time and space, interactivity and virtual restructuring of the educational space. One way to implement such a model of training is web-based - use of the WWW as a virtual environment to access educational materials or to organize the learning process. This work presents a virtual learning environment (VLE) developed for students and made up of modules of dynamically changing content implemented by authorized users. The aim is, through advanced technology for e-learning, testing and self-testing to stimulate students’ activity to focus their potential on the acquisition of the necessary knowledge, skills and competences. The VLE was developed under the Human Resources Development Operational Programme.

Assessment Criteria for Non-auditorial Educational Forms in Informatics

Report published in the Proceedings of the National Conference on "Education in the Information Society", Plovdiv, May, 2013

Technology Integration and School Leadership

The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB) brought many significant changes to American schools including accessibility to technology. Through an extensive literature review of the relationship between technology leadership and student achievement, five major themes emerged from data that support the need for more effective computer-based education in schools.

Training National Park Service Concession Specialists

In recent years, the Internet has become the medium of choice in distance education, and a prominent delivery tool in many hospitality management programs. When students cannot be educated on site, web-based education has proven to be the next best thing to in-person instruction. The authors describe a project in which the Internet is used to educate National Park Service concession specialists, exploring the reasons the project was instigated, its development and funding, and educational challenges and solutions. Such web-based instruction can be used as a means to attract outside grants and revenues for hospitality management programs.

A concepção de humanização no contexto da formação médica: o caso da UFRN

This thesis aims at understanding the aspects related to the concept of humanization that contribute to a humanized education in the pedagogical project of the medicine graduation course of the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte (UFRN). It has been used a qualitative research through non - structured interviews to six professors and through the focus group technique with participant observation of 30 students of the 2 nd , 4 th and 6 th terms of the med program. The data has been analyzed through the cate gorical thematic subject analysis technique from which two categories have emerged: tendency changes and initial changes. In the former we ’ ve identified aspects related to the social reality based in the experiences of professors and students in their work field; the competencies such as stimulation to the students ’ critical and reflexive knowledge through professors ’ encouragements and learning to learn as a way of developing professors ’ education towards the process of learning and evaluation of students. In the latter, we ’ ve noticed positive and negative aspects. While in the positive aspects we ’ ve testified actions and attitudes that were crucial for the development of the curricular proposals, in the negative ones we ’ ve verified controversial arguments between the students and teachers ’ speeches regarding the process of medical education in a humanized approach. For last, we ’ ve got large different results within the period investigated. However, we understand that the data found in the study has contribu ted to reach the proposed objectives regarding what has been perceived between the professors and students ’ point of views in relation to a humanized based education. Even if it ́s an initial perception, it is moving towards a medical education more humaniz ed and centered in the human being.

Learning Environments in Design Studio Culture

The paper reports on a study of design studio culture from a student perspective. Learning in design studio culture has been theorised variously as a signature pedagogy emulating professional practice models, as a community of practice and as a form of problem-based learning, all largely based on the study of teaching events in studio. The focus of this research has extended beyond formally recognized activities to encompass the student’s experience of their social and community networks, working places and study set-ups, to examine how these have contributed to studio culture and how there have been supported by studio teaching. Semi-structured interviews with final year undergraduate students of architecture formed the basis of the study using an interpretivist approach informed by Actor-network theory, with studio culture featured as the focal actor, enrolling students and engaging with other actors, together constituting an actor-network of studio culture. The other actors included social community patterns and activities; the numerous working spaces (including but not limited to the studio space itself); the equipment, tools of trade and material pre-requisites for working; the portfolio enrolling the other actors to produce work for it; and the various formal and informal events associated with the course itself. Studio culture is a highly charged social arena: The question is how, and in particular, which aspects of it support learning? Theoretical models of situated learning and communities of practice models have informed the analysis, with Bourdieu’s theory of practice, and his interrelated concepts of habitus, field and capital providing a means of relating individually acquired habits and modes of working to social contexts. Bourdieu’s model of habitus involves the externalisation through the social realm of habits and knowledge previously internalised. It is therefore a useful model for considering whole individual learning activities; shared repertoires and practices located in the social realm. The social milieu of the studio provides a scene for the exercise and display of ‘practicing’ and the accumulation of a form of ‘practicing-capital’. This capital is a property of the social milieu rather than the space, so working or practicing in the company of others (in space and through social media) becomes a more valued aspect of studio than space or facilities alone. This practicing-capital involves the acquisition of a habitus of studio culture, with the transformation of physical practices or habits into social dispositions, acquiring social capital (driving the social milieu) and cultural capital (practicing-knowledge) in the process. The research drew on students’ experiences, and their practicing ‘getting a feel for the game’ by exploring the limits or boundaries of the field of studio culture. The research demonstrated that a notional studio community was in effect a social context for supporting learning; a range of settings to explore and test out newly internalised knowledge, demonstrate or display ideas, modes of thinking and practicing. The study presents a nuanced interpretation of how students relate to a studio culture that involves a notional community, and a developing habitus within a field of practicing that extends beyond teaching scenarios.

Differential ability and attainment in language and arithmetic of Dutch primary school pupils.

Background. In pre-school and primary education pupils differ in many abilities and competences (‘giftedness’). Yet mainstream educational practice seems rather homogeneous in providing age-based or grade-class subject matter approaches. Aims. To clarify whether pupils scoring initially at high ability level do develop and attain differently at school with respect to language and arithmetic compared with pupils displaying other initial ability levels. To investigate whether specific individual, family or educational variables co-vary with the attainment of these different types of pupils in school. Samples. Data from the large-scale PRIMA cohort study including a total of 8258 grade 2 and 4 pupils from 438 primary schools in The Netherlands. Methods. Secondary analyses were carried out to construct gain scores for both language and arithmetic proficiency and a number of behavioural, attitudinal, family and educational characteristics. The pupils were grouped into different ability categories (highly able; able; above average; average and below). Further analyses used Pearson correlations and analyses of variance both between and within ability categories. Cross-validation was done by introducing a cohort of younger pupils in pre-school and grouping both cohorts into decile groups based on initial ability in language and arithmetic. Results. Highly able pupils generally decreased in attainment in both language and arithmetic, whereas pupils in average and below average groups improved their language and arithmetic scores. Only with highly able pupils were some educational characteristics correlated with the pupils’ development in achievement, behaviour and attitudes. Conclusions. Pre-school and primary education should better match pupils’ differences in abilities and competences from their start in pre-school to improve their functioning, learning processes and outcomes. Recommendations for educational improvement strategies are presented in closing.

The Development of Educational Materials for the Study of Architecture using Computer Game Technology

Computer game technology provides us with the tools to create web-based educational materials for autonomous and collaborative learning. At Worcester, we have researched the use of this technology in various educational contexts. This paper reports one such study; the use of the commercial game engine “Unreal Tournament 2004” (UT2004) to produce materials suitable for education of Architects. We map the concepts and principles of Architectural Design onto the affordances (development tools) provided by UT2004, leading to a systematic procedure for the realization of buildings and urban environments using this game engine. A theory for the production of web-based learning materials which supports both autonomous and collaborative learning is developed. A heuristic evaluation of our materials, used with second-year students is presented. Associated web-pages provide on-line materials for delegates.

Strategisk kompetensutveckling : En organisations strategiska förhållningssätt till kompetensutveckling

I denna fallstudie undersöks hur en kompetensbaserad personalstrategi ter sig inom en organisation. Då det är ett brett område har en avgränsning gjorts och det är enbart kompetensutveckling som berörs. Syftet är att skapa förståelse för det strategiska förhållningssättet till kompetensutveckling inom en organisation. Inom ramen för våra forskningsfrågor undersöks också de verktyg och metoder som en organisation använder sig av för att utveckla rätt kompetens samt de hinder och utmaningar som finns. Det har av tidigare forskning framkommit att ett strategiskt förhållningssätt är avgörande för en organisations överlevnad och framgång. Det finns en samstämmighet kring att organisationer vid valet av kompetensutvecklingsinsatser behöver utgå från verksamhetens behov, kundkrav och framtida mål för att bli gynnsamma. Syftet för insatserna blir därmed avgörande och en central del i det strategiska förhållningssättet till kompetensutveckling. Studien utgår från en fenomenologisk ansats och insamling av data har skett med hjälp av sju semi-strukturerade intervjuer med öppna frågor som utgått från tydliga teman. Studiens intervjuer har genomförts i en politiskt styrd organisation med cirka 5000 anställda och analysen av dessa intervjuer har skett enligt en femstegsmodell där vi avsett att synliggöra de mest väsentliga beståndsdelarna av fenomenet. Studien har tydliggjort hur organisationens strategiska förhållningssätt ser ut och också tydligt påvisat faktorer som gör det svårt att upprätthålla. De verktyg och metoder organisationen använder sig av är exempelvis webbaserad utbildning, ständiga förbättringar, nätverk, händelsehanteringssystem, en utbildningsplattform samt ett formulär för utbildningsförfrågningar. De hinder och utmaningar som synliggjorts är exempelvis utomstående faktorer, ekonomi, ansvarsfördelning och samverkan. Vår studie har också bidragit till en insikt i hur viktigt det är att noga överväga vilken metod som bör användas vid olika typer av kompetensutvecklingsinsatser. Det är viktigt att inte låta fokus hamna på att genomföra det minst kostsamma, utan låta valet av metod syfta till att ge det mest effektiva lärandet. Det är viktigt att i varje skede göra strategiska avvägningar som inte enbart har sin grund i ekonomiska perspektiv vad gäller besparingar och minskade kostnader. Ett intressant område till vidare forskning ser vi i chefsperspektivet. Vi finner detta intressant då det både genom tidigare forskning och genom vår egen studie tydligt har framgått att chefer har en nyckelroll och det finns därför ett intresse att närmre undersöka den roll som chefer delegeras i kompetensutvecklingsinsatser och vilka möjligheter de har i arbetet med dessa frågor.

Economic competence and financial literacy of young adults. Status and challenges

This book will concentrate on economic competence and financial literacy of young adults in the US, Europe and South America. The subjects of the research are mainly individuals who have begun an apprenticeship or university education. Economic competence and financial literacy are of special interest for this group because they are usually in the unique position of being responsible for managing their own financial affairs autonomously, often for the first time. Furthermore, economic competence is key to social participation and active citizenship. (DIPF/Orig.)