An Industry View of Experiential Learning

With the downsizing of hotel companies in the 1980s and 1990s. internships became a way of supplementing staff during peak seasons and auditioning students for full-time positions upon graduation. The authors surveyed corporate directors of human resources on specific activities and tasks associated with experiential learning in the guest services areas of hotels.

Student Achievement of Experiential Learning Objectives

Experiential learning is an important component of undergraduate hospitality programs, but most of the research in this area has focused on administrative and design issues. The author reports on a study undertaken to ascertain student perceptions as they relate to three commonly stated goals of experiential programs: the application of classroom studies, technical training, and management development.

Improving resource management in virtualized data centers using application performance models

The rapid growth of virtualized data centers and cloud hosting services is making the management of physical resources such as CPU, memory, and I/O bandwidth in data center servers increasingly important. Server management now involves dealing with multiple dissimilar applications with varying Service-Level-Agreements (SLAs) and multiple resource dimensions. The multiplicity and diversity of resources and applications are rendering administrative tasks more complex and challenging. This thesis aimed to develop a framework and techniques that would help substantially reduce data center management complexity.^ We specifically addressed two crucial data center operations. First, we precisely estimated capacity requirements of client virtual machines (VMs) while renting server space in cloud environment. Second, we proposed a systematic process to efficiently allocate physical resources to hosted VMs in a data center. To realize these dual objectives, accurately capturing the effects of resource allocations on application performance is vital. The benefits of accurate application performance modeling are multifold. Cloud users can size their VMs appropriately and pay only for the resources that they need; service providers can also offer a new charging model based on the VMs performance instead of their configured sizes. As a result, clients will pay exactly for the performance they are actually experiencing; on the other hand, administrators will be able to maximize their total revenue by utilizing application performance models and SLAs. ^ This thesis made the following contributions. First, we identified resource control parameters crucial for distributing physical resources and characterizing contention for virtualized applications in a shared hosting environment. Second, we explored several modeling techniques and confirmed the suitability of two machine learning tools, Artificial Neural Network and Support Vector Machine, to accurately model the performance of virtualized applications. Moreover, we suggested and evaluated modeling optimizations necessary to improve prediction accuracy when using these modeling tools. Third, we presented an approach to optimal VM sizing by employing the performance models we created. Finally, we proposed a revenue-driven resource allocation algorithm which maximizes the SLA-generated revenue for a data center.^

Maximizing Hospitality Learning Outcomes: An Integrated Experiential In-Class Approach

This study explored the influence of an experiential, in-class approach to the hospitality curriculum as a means of increasing its efficiency and effectiveness. Specifically, the study provides an example of how hospitality faculty might utilize an experiential, in-class approach to integrate additional hospitality-specific content along with process and content issues for working in teams and team decision-making. The results of this study support the efficient and effective use of an experiential inclass teaching method. The value of this study is twofold: (1) it provides an initial test of this approach’s usefulness and (2) it provides a forum for continued conversations of how experiential approaches can be utilized to enhance and reinforce other hospitality content and managerial skills and to bridge the gap between vocational and liberal education outcomes.

The effect of study skills instruction on the study strategies and attitudes of college students with learning disabilities

The purpose of this study was to determine the effects of participating in an existing study skills course, developed for use with a general college population, on the study strategies and attitudes of college students with learning disabilities. This study further investigated whether there would be differential effectiveness for segregated and mainstreamed sections of the course.^ The sample consisted of 42 students with learning disabilities attending a southeastern university. Students were randomly assigned to either a segregated or mainstreamed section of the study skills course. In addition, a control group consisted of students with learning disabilities who received no study skills instruction.^ All subjects completed the Learning and Study Strategies Inventory (LASSI) before and after the study skills course. The subjects in the segregated group showed significant improvement on six of the 10 scales of the LASSI: Time Management, Concentration, Information Processing, Selecting Main Ideas, Study Aids, and Self Testing. Subjects in the mainstreamed section showed significant improvement on five scales: Anxiety, Selecting Main Ideas, Study Aids, Self Testing, and Test Strategies. The subjects in the control group did not significantly improve on any of the scales.^ This study showed that college students with learning disabilities improved their study strategies and attitudes by participating in a study skills course designed for a general student population. Further, these students benefitted whether by taking the course only with other students with learning disabilities, or by taking the course in a mixed group of students with or without learning disabilities. These results have important practical implications in that it appears that colleges can use existing study skills courses without having to develop special courses and schedules of course offerings targeted specifically for students with learning disabilities. ^

Statistical dialog management for health interventions

Research endeavors on spoken dialogue systems in the 1990s and 2000s have led to the deployment of commercial spoken dialogue systems (SDS) in microdomains such as customer service automation, reservation/booking and question answering systems. Recent research in SDS has been focused on the development of applications in different domains (e.g. virtual counseling, personal coaches, social companions) which requires more sophistication than the previous generation of commercial SDS. The focus of this research project is the delivery of behavior change interventions based on the brief intervention counseling style via spoken dialogue systems. ^ Brief interventions (BI) are evidence-based, short, well structured, one-on-one counseling sessions. Many challenges are involved in delivering BIs to people in need, such as finding the time to administer them in busy doctors' offices, obtaining the extra training that helps staff become comfortable providing these interventions, and managing the cost of delivering the interventions. Fortunately, recent developments in spoken dialogue systems make the development of systems that can deliver brief interventions possible. ^ The overall objective of this research is to develop a data-driven, adaptable dialogue system for brief interventions for problematic drinking behavior, based on reinforcement learning methods. The implications of this research project includes, but are not limited to, assessing the feasibility of delivering structured brief health interventions with a data-driven spoken dialogue system. Furthermore, while the experimental system focuses on harmful alcohol drinking as a target behavior in this project, the produced knowledge and experience may also lead to implementation of similarly structured health interventions and assessments other than the alcohol domain (e.g. obesity, drug use, lack of exercise), using statistical machine learning approaches. ^ In addition to designing a dialog system, the semantic and emotional meanings of user utterances have high impact on interaction. To perform domain specific reasoning and recognize concepts in user utterances, a named-entity recognizer and an ontology are designed and evaluated. To understand affective information conveyed through text, lexicons and sentiment analysis module are developed and tested.^

The development of a learning module for youth care counsellors working with incarcerated youth

Background: A shift toward a rehabilitative model of care has prompted the Newfoundland and Labrador Youth Centre to institute a policy restricting seclusion and restraint as a means of behavioural management. This policy has been received with skepticism by youth counsellors who use these methods to contain disruptive behaviours. Insufficient training in mental health has precipitated feelings of inadequacy as they feel ill-equipped to do their jobs. Purpose: The purpose of my practicum is to develop a mental health learning module for youth counsellors to reduce seclusion and restraint in youth corrections. Methods: A literature search illustrated what is known on the topic of seclusion and restraint in youth corrections. Consultation with stakeholders revealed staff attitudes regarding the policy and its operational impact. An environmental scan revealed the availability of other resources intended to address disruptive behaviours. Conclusion: The learning module is focused on mental illnesses to increase youth counsellors’ competency in managing disruptive behaviours while minimizing the use of seclusion and restraint.

How does problem based learning fit with cognitive load theory?

This paper reports on an investigation with first year undergraduate Product Design and Management students within a School of Engineering. The students at the time of this investigation had studied fundamental engineering science and mathematics for one semester. The students were given an open ended, ill formed problem which involved designing a simple bridge to cross a river. They were given a talk on problem solving and given a rubric to follow, if they chose to do so. They were not given any formulae or procedures needed in order to resolve the problem. In theory, they possessed the knowledge to ask the right questions in order to make assumptions but, in practice, it turned out they were unable to link their a priori knowledge to resolve this problem. They were able to solve simple beam problems when given closed questions. The results show they were unable to visualise a simple bridge as an augmented beam problem and ask pertinent questions and hence formulate appropriate assumptions in order to offer resolutions.

The paradoxes of risk management in the banking sector

This paper uses empirical evidence to examine the operational dynamics and paradoxical nature of risk management systems in the banking sector. It demonstrates how a core paradox of market versus regulatory demands and an accompanying variety of performance, learning and belonging paradoxes underlie evident tensions in the interaction between front and back office staff in banks. Organisational responses to such paradoxes are found to range from passive to proactive, reflecting differing organisational, departmental and individual risk culture(s), and performance management systems. Nonetheless, a common feature of regulatory initiatives designed to secure a more structurally independent risk management function is that they have failed to rectify a critical imbalance of power - with the back office control functions continuing to be dominated by front office trading and investment functions. Ultimately, viewing the 'core' of risk management systems as a series of connected paradoxes rather than a set of assured, robust practices, requires a fundamental switch in emphasis away from a normative, standards-based approach to risk management to one which gives greater recognition to its behavioural dimensions.

Problematizing practice: MacIntyre and management

Alasdair MacIntyre’s distinction between institutions and practices helps illuminate how powerful institutional forces frame and constrain the practice of organizational research as well as the output and positioning of scholarly journals like Organization. Yet his conceptual frame is limited, not least because it is unclear whether the activity of managing is, or is not, a practice. This article builds on MacIntyre’s ideas by incorporating Aristotle’s concepts of poíēsis, praxis, téchnē and phrónēsis. Rather than ask, following MacIntyre, whether management is a practice, this wider network of concepts provides a richer frame for understanding the nature of managing and the appropriate role for academia. The article outlines a phronetic paradigm for organizational inquiry, and concludes by briefly examining the implications of such a paradigm for research and learning.

Effects of Altered Prenatal Sensory Stimulation on Postnatal Contingency Learning in Bobwhite Quail Neonates (Colinus Virginianus)

Preterm infants are exposed to high levels of modified early sensory experience in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU). Reports that preterm infants show deficits in contingency detection and learning when compared to full-term infants (Gekoski, Fagen, & Pearlman, 1984; Haley, Weinberg, & Grunau, 2006) suggest that their exposure to atypical amounts or types of sensory stimulation might contribute to deficits in these critical skills. Experimental modifications of sensory experience are severely limited with human fetuses and preterm infants, and previous studies with precocial bird embryos that develop in ovo have proven useful to assess the effects of modified perinatal sensory experience on subsequent perceptual and cognitive development. In the current study, I assessed whether increasing amounts of prenatal auditory or visual stimulation can interfere with quail neonates’ contingency detection and contingency learning in the days following hatching. Results revealed that augmented prenatal visual stimulation prior to hatching does not disrupt the ability of bobwhite chicks to recognize and prefer information learned in a contingent fashion, whereas augmented prenatal auditory stimulation disrupted the ability of chicks to benefit from contingently presented information. These results suggest that specific types of augmented prenatal stimulation that embryos receive during late prenatal period can impair the ability to learn and remember contingently presented information. These results provide testable developmental hypotheses, with the goal of improving the developmental care and management of preterm neonates in the NICU setting.

Statistical Dialog Management for Health Interventions

Research endeavors on spoken dialogue systems in the 1990s and 2000s have led to the deployment of commercial spoken dialogue systems (SDS) in microdomains such as customer service automation, reservation/booking and question answering systems. Recent research in SDS has been focused on the development of applications in different domains (e.g. virtual counseling, personal coaches, social companions) which requires more sophistication than the previous generation of commercial SDS. The focus of this research project is the delivery of behavior change interventions based on the brief intervention counseling style via spoken dialogue systems. Brief interventions (BI) are evidence-based, short, well structured, one-on-one counseling sessions. Many challenges are involved in delivering BIs to people in need, such as finding the time to administer them in busy doctors' offices, obtaining the extra training that helps staff become comfortable providing these interventions, and managing the cost of delivering the interventions. Fortunately, recent developments in spoken dialogue systems make the development of systems that can deliver brief interventions possible. The overall objective of this research is to develop a data-driven, adaptable dialogue system for brief interventions for problematic drinking behavior, based on reinforcement learning methods. The implications of this research project includes, but are not limited to, assessing the feasibility of delivering structured brief health interventions with a data-driven spoken dialogue system. Furthermore, while the experimental system focuses on harmful alcohol drinking as a target behavior in this project, the produced knowledge and experience may also lead to implementation of similarly structured health interventions and assessments other than the alcohol domain (e.g. obesity, drug use, lack of exercise), using statistical machine learning approaches. In addition to designing a dialog system, the semantic and emotional meanings of user utterances have high impact on interaction. To perform domain specific reasoning and recognize concepts in user utterances, a named-entity recognizer and an ontology are designed and evaluated. To understand affective information conveyed through text, lexicons and sentiment analysis module are developed and tested.

Digital anthropology and educational eGames: learning through behavioural patterns in digital, game-based contexts

The selected publications are focused on the relations between users, eGames and the educational context, and how they interact together, so that both learning and user performance are improved through feedback provision. A key part of this analysis is the identification of behavioural, anthropological patterns, so that users can be clustered based on their actions, and the steps taken in the system (e.g. social network, online community, or virtual campus). In doing so, we can analyse large data sets of information made by a broad user sample,which will provide more accurate statistical reports and readings. Furthermore, this research is focused on how users can be clustered based on individual and group behaviour, so that a personalized support through feedback is provided, and the personal learning process is improved as well as the group interaction. We take inputs from every person and from the group they belong to, cluster the contributions, find behavioural patterns and provide personalized feedback to the individual and the group, based on personal and group findings. And we do all this in the context of educational games integrated in learning communities and learning management systems. To carry out this research we design a set of research questions along the 10-year published work presented in this thesis. We ask if the users can be clustered together based on the inputs provided by them and their groups; if and how these data are useful to improve the learner performance and the group interaction; if and how feedback becomes a useful tool for such pedagogical goal; if and how eGames become a powerful context to deploy the pedagogical methodology and the various research methods and activities that make use of that feedback to encourage learning and interaction; if and how a game design and a learning design must be defined and implemented to achieve these objectives, and to facilitate the productive authoring and integration of eGames in pedagogical contexts and frameworks. We conclude that educational games are a resourceful tool to provide a user experience towards a better personalized learning performance and an enhance group interaction along the way. To do so, eGames, while integrated in an educational context, must follow a specific set of user and technical requirements, so that the playful context supports the pedagogical model underneath. We also conclude that, while playing, users can be clustered based on their personal behaviour and interaction with others, thanks to the pattern identification. Based on this information, a set of recommendations are provided Digital Anthropology and educational eGames 6 /216 to the user and the group in the form of personalized feedback, timely managed for an optimum impact on learning performance and group interaction level. In this research, Digital Anthropology is introduced as a concept at a late stage to provide a backbone across various academic fields including: Social Science, Cognitive Science, Behavioural Science, Educational games and, of course, Technology-enhance learning. Although just recently described as an evolution of traditional anthropology, this approach to digital behaviour and social structure facilitates the understanding amongst fields and a comprehensive view towards a combined approach. This research takes forward the already existing work and published research onusers and eGames for learning, and turns the focus onto the next step — the clustering of users based on their behaviour and offering proper, personalized feedback to the user based on that clustering, rather than just on isolated inputs from every user. Indeed, this pattern recognition in the described context of eGames in educational contexts, and towards the presented aim of personalized counselling to the user and the group through feedback, is something that has not been accomplished before.

‘Learning to be Zen’: Women travellers and the imperative to happy

This paper follows the emotional management of lone, independent women travellers as they move through tourist spaces, based on my doctoral research Embodiment and Emotion in the experiences of independent women tourists (2012). Specifically, this paper will focus on ‘gendering happiness’ by arguing that women travellers are significantly compelled to feel and display characteristics of happiness, humour and ‘learning to be Zen’ in order to be successful travellers. The imperative to become, and remain, happy and humorous in the face of embodied, emotional and gendered constraints is a key feature of women’s reflections of their travelling experiences, mirroring the recent emergence of literature into happiness and positive thinking within feminist theory (Ehrenreich 2010, Ahmed 2010). Negotiating ‘bad’ emotions provides a powerful insight into the perceptions of women travellers; to remain happy can mask problematic power relations and other forms of resistance. This is not to say that emotional negotiation is not partly a form of effective resistance, rather, I wish to make room for the freedom to be unhappy and angry in travelling space without feeling failure for not achieving a successful travelling identity.

Nurses' experiences of pain management for people with advanced dementia approaching the end of life: a qualitative study

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES: To explore hospice, acute care and nursing home nurses' experiences of pain management for people with advanced dementia in the final month of life. To identify the challenges, facilitators and practice areas requiring further support.

BACKGROUND: Pain management in end-stage dementia is a fundamental aspect of end of life care; however, it is unclear what challenges and facilitators nurses experience in practice, whether these differ across care settings, and whether training needs to be tailored to the context of care.

DESIGN: A qualitative study using semi-structured interviews and thematic analysis to examine data.

METHODS: 24 registered nurses caring for people dying with advanced dementia were recruited from ten nursing homes, three hospices, and two acute hospitals across a region of the United Kingdom. Interviews were conducted between June 2014 and September 2015.

RESULTS: Three core themes were identified: challenges administering analgesia, the nurse-physician relationship, and interactive learning and practice development. Patient-related challenges to pain management were universal across care settings; nurse- and organisation-related barriers differed between settings. A need for interactive learning and practice development, particularly in pharmacology, was identified.

CONCLUSIONS: Achieving pain management in practice was highly challenging. A number of barriers were identified; however, the manner and extent to which these impacted on nurses differed across hospice, nursing home and acute care settings. Needs-based training to support and promote practice development in pain management in end-stage dementia is required.

RELEVANCE TO CLINICAL PRACTICE: Nurses considered pain management fundamental to end of life care provision; however, nurses working in acute care and nursing home settings may be under-supported and under-resourced to adequately manage pain in people dying with advanced dementia. Nurse-to-nurse mentoring and ongoing needs-assessed interactive case-based learning could help promote practice development in this area. Nurses require continuing professional development in pharmacology. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.