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1.
Interest in quality is well established within higher education. This paper will critically review the most commonly used definitions of quality: fitness for purpose and value for money. It will point out that these two definitions are important but they ignore the emancipatory power of higher education and the development needs of academics and students. This paper will propose a new understanding of quality as a virtue of professional practice, which can be used as a useful force for individual academics and students to increase their commitment to learning and teaching. A new model of quality evaluation will be outlined as a supportive mechanism to enhance academics’ professionalism and to increase students’ capability to learn.  相似文献   

2.
Abstract

This paper examines the use of curriculum negotiation in programmes designed to prepare academics for their teaching role, arguing that this is an effective way to meet growing demands for professionalism in higher education teaching. A postgraduate certificate course which has been developed and evaluated by the authors for three years constitutes a case study through which the issues are examined. The course is based on nine basic principles derived from the literature on teaching and learning in academic contexts. These principles provide a framework for discussing the course and the responses of its participants. Implications of this case study for the wider use of negotiation as a way of developing the teaching professionalism of academics from a wide range of disciplinary contexts are then discussed.  相似文献   

3.
In this work, we contribute to the debate on the transformation of higher education institutions (HEIs) in post-apartheid South Africa by examining the changing demography of academic staff bodies at 25 South African HEIs from 2005 to 2015. We use empirical data to provide initial insights into the changing racial profiles of academic staff bodies across age, gender and rank and then summarise our findings into a transformation ‘scorecard’ which provides an indication of how all racial groups in the country are performing in terms of their representation in higher education. Initial results indicate that most academics in South Africa are middle-aged (between 35 and 54) but an ageing trend is evident, particularly among white academics. In terms of gender, males marginally outnumber females, although we estimate an equitable distribution to be attained within the next 5 years. Significantly, the data indicate that there is an upwards trajectory of black African academics across all rankings from 2005 to 2015 and a concomitant downward trajectory of white academics across all rankings. Both Indian and coloured academics most closely represent their national population representation. Our transformation ‘scorecard’ indicates that the demography of academic staff at higher education institutions in South Africa is changing and will continue to change in the future, particularly within the next 20 years if current trends continue.  相似文献   

4.
Formative assessment is of critical importance to student learning. With learning and teaching, and also retention, high on the agenda of higher education, the professionalism of academics as educators is of increasing significance. A key component of educators' professionalism—formative assessment—is weakly conceptualised, and hence it is likely that the contribution of formative assessment to student learning and retention is not being optimised. The first, larger part of this article discusses formative assessment in the context of the current political and structural environment of higher education. The second part considers how formative assessment might better contribute to student development and retention, particularly in the critically important first year of a higher education program.  相似文献   

5.
This paper challenges the view that academic professionalism resides in the professional 'autonomy' of the academic, the 'self-regulation' of academics as an occupational group, and the differential 'status' of academic workers. This still influential (though residual) notion of academic professionalism, it is argued, leads to institutional stasis. What is required is greater reflexivity by academics in respect of their underlying professional values. In particular the piece challenges the academic community (of which the author is a member) to re-think academic freedom – the bedrock of professional identity within that community – in terms of increased inclusivity: 'freedom for all' rather than 'freedom for academics' The paper touches on issues relating to practice and organisational structure, but focuses primarily on the need for academics to shift the moral bases of their claim to professionalism. In so doing, it also challenges the post-Dearing consensus that the debate on academic professionalism can be adequately conducted in terms of 'standards' and 'outcomes'. A prime purpose of the paper is to promote debate and discussion by setting a different kind of agenda (a moral agenda) and by couching that agenda within a different kind of discourse (one that invites and admits moral speculation).  相似文献   

6.
Declining trust in public services has led to increasing calls for higher education to be ‘accountable’ for the quality of its teaching and learning provision. However, increasing levels of quality evaluation have led academics to feel that their professionalism is under attack. Reflecting on this history and various dimensions of accountability, this paper seeks to interpret accountability by addressing two questions: What is accountability in higher education? How can it be related to academic professionalism? The paper argues that professionalism and accountability appear to be contradictory terms, but can exist simultaneously. If academics' moral and social responsibility becomes requisite to an enhanced social accounting for the quality of university teaching and learning, there could be less perceived tension between academic professionalism and accountability.  相似文献   

7.
This paper builds on previous research into teachers' conceptions of learning and teaching with an investigation of information technology academics. Using a phenomenographic approach to build a model of IT academics experiences and practice of teaching we aimed to identify any specific issues that academics in the IT discipline face and to assess the impact of the changing higher education environment on their teaching experiences. While there were few discipline-specific issues we did find that the current higher education environment appears to be negatively affecting the quality of teaching and learning within the IT discipline and indications are that these environmental factors are affecting academics within other disciplines. We concluded that current institutional policies, including teaching and learning quality measures and lack of resources, are compromising the way subjects are delivered. In some cases academics are discouraged from improving their teaching practice.  相似文献   

8.
Australian academics and practitioners in the human services are particularly susceptible to social, political and economic influences in respect of their relevance, viability and operations. In fact, it can be argued that the impact of these influences has placed human service practitioners and academics in a perpetual state of vulnerability. Australian universities have been challenged to make their programmes more relevant and viable to the community at large, and practitioners face increasing workloads with limited resources based on restricted fiscal allocation, and the changing relationship between government and service providers. Drawing on interview data from twenty-one (n = 21) practitioners, this article highlights their identified problems regarding the notion of professionalism in the human services with a particular focus on ethical dilemmas in human service practice. Gleaning these details will be a basis for recommending necessary professionalethics curricula content in human services programmes offered in Australian universities. Moreover, while the research data is Australian based, the authors contend that the universal theories and principles underpinning human service practice justify the significance and value of the data as an important source for international consideration in curriculum development of human service academic programmes.  相似文献   

9.
This research is based on an empirical study exploring how academics make curriculum decisions and their perceptions of the influences that shape their decisions. Interviews were held with 20 academics from diverse disciplines, who were both research active and committed to teaching. The higher education curriculum was conceptualised as a field of decision-making shaped by academics’ beliefs about educational and contextual influences. The study identified five distinctive curriculum orientations representing coherent patterns of curriculum decisions aligned with academics’ beliefs about educational purposes. Case studies are presented to elucidate each of the curriculum orientations. Curriculum orientations were also found to shape academics’ responses to educational change. The following higher education change drivers are explored: graduate employability and the skills agenda, teaching–research relationships, changing understandings about teaching and learning, educational technologies and flexible delivery. The findings suggest implications for institutional curriculum change initiatives and academic development programmes.  相似文献   

10.
Manhong Lai 《Compare》2007,37(1):53-68
Beginning in the 1990s, the education departments of Hong Kong and Shanghai began to actively initiate reform with a focus on the quality of education. In reviewing the implementation of educational reform in these two societies, we found that Hong Kong teachers tended to only adopt those policies which they felt were beneficial for students' learning, whereas Shanghai teachers tended to conform more to the state's requirements. Teachers in Hong Kong strongly expressed their frustration over the intensification of their work, while teachers in Shanghai seldom expressed disagreement over the state initiatives. Concerning the meaning of teacher professionalism, teachers in Hong Kong were more able than their counterparts in Shanghai to develop their own interpretations. However, at the same time, teachers' work in Hong Kong was still being monitored by the emerging schooling market, while the work of Shanghai teachers was monitored by the state. Teachers' work in both societies can be interpreted as ‘confined professionalism’. In addition, in both of the two societies teachers' awareness of their professionalism was comparatively weak. Further empowerment in this area is needed.  相似文献   

11.
By comparing two distinct settings–Portugal and Finland–and based on previous studies revealing similar trends in both countries, this article analyses the relationship between institutional and academic autonomy in the higher education sector. Based on crosschecking of the literature review and 47 interviews with key actors in both the Portuguese and Finnish higher education systems, the authors analyse the extent to which the political attempts to increase institutional autonomy are perceived by academics in these countries as leading to an increase in their professional autonomy. Data reveals that there is a lack of complete correspondence between the way different institutional dimensions have been changing at the organisational level and the way academics perceive the effects at the professional level. While there is a correspondence in the perceptions over organisational and interventional autonomy, no correspondence is found concerning policy autonomy in both countries. Furthermore, there are no homogeneous perceptions within academics group in each country concerning professional autonomy.  相似文献   

12.
The paper explores academic staff and departmental research and teaching cultures in the Education Departments of five universities in Scotland and England, countries with increasingly diverging public policies in respect of education. The relationship between research and teaching, how the purposes of universities are defined and the status of research in Education are current UK higher education policy preoccupations. Data is drawn from interviews with 40 academics, observation of department settings, documentation and websites. The analysis draws on the work of Bourdieu, considering the changing habitus of individual academics, their departmental and academic subject context and the forms of symbolic capital now required in Scottish and English Education departments in response to new policies affecting their academic field. The paper also utilises recent literature on the research–teaching relationship. The career trajectories of respondents, their habitus and the forms of symbolic capital that they bring to academic life are examined, as are the extent to which the teaching and research cultures in each of the five departments studied mirror each other and whether these also reflect the two different policy contexts. The themes how academic cultures are shaped and research/teaching connections viewed have international as UK relevance.  相似文献   

13.
Like many other higher education systems in the Western world, Dutch higher education underwent profound changes during the last decade. In this article we will present an overview of these changes, and try to formulate an analytical framework that might be suited to analyze this process. In order to set the stage, we will begin with an overview of the Dutch higher education system, in which the broad structure is described, and some trends are presented. Next, an overview is given of the retrenchment and restructuring operations with which Dutch higher education was confronted during the last decade. Drawing, mainly, on public administration and political theory, we then attempt to formulate a framework for analysis. In this we focus on the Dutch higher education system as a policy network, and address the relationships that exist between the various key actors in the network: between government and higher education, among higher education institutions themselves, and among the different actors within the institutions, especially administrators and academics. In doing so, we hope to demonstrate that at all these levels some identical basic processes operate which to a large extent determine the outcomes of governmental policies aimed at changing the higher education system. Time and again the modern state stumbles over the academic system (Clark 1983: 137)  相似文献   

14.
The policies of the Australian federal government are clearly intended to bring about a fundamental transformation of the country's higher education system. The Australian case, however, presents several paradoxes. Policy changes are being initiated by a federal government that has no legislative control over state chartered higher education institutions. While the federal government wishes to see a more diversified and adaptive higher education system, it seems to be implementing a reward structure for individual institutions and academics which encourages imitation of the elite universities. Although government claims that its new policy initiatives are designed to debureaucratize the system, a significant proportion of the Australian academic community claims that government is centralizing control. This article explores these and other issues facing Australian higher education, not for the purpose of resolving the seeming paradoxes, but to suggest a particular research agenda for investigating change in higher education.  相似文献   

15.
This article studies the dilemma between professionalization and professionalism in the development of teaching into a bureaucratic organization in Hong Kong. Professionalization and bureucractization are simultaneous processes. Teaching as an occupation has grown from a state of idiosyncrasy to a profession with defined boundaries. However, achieving system efficiency and technical rationality, both features of bureaucracy, could undermine or suppress teachers’ individual autonomy. Thus, bureaucratization supports professionalization by raising the status of teaching, but undermines professionalism by constraining teachers’ autonomy. The article examines the changing pattern of stratification and how it shaped the relationship between the professionalization, bureaucratization and professionalism of teaching in Hong Kong. It argues that teaching cannot be a true profession without realizing professionalism, and that teacher education has a central role in the drive towards it. Key Words: Hong Kong teachers, teacher education, professionalization, professionalism, stratification  相似文献   

16.
Changes within the higher education sector have had significant effects on the identity of the individual academic. As institutions transform in response to government‐driven policy and funding directives, there is a subsequent impact upon the roles and responsibilities of those employed as educational professionals. Academic practices are changing as multiple roles emerge from the reshaping of academic work. Institutional pressures to produce specific research outputs at the same time as teaching and undertaking managerial/administrative responsibilities are creating tension between what academics perceive as their professional identity and that prescribed by their employing organisation. Reconciling this disconnect is part of the challenge for academics, who are now seeking to understand and manage their changing identity. Narratives obtained from research in a university with a polytechnic background and an institute of technology (aspiring to be a university), provide some subjective reflections for examining this issue.  相似文献   

17.
18.
This article explores constructions of teacher identities at a time of significant changes to public service professionalism. The article draws on different discourses of professionalism, contrasting ‘organisational’ and ‘occupational’ professionalism, with discourses of ‘personal’ and ‘critical’ professionalism, to explore changing meanings and enactments of teacher professionalism in the 2000s. Narratives of three novice teachers, followed over eight years, are used to consider the impact of dominant discourses of ‘organisational’ professionalism in English further education, resulting in inbound, outbound and peripheral trajectories. In response, the article considers how practitioners might engage critically with current changes, arguing that it is necessary to work with what matters to teachers, such as their relations with students, teaching and learning and subject specialism. Such work might create, at least temporarily and locally, spaces in which more favourable conditions towards socially just and enabling educational practices can be worked towards.  相似文献   

19.
20.
If we are to realise the potential of blended learning in higher education, then further research into academic practice and relevant academic development is essential. Our review of literature on blended learning in higher education reveals an interesting scholarship landscape which, when described in detail, pointedly directs attention to the lack of literature seeking to understand academics’ current blended practices. We argue that this is problematic in terms of formulating the required professional development and support. In essence, this paper uncovers the need for further research into understanding not only why academics may choose to engage in blended learning, but also, once engaged, why some choose to integrate technology to create transformative blends while others choose minimally impacting blends. This paper may interest those supporting academics in developing blended learning. It provides a guiding resource both for researchers investigating blended practices and those embarking on blended learning implementations.  相似文献   

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