Search results

This paper reports on an empirical study exploring the way in which campus‐based higher education institutions (HEIs) in the UK apply their internal quality assurance and enhancement (QA/QE) procedures to their e‐learning courses. The purpose of this paper is to identify those characteristics of e‐learning courses which affected the capacity of these procedures to assure and enhance the quality of courses.

A case study approach is selected as most appropriate for an in‐depth examination of the features of the courses as well as the way in which the procedures are applied. Two sets of data are collected and analysed from each of four e‐learning courses: QA documentation and interviews with stakeholders.

It is found that the main factors impacting on the effectiveness of the QA procedures are: the organisational position that these courses had within their institutions; the distributed configuration of course, teams; the disaggregated processes that characterise e‐learning courses; and the distant location of students. These factors are found to be impacting on the potential of the QA/QE procedures to enhance the quality of the courses.

These case studies highlight the need for campus‐based universities to reassess their approach to the QA/QE of e‐learning courses, and identify the challenges that course teams face in moving on from the application of QA procedures to addressing the issues of QE.

The originality of this paper lies in its analysis of empirical data about the application of QA/QE procedures in e‐learning courses in higher education.

The chapter discusses pedagogical models of digital learning in the United Kingdom with a focus on online and blended learning, rolled out as a case study in one university. The chapter appraises the effectiveness of the model that implemented and foregrounded the evidence in the wider literature on models of digital learning in higher education. The chapter provides thematic analysis and methodological opportunities for the improvement of practice and presents a set of implementation implications and pitfalls to avoid for higher education institutions in Africa. Furthermore, a number of trends regarding the blending of learning and communication synchrony in digital learning have also been identified.

In the context of debates about the performance of Higher Education (HE) in which quantitative measures proliferate, this chapter reports the top line observations of an initial exploration of the preparedness for practice of recent graduates of a Public Relations (PR) course at a post-1992 United Kingdom (UK) Higher Education Institution (HEI). Preparedness for practice is chosen as a conceptual lens (as preparedness for the uncertainty of practice) because HEIs frequently promise it. Using a Bourdieusian framework, preparedness is considered in relation to habitus-field match and HE performance as capital-added in habitus transformation. The chapter offers a complementary way of considering the dynamic between educator and recent graduate agency and how that might be applied when studying course and student performance, designing curricula and developing appropriate ‘signature pedagogies’, especially for those HE actors tasked with delivering against the ‘promise’ of graduate preparedness. In considering preparedness for practice as a performative function of HE, the chapter is located in wider societal debates about the ‘worth’ of HE and offers insight for educators of future PR practitioners.

Humans lifespan is characterized by delayed maturation. Delayed maturation may arise when juvenile mortality is reduced. Recent research suggests that juvenile mortality reduction could be achieved via provisioning to weaned juveniles, particularly during health crises. Here I test this idea with data on the causes, distribution, and duration of injuries and illnesses suffered by Shiwiar forager-horticulturalists during the juvenile period. Health insults for which prolonged care is necessary for survival are a recurrent feature of the juvenile lifespan. About half the individuals for whom data on disability duration were gathered suffered health insults likely to be lethal without extended aid; over 80% were born after a parent suffered such an event; and over 90% were born after a direct ancestor in the two ascending generations suffered such an event. The data indicate that health-care provisioning reduces juvenile mortality, and that provisioning of sick and injured juveniles has important fitness consequences in this population.

In this chapter, I use the term “biopolitics” to mean evolutionarily informed political science. Politics has been characterized as “Who gets what, when, and how” (Lasswell, 1936), but rather than about material possessions, politics is understood to be about power, more specifically about collective power, especially differential group power competition, hierarchy and stratification in power distribution, and the universal struggle to enhance power, and to maintain or challenge/destroy this status quo. Politics “should be found in any system of nature in which conflicts of interest exist among cooperating organic units” (Johnson, 1995, p. 279). My main focus will be competitive intergroup relations in monkeys and apes, or as I (van der Dennen, 1995) called it “intergroup agonistic behavior” (IAB). I also briefly treat interindividual and intercoalitionary agonistic behavior when relevant.

E-learning has gained much focus from educators and researchers, with many extolling e-learning over traditional learning. Despite this focus, implementation of e-learning systems often fails. The purpose of this paper is to consider a range of barriers, impacting the success of e-learning implementations, yet to the best of the authors’ knowledge no conceptual framework is able to consolidate existing research.

This paper undertook an in-depth review of literature concerning e-learning implementation barriers. Papers were extracted from established peer-reviewed journals and open sources. Articles not related to e-learning implementation barriers were discarded. A total of 259 papers were identified, published between 1990 and 2016. Hermeneutics and data-driven qualitative content analysis was used to define 68 unique barriers.

The 68 unique barriers were thematically grouped into four conceptual categories, i.e. Technology (T), Individual (I), Pedagogy (P), and Enabling Conditions (EC). These four categories led to the conceptualization of “TIPEC” framework, which highlights the key concepts hindering e-learning implementation and delivery. Results show that most articles only consider a narrow range of success barriers.

The proposed TIPEC framework acts as a guide for education practitioners, system developers, policy makers, and researchers. It provides stakeholders with a summary of e-learning barriers.

This paper fulfils an identified need for a conceptual framework that consolidates all current research related to e-learning implementation barriers.

Educational design patterns offer practical strategies that can be shared and adapted to address problems in teaching and learning. This article explores how educational design patterns for connected learning at scale at an Australian university may be adapted to a Vietnamese higher education context.

12 educational design patterns that address the challenges of active learning and large teaching team management are discussed. The authors then critically reflect on their cross-cultural adaptation for the higher education context, from an Australian to a Vietnamese university.

Transitioning from passive to active learning strategies and effectively leading large teaching teams present similar challenges across our contexts. Educational design patterns, when dynamically adapted, may assist educators to teach skills that are critical for work and the future. Higher education institutions globally could enhance their practices by incorporating international best practice approaches to educational design.

The Connected Learning at Scale (CLaS) educational design patterns explored in this article offer solution-oriented strategies that promote a more active learning experience. This paper identifies adaptations for educators, especially those in Vietnamese higher education that respect traditional structures, cultural nuances and resource limitations in implementation.

Whilst educational design patterns are well-researched in the Western contexts, few studies analyse design patterns in an Asian, and in particular the Vietnamese context. More research is needed in the cross-cultural adaptation of educational design patterns that joins practice and theory.