Rowena Yeats, Peter Reddy, Anne Wheeler, Carl Senior and John Murray
Academic writing is often considered to be a weakness in contemporary students, while good reporting and writing skills are highly valued by graduate employers. A number of…
Abstract
Purpose
Academic writing is often considered to be a weakness in contemporary students, while good reporting and writing skills are highly valued by graduate employers. A number of universities have introduced writing centres aimed at addressing this problem; however, the evaluation of such centres is usually qualitative. The paper seeks to consider the efficacy of a writing centre by looking at the impact of attendance on two “real world” quantitative outcomes – achievement and progression.
Design/methodology/approach
Data mining was used to obtain records of 806 first‐year students, of whom 45 had attended the writing centre and 761 had not.
Findings
A highly significant association between writing centre attendance and achievement was found. Progression to year two was also significantly associated with writing centre attendance.
Originality/value
Further, quantitative evaluation of writing centres is advocated using random allocation to a comparison condition to control for potential confounds such as motivation.
Details
Keywords
Alistair Hewison, Nicola Gale, Rowena Yeats and Jonathan Shapiro
The purpose of this paper is to report the findings from an evaluation project conducted to investigate the impact of two staff engagement programmes introduced to four National…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to report the findings from an evaluation project conducted to investigate the impact of two staff engagement programmes introduced to four National Health Service (NHS) hospital Trusts in England. It seeks to examine this development in the context of current policy initiatives aimed at increasing the level of staff involvement in decision‐making, and the related literature.
Design/methodology/approach
A mixed‐methods approach incorporating document analysis, interviews, a survey and appreciative inquiry, informed by the principles of impact evaluation design, was used.
Findings
The main finding to emerge was that leadership was crucial if widespread staff engagement was to be achieved. Indeed, in some of the trusts the staff engagement programmes were seen as mechanisms for developing leadership capability. The programmes had greater impact when they were “championed” by the Chief Executive. Effective communication throughout the organisations was reported to be a prerequisite for staff engagement. Problems were identified at the level of middle management where the lack of confidence in engaging with staff was a barrier to implementation.
Practical implications
The nature of the particular organisational context is crucial to the success of efforts to increase levels of staff engagement. The measures that were found to work in the trusts would need to be adapted and applied to best meet the needs of other organisations.
Originality/value
Many health care organisations in England will need to harness the efforts of their workforce if they are to meet the significant challenges of dealing with financial restraint and increasing patient demand. This paper provides some insights on how this can be done.
Details
Keywords
Carl Senior and Robert Cubbidge
The purpose of this paper is to place all of the contributions to this special issue into a theoretical framework and to highlight the role that the so‐called “information age…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to place all of the contributions to this special issue into a theoretical framework and to highlight the role that the so‐called “information age mindset” has in the facilitation of employability skills.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper discusses the major themes of this special issue.
Findings
Undergraduate students do see the importance of technological innovation in the classroom but they see the development of experiential or work‐based skills to be more important.
Practical implications
Future curriculum design should consider the expectations and attitudes of the modern day undergraduate student to ensure that potential employability is maximised.
Originality/value
The findings are placed into the wider context of the emerging field of evolutionary educational psychology.