Cheryl J. Craig, Rakesh Verma, Donna W. Stokes, Paige K. Evans and Bobby Abrol
This research examines the influence of parents on students studying the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) disciplines and entering STEM careers…
Abstract
This research examines the influence of parents on students studying the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) disciplines and entering STEM careers. Participating youths were awarded scholarships from large funded US grant programmes. Cases of two graduate students (one female, one male) and one undergraduate student (male) are featured. The first two students in the convenience sample are biology and physics majors in a STEM teacher education program; the third is enrolled in computer science. National reports emphasizing the importance of parents on their children's education are presented, along with diverse international literature. The use of narrative in STEM curriculum and narrative inquiry in STEM research are also documented. Experience, story, and identity form the study's conceptual frame. The narrative inquiry research method employs broadening, burrowing, and storying and restorying to elucidate the students' academic trajectories. Incidents of circumstantial and planned parent curriculum making surfaced when the data were serially interpreted. Other noteworthy themes included: (1) relationships between (student) learners and (teacher) parents, (2) invitations to inquiry, (3) modes of inquiry, (4) the improbability of certainty, and (5) changed narratives = changed lives. While policy briefs provide sweeping statements about parents' positive effects on their children, narrative inquiries such as this one illuminate parents' inquiry moves within home environments. These actions became retrospectively revealed in their adult children's lived narratives. These small stories, while not generalizable, map how students, shaped by their parents' nurturing, enter the STEM disciplines and STEM-related careers through multiple pathways in addition to the identified pipeline.
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Valeriia Palii, Mariana Velykodna, Marcio Pereira, Rosaleen McElvaney, Sam Bernard, Vitalii Klymchuk, Oleg Burlachuk, Alexander A. Lupis, Nadiia Diatel, Jane L. Ireland, Kimberley McNeill, Janina L. Scarlet, Ana L. Jaramillo-Sierra, Bassam Khoury, Diana Rocio Sánchez Munar, Sarah L. Hedlund, Tara Flanagan, Jeanne LeBlanc, Diana Maria Agudelo Velez and Yvonne Gómez-Maquet
This paper aims to discuss current work and further steps of the psychological hotline launched by the National Psychological Association of Ukraine (NPA), along with a call for…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to discuss current work and further steps of the psychological hotline launched by the National Psychological Association of Ukraine (NPA), along with a call for action to mental health professionals worldwide.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper describes the training and support of the NPA’s hotline staff as well as reflections on the hotline’s work from June 2022 to April 2023.
Findings
With broad international support, the NPA’s psychological hotline currently operates in 21 countries providing psychological assistance and referrals to other service providers within Ukraine and abroad. The authors propose further steps of its work, including international collaboration.
Originality/value
Providing citizens of Ukraine with broad public access to evidence-based remote psychological support through NPA’s hotlines is a high priority considering the war’s negative impact on mental health diverse and the limited capacity of the state mental health system.
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Andreas Hinterhuber and Bernard Quancard
This paper aims to discuss the changing role of the strategic account manager (SAM).
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to discuss the changing role of the strategic account manager (SAM).
Design/methodology/approach
This paper takes the form of an interview.
Findings
SAMs, in the future, will be ecosystem captains capable of managing complex relationships and teams, of organizing data and of telling stories with analytics. SAMs in the future will be assessed along with a set of metrics that it is similar to metrics of how top management consultants are evaluated: activities, competencies, intermediary results, sales/margins and quantified business value.
Originality/value
This interview discusses the current and future best practices of strategic account management.
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Cheryl J. Craig, Paige K. Evans and Donna W. Stokes
This chapter outlines the contents of Preparing Secondary STEM Teachers to Teach in America's Urban Schools. The volume begins with an overview of the teachHOUSTON STEM teacher…
Abstract
This chapter outlines the contents of Preparing Secondary STEM Teachers to Teach in America's Urban Schools. The volume begins with an overview of the teachHOUSTON STEM teacher education program in Chapter 2 and is followed by an account of the collaboration that took place between a Physics professor and a teachHOUSTON Physics teacher educator and its impact on STEM teacher preparation in Chapters 3-4. Chapters 5 and 6 include discussions about formal and informal learning opportunities and include a narrative of a student's experience on how the Noyce Internship Institute contributed to their STEM teacher learning. In Chapters 7–9, readers learn about the influence of parents, teachers, and professors on students' entry into and decision to work in the STEM and/or STEM education field, with an emphasis on those in STEM teacher education. Chapter 10 highlights the value of scholarship grants; Chapter 11 addresses the growth and development of teachHOUSTON, the impact of the scholarships awarded to many of its students and traces where its graduates currently are teaching in order to demonstrate that teachHOUSTON has fulfilled its mission. The final chapter of the book reflects on teachHOUSTON as a secondary urban teacher education program and summarizes significant points that have led to its success.
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Bernard Kissi-Abrokwah and Kwame Kodua-Ntim
The purpose of this paper is to identify knowledge sharing practices used among parents with children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD).
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to identify knowledge sharing practices used among parents with children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD).
Design/methodology/approach
The study was based on qualitative philosophical foundations, where phenomenological case study design was used to make an in-depth understanding of how parents whose children are diagnosed with ASD shared knowledge among themselves. The population for this research consists of parents whose children have been diagnosed with ASD in Ghana. The study sampled for the study was 12 parents and was selected from 4 autism awareness centres in Ghana to obtain data through the use of focus group discussion and analysed with the aid of thematic analysis.
Findings
The study showed that the dimensions of knowledge sharing practices used by parents with autistic children were after-action review/lesson learnt, brainstorming, mentoring, coaching system, discussion forum, face-to-face meeting, documentation, peer assistance and storytelling. Finally, the study also revealed that knowledge sharing practices used by parents with autistic children help them in their daily engagement.
Social implications
An aspect of the training of social workers should focus on how to assist parents, family and neighbours of children with ASD. The government through the needed ministries and agencies should create a social support system to assist parents and families with children with ASD. Counsellors should avail their services to parents with children with ASD as early as possible to avoid or ameliorate some of the emotional and psychological challenges of these parents.
Originality/value
The paper offers a comprehensive overview on how knowledge sharing transforms the individual to learn and accept autistic condition in Ghana.
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Library automation is required in academic libraries to meet the dynamic demands of clients. This study aims to investigate the level of clients’ satisfaction of Sam Jonah library…
Abstract
Purpose
Library automation is required in academic libraries to meet the dynamic demands of clients. This study aims to investigate the level of clients’ satisfaction of Sam Jonah library automation.
Design/methodology/approach
The study utilized the descriptive research design by using an exploratory case study research method. A disproportionate stratified random sampling was used to select 322 respondents (undergraduates, postgraduates and lecturers/researchers) who consented to participate in the study. Questionnaire and informal interview were used for the data collection.
Findings
The study showed that more than half of the clients of Sam Jonah library were moderately satisfied with the library’s automation. Clients mostly access internet/Wi-Fi and reference service. Patronage of the services including photocopying, borrowing of books (circulation), e-resources/academic databases, institutional repository, library website and the OPAC was not encouraging. Increase in user education was recommended to improve their usage.
Research limitations/implications
The study was limited to only one academic library, namely, Sam Jonah library of the University of Cape Coast, Ghana.
Originality/value
The study provides insight into a case study of satisfactory level of clients in accessing automated services of Sam Jonah Library to serve as a basis for further research.