Trends in Higher Education

Undergraduate learners are ideal candidates for participation in service-learning projects, which allow learners to apply course concepts in a community setting where both the university and community benefit. In pre-health fields, undergraduate students can serve as teachers for concepts such as food literacy. This study examined whether a rigorous virtual professional development model would improve self-efficacy of undergraduate participants to teach food literacy to adolescents. A purposive sampling of participants (n = 12) from two universities participated in a yearlong virtual service-learning project and a community of practice professional development model. Tasks included virtual lesson modeling and virtual development of short, learner-centered activities for an adolescent food literacy curriculum. Informal interviews were conducted at the end of the academic year. Participants reported that the virtual service-learning project connected to their coursework, improved their confidence and professional communication, and was a safe space for growing their teaching practice. Findings were not generalizable due to the small n and purposive sampling, and participants were unable to teach adolescents during the pandemic. The service-learning project may be transferable to local health departments as there is a demonstrated need of alternative implementation models for health education interventions. Full article

This paper will be focusing on discussions on how to use small-scale, higher-institution-based film festivals (including film competitions) as a vehicle to motivate students who are majoring in media and screen production to improve their production quality for both module assignments and competition-targeted special projects. Moreover, this paper will argue that, by inviting industry representatives to be involved in judging and commenting on student works, such small-scale film festivals organised by higher education institutions over time may grow into a platform that not only recognises and supports budding directors, screenwriters, actors, and actresses in Brunei but also acts as a playing field in which novice filmmakers can connect with experts, exchange ideas, acquire valuable skills, and enable further collaboration in the future. Based on first-hand data collection, an analysis, and semi-structured interviews of the multiple parties involved, our discussions cover how to launch the production process for screen-practice-based education, how to organise module assignments to fit the themes of specific film festivals/competitions, and how to overcome the challenges facing students working in a multicultural production team, etc. Two higher-institution-based film festivals, i.e., PRISM UBD Short Film Festival organised by Universiti Brunei Darussalam and the Dracula Digital competition, a mobile-phone filmmaking competition run by Transilvania University of Brasov, Romania, are used as analytical case studies. Full article

The harmful use of animals in university education has been the topic of an ongoing debate for many years. With growing animal welfare concerns and the advancement of humane teaching methods, students have been asking for more ethical educational approaches. Consequently, many universities have established policies regarding conscientious objection to harmful animal use in education. These policies allow students and faculty members who object to the harmful use of animals on ethical or religious grounds to opt out of participation in such activities without facing negative consequences. Several universities worldwide have already implemented formal policies. However, no studies have yet investigated the extent of conscientious objection policies at universities within the EU and Switzerland. Therefore, the aim of this study was to assess—for the first time—the prevalence of conscientious objection policies at medical and veterinary faculties in Europe. The data showed that 94% of 348 faculties across 28 European countries still do not have a written and publicly available policy that allows students to use humane teaching methods. The future development and widespread implementation of such policies is an essential step toward creating an educational environment that is inclusive, respectful, and committed to ethical and innovative practices. Full article

In the process of ensuring inclusive education, teachers’ individual roles are shifting towards collaborative practice, involving sharing tasks and expertise among a wide range of educational professionals. Policies for inclusion have resulted in a sense of urgency among universities to better educate teachers for inclusive practice. Yet, the tools to support this demand appear to be quite limited, or do not address the gaps in teacher professional learning identified in the research. Proceeding from the outcomes of a policy review on teacher professional learning for inclusion in Europe, the European Agency for Special Needs and Inclusive Education explored the use and relevance of the Profile of Inclusive Teachers, developed in 2012, for all education professionals. This paper reports on the approach and the main findings of a study conducted in collaboration with European countries, leading to a new and complementary Profile for Inclusive Teacher Professional Learning developed in 2022. The new Profile is built upon the initial 2012 Profile for pre-service teachers and aims to include all education professionals in teacher professional learning opportunities for inclusive education. Findings highlight the Profile’s core values and areas of competence and the essential features of competence development for inclusion. The paper concludes with recommendations for the collaborative use of a shared competence framework for inclusion and the role of universities offering teachers professional learning for inclusion. Full article

An ethical and effective engineering practice is inherently place-responsive and designs for a sustainable future. Engineering students must therefore be educated within a sustainable and sociotechnical paradigm. In the spring of 2022, the integrated engineering department of the University of San Diego offered a new photovoltaic solar energy course for junior and senior students. Informed by place-based pedagogies and culturally sustaining pedagogies, we designed the course to be relevant to the students’ lived experiences by coupling the learning about the technical elements of solar energy with a focus on solar energy projects and sustainability on campus. Prior to running the course, we identified four potential new solar investment/upgrade projects for the university. We divided the class into four teams, with each team assigned to assess the feasibility of a solar project through (1) social, (2) technical, (3) economic, and (4) environmental analyses. Finally, the students integrated their findings and made recommendations to key university stakeholders about how to proceed with solar energy investments on campus. In this paper, we share the course project design, our findings from implementing it, and ideas for adapting it to other place-based sustainability learning experiences. Full article

Community-partnered engineering projects provide a mechanism for cultivating the development of sociotechnical engineers prepared to design within diverse and complex cultural, environmental, social, and other contexts. During the 2021–2022 academic year, we guided three teams of senior undergraduate engineering students through year-long community-partnered projects for their required capstone design course, which instead typically features corporate/industry-sponsored projects. We analyzed end-of-semester reflections (both fall and spring semester) from each student using inductive thematic analysis to explore how they perceived their experiences. The themes that emerged from the student reflections, including connectivity, transdisciplinary, multiple stakeholders, sustainability, justice, and ethics, are all components of the sociotechnical engineering capabilities that we are working to develop in our students. We consider these findings encouraging, and suggestive that integrating community-partnered projects into engineering capstone design offerings is worthwhile and effective. However, our implementation was not without challenges, such as trying to force the projects to fit into a course structure and timeline developed to support corporate/industry-sponsored project teams, which was burdensome to the community-partnered project teams. In this paper, we highlight both the complexities and benefits of this approach and insights gained from student and instructor reflections. Full article

Learning Analytics applications, and their associated dashboards, are frequently used in post-secondary settings; yet, there has been limited work exploring the motivational implications of their deployment, especially for under-served student populations that are more susceptible to (perceived) negative messages about their academic performance. In this paper, I argue that Situated Expectancy-Value Theory (EVT) is well-positioned to serve as a useful lens when developing and evaluating learning analytics dashboard designs and their future development. Used in this way, SEVT can help the learning analytics community to ensure that student experiences with learning analytics are adaptively motivating, both in general and for underserved student populations more specifically. Full article

Companies and their executives are concluding that to accomplish their complex tasks and all-encompassing missions and goals, they must step outside the traditional realms of teamwork and partnership and engage in cross-cultural and multinational alliances. One of the principal areas affecting teamwork today, especially in diverse workplaces, is the variety of cultural value orientations that the members relate to. To better prepare students for joining global enterprises, it is necessary to understand their cultural orientations and how those may influence their teamwork interactions. This study used a mixed methods design to characterize computer and information technology undergraduate students’ cultural orientations and their cultural awareness in the context of teamwork experiences. The data for the study was collected in the form of a reflection assignment that was implemented during the first week of classes as a way to promote students’ cultural awareness and how that may play out in their teamwork interactions. The reflection assignment had two parts: (i) a survey and (ii) reflection questions. The study used descriptive statistics and t-tests to analyze the survey (quantitative data), and thematic analysis was conducted to analyze the reflection questions (qualitative data). Our analysis of the quantitative data revealed that students identified the following core values they are Individualism, Equality, Monochronic, Meritocracy, Informality, Personal Efficacy, and Directness, and these values resonated with most of the students in class. Corresponding qualitative themes that emerged regarding students’ beliefs of how those values may play out in their teamwork experience were (a) Treating everyone equally and understanding others, (b) Increasing temporal Awareness, (c) Enacting effective communication, (d) Monitoring the progress of team members and (e) Establishing rules and boundaries. Full article

The increased competitive academic environment pushes higher institutions to improve their service quality for meeting the market demands. It is thus necessary to assess the factors that satisfy students and make them loyal to the university. This study has focused on assessing service quality, using the SERVQUAL Model to measure students’ satisfaction with private universities in Bangladesh. In the study, the primary data collection method through a questionnaire with the 5-point Likert scale was adopted to collect data from 229 students who are currently studying in different private universities in Chattogram, Bangladesh. Structural equation modeling (SEM) has been performed to analyze the data through the AMOS 22 statistical package. The findings report that a comfortable lecture room under the tangible dimension, providing service on time under the reliability dimension, the capacity of administrative staff to solve immediate problems under the responsiveness dimension, proficient lecturers for teaching and research under the assurance dimension, and focus of university management on students under the empathy dimension have a great influence on student satisfaction. The study concludes that managers and authorities of private universities must focus on ensuring better service quality as student satisfaction largely affects the sustainability and recurrence development of the institutions. Full article

This article reports on a research project on university teaching and learning in the context of pandemics. Sixteen university professors and fifteen bachelor’s degree students were interviewed regarding “emergency e-assessment practices” during the first lockdown semester at a Spanish institution. The research aimed to understand their perception of how generic competencies were being assessed. Data were generated in semi-structured individual interviews. The main findings are: (a) generic competencies are not explicitly considered in e-assessment practices; (b) online assessment practices follow mainly a summative purpose; (c) digital technologies are not considered for the instructional design; (d) both instructors and students lack assessment literacy. Furthermore, there are difficulties in reaching a shared understanding regarding what competency-based assessment means and its implications for daily praxis. The results underline the challenge of using digital technologies for fostering and assessing generic competencies, as well as the need for assessment literacy on both sides, teachers and students. Full article

Equity, equality, diversity, inclusion, belonging, dignity, justice, accessibility, accountability, and decolonization are individual concepts used to engage with problematic social situations of marginalized groups. Phrases that put together these concepts in different ways, such as “equity, diversity and inclusion”, “equality, diversity, and inclusion”, “diversity, equity and inclusion”, “equity, diversity, inclusion, and accessibility”, “justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion”, and “equity, diversity, inclusion, and decolonization” are increasingly used, indicating that any one of these concepts is not enough to guide policy decisions. These phrases are also used to engage with problems in the workplace. Universities are one workplace where these phrases are used to improve the research, education, and general workplace climate of marginalized students, non-academic staff, and academic staff. EDI policy frameworks such as Athena SWAN and DIMENSIONS: equity, diversity, and inclusion have been also set up with the same purpose. What EDI data are generated within the academic literature focusing on EDI in the workplace, including the higher education workplace, influence the implementation and direction of EDI policies and practices within the workplace and outside. The aim of this scoping review of academic abstracts employing SCOPUS, the 70 databases of EBSCO-HOST and Web of Sciences, was to generate data that allow for a detailed understanding of the academic inquiry into EDI. The objective of this study was to map out the engagement with EDI in the academic literature by answering seven research questions using quantitative hit count manifest coding: (1) Which EDI policy frameworks and phrases are mentioned? (2) Which workplaces are mentioned? (3) Which academic associations, societies, and journals and which universities, colleges, departments, and academic disciplines are mentioned? (4) Which medical disciplines and health professionals are mentioned? (5) Which terms, phrases, and measures of the “social” are present? (6) Which technologies, science, and technology governance terms and ethics fields are present? (7) Which EDI-linked groups are mentioned and which “ism” terms? Using a qualitative thematic analysis, we aimed to answer the following research question: (8) What are the EDI-related themes present in relation to (a) the COVID-19/pandemic, (b) technologies, (c) work/life, (d) intersectionality, (e) empowerment of whom, (f) “best practices”, (g) evaluation and assessment of EDI programs, (h) well-being, and (i) health equity. We found many gaps in the academic coverage, suggesting many opportunities for academic inquiries and a broadening of the EDI research community. Full article

The educational system in the Philippines has been slowly progressing in terms of its technological infrastructures, such as web portals. Such a pattern in web portal development prompts stakeholders to carefully consider the adoption constructs, in order for limited and scarce resources to be wisely allocated. Therefore, this paper intends to assess an academic web portal by extending the classical technology acceptance model (TAM) framework with the addition of perceived visual attractiveness. A case study in a state university in Cebu, Philippines, in which 418 undergraduate students participated, was performed to explore relationships among constructs. Using structural equation modeling, the results indicated that perceived attractiveness poses a significant influence on perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness, which thereby significantly impacts perceived attitude and behavioral intention. Such results can aid stakeholders in managing resources in the development of academic web portals by focusing on important constructs such as perceived visual attractiveness. Full article

University students increasingly use mobile devices in their studies, while during the COVID-19 pandemic, mobile technology supported learning was applied by many students. Exploring students’ mobile technology perceptions is an ongoing research issue. This pilot study aimed to explore postgraduate students’ perspectives on the benefits and learning possibilities of mobile devices’ usage in their studies. In total, 34 Greek postgraduate students participated, and they answered an online questionnaire. The students expressed positive, strong perceptions, indicating their awareness of mobile technology learning possibilities and educational benefits for their studies. Almost all students (94.1%) agreed that mobile technology should be used to connect postgraduate students with people, content, and resources, and that mobile devices bring new learning opportunities in a postgraduate programme. Isolated significant differences were observed with regard to age and postgraduate mode of study (more positive views were expressed for blended mode in comparison to face-to-face mode). Implications for tutors, educational practices, and university policies are discussed. Full article

Many higher education institutions moved from in-person to online teaching during the COVID-19 pandemic, but these shifts have a longer history and potential. They require challenging individual and collective decision making by staff, beyond their usual repertoire of practice. This paper, therefore, aims to understand the nature of decisions that staff made as they moved to online teaching, the reasons, processes, and reflections on the perceived impacts. Eighty-four participants with diverse roles connected to moving online from four institutions across Africa were purposively sampled. Using a constructivist paradigm and qualitative approach, participants were invited to describe decision-making experiences through short narratives with prompts around their context, decisions, and impacts. Twenty-two of these participants attended a workshop to augment the narrative data and identify good practices. Qualitative analysis directed by Activity Theory concepts revealed that decisions related to policy and rules, pedagogy, community, and technology were frequently cited by participants. The main objective expressed in these narratives was maintaining the continuity of education for students. However, mixed impacts were observed on student engagement, and further decisions were made in response to this. Common challenges related to tools and technology, and similarly, the biggest tension for implementing the decisions was found between tools and technology and the participants or their communities. Good practices include updating policies and introducing continuous assessment. Implications for reflective professional practice are discussed, including how previous practices are initially drawn on to try to reproduce in-person teaching online but then adapt in recognition of the tensions this raises. Full article

Despite the fact that the member countries of the European Union initiated a reform of university education two decades ago to promote employability, giving importance to soft skills beyond the purely technical ones of each degree, there is still an important contrast between the demand for this type of skills on the part of the labor market and the educational offerings of universities. Therefore, it is necessary to analyze the impact that the concept of employability and soft skills really has on the scientific community and the patterns of collaboration between the European Union, the UK and Switzerland, among researchers in these matters, through a bibliometric study of the scientific publications in the area, collected in the databases Web of Science and Scopus during the period from 1996–2022, presenting the most significant bibliometric data through a descriptive and quantitative methodology. The main results allow us to detect, among other conclusions, an increase in scientific production from 2010 but minimal scientific collaboration, since 90% of the total number of works were signed by a single author. Two countries, the UK and Australia, have 80% more scientific production on these topics than Spain. This bibliometric study offers a descriptive and analytical panorama, from diachronic and synchronic perspectives, of the main bibliometric variables in two of the databases with the greatest impact among the scientific community (WOS and Scopus), allowing researchers and institutions to visualize the most developed study trends and the strongest emerging lines of research. The necessary rapprochement between the university and the company, in this way, will help the university to know its present situation but also to discover what learning strategy it should consider reducing the training gap in competences. Full article

Spain has a serious depopulation problem in large part of its territory and mainly in rural areas, where the population density is even lower than ten inhabitants per km². An example of this depopulation phenomenon, known as “depopulated Spain”, is the region of Castilla y León. STEAM knowledge areas (Sciences, Technologies, Engineering, Art, and Mathematics) are essential to achieve the socio-economic growth of the territories and, with it, the desired population growth. Faced with this challenge, STEAM graduates can help to strengthen the industrial fabric and increase economic development. The main objectives of this research are the analysis (i) of the trend and (ii) of the gender gap in STEAM degrees and Ph.D. programs in Castilla y León. The evolution of the number of enrolled and graduated students in STEAM knowledge areas in the last years was analyzed to achieve these objectives, as well as the future trend. The results obtained showed a lack of STEAM graduates in Castilla y León, as well as the existence of a gender gap. Given this scenario, it is difficult to affirm the sustainability of the research, economic, and industrial systems in the region. Full article

This article is concerned with the tenure track (TT) model, which has become increasingly used to extend the period of early career academics’ probation from one to five years across the EU. This article focuses on the TT in Trinity College Dublin (TCD), the oldest and most prestigious university in Ireland, one where gender equality has been embedded more consistently and where the pace of change has been faster than in other Irish universities. Drawing on interviews with thirteen men and women in three faculties, all but one of whom had successfully achieved tenure, this article explores their acceptance of the TT model and the perceived relevance of gender. Men were more likely to accept the model and less likely to see it as gendered. Even those women who identified a lack of clarity around maternity leave and/or gender differences in negotiating ‘fixed’ starting salaries did not identify a systemic gender issue but blamed themselves. Women who were ‘outsiders’ to TCD and in the arts, humanities and social science faculty were most likely to be critical of the model. The findings suggest the importance of a cautionary appraisal of TT, even in institutions that have actively sought to enhance gender equality. Full article

The aim of this paper is to cultivate the future in Higher Education (HE), firstly by looking backward and learning from the past, then by looking around and questioning the present, and finally, by looking forward and imagining the future of HE. This paper seeks to answer the question of how HE can foster students’ life-world becoming, their emancipatory competence with wisdom pedagogy. The research method is based on selected literature from German educational philosophy (Herder, Humboldt, Hegel, Heidegger, and Gadamer) and on recent international publications discussing Bildung, self-cultivation, and life-world becoming in relation to HE. The findings show the need for moral education to enhance students’ flourishing in life with wisdom pedagogy. In the future, HE needs to focus more on cultivating character, emancipatory competence, life-world becoming, values, justice, trust, truth, and intellectual virtues such as intellectual humility, curiosity, open-mindedness, and courage. This paper offers a framework for synthesizing the epistemological and ontological goals of HE, and a framework that presents the place and role of wisdom pedagogy in developing emancipatory competences. This paper argues for applying wisdom pedagogy and its methods by teachers in HE to foster students’ capacity to flourish in life. The paper calls for more debates and research in understanding wisdom pedagogy in HE. Full article

The sudden shift of online teaching activities in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic has caused disruption. It has been a challenge for both students and teachers. It has also presented an opportunity for a critical analysis of the subject of the educational process in an era of wide access to information technology. One of the desirable consequences of the analysis is to highlight the didactic usefulness of hybrid events. A collective autoethnographic text about the challenges related to moving teaching activities to an online environment during the pandemic at Transilvania University in Brașov (Romania), and an observation report on a cultural event held in hybrid mode in a Europe for Citizens project, hosted by the same university, support the recommendation to consider hybrid education as a solution that must be available to teachers for the efficient management of future possible crisis situations. The teachers retroactively appreciated the logistical, economic and comfort advantages of online education, but they pointed out the difficulties of conducting the teaching process entirely online. The hosted hybrid event highlighted the utility of being able to quickly transition from offline to online. Hybrid learning is efficient because it can combine the benefits of online and offline learning. Teachers trained to manage hybrid events will feel a reduced impact in future crisis situations. Full article