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1 – 5 of 5Anna Schreuer, Annina Elisa Thaller and Alfred Posch
This paper aims to explore the manoeuvring room of higher education institutions to take action to reduce emissions from academic flying. In particular, this study investigates…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to explore the manoeuvring room of higher education institutions to take action to reduce emissions from academic flying. In particular, this study investigates how university staff and central actors in university management evaluate potential measures in this area.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors applied a single case study design encompassing an online survey directed at staff (N = 338) and 11 semi-structured interviews with key actors from management at an Austrian university. The authors used descriptive statistics and qualitative content analysis to examine the data.
Findings
This study found considerable support among university staff in principle for implementing measures to reduce academic flying, but also serious concerns about the fairness and viability of some restrictive measures, especially disincentives and caps on flying. However, bans on short-haul flights were largely supported. Actors from university management saw their manoeuvring room limited by the potential resistance and non-compliance of staff, as well as by framework conditions external to the university.
Practical implications
Dedicated leadership is needed to facilitate broad commitment within the university and to avoid shifting the responsibility between different governance levels. Restrictive measures to reduce academic air travel will be more readily accepted if perceived as fair and viable.
Originality/value
Although several papers have addressed the behavioural and institutional factors that sustain extensive flying in academia, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is one of the first contributions to investigate the potentials and challenges of introducing measures to reduce air travel in higher education institutions.
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The purpose of this paper is to show that lesson study by including elements from music and music education can sustainably expand and improve the dialogical space for teaching…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to show that lesson study by including elements from music and music education can sustainably expand and improve the dialogical space for teaching and learning in higher education, especially for primary and secondary teacher education students.
Design/methodology/approach
For the first time under the topic “Lesson Study: Music in Dialogue,” corresponding study programs were prepared at the University College of Teacher Education, Lower Austria. The data material from which answers to research questions can be generated are the “Didactic Design Pattern” and classical research lesson planning, observation and discussion instruments. Moreover, discussion protocols of the reflection meetings offered insights the participants gained through sharing their experience of a series of lesson study cycles including focussed collaboration between mentors, teachers, teacher education students and primary school pupils.
Findings
Within the lesson study groups, the space for cooperation and dialogue widened considerably and the interest in the work and expertise of each other increased. Based on the principles of a “community of practice,” this study shows the positive effects of professional collaboration on primary and secondary teacher education students and a lasting impact on their pupils’ learning. Thereby, the dialogical principle was found to play a central and important role. In connection with music- and art-related processes, previous limitations in teaching and learning with music can be exceeded for pupils, teacher education students and teachers.
Research limitations/implications
This study, therefore, provides new insights into questions of organization and implementation, as well as scientific and didactic support in professional learning communities.
Originality/value
So far, there has been little practitioner research through lesson study in the field of music education. In particular, lesson study enhancing the cooperation between music education and other subject areas through dialogical-integrative work has brought about knowledge and insights of great importance for the further development of an appropriate didactic approach in dialogic music education.
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Stefanie Hölbling, Gottfried Kirchengast and Julia Danzer
This study aims to investigate patterns in international travel behavior of scientific staff depending on the categories of gender, scientific field and scientific seniority…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to investigate patterns in international travel behavior of scientific staff depending on the categories of gender, scientific field and scientific seniority level. The learning from salient differences possibly revealed may inform measures for reducing travel greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, especially for high-emitting staff groups, and help strengthen the equality between scientists of different categories concerning their travel behavior.
Design/methodology/approach
The study collected and used novel empirical data on travel GHG emissions from University of Graz scientific staff for five consecutive years (2015–2019) and used statistical analysis and inference to test and answer three distinct research questions on patterns of travel behavior.
Findings
The travel footprint of scientific staff, in terms of annual GHG emissions per scientist, exhibits various highly significant differences across scientific fields, seniority and gender, such as male senior natural scientists showing ten times higher per-person emissions than female junior social scientists.
Originality/value
The five-year travel GHG emissions data set across all fields from natural sciences via social sciences to humanities at a large university (Uni Graz, Austria, about 2,000 scientific staff) and across seniority levels from predocs to professors, both for female and male scientists, enabled a robust empirical study revealing distinct differences in travel GHG footprints of academic staff. In this way, the study adds valuable insights for higher research institutions toward effective GHG reduction policies.
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