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1 – 10 of 334Sarah K. Stice and Mark D. McCarthy
We articulate cycles of creative storying and data analysis and the wonder that motivated the project by detailing our reading, thinking and writing processes to contribute to the…
Abstract
Purpose
We articulate cycles of creative storying and data analysis and the wonder that motivated the project by detailing our reading, thinking and writing processes to contribute to the conceptual and practical literature on collaborative writing as method.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper documents a process of collaborative writing as method that produced a co-written fictional narrative that evokes questions about schooling.
Findings
Our process began with world-building for our fictional future, creating characters to serve as a lens for analysis. From our discussions of the data, we crafted a plotline to present our themes in coherent story. As we explored and shared our readings, interdisciplinarity shaped our project in unique ways.
Research limitations/implications
Throughout, our collaboration and fiction-writing opened spaces for wonder, interdisciplinarity and joy that may inspire other researchers to engage in collaborative and/or creative writing processes.
Originality/value
Adding to the rich literature of arts-based research methods, we contribute our reflections on the pragmatics of incorporating reading, writing and thinking for collaboration and creative writing as qualitative research methods for document analysis.
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Isabelle Cuykx, Caroline Lochs, Kathleen Van Royen, Heidi Vandebosch, Hilde Van den Bulck, Sara Pabian and Charlotte de Backer
This scoping review aims to explore how “food media”, “food messages” and “food content” are referred to in scholarly writing to enhance a shared understanding and comparability.
Abstract
Purpose
This scoping review aims to explore how “food media”, “food messages” and “food content” are referred to in scholarly writing to enhance a shared understanding and comparability.
Design/methodology/approach
Following the PRISMA, ScR-guidelines, four scientific databases were screened on published manuscripts in academic journals, books and doctoral theses mentioning food media, content and messages within the prevalent meaning as in human communication.
Findings
Of the 376 included manuscripts, only a small minority (n = 7) provided a conclusive definition of at least one of the three earlier-mentioned concepts; 40 others elucidated some aspects of food media, messages or content; however, they emphasized different and, sometimes even, contrasting aspects. In addition, the review explores in which disciplines the manuscripts mentioning food media, messages or content occur, which methodologies are used and what target groups and media are most common.
Originality/value
Based on this aggregated information, a definition of food media, messages and content is proposed, aiming to enhance the comparability of diverse academic sources. This contribution invites scholars to critically reflect on the included media and content types when comparing studies on food media, messages or content.
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Patrick Hopkinson and Mats Niklasson
This paper aims to introduce International Digital Collaborative Autoethnographical Psychobiography (IDCAP).
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to introduce International Digital Collaborative Autoethnographical Psychobiography (IDCAP).
Design/methodology/approach
This paper describes how IDCAP was developed to answer research questions about what it takes and what it means to recover from mental illness. During its development, IDCAP combined the diverse and intersectional experiences, knowledge and interests of an Anglo-Swedish research team with what could be found in different publications concerning the experiences and the mental illnesses of the musicians Syd Barrett, Peter Green and Brian Wilson.
Findings
IDCAP combines features of autoethnography and psychobiography to offer a novel qualitative research method.
Research limitations/implications
Whilst IDCAP was created to focus on recovery from mental illness and musicians, it can be applied to other areas of research. It shares the same limitations as autoethnography and psychobiography, although some of the features of IDCAP may go some way to mitigate against these.
Practical implications
IDCAP is a novel research method that is offered to other researchers to develop and enhance further through application.
Social implications
IDCAP is a collaborative research method that encourages the involvement of a wide range of researchers from different countries and cultures. It can be used to give voice to marginalised groups and to counter discrimination and prejudice. Recovery from mental illness is a topic of great personal and social value.
Originality/value
IDCAP is a novel research method that, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, has not been explicitly used before.
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This study aims to investigate the influence of ChatGPT, an AI-based chatbot, on the digital learning experience of students at Mzumbe University.
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to investigate the influence of ChatGPT, an AI-based chatbot, on the digital learning experience of students at Mzumbe University.
Design/methodology/approach
This study adopted a qualitative research design to gather in-depth insights from participants. Semi-structured interviews and an analysis of previous chat content were used as primary sources of data. Thematic analysis was used to analyze the qualitative data, allowing for the exploration of participants’ perspectives, experiences and opinions regarding the integration of ChatGPT into the learning process.
Findings
The results of the study demonstrated that ChatGPT is widely used in educational contexts and has a positive influence on students’ study habits, academic performance, and understanding of course material. Students appreciated the system’s simplicity, tailored instructions, and the promptness and accuracy of the responses. Despite the possibility of isolated mistakes.
Research limitations/implications
It is important to recognize the limitations of this study. First, the sample size was small, limiting the broad application of the results. Second, this study’s narrow emphasis on students at Mzumbe University limits its applicability in other situations. Furthermore, depending on self-reported experiences, biases, such as individual interpretation or recollection bias, can occur.
Practical implications
Educators can maximize ChatGPT in the classroom by using study insights. Its advantages, such as effectiveness and enhanced performance, highlight the possibility for student-centered learning. Practitioners are guided by their awareness of problems, such as probable errors. Constant updates guarantee ChatGPT’s applicability and provide educators with useful advice.
Social implications
Peer impact is highlighted in this study concerning social factors on the adoption of AI in education. Resolving issues preserves public confidence. Views influence public opinion and direct policymakers in discussions about safe AI use. It influences public attitudes while navigating the ethical integration of AI.
Originality/value
This study offers insightful information about the impact of ChatGPT on digital learning in Tanzania’s higher education. It makes innovative research contributions that enhance educational practices and emphasizes the advantages, difficulties and demands of responsible usage in the context of AI-based chatbots.
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Behnam Soltani and Michael Tomlinson
This study introduces a non-orthodox approach to the dominant policy-based approaches to graduate employability through contextualizing international students’ everyday…
Abstract
Purpose
This study introduces a non-orthodox approach to the dominant policy-based approaches to graduate employability through contextualizing international students’ everyday experiences within their educational and wider structural contexts of the labour market.
Design/methodology/approach
The study used narrative frames to collect data from 180 international students from China, Hong Kong, India, Sri Lanka, Vietnam and Nepal at a New Zealand tertiary institution. Narrative frames as a research tool in educational contexts are used to ellicit the experiences of individuals in the form of a story as participants reflect on their experience. The frames use sentence starters to draw responses from participants about their experiences (Barkhuizen and Wette, 2008).
Findings
This study argues that, through a socialization process, international students develop identities that fit an ever-changing labour market. This process is catalysed by a higher education landscape that produces career-ready subjects capable of appropriating different social spaces that prepare students and graduates to enter the labour market. Further, it argues that graduate employability should be understood as a complex process through which students and graduates socialise themselves through negotiating the socioacademic spaces by (1) familiarising themselves with the dominant workspace norms, (2) positioning themselves as more career-ready individuals, and (3) imagigining employable selves capable of meeting the needs of the job market.
Research limitations/implications
This study has limitations. Only one data collection source has been used. It would have been great to use narrative frames along with interviews. In addition, the data would have been stronger if the researcher could have used classroom observations, which could be a future initiative.
Practical implications
This study could provide practical insights to tertiary institutions about international students’ developing capabilities and identities so they could better prepare themselves for the world of work. Further, this study provides insights about some of the challenges that international students face in tertiary contexts to become career-ready. Hence, educators could employ strategies to better support these learners in their everyday learning spaces. This study also has useful benefits for future and current international students and international graduates regarding what investments they need to make so they can better socialize themselves in their tertiary and workplace practices.
Social implications
This study has social implications. It helps international students better understand the social, cultural and academic expectations of their host countries. Therefore, they could better socialize themselves into those practices and contribute more effectively to their academic and workplace communities. The study also helps academic and workplace institutions strategize more effectively to address the social and cultural needs of international graduates. The study also contributes to the social and cultural understanding of the teachers that engage with international students on a daily basis by helping them devise activities that better address these students’ and graduates’ needs.
Originality/value
The study adds theoretical and methodological value to the debates around graduate employability. It includes the voices of 180 students and unravels their day-to-day experiences of capability building and employability development from their own perspectives.
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Vanessa Amaro and Manuel João Pires
To explore the interplay between human translators and AI tools, focusing on tertiary students' perceptions in the context of Portuguese-Chinese translations in Macao.
Abstract
Purpose
To explore the interplay between human translators and AI tools, focusing on tertiary students' perceptions in the context of Portuguese-Chinese translations in Macao.
Design/methodology/approach
This research employed a mixed-methods approach. Quantitative surveys were complemented by qualitative responses. Qualitative class observations (participant and non-participant) and autoethnography further enriched the insights. Participants included undergraduate and postgraduate students in translation studies from the Macao Polytechnic University.
Findings
The data revealed a dual perspective: appreciation for AI’s efficiency contrasted with concerns about its potential to overshadow human touch in translations, especially in cultural nuances. Views on integrating AI into curricula were diverse, but a balanced, synergistic approach between human expertise and AI efficiency emerged as a common theme.
Originality/value
This study offers a fresh perspective by integrating various methodologies, capturing both statistical and experiential insights on the evolving relationship between AI and human translation efforts in academia.
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Political Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), based on ideas about deliberative democracy, have been criticised for increasing corporate power and democratic deficits. Yet…
Abstract
Purpose
Political Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), based on ideas about deliberative democracy, have been criticised for increasing corporate power and democratic deficits. Yet, deliberative ideals are flourishing in the corporate world in the form of dialogues with a broad set of stakeholders and engagement in wider societal issues. Extractive industry areas, with extensive corporate interventions in weak regulatory environments, are particularly vulnerable to asymmetrical power relations when businesses engage with society. This paper aims to illustrate in what way deliberative CSR practices in such contexts risk enhancing corporate power at the expense of community interests.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper is based on a retrospective qualitative study of a Canadian oil company, operating in an Albanian oilfield between 2009 and 2016. Through a study of three different deliberative CSR practices – market-based land acquisition, a grievance redress mechanism and dialogue groups – it highlights how these practices in various ways enforced corporate interests and prevented further community mobilisation.
Findings
By applying Laclau and Mouffe’s theory of hegemony, the analysis highlights how deliberative CSR activities isolated and silenced community demands, moved some community members into the corporate alliance and prevented alternative visions of the area to be articulated. In particular, the close connection between deliberative practices and monetary compensation flows is underlined in this dynamic.
Originality/value
The paper contributes to critical scholarship on political CSR by highlighting in what way deliberative practices, linked to monetary compensation schemes, enforce corporate hegemony by moving community members over to the corporate alliance.
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This paper explores some of the recent developments and transformations in Africa's higher education.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper explores some of the recent developments and transformations in Africa's higher education.
Design/methodology/approach
It employs an extensive review of literature based on some dominant thematic areas characterizing the main trends and developments in Africa's higher education.
Findings
The paper mainly highlights the impacts of academic partnerships on these transformations, with a focus on research, postgraduate training, mobility and some new intra-African initiatives. Following the unprecedented effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, digitalization comes out as an important turning point for Africa's higher education, which should be exploited for more opportunities. The paper calls for collaborative efforts to address the challenges facing Africa's higher education for the repositioning of Africa as a meaningful player in the unfolding global knowledge society.
Practical implications
The outcomes could be useful to researchers focused on international education, policymakers and higher education leaders and international development partners working on higher education in Africa. It could also be useful for structuring future collaborations between Africa and other regions of the world.
Social implications
The paper calls for enhanced and mutually beneficial collaborations and disruption of the imbalances that have characterised North–South collaborations. It proposes some possible approaches and alternatives that could be used for redress.
Originality/value
The paper is original and relies on some of the new developments in Africa, including the impacts of COVID-19 and digitalization on the future of higher education collaborations with Africa.
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Zhuo Min Huang, Heather Cockayne and Jenna Mittelmeier
The study explores diverse and critical understandings of “international” in a higher education curriculum context, situated in a curriculum review of a postgraduate taught…
Abstract
Purpose
The study explores diverse and critical understandings of “international” in a higher education curriculum context, situated in a curriculum review of a postgraduate taught programme entitled “International Education” at a university located in England. Our study problematises and decentres some dominant, normalised notions of “international”, exploring critical possibilities of engaging with the term for higher education internationalisation.
Design/methodology/approach
We examined a set of programme curriculum documents and conducted a survey exploring teaching staff’s uses and interpretations of “international” in their design and delivery of course units. Through a thematic analysis of the dataset, we identify what “international” might mean or how it may be missing across the curriculum.
Findings
Our findings suggest a locally-developed conceptualisation of “international” beyond the normalised interpretation of “international” as the inclusion or comparison of multiple nations, and different, other countries around the global world. More diverse, critical understandings of the term have been considered, including international as intercultural, competences, ethics, languages and methods. The study provides an example approach to reflective scholarship that programmes can undergo in order to develop clarity, depth and purposefulness into internationalisation as enacted in a local curriculum context.
Originality/value
The study provides a first step towards establishing clearer guidelines on internationalising the curriculum by higher education institutions and individual programmes in order to challenge a superficial engagement of “international” within internationalisation. It exemplifies a starting point for making purposeful steps away from normalised notions and assumptions of international education and facilitates development towards its critical, ethically-grounded opportunities.
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Ling Luo, Hong Ji, Shu-Ning Chen and Xin Chen
The purpose of this study is to determine the competency characteristics required for the employment of master’s degree students in educational technology.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to determine the competency characteristics required for the employment of master’s degree students in educational technology.
Design/methodology/approach
A combined qualitative and quantitative method was used to consult multiple experts through a modified Delphi method. Competency characteristics were extracted from Chinese recruitment apps, national recruitment websites and university training programs. Ten senior teacher experts who teach educational technology master’s students were consulted through a questionnaire consultation to validate the proposed competency model. The weights of competency characteristics were determined through a combination of the analytic hierarchy process and entropy method.
Findings
The results show that when recruiting educational technology master’s students, more emphasis is placed on operational skills. The majority of companies tend to assess practical abilities rather than theoretical knowledge. Relevant knowledge of educational technology, psychology, computer science and education is considered to be the basic knowledge components of educational technology master’s students, while professional skills are the core skills required for their positions. Therefore, universities need to focus on training, educational technology graduate students in these areas of competence. The study also found that professional qualities (such as physical and mental fitness) and personality traits (interpersonal communication and interaction) receive more attention from companies and are essential competencies for educational technology master’s students.
Originality/value
A competence model for educational technology master’s students is proposed, which includes aspects such as knowledge, personal skills/abilities, professional qualities and personality traits. The competence elements included in this model can serve as reference indicators for universities to cultivate the competence of educational technology master’s students, as well as reference points for recruiting units to help them select talents. This represents a new dimension in research related to the employment of educational technology master’s students. The study enriches the research objects and competence dictionary in the field of competence research.
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