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The quality of academic programs is drastically affected by the design of the courses within the program. The design and delivery of courses are the most essential elements for building quality in academic programs. The purpose of this paper is to customize the techniques of quality function deployment (QFD) for designing courses and demonstrate its use in the design of a basic statistics course in the Department of Systems Engineering, King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals. In this study, organizations from industry are used as external customers. Faculty members and students are utilized as internal customers to identify the course technical requirements. Then QFD process planning matrices are used for developing several alternative course design concepts. Then based on a simple decision criterion the design concept that closely meets customer requirements is identified. The result of the analysis is a balanced basic statistics course.

Purpose – This study aims at finding out the implementation of English for specific purposes (ESP) course and identifying the challenges faced by English lecturers in designing an ESP course for first-year students in the Engineering Faculty of Malikussaleh University.

Methodology – This study implements qualitative research through interviews as a means of data collection.

Findings – This study addresses the application of an ESP course and identifies the challenges appeared during the stages of designing. The study reveals that an ESP course is not completely implemented. In fact, the course provided little ESP contents. The paper also reveals that, in terms of challenges, each stage of design presents its own challenge. To design an ESP course involves five crucial stages, that is, needs analysis, syllabus, material, teaching, and evaluation. Teachers encounter challenges as the design process takes place.

Research Limitations/Implications – The present study provides an account of how English teachers view challenges in implementing a complete ESP course. However, further research should be conducted to discover the possibility of application of ESP course in national universities in Indonesia.

Practical Implications – This paper offers solutions in order to make the implementation of ESP course feasible in the university.

Originality/Value – There have not been any research in ESP application for engineering students in Malikussaleh University.

The purpose of this paper is to explore how to design a web‐based course in the context of China for self‐directed learning from four perspectives – i.e. pedagogical, psychological, social and technological – and also to summarize the design principles for the web‐based course.

The paper reviews literature related to: self‐directed learning, with a view to bringing out its capabilities and capacities for use in a web‐based environment; theories and pedagogies of learning with a view to imbuing them for the design of web‐based courses; and challenges of the design of web‐based courses with a view to gauging its acceptability.

The development of a successful web‐based course needs to focus on multiple perspectives — pedagogical, psychological, social and technological – in order to contextualize it for learner‐centeredness. The results show that the course designed based on these dimensions was flexible, useful and welcomed.

This paper describes a conceptual framework for designing a web‐based course from four perspectives and also presents a series of design principles for a web‐based course.

This research has been taken up by the human resource center of organization X, for designing a curriculum for a training course named “Basic Computer Application”, by optimizing topics and finalizing teaching strategies, based on needs and expectations collected from past and prospective training participants from different ranks of employees of X. The study aims to discuss this issue.

The research strategy adopted is based on a survey conducted using a specially designed questionnaire. The questionnaire was circulated to 256 personnel selected randomly having computer backgrounds as well as non-computer backgrounds, who had either attended past batches of the same training course or attended different training courses. The data thus collected was processed using VOC Table and the affinity diagram and subsequently fed into the house of quality (HOQ) for obtaining desired output.

The study has identified and optimized topics for the course, based on employee needs/wants, using the two-stage QFD approach. After delivering the course with an optimized curriculum and teaching strategy, it is observed that the overall participant satisfaction performance of the course has increased from 3 to 4.6, which is higher than the goal set at 4. This indicates an overall enhancement in the satisfaction of participants with the delivery of the new improved course curriculum.

As indicated by the survey findings, the competence level of personnel with computer backgrounds is higher than that of personnel without computer backgrounds, which would result in different design considerations while constructing QFDs for these two entirely different groups of participants. This study has been limited to the course curriculum design for personnel with non-computer backgrounds only. The curriculum design for personnel with computer backgrounds will be addressed separately, in a future study.

This is an original study conducted on randomly selected employees across the country from among personnel working for different establishments of organization X. The approach taken in this study for optimizing a course curriculum is unique in the way that it uses a two-stage QFD, which is traditionally used for the design of a product, its components, and the subsequent manufacturing process. This study has employed a planning matrix that incorporated participant-given ratings for each individual need and also participant-decided benchmarking ratings of other similar courses. Estimation of final target has been done by factoring in participants' competence ratings for each individual topic, for a more truthful representation of participant opinion on the final output. This study has also adopted a unique approach of considering only top 80% (in terms of frequency of occurrence) of total responses while calculating weighted averages, instead of calculating the mean value of all data points. In this way, only the significant contributors have been considered while analyzing data.

This paper describes the curriculum design of an architectural studio course aimed at making concepts of sustainability accessible, understandable and practicable to second-year undergraduate students. Architectural education and design pedagogy is shaped and interrogated in the Global North or Western Europe and North America and influences various pedagogical approaches in the Global South. By including exemplars, voices and practices from global, historical, vernacular and contemporary contexts, understanding of sustainability is enriched.

The approach to course design included decolonising the curriculum and making it relevant for globally diverse future professionals. The studio theme of “memory and history” was framed as responsiveness to context and experiencing the site. Students were required to define place, and articulate form and space with sensitivity towards social, cultural, environmental and ecological aspects. The lectures, exercises and interactive activities emphasised design process, in-progress work, and experimentation through sketching, diagramming, drawing, and making study models which scaffolded student learning under the guidance of tutors.

The findings show that to make the process of learning to design in an environmentally responsive manner explicit for students, approaches to curriculum design must have a global and inclusive curriculum, engage students in experiential learning through doing/making to develop critical thinking skills, encourage students to synthesise and transfer learning to and from other settings and contexts, and interpret knowledge-power relationships and co-construction processes embedded in studio-based teaching and learning.

The original contribution of the course is that it creates an inclusive, experimental and decolonised space for co-construction of knowledge about designing sustainable environments.

The paper aims to analyse the application of a pedagogy-based approach to designing online language learning courses. It aims to evaluate course efficiency from three perspectives – provider, recipient and wider community perspective and define the extent to which the target course could be applied for developing tourism and hospitality industry students’ and employees’ language competences in Europe.

In line with pragmatism paradigm, a summative/outcome evaluation research in provider, recipient and wider community perspective was conducted in Latvia, Croatia, Slovenia, Romania and Italy. It comprised a focus group interview of 8 language teachers (the provider perspective), a survey of 505 students (the recipient perspective) and a survey of 106 language teachers and 161 industry representatives and 10 expert interviews (the wider community perspective).

The results highlight the main strengths of online learning environments and emphasise the efficiency of the pedagogy-based approach applied in designing an online course. The created courses are beneficial and may be used to foster the development of tourism and hospitality industry students’ and employees’ language competences.

The research sample is composed of language learners from five countries, but it is not proportionally distributed. Another limitation refers to the languages piloted. Further in-depth study concerning less widely used languages is required.

The research results enable understanding certain aspects of designing online language learning courses, provide evaluators’ feedback, suggest the course application for language learning and reveal the European value added.

The research explores the specifics for designing online language learning courses for Languages for Special Purposes for the application in tourism and hospitality industry. The course efficiency and quality are evaluated from provider, recipient and wider community perspective.

This paper was written for a special issue of Kybernetes devoted to cybernetics and design. It aims to focus on case studies that are both informed by cybernetic and systems thinking and constitute a form of second‐order design praxis.

The case studies exemplify reflective practice as well as reporting outcomes, in terms of new understandings, from an action research process.

The paper describes what was involved in course design, from a cybernetic perspective, to effect systemic environmental decision making as well as developing and enacting a model for doing systemic inquiry (SI), which enabled situation‐improving actions to be realised in a complex, organisational setting. The paper lays out the theoretical and ethical case for understanding first‐and second‐order designing as a duality rather than a dualism.

There is a danger that readers from an alternative epistemological position will judge the paper in terms of knowledge claims relevant only to their own epistemological position.

The main outcomes suggested by this paper concern the possibility of transforming the current mainstream identity of educators, project managers and researchers to a position that offers more choices through both epistemological awareness (and pluralism) and the design of learning systems, including SI, as second‐order devices.

The case studies are based on both novel settings and theories in action; the concept of the learning systems as both a design and systemic practice as well as an epistemological device is novel. The paper is potentially of relevance to any practitioner wishing to use systems or cybernetic thinking. It is likely to be of particular relevance to education policy makers and public sector governance.

Challenge-based learning (CBL) is a trending educational concept in engineering education. The literature suggests that there is a growing variety in CBL implementations, stemming from the flexible and abstract definition of CBL that is shaped by teachers' perceptions. The chapter discusses how the CBL concept has been developed at Eindhoven University of Technology and describes the development and use of two educational resources aimed to facilitate conceptualization, design, and research of CBL for curriculum designers and teachers. The first resource is a set of CBL design principles for framing the variety of CBL and providing teachers with advice about how to develop CBL courses within an overall CBL curriculum. The second resource is a curriculum-mapping instrument called the CBL compass, which aims at mapping CBL initiatives and identifying gaps, overlaps, and misalignments in CBL implementation at a curriculum level. Both CBL design principles and the CBL compass have been developed by combining insights from theory and practical examples of CBL at TU/e into a higher order model of vision, teaching and learning, and support. We discuss the two educational instruments and showcase their application in the Eindhoven Engineering Education (E³) program, and we discuss preliminary findings and insights. The chapter concludes with recommendations for future practice and research.

This paper aims to provide an introductory overview and selected annotated bibliography of recent resources on library instruction and information literacy across all library types.

It introduces and annotates English-language periodical articles, monographs, dissertations and other materials on library instruction and information literacy published in 2014.

It provides information about each source, discusses the characteristics of current scholarship and highlights sources that contain unique or significant scholarly contributions.

The information may be used by librarians and interested parties as a quick reference to literature on library instruction and information literacy.

HyFlex course design is an effective instructional course design that combines active and transformative learning techniques. HyFlex course design encourages active learning by focusing on interactive activities, discussions, and collaboration. It also allows learners to collaborate effectively and flexibly as a community, providing peer support and opportunities for authentic dialogue and learning experiences. HyFlex course design provides the opportunity for transformative learning through its ability to offer personalized educational experiences to individuals. It facilitates greater customization of the learning experience, allowing individual learners to access tailored educational modules, offer personalized educational experiences to individuals, and effectively develop and build independent and critical thinking skills. This conceptual review, supported by implications from HyFlex literature and triangulated with experts' views undertaking a Delphi study, facilitates understanding the current state of research in HyFlex course design and future application strategies. Existing research has identified HyFlex courses as a promising means of engaging students in active learning. Allowing students to learn through flexibly predesigned mixed online and in-person experiences enables higher levels of student autonomy and supports students in taking more ownership of their learning. This approach can facilitate an understanding of how HyFlex courses can improve active learning practices in higher education. The review study findings identify the reported alignment issues and challenges, suggest four strategies and actions for policymakers and stakeholders, and provide a suggested research agenda for bridging identified research gaps.

Future research can provide evidence of the benefits of HyFlex course design and how flexible course design can address the challenges of traditional face-to-face courses, such as reduced student engagement, lack of student-centered approaches, and limited support for different learning styles. Further research can focus on strategies that can be used to promote active learning in HyFlex courses. Moreover, research can investigate how this kind of course design can equip educators with the skills and knowledge needed to design and implement effective and meaningful active learning experiences. Finally, research can assess the potential impact of HyFlex course design on student outcomes, including performance, satisfaction, and engagement.