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The purpose of this paper is to present an integrated model of didactic, practice and interdisciplinary service learning in healthcare education, and determine the students’ perceptions on the benefits of this integration.

A pre and post survey design was utilized to examine health professions students’ perspectives with respect to learning outcomes relevant to professional benefits of a service learning capstone. The surveys consisted of 36 items for measuring the interdisciplinary course characteristics and perceived benefits of the integrated approach. The required interdisciplinary (used interchangeably with interprofessional) course was constructed as an integrated didactic, practice interdisciplinary service learning model. The sample consisted of undergraduate students (n=53) who completed the interdisciplinary senior seminar capstone course taught by one faculty member in one of three course sections. Structural equation modeling based on partial least squares was used to analyze the significance of constructs. Students’ reflections on interdisciplinary service learning were also collected and summarized.

The study demonstrated the significance of interdisciplinary course and team preparation on perceived professional benefits and positive community service learning experience.

Further studies are needed and being pursued to address practitioners’ perceptions of interdisciplinary education. To fully complete the assessment of interdisciplinary education, longitudinal studies must be pursued with graduates and their employers. A larger sample size could be used to repeat this study.

The model employed in this study may be utilized as a component of practice education and clinical practice to address accreditation requirements, quality patient-centred care, and engaging students in valuing interprofessionalism and service.

This study presents an integrated model of didactic, practice and interdisciplinary service learning in health professions education, and demonstrates the benefits of the model with health profession students’ perceptions of interprofessional education (IPE). This study contributes to professional learning research as the impact of IPE has been questionable due to lack of rigorous evidence.

This study explores the effects of interdisciplinary education on engineering students by observing students' competencies before and after the programme.

The effects of interdisciplinary education were studied over three years through the use of a survey to test the social competencies of organisational life and the interdisciplinary competencies of college students. A total of 5,185 responses were collected from engineering students who took part in interdisciplinary education programmes. The survey was conducted during weeks 3 and 14 of each semester, and a comparison test was used to reveal any changes.

Among the 12 competencies developed or adapted, leadership significantly improved during all six semesters. Analytical thinking, interpersonal competency, professional attitude, global-mindedness, and creative attitudes also improved in some of the semesters.

It was not possible to control for the effect of classes that students were attending in addition to the targeted interdisciplinary class. However, this study was able to examine empirically the improvement of competencies for future engineers, and its findings provide a basis for future researchers to elaborate on other competencies as well.

The study recommends competencies needed by engineers working in the Fourth Industrial Revolution, examining the effects of interdisciplinary education on competency development. It contributes to strengthening the current trend in universities that seek to reform interdisciplinary education by empirically verifying its effectiveness.

This paper aims to provide insights into the evolution of the concept of interdisciplinarity in management science and management education.

A range of recently published (1993‐2002) works, which aim to provide practical advice rather than theoretical books on pedagogy or educational administration, are critiqued to aid the individual make the transition into academia. The sources are sorted into sections: finding an academic job, general advice, teaching, research and publishing, tenure and organizations.

The paper finds that in the evolution of management education and management science interdisciplinarity took different forms: synoptic and instrumental. Both forms resulted from different knowledge strategies of competing and cooperating disciplines. It concludes that in The Netherlands instrumental versions of interdisciplinarity in management research and education prevailed.

The paper studies the evolution of interdisciplinarity in management education and management science in the Dutch higher education context. It assumes that the pattern of evolution differs from country to country.

Interdisciplinarity is a complex concept. This study provides practical insights into the dynamics of interdisciplinary collaboration.

Much has been written about interdisciplinarity in science and education. However there is hardly any empirical and historical research on this topic.

In higher education, interdisciplinarity involves the design of subjects that offer the opportunity to experience ‘different ways of knowing’ from students’ core or preferred disciplines. Such an education is increasingly important in a global knowledge economy. Many universities have begun to introduce interdisciplinary studies or subjects to meet this perceived need. This chapter explores some of the issues inherent in moves towards interdisciplinary higher education. Definitional issues associated with the term ‘academic discipline’, as well as other terms, including ‘multidisciplinary’, ‘cross-disciplinary’, ‘pluridisciplinarity’, ‘transdisciplinarity’ and ‘interdisciplinary’ are examined. A new nomenclature is introduced to assist in clarifying the subtle distinctions between the various positions. The chapter also outlines some of the pedagogical and epistemological considerations which are involved in any move from a conventional form of educational delivery to an interdisciplinary higher education, and recommends caution in any implementation of an interdisciplinary curriculum.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a rationale for developing interprofessional competencies among graduates from professional and graduate programs, so that they are well prepared to participate in local, national and global social change strategies.

After reviewing the literature on strategic social change initiatives the authors briefly describe two such initiatives: corporate social responsibility initiatives and social entrepreneurial ventures. After reviewing the interprofessional literature from various disciplines and professions, the authors categorized them into “competencies,” “rationale,” “conceptual framework,” “principles” and “challenges.” An examination of exemplar pedagogy from this body of literature suggests ways to prepare students to lead and actively participate in innovative, collaborative social change initiatives.

Interdisciplinary competencies include teamwork, communication, contextual understanding, negotiation, critical thinking, leadership, openness and adaptability. Interprofessional educational models are difficult to implement, however, ethical responsibility of educators to prepare students for complex realities trumps the challenges.

Interprofessional educational experiences can enable students to engage in generative and transformational learning which can later facilitate in creation of innovative solutions for society's recalcitrant physical, social and environmental issues.

Based on the system's perspective, the paper provides guidelines and strategies for implementing interprofessional pedagogical initiative.

Using the lens of social physics, this study aims to examine how, if at all, one graduate training program fostered collisions or meaningful interactions, between students and faculty from different disciplinary backgrounds.

Qualitative, ethnographic case study methods.

The University of Maryland’s National Research Traineeship program fostered collisions between students and faculty from different disciplinary backgrounds by facilitating exploration, idea flow and engagement within an interdisciplinary scholarly community. These collisions generated productive opportunities for student learning, development and collaborations, but at times also produced non-generative outcomes.

This study names specific, strategic activities (e.g. regular research talks, physical space) that graduate programs can use to facilitate interdisciplinary collaborations among students and faculty and considers the extent to which such activities contribute to organizational change.

This paper applies new theories (collisions and social physics) to understanding interdisciplinary collaboration and identifies aspects of graduate training programs that may be replicable in other institutional settings.

This paper aims to argue that substantive changes are required in both curricula and pedagogical practice in higher education institutions to challenge dominant epistemologies and discourses and to unsettle current ways of thinking about, and acting in relation to, the environment. Central to such a shift, it is argued, is the need for higher education curricula to be interdisciplinary and for pedagogical practices to work to build capacities in students for critical and reflective thinking.

In this paper, a case study of our reflections is offered on a subject designed to promote capacities in students for critical and reflective thinking via an interdisciplinary approach. The paper uses data from student reflective essays and student course evaluations to make an argument for the success of this approach.

Genuine transformative learning can occur within a constructivist informed pedagogical approach to teaching for sustainability.

Research implications are that genuine transformation can occur in students’ thinking processes (which the paper argues is critical for effective education in sustainability) with appropriately designed courses in higher education.

More effective environmental actors and thinkers, who can critically engage with the complexity of environmental problems.

Social implications include a more effective and socially just higher education for sustainability

The authors know of no other narrative that addresses attempts to educate for sustainability using this approach.

The objective of this paper is to present the Interdisciplinary Higher Education Program (ProFIS) of the University of Campinas – UNICAMP – and discuss the main challenges related to the implementation of the program and the impact on the educational and professional trajectory of students. ProFIS was set up with a distinctive approach towards social inclusion and curricular innovation, seeking to attract the best students from public high schools to offer them a general education program as a first step in higher education. Another novelty is the inclusion of an ongoing evaluation of the program from its implementation. It merges monitoring and impact evaluation instruments to monitor and improve the quality, efficiency and effectiveness of the interventions. Preliminary results will be discussed in relation to retention and social inclusion.

This study aims to examine and compare faculty perceptions of the process of institutionalizing sustainability, developing sustainability pedagogy and activating key sustainability competencies between the University of Oklahoma (OU) and Arizona State University (ASU).

Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 17 professors in the Department of Geography and Environmental Sustainability at OU and 10 professors in the School of Sustainability at ASU.

The results highlight the complexity of teaching sustainability in an interdisciplinary manner in both programs. Professors are incorporating many of the key competencies of sustainability teaching, but in a patchwork manner that does not necessary follow the comprehensive frameworks from the literature.

The comparative analysis leads to recommendations for teaching sustainability in higher education.

This study contributes to theories of sustainability teaching by identifying gaps between what professors are actually doing and experiencing and a set of best practices from the literature.

The authors examined team-learning processes in short-term student project teams operating in an intensive design competition at a public university. The purpose of this paper is to explore the critical facilitators, inhibitors and processes for fostering students' creativity within interdisciplinary design teams in higher education.

The authors used a qualitative design to explore facilitators, inhibitors and critical processes in interdisciplinary student project teams. They conducted focus group interviews with three winning interdisciplinary teams that participated in a three-day design competition and used a constant comparison to analyze the data.

The authors identified themes that contributed to creativity at the individual level, the team level and the resource level. The key findings included 12 critical team process phases to achieve one common goal.

The findings of the study yielded to a holistic model of interdisciplinary team development for creativity. Implications for educators and practitioners and suggestions for researchers to expand the interdisciplinary team process model were discussed to facilitate interdisciplinary team creativity in higher education.