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Creating suitable learning conditions in university classrooms continues to be a topical issue in higher education. The above means that a continued search for innovative teaching and learning strategies in universities remains a priority issue. The study therefore investigated conditions that facilitate the effective implementation of cooperative learning (CL) as well as how CL influences the academic performance of students in universities in Zimbabwe.

The research adopted a quantitative research approach located in the descriptive research design. A sample of 341 undergraduate students selected using a simple random sampling strategy from a sample frame of 701 undergraduate students participated in the study. The study first used a pre-test and later, a post-test to determine the initial and end of semester (EOS) academic performance levels of students, respectively, on a Calculus 1 course. A self-constructed structured questionnaire was also used for data collection on the views of students towards the use of CL with particular reference to the 5 dimensions of positive interdependence (PDI), promotive interaction (PI), individual and group accountability (IGA), social and interpersonal skills (SS) and group processing (GP). The questionnaire was validated using confirmatory factor analysis. Structural equation modelling was used to test proposed relationships. A total of 341 questionnaires were administered through an email survey. Of the total, 149 completed questionnaires were received from the students, giving a return rate of 43.7%.

The results showed that positive interdependence, promotive interaction, social and interpersonal skills, individual and group accountability as well as group processing were important antecedents to the effective implementation of CL in universities. The results further showed that CL plays a significant role in improving the academic performance of university students; hence, academic performance was viewed as a significant consequence of CL.

This is the first study on the application of CL to enhance the academic performance of university students in the context of Zimbabwe. As a result, caution should be exercised when generalising the results as more studies to either confirm or disconfirm these results in the context of Zimbabwe may still be required.

These results have implications on policy and practice with regards to active teaching strategies in universities. With regards to practice, the results demonstrated that the use of group activities that allow students to share knowledge and support each other while the teacher plays a facilitating role is important for enhancing students' academic performance. With regards to policy, the results showed that universities can enhance the academic performance of students if policies that promote student-centered teaching and learning approaches to ensure that teaching in universities is more student-led than lecturer-led are developed.

While many studies have been conducted in other contexts, to establish the influence of CL on the academic performance of university students, there is no known study on the influence of CL that has been conducted in the context of Zimbabwean universities. The results of this study therefore are an eye opener on the role of CL in enhancing the academic performance of students in Zimbabwean universities.

The purpose of this study is to examine how dialogic spaces were co-constituted (opened, broadened and deepened) between students engaged in divergent and convergent collaborative learning tasks, orchestrated by teachers in Finnish primary and secondary schools. The concept of dialogic space refers to a dynamic, shared resource of ideas in dialogue and has come to represent an ideal form of educational interaction, in the contexts of collaborative learning, joint creative work and shared knowledge-building.

A socio-cultural discourse analysis of video-observed classroom dialogue, entailing the development of a new analytic typology, was undertaken to explore the co-constitution of dialogic space. The data are derived from two qualitative studies, one examining dialogue to co-create fictive video stories in primary-school classrooms (divergent task), the other investigating collaborative knowledge building in secondary-school health education (convergent task).

Dialogic spaces were opened through group settings and by the students’ selection of topics. In the divergent task, the broadening of dialogic space derived from the heterogeneous group settings, whereas in the convergent task, from the multiple and various information sources involved. As regards the deepening of dialogic space, explicit reflective talk remained scarce; instead the norms deriving from the school-context tasks and requirements guided the group dialogue.

This study lays the groundwork for subsequent research regarding the orchestration of dialogic space in divergent and convergent tasks by offering a typology to operationalise dialogic space for further, more systematic, comparisons and aiding the understandings of the processes implicated in intercreating and interthinking. This in turn is of significance for the development of dialogic pedagogies.

The purpose of this study is to identify signs of unnecessary assurance of learning (AoL) complexity and to provide suggestions for simplifying the AoL processes.

While this paper is grounded in the existent AoL literature, the paper also presents several anecdotal observations from the authors’ practical knowledge in designing, leading, maintaining and consulting on AoL systems and processes.

Based on both a conceptual review of AoL literature and the authors’ own experiences, the authors outline 13 specific symptoms of unnecessary AoL complexity, identify potential underlying causes for each symptom and propose practical solutions that can increase the efficiency and effectiveness of dysfunctional AoL systems and processes.

Although this work is grounded in the existent AoL literature, the present paper presents several anecdotal observations from the authors’ experiences. While the intent is to provide guidance that is actionable, it is understood that variability exists within and across schools and programs. Future research is needed to provide a more formal structure for reviewing AoL complexity, efficiency and effectiveness.

While future research is needed to provide a more formal structure for reviewing AoL complexity, efficiency and effectiveness, the intent of this paper is to provide guidance that is actionable with the understanding that variability exists within and across schools and programs.

Society increasingly is demanding accountability from institutions of higher learning, and properly structured AoL programs can provide evidence of institutional effectiveness in preparing students to be productive members of society in their chosen fields of study. Stated succinctly, “although accountability matters, learning still matters most” (Angelo, 1999, n.p.).

Consideration of the 13 symptoms presented here along with other drivers that are unique to each school and program should result in the identification and development of practicable remedies to simplify AoL processes and systems, increase efficiency and effectiveness and improve the documentation of improvements to student learning.

Faculty participation in the assurance of learning (AoL) is requisite both for the effective operation of the system and for accreditation compliance, but faculty often resist engaging in AoL tasks. The purpose of this paper is to provide specific recommendations to address faculty concerns and to guide AoL systems toward maturity.

This paper provides a comprehensive model of faculty resistance perspectives aligned to AoL maturity, provides specific responses to faculty resistance and introduces success markers of progress toward maturity.

Specifically, a three-stage model of AoL system maturity is presented and aligned with five faculty perspectives. For each faculty perspective, responses targeting causal factors are proposed and signs of progress toward the next level of faculty engagement are highlighted.

Faculty and AoL leaders will be able to identify their current stage of AoL system maturity and implement practical solutions to move to the next stage of system maturity.

Understanding the motivations for faculty resistance will facilitate more meaningful and effective internal interactions as a school seeks to improve its AoL system. In turn, a more effective AoL system will promote better learning experiences for students; and better learning allows students to become productive in their chosen careers more quickly, thus improving society as a whole.

To the knowledge, no prior paper has organized faculty resistance along a maturity continuum, provided targeted responses based on the level of maturity or included signs that indicate growth toward the next level of maturity.

The purpose of this paper is to examine what impacts university students perceived from their short-term intensive international courses as part of undergraduate multidisciplinary education.

The study design was informed by interpretative phenomenological analysis. Semi-structured interviews explored informants’ views of their experience to elicit key themes of their experience.

The analysis resulted in four major themes: personal development, generic skills, global perspectives and subject-specific matter. Some text segments were coded with multiple themes, which suggests that the impacts of short-term international courses are multifaceted.

Academic topics of the courses substantially centred around humanities and social sciences at a particular university. This paper furthermore primarily depended on students’ self-reported answers, and it is possible that the participants who chose to enrol in the elective international courses may be principally willing to acquire global competence. Therefore, this study did not set out to present the generalised impacts of any short-term international courses.

The findings could be used as a conceptual tool for the design and evaluation of new and existing courses. In addition, the four major themes that this study elicited are useful as a cue for students’ self-reflection about their own learning experiences.

There have been significant efforts devoted to increasing the quantity of short-term international programs, but there has been less focus on the quality of these programs. This study supports the findings of existing literature but also identified one of the potential unfavourable impacts that short-term international courses may have on students’ development.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a framework to evaluate and assess the performance of the COVID-19 vaccine distribution process that is sensitive to the unique supply-side and demand-side constraints exhibited in the US vaccine rollout.

A queuing framework that operates under two distinct regimes is formulated to analyze service rates that represent system capacity to vaccinate (under the first regime) and hesitancy-induced throughput (under the second regime). These supply- and hesitancy-constrained regimes form the focus of the present paper, as the former reflects the inherent ability of the nation in its various jurisdictions to mobilize, whereas the latter reflects a critical area for public policy to protect the population’s overall health and safety.

The two-regime framework analysis provides insights into the capacity to vaccinate and hesitancy-constrained demand, which is found to vary across the country primarily by politics and region. The framework also allows analysis of the end-to-end supply chain, where it is found that the ability to vaccinate was likely constrained by last-mile administration issues, rather than the capacity of the manufacturing and transportation steps of the supply chain.

This study presents a new framework to consider end-to-end supply chains as dynamic systems that exhibit different regimes because of unique supply- and demand-side characteristics and estimate rollout capacity and underlying determinants at the national, state and county levels.

Critical infrastructure (CI) plays an essential role in reading, reacting and responding while dealing with natural disasters. This study address food supply chain resilience by proposing an FSC resilience model that explains the food product and transport flow via production, processing, distribution and retailing in circumstances of (CI) collapses post a natural disaster.

A combination of qualitative methods was conducted to obtain a comprehensive overview of the food and beverage sector in Puerto Rico. The full dataset comprised of seven focus groups for a total of 52 participants and 12 in-depth interviews.

FSC resilience is seen in this study through the managerial actions taken by members of the Chain: innovating, transforming, adapting, and flexibilising business models and operations.

This study is the first to address FSC resilience from the perspective of net food importer economy in the context of natural disasters and prolonged Critical infrastructure (CI) breakdown, and the first one in proposing an FSC resilience model that explains the food product and transport flow via production, processing, distribution and retailing in circumstances of CI collapses post a natural disaster.

There is widespread concern about the fact that small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) seem to be particularly vulnerable to cyberattacks. This is perhaps because smaller businesses lack sufficient situational awareness to make informed decisions in this space, or because they lack the resources to implement security controls and precautions.

In this paper, Endsley’s theory of situation awareness was extended to propose a model of SMEs’ cyber situational awareness, and the extent to which this awareness triggers the implementation of cyber security measures. Empirical data were collected through an online survey of 361 UK-based SMEs; subsequently, the authors used partial least squares modeling to validate the model.

The results show that heightened situational awareness, as well as resource availability, significantly affects SMEs’ implementation of cyber precautions and controls.

While resource limitations are undoubtedly a problem for SMEs, their lack of cyber situational awareness seems to be the area requiring most attention.

The findings of this study are reported and recommendations were made that can help to improve situational awareness, which will have the effect of encouraging the implementation of cyber security measures.

This is the first study to apply the situational awareness theory to understand why SMEs do not implement cyber security best practice measures.

This study aims to determine whether consumers are willing to pay a premium for locally produced hard apple cider and examine the factors influencing this premium. This study examines the influence of hard apple cider attributes and consumer characteristics on consumer preferences for local hard apple cider.

Data from a 2019 survey of 875 Tennessee consumers regarding their preferences for a local hard apple cider were obtained. Probit estimates were used to calculate the premium consumers were willing to pay for a locally made hard apple cider and factors influencing this premium. A multivariate probit was used to ascertain factors influencing the importance of attributes (e.g. heirloom apples, sweetness/dryness, sparking/still and no preservatives added) on local hard apple cider preference.

Consumers would pay a $3.22 premium for local hard apple cider compared with a $6.99 reference product. Local foods preferences, urbanization, weekly purchases of other alcoholic beverages and shopping venues influenced premium amounts. Other important attributes were sweetness/dryness and no preservatives. Influence of consumer demographics suggests targeted marketing of local ciders could be successful.

Few studies examine consumer preferences for hard apple ciders. This study represents a cross-sectional analysis of the premium consumers would pay for local hard apple ciders and the importance of other hard apple cider attributes.

The purpose of this paper is to describe an online faculty development pilot course on how to engage students online. A framework was used, referred to as the Trifecta of Student Engagement, for the design of the course. The Trifecta of Student Engagement proposes that students, in order to be fully engaged in a course, need to be engaged with their course content, with their peers and with their instructor. The course has three units of content that each correspond to the Trifecta of Student Engagement. This course has gone through one pilot with faculty and has impacted students and faculty positively.

An online faculty development course was piloted with eight faculty members across a range of disciplines who participated in the program. After taking the course, they had to apply the Trifecta of Student Engagement framework to a course they taught and share what they did via written report, webinar, or web presentation. This study summarized the faculty participants’ written reports and presentations as well as provided a qualitative evaluation on the impact this course had on students and faculty.

After faculty applied the Trifecta of Student Engagement framework to courses taught, faculty saw an improvement in student engagement, satisfaction, learning and achievement. Three faculty surveyed students to determine their engagement and satisfaction and found students to respond positively to the use of tools and activities for student-to-content engagement, student-to-student engagement and student-to-instructor engagement. Two faculty examined student grades to determine if there were changes in student outcomes. One professor saw average grades increase by 11 percent. Another professor saw grades improve by 8 percent. She also found that student assessment of learning increased by 0.57. Both faculty attributed the improvement to the effectiveness of the teaching strategies employed.

This research is limited to the eight faculty who participated in the pilot. Some faculty used methods to attempt to measure the impacts of their teaching practices by surveying students and looking at student performance data. A second pilot is needed for additional faculty to take the course and apply the Trifecta of Engagement framework to generate more data for impact.

Institutions looking to create an online teaching professional development course for faculty can utilize the Trifecta of Student Engagement framework for their course design. Additionally, faculty can read about tools and strategies that they can immediately apply to create more student-to-content engagement, student-to-student engagement and student-to-instructor engagement.

Faculty can be more intentional in how they engage students in their online course experience.

This paper adds to the literature on faculty development regarding student-centered teaching practices. Other institutions looking to create a faculty development course or program that utilizes a student-centered framework may find aspects of this paper useful for their own online teaching professional development initiatives.