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The purpose of this study is to explore how multicultural curriculum and instruction in a teacher-credentialing program prepared pre-service teachers to work with diverse students.

The research method used was a qualitative approach. The research design was a descriptive single embedded case study to interview pre-service teachers who were in their second semester in a teacher-credentialing program at a university on the west coast and pre-service teachers who were in their final semester in the same teacher-credentialing program. Pre-service teachers discussed their disappointment in the program for their lack of training in how to work with culturally diverse students.

The findings from the study will add to the body of knowledge specific to teacher-credentialing programs, curriculum developers and universal design for learning on K-12 education.

As schools become more diverse, an important role of teacher-credentialing courses is to train future teachers with the knowledge to assist culturally diverse students. If teachers were multicultural teachers, they would be better prepared to instruct culturally diverse students and could acknowledge sociocultural resources and information that students bring to the classroom.

The study is essential because training teachers to instruct culturally diverse students is critical as student demographics become more diverse.

In pursuit of democracy, John Dewey argued that public education should be the driving force. As educators strive to address issues of social justice and create inclusive academic environments, they must address the inequalities that are perpetuated in our educational system. Higher education (HE) plays a pivotal role, as it has the potential to shape those who will go on to become future educators, lawmakers, and politicians. Recognizing the importance of HE, we have the responsibility to address inclusivity in and out of the classroom. This chapter examines how critical pedagogy can be used as a tool to promote social justice in HE. In doing so, it will challenge educators to begin to address socially constructed ideas that are agents of oppression. Utilizing critical pedagogy, faculty and students can learn together and critically challenge these educational and social injustices. This will have a rippling impact on our educational system and society as a whole. Successfully implementing this pedagogical approach can lead to diverse and inclusive classrooms that foster learning for all students.

The Covid-19 pandemic forced educational institution to rapidly switch to online delivery. Even if the pandemic seems to be over, online learning will continue to constitute at least a part of the course’s delivery in the future. With that in mind, this study aims to explore the factors that influence teaching presence online and how these perceptions will guide teachers to adopt practices that will impact their presence accordingly. Given the changes implemented due to the pandemic, this study is essential to identify the significance of teaching and social presence in online classes.

Semi-structured interviews were used to find answers to the posed research questions. Exploring the perceptions and experiences of four university teachers, this study, informed by the community of inquiry (CoI) model, investigated the impact of teaching and social presence on the online learning experience in higher education.

The findings indicate that teachers acknowledged the importance of these two elements in teaching online. Moreover, the study investigates how teachers could establish teaching and social presence to enhance the online learning experience.

The study explores teachers’ views on the importance of presence, their practices to achieve in an online learning environment and addresses a gap in the literature on “teaching presence from the educator’s perspective, [since] most studies exploring the student’s perspective” (Gurley, 2018, p. 200).

In this account of a study of a Theatre of the Oppressed (TO) intervention in a preservice teacher classroom, the authors explore an alternative way of learning to teach, as well as the dynamics of interdisciplinary collaboration between Theater and Education. Measures of racial and political attitudes did not demonstrate any change in the preservice teachers; however, several limitations made these findings inconclusive. Observations and journal entries suggested that interactive theater may be a promising way to make beliefs about teaching and learning visible, and therefore accessible for critical reflection.

This paper aims to present the qualitative findings on students’ and teachers’ experiences in communicating and interacting with students and teachers from different ethnic backgrounds in the Malaysian vision schools initiative.

Face-to-face interviews were conducted involving 15 informants comprising of three headteachers, three teachers and nine students. The interviews centred on the informants’ experiences and views living and experiencing the reality of the vision schools which is comprising three major races; Malays, Chinese and Indians; which is represented by the three school types which are a national school, Chinese vernacular and Indian vernacular schools.

The interview data revealed that the intercultural communication in the vision schools had triggered intercultural understanding and awareness of cultural diversity in the schools. However, the interview data with experienced teachers showed some drawbacks of the intercultural dynamics at the school complex. Among the weaknesses were the absence of structured and formal training on intercultural and multicultural education, lack of trust and poor social skills which may have hindered effective intercultural communication from taking place.

This study presents the informants’ experiences and views on the reality of intercultural interaction among students and teachers in the context of the Malaysian vision school initiative.

This paper aims to explore the impact of differences in educational traditions on conventions of teaching and learning, and on the measurement of learning outcomes. These are critical issues within the context of business schools that are steeped in one dominant tradition but have a large population of international students previously educated in other traditions. The paper argues that international students face the challenge of satisfactorily demonstrating learning according to foreign conventions that are different from what they would have been accustomed to within the framework of their home educational tradition.

This study draws on a bilingual literature review to capture differences in educational traditions between Australia and China. It then uses logistic regression to analyze the performance of 800 domestic and international Chinese students across a range of different assessment formats at a large Australian business school.

The study finds statistically significant differences in the performance of these two student groups on different assessment types. It concludes that the conventions on approaches to the assessment of learning shaped by a specific educational tradition can hamper the effective demonstration of learning among students from other educational traditions.

The paper focuses on issues related to the assessment of learning in multicultural higher education contexts, which has received less attention in the literature compared to issues on teaching approaches in multicultural contexts. The paper also highlights important implications on the validity of the measurement of learning outcomes and on the subsequent impact on graduate recruitment.

This study seeks to evaluate the application of a social‐virtual curriculum delivered through in‐classroom and web‐based activities, aiming to develop youth's social‐cultural skills, cultural competency and multicultural awareness. Specifically, the study evaluates the overall impact of the curriculum to the participating youth's Universality‐Diversity Orientation, diversity of contact, relativistic appreciation (RA) and comfort with differences. It examines the influence of gender, ethnicity and religion to the aforementioned variables. Finally, it aims to identify the role of the curriculum and the Web 2.0 in promoting multiculturalism and multicultural education and in changing youth's perceptions, and attitudes towards others.

A quantitative approach was applied, using the Miville‐Guzman Universality‐Diversity Scale that measures an individual's Universal‐Diverse Orientation. Descriptive (frequencies, percentages, means, standard deviations and Cronbach's alpha) and inferential (the independent t‐test, the paired‐sample t‐test and the one‐way analysis of variances) statistics were conducted. Questionnaires were given to 303 students. The pre‐measurement took place in April 2008 (70 per cent response rate) and the post‐measurement took place in June‐July 2009 (45 per cent response rate).

The study discusses the impact of the social‐virtual curriculum, the influence of gender, ethnicity and religion, the role of the social‐virtual curriculum and the Web 2.0 tools in promoting multiculturalism and multicultural education and in changing youth's beliefs, perceptions and attitudes towards others and the new learning, collaboration and communication culture established.

The study constitutes the foundation for further research to be conducted regarding the educational use of Web 2.0 tools, the in‐depth examination of the application of the educational networking within the school curriculum.

This study aims to document the impact of an 80-h virtual Spanish language immersion program on four elementary school leaders in Kentucky.

This study used a mixed methods approach. Each subject participated in three semi-structured interviews with the researcher and a standardized oral language assessment.

Participants expressed greater confidence when interacting with students and families who do not speak English, greater empathy for students learning English, new cross-cultural understandings and deeper knowledge about the language acquisition process and language instruction.

Training in a foreign language may prove to be a valuable professional learning activity for leaders seeking to develop a stronger skillset and mindset for multicultural education.

This paper contributes to the literature by documenting a previously un-researched virtual language immersion program.

This paper aims to analyze the skills and attitudes development of multicultural teams. In todays’ environment, business interconnectivity and multicultural societies are becoming the normal way of living. Although students are increasingly facing multicultural learning environments, their awareness and willingness or harmonious and productive learning in these environments need to be prepared for in a systematic manner. Therefore, it is necessary that the students are conscious of their commonalities and differences with other students to gain cultural competence. Students’ progress in developing their cultural intelligence is determined by co-operative social skills and the amount of interactions in a multicultural environment.

The research was conducted using a quantitative methodology. The questionnaire development roots in a students’ self-assessment scheme proposed by Armstrong (Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania) covering the progress made during the participation in an intercultural project.

The research findings relate to attitudes toward developing and sharing knowledge, stress, learning and task orientation, intercultural communication and cultural awareness skills related to the impacts of culture on the different ways of learning when working in multicultural teams. The study confirmed that knowledge gains and competence progress are higher in international teams compared to national teams.

To provide for better differentiation as to the student profile, e.g., nationality, cultural categories, a larger sample size is suggested.

The study might be seen as a road map for universities and international companies alike for imparting cognitive, affective and behavioral competencies.

This study complements previous studies investigating the phenomenon of stress with multi-cultural complexity in more long-term durations. It implies stress factors to appear also in short-term multi-cultural exposures.