Journal of Applied Research in Higher Education最新文献

Purpose

This study aims to investigate the relationship between workplace spirituality (WPS) and faculty critical thinking (CT) and the mediating effect of knowledge management (KM) among faculty at public universities.

Design/methodology/approach

The study employed a quantitative, cross-sectional research design to attain the objective. Using simple random sampling, the data were collected from 295 faculty members working in public universities in Sindh, Pakistan. The hypothesized relationships were tested using structural equation modeling (SEM) based on covariance and mediation analysis was conducted using Preacher and Haye’s (2008) approach.

Findings

Findings revealed a significant positive association between WPS, KM and faculty CT. In addition, the results indicated that KM played a partial mediating role in the relationship between WPS and CT.

Practical implications

Encouraging WPS can cultivate an environment of transparency, teamwork and knowledge exchange, promoting and enhancing faculty CT abilities.

Originality/value

Rare research exists regarding the connections between WPS, KM and CT in the Pakistani higher education system.

Purpose

Academic integrity is vital to the success and sustainability of the academic project and particularly critical in the training of ethical and informed health professionals. Yet studies have found that cheating in online exams was commonplace during the COVID-19 pandemic. With the increased use of online and blended learning post-COVID-19, an understanding of student cheating dynamics is essential for developing effective strategies to combat academic dishonesty in the rapidly changing educational landscape.

Design/methodology/approach

This study explored academic integrity and reasons for dishonesty from the perspective of health sciences students at a South African University of Technology (UOT) via the Fraud Diamond. To gain an in-depth understanding of the topic, a qualitative method was employed, and data were collected via focus group discussions with nine student class representatives. These data were analysed thematically using the Clarke and Braun approach.

Findings

Cheating during online assessment was common and innovative, with students manipulating others and exploiting friendships to facilitate dishonest practices. Student motivations for dishonesty included a lack of consequences and pressure due to a lack of time management, engagement and preparation.

Practical implications

This study underscores the need for institutions to adopt an adaptable, multi-faceted approach that addresses student cheating opportunity, motivation and normalisation of dishonest practices whilst strengthening academic integrity policies and enforcement thereof.

Originality/value

The findings contribute valuable insights into the ongoing academic integrity crisis in higher education in the South African context.

Purpose

This qualitative study assesses the enablers of the work of a novel, self-managing digital pedagogy peer support team in a Finnish higher education institution.

Design/methodology/approach

This study employs a qualitative methodology with in-depth interviews of five digital pedagogy facilitators. The data collected are analyzed with the ATLAS.ti software. The analytical approach follows a deductive method, applying the categories derived from Magpili and Pazos (2018) who investigated the input variables of self-managing teams through their extensive literature review.

Findings

The primary findings underscore the suitability of Magpili and Pazos' variables for evaluating the performance enablers of self-managing teams. Furthermore, the findings emphasize the significance of leadership and effective communication as essential prerequisites for achieving elevated performance levels.

Research limitations/implications

This study focuses on the enablers of team performance from the perspective of the team members. To enhance comprehensiveness, subsequent phases should incorporate viewpoints from clients, namely peer instructors, and focus on the mediator and outcome aspects of the team effectiveness framework.

Practical implications

This study offers actionable recommendations for higher education institutions aiming to adopt a peer mentor model akin to the one delineated in the study.

Originality/value

This study analyzes a collaborative approach to advancing digital pedagogy within higher education institutions and discusses the enablers for successful performance within self-managing teams.

Purpose

The impact and collective threat of climate change is of key concern to all. Music and arts education can play a role by responding to the ongoing climate crisis through the creation of artworks as activism. This paper discusses a collaborative online international music project and its potential contribution to sustainable development education.

Design/methodology/approach

10,427 miles and 11 hours apart, music education students undertook the project, working in groups with a mix of students from Aberdeen, Scotland and Melbourne, Australia in each group. Each student collected video footage that captured their experience of climate concerns related to their environment. Students combined and edited the footage then collaboratively composed music to accompany the footage. This research was conceived as a collaborative self-study project undertaken by the authors as music teacher educators.

Findings

The results show a range of musical and extra musical outcomes and challenges. Evidence suggests that a collaborative online international music learning experience may contribute to sustainable development education and regenerative practice more broadly. Students began to develop their practice as educators for school and community contexts embedding learning for sustainability and climate consciousness, thus enabling them to develop as active global citizens.

Originality/value

This paper argues for greater attention to the affordances of digital collaborative music technology tools to facilitate creative projects as well as the need to reimagine musical experience, drawing together strands of music, sustainability education, technology and global citizenship. This paper also argues for the importance of embedding the UN Sustainable Development Goals in teaching and learning in Higher Education.

Purpose

The paper explored students-staff classroom co-creation and students' involvement in out-of-class engagements as means of fostering employability skills in higher education institutions (HEIs). The paper aimed to present an alternative but equally effective means that HEIs can leverage to foster relevant 21st Century employability skills among undergraduates using day-to-day in-class and out-of-class activities and other non-formal campus activities.

Design/methodology/approach

The study adopted descriptive survey design. A total of 350 undergraduates who participate in out-of-class activities were purposively selected from seven (7) faculties. An instrument designed by the author was used to gather data for the study. The instrument was subjected to Cronbach Alpha analysis for item-by-item consistency and it yielded the reliability co-efficient of 0.88. Data collected from the respondents were analyzed using descriptive statistics of frequency count, mean and standard deviation.

Findings

Interactive classrooms, where students and lecturers co-create to provide solutions to problems enhance students' self-esteem, problem solving, analytical, communication and leadership skills amongst others. It was also found that students who got involved in one or more out-of-class activity on campus acquire specific competencies such as networking, collaboration, communication, leadership, multidisciplinary thinking, etc.

Research limitations/implications

Due to a limited sample size, it might be inappropriate to generalize findings. Researchers are encouraged to test this proposition further.

Practical implications

The paper highlights the need for HEIs to leverage student-staff co-creation and out-of-class engagement in their bid to produce employable graduates.

Originality/value

This paper clearly presents alternative but effective means of fostering employability in HEIs.

Purpose

This paper investigates the key determinants affecting household spending for university degree in Vietnam. This paper serves as empirical evidence for policymakers to select appropriate factors to estimate financial needs for university students in Vietnam.

Design/methodology/approach

We employ an innovative variable selection approach with adaptive LASSO for Tobit Regression Model.

Findings

The results suggest income, region and ethnicity play significant roles in determining higher education expenditure at Vietnamese households. Gender-related indicators (such as gender of household head, student’s gender), distance to school, occupations, etc. are empirically insignificant.

Originality/value

This study proposes a data-driven method by interfering regulation and Tobit regression to understand the divergence in higher education spending. Especially, adaptive LASSO was first introduced to identify key determinants of higher education expenditure at household level in Vietnam. It hopes to tackle over-fitting problems of traditional OLS regression in previous literature.

Purpose

Education 4.0 (E 4.0) represents a new paradigm in the field of education, which emphasizes a student-centric approach that allows learners to access education anytime, anywhere, tailored to their individual needs through modern-day technologies. The purpose of the study was to unearth the critical success factors (CSFs) essential for the successful implementation of E 4.0.

Design/methodology/approach

The CSFs were unearthed using a literature review and further the interrelationships were analysed using multi-criteria decision making (MCDM) approach.

Findings

The study unearthed 15 CSFs for the successful implementation of E 4.0. The most important factor for the successful implementation of E 4.0 was personalized learning which was found to be the casual factor. The other causal CSFs were clear vision and leadership for E 4.0, stakeholder involvement, data analytics in teaching and learning, inter-disciplinary learning and blended learning environments. The effect factors were digital citizenship-based education, teacher training and development for E 4.0, supportive environment, curriculum redesign for E 4.0, open educational resources, digital technologies, formative assessments, infrastructure for E 4.0 and sustainability in education.

Research limitations/implications

This is the first study which unearthed the CSFs and found the interrelationships among them, thus contributing to the theory of technology organization environment.

Originality/value

This study represented a pioneering effort in understanding the CSFs underpinning the successful adoption of E 4.0, paving the way for a more personalized, tech-savvy and effective education system.

Purpose

This study presents a comprehensive investigation of turnover intention within the context of higher education, specifically focusing on private universities in Egypt, to develop a robust conceptual framework to explore this phenomenon.

Design/methodology/approach

The study sample comprised both male and female tenured faculty members from private universities, and data were collected through questionnaires, resulting in 396 completed responses. Statistical analysis was conducted using SPSS and partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) software.

Findings

The study highlights the significant impact of work-life balance (WLB) and organizational commitment on turnover intention, with job satisfaction as a mediating factor. Additionally, the research reveals that emotional intelligence (EI) does not directly influence turnover intention, but its effects are fully mediated by job satisfaction.

Originality/value

This research not only advances the theoretical understanding of why academics contemplate leaving their positions but also underscores the significance of this topic. Moreover, by exploring turnover intention in the private education sector of the Middle East, the study addresses a notable gap in the existing literature.

Purpose

The study intends to evaluate students’ intention to shift from cash payment to mobile payment system for academic fee payments through push, pull and mooring framework. Push factors comprise risk and service-related factors, pull factors consist of subjective and aspect-based factors and mooring factors include cost and cognitive factors.

Design/methodology/approach

Sample of the study consists of around 296 undergraduate and postgraduate students from different higher educational institutions located in India. The questionnaire for data collection comprises 21 Likert scale-based items distributed among seven constructs. Partial least square structural equation modeling is used to identify the significant factors influencing students’ intentions.

Findings

Five of the factors, namely, risk, service, subjective, aspect and cognitive significantly influence student’s intention to switch to mobile payment system for academic fee payments. Moderation analysis indicates that the impact of the push and pull factors on switching intention towards mobile payments has a more positive influence among male students.

Originality/value

This study is probably the only study that tested the specific push, pull and mooring factors influencing intention to switch to mobile payment from cash payment in the Indian education system based on the incentive, Fogg behavior and status quo bias theory for academic fee payment.

Purpose

Groups of students were enrolled in a course that sought to produce a three-phase theoretical model over three semesters.

Design/methodology/approach

A design project to comprehensively address school violence was launched at a university in eastern Pennsylvania.

Findings

This article updates the recent and most critical finding of the project by illuminating specific implications of the importance of teacher training and the development toward competence in recognition of children who are emotionally and psychologically injured through proactive measures such as screening for emotional and psychological well-being.

Research limitations/implications

Although the model has not been tested, screening to identify those in need of emotional support and training to support teachers is clear. Screening and training offer important opportunities to help learners build skills toward resilience to soften the effects of trauma.

Practical implications

A view of the “whole child” with regard to academic success could further foster social and emotional development.

Social implications

Early intervention can prevent the onset of symptoms associated with posttraumatic stress and related disorders. This effort alone may significantly reduce the uncomfortable incidences and perhaps ultimate prevention of the violence that is perpetuated among children.

Originality/value

Preliminary research supports a continued conversation regarding effective tools to find children emotionally and psychologically at-risk, which allows teachers an opportunity for timely emotional and psychological interventions.