On the Horizon最新文献

Purpose

This study aims to explore how Black homeschooling organizations based in the United States with a public web presence in 2023–2024 characterize their missions and what these mission statements can tell us both about the growing homeschooling movement among Black parents, as well as its potential implications for education as a means of individual and collective uplift and positive social change.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper used critical constructivist grounded theory (Levitt, 2021) and emergent coding to analyze the mission statements and organizational descriptions of all 19 U.S.-based Black homeschooling organizations with a public facing web presence identified via Google search in 2023 and 2024.

Findings

Utilizing Afrofuturism as our theoretical framework, themes such as Black self-determination, community, support, and resources, and safety and empowerment emerged. Black homeschooling organizations offer families a safe and informative community as they seek agency, autonomy and brighter futures for their children than may be on offer in traditional schools.

Originality/value

Our research fills an empirical gap in the literature on Black homeschooling by examining an existing but, so far as this paper could determine, unstudied population of U.S.-based Black homeschooling organizations. Our research also contributes by applying Afrofuturism and fugitive pedagogy as novel theoretical frameworks to better understand the move toward homeschooling by increasing numbers of Black parents.

Purpose

This exploratory research intends to comprehend the perspectives of high school teachers toward incorporating technology in instruction.

Design/methodology/approach

Drawing upon Davis’s technology acceptance model as a theoretical framework, this study examines several aspects, including teachers’ access to and ease of using technology, as well as the support provided by educational institutions for the integration of technology in teaching. The quantitative data analysis (reliability tests, descriptive statistics, Mann–Whitney test) was computed via Statistical Package for the Social Science software. Furthermore, the study uses structural equation modeling to validate and substantiate the relationships (path analytical model) between the examined variables.

Findings

The key finding points to the fact that female teachers have statistically significant positive beliefs toward technology usage/integration in instruction than their counterparts (i.e. male teachers) (p < 0.01). Even though there exists no significant difference in computer usage/integration of teachers across age, nationality, grade, educational level and years of teaching experience, findings demonstrated the impulse of assisting and acclimating high school teachers to use technology in their education. Conclusively, the study culminates with future scope, considering the derived findings.

Originality/value

The study illustrates a validated framework (through path analytical modeling) for teachers’ technology integration in instructions. It highlights that the extent to which teachers use technology in the classroom is impacted by factors such as their accessibility to technology, comfort with its usage and the level of institutional support they receive for integration.

Purpose

This paper aims to address the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goal 4 “quality education” through the adoption of heutagogic ideas in improving work-based learning for individuals.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper locates a discussion of heutagogy within the wider context of vocational and higher education, as well as through reference to the theoretical discourse on learning theory.

Findings

Heutagogy is concerned with the development of individual capability through the creation of a learner-determined curriculum that is attuned to professional goals. Organizations that adopt heutagogic approaches enhance corporate adaptiveness through personalized learning.

Originality/value

This briefing provides the reader with an accessible insight into both the individual and organizational benefits of adopting heutagogic ideas in professional development. As organizations confront an increasingly uncertain external environment, this paper offers an insight into how to develop individual capability.

Purpose

The purposes of this study were to calculate the confirmatory factor analysis in the measurement model using robust measures (McDonald’s omega and Cronbach’s alpha) to ensure the reliability of the proposed scale and to explore the measurement invariance of the scale per the participants’ gender.

Design/methodology/approach

The methodological sample had 408 students from a private university in northern Mexico, of which 200 (49%) were male and 208 (51%) were female; the sample age range was 18–58 years (M = 22.4 years, SD = 6.0). The data analysis included descriptive and normality, dimensionality, reliability and measurement invariance.

Findings

The social entrepreneurship competency measurement model showed acceptable adjustment indexes in evaluating the internal structure, reliability and factorial invariance by gender of the study participants.

Research limitations/implications

Even though the contributions of this study are evident, these findings must be taken with caution due to some limitations. First, the proposed measurement model uses a self-reported scale, so it is essential to include other measurement methods with less implicit social desirability. Second, although the sample was intended to be representative, it only drew from a specific geographical area, making it difficult to generalize these findings to culturally diverse areas. Third, this study did not consider other validity measures; for example, concurrent, divergent and predictive, so future studies should consider examining the relationship of social entrepreneurship with other factors.

Practical implications

From the practical perspective, this study provides a parsimonious instrument regarding the number of items included in the measurement model. From the theoretical perspective, the present study contributes to delimiting the dimensions of social entrepreneurship competency.

Originality/value

This study contributes to the field of social entrepreneurship, particularly in the area of construct measurement, by offering a measurement model with solid evidence of internal structure validity, reliability and factorial invariance for the perceived achievement of social entrepreneurship competency.

Purpose

The aim of this empirical study is to identify the relationship between student accommodation characteristics (SACs) and academic performance (AP). SACs, considered as the single independent variable, were divided into three further constructs: perceived location advantage (PLA), perceived facilities (PFs) and perceived safety and security (PSS). This study also intends to uncover the mediating role of perceived overall satisfaction (POS) over the direct relationships.

Design/methodology/approach

The study used a cross-sectional quantitative survey methodology to investigate the hypothesized relationships based on 384 sample responses (n) selected using purposive sampling techniques from six Scottish universities. The study used IBM SPSS version 29 and partial least squares-structural equation modeling version 4 for descriptive statistics and for testing the hypotheses, respectively.

Findings

Based on survey responses and the application of proper statistical measures, this study found that all three independent constructs (PLA, PFs and PSS) have a significant positive association with the dependent variable, AP. The mediator (POS) was also found to be positively correlated with AP. Furthermore, this study identified that POS can partially mediate all three direct relationships.

Originality/value

By extending and validating current theories such as satisfaction frameworks, student engagement models and servicescape psychology, this study can significantly advance the current state of the literature. It highlights how crucial holistic satisfaction can mediate the association between academic achievement and the features of student housing. The results provide theoretical justification for incorporating accommodations into planning and policy for education. Additionally, by emphasizing on the crucial elements that enhance students’ well-being and academic achievement, such as location, safety, aesthetics and extensive support services, the study offers significant management insights.

Purpose

The purpose of this study was to explore the experiences of former teachers who transitioned into self-directed education (SDE), a K-12 educational paradigm where learning is authentically student-led.

Design/methodology/approach

Drawing on Ivan Illich’s Deschooling Society and qualitative thematic analysis of interviews with educators who have left conventional teaching, the research delves into understanding the modern concept of deschooling, critique of conventional schooling’s limitations and the implications of both for the future of educational practice.

Findings

The study highlights the themes that emerged from a cross-analysis of text and lived experience, emphasizing the need for childhood autonomy and agency in approaches to education. This study reveals a reimagined relationship and new profession for educators as they reemerge on the other side of the deschooling process. This study offers insights into the transformative potential of deschooling and SDE’s alignment with Illich’s vision for a lifelong learning society that transcends institutional constraints, thereby contributing to the discourse on educational reform and the empowerment of authentic learner-directed education.

Originality/value

Research on SDE as a field is quite limited, with no known prior empirical studies on SDE mentors or their process of deschooling. This work also provides theoretical novelty in using Deschooling Society as a lens for understanding the phenomenon of deschooling through lived experience as a critique of modern society and creating a real, re-envisioned future.

Purpose

From the in-group status as a former homeschool parent, the goal is to problematize the entanglement of neoliberalism within self-directed education (SDE) pedagogies. Further and importantly, this study aims to bring attention to and examine the neoliberal resistant practices found in Black homeschooling.

Design/methodology/approach

A narrative literature review, content analysis and autoethnographic reflection to critically examine the neoliberal subjectivity of SDE and identify neoliberal-resistant SDE practices of Black homeschooling families.

Findings

This paper identifies SDE’s vulnerability to neoliberal subjectivity despite the neoliberal oppositional ethos of many of its practices and its antiestablishment historical context and rhetoric. It analyzes conceptions of self, autonomy and freedom (the ideas that underwrite self-direction) that can inform a critical self-directed learning (SDL) approach. It explores contemporary Black homeschooling and SDE practices for evidence of these conceptions, arguing that this demographic, at the margin of the discursive homeschooling community, instantiates an authentic resistance and disruption to neoliberal subjectivity in SDE.

Originality/value

Very little research has been done on neoliberal subjectivity in the discursive SDE community. The vulnerability of SDE to neoliberalization is important to SDL homeschoolers, unschoolers and other SDE facilitators who want to practice alternative-to-mainstream values or social justice-oriented pedagogy. Without awareness of this vulnerability, neoliberal hegemony can be reproduced by SDE practices.

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the factors that influence business students’ adoption of e-learning systems by merging innovation diffusion theory (IDT) and the teaching for professional competence model (TPCM).

Design/methodology/approach

Snowball sampling was used to conduct the survey. In addition, 217 responses were obtained from students at private educational institutions. Similarly, literature on the determinants of e-learning adoption, TPCM, and IDT were reviewed to contribute to the factors that are instrumental in determining e-learning systems adoption.

Findings

The findings of the study show that e-learning systems adoption is influenced by factors such as online collaborative learning (OCL) and technology self-efficacy. Above all, the OCL variable was found to be influential in determining students’ adoption of e-learning systems platforms. On the contrary, perceived attributes such as perceived compatibility and perceived relative advantage were found not to be significant determinants of e-learning systems adoption.

Research limitations/implications

This study contributed not only to the theoretical extensions but also to practical implications, which would benefit the policymakers of higher education providers in terms of e-learning system adoption in the country.

Originality/value

IDT and TPCM models are evaluated alongside additional variables, namely, OCL and technology self-efficacy. As a result, this paper will serve as a useful reference guide for academicians, higher education administrators, and future researchers.

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to connect emerging conceptions of childhood in the capabilities approach (CA) literature to models of self-directed education in hopes of articulating and defending the educational goal of promoting children's participative capabilities.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper offers a conceptual and theoretical exploration of childhood from a CA perspective and seeks to connect it to self-directed education.

Findings

The author argues that self-directed education, especially democratic schools in the model of the Sudbury Valley School, is well-suited to the task of promoting children's participative capabilities and that people should, therefore, consider this the kind of education to which children have a right.

Originality/value

By applying the CA framework to self-directed education, this paper makes an original contribution in two directions: first, it offers a new set of theoretical tools for self-directed education scholars; second, it offers capabilities theorists interested in promoting children's participative capabilities with a new model of education.

Purpose

This study aims to present the experiences with self-determination and taking ownership of life in Sudbury model schools that allow students true choice.

Design/methodology/approach

For this qualitative study we used a thematic analysis (TA) methodology. The study is based on semi-structured interviews with 14 adult participants from eight different Sudbury model and comparable schools in the Netherlands, Israel and the US. These schools offered students real choice in the curriculum program. Transcripts were analyzed and corresponding meanings thematized. Self-determination theory (SDT) is used as a lens to interpret the findings.

Findings

The findings suggest that an organizational structure that supports own responsibility in an absence of an imposed program and a culture of no-interference creates conditions for taking ownership of life and choices (self-determination) and encompasses taking ownership of learning, education and one’s future. Taking ownership of one’s life seems to be related to strongly internally oriented processes with an internal locus of causality, to find their own motivation and taking responsibility for choices, behavior and consequences in a SDT need supportive social context.

Research limitations/implications

This study is part of a larger research that addressed multiple facets of their experiences with their schools to understand the longer-term effects these schools had on the adult lives of participants. This limits the scope of this paper to only explore the conditions that led to the mental state of “taking ownership of one’s life.”

Originality/value

Conditions that can lead to long-term self-determination of one's life and future in a school setting is an unexplored area of research.