Study on the Improvement of Teaching Quality Management System for Higher Engineering Institutes

Based on the analysis of its establishment and implementation of controlling scheme of the teaching quality management system (TQMS) for advanced institutes of technologies domestic and overseas, from the inspect of the management principles of TQM and 6σas well as the process method of ISO9000 family standards, in combination with the evolution scheme of teaching quality of undergraduate courses in ordinary universities, applying the running principles of PDCA ,this paper has probed into the objectives of the establishment and improvement of the management system on teaching quality, put forward its basic procedures. We believe that its establishment and maintenance should have four stages, namely, plan, do, check and action, as well as eight steps, which includes decision-making, programming, analysis, design, running, assessing, improvement and perfection, which, lays a solid foundation on concrete teaching quality assurance programs for its improvement. Key words: quality management system, procedure improvement, implementation and maintenance, continual improvement, institutes of technology. Résumé: Basé sur l’analyse de l’établissement et de l’application du plan de contrôle du système de gestion de la qualité d’enseignement pour les instituts de technologie supérieurs tant nationaux qu’ étrangers, à partir de l’examination des principes de gestion de ce système et de 6σainsi que la méthode de traitement des standards familial ISO9000, en combinaison avec l’évolution du système de la qualité d’enseignement des cours universitaires dans les universités ordinaires, en applicant les principes de PDCA, cet essai explore les objectifs de l’établissement et de l’amélioration du système de gestion de la qualité d’enseignement et met en avant ses procédures de base. On croit que son établissement et maintenance devrait comporter quatre étapes, soit plan, application, révision et action, et huit pas qui comprennent prise de décision, programmation, analyse, design, application, évaluation, amélioration et perfection, qui, jette une base solide avec des programmes concrets d’assurance de la qualité d’enseignement pour son amélioration. Mots-Clés: système de gestion de la qualité, procédure d’amélioration, application et maintenance, amélioration continuelle, instituts de technologi

Minority Entrepreneurship: How Access to Capital and Strategic Decisions Affect Success

Many researchers have discovered that entrepreneurship is a source of financial freedom that if done successfully will ensure wealth for generations. With that idea in mind, minorities have seized that opportunity in record numbers with hopes that they will become prosperous. However, in addition to the increased success rate of minority-owned businesses, there is a rise in the failure rate of minority-owned businesses specifically in the African-American community. In this thesis, we will conduct a case study of three entrepreneurs at different stages that supports the theory that access to capital and strategic decisions affect the success of minority entrepreneurs. This case study will provide an in-depth and holistic understanding of issues that plague minority entrepreneurs

The study of flipped-classroom for pre-service science teachers

La relativamente nueva metodología, el aula volteada, es una de las metodologías de instrucción de aprendizaje mixto en la que se invierte el aula tradicional. Esta metodología afirma que los estudiantes pueden participar y comprometerse más exitosamente en su clase y pueden lograr un mejor aprendizaje cuando su aula está volteada. Este trabajo presenta un estudio de dos años de duración para medir los efectos del modelo de aula invertida en el rendimiento, las percepciones y las emociones de los estudiantes de formación de profesores en educación científica. En particular, esta investigación se llevó a cabo durante dos cursos, 2014/2015 y 2015/2016, en una asignatura de ciencias generales. Con un cuestionario post-tarea, obtuvimos la información para evaluar su desempeño, percepciones y emociones, hacia la clase. Los resultados confirmaron que se encontró una diferencia estadísticamente significativa en todas las evaluaciones con los estudiantes del modelo de aula volteada, con un rendimiento superior en promedio, mostrando percepciones favorables y demostrando emociones positivas sobre el modelo de aula volteada. Por lo tanto, los estudiantes estaban listos para tomar más cursos siguiendo el modelo de aula invertida. Los resultados obtenidos en este estudio muestran una prometedora inclinación sobre el rendimiento, las percepciones y las emociones de los estudiantes hacia la metodología del aula volteada, y darán un nuevo impulso a esta metodología de instrucción relativamente nueva.The relatively new methodology, flipped-classroom, is one of blended learning instruction methodologies in which the traditional-classroom is inverted. This methodology asserts that students can participate and engage more successfully in their class and can attain better learning when their classroom is flipped. This work presents a two-year study to measure the effects of the flipped-classroom model on the performance, perceptions, and emotions for teacher training students in science education. Particularly, this research was carried out during two courses, 2014/2015 and 2015/2016, in a general science subject. With a post-task questionnaire, we obtained the information to assess their performance, perceptions, and emotions, toward the class. The results confirmed that a statistically significant difference was found on all assessments with the flipped-classroom students, performing higher on average, showing favorable perceptions, and demonstrating positive emotions about the flipped-classroom model. Thus, the students were ready to take more courses pursuing a flipped-classroom model. The results achieved in this study show a promising inclination about the performance, perceptions, and emotions of students toward the flipped-classroom methodology, and will provide an entirely a new impetus for this relatively new instruction methodology.• Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad y Fondos FEDER. Proyecto EDU2016-77007-RpeerReviewe

The study of flipped-classroom for pre-service science teachers

La relativamente nueva metodología, el aula volteada, es una de las metodologías de instrucción de aprendizaje mixto en la que se invierte el aula tradicional. Esta metodología afirma que los estudiantes pueden participar y comprometerse más exitosamente en su clase y pueden lograr un mejor aprendizaje cuando su aula está volteada. Este trabajo presenta un estudio de dos años de duración para medir los efectos del modelo de aula invertida en el rendimiento, las percepciones y las emociones de los estudiantes de formación de profesores en educación científica. En particular, esta investigación se llevó a cabo durante dos cursos, 2014/2015 y 2015/2016, en una asignatura de ciencias generales. Con un cuestionario post-tarea, obtuvimos la información para evaluar su desempeño, percepciones y emociones, hacia la clase. Los resultados confirmaron que se encontró una diferencia estadísticamente significativa en todas las evaluaciones con los estudiantes del modelo de aula volteada, con un rendimiento superior en promedio, mostrando percepciones favorables y demostrando emociones positivas sobre el modelo de aula volteada. Por lo tanto, los estudiantes estaban listos para tomar más cursos siguiendo el modelo de aula invertida. Los resultados obtenidos en este estudio muestran una prometedora inclinación sobre el rendimiento, las percepciones y las emociones de los estudiantes hacia la metodología del aula volteada, y darán un nuevo impulso a esta metodología de instrucción relativamente nueva.The relatively new methodology, flipped-classroom, is one of blended learning instruction methodologies in which the traditional-classroom is inverted. This methodology asserts that students can participate and engage more successfully in their class and can attain better learning when their classroom is flipped. This work presents a two-year study to measure the effects of the flipped-classroom model on the performance, perceptions, and emotions for teacher training students in science education. Particularly, this research was carried out during two courses, 2014/2015 and 2015/2016, in a general science subject. With a post-task questionnaire, we obtained the information to assess their performance, perceptions, and emotions, toward the class. The results confirmed that a statistically significant difference was found on all assessments with the flipped-classroom students, performing higher on average, showing favorable perceptions, and demonstrating positive emotions about the flipped-classroom model. Thus, the students were ready to take more courses pursuing a flipped-classroom model. The results achieved in this study show a promising inclination about the performance, perceptions, and emotions of students toward the flipped-classroom methodology, and will provide an entirely a new impetus for this relatively new instruction methodology.• Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad y Fondos FEDER. Proyecto EDU2016-77007-RpeerReviewe

The University and the Aims of Professional Education

The graduate schools of elite American universities, Daniel Bell wrote not many years ago (though before elite had become a term of opprobrium), stand at the center of their parent institutions, a position from which they dominate not only American higher education but, increasingly, the intellectual life of the nation. Michigan was, of course, high on Bell\u27s list of elite universities, and it is, therefore, fitting that we mark the fiftieth anniversary of the establishment of its graduate school as an occasion worthy of celebration

The Ecology of the Ideal Villa

The villa is more than a farmhouse in the country. According to James Ackerman, the villa is the most articulate architectural typology of the ideologies of its makers. For at least three millennia, its anthropological role has changed very little, serving as a periodic rural residence for urban élites who seek to escape from the city and engage in agriculture and contemplation. While in residence, the patron reflects on the virtue and beauty of the landscape and becomes aware of the wonders of dwelling within it. Villa builders try to construct a terrestrial paradise—an ideal place that expresses fundamental consonance with nature and the cosmos. The villa, then, becomes an expression of its makers apotheosis. How and where do the makers of villas give form to that aspiration, and what conditions are required for its realization? Through examinations of the built villas of Andrea Palladio and others, we can begin to read the villa as the architectural means best suited to express the philosophical dreams of its patrons

Organizational Effectiveness of Naval State University: Proposed Institutional Capacity Building

This research sought to study the organizational effectiveness of Naval State University (NSU), Biliran, Philippines.  It was intended to answer the organizational effectiveness of the delivery of service by the present academic organizational set-up in terms of: Instruction, Research, and Community Extension. The study used the descriptive survey method through the aid of focus group discussion and researcher-made guided questions as the main     instrument for data collection.   There were items in the instrument that were patterned from the accreditation activities by the Accrediting Agency of Chartered Colleges and Universities in the Philippines (AACUP). The researcher tapped a third party who was an expert in conducting focus group discussions.  The expert researcher who conducted the FGD was not connected with the Naval State University to avoid any biases.  The activity of FGD was recorded with the consent of the key informants. The key informants were the key officials of the university. And they come up with only one answer in each item or indicator. The data were recorded according to the frequencies and corresponding percentage. After analyzing and interpreting the processed data, the Organizational Effectiveness of NSU in the areas of: Instruction, Research and Community Extension were rated as very effective. But some    indicators were identified for needed improvements. And the institutional capacity building as designed in the study should be implemented accordingly

Fall 2015

Five minutes with Dean Alicea; Alumnus explores the reality of working at Google; Sharing competence-based expertise in the field; ArtShare challenges traditional notions of art; SNL faculty shine while pursuing creative endeavors; The buzz; Alumni sharing knowledge offers career guidance to students, alumn

Un Début dans la Vie Humaine (A Start in Life): Liberal Education and the Modern University

As students increasingly make the choice to attend university for their higher education, their lives are forever shaped by their experiences inside and outside of the classroom. My paper aims to determine the state of liberal education in the context of the rise of STEM fields, online learning, and economic pressures in political society. With an analysis of works by Aristotle, John Dewey, Michael Oakeshott and Leo Strauss, this paper develops a dialogue around the basis and tensions of liberal education. Robert M. Hutchins, Hubert Dreyfus and Sean Dorrance Kelly bring forth the importance of the Great Books to that conversation. A public interview with President of Wesleyan University, Michael S. Roth, extends the discussion to today’s university. My paper concludes with an investigation into Boston University. Using multivariate regression, this study finds peculiarities about the influence of several goals of liberation education on feelings about future jobs. Additional content analysis reveals student understandings of liberal education, motivations for attending school as well as impactful courses and books. My ultimate hope is for administrators and faculty to preserve the vision of liberal education by demonstrating its ability to prepare students to graduate as moral citizens and professionals, as human beings moving towards their full potentials