Does student proactivity guarantee positive academic results?

This paper analyzes the impact of students’ proactivity on academic performance based on a sample from students enrolled in an introductory course of Political Economy at the University of Seville (Spain) in three consecutive courses (2014–2015, 2015–2016 and 2016–2017). Proactivity is measured by several indicators, such as class attendance, case-study oral presentation and its delivery in a foreign language, all of them being non-mandatory activities for students who have participated in the experiment. Specifically, this study aims to assess the impact of a student’s proactivity on two academic outcomes: (i) to pass or fail the exam; and (ii) the score obtained. Impact assessment has been performed using a probit and ordered multinomial logit models. The results show that a student’s proactivity measured by class attendance and case-study presentation significantly increases the probability of passing the exam, while the impact of using a foreign language seems to be non-significant. In relation to the score obtained, the proactivity measured through the case presentation raises the probability of obtaining a higher mark more than regular class attendance.Junta de Andalucía proyecto SEJ-132Universidad Autónoma de ChileUniversidad de Sevilla. Departamento de Análisis Económico y Política Económic

The volume and source of cyberabuse influences victim blame and perceptions of attractiveness

Cyberabuse is an escalating problem in society, as opportunities for abuse to occur in online public domains increase. Such acts are often defined by the frequency of abuse, and in many cases multiple individuals play a part in the abuse. Although consequences of such acts are often severe, there is typically little public sympathy/support for victims. To better understand perceptions of victims of abusive online acts, we manipulated the Volume (low, high) and Source (same-source, multi-source) of abusive posts in artificially-manipulated Facebook timelines of four fictitious ‘victims’. One hundred and sixty-four participants [United Kingdom-based; aged 18–59] rated ‘victims’ on measures of direct victim blame (DVB) and perceived social-, physical- and task-attractiveness. Results revealed significant Volume × Source interactions on DVB and social-attractiveness ratings. Few abusive posts authored by a single source yielded higher DVB and lower social-attractiveness ratings. Strong correlations between attractiveness and DVB were observed. We propose that our results could be due to an observer desensitization effect, or that participants interpreted the posts as indicative of friendly ‘teasing’ or ‘banter’ within an established social relationship, helping to explain why victims of online abuse often receive little sympathy or support

Chilean higher education managers’ information systems acceptance and quality management perceptions

Chilean higher education institutions face pressure to meet quality management (QM) standards and to use educational management information systems (EMIS) for managing the information related to academic activities. This doctoral research addressed the link between the use of EMIS in higher education and the QM processes, on which insufficient research was conducted so far. Against the background of the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology and within the QM conceptual framework, I aimed to reduce this research gap by exploring the relationship between higher education managers’ EMIS acceptance and QM perceptions, and by identifying specific manager profiles. In Study 1, a systematic review of Chilean literature suggested a close relationship between QM, accountability, and the use of EMIS. However, difficulties in implementation and long-term planning were noted. In Study 2, an instrument to assess perceptions about QM and accreditation was validated. Using this instrument, three different types of managers were identified by a cluster analysis conducted in Study 3: “Elders”, “Mediators”, and “Worker Bees.” These results are in line with previous research, as EMIS usage differs according to a person's position, individual traits, and preferences. Accordingly, a customized training program was recommended, which considered individual needs, staff plans, and the identified manager profiles. As higher education institutions developed plans to invest in more EMIS licenses and implement training, the aforementioned factors may help reduce investment costs. Additionally, the results of this doctoral research lay the ground for designing mass-customized manager training for managers based on their specific profiles and the organization's characteristics.Chilenische Hochschuleinrichtungen stehen unter dem Druck, Qualitätsmanagement (QM)-Standards zu erfüllen und Bildungsmanagement-Informationssysteme (EMIS) zu verwenden, um die auf akademische Aktivitäten bezogenen Informationen zu verwalten. Diese Dissertation setzt am bisher nur unzureichend erforschten Zusammenhang zwischen dem Einsatz von EMIS in der Hochschulbildung und den QM-Prozessen an. Vor dem Hintergrund der Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology und im Rahmen des QM-Konzepts wurde der Zusammenhang zwischen der EMIS-Akzeptanz von Hochschulmanagern und der QM-Wahrnehmung untersucht und spezifische Führungsprofile identifiziert. In Studie 1 deutete ein systematischer Überblick der chilenischen Literatur auf einen engen Zusammenhang zwischen QM, Akkreditierung und der Verwendung von EMIS hin. Allerdings wurden Schwierigkeiten bei der Umsetzung und langfristigen Planung der Qualitätsmaßnahmen festgestellt. Davon ausgehend wurde in Studie 2 ein Instrument zur Erfassung der Wahrnehmung von QM und Akkreditierung validiert. Mit diesem Instrument wurden in Studie 3 drei verschiedene Managertypen mittels Clusteranalyse identifiziert. Darauf aufbauend wurde abschließend das Konzept eines maßgeschneiderten Schulungsprogramms vorgeschlagen, das individuelle Bedürfnisse und Personalpläne berücksichtigt. Da Hochschuleinrichtungen planen in mehr EMIS-Lizenzen und Schulungen zu investieren, können die oben genannten Faktoren dazu beitragen, die Investitionskosten zu senken. Darüber hinaus legen die Ergebnisse dieser Arbeit den Grundstein für die Entwicklung massenindividualisierter Schulungsprogramme für Hochschulmanager auf Basis ihres spezifischen Profils und der Charakteristika der Organisation

Business School Student Satisfaction with Emergency Remote Teaching

This study analyzes Peruvian Business School students’ experiences with emergency remote teaching during the COVID-19 pandemic. We used the critical incident technique (CIT) to explore the salient factors on which students based their satisfaction and dissatisfaction with their online education. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews conducted with 27 MBA students. The results comprised 56 incidents – 25 satisfactory and 31 unsatisfactory – in the two major categories of Virtuality and the Teaching-Learning Process. This study contributes a new perspective on online education through the analysis, conducted through CIT, of the Peruvian Business School students’ experiences with online education during the COVID-19 pandemic. Some of the most relevant positive incidents included the recording of classes to review them later; the existence of Learning Management Systems to support the development of online materials; the possibility of entering online classes instead of in-person classes, as well as the flexibility with regard to location. The study allows us to determine several critical aspects in the two identified categories that should be considered when improving future online or hybrid programs

Otterbein Towers Spring 2016

Heroes are described in many ways. The words on this cover come from the stories in this issue. What qualities and characteristics define a hero for you?https://digitalcommons.otterbein.edu/towers/1033/thumbnail.jp

Speech and Silence in Chilean Intercultural Teacher Education

In this dissertation, I explore and continue to ponder the work of intercultural teacher education in Chile in a context of ongoing and varied violence over territory. I analyzed how teacher educators talk about their work and looked at how the programs address or not, the context of violence and Mapuche resistance. In addition, how the programs present themselves in different documents to see what questions arise from this exploration of teacher education discourse.I asked: 1. In what ways do teacher educators talk about intercultural education? 2. In what ways do program documents, in two teacher education programs discuss intercultural education? I am not trying to provide answers on how to improve teacher education, rather to provoke, inform, generate, and open questions about teacher education in settler contexts. In Chile, the struggles over land for the Mapuche are ongoing and a constant focus of governments and industry that continually label and persecute this struggle as acts of terrorism. This conflict is part of the everyday lives of students and teachers across the area where the Mapuche claim ancestral land. In teacher education there is an increasing amount of scholarship around land education (Calderon, 2014), and place-based education that focuses on bringing, alternately, place, land and water, and territory into the conversations of teacher education. In the various articles and debates about this focus, there are critiques of the ways in which earlier scholarship engaged with place without considering how it came to be occupied through settler violence, as well as with the lack of reflection of indigenous communities in that same land. In my research, I build on this work to examine the work of intercultural teacher education through two theoretical frameworks, settler colonialism, and Foucauldian theory of power/knowledge and discourse to think through this context. I used a case study methodology and interviewed nine teacher educators from two different programs in intercultural teacher education. One program is one of two fully intercultural programs and the other a branch from one of the two most prestigious universities in Chile. I also collected documents and kept a multimodal researcher journal with photos, descriptions, feelings, memos, and other items like news, op-eds, Facebook posts from Mapuche communities. I analyzed my data through three conceptual frames, place, education sovereignty, and personhood. In my analysis of place, I considered the context of intercultural education and examined how public and government-sponsored areas communicate an ideal of peaceful coexistence between two cultures, and how, while I was there, and before, and since, this discourse is interrupted and resisted by Mapuche communities. I also analyze the architecture of the programs and the ways on which teacher educators talk about place in their work to look at the ways in land, territory, and place are in tension in the work of intercultural teacher education in this specific context. On education sovereignty, I examined my interviews and documents from the lens of indigenous education sovereignty and from the concept of sovereignty as necropolitics. In the ways in which teacher educators talk about their work there are differences regarding the ways in which they frame why they teach their students what they teach them and for what purpose. The Mapuche teacher educators, across programs, express ideas of understanding their context and history of dispossession and the work of intercultural education as survivance, through reculturation, language, and self-determination. In my analysis of personhood and the ways teacher educators talk about teaching their students, I looked at how the focus on identity relates to ideas of diversity and inclusion that are related to the concerns some Non-Mapuche professors have about indigenous radicalism or supremacy. I traced these ways of talking about their work to the notion of culture as a way of classifying otherness to their pedagogical approaches to teaching diversity by looking at the Mapuche communities as those who are the most different. I explored their ways of talking about their work through the lens of productive inclusion, and how their concern over the inclusion of newly-arrived, migrant families can be deployed to erase the reculturation, self-determination of indigenous intercultural education. This research will contribute to the literature in Chile regarding intercultural teacher education as well to broader conversations about including settler colonial perspectives in teacher education in general. I hope that it will also help teacher educators and new teachers have an increased sense of the assumptions of intercultural education discourse in their processes of education as well as inform discussions regarding what these discourses do in initial teacher education