Health and Social Care Educators' Competence in Digital Collaborative Learning: A Cross-Sectional Survey

The ongoing change from traditional pedagogy to digital collaborative learning requires a new mode of teaching, learning, and educators' responsibilities. For competence in digitally mediated teaching, educators need understanding of how to provide appropriate digital environment to learn collectively and individually. The aim of this study was to describe and explore health and social care educators' perceptions of their current level of competence in digital collaborative learning and identify distinct educators' profiles. Data were collected via cross-sectional survey from educators in 21 universities of applied science and eight vocational colleges in Finland using an instrument covering two subdimensions: educators' competence in fostering construction of knowledge in digital collaborative learning, and supporting students in individualized collaborative learning. The data were analyzed by statistical methods. Three significantly differing clusters of educators' profiles were identified, and a significant association between type of current work organization and their self-reported competence in digital collaborative learning was found. The vocational college educators rated their competence in fostering construction of knowledge in digital collaborative learning as significantly lower than higher education educators. There were also remarkable differences in competence in supporting students' individual collaborative learning. To provide such support, sufficient competence in teaching in digital learning environment is essential, and our study highlights clear needs to enhance this competence

Qualitative study of social and healthcare educators' perceptions of their competence in education

Competent educators are needed to ensure that social and healthcare professionals are effective and highly competent. However, there is too little evidence-based knowledge of current and required enhancements of educators' competences in this field. The aim of this study was to describe social and healthcare educators' perceptions of their competence in education. The study had a qualitative design, based on interviews with educators and rooted in critical realism. Forty-eight participants were recruited from seven universities of applied sciences and two vocational colleges in Finland, with the assistance of contact persons nominated by the institutions. The inclusion criterion for participation was employment by an educational institution as a part-time or full-time, social and/or healthcare educator. Data were collected in the period February-April 2018. The participants were interviewed in 16 focus groups with two to five participants per group. The acquired data were subjected to inductive content analysis, which yielded 506 open codes, 48 sub-categories, nine categories and one main category. The educators' competence was defined as a multidimensional construct, including categories of educators' competences in practicing as an educator, subject, ethics, pedagogy, management and organisation, innovation and development, collaboration, handling cultural and linguistic diversity, and continuous professional development. Educators recognised the need for developing competence in innovation to meet rapid changes in a competitive and increasingly global sociopolitical environment. Enhancement of adaptability to rapid changes was recognised as a necessity. The findings have social value in identifying requirements to improve social and healthcare educators' competence by helping educational leadership to improve educational standards, construct a continuous education framework and create national and/or international curricula for teacher education degree programs to enhance the quality of education. We also suggest that educational leadership needs to establish, maintain and strengthen collaborative strategies to provide effective, adaptable support systems, involving educators and students, in their working practices

Using the mitochondria-targeted ratiometric mass spectrometry probe MitoB to measure H₂O₂ in living <i>Drosophila</i>

The role of hydrogen peroxide (H&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt;O&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt;) in mitochondrial oxidative damage and redox signaling is poorly understood, because it is difficult to measure H&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt;O&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt; in vivo. Here we describe a method for assessing changes in H&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt;O&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt; within the mitochondrial matrix of living &lt;i&gt;Drosophila&lt;/i&gt;. We use a ratiometric mass spectrometry probe, MitoB ((3-hydroxybenzyl)triphenylphosphonium bromide), which contains a triphenylphosphonium cation component that drives its accumulation within mitochondria. The arylboronic moiety of MitoB reacts with H&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt;O&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt; to form a phenol product, MitoP. On injection into the fly, MitoB is rapidly taken up by mitochondria and the extent of its conversion to MitoP enables the quantification of H&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt;O&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt;. To assess MitoB conversion to MitoP, the compounds are extracted and the MitoP/MitoB ratio is quantified by liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry relative to deuterated internal standards. This method facilitates the investigation of mitochondrial H&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt;O&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt; in fly models of pathology and metabolic alteration, and it can also be extended to assess mitochondrial H&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt;O&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt; production in mouse and cell culture studies