Preparing Instructional Leaders: Evaluating a Regional Program to Gauge Perceived Effectiveness

An instructional leadership program (ILP) has offered education and support to three cohorts of educational leaders in Nova Scotia, Canada, amounting to approximately 130 participants. Quantitative and qualitative feedback from a convenience sample (n = 90) suggests that the ILP offers an extremely useful practical program; in fact, 95 percent of the sample indicates advances in the categories of professional growth, improved instructional leadership, and tangible progress in administrative effectiveness. Systemic and school environment trends have dictated that educational leaders need a skill set that positions them to respond more aptly to issues of poverty, socioemotional health, and mental health while attending to improved community building both within the school and in the greater public. This study uses surveys, interviews, and focus groups to identify emerging and impending challenges

Education Research in the Canadian Context

This special issue of the International Journal of Education Policy & Leadership (IJEPL), Research in the Canadian Context, marks a significant milestone for the journal. Throughout our twelve-year history, we have sought to publish the best research in leadership, policy, and research use, allowing authors to decide the topics by dint of their research. While this model still serves as the foundation for IJEPL content, we decided to give researchers a chance to engage in deeper conversations by introducing special issues. In our first special issue, researchers discuss their work within the scope of education policy, leadership, and research use within the Canadian context. While many aspects of leadership, teaching, and learning can be seen as similar across contexts, there are also issues of particular concern within national, regional, provincial, or local spheres, particularly when looking at policy and system changes. The researchers featured in this issue provide an important look into education in Canada.PolicyIn the policy realm, Sue Winton and Lauren Jervis examine a 22-year campaign to change special education assessment policy in Ontario, examining how discourses dominant in the province enabled the government to leave the issue unresolved for decades. Issues of access and equity play out within a neoliberal context focused on individualism, meritocracy, and the reduced funding of public services. While Winton and Jervis highlight the tension between policy goals and ideological contexts, Jean-Vianney Auclair considers the place of policy dialogues within governmental frames, and the challenge of engaging in broadly applicable work within vertically structured governmental agencies. One often-touted way to move beyondResearch useWithin the scope of research use, Sarah L. Patten examines how socioeconomic status (SES) is defined and measured in Canada, the challenges in defining SES, and potential solutions specific to the Canadian context. In looking at knowledge mobilization, Joelle Rodway considers how formal coaches and informal social networks nserve to connect research, policy, and practice in Ontario’s Child and Youth Mental Health program.LeadershipTurning to leadership, contributing researchers explored the challenges involved in staff development, administrator preparation, and student outcomes. Keith Walker and Benjamin Kutsyuruba explore how educational administrators can support early career teachers to increase retention, and the somewhat haphazard policies and supports in place across Canada to bring administrators and new teachers together. Gregory Rodney MacKinnon, David Young, Sophie Paish, and Sue LeBel look at how one program in Nova Scotia conceptualizes professional growth, instructional leadership, and administrative effectiveness and the emerging needs of administrators to respond to issues of poverty, socioemotional health, and mental health, while also building community. This complex environment may mean expanding leadership preparation to include a broader consideration of well-being and community. Finally, Victoria Handford and Kenneth Leithwood look at the role school leaders play in improving student achievement in British Columbia, and the school district characteristics associated with improving student achievement.Taken together, the research in this special issue touches on many of the challenges in policy development, application, and leadership practice, and the myriad ways that research can be used to address these challenges. We hope you enjoy this first special issue of IJEPL

The longitudinal development of social and executive functions in late adolescence and early adulthood

Our earlier work suggests that executive functions and social cognition show protracted development into late adolescence and early adulthood (Taylor, Barker, Heavey and McHale, 2013). However, it remains unknown whether these functions develop linearly or non-linearly corresponding to dynamic changes to white matter density at these age ranges. Executive functions are particularly in demand during the transition to independence and autonomy associated with this age range (Ahmed and Miller, 2011). Previous research examining executive function (Romine and Reynolds, 2005) and social cognition (Dumontheil, Apperly and Blakemore, 2010) in late adolescence has utilised a cross sectional design. The current study employed a longitudinal design with 58 participants aged 17, 18 and 19 years completing social cognition and executive function tasks, Wechsler Abbreviated Scale of Intelligence (Wechsler, 1999), Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (Watson, Clark and Tellegen, 1988) and Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (Zigmond and Snaith, 1983) at Time 1 with follow up testing 12 to 16 months later. Inhibition, rule detection, strategy generation and planning executive functions and emotion recognition with dynamic stimuli showed longitudinal development between time points. Self-report empathy and emotion recognition functions using visual static and auditory stimuli were stable by age 17 whereas concept formation declined between time points. The protracted development of some functions may reflect continued brain maturation into late adolescence and early adulthood including synaptic pruning (Sowell, Thompson, Tessner and Toga, 2001) and changes to functional connectivity (Stevens, Kiehl, Pearlson and Calhouln, 2007) and/or environmental change. Clinical implications, such as assessing the effectiveness of rehabilitation following Head Injury, are discussed

A systematic review of the impact of stigma and nihilism on lung cancer outcomes

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>This study systematically reviewed the evidence on the influence of stigma and nihilism on lung cancer patterns of care; patients’ psychosocial and quality of life (QOL) outcomes; and how this may link to public health programs.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Medline, EMBASE, ProQuest, CINAHL, PsycINFO databases were searched. Inclusion criteria were: included lung cancer patients and/or partners or caregivers and/or health professionals (either at least 80% of participants had lung cancer or were partners or caregivers of lung cancer patients, or there was a lung cancer specific sub-group focus or analysis), assessed stigma or nihilism with respect to lung cancer and published in English between 1^st January 1999 and 31^st January 2011. Trial quality and levels of evidence were assessed.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Eighteen articles describing 15 studies met inclusion criteria. The seven qualitative studies were high quality with regard to data collection, analysis and reporting; however most lacked a clear theoretical framework; did not address interviewer bias; or provide a rationale for sample size. The eight quantitative studies were generally of low quality with highly selected samples, non-comparable groups and low participation rates and employed divergent theoretical and measurement approaches. Stigma about lung cancer was reported by patients and health professionals and was related to poorer QOL and higher psychological distress in patients. Clear empirical explorations of nihilism were not evident. There is qualitative evidence that from the patients’ perspectives public health programs contribute to stigma about lung cancer and this was supported by published commentary.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Health-related stigma presents as a part of the lung cancer experience however there are clear limitations in the research to date. Future longitudinal and multi-level research is needed and this should be more clearly linked to relevant theory.</p