A philosophical investigation into the concept of quality in education

My thesis is a philosophical conversation inquiring into the concept of quality and excellence in education. It is a teasing out of conceptual strands by arguing in many different directions for what we mean by this concept. Then by clarifying, new perspectives open up. I present an argument that supports the technical appropriation of business models of quality in those aspects of state education that are preoccupied with accountability. My argument does not support the assessing of quality or of excellence in teaching with performance checklists or tests results. Philosophical texts, relevant educational literature and government papers are consulted, and these inform the analysis of conversations with teacher colleagues. The conversations give rise to a possible new theory of quality based on teachers' moral integrity and professional judgement.I study the work of industrialists Juran and Demming and the success of the quality movement in industry in the twentieth century. I review some of the innovative practices in the 1990s that teachers engaged in following an industrial model of quality. I had philosophical conversations with colleagues and I was challenged not only by their accommodation of the new business language but also by their stories revealing that their moral integrity and professional judgement did not figure in the current concept of quality. I study the relevant philosophy of Plato and Dewey after analysing the conversations about quality that I have with practising teachers. I write dialogues as a self-study in an attempt to reconceptualise the strands of the concept of education of quality in education. I propose a theory based on moral principles that runs counter to the prevailing ethos of performativity.The inappropriateness of the industrial model in assessing quality in education is clearly articulated in the teachers' conversations. Their stories transparently reveal that education is more a moral endeavour than a business or managerial enterprise. The stories indicate that there can be no pre determined definitive list nor any measurable means of evaluating the concept of quality that gets to the heart of the matter. There can be degrees of excellence in judging teachers' performance according to required outcomes, but this does not relate to the intrinsic aims of education. The stories offer insights into elements of quality that are valued by professional teachers and raise the question of whether it is possible to assess such excellence, or indeed ifit is necessary. If these stories clarify the concepts for us, as I claim they do, how could we best proceed to use these valuable insights that contrast strikingly with equating quality with indexed quantity? Educational policy, teacher education, including continuing professional development and educational leadership are possible areas to explore further

Are medical students influenced by preceptors in making career choices, and if so how? A systematic review

Author version made available in accordance with the publisher's policy.Introduction: Increasingly medical students undertake clinical training in distributed learning environments. The driving factor for this is predominantly to address medical workforce shortages. In these environments students are often taught by private practitioners, residents, house staff and registrars, as well as faculty. Through a mix of short- and long-term preceptorships, clerkships and rotations, medical students are exposed to a wider range of preceptors, mentors and role models than has traditionally been the case. The aim of this systematic review was to understand if and how medical students’ career choices are influenced by their interactions with preceptors. Method: A search of Ovid Medline, Scopus, ISI Web of Science, PubMed, Eric and CIHNAL was undertaken. The search was structured around the key terms: Medical Student, Career Choice and Preceptor, and variants of these terms. Search limits were set to English-language publications between 1995 and 2010. Results: A total of 36 articles met the selection criteria from the 533 citations sourced from the search. Required preceptorships as short as 3 weeks’ duration influence the career choice of students when they rate the preceptor as a high quality teacher. Preceptors who are judged (by students) as high quality teachers have the greatest influence on student career choice by up to four-fold. When students judged a preceptor as being a negative role model, a poor teacher or lacking discipline specific knowledge they will turn away from that field. The positive influence of relationships between preceptors and students on career choice is strongest where there is continuity of preceptors, continuity of care, and continuity of patient interactions. The longer the duration of the preceptorship the greater the influence on student career choice, particularly in primary cares environments. Conclusion: This review adds to the literature by identifying how differing components and combinations of components of a preceptorship influence medical student career choices. Multiple components of the preceptorship combined have a greater influence. In free choice, longitudinal integrated clerkships’ duration of placement and continuity relationships with preceptors have the greatest influence on medical students in pursuing a primary care career. This information informs medical schools, curriculum designers and policy-makers in reforming medical education to address workforce shortages

Investigating eye movement patterns, language, and social ability in children with autism spectrum disorder

Although all intellectually high-functioning children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) display core social and communication deficits, some develop language within a normative timescale and others experience significant delays and subsequent language impairment. Early attention to social stimuli plays an important role in the emergence of language, and reduced attention to faces has been documented in infants later diagnosed with ASD. We investigated the extent to which patterns of attention to social stimuli would differentiate early and late language onset groups. Children with ASD (mean age = 10 years) differing on language onset timing (late/normal) and a typically developing comparison group completed a task in which visual attention to interacting and noninteracting human figures was mapped using eye tracking. Correlations on visual attention data and results from tests measuring current social and language ability were conducted. Patterns of visual attention did not distinguish typically developing children and ASD children with normal language onset. Children with ASD and late language onset showed significantly reduced attention to salient social stimuli. Associations between current language ability and social attention were observed. Delay in language onset is associated with current language skills as well as with specific eye-tracking patterns

Associations between language development and skin conductance responses to faces and eye gaze in children with autism spectrum disorder

Attention to social stimuli is associated with language development, and arousal is associated with the increased viewing of stimuli. We investigated whether skin conductance responses (SCRs) are associated with language development in ASD: a population that shows abnormalities in both attention to others and language development. A sample of 32 children with ASD (7 y – 15 y; M =9 y) was divided into two groups, based on language onset histories. A typically developing comparison group consisted of 18 age and IQ matched children. SCRs were taken as the participants viewed faces. SCRs differentiated the ASD group based on language onset and were associated with abnormal attention to gaze in infancy and subsequent language development

Velocity-space sensitivity of the time-of-flight neutron spectrometer at JET

The velocity-space sensitivities of fast-ion diagnostics are often described by so-called weight functions. Recently, we formulated weight functions showing the velocity-space sensitivity of the often dominant beam-target part of neutron energy spectra. These weight functions for neutron emission spectrometry (NES) are independent of the particular NES diagnostic. Here we apply these NES weight functions to the time-of-flight spectrometer TOFOR at JET. By taking the instrumental response function of TOFOR into account, we calculate time-of-flight NES weight functions that enable us to directly determine the velocity-space sensitivity of a given part of a measured time-of-flight spectrum from TOFOR

Relationship of edge localized mode burst times with divertor flux loop signal phase in JET

A phase relationship is identified between sequential edge localized modes (ELMs) occurrence times in a set of H-mode tokamak plasmas to the voltage measured in full flux azimuthal loops in the divertor region. We focus on plasmas in the Joint European Torus where a steady H-mode is sustained over several seconds, during which ELMs are observed in the Be II emission at the divertor. The ELMs analysed arise from intrinsic ELMing, in that there is no deliberate intent to control the ELMing process by external means. We use ELM timings derived from the Be II signal to perform direct time domain analysis of the full flux loop VLD2 and VLD3 signals, which provide a high cadence global measurement proportional to the voltage induced by changes in poloidal magnetic flux. Specifically, we examine how the time interval between pairs of successive ELMs is linked to the time-evolving phase of the full flux loop signals. Each ELM produces a clear early pulse in the full flux loop signals, whose peak time is used to condition our analysis. The arrival time of the following ELM, relative to this pulse, is found to fall into one of two categories: (i) prompt ELMs, which are directly paced by the initial response seen in the flux loop signals; and (ii) all other ELMs, which occur after the initial response of the full flux loop signals has decayed in amplitude. The times at which ELMs in category (ii) occur, relative to the first ELM of the pair, are clustered at times when the instantaneous phase of the full flux loop signal is close to its value at the time of the first ELM

Review of Area of Need

To review Area of Need (AON) provisions in relation to General Practice services in the Greater Darwin (including Palmerston and Litchfield) and Alice Springs and to identify improvements to existing AON processes

Review of Area of Need

To review Area of Need (AON) provisions in relation to General Practice services in the Greater Darwin (including Palmerston and Litchfield) and Alice Springs and to identify improvements to existing AON processes