Disadvantage or Disadvantaging: Conceptualising Class Differences in Education as a Disease or as a Process?

Much of the writing on differences in educational attainment by different social classes in Ireland has started by accepting the use of the tenn \u27educational disadvantage\u27 and trying to define it afterwards (Kellaghan et at., 1995; Boldt and Devine, 1998). Others, like Drudy and Lynch have simply dismissed the use of the tenns out of hand, preferring instead to write about social class differences in education (1993, p 52). Far from discouraging the use of the term, this latter sort of intervention seems to have had no effect and the use of the tenn has continued to proliferate in this decade. The tenn is now widely used by agencies from the Conference of Religious in Ireland (CORl) to the Combat Poverty Agency (CPA) to the Government of Ireland. It is used by researchers, teachers, policy makers and those who fund research. It appears that the tenn is here to stay. Despite a recent comprehensive review of research in the area (Boldt and Devine, 1998), it is still far from clear what is meant by educational disadvantage. In this paper I will look at the different definitions of educational disadvantage proposed. I will argue that the use of the tenn in Ireland has many similarities with the use of the tenn at-risk in the US and has similar problems. The at-risk model understands educational disadvantage as akin to a disease or a condition - it is something the individual has. I will argue that educational disadvantage should be seen as a series of active processes, rather than a condition. Such an approach to educational disadvantage has serious consequences for our attempts to research and to measure the phenomenon

Emotional empathy and engineering students’moral reasoning

Although engineering education is often characterized as a principally rational activity, research suggests that emotions are vital for learning at all levels of education. In ethics education in particular, there is evidence that including mild emotional information in case studies can enhance learning. Evidence also suggests that specific emotions such as guilt and shame can impact on motivation to act in ethical scenarios. The place of emotions in ethics education remains controversial, however, since emotion can be perceived as a source of bias rather than as a valuable factor in learning and in motivating action. While some specific emotions have been explored in ethics research, there is a lack of empirical research addressing the relationship between ethical judgement and emotional empathy. In this research, therefore, we aimed to investigate the impact of mild emotional empathy on engineering students' ethical judgements. We conducted this study as an experimental design with 305 participants in two groups. Both groups took a modified version of the Engineering and Sciences Issues Test (ESIT) with an experimental group in which we induced a low level of emotional empathy and an emotionally neutral control group. Results show that a low level of emotional empathy does not impact participants' ethical decisions/judgments. Since the prior research evidence suggest that low level of emotional content improves learning, and given that it does not introduce biases in moral reasoning, we conclude it would make sense to include a low level of emotional content into ethics case studies

Assessing Emotional Intelligence and Its Impact in Caring Professions: The Value of a Mixed-Methods Approach in Emotional Intelligence Work with Teachers

A considerable body of research into the impact of having emotional intelligence has attracted attention to the concept. The strength of this research lies in the link between scores on emotional intelligence tests and outcome measures such as performance in work or in other aspects of life. Much of the focus in this has been in the use of emotional intelligence measures by management consultants, meaning many studies have been conducted in the context of organisational research and managerial practice with comparatively little attention been given to “caring” professions such as teaching where emotional intelligence is argued to be important. This is all the more important since what data exists on emotional intelligence and teachers suggests that, during their preservice stages of teacher education at least, they typically have a level of emotional intelligence significantly below the average for the wider population. What, then, can be meaningfully said about the ways in which emotionally intelligent people would perform differently than less emotionally intelligent people in a profession like teaching

The silent politics of educational disadvantage and the National Anti-poverty Strategy

Educational disadvantage is an essentially contested, political concept. At the same time there is a ‘phoney consensus’ surrounding the issue, i.e., policy debates on the topic often fail to reflect this contestation. This lack of awareness of the political context to the debate is evident in relation to the targets and measures set for addressing educational disadvantage. While Lynch has pointed out the political undertones of ‘comparative’ targets and measures, the conservative political position inherent in the ‘outputs-led’ model has not properly been explored. Indeed, the apparently technical and value-free nature of targets and measures has enabled this conservative political perspective to become embedded in public educational policy without debate

Emotions in engineering education

Contrary to common stereotypes, engineering education and practice are not purely rational activities. Emotions, just like cognition, play important roles in teaching, learning, and professional practice. Today, there is a nascent body of research exploring emotions in engineering education (EEE). However, much of the existing research does not adequately theorize emotions, and the range of theories and methods used is still relatively narrow. With this chapter, we hope to inspire more investigators to conduct EEE research and to explore currently underutilized theories, methods, and research foci. This chapter introduces the reader to the multidisciplinary field of emotion research, then focus specifically on EEE research. It describes different disciplinary and theoretical perspectives on emotions, as well as methods and methodologies for EEE research. Finally, the chapter covers dominant themes in the existing EEE literature, outlines important and promising areas for future research, and provides advice for researchers and doctoral students who plan to pursue EEE research

How emotionally intelligent are pre-service teachers?

Although there is evidence that teacher emotional intelligence is important for pupil adjustment and learning and for teachers in managing the emotional demands of their work, little is known about the levels of emotional skill of teachers and beginning teachers. Using Mayer and Salovey's emotional intelligence (EI) model and the MSCEIT test of EI, this study investigates how emotionally skilled student teachers are (N = 352). Results show lower than average levels of EI among student teachers, but with important differences between students and across emotional skill areas. The implications of the findings for pre-service teacher education are explored