What Engages Doctoral Candidates in Biological and Environmental Science to Doctoral Studies?

Peer reviewe

What disengages doctoral students in the biological and environmental sciences from their doctoral studies?

This study explored the causes of student disengagement from their doctoral studies in the biological and environmental sciences. The data came from interviews of 40 doctoral students (male = 15, female = 25) and underwent qualitative analysis for content. Our results showed that doctoral studies provide multiple contexts for disengagement, such as the scholarly community and supervision, while doctoral students’ sense of distress, cynicism and inefficacy emerged as central components of disengagement. The study identified isolation, indifference, and lack of support and constructive feedback as sources of cynicism, while distress and inefficacy were more often related to failure or lack of progress in research. Our findings indicate that the source of disengagement can vary not only between individuals, but also between the academic activities at hand. Thus, while promoting an engaging doctoral experience, awareness of what typically triggers disengagement in the doctoral journey is vital.Peer reviewe

Students’ perceptions of self-assessment and their approaches to learning in university mathematics

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The role of self-compassion in teachers’ psychological well-being in face-to-face and online teaching during COVID-19

Viimeaikaiset tutkimustulokset opettajien hyvinvoinnista ovat huolestuttavia, ja hyvinvoinnin haasteet ovat edelleen lisääntyneet COVID-19 pandemian aiheuttaman äkillisten opetusjärjestelyjen muutosten seurauksena. Tässä kvantitatiivisessa tutkimuksessa tarkastelemme peruskoulun opettajien itsemyötätuntoa, joka on keskeinen resilienssiä tukeva tekijä, sekä psykologista hyvinvointia työhön liittyvän stressin, uupumusriskin ja pystyvyysuskomusten kautta. Opettajien kokemuksia tarkastellaan sekä lähiopetuksessa että etäopetuksessa COVID-19 pandemian aikana. Tutkimukseen osallistui erään kunnan perusopetuksen opettajat (N=116), jotka täyttivät itsemyötätuntoa, stressiä, uupumusriskiä ja pystyvyysuskomuksia mittaavan kyselylomakkeen. Tutkimuksessa tunnistettiin kolme opettajaprofiilia: 1) itsemyötätuntoiset opettajat, 2), itsemyötätuntoiset ja itsekriittiset opettajat, sekä 3) itsekriittiset opettajat. Tulokset osoittavat, että etäopetus oli haaste kaikkien opettajaprofiilien työhyvinvoinnille, mutta itsemyötätunnon suojaava vaikutus oli läsnä molemmissa konteksteissa. Itsemyötätunnon tukemista voidaankin pitää kestävänä tapana tukea opettajien työhyvinvointia.Recent research shows worrying results concerning teachers’ psychological well-being. The challenges have further increased due to the COVID-19 pandemic, as it has forced teachers to rapidly change their teaching. In this quantitative study, we address the differences in schoolteachers’ experiences of face-to-face and online teaching during COVID-19 from the perspective of self-compassion (an important source of resilience when faced with life stressors and sudden changes) and teaching-related well-being. The teachers in one Finnish municipality (N=116) answered an electronic questionnaire measuring their self-compassion and teaching-related well-being (stress, burnout, self-efficacy) in face-to-face and online teaching contexts. Three teacher profiles were identified: (1) Self-compassionate teachers, (2) a mixed group reporting both self-compassion and self-criticism and (3) self-critical teachers. The results show that online teaching had challenged all teachers’ well-being, but the protective element of self-compassion was present in both contexts. Therefore, strengthening teachers’ self-compassion can be seen as a sustainable investment in the teachers’ well-being

Student perspectives on how different elements of constructive alignment support active learning

Constructive alignment is often promoted as a principle to enhance the quality of learning but the student perspective has often been neglected when exploring its influence on student learning. There is therefore a need to further explore how students' experiences of the different elements of constructive alignment influence the approach to learning they adopt. Student perceptions and their approaches to learning were analysed. The results show that different elements of constructive alignment had a clear role in guiding student learning. The teaching and assessment related factors appeared to play a crucial role in guiding student learning and studying. Teaching and assessment that required students' active involvement clearly encouraged students to adopt a deep approach to learning whereas the opposite was true for more traditionally organised courses. The intended learning outcomes did not seem to influence student learning much. The results also imply that the key is to find an optimal level of challenge to support student learning and studying. The study deepens our understanding of the importance and influence of constructively aligned teaching to students' learning processes.Peer reviewe

Opiskelijoiden itsearvioinnin laaduntarkastelua suuren kurssin kontekstissa

This study is part of an ongoing larger project concerning student self-assessment skills in university courses. We have developed a method enabling large cohorts of students to assess their own learning outcomes and to give their own course grades with the help of an automatic verification system. This paper explores the question of accuracy, namely, whether the self-assessed grades correspond to the students’ actual skills, and how well the automatic system can pick up issues in the self-assessment. Based on an expert’s evaluation of the skills of two students, we conclude that although for large part the model works as intended, there are some cases where neither the self-assessment nor the computer verification seem to be accurate.Peer reviewe

The value of academics' formal and informal interaction in developing life science education

Concerns have been expressed that the engagement shown by committed individuals is not fully utilized by their organizations while there is insufficient knowledge of which conditions facilitate teaching collaboration and lead to improvements in university education. Portfolios of 43 life science academics applying to enter to the University of Helsinki Teachers' Academy were analyzed through content analysis. Five categories of interactive or collaborative practices emerged from the data: (1) Interacting with peers for personal development, (2) Sharing good teaching practices, (3) Teaching together, (4) Producing educational artefacts, (5) Developing education systematically. The practices occurred in both formal and informal settings, and both settings were present in all categories. In contrast with the formal practices, the informal practices were described in an enthusiastic way. The engagement shown by the scholarly teachers was mostly realized in informal settings. There is probably unrealized potential in the scholarly teachers' teaching-related practices through which they could contribute to the development of teaching in academia. Formal communities related to teaching should be developed to promote deeper collaboration and to foster the participants' feeling of personal commitment and ownership.Peer reviewe

Detecting peatland vegetation patterns with multi-temporal field spectroscopy

doi: 10.1080/15481603.2022.2152303Peatlands are one of the most significant terrestrial carbon pools, and the processes behind the carbon cycle in peatlands are strongly associated with different vegetation patterns. Handheld spectroradiometer data has been widely applied in ecological research, but there is a lack of studies on peatlands assessing how the temporal and spectral resolution affect the detectability of vegetation patterns. We collected field spectroscopy and vegetation inventory data at two northern boreal peatlands, Lompolojankka and Halssiaapa, between late May and August 2019. We conducted multivariate random forest regressions to examine the appropriate periods, benefits of multi-temporal data, and optimal spectral bandwidth and sampling interval for detecting plant communities and the two-dimensional (2D) %-cover, above-ground biomass (AGB) and leaf area index (LAI) of seven plant functional types (PFTs). In the best cross-site regression models for detecting plant community clusters (PCCs), R-2 was 42.6-48.0% (root mean square error (RMSE) 0.153-0.193), and for PFT 2D %-cover 53.9-69.8% (RMSE 8.2-17.6%), AGB 43.1-61.5% (RMSE 86.2-165.5 g/m(2)) and LAI 46.3-51.3% (RMSE 0.220-0.464 m(2)/m(2)). The multi-temporal data of the whole season increased R-2 by 13.7-24.6%-points and 10.2-33.0%-points for the PCC and PFT regressions, respectively. There was no single optimal temporal window for vegetation pattern detection for the two sites; in Lompolojankka the early growing season between late May and mid-June had the highest regression performance, while in Halssiaapa, the optimal period was during the peak season, from July to early August. In general, the spectral sampling interval between 1 to 10 nm yielded the best regression performance for most of the vegetation characteristics in Lompolojankka, whereas the optimal range extended to 20 nm in Halssiaapa. Our findings underscore the importance of fieldwork timing and the use of multi-temporal and hyperspectral data in detecting vegetation in spatially heterogeneous landscapes.Peer reviewe