This study investigates the reflexive relationship between the challenges encountered during the development and teaching of the qualitative research method (QARM) program and the stories of PhD students about their experiences with the course. The study is based on a number of pedagogical issues drawn from postgraduate students combined with an…

The aim of this study was to develop an electronic performance support system (EPSS) to improve students' performance in the topic of scientific research methods. A review of the literature shows that EPSSs are usually developed using advanced programming technologies. This limits the widespread use of EPSS for educators and researchers. In this…

Over the past three decades, researchers have studied doctoral research training programs using large scale surveys making visible trends in numbers of and kinds of research courses required, or using focused qualitative methods to gain rich, textured accounts of graduate school experiences. Both kinds of studies fail to capture the local,…

In a previous article published in the "Journal of College Reading and Learning," we presented the results of a self-study of our commitment as faculty and staff members to providing a multicultural learning experience for our students. This follow-up article provides the findings of a study conducted during spring semester 2004 to explore student…

Training health professionals within university environments has traditionally focused on face-to-face methods. Practitioners working within the UK National Health Service (NHS) have found it difficult to gain leave from work to attend for study due to the demands of the NHS and staff shortages. In response, the authors developed a distance…

Use of student focus groups to help shape college and university student recruitment efforts is examined, illustrated with the experiences of a variety of institutions. Benefits and limitations of the approach are noted, specific techniques for maximizing the groups' effectiveness are suggested, and uses of the resulting information are discussed.…

To attempt to incorporate the perceptions of consumers of alcohol education programs about topic relevance and importance, a modified version of a methodology that extracts, evaluates, and combines information from novices and experts to determine commonly held scripts and schema was used. In the first of two studies, 37 students at Texas…

Five separate papers comprise this report of a project in which researchers developed and evaluated methods for helping young adults enhance their use of reading as a learning skill. The first paper discusses tools designed to increase readers' awareness of what they do as they read, teaching approaches used to promote skill development, and…

A pilot study was initiated to achieve reliability and especially validity indexes for measuring research and development impact. Two opposing questionnaires were administered to each of three target groups: 164 high school vocational education students, 120 secondary school vocational education teachers, and 56 vocational education…

A two-phase survey was conducted by the Center for Applied Linguistics Clearinghouse for Self-Instructional Language Materials to (1) identify modern language departments of U.S. colleges and universities using programed materials, and (2) describe the extent of the departments' use and development of such materials. A brief description of the…

The focus-group interview format was used to investigate the implementation of the Career Ladders teacher-incentive program in a rural school district in Arizona. Two interviews were planned for each of the following groups: (1) school board members; (2) Career Ladders steering committee; (3) administrators; (4) central office staff; (5) parents;…

The proceedings contains: "Extending Equality" (Armstrong); "Phenomenology of Emergent Meaning from Dialectical Questioning and Answering in Adult Learning (AL)" (Xue-Ming Bao); "Study of Structural Dimensions and Predictive Capability of Adult Attitudes toward Continuing Education Scale and Education Participation Scale" (Blunt); "Ideological and…

Intended for use by educators and the public, this report interprets the findings of two research studies on competency-based vocational education (CBVE) in Kentucky secondary schools: "The Development of an Instrument to Measure Student Attitudes toward Competency-Based Individualized Instructional Modules," by John C. Thomas, and…

This first of the two-part proceedings of an Australian Conference on Youth schooling and unemployment contains the texts of 26 research papers. Focus of the papers is on educational practices and specific problems in educational research. Topics covered in individual reports include student perceptions of specific courses; quantification in case…

This second of the two-part proceedings of an Australian conference on youth schooling and unemployment contains 25 research reports and texts from two symposia on alienation from school to work, and youth in transition. Focus of the papers is on educational practices and specific problems in the area of educational research. Topics covered in…