This qualitative study sought to explore best practices at small, private liberal arts institutions that experienced large increases in African American graduation rates. Particular focus was on institutions that enrolled less than 17% minority students whose overall enrollment fell within the middle 50% of all SAT scores and the middle 50% of…

Over the years, many policies have been implemented across nations to prevent, reduce and tighten enforcement on smoking and tobacco use. However, despite all of the major initiatives, smoking related deaths and diseases still remain high and present a major challenge for many nations of the world. In this paper we argue that conducting a critical…

Many young refugees face significant difficulties in securing support from social services providers. This study invited 21 young refugees aged 16 to 21 to take part in focus groups and follow-up interviews about their experiences of accessing this support. The findings reveal that young refugees may deliberately conform to expectations about…

The purpose of this article is to expand on a previous study on the development of a scoring rubric for information literacy. The present paper examines how students at the Department of Information Services and Information Management, The Hague University, use the scoring rubric for their school work and/or in their regular jobs and social life.…

We sought to discover adolescents' thoughts about participation in longitudinal research and identify recruitment and retention strategies that were meaningful to them. We conducted seven focus groups with 10-15-year-olds in two large rural centers in New South Wales, Australia, and all focus groups were digitally recorded, transcribed, and…

This article describes a partnership research project carried out by a research team consisting of people with learning disabilities and people without learning disabilities. The research explored people's understandings of advocacy and identified gaps in advocacy provision for people with learning disabilities and their families. Four focus…

The ability to write concise and accurate scientific reports is highly valued in university level science. From reflection on marking student final year reports, it was apparent that many students have had insufficient practice at writing complete "scientific paper" style reports by that time, although some do it very well. This is a previously…

The aim of this study was to provide a better understanding of ICT teachers' assigned position and to determine school administrators' and other teachers' perceptions towards ICT teachers and these teachers' positions, and to reveal the similar and discrepant aspects of their tertiary education and the roles (work and responsibilities) assigned to…

From an ethical standpoint, there are questions about the best ways to include adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities in research. Scholarship reflects divergent responses to these enduring questions and values that can be at odds with one another. To deepen our understanding of beliefs in the scientific community about how to…

Purpose: Sustainability initiatives typically operate for a limited time period, but it is often unclear whether they have lasting effects. The purpose of this paper is to examine a laboratory fume hood campaign, in order to identify factors that might contribute or detract from long-term change persistence. Design/methodology/approach: The…

This study contributes to the emerging literature on commercial advertising and youth gambling by exploring adolescent's exposure to and perceptions of gambling advertisements. We analyzed a sample of 50 youth in six focus groups between the ages of 13 and 18 to examine the process by which youth perceived, received or rejected the form and…

Based on a comparative survey supplemented with focus group interviews, it was found that an action learning activity in an entrepreneurship programme produced both positive and negative results with regard to the entrepreneurial traits of students and their inclination towards entrepreneurship, depending on the influence of external and…

The development of two new money-attitude scales measuring entitlement and conscientiousness in adolescents are described. The scales were developed through student and focus group input and from a review of literature on entitlement and conscientiousness as a new adolescent financial education curriculum was being developed. The findings from 265…

This paper asks whether education is a viable route to better livelihoods and social inclusion for children living in poor urban areas in Dhaka, Bangladesh. It uses qualitative interviews with 36 students aged 11-16, living in slum and middle-class areas, and also draws on data from a larger, mixed-methods study to provide context. Many children…

This article examines the implementation and impacts of a program intended to improve research-led teaching in schools. Little consideration is given to the role of research-led teaching in schools; the argument is that this is a consequence of fractures between schools and universities. A program was developed to bring contemporary geographical…