Discusses the definition and roles of educational technologists. Highlights include an historical background; formal training programs; the marketplace for job opportunities in the field; job titles; and what attracted students to the field. (LRW)

Event-history analysis of data from 1979-91 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth panels (3,108 women, 3,003 men) showed that women received less initial company-provided training. Occupational gender segregation and family obligations afforded men better training opportunities than women. (SK)

Data from a national survey of 2945 employers showed that those most likely to have formal training programs were larger and had high-performance work systems, capital-intensive production, and better-educated workers. More workers were trained in companies with larger investments in physical capital or new forms of work organization. (SK)

Case studies of transportation needs of individuals with severe disabilities illustrate various methods of training them in transportation use and locating options. (SK)

Line managers in empowering (n=58) and nonempowering (n=37) British companies were compared. Although "empowered" managers felt better equipped to supervise, they appeared undertrained and unmotivated to develop staff. "Empowerment" was often indistinguishable from work intensification. (SK)

Seven case studies of Dutch organizations were used to analyze the relationship between organizational characteristics and types of on-the-job training (OJT) using contingency theory. When the type of structured OJT corresponded to the type of organization, the probability of effectiveness was greater. (SK)

Includes three brief essays that offer practical pointers for managers who handle training for their organizations. Highlights include a training function checklist for executives; questions executives should ask about training; and the cost of unstructured, informal on-the-job training. (LRW)

Western Australia Department of Training is supporting a Literacy and Numeracy Pilot in which providers identify the literacy and numeracy skills their projects address, how skill needs are assessed, and what strategies are used to deliver instruction. Three industries are targeted for the pilot, which attempts to make literacy and numeracy…

The principal shortage means that many educators, including assistant principals and resource teachers, are moving into the job with little training. Mentor and apprenticeship relationships can aid leadership development. Exemplary leaders' highest calling is to build leadership in others--exemplified in Santa Cruz's Growing Our Own" program.…

Five case studies compared output-related funding (ORF) in Britain's Training for Work program with input-based funding used by the European Social Fund. The nature of incentives in ORF led to creaming and encouraged curtailed training for immediate employment. These perverse incentives make cost-effectiveness data misleading. (SK)

Interviews with 200 training professionals in Australia suggested that the way competence and standards are constituted in competency-based education is not entirely congruent with employer needs. They could be reconsidered in order to represent the nature of vocational knowledge and characteristics of work. (SK)

Studied the likelihood of obtaining employment for job training participants and nonparticipants and the types of jobs women obtained. Results for 150 treatment (job training) and 530 control cases show a differential training effect for full- and part-time workers and little or no effect of job training on a disadvantaged woman's probability of…

Details a pilot customer service training scheme at Paramount Hotels, which leads to a National Vocational Qualification level 3 in customer services. Describes how the training was designed and delivered, and furnishes the views of Paramount Hotels and some of the participants.

This article covers the application of virtual reality (VR) to training and lifelong learning. A number of considerations concerning the design of VR applications are included. The introduction is dedicated to the more general aspects of applying VR to training. From multiple perspectives, we will provide an overview of existing applications with…

Each year, on the anniversary of the 2005 National Education Summit on High Schools, Achieve releases an annual 50-state progress report on the alignment of high school policies with the demands of college and careers. "Closing the Expectations Gap, 2009" is the fourth annual report in this series. The report details state progress implementing…