Adult educators often struggle with finding creative ways to help students understand adult learning theories and applications of those theories in professional practice. Media analysis of popular culture can uncomplicate this task by engaging learners in understanding concepts, principles or theories (Baumgartner & Merriam, 1999). The purpose of…

The study of transformative learning within collaborative teams was conducted to gain new applicable knowledge used to influence overall school improvement and implementation of professional learning communities. To obtain this new knowledge, the Professional Learning Community Collaborative Team Survey (CTS) was developed and psychometrically…

The purpose of this phenomenological study was to explore how lived experiences prompt first-generation college students to engage as peer mentors, and how they experienced leadership development. Participants included thirteen first-generation college students, who engaged in peer mentoring. An explanatory model that surfaced from data collection…

This research examined how Rumi's poetry impacts the lives of individuals who study his teachings, written 800 years ago in his masterpiece, "Mathnawi." After teaching Rumi for the last 15 years, I was aware of positive changes in my students' lives but wanted a more in-depth understanding of what drew the students to Rumi's poetry and…

To relieve the nursing faculty shortage, notable numbers of master's prepared clinical nurse experts are entering the ranks of nursing faculty to teach the prelicensure nursing student. The transition from clinical practice to the academia raises concern about the adequacy of preparation for the complex specialization role of nurse educator. In…

Is distance learning transformational? The author heard this question posed to a panel of faculty members during Distance Education Week activities. After reflecting upon her own students' reaction to her syllabus, her answer to the question changed from an initial, enthusiastic "yes" to a reflective "maybe," given the most favorable environment.…

Transformational learning is a process resulting in deep and significant change in habitual patterns of identity, thought, emotion, and action, enabling new approaches to role enactment. This article explores how moving from a framework of dilemmas, which require solutions and one-sided choices, to a framework of paradoxes that embraces tensions…

This study examines the acculturative challenges facing non-English speaking background (NESB) international doctoral students in the process of discipline enculturation. Twenty NESB doctoral students at three New Zealand universities from eleven countries participated in the semistructured interviews. The study has found that their transformative…

This article develops a complex understanding of safe space in relation to adult refugee learners' oral literacy practice of telling stories of violent life experiences in English as a second language (ESL) classrooms. A rhizoanalytic approach brings theoretical and empirical elements into conversation to ask two questions. Can the exigencies of…

A work placement module is compulsory in the second year of most degree programmes at York St John University, as part of an institution-wide strategy to embed employability in the curriculum. As most languages students spend their second year studying abroad, the Languages in the Workplace module was designed in such a way that the setting up of…

This study examines the effectiveness of a specially designed intervention in changing preservice teacher beliefs about the education of linguistically diverse students. The experiment involved a semester-long online letter exchange with English learner (EL) pen pal partners from two public schools. The research questions included: What effect did…

The knowledge society arises from the combination of four interdependent elements: the production of knowledge through research, its transmission through education, its dissemination through information and communication technologies, and its exploitation through innovation. For this reason, higher education institutions (HEIs) are the main…

Although TESOL in-service teacher education committed to "culturally sustaining pedagogy" (Paris, 2012) has underscored the critical role of teachers' professional subjectivities for student achievement, relatively few studies have attempted to capture the perspectives of African American classroom teachers working with English language…

The twentieth century has been characterised by the proliferation of human rights in the discursive practices of the United Nations (Baxi, 1997). In this article, we explore the continual process of rights-based education towards transformative action, and an open and democratic society, as dependent upon the facilitation of human rights literacy…

Each year, millions of people around the world are affected by natural disasters. Following these disasters, many students from colleges and universities arrive to support the affected areas. These seamless leadership learning opportunities engage students by allowing them to implement the concepts they learned in a classroom. Humanitarian relief…