Improving the Academic Climate of an R1 STEM Department: Quantified Positive Shifts in Perception

AbstractThe ever-increasing competitiveness in the academic publishing market incentivizes journal editors to pursue higher impact factors. This translates into journals becoming more selective, and, ultimately, into higher publication standards. However, the fixation on higher impact factors leads some journals to artificially boost impact factors through the coordinated effort of a “citation cartel” of journals. “Citation cartel” behavior has become increasingly common in recent years, with several instances being reported. Here, we propose an algorithm—named CIDRE—to detect anomalous groups of journals that exchange citations at excessively high rates when compared against a null model that accounts for scientific communities and journal size. CIDRE detects more than half of the journals suspended from Journal Citation Reports due to anomalous citation behavior in the year of suspension or in advance. Furthermore, CIDRE detects many new anomalous groups, where the impact factors of the member journals are lifted substantially higher by the citations from other member journals. We describe a number of such examples in detail and discuss the implications of our findings with regard to the current academic climate.

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The academic climate and student-teacher relationship as determinants of academic motivation

10.47040/sd0000081 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 11 (1) ◽

pp. 34-46

Author(s):

Ruxandra Toma

Keyword(s):

Academic Motivation ◽

Student Teacher Relationship ◽

Teacher Student ◽

Academic Climate ◽

Teacher Student Relationship ◽

Career Anxiety ◽

Academic Amotivation ◽

Student Relationship ◽

The University ◽

The Relationship

In this study we focus on the university students and the factors that influence their academic motivation. The participants were 202 students from different universities and specializations, 167 females and 35 males, aged 18-31 years, M = 21.33, SD = 2.15. We used Perceived Academic Climate Scale (Felner, 1993), Teacher-Student Relationship Scale (Brinkworth et al., 2018), and Academic Motivation Scale (Vallerand et al., 1992). Our objective was to identify the relationship between academic climate, teacher-student relationship (TSR), and academic motivation in the university environment, and to investigate the influence of the career anxiety on the academic motivation of students. The results show that anxiety regarding future career can moderate the relationship between school climate and academic amotivation and also between TSR and academic motivation.

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Potential in Play

Critical Studies in Improvisation / Études critiques en improvisation ◽

10.21083/csieci.v13i1.5794 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 13 (1) ◽

Author(s):

Jamie Sandel

Keyword(s):

21St Century ◽

Liberal Arts ◽

21St Century Education ◽

Academic Climate ◽

Arts Pedagogy ◽

Context Dependent ◽

Lev Vygotsky ◽

Improvisation Pedagogy

Liberal arts pedagogy, characterized by its emphasis on adaptability and breadth, thrives on the input of fresh perspectives; arguably, it requires them to maintain its relevance. In this paper, I engage theoretical and applied scholarship on improvisation pedagogy to illustrate how integral improvisational thought is to the spirit of the liberal arts. Considering the liberal arts ‘toolkit’ as, essentially, that of an improviser—a rounded, context-dependent and hybridizing approach that is well-suited to novel and sometimes unforeseeable scenarios—reaffirms the liberal arts’ value in the shifting academic climate of the 21st century, in which such skills are increasingly necessary. In order to explore that potential, I synthesize the foundational works of Lev Vygotsky, Stephen Nachmanovich, and Ed Sarath with newer scholarship on 21st century education.

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