scholarly journals Undergraduate perceptions of value: degree skills and career skills

2017 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 435-440 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kyle W. Galloway
Keyword(s):  
Undergraduate Students ◽  
Perceived Value ◽  
Specific Knowledge ◽  
Transferable Skills ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Subject Specific ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Career Skills

Recent data suggests that of the UK students graduating with a degree in chemistry in 2015, only 18.9% continued to employment as ‘Science Professionals’. While this shows the wide range of employment that is available for chemistry graduates, it also highlights the need for them to have relevant transferable skills, rather than just the well-developed, subject-specific knowledge that they would be expected to possess. In 2010 Hanson and Overton published a study on the degree skills valued by UK graduates who had found employment and then reflected on the most useful aspects of the degree course. The new investigation reported here expands on this previous work by evaluating the perceived value of these skills by chemistry undergraduate students (years 1, 2, 3) along with their planned occupation after graduation. The results of the skills questionnaire are discussed, along with a survey of the main skills that the students wished to gain by participating in a new extra-curricular module specifically designed to enhance career skills, and the activities designed to develop those skills.

scholarly journals The impact of housemate relationships on undergraduate student wellbeing

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lucy Foulkes ◽  
Ariyana Reddy ◽  
Juliette Westbrook ◽  
Elizabeth Newbronner ◽  
Dean McMillan
Keyword(s):  
Psychological Distress ◽  
Undergraduate Students ◽  
Qualitative Content Analysis ◽  
Positive Relationships ◽  
Student Wellbeing ◽  
Practical Support ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The Uk ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Relationship

Rates of psychological distress in UK undergraduate students are high. The majority of undergraduate students live with same-age peers, and are in a developmental period characterised by changes in social cognition and social relationships. As such, examining the relationship that students have with their housemates may be critical for understanding student wellbeing. In the current study, N=90 undergraduates at universities across the UK took part in an online qualitative study examining the role that housemates play in student wellbeing. Four themes were constructed from the data using inductive qualitative content analysis: Positive relationships stem from constant contact and shared experience; Positive relationships enable a wide range of emotional and practical support; Conflict stems from disrespect; and Poor relationships lead to loneliness, isolation and psychological distress. Together, the themes demonstrate the divergent impact that housemates can have on student wellbeing: they can be a source of immense support or great unhappiness. The findings demonstrate that, to understand wellbeing in UK undergraduates, relationships within student accommodation should be examined.

scholarly journals Experimenting with undergraduate practicals

2016 ◽  
pp. 3-5
Author(s):  
David J McGarvey
Keyword(s):  
Physical Chemistry ◽  
Problem Solving ◽  
Experimental Approach ◽  
Laboratory Work ◽  
Specific Knowledge ◽  
Subject Knowledge ◽  
Transferable Skills ◽  
The Past ◽  
Team Working ◽  
Subject Specific

In my experience the prescriptive nature of many undergraduate practicals restricts the scope for students to apply and develop their subject-specific knowledge. In addition, the nature of such practicals places limitations on their effectiveness for development of problem solving, team working and transferable skills. In recognition of this, a number of laboratory practicals in physical chemistry have been developed (some from existing traditional scripts) which feature clearly formulated and explicit objectives, but which omit detailed instructions to a greater or lesser extent. One particular aspect of these practicals is that the onus is placed on students to design a viable experimental approach in order to achieve the stated objectives and to reflect critically on their work. In this respect some of the practicals may be considered as structured mini-projects. Another implicit aspect is an attempt to encourage students to de-compartmentalise their subject knowledge (e.g. organic mechanisms in a ‘physical’ chemistry practical).The practicals have been used successfully at levels 1 and 2 during the past two years at Keele, and although the approach described has been applied to laboratory work in physical chemistry, there is no reason why it cannot be applied more generally.

Read, Understand, Learn, & Excel: Development and Testing of an Automated Reading Strategy Detection Algorithm for Postsecondary Students

2019 ◽  
Vol 28 (3) ◽  
pp. 1257-1267 ◽  
Author(s):  
Priya Kucheria ◽  
McKay Moore Sohlberg ◽  
Jason Prideaux ◽  
Stephen Fickas
Keyword(s):  
Academic Success ◽  
Undergraduate Students ◽  
Expository Text ◽  
Reading Strategy ◽  
Detection Algorithm ◽  
Expository Texts ◽  
Human Observer ◽  
Behavioral Strategies ◽  
Periodic Review ◽  
Wide Range

PurposeAn important predictor of postsecondary academic success is an individual's reading comprehension skills. Postsecondary readers apply a wide range of behavioral strategies to process text for learning purposes. Currently, no tools exist to detect a reader's use of strategies. The primary aim of this study was to develop Read, Understand, Learn, & Excel, an automated tool designed to detect reading strategy use and explore its accuracy in detecting strategies when students read digital, expository text.MethodAn iterative design was used to develop the computer algorithm for detecting 9 reading strategies. Twelve undergraduate students read 2 expository texts that were equated for length and complexity. A human observer documented the strategies employed by each reader, whereas the computer used digital sequences to detect the same strategies. Data were then coded and analyzed to determine agreement between the 2 sources of strategy detection (i.e., the computer and the observer).ResultsAgreement between the computer- and human-coded strategies was 75% or higher for 6 out of the 9 strategies. Only 3 out of the 9 strategies–previewing content, evaluating amount of remaining text, and periodic review and/or iterative summarizing–had less than 60% agreement.ConclusionRead, Understand, Learn, & Excel provides proof of concept that a reader's approach to engaging with academic text can be objectively and automatically captured. Clinical implications and suggestions to improve the sensitivity of the code are discussed.Supplemental Materialhttps://doi.org/10.23641/asha.8204786

‘I’m an expert in me and I know what I can cope with’: Patient expertise in rheumatoid arthritis

2014 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 249-261 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tessa Sanderson ◽  
Jo Angouri
Keyword(s):  
Rheumatoid Arthritis ◽  
Meta Analysis ◽  
Healthcare Systems ◽  
Specific Knowledge ◽  
Active Involvement ◽  
Domain Specific ◽  
Access To Health ◽  
Patient Expertise ◽  
Domain Specific Knowledge ◽  
The Uk

The active involvement of patients in decision-making and the focus on patient expertise in managing chronic illness constitutes a priority in many healthcare systems including the NHS in the UK. With easier access to health information, patients are almost expected to be (or present self) as an ‘expert patient’ (Ziebland 2004). This paper draws on the meta-analysis of interview data collected for identifying treatment outcomes important to patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA). Taking a discourse approach to identity, the discussion focuses on the resources used in the negotiation and co-construction of expert identities, including domain-specific knowledge, access to institutional resources, and ability to self-manage. The analysis shows that expertise is both projected (institutionally sanctioned) and claimed by the patient (self-defined). We close the paper by highlighting the limitations of our pilot study and suggest avenues for further research.

A JOURNEY TO MEASURE STUDENT COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT BENEFITS: EVIDENCE FROM AUSTRALIA

2019 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 16
Author(s):  
Ellen Chung ◽  
Hamish B Coates
Keyword(s):  
Community Engagement ◽  
Undergraduate Students ◽  
Factor Loading ◽  
Higher Learning ◽  
Four Dimensions ◽  
Student Community ◽  
Institutions Of Higher Learning ◽  
Final Questionnaire ◽  
Civic Skills ◽  
Career Skills

Community engagement is a phenomenon that has received increasing attention among institutions of higher learning in recent years, and students engaging with communities are generally seen as beneficial. Given this, surprisingly little is known about this form of engagement in Australian higher education, let alone methods to measure its benefits on students. This study discussed the development of the Student Community Engagement Benefits Questionnaire (SCEBS), a questionnaire that measures the perceptions of community engagement benefits among undergraduate students in Australia. The final questionnaire has 32 items allocated to four benefit scales: (1) Career skills, (2) Diversity skills, (3) Interpersonal skills, (4) Civic skills. Most benefit items had a factor loading of atleast 0.40 with its own scale. The results of the factor analysis revealed that the four scales accounted for 53% of the total variance. The alpha reliability coefficient for the four scales ranged from 0.79 to 0.91. Based on these findings, the Student Community Engagement Benefits Scale (SCEBS) is a valid and reliable instrument that can be used in the field of education. Undergraduate students also reported statistically significant changes in the four dimensions after participating in community engagement activities.

Participating in an international project on readers’ response to Lord of the Flies: insights into undergraduate students’ responses

2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 27
Author(s):  
Ghazal Kazim Syed ◽  
Manzoor-ul-Mustafa Panhwar
Keyword(s):  
Undergraduate Students ◽  
International Study ◽  
Literature Circles ◽  
Collaborative Teaching ◽  
International Project ◽  
Teaching Techniques ◽  
Innovative Methods ◽  
Lord Of The Flies ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Teaching Pedagogies

<p>This paper presents the findings of a study based on students’ response to participating in an international project. This international project was a collaboration between Pakistan, the UK and Norway. Collaborative teaching techniques of using literature circles within each class and google circles across the three contexts (online) were used. Twelve participating students from Pakistan were interviewed to explore their reactions to the international study. Students felt that they learnt new things from the use of these innovative methods, were able to learn from foreigners and felt a sense of connectivity to their groups. It is recommended that students from Pakistan be given such exposure to overcome their hesitation. It is recommended that further research be carried out in other contexts as well to determine if the use of such teaching pedagogies can benefit other teachers of literature.</p>

ESRC Review

2020 ◽  
pp. 657-698
Author(s):  
Simeon J. Yates ◽  
Jordana Blejmar
Keyword(s):  
Social Research ◽  
Social Science Research ◽  
Research Work ◽  
Science Research ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The Us ◽  
Levels Of Automation ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Technological World ◽  
Ways Of Being

Two workshops were part of the final steps in the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) commissioned Ways of Being in a Digital Age project that is the basis for this Handbook. The ESRC project team coordinated one with the UK Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (ESRC-DSTL) Workshop, “The automation of future roles”; and one with the US National Science Foundation (ESRC-NSF) Workshop, “Changing work, changing lives in the new technological world.” Both workshops sought to explore the key future social science research questions arising for ever greater levels of automation, use of artificial intelligence, and the augmentation of human activity. Participants represented a wide range of disciplinary, professional, government, and nonprofit expertise. This chapter summarizes the separate and then integrated results. First, it summarizes the central social and economic context, the method and project context, and some basic definitional issues. It then identifies 11 priority areas needing further research work that emerged from the intense interactions, discussions, debates, clustering analyses, and integration activities during and after the two workshops. Throughout, it summarizes how subcategories of issues within each cluster relate to central issues (e.g., from users to global to methods) and levels of impacts (from wider social to community and organizational to individual experiences and understandings). Subsections briefly describe each of these 11 areas and their cross-cutting issues and levels. Finally, it provides a detailed Appendix of all the areas, subareas, and their specific questions.

Punk as Folk: Continuities and Tensions in the UK and Beyond

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pete Dale
Keyword(s):  
Folk Music ◽  
Music Making ◽  
Collective Creativity ◽  
Living Tradition ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The Us ◽  
The Common ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The Uk

Numerous claims have been made by a wide range of commentators that punk is somehow “a folk music” of some kind. Doubtless there are several continuities. Indeed, both tend to encourage amateur music-making, both often have affiliations with the Left, and both emerge at least partly from a collective/anti-competitive approach to music-making. However, there are also significant tensions between punk and folk as ideas/ideals and as applied in practice. Most obviously, punk makes claims to a “year zero” creativity (despite inevitably offering re-presentation of at least some existing elements in every instance), whereas folk music is supposed to carry forward a tradition (which, thankfully, is more recognized in recent decades as a subject-to-change “living tradition” than was the case in folk’s more purist periods). Politically, meanwhile, postwar folk has tended more toward a socialist and/or Marxist orientation, both in the US and UK, whereas punk has at least rhetorically claimed to be in favor of “anarchy” (in the UK, in particular). Collective creativity and competitive tendencies also differ between the two (perceived) genre areas. Although the folk scene’s “floor singer” tradition offers a dispersal of expressive opportunity comparable in some ways to the “anyone can do it” idea that gets associated with punk, the creative expectation of the individual within the group differs between the two. Punk has some similarities to folk, then, but there are tensions, too, and these are well worth examining if one is serious about testing out the common claim, in both folk and punk, that “anyone can do it.”

scholarly journals An exploration of migrant women’s perceptions of public health messages to reduce stillbirth in the UK: a qualitative study

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Tomasina Stacey ◽  
Melanie Haith-Cooper ◽  
Nisa Almas ◽  
Charlotte Kenyon
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Perinatal Mortality ◽  
Health Professionals ◽  
Health Messages ◽  
Migrant Women ◽  
Global Public Health ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Public Health Messages ◽  
Associated Risk Factors ◽  
The Uk

Abstract Background Stillbirth is a global public health priority. Within the United Kingdom, perinatal mortality disproportionately impacts Black, Asian and minority ethnic women, and in particular migrant women. Although the explanation for this remains unclear, it is thought to be multidimensional. Improving perinatal mortality is reliant upon raising awareness of stillbirth and its associated risk factors, as well as improving maternity services. The aim of this study was to explore migrant women’s awareness of health messages to reduce stillbirth risk, and how key public health messages can be made more accessible. Method Two semi-structured focus groups and 13 one to one interviews were completed with a purposive sample of 30 migrant women from 18 countries and across 4 NHS Trusts. Results Participants provided an account of their general awareness of stillbirth and recollection of the advice they had been given to reduce the risk of stillbirth both before and during pregnancy. They also suggested approaches to how key messages might be more effectively communicated to migrant women. Conclusions Our study highlights the complexity of discussing stillbirth during pregnancy. The women in this study were found to receive a wide range of advice from family and friends as well as health professionals about how to keep their baby safe in pregnancy, they recommended the development of a range of resources to provide clear and consistent messages. Health professionals, in particular midwives who have developed a trusting relationship with the women will be key to ensuring that public health messages relating to stillbirth reduction are accessible to culturally and linguistically diverse communities.

scholarly journals Redefining peer learning: Role of student entrepreneurs in teaching entrepreneurship in the UK higher education context

2021 ◽  
pp. 095042222110126
Author(s):  
Stella Xu ◽  
Zimu Xu ◽  
Fujia Li ◽  
Arun Sukumar
Keyword(s):  
Student Engagement ◽  
Course Design ◽  
Cultural Backgrounds ◽  
School Students ◽  
Arts And Humanities ◽  
The Arts ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Student Entrepreneurs ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Uk Higher Education

Entrepreneurship-related modules have become increasingly popular over the years, not only among business school students but also among those from other disciplines, including engineering and the arts and humanities. In some circumstances, they are offered as optional modules for students across different faculties and disciplines. While it is beneficial to mix students with different backgrounds, bringing in a wide range of perspectives, there are also challenges relating to course design and student engagement. With these challenges in mind, the authors trialled a new approach in the hope of motivating students from diverse academic and socio-cultural backgrounds to engage more fully in the classroom by utilising student entrepreneurs as guest speakers. The student-centric approach has proved effective in enhancing student engagement, as evidenced by both informal and formal feedback.

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