scholarly journals Effect of COVID-19 pandemic on grade inflation in higher education in Turkey

PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (8) ◽  
pp. e0256688
Author(s):  
Engin Karadag

This study analyzes the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on grade inflation in higher education. Data were collected from five universities in Turkey, including grades of 152,352 students who attended 2,841 courses conducted by 903 instructors before the COVID-19 pandemic and grades of 149,936 students who attended 2,841 courses conducted by 847 instructors during the COVID-19 pandemic. The results of this study demonstrate that the COVID-19 pandemic causes a marginal increase in grades in higher education when the other factors that might explain the differences are controlled. Grade inflation of 9.21% is the highest ever reported in literature. Compared with a year ago, DD and DC grades decreased 55%; FD and FF grades decreased 31%; and the highest-grade AA increased 41% for courses taken during the pandemic. Additionally, classroom population, academic history of the instructor, class level, field, university entrance scores, and course execution and evaluation (grading) forms of course notes are important determinants. This increase can be explained by the effort of instructors who are accustomed to face-to-face settings. When they suddenly switch to distant education, they might try to grade higher to compensate for the unforeseen negative circumstances.

2006 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-15 ◽  
Author(s):  
David F. Labaree

I want to tell a story about American higher education. Like many historical accounts, this story has a contrapuntal quality. As we know, historians frequently find themselves trying to weave discordant themes into complex patterns in the hope of making harmony. The reason for this is that simple themes are hard to find in the account of any complex social institution, especially one like education, which is composed of a motley accumulation of historical residues and social functions. We often come across one point about education that makes sense and then find a counterpoint that also makes sense. If we cannot eliminate one in favor of the other, then we try to put them together in a way that does not violate the rules of harmony and historical logic. In the effort to do so we, therefore, find ourselves in the business of writing fugues.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
ENGİN KARADAG

Abstract Background: Grade inflation in higher education institutions, that is the increase in students’ grades, has been observed since the 1960s. There are comprehensive proofs that document the allegations, prevalence and severity of grade inflation in higher education especially in American universities for the past 10 years. This study analyzes the change in the ratio of those graduated with a “very good (>2.99)” degree from medical education in Turkey within a 15-year-long period, the grade inflation (when all other factors are constant), and factors that affect the course grade. Methods: The analyses were carried out using the grade point average (GPA) of 9.618 students graduated from the medical faculty of 25 universities in Turkey, and 288.540 student grade for 7.597 courses. The study used the “real” university random effects estimator modeling considering the differences in universities with correlation, ANOVA, t-test and ANCOVA analyses. Results and Conclusion: The results revealed that there was a marginal increase in grades in medical training before graduation after checking the effects of factors that might affect the graduation grades. The 29% grade inflation detected is in line with the literature and is one of the highest values that have been reported so far. It was also detected that the ratio of graduates with a “very good (>2.99)” degree was 17% in 2005 and it increased to 46% in 2020. Additionally, the class size, academic degree of the tutor, grade, content of the course, types of the universities (public & non-profit private), accreditation of the program, and the age of the faculty are important determinants of course grades. According to these results, it is clear that both the uncontrolled expansion of medical faculties in Turkey and the decrease in quality cause an increase in grades. One of the most important results obtained is that accreditation slows down the grade inflation. Both the course grades following the accreditation process and the inflation in the graduation grades (grade inflation) slowed down significantly in the accredited faculties. This finding is an important example of the necessity of accreditation, which is referred to as the “golden standard” to improve the quality of medical education.


2021 ◽  
Vol 3 (5) ◽  
pp. 96-106
Author(s):  
Elena-Ancuța SANTI ◽  
◽  
Gabriel GORGHIU ◽  
Mihai BÎZOI

The classic educational process organized in universities becomes quite rigid in the current pandemic context, which claims especially online activities, with students who increasingly feel the need to be guided and helped. In this respect, the students have to be supported through tutoring and mentoring activities, dedicated mainly to 1 st -year students with a high risk of dropout. The tutoring, coaching, and mentoring activities take time and the related effort for the tutor is quite high. On the other hand, the need to benefit from such activities is certain, requiring the identification of proper ways for students to have access to counseling activities, in which the effort of the counselors is not overwhelming. A viable environment would be the setting-up and the maintaining of a dedicated web platform, specially designed for such purposes. This platform facilitates coaching activities for a larger number of users, compared to face-to-face meetings. Also, the students can be counseled on topics that do not directly involve the educational process but are associated with it. This paper aims to summarize the current theoretical perspectives concerning online coaching in higher education, as a support strategy for students who experience difficulties, to prevent early school leaving, highlighting the characteristics and effective methodological approach related to this process


Author(s):  
M. Alie Humaedi

Hundreds of Islamic higher education has been developing in Indonesia. Despite its existence, the struggle may not yet be considered significant compared to public universities. On the other hand, Indonesia has a high level of multiculturalism and major religious communities which can trigger a better product of Islamic higher education. This fact shows that prominent problems still rise both in the structure and paradigm of the distinct teaching, also in the level of how scholar responses in contemporary issues. The blame can be taken to the reality that the learning paradigm and structure are still providing limitation in specific religious knowledge. In order to establish an Islamic higher education to be called the center of learning and research as an agent of civilization development, the religious and integral social culture education must be capable in determining the cultural context and geo-history of the people which affects both the internality of a religion and the daily practices. Puluhan bahkan ratusan pendidikan tinggi agama Islam telah ada di Indonesia. Bila dibandingkan dengan pendidikan tinggi umum, kiprahnya pun masih belum terlihat banyak. Padahal, di tengah tingkat keberagamaan dan jumlah pemeluk agama yang besar, tentu keberadaan dan perannya bisa lebih dari apa yang terlihat sekarang. Artinya, ada masalah krusial, baik dalam struktur dan paradigma keilmuan yang diajarkan, maupun tingkat pemahaman para sivitas dalam menjawab isu-isu kontemporer. Ujung pangkalnya tetap satu, yaitu struktur dan paradigma keilmuan yang masih sebatas pengkajian spesifik ilmu-ilmu agama saja. Pendidikan integral ilmu agama dan keilmuan sosial kebudayaan yang bisa membaca dan mengangkat konteks kultur dan geo-historis masyarakat, yang berpengaruh dalam internalisasi keagamaannya ataupun praktik kehidupan pelaku, sangat penting untuk dirumuskan dan ditetapkan sebagai bagian tidak terpisah mencipta pendidikan tinggi agama Islam yang menjadi center of learning and research, sekaligus agen perubahan di masyarakat.


2020 ◽  
Vol 49 (5) ◽  
pp. 376-381
Author(s):  
Karly Ford ◽  
Kelly Rosinger ◽  
Qiong Zhu

One ethnoracial reporting category perplexes higher education researchers: “race and ethnicity unknown.” Using the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS), we constructed a 28-year panel of 4,401 institutions. We find that the for-profit sector ranges from 5% to 18% “race unknown” students. In addition, almost 10% of students attending the most selective institutions were reported as “race unknown” in 2009 before dropping off precipitously. The size of the “race unknown” category can be attributed to some combination of student responses and data collection practices. We suggest researchers refrain from dropping “race unknown” from their studies as doing so may bias findings for the other ethnoracial categories, especially when comparing rates of student enrollment across institutional types.


Author(s):  
Jan-Otmar Hesse

AbstractThe Economic History Committee of the Verein für Socialpolitik was founded 70 years ago as the first interest group for economic and social history in Germany. As did its five counterparts of other subfields in economics, the committee aimed at intensifying academic exchange in this field. Furthermore, it served as a lobby organisation for the discipline in the fast changing politics of higher education in Germany. It therefore can be considered as an important step in the discipline’s professionalization. The article gives a brief overview of the development of economic history in Germany starting with the Historical School at the end of the 19th century. The second part is dedicated to the institutional and academic history of the committee using archival documentation.


Problemos ◽  
2009 ◽  
Vol 76 ◽  
pp. 9-27 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marius Povilas Šaulauskas ◽  
Alfredas Bumblauskas

Straipsnyje teigiama, kad universitas, arba Academia Europeana, – tai visų pirma vertybinė, o ne ekonominė, profesinė ar politinė kategorija. Aksiologinė universitetinę erdvę vienijanti struktūra trilypė, ją sudaro trijų skirtingų epochų vertybiniai kodai. Pirma, viduramžių polilogas, pagrįstas multicentrizmo principu ir netarpišku kompetencijos perteikimu. Antra, modernusis statizmas ir scientizmas, besiremiantis nacionaliniu monocentrizmu ir tarpišku, rašytiniu, ir netarpišku, žodiniu, kompetencijos perteikimu. Trečia, šiuolaikinis ekonomizmas ir globalizmas, palaikomas transnacionalinio monocentrizmo ir įtarpintos kompetencijos perteikimo instrumentarijumi. Parodoma, kad Vilniaus universitetas turi visų trijų paradigmų reiškimosi tarpsnius, o Lietuvos Tūkstantmečio idėja yra postūmis konceptualiai permąstyti Vilniaus universiteto patirtis. Straipsnyje parodoma, kad visi trys Academia Europeana vertybiniai dariniai Vilniaus universiteto, matomo kaip europinės universitetinės erdvės „kraštutinio krašto“, istorijoje patyrė esminę radikalizaciją, tačiau išsaugojo prasmių universiteto tradicijas. Tvirtinama, kad tvari universitetinio išsilavinimo plėtra neįmanoma be darnios visų trijų istoriškai susiklosčiusių vertybinių klodų plėtotės, kurios pagrindą sudaro klasikinio polilogo – iš rankų į rankas perduodamos egzistencinės prasmės paieškõs – tradicija.Pagrindiniai žodžiai: Europos universitetai, Vilniaus universitetas, išsilavinimo aksiologija, aukštasis mokslas, Bolonijos procesas.The Threefold of Academia Europeana: A Case of Universitas VilnensisMarius Povilas Šaulauskas, Alfredas Bumblauskas SummaryThe article argues that universitas or Academia Europeana is, first and foremost, a category of value and not an economic, professional or political entity. Axiological structure that unites the university habitat is threefold. It consists of the three clusters of values coming from the different epochs. First, polylogue of the Middle Ages based on the principle of multicentrism and unmediated, face to face sharing of competence. Second, modern statism and scientism founded in the national monocentrism and a combination of mediated, written, and unmediated, verbal, sharing of competence. Third, modern economism and globalism supported by the national monocentrism and the instrumentation of mediated sharing of competence. It has been showed that Vilnius University possesses all three value clusters, while the idea of the millennium of Lithuania serves as an impetus to conceptually recapture the historic experiences of Vilnius University. The article shows that the three value formations of the Academia Europeana in the history of Vilnius University, which is posited as the extreme edge of the European university habitat, underwent an essential, even extreme, radicalization. It has been argued, that sustainable development of university education is unthinkable without the consonant development of all three historically formed clusters of values, the most important of which still continues to be centered around the tradition of classical polylogue – unmediated search for existential values that is carefully passed on from hands to hands and from generation to generation.Keywords: European Universities, Vilnius University, axiology of education, higher education, Bologna process.an>


2012 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. 55-70 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ceylan Gündeğer ◽  
Sümeyra Soysal ◽  
Esed Yağcı

The purpose of this study is to determine PLT (Program of Training Lecturer) research assistans' views about domestic and outland language training. Accordinglythe opinions were obtained from 10 PLT research assistants, who had domestic language training, and 11 PLT research assistants, who had outland language training, with 5 open-ended questions semi-structured interview formby having face to face interview. In data analysis the content analysis was used. The results of the study revealed that PTL research assistants had expectations of general and academic English from domestic language education. Most of research assistants noted that domestic language education didn't meet those expectations. The most important problems faced by research assistants were housing and exam-business anxiety in language education. Also research assistants stated that they had not found an effective language education. Finally PTL research assistants have made some suggestions both CHE (the Council of Higher Education) and other PTL research assistants. On the other hand it is concluded that PTL research assistants', who had outland language training, most important expectations are to improve their ability in speaking, writing an article and giving a presentation. In addition the research assistants had some problems about housing, teachers'qualifications and the Turkish students in a class and had not solved this problems. It is seen that they don't find the training program effective and further it was not satisfy their expectitons. Accordingly it is seen that, the most important things are prefering the countries, have native speakers like USA, UK, Canada, reducing the Turkish student in a class and being in the academic environment like universities instead of courses.


2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 26-32
Author(s):  
Nurulhuda Abdul Rahman ◽  
Muhammad Ridzuan Idris ◽  
Khairul Salleh Baharudin

Internet of Thing (IoT) is one of the elements that drive the development of the Industrial Revolution (IR 4.0). Therefore, IoT has become the most important agenda in the globalization era including the field of education. The IoT element has been widely engaged in higher education syllabus. However, in COVID 19 pandemic, the teaching and learning process for IoT becomes more challenging and difficult to deliver. As a solution, the Educational Kit for IoT Online Learning has been developed. This online learning kit will help students to practically learn the IoT without a face to face lecture. The objectives of the paper are to provide an overview of existing IoT education solutions and to develop IoT online learning kit. This learning kit consists of IoT development hardware and software which are equipped with a camera that connected to the online conference software. This paper will explain the development of the kit. Compared to other kits, this learning kit can directly be used for online learning and helps students to practice IoT at home, especially during a pandemic. On the other hand, IoT Online Kits is a pioneer in higher education for practical online learning.


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