scholarly journals Is There a Real Need for the Preparatory Years in Higher Education? An Educational Data Analysis for College and Future Career Readiness

2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (10) ◽  
pp. 396
Author(s):  
Hani Brdesee ◽  
Wafaa Alsaggaf

Universities seek to qualify students for their academic and career futures and meet labor market requirements. Hence, a preparatory year is provided to bridge the gap between high school outcomes and the needs of university study plans. The preparatory year is the first year of support in the life of university students, and for decades, it has been recognized as important. It is considered the most crucial stage in the life of university students, where they build and refine their skills and choose their academic major, in which they complete their academic and career life. Due to the importance of this year, which requires the full attention and care of the higher authorities in terms of preparation, development, and renewal, this research outlines the importance of the preparatory year at a local level and in international institutions. Moreover, it sheds light on the details of King Abdulaziz University (KAU) students as a case study. It measures the relationship between the admission weighted ratio (AWR), the college enrollment allocation weighted ratio (CEAWR), and the performance of three batches of male and female students (three consecutive years), with details of students’ college allocation after the end of the preparatory year. More importantly, it aims to realize students’ progress through their weighted averages during their preparatory year, and the extent to which the goals of the preparatory year are achieved. After an analytic survey of the reality of the preparatory year, based on the statistical tests conducted, this study found that it is not possible to be satisfied with the weighted ratio for colleges’ direct allocation of high school students. The tests showed a difference between the AWR and that of the CEAWR, which indicates a change in the level of students’ performance from high school to university, due to the positive impact of the preparatory year. More precisely, it was noted that there is a possibility of studying the sufficiency of the weighted ratio for the direct allocation of some colleges in future research.

2017 ◽  
pp. 125-130
Author(s):  
Minh Tam Nguyen ◽  
Phuc Thanh Nhan Nguyen ◽  
Thi Thuy Hang Nguyen

The increasing use of smartphone among young people is creating negative effects and is an important public health problem in many countries. Smartphone abuse and addiction may cause physical and psychological disorders among users. However, the awarenes on this issue has been inadequate due to lacking of evidence. Objectives: To describe the current situation of smartphone using among students at highschools and universities in Hue city and to examine the relationship between smartphone using and sleep disturbances and psychological disstress among participants. Methods: A cross-sectional study with a randomly selected sample of 1,150 students at highschools and universities in Hue city. SAS-SV scale was used to evaluate phone addiction status, K10 scale was used for psychological distress assessment and PSQI scale was used to examine the sleep quality. Results: The proportion of students at highschools and universities having smartphones was 78.0%. The rate of smartphone addiction among high school students was 49.1% and that among university students was 43.7%. There was 57.3% of high school students had poor sleep quality, and that of university students was 51.6%. There was a statistically significant association between smartphone addiction and sleep disturbances and psychological disstress among participants (p <0.05). Conclusion: The prevalence of smartphone addiction among students at highschools and universities is alarming and is related to sleep disturbances and psychological disstress among participants. There is a strong call to develop intervention to help students to aware and manage the use of smartphone effectively.


2021 ◽  
pp. 088626052110283
Author(s):  
Cara Herbitter ◽  
Alyssa L. Norris ◽  
Kimberly M. Nelson ◽  
Lindsay M. Orchowski

Previous research indicates that teen dating violence (TDV) is more common among sexual minority than heterosexual adolescents, with approximately half of female sexual minority adolescents (SMA) endorsing TDV victimization in the last year. In samples of adolescents without regard to sexual orientation, exposure to violent pornography is associated with TDV, but this relationship has not been assessed in female SMA. The current study sample consisted of 10th-grade high school students aged 14–17 who identified as cisgender females ( N = 1,276). Data were collected from a baseline survey prior to the delivery of a sexual assault prevention intervention. Female SMA had 2.54 times the odds (95%CI [1.75, 3.69]) of being exposed to violent pornography and 2.53 times the odds (95%CI [1.72, 3.70)]) of TDV exposure compared to heterosexual girls. Exposure to violent pornography was not associated with involvement in TDV among female SMA, controlling for episodic heavy drinking ( aOR = 2.25, 95%CI [0.88,6.22]). Given the relatively higher rates of violent pornography and TDV exposure among female SMA compared to heterosexual girls, it is critical that sex education curricula address these experiences and meet the needs of adolescents of all sexual orientations. Future research can assess how these TDV interventions might be tailored for female SMA. Although we did not find that exposure to violent pornography was associated with TDV among female SMA, these investigations should be replicated with larger data sets, given that the association between exposure to violent pornography and engagement in TDV was in the expected direction.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (15) ◽  
pp. 8394
Author(s):  
Tsen-Yao Chang ◽  
Yu-Chieh Chiu

Taiwan began to implement a new high school syllabus nationwide, in 2019. The Ministry of Education has also established a high school student Academic Portfolio System (APS) to collect the learning process of high school students for future university admissions references. However, during this period, high school students and their parents had many opinions on the implementation of the new system. There were even groups of students protesting. The main purpose of this research is to explore the factors that affect the system usage intentions of high school students. Based on the theory of reasoned action (TRA) and the technology acceptance model (TAM), this research established a research model. The research variables include system interface design, usefulness, ease of use, attitude, subjective norms, and usage intentions. A total of 712 questionnaires were collected from high school students in northern Taiwan. Data analysis is carried out in three stages: descriptive analysis, measurement model verification, and structural equation modeling. The results of the study found that system interface design has a significant impact on the perceived ease of use. Factors such as ease of use, usefulness, attitude, and subjective norms also have a significant positive impact on usage intention; ease of use and usefulness positively affect attitudes toward using. Finally, according to the results, some practical implications were proposed for implementation references from the perspectives of education authority, high schools, teachers, and students.


2016 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 26-36 ◽  
Author(s):  
Talida M. State ◽  
Judith R. Harrison ◽  
Lee Kern ◽  
Timothy J. Lewis

Little is known about the feasibility and acceptability of interventions designed to address the needs of high school students with emotional and behavioral challenges and adopted by their teachers. In this study, 336 general and special education teachers rated classwide interventions (e.g., expectations, routines, positive student–teacher interactions [PSTI]) and individual student interventions (e.g., study skills, organizational skills) in terms of priority, feasibility, and acceptability before implementation. Teachers who implemented the interventions rated their acceptability post-implementation. Results indicated that acceptability ratings varied across interventions, and it appeared that teachers rated interventions that required the least amount of time to implement (e.g., PSTI) most acceptable and those that required the most time for implementation (e.g., study skills) least acceptable. Lack of time, perceived lack of effectiveness, and poor environmental fit were often cited as reasons for lack of feasibility. Regression analyses revealed that teacher characteristics (e.g., years of experience) and type of intervention (e.g., classwide vs. individualized) contributed to teacher ratings of intervention acceptability. Implications for future research and practice are discussed.


2016 ◽  
Vol 8 (9) ◽  
pp. 271 ◽  
Author(s):  
Baratali Rezapour ◽  
Firoozeh Mostafavi ◽  
Hamid Reza Khalkhali

<p><strong>OBJECTIVES:</strong> Students attend sedentary life style and less like vigorous physical activity. This study investigated the effects of School-based intervention<strong> </strong>on increasing physical activity for decreasing obesity among high-school obese and overweight boys, based on the components of PRECEDE PROCEED Model, to participate in median - vigorous physical activity among the first Period of high school boys in the city of Urmia, Iran</p><p><strong>METHODS:</strong> This study was an experimental intervention that conducted at 4 high schools that were divided into 2 groups of intervention (40) and the control (40) male students, schools in junior high schools in Urmia.</p><p><strong>RESULTS:</strong> Three and six months after the intervention, significant differences were found between the experimental and control groups of schools, in the amount of students’ participation in vigorous physical activity (p&lt;0.01).</p><p><strong>CONCLUSIONS:</strong> According to the results, the school-based intervention and components of PRECEDE PROCEED Model had a positive impact on the improvement of physical activity and decrease in physical inactivity among the students.</p>


2021 ◽  
Vol 32 (4) ◽  
pp. 331-342
Author(s):  
Esther Nartey ◽  
◽  
Ruby Hanson ◽  

The purpose of the study was to determine the perceptions that senior high school (SHS) chemistry students and teachers have about organic chemistry as well as to compare organic chemistry topics that are difficult for students and teachers. Simple random sampling (lottery) and purposive sampling methods were used to select a sample of one hundred (100) SHS students who studied elective chemistry and ten (10) chemistry teachers. The research instruments used to collect data for this study were the ‘organic chemistry perceptions questionnaire for students’ (OCPQS) and ‘organic chemistry perceptions questionnaire for teachers’ (OCPQT). Descriptive statistics (frequencies and percentages) were used to analyze the data collected. The findings revealed that these SHS students have a fairly positive perception of organic chemistry while their teachers had a highly positive perception of organic chemistry. Preparation and chemical reactions of alkenes, preparation and chemical reactions of alkynes, structure and stability of benzene, reactions of benzene, comparison of reactions of benzene and alkenes, petroleum, polymers and naming of alkanes and structural isomerism were perceived by students as difficult to understand. The rest of the Ghanaian SHS organic chemistry topics (26 out of 34 topics) were perceived as easy to understand by students. Also, the teachers perceived all the SHS organic chemistry topics as easy to teach with the exception of reactions of benzene. The insights gained about teachers’ and students’ perceived difficult organic chemistry topics in this study imply that teachers’ perceptions and how these are communicated to students can have significant effects on learning. The authors believe that both teachers and learners could benefit from this increased awareness of perceptions about difficulties in teaching and learning organic chemistry. They therefore suggest that further studies into how teachers’ perceptions influence their teaching and consequently their students’ experiences be carried out. In addition, in future research, a diagnostic test based on the topics in the SHS organic chemistry syllabus could be added to ascertain whether the perceived difficult topics are actually difficult for students to answer questions on. This would help teachers to separate perceived difficulties from the actual difficulties (realities) and be able to address them in their lessons.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joachim G. Piepenburg ◽  
Lukas Fervers

AbstractDespite an almost endless list of possible study programs and occupational opportunities, high school students frequently focus on pursuing a small number of well-known study programs. Students also often follow gender-typical paths and restrict their attention to study programs in which the majority of students consists of same-gendered people. This choice pattern has far-reaching consequences, including persistent gender segregation and an undersupply of graduates in emerging sectors of the industry. Building on rational choice and social psychological theory, we argue that this pattern partly occurs due to information deficits that may be altered by counseling interventions. To assess this claim empirically, we evaluated the impact of a counseling intervention on the intended choice of major among high school students in Germany by means of a randomized controlled trial (RCT). We estimate the effect by instrumental variable estimation to account for two-sided non-compliance. Our results show that the intervention has increased the likelihood that participants will consider less well-known or gender-atypical study programs, particularly for high school students with lower starting levels of information. Supplementary analyses confirm that a positive impact on information seems to be one of the relevant causal mechanisms. These results suggest that counseling services have the potential to guide high school students to less gender-typical and well-known majors, possibly reducing gender segregation and smoothing labor market transitions after graduation.


Author(s):  
Naomi Katayama ◽  
Shyoko Kondo

A dental questionnaire survey conducted on 34 high school students, 55 university students, 23 Middle-age who participated in the university festival. Participants answered yes or no to ten self-administered questions. Also, participants described the hardness of meals, brushing teeth after meals, and time to spend eating in a questionnaire. As a result, some students even had some guminflammation. Middle –Ages had many people who had experience with swollen gums (52.2%). Of the participants, the Middle Ages were few who applied fluorine (17.4%), and many were students (high school students 64.7%, university students 90.9%). Most people brush their teeth after breakfast or dinner. Participants replied that they usually eat a little hard (52.0%) or soft (38.1%) food. One high school student replied that he usually eats soft food. The time to eat was longer than breakfast and then dinner, but it was less than 30 minutes ever for dinner. Middle-Ages ad an average time to spend eating of fewer than 10 minutes for breakfast, 14 minutes for lunch, and 22 minutes for dinner. Middle ages had shorter meal times in all than students. Form the results of the participants; we wondered if they did not chew food very well because they eat soft food in a short time.


2003 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 30-40 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jacqueline M. Lamb ◽  
Kathryn R. Puskar ◽  
Susan Sereika ◽  
Kathy Patterson ◽  
Judith A. Kaufmann

Anger and aggression in school children are a major concern in American society today. Students with high anger levels and poor cognitive processing skills are at risk for poor relationships, underachievement in school, and health problems. This article describes characteristics of children who are at risk for high anger levels and aggression as well as those who are able to modulate their anger. Results of a survey are reported which describe levels of anger in 624 rural high school students. This sample reported lower levels of anger, compared to the normative group. Differences among the sample include higher internal anger expression in girls, higher trait anger in boys ages 15–16, and higher trait anger in girls ages 16–17. Recommendations are made for future research and specific steps that school nurses can take.


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