scholarly journals A Comparison of Undergraduate Students’ Perception of Tutorials Before and During the COVID-19: A Case of the University of Kwazulu-Natal in the Discipline of Public Governance

2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 217
Author(s):  
Jabulani Nyawo

Enhancing students’ learning experience through support structures such as tutorial sessions is essential.  Students attending the tutorial sessions within the Discipline of Public Governance have never been given the opportunity to provide feedback on the sessions they have attended. They only get a chance to evaluate their lecturers using closed and open-ended questions to capture their learning experiences about modules’ structure, content, delivery and assessments. This implied a need to explore the students’ perceptions about the tutorial sessions during the normal conditions and under severe conditions like this of COVID-19. The quantitative approach was utilised and the data was collected through the distribution of questionnaires to the undergraduate students. The participants attended tutorials within the Discipline of Public Governance during the first semester of the year 2020. The study findings indicated that tutorial sessions occupy a critical role in students' development and learning. It is the platform for the students to easily interact with other students, discuss issues, and improve their performance. The study recommends that higher education institutions invest in the tutorial structure as one of the student support systems as it produces positive results in enhancing student learning. Redefining and reviewing the tutorial support structure is always crucial to improve the tutorial sessions' quality. 

Author(s):  
Abd AlKhaleq Muhammad Al-Zyoud

This study aimed at exploring the level of academic freedom at the Hashemite University in Jordan from the perspective of the undergraduate students, and whether there are impacts of the students’ gender, academic level, or specialization. The sample consisted of (376) undergraduate students (111 male, 265 female), who are registered at the university for the first semester of the academic year 2019/2020, from all faculties of the Hashemite University. The results showed that 25.5% of participants perceived a high level of academic freedom, 57.2% of participants perceived a moderate level, and 17.3% of them perceived a low level. Significant differences were found due to academic level; academic freedom perceived level among senior students was higher than all other years (freshmen, sophomores and juniors), but no significant differences were found due to students’ gender, or specialization. In light of the study results, the researcher recommends a number of recommendations such as: raising the awareness about the academic freedom among the students, faculty members, and the staff the Jordanian universities, conducting survey studies that measure the level of academic freedom among the students at various Jordanian universities, Supporting the academic freedom of the students at the institutions of higher education through deliberate and planned initiatives.


2019 ◽  
Vol 43 (3) ◽  
pp. 397-400
Author(s):  
P. K. Rangachari

Twenty-eight undergraduate students in a health sciences program volunteered for an exercise in the history of examinations. They had completed a second-year course in anatomy and physiology in which they studied modern texts and took standard contemporary exams. For this historical “experiment,” students studied selected chapters from two 19th century physiology texts (by Foster M. A Textbook of Physiology, 1895; and Broussais FJV. A Treatise on Physiology Applied to Pathology, 1828). They then took a 1-h-long exam in which they answered two essay-type questions set by Thomas Henry Huxley for second-year medical students at the University of London in 1853 and 1857. These were selected from a question bank provided by Dr. P. Mazumdar (University of Toronto). A questionnaire probed their contrasting experiences. Many wrote thoughtful, reflective comments on the exercise, which not only gave them an insight into the difficulties faced by students in the past, but also proved to be a valuable learning experience (average score: 8.6 ± 1.6 SD).


Author(s):  
Veronica Sanchez-Romaguera ◽  
Robert A Phillips

Drawing from several years of experience, this work describes lessons learnt in designing, delivering and assessing two interdisciplinary enterprise units offered undergraduate students from any discipline studing at the University of Manchester (UK). Both units are electives (optional). One unit is delivered to first year undergrdaute students whereas the other unit is delivered to third/fourth year undergraduate students. Experiential learning and interdisciplinary cohorts are core aspects of both units. Students work on ‘real-world’ projects to develop a credible and competitive solution within a tight dead-line. In this paper, findings are drawn from data collected from staff and teaching assistants observations, students’ reflective diaries and students’ feedback. Findings showed that in general, students at both levels, year 1 and year 3/4, regarded the experience challenging at first due to the ‘unusual’ learning environment when compared to the education that most students have experienced prior to the units here discussed. However, most students highly regarded the interdisciplinary experiential learning experience. The paper contributes to the growth of knowledge and aids understanding of how experiential learning and interdisciplinarity have been effectively combined and introduced in the university curriculum. Although this works focused on enterprise education the experience-based guidance here described is also applicable to a much wider range of situations and academic areas of study. Keywords: Enterprise and Entrepreneurship Education; Employability; Experiential learning; Interdisciplinary education;


2017 ◽  
Vol 2 (5) ◽  
pp. 127
Author(s):  
Mazni Saad ◽  
Rosita Husain ◽  
Wan Nurul Fatimah Wan Mohamad Nawi ◽  
Nafiza Mahyuddin

This study investigates the expected learning experience that determines their desire to further their studies at the same university. A cross sectional analysis was done on 190 undergraduate students in a public higher learning institution. Their opinions were sought regarding the present quality of services offered by the university. The students were very concerned about the quality of teaching, their lecturers and the facilities on offer, and more so the course fees structure, technology, and support systems. There is a need to look again at some of the major complaints addressed, which could guarantee the return of these students to its doorstep.Keywords: Satisfaction; learning experience; quality services; private university; Malaysia.ISSN: 2398-4287© 2017. The Authors. Published for AMER ABRA by e-International Publishing House, Ltd., UK. This is an open access article under the CC BYNC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Peer–review under responsibility of AMER (Association of Malaysian Environment-Behaviour Researchers), ABRA (Association of Behavioural Researchers on Asians) and cE-Bs (Centre for Environment-Behaviour Studies), Faculty of Architecture, Planning & Surveying, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Malaysia.


2021 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 129-139
Author(s):  
S Akuma ◽  
H Abakpa

Students’ academic performance in the university environment changes from one academic year to another as they climb up the ladder of their academic programme. Predicting students’ academic performance in higher educational institutions is challenging due to the lack of a central database of students’ performance records. The other challenge is the lack of standard methods for predicting students’ performance and other moderating factors like physical, economic and health that affect students’ progress. In this work, we predicted students’ performance based on previous academic results. A model to predict students’ performance based on their Cumulative Grade Point Average (CGPA) was developed using Linear Regression Algorithm. A dataset of 70 undergraduate students studying Computer Science was analyzed and the results show that the model was able to predict the 4th year CGPA of the Students using the previous Cumulative Grade Point of the past three years with an accuracy of 87.84%, and a correlation of 0.9338. This study also identified students’ second semester CGPA in the first year and their first semester CGPA in the second year as the most important CGPAs that affect the accuracy


Author(s):  
William W. Melek ◽  
Gordon D. Stubley

This paper presents the main findings of recent experience in teaching open-ended design workshops for 3rd year undergraduate students at the Department of Mechanical and Mechatronics Engineering of the University of Waterloo. The paper offers several observations gathered from teaching this course two consecutive years with different classroom lecture format and project(s) scope/expectations. Based on a comparative study between the two offerings, we identify several strategies that contributed to a more enhanced learning experience during the modified course offering. Keywords: open-ended design, evaluation criteria, design workshop


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Liam Langford ◽  
James Pearce ◽  
Shane Lenson

Introduction:Numerous challenges can impede the quality of ambulance service clinical placements for undergraduate paramedicine students. Inspired by positive results from a nursing facilitator model, this study reports on a collaboration between an Australian university and ambulance service that piloted a paramedic clinical facilitator for undergraduate paramedic students during their ambulance clinical placements. The objective of this study is to describe the experiences of a clinical facilitator model for undergraduate paramedicine students during ambulance clinical placements.Methods:Two focus groups with a total of 11 paramedic student participants were conducted, as well as two semi-structured interviews with a total of three paramedic preceptors. Purposive sampling was used to recruit participants. Thematic analysis was used to code and identify themes in the data.Results:Three broad, over-arching themes arise from the data; 1.) Increased educational opportunities, 2.) Improved clinical placement management, and 3.) Greater student support and welfare. Both students and paramedic preceptors felt that the paramedic clinical facilitator model improved the quality of ambulance clinical placements for undergraduate paramedicine students. Conclusion:This study suggests that a paramedic clinical facilitator model may improve the quality of ambulance service clinical placements for undergraduate paramedicine students, leading to a more positive learning experience. Universities and ambulance services could consider implementing a paramedic facilitator model for ambulance clinical placements.


2014 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 23-38 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barbara Anne Sen ◽  
Pamela McKinney

Reflective writing is a key professional skill, and the University of Sheffield Information School seeks to develop this skill in our students through the use of reflective assessments. Reflection has been used as a means of supporting Information Literacy development in the Higher Education context and recent pedagogical IL frameworks highlight the important role of reflection. This paper presents an analysis of Undergraduate students’ reflective writing on one module. The writing is mapped against two models of reflection to understand the nature and depth of the students’ reflection and through this understand their Information literacy development, with the overall aim of improving the teaching and learning experience for the future. Key findings are that students did reflect deeply and identified a number of ways in which they felt their IL had developed (e.g. developing a knowledge of specialist sources), ways they could have improved their information literacy practices (e.g. through storing information in a more organised fashion), and ways that we could improve our teaching (e.g. by providing appropriate scaffolding for the activities).


2020 ◽  
Vol 202 ◽  
pp. 15018
Author(s):  
Heriyanto ◽  
Yanuar Yoga Prasetyawan ◽  
Ika Krismayani

Information comes in different forms, and it influences people’s preference in finding and using information. The covid 19 pandemic which has been experienced by Indonesian undergraduate students may have provide new ways on how they looking and using information related to their study. This qualitative study explores the distance learning experience of undergraduate students in one of the University in Semarang during their study from home. It aims to identify how these students have developed their remote study as well as their strategies on searching and using information. A qualitative method was employed by applying semi-structured interviews for collecting data. The data then analyzed by using Thematic Analysis to uncover the pattern of the distance experience of the students. The preliminary findings show that most of the participants have some issues on using optimizing the learning systems, however they finally able to build their own strategies to cope with this new situation. Electronic resources becomes their main information resources because accessing the physical library building is no longer an option. These preliminary findings benefit not only for the next process of the research but also to inform university library about the way undergraduate students experience information resources so that it can be used for the library for developing their information services to students.


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