Toward Systemic Transformation in Education

In this conclusion, the authors consider steps toward systemic transformation in education. They offer proposals for relation-enriching actions in the classroom, the whole school, the community, higher education institutions, and beyond. In the classroom, the authors emphasize the art of inquiring, the art of listening, the art of appreciation, and the art of disagreeing; in the whole school, they advocate a relational ethos and the development of a culture of inquiry and collaboration, participative decision-making, and relational responsibility; in the community, they propose that parents should be co-learners and co-authors of the educational narrative and that neighborhood institutions should serve as school’s learning partners; in the case of higher education institutions, the authors stress these institutions’ role in expanding students’ learning and supporting teachers’ professional development. Finally, the authors point out that a systemic transformation in education invites a globally shared inquiry into new ways living together.

A Case Study of Teaching High-level Reflection to Teachers: Dissecting My Failing Journey

While the teacher education literature stressed the importance of teachers’ reflection for the purpose of their professional growth, very few focus on teacher’s personal intellectual growth, intelligent dispositions. In fact, teacher educators are concerned about teachers’ anti-intellectualism, as most teachers stay at their comfort zone and resistant against complex higher order thinking. This case study is an attempt to showcase how to enhance teachers’ intellectual growth in the university classrooms. Using Valli’s typology of reflections, this study first identifies what level of reflections teachers engage, and documents what attempts I, as a teacher educator, made to promote higher order thinking. The finding confirms the existing literature that teachers tend to engage in pragmatic/practical thinking, and are not ready, or not willing, to take up a deeper level of intellectual reflections. My efforts to cultivate a culture of inquiry became unsuccessful, because teachers’ practicality-oriented mindset conflicts with my goal of promoting nonpragmatic inquiry, i.e., higher order thinking. This study leaves an implication for teacher educators: Teacher education curriculum oughts to undergo a paradigmatic change from pragmatic inquiry into non-pragmatic inquiry to allow teachers beyond the normative framework, and nourish teachers’ intellectual life.

Leadership

Chapter 9 identifies specific leadership blind spots that frequently emerge as TNGOs move to adopt more ambitious mandates and implement strategic changes to secure organizational relevance and legitimacy. Traditional leadership in the sector has often lacked a culture of inquiry while also struggling to work in an environment of growing complexity and ambiguity. While organizations in crisis may be tempted to rely on charismatic leaders and their promises, new leadership models emphasize shared, distributed forms of leadership, post-heroic leadership styles, collaborative skills, humble personalities, a capacity to self-reflect and identify personal needs, and a focus on results, credit-sharing, and the building of authentic relationships. There is growing consensus around a shift in leadership needs, but sectoral norms tend to relegate leadership development to an area of underinvestment and neglect.

INQUIRY AS A KEY TO DEEPER LEARNING

In spite of the fact that critical thinking is a vital skill not only during studying at university but in everyday life either, students are often unprepared for critically thinking when they start their studies. That is why it is so necessary to explain how to use practical strategies for developing these skills for a successful academic life. First of all, teachers should always bear in mind Bloom’s Taxonomy as it helps them to find the correct way for teaching showing the nearest and the furthest goals in their work. The levels start from the simplest and go to the most complicated ones showing that no one can acquire a higher level without mastering the lower ones and that their acquiring is necessary for bringing up critically thinking students. Creating a culture of inquiry is constant work which grows problem-solving learners with deeper understanding of important knowledge. Being convinced that a significant tool for creating a culture of inquiry is essential questions that drive and motivate learning, the authors have designed some recommendations that can encourage inquiry-based learning process and involve students in it. As inquiry-based learning elevates students’ autonomy and collaboration, and helps to create a culture focused on researching rather than reproducing information, the authors consider that teachers should focus on question formulation technique. Besides, four phases of inquiry-based learning have been distinguished and described in details.

Implementation Science in Nutrition: Concepts and Frameworks for an Emerging Field of Science and Practice

Malnutrition in all its forms has risen on global and national agendas in recent years because of the recognition of its magnitude and its consequences for a wide range of human, social, and economic outcomes. Although the WHO, national governments, and other organizations have endorsed targets and identified appropriate policies, programs, and interventions, a major challenge lies in implementing these with the scale and quality needed to achieve population impact. This paper presents an approach to implementation science in nutrition (ISN) that builds upon concepts developed in other policy domains and addresses critical gaps in linking knowledge to effective action. ISN is defined here as an interdisciplinary body of theory, knowledge, frameworks, tools, and approaches whose purpose is to strengthen implementation quality and impact. It includes a wide range of methods and approaches to identify and address implementation bottlenecks; means to identify, evaluate, and scale up implementation innovations; and strategies to enhance the utilization of existing knowledge, tools, and frameworks based on the evolving science of implementation. The ISN framework recognizes that quality implementation requires alignment across 5 domains: the intervention, policy, or innovation being implemented; the implementing organization(s); the enabling environment of policies and stakeholders; the individuals, households, and communities of interest; and the strategies and decision processes used at various stages of the implementation process. The success of aligning these domains through implementation research requires a culture of inquiry, evaluation, learning, and response among program implementers; an action-oriented mission among the research partners; continuity of funding for implementation research; and resolving inherent tensions between program implementation and research. The Society for Implementation Science in Nutrition is a recently established membership society to advance the science and practice of nutrition implementation at various scales and in varied contexts.

Developing a Measure of Students’ Potential Involvement in Scholarly Activities

Background: Pharmacy schools must encourage a culture of inquiry so future pharmacists approach practice in a scholarly fashion. Objectives: To develop an instrument measuring intentions to engage in various scholarly activities. Methods: Items representing scholarly activities relevant to pharmacists were developed. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was used to refine the list and identify underlying factors. Internal consistency was examined using Cronbach’s alpha. Results were compared across student characteristics using unpaired t tests and 1-way analysis of variance. Key Findings: The initial list of 54 items was reduced to 31 after review and then administered to 381 pharmacy students (337 complete responses; 88% response rate). EFA suggested 3 factors with 4 items being removed due to low factor loadings. The final Potential Involvement in Scholarly Activities (PISA) instrument contained 27 items in 3 domains: research activities (13 items), professional writing (9 items), and practice evaluation/quality improvement (5 items). Cronbach’s alphas were ≥0.85 for the total scale and domains. PISA scores were statistically higher for first-year students and those with previous research experience or post-graduate training interests. Conclusions: Initial development of the PISA instrument suggested a 3-factor structure with acceptable internal consistency in this sample. Continued work is needed to examine the instrument in more diverse samples.