Academic Restructuring Research Articles

Academic Restructuring Towards Flexible Learning in Philippine Pharmacy Education

Academic Restructuring Towards Flexible Learning in Philippine Pharmacy Education

Developing the Next Generation of Nursing Disciplinary Leaders in Higher Education: Protocol for a Sequential Mixed Methods Study.

Leading nurse education and research in the higher education (HE) sector has become increasingly challenging over the last decade with many universities in Australia and New Zealand having undergone academic restructuring. The future of HE faces many challenges including recruitment of suitably qualified staff to lead teaching and research and advance professional disciplines. Increasing cultural diversity of the Nursing workforce and the communities' nurses serve, and the identification of cultural attributes in the context of racial inequities exposed by the pandemic and the climate emergency suggest different forms of leadership may be required in the future by those leading nurse education in the HE sector. Currently, there is a dearth of research evidence that identifies the qualities, behaviors, and characteristics (collectively identified as core attributes) required by nurse academic leaders. This research aims to identify an evidenced based set of core attributes that are required to lead the discipline of Nursing in the Australian and New Zealand HE sectors. This research is using a 2-phase sequential mixed methods design incorporating a scoping review; and Delphi technique. In phase 1, a scoping review will be undertaken to identify the qualities, behaviors, and characteristics that can influence the evolution of the next generation of academic nurse leaders. A set of draft statements and questions will be prepared based on analysis of findings from the review. Phase 2 uses Delphi technique consisting of e-survey rounds with experts in leading nursing faculties in Australia and New Zealand. An Expert Advisory Group will consider the initial set of draft statements and questions from phase 1. Consistent with Delphi technique, a series of "rounds" will then occur using an e-survey method. Established leaders (Professors and Associate Professors who are members of the Council of Deans Australia and New Zealand) will rate their level of agreement to statements on the qualities, behaviors, and characteristics required to lead the discipline of nursing in the HE sector in Australia and New Zealand. The findings of the scoping review will identify what is currently known about the qualities, behaviors, and characteristics of academic nurse leaders. Quantitative and qualitative results from the Delphi study will initially be reported in separate manuscripts for publication. It is projected that a final paper will be prepared from aggregated research data and outline how the findings can inform the preparation of future academic nurse leaders. The generation of an evidenced-based set of core attributes will serve to inform the next generation of academic nurse leaders including informing recruitment processes and postgraduate nurse leadership programs. It is anticipated that the data sets and findings will be transferrable to other disciplines within HE to aid in future-proofing discipline-based expertise and leadership in the context of academic restructure. PRR1-10.2196/40677.

Restructuring of Academic Tracks to Create Successful Career Paths for the Faculty of Rutgers Biomedical and Health Sciences.

BackgroundWe report faculty affairs lessons from the formation and academic restructuring of Rutgers Biomedical and Health Sciences. Our approach may be a blueprint for development of a new track system that can be adapted by other institutions, after consideration of their own special circumstances.MethodsWe created new Appointments and Promotions guidelines consisting of one Tenure Track and four Non-Tenure Tracks, each with different missions. We restructured faculty performance evaluations to include mission-based criteria, an expanded rating scale, and specific expectations. After negotiating these new processes with our faculty union, we enacted central oversight to ensure uniform application of these processes and their associated criteria. We communicated the guidelines and the evaluation system widely. We created programs for universal mentoring, publishing education, diversity, and faculty development.ResultsAll faculty in our seven schools went through track selection. Anxiety and incomplete understanding improved after implementation. Evaluations with expectations for the following year and an expanded scale for more nuanced assessment served as mentoring tools. Requirements for mentor assignments and diversity education created an atmosphere of nurturing and inclusion. Publications, extramural support, and faculty satisfaction increased after implementation of the guidelines.ConclusionLessons included the need to review and learn from guidelines at other institutions, to create tracks that align with different jobs, the necessity for central oversight for uniform application of criteria, the need for extensive and frequent communication with faculty, and that fear of change is only reduced after evidence of success of a new structure. The most important lesson was that faculty rise to expectations when clear, ambitious criteria are delineated and universally applied.

Limites para afiliação à vida acadêmica de estudantes de camadas populares no contexto de expansão universitária

Resumo Este trabalho objetiva compreender a trajetória acadêmica de estudantes de camadas populares, no curso de engenharia elétrica, criado no contexto de expansão universitária. Em termos teóricos, a pesquisa se apoia nos conceitos de habitus e disposições, nas perspectivas apresentadas por Bourdieu e Lahire; nas noções de integração e afiliação universitária, formuladas, respectivamente, por Tinto e Coulon e nos estudos sobre trajetórias escolares improváveis. Em um total de 99 estudantes, foram identificados nove como pertencentes às camadas populares, dos quais oito participaram da construção dos retratos sociológicos que buscou compreender quais disposições e tipos de comportamentos foram condicionantes para o ingresso e para o processo de integração e afiliação ao ensino superior. A expansão de vagas bem como a reformulação dos processos seletivos para ingresso na instituição são questões estruturais que favoreceram a chegada desses estudantes em um curso considerado de alto prestígio social. Entretanto, a ausência de uma restruturação acadêmica capaz de acolher estudantes de diferentes origens sociais se mostra como fator contrário à democratização real do ensino superior. Além disso, a conclusão da educação básica, embora tenha permitido o acesso ao curso, parece não ter dotado os estudantes de competências, habilidades e conhecimentos necessários à afiliação ao ensino superior. Portanto, questões escolares estruturais, originárias ainda na educação básica, se colocam como um obstáculo para o sucesso universitário. Nesse sentido, a pedagogia racional bem como a pedagogia da afiliação parecem apontar para uma reestruturação universitária, em uma perspectiva inclusiva.

The Changing Nature of Academic Work: Canadian Universities and the Flexible Firm Model

Though much literature has been produced on the topic of academic restructuring, those works concerned with the Canadian context have mainly focused on issues of corporate­university linkages, the role of state coordination of public universities, and the disparity between funding and student enrollment. Very little work has been done in documenting or analysing the role of adjunct faculty, who now make up nearly half the university faculty, in Canadian universities. Statistics Canada has only once collected data on part­time faculty, and only one current analysis of this data has been conducted (Omiecinski, 2003). The Canadian Association of University Teachers, furthermore, only publishes data concerning full­time faculty members. The implications of an emerging division between the use of full­time and part­time faculty on the nature of academic work and the quality of post­secondary education has been yet unexamined. Drawing on labour market segmentation theory, this study presents the multiple ways in which the work of academic staff in Canadian post­secondary education has conformed to the principles of the flexible firm model, first observed of private business firms in the 1980s by John Atkinson. A series of semi­structured interviews with academic faculty and administrators, as well as a collection of current secondary source data, informed the basis of this research. It was found that the changing nature of academic work in post­ secondary education is negatively affecting the quality of undergraduate education provided in Canada.

The Changing Nature of Academic Work: Canadian Universities and the Flexible Firm Model

Though much literature has been produced on the topic of academic restructuring, those works concerned with the Canadian context have mainly focused on issues of corporate­university linkages, the role of state coordination of public universities, and the disparity between funding and student enrollment. Very little work has been done in documenting or analysing the role of adjunct faculty, who now make up nearly half the university faculty, in Canadian universities. Statistics Canada has only once collected data on part­time faculty, and only one current analysis of this data has been conducted (Omiecinski, 2003). The Canadian Association of University Teachers, furthermore, only publishes data concerning full­time faculty members. The implications of an emerging division between the use of full­time and part­time faculty on the nature of academic work and the quality of post­secondary education has been yet unexamined. Drawing on labour market segmentation theory, this study presents the multiple ways in which the work of academic staff in Canadian post­secondary education has conformed to the principles of the flexible firm model, first observed of private business firms in the 1980s by John Atkinson. A series of semi­structured interviews with academic faculty and administrators, as well as a collection of current secondary source data, informed the basis of this research. It was found that the changing nature of academic work in post­ secondary education is negatively affecting the quality of undergraduate education provided in Canada.

Whatever Happened to Art and Design?: Using Archival Practice to Manage the Impact of Academic Restructuring on Institutional Repositories

ABSTRACT. In the interest of providing access to and preserving scholarship produced by faculty, students and staff, many universities have developed and implemented institutional repositories. Repositories are often organized into communities that correspond to campus units, including departments, research centers and institutes, and administrative offices. Universities, however, frequently undergo academic restructuring, which can make repository organization out of sync with university organization. This article addresses the impact of academic restructuring on repositories and looks to practices from archival arrangement and description to create repository organizational structures and community descriptions flexible enough to reflect university organization, despite changes arising from academic restructuring.

Rethinking STEM Education: An Interdisciplinary STEAM Curriculum

The State University of New York at Potsdam, with support from Lockheed Martin, has developed a multidisciplinary program intended to foster creative thinking by combining studies in the arts, humanities, and STEM fields. The College has a long tradition of innovative education in the arts, natural and social sciences, computer science, and mathematics. This “STEAM” approach will support the development of versatile professionals for the evolving workplace. To develop this program, a team of STEAM faculty members examined existing literature on the development of creativity as well as multidisciplinary models in industry, business, and education. Through academic restructuring of traditional educational models, this curriculum will be at the forefront of engaging learners in team-based multidisciplinary problem solving through mentoring, learning communities, research projects, and partnerships with outside agencies. The program is a model for the education of scientists who will be able to create innovations in modern science and technology necessary to address the complex problems facing human society.

Creeping Capitalism and Academic Culture at a Canadian Law School

This paper considers the influence of academic restructuring associated with neo-liberal postsecondary policies on the culture of law schools and legal scholarship in Canada. It offers empirical data from a case study of the Faculty of Law at the University of British Columbia. This paper examines the impact of the changing Canadian political economy on the scholarship and culture at the law school and explores the implications for professional autonomy and academic freedom. The findings suggest that, at the time of data collection (2002-2004), the changing political economy had not (yet) affected the law school at the University of British Columbia in the same manner as other jurisdictions and disciplines described in the literature. The data shows that law professors who participated in the study experienced increasing pressures associated with corporatization, commodification and marketization in the larger university, however they consistently described high levels of academic freedom and professional autonomy over their work and scholarship. While there is some evidence of the transformation of academic culture associated with economic restructuring there is also evidence that law professors at this school have maintained control over the direction of their intellectual scholarship.Cet article se penche sur l’influence de la restructuration académique associée aux politiques postsecondaires néo-libérales sur la culture au sein des écoles de droit et sur les études juridiques au Canada. Il présente des données empiriques à partir d’une étude de cas de la Faculté de droit à l’Université de Colombie- Britannique. L’article examine l’impact de l’économie politique canadienne changeante sur l’érudition et la culture à l’école de droit et explore ce que cela implique pour l’autonomie professionnelle et la liberté de l’enseignement. Les résultats suggèrent qu’au moment de la collecte des données (2002-2004), l’économie politique changeante n’avait pas (encore) eut d’effet sur l’école de droit à l’Université de Colombie-Britannique de la même façon que dans d’autres secteurs et d’autres disciplines décrites dans la littérature. Les données indiquent que les professeurs de droit qui ont participé à l’étude sentaient des pressions croissantes associées à la corporatisation, la commercialisation et la marchandisation à l’université dans son ensemble, toutefois ils ont décrit régulièrement de hauts niveaux de liberté de l’enseignement et d’autonomie professionnelle par rapport à leur travail et leurs études. Quoiqu’il existe de l’évidence de la transformation de la culture académique associée à la restructuration économique, il y a aussi de l’évidence que les professeurs de droit de cette école ont maintenu le contrôle de l’orientation de leur travail intellectuel.

Sociologists in Research, Applied, and Policy Settings: Bringing Professionals in from the Cold

Historically, U.S. sociologists employed outside the professoriate had lower status and were less likely to be considered professionals than those inside. Academic restructuring may result in a closing of the status gap. This article, based on the responses of 600 PhD sociologists employed in applied, research, and policy positions, focuses on whether historically agreed upon professional characteristics, such as use of specialized knowledge, autonomy, ethical norms, and basic research, are related to overall job satisfaction and satisfaction with economic security. We expected that professional characteristics were significantly related to overall satisfaction, but not to satisfaction with economic security. Our expectations were generally met. Respondents used sociological theories, methods, and concepts to analyze social issues, design interventions, and evaluate solutions. Professional job characteristics result in higher job satisfaction, when other factors are held constant. In contrast, professional characteristics do not significantly increase satisfaction with economic security; rather sector; occupation, and age cohort appear to do so.

Emphasizing Performance Goals and High-Quality Education for All Students

Schools of the future will involve parents, will empower principals and teachers, will emphasize early childhood education, and will strengthen curricula in mathematics, science, English, foreign languages, and the social sciences, Mr. Cavazos predicts. Most of all, schools of the future will have more sensitivity to the differing needs of an increasingly diverse population. WHEN President Ronald Reagan asked me to join his Cabinet as secretary of education, I was delighted. My involvement in elementary and secondary education had been minimal, but I knew that our public elementary and secondary schools needed revitalization and restructuring. I was especially interested in enhancing the education of minorities. This aim had been a major focus of my tenure as a medical school dean and a university president. With my appointment as secretary, I brought to the office many years of experience in medical, graduate, and undergraduate education and a sharp focus on minority education. Growing up in Texas, I received my early childhood education in two schools. One was a two-room school on a South Texas ranch, and the other was in a small town nearby. In both places, the school was a justified source of local pride. When I joined the Cabinet, I believed that the nation's future depended on what happened in the schoolhouse, and I remain convinced that there is no more important job than the education of our children. When I assumed office, I knew that the major item on my agenda as secretary would be to provide leadership at the federal level that would help improve our public elementary and secondary education system. It was obvious to me that I would have to create an alliance of people committed to enhancing education. This alliance would have to include teachers, parents, students, school administrators, school board members, governors, and businesspeople. I believed then and I still believe that education is the source that nurtures the freedoms we enjoy in all aspects of our lives. The idea of universal education, which spread across America in the 19th century, thanks to the pioneering efforts of Horace Mann, was critical for the building of a prosperous and democratic nation. As secretary I sought to have all Americans renew their commitment to universal education. I wanted to ensure that all people -- regardless of race, gender, disabilities, or economic circumstances -- would have access to schools of excellence. During my tenure as secretary, I found that many educators, parents, employers, and teachers were aware of the need to enhance our school systems, and they worked diligently to improve the system. The need for this renewal had long been acknowledged. In 1983, under the leadership of Secretary Terrel Bell, the department published A Nation at Risk, which urged us to find ways to improve education. Still, up to the time of my appointment, the nation had failed to undertake the thorough restructuring needed to reverse our educational decline. By restructuring, I mean fundamental, radical changes in the organization of our schools. The ultimate purpose of restructuring is to create schools that continuously change and adapt in response to the needs of both students and society. To me, academic restructuring is not an end but a process, leading to constant renewal of both schools and teaching. The precise nature of these changes must depend on local conditions and circumstances, but they have only one purpose: to allow parents, teachers, and administrators to respond to the needs of students rather than to the requirements of a bureaucracy. Prior to my appointment, many efforts had been made to improve education, but we seemed to have just tinkered around the margins of real reform. Significant improvement of students' performance had not occurred. Perhaps my major achievement as secretary and the principal issue that confronted me during my tenure was the establishment of the national education performance goals. …

The Meaning of Tradition: An Introduction

Call it tradition or not, end-times bring on reflection, new-times prompt forecast Folklorists who might study and themselves are imbued with tradition, according to Alan Jabbour who introduced the 100th anniversary of the American Society in 1988, embraced the occasion of a centennial to on the ancestral missions that have shaped us, the inherited values that we reflect and must radiate into the future (Jabbour 1988: vii). Leaving behind the twentieth in 2000 predictably ushered in another wave of reflection on folklore's fundamental principles. Even before the calendar turned to that magical number ballyhooed by the popular press, folklorists anticipated change with several anniversary celebrations that inspired them to look back to the forces that gave birth to their subject and ahead to challenges as scholarship matures and society changes. Eight years after the American Society's centennial celebration, the 150th anniversary in 1996 of the coining of the English word presaged a round of symposia on folklore's fate as the ended (Brown 1996). Special issues of journals appeared heralding renewed efforts to locate folklore's study in scholarship and identify its core values (Feintuch 1995; Harlow 1998). All kinds of revisiting were apparent. The ground broken by Toward New Perspectives in (Paredes and Bauman 1972) rated a twenty-year retrospective with the philosophical title theorizing folklore in the journal Western (Briggs and Shuman 1993). The perspectives hailed by organizers of an applied meeting at Point Park, Pennsylvania, was the subject of Point Park Revisited (1998), a special issue of the Journal of Research. The Historian in 1996 took up On (Not) Defining with bows to Stith Thompson's stock-taking essay Folklore at Mid-- century (Baker 1996). Maybe it was the feeling that more than a turn and a reason for revisiting, but something on the order of a catapult into a new millennium brought the rhetoric of reflection to the level of crisis (Kirshenblatt-Gimblett 1998). With apocalyptic overtones of millennium beliefs, some scholars could not resist the temptation to speculate on the end of folklore (Toelken 1998; see also Kirshenblatt-Gimblett 1996; Bendix 1998). The twentieth has passed and is still here. In fact, there is reason in some quarters for optimism. theory ripples through a widening circle of fields, including recently planted ones of cultural studies, gender studies, whiteness studies, and organizational development. More presses than ever before seek out books on and folklife, and the Internet has become a hotbed of transmission. Federal endowments have folklorists at their helm; news of academic appointments and public programs resounds through the fraternity. Whether one views as half empty or half full, serious questions remain. Whether a time of reflection or crisis, it is avowedly a period of restructuring. One place for restructuring is in communication, as the Internet and wireless broadcasting have led to rethinking of performance as a face-- to-face or localized encounter. Even as some observers bemoan the loss of intimacy in community and group, others note the reclustering of networks by shared, and often overlapping, interests that engender folklore. Another source of restructuring is increased mobility which has on the one hand informed ideas of transnationalism and globalism, and on the other encouraged reunions, festive occasions, and temporary communities worthy of folkloristic attention. Yet another is an academic restructuring as disciplines once devoted to an uplifting intellectual mission ally themselves, fragment, and reconfigure in response to populist, post-modern, post-sentimental pressures by which a dizzying array of popular expressive forms from advertisements to zoos become symbolic cultural texts. …

Academic restructuring: Organizational change and institutional imperatives

A perennial challenge for universities and colleges isto keep pace with knowledge change by reconsideringtheir structural and resource commitments to variousknowledge areas. Reflecting upon changes in theacademic landscape of public higher education in theUnited States over the past quarter of a century, theauthor diagnoses a macro-trend whereby the dominantlegitimating idea of public higher education haschanged from higher education as a social institutionto higher education as an industry. Threeinterrelated mechanisms are identified as havingadvanced this process: academic management, academicconsumerism, and academic stratification. This pattern of academic restructuring reflects multiple institutional pressures. Whilepublic universities and colleges have increasinglycome to rely on market discourse and managerialapproaches in order to demonstrate responsiveness toeconomic exigencies, they may end up losing legitimacyas they move away from their historical character,functions, and accumulated heritage as educationalinstitutions. Thus, responsiveness to compellingeconomic pressures that dominate contemporaryorganizational imperatives in an attempt to gainlegitimacy in one dimension may result in loss for another.Wholesale adaptation to market pressures and managerialrationales could thereby subsume thediscourse about the future of colleges anduniversities within a logic of economic rationality ata detriment to the longer-term educational legaciesand democratic interests that have long characterizedAmerican public education.

Research Mentoring in a Changing Environment: A Case Study

ABSTRACT Mentoring, as an arrangement for academic and professional development in higher education, is a relatively recent innovation. Planned and structured collegial support has been seen to serve two functions, these being of a compensatory and nurturant kind. The case study, reported here, is distinctive in that it discusses research mentoring in an institution undergoing significant academic restructuring. The nature of the project was one in which the mentor/mentees relationship was developed in recognition of the participants being peers but having experienced different academic histories. The process was seen to be a generative one which passed through four stages: initiation; cultivation; separation and redefinition. The study is coauthored by all participants in the process and can be represented as reflexive inquiry as it captures the growing awareness and insightfulness of each person playing out his or her roles. In this sense, then, the paper is a reflective evaluation of the process rather...

Being Productive, Being Clever: The Enchanted Forest of Intellectual Property

Government rhetoric and policies exhort Australian universities to be ‘productive’ and to build a ‘clever country’. Academic award restructuring is an important element in this re-shaping of Australian higher education, although the increasingly fashionable term ‘intellectual property’ enters higher education discourse and re-defines academic labour and the ways in which academics perceive themselves and their roles. It is argued that the term intellectual property carries within it a range of meanings extending beyond the legal world of patent and copyright and that this privatising and capitalising discourse has the capacity to transform universities. The individualising and formalising of academic labour goes against the tradition of university collegiality and, crucially, contradicts the processes by which ideas and skills are constituted within a university. Inappropriate intellectual property discourse has the potential to devalue university work by positing a model drawn from the world of the managerialists within the bureaucracy and private sector.

Towards Total Quality Management in Higher Education at Aston University?a case study

The theme of ‘Quality’ has been embedded in Aston University's strategic plans for long term success during a decade of change brought about by the national policy to restructure the British Higher Education system. The philosophy and techniques of Quality Management have been applied as a means of ensuring continuous improvement and progress towards Aston's mission to be a leading technological university. The strategic plan has led to major projects including academic restructuring to ensure that departments cover disciplines consistent with the mission, and the provision of a high quality support infrastructure. The plan for growth is rooted in the concepts of understanding who the ‘customers’ are, in understanding their needs and serving them well. The formation of a Quality Council has marked a further stage in the realisation of an integrated Quality Management programme. The purpose of the Council is to review the University's processes and Critical Success Factors in order to identify key areas for improvement. An extensive education and training programme has been launched and there has been experimentation with the vital Quality Management technique of ‘Quality Function Deployment’.

The Academic Restructuring of British and German Universities and Greater Efficiency: a comparative perspective

Abstract The paper describes, on a comparative basis, the approaches to, and the methods and effects of, academic restructuring in the universities of the United Kingdom and the Federal Republic of Germany, which has become necessary in the light of dwindling resources. The aim is to rationalise provision in order to achieve greater efficiency. To that effect courses and departments have been, or may be, closed or combined, and institutions may have to merge or even close. On the other hand, selective steps have been taken in both countries to protect and strengthen science and technology, especially research in these areas. The article also analyses the differences and similarities of such measures, given the underlying different traditions and conditions. It highlights, in particular, the role of the governments or their agencies in the implementation of such policies.

Archaeology beyond Anthropology

Archaeology‘s relationship to anthropology in the United States has been one of a natural and beneficial alliance. Archaeologists are currently showing more of an interest in formal models drawn from outside anthropology, but the classification of American archaeology as a subdiscipline in anthropology generally remains unquestioned. We argue that at the present time archaeological research is being hindered by its institutionalized relationship to anthropology and its uncritical use of models from other disciplines. Archaeologists will make the greatest theoretical progress if they view their discipline as an autonomous technique with no a priori ties to sociocultural anthropology. Archaeology as a technique makes possible a truly interdisciplinary research base, but requires in turn a reorganization of research and training procedure as well as an academic restructuring.