Space Of Higher Education Research Articles

A Study Exploring Learners' Informal Learning Space Behaviors, Attitudes, and Preferences

What makes a successful informal learning space is a topic in need of further research. The body of discourse on informal space design is drawn from learning theory, placemaking, and architecture, with a need for understanding of the synergy between the three. Findings from a longitudinal, quantitative, and qualitative study at Sheffield Hallam University, explore learners' behaviors, attitudes, and preferences toward informal learning spaces in higher education, within and outside of the context of the academic library. The learning spaces study contributes to the discourse on informal learning spaces design by producing a typology of nine learning space preference attributes which address aspects of learning theory, placemaking, and architecture. The typology can be used to evaluate existing spaces and inform redevelopment of informal learning spaces in higher education institutions. Implementing the typology will be subject to localized conditions, but at Sheffield Hallam University the key conclusions have included developing a portfolio of discrete, interrelated learning environments, offering spaces with a clear identity and encouraging students to translate their learning preferences into space selection.

Market orientation: the key to the future of virtual universities

Nowadays, universities are making a great effort orienting their strategies to the market. In this line, they are adopting new technologies and even offering virtual degrees. This research tries to analyse whether the market orientation of virtual universities leads them to increase student’s trust towards the institution, the affective and calculative commitment of the students and, in summary, the future intention to use of the services that University provides. These issues are of great interest because of the increasing competition in educational market brought by the European Space for Higher Education and widely use of new technologies.

Transforming spaces and identities: the contributions of professional staff to learning spaces in higher education

Staff are a university's key resource. Typically, research has concentrated on the contribution of academic staff, and has largely overlooked the crucial role of professional staff. However, recently there has been an increase in research by professional staff, about professional staff. In Australia, professional staff comprise more than half the higher education workforce, and a more rigorous understanding is needed of the contribution that professional staff make towards the strategic goals of their institutions. This paper explores the work of professional staff, focusing on the contributions that this group of staff makes to the design, development and maintenance of learning spaces, both physical and virtual. This research is part of ongoing doctoral research into the work of professional staff at one Australian university. Following a preliminary framing study, a case study was undertaken using semi-structured interviews with a range of professional staff. Emerging from these interviews is a conceptualisation of the work of professional staff in relation to student outcomes, from the perspective of professional staff themselves. This research is illuminating the working lives of professional staff, the changing and increasing complexity of their roles, and the contributions professional staff make to their institution's student outcomes.

Developing learning spaces in higher education: An evaluation of experimental spaces at the University of Leicester

Consideration of the physical environment in which learning takes place has become a growing area of academic interest over the past decade. This study focuses on the experiences and perceptions of academic staff and students who used three refurbished, and innovative, learning spaces at the University of Leicester. The results suggest that the physical environment can have an impact on the emotional and motivational experiences of students and staff. However, there is some suggestion that learning space development should not be at the expense of approaches to pedagogy which do not foreground the use of technologies.The analysis of the users' experiences leads to the proposition of a theoretical model for the apt design of future learning spaces in Higher Education. The DEEP learning space framework outlines the need for careful consideration being given to dynamic, engaging, ecological and participatory (DEEP) dimensions within the twenty-first century learning space.

Adaptation of a computer programming course to the ESHE requirements: evaluation five years later

In the academic year 2010–2011, Spain finished the process of introducing the regulatory changes derived from the Bologna Declaration and the new European Space for Higher Education (ESHE). These changes have implied the updating of university degrees’ structure as well as the inclusion of the European Credit Transfer System (ECTS). This paper describes the process of adaptation of two basic first-semester core subjects of computer engineering to one of the basic aspects of the ESHE, the adoption of the ECTS. The process described in the paper was developed in the framework of the pilot plan undertaken by the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona between 2005 and 2010. The proposed course design implies a better coordination and integration of the contents of two different subjects that students follow simultaneously, and it is based on the combination of project-based learning and cooperative learning. After the experience finished, an extended quantitative and qualitative analysis of the academic results over the five-year period has shown an improvement in the students’ learning outcomes.

ANALYSIS OF VALUES AND ATTITUDES ON MORAL ISSUES IN UNIVERSITY STUDENTS POSTGRADUATE

The present study aims to provide an analysis of values and attitudes in a sample of post-graduate students and to provide an assessment of the impact and satisfaction that they had been reported in specific educational activities for solidarity. This study is framed by the project of educational innovation "A cross sectional study in education for solidarity in the training of psychologists and educators" (PIE 10-127; 2010-2012). Participants were 226 post-graduate students belonging to various specialities of the MSc in Teaching of Secondary Education and High School, Vocational Training, and Teaching Languages, aged between 22 and 49 years. The data obtained demonstrate that the majority of the interviewes strongly agree with aspects of the situation that can be considered stealing, a violent action or the avoidance of conflict. Most students graduate participants do not collaborate with NGOs; who mention the lack of time, the issue not being raised as well as not being involved in any solidarity activity noting as reasons: lack of information, idleness, not having the opportunity presented and not having the funds to do so. In addition, students have found these educational activities for solidarity very satisfactory, for example, the "discussions, work and reflection on the importance of volunteerism and solidarity in the present world" and “design of a solidarity act”. Key words: basic competence, European space of higher education, evaluation of values and attitudes, university students.

Curricula Design Based on Competencies in Romanian Higher Education

With the Bologna Declaration, educational systems of a great number of European countries are living a changing process, with the common goal to create a European space for higher education in order to enhance the employability and mobility of citizen and to increase the international competitiveness of European higher education. In our paper we propose a new vision on competencies system design in Romanian higher education. We explain how educational system can be transformed and adapted based on companies’ requests and also on European educational requirements. Other objectives of our paper are to define the basic competencies of graduated students after Bologna process, to define the competencies required by employers to graduated students and to classify general competencies for each year of study. This new vision and competencies design are able to harmonize academic requirements and labor market demands in Romania with European space in the context of labor migration in Europe.

Una plataforma internacional de apoyo a la docencia basada en noticias

The new educational context defined by the European Space for Higher Education (ESHE) encourages the student’s autonomous work, that requires new tools for enhancing the information access. In this paper we present iCollege , an educational platform that is able to recover relevant information from international breaking news and present it classified; easing the burden of students’ and lecturers’ work. Furthermore, it promotes the student reading habit in other languages, facilitates the integration of foreign visiting students and shows the different viewpoints that the international press media publishes about a topic. Due to the integration with the Content Management System it encourages the students’ collaborative work while helping the supervision and grading for the lecturers.

Leadership and Learning Landscapes: the Struggle for the Idea of the University

This paper focuses on the academic involvement in the design and delivery of new teaching and learning spaces in higher education. The findings are based on research conducted at 12 universities within the United Kingdom. The paper examines the nature of academic involvement in the design and decision-making process of pedagogic space design, revealing some of the complexities and the tensions within this area of academic leadership. The research found that innovation and creativity on particular projects is often restricted by the project management decision-making processes and that broader institutional aims are often underplayed once the design process goes into project mode. The paper concludes by calling for greater academic involvement in the design process in ways that allow for critical reflexivity based on discussions around the concept of ‘the idea of the university’.

Engineers’ spatial orientation ability development at the European Space for Higher Education

The aim of this research was to determine whether the new geographic information technologies, included as teaching objectives in the new European Space for Higher Education Engineering degrees, develop spatial abilities. Bearing this in mind, a first year seminar using the INSPIRE Geoportal (Infrastructure for Spatial Information in Europe) was designed, involving 46 engineering students from the University of La Laguna. The spatial orientation ability development was analysed through statistical inference methods, using the Perspective Taking/Spatial Orientation Test.

Proposals to Improve the Legal and Linguistic Learning In a Bilingual Classroom: Applying in the European Space for Higher Education Some Practical Guidelines Drawn from a Teaching Experience in the U.S.

This paper presents a series of suggestions on how to maximize the legal and linguistic learning of Spanish-speaking students who are going to take a class on international contracts using English as an additional language. The degree of success in terms of learning given by the various techniques and tools proposed in this paper has been contrasted by the author in the opposite fact pattern: American students who have completed a course on international contracts also using the Spanish language the classroom. The option of learning international contracts from a multilingual perspective is gaining importance in the Spanish University, as it should be able to provide effective responses to the challenges of the European Space for Higher Education. In addition, the feedback obtained in this foreign experience on international contracts can be exported and applied to the study of other legal disciplines at European/Spanish law schools.

The adaptation of the studies of Law to the EHEA: the experience of the pilot groups in the subjects of Administrative Law I and II in the Faculty of Law of the University of Malaga

This article gives notice of the experience carried out at the Law Faculty of the University of Málaga to anticipate the implementation of the European Space for Higher Education (ESHE). The author has been in charge of two subjects, Administrative Law I and II, for 3rd and 4th year undergraduate Law students. The methodology put into effect received the general label of “pilot groups”. It has consisted of fashioning small groups (up to 50) of students who voluntarily wanted to participate in the ESHE way of teaching before the implementation of the new Syllabus for Law Degree in the University of Málaga. The use of the case method and a more comprehension-oriented style of education was a big challenge, taking into consideration the strong academic tradition in Spanish Law Schools, but the results achieved have been a success and a stimulant experience for the imminent, generalized introduction of the ESHE. The surveys passed onto the students by the Centro Andaluz de Prospectiva, an external, independent higher education quality controller,show a remarkable degree of satisfaction.

Reflections on the Bologna Process: the making of an Asia Pacific Higher Education Area

The Brisbane Communiqué's goals and initiatives seem to follow the Bologna Process' normative path towards the creation of a common regional higher education space. However, comparing demography, socio-economics, student mobility, political economy framework and the initiatives undertaken by both the Brisbane Communiqué and the Bologna Process show both a convergence and a divergence between the two participating regional groups of countries. A number of rationales were pointed out why the Bologna Process cannot simply be emulated within the region but can only serve as an example. This includes the different demographic and socio-economic make-up of the Asia Pacific region, the fact that the region, especially with China and Korea, account for the significant number of outbound student mobility, and the divergence of the two initiatives’ evolutionary paths.

The Disruptive Dialogue Project: Crafting Critical Space in Higher Education

The Disruptive Dialogue Project (DDP) is a dialogic network of education scholars committed to fostering conversations that trouble normative practices of critical qualitative scholarship, pedagogy, and methodology, within an interstice of the contemporary educational inquiry landscape. In this essay, we describe the origins of the DDP as well as present a conceptual framework of the Project based on four spatial understandings of our disruptive activity (i.e., the DDP space as energy, alternative, critique, and possibility). Building on this conceptual model, we provide an overview two specific strategies / spaces the DDP intentionally cultivates as means of transformation and resilience – “disruptive” academic conference symposia and bi-weekly DDP teleconferences –and discuss the role these activities play in the development of our critical colleagueship. Our intent in sharing the DDP narrative is not to promote imitation of our project, but rather to encourage other critical scholars to create, seek out, produce and pull apart interstices of their own; spaces that disrupt the hegemonic narratives of educational research and faculty life.

An Experience of Educational Innovation for the Collaborative Learning in Software Engineering

This paper describes the experience in collaborative learning based educational innovation for the Software Engineering Subject at the Telecommunications Engineering School of the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid. We describe the context of evolution of the Software Engineering related subjects in the Masterâ??s degree in Telecommunications Engineering (specialization in Telematics) for their adaptation to the educational and organizational postulates of the European Space for Higher Education. In this context, we describe a pilot project for the adaptation of the Software Engineering Lab course, which includes the development and validation of a software engineering tool environment and a web platform for collaborative work.

The Role of Outside Affordances in Developing Expertise in Online Collaborative Learning

Web 2.0 tools have introduced a dynamic aspect to learning in contemporary classrooms. Pre-service teachers require expertise in the use of these spaces. The metaphor of outsideness—engaging with distant peers using Web 2.0 tools—has affordances that support the development of this expertise. In this paper, a conceptual framework is outlined that links a model of developing expertise with the affordances of outsideness and a case study of pre-service teacher education is used to demonstrate the framework’s possibilities and limitations. Implications are drawn for the use of online collaborative spaces in higher education.

European Educational Programmes as a Bridge over Troubled European-Israeli Water

EU-Israeli trade relations appear to be comprehensive and close. Yet these developed relations should not conceal the true colours of European-Israeli socio-political relations, relations that are characterized too often by ignorance, stereotyping, mistrust, and tension. This state of affairs adversely affects the ability of both the European Union (EU) and the State of Israel to fully realize the enormous potential of their relations. This article focuses, in abstracto and in concreto, on the means by which higher educational cooperation can alleviate that state of affairs to a certain extent, analysed through an International Relations (IR) perspective, drawing on the experience gained in intra-Community and inter-Community contexts. This article, however, also places emphasis on the limitations inherent in such cooperation in terms of forging regional, European-Israel affinity, limitations that are derived, inter alia, from the somewhat heterogeneous nature of the European higher education space.

Assessment of the online forum

In the last decade, not only the advances in educational investigation but also the reforms promoted in the European Space of Higher Education, have brought about a change in the concept of learning, and in consequence, in the evaluation. However, the evaluation is today a task which is still unfinished in the Spanish university, in which the greater part of the teachers evaluate practically exclusively through a final exam based of memorised questions (Zabalza, 2003; Bonson and Benito, 2005). This traditional model is more obvious in online teaching. In this study we propose the integration of this new model of evaluation in the e-learning Moodle Platform and we propose the online forum as a communication tool with wide possibilities for didactic innovation and for the assessment from an alternative approach. We also offer a proposal to assess the online forum via an instrument like the rubric.

Adapting software engineering teaching to the new European space for higher education: a case study

The new context of the European space for higher education (ESHE) implies changes to traditional teaching methods. Teaching will become student-centred and students will participate more actively in their learning. Though these changes have not been implemented yet, an adaptation process to the new philosophy becomes necessary. This paper presents a case study of the adaptation process of the Software Engineering course for Computer Science undergraduate students at the Pontifical University. We explain how to organise this subject using innovative teaching and assessment methods and tools, and how to adapt the traditional syllabus to the ESHE requirements.

An Innovative Educational Project at the University of Granada

The European Space of Higher Education (ESHE) is a new conceptual formulation of the organization of teaching at the university, largely involving the development of new training models based on the individual student’s work. In this context, the University of Granada has approved two plans of Educational Excellence to promote a culture of quality and stimulate excellence in teaching. The Area of Environmental Technology in the Department of Civil Engineering has developed an innovative project entitled Application of new Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) to the Area of Environmental Technology teaching to create a new communication channel consisting of a Web site that benefits teacher and student (“Environmental Studies Centre”: http://cem.ugr.es). Through this interactive page, teachers can conduct supervised teaching, and students will have the tools necessary for guiding their learning process, according to their capacities and possibilities. However, the material is designed to serve as a complement to the traditional method of attended teaching.