Institutional Ethos Research Articles

Professionalising Teaching Practice in Higher Education: A study of disciplinary variation and 'teaching-scholarship'

There has been extensive research in the last few years on adapting teaching to differences among learners, on the social and institutional context of teaching in higher education and, more recently, on the theory and methods of research on teaching. Less attention has been paid to how academics from different discipline areas actually prefer to engage in teaching-scholarship. The terms 'teaching-scholarship' and the 'scholarship of teaching' are used interchangeably in this article to include both ongoing learning about teaching and the demonstration of teaching knowledge. Most studies in this regard have been normative or descriptive. The 'professionalisation' of teaching practice in higher education is becoming more important as universities try to respond to an increasingly diverse and discerning student population, issues relating to standards and quality, growing international competition, and generally 'doing more with less'. This study sought to inquire into the relationship between a number of factors that characterise academics working in higher education and their approaches to the scholarship of teaching. Findings from this exploratory study suggest that discipline and teaching conceptualisation have the strongest influence on teaching scholarship, while qualifications and years of teaching have a moderate impact, and gender and post do not appear to play a significant part. General strategies in support of teaching scholarship that emerge from the study and the literature relate to the importance of educational and organisational development. Future investigations might examine institutional ethos, work distribution and climate factors and their relationship to promoting teaching scholarship in different types of higher education institutions.

Zoo city: Bourgeois values and scientific culture in the industrial landscape

The modern zoological garden developed in the nineteenth century as a site of instruction for the urban populace. In particular, the dual visions of bourgeois respectability and modern science shaped the institutional ethos of zoological gardens and, consequently, the spatial form of the site. Both visions dictated standards of decorum in exhibition design, the arrangement of exhibits, and the location of the zoo site in the city. The path of instruction from zoo directors to audience, however, was not unilateral. Rather, popular expectations of animal behaviour led zoo directors to broaden their standards of exhibition. One standard that remained throughout the nineteenth century was that the world was organized hierarchically between species, between humankind and animals, and between the contentious class structure of the industrial city.

Tradition, Culture and Ethos: The Impact of the Further and Higher Education Act (1992) on Sixth Form Colleges and Their Futures

The Further and Higher Education Act (F and HE Act) (1992) brought two very different sorts of post-16 education institutions into one sector. For sixth form colleges (SF colleges), the transition to independent status appears to have been more problematic than it does for further education (FE) colleges. This paper draws on interviews with a sample of SF college principals to try to establish how the origins and traditions of SF colleges which have given rise to a particular sort of institutional ethos might act as a barrier to the sorts of changes which the F and HE Act sought to bring about. These changes were in accord with the embedding of Thatcherite principles of choice and competition through the workings of the market. This paper attempts to show how the ethos of SF colleges is at odds with those principles and questions whether such changes are positive changes.

Creating a New Patient-Provider Relationship: A Personal Challenge

The Challenge of a New Ethos In his article, Promisekeeping: An Institutional Ethos for Healthcare Today, David Thomasma has laid down what may be the most important challenge facing the leaders of healthcare institutions today. Put as simply as possible, it is to create a new patient-provider relationship that works in the best interests of the patient at a time when a torrent of trends and incentives threaten to sweep those interests aside. This challenge is not directed at the healthcare system as a collective, and it does not have an academic, global, or visionary ring to it. Rather, it is rooted in the sometimes harsh reality that there is no systematic way to resolve the conflict between the apparent lack of resources to care for people and the human hope, instinct, and expectation of healthcare. In fact, for all the discussion of managed care, the delivery of medical services remains largely an episode-illness and injury-encounter mechanism. Although some of the building blocks of this new patient-provider ethos can be expressed in institutional policies and protocols, giving the idea a presence in today's chaotic healthcare environment is a deeply personal challenge, touching on the most basic individual values. It is far easier to create rules for disclosure, processes for appeals, and methods for electing ethics committees within health plans than it is to instill a culture of promisekeeping that will work across healthcare settings and over time. Thomasma has clearly identified the choices that will confront everyone from caregivers at the bedside to executive, physician, and governance leaders every time they look a patient or a community in the eye. As we pay closer attention to the relation of clinical interventions and economics, we must design effective ways to give a voice to those who actually provide the care and those who receive it. The Voice of the Patient The last four words deserve particular emphasis because Thomasma has put his finger squarely on the element of this new ethos that we are doing the least about: talking with our patients in particular and the public in general about how the changes in the delivery of and payment for healthcare services will affect them. Some of this is intentional, but much of it, I think, stems from a tradition of mystery and unspoken promises that has surrounded healing institutions and professions. From the point of view of the provider, the tradition's unspoken promises were that patients were always receiving the highest quality of care and the best efforts of the caregivers; of course we were doing the right things and doing them well. From the patient's perspective, the trust in physicians and institutions was traditionally strong. Hospitals were mysterious places-the public seldom saw what went on behind the scenes and had little or no understanding of the complex systems and relationships on which the patient care process was built. But all that has changed. Beginning in the 1980s, the federal government released Medicare mortality data and the public got its first real glimpse behind the mystery. That data raised legitimate questions about the comparative quality of care being delivered to elderly Americans, and, although it sent shock waves through the field, it broke an ancient barrier. Many sectors of the public-patients, government, business, insurers, and the media, to name a few-wanted to know more about what we do and how we do it. They began, in fact, to ask the question Thomasma poses as one of his central points: Are we doing the right things and doing them well? Regrettably, our track record at initiating a dialogue with the public has been weak. We relied on the traditional trust I mentioned earlier, even though it was eroding beneath our feet. No matter what cost constraints government or insurers levied, we assured the public that we always kept the quality of care high. When a severe nurse shortage occurred a decade ago, we again assured everyone that the quality of care never was affected. …

Promisekeeping: An Institutional Ethos for Healthcare Today

The relationship between a physician and a patient, which survived unchanged for decades--indeed centuries--has in recent years undergone a serious change due to the advent of managed care. Controlling costs and maximizing profits are now as equally important as medical concerns, and ethical, economic, and political issues have forever changed the way physicians perform their duties. This article proposes the concept of promisekeeping as a remedy to the sometimes contradictory positions in which patients and providers find themselves. Composed of honesty, explicit disclosure, flexible decision making, and, most of all, beneficence, promisekeeping is one method to ensure that all parties in the managed care system can succeed.

Sensitizing Mental Hygiene Therapy Aides to the Needs of Patients' Relatives

Over the past decade we have witnessed a paradigmatic shift in our notions about families of chronic mentally ill persons. A number of publications have highlighted the burdens and needs of such families ( 1-4), and innovative programs designed to enhance coping skills have proven useful to both patients and their relatives (5-8). When located in hospital settings, these programs must be integrated within an institutional ethos that fosters respect for relatives as potential allies in treatment rather than one based on an adversarial or pathogenic view of families. As part of an attempt to create such an ethos, the Family Support Project was implemented in the fall of 1985 at the Buffalo (N.Y.) Psychiatric Center (9). In discussions with patients’ relatives it became apparent that the attitudes and behaviors ofmental hygiene therapy aides (known in other states as mental health aides or nurses’ aides) can have enormous impact on relatives who may well have more face-to-face contact with these aides than with any of the professional members of the treatment team. A 1985 survey of250 relatives of

Toward a flexible methodology in studying media meaning:Dynastyin Norway

Determining the “meaning” of a media event is a complex and mutlifacited endeavor. Recent communication literature has argued that meaning can be elicited and/or inferred from media consumers. While consumers certainly are a very relevant part of the process, other issues, most notably institutional economics and cultural ethos, are very important in understanding the media‐meaning process. This article explores the relationship among these variables and suggests that communication researchers must adopt a flexible methodology capable of considering all relevant forces. The case of Norway's broadcasting of the U. S. television series Dynasty is used to help illustrate certain of these premises.

The Parent-Student-University Relationship:

The importance of a widely understood and accepted institutional ethos which informs the endeavors of all who work with students and their parents can hardly be overstated. Student affairs professional must work to ensure that the values, goals, and expectations of the institution are evaluated in light of information about student development needs, clarified for everyone involved in the educational venture, and widely promulgated within the institution and to students and their parents. Ongoing consultation among student affairs staff is necessary to ensure equitable and timely delivery of services and the manifestation of established values at every level of the institution.

2. The School, the Library and the Feminist

The librarian who works in a school will find that she is rubbing against rather than with the grain when she tries to practise “feminist values” in the management of the school library. In most, not all, cases, the librarian will find herself in conflict with the institutional arrangements, procedures and ethos of the school. Success in attempting to resolve these conflicts will depend more on interpersonal skills than organisational or administrative ones. Ideally, if her daily endeavours are to be positive and effective they will be a contribution to reform of the institution rather than a reaction to it.

Transition in the cotherapy dyad: To wait or not to wait

Transition within the cotherapy dyad is explored and examined in relation to institutional ethos and needs, the attitudes and needs of the psychotherapy group, and the attitudes and needs of the cotherapists. The timing of transition is discussed as are a variety of potential approaches to transition within the cotherapy dyad. Some significant dynamics which underlie the process of transition within the cotherapy dyad are examined and discussed in relation to their potential effects on the psychotherapy group and group process.