Student support is a key focus within the widening participation agenda, as effective support enhances retention and success. However, student support is not well defined in higher education, which is problematic as it is difficult to measure success if stakeholders have different definitions. Without clear boundaries in student support, educators…

For second language learners, an international experience can have positive effects on language learning and intercultural development even when participating in a program of relatively short duration. One issue which has not yet received attention is the potential impact that the study abroad experience may have on social participation and…

Students are often frustrated and confused by the study of leadership since the field cannot offer an agreed-upon definition of the construct. Students are expected to develop leadership skills without understanding what leadership actually is. The Leadership Exploration Project is a multiweek exercise that gives late undergraduate or graduate…

The neoliberal system in Chile has caused socio-educational inequities which have been evidenced by the poor academic results of public school students in national and international standardized tests in Math, Language, Science, and English. These inequities and academic results call for preparing teachers to help diminish disparities in the…

Competency-based education (CBE) is the hot new thing in higher education. While forms of CBE have been around since the 1970s, there has been a surge of interest in CBE, with more than 600 postsecondary institutions now reporting that they are either offering competency-based degree programs or are planning to do so. Similarly, institutional…

Although competency-based education (CBE) has existed since the early 1970s adult-focused degree programs, interest in CBE has spiked in recent years due to the increased attention on higher education affordability and accountability. This article reviews the extant literature on CBE to address the following questions: (a) What are the definitions…

This chapter explains the meaning of meaning-making for the quarterlife generation. It describes what is called the meaning-quest--consisting of nine core meaning-making questions--and offers two examples of the pedagogy that the authors use in working with students.

A critical task for peace pedagogy is to challenge views of peace as primarily responses to declared war. Crisis-based politics tend to focus on exceptional situations and fail to capture the entire spectrum of violence. Premised on the idea that peace cannot be understood in isolation of larger structural problems, this paper proposes the concept…

College and University faculty members have increasingly adopted experiential learning teaching methods that are designed to engage students in the learning process. Experiential learning is simply defined as "hands-on" learning and may involve any of the following activities: service learning, applied learning in the discipline,…

The California Community Foundation's Promises That Count Initiative supports the development, implementation, and continuous improvement of College Promise efforts in Los Angeles County (L.A. County). Promises That Count activities will include research, technical assistance, the development of a professional learning community, and a series of…

This paper explores how a preservice teacher defined, experienced, and transacted with multiple professional communities in becoming a social justice-minded urban English teacher. It extends research on urban teachers and professional communities by arguing that professional community in relation to urban teachers must be informed by…

Committed to developing an institution-wide intercultural competence curriculum for master's-level students preparing for international careers, a team of nine professors from across disciplines deliberated for a year on their fundamental understandings of intercultural competence and what it would mean to facilitate the development of that…

The world of work is changing profoundly, at a time when the global economy is not creating a sufficient number of jobs. Many documents issued by the EU and various researches, carried out by companies and human resources experts, point out that the so-called "soft" skills are closely connected with employability, particularly for young…

Massive open online courses (MOOCs) continue to attract press coverage as they change almost daily in their format, number of registrations, and potential for credentialing. An enticing aspect of the MOOC is its global reach. In this paper, we will focus on a type of MOOC called a cMOOC because it is based on the theory of connectivism and fits…

As the coauthor (with Susan Dean) of a formally for-profit and now open (i.e., free on the web) textbook, "Collaborative Statistics," this author has received many questions about open educational resources (OER), which can be summarized as follows: (1) What are OER?; (2) Why do you support, actively promote, and speak about OER?; (3) If a book is…