The 21st century economy is driven by information and communication technologies (ICT). This change has made innovation, manufacturing and production of products and services, rather than manufacturing of material goods, the driving force of economies of leading countries (Wagner, 2008). Due to this shift, today's 21st century society and…

This paper presents a Change Leadership Framework and applies the framework to the role of leadership in a State Education Agency (SEA) in setting the conditions for change to accelerate student learning. These conditions include the way the SEA directs its own change and the way it inspires and leads constructive change in districts and schools.…

This "FOCUS Technical Brief" summarizes a paper recently published in the open-access journal Implementation Science1 (Stone & Lane, 2012). The full paper presents a conceptual framework that integrates all three knowledge-generating methods--scientific research (R), engineering development (D), and industry production (P)--into a…

A teaching innovation for first year engineering students' was designed to involve inquiry-based questions, an electronic graphical medium, small group activity and modifications to assessment. The use of an inquiry approach was intended to encourage students' deeper engagement with mathematics and more conceptual understanding. Data were…

In this article, the author discusses the transformative power of care. In the interest of achieving some modicum of clarity, the author begins with a definition of the word "care." For each of the different school constituencies, there exist categories of actions through which educators demonstrate care. Broadly, these categories include:…

Introduction: The growing population of elderly people is impacting on overstretched dental services in many countries, as many individuals are retaining natural teeth and may have dentures or implants, all of which influence the way in which the oral cavity must be cared for. A major difficulty for older residents is their decreasing level of…

"Chalk and talk" had been the staple pedagogical approach of my Science teaching practice since entering the profession. I felt that there was a great deal of information that I must impart to my students. My tried and tested way to deliver information to my students had always been simply to stand in front of them and tell it to them... So what…

This paper is a response to Hoban and Neilsen's (2010) Five Rs model for understanding how learners engage with slowmation. An alternative model (the Learning MMAEPER Model) that builds on the 5Rs model is explained in terms of its use in secondary science preservice teacher education. To probe into the surface and deep learning that can occur…

The Higher Education Academy (HEA) is committed to enhancing the quality of learning and teaching for all university students in the UK, and the inaugural conference for the Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) subjects, held in April 2012 at Imperial College, London, aimed to showcase research and evidence-based educational…

Historically, distance education applications served a select group of students through self-paced technical short courses that required scant to little interaction with their instructors. Today's 21st century distance education focuses on a) reaching underserved prospective students within a social justice framework, b) global recruitment, and c)…

This study presents the design, effect and utility of using audiovisual material containing real images of dissected human cadavers as an innovative educational strategy (IES) in the teaching of Human Anatomy. The goal is to familiarize students with the practice of dissection and to transmit the importance and necessity of this discipline, while…

Recent debates question the extent to which adopting an educational innovation requires compromise between the innovation's original design and the adoption site's context. Through compromises, the innovation's fundamental principles may be transferred, transformed, or abandoned. This paper analyzes such compromises during the piloting of…

This article briefly summarizes findings from a review of 95 empirical studies of games used in instruction. The article suggests that such efforts are best assessed as transfer from game play to performance on external tasks that are targeted by the instruction. Review findings suggest that such transfer may be expected only if the cognitive…

There is a growing consensus that the United States and its regions, including the Midwest region, will increasingly compete on innovation. This also is widely recognized in the business world. There is also growing consensus that innovation talent--the human talent to drive and support innovation--will be a major key. Despite this consensus,…

University career counsellors invest a lot of time and effort in the development of the skills and knowledge associated with self-reliance in job interviews. The resource-intensive nature of this approach needs to be reconsidered in the context of overall careers service delivery. More specifically, the key barriers to achieving a competent degree…