The development and enhancement of alliances among universities, industry, and government is widely seen as a prescription for strengthening the competitiveness of regional and national economies. The interaction of university and industrial scientists is examined, and whether the creation of Ontario's Centres of Excellence should serve as a model…

Presents a contrastive text-linguistic study of rhetorical differences between texts written by academics with different cultural backgrounds, but using as a means of expression the same language: English. Results indicate that Anglo-American writers use more metatext than Spanish-speaking writers, seem more concerned with orienting the reader,…

A discussion of comparative higher education looks at the types of comparative studies that can be attempted, and whether they must test pre-constructed hypotheses. Some of these hypotheses are outlined. The contributions of a current international comparative study (United Kingdom, Norway, Sweden) are examined. (MSE)

In Canada's Exemplary Schools Project, a national committee designed and coordinated 21 case studies. A committee member recounts decisions made about design and method, and highlights differences between method and methodology, as well as variations in conceptualization of qualitative research. Discusses the meaning of "exemplary,"…

A guide for college faculty who have never written research reports for journal publication outlines the rationale for writing such reports, outlines difficulties in getting published initially, explains factors that may contribute to failure of a research project, and provides specific procedures for producing a publishable paper. Advice…

Describes the Okapi projects and the work of the Centre for Interactive Systems Research at the City University of London (England). Okapi, an experimental text retrieval system, has been used as the basis for a series of projects addressing aspects of user information-seeking behavior and user-system interaction, as well as system design.…

Discusses the use of transaction logging in Okapi-related projects to allow search algorithms and user interfaces to be investigated, evaluated, and compared. A series of examples is presented, illustrating logging software for character-based and graphical user interface systems, and demonstrating the usefulness of relational database management…

Describes development and implementation of the IEA (International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Assessment) Preprimary Project, a cross-national study of early childhood education and care. (BB)

Investigates the development of a perception of values in childhood. Perception of values is defined as being different than those of morality and conventions. Responses to seven scenarios are analyzed. Concludes that there is a distinct concept of values among children and that the instinct for this increases with age. (KO)

Points out inadequacies in the numeric data set that accompanied the Supplementary Empirical Teaching Units in Political Science (SETUPS) monograph on the U.S. Supreme Court. Suggests that the data not be used for research purposes but notes they may be utilized as a teaching tool in discussing quantitative methods of analysis relative to Supreme…

Study of 10 exemplary research university faculty found their guiding principles for balancing research and teaching included a life centered on primary concerns, commitment to teaching, a sense of interdependence between teaching and research, self-improvement as a way of life, seizing opportunities, persistence, avoidance of politics and gossip,…

The use of graduate student support groups to complement the academic advisor's role and reduce students' sense of isolation is examined, particularly for female graduate students. Intersection of research on collaborative groups for thesis-writing and on gender-related communication patterns is examined to suggest how such groups can be…

Describes the implementation and evaluation of a nondirected student research project that aimed at acquainting students with some of the procedures used by physicists in the real world. Outlines specific project designs used by the students. (JRH)

Librarians from three regional campuses of Kent State University examine cooperative learning as an alternative to a lecture format for bibliographic instruction. The results of a research project comparing the effectiveness of cooperative learning and traditional methods are presented. Discussion includes problems in the evaluation process; steps…

Describes a study at a Michigan high school that investigated elements that contributed to a meaningful library research task. Highlights include information literacy; students' feelings of satisfaction and achievement; student questionnaires and student and teacher interviews; group work; and process instruction. (LRW)