Introduction: Despite the relatively high prevalence and challenges of visual impairments, limited funding is available for ophthalmologic research in the Netherlands. The research needs of people with visual impairments could aid the ophthalmological research community to optimally distribute research resources. The objective of the study…

Professional development (PD) for graduate teaching assistants (GTAs) has been repeatedly emphasized as an essential component of future faculty training. Nonetheless, attempts to integrate PD programs into graduate curriculum are met with resistance from some stakeholders. The authors investigated stakeholders' perceptions of a novel GTA PD…

Background/Purpose: Physical education teacher education (PETE) programs have been encouraged to provide teacher candidates (TCs) with the competencies and dispositions needed to implement a variety of curriculum and instructional models. Likewise, it has been suggested that TCs should have opportunities to practice implementing such models in…

Our research is a comparative qualitative study. The material has been gathered from the cities of Helsinki and Catania. The target cities showcase varied successes and models of smart cities. In the cities, key people involved in the smart city concept--with different kinds of professional backgrounds--were interviewed, both individually and in…

There is a growing body of research interrogating the discursive construction of "rural" in negative terms--as lacking, in decline or in crisis. This paper contributes to this body of literature by taking as its point of departure skilled trades training in Canada's most easterly province, Newfoundland and Labrador. To meet the labour…

The California 4-H Science Leadership Team conducted a statewide assessment to evaluate the needs of county-based 4-H programs related to the key areas of the 4-H Science Initiative: program development and design, professional development, curricula, evaluation, partnerships, and fund development. The use of multiple qualitative data sources…

The present study investigated the needs of adult education staff pertaining to adult students' mental health issues within a local school board. The study utilized mixed-methods design and was divided into progression of three separate studies. An initial focus group was conducted to identify the 12 participants' concerns and provide a direction…

Child sexual abuse (CSA) is a global public health problem with major consequences for the individual child and society. An earlier Swedish study showed that the school nurses did not initially talk about nor mention CSA as one form of child abuse. For the child to receive adequate support, the disclosure is a precondition and is dependent on an…

Few empirical studies exist to guide researchers in determining the number of focus groups necessary for a research study. The analyses described here provide foundational evidence to help researchers in this regard. We conducted a thematic analysis of 40 focus groups on health-seeking behaviors of African American men in Durham, North Carolina.…

This qualitative case study examined how middle school science teachers conducted collaborative inquiry and reflection about students' conceptual understanding, and how individual teachers in the middle school science group acted and made reflections in response to their collaborative inquiry. It also examined external influences that affected the…

An increasing number of virtual patients (VPs) are being used in the classroom, which raises questions about how to implement VPs to improve students' satisfaction and enhance their learning. This study developed and validated a scale that measures acceptability and attitudes of medical students towards the use of the VP education tool in the…

This paper discusses the results of a qualitative study that examined the professional growth of undergraduate peer mentors as teacher leaders during an innovative Learning Community initiative designed for a teacher education program at the University of Saskatchewan. The paper describes the extent to which peer mentors exhibited characteristics…

This article focuses on a case study of internationalisation of education, a process of change pertaining to the mission, vision and delivery of education. Teachers working in international schools can be understood as gearing a student's disposition towards the ability and preparedness to handle and value differences and diversity. In an effort…

This article presents the findings from a focus group discussion conducted with first year undergraduate dance students in March 2015. The focus group concluded a cycle of action research during which the researcher explored the use of enquiry-based learning approaches to teaching dance technique in higher education. Grounded in transformative and…

This article reports on a small-scale exploratory study that examined how native-speaking English teachers (NETs) working in the Primary Native-speaking English Teacher (PNET) Scheme construct their professional identity(ies) and explored the barriers to their professionalism that exist within their role and context. Data were collected using…