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With the development of technology, the circulation of information around the world has accelerated. Journalism has now entered social media and mobile phones and has started to accompany people everywhere. The role of the media in education helps to learn, develop and keep alive a culture, and then transfer it to new generations. Media messages prepared for educational purposes aim to educate the individual and society on certain issues. The media is integrative with publications that raise awareness of the country, state and nation, make people popular, protect and protect national values. Thanks to the developing technology, politicians benefit from the educational role of the media by using new media tools as well as traditional media. In this study, the concepts of communication and media are explained in detail. In the continuation of the study, it was tried to reveal what needs to be done about the realization of a successful corporate perception management by mentioning the importance of corporate perception management in public administration by making use of the developing technology. Using content analysis, the interviews of the President of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, Ersin Tatar, in the TRNC and universities in Turkey in October 2023 were examined.

This article details an investigation into the onscreen marking (OSM) of Liberal Studies (LS) in Hong Kong--where paper-based marking (PBM) of public examinations is being phased out and wholly superseded by OSM. The study involved 14 markers who had previously rated Liberal Studies scripts on screen in the 2009 Hong Kong Advanced Level examination. In the study, the 14 markers re-marked, on paper, a number of the scripts they had marked on screen in the 2009 examination. Using multi-faceted Rasch analysis, a five-faceted design was employed, modeling markers, test takers, input questions, rating scales, and the marking medium. Results showed that all factors generally exhibited good data fit. With the major facet for investigation being the method of marking, logit values centred at zero emerged. The hypothesis that the method of marking does not intrude on scores awarded to test takers when scripts are marked on screen or on paper was therefore accepted. Since all public examinations in Hong Kong will be marked solely on screen in 2012, it is vital for professional and public confidence that the scores returned from the OSM marking system can be considered as reliable as those obtained from paper-based marking. Results from the current study suggest that this is so. Given that many countries and jurisdictions globally are considering the implementation of OSM technology--albeit not in the all-embracing manner of Hong Kong--the current study provides further validation for the worldwide adoption of such technology. (Contains 3 footnotes, 6 tables, and 1 figure.)

This paper is motivated by the idea that the study of the interplay of research and policy related to Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) in specific national contexts can contribute to global conversations about the relationships between education research and policy-making. It is written by two individuals who have been involved in various roles within the development of ESD research and policy in Cyprus. The study involved thematic analysis of all ESD policy and research documents in Cyprus from 1998 and 2017, in order to examine interactions between research and policy. Findings suggest that ESD research and policy in Cyprus empower each other, with researchers participating to on-going policy development and policy processes highlighting new directions for research. Based on these findings, we discuss the effectiveness of a participatory model for ESD research and policy processes, and the importance of situations where education policy interrupts established research traditions. Further, we highlight the danger of research being suppressed under the power of politics. We conclude that the study of the development of ESD research and policy in specific national contexts, especially beyond Western Europe and North America, can reveal the varied possibilities in the interplay of policy and research, and therefore can inform understandings of the relationships between them.

This paper examines teachers' understandings of affective indoctrination in a conflict-affected society, focusing on how teachers' political orientations are entangled with these understandings. The exploration is conducted through a qualitative study of Greek-Cypriot primary and secondary school teachers who are identified as either conservative or progressive. The findings highlight that regardless of political orientation, teachers interpret the term indoctrination through a negative lens. However, teachers of progressive orientation view affective indoctrination as a part of everyday educational practices, whereas teachers of conservative orientation understand affective indoctrination as an exceptional case. The paper discusses the implications for teaching and teacher education. The relevance of teachers' political orientation makes it all the more necessary that teachers and teacher educators delve deeper into the political and pedagogical implications of the entanglement between political orientations and understandings of affective indoctrination in schools.

Purpose: Microteaching is a teacher training method based on microclasses (groups of four or five students) and microlessons lasting no more than 5-20 min. Since it was first explored in the late 20th century in experiments at Stanford University, microteaching has evolved at the interdisciplinary level. The purpose of this paper is to examine the networks found via an analytical bibliometric study of the scientific output related with microteaching in teacher training, through a study and examination of the Web of Science database. Design/methodology/approach: This research was conducted with the VOSviewer tool for content analysis through data mining and scientific network structure mapping by means of the normalisation technique. This technique is based on the association strength indicator, which is interpreted as a measurement of the similarity of the units of analysis. Findings: Two hundred and nine articles were thus obtained from the Web of Science database. The networks generated and the connections among the various items, co-authorship and co-citation are presented in the results, which clearly indicates that there are significant authors and institutions in the field of microteaching. The largest cluster is made up of institutions such as Australian Catholic University. The most often-cited document is by Rich and Hannafin. Allen (1968), who defines microteaching as a technique based on microclasses and microlessons, is the author most often cited and has the largest number of connections. Research limitations/implications: This research's limitations concern either aspects that lie beyond the study's possibilities or goals that have proved unattainable. The second perspective, which focuses on skill transfer, contains a lower percentage of documents and therefore has a weaker central documentary structure. Lastly, the authors have also had to bear in mind the fact that the scientific output hinges upon a highly specific realm, the appearance and/or liberalisation of digital technologies and access to those technologies in the late 20th century. Originality/value: This research shows that microteaching is a promising area of research that opens up vast possibilities in higher education teacher training for application in the realm of technologies. This paper could lead to several lines of future research, such as access to and the universal design of learning from the standpoint of different communication and pedagogical models based on microteaching.

The pedagogies of fostering possibility thinking (PT) have been investigated for over a decade in early year and primary settings. This paper reports the findings of a qualitative study that sought to identify the teachers' pedagogical practices that foster children's (aged 9-10) PT through alternative resources of learning such as museums in Cyprus. Eight primary teachers took part, and the findings were compared with the existing PT literature which offers an in-depth investigation of the pedagogical features nurturing PT (time, space, learner's agency, standing back and forward). The analysis also suggests a new pedagogy (narrative improvisation) that teachers started using after the museum visit. The study provides a starting point for further research on the aspirations of pedagogies fostering PT using alternative resources of learning such as museum spaces. This paper presents the key findings of the study through a figure and ends with suggestions for further research.

This paper describes the methodological design of a qualitative research strategy that followed the bricolage approach. The research, a qualitative case study, followed the empowerment journey of 12 adult learners in a second chance educational programme, aiming at recording the mechanisms through which the learners were empowered or disempowered. The initial plan to use a single methodology was modified to address the challenges that raised from the study itself. This modification led to the implementation of the bricolage approach. Following the bricolage principles opened a space of a creative combination of different methodologies, theories, and tools and the implementation of all the five types of bricolage, namely the theoretical, the methodological, the interpretive, the narrative, and the political. The paper presents a detailed account on how bricolage was developed as a "custom-fit" construct to serve the goals of the study. Hermeneutic Phenomenology and Critical Discourse Analysis were the two main methodologies combined.

The 22nd Workshop on Aggression was held in Limassol, the 2nd second largest urban area in Cyprus, in November 22-25, 2017, and was organized by the University of Cyprus. There were five keynote speakers, eight symposia, nine paper sessions and one poster session. In total, 78 high quality individual papers were presented, covering a broad area of research fields in accordance to the theme of the workshop. The thematic focus of the 22nd Workshop on Aggression 2017 was "Contemporary perspectives on aggressive behavior: Exploring trends across the lifespan". The conference aimed to present the latest research and stimulate interdisciplinary research mainly in the fields of: (1) conventional and cyber forms of aggression; (2) personality and environmental factors of aggression; (3) neuroscience and aggression; and (4) prevention and intervention programs of aggression.

In Cyprus the introduction of printing coincided with the beginning of the British occupation. Thereafter, all printed documents had to address a multilingual audience as English, Greek, and Ottoman Turkish were in use. This article focuses on a distinctive characteristic of the local printing history namely the practice of multiscript printing and the visual appearance of multilingual documents that addressed a linguistically multifarious society. For comparative reasons two different kinds of documents are examined: multilingual administrative documents and advertisements. The analysis of the documents provides insights into the practice of multiscript printing, i.e. the technical resources (printing methods and available types), the skills of printers, and the typographic conventions applied on multilingual documents. In conjunction with archival evidence these documents become mirrors of political convictions, social norms, and commercial transactions that linked a peripheral printing trade with the European centres. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The need for self-directed learning for professional development drives an increase in the delivery of easy to use 'just-in-time' resources that respond to the often-dynamic workplace and work culture. This is especially important in the era of globalisation, when the number of employees, who are culturally diverse, increases each year. Most medium and large companies operate in an international environment, and this is due to the expansion of international enterprises with branches in various countries that requires cooperation with foreign clients, and the employment of foreign nationals in their companies. In order to guarantee the effectiveness of workings in companies, there is a need for continuous education in the aspect of the cultural diversity. This paper explores micro-learning, which focuses on delivering brevity through bite-sized learning units or short-term learning activities. Learning content in this case can take many forms, from text to interactive multimedia. These contents are often created on demand, which can sometimes be less contextualised and pedagogically informed. Based on a case study of the need for training on cultural risks in multi-cultural organisations, this paper focuses on the design of mini-games as playful learning resources for supporting an online learning platform that has been developed as a response to this training need. Fifteen mini-games have been developed to complement eight main topics related to cultural risks and to promote reflection, practice and the self-assessment of knowledge acquired through the platform. The main eight topics represent the risk areas identified that include cultural awareness, understanding different cultures, communication, learning styles, hierarchy, team-working, qualities in the working place, and stereotypes through a survey carried out with personnel (n=154) from multi-cultural organisations across five countries - Cyprus, Italy, Latvia, Poland, and the UK. The discussions include unpacking the mapping of pedagogical and gameful design considerations based on Arnab et al.'s (2015) Learning Mechanics-Game Mechanics Mapping (LMGM) model. The paper also discusses the findings from the testing of the online platform across 5 countries including 166 participants (two-step testing). The insights provided will be valuable to researchers, practitioners, designers, and developers of micro-learning resources.

This study aims to identify how feasible it is to use comparative judgement (CJ) and student judges to assess the writing performance of English language learners. For this purpose, 35 paragraphs written by the students who were enrolled in a freshman Academic Writing course at a semi-private university located in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus were selected and uploaded to http://www.nomoremarking.com website. Ten instructors of the Academic Writing course and 112 students taking the course volunteered to participate in the study. Then, the students were taken into 5 groups according to their writing performance level. In total, around 350 comparisons were done by each group. The results suggested that it could be feasible to use CJ to assess short writing performance like paragraphs if the instructors were experienced and trained. Moreover, instructors liked CJ and described it as a more practical, easier, fairer, faster, more enjoyable way of marking student papers. The students also liked CJ and it was also found that students who were high achievers in paragraph writing might be used to mark student papers through comparative judgement as long as they were trained.

Considering the potentially important influence of teachers' beliefs on their practices, the purpose of the present study was to examine what, if anything, pre-service kindergarten teachers from Greece and Cyprus had in common in terms of self-reported beliefs and self-reported practices related to the National Association for the Education of Young Children's policy statement for developmentally appropriate practices. Pearson correlations and one-way analysis of variance were used to compare overall mean scores for beliefs measured by the Teachers Beliefs Scale to those of practices measured by the Instructional Activities Scale. Research analyses revealed both similarities and differences as far as Cypriots' and Greeks' beliefs and practices are concerned. Nationality has been found to be correlated with the mean score assigned in the total survey. Further, beliefs have been found to predict self-reported practices. (Contains 3 tables.)

In qualitative doctoral research the methodological approach, and the research design are extremely important when ensuring the rigorousness of the work. This is particularly significant for all researchers, and even more for doctoral students who are still developing their research and analytical skills. This paper aims to support doctoral students in their research journey by highlighting some of the tensions involved in conducting qualitative research by unpicking the experiences of two doctoral students to learn from the concerns, questions and reflections on the use of qualitative methodology in their doctoral research projects. The findings reveal challenges and insights with regards to reflection, educational research and the developing identity of being a researcher. The paper discusses these reflections to support and guide doctoral students as early career researchers when planning and conducting qualitative research in educational settings.

Emergence and development of the blockchain technology, which is able to transform into "a most powerful disruptive innovation", shall definitely concern universities. Moreover, nowadays the blockchain technology meets the challenges that both the system of higher education and the entire society are currently facing. Advantages of the blockchain technology are decentralized open data, absence of forgeries, safe storage of information, and reduction of transaction expenses related to data checkup, control, and verification. This paper provides a critical analysis of application of the blockchain technology considering with its applicability opportunities and restrictions in education; it also aims to identify the consequences of its influence upon the development of education. The article analyzes real cases when this technology was applied, with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) as an example. The MIT applied it to protect and validate the certificates that it issued. Another example is the Sony Global Education that forms individual data on its trainees' competencies and productivity; a third one relates to the University of Nicosia, which was the first to use smart contracts and accept cryptocurrency as a form of payment. The paper also considers the elements of the blockchain technology at universities (both in Russia and outside it), which participate in massive open online courses. It determines the scope of application of this technology in the Russian educational system. In addition, this article provides a literature review related to application of the blockchain technology; the review includes works by such renowned researchers as D. Tapscott, B. Bleir, A. Watters, A. Grech, A. Camilleri, M. Swan, A. Zaslavsky, etc. The paper analyzes the obtained findings of the survey that its authors have conducted among experts, professors, and specialists involved in accreditation. Thus, the paper provides an analysis of opportunities and restrictions related to application of the blockchain technology in higher education.

This conceptual paper aims to annotate the existing practices and actions of entrepreneurial education in Cyprus and Greece educational organizations taking into account the centralized school contexts. At the same time, it presents the literature background regarding the new principal's role in the 21st century in order to provide adequate school practices and actions in recent years. Specifically, it seeks to report the entrepreneurship theory and aspects concerning current practical applications in educational organizations. Consequently, the study indicates that according to the entrepreneurial education via the educational systems has the opportunity to adapt relevant programs for leading the schools in the effectiveness and improvement.

Goal: The problem of the authenticity of teacher questions has not received sufficient attention from educational researchers interested in the intersection between dialogue and argumentation. In this paper, we adopt a definition of authentic questions as dialogical units that prompt teacher-student interactions that are both productive (i.e., several students participating) and constructive (i.e., students produce arguments of high complexity). Our goal is to analyze whether and how specific types of dialogue prompts can encourage students' engagement in more sophisticated argumentative interactions, as manifested through the construction of high-complexity arguments. Method: We describe the implementation of our analytical approach to a large corpus of classroom interactions from five European countries. The corpus was segmented into dialogical sequences, which were then coded according to the argumentation dialogue goal expressed in the sequence. We also coded students' arguments according to Toulmin's elements and distinguished between low- and high-complexity arguments from a structural point of view. Findings: Our findings show the predominance of the so-called Discovery questions as prompts that are both productive and constructive and Inquiry questions as prompts of argumentative constructive interactions. We discuss the importance of these findings for teacher professional development purposes.

This paper examines the use of vignettes as a research method in a comparative exploration of the provision for children with special educational needs across eleven countries. The investigation selected in-country researchers, who responded to questions with respect to children described in 14 vignettes. The questions related to school placement options; assessment processes; support arrangements; service provision; curriculum responses and those involved in placement decisions. The vignette findings were able to highlight differences in placement decisions between the countries; the general lack of pupil voice in decision making and the ubiquitous influence of medical categories within educational settings. The utility of using vignettes in this type of research is discussed in relation to reflecting the complex reality of educational practice in different countries.

This paper argues for establishing stronger links between educational effectiveness research and school improvement. It presents the results of a 3-year study investigating the impact of the dynamic approach (DA) to school improvement on promoting student achievement in mathematics. It explores duration (offering the DA for more than 1 year) and sustainability effects of the DA. A sample of 18 secondary schools in Cyprus participated in this study. Two experimental groups used the DA to develop their school improvement strategies. The first group employed the DA for the first 2 intervention years and was more effective than the control group in promoting mathematics achievement at the end of the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd year. Schools that made use of the DA for all 3 years were found to be the most effective at the end of the 3rd year. Implications for research, policy, and practice are discussed.

In this paper, we set out to examine children's voices on inclusion through a systematic review of empirical studies carried out in Cyprus over the past 20 years. Specifically, it focuses on research related to this field and investigates the ways in which these studies illustrate the importance of children's perspectives as a means for promoting inclusion and challenging segregational practices. The aim of such analysis is to bring to the surface the diverse ways and methodological tools in which children may be actively involved and have their voices heard. Moreover, our analysis seeks to point out the major issues raised by children with regards to areas of concern or suggestions for inclusion. In this context, the originality of this study lies in integrating findings and perspectives from the available empirical studies as well as in synthesising research findings to depict evidence on a meta-level and reveal areas in which more research is needed and to sum up suggestions for further policy-making.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to investigate school principals' leadership styles in Cyprus in relation to students' support for special education needs within the context of inclusive education. Design/methodology/approach: The original type of evidence was qualitative empirical research through the examination of four case studies in school organizations with a high number of students with special education needs. Using the interview protocol, data on school principals' leadership styles were collected from school principals and teachers. The empirical development theory method was used to analyze the data. Findings: The findings suggest that in the respective school organizations, a combination of all leadership styles can support the desired outcomes of students with special education needs, thereby promoting the inclusive education aspect in school organizations. However, there was a preference for the entrepreneurial leadership style, which connects the external leadership dimension with school principalship. Originality/value: These findings could assist in shaping a specific educational policy that includes professional development for school principals in entrepreneurship in order to support students with special education needs. Furthermore, the results could be compared to those in other contexts where school principals' leadership styles and practices are promoted in relation to the support of students with special education needs.

Although concepts such as research without borders have become more commonplace in recent decades, few studies have investigated the capabilities that global researchers require to cross both cultural and disciplinary borders. This paper explores global capabilities along with strategies and spaces that may facilitate academic researchers' acquisition and development of global research competence. The study's dataset comprises responses of 26 participants across 15 countries -- all of whom are members of a specific comparative education society -- who contributed their views via e-questionnaire. Findings indicate that research capacity building is a dynamic process and global competence calls for complex skills and conscious attitudes. Commitment to expand scientific curiosity beyond one's own culture and academic discipline appears to be a main criterion in achieving global competence. Results of this study are not meant to be prescriptive but rather exploratory and informative for a broad group of academic stakeholders.

This paper examines the extent to which teacher factors of the dynamic model of educational effectiveness can explain variation in student achievement in mathematics. It also searches for the extent to which any of these factors matters more for academically resilient students than for all the other low-socioeconomic-status students. Participants were all teachers (N = 66) of 14 schools in socioeconomically disadvantaged areas who teach mathematics to students of Grades 4-6 (N = 904). Teacher factors were measured through a student questionnaire, whereas mathematics achievement at the beginning and the end of the school year was measured through written tests. Student background characteristics were measured through a student questionnaire. Information on parents' occupational status was also collected. Multilevel modelling analysis revealed that all teacher factors explain variation in mathematics achievement. Differential effects for all factors but modelling and assessment were identified. Implications of findings are discussed.

International students are not only agents for the internationalisation of a campus environment but also a crucial source of income for universities and a country's economy. Thus, their recruitment and retention are vital and prioritised by university leadership and policymakers. However, scant attention has been given to investigating international student withdrawal, even more so on visa-related matters. This paper focuses on the lived experiences of five former students from Syria who withdrew from education pursuits in Malaysia due to visa-related issues. This phenomenological study found the absence of clear knowledge of immigration procedures among institution staff and unsympathetic treatment towards international students were the primary reasons behind withdrawals. These findings suggest negative student experiences affect not only current students but also potential students. Whilst the findings add to existing knowledge and future studies, the study marks the first in-depth investigation concerning the impact of visa-related issues on international student withdrawal.

The paper investigates the potential of using international large-scale assessment studies for conducting follow-up studies testing models of educational effectiveness. The impact of teacher factors coming from the "dynamic model of educational effectiveness" and the "dialogic education theory" on student literacy achievement is examined. Modern Greek teachers from secondary schools that participated in PISA 2018 (Accessed on https://www.oecd.org/pisa/data/pisa2018technicalreport/) in Cyprus were recruited. Two Grade 11 classes per teacher were selected, giving 392 students in total. Observation data from Greek lessons and student literacy achievement data were collected. Two multilevel regression analyses were conducted: one with the whole student sample and one with only students from whom PISA prior achievement measure was identified. When prior achievement (i.e., PISA measure) was considered, additional and larger effects of factors on student final achievement were detected. Both analyses reveal that when factors from both frameworks were considered, larger variance in student achievement was explained.

Differentiation is a key concept in the Cypriot music curriculum, last revised in 2010. This paper aims to investigate teachers' interpretation and implementation of differentiation in their music classrooms. Interviews with Cypriot classroom music teachers and focus groups with their students took place within the context of a larger research project that investigated how elements of the Cypriot music curriculum were interpreted and applied by teachers and how this pedagogy in turn influenced students' motivation. Interviews were carried out with eight music teachers. Differentiation, as understood and implemented by these Cypriot music teachers, differed in fundamental ways to differentiation as conceptualised in academic literature concerned with this concept. These findings may serve as a point of reflection for future professional development in Cyprus relating to differentiation and its implementation.

Parallel to the overwhelming development of information and technology in today's world, changing work and living conditions have caused changes in the educational needs of both society and the individuals. This study aimed at determining the educational needs for technology and design courses of today's students who grow with technology and the digital world. The participants in this study in which a mixed method was used were the 7th year students studying in state secondary schools of TRNC (Turkish Republic of North Cyprus) in the 2016-2017 academic year. In the qualitative dimension, the students were assigned to write a composition and in the quantitative dimension, a needs analysis questionnaire was implemented. The data were analyzed through content analysis, arithmetic averages, and standard deviation. The priority in this research was to determine the students' expectations towards technology and design course and according to these expectations, their educational needs were categorized. At the end of the research, the needs for technology and design course were determined in three different categories: general needs, needs for design, and needs for information technologies. [This work was presented as a paper at the International Conference on Interdisciplinary Educational Reflections Conference at Near East University in Nicosia, 29-30 March 2019.]

This study aims to identify the literacy skills of individuals whose highest level of education was in the field 'teacher training and educational sciences'. The study sample comprised 10,618 individuals in the field of teacher training and educational sciences, selected from 31 countries (participating in the International Adult Skills Assessment Programme during the 2014-2015 survey) using a multi-stage sampling method. The study employed multi-level latent class analysis and three-step analysis in order to determine both the number of multi-level latent classes of educators' literacy scores as well as the selected independent variables' success in predicting those latent classes. The analysis revealed that educators in Germany constituted the group with the highest literacy skills while educators from Singapore comprised the group with the lowest literacy skills. [This study was presented at the 9th International Congress of Educational Research. Ordu University, Ordu, Turkey.]

This paper engages with the issue of teacher education for inclusion and particularly with the approach of employing disability arts and narratives of people with disabilities in university based courses for inclusion. It draws on three examples of anti-oppressive curricula that were developed as part of a graduate university module in Cyprus that encouraged student teachers to engage with disability arts and narratives in order to understand key ideas developed in disability studies and inclusive education. The three examples presented in this paper are representative of the three approaches all the participating student teachers followed, and indicate the strategies they used and the nature of the materials they chose. The discussion considers how these approaches can further inform teacher education for inclusion and how using disability arts and narratives can inform the discussion on other issues concerning teacher education of inclusion.

The main purpose of this paper is to offer important insights into both immigrant and native students' experiences on interculturalism as well as identifying their inputs regarding the ways in which intercultural school development could occur. Interviews were carried out with 48 children; 24 Cypriots and 24 immigrants from 4 primary schools in Cyprus. Based on their perspectives regarding the improvement of culturally diverse schools, three thematic categories emerged from the data analysis; the structural and school organisational level; the socio-personal level; and the didactic and curricular level. Arguably, on the basis of the data analysis, sub-factors underpinning these levels were found to have implications for educational policy and practice aiming at the promotion of cultural awareness, intercultural competence, inclusion and respect in schools.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore successful school principalship in Cyprus based on a ten-year research project, and in particular, by analysing leadership knowledge based on concrete actions of successful school principals derived from multiple case studies from the primary and secondary education sectors in Cyprus. Design/methodology/approach: The initial type of evidence was original qualitative empirical research undertaken through the examination of 11 case studies of successful primary and secondary school principals across Cyprus. Following, for the purposes of this paper a cross-case reanalysis was performed in order to extract successful actions from the participating school principals. Findings: Based on the emerging actions from the cross-case analysis, findings indicate that successful school principals, both in primary and secondary education, develop external relations, as well as networking with all relevant actors; create a collaborative and shared ownership feeling among their members and within their school organization; and finally promote a clear vision, based on a specific number of values. Originality/value: This overall effort led us to the articulation of certain successful actions, which could be related and compared to the results in other successful school principalship contexts. Furthermore, it could contribute to the cross-country comparative knowledge body on successful school principalship, with different educational policies and different social contexts.

This paper aims at examining the institutional framework within which Special Units (SUs) in Cypriot secondary education operate. The establishment of SU targets to facilitate the education of pupils defined as having special educational needs (SEN) in mainstream schools, and their operation is governed by the 1999 law and subsequent amending acts and circulars. Neither the operation of the SUs and the institutional framework that guides their operation have yet been investigated. The main aim of our research was to investigate teachers' and parents' views of the way in which SUs function, as well as their opinions of the legislative sections relating to the special units. This process led to the creation of a critical approach called the Institutional Framework for Special Units in Cyprus. Lastly, the participants were asked to propose ways in which the SUs could operate an inclusive environment. This paper presents qualitative research conducted in three secondary schools in Cyprus. Our sample consisted of 52 participants (heads, special education associate administrators, assistant heads, teachers, parents) over a five month timespan (September 2017-February 2018). The results lead to the conclusion that immediate action for further improvement and change is imperative, primarily for the benefit of pupils defined as having SEN.

In the face of ongoing school budget cuts, increasing student numbers and national educational policy environments that demand more from schools, like it or not, school leaders are being forced to be much more market-oriented in their thinking and ways of being than at any other time before. A school is an important site for social development, and in some communities in some countries, there may be only one school in an entire community. Nevertheless, as countries continue to grapple with reduced government funding on education, many schools risk the threat of closure. And, as education consumers (parents) and users (students) demand more and better value and results from schools, competition between schools have simultaneously increased. Thus, the environment in which school leaders' work is requiring and fostering entrepreneurial leadership. The findings reported in this paper, derive from a larger sixteen country, five continent study of 61 school leaders on the "Nature of School Leadership". The main conclusions presented in this paper are that, male and female school leaders approach entrepreneurial in very different ways; "national culture" and "national context" significantly influences and shape the work, and thus the attitudes and behaviours of school leaders, who must embrace entrepreneurialism as an essential skill, and a response to changes in school funding arrangements, and the changing role of education in national educational policy agendas.

In recent years, more and more systematic research has been conducted in science fields, focusing on identifying alternative ideas that the students have for essential concepts and principles of physics. This has resulted in the production of essential and valuable international bibliographic information in various science fields, including mechanics. In the present paper, we focus on physics, particularly in classical mechanics, including key concepts such as weight, energy, force, action/reaction, and work. A multiple-choice questionnaire was given to senior students of primary school, middle school, and Cyprus's high school. We analyzed the percentage of correct and incorrect responses of the three survey groups to determine whether the responses were related to the group's age or representative of statistical fluctuations. For most questions, there was a statistically significant correlation with age, as opposed to gender, which does not appear to play a role in students' correct answers. In particular, our results suggest that the alternative conceptions of students, reflecting misconceptions and preconceptions, reduce with age or equivalently with the education level. Nevertheless, there are also many questions for which such a correlation cannot be established. Our study can be used in science teaching, on the design of curricula, and teachers' professional development.

Inquiry-based learning (IBL) is a more student-centered approach to mathematics teaching that is recommended by many policy and curriculum documents across Europe. However, it is not easy for teachers to change from a more teacher-centered way of teaching to inquiry-based teaching as this involves a change of their role in class. Professional development courses are one way to help teachers with this endeavor. Within the discussion of effective professional development, beliefs are often named as an important influencing factor. In this respect, much research has been carried out on how beliefs on mathematics teaching impact the outcomes of the course. However, there has been much less research on what beliefs mathematics teachers develop on inquiry-based learning and how this might impact their (perceived) classroom teaching. Therefore, this paper presents an international research study carried out within the European Project Primas, in which professional development courses on inquiry-based learning were conducted in 12 countries. Using the case-study approach, this paper aims at answering the following questions: 1. What kind of beliefs about IBL do mathematics teachers across Europe develop? 2. How do these beliefs relate to teachers' perceived enactments of IBL?

It is a known fact that every profession needs to be developed during its practice. To be able to acquire this we need to know the characteristics of teachers related to their professional development. For this purpose this study tries to develop a scale to measure teacher characteristics which would help in designing in-service training programs to educate teachers. The first draft of the scale had 69 items and was administered to 99 senior teacher candidates in the faculty of education. The results were analysed by using exploratory factor analysis. As a result it was found that the scale contains three components, namely, teacher-student interaction characteristics with 13 items, characteristics related to teaching profession with 11 items, humanistic and justice characteristics of teachers with 9 items. [This paper was presented at the International New Horizons in Education (INTE) Conference (7th, Vienna, Austria, 2016).]

Purpose: The paper discusses the influence of instructional leadership on effective teacher teaching practices and learning outcomes. In particular, the paper examines one of the instructional leadership practices, namely teaching evaluation, and seeks to investigate the influence on the effective teacher practices and on the achievement of 6th grade primary school students studying mathematics in the Cyprus educational system. Design/methodology/approach: A quantitative research approach was deemed appropriate and employed for the purpose of the research subject, and in particular for the type of questions studied. Data were collected from 81 principals, 139 6th grade teachers and 1,553 students in the Cyprus educational system. In addition, data analysis was performed using structural equation models (SEM). Findings: The instructional leadership approach assumes that principal evaluations influence high learning outcomes. Findings demonstrated that the principal evaluation has a positive and statistically significant impact on effective teaching practices and student achievement. Originality/value: It is important to acknowledge that in the Cyprus educational leadership field the correlation among the instructional leadership, the effective teaching practices of teachers and the students achievements were not examined through the above parameters. Furthermore, the survey provided important insights into the principals, teachers, pupils and, more generally, on Cyprus's educational policy.

This article maps the scientific production and the contents associated with the sustainable development goals and their integration with universities during the past 21 years. Although many of the topics related to sustainable development goals (SDGs) have been addressed in different studies for decades, it is since 2015 onwards that they gained greater prominence due to the inclusion of higher education as an important actor in the fulfillment of the 2030 agenda and the United Nations SDGs. For the purpose of this paper, a bibliometric analysis of 871 papers, 535 documents in Scopus, and 336 in Web of Science (WoS) from 1998 to 2019 was performed, and the Bibliometrix analysis tool was used. The objective of this mapping is to answer the following research question: Is the integration of the Sustainable Development Goals and Universities a field of study? An analysis of the network of collaborators and trend topics in Scopus and WoS allows us to identify the concurrence and relationships of some keywords, such as sustainable development, sustainability and planning, and some background words, such as humans and global health. In another analysis, the word "higher education" is related to change. This article suggests that the integration of the Sustainable Development Goals in Universities is becoming a field of study under exploration, with a peak of production in 2016 and that has remained stable in the last three years, but thanks to the leading role assigned to Universities, intellectual production should increase in the following years.

The purpose of this article is to provide information and data that will contribute to the enhancement of teaching methodologies for online learning and teaching at all educational levels and disciplines (including adult education). More specifically, it attempts to shed light on media trends and prospects as educational activities and techniques, as well as on the utmost importance of the use of television content as audiovisual educational content. This venture focuses on the cases of Cyprus and Greece following literature materials and reviews, research results, and findings of previous numerous studies and research papers from and through the Internet that were considered as background. The aforementioned were applied in a pilot case study with adult educators as adult learners (18 years and older), providing literature data and historical elements as a source of further study. The findings from the pilot case study revealed that the television content can also shape (adult) learners' perceptions on how they understand and learn in an online environment in regard to the generational cohort they belong. Furthermore, the results disclosed that an online educational process utilizing audiovisual media technologies and audiovisual content (audiovisual media communications) may support technology-enhanced learning through non-verbal communication in the new streamlined digital era in which we live. An important conclusion of this article is that the (inter)national genealogical characteristics and habits, the inherent and special characteristics, and the socio-cultural identity of learners, as well as the various (inter)national social-phenomena (e.g., media socio-phenomenon, Internet phenomenon, revival phenomenon, etc.) of the past and present, should always be taken into account by education administrators and educators, in order to maintain a quality and sustainable future education.

Our purpose in this paper is to shed light on the intricacies of designing and enacting curricular innovations aiming to enhance students' interest in science and their understandings of STEM careers. We present the design and describe the implementation of a set of STEM career-oriented curriculum materials referred to as career-based scenarios. A review of the literature demonstrates that such curricular innovations create potentially useful mechanisms for broadening students' awareness of STEM careers and facilitating more informed decisions. We present the design process we followed to create career-based scenarios and we provide a rationale for each design decision. We also provide a description of the implementation of one representative scenario in three school classrooms. We conclude with a reflective section in which we identify reflections from our experiences and broader implications for curricular innovations targeting students' interests.

Patriotism is an important and well-accepted value in educational institutions. As a civic virtue, it has always been included in education/training programs. This study aims to compare research articles on teaching of patriotism that were conducted in the last 20 years. The document analysis method was employed in the study for this purpose. The data were collected through the international databases e.g. Wiley, Jstore, Elsevier, Taylor & Francis. 218 articles were found by searching the keywords "patriotism", "patriotic education", and "teaching of patriotism". Upon initial analysis, it was decided that 110 articles would serve the purpose of this study. Content analysis technique was employed to reveal patterns of the selected articles. The number of articles published on patriotic education in each countries, the publication dates of these articles and the comparison of these articles according to countries, purposes, is presented in this study. The paper at hand shows that only some articles have a critical perspective on patriotism. Implications are made based on results.

This paper draws on design-based research to develop a real-world classroom Augmented Reality (AR) scenario, which was accompanied by tasks used to mediate intercultural telecollaboration. It investigates the role of these tasks and AR scenario in enacting affordances to enrich students' learning experiences, to establish a connection between classroom management techniques, their local context and future teaching practices and to promote insightful reflections on such practices. The trajectories upon which these tasks were designed were practice-oriented, where students were invited to explore three options in dealing with classroom misbehavior and reserved students. Using their mobile devices, students could view in AR a classroom setting, a student's disruptive behavior and three possible approaches in dealing with such behavior. Upon exploring the three options in handling classroom misbehavior, students across the two participating academic institutions in Europe could post their comments on a newly created platform, ReDesign.

Environmentally friendly occasions allow foreign language learners to further concentrate on realizing their extensive knowledge of the English language. Exercises and activities performed in foreign language classes have been criticized for a lack of authenticity, which prevents language learners from learning the real-life usage of language. In this paper, we developed a qualitative model based on the thematic analysis method (TAM) to distinguish the efficacy of research strategies. The number of participants was defined based on theoretical saturation. To collect the data, 18 participants were selected from the Eastern Mediterranean University (EMU) in Cyprus. The selection of participants was according to their involvement in research-based projects. Theoretical saturation occurred after 15 semi-structured interview forms from participants; however, we selected three extra participants to obtain more reliable results. The reliability of the qualitative model was explicitly illustrated by colleagues who were experts in this field by reviewing and analyzing the proposed model with previous models. It was concluded that the two principles of motivation (principle 11) and provision of collaborative opportunities (principle 4) had the highest frequencies, of 22.47% and 19.66%.

This study investigates the possibility and efficacy of paper-based, in-class, data-driven learning (DDL) of academic lexical bundles below the C1 level of proficiency described by the Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR; advanced high ACTFL). A two-stage experimental design involving three groups (n = 41) and 24 two-to-four word academic items was implemented. First, the question of whether this type of learning works with these items below the C1 level is addressed through a nonequivalent-groups quasi-experimental design covering a five-week period. The results indicate that this technique is effective at the B2 level, but not at the A2-B1 level. Next, an equivalent-groups experimental design compares this style of learning to conventional techniques at the B2 level. The results of this stage suggest that paper-based, in-class DDL is more effective than conventional learning with academic lexical bundles at the B2 level.

Purpose: This paper is based on the emergency changes we have had to make in the European DEIMP Project (2017-2020), "Designing and Evaluating Innovative Mobile Pedagogies" (DEIMP). DEIMP is undertaken by a transnational consortium comprising partner institutions and schools from the UK (coordinating), Australia, Belgium, Cyprus, Ireland and The Netherlands. As well as the enforced changes to the project, there have been major adjustments in how education is being provided in each of our countries, across all sectors: primary, secondary and tertiary. The purpose of this paper is to provide pragmatic guidelines that will help us respond effectively in the uncertain present, and plan systematically for an unpredictable, post-pandemic future. Design/methodology/approach: The authors outline 21 design principles underpinning innovative mobile learning, which will be of pragmatic use to all using mobile learning in the COVID-19 pandemic. These principles have emerged in the context of the three-year European DEIMP Project (2017-2020). The authors also examine major educational changes that have recently been imposed upon teachers and educational researchers, and key aspects of the current emergency response in education internationally, and resultant implications for educational technology and mobile learning. Findings: A living record highlighting what is currently happening in the educational systems of the DEIMP project's respective partner countries. The paper outlines design concerns and issues, which will need to be addressed as the authors endeavour to bridge both the digital divide and digital use divide in remote education. Furthermore, the paper illustrates 21 pragmatic design principles underpinning innovative mobile pedagogies. Originality/value: A comparative study of the effects of the pandemic across six countries, including The UK, Australia, Belgium, Cyprus, Ireland and The Netherlands. The authors outline 21 design principles for mobile learning, which is hoped will help us respond effectively in the uncertain present, and plan systematically for an unpredictable, post-pandemic future.

This paper describes aspirations and contributions that grew out of a developmental cycle of design-based research (DBR) implementation conducted over a three-year project. DBR engineers new learning environments and improves learning in context whilst communicating usable knowledge for learning and teaching in complex settings. This project employed constructionism as an overarching framework, a theory of learning, teaching, and design, which supports that learning occurs more effectively when learners understand the world around them by creating meaningful artifacts that can be probed and shared. In an attempt to infuse elements of constructionism in the use of social technologies, groups of learners were assigned to construct an artifact within social technologies. The main data collection tools employed were students' and instructor's reflections, a questionnaire, semi-structured interviews and observation of groups' activity within social technologies. Such an inquiry revealed both strengths and challenges with regard to implementing DBR and reporting how designs function in real-life settings. This paper brings forward considerations related to reporting intentionally designed interventions, potentials and limitations of DBR and implications for future DBR implementations.

COVID-19 changed not only the way we live but also the way we teach and prepare pre-service teachers. The purpose of this paper is to describe the shift from a conventional STEM fair to an online teaching environment prepared by elementary pre-service teachers after the closure of the educational system in Cyprus as of March 2020. We describe a 3-steps process followed for the design, development, and delivery of the STEM fair concerning the technological equipment used, the activities' adaptations made by the pre-service teachers', and the level of readiness to teach online based on the initial outcomes of the STEM fair. The brief paper concludes with practical implications and suggestions for future attempts about online teacher education.