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Practitioner research, as one example of research supported by universities, has developed in unexpected ways, some of them unhelpful and has not always generated the benefits predicted. This paper argues that practitioner research has become shaped more by the needs of universities than by the schools and teachers it was hoped it would serve. The paper goes on to explore the idea that the promise of practitioner research has been so beguiling that it has commandeered more than a wise share of attention in universities and that this has been at the expense of exploring some other avenues of engagement with schools. The paper notes that the evolution of practitioner inquiry has taken place at a time when regimes of accountability driven by central government have been visible globally and when universities and schools each had significant pressures to fulfil policy imperatives. The pressure towards performance has in England drawn the attention of universities and schools away from, rather than towards, each other: schools to revised curricula and performance, universities to research and funding. Practitioner research became developed as a skeleton for higher degrees and in that arena universities came to have a role in promoting and at the same time inhibiting and possibly damaging its development. Hopes that practitioner research would come to contribute to mainstream research were not fulfilled and both educational and more especially practitioner research remain problematic in the wider university research agenda. One response is to renew efforts to improve existing approaches and examples of this are now widespread. However, the paper observes that, at present universities’ support for schools seems to reflect only a small part of their much wider expertise and argues that education departments in universities might think much more radically about the range of expertise that they can offer schools, a more imaginative exploration. The paper continues by noting that the challenge for university departments of education of working together equally with schools and teachers is easy to aspire to, but not to fulfil, and this impacts on working with the authentic concerns of schools and on sharing expertise. Further opportunities are available: beyond education departments: for example, other university departments have expertise that education departments might link with which has hitherto remained unexplored. Additional areas which remain under-researched are the processes of incorporating educational change and in making judgments about educational initiatives. Readers are reminded that the accidental barriers produced by the categories of research, teaching and administration are accountancy categories and may demand creative and determined responses. The paper concludes that there is too much to lose by not exploring these or other wider possibilities and much to gain by doing so including opportunities in research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines taught masters' degrees (M courses) in higher education in Great Britain and how this can be reconciled with the British government's program of lifelong learning. With a rising number of individuals holding degrees in Britain, the author examines why they are not attracted to M courses. Focus is given on adult learning theories in M courses. The author also provides information on factors that prevent the development of M courses that meet the needs of lifelong learners.

To provoke debate, the paper, after fifteen years, repeats and expands on an analysis of the use of empirical data and the role of quantification in articles published in some major British journals of sociology. The earlier paper argued that the training of undergraduates, and the influence and example of their teachers, tends to orient them, well before graduate education begins, towards particular kinds of research topic and, where empirical data are used, approaches employing no quantification or very simple techniques. It suggested this would be a self-reinforcing process unless there were far-reaching changes in undergraduate curricula which were unlikely to come about. It predicted that the divide between these aspects of British sociology and that practised in North America and many parts of Europe would widen further. British sociology has become somewhat more empirical over the past fifteen years, with the bulk of this expansion in the qualitative area. The more sophisticated quantitative approaches are not much more in evidence than before. This raises a number of questions which should be a matter of debate. It is worrying that the debate does not seem to be taking place. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The teaching of the social and behavioral sciences as disciplines within the education and training of health care professionals is a relatively new phenomenon in the United Kingdom. The push for their inclusion in medical, nursing, midwifery, and radiography curricula is a consequence of major changes in the system and service of health care in Britain, which lent a greater urgency to the professionalization of these occupations. This, in turn, called for professional and educational validating bodies to fundamentally reorganize courses, to raise their academic level, and to encourage widespread research into learning styles, continuing professional development, and alternative educational delivery modes such as open and distance learning. In teaching sociology across a range of newly developed health care courses we have had to consider the dynamics of United Kingdom health care education that prompted their development. This paper is based on our experiences in designing, implementing, and evaluating such courses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background/Context: On January 29, 2008 the Toronto District School Board (TDSB) approved a city-wide Africentric elementary school under their Alternative School policy, sparking a contentious debate. Calls for Black-focused schools also arose in 2008 in London in response to the disengagement of African Caribbean youth. The historical record indicates, however, that community campaigns for Black educational programs stretch back over 40 years in both cities. Focus of the Study: This paper analyzes the development of Black-focused education in Toronto and London from 1968 to 2008 through the responses of Black parents and community activists to the historic underachievement of African Caribbean students (particularly males) in the public schools of both cities. Black-focused education is situated within the larger social, political, and national contexts and the critical incidents that fueled the development of race equality policy. The article explores how the "politics of place" influenced the trajectory of Black-focused education in each city. Research Methodology: Two parallel historical case studies were conducted using primary source material from community-based archives, secondary sources on the history of African Caribbean immigration and the development of Black community organizations, and oral history interviews with 10 Black education activists in Toronto and 7 activists in London. Conclusions: This comparative study conceptualizes this transnational phenomena as "resistance to racism" and examines how Black-focused curriculum and ideology was adapted to local conditions in Canada and Britain. Parents and community activists aimed to develop the citizenship rights of African Caribbean students, establish a diasporic sensibility, and promote the right of children of African descent to a quality education wherever they may reside. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Faculty of Mechanical Engineering Universiti Teknologi MARA, Malaysia, has sought accreditation from the UK Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IMechE) for its Bachelor of Engineering (Honours) Mechanical programme. To be accredited, the programme must satisfactorily incorporate the UK-SPEC general learning outcomes, which have to be mapped to the Faculty's programme educational objectives and programme outcomes. The contents of the various courses comprising the programme have to be integrated to bring all the learning outcomes together and taught in a systematic approach to become a total system. In the project design, issues such as sustainable development, risk, health and safety, and professional ethics are areas of concern. This paper describes how IMechE's UK regulations and requirements are being met, and relates the Faculty's experience with the accreditation process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues for a process based science curriculum, and illustrates how the TASC Framework provides a flexible problem-solving framework that learners can effectively use for the carrying out the independent science investigations that are required by the National Curriculum (UK). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is an indication that across higher-education engineering courses in the UK, the extent and content of risk education varies, and is not always commensurate with the level of risk that undergraduates could be responsible for in their subsequent professional lives. Consequently, a project was set up to incorporate risk education into the curriculum of an undergraduate engineering course in a UK university for the 2005/06 academic year. A set of learning outcomes was developed from a template of topic areas in consultation with key stakeholders. These learning outcomes formed the basis of a questionnaire that was designed to assess students' awareness of risk issues. This paper describes the development of the questionnaire, the interpretation of the results, and how the questionnaire will be used to help achieve the desired learning outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers information on sociology. It is emphasized that sociology as a discipline is obsessed with its history. The British Sociological Association is pioneering the studies for future trends in sociology. John Scott noted that the answers to sociology's fragmentation lies in reassertion of a strong teaching curriculum around its classic issues and defense of the continuing viability of the social as a subject of analysis.

In this paper I draw on my experience, in the context of the UK higher education sector, of trying to be `useful'. Specifically, I discuss cultural policy work, and contextualize this through debates in both cultural studies and geography concerning relevance and engagement beyond the academy. In a confessional tone, I argue that the translations that occur in the policy environment can result also in ‘mundanization’ in the emptying out of applied research as it is repurposed to suit the pressing needs of a public sector, fast-policy audit culture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reports on a postal survey of first year Sociology degree courses in the United Kingdom. The main feature of the results is their uniformity and traditionalism. Both polytechnics and universities work within considerable resource constraints in the first year, frequently teaching large numbers. Teaching relies heavily upon lectures and a highly planned course, with limited class/tutorial support. Although courses are constantly revised and few teachers appear satisfied, there is considerable consensus upon the contents of courses with a limited number of elements usually combined into one or more of a few recognizable types. The source of this constant revision yet limited range lies in the tension between the empirical aspiration to describe the social world and the complex issues raised by attempts to do so, the difficulty of which is often seen as frustrating to students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Whilst the faculties of literacy and numeracy are rightly recognised as worthy of pedagogical nurturing, this article champions a more venerable articulacy – visualcy – crucial to a healthy culture, arguing that the one domain of human inquiry which distinguishes the visual arts from other disciplines is surely that surrounding the faculty of vision. The ascendency within the contemporary artworld of a relational aesthetics is traced through a brief history of the relationships between visual artforms and their socio-political contexts. It is suggested that the shift of emphasis away from the perceptually intriguing is in part a consequence – perhaps unintended – of the neoliberal values permeating the UK Higher Education sector in the last decade. The article ends with a proposal for a visual arts pedagogy based on five key principles of visualcy explored through the medium of drawing, illustrated with work by the author and students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this research was to examine pre-service teachers' articulation of their learning through the development of a shared professional language of teaching practice focused on meaningful physical education. Qualitative data gathered from 90 pre-service teachers over four years in Canada and Ireland were analysed. Framed by a didactical research framework, pre-service teachers used elements of the shared language to articulate why they would promote meaningful experiences in physical education, what the features of meaningful experiences tend to consist of, and how they would use particular strategies to promote meaningful experiences. This research demonstrates how a shared language that reflects a coherent approach in physical education teacher education can support pre-service teachers to access, interpret, and articulate their learning about teaching in ways that support meaningful experiences for pupils. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As part of the curriculum review process, the SAC proposed that critical appraisal, which sits in the Generic Curriculum of ST1-3 training, should be tested in specialty training rather than at the Intercollegiate Specialty Fellowship Examination and therefore some further discussion requires to be had with the Royal Colleges. The GDC require us to develop Syllabus and Assessment Strategy documents, which along with the curriculum will form a trilogy for ST1-3 training in Orthodontics. Look out for the new curricula, syllabi and assessment strategies - these are the new training trilogies for specialty training in orthodontics. [Extracted from the article]

Introduction Simulation is increasingly used throughout medicine. Within ultrasound, simulators are more established for learning transvaginal and interventional procedures. The use of modern high-fidelity transabdominal simulators is increasing, particularly in centres with large trainee numbers. There is no current literature on the value of these simulators in gaining competence in abdominal ultrasound. The aim was to investigate the impact of a new ultrasound curriculum, incorporating transabdominal simulators into the first year of training in a UK radiology academy. Methods The simulator group included 13 trainees. The preceding cohort of 15 trainees was the control group. After 10 months, a clinical assessment was performed to assess whether the new curriculum resulted in improved ultrasound skills. Questionnaires were designed to explore the acceptability of simulation training and whether it had any impact on confidence levels. Results Trainees who had received simulator-enriched training scored higher in an objective clinical ultrasound assessment, which was statistically significant (p = 0.0463). End confidence scores for obtaining diagnostic images and demonstrating pathology were also higher in the simulation group. All trainees stated that transabdominal simulator training was useful in early training. Conclusions This initial study shows that embedded into a curriculum, transabdominal ultrasound simulators are an acceptable training method that can result in improved ultrasound skills and higher confidence levels. Using simulators early in training could allow trainees to master the basics, improve their confidence, enabling them to get more educational value from clinical ultrasound experience while reducing the impact of training on service provision. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article interprets changes in human rights education in English school policy on values which have increasingly been framed by PREVENT and a move from international to national expressions of values. It reveals the extent of the impact and nature of this change on human rights education in school policy for the first time. It reports changes from minimal to maximal expectations compounded by an increased focus of school performance. It illustrates the extent to which values are politically framed and significantly how recently ‘sudden’ political changes in the United Kingdom can be seen as part of a change trend which is almost 10 years old. It draws on Schwartz’s theoretical structure of values, Baxi’s conceptualisation of rights and Lohrenscheit’s notion of learning about and learning for human rights as these, respectively, reveal conceptual clarity in values, human rights and pedagogy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Given the complex and messy contexts of schooling, conversations between religion and schooling can be 'admitted' as examples of the sort of situated conversation that goes beyond the 'false necessity' of universal state-controlled school-based education. There are distinct claims to be made about religion and schooling in general, and about the pupils and staff in the school (implied by a model of school as community, like a household), and about the school curriculum (where religious and related issues are difficult to address without a subject that is, or is like, religious education). The incorrigible plurality of life encourages a lively conversation between religion and schooling. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Effective undergraduate education is required to enable newly qualified doctors to safely care for patients with palliative care and end-of-life needs. The status of palliative care teaching for UK medical students is unknown. Aim: To investigate palliative care training at UK medical schools and compare with data collected in 2000. Design: An anonymised, web-based multifactorial questionnaire. Settings/participants: Results were obtained from palliative care course organisers at all 30 medical schools in 2013 and compared with 23 medical schools (24 programmes) in 2000. Results: All continue to deliver mandatory teaching on ‘last days of life, death and bereavement’. Time devoted to palliative care teaching time varied (2000: 6–100 h, mean 20 h; 2013: 7–98 h, mean 36 h, median 25 h). Current palliative care teaching is more integrated. There was little change in core topics and teaching methods. New features include ‘involvement in clinical areas’, participation of patient and carers and attendance at multidisciplinary team meetings. Hospice visits are offered (22/24 (92%) vs 27/30 (90%)) although they do not always involve patient contact. There has been an increase in students’ assessments (2000: 6/24, 25% vs 2013: 25/30, 83%) using a mixture of formative and summative methods. Some course organisers lack an overview of what is delivered locally. Conclusion: Undergraduate palliative care training continues to evolve with greater integration, increased teaching, new delivery methods and wider assessment. There is a trend towards increased patient contact and clinical involvement. A minority of medical schools offer limited teaching and patient contact which could impact on the delivery of safe palliative care by newly qualified doctors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Theater-based interventions are a viable prevention strategy for changing sexual health knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors related to HIV prevention. However, few studies have explored interventions in English-speaking, high-income countries such as the United States, Canada, or the United Kingdom. This article critically reviews the literature to identify key characteristics of theater-based HIV prevention strategies used for adolescents in school-settings in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom. Specifically, we identify the theatrical approach used in HIV prevention interventions, the behavioral theories that inform such interventions, and the study design and results of existing evaluation studies conducted in school settings. In the 10 articles reviewed, we found limited grounding in theory and the use of nonrigorous study design. To strengthen the evidence and practical application of theater-based HIV prevention interventions, we highlight three specific recommendations for practitioners and researchers: (1) define and operationalize the theater approach and techniques used, (2) ensure theater-based interventions are grounded in theory, and (3) conduct rigorous evaluation of theater-based interventions. These recommendations are key to strengthening future research on and implementation of theater-based interventions for HIV prevention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses a study on the perception of nursing students/ educators on the contribution of ethics education to ethical competence of nursing students. It addresses questions including how they look at general contribution of ethics education, contribution of ethics education to ethical competence and features of ethics education needed to promote ethical competence. It suggests that ethics education adds to the ethical awareness and ethical reasoning competencies of nursing students.

The author reflects on the changes in higher education particularly on the quality of teaching in biochemistry and the threats posed by the disruptions caused by enforced institutional organisations. He comments on the efforts of the British government to address national indifference to education. He highlights the findings of a report made by the Royal Society of Medicine on the public understanding of science. He cites the need to maintain the standards of learning through expanding and lengthening of degree courses.

Background: The Health for Life in Primary Schools Program helps schools promote healthy, active lifestyles through curriculum support related to healthy eating and cooking, growing food, physical activity, and family involvement. These interrelated strands are shown to have the greatest impact on healthy lifestyles, and the Health for Life in Primary Schools Program seeks to make these not one-off lessons, but a sustainable part of a school's culture. Each school involved with the program develops its own Action Plan in order to achieve program goals. Each school is assessed by an audit of facilities, skills, and curriculum at baseline and follow-up, and the pupils complete an on-line questionnaire at baseline and follow-up. Other impact measures are individual to the school and relate to its own Action Plan. Method: Health for Life in Primary Schools sought to assess the cohesiveness and strength of the program using the Program Impact Pathways (PIP) model. The program was deconstructed to its individual parts, with each part assessed in terms of its contribution to the overall program and constraints upon its effectiveness. Results: The PIP analysis helped clarify the logic and structure of the program, whether its objectives can be achieved, the Critical Quality Control Points (CCPs), and the impact measures required to demonstrate success. The core indicators identified for impact evaluation were knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors of pupils around healthy eating, cooking, growing food, and physical activity. Conclusion: The PIP model confirmed that the Health for Life in Primary Schools Program is well structured and is well suited to achieve its goals. The findings were presented at the Healthy Lifestyles Program Evaluation Workshop held in Granada, Spain, 13-14 September 2013, under the auspices of the Mondelēz International Foundation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Support for writing instruction amongst lecturers in UK Universities is high, but they often prefer it to be provided by dedicated study skills specialists operating outside subject curricula. Yet because of the well-documented problems with the skills approach (where literacy support frequently becomes a generic add-on), American models such as Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) and Writing in the Disciplines (WID) make a strong claim that writing stratagems and thinking/theorizing within disciplines are actually intrinsically linked. It is accordingly now a commonplace in such literacy research that writing development needs to be contextualized within the disciplines, and interest in adapting such approaches to the UK context is burgeoning. A recent project at Nottingham Trent University set out to explore the prospects for such an adaption through the piloting of an embedded approach in the Social Theory subject area, but the project ran into a series of resistances that came close to thwarting it entirely. The initial challenge lay in convincing time-poor subject lecturers to engage with the literacy initiative and to find space for it in an already saturated curriculum. Yet it seemed that behind the surface perception that the embedding of literacy development would be onerous, or would squeeze out core subject content, there lay a deeper attitude that such development was both ‘beneath’ subject lecturers and unconnected to the specific concerns of their academic discipline. This reflection piece, co-written by the academic support coordinator championing the initiative and the Social Theory Subject Leader, seeks to understand some of these attitudes, using the work of Sigmund Freud and Theodor W. Adorno to probe various psycho-social aspects of the phenomenon of resistance to the embedding of writing development in a discipline. What emerges is a reflection on practice which arguably reveals a certain complex around the status of teaching as opposed to lecturing, alongside a process of displaced resistance to the managerialist and vocationalizing discourse which is on the ascendency within UK universities. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Taking a model of global citizenship that is primarily a matter of seeing the self-in-the-world as one dwelling among others, this article focuses on experiences of students with individual “significant others” and among international student communities, drawing on a 3-year study into U.K. undergraduate students participating in international mobility activities. Participants reveal how lived experience of Otherness in such intersubjective encounters enables moves to identify Self with others and to personalize hitherto distant places and practices. Even in the context of international mobility, encountering difference does not depend on the crossing of national cultures but on recognizing Otherness in all we may engage with and in ourselves. Most of the encounters in this study take place outside of the host culture or the “designed” features of the international mobility activities, suggesting opportunities for multicultural/international campuses to develop spaces for similarly rich learning for the nonmobile majority. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A questionnaire was sent to the heads of internationalization in the business schools of all U.K. universities. Sixty-five replies were received. The document covered, inter alia, the internationalization activities undertaken by the respondents’ schools, the intensities with which internationalization had been implemented, motives for internationalizing, approaches adopted (gradualistic vs. simultaneous), possible links with graduate employability, and the role of innate predilections toward internationalization held by senior business school managers. A schematic model intended to explain the speed, extent, and intensity of a business school’s internationalization was developed and tested. It transpired that levels of internationalization activity within the sample institutions were substantial. The degree and/or speed of internationalization within a business school appeared to depend significantly on the financial situation of the host university, managerial inclinations favoring internationalization, financial dependence on foreign students, the desire to attract greater numbers of students from overseas, the size of the business school and the age of its host university, and the belief among senior managers that an internationalized curriculum improved the employment and career prospects of British born as well as foreign students. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Discussions of student transition from the study of languages in UK high schools to the study of languages at university usually focus on the vertical transition, comparing the differences in curricula and approach to languages taken in each sector. Whilst acknowledging that this aspect of the student transition is important, this article explores the transition in a broader disciplinary context by raising questions about how other subjects students have studied before entering higher education may help or hinder the transition. As well as drawing on relevant literature in the Arts and Humanities field, we also discuss the findings of a case study, which investigated the views of students and teachers in one English university and one English high school. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The need for journalism curriculum reform is widely acknowledged in the United Kingdom, yet the wheels of the academy turn slowly. How are its journalism educators to resolve this dichotomy and meaningfully prepare their students for the realities of a fast-changing profession? This essay critically reviews an intervention designed to complement and inform the process of curriculum development, while equipping journalism students with the additional skills and attributes that they will need in order to break into an industry that is, by all accounts, changing its shape and shifting its expectations of its workforce. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Occupation-focused models are one method of integrating occupation into occupational therapy education programmes. They offer a theoretical basis for practice by providing explanations about the process and practice of the profession. Method: This exploratory study used a quantitative research framework to investigate which occupation-focused models are included in occupational therapy programmes, the rationale for their inclusion and how the models are integrated into curricula. A survey was sent to 193 occupational therapy programmes in Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom and the United States. Results: The response rate was 33.8% (n = 65). The data showed that each programme included between 3 and 10 occupation-focused models. The Canadian Model of Occupational Performance and Engagement and the Model of Human Occupation were included in 98.5% of all curricula surveyed. Conclusion: The educators used a multilayered decision-making process to determine which occupation-focused models to include in a curriculum. The instructional methods varied, but most programmes used practice placement education as a teaching strategy. Further research is required into how curriculum design influences a practitioner's future use of occupation-focused models in practice. A better understanding is needed of how professional practice education affects students' values and attitudes towards the use of occupation-focused models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Middle Eastern Studies, modern foreign languages and Islamic Studies have been recognized by the UK government as strategically important subjects in higher education. Motivated by government concerns about lack of knowledge about the Middle East and the radicalization of British Muslims, this designation has complex implications for the teaching and learning of Arabic language and Islamic Studies. Factors influencing the teaching of these disciplines in the UK are characterized by connections and disconnections which are historical, political, geographical and motivational. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One might expect governments to react to deepening European integration since the mid-1980s by updating national school curricula in social science subjects such as history and geography so as to reflect the new realities. France has done so, whereas England has not. This study asks how one explains this variation in outcome. Established explanations for why Britain has been a more reluctant European than France on other issues provide a useful starting point. However, a more thorough explanation for the outcome on this issue is gained by instead looking at the role of historical legacies in education ("laissez-faire" and decentralization in England and "faire" and centralization in France) that date back to the beginnings of the spread of mass education in the 19th century. These unique national legacies served as a prism through which Europeanization was filtered, and this contributes to an understanding for the variation in contemporary curricula content. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the evolving relationship between curriculum design, teacher perceptions, and the lived experience of students participating in an international programme of study within a U.K. university business school. The article illustrates the challenges inherent in supporting cross-cultural learning within diverse cohorts and explores the use of reflective learning strategies as a means of promoting cross-cultural understanding. It concludes with a discussion about the positioning of university curricula as international spaces within local contexts and questions the degree to which implicit pedagogical norms support inclusivity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author reflects on questions related to European tuning or benchmarking for women's and gender studies. The author focuses her reflections based on her participation in a workshop in Bologna, Italy and as a women's studies scholar and advocate based in Great Britain. She suggests ways on how women's and gender studies can forward its negotiation with European institutionalization of the field. She concludes that tuning, both in positive and negative light, raises significant questions about power relations which characterizes the field of women's and gender studies.

In the last 30 years there has been a transformation in the way in which young people in the UK have become journalists. Not only has journalism become a graduate occupation but there has also been a steady increase in the number of university journalism courses and degrees. This development has been greeted with both scepticism and anxiety by already established journalists, who argue that universities are unsuited to prepare new entrants for the 'realities' of journalism as an occupation. This article reports on a survey of graduates from journalism programmes in Scotland. The evidence of this survey is, first, that a journalism degree is, in fact, an effective preparation for a successful journalism career and, second, that graduate journalists absorb news-room culture without difficulty, to the extent of discounting the value of their own 'academic' journalism training. There is some evidence, though, that graduate journalists do bring a new perspective to the assessment of journalism as a career. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the UK, North America and Australia, credit-bearing discipline specific English for Academic Purposes (EAP) courses are seen as a challenge to remedial views of English as a Second Language and a key element in revitalizing a profession on the periphery of the institution. However, the EAP field has to confront not only institutional challenges to its acceptability as a discipline but also tensions within the field. In this article we examine the tensions which underpin current and future directions in the field, review the development of credit-based EAP courses in the US, UK and Australia, and illustrate our discussion with a case study from the University of Melbourne, We conclude by arguing that discipline specific credit-based EAP offers promising hope for the future of the EAP discipline in higher education, but that to achieve this end the field and practitioners need to find a position between critique of and accommodation to discipline specific content. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article focuses on the academic discipline of geography in Great Britain. Like many other academic disciplines, geography is largely a twentieth-century creation. University-level teaching was introduced at Cambridge and Oxford Universities in the late 1800s, after considerable lobbying from the Royal Geographical Society. Geography as a subject has a long history, but it was only from the late nineteenth century that the efforts of individual geographers were crucial to the creation of a credible niche for an academic discipline within the country's universities.

The authors suggest that the recess period serves a positive purpose in the primary school curriculum, counter to the current practice of minimizing recess in many schools across North America and the United Kingdom. The authors' position is embedded in the larger debate about school accountability; they argue that school policy should be based on the best theory and empirical evidence available. They support their argument for the importance of recess with theory and with experimental and longitudinal data showing how recess breaks maximize children's cognitive performance and adjustment to school. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An audit of undergraduate trauma and orthopaedic surgery teaching was carried out in 24 of the 27 medical schools in Great Britain and major differences were found between the medical schools. The range of time spent in teaching trauma and orthopaedic surgery for undergraduates varied from 3 weeks to 12 weeks and in five out of 27 medical schools trauma and orthopaedic surgery tuition was split between various years of the clinical curriculum. In some schools there were 30 students on a firm and in others only one. The opportunity for undergraduates to give feedback to their teachers, the use of objective assessment at the end of such an appointment by the teachers, varied between medical schools. To avoid some of these very basic differences between our medical schools, the teaching of clinical subjects to undergraduates in medicine should be reviewed nationally and minimum standards set. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]