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The COVID-19 pandemic has popularized online learning as a mode of teaching and learning in universities, thereby exacerbating college students' stress levels in multiple ways. To enhance the quality of college student training, it is crucial to investigate the impact of perceived stress on their online self-directed learning. Using questionnaire data from 969 college students across China, this study performed an empirical analysis of the influence of perceived stress on their online self-directed learning, while also exploring the mediating role of phone dependence and the moderating role of self-management ability. The findings indicate that, firstly, perceived stress has a significant and positive effect on college students' online self-directed learning. Secondly, phone dependence masks the positive impact of perceived stress on students' self-directed learning, thereby weakening the effects of employment and learning stress on their online self-directed learning. Thirdly, self-management ability positively moderates the relationship between employment, social, interpersonal, and learning stress and college students' online self-directed learning. Fourthly, rural college students' online self-directed learning is more susceptible to employment, social, and interpersonal stress; vocational college students' self-directed learning is more influenced by employment, social, and learning stress; and students in the "Double First-Class" initiative universities are more likely to develop phone dependence. Therefore, this paper asserts that using stress reasonably, controlling stress appropriately, channeling stress properly, and enhancing self-management abilities can aid college students in learning autonomous online.

Despite the large quantity of research projects about online learning, studies on students' language learning motivation, self-efficacy belief, and metacognitive strategy use in the online learning setting are limited. The present paper aims to fill this gap through assessing learners' metacognitive strategies, language learning motivation, self-efficacy belief, and their perceived progress in English learning. Responses to surveys were administered two times. The collected data were subject to longitudinal mediation analysis. The participants were a total of 627 university students in China. Results showed a positive and significant relationship among the four variables. The findings highlighted four significant longitudinal mediation patterns. Overall, self-efficacy belief predicted the use of metacognitive strategies, which in turn predicted their language learning motivation and perceived online English learning progress. The findings supported the mediating role of language learning motivation and metacognitive strategies. The findings showed the potential to enhance online English learning by facilitating learners' self-efficacy belief, language learning motivation, and metacognitive strategies.

Collaborative learning (CL) is widely used in higher education around the world because it is associated with increases in students' knowledge and social skills. Low student engagement in CL activities has been identified as a common issue, while there is no CL-specific engagement scale to measure and understand engagement in such settings. Additionally, although western countries have been investigating student engagement since the 1950s, there have been comparatively few studies of this important construct in China. To address these imbalances, the present paper adopted a mixed methods approach to developing and validating a Chinese CL engagement scale. In the quantitative study, Chinese university students (N = 405) completed an anonymous online survey to assess their engagement in CL activities. Results from exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses supported a hierarchical (second-order) three-factor model of student engagement (behavioural, cognitive and emotional engagement), consistent with the tripartite conception of student engagement in Western countries. Participants were further divided into three unique groups based on engagement scores, and in the qualitative study, 12 participants from three groups were interviewed about CL experiences. Interviews served to further validate the quantitative results. The significance, limitations, and implications of these findings are discussed.

The medical field is facing a physician-scientist shortage, threatening future medical research and development. Medical institutions can contribute to developing physician-scientists by stimulating students' involvement in research. In this study, a medical undergraduate teaching module to develop research skills and encourage interest in research was held in Chongqing, China. Undergraduate medical students at Chongqing Medical University completed research skills training. Before and after the training, an online, anonymous, self-reported questionnaire was administered. The self-reported questionnaire investigated students' demographic characteristics, students' perception of attitudes toward conducting research, research skills (e.g., identifying and utilizing information, critical appraisal of literature, paper writing, and understanding of research), and feedback on scientific research training. The module was implemented with 25 students from July 2019 to October 2019, and 96.0% (N = 24) of participants responded to the questionnaire both prior to and after the training. In the evaluation of research skills, results showed that use of appropriate tools for research (Z = -3.340, p < 0.01), students' ability to undertake a focused literature search (Z = -3.40, p < 0.01), identifying and utilizing information (Z = -3.34, p < 0.01), and paper-writing skills (Z = -3.49, p < 0.01) were significantly improved after the undergraduates participated in the scientific research training. A qualitative analysis of the feedback showed that students found that the training helped to enhance their knowledge, improve their study scores, and motivate them to conduct research in the future. Early scientific research ability training strengthened the research skills of medical undergraduates and motivated them to pursue research.

Fairy tales have been an essential ingredient in children's literature. Canonical fairy tales passed down from generation to generation not only enrich children's imagination but connote significant values typical of the community. However, as time passes, contemporary writers often challenge these traditional values when they work on the same topic. This changing face is evidenced by Emma Donoghue's rewriting of classical tales. Based on my teaching of Donoghue's story 'The Tale of the Bird' alongside Andersen's 'Thumbelina' at a university in Hong Kong, this paper discusses the ever-evolving cultural values and the benefit of reading Donoghue via Andersen or vice versa in the literature class and beyond.

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.

The adoption of English medium instruction (EMI) in higher education has gained popularity in China's tertiary education as a result of globalization. International students in Chinese universities are celebrated as part of soft power projection to extend China's global impact. Informed by Piller and Cho's concept of "Neoliberalism as language policy" (2013) and Collins' "social reproduction theory" (2009, 2012), this study attempts to explore the EMI learning experiences of a cohort of international students at a border university in China. The policy documents, in-depth interviews, classroom observation, reflective journals and online interactions converge to reveal that, international students in EMI programmes experience exclusion and inequality despite the welcoming discourses of diversity. The paper highlights the necessity to pay attention to the ways in which higher education institutions reproduce inequalities of social stratification of international students through explicit and implicit institutional practices. It is argued that EMI policy in China's peripheral regions targeting international students from less-developed countries tends to perpetuate and accentuate educational inequalities. The study sheds light on a more inclusive pedagogical approach to alleviating international students' marginalisation and educating students of diverse linguistic, cultural, socioeconomic backgrounds for global citizenship in the context of China's Belt and Road Initiative.

Since the 2010s, Portugal has experienced a considerable growth in the number of Chinese international students, who have been attracted by the country's image of tolerance and openness for diversity. However, as it was reported in other contexts, throughout the health crisis, these students were blatantly confronted with racial microaggressions in their daily routines inside and outside their higher education institutions' facilities. Drawing on evidence from 30 in-depth interviews conducted with Chinese international students in Portugal and following a thematic analysis approach, this paper analyses how they frame and perceive their encounters with racism in their daily lives during the pandemic. We argue that Chinese international students resort on distinct discursive strategies to negotiate their encounters with racism during their sojourns in Portugal throughout the health crisis and to negate their "otherness" as a racial minority in the country.

This paper proposes a distance-based doctoral supervisory model to support students in the process of navigating self, agency, and emotions over their doctoral journey. The model emerged through our examination of the lived experiences of three Chinese female doctoral students who, though enrolled as internal students in our New Zealand university, were prevented by the pandemic from returning from their Spring Festival sojourn to China, and continued their study by distance. We employed narrative analysis to deeply engage with their stories shared in diaries and one-on-one interviews, alongside social media interactions. These revealed a strong commitment to study emanating from answerability toward their research projects, already underway, and agentive actions to maintain peer-to-peer academic and emotional support, enabling resilience and reflexivity about personal values and needs. Learning from this experience, we emphasize in our model the need to nurture important bonds between students, their peers and their supervisors in online environments.

While the positive role of engagement in students' learning achievements has been well documented, limited studies have examined whether or how learner engagement would vary with their achievements over time, especially within an unstructured digital learning context. This paper using a purposive sampling method reported an exploratory study on how English as a foreign language (EFL) undergraduate students with lower and upper proficiency levels (LP and UP) behaviorally engaged in their self-initiated mobile-assisted English learning (MAEL) beyond the classroom. Participants were senior-year undergraduate students from universities in central China. Quantitative analysis based on 409 questionnaires showed that there were significant differences in both how long and how often students participated in MAEL across proficiency levels, with LP learners investing more time on a more frequent basis than UP learners. However, there was no significant effect of language proficiency on the number of students' MAEL resources employed. Besides, EFL proficiency was also found to play a mediating role in students' learning preferences despite their common interest in receptive learning practices. Qualitative data from 36 follow-up semi-structured interviews revealed students' cognitive and emotional rationales behind these learning behaviors. This study might offer some fresh insight into the complexity of foreign language learner engagement with self-initiated mobile-assisted learning in Chinese higher education.

The objectives of this work are to investigate the impact of automating the student assessment process using the Schoology web-based learning management system as an example and determine its effectiveness and usability by performing a comparative analysis between the survey results of educators and students. The research methodology is based on an exploratory survey using a data collection questionnaire composed of closed-ended questions. The respondents are 630 students and 159 faculty members from three Chinese higher education institutions. The data analysis enables the conclusion that the overall student and faculty satisfaction with Schoology is high (83.4% and 55%, respectively). The students and educators indicate that with the introduction of Schoology, learning and teaching became easier (82.5% and 53.4%, respectively). In line with this, the analysis of the effect of the automated performance assessment implementation on student academic performance find that learners are more prone to better learning outcomes after this system's launching. The practical significance of this paper is that it demonstrates the positive influence of the Schoology system on educational process effectiveness.

This paper addresses the perceptions and mechanisms of doctoral student job decisions regarding the pursuit of careers in the government sector in China. Through the lens of social cognitive career theory (SCCT), we analysed 30 semi-structured interviews that had been conducted with doctoral students from two prestigious Chinese universities who wish to work as civil servants. This study describes doctoral students' understanding of careers in government employment from the perspectives of work content, promotion channels and professional norms. The mechanisms influencing student career choices include personal goals, self-efficacy, outcome expectations and environment. The clear goal of political ambition and work--life balance directly drives doctoral students to choose government institutions for employment. The diploma signal of doctoral degree itself and academic training give doctoral students a high sense of self-efficacy, which is necessary for their choice of employment in the government. Occupational safety, occupational benefits and occupational value constitute the expectations of positive outcomes providing doctoral students with good feedback. In the current environment, the labour market situation and the impetus of universities combine to form a push force and the preferential recruitment policies of the state form a pull force, which jointly promote doctoral students to make decisions to work in government sector. In this paper, the fact that the Chinese government introduced the 'special selected graduates' scheme for doctoral students from prestigious universities in hope of recruiting intellectual elites to improve the quality of civil servants and the modernization level of social governance. Universities encourage PhD graduates to enter the government, hoping that this would enhance their social influence and reputation, thereby safeguarding their status as prestigious universities. From an institutional perspective, the process of doctoral students becoming civil servants can be said to be a form of cooperation between the government and universities.

Global science is more networked and connected than ever before. The rise of research collaborations occurs not only in the established Euro-American science systems that hold 'central' nodes in the globally networked science, but also in other parts of the world as science systems pluralise and multipolarise. Yet, research collaborations between traditionally non-central science systems are understudied. This paper examines factors leading to increased research collaborations between scientists in China and Turkey, two "traditionally" non-central science systems. A multiple regression analysis was conducted using an original dataset of 2256 collaborative papers and 605 China-based and Turkey-based scientists. The analysis reveals the statistically significant role of in-person mobility to the other system in increasing research collaborations. Additionally, being male instead of female and working in a university instead of a research institute are statistically significant predictors of increased research collaborations. The paper adds further nuances to the literature, suggesting that having obtained a PhD abroad or being in a large city may not lead to increased collaborations among traditionally non-central systems, although they may increase international collaborations at the conflated global level.

To tackle the problem of graduate employability (GE), higher education researchers and practitioners are suggesting the inclusion of employability modules in university curricula. However, the orthodoxy of the major-based undergraduate curriculum (MBUC) has rarely been challenged in the GE literature. Drawing on Clarke's (2018) [Clarke, M. (2018). Rethinking graduate employability: The role of capital, individual attributes and context. "Studies in Higher Education," 43(11), 1923-1937. https://doi.org/10.1080/03075079.2017.1294152] integrated employability model, this paper explores how MBUC affects undergraduate students' GE development. The data were 27 interviews with undergraduates majoring in Portuguese at six Chinese universities. Findings show that the MBUC weakens students' perceived employability by cultivating a single rather than compound skill set, limiting their social circles and, therefore, horizons for action and delaying their career self-management. More directly, it affects GE in some cases by overproducing a homogeneously skilled workforce. We argue that in many fields of the current world of work, the MBUC may have contradicted its original, and once achieved, goal of enhancing GE for a particular profession; rather, in practice, it has become an obstacle to GE development.

This article presents an ethnographic case study of pre-service teachers' transformative learning in a Culture-Writing course at a Chinese university. In recounting three stories with fieldwork data gleaned from moments of students' pre-class discussions, reflective writings, and reports on term-paper projects, this study showcases how a group of student-teachers transformed "the self" through getting to know and/or re-understanding "other(s)." Learning to 'write culture', as their teacher led them to see, is to appreciate the lifeworlds of others and further to destabilise taken-for-granted assumptions, beliefs, and understandings, thereby leading towards transformation. I argue that transformative learning takes place in the process of knowing and rebuilding the self in relationships with other(s). It constitutes moments of critical shift that place the self and identity in a more reflexive, relational, and reversible position within specific socio-cultural contexts. This study contributes to the ongoing discussions on transformative education by illuminating how other(s) play a role in promoting pre-service teachers' transformation in a classroom-based course.

In China, higher education institutions (HEIs) have a governance arrangement in which the university president and the party secretary occupy key roles. However, their legal roles as institutional leaders are vaguely specified in existing legal frameworks. Based on a four-dimensional theoretical model, this paper (i) clarifies the leadership roles in the dual governance structure, (ii) explores how HEI leaders (i.e. presidents and party secretaries) perceive their leadership, and (iii) applies the unique Chinese practices as a valuable test bed for critical reflections on how existing theoretical models of leadership are relevant in Chinese contexts. Through in-depth interviews with six top-level leaders from six Chinese public HEIs, our findings indicate that Chinese HEI leaders apply more structural than symbolic dimensions in their leadership practices. Whereas studies on institutional leadership conducted outside China tend to highlight the symbolic dimensions of leadership practices, our study suggests that top-level Chinese HEI leaders may assume the role of university managers rather than institutional leaders. We offer some reflections on the relevance of existing theoretical models of leadership and suggest the directions for further theoretical enhancement.

This paper aims to study the features of vocal improvisation using interactive musical technologies. The survey method contributed to determining the level of vocal skills of 214 respondents auditioned before the experiment. The authors developed a training programme based on previously received information. It included breathing, technical, aesthetic, and vocal improvisation skills. The results showed that 93% of the experimental group believed that interactive technologies had advantages in the educational process, and 63% of the control group believed that they had no advantages. The survey of the students allowed identifying elements that required improvement or changes in the curriculum. The students of the experimental group showed that using national Chinese instruments for accompaniment was important for 32% of the respondents, 27% chose the answer "other", which included systematic and more frequent cross-sections of knowledge, the involvement of foreign approaches to learning. The calculation of the level of knowledge obtained showed that 88% of the students demonstrated a high level in the experimental group, a low one was only in 2%. Study prospects relate to studying technical and aesthetic elements to be applied during classical and folk vocal performance.

Recently, researchers have proposed to leverage technology-supported data (log files) to investigate temporal and sequential patterns of interaction behaviors in learning processes. There are two major challenges to be addressed: clarifying the positioning of interaction levels and identifying the evolution of the interaction action patterns in learning processes, particularly for students with differing achievements. This paper explores the use of sequential pattern mining to address the evolution of student action patterns in Massive Private Online Courses (MPOCs) and compare these patterns between different achievement groups. The study was conducted with first-year undergraduate computer science students enrolled in a computer application course at a traditional open university in one of the Chinese provinces (N = 1375). The results showed the development of various action patterns in each phase of the course and the distinct action patterns for high-achieving and low-achieving students. The findings of study provide a new perspective for instructors and students to understand interaction patterns at the fine-grained level, and can help instructional designers develop learner-cantered courses and platforms to improve online learning.

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.

Hands-off data-driven learning is a data-based, student-oriented learning model characterized by inquiry and discovery. English context vocabulary teaching is the key to English teaching in colleges and an important indicator to evaluate the quality and level of college English teaching, which is a language teaching paradigm focusing on the language environment. Combining the two approaches can give students a more realistic, practical, and meaningful language learning experience. This paper analyzes the vocabulary learning level of two non-English major undergraduate classes at Southwest University of Political Science and Law before and after the application of the context experiment. The positive effect of context vocabulary teaching in the control groups is verified by comparing and analyzing the influence of context teaching based on hands-off data-driven learning on their scores and learning results between the experimental and control groups. It shows that the combination of context in English vocabulary teaching with hands-off data-driven learning can help to improve students' ability to understand, absorb, and apply English vocabulary.

Translanguaging goes between linguistic and/or modal boundaries and beyond them (Li, W. (2011a). Moment analysis and translanguaging space: Discursive construction of identities by multilingual Chinese youth in Britain. "Journal of Pragmatics", 43(5), 1222-1235. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pragma.2010.07.035). The appearance of this new concept marks a significant development of multilingualism studies. This paper is based on an empirical study of creating a translanguaging space and positive 'classroom climate' (Gabrys-Barker, D. (2014). Success: From failure to failure with enthusiasm. "Studies in Second Language Learning and Teaching", 4(2), 301-325. https://doi.org/10.14746/ssllt.2014.4.2.7) by allowing for students' emotional expression and supporting their emotions to benefit EFL (English as a Foreign Language) learning in the Chinese context. The visual data are multilingual and multimodal student-made artefacts called "emotional curves" completed by newly registered university students as descriptive homework of their emotions about English learning in the classroom. These emotional curves create a translanguaging space where students adopt multiple linguistic and semiotic resources to express emotions and identities freely and creatively. The multimodal discourse analysis of emotional curves is combined with (auto)ethnographic observations and interviews, which shed light upon the emotional motivation for translanguaging and manifest effective teacher-student communication owing to the teacher's 'emotional scaffolding' (Park, M. H. (2014). Increasing English language learners' engagement in instruction through emotional scaffolding. "Multicultural Education", 22(1), 20-29.) strategies. Theoretically, this paper highlights the transformative power of translanguaging space and clarifies emotional representations of translanguaging theory. Pedagogically, this study advocates acknowledging and scaffolding students' emotions to establish better teacher-student relationships and create a flexible translanguaging space and harmonious classroom climate.

The vast majority of Chinese universities have embraced higher education reform that emphasizes a "publish or perish" ideology. This brings challenges to the early-career academics, especially those working in language-related fields. This paper employs a multiple case study to explore the identity tension of early career academics in applied linguistics. The three cases had diverse backgrounds and demonstrated different identity trajectories. Data were triangulated through narrative frames, interviews, and documents. Data analysis was conducted using an inductive approach that focused on interpreting the underlying meanings within the data, drawing upon relevant theoretical frameworks for guidance. The findings revealed an array of identity options (e.g., "temporary worker", "blind follower", "green pepper", "leek"). The factors that shaped the identity construction included the shifting value of being a teacher and researcher, intensified "publish-or-perish" ideology, and changing institutional and societal systems and requirements. Implications on teacher development for early-career academics in applied linguistics were proposed based on the findings.

Teaching quality assurance has become a common concern and a common pursuit for institutions of higher learning around the world. This paper takes teaching quality as a governance issue in higher education, as different governance systems entail different approaches to quality assurance. Through a detailed examination of the Chinese system in teaching administration in comparison with the Canadian system, this study aims to provide insights on different approaches to teaching quality assurance in more centralised and decentralised governance structures. Based on the findings of this study, no winner can be declared between centralised and decentralised systems in the area of teaching quality assurance. Instead, the study points to different strengths in each system. With more local autonomy, the decentralised system better respects disciplinary uniqueness and academic freedom in teaching. With more national planning, the centralised system secures a system-wide threshold in teaching quality and an optimal long-term development.

This paper explores what the measures of utterance fluency typically employed in Automatic Speech Evaluation (ASE), i.e. automated speaking assessments, tell us about oral proficiency. 60 Chinese learners of English completed the second part of the speaking section of IELTS and six tasks designed to measure the linguistic knowledge and processing assumed to underpin second language speech production. A sample of eight native speakers rated the learners' oral productions for functional adequacy. Analyses of the data confirm: (1) articulation rate, mid-clause pause frequency, and repetition frequency predict functional adequacy, (2) breadth of lexical knowledge is the main predictor of articulation rate as well as functional adequacy, (3) speed of syntactic processing predicts end-clause pause duration and speed of lexical processing predicts mid-clause pause duration, and (4) measures of utterance fluency together account for 60% of the variation in functional adequacy scores. These findings suggest that articulation rate best reflects overall functional adequacy. Moreover, other measures of utterance fluency reflect different areas of underlying knowledge and processing, opening up the possibility of automating diagnostic speaking tests.

In the field of applied linguistics, Diane Larsen-Freeman is widely recognized, among her numerous contributions, as the originator of Complex Dynamic Systems Theory (CDST). Over the years since her seminal publication (Larsen-Freeman, 1997), CDST has evolved into a meta-theory that guides the field's thinking on a variety of developmental phenomena, not least the study of second language acquisition. As its theoretical potency rises, so does the need to achieve a tangible understanding of CDST's core constructs. In this paper, we empirically examine one such construct, co-adaptation, in the context of asynchronous dyadic interaction. A data corpus of 39 emails sent between two college students in China and the United States over the course of seven weeks is analyzed using NVivo 12. Co-adaptation is observed at the pragmatic, discourse, and linguistic levels. True to the spirit of CDST, we describe, and discuss the nuances of, our findings. Considering the novelty of our approach to data analysis, we end by reflecting on the limitations specific to our study, as well as worthwhile directions for future pursuits.

The persistent gender inequalities in higher education are an ongoing concern among academics. This paper investigates how male and female academics perceive the need for gender-related changes to support academic women's career advancement in China. Drawing on 40 interviews with male and female academics at a leading Chinese research university, this paper finds that attitudes among male academics were overwhelmingly negative toward the necessity for gender-related changes, whereas the female academics' responses varied. Two underlying issues cause the relatively similar degrees of unwillingness of men and women to make gender-related policy changes at universities. First, these academics had a strong belief in merit-based rules for promotion, which embedded gender blindness in the name of 'fairness'. Second, the power of individual choice was the determining factor for women's career progression, although both men and women acknowledged that their traditional cultural beliefs were rooted in processes and practices that systematically disadvantaged women. The findings expose academics' low expectations for the successful creation or implementation of institutional policies that support academic women's career development, considering that male academics did not support gender-related changes, and female academics were not united in their perspectives. In addition, socio-cultural norms were a critical obstacle. The findings suggest that the successful implementation of any gender policies must meet two conditions: they should stress equal opportunities for both sexes and should not jeopardize the perceived 'fair' meritocracy in academia.

Involving the global issues as listed in Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in education is necessarily done in the education process, especially in English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learning. Exposure to global issues is known to improve students' understanding, awareness, and ability to solve urgent issues faced by global society. This paper aims to find out the trend of research on the coverage of SDGs in students' learning process. This systematic literature analysis was done by applying Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) Method. A total of 25 studies were recognized through a systematic search by using Sustainability, SDGs, and EFL as keywords. The result shows that the trend of associating SDGs with EFL settings was done mostly in Indonesia. In the recent year 2022, it reached the highest number of studies in the particular matter with 7 total of research. It was also found that the study involving SDGs on EFL learning was mostly done in the tertiary setting, compared with K-12, junior high school, secondary, high school, and other educational institutions. It was also discovered that the specific area of study enhances EFL students' learning achievement, environmental awareness, global citizen values, as well as students' levels of self-norms, beliefs, and self-value.

Purpose: The number of universities offering Master of Translation and Interpreting (MTI) in China has increased to 316 in 15 years. This paper aims to take a closer look at the production patterns of experimental report theses in terms of total number, distribution across universities, supervision model and research content, reflects on the problems and suggests improvements, provides a reference for MTI education in China and beyond. Design/methodology/approach: This paper presents a bibliometric analysis of the published final theses of experimental reports for the MTI in China between the years 2012 and 2022, the period during which this type of thesis was produced, to identify the production patterns of these theses. Findings: The number of experimental reports published by the nine leading universities accounts for 80% of the total 296 papers. The uneven development is also reflected in the supervision model and research content. Most universities can structure the main content of theses according to the suggestions of the MTI Guidance Training Outline. However, there are still deficiencies in the areas of experimental design, experimental validity, research questions and academic standards. Originality/value: This paper reflects on the problems of MTI theses of experimental reports. Also, suggestions are made for linking top-level design and university education, for joint progress in faculty development and talent training and for integrating industrial aspects and international visions, to provide a reference for MTI education in China and beyond.

This paper reports on a study that examined the process of two international doctoral students' academic socialisation in Chinese universities. Drawing on the concept of academic socialisation and social network analysis, we analysed multiple types of data, including study-abroad social network questionnaires, concentric circles interviews, reflective journals, and observational field notes over six months. The analysis of findings revealed that doctoral supervisors acted as the most influential agents in guiding the participants' academic socialisation. The participants also enacted agency to engage in a self-directed socialisation process during which they strategically appropriated resources to cope with various challenges. By unpacking the multi-layered relationships in the participants' networks, this study provides insights into the dynamic and intricate processes of international research students' academic socialisation. Implications are briefly addressed to support international students' experiences in postgraduate research programmes for successful academic socialisation.

The massification of higher education has dramatically changed the association between credentials and jobs in advanced countries, while its impacts in transitional economies have received less academic attention. To address this research lacuna, the paper utilizes rich information from China's national surveys of college graduates from 2003 to 2019 and multiple waves of census data to explore the temporal and spatial effects of tertiary education expansion on college graduates' job sorting. Regression results from the fixed effects model and the two-stage least-squares model indicate that, on the temporal dimension, the higher education expansion has weakened ties between college credentials and quality jobs over the past 20 years. Recent graduates are more likely to work in informal, non-urban, and non-public sectors, and the college earnings premium has also declined. There is a persistent gap in employment outcomes between bachelor's and associate degree holders. On the spatial dimension, the growing enrolment size leads to skill sorting towards low skilled regions. The study argues that the dynamic effects of college credentials may be explained by labour market flexibility and cohort crowding after higher education expansion. This paper calls for a critical reflection on the merit of further massification of higher education in developing economies, regarding its potential impacts on intergenerational inequality and regional inequality.

Since the twenty-first century, universities in many countries, including China, have introduced tenure-track employment to attract outstanding faculty. Through a survey of 1,099 faculty members from 21 high-level research universities in China, this study used a quasi-experimental method to examine the effect of the tenure track on faculty members' academic performance. The results suggest that the implementation of the tenure track led to an increase in the number of academic publications, but a decrease in the number of high-quality academic articles. The study further analyzed the underlying mechanisms by which the tenure track affected faculty members' academic performance, and found that introducing the tenure track increased cross-institutional collaboration, thereby promoting academic productivity. However, it resulted in a reduction in research collaboration within the institution, which hindered academic publication in high-impact journals. In terms of disciplinary heterogeneity, this study shows that the negative effect of the tenure track on publication quality was more significant in science than in engineering. Based on the research results above, this paper proposed several suggestions for improving the tenure system to ensure research excellence.

This paper examines intersecting concerns in global citizenship education (GCE) and English Language Teaching (ELT) in the face of globalisation. While these two educational agendas cannot be assumed to automatically converge, our study signals that promising overlaps emerge from the enactment of dialogic practices in second language education. Drawing upon an ELT reading course in Chinese higher education, we elaborate on how a Freirean informed approach opens up pedagogical encounters and opportunities for undergraduates to become interculturally aware citizens. The pedagogic vignettes presented here challenge the dominance of pragmatic orientations of ELT in mainland China today while instigating a teaching paradigm shift. Though practical language skills have been touted within Chinese universities for decades, we argue for an integration of GCE into teaching and learning English in a dialogic manner, thus developing bilingual and interculturally aware learners who critically engage with the uncharted terrain of an increasingly globalised world.

Drawing on data collected from multiple sources, this qualitative case study investigates how seven English-as-a-foreign-language (EFL) academics from a university in mainland China perceive and cope with their professional vulnerability within the system of performativity. Three themes were generated from the data: (1) professional vulnerability as a state of conformity and self-learning, (2) professional vulnerability as a state of constrained agency, and (3) professional vulnerability as a state of disengagement. The findings not only reflect the complex and dynamic nature of EFL academics' professional vulnerability, but also unpack numerous contextual and personal factors mediating EFL academics' experiences of professional vulnerability. The paper ends with some practical implications on how to mitigate the negative influences that vulnerability has on EFL academics' professional practice within the system of performativity.

This paper describes a qualitative participatory action research study applying critical cosmopolitan literacies principles with pre-service English as a foreign language (EFL) teachers to address global human rights issues through international English youth literature. Using literary works on sociopolitical issues alongside critical pedagogy engagements and teaching practicum in various educational settings, the author as a teacher-researcher attempts to raise the student teachers' critical awareness to issues of power, privilege, and social justice embedded in the multicultural and multimodal texts. Analysis of the qualitative data indicates important outcomes in terms of an enhanced understanding of critical human rights issues pertaining to the formation of student teachers' identities as global-conscious and socially responsible educators. Meanwhile, with explicit guidance from the teacher educator, the student teachers also develop communicative intercultural competence, high-order thinking skills, and learning agency by engaging in multiliteracies practices within a cosmopolitan literacies orientation.

The fragmentation of academic work and its uneven distribution among academic staff have produced particular challenges for new entrants to teaching in Higher Education, Early Career Teachers [ECTs]. In this paper, documentary analysis of the narratives of fourteen ECTs, who worked across six different continents, was undertaken. The findings highlight the diverse forms of precarity that ECTs face, which cut across migratory, identitarian, economic, and ideological dimensions. It discusses ECTs' reflections on their expectations of teaching and their adaptation to the demands of neoliberal Higher Education. Drawing from their narratives and Sevil Sümer's theories of differentiated academic citizenship, ECTs are recognised as 'precarious academic citizens'. This has important implications for revealing the unique circumstances of this group, thereby opening further questions as regards their mentoring and support to enable them to be situated more equally as citizens of the academy.

Higher education institutions are increasingly moving from traditional education approaches to incorporate online and distance learning (ODL) models, and this represents a substantial educational challenge for many educators. One way to support this challenge is by providing appropriate professional development (PD) for the design of ODL. Based on models from the Open University, UK this paper contends that PD for the design of ODL should align learning design frameworks with constructivist and student-focused pedagogies to manage the change to the professional teaching identities of participants that designing ODL represents. Robust professional identities are important for mitigating anxiety, embedding lasting change and leveraging the benefits of ODL for institutions and students. In this study, the rationale, model, and strategies of the Learning Design and Course Creation Workshop, based on current literature and participant feedback gathered immediately after instances of the PD was completed in China, are described. Evidence and examples of impact gathered from a second instrument, gathered after implementation, is also provided, and discussed in this context. The findings and conclusions will be of interest to those tasked with providing PD to support educators faced with rapid educational change, particularly as a response to the global demand for the design of ODL.

The practice of Corrective Feedback (CF), which is situated within a Second Language Acquisition (SLA) Paradigm, is currently positioned towards an accuracy-orientated delivery based on native speaker norms. This is despite the recognition in different areas of linguistic research that there is considerable variation in the way that English is spoken around the world. This paper argues that the epistemological assumptions and methodological approaches to investigate CF within an SLA paradigm have various underlying weaknesses that undermine research findings. These findings purport to provide support for an accuracy-orientated CF in the English classroom. However, it is suggested in this paper that a meaning-orientated CF would be more reflective and beneficial for students given the transformative changes that have occurred to English over the past 30 years. This perspective is discussed in relation to one teacher's approach to CF who participated in a larger project which examined CF conducted in a British-Sino University.

"Global Engineering Education Accreditation" (GEEA) is an internationally accepted quality assurance system for engineering education in universities, and technology competitions for college students are also considered important approaches to achieve the educational objectives and meet graduation requirements of GEEA in practice aspects. In this paper, the competency of guiding teachers of technology competitions for Chinese college students is evaluated through a case of "National Competition of Transportation Science and Technology for Students" (NACTranS). Firstly, 7 theoretical hypotheses of the modified "structural equation modeling" (SEM) for competency were developed by concentrating on some principles pertaining to the key concepts of GEEA. Secondly, competition results were set as the dependent variable and 3 dimensions of competition (topic selecting, works producing and team managing) were set as the independent variables under the modified SEM. Meanwhile, both administrative ranks and regional locations of universities where guiding teachers work were set as intervening vectors so as to explain the formation mechanisms of competency. Thirdly, a case study of NACTranS data from 68 universities in China's mainland was done through modified SEM calculating. The conclusions indicate that competency of guiding teachers is not only represented by 3 dimensions but also indirectly manipulated by 2 intervening vectors. According to the case calculating by modified SEM, the determinant of guiding teachers' performance in topic selecting is the administrative ranks of universities, whereas their performance in works producing is dictated by the regional locations of universities. Various improvements on the competency of guiding teachers can be carried out in schools of engineering in Chinese universities, such as sufficient academic communications, efficient industry-university-research cooperation and so on.

A discussion forum is an indispensable part of a massive open online course (MOOC) environment as it enables knowledge construction through learner-to-learner interaction such as discussion of solutions to assigned problems among learners. In this paper, a machine prediction model is built based on the data from the MOOC forum and the depth of discussion of solutions to assigned problems on the topic among students was analyzed. The data for this study was obtained from Modern educational technology course through Selenium with Python. The course has been offered to a total of 11,184 students from China seven times since February, 2016. The proposed model includes the formula of the depth of problem-solving discussion in MOOC forum and its prediction probability. The efficiency of the prediction model and the most important factor of the depth of problem-solving discussion in MOOC are explained in the paper. Based on the results, useful suggestions for effective teaching in MOOC forums are provided in the article.

This paper explores the practical prospects for using artificial intelligence technologies in professional English-speaking translator education. At the online conference 'Translation Skills in Times of Artificial Intelligence' (DingTalk platform, January 2022), the teachers of higher education institutions in China prioritized the translator's competencies necessary for successful professional activity during the digital transformation of social and economic business relations. The educators also evaluated the demand for online services used in the education of English-Chinese interpreters. The survey results showed that the use of artificial intelligence technologies in educational practices could have a significant impact on the development of key competencies of future translators. Using a competency-based approach to interpreter training and considering the need to develop abilities, knowledge, and skills required for successful professional translation activity, the author developed the pedagogical concept of the online educational course 'Simultaneous and asynchronous translation in a digital environment.'

Background Studies: Captioning and repetition are widely used multimedia instructional devices for non-native students. Generally, studies in this area have tended to focus on second language literacy skills rather than on learning new content knowledge. Additionally, posttests were administered immediately after the treatments, while the delayed influences of captioning and repetition have never been investigated. Objectives: This paper addressed these research gaps in two separate studies. More specifically, this study attempted to examine the influences of captioning and repetition on non-native students' immediate and relayed retention. Methods: In Study One, three captioning conditions; word-by-word captions, closed captions, and no-captions; were compared to examine their efficacies in immediate and delayed content knowledge retention on 82 Chinese university students. To address the limitations in Study One as the multimedia lesson was short and played only once, Study Two incorporated captioning and two repetition types in its design. One hundred and eleven Chinese university students watch a video lesson in one of four captioning and repetition conditions. Results: The statistical analyses of Study One indicated that there were no significant differences in both immediate and delayed retention test scores across the three captioning condition. Similarly, in Study Two, there were no significant differences in retention tests scores across the four captioning and repetition conditions. Findings: Neither the availability of captions nor the repetition types had any impact on the Chinese students' immediate or delayed content knowledge retention, which lent support to existing studies. Based on the research results, the limitations and future study possibilities are discussed.

The paper measures the impact of the developed approach to teaching the translation theory, using the psycholinguistic features of the English language. The factor analysis validation framework was used to control the data of this study. 190 s-year students from Xxx University majoring in translation studies were surveyed. The results of the post-assessment of groups B show an increase in scores according to three special criteria: the value of the language mental representation understanding level increased by 25.3%, language mechanisms processing by 30.8%, the indicator of linguistic resources by 44.6%. Additionally, students from mini-groups B received an average of general assessment criteria 7.2% higher than the control group. Correlation analysis suggests that as the mastery level of special skills in the English language theory increases, the effectiveness of the pedagogical process will also increase, considering psycholinguistic features of the English language. The research findings may be relied upon when building the expertise in new practices intended to develop effective teaching strategies enhancing the competencies of future translators. Application of the research findings can improve the effectiveness of teaching translation theory to students in the People's Republic of China.

China released two new policies in 2021, the 'double reduction' and a Gaokao (National College Entrance Examination) regulation, which have significantly impacted English learning and Languages other than English (LOTEs) learning respectively. This has intensified the existing dispute over 'English fever' and made people question whether the 'winter' of English education in China has come. In this article, findings from a multiple-case study exploring teachers' and students' opinions on the value of English learning in Chinese higher education are discussed under the circumstances of such new policies. This study employs the Bourdieusian approach and involves English major, non-English major learners as well as their teachers in Yunnan and Shanghai, two socio-economically different areas, to see diversity. The participants reported a cooling down of the 'English fever' in the universities and the wider society, yet an increasing demand for a higher level of English proficiency in particular industries or disciplines. The findings also demonstrate the tension between the standardised national curriculum and regionally different language needs along with the influence of an incoherent national curricula for different educational stages regarding foreign language education. This paper concludes with suggestions to modify the curriculum and teaching practices for multilingual and English for Specific Purposes (ESP) education in China as well as other English as a Foreign Language contexts.

More than half of the presidents in top universities of China have been grown up in their original universities. According to the upper echelon theory, the "indigenization" characteristics of university presidents will have an impact on their cognitive level and thus affect the scientific research performance of universities. Based on data from the National Natural Science Fund Projects and the National Social Science Fund Projects of China from 2007 to 2016, as well as individual characteristics of presidents, this paper empirically investigates the influence of the growth experience of presidents in 115 "Project 211" universities on scientific research performance. The results show that the presidents who grow up from the original universities have a significant negative impact on national fund projects, especially on the national natural science foundation projects. This paper suggest that the reason maybe the insufficient motivation and less access to external resources for native presidents. Some corresponding policy recommendations are proposed for this purpose.

In educational research, there has been much stricture of neoliberalism as a scourge. In the higher education sector, the neoliberal turn has been observed as eroding academic freedom and deprofessionalising academics. Early career academics are often described as victims of neoliberalism. In this paper, we take a positive perspective through a deep dive into resilience that enables self-transformation and, potentially, system change. Our paper is situated in the Chinese higher education context where the "up-or-out" system has been put in place, mirroring the neoliberal university at a global range. We--a mid-career researcher and an early career academic--analyse our collective narratives generated through WeChat text and voice message. Drawing insight from Bourdieu's reflexive sociology, our narratives lead to four themes: capital accumulation and self-transformation, shaping the publication habitus, emancipation from symbolic violence, and resilience to symbolic domination. We conclude the paper with a call for sociology of resilience and recommendations for deneoliberalising higher education.

This paper examines the experiences of nine Chinese girls and young women as they explore and negotiate queer subjectivities within the constraints of patriarchal and (hetero)sexual norms surrounding girlhood and young femininity. I focus on filial piety ("xiaoshun") as a normative gendered discourse being reconfigured in changing gender, familial and other power dynamics in China. I argue that the discourse of filial piety continues to naturalise a heteronormative girlhood that will smoothly transition into young womanhood prepared to take on responsibilities of 'getting married and having kids'. This narrative, however, is in tensions with girls and young women's diversified expressions of sexualities. Through the participants' own accounts of queer explorations, I demonstrate how they actively engage and reflect on these tensions with familial and filial discourses while navigating the (im)possibilities of becoming queer girls across varied socioeconomic and family backgrounds. The findings of this study offered new insights into how familism and filial piety are woven into Chinese gender and sexual politics and being constantly (re)negotiated. My conceptualisation of queer girlhoods in China shows how queer girls and young women are marginalised in and around family. In the meantime, it demonstrates the emergent strategies of queer resistance and negotiations of filial piety through delaying marriage and managing familial intimacy.

This paper investigated project-based governance (PBG) in China's higher vocational education (HVE) with a main research question asking how PBG works in China's HVE. Using case study as a research strategy, the paper examines the application and effect of the PBG model on Chinese HVE within the analytical framework of PBG-based agency theory. Twenty-three faculty members from both administrative and academic departments in College Plateau (pseudonym) were recruited to participate in a person-to-person interviews. They were expected to share their observations and perspectives on the PBG model as applied to HVE. As supplementary materials, the Chinese government's policy documents and statistics, as well as institutional policy documents, were also looked at for a brief discussion of governance of China's HVE. The results showed that the PBG model has greatly challenged the traditional administrative, distribution and personnel systems, as well as the college-enterprise cooperation model, and academic performance of higher vocational colleges (HVCs). These changes have brought higher academic achievements and greater social resources to College Plateau. However, they have also caused many negative effects, such as homogeneity of organizations and the Matthew effect among HVCs.

This paper explores a possible future of postdigital education in 2050 using the means of social science fiction. The first part of the paper introduces the shift from 20th century primacy of physics to 21st century primacy of biology with an accent to new postdigital--biodigital reconfigurations and challenges in and after the COVID-19 pandemic. The second part of the paper presents a fictional speech at the graduation ceremony of a fictional military academy in a fictional East Asian country in 2050. This fictional world is marked by global warfare and militarization, and addressed graduates are the first generation of artificially evolved graduates in human history. The third part of the paper interprets the fictional narrative, contextualizes it into educational challenges of today, and argues for a dialogical, humanistic conception of new postdigital education in a biotech future.