International and Comparative Education Commons^™

The Patriarchy’S Role In Gender Inequality In The Caribbean, Erin C. O'Connor

Student Publications

While gender equality in the Caribbean is improving, with women’s growing social, economic, and political participation, literacy rates comparable to those in Europe, and greater female participation in higher education, deeply rooted inequalities are still present and are demonstrated in the types of jobs women are in and the limited number of women in decision-making positions. Sexism, racism, and classism are systemic inequalities being perpetuated in schools, through the types of education offered for individuals and the content in textbooks. Ironically, the patriarchy is coexisting within a system of matrifocal and matrilocal families, with a long tradition of female economic …

Active Development Of Tacit Knowledge: Adtk In A World Without Farmers, Roger E. Garrett Jr.

Capstone Collection

Experiential Learning Theory (ELT) and extensions such as Transformative Learning Theory offer significant potential for skill development later in life – reskilling. Despite wide acceptance and deployment, practitioners are still obliged to design their own methods and activities in order to implement these theories. This paper introduces a novel curricular model, Active Development of Tacit Knowledge (ADTK). Educators can use ADTK to effectively implement and scale ELT. Agricultural Education, specifically the training of new farmers, is used as a sample context to demonstrate ADTK. In new-farmer education, it is necessary to compress the educational cycles of dozens of years of …

The Use Of Agents In International Student Recruitment: International Education Professional’S Opinions, Emily M. Kirsch

Capstone Collection

The use of recruitment agents in international student recruitment is a controversial topic with divisive and differing opinions among international education and higher education professionals. This paper researches international educator’s opinions on the use of recruitment agents in international education and explores the idea of a framework to regulate their use. A survey was sent out to international educators across the United States. 119 respondents gave their opinions on the use of agents and provided a valuable snapshot of the current outlook on the ethics and necessity of the use of agents.

Teaching Australian Literature In A Class About Literatures Of Social Reform, Per Henningsgaard

English Faculty Publications and Presentations

This article presents an intriguing thesis about proximity and identification, distance and empathy based on the experience of teaching Sally Morgan’s My Place to American university students alongside Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle and Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin in a class examining literature as an agent of social change. Indeed, its response to the question, “How does the Australian production of My Place influence its American reception?” will surprise many people. Students more readily demonstrate empathy with characters and are prepared to ascribe their unenviable life circumstances to social structures that propagate oppression when reading literature about cultural groups …

Environmental Sustainability, Cultural Awareness, And Personal Growth: A Short-Term Study Abroad Program Design For The University Of Colorado, Boulder, Jana K. Howlett

Capstone Collection

The University of Colorado (CU), as with many academic institutions in the United States, has seen a consistent increase in the number of students opting for short-term study abroad programs. A growing concern in the field of international education is whether it is possible for students to mature in cultural competence from such a short time spent abroad. In an initiative to deliberately increase students’ intercultural growth during short-term excursions, Global Seminar: Environmental Sustainability and Cross-Culture Contact in Costa Rica (GSCR) proposes a program that implements two new aspects to CU’s study abroad options: a course-linked program and an …

Corporate Social Responsibility Enrichment Exchange Program, Deborah Waggoner

Capstone Collection

In this globalized age, international companies and organizations are working in more countries than ever before, and consumers and concerned citizens now have the opportunity and, perhaps even the responsibility, to better understand the environmental and social impacts of the companies and organizations with which they do business.

The concept that businesses and organizations need to be responsible to society for their direct and indirect impacts on people and the environment has become known as corporate social responsibility (CSR). As CSR continues to be a growing practice, companies seem to be approaching it from very different angles, depending upon their …

Access Abroad: A Design In Equitable Access To Education Abroad, Matthew Zielsdorf

Capstone Collection

Access Abroad is an innovative short-term, faculty-led education abroad design that increases accessible, transformative study abroad programming and enhances academic and intercultural program quality for students enrolled in the Educational Opportunity Fund (EOF) at The College of New Jersey. The unique design of Access Abroad harnesses key institutional and financial resources at the college to allow 12 EOF undergraduate students to study in La Paz, Bolivia for four weeks in May 2015 with a faculty leader from the School of Humanities and Social Sciences. The curriculum will foster student exploration of culture, identity, and community and contribute to the development …

Más Allá De Las Fronteras: Pasos Hacia La Educación Intercultural Basados En La Experiencia Con Alumnos Migrantes En 6 Escuelas Primarias En Buenos Aires, Argentina Y Santiago, Chile, Kendra Layton

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Esta investigación explora los efectos y los beneficios de la inmigración en Chile y Argentina en el ámbito escolar al tomar como foco seis escuelas en Santiago y Buenos Aires. Situadas en tensión con culturas que prescriben al paradigma de la asimilación, el objetivo general es indagar sobre la presencia de programas interculturales que se adapten a los alumnos migrantes, una modalidad basada en la apertura, reconocimiento y enriquecimiento de culturas distintas. Para indagar que tanto las escuelas emplean el enfoque de interculturalidad, la investigación analiza el discurso del personal, observa su práctica en el aula y explora los alcances …

Student Participation At School And Future Civic Engagement: Results From Iccs 2009, Wolfram Schulz, John Ainley, Julian Fraillon

Civics and Citizenship Assessment

Civic and citizenship education aims to prepare young people for their roles as citizens in society. Potential learning outcomes include enhanced knowledge and understanding of civic-related issues as well as student attitudes and behaviours. This paper focuses on the importance of civic participation at school as part of this learning process. Civic participation at school has been emphasized increasingly in the literature in studies of the associations between student participation at school and their expected future engagement in society. The data presented in this paper were collected as part of the International Civic and Citizenship Education Study (ICCS 2009), which …

Attitudes Towards Political Engagement Among Lower Secondary Students In East Asian Countries: Results From Iccs 2009, John Ainley, Wolfram Schulz, Julian Fraillon

Civics and Citizenship Assessment

Based on student survey data from five East Asian countries, the paper contains an analysis of attitudes towards the use of personal connections in politics and towards personal morality among politicians. The first part of the analysis describes the extent and variations of these attitudes which are viewed as of particular relevance within the East Asian context. The second part of the analysis investigates the relationship of these attitudes with student background and school-related variables such as civic knowledge as well as uncovering to what extent these attitudes are related to indicators of future civic engagement among students.

Civic Knowledge And Engagement Among Students From Immigrant And Non-Immigrant Backgrounds, Tim Friedman, Wolfram Schulz, Julian Fraillon, John Ainley

Civics and Citizenship Assessment

Civic and citizenship education has the goal of preparing young people for their role as citizens in society through the acquisition of civic knowledge and development of positive attitudes toward engagement. However, globalization and higher levels of migration have led to a re-thinking of the way education should be prepared young people for citizenship in an increasingly globalized world which is no longer only defined by notions of nation states. This paper focuses on the relationship between immigrant background and indicators for civic knowledge and engagement. The data used were collected as part of the IEA International Civic and Citizenship …

School For Global Inclusion And Social Development: Expanding The Umass Boston Community On A Regional, National, And International Level, David Temelini, Institute For Community Inclusion, University Of Massachusetts Boston

Office of Community Partnerships Posters

The School for Global Inclusion and Social Development (SGISD) is the newest graduate school at UMass Boston. We are the first graduate program in the world to focus on wellness, disability, and economic development from an international perspective. The first students in our master's program will start classes in January 2014, with our PhD program to launch in September 2014. SGISD's emphasis is on groups of people who are excluded from communities here in the U.S. and abroad, due to disability or other conditions. Instruction will be delivered on campus, online, and through international exchange programs.

Helping Developing Countries Implement The Young Athletes Program, Paddy C. Favazza, Kathleen Ghio, Gary N. Siperstein, Center For Social Development And Education, University Of Massachusetts Boston

Office of Community Partnerships Posters

The Center for Social Development and Education is implementing Young Athletes (YA), a motor play program, in five developing countries: Kenya, Romania, Malawi, Venezuela, and Tanzania. Young Athletes is a theoretically-based program designed to improve the motor development of children with disabilities (ages 3-7) through various motor activities. Clinical trials conducted by CSDE (Favazza et al., 2013) indicate that the Young Athletes program significantly improves the motor skills of children with disabilities. The program is now being introduced internationally to address the needs of children in developing countries.

An Exploration Of The Reconciliation Model At The Max Rayne School In Jerusalem, Israel; The Cycle Of Victimization, Structural Discrimination And Nationalistic Abuse, Familial Socialization And Psychological Trauma Of Children In Relationship To Israeli-Palestinian Context, Amelia A. Sampat

Selected Honors Theses

The ongoing conflict between the Israeli and Palestinian people of present-day Israel has led to the development of reconciliation processes that influence the psyche of young Israeli and Palestinian children (Zembylas, 2007). A problem arises when these processes require a lengthy period of time. In doing so, the extended process can maintain the political status quo and thereby perpetuate a cycle of victimization, structural discrimination and nationalistic abuse, in addition to familial socialization and psychological trauma. This study explores how the reconciliation methods of the Hand-in-Hand bilingual model at the Max Rayne School in Jerusalem, Israel either perpetuate or work …

‘Headmasters Become Noblemen’: Mainland Chinese Teachers’ Perspectives On Changes In Education In The Post-Mao Era, Lorin G. Yochim

Comparative and International Education / Éducation Comparée et Internationale

In this article I report findings of research into the lives and work of Mainland Chinese teachers of English in a broader context characterized by market economic reform. I draw on transcriptions of group interviews to describe and discuss teachers’ lives and work, and forward a critical analysis that posits a connection between teachers’ accounts and the re-structuring of social relations in post-Mao China. The article details one of several themes treated in the study, specifically the broad category of ‘effects of educational reform.’ I suggest that the compliance and resistance apparent in these accounts reveals Chinese teachers to be …

Study Abroad And Identity: The African American Experience, Alicia Ranney

Capstone Collection

Not all students are alike, nor should they be treated as 'one size fits all' in study abroad. Students have different backgrounds, goals, and expectations of what they will gain from an international academic experience. Minority students face different types of challenges in study abroad than their non-minority counterparts.

This paper seeks to answer the question “does study abroad change the identity of African American students?” and examines the challenges of identity and racism and how those two factors may decrease participation rates of African Americans in study abroad. Students from Marygrove College in Detroit, Michigan were surveyed before and …

American Ways: A Course In Contemporary U.S. Culture For International Students, Christopher D. Fitch

Capstone Collection

International student populations are increasing in large proportions at universities across the United States. The onset of culture shock and difficulty communicating and relating with their new peers compounds an already difficult situation. Universities and colleges need a method to accommodate these students and help facilitate their transitions into a completely new academic and social environment.

“American Ways: A course on Contemporary American Culture for International Students” is a semester-long university level course designed to give knowledge and understanding of “American” culture to international students attending U.S. higher education institutions. It will cover topics surrounding U.S. culture that …

The Costs Of Class: Private Schooling, Parental Choice, And Class Aspirations Among Kathmandu’S Working Poor, Andrew Chen

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Over the last two decades, the ‘de facto’ privatization of educational services has emerged as a significant policy trend in Nepal’s educational sector; however, unlike earlier decades when private schools catered exclusively to the privileged classes, the expansion of low-cost ‘budget’ private institutions have begun to serve lower socioeconomic and marginalized classes of the population. This project examines parental perceptions and decisional contexts surrounding the choice of private school for children f the working poor in Kathmandu. Specifically, the study uses the lens of class to explore the rationale, anxieties, and aspirations of working poor parents as they navigate the …

Changes In Knowledge About And Perception Of Civics And Citizenship Over A Ten-Year Period: Comparing Cived 1999 And Iccs 2009, Wolfram Schulz

Civics and Citizenship Assessment

A larger number of countries involved in the IEA International Civic and Citizenship Education Study (ICCS 2009) had also participated in the previous IEA CIVED study undertaken in 1999. The civic knowledge test included a subset of CIVED items which were used to derive comparable measures of civic content knowledge, one of the subscales reported in CIVED 1999. Some of the ICCS 2009 questionnaire material also included items that were similar or even identical in wording to those used in CIVED but for which some general format changes were applied. This paper discusses the potential for comparing results from both …

Evaluating The Contribution Of Schools To The Development Of Young People As Future Citizens, Bruno Losito, Elisa Caponera, Cristiano Corsini, Paola Mirti

Civics and Citizenship Assessment

This paper will illustrate how the contribution of schools to students’ civic knowledge and attitudes was analyzed in ICCS 2009. It is divided into three parts. The first part illustrates the constructs and variables included in the ICCS instruments (student, teacher and school questionnaires) and their relationship with findings from previous studies about civic and citizenship education and school effectiveness. The second part of the paper presents some major findings for European countries in relation to the influence of school context on student outcomes. While comparing them with the results from other studies, this paper discusses the extent to which …

Measuring Civic Knowledge Among Young Adolescents In The International Civic And Citizenship Education Study, Julian Fraillon, Wolfram Schulz, John Ainley

Civics and Citizenship Assessment

Young people’s acquisition of knowledge about, and their development of and understanding of key concepts in, civics and citizenship is widely seen as an important function of most education systems. From a national perspective, civic knowledge would typically encompass aspects related to the country’s political system and its institutions, rights and responsibilities of citizens, mechanisms of engagement in society as well as general concepts (such as national identity, tolerance or shared values) (Schulz, Ainley, Fraillon, Kerr & Losito, 2010a & 2010b). Depending on the curriculum for civic and citizenship education in a country, it would be expected that these aspects …

Assessing The Intended Participation Of Young Adolescents As Future Citizens: Comparing Results From 26 European Countries, John Ainley, Tim Friedman, David Kerr, Wolfram Schulz

Civics and Citizenship Assessment

Recent developments in the economic and social politics of Europe have led to a quickened interest in the intentions of young people to participate as citizens. This paper focuses on students from 26 European countries who were in Grade 8 in 2009 and who will typically gain formal electoral rights in 2013. It analyzes young adolescents' intentions to participate as citizens through political participation as adults through electoral and active political participation. The paper is based on the IEA International Civic and Citizenship Education Study which investigated the ways in which young people in lower secondary schools were being prepared …

Stable, Practical, And High-Paying: How Second Generation Indian/Pakistani Adults Are Affected By Parental Pressure In Their Career Choices, Sabrina Eveland

Capstone Collection

This study explores the pressure to succeed that some Indian and Pakistani first generation parents put on their second generation children living in the United States. The study was conducted through guided interviews with fourteen interviewees; six first generation parents who immigrated to the United States between 1966 and 1978 and eight second generation adult children between the ages of 20 and 35. The study captures the intergenerational stress that occurs when parents want their adult children to study traditional and stable careers that the second generation adults are not necessarily interested in. It also explores the pressures and limitations …

A Phenomenological Study Of Motivations, Experiences And Reflections As Related To Teacher Training And Development In Tanzania, Melinda Ingiaimo

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

In third world countries where education often takes a back seat to survival, teachers struggle to prepare themselves to shape the destiny and future of the upcoming generation. This study examined the phenomena of Tanzanian teacher preparation with special emphasis on the motivating factors, common experiences and reflections of participants concerning their preparation process for teaching in a government funded school. This study inquired into the immediate teaching environment and the ongoing teacher development processes. Fifteen Tanzanian teachers were purposefully chosen for this study and data was gathered utilizing a semi-structured interview, a survey and a focus group. The teacher …

Social Origin And Citizenship Participation In Latin American Schools, Juan Castillo

Civics and Citizenship Assessment

Empirical research in political participation has consistently shown that participation is characteristic of those with higher socio-economic status and formal education (Brady, Verba, & Schlozman, 1995; Lijphart, 1997; Dalton, 1988; Han, 2009; Marien, Hooghe, & Quintelier, 2010). Socio-economic status differences among citizens are accentuated in societies with high economic inequality as the Latin American ones (De Ferranti et al., 2003; Deininger & Squire, 1996; Dion, 2007; Hoffman & Centeno, 2003; Korzeniewicz & Smith, 2000), and therefore it would be expected to find political inequality in terms of participation in this region (Côrtes & Dubrow, 2011). Such a link is not …

Civic Participation At School And School-Based Community Participation, Elisa Caponera, Bruno Losito, Paola Mirti

Civics and Citizenship Assessment

The idea of civic and citizenship education underpinning ICCS recognizes that civic and citizenship knowledge, dispositions to engage and attitudes related to civic and citizenship education are linked to the variety of contexts where students live, including family background, classrooms, schools, and the wider community (Schulz, Ainley, Fraillon, Losito, Kerr, 2008; Schulz, Ainley, Fraillon, Kerr, Losito, 2010). Particular importance is given to the actual opportunities students have to actively participate in school life and in the community where the school is located. The first part of this paper will provide a general overview of how schools in the countries participating …

Introduction, Daniel Paracka, Darina Lepadatu

Journal of Global Initiatives: Policy, Pedagogy, Perspective

Introduction to the issue.

Community Perspectives- How Study Abroad With Service Learning Impacts The Locals, Sarah J. Delcambre

Capstone Collection

This case study focuses on the community perspectives of homestay families, partner organizations, and local program staff that collaborated with Xplore USA Summer Language Adventure Camps in the Summer of 2011, in Asheville, North Carolina. The researcher focused on the service work aspect of the Xplore programming, and its impact on the local community via the local community’s perspective, to inform the reader of an underexplored subject. Interviews and survey results showed that the volunteer service projects performed by Xplore students and their local brothers and sisters were perceived as beneficial by an overwhelming majority of all local parties concerned: …

Challenges In The Land Of Hope: Phoenix Area Refugees And The Recession, Valerie E. Nightingale

Capstone Collection

Refugees in the United States today have greater access than ever to training programs and specialized service providers who assist with cultural adjustment to the U.S. as well as pre-employment training, job placement and retention services. Service providers develop job opportunities in the local community through partnerships with dedicated employers who see value in hiring new Americans and purpose in collaborating with voluntary agencies to overcome barriers for employees. During the recession there has been greater challenges for employment specialists to find employment for refugee clients and employers have noted some reluctance in hiring employees with low or non-existent English …

Project Gaya: A Study Abroad Program Design For Fundación Operación Gaya Internacional, Lauren E. Johanson

Capstone Collection

Since 2008 Fundación Operación GAYA Internacional, a Costa Rican NGO has provided youth training and development programs to local youth in Costa Rica, empowering young people to be “architects” in the development of their own communities and to take the lead in creating a world that is more peaceful and just. Through the implementation of Project GAYA, the foundation will expand its programming to international youth for the first time.

The proposed program offers a comprehensive program design for a short-term study abroad experience for U.S. high school students to Costa Rica. Students will engage in experiential learning and critical …