The right to intercultural education: students’ perspectives on schooling and opportunities for reconciliation through multicultural engagement in Bosnia and Herzegovina

ABSTRACT

In post-conflict societies, such as Bosnia and Herzegovina, education is recognised as a key factor in reconciliation. Yet the 1995 Dayton Peace Agreement set in process arrangements that mean that Bosnia and Herzegovina’s three constituent ethnic groups (Bosniaks, Croats and Serbs) are educated separately. This paper examines students’ right to integrated schooling and an intercultural education, in keeping with the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. It reports on small-scale empirical research on the impact of integrated and segregated education on students, focusing on the experiences of students who have had access to Bosnia and Herzegovina’s only fully integrated school. There are tensions between the competing educational rights of students and the cultural rights of ethno-cultural communities. Since entrenched political problems hinder the reestablishment of integrated public schooling, the paper considers the potential of service-learning and multicultural community engagement to challenge ethno-nationalist ideas promoted through segregated schools and enable peace and reconciliation.     

Caught in the Cross Fire: Children’s Right to Education During Conflict — The Case of Nepal 1996–2006

The article focuses on the impact on children, schools and education during the 10 year conflict in Nepal and raises questions for further research on schooling in the post‐conflict era. The article is based on research undertaken as part of a British Council funded Higher Education Link. Focus group discussions and interviews were conducted with school children, parents, teachers and community leaders between 2004 and 2006 and draws on informal discussions and observations with NGOs and teachers in the post‐conflict period, including NGOs visual methods to enable children’s voices to be heard in the peace process.     

Applying a Critical and Peace Education Lens to the American Revolution in the Social Studies Classroom

Abstract

The American Revolution is central to the identity of citizens of the United States. It is, therefore, rarely critiqued in the U.S. social studies classroom. This article examines how teachers can discuss the American Revolution using both a critical historical approach and the ideas of peace education, particularly the strand that focuses on the problematization of war. Specific examples are given for how teachers can critique some of the national myths surrounding the American Revolution. Furthermore, the rationale for this critique of the American Revolution is presented, particularly as it relates to the problematic history of minorities in the aftermath of the Revolution and the relationship between students’ views of the American Revolution and the ties to modern-day violence and military engagements. The goal for this more nuanced understanding of the American Revolution is not only to make students more critical thinkers in regard to their history but hopefully to also help them gain a healthier societal outlook in regard to the issues of peace and conflict.     

Can we empathize with the narrative of our enemy? A personal odyssey in studying peace education

The reader is taken on a journey spanning some 30 years devoted to the author’s involvement in practicing, teaching and studying peace education. The core concept in this journey is active bystandership, which implies the capacity to disengage from our ethnocentric narratives and perceptions and to face the emotional challenges of acknowledging narratives that contradict our collective assumptions about the conflict and accept the moral obligation to address our contribution to violence. The author describes her non-professional as well as her professional activity in academia of participating, initiating, teaching and facilitating peace education projects. She describes inter and intra-group encounters and attempts to identify the limitations and opportunities of each type. Finally, some research methods and results of recent studies in peace education, especially regarding perceptions of collective narratives, are presented and discussed.     

Use of standardized client simulations in an interprofessional teaching concept for social work and medical students: first results of a pilot study

ABSTRACT

Teaching concepts with standardized clients/patients (SC) had been successfully implemented in the education of health professionals. Benefits were also demonstrated for social work education. Based on former experiences with simulated clients in medical education, we developed an innovative teaching concept for social work and medical students. We focused on the training of consultations with clients suffering from a serious illness like cancer—with different learning goals for medical students (e.g. breaking bad news) and social work students (e.g. psychosocial exploration and counseling). Both groups should gain knowledge about the other professions tasks and learn to handle clients’ emotional reactions. In addition to role-plays with simulated clients in small groups, the concept includes an interprofessional lecture by physicians, psychologists, social workers, and lawyers as well as a visit on the palliative care ward (for social work students only) and a research colloquium. A formative evaluation shows high satisfaction with the teaching concept. The students underline the realistic setting, interprofessional contact, authentic talks and direct feedback. The SC method and its interprofessional application proved to be a practicable and motivating way to enhance conversational skills.     

Cigarette Use Among Young Adults: Comparisons Between 2-Year College Students, 4-Year College Students,and Those Not in College

Abstract

Objective: To examine cigarette smoking among young adults based on education status. Participants: Community-based sample of 2,694 young adults in the United States Methods: The authors compared 3 groups—those not in college with no college degree, 2-year college students/graduates, 4-year college students/graduates—on various smoking measures: ever smoked, smoked in past month, smoked in past week, consider self a smoker, began smoking before age 15, smoked over 100 cigarettes in lifetime, ever tried to quit, and plan to quit in next year. Results: The authors found that for nearly all the smoking measures, the 4-year college group was at lowest risk, the noncollege group was at highest risk, and the 2-year college group represented a midpoint. Differences between groups remain after adjusting for parents’ education and other potential confounding factors. Conclusions: Smoking behaviors clearly differ between the 2-year, 4-year, and no college groups. Interventions should be tailored for each group.     

Utilization of the interprofessional education,practice, and research model in HBCU social work education

ABSTRACT

Historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) are often overlooked as a resource to address the need for a diverse healthcare workforce even though they are an essential component of ensuring diversity. In order to meet the needs of the current patient population, HBCUs’ social work programs must move from silo education, practice, and research pedagogy to inter-professional education (IPE), practice (IPP), and research (IPR) modalities when developing partnerships that promote the elimination of health disparities. This article discusses the contributions of a HBCU’s School of Social Work to the growth of IPE, IPP, and IPR utilizing the Ujima principle of Nguzo Saba. The projects developed were an attempt to provide meaningful and relevant education to social work students while exposing them to a collaborative inter-professional education, practice, and research experience. The three social work projects included intra-university and social community collaborations and exposing students to experiential inter-professional education, practice, and experimental learning. This is an opportunity for social work students to become involved in the evolving best practices pedagogy for inter-professional education, practice, and research which social work must embrace in order to fulfill the National Association of Social Workers imperative of preparing students to work in collaborative health care teams. The expected outcomes of these inter-professional ventures reflect a HBCU’s commitment to increasing the competency in inter-professional modalities aimed at supporting, empowering, and preparing high caliber diverse graduates who will grow the future and lead the world as a diverse healthcare workforce.     

Framing and counter-framing a Peace March in Russia: the use of Twitter during a hybrid war

ABSTRACT

Framing is vital to the capacity of social movements to enlist popular support and sustain contentious collective action. Using the case of a Peace March held in Moscow on 21 September 2014, the article examines how antiwar activists and their opponents framed a protest against Russia’s intervention in Ukraine. The study argues that different interpretations of patriotism underpinned divergent evaluations of the conflict and the construction of opposing identities. An analysis of Twitter posts on the eve of the march shows that peace activists positioned themselves as citizens with high moral standards and a healthy dose of patriotism, criticized the Russian government for military intervention in Ukraine, and called for a peaceful conflict resolution. In turn, opponents of the march considered themselves as real patriots and their adversaries as national traitors, denied Russia’s military presence in Ukraine, and fomented an attack on critics of Russian foreign policy. The study contributes to social movement literature by analyzing the framing of antiwar activism on a social media platform in the midst of a hybrid war, marked by a great deal of ambiguity and deception about causes, dynamics, and consequences of military operations by state and non-state actors.     

Emotionalized learning experiences: Tapping into the affective domain

The experimental study was undertaken to examine the effect of emotionalized learning experiences on the academic achievement of students at Preston University. The major objectives of the study were to identify the effect of teaching methods on students’ academic achievement and to evaluate the relationship between affective learning conditions and students’ academic achievement. Based on four intact semesters, the population of the study comprised 140 students from the Bachelors of Business Administration Program. The whole population was considered as the sample. The control group (28 students) was taught through the interactive lecture method, whereas, the experimental group 1 (35 students), experimental group 2 (46 students) and experimental group 3 (31 students) were taught through the activity method, reflective learning method and cooperative learning method respectively. Results indicated a significant difference between the pretest and posttest scores obtained in the achievement test as a result of the effect of teaching methods used for offering the emotionalized learning experiences. There was also a significant relationship between affective leaning conditions and students’ academic achievement. Furthermore, it was found that students’ academic achievement in the affective domain was highest with regard to workshops 1, 2 and 3. It was concluded that the emotionalized learning experiences offered to the students via the four teaching methods helped students in enhancing their knowledge, changing their attitudes and developing their skills with regard to living a happy, healthy and meaningful life. However, the reflective learning method proved to be the most suitable followed by the interactive lecture method, the cooperative learning method and the activity method.     

Educators and synoptic prudentialism: Educator reflections on educator training,student surveillance and using technology for student outreach

Surveillance plays several interrelated and essential roles in contemporary education. In the current article, we explore the understandings and experiences of educators related to surveillance; especially the ‘vertical’ surveillance ‘from below’ students themselves direct towards educators both inside and outside of the classroom (referred to as ‘sousveillance’). We also explore the prudential ‘intrapersonal’ and reflexive surveillance undertaken by educators to align and adjust to the expectations of educator professionalization, including during educator training, especially in terms of their social media use and under a context of synoptic prudentialism in schools. Synoptic prudentialism refers to the reflexive actions and adjustments by individuals and organizations in response to an acute awareness of widespread social surveillance—the many watching the few. Educators noted risks posed by surveillance, including sources of potential harm, both personal and professional. Findings reveal that, reinforced by the legal scare stories encountered during educator training programs, educators feel overwhelmingly vulnerable to the potential sousveillance of students, and are receiving little advice beyond the requirement to ‘be careful’. We explore educators’ privacy management strategies in response, for example, in response to concerns over students capturing videos in the classroom where situations may be taken out of context. This prudential framework, moreover, may also be inhibiting educators’ ability to conduct outreach with students to detect and respond to online mediated conflict and harm.     

An Evaluative Review of Outcome Research on Universal Mental Health Promotion and Prevention Programs for Higher Education Students

Abstract

Objective: This review is the first large-scale attempt to evaluate the effectiveness of universal promotion and prevention programs for higher education students on a range of adjustment outcomes. Participants/Methods: The current review examined 83 controlled interventions involving college, graduate, and professional students, with a focus on 3 main outcomes: social and emotional skills, self-perceptions, and emotional distress. Results/Conclusions: Skill-oriented programs that included supervised practice demonstrated the strongest benefits, thus showing promise as a successful mental health promotion and preventive intervention. In comparing different intervention strategies, mindfulness training and cognitive-behavioral techniques appear to be the most effective. Furthermore, interventions conducted as a class appear to be effective, suggesting the potential for exposing higher education students to skill training through routine curricula offerings. This review offers recommendations for improving the experimental rigor of future research, and implications for enhancing campus services to optimize student success in psychosocial—and thus ultimately academic—domains.     

School Discipline,Race, and the Discursive Construction of the “Deficient” Student

Abstract

Research has demonstrated how, in the current era of mass incarceration, the punitive arm of the state now extends beyond traditional criminal justice structures into institutions typically associated with providing care or a social good. The negative effects of this shift have disproportionately impacted marginalized populations, particularly low-income black and Latino communities. This article examines one way that this extension has manifested in the realm of public education. Based on ethnographic data from a public Grade 6–12 Disciplinary Alternative Education Program (DAEP) in Texas, this article scrutinizes the program’s behavioral rules and disciplinary procedures. The analysis focuses on students’ introductory experience to the DAEP as a “strategic research site” to illuminate the program’s formal objectives, methods to achieve their institutional goals, and their intended effects on students. I find that the practices and procedures in place at the DAEP operate through racializing surveillance to constitute “disciplinary technologies” devoted to the transformation of “culturally deficient” students—a racialized and gendered classification—into docile bodies. Students are disciplined through punitive and rehabilitative methods premised on the discursive construction of “deficient” students and families.     

Education for a sustainable future? Students’ experiences of workshops on ethical dilemmas

ABSTRACT

The goal of education for sustainable development (ESD) is to promote the values, behaviors, and lifestyles that are needed to find solutions to global economic, social, and environmental challenges. Social work and social work education have an important role to play in ESD, and poverty reduction, health, and well-being are important issues for social work as well. UNESCO, as well as the provisions of the Sweden’s Higher Education Ordinance, emphasizes the importance of higher education in meeting the future challenges to creating a sustainable society. Social work education at Örebro University has a long tradition of collaboration with service user organizations, for example by holding workshops on ethical dilemmas. This article describes these workshops and explores the students’ experiences of them. Four themes were identified: the perspective of ‘the other’ (and my own role), the importance of a nonjudgmental approach, the complexity of ethical dilemmas, and awareness of the complexity of social work. The workshops give the students a platform where they can gain practical knowledge and experience. Through the workshops, the students began to reflect on their own inner ethical compass, as well as on their own role and the challenging nature of social work.     

Social media,empathy and interpersonal skills: social work students’ reflections in the digital era

ABSTRACT

This paper examines second-year social work students’ (n = 19) reflections on empathy as part of an interpersonal skills course at a regional university in Australia. Students were asked to consider their personal, online and classroom experiences, before responding to a reflective learning prompt: ‘Online communication is killing connection: (the Facebook Like symbol) does not equal empathy’. Qualitative analysis of their responses identified tensions between students’ engagement with social media and their developing understandings of empathy. Students reported an ease and confidence in the use of social media, but were also aware of the risks associated with perceived anonymity, shifting boundaries and an absence of audial and verbal cues in establishing context and quality of communication. Their reflections also suggested that the range of stimulus material used in the interpersonal skills course—including podcasts—had increased their social media awareness and their desire to improve their online interpersonal skills. The implications for professional and pedagogical objectives, as well as curriculum design are discussed.     

Master status or intersectional identity? Undocumented students’ sense of belonging on a college campus

ABSTRACT

Research on undocumented students in the United States often focuses on the challenges they face navigating postsecondary education, rooted in their precarious legal status. The observed influence of legal status on undocumented students’ sense of belonging and academic progress provides compelling evidence that being undocumented functions as a master status – a salient identity that conditions students’ educational incorporation. Yet, this research tends to highlight legal status while deemphasizing or excluding other identities. Our study takes an intersectional approach. Using focus group data with undocumented students at a Hispanic-Serving Institution, we show that students rarely identify legal status in isolation or implicate it as the sole source of adversity. Instead, students’ reveal a sense of belonging rooted in multiple dimensions of identity including ethnicity and class. This study reconsiders the utility of the master status concept in favour of an intersectional one for a comprehensive picture of undocumented students’ educational incorporation.     

推绿色教育促城市绿色发展

教育对绿色城市建设和城市的可持续发展具有重要促进作用,国际上一些国家和城市已较早地开始了以推行绿色教育来促进城市绿色发展的进程,取得了较好的效果。本文概述了绿色教育理念的形成和内涵,重点总结了国际上一些国家和城市在发展绿色教育中所积累的宝贵经验,并对中国城市绿色教育发展的概况和问题进行了简要分析,在此基础上提出了国际绿色教育经验对中国城市可持续发展的启示。     

For the Love of Fluffy: Respecting,Protecting, and Empowering Transitional Objects in the Context of High-Conflict Divorce

ABSTRACT

Transitional objects are those idiosyncratically determined, beloved blankies and stuffed animals that communicate an absent parent’s affection. As such, transitional objects serve the short-term need to cope with separation, and the long-term need to move toward autonomy. This article discusses the value, use, and misuse of transitional objects in the context of coparental conflict. The concept of alienation-by-proxy is introduced. Specific recommendations are provided, including the therapeutic creation and empowerment of transitional objects to assist children experiencing separation anxiety, consideration of the role of transitional objects in child custody evaluations, and the court’s responsibility to encourage litigating parents to respect the child’s needs for transitional objects.     

Body mass index, academic achievement, and school context: examining the educational experiences of adolescents at risk of obesity

Reflected self-appraisal suggests that individual functioning is related to the fit between individual characteristics and the norms of their primary contexts. To apply this social psychological concept to the study of obesity, we hypothesized that adolescents at risk of obesity would have lower academic achievement overall than other students, especially in schools in which their weight status was most likely to elicit negative evaluations. Multi-level modeling of nationally representative data revealed that the negative longitudinal association between risk of obesity and achievement was stronger in schools with higher rates of romantic activity and lower average body size among students, two school contexts in which obesity was likely to be stigmatized, but weaker in schools with higher rates of athletic participation, a school context in which such stigmatization was also likely. Additional analyses suggested that this last, unexpected finding reflected a process of niche-picking.