Dissertação (mestrado) - Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Paraná, Curitiba, 2004 / Inclui bibliografia / As constantes e incontidas mudanças em todas as esferas da sociedade humana atestam que a realidade não é permanente. Diferentes cosmovisões representam formas diversas de conceber, ser e agir segundo o âmbito em que cada um se move. Cada cultura apresent / I costanti e incontenibili cambiamenti in tutte le sfere della società umana confermano che la realtà non è permanente. Le differenti vedute rappresentano forme diverse di concepire, essere e agire secondo l'ambito nel quale uno si muove. Ogni cultura pre

Dissertação (mestrado) - Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Paraná, Curitiba, 2006 / Bibliografia: f. 97-102 / Este trabalho de pesquisa de dissertação de mestrado tem como tema a avaliação institucional nas Instituições de Ensino Superior - IES. Na delimitação do tema a investigação enfoca a avaliação institucional no contexto da auto-avaliação ou Avaliação Inter

Dissertação (mestrado) - Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Paraná, Curitiba, 2007 / Bibliografia: f. 97-105 / Esta pesquisa visa discutir quais foram e como se desenvolveram as propostas relativas à Educação Infantil em Piraquara, provenientes das políticas educacionais, onde duas propostas curriculares (Projeto Araucária 1993 # 2000) e (Proposta Curricular da Ed / This research aims at to argue which had been and as if they had developed the relative proposals to the Infantile Education in Piraquara, proceeding from the educational politics, where two curricular proposals (Project Araucária 1993 - 2000) e (Proposal

Dissertação (mestrado) - Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Paraná, Curitiba, 2005 / Inclui bibliografia / Os Cursos Superiores de Tecnologia são cursos de graduação, que estão enquadrados dentro do contexto da Educação Profissional de nível Tecnológico, visando formar profissionais competentes que atendam a uma sociedade em constantes mudanças e transformaçõe

The purpose of this study is to investigate the feasibility, practicality and desirability of establishing a virtual university using Internet-based technology in Saudi Arabia. The intention would be to deliver higher education in order to accommodate the rapid growth in the number of secondary school graduates. This is regarded as one of the most important challenges currently facing higher education institutions, particularly universities in the Kingdom. The questionnaire in this study was designed to obtain respondents' views in relation to the proposed model. It was distributed to 996 teaching members (male and female) at three major universities: KSU, IMIU and KAU. The number of questionnaires returned was 538; this represents about 57% of the total sample. The majority of respondents (about 67.7%; N= 364) suggested that establishing a virtual university in Saudi Arabia was appropriate to meet the increasing demand for higher education. Group B represented the highest percentages of agreement at around 92.7%, while Group A represented nearly 60.2%. In contrast, the remaining 32.3% of the total number of respondents believed that there are alternative available solutions that can be utilised in order to overcome this problem. Almost 19.0% stated that they would like the private sector to take its responsibility seriously and begin autonomously, or collaboratively with the Saudi government, to construct more traditional colleges and universities in all regions of the Kingdom. Around 51.1% were in favour of the MI-IE, on behalf of the Saudi government, taking full control of higher education provision, introducing more traditional public colleges and universities throughout the Kingdom. Finally, almost 29.9% appreciated any effort made by the current traditional universities to increase their capacity to absorb more students now and in the future. Interviews were carried out in order to gain respondents' opinions on the overall situation. These interviews were composed of two sets: the first set was conducted with various decision-makers at the HESC, the MMHE, KSU, INIIU, and KAU. The second set was conducted with the Director of IU at KACST, the Manager of Internet Services at STC, and one representative of the ISPs in the Kingdom. The outcomes revealed that, in recent times, the higher education system in general and universities in particular have encountered, in addition to the rising number of secondary school graduates who wish to pursue higher education, other problems such as a lack of equal educational opportunities, a lack of educational quality, increased drop-out rates and a lack of interest in learning by some students, a lack of well-forged and mutual relationships between universities and the private sector, and so on. The application of SSNI, which made use of the results of the questionnaires and interviews, determined and confirmed the improvements needed to surmount these limitations. The proposed system encompasses strategic planning, content, communication technology and relevant systems for central support. Each part of the system was logically built to carry out certain activities that work in harmony with the others in order to achieve the mission of the entire system. The study concluded that a virtual university was both systematically desirable and culturally feasible; therefore, recommendations were made for its implementation.

This thesis reports on the key elements of an action research study in which I looked at my practice over a three year period of teaching ethics in management in a London university using an action research epistemology. I was concerned about how to effectively teach and facilitate the learning of ethics on undergraduate management programmes, and my main focus was to consider my integrity in practice and thus my praxis as lecturer and researcher. I have described and explained two action research cycles, in which I established and developed an innovative approach to my practice. I have mapped and evaluated the changes that I put into place to improve my practice. The thesis shows how I developed reciprocal learning environments in class whereby students could engage critically, both cognitively and emotionally, with ethical dilemmas. I show how students undertook mini action research projects which helped them to develop a voice through questioning their own and others’ values. For many students, learning ethics through action research is a profound, transformative and reciprocal process that has its own integrity. I also show how I developed an understanding of the theory of praxis through using integrity in practice within my educational setting as a foundation, principle and guide. The journey has been a profound and challenging task of self-reflection on my work as a university lecturer. It has changed the way that I see myself as a teacher and it has offered me a deeper commitment towards my practice.

Informed by a sociological approach, this thesis provides an account of the theoretical and empirical context of pharmacy students' undergraduate careers, beginning with the decision to enter higher education and ending with the final undergraduate year of a pharmacy student's education. The main aim of the published work and of the academic field that it contributes to is to advance understanding of why young people choose to study pharmacy (and thus choose pharmacy as a career), and career aspirations and influences over the course of their pharmacy school career. By establishing what influences and shapes pharmacy students' choices this thesis also provides an account of the degree to which career preferences are limited initially by awareness of opportunities, by socialisation and habitus, and how these are related to undergraduate career success.The thesis reports findings from studies using a range of methods including focus groups, surveys, and secondary analysis of pharmacy student data from a number of sources. Subjects investigated by the work are British undergraduate MPharm students and graduates. Numbers applying to study pharmacy, numbers accepted, and numbers entering the MPharm are compared and the relative risk of attrition from the MPharm, are also examined. Findings reported here are relevant to undergraduate pharmacy education policy-makers, heads of pharmacy schools, pharmacist employers, the General Pharmaceutical Council (GPhC) and to those responsible for pharmacy workforce planning.While the primary aim of the thesis is to improve understanding of (undergraduate) pharmacy careers through the application of a number of sociological theories and perspectives, the thesis also considers the ways that findings can usefully inform pharmacy education and policy agendas.

Most contemporary organizations make use of computer-based information systems to support their management activities. There is considerable evidence that many of these systems experience problems during the development phases and a large proportion of these systems may, using specific criteria, be classed as failures. The reported high level of such failure in the development of computer-based information systems is not a new phenomenon for business, having been present almost from the inception of these systems. The frameworks that guide developers through the process can be labelled as information systems development methodologies, or ISDMs.For an educator involved with the teaching of some or all aspects of the development process this perceived high level of failure of systems development and implementation in practice raises some significant concerns. If there is a 'silver bullet' approach that students need to be equipped with to become successful systems developers we need to identify it and ensure that they are proficient with it. If there is no silver bullet we need to acknowledge this in our teaching and equip the students with the critical thinking skills to help them appreciate this in their later practice.This thesis takes as its central theme the view that there is currently no 'silver bullet' and one may never be found to fit all development projects and environments. Under such a constraint our students, as would-be practitioners, need to be helped to approach practice unfettered by a naïve belief that there is a single approach that offers guaranteed success in the development of information systems. Flexible, contingent and possibly creative approaches need to be fostered so that students can both work in the field and can contribute to both the overall understanding of that field and to their own personal development. The thesis considers the role of multiple perspectives, constructivism, language, communication and reflection as vehicles to allow the building and sharing of accessible understanding of information systems development methodologies in a tertiary education setting. The issues are explored through the design and development of a Masters course titled 'Information Systems Development Methodologies' that was designed and implemented at the University of South Australia in the period 1999 to 2008. The course was initially designed within an interpretivist paradigm and rather than following a traditional systems analysis and design path could be viewed more as a liberal arts course. However, as the course moved towards the end of its life it began to take on a more positivistic flavour.The story of the course emerged from a series of action learning cycles and is told from the perspective of the author who was both the researcher and the subject of the research.

The thesis explores the experiences of 24 young women from a town in North West England ('Millthorne') as they make their way through their first year of university study. The project is based on a qualitative, longitudinal methodology comprising of three in-depth interviews conducted with each respondent before, during and after the first year of study. The aim of the research was to examine the 'process of relating' (Mason, 2004) for the 24 respondents, in order to think through the ways in which individual actions and identities emerge out of experiences of relationships with kin and non-kin. The project thus contributes to a growing body of literature which attends to the emotional and moral dimensions of social life, and which seeks to challenge ideas around individualism. The public story (Jamieson, 1998) around going to university is one which stresses notions of selfhood, adventure and individualism and so, in the early interviews, respondents expressed a sense of expectation that their identities and relationships would alter significantly once university began. They expected that, by going to university, they would be removed from the clutches of family and that longstanding friend relationships based at home would be replaced by better, more enduring relationships formed within the context of university. The interviews carried out later in the project, however, revealed a divergence between respondents' expectations of kin and non-kin relationships and their real-life, everyday experiences. Significantly, family and longstanding friendships continued to play a central role, leaking into the spaces of university through virtual and imagined as well as tangible means. This meant that respondents did not experience the move to university in the ways they had anticipated and it was not the wrench that many had hoped or feared. What this study demonstrates is the complexity of personal relationships and the ways in which feelings of attachment and relatedness play out in different ways and at different times. Personal relationships are active and dynamic and it is the longitudinal methodology employed in this research which reveals this. Clearly people speak about relationships in particular ways at different junctures in the life course, appealing to discourses of individualism at some points and the security of relationships at others. It is imperative therefore, to capture the richness and complexity of the emotional and the personal, if one is to fully understand the social.

This study aimed to explore Occupational Therapists’ narratives of “the self” as a therapeutic agent, linking personal development and insight to professional development as an Occupational Therapist (OT). Three female, newly qualified OTs constructed a series of six arts based narratives, using creative media, over the course of three workshops. The narratives developed from an initial exploration of “the self as therapist” then continued through individual exploration of emergent personal themes. Each pictorial narrative was presented verbally to the group and the presentation and discussion of the images were videotaped. The transcribed stories, alongside the artwork, were analysed and revealed clear evidence that personal narratives have the potential to be active, dynamic processes with important implications for therapeutic practice, education and research. The study highlighted the tension generated by conflict or dissonance between the therapist’s sense of self and their professional role. Exploration of this conflict using art and narrative approaches showed how active story telling around challenging issues can lead to greater personal insight, autonomy and resolution through the re-integration of concealed aspects of the self.