This dissertation positions Community Theatre as an agency for development and education based on the educational principles of Freire and Boal’s Theatre for Development. The dissertation argues that Appreciative Inquiry can enrich the practice of Community Theatre by approaching HIV and AIDS education through an asset-based, participatory, inclusive, learner-centred approach. The dissertation further hypothesises that the infusion of the 4-D process of Appreciative Inquiry into Community Theatre processes aimed at HIV and AIDS education will enhance young people’s agency as active participants and agents of change in their communities beyond the didactic notions inherent in ABC education approaches to HIV prevention. This approach can encourage meaningful participation and critical consciousness amongst young people in the HIV prevention response. / Dissertation (MA (Drama))--University of Pretoria, 2010. / Drama / unrestricted

The purpose of this study was to examine efficacious instructional strategies that the New England Community College (NECC) nursing program could implement in the curricula to improve National Council Licensure Examination Registered Nurse (NCLEX-RN) first-time pass rates. Effective strategies from students and nursing program faculty had used were investigated. Such strategies support student nurses in their efforts to succeed on the first administration of the exit examination. The rationale for this study and resulting project was that they could improve NCLEX-RN first-time pass rates and positively impact the local hiring of qualified nurses. Guided by Knowles's adult learning theory, key results of the study and resulting project were developed from effective instructional strategies discovered from former NECC students. The central research question focused on identifying which teaching-learning strategies in the NECC nursing curricula improved students' critical thinking skills and problem solving skills. A qualitative case study design was employed with a purposeful sample of 15 former NECC nursing program graduates. Participant focus groups and annual program/accreditation documents were used to collect data to address how student nurses learn best in order to be successful on the exit examination. The project was the creation of a 3-day seminar in the first semester curriculum that focuses on effective licensure preparation instructional strategies to establish and maintain high NCLEX-RN pass rates. Implications for positive social change include, but are not limited to, improving students' problem solving skills and application of critical thinking strategies in order to positively impact the lives of the patients whom they will serve.

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In the United States, the community food movement has been put forward as a potential solution for a global food system that fails to provide just and equitable access to nutritious food. This claim has been subject to the criticism of a variety of scholars and activists, some of whom contend that the alternative food movement is complicit in the re-production of neoliberalism and is therefore implicated in the making of the unjust system. In this dissertation I use theories of Deleuze (and Guatarri) and science and technology scholars to enter the middle of this dichotomy. I argue that both readings of community food work, as just and unjust, rely on realist epistemologies that posit knowledge as representative of an existing reality. I alternatively view knowledge as much more contingent and plural, resulting in a multiplicity of realities that are much less fixed. The idea that reality is a product of knowledge, rather than the inverse, raises the question of how reality might be made differently, or of ontological politics. This is the question I set out to interrogate: how might the realities of community food work be read and made differently, and how this reading might open new possibilities for transformation? To explore this question, I conducted interviews with 18 individuals working for three different non-profit community food organizations in central Appalachia. I used and appreciative inquiry approach to capture stories that affected these individuals' stories about their work captured their visions and hope for food system change. I then used a (non)method, rhizoanalysis, to code the data affectively, reading for the interesting, curious, and remarkable, rather than attempting to trace a strong theory like neoliberalism onto the data. Drawing on Delueze and Guattari, I mapped excerpts from the data into four large narrative cartographies. In each cartography, the narrative excerpts are positioned to vibrate against one another; my hope is that these resonances might open lines of flight within the reader and space for new ontological possibilities. For adult and community educators, I posit this rhizoanalysis as a poststructuralist contribution to Freire's concept of the generative theme and of use to broader project of agonistic pluralism. / Ph. D.

The postmodern organisation and its leaders are faced with relentless turbulence and change and a compelling economic drive for success. The recent exponential rise in the popularity of coaching can be ascribed to the business need for the development of leadership bench-strength. Appreciative inquiry (AI) claims to be a source of untapped strength for organisations in the postmodern world and a source of sustainable solutions and genesis for energy. However, the scarcity of evidence of coaching linked to a postmodern stance, incorporating AI principles, as well as using group-based coaching methods, provided an opportunity for this study to respond to the challenges and contribute to the theory and practice of leadership coaching in the organisational setting by investigating the transformative effects of a postmodern group-based leadership coaching programme (LCP) on leaders’ personal and professional perspectives. The premises suggest that postmodern group-based coaching is a practical and cost-effective methodology in multi-cultural international organisations. Furthermore, postmodern coaching in groups can transform the personal and professional perspectives of leaders, specifically in transforming future plans, goal-directedness, confidence, resilience, hope, subjective well-being and empowerment as a leader, as well as broadening life outlooks. Key transformative themes were identified: self-knowledge, appreciation of others, broader vision, self-control and work-life integration. This applied study has made a valuable contribution to the body of research in the area of postmodern and group-based coaching. Replication of the study in other industries, setting and with different levels of leadership, training of postmodern coaches and robust follow-up coaching were identified as opportunities for further exploration. / Industrial & Organisational Psychology / D.Lit. et Phil. (Industrial Psychology)