Philosophiae Doctor - PhD (Nursing) / Literature attest that holistic approach to care is the best way to ensure that all human needs, including spiritual needs are taken care of. As such holistic approach to care accepts the notion of "wholeness" nature of the patient. However, in practice patient's holistic needs, which are essential for optimum health, are not routinely addressed when practicing nursing. This implies that regardless of the nurses doing their best to attend to patient's health needs, patients still do not achieve their required optimum health. Furthermore, in the face of good nursing education programmes, attempts to meet the patient's care needs as advocated, a gap still exists in rendering nursing services that truly promote health in a holistic manner. Confusion regarding the scope and holistic nature of nursing, relates not only to nursing organisations having failed to define nursing with clarity concerning the spiritual dimension of care; but they have also not succeeded in implementing nursing that is truly holistic. In this study, it is argued that where spiritual care aspects in nursing remain at the periphery, holistic nursing cannot be truly attained. According to Burkhardt and Hogan promoting one's spirituality within a nursing paradigm can be one way to promote and optimise health, particularly in response to illness. In view of the existing gap between teaching-learning of spiritual care and espoused theory of holistic nursing, a need to develop a theory that would guide and assist nurse educators and nursing students in the teaching and learning of spiritual care was imperative. The aim of this research was to generate a practice theory for teaching-learning of spiritual care in the undergraduate nursing programme at a higher education institution by answeringthe research question "how can a practice theory for teaching-learning of spiritual care in the undergraduate nursing programme at a higher education institution in the Western Cape be generated? Ethical procedures were applied in accordance to stipulations of the University Research Ethics Committee. The credibility of the study was ensured by application of Guba's model of trustworthiness for qualitative data.

The purpose of the present study is (1) to describe the North Texas State University organizational climate as perceived by undergraduate-and graduate-level students, (2) to compare their perceptions of institutional characteristics with students in other (norm group) universities throughout the nation, (3) to compare selected nominal subgroup data of the undergraduate-graduate student population in regard to their perception of the organizational climate, and (4) to provide sound information that is of use to administrative , faculty, and staff personnel that are interested in efficient and effective utilization of university manpower in order to facilitate the educational experiences that undergraduate-and graduate-level students receive during their tenure at the university.

Magister Pharmaceuticae - MPharm / Background In recent years the focus of pharmacy practice has changed from being primarily ‘drugcentred to’ one which is ‘patient-centred’ (El-Awady et al., 2006, p.1). Developments in pharmacy curricula worldwide are reflecting this change. Pharmacy courses no longer concentrate primarily on theoretical content, but increasingly on the ability of students to apply their theoretical knowledge in practice.The South African Pharmacy Council (SAPC) requires that pharmacy education and training in South Africa equips pharmacists for the roles they will take on in practice. In order to accomplish this, the SAPC has prescribed competency unit standards for entry level pharmacists which may serve as a guide for pharmacy educators. A significant challenge in pharmacy education is the application of theory in practice settings(Bucciarelli et al., 2007), which possibly affects the ability of entry-level pharmacists to meet the SAPC unit standard competencies. The dire shortage of pharmacists in public sector health settings further emphasizes the need for a level of competency of entry level pharmacists so that they may enter the workplace ready to serve the medicine related needs of society.Service-learning is defined as experiential learning in which students engage in structured activities that address community needs and promote learning. The purpose of this study was to design, implement and evaluate a Service-learning in Pharmacy (SLIP) intervention which is intended to serve as a generic model which can be used in tertiary hospital pharmacies. The SLIP intervention aimed to promote student learning by providing opportunities for students to engage in structured activities, while simultaneously alleviating pharmacy workload.Methods: The study was directed to UWC final year pharmacy students and pharmacists employed at a hospital pharmacy. Qualitative and quantitative research methods were used in evaluating this pre- and post-intervention enquiry. Qualitative evaluation methods included pre- and post- focus group discussions with students to assess student knowledge and expectations of SLIP. Covert observation of pharmacists was used to assess current views and receptivity toward student activities during the SLIP course. Quantitative evaluation methods included pre- and post-intervention student competency assessments in areas of hospital pharmacy practice (compounding, dispensing and clinic/ward pharmacy), and pre- and post-intervention questionnaires which assessed pharmacists’ views and receptivity toward SLIP. Results Students (n=16) and pharmacists (n=9) who were involved in the intervention comprised the study cohort.Qualitative: Pre-intervention, students indicated a lack of confidence and apprehension toward SLIP. Pharmacy managers were anxious about lack of time and space and the additional burden of training students. Post- intervention, students experienced a sense of professionalism and could connect with varied theoretical knowledge. They were both enthusiastic about this style of learning (“saw the pharmacy profession with new eyes”) and realized the need for more skills development in clinical pharmacy. Pharmacists’ receptivity to SLIP increased once student contribution to service delivery became evident.Quantitative: Student competency in areas of hospital pharmacy practice increased as a result of their participation in the Tygerberg SLIP model. Students also made a valuable contribution to service delivery at Tygerberg hospital pharmacy. This was quantified as the total number of services in compounding (n= 807), dispensing (n=2090) and clinic/ward services (n= 37). Conclusion:The SLIP intervention resulted in improved perceptions and receptivity of pharmacists to service learning initiatives. Students’ level of competency increased in hospital pharmacy practice and they contributed to service delivery at Tygerberg hospital pharmacy. Further studies are needed to evaluate the impact of the SLIP model on patient care and health outcomes.

Esta pesquisa tem sua origem no seguinte questionamento: o \"fazer pesquisa\" (desenvolver estágio de Iniciação Científica) é um fator relevante para a apropriação da linguagem científica pelo aluno de graduação em Química? Como se dá essa apropriação? Com o intuito de elucidar esse questionamento observamos o percurso trilhado durante um ano por dois alunos de Iniciação Científica em Química. Nesse período realizamos entrevistas com os orientadores e os alunos, além de observações no local, as quais incluíram gravações em áudio e coleta de materiais orais e escritos produzidos pelos alunos, relacionados ao desenvolvimento das suas pesquisas. Procuramos subsídios para a interpretação dos dados, nos estudos da Sociologia e Antropologia da Ciência, desenvolvidos por Latour e Woolgar, e na Análise do Discurso de linha francesa, como vem sendo divulgada por Eni Orlandi, especialmente quanto às noções de tipologia do discurso e autoria. A análise dos resultados com relação à tipologia revelou nos diálogos entre orientadores e alunos, ocorridos no laboratório, um deslocamento do discurso predominantemente autoritário para um discurso polêmico. Quanto à autoria percebemos na produção do relatório de pesquisa o exercício da repetição empírica e formal, além do uso da repetição histórica, que demonstra a posição de autor ocupada pelos alunos. Observamos ainda na produção de trabalhos para congressos o uso de diferentes tipos de enunciados científicos, classificados por Latour e Woolgar, em diferentes situações que evidenciam a utilização adequada da linguagem científica. Essa investigação nos levou à percepção sobre a influência da Iniciação Científica na apropriação da linguagem científica, e indicou que esse processo se deu por meio da troca com os pares, da imitação de modelos, e, principalmente, da vivência da pesquisa. / This research has its origin in the following questions: is \"doing research\" (developing an Undergraduate Research Project) a relevant factor for the appropriation of scientific language by undergraduate students in Chemistry? How does this appropriation occur? With the intention of understanding these questions we observed two students in Undergraduate Research in Chemistry, by following them closely for one year. During that period we accomplished interviews with the supervisors and the students, and work site observations which included audio recordings and collected spoken and written data produced by the students related to the development of their research. We searched for assistance to analyze the data, within the Science\'s Sociology and Anthropology studies, developed by Latour and Woolgar, and in the Discourse Analysis, in its French approach, as divulged by Eni Orlandi, specifically according to the concepts of discourse typology and authorship. The results of the analysis related to typology demonstrate that in the conversations between supervisors and students carried out in the laboratory there is a transition from a predominantly authoritarian discourse to a polemical discourse. According to the authorship, we realized that in the production of the research report there was the exercise of empirical and formal repetition, beside that, the use of historical repetition which demonstrates the author\'s positions occupied by the students. We also observed in the preparation of work for congresses, that the use of different types of scientific statements indicated the adequate use of scientific language. Therefore, this research leads us to conscientiousness about the influence of Undergraduate Research in the appropriation of scientific language and indicated that this process occurred through the exchange among groups, the imitation of patterns and mainly the research experience.

This project involves controlling and characterizing the morphology of the active layer in a special type of organic photovoltaics (OPVs), consisting of porphyrin-fullerene composites, with emphasis on electron exchange interactions between the two components. The Vienna Ab Initio Simulation Package (VASP) is applied to model a variety of donor-acceptor complexes containing fullerene and porphyrin in terms of their stabilities as well as their geometric, electronic, and charge transfer features. The goal is to identify supramolecular chain structures with highest occupied molecular orbitals (HOMOs) and lowest unoccupied molecular orbitals (LUMOs) that may serve as electron (hole) transfer channels in a photovoltaic device. A stable structure, involving the planar adsorption of a porphyrin unit on a C60 hexagon, has been identified. The results for fullerene have been extended to phthalocyanine–fullerene dyads where the fullerene-derived unit Phenyl-C61-butyric acid methyl ester (PCBM) is connected to a porphyrin analogous electron donor through two oxygen-linked benzene rings. In both cases, the HOMO is located on the porphyrin segment, the LUMO on the fullerene component. As a fullerene, PCBM is a material of very high electron affinity, but it has better solubility properties than fullerene. It is often used in plastic solar cells or flexible electronics in conjunction with electron donor materials such as P3HT or other polymers. The results of our work contribute to the ongoing effort of using computational modeling to identify fullerene-based materials of potential relevance for organic photovoltaics.

The changing demographics of the United States directly impacts the populations that music therapists serve. The American Music Therapy Association (AMTA) provides a list of competencies regarding race, culture, and diversity, but how these are addressed in the classroom is not standardized. The purpose of this study was to examine music therapists’ perceptions of their training in multicultural competence. The researcher emailed 7,539 board-certified music therapists, 631 of whom completed the survey. Results indicated that 55.6% of music therapists think that multicultural competence is important, and the majority said that they felt prepared to demonstrate multicultural competence after completion of an undergraduate/equivalency music therapy program. Chi square analyses showed no significant associations between ratings of importance and gender or race/ethnicity. Results also indicated that classroom instruction was the most common way the competencies were addressed in undergraduate/equivalency programs. Qualitative analysis of how participants thought they could be better prepared revealed four themes: music skills, curricular integration, experience, and classroom activities.

Social media has been increasingly used in education to facilitate innovative instruction. Mainland Chinese people could not use popular social media platforms such as FacebookTM because the government blocked them. Little research studied social media use by Mainland Chinese students and teachers in the isolated network environment. This quantitative study utilized social constructivism, connectivism, and the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT2) as the theoretical base. Research questions explored the influence of 6 UTAUT2 predictors on social media use intention and the influence of social media use intention on social media use behavior. The study used a convenience sample of 197 undergraduate students and 54 full-time faculty from 2 public science and technology universities in Guangzhou, Guangdong province, Mainland China. Survey data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, simple regression, multiple regression, and moderation analysis. The findings showed that performance expectancy, effort expectancy, social influence, facilitating conditions, hedonic motivation, and habit significantly influenced social media use intention, and social media use intention significantly influenced social media use behavior. Age moderated the relationship between facilitating conditions and social media use intention, and gender moderated the relationship between habit and social media use intention. The findings might be used to promote positive social change by providing insights of social media use by Chinese students and teachers for university administrators, government, and social media platform designers. Better understanding might facilitate adoption of social media in education and therefore improve teaching and learning for Mainland Chinese students.

The work presented in this thesis focuses on educational issues in first-year biology courses at university. First-year courses are important because they have the potential to influence student retention and subsequent subject selection choices, as well as learning at higher levels. Further, biology is considered to be an important enabling subject in New Zealand because of the Government's drive towards a biotechnology-based knowledge economy. Specifically, the work in this thesis explores the educational implications of the increasingly diverse academic backgrounds of students entering first-year biology courses on teaching and learning in these courses. A social constructivist view of learning is adopted, in which prior knowledge of the learners is considered to have a significant influence on their learning. The social context of learning interactions also is considered to be important. The research involved three phases: identification of prior knowledge assumed by faculty; identification of actual prior knowledge of students; and the implementation and evaluation of an intervention programme based on concept mapping. In order to investigate faculty assumptions of student prior knowledge, 35 faculty from six New Zealand universities were interviewed. Document analysis and classroom observations provided data triangulation. The findings for this phase of the research suggest that faculty were aware of the diverse prior knowledge of students, and reported a tension between teaching from scratch in order to accommodate those with very limited prior knowledge; and the risk of boring those with more extensive relevant backgrounds. A range of concepts that are not explained during teaching (i.e., concepts it is assumed students understand) were identified, including biology-specific concepts and relevant chemical and mathematical concepts. In the second phase, research findings from phase one were used to develop a prior knowledge questionnaire administered in two successive years to all students enrolled in first-year biology courses at one New Zealand university. Data analysis for this phase suggests that although students with more extensive prior biology study were more likely to have a scientifically acceptable understanding of some key concepts, this was not true of all the concepts that were investigated, including chemical and mathematical concepts. The data also point to differences between what faculty expect students to know, and what students actually know. Furthermore, few students, regardless of the extent of prior biology study, were able to demonstrate understanding of the relationships between important biological concepts. In the third phase of the research, an intervention based on concept mapping was implemented and evaluated. Two of the six weekly tutorial classes associated with two first-year biology courses were used for the purposes of the intervention. The intervention differed from the other concept mapping studies reported in the literature in that its implementation was of long duration, viz., a period of 11 weeks. Students who participated in the intervention reported in 'tutorial experience questionnaires' and subsequent interviews that concept mapping helped them to learn the biology content covered during lectures, and to identify links between concepts. A large proportion of participants indicated that they used concept mapping for biology study outside of the intervention tutorial classes, and in some cases in other courses of study. Classroom management strategies appeared to contribute to the positive views about the use of concept mapping during tutorials. Specifically, the tutor modelled the use of concept mapping, but students were also given opportunities to construct their own maps. The role of the tutor in guiding discussions with students and providing feedback was also viewed as being important. Detailed analysis of course assessment tasks suggests that concept mapping enhanced learning for test questions that require understanding of links between concepts. Where tasks require only the recall of facts, concept mapping does not appear to make a statistically significant difference to student performance. The findings from the concept mapping intervention thus suggest that although concept mapping is a strategy that can be used effectively in tertiary biology tutorial classes, it is more worthwhile if the type of deep learning that is encouraged by the use of concept mapping is also the type of learning required to successfully complete assessment tasks. This raises the issue of whether the type of learning faculty specify in course objectives is the type of learning they actually seek to develop in course delivery and associated assessment regimes.

This qualitative research project explored the experiences of nurse educators who sought to assess aspects, which could be related to facilitation of emotional competence, in nursing students. Focus groups were conducted in three different educational institutions, offering a Bachelor of nursing degree. Each of the participants had a teaching and assessment role within the school of nursing. The contributions of the nurse educators and their interactions were audio taped, transcribed and then later, analysed using thematic and focus group analysis practices.From the analysis of the experiences of the nurse educators, four predominant themes arose which capture the areas of importance to the participants. Student nurses can develop emotional competence by critically reflecting during classroom and clinical experiences. Continuous consideration must be made within each practicing area of nursing, of the environmental and relational challenges which inhibit or facilitate nurse's ability to practice with emotional competence. Educators and practicing nurses, who work alongside students, must uphold the expectation that emotional competence is a requisite ability and provide opportunities to foster emotional growth and skills to resolve conflict within the culture of nursing.A common view shared by the educators was that the profession of nursing needs to have a clear understanding of what constitutes emotional competence. Strategies to realistically incorporate emotional competence into the educational curriculum and competency based assessment opportunities within nursing education are required.Suggestions are presented from which undergraduate nursing education can facilitate development of emotional competence with those students working toward becoming a registered nurse. Emotional competence is suggested as an essential learning outcome in the movement toward transformative nursing education and a collaborative nursing profession.

Thesis (Ph.D. (Business Management))--North-West University, Vaal Triangle Campus, 2005.