Since the late 1990s, the UK Government has a policy to support Widening Participation (WP) measures in UK universities. These measures aimed to increase the demographic and socio-economic profile of the undergraduate student population across all UK universities. The target for these measures includes a focus on mature applicants, women entrants, and ethnic minority representation. Latest data (2010/2011) from the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) indicates whilst by far the largest proportion of full-time entrants to undergraduate places are the ‘traditional’ 19 year entrant with A level qualifications (288,590). By comparison a further 77,155 entrants are mature, those aged over 21, who have gained a variety of accepted entry qualifications. One such recognised qualification is that of an Access to Higher Education Diploma. The Access programme is usually undertaken by mature students, with no previous qualifications, who after successful completion of a one-year full-time course are then able to apply for an undergraduate course. It is estimated that one in four mature entrants will enter a university course with an Access qualification (HEFCE, 2006). Against a backdrop of a changing and more diverse student population, a discourse has emerged around the retention of HE students. Current data suggests that one in every twelve undergraduates will leave their university programme in the first year of study (Thomas, 2012a). The attrition of students who have entered university is not only an economic cost to the institution and the individual but is considered a wider social cost. Within the body of work on student retention there is an emerging focus on pre-registration nursing programmes, which were traditionally delivered in nursing schools attached to hospitals but since the 1990s are now delivered in HE institutions. Historically there have been concerns about the levels of student attrition from all nursing programmes and this has continued to the present day with individual Schools of Nursing and the Department of Health trying to address the issues around retaining pre-registration nursing students. Concerns around student retention have given rise to a prolific and substantive body of work around HE student retention both in the UK and wider afield, with much of this work underpinned by the seminal work of Tinto (2002, 1993). Studies on student retention agree that understanding and addressing the issues of student retention is complex, with multiple reasons why students leave early. The largest proportion of research undertaken on UK pre-registration nursing programmes have focussed on the reasons why students leave pre-registration nursing programmes rather than what makes them stay. The research questions asked in this thesis are not around student retention, although this phenomenon provides a backdrop to the study, but around learner persistence by mature Access entrants on UK pre-registration nursing programme. This research raises important questions about what is enabling mature entrants to persist on their programme, since data indicates that mature entrants account for 46% of all nursing students who enter pre-registration nursing programmes in the UK. This study is located in one large UK School of Nursing that attracts over 19% of their student cohort as mature Access entrants. This study follows nine individuals through their second year of a three-year programme to understand their transition, through this mid-point year, as an understanding of the transitions for these mature entrants is currently lacking in the literature. The nine participants were recruited via an electronic survey and were interviewed on three occasions throughout their 2nd year of a DipHE/BSc pre-registration nursing course in order to gain an understanding of their lived experiences as mature Access entrants. Data analysis in this study utilised Glaser and Strauss (1967) classic grounded theory (CGT) methodology. The findings from this CGT study indicate two phases in the participants’ journey enabling them to successfully complete their pre-registration nursing programme: Phase One - pre entry to university and participant journey towards their current course and Phase Two – continued journeys in the first 2 years of nurse training with 5 main categories metaphorically described as: ‘Home Territory’, ‘No Man’s Land’, ‘I Can See Land, ‘Lost Bearings’ and ‘Wearing the Uniform’. These metaphor categories describe a journey that is undertaken from when participants left school and made their early career decisions, through to participants exploring opportunities of further study and gaining an Access qualification to participants been accepted onto a DipHE/BSc pre-registration nursing programme. The study findings indicate that despite the known transition hurdles that result in some student nurses leaving their course early, the nine participants in this study were able to persist successfully on their programme. The study findings suggest that there are significant factors that have enabled these nine mature Access entrants to have a ‘persistent’ approach. These are the ‘learner profile’, ‘On-programme’ and ‘Environmental’ factors and are presented as a framework for a grounded theory of mature learner persistence directly taken from the lived experiences of the nine individuals in this study. These significant factors for a theory of learner persistence include an overarching ‘profile of the learner’ that enters a pre-registration programme and includes their entry qualification, age, career aspiration, and previous experience of nursing. Whist ‘on-programme’ factors aid learners’ ability to overcome the transitions into university and the clinical practice requirements of the programme. The skills and experiences gained through obtaining an Access qualification and the preparation for higher-level study is a significant factor in enabling the study participants to overcome the difficulties that they experienced over their first two years of their DipHE/BSc programme. An additional factor for their persistence was a strong career motivation, a desire to become a nurse. This career motivation underpinned the reasons why participants choose an Access programme, provided a route into university and enabled them to focus on their DipHE/BSc pre-registration nursing programme. UK Schools of Nursing who offer pre-registration programmes are required to attract and retain the very best student nurses. This presented theory of mature student learner persistence raises important questions about the policy for selection, recruitment, and retention by all HE providers and policy makers of nurse education. The findings demonstrate how different factors enable learners to persist and recommends that these should be incorporated into the recruitment stage and furthermore how to support learners during the 3-years of a pre-registration nursing programme.

The research describes the communicational practices of HE lectures employing a PowerPoint slideshow in order to examine the multimodal dynamic of this genre for exposition. Based on pragmatist conceptions of learning and theories of visual/ verbal processing, the research explored how different slide-elements were integrated with lecturers’ speech, and how this integration related to students’ engagement. A two-stage mixed method investigation collected video-recordings of 22 lectures and interviews with 9 lecturers. Additionally, focus groups were carried out with 37 students, and copies of their lecture notes were made and analysed. Using the resulting data, three separate empirical studies revealed; 1) Two characteristic speech-slide relationships were associated with the extent and explicitness of speech-slide integration. In the “referent” relationship, the lecturer addresses and comments on slide-text, and in the “scaffolding” relationship, the slide-text serves to structure their speech. 2) The relationship employed depended on lecturer intentions for the slide-lecture, which predominantly involved elaboration of the lecture outline. Consequently, students regarded slide-text as lecture notes, and expected it to be addressed consistently and explicitly. Owing to their focus on recording the slide-text and accompanying explanation, there was shown to be little opportunity for meaningful interaction with the slide-lecture. 3) Visual elements have the potential to engage students in a meaningful interaction, yet integration of them by lecturers revealed that they were not often exploited to such ends. It is concluded that the integration of text in slide-lectures presents little opportunity for achieving a fully engaging lecture experience. Although visual elements offer a promising alternative, little is known about how text or visuals can best be integrated with speech to this end. Thus slide-lectures might be more pedagogically profitable if lecturers are better informed about how their integration can be used to invite students to engage with evidence on screen. This thesis contributes towards knowledge about such integration.

Personal tutoring is a term commonly used in the policy and practice of higher education. Extant literature utilizes the term, but there is no common understanding of its ethos within the higher education profession. Consequently the tacit nature, purpose and outcomes of one-to-one interactions between tutors and students, which have been at the heart of UK higher education since medieval times, risk invasion by policy imperatives such as employability and student retention, or risk marginalization as off-stage activities that occur in invisible space at the periphery of higher education practice. The thesis begins by exploring research and literature on the social and institutional contexts of activities which involve personal, supportive interaction between tutors and students, alongside literature on emotion work and emotional labour, counselling supervision and therapy culture, using a theoretical lens of critical social interactionism. This produced themes which were used to frame part of the data production and analysis. The purpose of the research is to explore the essence of the personal tutorial from the tutor’s practice perspective, and to locate this in its social and institutional contexts, enabling tutors to illuminate the essence of practice that takes place behind closed doors. The focus of data production is the reflective accounts of tutors participating in the study. Ten participants from a range of UK universities produced brief written reflections about one-to-one interactions with students, followed by an individual interaction between researcher and participant, based on exploring the written reflection. These methods are underpinned by critical theory which relates to the emancipatory, transformative outcomes of facilitated critical reflective practice. Participants revealed critical reflection is unlikely to occur in the absence of facilitation. The opportunity for tutors to take part in facilitated, critical reflective practice to explore personal interactions with students produced awareness of what shapes the nature and outcomes of personal tutoring, often resulting in transformation and articulation of practice. Contextualization by participants tended to be limited to institutional and personal factors, there was less engagement with wider social policy issues. There was little evidence that participants were aware of literature and practice models relating to personal tutoring, and little evidence of professional development opportunities in this area. Practice generally occurred in invisible space and time, and tended to be based on personal judgement rather than practice ethos. If personal tutoring is to become established as an essential practice at the heart of higher education, action will be needed to recognize and value its ethos, including social and pedagogical purpose.

Almost two decades after the end of apartheid, the higher education system in South Africa remains marked by inequity at both staff and student levels. Current research in this area focuses on measuring inequity but does little to explain why and how it persists. This research explores gender and race equity in South African universities using three critical case studies of the University of Kwa-Zulu Natal, the University of Pretoria, and the University of Cape Town. Using Dorothy Smith’s Institutional Ethnography, broadly conceived, this research examines the daily practices, processes and discourses that give rise to inequitable institutions. The case study of the University of Kwa-Zulu Natal revealed disjunctures between the push in commercialising universities, illustrated in the new managerialist approach and focus on research, on one hand, and the State’s goal to transform and redress, on the other. This tension was articulated in the incongruence between boss texts, such as the Employment Equity Act, and more local institutional texts that emphasised the employment of “productive” staff members. These competing national and institutional demands and pressures blunted the impact of equity policies and strategies. In the case study of the University of Pretoria, gender and racial inequity is maintained and reproduced through various practices and processes, some formal and others informal, both at institutional and individual levels. Students reproduced the racialism and racism that forms part of racial interaction in broader South African society. Despite having equity policies in place, there were significant enclaves of inequity, shown through the lack of female representation in some departments and in student politics, and importantly in the de facto segregation that continues in the student body. In the case study of the University of Cape Town, institutional structures and practices that both maintain and reproduce inequality were identified. In this instance, the formal arrangements and structures of the university were found to lead to the exclusion of and discrimination against certain groups of people. Examples of such institutional structures and processes include, but are not limited to: the concentration of power at middle management; the white-male domination in senior management; and the absence of an intersectional approach in equity policies and measures. Thus despite important progressive policies and ideals, the structural nature of the university served as one of the key obstacles to racial and gender equity. Together, the case studies carried out point to the objectified forms of consciousness and organisation that rely on and help create textual realities. The management of equity in South African institutions is characterised by disjunctures and competing interests and not necessarily by poor implementation, which has been suggested as the explanation by other researchers. The discourses of race, and gender that dominate South African society play an important role in informing how equity matters are managed and experienced at the local level. The local practices and realities of individual Universities should be understood as being framed and influenced by the ruling relations of higher education and the State.

This thesis explores the degree to which perceptions of lecturers and middle-leaders about the actual and desired organisational characteristics of a Higher Education Institution in Oman converge and/ or diverge with regard to the effective operation of teaching and learning processes within the institution. Using a card sort of 32 criteria derived from 16 factors of effectiveness drawn from the literature, it analyses the data quantitatively to arrive at participants’ perceptions of the factors currently operating in the organisation and those desired for the future, and therefore which factors enable or hinder operational processes. Findings show that at the characteristic level, divergence is significantly greater between lecturers and middle-leaders, irrespective of faculty, than between lecturers from different faculties, or middle-leaders from different faculties. Current lecturer perceptions of organisational effectiveness/ ineffectiveness converge most strongly on factors of Collaboration and Professional Development. Middle-leader perceptions of current organisational effectiveness/ ineffectiveness converge most strongly on factors of Expectations of Success, Accountability, Professional Development, Environment, and Focus. At the more-desired/ less-desired level convergence is strongest between lecturers and middle-leaders on the factors of Expectations of Success, Collaboration and Professional Development. The study concludes that at the current level, there is a gulf between lecturers and middle-leaders that needs to be bridged if the organisation is to effectively organise the management of teaching and learning practices. The findings extend effectiveness into Higher Education in Oman and support the use of factors of effectiveness in educational research. Findings also demonstrate the usefulness of focus groups, card sorts and a quantitative analysis of data as starting points for organisational self-evaluation and review. Recommendations encompass further research as to how organisational members conceptualise and measure ‘success’, ‘collaboration’ and ‘development’; and investigation of other stakeholder perceptions of effectiveness.

Saudi Higher Education has started to move with the international trend towards blending face-to-face with online instruction when developing new educational processes. As a contribution to the innovations in Saudi Higher Education, this study explores the perceptions of Saudi female lecturers and undergraduate students towards blended learning from their experience as participants in blended courses. The advantage of blended learning was recognized by the Ministry of Saudi Higher Education as a solution to the challenge of providing college education to the rapidly growing student population. As the move to a blended learning model represents a radical shift in the Saudi educational system, this study shows how Saudi students and lecturers reacted to this change and how it affected the quality of their learning and teaching experience. The objective of the study is to identify Saudi female undergraduate students’ and lecturers’ perceptions of the advantages, challenges and future of blended learning. Consequently, the key factors that influence the lecturers’ and students’ views are discussed, and recommendations for future research, strategy and practice are provided. Qualitative methods were used to obtain rich descriptive data to facilitate the exploration of the phenomena. Based on interpretative philosophy, the data was analysed in the form of explanation and interpretation of the participants’ perceptions of blended learning. The study concludes that blended learning has the potential to offer a successful learning experience in Saudi Arabia. As there are always challenges of adaptation when a new approach is employed, this research provides insight into how the challenges of implementing blended learning in Saudi Higher Education could be addressed. A theoretical blended learning framework is introduced to provide the factors that influence the implementation of blended learning. One of the major conclusions is that a blended learning environment offers Saudi females the flexibility to continue their higher education while maintaining their own cultural values and traditions.

<p> The purpose of this study was to compare the work ethic attitudes and behaviors of entering Ethos freshmen to students who were about to graduate. Data was collected by two means, first by using the Multidimensional Work Ethic Profile (MWEP) instrument and the second by analyzing existing work ethic grades issued by faculty. The dependent variables were the seven dimensions of work ethic in the MWEP and the five Ethos work ethic traits. The population for this study consisted of members of the freshman and graduating classes from the 2013-2014 and 2014-2015 school years. A purposive sample was taken from work ethic surveys and the work ethic grades of the selected college students, comprising a sample believed to be representative of the total population. Data analysis involved descriptive statistics. Descriptive statistics were used to summarize the results and to determine whether there was a significant difference between the means of freshmen and graduates&rsquo; self-assessments. Similar methods were used to analyze and report any differences in the means of freshman and graduate work ethic grades awarded by faculty. </p><p> Results should be considered baseline information for Ethos College leadership to consider and to improve upon. Recommendations for future study include replicating this study for present and future classes, to look for trends in work ethic as curriculum develops and evolves. The overarching research question was, does the teaching and methodology at Ethos improve the work ethic of its students? Student survey data and the faculty-awarded work ethic grades were used to determine if there was value added from the training provided by Ethos leadership and faculty. The Ethos Board of Trustees, President, Office of Education, Academic Dean, and the Vice President of Education, the college&rsquo;s chief academic officer, were accountable for providing quality educational processes in all areas of education at the college. There were mixed results in the evidence that the college was successful in this important discipline impacting student-learning outcomes.</p>

<p>The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between the supervisory alliance and countertransference disclosure of social work trainees in direct practice. Eighty-six social work trainees in direct practice, receiving supervision in field placement, (<i>N</i> = 86; 89.5% female, 8.1% male; 73.3% White, 11.6% Hispanic\Latino; 5.8% Asian/Pacific Islander, 4.7% bi-racial; 3.5% African American/Black) completed Internet-administered self-report questionnaires assessing comfort with and likelihood of countertransference disclosure in supervision, supervisory alliance bond, and demographic items. Analyses revealed statistically significant positive correlations between the supervisory alliance and comfort with and likelihood of countertransference disclosure among trainees. These results build on past findings regarding the importance of the supervisory alliance in relation to trainee disclosure among various mental health practitioners. The results of this study have significance for clinical supervision practices in developing supervisee competencies and promoting client welfare. </p><p> <i>Keywords</i>: Supervisory Alliance, Countertransference Disclosure, Social Work, Use of Self </p>

<p> There is an absence of research examining the relationship between the experiences that occurred while holding formal student leadership positions and leadership identity development. This study will investigate if leadership can be learned through the lenses of the leadership experience of men who hold the formal student leadership position of chapter president within their local chapters of their national social fraternal organization. The design of the study is quantitative in nature and will utilize an electronic survey to examine the impact of a college student&rsquo;s leadership identity development from holding a position of leadership within a student organization. </p>

<p> Community colleges have seen large increases in students enrolling in online courses nationally. This trend does not appear to be slowing down, in-fact, the number of students enrolling in online courses is increasing. A number of these first-generation students come from disadvantaged backgrounds. This study attempted to isolate variables that can best predict a community college student's chance of successful completion in the online environment. </p><p> Ten variables were studied at one community college in Missouri (MOCC) during academic years 2010-2012. The variables were; College division, age, gender, academic semester, academic level, prior remediation, prior online course, grade point average, financial assistance, credit hours enrolled. The study used archived data with 9,540 individual cases. A chi-square analysis was used on the dichotomous and categorical variables and continuous variables were analyzed using an independent <i>t</i>-test. Once significance had been established the variables were analyzed again using a forced entry logistic regression to determine the statistical probability of the variables. All variables except prior remediation showed significance using the three analysis methods. The predictive abilities of logistic regression showed that students with a GPA of 3.0 or higher, enrolled in a Career and Technology field of study, male, receiving financial aid, enrolled in 10.5 credit hours in the summer and an age of 30 were the most likely to successfully complete online courses at MOCC.</p>