The purpose of this study is threefold: (1) to find out the qualities employers expect in beginning workers, (2) to investigate the importance attached to personality by some writers in the literature of the business education field, and (3) to compile information that will be of aid to students of Dallas Technical High School in developing the needed personal qualities and skills.

Call number: LD2668 .T4 1961 L38 / Master of Science

Doctor of Education / Curriculum and Instruction Programs / Rosemary S. Talab / The purpose of this case study was to explore Teaching Presence in the undergraduate online Business course environment. This study explored the following three Research Questions: 1. How do undergraduate Business students perceive Teaching Presence in online courses? 2. What Teaching Presence components do undergraduate Business students find valuable in online courses? 3. How do exemplary undergraduate online Business course faculty demonstrate Teaching Presence in online instruction? The population of this study consisted of 20 undergraduate Business students and 3 student-nominated Business faculty. Participants included Business students enrolled in online Business courses. Based on the student interviews, the faculty most often nominated by the students as demonstrating effective methods of Teaching Presence in online Business courses served as faculty participants. Interviews of students and faculty were conducted during the Fall 2015 semester. There were 101 units identified for Research Question 1, with 46 units for the theme of "Direct Instruction", 36 for the theme of "Discourse Facilitation", and 19 units for the theme of "Design and Organization". The major findings from these research questions were that undergraduate Business students perceived online course Teaching Presence most through Direct Instruction. Students perceived prompting student engagement in discussions and encouraging student participation as important elements of the "Discourse Facilitation" theme. Students perceived good course design methods as being important to Teaching Presence. There were 245 units identified for Research Question 2, with 93 units for the theme of "Design and Organization", 88 units for "Discourse Facilitation" and 64 units for Direct Instruction". The major findings were that the "Design and Organization" theme was found to be most valuable to undergraduate Business students in the form of designing methods and establishing time parameters. Setting a climate for learning within the "Discourse Facilitation" theme and confirming understanding within the "Direct Instruction" themes were important to students when discussing what Teaching Presence components they found valuable in online Business courses. There were 81 units identified for Research Question 3, which consisted of faculty interviews focused on how exemplary online Business course faculty demonstrated Teaching Presence. The themes that were found in the faculty interviews were 30 units for the "Design and Organization" theme, 26 units for the "Discourse Facilitation" theme and 25 units for the "Direct Instruction" theme. The major findings were that the "Design and Organization" theme was found to be of the utmost importance to exemplary faculty when discussing the demonstration of Teaching Presence in online Business courses. Within the "Discourse Facilitation" theme, faculty emphasized the importance of drawing in participants and prompting discussion. Confirming understanding was found to be the most important aspect of the "Direct Instruction" theme. Recommendations for the research setting were in the areas of learning activity clarity, the use of integrated video lectures, enriched student-instructor interaction strategies, and technological tools to identify student comprehension struggles. Recommendations for future research including a study of Teaching Presence in different academic disciplines and in different academic environments, the efficacy of various technologies in enhancing Teaching Presence, and instructor attributes influencing Teaching Presence.

Thesis (MBA)--Stellenbosch University, 2015. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: In most developing economies, and in South Africa in particular, students’ perceptions, motives and attitudes towards the Master of Business Administration degree (MBA) have increasingly become a topic of interest to researchers and academics. Given the high number of students registering to study towards an MBA degree each year, this research assignment aimed to investigate and illuminate the perceived impact of an MBA degree from the University of Stellenbosch Business School (USB) on salary and career advancement. Data was collected through a carefully designed and structured questionnaire. Supplemented by a comprehensive literature review, the study applied descriptive and inferential statistical procedures along with various tools of analysis to analyse the perceived effects of the USB MBA degree on its students’ income and career advancement. The general perception among MBA graduates was that an MBA degree might help them achieve a major breakthrough in their career path and long-term advancement, accompanied by an increase in income. A further perception was that the reputation of an accredited business school would get them rewarding job opportunities at reputable organisations.

<p> A student&rsquo;s ability to achieve his or her goal in an online course depends on the quality of the material presented by the instructor, and the motivational aspect of the student before committing to an online course. However, neither of these can be reached to their maximum if the dominant learning styles of students are not uncovered prior to enrolling in an online course. With the quick expansion of online learning in higher education, proper protocol has not been taken in order to help millennials reach their full potential, by allowing instructors to help identify methods to communicate with the students through an online platform. To maximize the impact of these two aspects, the dominant learning styles of millennials must be uncovered. The purpose of this quantitative study was to examine the dominant learning styles of millennials enrolled in an online business course, on order to provide instructors with insight of how to present course material to students in an online platform. The population consisted of 37 millennials enrolled in three separate online business courses at a California State University. Data were collected using one research instrument, the Building Excellence (BE) Learning Style Survey, consisting of approximately 120 questions. The survey instrument was used to measure the dominant learning styles of the participants among 28 different elements among six categories (perceptual, psychological, environmental, physiological, emotional, and sociological). The study looked into the perceptual category to reveal a strong necessity of millennials preferring to learn material by having it presented using visual images, and/or visual text. By improving the method of instruction in an online business course to incorporate with these learning styles, instructors can maximize their ability to teach students.</p>

In order to enhance students' understanding of the interrelationships between business administration, business mathematics and accounting, the recently developed curriculum of Austrian commercial schools comprises one global subject in which the contents of these three subjects have been combined. A second subject called "business practice" has been introduced to provide sufficient time to apply the acquired business knowledge to practice-oriented tasks. The results of a formative evaluation study show that several teachers have considerable difficulties to put the main ideas of these two subjects into practice and that many students find it hard to understand the identity of these two subjects. (authors' abstract)

The primary objective of this study is to identify the perspectives of the stakeholders on the business curriculum, and the curriculum gaps between them. While the perspectives can be captured on a few continuum, such as the ‘critical’-‘managerialist’ continuum (Macfarlane and Perkins, 1995), this study chose to measure the perspectives of the stakeholders on the ‘about business’-‘for business’ continuum (Tolley, 1983). The study collected primary data from the business lecturers, the business alumni, and the business students of the case institution. The data were collected from the target respondents via a constructed, pilot-tested and reliable questionnaire. The questionnaire made it possible to measure the perspectives of the stakeholders in terms of ‘about business’ and ‘for business’. The results confirmed that the lecturers have a high ‘about business’ orientation (mean = 4.25 out of 5). The ‘about business’ mean score of the alumni is 3.70 and the mean score for the students is 3.71. It is surprising that the lecturers scored high in ‘for business’ (mean = 3.88 out of 5), even higher than for the alumni (mean = 3.35) and the students (mean = 3.38). The t-test procedures confirmed the curriculum gap in terms of ‘about business’ between the lecturer and the alumni is significant (t=4.47, p=0.001); and between the lecturers and the students is also significant (t=4.45, p=0.001). The curriculum gap in terms of ‘for business’ between the lecturers and the alumni is significant (t=3.80, p=0.001); and between the lecturers and the students is significant (t=4.06, p=0.001). Both the ‘about business’ score and the ‘for business’ score of the lecturers are higher than those for the alumni and the students, indicating that the lecturers intend to provide a business curriculum to educate the students for life and at the same time preparing the students for employment. Although there is no cause for concern in this respect, the lecturers are recommended to collaborate with the stakeholders in order to satisfy the expectations of all stakeholders concerned.

<p>Agricultural system in Ghana underperformed because of limited financing, which constrained some small-scale maize and cassava farmers. The purpose of this case study design was to explore the methods that some small-scale maize and cassava farmers in Amankwakrom Subdistrict used in obtaining farm financing. Two themes from the literature review were a lack of collateral for small-scale farm financing and the small-scale farmers cooperative associations? role in farm financing. Regional-scale management sustainability index formed the conceptual framework for this study. Data collection included semistructured face-to-face interviews with 8 fluent English speaking small-scale maize and cassava farmers who have obtained farm financing in the previous years. Using the Microsoft Excel and Non-numerical unstructured data indexing and theorizing software program for data analysis method, 3 major themes emerged: the farmer?s membership benefits of working in cooperative associations; farmer?s ability to provide the collateral requirements for the financial institutions; and farmer?s good loan repayment history. The study findings indicated that some small-scale maize and cassava farmers obtained farm loans because they used the cooperative associations as their collateral assets in order to satisfy for the requirements of the financial institutions. Social implications include the potential to guide the small-scale maize and cassava farmers to access farm credits to use in expanding their farm sizes. Expansion in farm sizes may result in more maize and cassava production that can help eliminate hunger and reduce poverty in the Amankwakrom Subdistrict of Ghana.

The problem of this study was to develop and analyze a useful approach to the professional development of faculty members in schools of business through the technique of self-appraisal. This study contained the following subdivisions: (1) a review of current college faculty development practices, (2) a review of current executive development practices within industry, (3) an explanation of the philosophy and technique of self-appraisal in professional development, (4) an application of the technique in six institutions of higher education, and (5) an analysis of results obtained from these institutions along with some suggestions for further research.

<p> Corporations seek Master of Business Administration (MBA) students who are ready to perform upon hiring. Business schools need to align instructional practices and technology with student, accreditation, and marketplace demands. Complex simulation use has increased exponentially to provide MBA students with business experience in the classroom. Methods to assess the effectiveness of complex simulations to achieve learning outcomes is limited to student perceptions of learning, satisfaction, and direct assessment separately. The purpose of this quantitative ex post facto comparative study was to examine MBA students&rsquo; perception of learning to real performance in integrative courses with complex simulation. Archival MBA student Peregrine COMP&trade; pretest, posttest, and SIRII&trade; scores were analyzed using independent t-test, paired sample t-test, and Pearson <i>r</i> coefficient. MBA students perceived higher levels of learning in courses with complex simulation based on the statistically significant increase in SIRII&trade; scores over courses without simulation. Another key finding from the quantitative study was the statistically significant negative correlation of students&rsquo; perception of learning to actual performance. Positive student perceptions of learning could hide a complex simulation&rsquo;s inability to meet student learning outcomes, according to the statistically significant decrease between pretest, and posttest Peregrine COMP&trade; scores. Based on the quantitative correlation analysis of student perceptions of learning to actual performance, MBA administrators and faculty need to evaluate the use of instructional technology from multiple data points to avoid applications that offer minimal value to achieving learning outcomes. Future research opportunities could include a larger MBA population from multiple regions of the United States. Additional studies could investigate undergraduate perceptions of learning to actual performance to assess any benefit from complex simulations.</p>