<p> The purpose of this explorative case study was to understand how the skill building, academic, and life learning experiences align and demonstrate an entrepreneurial mindset and individual entrepreneurial orientation. The study used a purposive sample of six self-selected students at Southwest Suburban Community College, part of a large community college district, in a major metropolitan area in the southwest United States. An action research approach provided an iterative process for the researcher to reflect and review the research process to ensure the participants&rsquo; stories demonstrated their lived experiences. </p><p> The study used two conceptual frameworks, Effectuation Theory and Individual Entrepreneurial Orientation, to provide different lenses of entrepreneurial orientation and mindset to frame the findings. The study&rsquo;s research question explored how skill building, academic, and life learning experiences of a purposive sample of self-selected community college students align with and demonstrate an entrepreneurial mindset and individual entrepreneurial orientation. </p><p> Two assertions emerged from the qualitative data analysis. The assertion of Willing Vulnerability and Purposeful Intentionality demonstrated the participants&rsquo; stories aligned with propositions inherent to the entrepreneurial mindset and individual entrepreneurial orientation found in the scholarship. Moreover, the assertions and the researcher&rsquo;s own meaning making during the action research process suggest several actions can be taken. These actions include curriculum development, faculty pedagogy, and institutional polices and can be employed by the researcher, colleagues, and leaders when developing and facilitating an entrepreneurial culture where students lived experiences are integrated and validated as emerging entrepreneurial mindset and orientation.</p><p>

Many colleges have faced the challenge of engaging faculty in teaching and learning professional development. The purpose of this project study was to investigate why full-time school of business faculty at a small community college in Canada do not complete college course design and student assessment training. Faculty members are urged to complete these trainings in order to implement their courses to successfully prepare students to graduate from college and launch professional careers. The research questions in this study focused on faculty perceptions regarding factors that have prevented their completion of this college's course design and student assessment professional development. The conceptual framework for this study was the Attention, Relevance, Confidence, and Satisfaction (ARCS) model of motivation developed by Keller. A bounded case study design using purposeful sampling was adopted and 12 faculty members from the department agreed to participate in the study. Data collection included interviews that were coded and analyzed for common themes. The key findings suggested that faculty would be interested in having input in mandated professional development so that sessions were more closely aligned with their learning needs and performance plans. The project, a white paper, included recommendations based on findings that may be used by the college to establish a faculty professional development policy that is connected to performance and refine the faculty professional development offerings to accommodate faculty learning needs. Student graduates of the college might benefit from this research as faculty, through professional development, become better able to address the knowledge and skills they require to be positioned to contribute effectively to their communities and the Canadian economy.

Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 39-03, Section: A, page: 1280. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1978.

The purpose of this study was to develop a systematic approach for planning and implementing new educational programs and revise existing ones based on more and better information which could assist educational planners in decision making regarding curriculum planning. The Venezuelan Community College System served as a frame of reference for this study; the Caracas Community College within the system, as the pioneer of the community college movement in Venezuela, was used as the specific reference point. / The methodology used in this study was reported in four parts. First, the general framework for the study, the systems analysis approach, was discussed. Second, from extensive research of curriculum development models an eight-step model was developed. Third, the simulation technique was used as a device to assist planners in decision making regarding curriculum planning before implementation could take place. Fourth, sensitivity analysis was conducted to determine how sensitive the model was to changes introduced in some variables and how these changes might affect the final results. / The computer program--SAMPIC--designed for this study was useful in first, creating a model (Model C) from which a number of reports were generated for decision-making purposes; second, in conducting the sensitivity analysis in which changes in job opportunities were made for five selected industries and several jobs within those industries. / The reports provided by this model should be useful to planners in determining (1) the educational programs and courses that should be offered or eliminated, (2) the adequate number of students to be enrolled in each educational program given demand and supply in order to avoid subemployment and unemployment among the graduates, (3) the necessary number of faculty, (4) the total cost per educational program regarding instructional and non-instructional cost, and (5) the effect on the total educational program or part of it when some conditions are changed. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 43-08, Section: A, page: 2537. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1982.

The purpose of this study was to seek to understand faculty culture at a community college and at a public, regional, comprehensive university. Although public, regional, comprehensive universities and community colleges share a number of characteristics, there are areas where their differences are most apparent, such as student abilities and qualities, faculty credentials, and community orientations, to name a few. While quantitative indicators are readily available by institutional type, there is limited information on the nature of the work of faculty in these institutions or the faculty beliefs about their work. Research on culture in these institutions in particular is also necessary in light of the increasingly complex, economic, technological, and global influences impacting them. In this study, the impact of institutional mission, student abilities and qualities, teaching orientation, and the external pressures related to state, federal government, and national mandates on faculty at community colleges and public, regional, comprehensive universities are analyzed using institutional and neo-institutional theories, as well as culture theory.

The purpose of the research was to determine whether the situational, institutional, dispositional, epistemological, and technological barriers that affect attrition in distance education apply to the business-based distance training arena. Although reports about distance training students indicate that attrition from distance training is a significant issue, the results from this study find that 90 percent of the business professionals who answered this survey that have taken business-based e-learning courses are not discontinuing their e-learning courses. This finding contradicts many published articles. The free-form comments written by the online learners who answered this survey provided some hints as to what may be keeping these business professionals from abandoning their e-learning courses. The respondents to this study acknowledge that interaction with other learners and with course facilitators, chunking of courses and curricula into appropriate sized pieces, technical support, good course design, and incentives to reach course or curriculum completion have kept them online.

This qualitative study explores the academic experiences of single-parent undergraduate students at North Carolina Central University. The world of single parents is one of children, employers and themselves. When the parent adds the role of student, educational demands may be difficult to balance. Family and work responsibilities may interfere with educational attainment. This study suggests that the experiences of single-parent undergraduate students consist of complex roles and responsibilities. Yet, with a solid commitment, a reduction in daily situational barriers, and faculty, staff and family support, these students are capable of attaining educational goals.

A case study analysis was used to investigate the changes in the lives of adult daughters when they became primary caregivers to parents with Alzheimer's disease. This research also explored beliefs, feelings, and perceptions of participants about their role. Based on in-depth and face-to-face interviews with 21 adult daughters and two daughters-in-law, this study argues that although intergenerational caregiving is accepted as a part of membership in families, it is also a source of family disharmony and conflicts. Family nursing is considered a burden based on the length of service. The scope of the changes in the lives of adult daughters/caregivers ranges from living arrangements, family relationships, young children, personal affairs, social activities, employment and economics, health of caregiver to religion. Although caring for AD patients is rigorous, highly stressful, and filled with demanding challenges, the findings of this study show that a majority of adult caregivers would do it all over.

The purpose of this study is to examine pragmatist constructivism as a science education referent for adult learners. Specifically, this study seeks to determine whether George Herbert Mead?s doctrine, which conflates pragmatist learning theory and philosophy of natural science, might facilitate (a) scientific concept acquisition, (b) learning scientific methods, and (c) preparation of learners for careers in science and science-related areas. A philosophical examination of Mead?s doctrine in light of these three criteria has determined that pragmatist constructivism is not a viable science education referent for adult learners. Mead?s pragmatist constructivism does not portray scientific knowledge or scientific methods as they are understood by practicing scientists themselves, that is, according to scientific realism. Thus, employment of Mead?s doctrine does not adequately prepare future practitioners for careers in science-related areas. Mead?s metaphysics does not allow him to commit to the existence of the unobservable objects of science such as molecular cellulose or mosquito-borne malarial parasites. Mead?s anti-realist metaphysics also affects his conception of scientific methods. Because Mead does not commit existentially to the unobservable objects of realist science, Mead?s science does not seek to determine what causal role if any the hypothetical objects that scientists routinely posit while theorizing might play in observable phenomena. Instead, constructivist pragmatism promotes subjective epistemology and instrumental methods. The implication for learning science is that students are encouraged to derive scientific concepts based on a combination of personal experience and personal meaningfulness. Contrary to pragmatist constructivism, however, scientific concepts do not arise inductively from subjective experience driven by consummatory activity. The broader implication of this study for adult education is that the philosophically laden claims of constructivist learning theories need to be identified and assessed independently of any empirical support that these learning theories might enjoy. This in turn calls for educational experiences for graduate students of education that incorporate philosophical understanding such that future educators might be able to recognize and weigh the philosophically laden claims of adult learning theories.

This qualitative study examines the impact of cultural change on the perspectives of business and economic teachers in Kazakhstan, a country that has experienced tremendous change since gaining its independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. During this study, eighteen participants completed semi-structured interviews. Data was analyzed using an approach derived from phenomenography. Six changes in society, as well as specific changes in students, were identified as significantly impacting participant?s teaching. Participants stressed that, as a result of the changes taking place, a new world was opening for them and a new model of higher education was emerging in post-Soviet Kazakhstan. While some teachers found a renewed interest in teaching, most found teaching more difficult as a result of cultural change, with some deciding to leave the profession altogether. The study?s participants also shared their understandings of effective teaching, identifying two goals and describing six approaches effective teachers use in teaching. Differences emerged between Soviet and post-Soviet teachers with respect to their commitment to the curriculum, their ability to adapt to changing teaching situations, and the effect of increased economic pressure on them. The study concludes that: (a) participants? normative expectations, or their roles, relationships, and responsibilities were most affected by change; (b) participants? pedagogical procedures were largely determined by how they learned to teach; (c) participants desired and were able to change their pedagogical procedures to adapt to changing contexts; (d) Soviet teachers had more difficulty adapting their teaching practices than their post-Soviet colleagues; (e) the context for teaching constrained teachers in their ability to adapt to cultural changes; and (f) while most beliefs about teaching were rooted in Soviet Kazakhstan, beliefs about teacher?s roles and relationships were changing in response to changes in Kazakhstan.