"Success" in education means different things to different people.
The purpose of this study was to examine conceptions of success (in
education) held by some students at Nunavut Arctic College. The author
is a white male from southern Canada and had not been to the Arctic
prior to this study. As such, it was necessary to employ a participatory
and respectful methodology. '
In three separate procedures, classes of Nunavut Arctic college students
were given index cards and asked to describe what it means to be
successful in education. As a class, we arranged the cards into common
categories on the floor in front of the classroom desks. Some students
wrote that success in education meant getting a good job. Some
reported that they learned best when they could understand what was
going on in a class. We decided as a class where each card belonged.
Conceptions of success in education emerged as groups of cards were
given titles, such as, "Understanding" or "Sharing knowledge." In the
final procedure, another group of students was interviewed with a tape
recorder to explore their conceptions in more depth.
"Success" in education in the Arctic (and elsewhere) typically has to do
with securing knowledge for personal development. Secondly, it is
concerned with instrumental or pragmatic concerns like getting a job.
For most people "success" in education involves a mix of personal and
instrumental factors. Hence, for the purposes of this study the author
used a heuristic device wherein "personal" and "instrumental"
conceptions of success could be plotted. Students' conceptions were
graphed along the two dimensions of instrumental application and
personal development.
Five conceptions emerged from the final study: "Understanding",
"Sharing", "Reaching goals in education", "Money" and "Certificate". The
conception "Understanding" was graphed in an area of low instrumental
application/high personal development; "Sharing knowledge" and
"Reaching goals in education" were graphed in an area of high
instrumental application/high personal development; "Money" was
graphed in an area of low instrumental application/low personal
development; and "Certificate" was graphed in an area of high
instrumental application/low personal development. / Education, Faculty of / Educational Studies (EDST), Department of / Graduate
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UBC/oai:circle.library.ubc.ca:2429/9185 |
| Date | 05 1900 |
| Creators | Gooding, John Douglas |
| Source Sets | University of British Columbia |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text, Thesis/Dissertation |
| Format | 8180776 bytes, application/pdf |
| Rights | For non-commercial purposes only, such as research, private study and education. Additional conditions apply, see Terms of Use https://open.library.ubc.ca/terms_of_use. |
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