Quality Assurance in an Academic Unit: A Case Study     

L. GELDERS  A. PROOST  C. VAN DER HEYDE 《European Journal of Engineering Education》1993,18(4):369-374

Total quality management (TQM) is a philosophy that is now accepted worldwide in the business environment. However, in higher education, quality management is not widespread. Quality efforts are mainly limited to specific tasks, such as course development, curriculum design, laboratory certification, etc. The Division of Industrial Management at K. U. Leuven decided in 1990 to develop and implement a total quality approach in its organization. This process recently resulted in a total quality system based upon the implementation of a quality handbook. This paper describes this unique experience of TQM in an academic unit.  相似文献   

The Introduction of Portfolios in Higher Education: a comparative study in the UK and the Netherlands     

JOS BEISHUIZEN  PATRIS VAN BOXEL  PHILIP BANYARD  ALISON TWINER  HELLE VERMEIJ  & JEAN UNDERWOOD 《European Journal of Education》2006,41(3-4):491-508

This article describes a comparative study of the introduction of student portfolios in two departments of the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam in the Netherlands and Nottingham Trent University in the UK. Portfolios are designed to facilitate effective management of lifelong learning, to provide a record of achievements and to encourage self-reflection by students.
The justifications for the portfolio initiative are different in the two countries. At the Vrije Universiteit, the initiative arose within the University but is being implemented by individual faculties. There is no standard model of implementation. At Nottingham Trent University, portfolios are being introduced as a response to a government directive, as part of a lifelong learning portfolio that each individual will carry forward into their working life. The University's response to this imperative is top-down and a University-wide model is being sought. The department model is one of several models that are being evaluated for this purpose.
This research project investigates whether these alternative starting points lead to differential responses from student users or not. Data are drawn from quantitative (questionnaires) and qualitative (interviews with managers, consultants and teachers) sources. Similarities and differences in students' responses to the portfolio exercise are identified and discussed in terms of factors such as the way the portfolios are introduced, the incentives offered to complete them, the role of the lecturer and peers in the monitoring of study progress, the quality of self-regulative skills, and students' learning expectations.  相似文献   

Training for Technology Entrepreneurs     

FABIAN MONDS  DICK VAN BARNEVELD 《European Journal of Engineering Education》1988,13(4):447-454

New technology-based business enterprises need qualified and highly motivated entrepreneurs with access to technical resources, facilities and expertise. This paper describes two training programmes for graduate technologists, which assist the transition from full-time education to successful entrepreneurial activity. The programmes are the European Technology Entrepreneurs Programme (ETEP) operating in Northern Ireland and in the Republic of Ireland, and Tijdelijke Onderemers Plaatsen (Temporal Entrepreneurial Placement, TOP) which operates in the Twente region of the Netherlands. Both programmes are sponsored by partnerships of universities and public authorities. The structures and features of ETEP and TOP, and the operating experiences since 1984, are described and discussed. It is concluded that technology entrepreneur development can be accelerated with the support of programmes such as ETEP and TOP. Arrangements for continued collaboration between the centres involved now includes participation in the EC SPRINT programme.  相似文献   

PREDICTION OF GRADE POINT AVERAGES IN NURSING SCHOOLS USING SECOND-ORDER MULTIPLE REGRESSION MODELS     

CHERYL L. REED  JOHN F. FELDHUSEN  ADRIAN P. VAN  MONDFRANS 《Journal of Educational Measurement》1972,9(3):181-187

The present study was concerned with the prediction of first year grade point averages of associate degree nursing students. The primary objective of this investigation was to determine whether the inclusion of quadratic and/or interaction terms in a regression model would improve the prediction of student nurses' grade averages. The predictor battery included cognitive, biographical, and personality variables. Results indicated that interaction and quadratic terms improve both the predictability of grade point averages and the replicability of these predictions. The inclusion of higher order terms in prediction research is suggested as a means of improving predictive efficiency.  相似文献   

Training of poor readers' phonological decoding skills: Evidence for syllable-bound processing     

WENTINK  HANNEKE W.M.J.  VAN BON  WIM H.J.  SCHREUDER  ROBERT 《Reading and writing》1997,9(3):163-192

A flash card computer program designed to increase decoding speed in reading was evaluated with a sample of 55 eight- to twelve-year-old Dutch poor readers by using a pretest-training-posttest control group design. The reading level of the poor readers was comparable to the reading level of normal readers in grade two. After 8 weeks of practicing (twice a week) for 30 minutes per session, children in the training group showed substantial improvements in decoding speed not only on pseudowords directly practiced during the training, but also in untrained pseudowords and in existing words. The no-training control group did not improve in decoding speed from pre- to posttest. The results, furthermore, indicate that syllable-bound processes play a role in phonological decoding in Dutch, and that the flash card method used in this study stimulates poor readers to decode letter strings into syllabic units, which leads to an increase in decoding speed. The role of the syllable in phonological decoding and the potential of a specific flash card technique as a means to improve decoding skills of poor readers are discussed.  相似文献   

Constructivist,Problem-Based Learning Does Work: A Meta-Analysis of Curricular Comparisons Involving a Single Medical School     

HENK G. SCHMIDT  HENK T. VAN DER MOLEN  WILCO W. R. TE WINKEL  WYNAND H. F. W. WIJNEN 《教育心理学家》2013,48(4):227-249

Effects of problem-based learning as reported in curricular comparison studies have been shown to be inconsistent over different medical schools. Therefore, we decided to summarize effects of a single well-established problem-based curriculum rather than to add up sometimes-conflicting findings from different problem-based curricula. Effect sizes were computed for 270 comparisons. The results suggest that students and graduates from the particular curriculum perform much better in the area of interpersonal skills, and with regard to practical medical skills. In addition, they consistently rate the quality of the curriculum as higher. Moreover, fewer students drop out, and those surviving need less time to graduate. Differences with respect to medical knowledge and diagnostic reasoning were on average positive but small. These outcomes are at variance with expectations voiced in recent contributions to the literature. They demonstrate that constructivist curricula can have positive effects on learning even if they deemphasize direct instruction.  相似文献   

The future of HRD     

JAN N. STREUMER  MARCEL R. VAN DER KLINK  KATINKA VAN DE BRINK 《International Journal of Lifelong Education》2013,32(4):259-274

What organizational, technological and training developments will become crucial in the coming years, and what consequences will they have for human resource development? These questions have led to a study carried out by the faculty of Educational Science and Technology at the University of Twente, in the Netherlands. The ultimate aim of the study was to create an inventory of trends and developments which professionals deem to be influential with regard to the future HRD field. One direct catalyst for the study was the report of a similar study in the United States, involving HRD executives, carried out by the American Society for Training & Development. Following a brief explanation of the research plan and methods, this article describes the findings of the Dutch study an compares these with the results of the American research. It concludes with comments regarding the implications of the information obtained through this investigation.  相似文献   

Quality Assessment by Students: The Case of a Postgraduate Engineering Programme     

D. VAN OUDHEUSDEN  J. PEPERSTRAETE 《European Journal of Engineering Education》1999,24(1):15-22

In the framework of an ISO 9001 certification, a permanent evaluation system of an educational programme has been installed. All students evaluate very frequently the quality of courses and seminars. The evaluations are summarized and made public in such a way that they constitute a regular, quantitative teaching appraisal for every professor and teaching assistant. This system has some advantages, but also unexpected disadvantages: it engenders a lot of work; there are interpretation difficulties; it causes some uneasiness among staff members; and, most importantly, it reinforces the student's attitude of non-involvement.  相似文献   

Regulating Academic Pressure: From Fast to Slow     

KAREN FRANÇOIS  KATHLEEN COESSENS  NIGEL VINCKIER  JEAN PAUL VAN BENDEGEM 《Journal of Philosophy of Education》2020,54(5):1419-1442

This paper investigates the impact of publication pressure on the ethics and the scientific integrity in the domain of mathematics and of the arts. Both research fields are specific in their methodology, being that they do not start from a classical hypothesis and researchers in these areas are not knowing what the outcome will be. The research design is open, and creativity is a main part of the research investigation. Both research fields do not rely on empirical cases nor on data collection or data handling. This could be a reason why mathematics and arts seem to be less subject to scientific misconduct. After presenting the (inter)national regulations on ethics and integrity, we will investigate a philosophical analysis in which we consider possible influences from publication pressure that became widespread over all disciplines. We will clarify if and how mathematics and the arts are sensitive to scientific research misconduct or questionable research practices.  相似文献   

Interdisciplinary Problem-oriented Higher Education at the University of Amsterdam: Development at the Interfaculty Department of Environmental Science of the University of Amsterdam 1976–95     

HANS VAN ZONNEVELD 《European Journal of Engineering Education》1996,21(2):175-183

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