中国高等教育国际化与双语教学

日新月异的科技更新与世界各国经济政治文化的交汇融合使得“国际化”成为了中国高等教育发展的重要内容之一。因此作为传播全球先进科研成果和培养国际性人才最行之有效的手段之一——“双语教学”应始终不忘“支持中国高等教育国际化”的时代使命,并坚持以国际化的视野探讨其推广的意义,目的及应采用的方式手段。研究中国高等教育国际化与双语教学的联系不仅是大势所趋,还能为两者发展历程中所遇到的问题及争议提供解决方案,从而为中国高等教育步入世界舞台,接受世界挑战贡献力量。     

Negotiating Neoliberal Empowerment: Aboriginal People,Educational Restructuring,and Academic Labour in the North of British Columbia,Canada

Aboriginal peoples in Canada are gaining influence in post‐secondary education through Aboriginal‐directed programs and policies in non‐Aboriginal institutions. However, these gains have occurred alongside, and in some cases through, neoliberal reforms to higher education. This article explores the political consequences of the neoliberal institutionalization of First Nations empowerment for public sector unions and workers. We examine a case where the indigenization of a community college in British Columbia was embedded in neoliberal reforms that ran counter to the interests of academic instructors. Although many union members supported indigenization, many also possessed a deep ambivalence about the change. Neoliberal indigenization increased work intensity, decreased worker autonomy and promoted an educational philosophy that prioritized labour market needs over liberal arts. This example demonstrates how the integration of Aboriginal aspirations into neoliberal processes of reform works to rationalize public sector restructuring, constricting labour agency and the possibilities for alliances between labour and Aboriginal peoples.     

Rotten to the core: Against a core curriculum for geography in UK higher education

Abstract

This paper examines some of the main reasons why a core curriculum for UK higher education is seen as being desirable, and challenges these arguments with particular reference to geography. It suggests that a core curriculum would be damaging for six main reasons: that problems exist over the identification of central elements which could provide the basis of a core; that the higher education experience should be enlightening rather than dehumanising; that the strength of geography as a very broad discipline would be damaged by the imposition of a core; that much of the most exciting geographical ‘knowledge’ is created at the research frontier rather than in any potential core; that there are problems over the choice of people who might determine any core; and that there are serious questions over precisely in whose interests a core might be created.     

Concerns,Attitudes, and Abilities of Early-Career Geography Faculty

Professional experiences during graduate school through the first few years of an academic appointment shape patterns of work and social behavior that prefigure the long-term success of new faculty members, including prospects for tenure and promotion. We explore these experiences through interviews and surveys with a sample of early-career faculty in postsecondary American geography. Our analysis reveals that teaching is the primary source of anxiety among new professors, many of whom begin their first academic positions with little or no preparation in learning theory, course design, or pedagogy. Many new faculty members struggle to maintain healthy personal and family lives, while adjusting to unfamiliar norms of their new institutions. New professors benefit from support offered by their department chairpersons and from working in collegial environments. Among women, we found a greater sense of self-doubt about their scholarly abilities and futures despite having records comparable in accomplishment to their male peers. Many women cope with this sense of marginalization by forming supportive mentoring relationships with other women faculty on campus and through disciplinary specialty groups. Networking with colleagues on campus and at academic conferences enhances the job performance and satisfaction of all faculty members irrespective of gender. Our findings underscore the importance of examining the social, professional, and disciplinary contexts of higher education to acquire a broader understanding of faculty development. This knowledge can help departments prepare new faculty for successful and satisfying academic careers.     

Teaching landscape in Spanish universities: looking for new approaches in Geography

In order to determine the degree of implementation of the teaching of landscape in the new curriculum for Geography Degrees in Spain, some aspects are analysed: educational plans are analysed and verified, the presence therein of subjects directly devoted to landscape, as well as the inclusion of indirect or cross landscape issues in the subjects related to teaching guides. We propose ideas for the necessary updating of landscape teaching at the university level in the context of Geography, with a view to adapting both professional practice and research.     

Sustainability Science Partnerships in Concept and in Practice: a Guide to a New Curriculum from a European Perspective

This paper makes the case for advancing sustainability science partnerships (SSPs) both within universities and through innovative means of integrating universities with external public‐private and civil sectors. It links the basic principles of sustainable development with an emerging science of cooperative learning that connects researchers to a wide range of partners. SSPs are specifically designed to be transformational through becoming active agents for societal change. Universities play a special role here because they can act both as communication networks and as laboratories for developing the capability to design and manage SSPs in the creative transition to sustainability. It is gratifying to note that these ideas are beginning to emerge in a number of universities, with European examples being highlighted in this paper. Further steps towards introducing full‐blooded SSPs across the university spectrum are suggested.     

Social Funds in Stabilization and Adjustment Programmes: A Critique

This article evaluates the impact of the large number of Social Funds (SFs) which were introduced over the last fifteen years to offset the increase in poverty induced by adjustment. SFs have enjoyed greater visibility and financial support by the donor community than traditional social security programmes, and raised expectations about improvements in living conditions in developing countries. Notwithstanding the visibility and administrative flexibility they enjoyed, and their fairly rapid implementation, SFs played only a minor role in reducing the number of adjustment poor and chronic poor and reversing adverse shifts in income distribution. This was due to problems in funding, targeting and sequencing, and cost‐effectiveness. The article concludes that, all in all, SFs have proven to be no panacea. Many of them were formulated with the political objective of reducing domestic opposition to the adjustment process. Greater impact on poverty would have required increased resources, more permanent relief structures, improved planning and targeting and, especially, better timing in relation to the fiscal cuts entailed by macroeconomic adjustment.     

Internationalization in the Helsinki Metropolitan Area: Images,Discourses and Metaphors

This paper investigates promotional images in the Metropolitan Area of Helsinki, focusing on the projection, outside national boundaries, of specific “ideas” concerning the cities of Helsinki, Espoo and Vantaa. After introducing the Helsinki Metropolitan Area, presenting its geographical features, urban dynamics, actual problems and actors involved in image-building, the focus of this research will be a comparison between the images proposed in promotional materials and policy documents by the various territorial units, looking at their differences, overlaps, synergies and clashes. In fact, as will be discussed, even if the images proposed by the cities consist of the same thematic fields (technology, nature, culture, etc.), they contain slightly different implicit messages, targets, representations of the cities, values, strategic orientations and approaches.     

Colonial Institutions: Uses,Subversions, and Material Afterlives

Archaeologically based explorations of colonialism or institutions are common case-studies in global historical archaeology, but the “colonial institution”—the role of institutions as operatives of colonialism—has often been neglected. In this thematic edition we argue that in order to fully understand the interconnected, global world one must explicitly dissect the colonial institution as an entwined, dual manifestation that is central to understanding both power and power relations in the modern world. Following Ann Laura Stoler, we have selected case studies from the Australia, Europe, UK and the USA which reveal that the study of colonial institutions should not be limited to the functional life of these institutions—or solely those that take the form of monumental architecture—but should include the long shadow of “imperial debris” (Stoler 2008) and immaterial institutions.     

Fieldwork@40: fieldwork in geography higher education

ABSTRACT

Fieldwork is the most powerful learning invitation in the toolkit of Geographical Education. This review of papers in The Journal of Geography in Higher Education (JGHE) suggests seven modes in the development of fieldwork. These are arrayed as a kind of historical, perhaps evolutionary, sequence but most remain current in Geography fieldwork practice. At the far end (1960s) of the sequence are didactic modes that are teacher centred and use the field as an adjunct to the classroom, in the middle (1990s) are modes that involve active learning and focus on the development of students as investigators and at the near end (2010s) are those that centred on the field study area and its qualities, that involve concern about the ethics of student engagement and that employ blended learning technologies. The review charts the JGHE’s gradual shift away from its original, almost exclusively, UK-focus toward something rather more international and inclusive. Fieldwork is where Geographers learn “from doing” Geography to “do” Geography. Its special attributes include providing experiential, sometimes transformative, learning through the immersion of the learner in the field experience. In 40 years, JGHE has helped Geography Fieldwork move from the margins of the curriculum to its current place at its core.     

Employability of German Geography Graduates: The Mismatch between Knowledge Acquired and Competences Required

The employability of university graduates is a concern in higher education as labour markets change more and more rapidly. This is of particular relevance for multi-faceted subjects such as geography. Studies on employability have to consider to what degree a university education helps graduates start a career. The results of a survey of 257 geography graduates of JLU (Justus Liebig University) Giessen, Germany, indicate that the traditional curricula did not necessarily prepare German geographers adequately for their jobs. The graduates possess more knowledge than required but lack important competences and transferable skills that the job market demands. This may be partly remedied by the introduction of project-oriented classes.     

The Formation of Large-scale Collaborative Resource Management Institutions: Clarifying the Roles of Stakeholders, Science, and Institutions

This article explores the emergence of collaborative institutional arrangements for managing natural resources in large-scale and complex resource settings, among numerous political jurisdictions and stakeholders. It examines four regional institutions in the United States: the Northwest Power and Conservation Council's Fish and Wildlife Program, the Chesapeake Bay Program, the CALFED Bay-Delta Program, and the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan. While a wealth of literature has looked at the emergence of smaller-scale resource management institutions, and some literature has begun to look at the characteristics and successes of these regional institutions, theory is lacking to explain the formation of these regional institutions. We first introduce three relevant streams of literature—on common pool resources management, on policy entrepreneurs and social capital, and on science and information in policy change—to frame our analysis. The comparisons of the cases point to the importance of integrating key insights from the literature for understanding the formation of collaborative resource governance. We emphasize how science, leadership, and prior organizational experience interact in facilitating institutional change, particularly in the process of raising awareness about resource management problems. In tracing the formation of these institutions, we also identify how external institutional triggers can help spur collaborative governance.     

Voting Technology,Political Institutions,Legal Institutions and Civil Society: A Study of the Hypothesis of Cultural Lag in Reverse

The 2000 Presidential election was plagued by butterfly ballots and ‘pregnant chads’. Electronic voting systems, lacking verifiable paper trails that are subject to possible fraud, promise to wreak havoc with the 2004 Presidential election. There is a great diversity of systems of voting technology in the 50 states: from paper ballots, lever‐operated machines and punch cards to optical scanners and electronic systems. Associated with each technology is an estimated error rate. The underlying theory of this paper was set forth by William F. Ogburn in his famous book entitled Social Change, published in 1922. Dividing culture into material and non‐material elements, Ogburn argued that non‐material elements lag behind material elements. His explanation for this lag is that technology, which underlies material culture, changes at a faster rate than elements of non‐material culture. Obgurn did not contemplate the possibility of a reverse lag, viz., technology lagging behind non‐material culture. In analyzing the anomalous relationships between voting technology, political institutions and legal institutions, a striking instance of a ‘reverse cultural lag’ is discerned. To eliminate the phenomenon of the reverse cultural lag, there is a need for a federally‐funded program of a uniform, state‐of‐the‐art voting technology, plus an amended Help America Vote Act, to implement the innovations in the 3,114 counties. The complex problems reviewed in this paper point to a vexing question: how do we educate an electorate in a democratic society—such as the United States in the twenty‐first century—to be responsible for ensuring that periodically‐elected representatives implement the will of the people?     

Transformative learning in community college human geography: a mixed methods study

ABSTRACT

The study explores the extent to which transformative learning occurs using quantitative and qualitative methods in a human geography course (N = 35) and explores student affect in relation to the learning environment. We used the eight-scale Transformative Learning Environments Survey (TLES) instrument for the quantitative analysis and an aligned analysis of student reflective work to capture the “voice” of the student as a qualitative approach that provided a rounded perspective of transformative learning. The TLES proved reliable where the sub-scale Alpha reliability ranged from 0.71 to 0.93 and a separate affect scale of Satisfaction was 0.95. The standardized regression coefficient between Satisfaction and the sub-scale of Student-Acting demonstrated the strongest positive association (0.27), followed closely by Disorienting Dilemma-Environment (0.24). The qualitative results supported the quantitative associations in most cases, but not all. The qualitative aspect to this present study offers a deeper look – beyond just statistical outcomes – using students’ own voices to explain their perspectives related to transformative learning.