Dijana Tiplic

Antecedents of Norwegian beginning teachers’ turnover intentions

This study aims at exploring several individual, organizational, and contextual factors that may affect beginning teachers’ turnover intentions during their first years of practice. The sample consists of 227 beginning teachers (69% female and 31% male) from 133 schools in Norway. The results show four important antecedents of beginning teachers’ turnover intentions: collective teacher efficacy, teacher–principal trust, role conflict, and affective commitment. Our findings suggest that organizational and contextual factors, and not necessarily individual competence perceptions, have a significant impact on beginning teachers’ turnover intentions. Also the findings suggest that beginning teachers should be studied separately from more experienced teachers. Implications for school leadership are discussed.

Bosnia-Herzegovina's Higher Education System: Issues of Governance and Quality.

Bosnia-Herzegovina (BiH) is seen as an intriguing case. Often described as a “miniature” of the Balkans due to its demographic pattern, the country has been exposed to a number of dramatic events during the past fifteen years. Today, international actors administer it as a sort of “semi-protectorate” concept, the definition of which is unclear even to its designers. Consequently, most of the reforms that took place and still take place at BiH’s universities are part of an agenda funded by international agencies. At the same time, one of the main critics of these international aid programs was that better appreciation of the existing universities’ structures is important in achieving the effective reforms (Temple 2002). This is in line with Castells’s argument that “effectiveness of the international aid will be conditioned by the ability to design policies that take into account the specificity of universities as institutions, and are able at the same time, to link the science and

Rights-based education and conflict: a cross-national study of rights discourse in textbooks

This paper investigates the extent to which rights-based education is utilised in textbooks from conflict-affected countries. Drawing on a unique dataset of 528 secondary social science textbooks from 71 countries from 1966 to 2008, we analyse factors that predict a rights discourse in texts. We find that textbooks from conflict-affected nations are significantly less likely to emphasise a rights-based discourse, while more recently published textbooks from more democratic countries are more likely to emphasise a rights discourse. Our findings have ramifications for curricular reform and rights-based education in conflict-affected nations.

The Role Played by Contextual Challenges in Practising Inquiry-based Science Teaching in Tanzania Secondary Schools

Our study aims to explore the practice of Inquiry-based Science Teaching (IBST) in schools with contextual challenges in Tanzania. The study draws on multiple data sources. Eleven teachers purposively selected were interviewed. Also, out of 11 teachers, seven were observed in their practical sessions. Participants were selected from community secondary schools in Iringa Municipality in Tanzania. We found that IBST is infrequently practised and then mostly at lower levels (conducting activities and drawing conclusions). Our findings indicate that the main contextual challenges for the practice of IBST include the restrictions by the practical examinations and inadequate resources. Findings also suggest opportunities for the practice of IBST in schools with contextual challenges, such as the use of locally available materials for generating students’ investigations and specific questioning techniques referring to local science applications. Thus the design of IBST may need to be adapted to the context of the learner. This may enable the effective practice of the higher levels of IBST even in the presence of contextual challenges.

Clear Mentoring: Contributing to Mentees’ Professional Self-confidence and Intention to Stay in their Job

Researchers have highlighted developmental mentoring as being beneficial and judgmental mentoring as hampering the potential positive outcomes of mentoring. We introduce the construct clear mentoring as a beneficial form of mentoring. The findings suggest that newly qualified teachers who perceive higher levels of mentoring characterized by mentees’ opportunities to reflect upon their own practice, openness to different approaches to being a teacher, and an atmosphere of relational trust are more likely to report lower levels of self-efficacy. In contrast, mentees who perceive higher levels of mentoring characterized by clear communication of feedback and advice are more likely to report higher levels of self-efficacy and lower levels of intention to quit. This study contributes to the field of mentoring by illuminating how mentors’ communication of evaluations, advice, and feedback can positively affect mentees, and how mentoring dominated by mentees’ perspectives can negatively affects mentees.