Len Cairns

Managing their own programme: a case study of the first graduates of a new kind of doctorate in professional practice

This article contributes to current debates about professional doctorates from a lifelong learning perspective, focusing on those who choose to undertake a doctoral programme in mid- or late career and their responses to the challenge of demonstrating their ‘doctorateness’ as evidenced in their previous and continuing professional work. It is based on the first 10 case histories of an extensive grounded theory study of the 150 candidates who have so far presented themselves for the professional doctorate of Middlesex University (UK) and reveals some insights into the pedagogical processes that come into play when people are given centre stage in the design and completion of doctoral programmes based on their own professional work. Central to those processes is the extent to which, in response to that responsibility, candidates successfully demonstrate their professionalism at the highest level within critical academic and professional environments. In accordance with grounded theory we conclude with some tentative propositions about the way in which the academic community might usefully engage in discussion about the style and range of professional doctorates and how they might be developed.

Enhancing Knowledge in Organizations: Developing Capacity and Capability through Learning and Leadership

There is now a large body of quite recent work across a range of different academic and practical disciplines and fields which could be grouped under the headings of “Knowledge” or “Learning” in organisations (Burton-Jones, 1999; Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, 2000; Prusak, 1997; Davenport & Prusak, 1998; von Krogh, et al., 1998; Choo, 1998). The essence of this research, writing and advocacy has been that the development of organisations through a conscious attention to knowledge (usually defined in terms of either data and information where there is a heavy information technology influence, or as a human or social capital, where there is more of a social learning influence) and how such knowledge can be enhanced through learning (usually a process involving training or on-the-job practices) is a significant and new approach to strategic and organisational operation.

Peripheral Social Learning in the Workplace and the Development of Corporate Capability: The Role of National Vocational Qualifications.

Abstract This study researches the contributions made to the development of corporate capability when workers complete competencybased workplace qualifications, such as the National Vocational Qualifications (NVQ) in eight United Kingdom organisations and the Vehicle Industry Certificate (VIC) in two Australian organisations. The study explores the features and indicators of successful learning in organizations from a social learning perspective and draws implications for organizations and employees from the case studies completed. Differences between organisation-driven and learner-driven engagement that emerged from the study, are also discussed.

The School Council Perspective

The School Council of what began as the Alpine School, and now known as the School for Student Leadership (SSL), is unique in the government run state school system in Victoria, Australia. It is unique in a number of ways. While the SSL is a school (not a camp or just an experiential learning centre) within the same system of all government run schools in Victoria, it provides for only Year 9 students and has a new cohort of students for each of the four terms in a school calendar year. The means that under the regulations for membership of a School Council, there is an issue with the election of parent members due to the cohort change each term and the multiple schools involved. The school offers a program that is also unique across the state yet it is required to operate within requirements as to school strategic planning and within the state Department of Education and Training accountability system. This chapter outlines some of these elements including the operation of the School Council and its role. In addition, highlights and challenges faced over the last decade and a half by the School Council are documented.

Social Networks: Impact on Teaching and Learning in Schools and Classrooms

Social networking has become a widespread WWW-based phenomenon of the late twentieth century that has been taken up especially enthusiastically by the young. Many social networking sites and possibilities have burgeoned into huge numbers of people being registered for the various groups to the point where hundreds of millions are engaged in frequent communication and socializing using their computers, telephones and massive amounts of time and energy. The implications of this ubiquitous take-up of the phenomenon for schools and classrooms have not escaped the attention of educators, and many enthusiastically have advocated bringing the approaches into classroom activities and utilizing the appeal they have for young students to motivate and engage them in learning.

Computers in Education: The Impact on Schools and Classrooms

Computers, over the past decades, have become pervasive in life and in schools in particular. Initially, classroom use by teachers tended to reproduce previous “skill and drill” approaches, but in the late twentieth century, calls for a rethink of the pedagogical basis for the employment and embedding of information technology (IT) across the curriculum led to some new ideas and uses. At the same time, computers became physically smaller and more portable with the advent of laptops and tablets and mobile telephones that had more sophisticated technology and offered new potential. Teachers, who appeared to be “late adopters” of the IT in classrooms, soon became more aware of the advantages of computers (in all their various emerging forms), and their potential for student learning and new applications and ideas emerged. The advent of the Internet and what has been referred to a Web 2.0 has had an even more serious impact on teaching and learning in schools and classrooms. Many education systems now have advanced connectivity to high-speed broadband and utilise the WWW for many different activities. Student sophistication, in many cases, often surpasses the teacher’s level of development in the use and application of computer technology, and this has created some different and interesting challenges for the profession.

Competence, Capability and Graduate Attributes

Competence, in vocational, higher education and workplaces has emerged in the twentieth century and into the twenty-first century as a term with multiple meanings and applications across these areas of educational endeavour as discussed elsewhere in this volume. In addition, the term ‘capability’ has come to prominence with a range of meanings from a synonym for competence in some usage, to the plural capabilities and sometime synonymously with capacity.