At Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) a Global Perspective Program (GPP) has evolved that provides an international experience for most graduates. Currently more than half of WPI students travel internationally to do academic work. WPI sends more engineering students abroad than any other U.S. university, and it is ranked second in the nation…

The purpose of experiential education is to combine experience and learning in ways that transform both. Students have experiences outside the classroom, and these experiences are integrated into the course curriculum, enriching both the experience and the class material. Successful experiential education assignments must first provide students…

In recent years, early women sociologists such as Harriet Martineau, Ida B. Wells, and Jane Addams have begun to appear in some introductory textbooks and theory books. Usually, they appear in a box, as a sidebar, or as selected "others." So why do we not know more about these women? Our research seeks to answer this question. Given the…

This paper describes an experiential learning exercise I have used to teach race discrimination in my introductory and criminology courses. The exercise is designed to introduce students to the concept of non-conscious forms of racial bias, a form of race discrimination often difficult for students to grasp. Using a hypothetical criminal case,…

This paper considers some of the problems inherent in teaching qualitative research methods within psychology. It stresses the use of a reflective approach to course design that aims to "emancipate" students in their own study and research, as well as equipping them with a combination of practical and theoretical skills. In addition to a brief…

Teacher education programs employ various strategies aimed at providing teachers with the knowledge, habits of mind, and practices necessary to work with increasingly racially and ethnically diverse students. Often, these efforts have centered on the addition of a multicultural foundations course. Research on multicultural foundations courses…

Little is known about the provision of statistics teaching for PhD students in UK medical schools. A recent survey found that statistics courses were available to PhD students in 13 of 21 schools responding. The provision across these 13 schools was variable in terms of contact hours and content. At a meeting of 27 medical statistics teachers,…

Academic institutions worldwide are constantly trying to refine or even reinvent their Information Systems (IS) curricula to address the needs of industry and government. As many IS curricula emerge, a number of them do not satisfy well recognized standards and even lack critical components. Furthermore, a highly competitive Information Technology…

Purpose: To provide an example of how colleges can partner with local EcoVillages to further sustainability curriculum on campus and the educational mission of the EcoVillages, and to strengthen ties with the community. Design/methodology/approach: Describes four structured courses developed for the Environmental Studies Program, including…

This article presents a constructionist approach to introducing technology, in particular robotics, in the early childhood classroom. The authors demonstrate how this approach is well suited, since the four basic tenets of constructionism have a long-standing tradition in early childhood education: (a) learning by designing meaningful projects to…

This study reports on the design and results of a two-semester study on the use of case study analysis and case writing in clinical experiences in an undergraduate teacher education program. Findings indicated that structured experiences with case studies and case writing increase preservice teachers' informed decision making on educational…

This book provides a showcase for "best practices" in teaching statistics and research methods in two- and four-year colleges and universities. A helpful resource for teaching introductory, intermediate, and advanced statistics and/or methods, the book features coverage of: (1) ways to integrate these courses; (2) how to promote ethical conduct;…

This paper reviews some emerging trends in applied linguistics in both Australia and New Zealand. It sketches the current scene of (selected) postgraduate applied linguistics programs in higher education and considers how various university programs define applied linguistics through the classes (titles) they have postgraduate students complete to…

A novel approach to improving instruction in an introductory computing course for freshmen non-computer-science majors is to couple it with a logic course as part of a Learning Community. Research has shown that effective Learning Communities can lead to higher academic achievement, better retention rates, diminished faculty isolation, and…

This paper describes a teaching experiment investigating the impact of using multiple teaching strategies and innovating while teaching collaboratively. The objective of this study was to examine the use of collaboration in trying a combination of face-to-face meetings, web courseware, and interactive two-way video in a graduate course. The major…