Massification is a reality facing universities around the world. While increased access to higher education has significant social and economic benefits, rapid growth in class sizes challenges institutions to maintain quality standards while teaching at scale, amidst ongoing cost pressure. This paper analyses this issue within the Australian…

Critical and creative thinking constitute important learning outcomes at doctoral level across the world. While the literature on doctoral education illuminates this matter through the lens of experienced senior researchers, the doctoral students' own perspective is missing. Based upon interviews with 14 doctoral students from four disciplines at…

The study explores how sense of global connectedness can be enhanced by creating opportunities for cross-cultural dialogue in higher education. Thematic analysis of randomly selected 15 learning journals, students' reflections on their learning during an international seminar was used to identify students' significant learning experiences. The…

Civic engagement in higher education encompasses a diversity of goals, strategies and activities. These include particular approaches to teaching and learning--community-based or service learning--which share an explicit civic focus and combine the features of experiential learning with opportunities for engagement. A range of…

This article describes higher degree research supervisors' experiences of supervision as teaching. While research education is considered central to the higher degree research experience, comparatively little is known to date of the teaching lenses adopted by supervisors as they go about their supervision. We worked with 35 supervisors engaged in…

Ideas of "how we learn" in formal academic settings have changed markedly in recent decades. The primary position that universities once held on shaping what constitutes learning has come into question from a range of experience-led and situated learning models. Drawing on findings from a study conducted across three Australian universities, the…

Across advanced industrial economies, programs in higher education are increasingly becoming occupationally specific and universities are being seen as providers of "higher vocational education". With this have come expectations that graduates from these programs will enjoy smooth transitions into professional practice. Aligned with these…

Two studies, a cross-sectional (173 first-year and 215 final-year participants) and a longitudinal (81 participants), examined whether two aspects of the learning experience of student teachers (epistemological beliefs and learning approaches), and the interrelations between them changed as a result of their tertiary education. Between the first…

With the help of sociological analysis, a categorization of four models of "community" is proposed, with each model related to a particular style of interaction and to a theory of learning in higher education. An alternative model is proposed based on the concept of working together in a joint action. (Author/LBH)

The discourses of academic disciplines in higher education can be confusing and mysterious for those who are new to university study. The confusion can be particularly great for students coming from cultural and language backgrounds that are different to those underpinning the dominant ideologies of higher education institutions. This article…