Background Sino-foreign cooperative undergraduate programmes are an important form of internationalised nursing education in China, yet little qualitative research has examined how students experience them in practice.Objectives To explore how undergraduate nursing students experienced and made sense of Sino-foreign cooperative undergraduate nursing programmes in China, and to identify perceived areas for improvement.Methods Semi-structured interviews were conducted with undergraduate nursing students. Participants were purposively sampled. Interview questions were informed by the Context-Input-Process-Product (CIPP) framework. Data were analysed using inductive and framework-informed thematic analysis, with the CIPP framework supporting interpretation.Results Students reported mixed experiences. Many valued internationalised learning and described gains in broader perspectives, resilience and proactive learning habits. They also reported challenges, including a hidden curriculum arising from perceived inconsistencies in expectations and standards across teaching teams. These difficulties were compounded by bilingual assessment demands and challenges in English academic expression, with students often relying on peer ‘translation work’ to interpret requirements. Limited opportunities to apply internationalised learning in local placements contributed to weak classroom-clinical transfer and uncertainty about readiness and future pathways. Students prioritised clearer assessment alignment, stronger classroom-clinical connections, and structured support for English development and internationally recognised licensure preparation.Conclusions The findings suggest that the value of internationalised nursing education is shaped not only by access to international curricula or bilingual learning opportunities, but also by how students interpret and connect these experiences to assessment, local clinical practice, and future pathways. Greater alignment across these areas may strengthen the practical value of Sino-foreign cooperative nursing programmes.
The study focuses on design-based research methodologies for enhancing preschool environments through co-researching with children and child-centred educational approaches, such as those of Reggio Emilia, Montessori, and Waldorf, which are extensively applied in Turkish preschool education. Qualitative research was conducted with 23 children aged 4–6.5 years in three kindergartens in İzmir, Türkiye, through field studies using design-based methods (mind maps, two-dimensional works (drawings), three-dimensional works (models)), narrative-based methods (verbal expression: interviews), and focus group interviews. It explores how children’s insights can inform the design of preschool environments by evaluating children’s perceptions, ideas, needs, and expectations through their participation with design-based tools.
Inclusive vocational education remains challenging in Namibia, where learners with diverse needs continue to experience unequal access to vocational learning opportunities. The Basic Prevocational Skills Course (BPVSC) was introduced to develop practical and foundational skills supporting employability, independent living and progression to further training. Although teachers are central to implementation, limited research has examined how they perceive preparedness for inclusive vocational teaching. This study examines teacher-perceived multi-level influences on preparedness for BPVSC implementation. Using qualitative, theory-informed content analysis, it analyses open-ended survey responses from 29 teachers across four regions in Namibia. The analysis focuses on perceived psychological, institutional and systemic influences, with institutional and policy processes interpreted through teachers’ written responses. The findings suggest strong normative commitment to inclusion, alongside variation in confidence and perceived capability. Participants described tensions between inclusive intentions and classroom practice, linked to limited self-efficacy, resource constraints and uncertainty about adapting practical vocational tasks. Leadership practices, collegial relationships and institutional routines were described as enabling or constraining professional agency, while policy misalignment, uneven resource distribution and deficit-oriented perceptions of vocational education were perceived as shaping implementation. The study identifies sustained professional learning, supportive school conditions, coordinated implementation and policy-resource alignment as necessary for strengthening inclusive vocational education.
This article explores how organizational stories and narratives used by internationally operated tutoring institutions are reinterpreted within local contexts, given the ongoing debates about edu-businesses. Drawing on qualitative fieldwork across three cases—comprising interviews and observations with local staff, instructors, learners, and families in Indonesia (2019–2024)—the study analyzes how their educational philosophies circulate through stories, acquire meaning through everyday interactions, and generate social functions. The findings show that participants are attracted not only to academic support but also to distinctive institutional identities and approaches that emphasize independence, self-expression, and personal character development. These narratives are adapted to address locally recognized challenges, including dissatisfaction with school practices, shifting parental involvement, and the pressures of rapid urbanization, while invoking ‘Japanese-ness’ or ‘Australian-ness’ as meaningful and practical ideals. Beyond their instructional roles, tutoring centers often function as community spaces or ‘second homes’, strengthening ties among learners, families, alumni, and local schools. However, these same networks can also function as markers of status, thereby reinforcing social exclusivity. Overall, this article argues for a more nuanced understanding of the localized manifestations of globally circulating edu-business, one that foregrounds contextual meaning-making, community formation, and inequality risks, thus moving beyond understanding solely in economic or cultural-hegemonic framings.
In the age of growing cultural diversity, multiculturalism is viewed as serving a moral educational function in fostering intercultural harmony. Focusing on Asian contexts, this scoping review aims to explore how moral values are taught within the context of multiculturalism in school curricula. This review was guided by the JBI Manual and PRISMA-ScR. We searched Web of Science, EBSCOhost, and ProQuest for English-language journal articles published between 2005 and 2025 on formal kindergarten-to-secondary curricula integrating multiculturalism and moral education. Of 1,089 records screened, 45 articles were included and synthesised using four curriculum components, with sub-categories developed inductively. Integration was most evident in values education, language, and arts subjects, primarily through collaborative activities promoting moral and character values and intercultural competence. Assessment focused mainly on attitudes and values, with limited attention to knowledge, skills, and behaviours. Regional differences were mainly shaped by local policy, demographic, and historical contexts. By synthesising dispersed evidence from moral education and curriculum studies, this review provides a broader perspective on teaching moral education across curriculum in multiculturalism contexts, informing context-responsive curriculum development and future research on teaching strategies, student outcomes, and underrepresented Asian contexts.
Doctoral education is central to strengthening research capacity and advancing knowledge production in Sub-Saharan Africa. However, challenges in supervisory quality, mentorship systems, and institutional governance continue to constrain doctoral completion, productivity, and equity. Comparative empirical evidence on supervision and mentorship systems in African higher education remains limited. This study examines how governance arrangements, supervisory practices, and mentorship structures shape doctoral supervision ecosystems in Ethiopia, Kenya, and Rwanda. Using a mixed-methods design, it integrates survey data (n=154), interviews (n=27), and policy dialogues under the Regional Scholarship and Innovation Fund (RSIF). Guided by the Doctoral Supervision Ecosystem Framework, the study explores institutional dynamics influencing supervision practices. Results reveal three patterns. Supervision in Ethiopia and Kenya is largely individualized and administratively assigned, with limited accountability and uneven engagement. Rwanda demonstrates a more coordinated model characterized by supervisory teams, structured monitoring, and institutional oversight. Mentorship remains predominantly informal across contexts, with limited integration into governance systems. Gender disparities constrain access for female doctoral candidates. By conceptualizing supervision as an institutional ecosystem rather than an individual supervisory relationship, the study extends doctoral education scholarship by demonstrating how governance structures, mentorship systems, and gendered institutional dynamics collectively shape doctoral outcomes in Sub-Saharan African universities.
Primary schools are institutions of educational opportunity, yet routine practices of instruction, documentation, discipline, intervention, and accountability may also reproduce inequity. This integrative narrative review develops organizational cognitive overload as a framework for explaining how accumulated and fragmented demands may exceed a school’s attentional, relational, interpretive, and implementation capacity. Literature was identified through targeted searches of ERIC, Education Source, APA PsycINFO, Scopus, and the Web of Science Core Collection conducted from January through July 2026, supplemented by Google Scholar citation tracing. Purposive conceptual sampling organized scholarship across seven domains, and a three-stage process of identification, comparison, and integration was used to synthesize recurring constructs and qualifying evidence. The synthesis distinguishes organizational cognitive overload from individual workload and burnout and proposes five dimensions of demand and five practice-level mechanisms: attentional fragmentation, interpretive narrowing, surface compliance, relational thinning, and institutional destabilization. Rather than treating overload as an independent cause of inequity, the framework explains how a demand-capacity imbalance may reduce the organizational resources available for contextual judgment, responsive relationships, and coherent implementation. Its distinctive contribution is a testable organizational model that integrates dispersed evidence while separating established component relationships from causal pathways that remain theoretical.
This systematic review examines how artificial intelligence (AI), including generative AI and explainable AI (XAI), is reshaping assessment practices in higher education. Drawing on 31 empirical, conceptual, and review-based studies published between 2015 and 2025, the review identifies major shifts in the use of AI-supported grading, personalised feedback systems, AI literacy initiatives, and hybrid human–AI assessment models. While these developments offer efficiency and pedagogical innovation, they also raise critical concerns regarding academic integrity, transparency, and institutional readiness.. Evidence shows a persistent geographical imbalance: research activity remains concentrated in the Global North, where institutions often demonstrate greater policy readiness and technological capacity, while studies from Global South contexts more frequently foreground AI literacyand infrastructure.. Using the Context–Intervention–Mechanism–Outcome (CIMO) framework, the review highlights persistent gaps, including limited theoretical integration, insufficient longitudinal evidence, and underrepresentation of diverse educational contexts. Key recommendations include the development of transparent governance structures, institution-wide AI literacy initiatives, and culturally adaptive assessment frameworks. Overall, the findings underscore the need for ethical oversight, empirical rigour, and cross-cultural collaboration to ensure that AI-enabled assessment is equitable, trustworthy, and educationally sustainable in higher education.
Early-career teacher attrition remains a persistent concern, and evidence on resilience-oriented supports in relation to retention remains fragmented. This review aimed to identify resilience-enhancing programs and support mechanisms for early-career teachers, synthesize their core support elements, and examine links with resilience development and retention-related indicators. Following PRISMA 2020 guidelines, searches were conducted across Scopus, Wiley Online Library, JSTOR, EBSCOhost, and APA PsycINFO. Fifteen studies met the inclusion criteria. Narrative synthesis identified five support categories: mentoring, coaching, and induction-based supports; mindfulness- and compassion-based programs; self-regulation and coping-focused training; collaborative preparation and professional learning community supports; and formal and informal support systems. Across these categories, core support elements included sustained relational support, collaborative professional community, structured reflection, emotion regulation and self-compassion practice, pedagogical and workplace scaffolding, self-regulation skills, and sustained program duration. Retention was mainly represented through proximal indicators rather than long-term observed retention. Findings suggest that these elements can inform self-development among early-career teachers, school-based induction, mentoring, coaching, and support systems, as well as policy-level professional development for beginning teachers. Future studies should develop and evaluate targeted interventions based on these elements, while future reviews should examine comparable teacher education systems and school settings in greater contextual depth.
The study focuses on the experiences of undergraduate students with Learning Management Systems (LMSs) at a rural South African university, where digital pedagogy is constrained by infrastructural limitations, socio-cultural diversity, and historical inequalities. In line with qualitative design and based on the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT), 20 students from different faculties were interviewed. Thematic analysis identified low LMS adoption due to limited digital literacy, internet access, and device availability. These barriers notwithstanding, mutual aid and student agency provide critical enabling factors. Participants feel that materials ought to be culturally relevant, multilingual, and designed with student participation in curriculum development. The LMSs were perceived as opening avenues of greater inclusivity in education; however, systemic and pedagogical limitations offset these opportunities. This contribution to the discourse on digital equity draws on perspectives on socio-technical and epistemic factors that shape LMS use in a rural higher education setting and offers propositions for inclusive, student-oriented innovation.
In the context of the digital intelligent economy, this study investigates the specialised reform of talent cultivation for the international business major by using a mixed-method design that integrates both quantitative descriptive and qualitative case analyses. Quantitatively, descriptive statistical analysis is conducted on the employment data of 519 graduates from the classes of 2022 to 2024, sourced from the career guidance centre of an application-oriented university. This analysis delineates the graduates’ employment status, occupational choices, and sectoral distribution. Qualitatively, the study examines the international business curriculum of the same local application-oriented university, focusing on the misalignment between the existing curriculum and student needs—as revealed by the quantitative findings—and synthesises the underlying problems in current talent cultivation, thereby proposing achievable reform pathways. These pathways include clarifying curriculum objectives with hierarchical practical training; constructing a dynamic technology-driven curriculum system; building a multidimensional practical platform; formulating a cross-cultural competence development framework; adopting differentiated cultivation strategies; and aligning talent training with regional industrial development. This research offers empirical evidence for cultivating international business talents in developing countries and provides practical insights for the specialised reform of application-oriented universities in the digital transformation era.
Digital learning technologies have increasingly transformed sport education by reshaping teaching, learning, and health-related practices. This narrative review synthesized evidence on the role of digital learning technologies in sport education, focusing on motivation, mental health and psychological well-being, and health behavior change. Peer-reviewed studies published between January 2000 and December 2025 were reviewed, including research on mobile learning applications, wearable technologies, virtual and augmented reality, and artificial intelligence–based adaptive learning systems. The findings suggest that these technologies can enhance motivation by promoting learner engagement, autonomy, perceived competence, and self-regulated learning. They may also support mental health through reduced anxiety, improved emotional regulation, and increased self-awareness. Furthermore, digital technologies facilitate health behavior change by encouraging physical activity participation and healthier lifestyle behaviors through self-monitoring, feedback, and goal setting. However, their effectiveness depends on pedagogical design, ethical implementation, and contextual factors. The current evidence is limited by the prevalence of short-term interventions, small sample sizes, and reliance on self-reported measures. Future research should employ longitudinal and experimental designs to better understand the long-term impact of digital learning technologies in sport education. Overall, strategically integrating these technologies may support educational, psychological, and health-related outcomes in sport education.
This article presents a teaching strategy based on sociocritical mathematical thinking, oriented to the learning of the decimal metric system in middle school students of the Instituto Buenavista (Quindío, Colombia). The proposal seeks to encourage critical, reflective and participatory thinking, linked to the construction of a fairer society. To this end, learning environments were designed contextualised in the social, economic, cultural and environmental reality of the community, integrating activities related to local agro-industrial exploitation, which is part of the institution’s technical secondary education. The methodology used was one of emancipatory action, allowing the generation of knowledge from the lived reality, through reflection, argumentation and the articulation between theory and practice. Collective work, group discussion and the shared construction of knowledge were promoted, strengthening the students’ understanding of the environment and their research skills. As a result, a positive impact was evidenced both in the learning of the decimal metric system and in the socio-economic projection of the students in their municipality, highlighting the relevance of this system as a basis for other scientific disciplines.
This study examines the mediating role of academic engagement in the relationship between school climate and physics achievement among secondary school students in Northwest Ethiopia. Using a correlational research design, data were collected via Likert-scale questionnaires from randomly selected Grade 11 and 12 students enrolled in the science stream. Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) was performed using AMOS version 24 to test the proposed theoretical model. The results revealed that the direct effect of perceived school climate on physics achievement was not statistically significant. Instead, perceived school climate influenced physics achievement indirectly through students’ academic engagement. A more detailed analysis indicates that while the overall relationship is fully mediated, specific dimensions of academic engagement play distinct roles. Specifically, emotional engagement, characterized by student interest and enthusiasm, emerged as the most critical mediating factor compared to other dimensions. These findings emphasize that cultivating a positive school climate is a prerequisite for fostering the deep engagement required to improve student outcomes in a challenging subject like physics. Theoretically, this study contributes to a discipline-specific model of academic achievement, providing an evidence base for educators and policymakers to improve STEM performance by optimizing school climate quality.
Mental health education in schools is widely recognised as critical to improving adolescent mental health; however, limited research has examined its design and delivery within Australian secondary schools. The policy context for mental health education exhibits fragmentation and ambiguity, alongside variability in approaches and limited evidence to guide practice. This study explored how educators within a single school sector navigate this complexity, drawing on interviews with eight educators across six independent Victorian secondary schools. Data were analysed using reflexive thematic analysis, informed by Bernstein’s theories of curriculum and pedagogy and Kutcher et al.’s Mental Health Literacy model, to examine how educators interpret policy, construct curriculum, and enact pedagogical approaches. Findings indicate that policy provided limited practical guidance, used primarily for compliance verification. In this context, educators engaged in complex recontextualising work to establish local coherence within structural and practical constraints. While pedagogy generally aligned with research on effective pedagogical practices, variability was evident in curriculum content coverage when examined through a Mental Health Literacy lens. These findings highlight the interpretive and organisational demands placed on educators, the equity implications of locally contingent curriculum decisions, and the value of the Mental Health Literacy model in supporting coherent, comprehensive curriculum design.
This article investigates how environmental issues are discursively governed in state-produced English textbooks used at the secondary level in Pakistan. The corpus comprises two English textbooks (Grades 9 and 10) published by the Punjab Curriculum and Textbook Board and the Punjab Education, Curriculum, Training and Assessment Authority (PECTAA), which are officially prescribed for secondary-level education in Pakistan. Adopting a Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) approach, the study draws on Fairclough’s three-dimensional framework . The analysis focuses on textbook units that address environmental themes, such as pollution, conservation and climate change. The study examines patterns of agency representation, grammatical choices and recurring discursive strategies. The findings suggest that environmental degradation is represented without clearly identifiable agents, while responsibility is framed as generalized and individualized. Institutional, political and economic actors are consistently backgrounded or omitted. These discursive patterns function to naturalize environmental harm and limit the scope of accountability within educational discourse. This study suggests that textbooks operate not only as pedagogical resources but also as sites of ideological work, where understandings of environmental responsibility are normalized. By foregrounding both linguistic patterns and strategic silences, the study contributes to ongoing debates on discourse, power and environmental governance in education, while also highlighting its relevance to global priorities such as quality education and climate action.
South African high school mathematics classrooms continue to face persistent conceptual underachievement and low learner engagement, particularly in under-resourced contexts. This mixed-methods study evaluates the effectiveness of an innovative learner-centered mathematics teaching strategy operationalized through the REACT teaching approach in bridging conceptual gaps among Grade 11 learners in South African high schools. Integrating principles of Critical Pedagogy and Humanistic Psychology, the research aims to empower learners through enhanced critical thinking, motivation, and self-directed growth, while challenging conventional teacher-centered methods. Employing a convergent parallel design, the study combines quantitative measures of conceptual understanding with qualitative insights into learner confidence, motivation, and agency. The sample includes 84 Grade 11 learners and four mathematics educators from diverse semi-rural and urban schools. Data collection involved pre- and post-intervention assessments on functions, alongside semi-structured interviews, learner reflections, focus groups, and classroom observations. Results indicate statistically significant improvements in learners’ conceptual grasp of functions, with corresponding moderate effect sizes, complemented by qualitative evidence of heightened motivation, emotional engagement, and active participation. The findings underscore the value of blending cognitive and affective approaches in mathematics instruction. The study recommends sustained teacher professional development, improved resource provision, and the wider use of learner-centered, contextually relevant pedagogy to strengthen conceptual understanding and learner agency.
Moral education and fostering youth character development have become the foci of Chinese moral education; yet most existing studies are confined to the Chinese education community and not shared with an international audience. This paper aims to bridge the gap between Chinese and Western explorations of moral education by engaging with the Self-Other Knowledge Asymmetry (SOKA) framework, thereby fostering cross-cultural dialogue and advancing theoretical understanding. More specifically, the objectives of the present study were twofold: first, to use a tried-and-tested instrument based on the Chinese Code for Primary and Secondary School Students to measure the moral status of primary and secondary school students in Suzhou, China. Second, instead of administering only a student self-report survey, as used in previous studies, the present study’s design also involved the ‘significant others’ of these students, such as their teachers and parents, to observe the convergence and divergence between students’ self-evaluations and those of their significant others. The study included 1040 students, 811 parents, and 276 teachers of these students. The study used multivariate analysis of variance and individual differences, as well as multidimensional scaling, to test five hypotheses. Although the significant others were not directly paired with the individual students, but explored on a whole-cohort basis, the results offer some interesting findings for further discussion. The results indicated that this study’s hypotheses were not fully supported. However, these findings have significant implications for understanding SOKA from a collective perspective.
The emergence of Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI) has created confusion about proper scholarly behaviour in assessment and research writing. The current study explores the perceptions and coping strategies adopted by university students regarding academic integrity fears under unclear expectations about the use of GenAI. Qualitative phenomenological research with personal, in-depth interviews was conducted with 14 students from an Australian university, using purposive sampling and phenomenological thematic analysis. Six themes emerged: Changing AI rules, Varying degrees of AI assistance, Efforts to use AI ethically, Defending authorship, Fear of asking for support, and Differing academic stakes. Uncertainties regarding authorship, disclosure, the potential for false-positive detections by AI detection software like Turnitin, and whether the AI-assisted work genuinely represented their intellectual contribution were the main causes of students’ worries and dilemmas about the use of GenAI. Research students were anxious about their scholarly identity, credibility as researchers, and becoming independent scholars, whereas coursework students were more worried about grade consequences and potential accusations of misconduct. These findings imply that anxieties about academic integrity may extend beyond a fear of misconduct. We recommend that universities should provide fair procedures to address AI detection issues, clear and task-specific guidelines, and a secure space where students can ask questions without fear of suspicion.
Chemistry and Physics teaching in Rwanda’s lower secondary schools is constrained by limited resources and conventional instructional approaches that may limit students’ engagement and understanding of scientific concepts. This study examined the effects of integrating Computer-Based Simulations (CBS) combined with Predict Observe Explain (POE) approach on teachers’ pedagogical practices. The study involved 40 Chemistry and Physics teachers purposively selected from public schools across 10 districts. Quantitative data were collected through surveys, lesson-plan analysis, and classroom observations, while qualitative data were obtained through semi-structured interviews. Quantitative data were analyzed descriptively and qualitatively through thematic analysis. The results showed that regular use of simulations increased from 7.5% to 18.7%, furthermore, classroom observations indicated substantial improvements in content delivery (55.1% to 81.3%) and lesson design and implementation (52.5% to 78.1%). Classroom culture also improved significantly (p < 0.05; d = 0.47), while lesson-planning scores increased from 70.5% to 81.3% (p < 0.05; d = 0.28). Interview findings further indicated increased student participation and engagement. Thus, integrating CBS with the POE approach strengthen teachers’ pedagogical practices and support more interactive science instruction. The study recommends sustained professional development in technology-enhanced pedagogies to strengthen science teaching in resource-constrained contexts.
