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This article examines the pedagogical transformation generated by dual apprenticeship training and its impact on the Benin crafts sector. Dual training combines vocational education at training centres with on-the-job training in workshops during the week. Graduates of this programme receive a certificate of professional qualification (Certificat de Qualification Professionnelle – CQP). For this qualitative research, the authors visited 7 training centres and 39 workshops to make direct observations. Using a life-history approach, they conducted formal and informal interviews with craftspeople and semi-structured interviews with CQP graduates, non-CQP graduates, professional association personnel, training centre staff and CQP trainers. This research was carried out in Parakou, the most important city in central and northern Benin. In total, 96 individuals were interviewed, using purposive selection to pick actors from professional associations, convenience sampling with non-CQP graduates and snowball sampling to reach other participants. The study is underpinned by social change theory, with an emphasis on the factors and agents of change. The research findings indicate that dual training has a favourable impact on skills development, competency transfer and job performance in the crafts sector. CQP graduates benefit from both theoretical knowledge and practical expertise gained during their training. Those who succeed in finding a job or even setting up their own workshop contribute to building a competence-based approach to apprenticeships and stand out in the competitive labour market. Craftspeople who are unable to stand out in the labour market face employment insecurity. The majority of the CQP graduates interviewed had developed high self-esteem and were proud of their valuable knowledge and their ability to deliver high-quality services to satisfied clients. This also affected their relationship with older generations of craftspeople in terms of contradictions in the execution of specific tasks in occupations. © 2023, UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning and Springer Nature B.V.

Surgical skills are an important competency for new graduates. Simulators offer a means to train and assess veterinary students prior to their first surgical performance. A simulated ovariohysterectomy (OVH) rubric’s validity was evaluated using a framework of content evidence, internal structure evidence, and evidence of relationship with other variables, specifically subsequent live surgical performance. Clinically experienced veterinarians (n = 13) evaluated the utility of each rubric item to collect evidence; each item’s content validity index was calculated to determine its inclusion in the final rubric. After skills training, veterinary students (n = 57) were assessed using the OVH model rubric in March and August. Internal structure evidence was collected by video-recording 14 students’ mock surgeries, each assessed by all five raters to calculate inter-rater reliability. Evidence of relationship with other variables was collected by assessing 22 students performing their first live canine OVH in November. Experienced veterinarians included 22 items in the final rubric. The rubric generated scores with good to excellent internal consistency; inter-rater reliability was fair. Students’ performance on the March model assessment was moderately correlated with their live surgical performance (ρ = 0.43) and moderately negatively correlated with their live surgical time (ρ = −0.42). Students’ performance on the August model assessment, after a summer without surgical skills practice, was weakly correlated with their live surgical performance (ρ = 0.17).These data support validation of the simulated OVH rubric.The continued development of validated assessment instruments is critical as veterinary medicine seeks to become competency based. © American Association of Veterinary Medical Colleges, 2023.

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to conduct a systematic review of the literature addressing international aid to education, primarily focusing on China's aid principles and its practice of scholarship programs and short-term training held in higher education institutions (HEIs). Design/methodology/approach: Using the systematic review approach, the authors identified 25 English-language articles in the academic databases. The review is driven by the analytical lenses of (a) the policy formulation and implementation of China's educational aid across macro-, meso- and micro-levels and (b) theories and methodologies that are commonly adopted in the existing studies. Findings: The review identified three themes: (a) China's aid discourse in the international aid landscape, (b) critical reflections on educational aid program management and (c) international students' study experiences and perceptions of China. The authors also outline prevalent theories and methodological approaches used in the existing literature. Research limitations/implications: This literature review provides a review of research on China's international aid to education in the past 20 years, as a frequently cited example of emerging donors that have taken alternative aid approaches, thus bringing about a broader and nuanced perspective of aid to education. It also generates implications for researchers who are interested in studying education and development in the global context. Originality/value: This study provides is first systematic literature review of studies on international aid to education provided by emerging donors, taking China as an example, to summarize its aid principles and aid practice in China's HEIs. © 2023, Emerald Publishing Limited.

This paper describes a preliminary investigation (PI) on how the student-centered learning can be adapted through computational thinking (CT) and segmenting principle. The PI is conducted to investigate the current issues of teaching and learning and the importance of student-centered learning. This study highlights two main domains; CT and segmenting principle as well as one technology intervention to be adapted in designing a learning material that could support the student-centered learning. Articles' reviews and semi-structured interviews are two main methods used in this study. Ten respondents were selected to participate in the interview which are one content expert of CT, three lecturers and six students from Malaysian Technical University Network (MTUN). The findings of PI proved that there is a need to develop a learning material that support the student-centered learning and strengthen the findings of literature reviews that there is a lack of CT knowledge and awareness among MTUN students. Researcher highlights that a learning material related to digital video production could be designed and developed to support the student-centered learning and adapting the segmenting, CT as well as interactive mobile AR technology intervention to reduce the students' cognitive load and increase students' performance and interest in learning. © 2023 Author(s).

Built upon the earlier literature review and research efforts on engineering pathways, we selected a total of 76 peer reviewed articles for a systematized literature review. Three inter-related developmental theories -the “life span, life space” theory, the Relational Developmental Systems Theory, and the Social Cognitive Career Theory-have informed our conceptual framework and guided our inquiry. We organize the selected articles by the life stages of high school, postsecondary education, and workplace experience. Through the review, we have identified pathway-related outcomes in each life stage, and various influencing factors in the categories of learning experiences and contextual factors, individual factors, and person inputs. We have discussed the implications of this review for engineering education research. Taking a student-centered approach, our review has suggested a number of practical implications for high school students and undergraduate students who desire to pursue engineering as a pathway. © American Society for Engineering Education, 2023.

College dropout proves to be a critical problem in undergraduate programs that directly affects students and the related community, due to direct economic losses and significant social costs. This article addresses a systematic review of the literature on predictors of student dropout intention in higher education, focusing on scientific production in Q1 and Q2 journals from 2018 to 2023, performing a bibliometric review and analyzing the available empirical and theoretical data on the phenomenon of college dropout intention and its affecting factors. The bibliometric results and those related to predictors of dropout intention introduced in previous studies are presented. The largest number of researchers studying this phenomenon are from Germany, however, the United Kingdom is the country with the largest number of publications. Previous research can be grouped into two categories: studies analyzing psychological factors of dropout intention and those related to academic and social integration. © 2023, Czech University of Life Sciences Prague. All rights reserved.

According to the socio-constructivist theories of learning, collaborative learning allows negotiation of shared meanings and co-construction of new knowledge among peers. This approach fits particularly well with healthcare professional education needs, as these professionals often face challenging issues that require the ability to fully understand the complexity of the patients’ health conditions through working with others. However, while collaborative learning approaches are widely used in face-to-face nurse education contexts, their online equivalent still seem to be understudied, in spite of their great potential for the field. This systematic literature review investigates: (1) to what extent are online collaborative learning activities being adopted and investigated in formal nurse education, (2) What kind of online collaborative learning activities/techniques are proposed and what team structures are employed, (3) what technologies are used to run these learning activities, and (4) what methods are used to evaluate the impact of these activities. Studies were included if they presented online collaborative learning activities proposed by Universities or VET (Vocational Education and Training) providers. Articles published in 2015 or later were collected in November 2022 from Scopus, Web of Science and Medline. A total of 1059 records were retrieved, selected and analysed by four coders, resulting in a final dataset of 75 papers that were coded for type of collaborative approach, study characteristics, research methodology used, strength of evidence, and relevance to the research questions. Most of them described the use of activities like Discussions, Case Studies and Peer Reviews, sometimes in association with Role Play. In terms of technologies, Learning Managements Systems, forums and social media were already common pre-pandemic, but during the lockdown synchronous communication tools – often used to support simulations – took over. Data collection was carried out quantitatively, qualitatively or using mixed methods, but in many cases data reporting is weak or absent at all. The majority of the retrieved papers illustrate activities where collaboration was not structured in any way and there was no joint assignment or common objective/artefact that learners needed to reach/produce. In case of blended interventions, often collaboration is limited to the face-to-face sessions, while the digital setting is used for individual work. In terms of social structure, most of the time small groups or plenaries are used. In summary, the review reveals that studies on online collaborative learning for nurses are limited, especially in Europe, and the design of online collaborative activities often clashes with the principles put forward by the Computer Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL) research community. Based on the results of the review we put forth some key recommendations, such as ensuring that online collaboration involves the creation of a shared artefact and striving to make virtual simulations actually collaborative, rather than limited to envisage student interactions in the debriefing phase. The paper also proposes a number of research areas seldom investigated and that would deserve further attention in the future. © 2023, Academic Conferences and Publishing International Limited. All rights reserved.

All over the world, poor and illiterate girls living in rural areas are at higher risk of becoming underage marriage than well-educated girls living in cities. Early marriages exacerbate inequalities between females and males in society and violate children's and women's rights. This study aimed to demonstrate temporal changes in the prevalence of child marriage and underage childbearing in Turkey by exploring the causes of regional variations in the schooling rate. Our retrospective, descriptive and register-based study obtained input data on childbirth, marriage, population and schooling from official statistics published by the Turkish Statistical Institute (TURKSTAT) and the Republic of Turkey Ministry of National Education. Based on official statistics, underage childbearing rates decreased from 2002 to 2019 in Turkey. This study outlined significant regional variations in the ratio of childbearing female under 18 to the population that were higher in the northeastern, central eastern, and southeastern Anatolia regions of Turkey than in other regions. During the same period, there were downward trends in the number of legal marriages of female aged 16–17 and the number of underage females who gave birth in contrast with an increasing population of girls living in Turkey. In terms of welfare, education and healthcare, developments in Turkey were considered to have contributed to the downward tendency of childbearing and marriages of underage females. However, an increase in the schooling rate of girls was the critical determinant of the observed tendency. Therefore, officially setting the compulsory education age to 18 can help to prevent underage marriage and childbearing. © 2022 Association of Child Protection Professionals and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

The literature lacks a systemic view of what needs to be done by Higher Educational Institutions (HEIs) to leverage student entrepreneurship and employability. In order to understand these issues, this study reviewed existing literature in order to understand the impacts and influences of student's employability and entrepreneurship. The results indicate “what we know” regarding entrepreneurship and employability leverage. Such requirements were codified in Companies, Students, HEIs, Courses, Educators, and Digital Resources. A second research stage focused on “what we need to know” about each requirement. Results pointed out gaps to be filled by future studies (considering stakeholder demands). Findings also suggest that researchers must help HEI managers improve their decisions. Among these decisions, we mention the leverage of entrepreneurship and employability in other areas of knowledge (in addition to business schools). The article concludes by stating some managerial, practical and theoretical implications derived from the literature review analysis as well as limitations and suggestions for future research. This will help to further clarify how student's employability can be enhanced through entrepreneurship education programs. © 2023 Elsevier Ltd

This study examines the lived experience of 30 vocational education students in Israel. This examination is important in light of international research asserting vocational schools to be spaces of social exclusion and given the relative lack of social work research regarding vocational schools. The findings of the study revealed four main themes: the dynamics of “working students” who contribute to their own and their family's livelihood; a history of social exclusion in academic schools prior to transitioning to vocational schools; experiences of exploitation and rights violation by employers, caregivers, and other adults; everyday coping strategies in the face of social exclusion. These four themes are analyzed, portraying the unique characteristics of youth in vocational schools facing social exclusion. The importance of examining vocational schools by social workers in light of these schools being spaces of social exclusion populated by marginalized youth is discussed. © 2023 Elsevier Ltd