Writing groups for doctoral students are generally agreed to provide valuable learning spaces for Ph.D. candidates. Here an academic developer and the eight members of a writing group formed in a Discipline of Public Health provide an account of their experiences of collaborating in a multicultural, multidisciplinary thesis writing group. We…

The importance of reflection in higher education, and across disciplinary fields is widely recognised. It is generally embedded in university graduate attributes, professional standards and course objectives. Furthermore, reflection is commonly included in assessment requirements in higher education subjects, often without necessary scaffolding or…

The professional development needs of early career academics (ECAs) are increasingly subject to scrutiny. The literature notes writing groups can be successful in increasing research outputs and improving research track records--a core concern for ECAs. However, the pressure on ECAs to publish takes the pleasure out of writing for many. We argue…

How novice lecturers learn to be successful in their role is relatively under-researched, although the assumption may be made that the newcomer has learned the fundamentals how to engage in academic practice--at least in terms of research and scholarship--via the PhD process. However, although many lecturers now enter from a professional or…

In a previous study it has been suggested that there are six stages that adults move through before they feel ready to participate in higher education, and proposed a chain-of-response (COR) model to describe the process. In this study we examine the reported experiences of nine adult entrants during the second year of a work-related degree…

While reflection continues to be promoted as a central feature of teachers' continuous professional development (CPD) activities in Scotland and elsewhere, a wider debate across professions and national boundaries has opened as to how reflection might be re-conceptualised to restore its social and critical dimensions. This paper seeks to…

Educators are inclined to think that the words they use in their discourses about policy, research, and practice mean what they mean them to mean. It is just as clear, however, that such discourses ideologically produce and reproduce relations of power that benefit some and disadvantage others. This essay begins an argument that educators need to…

This paper considers the implications of current notions of the learning city. It argues that popular neoliberal ideologies create an environment in which lifelong learners strive for the learning city as an end product, both in production and for consumption, rather than embrace it as a living, social context. The rhetoric of the knowledge…

This paper considers the bottom-up vision of the learning society. Unlike the top-down approach, the bottom-up approach does not start by specifying the purposes of learning which should direct the development of the learning society, but from observing interactions among learning individuals as agents. While in the relevant literature and…

The adoption of a more "open" national training market in vocational education and training (VET) in Australia has led to considerable changes in VET organizations and considerable challenges for VET managers. Recent research has established the critical role that 'strategy' plays in leading and managing these organizations and the significance of…

There is a current consensus in the literature and policy documents on postgraduate supervision that positions mentoring as the most effective supervision strategy. Authors suggest that this approach to supervision overcomes some of the problematic, hierarchical aspects embedded in supervision as a pedagogical practice. They portray supervision as…

This paper examines some of the ways in which e-learning has failed to live up to its early promise and suggests how this situation might be remedied. Two of the main challenges for the future of e-learning are explored: the ever shifting nature of the e-landscape, characterized by its rapidly changing technologies, software and marketing…

This paper discusses three technologies used in an adult continuing education Masters programme: blogging, learning objects and e-portfolios. My reflections on their use and on the literature underpinning their use form the basis of the discussion. All three of these technologies were used to promote self-directed learning, reflection and learner…

E-learning is commonly thought of as a means of overcoming the constraints of time and space: offering the possibilities of "anytime, anywhere" learning. The argument in this paper is not intended to debunk this as a myth, but to examine some of the ways in which time and space are understood in relation to learning and e-learning. In the context…

Against a background of declining union significance and falling membership, this article reviews the recent development of trade union workplace learning in Britain. It is argued that the dominant framework within which this learning is currently undertaken is one of "employability". Instead of an employability framework, it is suggested that an…