Active learning engages students where they enjoy the learning process and gain a better understanding of course content. Active learning, such as an in-class game, can mitigate inattentive listening to material presented in a traditional lecture format. The Merch Game is an innovative, in-class retail simulation game that uses student…

Purpose: This study aims to promote sustainability-based education in fashion design and merchandising program to enhance students' knowledge, skills and attitude about sustainability development, organizational responsibility and personal responsibility from the cotton industry perspective. Design/methodology/approach: To conduct this study,…

In a sea of applicant uniformity, how can an undergraduate student develop a means of personal differentiation while attempting to land an internship or job? That is the dilemma of the roughly 1.9 million Millennials graduating with bachelor's degrees within the United States in 2015 (Hussar & Bailey, 2015). Although the national unemployment…

The following are journal reflections written by Morgan State University Family and Consumer Sciences-Fashion Merchandising students in 2020, during the early phases of the COVID-19 pandemic. As we navigated through a semester that should have had students completing practicum credits, they instead wrote about recouping the time and identifying…

The growing number of online and hybrid graduate programs and their particular relevance to older female students suggests the salience of hybrid education for female-dominated degrees such as apparel merchandising and design (AMD). The current study reports on the initial iteration of an action research assessment of the hybrid option of an AMD…

Experiential education programs, such as international and domestic study tours, bridge the limitations of formal learning classroom by allowing students to experience reality in a new learning dimension. This mixed-methods study explores experiential learning during a domestic interior design study tour to New York City and an international…

This paper focuses on a deductive, participative, and iterative process for curricular revision at a public Midwestern university in the Merchandising and Fashion Design program. A systematic, nonlinear, organized process is presented and details specific components used in curricular review. The guiding framework for the redesign was that of…

Merchandising and consumer economics traditionally have been part of family and consumer sciences (FCS) within the ecosystems framework. The purpose of this article is to examine progress of this sub-system within FCS. Specifically, the authors explore the relevance of the systems approach for merchandising programs and conclude that this model is…

This paper proposes a new computer-aided educational system for clothing visual merchandising and display. It aims to provide an operating environment that supports the various stages of display design in a user-friendly and intuitive manner. First, this paper provides a brief introduction to current software applications in the field of…

An authentic learning strategy fostering students' active learning was studied using the scenario of a real-world project. Students from two different classes at two different universities worked as clients or consultants to develop an apparel sourcing strategy. Quantitative and qualitative data were gathered from 44 undergraduates enrolled in…

Many educators believe that student learning is enhanced when they are actively involved in classroom activities that require student inquiry. The purpose of this paper is to report on three student inquiry projects that were incorporated into a merchandising class with the focus on making students responsible for their learning, rather than the…

The purpose of this paper is to describe an educational partnership experience between rural retailers and graduate students in a Merchandising, Apparel and Textiles program. Students were afforded an opportunity to work with small business owners in rural communities, giving them real world exposure to the actual challenges being faced by…

The goal of this paper is to illustrate how the promotion of 21st Century process skills can be used to enhance student learning and workplace skill development: thinking, problem solving, collaboration, communication, leadership, and management. As an illustrative case, fashion merchandising and design students conducted research for a…

Drawing on the marketing literature, as well as the views of both marketing educators and current marketers in Canada, a survey was conducted of marketing practitioners to determine their top priorities for improvement in marketing education, as well as the key challenges in need of attention. An importance-performance analysis was carried out on…

At Iowa State University, the introductory textile science course is a required 4-credit class for all undergraduate students enrolled in the Apparel, Merchandising, and Design Program. Frustrated by a perceived gap between students who easily comprehended course material and those who complained and struggled, the instructor implemented an…