48 the potential of the essay in formative assessment: literature review sandija gabdullina liepaja university faculty of pedagogy and social work, latvia abstract. this scientific research explores the potential of using essays as a formative assessment tool in the context of the competencies approach. the competencies approach emphasises the importance of focusing on learning progress and needs to promote successful learning, thus formative assessment plays a pivotal role in facilitating effective learning. the study highlights the significance of essay writing in promoting critical thinking, problem-solving, and self-directed learning. however, students often perceive essays solely as a means of summative assessment, lacking a comprehensive understanding of the assessment criteria. to address this issue, the research emphasizes the importance of involving students in the learning process by collectively defining outcomes, establishing assessment criteria, and providing constructive feedback. clear objectives and feedback are crucial in fostering self-regulated learning and lifelong learning. the study highlights the need for studentteacher collaboration to enhance students' attitudes towards learning. challenges in implementing formative assessment, such as providing quality feedback to each student, are acknowledged. in the context of foreign language learning, essays serve as valuable tools for formative assessment, providing insights into students' learning achievements. furthermore, the development of criteria for self-assessment and self-regulated learning skills is essential for effective formative assessment. keywords: essay writing, foreign language learning, formative assessment, writing skills. to cite this article: gabdullina, s. (2023). the potential of the essay in formative assessment: literature review. education. innovation. diversity, 2(6), 49-54. doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2023.1.7176 introduction formative assessment, which involves clearly articulating outcomes, discussing and identifying levels of performance, and providing feedback, has become relevant in the context of the competence approach. achieving the learning objective requires a focus on both learning progress and learning needs, thus facilitating the most successful and effective learning. čakāne (2018) emphasizes the importance of finding new solutions to facilitate and improve formative assessment. nagowah & nagowah (2009) highlight the essay as one of the formative assessment methods, as students analyse, synthesise, and critically evaluate information when writing an essay. essay writing is particularly conducive to:  critical thinking and problem-solving, involving the precise formulation of questions; critical evaluation, exploration, and analysis of complex situations, including ideas and multiple contexts; synthesising and interpreting information; reasoning and drawing valid conclusions; articulating the problem, justifying the need for solutions, proposing solutions, and applying the findings in a different context; using problem-solving strategies. writing an essay is an effective way to promote critical thinking. marni, silvia, & titik's (2019) research indicates that critical thinking in an argumentative essay is expressed through analytical thinking, in which a situation is analysed, and evidence and reasons are sought to point to solutions through the knowledge and information provided to the student. writing an argument is a process of problem-solving, which in turn promotes self-regulation in order to achieve goals.  self-directed learning in which the learner regularly sets goals, develops a plan for achieving goals, formulates criteria, and uses them to evaluate performance, plan, and improve goal achievement; independently analyses their own behavior and emotions and seeks ways to manage them; independently selects, adapts and develops their own https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2023.1.7176 49 thinking strategies in complex situations; independently uses criteria to help monitor and improve their work, evaluates, summarises and purposefully uses gained experience in the future (ministru kabinets, 2019). the professional experience of the author shows that students often associate essay writing with a summative assessment, do not always fully understand the criteria for essay writing, and do not always receive feedback, for example, due to time constraints. the observations of the author also show that, when writing an essay, students are aware of what exactly they have learned in the context of the essay topic. also, a study of theoretical sources of knowledge reveals that assessment needs to focus primarily on formative assessment, even when the work is assessed by summative assessment (dunn & mulvenon, 2009). there are also situations in which students or their parents feel that summative assessment is more important than formative assessment. sasser (2018) also highlights that a point score's summative assessment outcome can be considered the most important assessment outcome. achieving the learning goal requires a focus on both learning progress and learning needs, thus facilitating the student's ability to learn most successfully and efficiently. learning to write involves a variety of activities such as generating and organizing ideas, analysing texts in different genres, summarising information, and refining texts (chen, 2022). west, malcolm, keywood, and hill (2019) emphasize not only problem posing, source exploration, analysis, and synthesis, but also drafting, essay development, self-reflection, and feedback as tools for essay development. thus, the focus is on opportunities for essay development, clarifying questions, and improving students' self-directed learning skills. the criteria sheet, which is available to students during the essay writing process, is also becoming relevant. flaksa (2021) points out that students need to have clear achievable results for formative assessment to be of high quality. when writing an essay, it is important for the student to be aware of current affairs in the context of different areas and events in society. the aim of this publication is to analyse the scientific knowledge of the essay as a method of formative assessment and to describe the potential of the essay in formative assessment. the analysis of pedagogical and psychological literature provides a comprehensive overview of the potential of essays in promoting student learning and educational quality. current affairs of formative assessment in the context of the competence approach changes in the curriculum also mean changes in the assessment system, which fundamentally changes the role of assessment. formative assessment is widely brought up to date and in a competence-oriented approach to learning content. formative assessment is widely actualized and used in a competence-based approach to learning for learning the curriculum. assessment for learning turns everyday assessment into a learning process (stiggins, 2011). to achieve this, čakāne (2018) and stiggins (2011) argue that it is necessary to involve students in their own learning process, in which outcomes are jointly defined and criteria are created, and students are involved in analysing their final results, leading to the definition of new outcomes. an essential part of formative assessment is the provision of feedback between the student and the teacher or between students. this type of assessment helps to better understand what the student knows or does not know and what needs to be improved. schools and teachers are looking at how to implement formative assessment how to check whether the intended outcome has been achieved and how to provide constructive feedback to students (čakāne, 2018). the foreign language curriculum also emphasizes the setting of clear objectives while providing feedback. formative assessment encourages students to engage more actively in the learning process and promotes self-regulated learning, which in turn will lead to more successful lifelong learning (bullock, n.d.). 50 essay writing has different purposes, such as improving writing skills, communication, learning, expressing an opinion, etc. (graham & harris, 2019). stikute (2006) emphasizes that writing an essay is a useful method for students' self-assessment and consciousness-raising at the level of knowledge, skills, and emotions because by writing an essay, students reveal their thoughts, feelings, experiences, and opinions, which are formed through evaluation, analysis, comparison: students form their views on a particular topic. in order to improve student learning and the quality of education, the use of formative assessment is emphasised, stressing that teachers need to facilitate changes in students' attitudes towards learning, but this cannot be achieved without student-teacher collaboration (gaybullaevna, 2021). bērziņš (2020) notes the importance of an individual approach, including individual discussion for feedback using a criteria sheet, emphasizing the need to develop a criteria sheet for self-assessment and self-skills development. dunn and mulvenon (2009) also emphasize that in evaluation it is very important to focus on formative assessment, even if the work is evaluated with summative assessment. black and william (2005) point out that a challenge in formative assessment can be the inadequate provision of quality feedback to every student in the classroom. if formative assessment is not implemented appropriately, it does not provide information on learning progress and needs, then the purpose of formative assessment is not achieved (akram, siddiga, nami, shahzad, & rashid, 2020). black and william (2015) emphasize that students need to be actively engaged in both the learning and formative assessment process, but motivation also becomes important. čakāne (2018) emphasizes that the lack of clear criteria, feedback, and constructive collaboration between teachers and students, as well as the lack of awareness of the formulated objectives, are obstacles to qualitative formative assessment. dodge (2009) and akram, siddiqa, nami, shahzad, & rashid (2020) also believe that teachers often do not have time to provide feedback to the student during the lesson because teachers often try to proceed faster with the learning content. sasser (2018), on the other hand, argues that formative assessment may not be taken seriously if the summative assessment outcome value in points can be taken as a more meaningful assessment outcome. this helps to identify complicating factors that could have a negative impact on the implementation of formative assessment:  lack of motivation;  lack of time and opportunity in lessons to give individual attention to each student;  lack of appropriate methodological material for formative assessment;  insufficient understanding of formative assessment for both teacher and students;  negative attitudes of parents and students towards learning and changes in the learning process. therefore, the essay becomes an important assessment tool because, firstly, it provides important information about the learning achievement of the student himself. at the same time, however, the development of a set of criteria for students' self-assessment and self-regulated learning skills becomes necessary. analysis of formative assessment opportunities in students' essays andrade (2019) defines self-assessment as the process of monitoring one's actions in order to make adjustments that improve learning and performance. self-assessment is an essential part of self-regulated learning, through which learners critically evaluate their own learning (lam, 2010). self-regulated learning occurs when the learner sets goals, monitors, and controls their emotions and actions to achieve the goals (zimmerman & schunk, 2011). as lam (2010) points out, self-assessment in writing tasks promotes metacognitive skills, including the ability to evaluate the content, set goals, and develop learning strategies and their effectiveness. yan and brown (2017) point out that self-esteem also depends on psychological factors such as 51 self-worth, self-efficacy, and motivation, as well as psychological factors of interpersonal relationshipsrelationships with peers, parents, mentors, etc. however, it is also important to recognize that the successful implementation and accuracy of self-assessment depends on the learner's autonomy in foreign language learning (jamrus & razali, 2019). graham and harris (2019) point out that students become better writers by learning to evaluate their own work and giving feedback to classmates. fung and mei (2015), on the other hand, in their study show that vocabulary, language use, organization, maturity of thinking, and awareness of mistakes improve after self-assessment. fahimi and rahimi (2015) in their study reveal that selfassessment provides knowledge on how to plan and review an essay. therefore, self-assessment of the essay before it is submitted to the teacher for summative assessment is very important (west, malcolm, keywood, & hill, 2019). a schematic representation of the factors and benefits influencing the effectiveness of self-assessment in the context of formative evaluation is presented in figure 1. figure 1 schematic representation of the factors and benefits influencing the effectiveness of self-assessment in the context of formative assessment (fung & mei, 2015; graham & harris, 2019; jamrus & razali, 2019; lam, 2020; yan & brown, 2017; zimmerman & schunk, 2011) dodge (2009) and akram, siddiqa, nami, shahzad, and rashid (2020) highlight that it is essays and other types of writing that take more time to implement formative assessment. the 4 types of formative assessment strategies mentioned by dodge (2009) can be implemented when writing an essay:  summarising and reflecting – students reflect on and make sense of what they have heard or read, relating it to their own learning experiences;  organization using lists, charts, and graphic organisers – students organize information, make connections, and indicate understanding using graphic organizers;  expressing information – students use words and/or pictures to make connections and enhance memory, making it easier to recall information;  collaborative group activities – students are given the opportunity to interact with other classmates to develop and demonstrate their conception of knowledge. 52 as graham and harris (2019), lam (2010), and fung and mei (2010) point out, students' collaboration leads to a better understanding of the topic and motivates them to strive to improve their performance. promoting mastery learning is important for every student. mastery learning is defined as a strategy based on each student achieving a desired goal or competency, linked to formative assessment: students acquire knowledge, skills, and attitudes, do formative assessment of what they have learned and, if they achieve the desired result, have the opportunity to do more indepth, creative tasks, while students who do not achieve the desired result improve and retest (winget & persky, 2022). conclusions in the competencies approach, the main purpose of assessment is to promote learning. however, for assessment to be successful, it is essential to involve learners in their own learning process, in which they collectively define the outcomes to be achieved and set criteria for achieving the objectives, while being involved in analysing their own final results, leading to the definition of new outcomes. formative assessment encourages students to actively engage in their learning, developing self-regulated learning skills and thus more successfully continuing their learning throughout their lives. to improve student learning and the quality of education, it is important to promote changes in students' attitudes to learning, which cannot be achieved without student-teacher cooperation. a challenge in the context of formative assessment may be the lack of quality feedback for each student. in foreign language learning at secondary school, the essay becomes an important formative assessment tool, as it provides important information about the student's own learning achievements. at the same time, however, the development of a set of criteria for students' selfassessment and self-regulated learning skills becomes necessary. references akram, m., siddiqa, a., nami, a. g., shahzad, w., & rashid, m. 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(2022). a practical review of mastery learning. retrieved from https://www.ajpe.org/content/ajpe/early/2022/01/13/ajpe8906.full.pdf 24 the challenges, risks and prospects of the realisation of the music methodology module of one – year education programme guntars bernāts1, andrejs mūrnieks2 1,2 university of latvia, latvia abstract. the reform of teachers’ education commenced by the ministry of education and science provides an opportunity to obtain a qualification as a teacher within one year, encompassing studies based in a working environment for those who already have higher education. the goal of the research is to identify the challenges, risks and perspectives of the realization of the module “music methodology” of the study course “integrated methods in teaching culture understanding and self-expression in art” within the one-year study programme “skolotājs”. the research compared study course plans in music teaching and choir work methodology at two latvian higher education institutions, as well as at two foreign higher education institution, where a qualification as a music teacher at a comprehensive school can be attained. the research was undertaken based on an analysis of theoretical sources, providing an understanding about a synthesis of varying contemporary methodological approaches. it encompasses the acquisition of a knowledge of cultural history and the history of music, the style and future directions of popular music, desirably not just theoretically but practically as well, in the education of the students. the actualization of such study courses as music teaching methodology, the research process in music teaching, music history and stylistics, the psychology of music, conducting, choir/vocal ensemble work, methodology and music project management are important for the high quality and integrated acquisition of music teaching methodology. keywords: perception of culture, music teacher, teaching methodology, teacher training. to cite this article: bernāts, g. & mūrnieks, a. (2021). the challenges, risks and prospects of the realisation of the music methodology module of one – year education programme. education. innovation. diversity, 2(2), 24-30. doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2021.1.5428 introduction the second – level higher professional education study programme skolotājs for attaining a teaching qualification within a year is being developed in collaboration with daugavpils university and liepāja university at the university of latvia. the goal of the programme is to encourage the introduction of motivated teachers in schools with experience from other sectors. the newly established study programme „the teaching power” is currently the only such study programme in the baltics, therefore it was of utmost importance to choose for the present research stage the higher education institutions, in which a b.a. programme in music teaching/pedagogy is being implemented at present: in latvia such institutions are the jāzeps vītols latvian academy of music and the daugavpils university, in lithuania – the vytautas magnus university, along with which the university of music and performing arts vienna represents the european values in culture education. the goal of the research is to identify the challenges, risks and perspectives of the realization of the module “music methodology” of the study course “integrated methods in teaching culture understanding and self-expression in art” within the one-year study programme “skolotājs”. the research compared study course plans in music teaching and choir work methodology at two latvian higher education institutions, as well as at two foreign higher education institution, where a qualification as a music teacher at a comprehensive school can https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2021.1.5428 25 be attained. the research was undertaken based on an analysis of theoretical sources, providing an understanding about a synthesis of varying contemporary methodological approaches. it is planned to continue the research in the future, focusing on the analysis of music teaching methodology modules separately within the framework of single year study programmes implementation. the reform of teachers’ education commenced by the ministry of education and science (latvijas republikas ministru kabineta tiesību aktu projekti, 2018) provides an opportunity to obtain a qualification as a teacher within one year, encompassing studies based in a working environment for those who already have higher education (margeviča-grinberga, 2021). this will allow for sector professionals to share their knowledge of other sectors in schools and to additionally obtain the skills required of a teacher which correspond with the new curriculum and approach of skola 2030. methods and materials the research is based on the comparison of the study programs created by music teachers working at four different universities. in the course of the present research the study programme plans of music teacher education were analysed in detail, along with the total number of credit points received, music teaching, specialised professional subject and collective music-making methodology study courses and their extent. the data gathered, as well as the knowledge, skills and competencies, that it is planned to acquire graduating from the study programmes of the four universities chosen for the comparison were compared to the planned study results from the implementation of the music methodology module of the study course “the integrated teaching methodology in the study field “understanding of culture and selfexpression in art”” within the one-year study programme “teacher”. contemporary approaches to the study process will be used in the programme: learning in groups, teaching and learning leadership, situational and personalized learning etc.however, the following need to be clarified for such a programme to validly function, 1) factors, which influence the perception of music currently(in the context of global cultural processes), the cultural traditions of music in latvia,as well as the main contradictions and problems in teaching music currently; 2) a comparison needs to be made of the existing experience at universities in creating the curriculum for teachers – together information about the required preconditions for the programme’s implementation and 3) the main dimensions of the curriculumneed to be defined. global tendencies in culture reveal the co-existence of various local traditions, subcultures and tendencies, or multiculturalism (giddens et. al., 2012), the dominance of mass culture in this coexistence and competition (hofstede et. al., 2010; kūle, 2006), the current trend of “living virtually” (mirzojevs, 2017), especially among young people, the influence of entertainment, art and the music industry on ways of listening to music and the contribution of the creative industry (caves, 2000). the need to maintain the originality of each national culture (including traditional culture) arises alongside these and contrary to the tendencies mentioned. in the case of latvia, this also means the values recognized by unesco, for example, the preservation and development of the song celebration traditions (non-material cultural heritage). american anthropologist clifford geertz (reads in latvian: gīrcs) wrote: “the spiritual consciousness of a specific people is specifically formed, mainly through the more carefully developed and usually more public rituals as well ... these fully developed ceremonies could be called cultural performances” (gīrcs, 1998, 116). in the case of latvia, the song celebrations could be considered such a unifying performance. 26 an equally important task for education is the need to motivate young people toward an ecologically responsible lifestyle (ergoto moderation, restraint, austerity and self-control), as well as to motivate them to a meaningful life within society. nationally defined goals in values education is contained in cabinet of ministers’ regulations no, 480. “the procedure for the evaluation of educative guidelines and information, teaching aids, materials and instruction and educative methods for students” (ministru kabineta noteikumi nr. 480, 2016). in the educational process, the learner's understanding, responsible attitude and actions are promoted, which confirms the following values the acquisition of human dignity, freedom, culture and the latvian language. the authors of the research are convinced that without the awareness and acceptance of these values, neither cultural understanding nor self-expression in art is possible. results and discussions all of the mentioned trends and tasks have to be taken into account in the process for learning music. this brings additional high demands in preparing music teachers. the first task for preparing a new curriculum is to clarify the scope of basic problems in the principles for learning music. as part of the first task, agreement has to be found on what we wish to achieve by teaching music at school. this is the goal (methodological) aspect. the next is the aspect of curriculum. what will be taught? finally, the methodical aspect. how will it be taught? a programme for educating teachers can be created depending on the types of answers to these three 3 problem issues. two main approaches are possible when considering the goal of teaching music in schools of general education: a) to teach music or b) to teach about music. in the first case, academic preparation that is sufficiently deep is required for teachers. not just a knowledge of the history of music, but also practical skills for playing a musical instrument (one or more), to conduct a choir, to lead musical ensembles, to encourage and motivate self-led learning for students. in the second case, in teaching only about music, some may think that a teacher’s professional skills in music is not required, limiting this purely to the skill of talking about music, getting students interested in listening to music and the skill of analysing what they have heard. the tradition in latvian musical education, however, is to emphasise the first approach (to teach music). in an ideal version, both approaches could be combined: to both teach about music, as well as to teach music. the next aspect, which must be borne in mind in creating a study programme, is the curriculum which will be taught in schools. this includes the skills, attitude and knowledge in developing a student’s musical competence. however, the type of musical material that will be used in developing all the previously mentioned components is important. in formulating the problem in simple terms, there are two options: a) to teach what is topical (that which is heard the most frequently and more in latvia, europe and the western cultural space, and that which is heard in the media consumed by most people in latvia), b) to teach what is valuable (that which has stood the test of time and that which has crystallised over a longer period of time. the fact that most young people “live” in this mass culture environment everyday cannot be ignored (kūle, 2006). this is exactly why the learning of the topical one of music, style and genre must also be included in the curriculum. but one cannot stop only at what is current and popular, as this would mean surrendering to the general consumer mentality. an opportunity should be provided for the student to also get to know and experience the wonder of classical music. the synthesis of both approaches, in turn, means including a knowledge of cultural history and the history of music, a learning 27 about the style and direction of popular music, preferably not just theoretically, but also practically, in student education (bautista et al, 2016). finally, the methodical aspect: how should it be taught? in this aspect too, there is its own antinomy or contrast between two approaches: emphasis mainly only a) on stimulating interest, or more b) on research. to teach in a simply pleasant or attractive way, or seriously, deeply and thoroughly? in the first approach, topicality, concreteness, situationism, compliance with contemporary assumptions and superficiality will dominate. the second approach will highlight the academic, the historic, criticism, comparison, analysis, synthesis and thoroughness. in the first approach, the study is like a game and attraction, while the second is like research, cogitation, and evaluation. a contemporary approach requires the synthesis of both extremes. the goal of the study programme is to provide theoretical and practical preparation for the new teacher, through acquiring modern principles of teaching methodology, familiarization with cultural phenomena and works of art, analysis, interpretation and the development of experience through creative activity. consequently, the fact that the acquisition of methodology is very important in the development of the new teacher can be concluded. the following tasks should be undertaken to achieve the goal of the study programme:  to provide theoretical and practical guidance to encourage competent activities by students, to improve their knowledge, skills, competence and creative ability;  to promote an understanding of the theoretical content of the subject of culture and art;  to provide knowledge and improve skills in modelling the teaching process, the choice of methodological techniques and the evaluation of student achievements. the tasks formulated once again confirm what was concluded previously. focusing on the number of lessons required to achieve the music teaching methodology, the study course calendar plan provides information that 24 lessons are planned in the acquisition of the m module (music teaching methodology). the jāzeps vītols latvian academy of music’s general education music teacher professional bachelor study programme’s study plan “music teaching and choir work methodology” provides courses with 18 ects (jāzeps vītols latvian academy of music, 2018). the daugavpils university’s professional bachelor study programme music prepares qualified and competitive music teachers for playing instruments or solo singing, or choir subjects, or for schools of general education. in the curriculum for the study programme, as in the jāzeps vītols latvian academy of music educational programme, music theory and history courses of 54 ects are planned, as well as professional specialization courses of 108 ects (daugavpils university, 2019). in the vytautas magnus university (lithuania) second-level professional higher education study programme music pedagogy there were study courses of 42 ects provided for programme’s specialization in conducting music ensembles (vytautas magnus university, 2020). at the university of music and performing arts in vienna, in 4 years of full-time study in the qualifications for agymnasium/crafts school music teacher and instrument playing/solo singing teacher or gymnasium/crafts school music teacher and second additional subject teacher study courses in the musical art field, 37 ects are acquired (university of music and performing arts vienna, 2019). 28 table 1 comparison of music pedagogy study programs jāzeps vītols latvian academy of music daugavpils university vytautas magnus university university of music and performing arts in vienna music teaching methodology – 7,5 ects choir subjects or music teaching methodology – 10,5 ects music lesson methodology 3 ects playing popular/folk music in a musical ensemble pre-school music teaching methodology – 1,5 ects solo singing and vocal work methodology – 9 ects foundations of music pedagogy 3 ects 2. instrument and practice rhythmic teaching theory and practice 3 ects didactics of music technologies 5 ects conducting 1.instrument/vocal arrangement – 1,5 ects arrangement – 1,5 ects ethnic culture and music ensembles – 5 ects improvisation – 1,5 ects psychology of musical activity – 5 ects multi-media work school choir work methodology – 1,5 ects choir science and choir work methodology – 3 ects conducting – 42 ects choir playing of carl orff’s set of instruments – i,5 ects planning and evaluation in music education 3 ects movement and dance total 18 ects total – 24 ects total – 66 ects total 37 ects the total planned number of credit points to be gained in the “integrated methods in teaching cultural understanding of and self-expression in art” study course is 4! this is a serious challenge for a high – quality educational process. conclusions from researching the attainment of the study course offered at latvian higher education institutions, as well as at foreign higher education institutions, it will be necessary to update the need for the following fundamental study courses for the high quality and integrated acquisition of music teaching methodology:  music teaching methodology;  research process in teaching (music teaching);  music history and stylistics;  psychology of music;  conducting, choir/vocal ensemble work methodology;  music project management. the lack of the specific study courses is identified in the result of the comparative research of the study programmes carried out regarding the content of the new music methodology module. a risk arises of not reaching the programme goal in a high qualitative way without integrating the acquisition of the abovementioned study course in the curriculum of the “integrated methods in teaching cultural understanding of and self-expression in art” study course. 29 as the result of this lack the students having completed the study course “the integrated teaching methodology in the study field “understanding of culture and self-expression in art”” within the one-year study programme “teacher” will have acquired a certain competency in only a single main approach mentioned in the theoretical study, namely – to teach about music. the main approach characteristic of the latvian music education tradition – to teach music – may be subjected to a limited, partial implementation due to the lack of appropriately thorough academic and professional education of the future teachers. also the ideal unification of the two approaches – to teach music and to teach about music – may become unattainable due to the lack of sufficient erudition and theoretical knowledge of the young teachers. references bautista, a., yau, x., & wong j. (2016). high-quality music teacher professional development: a review of the literature. music education research, volume 19, issue 4 doi: doi.org/10.1080/14613808.2016.1249357 caves, r. e. (2000). creative industries: contracts between art and commerce. harvard university press. daugavpils university. (2019). self-evaluation report for the study direction “art” for 2018/2019. study year. the faculty of music and arts. retrieved from https://du.lv/wpcontent/uploads/2020/04/maksla_pasnovertejuma-zinojums_2018_2019.pdf giddens, j., nortth, s., carlson-sabelli, l., rogers, e., & fogg, l. (2012). using a virtual community to enchance cultural awarness. journal of transcultural nursing: official journal of the transcultural nursing society, 23(2); 198204. gīrcs, k. (1998). kultūru interpretācija. [clifford geertz, the interpretation of cultures]. rīga: izdevniecība agb. hofstede, g., hofstede, g.j.,minkov, m. (2010). cultures and organizations: software of the mind. intercultural cooperation and its importance for survival. retrieved from https://eedu.nbu.bg/pluginfile.php/900222/mod_resource/content/1/g.hofstede_g.j.hof stede_m.minkov%20-%20cultures%20and%20organizations%20%20software%20of%20the%20mind%203rd_edition%202010.pdf jāzeps vītols latvian academy of music. (2018). professional bachelor’s study programme music teacher study plan. retrieved from https://www.jvlma.lv/studijas/aktualiestudiju-plani-1/studiju-virziens-izglitiba-un-pedagogija kūle, m. (2006). eirodzīve: formas principi, izjūtas.[eurolife: forms, principles, feelings]. rīga: lu fsi. latvijas republikas ministru kabineta tiesību aktu projekti. (2018). informatīvais ziņojums "priekšlikumi konceptuāli jaunas kompetencēs balstītas izglītības prasībām atbilstošas skolotāju izglītības nodrošināšanai latvijā". [informative report "proposals for the provision of conceptually new competence-based teacher education in latvia"]. retrieved from http://tap.mk.gov.lv/lv/mk/tap/?pid=40444622&mode=mk&date=201801-09 margeviča-grinberga, i. (2021). skolotāja profesionālā kompetence mūsdienu mainīgajā, neparedzamajā pasaulē. [teacher's professional competence in today's changing, unpredictable world] pedagogu profesionālā lietpratība – evolūcija vai revolūcija/tagad retrieved from https://maciunmacies.valoda.lv/wpcontent/uploads/2021/03/tagad_2021_web_2021.pdf ministru kabineta noteikumi nr. 480. (2016). izglītojamo audzināšanas vadlīnijas un informācijas, mācību līdzekļu, materiālu un mācību un audzināšanas metožu izvērtēšanas kārtība. [the procedure for the evaluation of educative guidelines and information, teaching aids, materials and instruction and educative methods for students, c.m.r., https://doi.org/10.1080/14613808.2016.1249357 https://du.lv/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/maksla_pasnovertejuma-zinojums_2018_2019.pdf https://du.lv/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/maksla_pasnovertejuma-zinojums_2018_2019.pdf https://eedu.nbu.bg/pluginfile.php/900222/mod_resource/content/1/g.hofstede_g.j.hofstede_m.minkov%20-%20cultures%20and%20organizations%20-%20software%20of%20the%20mind%203rd_edition%202010.pdf https://eedu.nbu.bg/pluginfile.php/900222/mod_resource/content/1/g.hofstede_g.j.hofstede_m.minkov%20-%20cultures%20and%20organizations%20-%20software%20of%20the%20mind%203rd_edition%202010.pdf https://eedu.nbu.bg/pluginfile.php/900222/mod_resource/content/1/g.hofstede_g.j.hofstede_m.minkov%20-%20cultures%20and%20organizations%20-%20software%20of%20the%20mind%203rd_edition%202010.pdf https://www.jvlma.lv/studijas/aktualie-studiju-plani-1/studiju-virziens-izglitiba-un-pedagogija https://www.jvlma.lv/studijas/aktualie-studiju-plani-1/studiju-virziens-izglitiba-un-pedagogija http://tap.mk.gov.lv/lv/mk/tap/?pid=40444622&mode=mk&date=2018-01-09 http://tap.mk.gov.lv/lv/mk/tap/?pid=40444622&mode=mk&date=2018-01-09 https://maciunmacies.valoda.lv/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/tagad_2021_web_2021.pdf https://maciunmacies.valoda.lv/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/tagad_2021_web_2021.pdf 30 c. 480]. retrieved from https://likumi.lv/ta/id/283735-izglitojamo-audzinasanasvadlinijas-un-informacijas-macibu-lidzeklu-materialu-un-macibu-un-audzinasanasmetozu-izvertesanas mirzojevs, n. (2017). kā raudzīties uz pasauli. [how to see the world]. rīga: jāņa rozes apgāds. nemateriālais kultūras mantojums. university of music and performing arts vienna. (2019). framework curriculum for the bachelor's degree in teaching.retrieved from https://www.mdw.ac.at/studienplaene/?stnr=33250&start=cur vytautas magnus university. (2020). subject pedagogy study plan. retrieved from https://www.vdu.lt/lt/study/program/subject/341/ https://likumi.lv/ta/id/283735-izglitojamo-audzinasanas-vadlinijas-un-informacijas-macibu-lidzeklu-materialu-un-macibu-un-audzinasanas-metozu-izvertesanas https://likumi.lv/ta/id/283735-izglitojamo-audzinasanas-vadlinijas-un-informacijas-macibu-lidzeklu-materialu-un-macibu-un-audzinasanas-metozu-izvertesanas https://likumi.lv/ta/id/283735-izglitojamo-audzinasanas-vadlinijas-un-informacijas-macibu-lidzeklu-materialu-un-macibu-un-audzinasanas-metozu-izvertesanas https://www.mdw.ac.at/studienplaene/?stnr=33250&start=cur https://www.vdu.lt/lt/study/program/subject/341/ title of the paper. 26 preferences for virtual music therapy and the use of technology in the practice of czech music therapists – a descriptive cross-sectional study jan koucun1, jiri kantor2 1,2 palacky university olomouc, czech republic abstract. the preventive restrictions imposed at the beginning of march 2020 led to the interruption of the therapeutic practice of most music therapists in the czech republic. the aim of this descriptive cross-sectional study was to find out what impact this situation had on the music therapy community at the end of may 2020, how many music therapists gained experience with virtual music therapy (vmt) and how ict and other technologies were used in music therapy practice. a survey with an extended version of a questionnaire created by gilboa, weiss and dassa (not yet published) for the purpose of an international survey in music therapy was used for data collection. based on the findings, most music therapists at the time had no experience with vmt, but a small number of practitioners were interested in using vmt even after the end of the lockdown. ict has been used more for receptive music therapy activities and its wider application faces problems such as a lack of knowledge and skills in the use of ict in the context of music therapy. based on these findings, a project focused on the implementation of best-evidence concerning vmt into czech music therapy practice was launched. also, we recommend creating projects focused on the use of ict (including applications in music therapy conducted faceto-face) in the near future. keywords: music therapy, virtual, telehealth, pandemic, survey, ict, covid. to cite this article: koucun, j. & kantor, j. (2021). preferences for virtual music therapy and the use of technology in the practice of czech music therapists – a descriptive cross-sectional study. education. innovation. diversity, 2(3), 14-21. doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2021.2.6708 introduction the onset of the pandemic in spring 2020 in the czech republic resulted in long-term epidemiological restrictions, as well as serious challenges, for most professions. one of the professions strongly influenced by the repeated lockdowns were arts therapists. in the course of 2020-21, many arts therapists in the czech republic had to suspend their therapeutic practice for a long time or start working through telehealth. however, the transfer of therapeutic practice into the virtual space is, in the case of arts therapies, much more difficult as compared with verbal therapy. as far as telehealth is concerned, the greatest complications were experienced by music therapists as all publicly available online communication platforms are primarily intended for verbal communication. music therapy is particularly complicated by the inability to synchronize sound and by the deformation of sound quality when playing an instrument or singing. therefore, virtual music therapy (vmt) had been used only sporadically before the pandemic, which is also confirmed by the limited number of publications. vaudreuil et al. (2020) investigated the use of vmt among military-connected populations on a continuum of clinical and community engagement and found positive responses, including a decrease in pain, anxiety, and depression. according to a case study conducted by lightstone, bailey, & voros (2015), vmt was effective in the treatment of a patient with post-traumatic stress syndrome and depression. fuller & mcleod (2019) described several models of vmt used for families of children with hearing impairment. more scientific evidence about vmt was published after https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2021.2.6708 27 the beginning of the pandemic. we conducted a scoping review and found 10 articles published from the onset of the pandemic to the 25th october 2020 (kantorová et al., 2021). moreover, we described different adaptations to music therapy practice, including adaptations to the goals, methods/techniques, space, musical instruments, technologies, flexibility and logistics, etc. a growing number of publications suggest that during the pandemic, music therapists became interested in vmt due to the adverse effects of the preventive measures on traditional music therapy practice (gaddy et al., 2020). regarding the fact that there are many music therapists in the czech republic outside the clinical sphere (kantor et al., 2016), an increased interest in vmt as an alternative to face-to-face music therapy was expected. during the lockdowns, music therapy, just as all external services, was immediately suspended in many workplaces. the most serious restrictions affected social services, which are the most common working environments for music therapists. a question emerged at the beginning of the pandemic as to how music therapists could be assisted in adapting their practice to the virtual environment. it was important to identify how many music therapists were experienced in vmt and how many music therapists considered the use of vmt in their practice. it was also necessary to identify the extent to which music therapists used ict in their music therapy practice, what obstacles they faced and what could help them utilise these resources. the application of vmt is largely dependent on the ability to use ict. therefore, data was needed to inform further planning of effective interventions to support music therapists during the pandemic. regarding the fact that during this time, an international cross-sectional study was being performed in the czech and slovak music therapy community led by avi gilboa, ayelet dassa and chava weiss aimed at evidence-based description of the music therapy profession, we added in the domestic version of the questionnaire items focused on the current situation regarding the use of vmt and ict in the music therapy process. this paper analyses only the data acquired from these additional questions in the czech republic and slovakia, since the findings may be of high importance in the ongoing pandemic time. methodology and sample we used the descriptive cross-sectional study design with a questionnaire survey. the study was approved by the ethical committee of bar-ilan university (e.mus.2021-13). the goal of the study was to answer the following questions:  did music therapists start to use vmt as a result of the pandemic and do they consider the use of vmt after the pandemic?  for what purposes do music therapists use ict?  what barriers do music therapists face in the use of ict in their practice? we used a modified version of the questionnaire created by a group led by avi gilboa, ayelet dassa and chava weiss and further modified by the authors of this paper. in this modified version, 5 questions were added (the questionnaire is attached in the appendix 1). the questionnaire includes general data (including respondents’ demographic data), data about their music therapy practice, etc. the additional items used a combination of questions with dichotomous answers, scales and open questions. the data analysis was based on descriptive statistics computed in ms excel and absolute and relative frequencies. the survey was conducted in the community of czech and slovak music therapists. both countries share common history and similar language and most slovak music therapists received training from czech lecturers. music therapists in the czech republic are organised in the music therapy association of czech republic (czmta) and several minor associations. the number of registered music therapists in czmta is about 200, including non-practicing and senior music therapists and music therapy students. the number of music therapists in slovakia is not known but we suppose it to be fewer than 40 persons (depending on the 28 professional criteria). currently, there is no functional music therapy association in slovakia and some slovak music therapists are registered with czmta. regarding the fact that music therapy lacks statutory recognition in both countries and for music therapists it is not obligatory to register anywhere, the number of respondents in the basic sample can only be estimated. inclusion criteria: practicing music therapist (including music therapy students and practitioners who do not achieve the professional standards established by czmta), whose practice is conducted in the demographic area of the czech republic or slovakia. exclusion criteria: respondents who lack qualification consisting of at least long-term training (more than 100 hours) or respondents who do not practice music therapy with clients. the survey was delivered through czmta, facebook groups/other social media and respondents were kindly requested to forward it to music therapy practitioners not registered with czmta. the data was collected during may 2020 and two reminders were sent by the czmta office. eventually, we included 64 respondents from the czech republic and 13 respondents from slovakia, together 77 respondents. no completed questionnaire was excluded from the sample. the demographic information (including years of experience in music therapy) concerning the research sample is shown in table 1. table 1 demographic characteristics of respondents czech republic slovakia gender female 51 (80%) 10 (77%) male 13 (20%) 3 (23%) age ≤ 30 3 0 31–40 15 5 41–50 25 5 51–60 17 2 61 > 4 1 years of experience less than 3 8 2 4–7 21 5 8–11 12 3 12–15 11 1 more than 15 12 2 n=77 the characteristics of music therapy practice are presented in table 2. the following is described:  main working environment – the most preferred examples of social care services included homes for the elderly and day care centres, whereas the most preferred educational institutions were special schools or nursery schools.  main client population – the most frequent special needs included intellectual disability, multiple disability, autism spectrum disorder, while the least frequent included behaviour and emotional disorders. the category of the elderly consisted of typical elderly persons as well as persons with dementia or parkinson’s disease. other client groups included chronically sick patients and persons after stroke.  main music therapy methods/techniques (for example improvisation or music and movement) and the most preferred musical instruments – these items enabled respondents to apply multiple choices and, therefore, the number of answers is higher than the number of respondents. 29 table 2 characteristics of music therapy practice czech republic slovakia main working environment educational 23 2 social care 30 10 private practice 5 1 health care 8 2 client groups persons with special needs 39 9 typical children and youth 7 3 elderly 8 1 psychiatric patients 7 1 other groups 3 3 music therapy methods/techniques improvisation 59 12 vocal improvisation 25 2 receptive techniques 28 6 song-writing 10 7 guided imagery 22 2 singing songs 36 9 recording of clients’ music 3 1 music and movement 35 8 most preferred musical instruments piano 29 6 acoustic guitar 35 7 drums/djembe 47 11 harp, lyre, kantel or other similar instruments 25 3 small percussions (such as orff, rumba balls, rain) 57 13 flute, ending, double, fujara 32 6 xylophone, metallophone 36 10 patam, handpad, handdrum, sundrum 20 5 ocean drum 32 7 n=77 research results and interpretation this section presents the data on respondents’ experience with vmt, preferences for vmt use after the pandemic, methods of ict use in music therapy sessions, as well as preferences for the use of ict in future music therapy practice. the experience of respondents with vmt gained before the pandemic is greater than expected, which confirms their effort to perform music therapy in the virtual space. however, respondents’ preferences concerning vmt in the future are largely negative. this result could have been influenced by the time of data collection, because in may 2020, the czech republic 30 was close to the end of the lockdown and most of the population did not believe in the reintroduction of preventive measures, which eventually took place in autumn 2020. at that time, a significant proportion of respondents were convinced about face-to-face music therapy, especially as there was seemingly no need to adapt to vmt as a result of the preventive measures. however, of the total number of respondents, some seriously considered the inclusion of vmt in their practice after the pandemic. table 3 experience with vmt / preferences for vmt czech republic slovakia previous experience with vmt yes 15 2 no 49 11 preferences for using vmt in the future (likert scale) 1 (no preference for use) 24 4 2 8 0 3 5 0 4 10 0 5 4 4 6 3 1 7 (maximum preference for use) 9 4 n=74 the remaining questions related to the use of ict and were not directly related to vmt. respondents also described ict applications used in face-to-face therapeutic sessions. the responses (table 4) suggest that more than half of respondents used ict directly in music therapy sessions, especially during receptive activities. specific examples of other types of ict use included a singing book application, matching music with vibrations and light effects in snoezelen, or simulation of musical instruments using ipad during active music therapy. in this case, too, respondents could indicate whether they would like to use ict in future music therapy sessions. in this case, the attitude to ict was more balanced than in the case of vmt, with a number of respondents willing to deepen their knowledge in ict. the biggest barriers to the use of ict in music therapy practice as suggested by respondents included the unavailability and cost of technology, as well as education in the area of ict. some respondents showed their willingness to participate in courses aimed directly at music therapy in specific population groups. table 4 use of ict in music therapy czech republic slovakia use of ict in music therapy sessions for active music therapy 15 5 for receptive music therapy 29 7 respondent does not use ict 30 3 ways of using ict for recording and storing client data 43 8 music applications for pc 7 3 music applications for tablet/mobile phone 19 4 ict as a compensation aid in mt 10 0 specific devices such as soundbeam or cymis 3 1 computer controlled therapy 1 0 interactive board 3 1 visualization (light stimuli according to ict controlled music) 4 1 31 ict controlled vibration stimuli 4 1 online internet/cloud services 25 5 i do not use ict 6 0 preferences for using ict in music therapy practice in the future (likert scale) 1 (no preference for use) 11 1 2 5 3 3 11 0 4 14 2 5 8 3 6 9 3 7 (maximum preference for use) 7 1 n=74 discussion and conclusion on the basis of the data presented in the previous section, the answers to the research questions are as follows:  only a few music therapists have gained experienced in vmt. however, a small number of music therapists consider the use of vmt after the release of the preventive measures due to the pandemic.  music therapists use ict primarily for receptive music therapy (listening to music) and administration. some music therapists use internet/cloud services and music applications for client intervention.  in the use of ict, music therapists face barriers in the form of insufficient skills and education in the form of ict use, as well as its cost and unavailability. the results of the questionnaire survey suggest that czech music therapists need to be supported in the use of ict in their therapeutic practice and that their interest in vmt is not necessarily linked to the necessity to adapt to the virtual environment due to the preventive measures that made face-to-face contact with clients impossible. in this respect, vmt appears to be a potentially legitimate form of music therapy (negrete, 2020). moreover, according to world health organisation (2021) estimates, a rapid end to the pandemic cannot be expected and although it is not clear whether there will be more lockdowns in the following months, including strict restrictions on physical contact, the interest in vmt is likely to increase even among those music therapists who held a negative attitude during the pandemic. the majority of respondents in this study work in social services and schools that have so far been strongly affected by the preventive measures and whose therapeutic practice could again be at risk of suspension. the greatest obstacle for therapists is the lack of knowledge and experience concerning ict. therefore, appropriate training activities need to be created for these purposes. the current need for the adaptation of music therapy practice to vmt should not be haphazard; without sufficient knowledge of vmt techniques and online platforms, music therapists can easily gain negative experience and thus confirm their belief that the virtual environment is not suitable for music therapy. musical improvisation was identified by respondents as the most common method in their practice, and it is musical improvisation that brings the greatest challenges in the online space. addressing these challenges requires the knowledge of specific adaptations (berman, 2020; knott & block, 2020). although there is only limited scientific evidence for vmt (kantorová et al., 2021), it is desirable to implement previously mentioned recommendations in therapy practice and ensure the highest possible quality of music therapy carried out in the virtual environment. one of the activities that used the data from this survey is an implementation project entitled “implementation of virtual music therapy into the private practice of czech music 32 therapists: a best practice implementation project”, which started in may 2021 and the objective of which is to implement the best evidence-based practice concerning vmt into the practice of czech music therapists, to increase the number of clients served, and to improve their satisfaction with music therapy services. in addition to supporting music therapists in using vmt, attention should also be on supporting various forms of ict during face-to-face sessions. as far as music and music therapy technology in the czech republic is concerned, a relatively great focus is on vibroacoustic therapy (vilímek, kantor, & kořínková, 2021) and other vibration platforms (for example using a vibration platform). in the past, a modification of the japanese cybernetic tool cymis was developed (koucun & kantor, 2016). in the interpretation of the results, the limitations of the present study must be considered, relating especially to external and internal validity. the data were obtained from a limited number of practising music therapists and, for practical reasons, the research sample was not selected in a representative manner and was based on relatively broad inclusion criteria. a nonstandardized questionnaire was used for data collection and the results cannot be compared with a control group. on the other hand, the recommendations and conclusions based on the present research would probably not change if more respondents were involved. moreover, the research focused on a highly topical issue and the results were required for timely implementation of interventions in order to protect the czech music therapy community (including music therapy clients) from much more serious impacts of the pandemic. acknowledgements the publication of this paper was supported by the project titled “research on inclusion of individuals with special needs”, iga_pdf_2021_024. references berman, a. 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(2021, august, 30). covid-19 strategic preparedness and response plan. retrieved from https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/who-whe2021.02 https://library.iated.org/view/kantor2016mod https://doi.org/10.1080/17533015.2015.1019895 https://doi.org/10.1080/17483107.2020.1775312 https://doi.org/10.13189/ujer.2021.090707 https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/who-whe-2021.02 https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/who-whe-2021.02 6 ego depletion and academic dishonesty in students college during pandemi covid-19 herdian1, nadia dwi suci ningtyas putri2 1,2 universitas muhammadiyah purwokerto, indonesia abstract. the covid-19 pandemic is still being felt until september 2021 in several countries around the world. we examine the impact of the covid-19 pandemic, especially on unethical behavior during online learning— other phenomena such as ego depletion trigger academic dishonesty behavior that occurs. a total of 92 students participated in this research. the measurement tool uses the ego depletion scale and the academic dishonesty scale. the results show that ego depletion is a significant predictor of academic dishonesty. the contribution of ego depletion to academic dishonesty is 16.3%. ego fatigue makes students choose an easier academic path, which they feel has been affected by the covid-19 pandemic. so that the behavior of academic dishonesty increases. the implications and research suggestions are discussed in detail. keywords: ego depletion, academic dishonesty, pandemic covid-19, online learning, students college, cheating, plagiarism. to cite this article: herdian & ningtyas putri, n.d.s. (2021). ego depletion and academic dishonesty in students college during pandemi covid-19. education. innovation. diversity, 2(3), 6-13. doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2021.2.6715 introduction the ongoing covid-19 pandemic until september 2021 in several countries still has a significant impact on human behavior. the results of many studies report that the covid-19 pandemic has a lot of effect on mental health (chaturvedi et al., 2021; drissi et al., 2020; herdian & chen, 2021; kaparounaki et al., 2020). in particular, the impact of the covid-19 pandemic was more significant on students than on workers, and women were more affected than men (marelli et al., 2021). so this can cause changes in the daily activities of people around the world. we conducted a particular study of the impact of the covid-19 pandemic on student activities. this is important to study because the covid-19 pandemic has an impact on school closures around the world. during the covid-19 pandemic, many studies reported that there was an increase in academic stress (herdian & mildaeni, 2021), increased anxiety (wang & zhao, 2020), sleep quality (marelli et al., 2021), to an increase in unethical behavior. on student academics (herdian et al., 2021). referring to this impact, we conducted a follow-up study on unethical behavior such as academic dishonesty among college students. this is important to study because we think that the impact of the covid-19 pandemic must be prevented as early as possible so that students can behave professionally in their academics. academic dishonesty behavior is a common thing in the academic environment. this refers to the number of studies on academic dishonesty in various countries in the world (charubusp, 2015; do ba et al., 2017; hendy & montargot, 2019; herdian et al., 2021; ismail & yussof, 2016; lahur, 2004; rawwas et al., 2004; ruipérez & garcía-cabrero, 2016; shalevska, n.d.) this happened not only during the covid-19 pandemic but also before. referring to the definition of academic dishonesty behavior, kibler (1993) defines it as a form of academic cheating and plagiarism that involves students in giving or receiving unauthorized assistance in academic training or receiving money for work that is not done by themselves (kibler, 1993). typical forms of dishonesty are using inappropriate information during tests, https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2021.2.6715 7 cheating assignments, and submitting false information (including plagiarism) (oran et al., 2015). the factor of academic dishonesty has been widely studied, which is considered a factor of dishonesty during the covid-19 pandemic is ego depletion. ego depletion is critical to study as a predictor of academic dishonesty because the phenomenon is that students experience many significant changes in activity during the covid-19 pandemic. students must adopt online learning, which so far there has never been any prior training. in addition, the many tasks and academic burdens make students vulnerable to stress. so that, at the same time, will trigger the emergence of ego depletion. ego depletion is a condition in which a person experiences a reduced desire or willingness to engage in action but is only temporary (baumeister et al., 1998). for example, lack of self-control, a result of ego depletion, reduces people's capacity to resist these self-serving temptations and consequently increases dishonesty (gino et al., 2011). the results of a review of 48 recent studies on ego depletion in college students stated that undergraduate students were susceptible to the effects of ego depletion (92% significant), and that included various cognitive and emotional variables such as self-control, prospective memory, and anxiety (gissubel et al., 2018). students have many demands that require optimal self-control, such as completing lecture assignments, academic demands, adaptation to new environments, financial management, interpersonal conflicts, etc. students who experience ego depletion in an experimental study conducted by price & yates (2010) prefer to work on more straightforward questions. it can be concluded that ego depletion can affect the lack of effort made on academic tasks. so that, in turn, will have an impact on unethical behavior. this research was conducted with a quantitative approach to examine the effect of ego depletion on academic dishonesty in college students. theory academic fraud is a fundamental problem for academic integrity in higher education (brimble & stevenson-clarke, 2005). academic dishonesty is a violation of unethical behavior in the performance of academic assignments, which includes cheating, fabrication, plagiarism, and facilitating others to take actions in academic cheating (pavela, 1997). academic dishonesty is an act of fraud or cheating intended to obtain more than desired results on exams, papers, homework assignments, or other learning assignments (miller et al., 2017). academic dishonesty is motivated by many factors, including motivation (siaputra, 2013; thomas, 2017), religiosity (khan et al., 2019), closer friendship, in students who have low grades (griebeler, 2017), personal characteristics (ruffle & tobol, 2017), self-efficacy (javed, 2020; onu et al., 2019) parents' pressure (punjab et al., 2017). until now, research on academic dishonesty is still often investigated to see how this behavior occurs and understand it comprehensively. the aspect of academic dishonesty refers to forms of academic dishonesty that have been previously studied by mccabe & trevino (1993) and stone et al. (2010), including cheating, collaboration, and plagiarism. cheating is rule-breaking behavior related to the intention to gain an unfair advantage over a party or parties with whom the fraudster has a norm-regulated relationship (green, 2004). one of the predictors of academic dishonesty is ego depletion. referring to the definition, ego depletion is a condition when people have psychological and physical exhaustion, limited energy that affects cognitive problems, passive tasks become suboptimal and cause negative reactions and attitude problems (undarwati et al., 2017). ego depletion is theorized as a loss of self-control after being exercised over a period of time, leading to a loss of conscious regulation of behavior (oehring, 2020). ego depletion occurs when the power in self-control is depleted. ego depletion is defined as a temporary state in which previous self-control reduces the individual's self-control resources (hurley, 2019). that ego depletion is a consequence of 8 exerting self-control on activities previously carried out, resulting in impaired self-control performance (dang, 2018). many factors that influence ego depletion include situational (banker et al., 2017), cyberbullying(zhang et al., 2021), personal demands, social demands, low self-control, task demands or too much burden, family problems, and conflicts with others. others (undarwati et al., 2017). ego depletion can result in passive behavior such as lack of initiative and impulsive behavior, such as decreasing mental control over behavioral responses (vonasch et al., 2017), increasing students' deceptive behavior (keller et al., 2020), and being a predictor of future anxiety (alharbi et al., 2021). in addition, the emergence of ego depletion can impact decreasing academic performance, concentration, leaving responsibility for tasks, and unethical behavior. methodology a total of ninety-two students of the faculty of islamic religion participated in this study. based on demographic data, the female gender is 57 (62%), and male is 35 (38%). students consist of semester 2 (6.5%), semester 4 (38%) semester 6 (38%) semester 8 (17.4%). based on gpa, participants who have gpa 2.00–2.74 are 4.3%, gpa 2.76–3.50 are 46.7%, gpa 3.51-4.00 are 48.9%. demographic information is shown in table 1. table 1 demographics of participants levels counts % of total cumulative % sex male 35 38.0 % 38.0 % female 57 62.0 % 100.0 % semesters 2 6 6.5 % 6.5 % 4 35 38.0 % 44.6 % 6 35 38.0 % 82.6 % 8 16 17.4 % 100.0 % gpa 2,00-2,75 4 4.3 % 4.3 % 2,76-3,50 43 46.7 % 51.1 % 3,51-4,00 45 48.9 % 100.0 % measurement academic dishonesty the scale developed by ampuni et al. (2019) was compiled based on aspects of academic dishonesty according to mccabe & trevino (1993) and stone et al. (2010), namely cheating collaboration and plagiarism. items totaled 11 favorable statements, using a likert scale scoring 5 (often) to 1 (never). example of a cheating statement item "cheating on the test in any way", example of an item for collaboration "allowing friends to copy my answers during the test". an example of an item for plagiarism is "plagiarism partially or completely using the internet". the academic dishonesty scale shows high internal consistency (α = 0.87). ego depletion the scale was developed by undarwati et al. (2017), which is based on aspects of ego depletion, including psychological fatigue, physical exhaustion, helplessness, drained energy, cognitive impairment, passiveness, suboptimal, negative reactions, and behavioral disturbances. there are two types of statements used in this scale, namely favorable and unfavorable. the number of items on the ego-depletion scale is 30. the likert scale is 5 (very true of me) to 1 (very untrue of me). examples of items used in this study include: "give up to do anything, tired of the situation, tired with existing activities, difficult to hold desire, chest 9 feels tight, body feels weak, head feels dizzy." the ego-depletion scale showed high internal consistency (α = 0.743). data analysis we used correlation analysis to see the relationship between demographic variables with academic dishonesty and ego depletion variables. at the same time, the main analysis uses a simple linear analysis to see the effect of ego depletion as a predictor of academic dishonesty. result and discussion we conducted a correlation test to see the relationship between each variable and demographic data. the results are shown in table 2. that sex correlates with academic dishonesty with a value of r = -0.364, p < .001. in addition, there is a significant positive correlation between ego depletion and academic dishonesty with a value of r = 0.403, p < .001. this can be interpreted that the higher the ego depletion, the higher the academic dishonesty. table 2 intercorrelation among demographic and variables sex semesters gpa academic dishonesty ego depletion sex — — semesters 0.21 * — 0.044 — gpa 0.333 ** 0.07 — 0.001 0.51 — academic dishonesty -0.364 *** -0.058 -0.074 — < .001 0.582 0.486 — ego depletion 0.029 0.07 -0.014 0.403 *** — 0.787 0.505 0.892 < .001 — note. * p < .05, ** p < .01, *** p < .001 in table 3, the results of the statistical analysis of ego depletion regression on academic dishonesty show that ego depletion has a significant effect on academic dishonesty with a value of f = 17.5, < .001. the value of r square shows that ego depletion contributes 0.163 or 16.3% to academic dishonesty. meaning that ego depletion is a significant predictor of academic dishonesty. the line of regression equation for this research model is y = 12,461 + (0.252) x. so it can be interpreted that academic dishonesty will increase by 0.252 for every change in ego depletion. table 3 linear regression result overall model test model r r² adjusted r² f estimate b p ego depletion to academic dishonesty 0.403 0.163 0.153 17.5 0.252 12.461 < .001 our results confirm that ego depletion is a predictor of academic dishonesty behavior. this is following the research conducted by keller et al. (2020) that ego depletion causes 10 deceptive behavior in students. ego depletion occurs because a lack of self-control, for example, reduces people's capacity to resist these self-beneficial temptations and consequently increases dishonesty (gino et al., 2011). during the covid-19 pandemic, students adapted to the online learning system. all devices must be provided to support the effectiveness of techniques in the implementation of online learning. another impact arises when online learning is carried out. students are required to have quite a lot of tasks and take up much time. students have many demands that require optimal self-control, such as completing lecture assignments, academic demands, adapting to new environments. the implication of this research is the policy of lecturers and campuses in providing various forms of academic assignments. fatigue occurs when students experience many demands during online learning, on the other hand, students must adapt to the new system. in addition, this research contributes to the welfare of students during online learning, which needs to be considered. because many policymakers or faculty staff may focus only on learning techniques because they need to adapt to online learning, this study has limitations that can be used as a basis for future research development. the many and diverse participants from all faculties may be considered so that the research results are more comprehensive. conclusion the impact of the covid-19 pandemic is still being felt by students. along with the impact felt by students, online learning also impacts students' psychological power, so that ego depletion behavior appears, which in fact can increase students' academic dishonesty behavior. the results of our study contribute to the unethical behavior of students during online learning. ego depletion proved to be a significant predictor of students' academic dishonesty. we hope that the student ego gets serious attention in online learning to handle the emergence of ego depletion behavior properly. references alharbi, b., ibrahim, k., al-rababaah, j., & al-mehsin, s. 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(2021). linking cyberbullying to job strain: roles of ego depletion and self-efficacy. journal of aggression, maltreatment & trauma, 1– 18. title of the paper. 31 values of education in europe after world war i in newly created countries – example of latvia pāvels jurs1, ivita pelnēna2 1,2 institute of educational sciences of liepaja university, latvia abstract. the first world war (1914 1918) strengthened the idea of self-determination of nations in europe, while the end of the war created favourable conditions for the creation of new states, including the proclamation of the republic of latvia on november 18, 1918. the creation of an independent latvia state for the first time gave an opportunity to create an education system based on national interests. as a result, the latvia education system during the period from 1919 to 1934 was transformed according to socioeconomic and political changes, creating for the first time a national education system based on the innovative pedagogical ideas of the given era. basically, during the period of latvia's first free state, in the democratic regime, the education system, in compliance with trends in europe, was dominated by reform pedagogy. the purpose of the article is, based on the content analysis of periodicals and historical sources, to identify the existing values of latvia education (school pedagogy) during the democratic period from 1919 to 1934, in the context of european educational values. as a result of the theoretical research, based on the content analysis of periodicals and historical sources, the following educational values have been identified as the most important: creativity; discipline; obedience of students; kindness; humility; individualization; personality of the teacher; professional mastery of the teacher; love of the fatherland. keywords: educational system, history, school, students, teacher, values. to cite this article: jurs, p. & pelnēna, i. (2023). values of education in europe after world war i in newly created countries – example of latvia. education. innovation. diversity, 2(6), 32-38. doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2023.1.7055 introduction the period of the first free state of the republic of latvia can be considered as a time of change in education, it is the time of the creation of a new national state, when the foundations of the state system and including the education system were laid. international trends in education, ideas of local intellectuals and pride in the creation of an independent country change the public attitude towards the education sector as a whole, emphasizing the need for society to get involved in the formation of education policy in order to jointly build a democratic, european and developed country. during the first decades of the 20th century, a considerable amount of new pedagogic trends emerge, which are positioned against the existing education system the pedagogical process in the concept of existing education is not centred around the human individuality and development of consciousness, therefore the newly introduced trends are considered suitable for the era and recognized as the only scientific ones (anspaks, 2003). it should be noted that the higher education sector also experienced a rapid boom, with an increase in the number of students, which was proportionally one of the highest indicators in europe, higher educational establishments and classical universities of various specializations were founded, allocating significant state funding to higher education and science (zids, 2019). moreover, the rapid growth of democracy was stopped by the coup d'état organized by karlis ulmanis on may 15, 1934, when as a result the parliamentary state system collapsed and the democratic value system was replaced by the features characteristic of an authoritarian regime, including changing educational values (jurs & pelnena, 2022). along with the era, educational values also change, they transform according to socio-economic and political changes, thus educational https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2023.1.7055 32 values and their transformation are a topical and important prerequisite for the development of the country. the purpose of the article is, based on theoretical research analysis of periodicals and historical sources, to identify the existing values of latvia education (school pedagogy) in the democratic regime during the period from 1919 to 1934. existing educational values in student learning the first world war, along with the geopolitical and military results, created a peculiar and unique ideological atmosphere in the world, placing the peoples’ right to selfdetermination in the centre of attention, it has influenced the destinies of multiple nations and created conditions for the foundation of new countries in europe, including the solemn proclamation of the republic of latvia on november 18, 1918 (bleiere, 2005). the territory of latvia also suffered significantly due to the war. however, paradoxically, the devastating war gave the peoples of eastern europe hope for a better future (national history museum of latvia, 2023). even though the initial stage of the formation of latvia was still very complicated (during the period from 1918 to 1920 the freedom struggle took place), shortly after the proclamation, on december 8, 1919, the law on latvian educational institutions was adopted, which determined the general compulsory free education in the mother tongue (compendium of laws and ordinances, 1919). the importance and value of education at this stage is valued very highly, indicating that industry in post-war latvia will not reach a high level for a long time, therefore a human being is considered as the direct source of latvia's prosperity (dreimanis, 1921). nevertheless, at the same time, the school attendance in the first years of the country's existence was often difficult for children and their parents, since the shortage caused by the war, as well as the need for children to do various jobs on their parents' or others' farms, prevented the possibility of successfully combining it with school attendance. even though there was a threat of punishment for deliberately not sending children to school, sanctions against parents were hardly ever implemented (staris & usins, 2000). the formation of the latvia state for the first time provided an opportunity to create an education system that is based on national interests and rich in progressive pedagogic knowledge. as p. dreimanis emotionally states in the monthly newsletter of the ministry of education: “the future of a free latvia is in its youth. it is our duty to find a way for the youth's development, to organize such a unit school where it could find the most useful material for its own activities upbringing. self-activity has been the basis of what the latvian people have achieved so far, self-activity in schools will ensure successful development in the future: citizens will grow up, capable of self-determination, creating an independent life” (dreimanis, 1921, 120). describing the educational values of the previous period, i.e., the period of the russian empire, a. dauge points out that until now, at the end of school, the youth were basically required to have acquired a certain amount of knowledge and that the students had certain skills to perform mechanical work. the following were mentioned as the tasks of the school in relation to the students: (i) help the new generation adapt to the natural and cultural conditions of the surroundings; (ii) learn the cultural performances of previous generations; (iii) implemented the ideals of society in life (zalitis, 1920). in the learning process, individualization is strengthened as one of the most important educational values. in the context of upbringing and pedagogy, the uniqueness of each personality is actively emphasized (students, 1998 (1933)), and as the basis of quality upbringing and pedagogy, the absorption into the personality of each child and young person is mentioned: “we must not carelessly measure all children with one measure (..) we must study the individuality of each” (barbins, 1926, 12). in this context, the importance of 33 working with students who have learning and behavioural difficulties is also highlighted: “at school, not all children are equally well-educated. some are more organized than others. some are more attentive, more obedient, quickly perceive everything, do their work neatly and with their behaviour seemingly help the teacher; while the others are even difficult to deal with (..) it is natural that the teacher's affinities are on the first side, while with the others the teacher leads a constant battle, even applying all kinds of punishments, which understandably help little and make the guilty even worse” (zigure, 1926, 3 ). values such as obedience, kindness, humility and love are described as important in the development of a child's personality, citing as the main argument that children are extremely important for the development of the country and society. the age period between 13 and 20 years, which is characterized as a time of preparation for the adulthood, is highlighted as particularly relevant. at this stage, parenting work is encouraged to be given special importance. at this stage, young people are generally characterized as reckless and with a tendency to dream and fantasize about their future, while when faced with difficulties during the implementation of these dreams, educators are encouraged to pay special attention to signs of hard-heartedness and sentimentality. when describing each of the genders, it is indicated that young men are characterized by audacity, impudence, focus on their ideals, striving for admiration. on the other hand, young women start to show their pride, they try to become more loved, admired, but they often turn out to be lazy and sloppy in their tasks (barbins, 1926). the involvement of society and family in school life is also assessed as a value, indicating that so far school and education issues have not been popular in society, while parents' interests have been more utilitarian (ozolina, 1922). thus, respectful cooperation becomes one of the cornerstones of pedagogy, which is mutual, creating closer cooperation among the school, students and their parents. discourse of educational values in the pedagogical process in order to implement the values of the new education system in life, the importance of the school as the implementer of these values is highlighted. the school is characterized as a place where strict order prevails and is oriented towards eternal values, based on objective norms and a high pedagogical idea. however, at the same time, it is emphasized that the school can no longer be a place where unnecessary severity, external formalism and pedantry prevail, even though emphasizing that students who do not want or cannot meet the school's requirements, should not be in school (dauge, 1924). describing the pedagogical task of the school, a. zvaigzne states: “the task of the school is to give children knowledge, or rather, to teach them to acquire the knowledge and train these children to apply this knowledge in life” (zvaigzne, 1926, 3). it should be noted that the law at that time stipulated that compulsory education is for children between 6 and 16 years of age. it should be noted that the law at that time stipulated that compulsory education is for children between 6 and 16 years of age. although there was an important emphasis on the individualization of the personality, the recognition of the essential importance of the collective in the growth of the personality also remained. the upbringing process is described as a process in which assimilation takes place through the collective, so the mutual influence of individualization and socialization on the development of personality can be observed. here, as an essential guarantor of a high-quality socialization process in the classroom, high-quality classroom management is mentioned, which is based on the teacher's ability to provide support for all levels of students' abilities, including support in the development of talents. in the learning process of socialization, the main benefits are described as the opportunity to view and analyse problems from different aspects, because the discovery of knowledge takes place from different directions, as well as 34 new aspects of problems that have not been analysed before are highlighted in discussions and cooperation (dauge, 1928). at the same time, the ideal of pedagogical activity is characterized as a learning process in which the student actively participates, demonstrating the skills of analysis, comparison and combination. such a learning process and skill development is described as the cornerstone of a harmoniously developed personality (dreimanis, 1921). the main goal of the teacher's pedagogical activity, in relation to the student, is the development of a harmonious and useful personality for society. the teacher's own personality is given little importance in the periodicals of this period of history, the main emphasis is on the teacher's ability to achieve all the above-mentioned results of teaching and upbringing. however, it is pointed out that in order for a teacher to achieve the goal of their pedagogical activity, they themselves must be experienced personalities, ones who have something to give to their students. a. dauge describes the teacher: “in order for the activity to take place in this direction, new teachers are needed for this those who themselves would be seekers, researchers, creative spirits. people whose knowledge, insights, and convictions would not have been mechanically appropriated, but primarily grown organically from their deep personal experiences” (dauge, 1920). teachers themselves must possess all the thinking and life skills they wish to develop in their students. the teacher is expected to be an original, independent and autonomous personality. only in this case will the teacher be able to serve as a role model for his students (dauge, 1920). the importance of the teacher's motivation is emphasized as important, stating that the teacher must be interested in their pedagogical activity, constantly observe their students and determine their development needs (zvaigzne, 1926), follow up on current pedagogic and educational findings in their field (petersons, 1928). the teacher must be flexible and in development (liepins, 1922a). in order for the teacher to be able to implement the pedagogical process in a high-quality way, psychology must also be among their interests. even though it is pointed out that knowledge of psychology does not yet guarantee pedagogical ability, however, for teachers who are recognized as endowed with pedagogical skills, the knowledge and application of psychology are considered as a valuable additional skill (dauge, 1928). mutual relations between teachers and students are considered to be an essential component of a quality learning process (liepins, 1922b). taking into account that the latvia state was newly formed and did not have its own experience as a national and independent state, very different ideological and political affiliations of teachers were observed, which was noticeable and also affected their daily work. as a. greber points out: “when transforming the school on new, national foundations, lots of things also change in the mutual relations among teachers (..) much to our regret and misfortune for our schools, these relations are often hostile. it often happens that teachers are divided into two hostile groups, where they fight each other. the reasons for this are the material conditions and the diversity of worldviews” (grebers, 1922, 107). already at that time, the issue of the disproportionate workload of teachers was brought up, especially when talking about rural schoolteachers. according to e. miller, the workload of teachers consists of both work with children and preliminary preparation for lessons, various action plans and reviews, discussions and conferences, emphasizing also the large amount of extracurricular activities, which results in teacher overload and health problems (miller, 1926). it should be noted that due to the lack of funding and human resources, the education system was unable to implement the set political goals for a long time after the adoption of the education law. the lack of materials was also due to the fact that there was no textbook that corresponded to the new teaching methods, ignorance of the language and the lack of materials in latvian were also an obstacle. l. ausejs also wrote about it in the monthly newsletter of the ministry of education: “knowledge of german and english was also 35 insufficient to be able to use teaching materials created in the languages of the respective countries in the learning process, so it was necessary to create them in latvian” (ausejs, 1923, 424). teachers of latvia studied the historical experience at home, gained inspiration for pedagogical ideas abroad, mainly in germany and russia. the main authorities who influenced the development of pedagogical thought in latvia were g. kersensteiner, h. gauding, j. h. pestalocijs, f. a. distervegs., k. usinskis, l. tolstoy, etc. (zukovs, 1999, 263.) the most prominent teachers of european countries, h. gaudings, a. bogens, o. zeinings, gave lectures and led open classes in latvia, introducing local teachers to new methods (kestere, 2005, 78). the pedagogical thought in latvia was developed by analysing foreign theory and practice, as well as the experience of local schools. in the monthly newsletter of the ministry of education, in the article “how german teachers work”, the author j. broka mentions: “relatively there are not many new teachers. they are hardly noticeable in the classroom: they ask little, tell little, sometimes only suggest, reprimand, help. all the work is done by students; therefore, here in the classroom there is life, joy, knowledge gained through work. but the number of these “new” teachers is constantly growing, as the old school staff are also trying to settle in and practice the new ways of working” (broca, 1923, 1220). it should be noted that basically during the period of latvia's first free state, in the democratic regime, the education system, in compliance with trends in europe, was dominated by the reform pedagogy, whose theoretical founder is considered to be j. dewey, who especially emphasizes that nature is the volume and interaction of various objects in time and space, while the goal of education is to create a unified set of knowledge and skills that correlates with the existence of each individual self-awareness both individually and as part of a common entirety (dewey, 1897). conclusions 1 the first half of the 20th century is a period full of challenges, changes, in which innovative ideas are encountered that face conservative resistance. especially in the postwar period the growth and emergence of new ideas can be seen in the education system as a whole. in schools, a student-centred learning approach is emphasized, while the teacher is the leader of the learning process and a support provider for the student. 2 based on the available and analysed historical sources, the following educational values can be identified during the first independence period of the latvia state in the democratic regime: (i) creativity as a value of teaching and learning, which allows to develop the individual characteristics of the student; (ii) discipline as a learning value, which was later also reflected in the student's evaluations, thus the students' behaviour was assessed formatively; (iii) individualization as a value of teaching and learning, being aware of the importance of the needs of the collective, thus the student was perceived as an individual of society, who, through a professionally implemented upbringing and learning process, can contribute to the growth of the collective and thus society; (iv) the teacher's personality and professional mastery as an essential prerequisite for the learning process provision; (v) students' obedience, kindness, humility and love of the fatherland as the value of education and a prerequisite for personal growth; (vi) cooperation as a value of teaching and learning, which is formed on respectful relationships, increasing the participation of parents in the growth of the school and the learning process improvement. 3 teachers and other developers of pedagogical thought learned from the good practices of other countries, trying to adapt the methods to schools in latvia, were invited to experience exchange events outside latvia, and hosted foreign teachers, thus the latvia state and employees of its education sector were actively involved in the exchange of 36 international experience and implementation of progressive pedagogical ideas. 4 when the state of latvia was founded, minority schools were also opened, which were financed from the state budget, thus preserving and promoting the culture of minority communities. the number of students and the number of higher educational establishments also increased rapidly, which was possible thanks to the increase in the state funding from the state budget for higher education and science. 5 despite the socio-economic and demographic consequences of the first world war, as well as the pronounced lack of material, technical and human capital, the newly established latvia state created its own education system, being aware of the innovative pedagogical approaches of the given era. acknowledgements this research is funded by the latvian council of science, flpp project “transformation of educational value for cultural and economic growth of social community” (izvetskkei), 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(2021). service-learning in social work education to develop social work competencies in university students. education. innovation. diversity, 2(2), 41-47. doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2021.1.5427 introduction service-learning, as a pedagogical approach bringing together students, academic staff and community members, is common throughout the world for several decades; however, some concerns are widely discussed in relation to the embedding of this educational method in higher education settings, attempting to “enrich and enhance higher education practices with students’ competences and skills in bridging theory and practice, acquiring agency that potentially leads to a positive social change ” (gruslyte, 2020, 201). the present paper narrows down the focus of investigation specifying service-learning for the field of social work education in university stud ies and aims to explore how the two concepts bridge the fields seeking to generate synergy and positive social change . earlier research works on the adaptation of the initial ly american model of servicelearning to local (lithuanian) socio-cultural and educational contexts (mažeikis, 2007; barzelis, barcytė, & mažeikienė, 2008; mažeikienė, ruškus, & vandzinskaitė, 2008; vandzinskaitė, 2011) have pointed out that it was being embedded to bridge the gap between theory and practice in university curricula and a combination of three elements, i.e. community service, purposeful academic learning, reflection, constituted the essence of this educational innovation (interchangeably called cooperative studies) (mažeikienė, 2008, 8), reaching for students’ improved competencies and skills, increased social awareness and agency as well as a positive social change, as the common good being constructed by the participants of this educational process. recent theoretical and empirical investigations of service-learning as a holistic pedagogical approach aiming to develop students’ work-life skills (communication, team-working and social skills as well as capacities in project-work, problem-solving, information literacy, communication, technological familiarity, time management, leadership), enhancing the integration of a pro -social disposition in young professionals-to-be, developing their civic-engagement competencies (embedding servicelearning in higher education. developing a culture of civic engagement in europe, 2019) https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2021.1.5427 42 put a stronger emphasis on the beneficial character of this pedagogy, closely investigating the contribution to all involved parties: students, the academia and communities. this is also under the scope of the present theoretical investigation, employing relevant literature review and a discussion to point out several negotiable aspects . knowledge and innovation for the social change describing service-learning, researchers relate it to social constructivism, since it facilitates the building of people’s competencies, their communal participation, civic activeness and engagement (mažeikis & lenkauskaitė, 2008, 30). the critical dimension in the servicelearning concept has been added in further stage of its scholarly development and relevant social contexts, in response to the emerging realities, social and academic demand as as well as prompting students “to think critically about social issues and act creatively to produce change” (mitchell, 2007, 101), implement it as “the act of service, of community involvement that changes the traditional learning experience” (ibid., 107). critical service-learning experiences, as advancement, may give students “a different perspective of the agency and its contribution to community, as well as a deeper understanding of the community served” (ibid., p. 108). the service-learning components ‘learning to serve’ and ‘serving to learn’ taking place within community and classroom are supplemented with ‘a social change orientation’, ‘working to redistribute power’ and ‘developing authentic relationships’ (mitchell, 2008). moreover, critical service-learning may be employed seeking to address the ways in which civic engagement can become repositioned and revitalised (preradović & mažeikienė, 2019). the re-positioning of service learning as an educational technique and continuous innovation is one of the concerns connected to the assumed missions of higher education institutions operating in the broader social context. social work is treated as a global profession, putting emphasis on social work theory, curriculum design, social work practice and professional identity (global social work: crossing borders, blurring boundaries, 2014). characterising the issues which social workers face in various sociocultural contexts and cases of social workers’ awareness and identity, carolyn noble and mark henrickson underline that “a philosophy of social work is dynamic, critical, and engaged with clients and the intersection of their multiple environments” (noble  henrickson, 2014, 12). more specifically, writing about social work practice, thomas o’hare notices that “beginning social workers develop their knowledge and skills through both classroom learning and practice experience” (o’hare, 2020, p. ix). further he adds: “the sources that have influenced the development of the essential skills curriculum in social work programs over the past century include theory, practice, wisdom, and tradition and, more recently, empirical research on the processes of psychosocial interventions and their relationships to client outcomes (…)” (ibid., 3). moreover, overviewing the evolution of social work concept, david how e calls social workers “raisers of consciousness” and “seekers after meaning” (howe, 2016). these insights emphasise the multifaceted nature and character of social work education that integrates higher education and broader communities through implementation of servicelearning. acknowledging that service-learning, as a pedagogical and social innovation, originated in the american socio-educational contexts, it is worth referring to the educational policy and accreditation standards for social work curricula, as defined by the us council of social work education in this respect. dealing with baccalaureate and master-level programmes, this organisation quite recently identified six dimensions in the discussed field: performance, knowledge, values, affective reactions, critical thinking, professional judgement (council for social work education [cswe], 2015). these 43 dimensions are overviewed by john poulin and selina matis who emphasise a significant change in assessing the holistic competencies in social work students seeking in their future careers to provide competent social work to clients (poulin  matis, 2015). in their view, the listed dimensions of competencies constitute, or circle around, the comprehensive competence (ibid.), though being drawn in a static manner. continuing the global discussion on service-learning and social work education processes and benefits, the reciprocity of the academia and communities making effect on and contributing to each other has been recently and relevantly broadcasted through the international webinar “how can universities improve their social impact” ([hcuitsi], 2021) bringing the issues of civic and ethical engagement, impact on communities, sensemaking of diverse expertise as well as knowledge and innovation support to the surface. this polylogue emphasised the need in building bridges between university communities and other communities, the impact of agency through academic research, engagement in solving realworld problems. universities are globally viewed as anchor institutions, not just research institutions; the encouragement and expectation is expressed to go beyond that and create stronger leaders, communities, economies. moreover, the said discussion revealed that the agency, engagement and research ought to be supplemented with wisdom as a higher purpose, i.e. to connect the knowledge systems; and, in this connection, there is an expressed call to create a model of social enterprise, to create solutions to occurring challenges. specified concept of service-learning in social work education to develop the discussion on the essence and purpose of service -learning, scholars and practitioners try to highlight this pedagogical approach among other experiential learning practices. discussions on the character and features of service-learning attempt to specify the concept of service-learning mostly focussing on the engagement, learning and contribution of the parties involved. catherine m. lemieux and priscilla d. allen call this phenomenon ‘academic service-learning’, underlining that it is “a pedagogical approach that integrates community service with academic study to promote student reflection, critical thinking, and creative problem solving” (lemieux  allen, 2007, 309). they put emphasis on the importance of specification because the “definitions frame how student and community-oriented outcomes are conceptualized and operationalized” (ibid., 312). another scholar, andrew furco, draws ‘the balance beam’ to locate five “service-focused experiential learning practices”: volunteering and internship activities at the bottom level (meaning the recipients of the service benefit more in the case of volunteering; whereas , in the case of internship, a student (as a provider) focuses more on learning and benefits from it); the middle level includes community service and field education, with field education giving more educational benefit to a student, rather than community service stronger favouring recipients; and service-learning is depicted at the top, demonstrating that it encompasses, grounds on the features, practices and experiences of th e other ones drawn below (furco & norvell, 2019, 21). moreover, the hyphen connecting the words and concepts ‘service’ and ‘learning’ reflects the reciprocity and mutual benefit to both, the recipient and the provider, service and learning, which are foundational to the concept encompassing the symbiotic relationship (ibid., 22). in his book on service-learning, dan w. butin suggestively points out that “the service is not to benefit only the server (…). not only should the server provide a meaningful and relevant service to those he is serving, but often members of the community being served should be the ones responsible for articulating what the service should be in the first place.” (butin, 2010, 5). the reciprocal character of learning from and in communities, academic and common society, as well as the awareness about this mutually 44 contributing process develops the professional and personal competencies in students. this resonates with the social work competencies listed and defined in the recent epas standard for social work education, pointing them out but not limiting with them in the educational process: ethical and social behaviour, engagement in diversity and difference, concern about human rights and social, economic and environmental justice, engagement in policy practice, attention to individual, families, groups, organisation and communities (cswe, 2015). the social work competencies are connected to the earlier mentioned six dimensions in social work. moreover, in the epas standard, the emphasis is also put on one more reciprocal, interactive and symbiotic nature of service-learning in social work education: the practice-informed research and research-informed practice (cswe, 2015). the latter aspect brings about not only the aspect of student learning but also the research component in the entire university education process and progress. recent scholarly negotiations in relation to the updating of the concept definition for a european socio-cultural context took place in the frame of an international project “europe engage”, revealing an emerging “unique european version of service learning” (furco & norvell, 2019, p. 32) and produced an updated quite extensive definition of service-learning: service-learning (sometimes referred to as community based or community engaged learning) is an innovative pedagogical approach that integrates meaningful community service or engagement into the curriculum and offers students academic credit for the learning that derives from active engagement within community and work on a real world problem. reflection and experiential strategies underpin the learning process and the service is link to the academic discipline. service learning brings together students, academics and the community whereby all become teaching resources, problem solvers and partners. in addition to enhancing academic and real world learning, the overall purpose of service learning is to instil in students a sense of civic engagement and responsibility and work towards positive social change within society. (ibid.) this definition also echoes the global trends and experiences observed and gained throughout implementation of service-learning by higher education institutions, intentionally integrating curriculum with community service components, as underlined by c. m. lemieux and p. d. allen, “reestablishing higher educations’ commitment to solving social problems in the communities in which such institutions reside” (lemieux  allen, ibid.). overviewing the elaborations on the integration of service-learning and social work education, they observe that “community-based learning is consistent with social work education approaches that model and teach empowerment-oriented practice”, “social work education offers a prototype for service learning”, “experiential and community-based models (…) have had a consistent presence in social work education”, “all of social work education is service-learning” (ibid., 313). the interconnection of service-learning and social work is also elaborated by a number of other researchers in the field who emphasise that social work educators engage in service-learning as methodology and philosophy leading to a social change, renewal of both the academy and society, that “service-learning presents an opportunity for social work to reinforce its mission”, for a student to be a community participant (phillips, 2007, 8), treat service-learning as part of the social work curriculum through “the functioning of and interrelationships between social systems, the strengths perspective in practice, and empowerment” (furuto, 2007, 22), emphasise collaborative responsibilities of the three service-learning partners (student, university, community) seeking to fulfill their expectations (furuto, 2007), yet point out that “[i]nstitutions of higher education vary in their commitment to service learning” ( majewski, 2007, 46). the positioning of two elements of service-learning in delivery of social work education is linked to the intentional focus on either service or learning, also either reciprocity or 45 separation (campbell  bragg, 2007, 210–211). however, the researchers conclude that “[h]istorically, social work education has been grounded in experiential education, in developing social workers to improve communities and to take action based on the core values of the profession” (ibid., 217). moreover, students are viewed as agents of social change, the transformative change (hcuitsi, 2021). the overall task of service-learning is “to inspire and empower” (ibid.). not only service-learning, as a concept, needs constant theoretical and practical revision; social work does, too. th. o’hare observes that “little work has been done to provide a conceptual model of social work practice that incorporates a broad array of (…) interdisciplinary influences (…)” (o’hare, 2020, 3). elaborating on the professional functions, he points out interventions that “comprise combinations of essential skills drawn from three major categories: (1) supportive skills (…); (2) cognitive behavioural coping skills (…); (3) case management skills (…)” (ibid., 4). thus, service -learning is employed as an educational approach to develop and meet these demands in developing the multiple competencies of social workers. one more constituent part of social work education, empowerment, is viewed “not as a goal, but as a process” (ibid., 21). through servicelearning, empowerment is developed in and endowed to the three parties: students, community members and academic staff, empowering themselves and others in the scope of their expertise and purposeful engagement. discussion the overviewed complex and evolving concepts of service-learning and social work education require a discussion on the engaging reciprocity, demand trends and contexts, as requiring updated competencies for the academia and (pre-service) social workers, also requiring increasing awareness and agency from the community side. in his book’s chapter on service-learning, “defining and disturbing service-learning in higher education”, d. w. butin brings a stir to the common flow by enquiring what servicelearning “truly is” (butin, 2010, ). he articulates several questions in relation to the essence of service-learning: “is service-learning a pedagogical strategy for better comprehension of course content? a philosophical stance commitment to the betterment of the local and/ or global community? an institutionalized mechanism fostering students’ growth and self-awareness concerning responsibility? or (…) a voyeuristic exploitation of the “cultural other” that masquerades as academically sanctioned “servant leadership” (…)?” (ibid.). the researcher asks these questions seeking to point out the needed balance between service and learning and to “link them in a meaningful way” (ibid., 5). he emphasises that “service-learning is never a singular, stable, or, ultimately, controllable practice (…)” (ibid., 4). indeed, most of the presently reviewed literary sources have proven the latter observation. much depends on the socio-educational approach to the competences of social workers-to-be and the demands of actual communities they intend to contribute to. as a pedagogical strategy, service-learning is a much-promising opportunity, if driven on the basis of both locally and globally identified and defined activity dimensions, contexts, expectations etc. in relation to social work and education in the field. however, as concluded in the earlier paper on goals and experiences in implementation of service-learning, “[t]he paradigm shift of service-learning and critical service-learning, the transition in the approach to higher education led by the goal to educate professionals who are socially-conscious, active citizens capable of demonstrating their agency, having work-life skills and having experience-based knowledge of culture they are about to immerse in as professionals likely leading to a positive social change in society drive the educational innovation further” (gruslyte, 2020, 208). not leaving the community role aside, it is worth 46 emphasising that reciprocity, partnership, shared wisdom and togetherness broaden the opportunities facilitated by the synergy. reviewing the ongoing scholarly investigations on service-learning in social work education, c. m. lemieux and p. d. allen conclude that “research lags far behind practice ideals” (lemieux  allen, 2007, 321), “[s]ervice-learning in social work education is a pedagogical approach in need of more rigorous evaluation research to advance knowledge and to inform practice in the field” (ibid.). being aware of continuous educational and social changes, they point out the need “to build theory from the design and conduct of servicelearning activities that produce meaningful outcome at all levels” (ibid., 312). elaborating on the social work theory, d. howe distinguishes two kinds of theory: theories for social work and theories of social work (howe, 2016). the beneficial reciprocity of service-learning and social work education, as continuously developing, interacting and symbiotically generating processes, seeks to explore and implement both aspects, for and of, because these are the key points in approaching the complex phenomenon of the socio-educational reality. in this respect, the present paper attempted to display the diversity of approaches, treatment of service-learning as an educational philosophy, method, innovation technique in social work education as an area where social and educational demands and visions meet to generate the positive social change. references barzelis, a., barcytė, l., & mažeikienė, n. 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(2011). mokymosi tarnaujant bendruomenei sociokultūrinė adaptacija lietuvos universitete. daktaro disertacija. šiauliai: šiaulių universiteto leidykla. http://dx.doi.org/10.17770/sie2020vol1.5078 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tnc82vudgni&feature=youtu.be http://www.jstor.org/stable/23044268 https://doi.org/10.1080/10665680701228797 https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ej831374.pdf https://www.bu.edu/ssw/files/2017/07/social-work-competencies-and-multidimensional-assessment-poulin-and-matis.pdf https://www.bu.edu/ssw/files/2017/07/social-work-competencies-and-multidimensional-assessment-poulin-and-matis.pdf https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315109053 16 modern approaches of student's social health formation in the process of physical education viacheslav babych1, оleksandr dubovoi2, serhii savchenko3, vitalii kurilo4, serhii kharchenko5, volodymyr zaitsev 6 1,2,3,4,5si ‘luhansk taras shevchenko national university’, ukraine 6chernihiv national technological university, ukraine abstract. objective: to ascertain the influence of the updated physical education syllabus in the context of forming social health of secondary school students, as well as motivation of schoolchildren for physical education classes. material: 457 school students (230 females and 227 males) of the 6th and 7th grades (aged 12-13) from different regions of ukraine were respondents of the survey. method: observation, interviews and the authors’ questionnaires (‘interest in physical education’with the use of customized tests by m. ginzburg (zaniuk, 2002), questionnaires ‘value orientations’ by m. rokeach (rozov, 2005), ‘orientation towards increasing social health of a person’, as well as a questionnaire on the need of accomplishments by yu. orlov and reyzas assertiveness schedule (big encyclopedia of psychological tests, 2007). results: it was discovered that in 2008-2009 only 23.7% of schoolchildren liked physical education classes. within this period of time, 18.5% of school students had a high level of orientation towards improving their own social health. the corrections made in 2012 to physical education syllabus contributed to an increase in the number of school students with a high level of motivation for physical education classes(+ 41.7%), as well as the number of students who had a high level of orientation towards improving their own social health (+23.3%). positive changes were also recorded after the improvement of physical education syllabus in 2017 (under conditions of physical education reformation in ukraine). the number of schoolchildren with a high level of motivation for physical education classes increased by 10.5% compared with the results recorded in 2012-2016. the number of students aimed at improving their own state of social health increased by 17.1%. the content of physical education syllabus of years 2012 and 2017 has significant advantages over the syllabus of the soviet times in the context of developing students’ desire to be engaged in physical education on the whole and improve their own level of social health in particular. it is characterized by the improvement of the system of assessing schoolchildren’s achievements in physical fitness, the option to increase the amount of time devoted to students’ mastering various kinds of sports that are of particular interest to them, and the focus on providing schoolchildren with key life competencies. keywords: education system, reformation, schoolchildren, school subject ‘physical education’, social health. to cite this article: babych, v., dubovoi, o., savchenko, s., kurilo, v., kharchenko, s., & zaitsev, v. (2021). modern approaches of student's social health formation in the process of physical education. education. innovation. diversity, 2(2), 16-23. doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2021.1.5420 introduction the problem of forming a physically and mentally healthy person arose with the advent of human society and was in the process of formation, supplementation and reinterpretation over centuries (iermakova, 2014). up to now, this problem has been relevant not only in ukraine but also in other countries of the world. thus, scientists from algeria (kenioua & boumasjed, 2016) emphasize the importance of maintaining mental health of young students through their integration into various entertainment and competitive activities. authors of the article ‘academic youth's health behavior’ (radzimińska et al, 2016) lay stress on the implementation of health promotion programs for polish students. the scientists note that the life style, habits and behaviour patterns of a person play an extremely important role in protecting his/her health. they also pay attention to the study of the peculiarities of psychological and social protection of children at the age of 12-14 (liashenko et al, 2017). https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2021.1.5420 17 within the frames of our research, we have also taken the scientific works that contain the analysis of the content of physical education syllabus in different countries of the world, including physical education syllabus in poland (turchyk et al, 2009), physical education in the us schools (osadchaya, 2004), peculiarities of the organization of physical education in canada and germany (danilova, 2010), physical education in west european countries (saparhasimova & pluzhnov, 2017) into consideration.we also relied on previous research in the context of determining the impact of the updated physical education program on the level of motivation of students to exercise. education in ukraine is being reformed now. the ministry of education and science of ukraine has developed foundations of the education standard ‘the new ukrainian school’ (hrynevych et al, 2016).any educator, from teacher-practitioners to leading scholars of pedagogical science could join the process. it is worth noting that the best practices of the most developed countries of the world and europe were taken into account when drawing up these extremely important legal and regulatory documents. thus, in the academic year 2017-2018, the subject ‘physical education’ was taught on the basis of an updated syllabus in accordance with the reform of general secondary education in ukraine. the research objective is: to ascertain the influence of the updated physical education syllabus in the context of forming social health of secondary school students, as well as motivation of schoolchildren for physical education classes. methods participants. 457 school students (230 females and 227 males) of the 6th and 7th grades (aged 12-13) from different regions of ukraine were respondents of the survey. the state of motivation of the schoolchildren for physical education classes and their desire to systematically raise their own level of social health were assessed with the help of a set of research methods: observation, interviews and the authors’ questionnaires (‘interest in physical education’with the use of customized tests by m. ginzburg (zaniuk, 2002), questionnaires ‘value orientations’ by m. rokeach (rozov, 2005), ‘orientation towards increasing social health of a person’, as well as a questionnaire on the need of accomplishments by yu. orlov and reyzas assertiveness schedule (big encyclopedia of psychological tests, 2007). the research objective is: to ascertain the influence of the updated physical education syllabus in the context of forming social health of secondary school students, as well as motivation of schoolchildren for physical education classes. mathematical and statistical processing. to compare the frequency distribution between students pearson's chi-squared test x2 was used. it allows juxtaposing two empirical distributions and concluding if they are consistent with each other. results and discussion within the framework of this research, it is important for us to carry out a content analysis of physical education syllabus at various stages of its improvement in 2012 and 2017, as well as to investigate its impact on schoolchildren according to two main indicators: orientation of school students towards the increase of their own level of social health by means of physical education (indicator 1) and motivation of students for physical education (indicator 2).in order to find out the impact of the updated physical education syllabus in the context of schoolchildren’s orientation towards improving their own level of social health (in the process of physical education), as well as the motivation of students for attending physical education classes, we compared the results of the students ‘questionnaires completed in 2008-2009 with the results obtained from questionnaires filled out in 2012-2016and in 2017-2018. these are 18 the periods when some corrections were made to physical education syllabus in terms of its content. the questionnaires, interviews and observations conducted allowed us to establish that in 2008-2009 (before the beginning of the reformation of physical education in ukraine) only 23.7% of school students liked physical education lessons, 28.9% liked them partially, 47.4% of schoolchildren did not like physical education at all. similar results were received regarding the desire of schoolchildren to increase their own level of social health in the process of physical education. thus, 18.5% of school students had a high level of orientation in the abovementioned context; 24.1% displayed partial orientation; and 57.4% of schoolchildren had lack of orientation towards the increase of their level of social health. given the information above, we can see that the results obtained according to the above indicators correlate with each other. more than one-third of school students showed insufficient level of motivation for physical education classes and orientation towards improving their level of social health by means of physical education. meanwhile, we will substantiate the reasons for such results later in the section ‘discussion’. we will focus on the analysis of physical education syllabus 2012 (developed by t.krutsevych as the head of the editorial board). unlike physical education in soviet times, the improved physical education syllabus (2012) is based on a modular system. we can emphasize the syllabus positive changes in the context of raising school students’ interest in physical education and social health. the thing is that since 2012 practically every kind of sports (within the frames of the subject ‘physical education’) can be an optional module. thus, teachers of physical education can develop their own optional modules for this syllabus (krutsevych et al, 2012), which have to undergo the process of verification. this is totally different from the requirements for a syllabus in soviet times, where its content was strictly regulated. the syllabus of 2012 also provides (at least, it is not excluded) an increase or decrease in the number of hours to study any module (kind of sports). thus, in case most schoolchildren are interested in this or that kind of sports (football, basketball, etc.), the teacher can increase the number of hours for teaching it. therefore, school students’ desires and aspirations are again taken into account. under these conditions, schoolchildren also have an opportunity to improve the level of technoque skills. the change in approaches to assessing school students’ achievements has a prominent role in the context of improvement of physical education syllabus. as it is noted in the syllabus, the following activities can be assessed in order to have a clear vision of schoolchildren’s educational achievements in physical education classes: 1. acquisition of a physical exercise technique (can be carried out independently from the educational standard). 2. meeting the educational standard (taking into account the dynamics of individual results). 3. performance of educational tasks in class. 4. acquisition of theoretical and methodological knowledge. we would like to put emphasis on the second point of the assessment of school children’s educational achievements in physical education classes. it states that the assessment of the fact whether the tasks performed meet the educational standard takes into account the dynamics of individual results. at the same time, the mark received for meeting the educational standard is not the main during the thematic, semester or annual assessment. in our opinion, this is the key point in the context of forming social health of adolescents within the frames of this subject. being focused on their own achievements, school students do not get disenchanted with themselves, their own willpower and abilities (the way it used to be in soviet times when the standards were not met). on the contrary, even if a school child is not able to show high results when trying to meet this or that norm, he (she) will eventually be able to see the progress in the 19 development of his (her) physical qualities, taking into account the dynamics of individual results. it also gives school students an impetus for further ‘small’ victories over themselves, and therefore directly affects the improvement of the state of social health of the schoolchildren. our research justifies the corrections made to the syllabus (2012). thus, the number of students who liked physical education classes doubled, from 23.7% (in 2008-2009) to 65.4% (from 2012 to 2016). as we can see, the difference between the results was + 36.5%, (p <0.05). the number of schoolchildren who did not like classes significantly decreased, from 47.4% to 18.2% (-29.2%). there also were significant positive changes to the number of students who had a high level of orientation towards raising their level of social health in the process of physical education. the number of students with a high level of such an orientation increased by 23.3% (from 18.5% to 41.8%, p <0.05). instead, the number of schoolchildren with a low level decreased by 35.7% (from 57.4% to 21.7%). from everything given above, we can also see that positive changes correlate with each other according to both indicators. this is especially relevant to the reduction of the number of schoolchildren with low level of interest (the first indicator) and low levels of orientation towards improving their own social health (the second indicator). the difference between them was only 6.5%. significantly greater differences were recorded regarding the number of schoolchildren with a high level of interest in physical education and orientation towards improving their social health. namely 13.2% in favour of the first indicator (interest in physical education). therefore, although the corrections made to the syllabus (2012) had a positive impact on both indicators, the positive changes in raising school students’ interest in physical education were more significant. meanwhile, within the framework of this research, it was important for us to establish changes upon both of the indicators (in dynamics) after the corrections to physical education syllabus made in 2017. firstly, we would like to analyse the corrections made to the syllabus in the context of the education system reformation in ukraine. the content of physical education syllabus 2017 (revised in accordance with order no. 52 of the ministry of education and science of ukraine dated 13january2017 and order no. 201 dated 10 february 2017, the head of the editorial board being m. tymchyk) is based on the acquisition of key vital competences by students. within the scope of this publication, we will briefly turn to the analysis of those content segments of the syllabus that address the problems of forming social health of adolescents and increase the motivation of schoolchildren to be engaged in physical education. thus, the content segment ‘environmental safety and sustainable development’ provides for the formation of social activity, responsibility and environmental awareness among school students, readiness to participate in solving environmental and society development problems, awareness of the importance of sustainable development for future generations. the content segment‘civil liability’ also has a direct impact on the formation of social health of contemporary adolescents. the implementation of this content segment (as it is indicated in the syllabus) is aimed at the formation of a responsible member of the community and society who understands the principles and mechanisms of the society functioning. these components are extremely important in the context of forming schoolchildren’s social health. the same applies to the content segment ‘health and safety’, within the framework of which it is proposed to consider issues that involve the formation of a schoolchild as a spiritually, emotionally, socially and physically competent member of the society that can lead healthy lifestyle and create a safe living environment. the syllabus emphasises that with the help of this content segment,school students will realize that physical education is an important means of increasing social activity of people, satisfying their moral, aesthetic and creative needs, a vital urge to have mutual communication, to develop friendly relations, etc. there is a stress laid on the importance of conscious attitude of students to their own health and health of other people, the ability to 20 organize a game or other type of motor activity, communicate in different situations of sports activities, defuse conflicts, achieve fair victory and admit defeat with dignity, ensure fair play, etc. the results of the school student survey in 2018 showed that the content segments introduced into the revised physical education syllabus positively influenced schoolchildren’s aspirations for increasing their own social health. this can be seen clearly if to compare this with the previous results of the school student survey. thus, if in 2014 the number of students with a low level of orientation towards improving their social health was 21.7%, then after the implementation of the revised physical education syllabus (in the context of reforming physical education in ukraine in 2018), there were 12.4% of them (-9.3%). the number of schoolchildren with a high level of such an orientation got comparatively increased from 41.8% of students in 2014 to 58.9% (+ 17.1%, p <0.05). we can also observe positive changes in the increase of the number of students who became more interested in physical education. from 65.4% (2014) to 75.9% in 2018 (+ 10.5%, p <0.05).). there was a decrease in the number of schoolchildren who did not like physical education lessons to 9.7% from 18.2% in 2014 (-8.5%). repeatedly, we can see that positive changes were recorded upon both indicators with minor differences between them.the dynamics of changes of motivation of schoolchildren for attending the physical education lessons as well as their orientation towards improving their social health can be clearly seen with the help of the diagrams (fig. 1 and 2). figure 1 the dynamics of changes of motivation of schoolchildren for attending the physical education lessons 23,70% 65,40% 75,90% 28,90% 16,40% 14,40% 47,40% 18,20% 9,70% 2008 2012 2017 a low level of motivation for the physical education lessons an average level of motivation for the physical education lessons a high level of motivation for the physical education lessons 21 figure 2 the dynamics of changes of the level of orientation of schoolchildren towards improving their social health from the results of the research described above, we can see that their change in dynamics correlates with the existing changes in the content of the subject ‘physical education’. the lowest indicators of the desire of schoolchildren to increase their own level of social health with the help of the possibilities provided by physical education, as well as the lowest rates of students’ desire to attend this class, were observed until 2012.this is the period when the subject ‘physical education’ was taught according to the syllabus which was to a large extent based on the syllabus developed in soviet times. starting from 2012 up to 2016, the interest in this subject and the desire to raise their own level of social health among school students gradually increased. in 2018 (the next year after physical education syllabus was finalized in 2017), there was also a certain increase in the number of students who became more interested in physical education and aimed at improving their social health. this, in our opinion, took place due to strengthening the theoretical part of the syllabus in the context of raising awareness among schoolchildren about the formation and preservation of their own health, ensuring social activity by means of physical education, acquisition of the necessary vital competencies, etc. the justification of the corrections made to physical education syllabus is confirmed by other studies by e. uvarov, m. belaid, s. yahiaoui. on analysing syllabi of physical education in schools of europe, the authors have discovered that today, in the organization of physical education, it is necessary to focus on the balanced effect of both the motor and intellectual components of physical education (uvarov et al, 2016). this also corresponds to the results of other studies, which state that one of the conditions for improving the motivation of school students to be engaged in physical education is to increase the level of knowledge in physical education (kondakov et al, 2015). one of the most important benefits of the improved physical education syllabus of 2012 and 2017 is that, unlike it used to be done according to the soviet syllabus, students are not forced to be involved in physical education. on the contrary, according to the concept of an updated syllabus, teachers are willing to persuade students of the importance of physical education. it is implemented through the improvement of the system of assessing schoolchildren’s progressing physical education, creating conditions for improving knowledge in the context of the beneficial effects of physical education for a person, taking into account the desires of school students to master a particular kind of sports, etc. the fact that there was a significant number of schoolchildren who did not like physical education lessons (until 2012) is substantiated by the content of the syllabus itself, which largely resembled physical education syllabus of the soviet era. in soviet times, neither desires of students nor facilities and resources or any other conditions and circumstances were taken 18,50% 41,80% 58,90% 24,10% 36,50% 28,70% 57,40% 21,70% 12,40% 2008 2012 2017 a low level of orientation towards improving social health an average level of orientation towards improving social health a high level of orientation towards improving social health 22 into account when choosing different kinds of sports to be offered to schoolchildren for mastering within the frames of the subject ‘physical education’. thus, school students’ identity and interests were ignored (by the system of physical education at the time), which, surely, negatively affected both schoolchildren’s desire to attend physical education and the state of their social health. meanwhile, this was not the worst thing that negatively influenced school students in this context. it should be noted that physical education classes in the soviet era were permeated with ‘drilling’ a child. this, in its turn, constantly ‘constrained ‘school students, and did not allow them to fully enjoy the classes. mastering any kind of sports (volleyball, basketball, etc.) was largely compulsory. physical education classes to a certain extent resembled a training session that should take place when preparing athletes in such institutions as children's sports school. when providing characterisation of the assessment of school students’ achievements in physical education (at the time), it is worth mentioning that, firstly, the educational standards of physical fitness were rather high for students. secondly, when this standards were designed they almost ignored the height of a schoolchild (for example, when jumping over a ‘pommel horse’), the weight (for example, when climbing up a rope), and other objective parameters that can somehow affect the performance. however, the assessment of schoolchildren’s achievements in physical education (in soviet times) for a term, or even an academic year, was based on the compliance with the standards of physical fitness. it is noteworthy that this did not take into account such aspects as students’ diligence when mastering a particular technical element, their activity in class, theoretical knowledge, etc. there was almost no individual approach to a child within the frames of the educational process in physical education classes. instead, a child who did not manage to comply with the standards, felt humiliated, awkward, and inferior. this, in its turn, negatively affected the students’ desire to attend such classes, as well as the state of social health of the vast majority of schoolchildren. conclusions summing up everything given above, we can draw the following conclusions: 1) the lack of an individual approach to personality within the educational process, coercion, unreasonably high standards of assessing achievements in physical education were the main negative manifestations of physical education in soviet times. this, in its turn, had a very negative impact on schoolchildren’s desire to be engaged in physical education, as well as on the state of their social health. 2) the syllabus of 2012 stipulates the improvement of the system for assessing the achievements of schoolchildren in physical education, taking into account possibilities for increasing the time for mastering the kinds of sports that schoolchildren are interested in. as a result, it significantly influenced the schoolchildren’s desire to be engaged in physical education, as well as on the state of their social health. 3) the content of the updated physical education syllabus (2017) has an enormous potential for providing schoolchildren with knowledge on the improvement of somatic and social health. the benefit of the revised syllabus (in terms of reforming physical education in ukraine), as compared to the syllabus 2012, is also its focus on providing schoolchildren with key life competencies. references big encyclopedia of psychological tests (2007). moscow: eksmo. danilova, l. 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(2002). psykholohiia motyvatsii. navchalnyi posibnyk. k.: lybid. https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.950949 https://doi.org/10.15561/20755279.2016.0305 https://doi.org/10.15561/20755279.2015.0103 https://doi.org/10.15561/18189172.2017.0406 https://osvita.ua/school/program/program-5-9/56135 https://doi.org/10.15561/20755279.2016.0607 http://repo.kspi.kz/bitstream/handle/item http://w1.c1.rada.gov.ua/ http://nus.org.ua/ https://cyberleninka.ru/ title of the paper. 57 intervention of autogenous training techniques for psychological preparedness of sports school students helēna vecenāne¹, žermēna vazne² 1liepaja university, researcher of liepaja university institute of educational sciences, latvia 2latvian academy of sports education, department of sports and training theory, pedagogy, psychology and pedagogical practice, latvia² abstract. athletes' success in sports is linked not only to good physical, technical and tactical preparedness, but also to psychological fitness. in sports psychology there are two basic types of psychological preparation, namely general psychological preparation and special psychological preparation. just as comprehensive physical preparation is the basis for an athlete's special, technical, tactical fitness, so comprehensive psychological preparation is the basis for an athlete's mental toughness both during the training and competing. regardless of the stressors, the athletes with higher levels of mental toughness can overcome more easily the negative effects of stress. in order to gain mental toughness skills, it is necessary to develop basic psychological skills at the same time as starting sports activities, and this process should continue in parallel with the entire training process. the aim of the study: to explore the intervention benefits of autogenous training (at) techniques for improving the psychological skills of young women volleyball players. research method: a survey was employed for obtaining the athletes' feedback. results: statistically significant changes were found in the self-assessment of athletes' well-being after autogenous training. the self-assessment results show that athletes reach different at acquisition levels as the result of a two-month at intervention: 7.7% of athletes do not have difficulty with at techniques, for 30.8% at come easy, but not always, 53.8% of athletes sometimes manage to feel warmth in different parts of the body, relax, concentrate, focus attention on breathing and repetition of the target formulas, but for 7.7% of athletes the acquisition results of at techniques are poor. keywords: autogenous training techniques, psychological preparation, athletes to cite this article: vecenāne, h. & vazne, ž. (2022). intervention of autogenous training techniques for psychological preparedness of sports school students. education. innovation. diversity, 1(4), 57-63. doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2022.1.6806 introduction the athletes' success in sports is linked not only to good physical, technical and tactical preparedness, but also to psychological fitness. the aim of the athlete's psychological preparation is to help the athletes achieve optimal development, experience, and performance, while the coaches must not only be the process managers of the respective sport, but also provide the athletes with psychological support (vealey, 2007). exploring the recommendations and methodical materials elaborated by volleyball federation (fivb, n.d.), in the section on the required qualities of volleyball players, the following indicators can be identified: mental states required for the players to learn volleyball techniques and tactics; mental states and qualities related to winning or losing competitions. the athlete qualities, such as self-confidence, positive thinking, willpower or determination, the ability to think and make decisions independently are also important. there are two types of psychological preparation: general and special. general psychological preparation is characterized by focusing on formation and development of universal (comprehensive, versatile, multipurpose) psychological skills, which, being important in sports, are valued in many other areas of human activity and form the basis for psychological preparedness. in turn, special psychological preparation means focusing on the formation and development of athletes' mental abilities and personality traits, promoting success in specific conditions of sports activity (ahatov & rabotin, 2008). https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2022.1.6806 58 the aim of the general psychological preparation is to improve the athlete's psychological skills, including the acquisition of stress management strategies, and it is a multifaceted process (weinberg & gould, 2019). just as general physical preparedness is the basis for an athlete's specific, technical and tactical fitness, so the general psychological preparedness is the basis for athlete’s mental toughness both during the training process and during competing. regardless of the stress factors, the athletes with greater mental resilience can overcome more easily the negative effects of stress. in order to achieve such psychological resilience, for an athlete it is necessary to develop basic psychological skills at the same time as starting sports activities, and this process should continue in parallel with the entire training process (kaiseler et al., 2009). the process of acquiring psychological skills is linked to systematic and consistent practice of psychological skills in order to improve the athlete's performance, increase wellbeing or achieve greater satisfaction from participation in sports and physical activity (weinberg & gould, 2019). the experience of sports psychology specialists shows that athletes sometimes have to wait a long time before the positive effects of the learned stress management techniques appear, and sometimes it can even lead to a decrease in the athlete's initial performance. better results appear when psychological preparation tools and strategies are integrated and have become an athlete’s natural way of thinking, feeling and behaving (uneståhl, n.d; bunszen & uneståhl, 1997). traditionally, the most commonly used methods for improving psychological skills in sports are guided imagination, relaxation, goal setting, inner self-talk, biofeedback learning, performance profiling and behavioural management techniques, of which four methods are used most frequently: guided imagination, goal setting, thought management, and relaxation/arousal regulation (vealey, 2007). a study by kaiseler et al. (2009) shows that athletes with higher mental toughness more easily overcome the negative effects of stress. in order to achieve such psychological toughness it is necessary to develop basic psychological skills throughout the entire training process. molina et al. (2018), studying the emotional reactions of young athletes during competitions, conclude that it is necessary to teach athletes from an early age to reinterpret cognitively situations, because uncontrolled emotional reactions divert attention and concentration during competitions. therefore, the athletes must learn to manage regularly the intensity of emotional reactions from the first years of competing, as well as to understand their emotional states, because, as the research data indicates, the young athletes often suppress emotions during the competition. by blocking emotional reactions, the opposite results are observed, increasing tension and anxiety. that is why it is so important to start the psychological preparation of young athletes in a timely manner, promoting the athlete’s psychological resilience, as it is a dynamic process characterized by a positive adaptation pace in the context of significant difficulties (fletcher & sarkar, 2012). for the psychological preparation of athletes, one of the well-tested training methods is autogenous training (at). at was first mentioned in 1932 by german psychiatrist johannes heinrich schultz. it consists of structured self-inspiration techniques and positive inner selftalk formulas. the term "autogenous" is derived from the greek words "autos" and "genos" and can be translated as "self-exercising" or "self-induction therapy". at is a conceptually designed system that has a physiological basis, and self-hypnotic (self-suggestive) recommendations are woven in the form of an intervention that connects the "mind" and the "body" (linden, 2007). autogenous training is a psychophysiological technique of self-control, which aims at physical and mental relaxation and consists of automated verbal suggestions by which individuals learn how to change certain psychophysiological functions, initially with minimal 59 intervention of another person, but when the technique is mastered – without any intervention of another person (gunter, 1996). thus, at is a comprehensive system with a broad philosophical basis, and its assumptions and goals are shared by other methods of relaxation and meditative practice. meditative experience and concentration are rooted not only in psychology but also in neuroscience and neurobiology. it affects not only the level of functional activity of the brain, but also affects structural changes in the grey and white matter, especially in the areas of the brain and networks related to attention and memory, interoception and sensory processing, as well as self-regulation and automatic regulation. these areas of central nervous system activity include the regulation of emotions and stress, which, in addition to the integration of the central autonomous regions, includes the limbic system, endogenous motivation and reward centres, thus reducing anxiety and ‘stress sensitivity’ as well as improving the ability to learn and remember (schlamann et al., 2010; esch, 2013). already in 1986, lindemanis (1986) writes that with the help of at, the athletes can overcome the pre-start fever and tension during competitions, the tension caused by inferiority complex and expectations of approaching competition, general nervousness and develop the ability to use all their resources to improve the performance and mobilize unused resources. according to ortigosamárquez, carranque-cháves & mendo (2015), the at technique positively modulates an athlete's pre-competition self-confidence and subjective vitality level, while research of mohammadi, ziabari & treur (2019) indicates the effectiveness of autogenic training in regulating an individual's tension and emotions. the main possibilities of using at in sports can be combined in three sets of exercises: a "mobilizing set" for pre-start apathy and fatigue; a "calming set" for reducing increased prestart anxiety, as well as anxiety after competing; and a "somnolent set" used in cases of increased negative tension and sleep disorders. these modifications focus on self-regulation of respiratory and cardiac functions, as well as neuromuscular apparatus and ideomotor training (reshetnikov, 2018), which helps to effectively implement the psychological preparation process of athletes to improve the performance in competitions (bidzan-bluma, pielak, & budnik-przybylska, 2017). the aim of this study is to explore the benefits of at interventions to improve the psychological skills of young volleyball players. methodology the research was carried out according to ethical rules, and a research group – volleyball players of the school of sports games, 16-18 years young women (n =13), was established. the parents of the young athletes were informed about the participation in the study in accordance with the provisions of the data protection law. all athletes had not previously practiced autogenous trainings, as well as they had not previously undergone psychological training sessions. a total of eight autogenous training sessions were designed and conducted, which included seven at exercises, and the sessions took place once a week during the two-month period. the research method – survey was employed for obtaining athletes' feedback. the survey consists of four questions that reveal the athletes' self-assessment of the acquisition quality of at techniques and acquired skills for the improvement of their psychological preparedness. additional two questions describe the athlete's well-being on a scale from 1-10 before and after acquisition of at techniques (cronbach's alpha α = 0.924), but t-test is used for a comparative analysis of the results and determines the differences in the related samples. there are also two open-ended self-assessment questions for the evaluation of performance quality of at exercises: “which exercises were successful?” and “which exercises caused 60 you difficulty?”. the performance of at techniques was assessed on a scale from 1-10, based on the following criteria: very high acquisition level (10 – "outstanding", 9 – "excellent"); high acquisition level (8 – "very good", 7 – "good"); medium acquisition level (6 – "almost good", 5 – "mediocre", 4 – "almost mediocre"); low acquisition level (3 – "weak", 2 – "very weak", 1 –"very, very weak"). the athletes completed the survey in writing immediately after the at sessions. for holistic and comprehensive development of the athlete's personality, the classical exercises of at techniques were summarized according to j.h. schultz (linden, 2007). when working on the cognitive or educational component, it is taken into account that these young women athletes previously did not have any information about at, and when compiling the set of at techniques, an explanatory part – a mini-lecture was included, as well as explanatory and educational work was performed at each at session. the assessment of performance quality of at techniques also includes the personality development component, which generally reflects the person's worldviews and attitudes that leads a person to action. in this case, the determining factors are the attitude and the ability to assess one's activities. by perfecting the emotional and willpower components, the acquisition of at techniques, like any other new exercise, requires willpower, patience and emotional return. psychophysiological components – at techniques include exercises, during which one can get a feeling of heaviness and warmth in the limbs, regular deep breathing, a feeling of warmth in the area of solar plexus, a feeling of coolness in the area of the forehead. summarizing the set of at techniques, the recommendations of reshetnikov (reshetnikov, 2018) on the components of psychomuscular part of at in sports were taken into account: the ability to relax muscles; the ability to visualize the content of at formulas as vividly as possible with a strong power of imagination but without mental strain; the ability to maintain attention to the chosen object; the ability to influence oneself with an appropriate verbal formula. this approach is intended for actualizing such psychological skills necessary for the athletes as concentration, self-control, relaxation, visualization, positive self-talk, selfesteem and self-confidence, and self-regulation of emotional manifestations caused by stress. the principle of gradualness was applied to acquisition of at techniques. therefore, when planning at sessions, a new element was gradually added to each at session; and in addition to the traditional two at parts – calming and activating, an introductory part was added with the task of breathing observation (10 breathing cycles), followed by the first exercise (invoking the feeling of heaviness and warmth in the limbs and solar plexus area). in the first three sessions, the classic at techniques were included (except for “the heart beats calmly and regularly”), a total of five exercises, and one exercise for exiting the state of relaxation. the given at techniques develop and perfect the athletes' bodily sensations, concentration abilities, attention retention and relaxation skills, and starting with the fourth session, another exercise was added – the target formula for the improvement of positive selftalk, self-confidence and self-belief. research results and discussion prior to the execution of at techniques, the average self-assessment scores of the athletes' well-being on a scale from 1-10 are m= 7.3; sd = 0.5, and m= 7.8; sd =0.6 after the execution of at techniques. the analysis of the data obtained from the athletes' well-being self-assessment before and after the intervention of at techniques show reliable (p<0.05) results – the well-being of the athletes improves after the execution of at techniques (see figure 1). 61 0 2 4 6 8 10 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 self-assessment of athletes' well-being on a scale from 1 to 10 before and after at intervention before at after at number of l essons figure1 self-assessment of athletes' well-being on a scale from 1 to 10 before and after at intervention (n=13) (created by the authors) analysing and summarizing the participants' reflection on the acquisition process of at techniques, the obtained results indicate that the athletes managed to relax and feel the warmth in some part of the body. in turn, the difficulties were experienced with invocation of warm sensations in certain specific parts of the body, feeling coolness in the forehead and with concentration on repeating the target formula. the athletes' self-reflections show that the same techniques that came easy in one session, can bring some struggles in another session. this suggests that learning at techniques requires more systematic practice and it would be advisable to motivate the athletes to practice them independently on a daily basis in order to strengthen the skills acquired in the training sessions. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 perfomance (score 1-10) 8 10 8 6 8 6 8 6 4 6 6 6 6 0 2 4 6 8 10 12 parti cipant self-assessment of athletes' at performance skills in points from 1-10 figure 2 scoring of athletes' at skills based on athletes' self-assessment (n=13) (created by the authors) when analysing the self-assessment of acquisition of at techniques, it can be assumed that at techniques do not cause difficulties for 7.7% of athletes as they assessed them with 10 points. for 30.8% of respondents the at techniques came easy but not always as rated with 8 points. 53.8% of athletes succeed sometimes when performing the exercises and feel 62 warmth in different parts of the body, relax, concentrate, focus attention on breathing and repetition of the target formulas, and assessed it with 6 points. in turn, 7.7% of athletes have a poor at technique acquisition score, rated with 4 points (see figure 2). the analysis of the research data undoubtedly indicates that the implementation of psychological skills programmes makes a significant contribution to the performance of the athletes in competitions and to the development of athletes' personalities (dehghani & ebrahimi, 2017; razali et al., 2017; vesković et al., 2019). at the same time, studies also indicate that short-term intervention does not provide reliable results, however, the acquired knowledge on the benefits of psychological skills programmes and the positive experience gained in the process of acquiring various mental techniques provide athletes with additional motivation for further development of psychological skills (kudlackova, 2011; bryant, 2017; mohebi et al., 2022). conclusions the self-assessments of athletes' well-being indicate that the athletes' well-being improved after performing of at techniques, and these changes are statistically reliable (p<0.05). the self-assessment results show that athletes reach a different at acquisition level as a result of the two-month long autogenous training intervention: 7.7% of athletes do not have difficulty with at techniques, for 30.8% at come easy, but not always, 53.8% of athletes sometimes manage to feel warmth in different parts of the body, relax, concentrate, focus attention on breathing and repetition of the target formulas, but for 7.7% of athletes the acquisition results of at techniques are poor. athletes should continue to develop concentration, relaxation and visualization skills in order to acquire persistent psychological skills and the ability to apply them in different situations. the results of this study show positive trends in the well-being self-assessment of the respondents after repeated use of at techniques, but due to the small number of respondents, the results cannot be generalized. preferably, the research study should be repeated including a larger number of respondents. references ahatov, а.м. & rabotin, i.v. 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(2023). a new development model of sustainable communication for higher education institutions. education. innovation. diversity, 2(6), 30-48. doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2023.1.7175 introduction higher education institutions are the important chain in provision of the interconnections between the workforce (school graduates, youth, or adults), representatives from different economic sectors, experts from research and innovation development organisations, and all the interested contributors. in these terms, higher education institutions are principle players that link all these stakeholders. the significance of higher education institutions is emphasized by their widely acknowledged main functions: education, research and innovation. thereby, modern higher education institutions, being the linking chain between different actors interested in cooperation with higher education sector, play an important role in strengthening regional development as well as economics (ahrens, zaščerinska, amanzholova, aleksejeva, zaščerinskis, aleksejeva, gukovica, & abjalkiene, 2021). the means for linking higher education institutions and their stakeholders from different regional domains and economic sectors is well accepted to be sustainable communication as it refers to each single activity in any life sphere being it a task implementation or opinion exchange. sustainable communication is considered to be of great significance as sustainable communication helps solving many issues. for example, strengthening sustainable competitiveness, as set out in the european green deal (fetting, 2020), or ensuring social fairness by putting into practice the first principle of the european pillar of social rights https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2023.1.7175 39 (european commission, 2018), or building society resilience to react to crises, based on the lessons of the covid-19 pandemic. the research purpose is to build a new development model of sustainable communication for higher education institutions. this research is qualitative as it aims at constructing a new model. the research integrates the use of theoretical analysis, comparative analysis of existing models, theoretical modelling, model creation, summarising analysis. methodology of the model creation the methodology of a model creation implies a range of logical and sequential steps. in step 1, the term “model” is defined. this also would need the comparison of model definitions, structures, and procedures. afterwards, in step 2, scientific literature on sustainable communication is reviewed and analysed. we analyse the terms “sustainability and “communication” first separately and, later, “sustainable communication” as one unit of analysis. we found out that sustainable communication is closely related to the terms “data”, “information”, and “knowledge”. then, in step 3, a new development model of sustainable communication for higher education institutions will be shown and explained in detail. it should be pointed that the methodology of this research is not a linear process. if step 2 does not give the expected results, then the researchers return to step 1 and revise the implemented work. the same refers to step 3: if the results of the research in step 3 are not satisfactory, the researchers re-consider the work done in step 2. research results before we start the creation of a model, it would be great to understand what a model means. thus, our search reveals that there are some definitions of the term “model” exist. some definitions refer to a model from the point of view of mathematics or engineering as well as other scientific disciplines. however, we looked for a more general definition of the term “model”. the notion of the term “model” was identified by kühne (2004) as a description of something. we found this definition to be not complete as there was no indication on whose description it should be. secondly, the use of ‘something” does not sound as a very scientific term. due to these, in our work, we rely on the model definition as a pattern of individual’s or individuals’ interpretation of a phenomenon (ahrens, purvinis, zaščerinska, & andreeva, 2015). models can be described verbally, digitally, graphically, in a video format, and in other forms (ahrens, purvinis, zaščerinska, & andreeva, 2015). features of a model have to be provided (ahrens, purvinis, zaščerinska, & andreeva, 2016), too. the features of a model are highlighted by parameters (ahrens, purvinis, zaščerinska, & andreeva, 2016) or, in other words, indicators. summarising these ideas, we can say that a model means a pattern of individual’s or individuals’ interpretation of a phenomenon in a variety of formats (visual, graphical, computer, etc) that is characterised by indicators. the present work considers a definition of a phenomenon to be a model. definition means the statement of the phenomenon notion, elements and process (ahrens, zaščerinska, & andreeva, 2013). consequently, this work will focus on giving a definition of sustainable communication. the definition to be created will disclose the notion, elements and procedural aspects of sustainable communication, thereby creating a new development model of sustainable communication. 40 sustainability is often connected with stability (emas, 2015). stability is understood as the process that proceeds without significant changes. this leads us to the need for two-sided sustainability (ahrens, zascerinska, & aleksejeva, 2021): sustainable communication, and sustainability communication. in this work, we differentiate these two terms in this way (ahrens, zascerinska, & aleksejeva, 2021): sustainable communication refers to the sustainable process of communication or, in other words, the sustainable process of information exchange (elving, 2020), and sustainability communication means communication for sustainable development or, in other words, individual’s knowledge, skills and attitudes to sustainable development. sustainability can be external and internal (ahrens, zascerinska, & aleksejeva, 2021). table 1 shows the relationships between the external and internal perspectives as well as sustainable communication and sustainability communication. table 1 the inter-relations between the external and internal perspectives as well as sustainable communication and sustainability communication (the authors) the system of the external and internal perspectives external perspective internal perspective sustainable communication sustainability communication consequently, individuals transform information into knowledge. individuals’ knowledge, skills and attitude are the results of information processing. here, the relationships between information and knowledge have to be highlighted. conventionally, when discussing the relationships between information and knowledge, the term “data” is also referred. table 2 demonstrates the relationships between data, information and knowledge. table 2 relationships between data, information and knowledge (the authors) term data information knowledge a short definition symbol facts definition a short description code, numbers, sign, text, audio record, or images, etc (kemp, butler-henderson, allen, & ayton, 2021). event statement (zelinkis, 2020; kalpana & kumar, 2020) statement of the phenomenon notion, elements and process (ahrens, zaščerinska, & andreeva, 2013) relationships between the terms data contain new facts (lasmanis, sporāne, pakalne, kalniņa, mukāne, hofmane, & mauliņa, 2008) information is processed, analysed and interpreted data (sedkaoui, 2019). knowledge is the processed information (ferreira, 2008) 41 it can be identified that data are the basis of information, information stems from data and lays the ground for knowledge, and knowledge is the processed information rooted in data. from the relationships between data, information and knowledge, we can discover the directions of movement between data, information and knowledge: from data through information to knowledge. organisation of an efficienct process of sustainable communication is an issue in many fields of our life as it allows for the increase of its results. conventionally, the communication process is regarded as a one direction linear process as depicted in figure 1. figure 1 the phases of the communication process (the authors) we consider the process of communication to be activity (tiļļa, 2003). accordingly, the activity theory by leontyev (leont’ev, 1978) is applicable to the design of the process of communication. it should be pointed that the activity concept originated with vygotsky (blunden, 2009), although activity theory is associated with the name of leontyev rather than vygostky: leontyev made a distinction between the individual action, and the social activity of which it is a part (leont’ev, 1978) and which gives it meaning (blunden, 2009). law of development or, in other words, interiorization (sitarov, 2004) defined by vygotsky as transformation of the external culture into the individual internal (wells, 1994) means that any function in the individual cultural development appears twice or on two planes (wells, 1994): first on the social level (the external perspective), and later, on the individual level (the internal perspective). it means that the process of sustainable communication consists of two phases: social activity in phase 1, and individual action in phase 2. later, the process of interiorization was widened by one more phase, namely the unity of external and internal perspectives (zaščerinska, 2013). figure 2 reflects the advanced process of interiorization. figure 2 phases of the development of the system of external and internal perspectives (ahrens & zaščerinska, 2012) the advanced process of interiorization allows assuming that the communication process is not the information exchange, as it is widely accepted, but information interaction. it means that any information is not transferred in one way, namely from the sender to the receiver. opposite, the sender and the receiver communicate with each other at the same time 42 as illustrated in figure 3. these individuals’ information meets, interacts, and enriches each other, thereby contributing to the creation of new knowledge. figure 3 the relationships between the sender and received information in the process of communications (the authors) it should be noted that we imply that there exist the relationships between the process of sustainable communications and the results of this process as shown in figure 4. figure 4 the relationships between the process of sustainable communications and the results of this process (the authors) the process of sustainable communication refers to the process of information exchange (elving, 2020) while sustainability communication means individual’s knowledge, skills and attitudes to sustainable development. we define the process of sustainable communication to be (ahrens, zaščerinska, lange, & aļeksejeva, 2021) a cyclic process as it can be repeated, of social nature as it changes within and by society, of bi-module nature as it includes both external and internal perspectives. based on these findings, we propose that the process of sustainable communication, on the basis of the relationships between information and knowledge, proceeds in three phases as revealed in figure 5. result of the process: sustainability communication the process: sustainable communication 43 figure 5 the phases of the process of sustainable communication (the authors) from the relationships between information and knowledge, we can discover the directions of the movement between information and knowledge: from existing information in phase 1 through information interaction or, in other words, quasi-knowledge, in phase 2 to new knowledge in phase 3. from our point of view, the process of sustainable communication oriented to new knowledge creation has to undergo through all the three phases as each phase of the process of sustainable communication is built on the previous one. here the recommendation is that the next phase of the process of sustainable communication is not initiated till the present phase of the process of sustainable communication is completed. discussion a point for a discussion is the establishment of the inter-connections between the term “model” and “definition”. this research result allows for the finding that definition is a model. however, in comparison to the definition serving as a model, models can be represented by a variety of formats: visual, graphical, computer, etc. the comparative analysis of definition of the term “model” provided by other researchers contributed to the identification of the definition of the term “model” formulated in the present work. this work offered a new perspective on what the term “model” is. in comparison to the definitions of model proposed by other researchers, the present work outlines that interpretation of a model belongs to an individual or individuals, model has to be characterised, model has to be featured by indicators. another issue to be considered by the scientific community as well as teachers is that very often the researchers think of the process of communication as a one-way process, despite they call it interactive, as shown in figure 6. for example, the communication process is conventionally described like that: “the sender receives a stimulus and encodes a message for the receiver. the receiver interprets the message and returns feedback to the first point” (llopis-lorente, díez, sánchez, marcos, sancenón, martínez-ruiz, villalonga, & martínezmáñez, 2017, p. 3). according to these researchers (llopis-lorente, díez, sánchez, marcos, sancenón, martínez-ruiz, villalonga, & martínez-máñez, 2017), afterwards, the sender and the receiver change their roles, and the cycle starts from the beginning. 44 figure 6 interactive model of communication (llopis-lorente, díez, sánchez, marcos, sancenón, martínez-ruiz, villalonga, & martínez-máñez, 2017) from our point of view, if two people are communicating, for example, one of them is talking about something. the second person can already react to the words of the speaking person by his/her face expressions or body language. this reaction is also communication as the speaking person based on the reaction of the listener can change the focus of his talk, the speed of delivery, the topic of the discussions, etc. thereby we support the finding that any activity is communication (zaščerinska, 2013). communication can be a movement of hand, facial expression, gesture, spoken words, and many others ways of information exchange. consequently, the connections between the external and internal perspectives assisted in finding that individuals do not communicate in a sequential way but they interact with each other at the same time. this is the novel contribution of this work. conclusions the present work allowed for the establishment of the inter-connections between the development of the system of the external and internal perspectives, on the one hand, and the implementation of the process of sustainable communication, on the other hand. the novel contribution of this research is that the inter-connections between the sender of the information and the receiver of the information in the sustainable communication process act at the same time, their information meets and exchanges, thereby promoting information interaction or quasi-knowledge creation. information interaction or quasiknowledge creation can be determined as a new phase in sustainable communication. the phase of information interaction or quasi-knowledge creation is found between phase 1 existing information and phase 3 new knowledge. the theoretical analysis of the terms “sustainability”, “sustainable”, and “communication” within the frame of the external and internal perspectives promoted the finding that sustainable communication is the process, and sustainability communication is the result of this process. the research results also reveal the phases of the sustainable communication process aimed at new knowledge development, thereby these phases are being considered as the new development model. implications for the implementation of sustainable communication imply that 45 sustainable communication is only one perspective, namely the external perspective, of the whole when referring to the relationship between sustainability and communication. sustainable communication should be analysed in relationship to sustainability communication as both are intertwined. sustainable communication is fully implemented when sustainability communication is complete, too. sustainable communication promotes the enrichment of individual’s knowledge, skills and attitude. if sustainable communication ends without a positive increase in sustainability communication, sustainable communication should be repeated. the present research is limited by the established inter-connections between the development of the system of the external and internal perspectives, on the one hand, and the implementation of the process of sustainable communication. another limitation is that the research was only qualitative. a limitation is also that only theoretical methods were deployed in the present work. the main concern in future research is the analysis of factors impacting phase 2 information interaction or quasi-knowledge creation in sustainable communication. investigation of cultural aspects of information interaction or quasi-knowledge creation requires research efforts to be devoted to. in regard to the use of methods, further research intends to widen the use of research methods from only theoretical to empirical ones. collection of quantitative data is a future research direction, too. for this, an online survey could be carried out. the sample might engage higher education institutions’ academic staff, management members, and students, on the one hand, and, on the hand, companies’ representatives, governmental staff members, and other interested stakeholders. interview and, specifically, focus group interviews could enrich the quantitative data to be collected from the online survey. the comparative analysis of answers obtained from different groups of respondents also deserves researchers’ attention to be implemented. acknowledgement project "development of sustainable communications of higher education institutions in social media" (comsus), ka220-hed cooperation partnerships in higher education, project number ka220-hed-b9271f3f. duration: 1 september 2022 31 august 2024. coordinator: fundacja im. zofii zamenhof, poland. references ahrens, a., purvinis, o., zaščerinska, j., & andreeva, n. 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(2020). synthesis of mof, mda, pim, mvc, and bce notations and patterns. in z. altan (ed.), applications and approaches to object-oriented software design: emerging research and opportunities (pp. 78-89). igi global. doi: https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-7998-2142-7.ch003 https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-7998-2142-7.ch003 title of the paper. 16 comparison of teacher’s and students’ ranking of english for academic purposes sub-topics andreas ahrens1, jelena zascerinska2 1hochschule wismar university of applied sciences technology business and design, germany 2centre for education and innovation research, latvia abstract. ranking implemented in the english for academic purposes course helps in selecting appropriate subtopics to be obtained by students. the aim of the present research is to compare teacher’s and students’ ranking of topics of the english for academic purposes course delivered to master of engineering students underpinning the elaboration of implications for the advancement of the english for academic purposes course. research methods applied include the use of theoretical as well as empirical methods. theoretical methods imply analysis of theoretical sources and theoretical modelling. the empirical study was characterized by its explorative nature. the empirical study was based on a survey carried out with 10 engineering master students of the master programme “information and electrical engineering” at hochschule wismar, germany. the data were interpreted and summarized. the summarizing content analysis allows proposing that the students positively evaluated the majority of the sub-topics of the delivered english for academic purposes course. the hypothesis was formulated. implications for the advancement of the english for academic purposes course were identified. directions of future work were proposed. the novelty of the research is revealed by the formulated hypothesis as well as implications. keywords: comparison, course advancement, course evaluation, english for academic purposes course, ranking, students’ ranking, sub-topics. to cite this article: ahrens, a. & zascerinska, j. comparison of teacher’s and students’ ranking of english for academic purposes sub-topics. education. innovation. diversity, 1(1), 16-25. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.17770/eid2020.1.5328 introduction students’ success in knowledge obtaining within a course is primarily ensured by satisfying the students’ needs in knowledge. however, a new knowledge is construed jointly with other learners (niemi, 2008, p. 12). as, on the one hand, students’ needs vary from year to year as well as from students’ group to students’ group, etc, and, on the other hand, a new knowledge is co-constructed, a course has to be advanced. consequently, course advancement implies the integration of • the satisfaction of students’ needs in knowledge as well as • students’ participation in knowledge co-creation. ranking in higher education is implemented for the analysis of quality and productivity (gonçalves & calderón, 2017). ranking refers to a course evaluation used for the advancement of the evaluated course. another application of ranking deals with making a choice from a number of options or candidates (tofallis, 2014, p. 118). by ranking, the act of summing up one's judgment of a performance or person into a single, holistic number or score is meant (elbow, 1994). ranking tends to emphasise vertical differences between the options or candidates (marginson & van der wende, 2007). at the same time, they obscure horizontal differences, differences of purpose and type (marginson & van der wende, 2007). the aim of the present research is to compare teacher’s and students’ ranking of topics of the english for academic purposes course delivered to engineering master students http://dx.doi.org/10.17770/eid2020.1.5328 17 underpinning the elaboration of implications for the advancement of the english for academic purposes course. the present research was of the qualitative nature. the applied research methods included the use of theoretical as well as empirical methods. the theoretical methods implied analysis of theoretical sources and theoretical modelling (ahrens, zascerinska, & melnikova, 2019). the exploratory type of the comparative study was implemented within the empirical analysis. the empirical study was based on a survey carried out with 10 engineering master students of the master programme “information and electrical engineering” at hochschule wismar, germany. the data were collected via a survey based on the questionnaire. the gathered data were interpreted and summarised. conceptual framework knowledge is the body of facts, principles, theories, practices (commission of the european communities, 2006, p. 16) and concepts (žogla, 2001a, p. 4). knowledge is conventionally created through the content transmission from educator to student (niemi, 2008, p. 12). consequently, the terms “knowledge” and “content” are used synonymously in this work. the dimensions of content in education comprise • content of education (beļickis, blūma, koķe, markus, skujiņa, & šalme, 2000, p. 74), • content of teaching/learning (žogla, 2001b, p. 96; andersone, 2007, p. 127) and • subject/discipline content (beļickis et al., 2000, p. 96). content is dynamic (zaščerinska, 2011a, p. 222). the nature of content changes from static transmitted content to knowledge that is ever renewable and often construed jointly with other learners (niemi, 2008, p. 12). knowledge creation is socially shared, and emerges from participation in socio-cultural activities (niemi, 2008, p. 12). as the contents and processes are intermediating (niemi, 2008, p. 12), content development is of the cyclic nature (zaščerinska, 2011b). the content development gradually proceeds from teaching in phase 1 through peer-learning in phase 2 to learning in phase 3 as shown in figure 1 (zaščerinska, 2011b). each phase of the process of teaching and learning content is separated from the previous one, and the following phase is based on the previous one (zaščerinska, 2011b). figure 1 phases of the process of content development (zaščerinska, 2011b) 18 in turn, english for academic purposes is defined as content and research integrated studying (zaščerinska, 2008; zaščerinska, aļeksejeva, zaščerinskis, & andreeva, 2013). it should be pointed that a course design implies course structuring and planning. a course is structured through the identification of topics. topics also refer to sequencing the course content. topics can be divided into sub-topics. the definition of english for academic purposes as content and research integrated studying provides us with two main topics to be covered within an english for academic purposes course (zaščerinska, 2008, 2010; zaščerinska, zaščerinskis, andreeva, & aļeksejeva, 2013): • a subject content (engineering, medicine, nature, etc) and • language research skills. analysis of other english for academic purposes courses reveals the use of the combination of language skills and academic study skills (english language institute, 2020). language skills include listening comprehension, fluency development, oral intelligibility, reading, grammar, writing, and vocabulary development, while academic study skills include test taking and note taking skills, academic vocabulary usage, critical reading and writing, comprehending academic lectures, research and library skills, formal composition forms and development, including research papers (english language institute, 2020). consequently, the proposed definition of english for academic purposes as content and research integrated studying (zaščerinska, 2008) is in full compliance with other researchers’ scientific results on the english for academic purposes elements. further on, the proposed definition of english for academic purposes is novel as it includes an innovative element, namely a subject content (engineering, medicine, nature, etc) (zaščerinska, 2008). this novel definition of english for academic purposes allows widening students’ learning opportunities for the students’ use of english for academic purposes in both professional and academic environments. two main topics, namely a subject content (engineering, medicine, nature, etc) and language research skills, include sub-topics as demonstrated in figure 2. figure 2 the relationship between english for academic purposes, its two main topics and sub-topics the sub-topics for the english for academic purposes course were selected based on the authors’ research results reflected in the publications indicated in the list of references and logically introduced by the authors of the present contribution: • introduction into presentation preparation (zaščerinska, 2009, p.160), • academic communication (gruenwald, ahrens, zaščerinska, melnikova, & andreeva, 2018; melnikova, kuprienė, jurgaitytė, zascerinska, & blažulionienė, 2020), • passive voice (zascerinska, aleksejeva, zascerinskis, gukovica, & aleksejeva, 2020), • presentation skills via making three presentations about  students’ native place. it should be pointed that the topic of students’ native place is selected for the english for academic purposes course due to a couple of reasons: students’ presentations skills are conventionally developed, on the 19 one hand, gradually, and, on the other hand, from simple to complex. presentation of students’ native place is, on the one hand, the first presentation of the proposed three, and, on the hand, it is simple as the place is well known to the presenter. at the same time, both presenting and audience students’ language research skills are still trained.  biography of an outstanding person (zaščerinska, andreeva, & aleksejeva, 2015). it should be pointed that the sub-topic “biography” is paid attention within the english for academic purposes course as, on the one hand, master studies engage students with the initial research activities, and, on the other hand, analysis of researchers’ biographies and students’ own biography building facilitate the development of students’ scientific identity (zaščerinska, andreeva, zaščerinskis, & aļeksejeva, 2016).  students’ term/course papers (zaščerinska, 2010) • problem solving (zaščerinska & zaščerinskis, 2012) • information and ideas • reading sub-skills • writing own biography (zaščerinska, andreeva, zaščerinskis, & aļeksejeva, 2016; ahrens & zaščerinska, 2019; ahrens, zaščerinska, & melnikova, 2019; zascerinska, aleksejeva, zascerinskis, gukovica, & aleksejeva, 2020). • academic writing with the focus on master thesis and scientific publication. the sub-topics for the english for academic purposes course are evaluated through students’ ranking aimed at making a choice (or ranking) from a number of options (tofallis, 2014, p. 118). it should be pointed that ranking differs from rating as rating means that the used categories are often given numerical labels, such as 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 (coe, 2010, p. 45). methodology the methodology of the present empirical study was led by the enabling research question: which sub-topics of the english for academic purposes course are positively evaluated by students? the purpose of the present empirical study was to compare the teacher’s and students’ selection of the sub-topics for the english for academic purposes course underpinning the elaboration of the implications for the advancement of the english for academic purposes course. the empirical study was carried out in august 2020. the sample was composed on the principles of sample appropriateness, sufficiency and confidence (ahrens & zaščerinska, 2015a). further on, table 1 demonstrates the factors that influenced sample size in educational research within the present study (ahrens & zaščerinska, 2014). 20 table 1 factors that influence sample size in educational research factors that influence sample size in educational research external perspective internal perspective surroundings’ and resources’ factors: access to the sample resources: time, personnel and its competences and experiences, technical support, etc researcher factors: aims of research, research methodologies, educational research paradigm, motivation, interest, skills, and experience source: ahrens, & zaščerinska, 2014. the sample was composed of 10 engineering students of the master programme “information and electrical engineering” at hochschule wismar, germany, for international students. the master programme “information and electrical engineering” for international students is popular at hochschule wismar, germany, as it ensures such economic resources, that influence the regional economics, as labour and entrepreneurship (ahrens, grünwald, bassus, andreeva, zaščerinska, & melnikova, 2018). it should be noted that the master programme “information and electrical engineering” at hochschule wismar involves the students from india only. however, the master programme “information and electrical engineering” is open for all the interested international students. all the students who participated in the empirical study have obtained a bachelor degree in electrical engineering in different universities of different regions of india. the interpretive research paradigm was used in the study. the interpretive paradigm is characterized by the researcher’s practical interest in the research question (cohen, manion, & morrison, 2003). the interpretive paradigm is featured by the researcher’s interest in a phenomenon. the interpretive paradigm is aimed at analysing the social construction of the meaningful reality. meanings emerge from the interpretation. the researcher is the interpreter (ahrens, purvinis, zaščerinska, miceviciene, & tautkus, 2018). the comparative study as a qualitative research design was employed (flick, 2004). comparative studies are well accepted in the research community for analysis of quality (hariharan, zaščerinska, andreeva, zaščerinskis, & aļeksejeva, 2015). the comparative approach or, in other words, comparative method sharpens the powers of description and plays a central role in concept-formation by bringing into focus suggestive similarities and contrasts among cases (colliers, 1993, p. 105). routinely used in testing hypotheses, it can also contribute to the inductive discovery of new hypotheses and to theorybuilding (colliers, 1993, p. 105). the exploratory type of the comparative study was applied (phillips, 2006). the exploratory type of the comparative study aims to generate new hypotheses and questions (phillips, 2006) which can be tested for generality in following empirical studies (mayring, 2007). the exploratory methodology proceeds from exploration in phase 1 through analysis in phase 2 to hypothesis development in phase 3 as illustrated in figure 3 (zaščerinska et al, 2016). 21 figure 3 phases of the methodolody of the exploratory research (zaščerinska, andreeva, zaščerinskis, & aļeksejeva, 2016) phase 1 exploration is aimed at data collection, phase 2 analysis focuses on data processing, analysis and data interpretation, and phase 3 hypothesis development is oriented to the analysis of results of the empirical study and elaboration of conclusions and hypotheses for further research (hariharan, zaščerinska, & swamydhas, 2013; ahrens & zaščerinska, 2015b). the data were collected through a survey. the survey was based on the questionnaire that included one question: could you mark three sub-topics which are the most important for you from the following list? the list included such sub-topics: • introduction into presentation preparation • academic communication • passive voice • making three presentations about • problem • information and ideas • reading sub-skills • writing own biography • academic writing? the data were collected by asking respondents to rank only three alternatives (coe, 2010, p. 45). the options available were placed in order without any attempt to describe how much one differs from another or whether any of the alternatives are, for example, good or acceptable (coe, 2010, p. 45). the collected data were processed via the summarizing content analysis. the summarizing content analysis seeks to reduce the material in such a way that the essential contents are preserved, but a manageable short text is produced (mayring, 2004, p. 269). research results table 2 presents the results of the empirical study. the results of the comparative analysis of the teacher’s and students’ ranking demonstrate that mostly the choice of sub-topics by both the teacher and students is similar. the summarising content analysis reveals that the students positively evaluated the majority of the sub-topics of the english for academic purposes course selected by the teacher. this finding indicates that the english for academic purposes course is qualitative 22 table 2 results of the students’ ranking of the sub-topics in the english for academic purposes course sub-topic students’ ranking introduction into presentation preparation xxxxxx academic communication x passive voice making three presentations xxxxxx problem solving xx information and ideas xxxx reading sub-skills x writing own biography xxx academic writing xxxxxxx source: by the authors however, the sub-topic “passive voice” has not received the students’ positive evaluation. this could be explained that the students had only three choices for pointing the most important sub-topics. another explanation could be that despite the students had some mistakes in writing their own sentences with the use of passive voice, the students showed the attitude to the use of passive voice as not something for learning as well as already natively existing in their spoken and written language. the researchers’ interpretation of this finding reveals that, • on the one hand, this attitude to the use of passive voice differs depending on a student experience, and, • on the other hand, more teaching efforts should be put into explaining the importance of passive voice in academic communication and writing. conclusions the theoretical findings allow concluding about the inter-connections between a course quality and similarities in the teacher and students’ selection of sub-topics of the english for academic purposes course. the empirical results show the students positively evaluated the majority of the subtopics of the english for academic purposes course proposed by the teacher. the top three sub-topics ranked by the students refer to • introduction into presentation preparation, • presentation skills via making three presentations, and • academic writing. the empirical results validate the research results that an english for academic purposes course should include • students’ making presentations as well as their public presentation, and • students’ writing own biography. as the results of the comparative analysis of the teacher’s and students’ ranking demonstrate that mostly the choice of sub-topics by both the teacher and students is similar, the conclusion is drawn that the english for academic purposes course is qualitative. the following hypothesis has been formulated: an english for academic purposes course is qualitative if 23  ranking of the sub-topics by both the teacher and students is similar,  students positively evaluate the sub-topics of the english for academic purposes course  if a sub-topic is  clearly explained,  obviously illustrated by the teacher to the students, and  permanently revised. implications for the advancement of the english for academic purposes course imply  reconsidering the inclusion of the sub-topics that have not received the positive evaluation from the majority of the students such as “passive voice” and “reading sub-skills” in the english for academic purposes course,  segmentation of the sub-topic “academic writing” as well as  allocating more time to the sub-topic 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(2001b). didaktikas teorētiskie pamati. rīga: raka. title of the paper. 47 eu youth beliefs in gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault andreas ahrens1, jelena zascerinska2, irina macovei3 1,2 hochschule wismar university of applied sciences technology business and design, germany 3 asociatia demetrius, romania abstract. gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault are the factors that impact youth engagement in the labour market and society. monitoring of gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault among young people in the european countries remains under-developed. the research aim is to analyse beliefs of young people in the european union in gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault. the research is built on the basis of both theoretical and empirical methods. the theoretical analysis shaped the conceptual framework of the research. the empirical study was based on the survey implementation. data were collected in five european union countries in march-april 2022. the data were analysed via the mean calculation as well as ranking. data interpretation was applied in order to summarise the study findings. the theoretical analysis allows for the establishment of the inter-connections between beliefs and values. the data analysis reveals that young people believe in gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault. the results show that physical appearance and people race are the top 2 beliefs that coincide in all the three phenomena, namely gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault. research limitations are outlined. future work is proposed. keywords: beliefs, gender based discrimination, sexual harassment, sexual assault, values. to cite this article: ahrens, a., zascerinska, j., & macovei, i. (2022). eu youth beliefs in gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault. education. innovation. diversity, 2(5), 47-57. doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2022.2.6963 introduction gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault are the factors that impact youth engagement in the labour market and society. young people are in the particular focus of the european union. this particular attention devoted to young people by the european union is reflected in the eu youth strategy for 2019–2027 (european commission, 2018). youth employment and social inclusion are based on diversity (european parliament, 2012). therefore, monitoring of gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault among young people can help recognise if any problems exist in the field of youth gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault. early problems identification in the field of youth gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault allows for faster appropriate reaction that could promote the increase in overall economic growth and social cohesion. in order to monitor the situation in the field of youth gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault, the european union implemented a couple of surveys. in 2012 gender inequalities in the european union were explored (european parliament, 2012). in 2015, european institute for gender equality (eige, 2015) revealed the prevalence of unwanted sexual attention among working population in europe. analysis of these studies shows that, in the previously implemented surveys, young people were not a target group. it means that the situation in gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault among young people might differ in comparison to other age groups. hence, the studies results cannot be applied to the population of young people in the european union. another issue is that the studies were centred on one field, for example, the study of the european https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2022.2.6963 48 union was devoted to only gender inequalities in the european union (european parliament, 2012). a study carried out by european institute for gender equality in 2015 (eige, 2015) concentrated only on unwanted sexual attention among working population in europe. that means that, on the one hand, only one field, namely unwanted sexual attention, and, on the other hand, only working population, were under investigation. consequently, monitoring of gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault among young people in the european countries remains under-developed. the research aim is to analyse beliefs of young people in gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault in the european union. the research is constructed on the basis of both theoretical and empirical methods. the theoretical analysis built the conceptual framework of the research. the empirical study was based on the survey implementation. the data were analysed via the mean calculation as well as ranking. data interpretation was applied in order to summarise the study findings. conceptual framework beliefs are defined to be individual’s assumptions on what is right or wrong. beliefs are the roots of values if values’ development is considered as tree’s growing as illustrated in figure 1. figure 1 the relationship between beliefs and values (the authors) beliefs can be considered from two perspectives (österholm, 2009): the social perspective, also known as the outer side, and the individual perspective, also defined as the inner side. values (the tree) beliefs (roots below the earth) 49 a mixture of different perspectives is a central cause for the creation of beliefs as a messy construct (österholm, 2009). consequently, young people beliefs in the field of gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault are crucial for the success of young people integration into the labour market and their social inclusion. beliefs in the field of gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault summarised in table 1 are based on the literature review implemented in december 2021february 2022. beliefs about employment, marital status, being young (xiao, zong, geng, deng, & zhu, 2020), religion (forman-rabinovici & sommer, 2018), race (perry, harp, & oser, 2013), physical appearance (lee, son, yoon, & kim, 2017), and educational level (carliner, sarvet, gordon, & hasin, 2017) were outlined. table 1 shows the beliefs that might impact gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault. table 1 beliefs in the field of gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault (the authors) belief gender based discrimination sexual harassment sexual assault perspective being young x x x outer/social race x x x outer/social physical appearance x x x outer/social marital status x x x outer/social educational level x inner/individual religion x outer/social employment x inner/individual table 1 demonstrates that gender based discrimination relates to all the beliefs found in the research literature, namely being young, race, physical appearance, marital status, educational level, religion, and employment. in turn, sexual harassment and sexual assault are found to be related to beliefs in being young, race, physical appearance, and marital status. hence, gender based discrimination relates to both inner and outer sides of an indivual while sexual harassment and sexual assault are mostly connected to the outer side of an indivudual. this finding explains the difference in the number of beliefs between gender based discimination, on the one hand, and sexual harassment and sexual assault, on the other hand. methodology of the survey analysis beliefs in the field of gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault illustrated in table 1 served as the basis of the survey questionnaire. the survey questionnaire was based on respondents’ self-assessment. each question in the questionnaire was applied the 4 point likert scale as demonstrated in table 2. table 2 the 4 point likert scale in the survey questionnaire (the authors) the 4 point likert scale in the questionnaire a short description of the 4 point likert scale 1 strongly disagree 2 disagree 3 agree 4 strongly agree 50 it should be noted that the survey questionnaire contained 62 questions in total. in this work, we keep the original number of the question in relation to beliefs in gender based discrimination (questions 5-11), sexual harassment (questions 38-41), and sexual assault (questions 55-58). in march-april 2022, the survey based on the elaborated questionnaire was carried out in five european union countries. altogether 309 respondents from czech republic, italy, germany, lithuania, and romania took part in the survey. table 3 discloses the survey results in socio-demographic characteristics of the respondents. table 3 survey results in socio-demographic characteristics of the respondents (the authors) nr question number of answers romania germany italy lithuania czech republic total 1 which country are you from? 69 61 56 63 60 309 2 what is your gender: a. male b. female c. other 15 53 1 43 18 0 10 44 2 28 35 0 17 35 8 113 185 11 3 what is your employment status: a. employer b. employee c. student d. entrepreneur e. other 1 9 59 0 0 1 4 54 2 0 0 17 39 0 0 0 5 58 0 0 3 24 33 0 0 5 59 243 2 0 4 what is your educational level: a. secondary school b. high school c. vocational school d. college e. university f. other: please, specify 34 1 1 0 33 0 0 0 0 0 61 0 5 2 1 0 48 0 1 24 1 32 4 1 15 0 0 44 0 1 55 27 3 76 146 2 thus, 309 respondents, young people, aged 18-30 from romania, germany, italy, lithuania, and czech republic participated in the survey. related to the gender of our respondents, 185 were females, 113 males, and 11 have chosen the category “other”. the majority of the respondents from romania are the female students from colleges and universities. the majority of the respondents from germany is represented by the male university students. the majority of the respondents from italy are female university students. the respondents from lithuania almost equally represent female and male students from colleges and universities. the respondents from the czech republic are mostly female students from colleges. the majority of all the respondents are university students. 51 the data collected by each partner was integrated into one excel file. afterwards, the data were cleaned and prepared for analysis. this included the survey questionnaire previously translated into national languages to be integrated into the unified file. the data preparation also aimed at checking the connections between the question and the question number in the partner’s surveys. the data were analysed via two methods: the mean and ranking (ahrens & zascerinska, 2020). the mean of a question in the dataset from the survey questionnaire represents the average value of the question in this dataset. the mean is based on the data taken from every observation shown by the respondents of the survey questionnaire. the mean indicates the center value in each question in the survey questionnaire. the center of the collected data is a numerical value from 1 to 4. the mean allows for the description of the data tendency. in the case of the present research, the mean shows whether the respondents agree or disagree with the survey questions about gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault. the mean results were analysed at the levels of: mean in each category, namely gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault, in each country, mean as the overall value in each category, namely gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault, in all the five partner countries, namely czech republic, italy, germany, lithuania, and romania. on the level of each country, the results of each question on each level of the 4 point likert scale were calculated separately and presented in a table. ranking refers to an evaluation used for the advancement of the evaluated item (ahrens & zascerinska, 2020). the use of the ranking method was thought as the act of summing up young people beliefs into a single, holistic number or score is meant (elbow, 1994). ranking was intended to emphasise vertical differences between the options (marginson & van der wende, 2007). the obtained mean of each question of each country was ranked. the options available were placed in order without any attempt to describe how much one differs from another or whether any of the alternatives are, for example, good or acceptable (coe, 2010, p. 45). it should be pointed that ranking differs from rating as rating means that the used categories are often given numerical labels, such as 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 (coe, 2010, p. 45). the higher was the mean the higher the question was ranked. research results table 4 reveals the mean results related to gender based discrimination in five participating countries. table 4 mean results related to gender based discrimination (the authors) nr question mean results in each country total mean all questions ’ mean roma nia germ any italy lithua nia czech republic 5 do you believe that younger people are more often to experience gender based discrimination? 2,71 2,52 2,91 2,76 2,69 2,72 2,87 6 do you believe that race of people might 2,81 2,67 3,36 2,75 3,23 2,96 52 impact gender based discrimination? 7 do you believe that physical appearance of people might impact gender based discrimination? 2,72 2,72 3,55 3,05 3,27 3,06 8 do you believe that marital status might impact gender based discrimination? 2,46 1,54 2,93 2,59 2,98 2,5 9 do you believe that your educational level might impact gender based discrimination? 2,61 2,67 3 2,43 3 2,74 10 do you believe that your religion might impact gender based discrimination? 2,65 2,69 2,95 2,63 3,15 2,81 11 do you believe that gender based discrimination might impact your employment? 2,51 2,54 3,21 2,62 2,92 2,76 source: the authors. n=309 the mean results presented in table 4 point that young people in italy and czech republic have a stronger belief in gender based discrimination in comparison to the respondents from romania, germany, and lithuania. table 5 shows the mean results of each question and each question ranking in relation to gender based discrimination. table 5 mean and ranking results related to gender based discrimination (the authors) nr question total mean ranking 5 do you believe that younger people are more often to experience gender based discrimination? 2,72 6 6 do you believe that race of people might impact gender based discrimination? 2,96 2 7 do you believe that physical appearance of people might impact gender based discrimination? 3,06 1 8 do you believe that marital status might impact gender based discrimination? 2,5 7 9 do you believe that your educational level might impact gender based discrimination? 2,74 5 10 do you believe that your religion might impact gender based discrimination? 2,81 3 11 do you believe that gender based discrimination might impact your employment? 2,76 4 source: the authors. n=309 53 the ranking results demonstrate that young people have a stronger belief that people experience gender based discrimination due to their physical appearance, race and religion. physical appearance, race and religion relate to the outer side of an individual. in regard to religion, we consider it to be an outer sign as individual’s religion could be recognised on the basis of an individual’s clothing, religious crosses, etc. the mean results related to sexual harassment are presented in table 6. table 6 mean results related to sexual harassment (the authors) nr question mean results in each country total mean all questions ’ mean roma nia germ any italy lithu ania czech republic 38 do you believe that younger people are more often to experience sexual harassment? 2,94 2,80 2,66 2,94 2,81 2,83 2,81 39 do you believe that people race might impact sexual harassment? 2,70 2,71 3 2,68 3,18 2,85 40 do you believe that people physical appearance might impact sexual harassment? 2,93 2,86 3,43 3,03 3,55 3,16 41 do you believe that marital status might impact sexual harassment? 2,29 2,16 2,28 2,33 2,85 2,38 source: the authors. n=309 the mean results shown in table 6 allow finding out that young people in czech republic, italy and romania have a stronger belief in sexual harassment in comparison to the respondents from germany and lithuania. table 7 demonstrates the mean results of each question and each question ranking in relation to sexual harassment. table 7 mean and ranking results related to sexual harassment (the authors) nr question total mean ranking 38 do you believe that younger people are more often to experience sexual harassment? 2,83 3 39 do you believe that people race might impact sexual harassment? 2,85 2 40 do you believe that people physical appearance might impact sexual harassment? 3,16 1 41 do you believe that marital status might impact sexual harassment? 2,38 4 source: the authors. n=309 the ranking results emphasized in table 7 allow for a finding that the young people have a stronger belief that sexual harassment refers to people physical appearance, race, and 54 being young. physical appearance, race and being young represent the outer side of an individual. table 8 discloses the mean results related to sexual assault. table 8 mean results related to sexual assault (the authors) nr question mean results in each country total mean all questions’ mean roma nia germ any italy lithu ania czech republic 55 do you believe that younger people are more often to experience sexual assault? 2,64 2,66 2,76 2,86 2,77 2,74 2,71 56 do you believe that people race might impact sexual assault? 2,54 2,66 3,02 2,60 3,07 2,78 57 do you believe that people physical appearance might impact sexual assault? 2,55 3,14 3,12 2,60 3,35 2,95 58 do you believe that marital status might impact sexual assault? 1,87 2,11 3 2,38 2,48 2,37 source: the authors. n=309 the mean results shown in table 8 allow discovering that young people in lithuania have a stronger belief in sexual assault in comparison to the respondents from germany czech republic, italy, and romania. table 9 demonstrates the mean results of each question and each question ranking in relation to sexual assault. table 9 mean and ranking results related to sexual harassment (the authors) nr question total mean ranking 55 do you believe that younger people are more often to experience sexual assault? 2,74 3 56 do you believe that people race might impact sexual assault? 2,78 2 57 do you believe that people physical appearance might impact sexual assault? 2,95 1 58 do you believe that marital status might impact sexual assault? 2,37 4 source: the authors. n=309 the ranking results emphasized in table 9 assist in finding that the young people have a stronger belief that sexual assault refers to people physical appearance, race, and being young. physical appearance, race and being young represent the outer side of an individual. table 10 reveals top 3 beliefs of young people in relation to gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault. 55 table 10 top 3 beliefs of young people in relation to gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault (the authors) ranking gender based discrimination sexual harassment sexual assault 1 physical appearance of people might impact gender based discrimination physical appearance of people might impact sexual harassment physical appearance of people might impact sexual assault 2 people race might impact gender based discrimination people race might impact sexual harassment people race might impact sexual assault 3 religion of people might impact gender based discrimination being young might impact sexual harassment being young might impact sexual assault source: the authors. n=309 the ranking results summarized in table 10 allow identifying that the young people have a strong belief that gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault are impacted by people physical appearance and race. it should be noted that physical appearance and race represent the outer side of an individual. survey findings the data analysis shows that the total mean of young people beliefs about gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault is 2,80 as shown in table 11. table 11 total mean in relation to gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault (the authors) gender based discrimination sexual harassment sexual assault total mean 2,87 2,81 2,71 2, 80 source: the authors. n=309 the results of the young people self-assessment carried out through the survey questionnaire contribute to the finding that physical appearance and people race are the top 2 beliefs that coincide in all the three fields, namely gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault. all the three phenomena, namely gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault, are influenced by an individual’s outer side or social perspective. the survey questionnaire also discloses that young people in czech republic and italy have stronger beliefs in gender based discrimination and sexual harassment while young people in lithuania have a stronger belief in sexual assault. discussion an interesting observation is formulated by österholm (2009). österholm (2009) finds that a mixture of different perspectives is a central cause for the creation of beliefs as a messy construct (österholm, 2009). the author would prefer to view beliefs from only one perspective: either from the social perspective or from the individual perspective. against this, another approach that identifies the unity of both perspectives the external (social) perspective and the internal (individual) perspective was elaborated by zaščerinska (2011). the approach received the name “developing the system of external and 56 internal perspectives” (zaščerinska, 2011). in this approach, there is a cycle based on three phases of the development of the system (beliefs in our research): in phase 1, beliefs are identified from the external (social) perspective, in phase 2, beliefs are defined as the unity of both perspectives the external (social) perspective and the internal (individual) perspective, and in phase 3, beliefs are analysed from the internal (individual) perspective. each phase is built on the previous one. if necessary, each phase and the whole cycle can be repeated. another issue that requires a deeper analysis is the belief of young people in physical appearance and race that might most impact the exposure of gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault. physical appearance and race are defined as an individual’s outer side or social perspective. it would be great to find out if an enrichment of an individual’s inner side or individual perspective through education could help diminish the impact of people physical appearance and race on the exposure of gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault. conclusions the theoretical analysis allows for the establishment of the inter-connections between beliefs and values. the mean in relation to young people beliefs in gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault shows that young people believe in gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault. results reveals that the respondents agree that a young age, people race and physical appearance, and marital status might impact gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault. for young people, physical appearance and people race are the most important factors related to all the three phenomena, namely gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault. marital status, educational level, and employment might not be so important when considering gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault. the study allows for a conclusion that an individual’s outer side or social perspective prevails when discussing gender based discrimination, sexual harassment, and sexual assault. the carried out study helps understand that the evaluation of gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault by young people in the selected european countries is heterogenous as young people have beliefs of different levels in regard to gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault. thus, young people in czech republic and italy have stronger beliefs in gender based discrimination and sexual harassment while young people in lithuania have a stronger belief in sexual assault. there are some limitations in the present research. a limitation is that the interconnections between beliefs and values have been set. the extended literature review might increase the list of young people beliefs in relation to gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault. a limitation also is the participation of the respondents from only five selected countries. participation of respondents from other countries in the survey might change the study results. future work proposed to compare young people beliefs about gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault with a level of exposure. comparative studies with other age groups are to be carried out, too. acknowledgement project “say no to gender based discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault! – #not me”, ka220-you – cooperation partnerships in youth, project number 2021-1 57 ro01-ka220-you-000028555. duration: 1st november 2021 – 31st october 2023. coordinator: asociatia demetrus, iasi, romania. we express our gratitude to all the project partners who helped us with the data 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(2011). language acquisition and language learning: developing the system of external and internal perspectives. in: zuģicka i., sast. proceedings of the 52nd international scientific conference of daugavpils university (pp. 412-417). daugavpils: daugavpils universitātes akadēmiskais apgāds „saule”, 2011, latvia. http://dx.doi.org/10.17770/eid2020.1.5328 http://apps.worldagroforestry.org/downloads/publications/pdfs/ja10133.pdf https://scholarworks.umass.edu/eng_faculty_pubs/12 https://europa.eu/youth/strategy_en https://eige.europa.eu/gender-statistics/dgs/indicator/genvio_sex_assa_sur__ewcs_unwantedsexatten https://eige.europa.eu/gender-statistics/dgs/indicator/genvio_sex_assa_sur__ewcs_unwantedsexatten https://www.europarl.europa.eu/at-your-service/files/be-heard/eurobarometer/2012/the-gender-inequalities-in-the-european-union/aggregate-report/en-aggregate-report-the-gender-inequalities-in-the-european-union-201203.pdf https://www.europarl.europa.eu/at-your-service/files/be-heard/eurobarometer/2012/the-gender-inequalities-in-the-european-union/aggregate-report/en-aggregate-report-the-gender-inequalities-in-the-european-union-201203.pdf https://www.europarl.europa.eu/at-your-service/files/be-heard/eurobarometer/2012/the-gender-inequalities-in-the-european-union/aggregate-report/en-aggregate-report-the-gender-inequalities-in-the-european-union-201203.pdf https://doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2017.12.024 https://doi.org/10.1186/s12939-017-0678-8 http://www.inrp.fr/editions/cerme6 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/pmc3783344/ https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fsir.2020.100121 6 instruments for measuring the professional identity of psychological help providers: rapid literature review elīna akmane1, kristīne mārtinsone2, zane krieķe3 1,2,3 rīga stradiņš university, latvia abstract. the concept of professional identity is widely described, indicating that it is dynamic and variable, as it simultaneously includes the development and formation of professional identity in the dimensions of time and content. professional identity manifests in various forms and it is measured by a variety of measurement tools. objective: to define what measurement tools are used to determine the professional identity of psychological help providers and to investigate the content of professional identity. method: a rapid literature review. a comprehensive search of scientific databases access medicine, clinical key, ebsco e-books, proquest ebook central, bmj journals, ebsco host, proquest, sage journals, wiley online library, science direct, dynamed plus and cochrane library was conducted in march, 2020 by two independent researchers therefore assuring data triangulation. database research included the keywords “professional identity”, “scale”, “measure”, with the boolean operator “and” adding professions: “art therapist”, “dance and movement therapist”, “drama therapist”, “music therapist”, “psychologist”, “psychiatrist”, “psychotherapist”, “nurse”, “social worker”, and additional selection criteria cross-sectional design studies about the measure of professional identity of different groups of psychological help providers and students, between 2009 and 2019, with full english text available. data analysis method was narrative synthesis, which consists of three sequential steps: description of studies in logical categories, analysis of data from each of the derived categories, and synthesized conclusions for all included studies. 366 studies were identified of which 21 were included in the study. results: as a result, 15 categories including 50 content items were identified as the measurement aspects of professional identity. keywords: measurement, professional identity, psychological help providers. to cite this article: akmane, e., mārtinsone, k., & krieķe, z. (2020). instruments for measuring the professional identity of psychological help providers: rapid literature review. education. innovation. diversity, 1(1), 6-15. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.17770/eid2020.1.5335 introduction during the recent decades the focus on the mental health of the society has increased in the world. the world health organization defines mental health as a state of well-being in which an individual realizes his or her abilities, can cope with normal life stress, work productively and is able to contribute to the benefit of his or her community (world health organization: fact sheets “mental health: strengthening our response”, 2018). to maintain or improve the mental well-being a variety of specialists are involved which implement cross-sectional strategies and interventions in mental health. psychological help is one of the options to support the improvement of mental health. when describing and discussing the psychological help several different terms are used in the literature such as “psychological care”, “psychological assistance”, “psychological treatment”. furthermore, with the development of psychological help, a range of specialists provide psychological help within their profession. psychological help is defined as a wide range of scientifically based methods of professional exposure, which are purposefully applied by specially trained professionals strengthen an individual's mental (psychological) well-being or reduce suffering (mārtinsone & sudraba, 2019). in line with this definition authors have applied psychological help as the key term for this article. http://dx.doi.org/10.17770/eid2020.1.5335 7 latvia's binding documents in the field of psychological help identify seven groups of professionals who are involved in the provision of psychological help (bortaščenoks et al, 2019). psychiatrists, psychiatric nurses, psychotherapists (doctors) and art therapists (in latvia – one profession that includes 4 arts therapies specializations – art therapists, dance and movement therapists, music therapists and drama therapists) are medical practitioners whose professional activity is directly related to the process of treatment and medical rehabilitation, within which additionally psychological help is provided. in contrast psychologists, psychotherapy specialists and social workers are not medical practitioners, but also provides psychological help within their profession. as representatives of different professions work in the field of psychological help the topic of professional boundaries becomes more and more relevant, because often, as professional lines become more flexible, professional limits converge (bortaščenoks et al, 2018; ricou et al, 2018), which can lead to confusion of professional roles and responsibility. as a result, the efficiency of interprofessional cooperation may be endangered (purvlīce et al, 2018). researchers in the professional field point out that the understanding of professional boundaries is based on the professional identity of each professional. in turn, the process of professional identity formation is one of the most important aspects of the existence and sustainability of each profession (spurgeon, 2012). research into how psychological help providers form their sense of professional identity, and how this can be tested and strengthened, is essential to the development of each profession (cowin et al, 2013). the concept of professional identity is widely described, indicating that it is dynamic and variable, as it simultaneously includes the development and formation of professional identity in the dimensions of time and content. already in 20th century constructive development theorist robert kegan, like other researchers of individual and professional identity development, indicated that professional identity formation is a lifelong process that integrates cognitive, social and emotional abilities and begins before starting professional studies and continues throughout his professional life (kegan, 1984). nowadays theoretical approaches to the formation of professional identity distinguish three domains through which professional identity is influenced and developed: individual, relational and collective identity (vignoles et al, 2011; skorikov et al, 2011), indicating that the individual domain includes personal characteristics, self-chosen or mandated commitments, beliefs about one’s self, and the impact of multiple life experiences, the relational domain expresses the influence on identity of significant individuals, such as family members, friends, mentors, and coworkers. the collective domain reflects the impact of the social groups to which an individual belongs or wishes to join. an individual’s status within the group and the group’s status within society are important contributors to this identity component. thus, the content of a professional identity is made up of various criteria deriving from theoretical background chosen by the researcher. in an attempt to measure the professional identity of different psychological help providers, different researchers have studied different aspects of professional identity: professional values (cowin et al, 2013; healey & hays, 2012; woo & henfield, 2015), belonging to, identifying with profession (adams et al, 2006), selfreport about comfort, confidence in key practice skills (casey et al, 2011), perceptions of professional development, personal and practice characteristics (kazantzis et al, 2010), professional engagement (healey & hays, 2012; woo & henfield, 2015), intra-individual and intergroup processes connected with the development of a professional identity (mancini et al, 2015), knowledge of the profession, attitude, professional roles and expertise, philosophy of the profession (woo & henfield, 2015). the purpose of this article is to define what measurement tools are used to study the professional identity of psychological help providers and to investigate the content of professional identity. we understand that professional identity in the process of its formation is 8 formed by certain aspects. this literature review will provide clarity on what tools have been developed to measure professional identity and what aspects of professional identity are measured. by exploring these aspects, the criteria that make up the content of professional identity were identified. method data sources for this study were cross-sectional design research studies about the measurement of professional identity for different groups of the psychological help providers, completed between year 2009 and 2019 with full english text available. the research studies were quantitative aiming to measure professional identity or related phenomena, including professional self-concept, professional values, professional engagement, and professional selfidentity. a comprehensive search of the scientific databases access medicine, clinical key, ebsco e-books, proquest ebook central, bmj journals, ebsco host, proquest, sage journals, wiley online library, science direct, dynamed plus and cochrane library was conducted in march, 2020 by two independent researchers therefore assuring data triangulation. a standardized search strategy was applied for each of the database, using the boolean operators and and punctuation mark”. main terms of this study were used as the key words for the search strategy: “professional identity”, “scale”, “measure”. in the research selection process, the name of the group of psychological help providers has been added (“art therapist”, “dance and movement therapist”, “drama therapist”, “music therapist”, “psychologist”, “psychotherapist”, “psychiatrist”, “nurse”, “social worker”). after the completion of the database searches, duplicates were manually removed by the two researchers. the titles and abstracts of the remaining articles were screened according to the selection criteria for full article review to identify the applicable articles for this study. the selection criteria were either applied or described measurement instrument for professional identity or related phenomena. each suitable article was reviewed to identify the specific measures that had been applied or described to evaluate professional identity with different groups of psychological help providers or students. data were analyzed in three sequential steps: 1) description of studies in logical categories, 2) analysis of data from each of the derived categories, and furthermore synthesized in final conclusions. results and discussion in total 366 studies were identified using the above-mentioned inclusion criteria to provide an overview of the tools for measuring the professional identity of psychological help providers. the studies included following psychological help providers: art therapists including 4 arts therapies specialization (6 studies), nurses (136 studies), social workers (51 studies), psychotherapists (8 studies), psychiatrists (53 studies) and psychologists (112 studies). after manually screening the selected studies by two independent researcher according to the criteria – applied or described instrument to measure professional identity, only 21 were suitable for further assessment and the selected studies included nurses (14 studies), social workers (2 studies), psychiatrists (1 studies) and psychologists (4 studies). for this study, the main category was the measurement tool of the professional identity which was either applied or described in the selected studies. from the studies included in this 9 research the following information was obtained: name of the tool, author, year, source. as a result, a list of the professional identity tools was developed (table 1). table 1. instruments for measuring the professional identity of psychological help providers no. name of the tool author year source 1. professional identity index manomenidis, kafkia, minaisidou, tasoulis, koutra, kospantsidou & dimitriadou 2017 manomenidis, g., kafkia, t., minasidou, e., tasoulis, c., koutra, s., kospantsidou, a., & dimitriadou, a. (2017). is self-esteem actually the protective factor of nursing burnout? international journal of caring sciences, 10(3), 1348-1359. 2. professional identity scale in counseling (pisc) woo & henfield 2015 woo, h., & henfield, m.s. (2015). professional identity scale in counseling (pisc): instrument development and validation, journal of counselor leadership and advocacy, 2(2), 93-112. 3. professional identity status questionnaire (pisq-5d) mancini, caricati, panari & tonarelli 2015 mancini, t., caricati, l., panari, c., & tonarelli, a. (2015). personal and social aspects of professional identity: an extension of marcia's identity status model applied to a sample of university students. journal of vocational behavior, 89, 140-150. 4. professional identity five factor scale tan, molen & schmidt 2015 tan, c. p., van der molen, h. t., & schmidt, h. g. (2015). a measure of professional identity development for professional education. studies in higher education, 42(8), 1504–1519. 5. professional identity scale for nursing students (pisns) hao, niu, li, yue & liu 2014 hao, y.f, niu, h.j., li, l.p., yue, s.j., & liu, x.h. (2014). measurement of professional identity in chinese nursing students. international journal of nursing sciences, 1(2), 137-144. 6. nurses’ professional values scale revised korean version moon, kim, kim, kim & lee original: (weis & schank, 2009) 2014 moon, s., kim, d. h., kim, e. j., kim, y.-j., & lee, s. (2014). evaluation of the validity and reliability of the korean version of the nursing professional values scale—revised. nurse education today, 34(3), 325–330. 7. chinese version of nurses’ selfconcept questionnaire (c-nscq) cao, liu, tian & guo 2012 cao, x. y., liu, x. h., tian, l., & guo, y. q. (2012). the reliability and validity of the chinese version of nurses’ self-concept questionnaire. journal of nursing management, 21(4), 657–667. 8. nurses’ professional values scale revised turkish version geçkil, ege, akın & göz original: (weis & schank, 2009) 2012 geçkil, e., ege, e., akin, b., & göz, f. (2012). turkish version of the revised nursing professional values scale: validity and reliability assessment. japan journal of nursing science, 9(2), 195–200. 9. the caseyfink readiness for practice survey casey, fink, jaynes, campbell, cook & wilson 2011 casey, k., fink, r., jaynes, c., campbell, l., cook, p., & wilson, v., (2011). readiness for practice: the senior practicum experience. journal of nursing education, 50(11), 646-652. 10. professional identity and values scale (pivs) healey, hays & fish 2010 healey, a., hays, d. g., & fish, j. (2010). a grounded theory study of female counselor educators on professional identity: implications https://www-sciencedirect-com.db.rsu.lv/science/article/pii/s0001879115000615?via%3dihub#! https://www-sciencedirect-com.db.rsu.lv/science/article/pii/s0001879115000615?via%3dihub#! https://www-sciencedirect-com.db.rsu.lv/science/article/pii/s0001879115000615?via%3dihub#! https://www-sciencedirect-com.db.rsu.lv/science/article/pii/s0001879115000615?via%3dihub#! https://www-sciencedirect-com.db.rsu.lv/science/article/pii/s0001879115000615?via%3dihub#! 10 for wellness and training. unpublished manuscript, sam houston state university, huntsville, tx. retrieved from: healey, a.c. & hays, d.g. (2012). a discriminant analysis of gender and counselor professional identity development. journal of counseling and development: jcd; alexandria, 90(1). 11. nurses’ professional values scale revised chinese version lin & wang original: (weis & schank, 2009) 2010 lin, y.h., & wang, l. s. (2010). a chinese version of the revised nurses professional values scale: reliability and validity assessment. nurse education today, 30(6), 492–498. 12. professional self identity questionnaire (psiq) crossley & vivekanandashhmidt 2009 crossley, j., & vivekananda-schmidt, p. (2009). the development and evaluation of a professional self identity questionnaire to measure evolving professional self-identity in health and social care students. medical teacher, 31(12), e603–e607. 13. the nurse professional identity scale liu 2009 liu, l. (2009). nurse professional identity and its relationship with stress and burnout. master’s thesis, the second military medical university, shanghai, china. retrieved from: zhang, y., wu, j., fang, z., zhang, y., & wong, f.k.y. (2017). newly graduated nurses' intention to leave in their first year of practice in shanghai: a longitudinal study. nursing outlook, 65(2), 202211. 14. nurses professional values scale revised npvsr weis & schank 2009 weis, d., & schank, m.j. (2009). development and psychometric evaluation of the nurses professional values scale-revised. journal of nursing measuremen, 17(3), 221-31 15. professional identity and engagement scale (pies), the pies revised version puglia 2008 puglia, b. (2008). the professional identity of counseling students in master’s level cacrep accredited programs (doctoral dissertation, old dominion university). available from proquest dissertations and theses database. retrieved from: healey, a.c., & hays, d.g. (2012). a discriminant analysis of gender and counselor professional identity development. journal of counseling and development: jcd; alexandria, 90(1). 16. macleod clark professional identity scale (mcpis-9) adams, hean, sturgis & clark 2006 adams, k., hean, s., sturgis, p., & clark, m.j., (2006). investigating the factors influencing professional identity of first-year health and social care students. learning in health and social care, 5(2), 55–68. 17. the social work values survey bradley, maschi & ward 2006 bradley, c., maschi, t., & ward, k. (2006). social work values survey. new york, ny: community research and evaluation collaborative. retrieved from: bradley, c., maschi, t., o'brien, h., morgen, k., & ward, k. (2012). faithful but different: clinical social workers speak out about cerrer motivation and professional values, journal of social work education, 48(3), 459-477. https://search-proquest-com.db.rsu.lv/pubidlinkhandler/sng/pubtitle/journal+of+counseling+and+development+:+jcd/$n/25041/docview/920211606/fulltextwithgraphics/e7b30c8ab6964fcepq/1?accountid=32994 https://search-proquest-com.db.rsu.lv/pubidlinkhandler/sng/pubtitle/journal+of+counseling+and+development+:+jcd/$n/25041/docview/920211606/fulltextwithgraphics/e7b30c8ab6964fcepq/1?accountid=32994 https://search-proquest-com.db.rsu.lv/pubidlinkhandler/sng/pubtitle/journal+of+counseling+and+development+:+jcd/$n/25041/docview/920211606/fulltextwithgraphics/e7b30c8ab6964fcepq/1?accountid=32994 https://search-proquest-com.db.rsu.lv/pubidlinkhandler/sng/pubtitle/journal+of+counseling+and+development+:+jcd/$n/25041/docview/920211606/fulltextwithgraphics/e7b30c8ab6964fcepq/1?accountid=32994 https://search-proquest-com.db.rsu.lv/pubidlinkhandler/sng/pubtitle/journal+of+social+work+education/$n/48631/docview/1152269394/fulltext/38c200f6d004bacpq/1?accountid=32994 https://search-proquest-com.db.rsu.lv/pubidlinkhandler/sng/pubtitle/journal+of+social+work+education/$n/48631/docview/1152269394/fulltext/38c200f6d004bacpq/1?accountid=32994 11 18. clarity of professional identity dobrow & higgins 2005 dobrow, s. r., & higgins, m.c. (2005). developmental networks and professional identity: a longitudinal study. career development international, 10(6/7), 567–583. 19. the values survey rognstad, nortvedt & aasland 2004 rognstad, m.k., nortvedt, p., & aasland, o. (2004). helping motives in late modern society: values and attitudes among nursing students. nursing ethics, 11(3), 227–239. 20. nurses selfconcept questionnaire cowin 2001 cowin, l. (2001). measuring nurses’ self-concept. western journal of nursing research, 23, 313–25. 21. the crn's development of psychotherapis ts common core questionnaire (dpccq) society for psychotherapy research in new zealand, the collaborative research network study (crn) 1989 kazantzis, n., calvert, s.j., orlinsky, d.e., rooke, s., & ronan, k. (2010). professional development perceptions and activities of psychiatrists and mental health nurses in new zealand. the new zealand medical journal (online), 123(1317), 24-34. according to the next steps of the narrative synthesis, the content of the professional identity’s measurement instruments was analyzed to make a final synthesized conclusion for this study. when analyzing the content of the professional identity measurement tools, 50 content items were identified to form the phenomenon of the professional identity. furthermore, equal content items were merged into categories (table 2). table 2. items and category/criteria forming the content of professional identity category/ criterion 1.belonging to a profession 2.professional self-esteem 3.professional self-reflection 4.practice in the profession 5.relationship with colleagues item 1.belonging to a profession 2.identification with the profession 3.professional role 4.professional self-esteem 5.professional self-image 6.professional affirmation 7.professional self-efficacy 8.professional self-reflection 9.in depth involvement in the profession 10.thinking about self in terms of profession 11.feedback from colleagues/peer s 12.supervision 13. personal psychotherapy 14. professional identity assessment 15. practice in profession 16. development of skills 17.work, relationship in multidisciplinary team 18.professional communication 19.professional relationship 20.professional social skills category/ criterion 6.professional difference 7.professional development and improvement 8.networking 9.distribution of knowledge 10.engaging behavior https://search-proquest-com.db.rsu.lv/pubidlinkhandler/sng/pubtitle/the+new+zealand+medical+journal+$28online$29/$n/1056335/docview/1034261122/fulltext/c162b2e93b75485fpq/1?accountid=32994 https://search-proquest-com.db.rsu.lv/pubidlinkhandler/sng/pubtitle/the+new+zealand+medical+journal+$28online$29/$n/1056335/docview/1034261122/fulltext/c162b2e93b75485fpq/1?accountid=32994 12 item 21.professional difference 22.professional uniqueness 23.social comparison 24.continuing education (workshops, seminars, conferences) 25.professional self-growth 26.reading professional books, journals 27.sertification / accreditation 28.working with cotherapist 29.shadowing other colleagues/peer s 30.informal meetings with peers 31.professional social support 32.teaching others 33.educating society about profession 34.supervisor, mentoring for colleagues 35.research in the profession 36.engaging behavior 37.participation in professional events (meetings, conferences) 38.involvement in a professional association category/ criterion 11.integration of personal characteristics 12.knowledge about profession 13.ethical and legal aspects of profession 14.knowledge , skills 15.review of professional obligations item 39.personal spirituality 40.personal values 41.personal views 42.altruism, desire to help 43.knowledge about the development, history, culture of the profession 44.following the development of the profession 45.philosophy of the profession 46.knowledge of professional legislation and normative documents 47.ethical issues of profession 48.knowledge, skills 49.disappointme nt in the profession 50.the desire to leave the profession, to change the profession as a result, 15 categories were designed which included the items that form the content of professional identity. moreover, these categories can be classified in line with theoretical approaches to the formation of the professional identity (vignoles et al, 2011; skorikov et al, 2011) – individual, relational and collective identity domains (table 3). table 3. categories in line with the theoretical approaches individual identity domain relational identity domain collective identity domain professional self-esteem professional self-reflection continuing education integration of personal characteristics knowledge and skills relationship with colleagues networking engaging behavior distribution of knowledge belonging to a profession practice in the profession knowledge about profession ethical and legal aspects of profession professional difference review of professional obligations according to this classification, most of the categories are regarding the collective and individual domains of the professional identity. only three categories are classified with the relational domain. nevertheless, this is also an important part of the professional development, 13 especially when discussing the professional borders (bortaščenoks et al, 2018; ricou et al, 2018). conclusions it can be concluded that professional identity is characterized in many aspects and there are various measuring tools to determine it. when studying professional identity, several parts of the content of professional identity are integrated in different measurement tools. thus, there is no single and comprehensive tool for measuring the professional identity of psychological help providers. as a result of this study 15 categories were identified as the content aspects of professional identity which could be applied in the further research studies regarding the professional identity measurement. thus, several different aspects of the professional identity were identified therefore enriching the theoretical bases of this phenomenon. the categories and content items were identified after screening 366 research articles about professional identity therefore not only confirming the broad viewpoint of the professional identity, but also providing a structured system on the measurement of this phenomenon. to increase understanding about professional identity it is necessary to continue to develop the content of this phenomenon. measuring professional identity for groups of the psychological help providers could help to understand how the professional identity of each of the group could be described content wise and to increase the understanding about the professional boundaries. references adams, k., hean, s., sturgis, p., & clark, j.m. 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(2017). newly graduated nurses' intention to leave in their first year of practice in shanghai: a longitudinal study. nursing outlook, 65(2), 202-211. 48 measurements of students’ wellbeing – case study in a latvian private school svetlana usca1, antra kļavinska2, inta rimsane3 1,2,3 rezekne academy of technologies, latvia abstract: currently, there is too much emphasis on academic attainment and rankings, and not enough focus on the student wellbeing in basic school. however, the education system (especially in the context of the covid-19 pandemic) has a significant opportunity to influence the health and habit formation of students who spend the greatest part of the day at school. there have been relatively few studies on student wellbeing in latvia. the most significant research has been carried out in collaboration with the researchers from the baltic countries (estonia, lithuania). the novelty of this research is related to the development of the theoretically and methodologically based indicators for measuring student wellbeing in an educational institution. the developed indicators will allow the teachers to clarify the situation, draw conclusions and improve the organizational culture. the goal of the research is to find out which indicators reflect the student wellbeing and how to measure them. based on the study and theoretical findings about the wellbeing indicators there was developed the questionnaire, which consists of self-assessment check list filled by students and evaluation check list filled by parents and teachers. the indicators were united into four wellbeing dimensions: mental wellbeing, cognitive wellbeing, social wellbeing, and physical wellbeing. the following participants filled in the check list and participated in the approbation of the questionnaire: 18 students ages 9-12, 18 parents and 18 teachers. it was suggested to assess the statements related to social, cognitive, physical and mental wellbeing following the likert scale. the data obtained in the survey was coded and processed in the program spss 25.0, using the frequency test, t-test, anova test. results indicated that students' sense of wellbeing is changeable. it is influenced by students’ age and gender, and their personal value system. therefore, measurement of student wellbeing should be done on regular bases. this will allow teachers to create an appropriate environment for the student, as well as to identify problems in a timely manner and, if necessary, start pedagogical correction work. keywords: cognitive wellbeing, psychological wellbeing, physical wellbeing, social wellbeing, student wellbeing, case study. to cite this article: usca, s., kļavinska, a., & rimsane, i. (2020). measurements of students’ wellbeing – case study in a latvian private school. education. innovation. diversity, 1(1), 48-56. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.17770/eid2020.1.5333 introduction the coronavirus pandemic has created disruption of education systems, which are facing the serious challenges for the policy-makers, school leaders, teachers, pupils and parents: from the traditional classroom situation and face to face contact with the teacher to distance learning via internet and active participation in e-learning environment. everyone has to learn how to cope with the stress, support each other, use new technologies and choose between the most and the less important issues. additionally, the education system of latvia has started the transition to the new curriculum and competency-based learning. restructuring of the learning process and uncertainty associated with it affect the wellbeing of all the involved persons: students, teachers and parents. lately the national and international conferences of latvia bring up the question if the student wellbeing is more important now, during the pandemic, than in pre-covid-19 because the positive atmosphere and support in the study process lead to better performance on tests. „wellbeing is diverse and fluid respecting individual, family and community beliefs, values, experiences, culture, opportunities and contexts across time and change. it encompasses http://dx.doi.org/10.17770/eid2020.1.5333 49 intertwined individual, connective and environmental elements which continually interact across the lifespan. wellbeing is something we all aim for, underpinned by notions, yet it is unique for each of us and provides us with a sense of who we are which needs to be respected. our role with wellbeing education is to provide the opportunity, access, choices, resources and capacities for individuals and communities to aspire to their unique sense of wellbeing, whilst contributing to a sense of community wellbeing” (price & mccallum, 2016, 17). the idea to explore the student wellbeing arose while working in the project “strengthening the academic staff of rezekne academy of technologies in the study field “education, pedagogy and sports”, 8.2.2.0/18/i/002. the authors of the article had an internship in one of few private schools of latvia which follows the key words "freedom", "choice" and "responsibility" in the study process. the school has small class sizes from the first to sixth grade and small number of teaching staff. all of them have the responsibility to ensure the safe, dignified, positive and supportive atmosphere which focuses on the cooperation between students, parents and teachers. one of the most important school objectives: to ensure the qualitative development and education process that results in the school graduates who are able to love, respect, support, make choices and decisions, set and achieve goals, think and solve life tasks, take responsibility, cooperate, create and improve their own and society's lives. the school enhances not only cognitive, but also psychological, social and physical wellbeing of the students. in the authors’ opinion, many schools of latvia pay too much emphasis on academic attainment and rankings but ignore the student wellbeing. the goal of the research is to find out which indicators reflect the objective measurements of the student wellbeing: external conditions (school strategy, organizational culture) or correlation with the students’ own value system. the research objectives: 1) to find out the meaning of the concept of “wellbeing” in the educational science; 2) to determine the methodological approaches for measuring student wellbeing, 3) to develop a questionnaire based on scientific data for the assessment of student wellbeing, 4) to approbate and improve the questionnaire (self-assessment check list) of student wellbeing by conducting a pilot study at school. in 2015, the extensive theoretically grounded research on student wellbeing has been conducted by pisa (the program for international student assessment) which examined 15year-old students' wellbeing in four main areas of their lives: performance in school, relationships with peers and teachers, home life, and how they spend their time outside the school. on average across oecd countries, students reported a level of 7.3 on a life-satisfaction scale ranging from 0 to 10. however, about 12% of students, on average across oecd countries and more than 20% of students in some countries reported that they are not satisfied with their life (they rated their satisfaction with life 4 or less on the scale) (oecd, 2017). there have been relatively few studies on student wellbeing in latvia. the most significant research has been carried out in collaboration with the researchers from the baltic countries (lithuania and estonia) in different international projects: “wellbeing and welfare of children in the baltic states: study report and recommendations” (nordic council of minister's office in latvia, žiburio fondas, latvian child welfare network, lapse huvikaitse koda, 2017) and “wellbeing of young people in the baltic states: research report” (agency for international programs for youth, 2019). both studies have developed the system of child and youth wellbeing indicators, which allow a regular comparison of wellbeing in the baltic states and internationally. the novelty of this research is related to the development of the theoretically and methodologically based indicators for measuring pupils’ wellbeing in an educational institution. the developed indicators will allow the teachers clarify the situation, draw conclusions and improve the organizational culture. 50 understanding of the concept of wellbeing in the context of education ryff (1995) associates personality wellbeing with such aspects of growth as development and self-realization, emphasizing the following factors: self-acceptance (positive attitude towards oneself, positive mood); positive relationships (trusting relationships with others, developed empathy); autonomy (ability to resist social pressure, self-regulation of behavior, ability to evaluate oneself according to the internal value system); personal growth (ability to move towards one's own improvement, development, openness to the new, behavior expresses knowledge and efficiency); existence of a goal, competence (ability to effectively use the surrounding opportunities, make choices according to values and needs). recent research views personality wellbeing as a complex concept, as the sum of cognitive, social, psychological, physical, and material wellbeing (borgonovi & pál, 2016; diaz, blanco, & mar, 2011). cognitive wellbeing refers to the skills and foundations students have to participate effectively in society, as lifelong learners, effective workers and engaged citizens. it comprises students’ proficiency in academic subjects, their ability to collaborate with others to solve problems and their sense of mastery in-school subjects. it incorporates actions and behaviors that may promote the acquisition of knowledge, skills or information that may aid them when they are faced with new, complex ideas and problems (pollard & lee, 2003). the psychological dimension of student wellbeing includes students’ evaluations and views about life, their engagement with school, and the goals and ambitions they have for their future (borgonovi, & pál, 2016), as well as efficiency and competence (becker, 1991). the physical dimension of student wellbeing refers to students’ health status, engagement in physical exercise and the adoption of healthy eating habits (statham & chase, 2010). physical wellbeing is characterized by the following indicators: satisfaction with one's body; balance of rest and leisure time; vitality and joy of life; pleasant fatigue; feeling of joy; ability to concentrate and react adequately; a feeling of a clean and wellgroomed body (frank, 2004). indicators of physical balance and goodness include several aspects: a sense of peace and physical liberation; vitality and joy of life; ability to relax the body in cases of increasing fatigue; feelings of joy and "taste of life"; concentration and response skills; a sense of hygiene and enjoyment of one’s body (wydra, 2014). the social dimension of student wellbeing refers to the quality of their social lives (rath, harter, & harter, 2010) including their relationship with their family, their peers and their teachers, and how they perceive their social life in school (pollard & lee, 2003), as well as desire to be loved and needed (becker, 1991). material resources make it possible for families to care for their children’s needs and for schools to support students’ learning and healthy development. households who live in poverty find it difficult to ensure that their children have access to the educational and cultural resources they need to thrive in school and to realize their potential. children who live in poverty – with poor housing conditions and poor diets – are more likely to have health problems (aber et al., 1997). so the model of wellbeing is multidimensional. there are four categories of variables related to school: 1) school environment (e.g. school organization), 2) social relations (e.g. teacher-student relationship, peer relationship), 3) self-actualization (e.g. value of students’ work); 4) personal health, satisfaction with the state of the body (tobia et al, 2018; wydra, 2014). 51 methodology one of the most important methodological materials for measuring wellbeing is „a framework for the analysis of student wellbeing in the pisa 2015 study” which provides a comprehensive overview and details the policy relevance of the following five dimensions of wellbeing: cognitive, psychological, social, physical and material wellbeing. the paper outlines the underlying indicators of each dimension and their theoretical and analytical value for education policy. this paper concludes by identifying data gaps within the indicators and exploring how future cycles of pisa could bridge these gaps in order to provide a more comprehensive portrait of students’ wellbeing” (borgonovi & pál, 2016, 4). based on the study and theoretical findings about the wellbeing indicators there was developed the questionnaire (becker, 1991; diaz, blanco, & mar, 2011; frank, 2004; ryff & keyes, 1995; tobia et al, 2018; wydra, 2014, etc.) which consists of self-assessment check list filled by students and evaluation check list filled by their parents and teachers. the indicators were united into four wellbeing dimensions: mental, cognitive, social and physical wellbeing (see figure 1). the following participants filled in the check list and participated in the approbation of the questionnaire: 18 students ages 9-12, 18 parents and 18 teachers. all groups of respondents were asked to rate the same items on a five point likert scale where 1 definitely disagree, 2 agree more than disagree, 3 don't know, 4 agree more than disagree, 5 strongly agree. in the research the about students’ wellbeing in the private school, the triangulation was used to capture different dimensions of the same data and avoid subjective approach. the data obtained in the survey was coded and processed in the program spss 25.0, using the frequency test, t-test, anova test. results the results analysis included the assessment of the factors and individual statements. the obtained results reflect the assessment statements of all the respondents and each group (figure 1). figure 1 average values in the diverse groups of respondents the factor analyses of all the respondent groups reflect the highest average value for the factor social wellbeing (mean 4.14), followed by cognitive wellbeing (mean 3.98) and psychological wellbeing (mean 3.90). the lowest average value is for the factor physical wellbeing (mean 3.74). the results show statistically significant differences depending on the 3,9 3,94 3,88 3,883,98 3,94 3,94 4,064,14 4 4,19 4,24 3,74 4,7 3,88 3,65 0 1 2 3 4 5 all respondents students parents teachers psyhological well-being cognitive well-being social well-being physical well-being 52 respondents’ groups (students, teachers, parents) in the assessments of the psychological wellbeing (p = .001) and social wellbeing (p = .027). the factor physical wellbeing has the highest evaluation in the students' answers. there are studies (costigan, lubans, lonsdale, sanders, & del pozo cruz, 2019) that emphasize that the time spent in physical activity improves the person’s overall wellbeing. the data was collected at school where the students spend a lot of time outdoors and physical activity is a regular part of their lives. this explains the high average value of the factor physical wellbeing. in the teachers' responses, the particular emphasis is given to the factors social wellbeing and cognitive wellbeing, which can be closely linked to the professional activity and its impact on the assessment criteria. factor social wellbeing was rated higher in parents' answers. statement analyses reflects the statistically significant differences between the respondent groups (table 1). table 1 average values of the statements and statistically significant differences between the respondent groups statement students teachers parents p student likes school premises 4,29 4,82 4,81 ,005 other people think that the student is a responsive, good person 3,41 4,41 4,25 .005 student is not afraid to express her/his opinion 3,41 1,53 1,69 ,000 people seldom manage to persuade the student to do what he does not want 3,35 2,12 2,81 ,011 it is difficult for a student to express her/his opinion at school 2,76 1,53 1,75 ,004 student is proud of himself 3,88 4,47 3,75 ,031 student likes to find out something new every day 3,88 4,35 4,75 ,025 student likes to learn something new every day 3,82 4,35 4,56 ,045 student enjoys conversations with classmates and schoolmates 4,06 4,82 4,56 ,004 student is happy to help others 4,12 4,59 4,81 ,008 student often feels very tired 3,00 2,00 2,13 ,018 on the other hand, the analysis of students’ answers provides the statistically significant differences (depending on students’ ages) in measuring the mental wellbeing (p = .047) and physical wellbeing (p = .005). there were statistically significant differences between male and female students in measuring the physical wellbeing (p = .043). the results show that measuring the wellbeing factors and indicators can be modified by students’ ages, gender or respondents’ sense of belonging to a particular group (student, teacher or parent). this allows us to assume that the student wellbeing has to be measured at school on a regular basis (at least once a year). this will allow teachers to create the supportive environment for the students, as well as to identify problems and, if necessary, start pedagogical correction in a timely manner. discussion and conclusions the developed questionnaire was based on triangulation so diverse viewpoints appear in the research. the questionnaire, on the one hand, reflects a broad definition of the student wellbeing, on the other hand, faces limitations of the detailed analyses. sometimes subjective wellbeing depends on value priorities (sortheix & lönnqvist, 2014, 2015). needs and wellbeing are related to values so the personal value system can affect the measurement of wellbeing components (lyubomirsky, sheldon, & schkade, 2005; bobowik, 53 basabe, paez, jimenez-aristizabal, & bilbao, 2011). values are related to motivation that influences attitudes, behaviors, and measurements (fischer & boer 2016). measurement of the wellbeing factors and related indicators highlight also the students' values, which are related to the motivation to take action and to the needs necessary for improving wellbeing. the gained data led to the necessity to design the new questionnaire which included the most important measuring indicators for the students. the questionnaire could provide a broader picture of the students’ values and needs to increase the personal wellbeing. the designing of the new questionnaire is also based on the fact that the schools need the ongoing work for measuring the student wellbeing. the new questionnaire was improved by offering the students to measure the personal significance of each statement (importance) and the relevance of the school community to the students' needs (reality). the improved questionnaire is shown in table 2. table 2 students’ questionnaire importance (how much it is important for you) statement reality (to what extent it is provided at school) d e fi n it e ly n o p ro b a b ly n o i d o n o t k n o w p ro b a b ly y e s d e fi n it e ly y e s d e fi n it e ly n o p ro b a b ly n o i d o n o t k n o w p ro b a b ly y e s d e fi n it e ly y e s i like school premises i have friends at school i feel lonely at school people around me consider me a responsive, good person i'm not afraid to express my thoughts at school people rarely manage to persuade me to do what i don't want to do it is more important at school to adapt to others than to be alone i feel safe at school: i'm not called, beaten, not robbed teachers are demanding and honest with me it's hard for me to express my thoughts at school if i have problems at school i know to whom to turn to solve them i am responsible for what i do studying at school depresses me i am proud of myself i'm sure i can do almost anything overall, i like myself at school i am not satisfied with my progress / achievements i have more disadvantages than other students at school i am afraid of punishment we participate in various competitions and events with class / schoolmates i can cope with school tasks on my own i can plan my time to manage everything i find it difficult to do school tasks i don't like to plan a day 54 i'm glad to learn something new every day at school i like to do something new at school i don't like being made to think of something new at school i am not afraid to make mistakes and learn from it my parents take part in school activities at school, i learn something new every day if others do not understand the theme, i explain it to them i trust my teachers teachers are friendly i feel accepted in my class my classmates consider me a reliable friend i like talking to classmates and schoolmates i am disappointed in my classmates / schoolmates i hear what others are saying i don't have friends who listen to me at school i trust my friends i am happy to help others i like to laugh at others i like that there are a lot of outdoor activities at school i like the way i look i often worry i often feel very tired my head or belly (or something else) often hurts i like food at school i like that we can choose food at school i like to decide about the size of my portion of food parents support me overall, i am happy with my school we assume that the proposed students’ self-assessment questionnaire would allow: 1) to identify the degree to which a student is feeling well at school, because students and adults (teachers, parents) may focus on different issues while answering the questions. the comparison between importance and reality would allow students to more accurately evaluate their needs and the school environment. 2) to analyze the students’ value principles and, if necessary, implement the correcting pedagogy in the classroom. the data from pisa research about student wellbeing show that „many of the differences, both between and within countries, in student wellbeing are related to students’ perceptions about the disciplinary climate in the classroom or about the support their teachers give them. in particular, schools can help eradicate bullying in partnerships with parents, community organisations and health or social services. the data also show that parental involvement and adolescents’ perceptions about the support their parents give them are associated with students’ feelings about schoolwork, their performance in pisa and their wellbeing, in general. the results suggest that forging stronger relationships between schools and parents to give adolescents the support they need – academically and psychologically – could go a long way towards improving the wellbeing of all students” (oecd 2017, 20). it is possible to measure the student wellbeing and make improvements only using the qualitative and methodologically accurate case studies. 55 the questionnaire needs to be approbated in several educational institutions. as a result, there will be created the measurement tool to collect the evidence of student wellbeing at basic school. references agency for international programs for youth, republic of latvia (2019). wellbeing of young people in baltic states: research report. riga-tallin-vilnius. 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(2014). der fragebogen zum allgemeinen habituellen wohlbefinden. retrieved from http://www.sportpaedagogik-sb.de/pdf/fahw-manual.pdf https://doi.org/10.1177%2f0022022113504621 https://doi.org/10.1002/casp.2193 http://www.sportpaedagogik-sb.de/pdf/fahw-manual.pdf 27 opportunities to learn history and culturology and to develop digital competence in the age of information technology pāvels jurs1, dina bethere2 1, 2 liepaja university, latvia abstract. technological progress, which sets scenarios for the development of humanity, affects the pattern of human behaviour in the most direct way and becomes an integral part of life, serving as progressives and at the same time also as regressive means in the educational process. the school should follow the modern digital age so it is necessary to offer students to learn the content of learning in an interactive, understandable, achievable and educational way. in order to facilitate the interaction of the digital competence of student’s with knowledgebuilding in the learning process of history and culturology, two years of development resulted in the creation of a website enabling students to learn more successfully history and culturology. it should also be noted that the european commission highlights the digital competence as one of the key competences for lifelong learning: it is recommended that the european union should raise and improve the level of digital competences at all stages of education and training (european commission, 2018). the aim of this article is, highlighting the importance of digital competence and information technology in the education process, identify students' growth rates in history and culturology studies using the learning platform developed and tested www.pavelsjurs.lv. the article reflects the introduction of innovation in the history and culturology subjects through an open interactive learning platform that can be used in daily education at school and for online learning. keywords: culturology, digital competence, educational process, history, information technology, students. to cite this article: jurs, p. & bethere, d. (2020). opportunities to learn history and culturology and to develop digital competence in the age of information technology. education. innovation. diversity, 1(1), 27-36. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.17770/eid2020.1.4421 introduction with the entry of digital technologies, the learning process is becoming more versatile and diverse, adapting to societal and labour market requirements, educational content conditions and the preconditions for the cognitive and metacognitive development of students'. digital technologies are today the engine of innovation, contributing to the growth of the global economy (kluzer & rissola, 2015). in parallel, the importance of access to education and the digital competence of students in the learning process through digital technologies should be emphasised. thus the digitization and accessibility of the curriculum is gaining importance. if a student has access to an intelligent and standard-appropriate digital educational content, the learning process is to some extent facilitated by the student – different smart devices can be used at all times and places, educational content becomes more accessible, providing opportunities for self-learning and better preparation, such as upcoming exams, and new opportunities for learning through distance learning. in addition to accessing and learning content in an interactive way through information technologies, the digital skills of students' are one of the key issues. in order to be able to adapt to a rapidly changing world, it is necessary, through a multi-plurality of education, to promote a set of basic human skills, including digital competence, which will help to adapt to the changes in globalisation (vuorikari, punie, carretero & brande, 2016). as confirmed by eurostat available statistics in the context of digital skills, in 2015, nearly half (44,5%) insufficient digital skills have been identified among eu citizens aged 16-74 in order to be able to participate fully in socio-economic processes (eurostat data, 2015). meanwhile, in a report http://dx.doi.org/10.17770/eid2020.1.4421 36 published by the european commission (2017) “europe's digital progress report 2017” it is concluded that: (i) 79% of eu citizens use the internet at least once a week; (ii); 71% of eu citizens use the internet every day; (iii) 44% of eu citizens do not have sufficient digital skills; (iv) 14% of eu citizens do not have digital skills and do not use the internet; (v) 37% of job seekers have insufficient digital skills; (vi) 11% of job seekers do not have digital skills at all (european commission, 2017). it should be noted that school achievements on history subject at the end of grade 12 are relatively low in the centralised exam of history, which is organised on a voluntary basis by students in general education institutions. in analysing the report published by the national centre for education of the republic of latvia in 2019 on the results of the state examination work, it should be concluded that the average history centralised examination rate in latvia is only 40.93% between 2017 and 2019, while the historical minimum exam rates at the end of grade 9 are 61.11% (valsts izglītības satura centrs, 2019). the methods used in the article are: theoretical (scientific and methodical literature, analysis of regulatory enactments) and empirical (data extraction, processing and analysis). the article highlights the analysis of the concept of digital competence, describing the development of learning platforms to study history, culturology. there was also a student survey conducted to assess the impact of the effectiveness of information technology on the learning process and students` learning outcomes. the theoretical and empirical research carried out led to the achievement of the aim of the article: highlighting the importance of digital competence and information technology in the education process, identify students' competence growth rates in history and culturology through the development and testing of an interactive learning platform www.pavelsjurs.lv. topicality and necessity of digital competence in the pedagogical process in the era of information technology, promoting the digital competence of students' in the pedagogical process is becoming one of the most important elements of learning. both: the importance and necessity of digital competence are also highlighted in policy planning documents at national level, for example, report of the ministry of education and science of the republic of latvia “digital competence in the educational process” it is emphasized that: “digital competence is the ability to use technology to acquire, store, create, evaluate, and exchange information to securely communicate and collaborate on collaborative / social networks using the internet and technology capabilities; ability to use information technology with conviction and criticism in education, work and leisure.” (latvijas republikas izglītības un zinātnes ministrija, 2015). the concept of digital competence as noted by the european commission in its report “key competences for lifelong learning – a european framework”, involves the convincing and critical use of information society technologies for work, leisure and everyday communication. they are based on computer skills for obtaining, evaluating, storing, creating, presenting, exchanging information, communicating and networking over the internet. digital competence requires a clear understanding and knowledge of the nature of information society technologies, their meaning and potential in everyday life. necessary digital skills include the ability to search, collect and process to use information, critically and systematically assessing the meaning of information, and understanding the differences between real and virtual information (european commission, 2017, p.7). critical thinking and practical knowledge are very important elements of digital competence, as the researcher z. rubene emphasizes: “education, upbringing based on the notion that by mechanically taking over non-reflective knowledge, developing the mind, can become a prototype of the mass society. thinking, inventing, solving important problems is possible only in individual, creative intellectual activity. if the learning http://www.pavelsjurs.lv/ 36 process does not exercise reasoning; does not encourage human initiative, but merely acquires non-practical knowledge, education becomes a mean of building a mass of indifferent, neutral individuals.” (rubene, 2004, p. 27-28). it should be noted that the use of information technologies to promote digital competence requires critical and informed treatment of students with available information arising from the self-directed learning process and the responsible use of interactive media. these processes, which can conditionally be called as the preparation phase of digital competence, should be directed initially through the professional and purposeful mediation of the teacher. thus, in the light of promoting digital competence in the pedagogical process, it would be advisable to promote the development of the digital competence of young people, not only, for example, in informatics lessons, but in any other subject, by ensuring effective learning of the learning process through the digital platform. digital competence can be characterised by a number of components that reveal the digital competence framework. for example, as elements of the digital competence structure can serve:  informative and media component – knowledge, skills, motivation and responsibility for information search, selection and analysis;  communicative component – knowledge, skills, motivation and responsibility for different forms of communication;  the technical component – knowledge, skills, motivation and responsibility for the effective and safe use of technical equipment;  consumer component – knowledge, skills, motivation and responsibility in solving various problem situations using information technology in everyday life (soldatova, nestik, rasskazova & zotova, 2013, p. 141). on the other hand, from the european commission's perspectives, the digital competence framework is described as:  information and data literacy – browsing, searching and filtering data, information and digital content, evaluating data, information and digital content, managing data, information and digital content;  communication and collaboration – interacting through digital technologies, sharing through digital technologies, engaging in citizenship through digital technologies, collaborating through digital technologies, netiquette, managing digital identity;  digital content creation – developing digital content, integrating and re-elaborating digital content, copyright and licences, programming;  safety – protecting devices, protecting personal data and privacy, protecting health and well-being, protecting the environment;  problem solving – solving technical problems, identifying needs and technological responses, creatively using digital technologies, identifying digital competence gaps (european commission, 2007, p. 8-9). digital competence involves the confident and critical use of information society technology for work, leisure and communication: promoting digital competence is today an integral part of educational content. being aware of the rapid development of information technologies and the need to promote students' digital competence in educational establishments, including latvia, the new competence-based basic education content, which was approved at the end of 2018, defines digital competence as one of the key competences in order to use digital technologies responsibly and effectively, acquire knowledge, create new content, share content and communicate, critically and constructively assess the role of technology and media society (ministru kabineta noteikumi nr. 747, 2018). by bringing together the various approaches described above in the content of the concept of digital competence, recognising the need to promote digital competence in the learning 36 process, it can be concluded that digital competence is: (i) students' knowledge and skills, by carefully analysing and critically evaluating, obtaining and processing information; (ii) safe and dignified virtual cooperation between students' using different forms of communication; (iii) knowledge, skills and dignity of students' in the development, storage and distribution of digital content; (iv) students' knowledge, skills and responsibility for security and problemsolving aspects in the digital environment. digitalisation of learning content in history and culturology classes in order to promote the development of a student as a personality, it is necessary constantly think about improvements in teaching and learning, taking into account both the rapid development of information technology and the demands of the labour market in relation to the cognitive and metacognitive preconditions of students. the teacher should provide an active and intellectually stimulating learning process in a responsive environment, where student receives the necessary support (fišers, 2005, p. 200). as a result, the teaching and learning process becomes a multi-faceted, focused and systematic collaboration between a student and teacher, where, with the professional skills and support of teacher, a student learns the skills needed for life, gains up-to-date knowledge and creates a positive and dignified attitude. measuring and harmonising the activities of the teacher and the student in achieving didactically justified development is the most important condition of teaching as a condition of fact (žogla, 2001, p. 174). it is the teaching method chosen by the teacher that largely determines the course of development of students' competence development. teaching method is a system of teacher-student didactic co-operation to develop pupils' knowledge and skills and develop cognitive abilities (zelmenis, 2000, p. 111). training methods for learning any subject must also be undermined by age requirements and technology benefits: neither school nor teacher can ignore technological progress, methodically justified approaches must be found where the benefits of modern technologies provide added value in improving the learning process and promoting the quality of education. a teacher needs to focus on a broad range of innovation technologies in day-to-day work in order to promote evolving learning and the effectiveness of learning history, both from the perspective of students and from the perspective of the teacher themselves. meanwhile, the thoughtful use of information technology in the pedagogical process can enhance students' curiosity, self-study and relative freedom of action (nikulina, 2000). the acquisition of a historical curriculum in general education institutions in latvia is governed by the cabinet regulations regarding samples of the state basic education standards and basic education programmes (2018) and cabinet regulations regarding the state standard of general secondary education and samples of general secondary education programmes (2019). the primary education standard lists as one of the results to be achieved in the context of learning history which is: “the student thinks and acts responsibly, knowing the consequences of his actions and respecting life as a value. he has developed sustainable, beneficial social habits in communication and interaction with fellow human beings, has developed national, historical and civic awareness and understanding of social and economic processes.” (ministru kabineta noteikumi nr. 747, 2018), while the standard of secondary education mentions it as one of the complex results to be achieved in the context of history acquisition: “the student explains the events of the world, their causation and idealistic background in the past and in the present, expresses his attitude towards social, economic, political processes and engages responsibly in them, takes decisions related to career and future opportunities and has a positive impact on prosperity locally and globally, sees injustice and acts in such a way as to prevent it, 36 treat it with dignity and understanding with society for diversity of purposes.” (ministru kabineta noteikumi nr. 416, 2019). the relatively low results of students' in state exam of history highlight the need to review the selected pedagogical approaches and learning methods, which would contribute to a more in-depth understanding of the processes of history, their causation and the impact of historical processes on present day – key aspects of the history learning methodology are the collection and availability of historical information, the promotion of historical causation analysis, and the analysis of historical sources to promote critical thinking and collaborative skills (quanchi & so’o, 2003, p. 11-12). learning history must not be confined to stating facts, history cannot be seen as an isolated chain of events, the process of learning history must promote the systematic thinking of students by offering a broad spectrum of information (weiner, 1995), provide students with transparent and easily accessible information, e.g. through powerpoint presentations, to explain complex concepts of historical events (neumann, 2015). at the high school stage, it is possible and even necessary to apply modular technology to the pedagogical process using information technologies that promote student cognitive and cognitive skills: analyse, synthesize and critically evaluate available information, and communication skills (vjazemskij & strelova, 2000). the use of information technologies in the learning of history and culturology contributes to an active and meaningful learning process, helping students to critically assess past events, understand the consequences of past events today, thereby modulating a possible future development scenario. in addition, for choosing the methods of teaching history or culturology, the types of interaction between the teacher and the student that are geared towards the objective of the learning process, it is important to promote the personal attitudes of the student towards a specific historical and social cultural events (vagin, 1972). the use of learning methods methods in learning process should also follow the trends of the 21st century and audience a demand of the society. therefore, more and more attention should be paid to interactive learning methods that would clearly facilitate student`s learning and simplify the learning of the subject. history and culturology, as subjects are very grateful for the use of interactive techniques. there are so many interesting websites where it is possible, for example, to walk virtuously around ancient egypt, greece, visit the prehistoric lasko cave, learn more about latvia's occupation in the virtual museum, etc. we, teachers, must also provide knowledge where to seek the necessary information, encourage students to constantly and critically assess available information on the internet. while understanding the need for the development of a learning approach in line with the dominance of modern technologies in society, as well as thinking about the availability of the learning content to be acquired by students to the acquisition of a history and culturology at a secondary school stage and the experience of the author working as a history and culturology teacher for 10 years, the author independently developed an interactive learning platform of latvian and world history. www.pavelsjurs.lv the interactive learning platform www.pavelsjurs.lv was developed in september 2014 on the basis of own-initiative and pedagogical experience, working as a teacher of history and culturology. according to the information provided by google analytics (http://analytics.google.com), between september 2014 and january 2020, 38887 users visited the interactive learning platform www.pavelsjurs.lv, mainly using learning materials of subjects of history of latvia and world, as well as culturology for grades 10-12. the home page, which is intended not only for secondary pupils or students, but also for any lead, provide:  presentations by the author using more than 40 different sources of literature, providing a comprehensive view of the content of the subject “history of latvia and the world”. presentations that allow students to download in pdf and pps formats in a free approach are all topics for educational content (essence and topicality of history; http://www.pavelsjurs.lv/ http://www.pavelsjurs.lv/ http://analytics.google.com/ http://www.pavelsjurs.lv/ 36 prehistory; ancient civilizations; ancient greece; ancient rome; early medieval europe and the baltics; the origins of christianity and the formation of the christian world; islam and the islamic world; the advanced middle ages; medieval livonia and lithuania; europe in the late middle ages; renaissance and reformation; big geographic discoveries. american, chinese, indian, and japanese civilizations; europe and the world in the age of absolutism and enlightenment; the baltics in the age of absolutism and enlightenment; the great french revolution; the baltics, europe and the world in the industrialization era in the first half of the 19th century; the baltics, europe and the world 2nd half of the 19th century early 20th century; first world war. acquisition of latvian independence; europe and the world in the inter-war period; latvia and the baltic states in the 1920s and 1930s; second world war; a split world; communist regime in latvia and the baltics; present day). to make it easier for users to navigate the topics, the structure of the website divide into sections by grades 10, 11, 12, which contain topics relevant to each class.  in addition to the free download of presentations on each topic, students have access to audio lectures created by the author on the website and presentations of cultural history in selected topics.  a set of homework tasks is available for students under each topic, prepared by the history teacher, v.klišāns, as well as free-access video resources from www.youtube.com and other different types of website that expand students' sight helps to better understand the subject to be learned.  thanks to material developed by teacher l.zitāne, the website has access to the “culturology” section, where students can download a variety of presentations dedicated to cultural-related topics: cultural theory issues (circles of culture, concept of culture, nature, culture and man, material and spiritual culture, culture of signs and symbols), prehistory and ancient middle eastern cultures (perceptions of the mythical world, prehistoric culture, mesopotamia, egyptian, hebrew culture), middle eastern and far eastern cultures (indian culture, vedas and hinduism, buddhism, chinese culture, philosophy, chinese intellectual heritage and achievements), ancient culture (ancient and ancient roman culture, ancient and ancient roman intellectual heritage), medieval culture (byzantine and islamic culture, medieval culture and theo centrism), renaissance culture (man and society in renaissance culture, importance and ideas of renaissance, renaissance art and architecture), culture of absolute enlightenment (absolutism and court culture, 18th century ideas and enlightenment, intellectual achievements of absolutism and enlightenment, rococo, realism and classicism), 19th century culture (19th century man and society, key ideas, scientific and technological achievements 19th century art and architecture), 20th century culture (20th century) century social life, postmodern tendencies, main ideas, youth counterculture, science development, 20th century art and architecture), latvian culture (ancient and traditional latvian culture, medieval and reformation culture in latvia, latvian culture from 17th century to first 19th century) party, fine arts and architecture at the turn of the 20th century in latvia, latvian culture in the 20-30s of the 20th century, latvian culture in the soviet times).  thematic planning of the subject for each class group and methodological suggestions for the development of reasoned essays.  useful open-access internet resources for deeper study of history and awareness raising. 36 approbation of an interactive learning platform in student assessment in order to evaluate effectively, systematically and objectively the created interactive learning platform for the subjects of history and culturology, in autumn 2019, a survey was carried out in one of latvia's general education institutions. the respondents were 10-12 grade students who use on daily bases the interactive home page www.pavelsjurs.lv. the aim of the survey was to clarify the assessment of students on the created learning tool and to identify learning growth indicators using the home page. the survey involved 86 respondents (grade 10-12 students). in first part of the survey, students had the opportunity to assess the impact of information technologies on the learning process and on the use of information technologies in the educational process (figure 1). from the answers given by the respondents, it can be concluded that:  the majority of respondents (98%) are convinced that the use of information technology can improve the learning process;  the majority of respondents (82%) are convinced that teachers targeted use information technology in the learning process;  the majority of respondents (74%) are convinced that the use of information technology in school curricula is appropriate and sufficient. figure 1 students' self-assessment of the use of information technology in the learning process in second part of the survey, students had an opportunity to evaluate the developed interactive learning platform (home page www.pavelsjurs.lv) in latvian and world history, culturology studies (figure 2). from the answers, it can be concluded that:  all respondents (100%) admit that the developed website helps to better acquire study material in history and culturology studies; in my school, teachers are purposefully applying information technology in the lessons purposeful use of information technology improves the learning process the use of information technology in teaching subjects at my school is appropriate and sufficient 37% 4% 9% 61% 78% 65% 2% 17% 26% 0% 0% 0% very much agree agree disagree very much disagree http://www.pavelsjurs.lv/ 36  almost all respondents (98%) admit that the developed home page helps to better understand historical and cultural processes;  all respondents (100%) admit to using the developed home page in preparation for tests in the history and culturology studies;  almost all respondents (98%) admit that the developed website is necessary for history and culturology studies. figure 2 students' self-assessment of the personal development through using of interactive learning platform (home page www.pavelsjurs.lv) in the third part of the survey, respondents had the opportunity to mention the benefits of the website. the students noted that the website is: (i) thoughtful and interesting because it includes both video and audio recordings to help you better understand the subject; (ii) easy to understand, easy to navigate and information are secure and reliable; (iii) very useful in cases where the student is unable to attend the class, since absenteeism can have a significant impact on a student's learning outcomes; (iv) a very good resource for developing your understanding of historical and cultural historical events in latvia and the world. on the other hand, respondents mentioned suggestions for improving the website: (i) to rethink the visual design of the website; (ii) to develop the mobile phone version and application of the website; (iii) to offer information and learning materials in english and russian. conclusions 1. purposeful and pedagogically based use of information technologies in the learning process stimulates students' interest in the subject being studied, promotes student`s achievement and the diverse teaching and learning process. in this way, the digitalisation of curricula and teaching aids acquires topicality in the pedagogical process, facilitating access to education and promoting digital competence among students. website www.pavelsjurs.lv helps better acquire study material of history and culturology the website www.pavelsjurs.lv helps me better understand cultural and historical processes i use the website www.pavelsjurs.lv in preparation for tests in the history and culturology studies the website www.pavelsjurs.lv is necessary in the history and culturology studies 74% 57% 70% 63% 26% 41% 30% 35% 0% 2% 0% 2% 0% 0% 0% 0% very much agree agree disagree very much disagree 36 2. in the age of information technology, promoting digital competence among students is becoming one of the most important elements of learning and pedagogical process. the concept of students' digital competence includes: (i) students' knowledge and skills, by carefully analysing and critically evaluating, obtaining and processing information; (ii) safe and dignified virtual cooperation between students' using different forms of communication; (iii) knowledge, skills and dignity of students' in the development, storage and distribution of digital content; (iv) students' knowledge, skills and responsibility for security and problem-solving aspects in the digital environment. 3. the versatile use of teaching methods should follow 21st century trends, labor market demands and request of audience. as a result, digital competence issues and interactive teaching methods are increasingly being addressed in the pedagogical environment, which would clearly facilitate student learning and simplify the learning process of subjects. 4. the challenge of teaching the subjects of history and culturology is not only to raise awareness of the causal relationships and interactions between historical and cultural processes, but also to foster students' systematic thinking, imagination and visual perception of historical and cultural events, providing students with transparent and easily accessible digital information in the form of presentations, videos and audio, thus allowing students to understand the characteristics of a particular era. 5. the empirical research carried out confirms the importance and effectiveness of the developed interactive learning platform (home page www.pavelsjurs.lv) in the learning process in the process of learning history and culturology, promoting students' interest and understanding of historical and cultural processes. at the same time, interactive learning platform needs the visual and technical 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(2001). didaktikas teorētiskie pamati. rīga: raka. https://likumi.lv/ta/id/303768-noteikumi-par-valsts-pamatizglitibas-standartu-un-pamatizglitibas-programmu-paraugiem https://likumi.lv/ta/id/303768-noteikumi-par-valsts-pamatizglitibas-standartu-un-pamatizglitibas-programmu-paraugiem https://visc.gov.lv/vispizglitiba/eksameni/statistika/2019/ 37 managing education during the coronavirus emergency: the case of a polish higher education institution gilberto marzano,1,2aleksandra zając1 1 spoleczna akademia nauk, poland 1,2 rezekne academy of technologies, latvia abstract. due to the threat posed by covid-19, most higher education institutions in europe have opted to switch to online remote courses and smart working with a view to keeping their students and university staff safe during the current pandemic emergency. face-to-face classes, including labs and workshops, have been canceled and substituted with online activities wherever possible, and new administrative procedures have even been established to support these radical changes. this article will analyze these changes in the light of a case study research conducted at the university of social sciences in poland. the primary objective was to conduct an exploratory examination of the learning management issues that have emerged from the forced distance learning activities adopted to minimize the effects of the covid-19 pandemic. the secondary objective was to gather testimonies regarding the impact that the imposition of smart working has had on the university staff. from the research activity, some significant elements emerged that have stimulated a deeper reflection on the use of digital technology in higher education. keywords: coronavirus covid-19 pandemic, e-leaning, distance learning, higher education institutions, online courses, smart working. to cite this article: marzano, g. & zając, a. (2020). managing education during the coronavirus emergency: the case of a polish higher education institution. education. innovation. diversity, 1(1), 38-48. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.17770/eid2020.1.5324 introduction the university of social sciences in lodz (san = społeczna akademia nauk) is the largest private university in poland, and is one of the most accredited. according to the polish ministry of science and higher education, it holds the third top-ranking position amongst the non-public higher educational institutions in the country. established in 1994, the university offers a wide range of bachelor’s and master’s programs in the major polish cities (such as warsaw, lodz, and krakow) with a branch campus in london. at present, some 16,000 students are enrolled at the university, with around 60,000 graduates. the programs on offer include mba and ph.d. studies, as well as an american master’s degree program that operates in cooperation with clark university in massachusetts. the primary focus of san is to provide students with the knowledge and the skills that will be required in the labor market of the future. the advent of the fourth industrial revolution is radically transforming society and the labor market (larsson & teigland, 2020; noyelle, 2019). indeed, the education commission (2017) predicted that, by 2030, more than half of the world’s nearly 2 billion youth will lack the necessary skills and qualifications that will be essential to function in the emerging global workforce. in this light, san has implemented various activities aimed at expanding its internationalization and investment in applied research involving researchers and experts from http://dx.doi.org/10.17770/eid2020.1.5324 38 abroad, improving the student exchange within the erasmus+ program, and establishing bilateral agreements with prestigious foreign universities. recently, from march 2020, the covid-19 pandemic has forced san, like other european higher education institutions, to adopt online teaching-learning methods. according to the international association of universities: […] more than 1.5 billion students and youth across the planet are affected by school and university closures due to the covid-19 outbreak. (international association of universities, 2020, https://www.iau-aiu.net/covid-19-highereducation-challenges-and-responses). however, the speed with which this move had to be implemented was unprecedented and often left both students and teachers utterly bewildered. indeed, many online teaching-learning activities had to be hurriedly improvised and, consequently, their standards of quality differed greatly from the well-planned components of previously existing online courses. moreover, the organization of remote classes and virtual exams, as well as of the various bureaucratic activities proved very challenging. in this article, some aspects that emerged in the learning management experience at the san are illustrated and discussed. in the following paragraphs, we present the research objectives and methodology contextualizing our exploratory investigation within the measures adopted by the polish government for higher education institutions during the covid-19 pandemic. then, we expose a preliminary analysis of the interviews conducted with a selected group of academic staff, students, and foreign participants in the erasmus plus program. research objectives and methodology the primary research objective was to explore the effects, both positive and negative, of the forced adoption of remote teaching-learning and smart working at the university of social sciences. agile working and electronic collaboration facilities such as video conferencing, text messaging, email, a version control repository, and google docs, were already in use at the university, primarily to support the activities of the international projects. at the same time, a blended learning approach had been widely adopted in various educational activities. nevertheless, the massive use of remote teaching-learning and working was an unprecedented experience, and the university was obliged to improvise quick solutions in lessthan-ideal circumstances. the secondary objective was to collect the first impressions and reactions to smart working from the university staff. it is well known that working in multiple locations can create organizational issues, especially if the division of tasks and the assignment of roles is not welldefined (bednar & welch, 2019; mcewan, 2016). as amstrong reports (2020, p. 219), the uk civil service suggested the following ten top tips in this regard in 2016:  let others know where and when you are working;  make sure the reporting structure is clear;  share calendars and schedules;  use electronic document management systems rigorously to ensure work is easily accessible to everyone;  be flexible about flexible working, so that no one is disadvantaged by the choices of others;  develop an etiquette for online communications and virtual meetings;  sign-post availability for phone contact or online discussion;  be fair and considerate about using space in the office; https://www.iau-aiu.net/covid-19-higher-education-challenges-and-responses https://www.iau-aiu.net/covid-19-higher-education-challenges-and-responses 39  support each other to succeed together. in this research, the case study methodology has been adopted. this is a qualitative methodology commonly employed in the social sciences to investigate a phenomenon in a real-life context (atchan, davis, & foureur, 2016). according to yin (2003), a case study design is appropriate when the boundaries between the phenomenon and its context are not immediately clear. as such, different methods can be combined to illuminate a case from different angles (johansson, 2007). case studies are often used in exploratory research since they can help to pinpoint elements of particular interest that might then be investigated through other methods. a case study research can be considered as a prelude to further analysis since it may enable a researcher to emphasize certain aspects of a more complex phenomenon in order to stimulate reflections that can then be transformed into a structured research hypothesis. in carrying out this research, we adopted a three-step methodology: 1. case study design – definition of objectives. 2. data collection – gathering of data and opinions. 3. analysis – reflection and discussion. we carried out our research through interviews that included academic teachers (latvian case study), academic teachers and students (polish case study), and academic teachers and administrative staff (italian case study). we also collected and analyzed the documents produced by the three universities to face the emergency. these documents included official administrative papers, institutional communications, official website content, staff emails, social network posts, and other relevant documents. we interviewed by telephone 20 academic teachers and 20 students from the warsaw campus of san. we also interviewed 12 international students participating in the erasmus plus program. all interviewed had been asked about their experience during the lockdown and the emergency remote teaching (ert). in particular, we asked them to express their opinions about:  efficacy of learning and collaborating in an online environment;  access to the ert information;  access to the san information technology infrastructure;  satisfaction with the ert environment and tools used by san;  satisfaction with the solution adopted by san for taking exams from home. we selected the interviewed considering their interest in online learning, full participation in the ert courses, participation in the bachelor’s and master’s exams. we aimed to explore two primary research questions: 1. what were the factors that influenced the overall satisfaction in the ert experience? 2. did the ert experience influence the opinion of students and teaching staff on digital learning? we also collected and analyzed the documents produced by the university to face the emergency. these documents included official administrative papers, institutional communications, official website content, staff emails, social network posts, and other relevant documents. higher education institutions in poland during the covid-19 pandemic following the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic in march 2020, all higher education institutions (heis) in poland were obliged to either suspend classes entirely or switch to a remote mode of teaching. 40 on march 3, the polish minister of science and higher education (mshe) issued a recommendation outlining strict preventive measures to apply in order to significantly reduce the risk of the infection spreading. in particular, the mshe recommended the suspension of all study trips by students, ph.d. students, academic teachers, and researchers either to or from areas threatened with outbreaks of coronavirus covid-19. normal classes and seminars for undergraduates, postgraduates, and doctoral students conducted in a traditional form remained frozen until may 24. most universities also published guidelines on what to do in the event of being infected, or on how to behave when staying in dormitory accommodation, and so on. the activities of heis in poland are regulated by the following authorities: 1. government of poland: www.gov.pl/web/coronavirus 2. chief sanitary inspectorate: https://gis.gov.pl/ 3. ministry of science and higher education: https://www.gov.pl/web/nauka/rekomendacja-ministra-nauki-i-szkolnictwawyzszego-w-zwiazku-z-sytuacja-zagrozenia-epidemiologicznego-w-konteksciepracownikow-uczelni 4. polish national agency for academic exchange: https://nawa.gov.pl/en/ on march 16, the msui announced a series of detailed recommendations to tackle the covid-19 threat in the university context. these recommendations included the introduction of new modalities of working designed to protect the academic community, urging institutions as much as possible to consider the adoption of remote working. access restrictions to buildings and premises were introduced for those who were unable to work remotely. the msui recommendations also applied to undergraduates and doctoral students, outlining measures to be taken for courses to be taught remotely. to mitigate some of the disruption, a temporary flexibility was proposed in regards to various administrative procedures, such as for the acceptance of papers or documentation by university departments, as well as the extension of deadlines for submitting applications and sitting exams. the msui recommendations were not binding, however, and rectors were given the final responsibility for making decisions regarding the implementation of specific measures. anti covid-19 measures at san in poland, lockdown restrictions began to be implemented in march 2020. fortunately, the situation remained largely under control in the majority of polish regions, with the exception, for a brief period, of the southern province of silesia. in common with other polish heis, then, san faced the covid-19 pandemic emergency by following the msui recommendations, and completed the third academic semester by adopting distance teaching-learning solutions. at the beginning, it was not easy to make decisions concerning the safety of students and the academic staff since the general situation was very unclear owing to the spread of inaccurate and deceptive information (parmet & paul, 2020; qi, du, liu, zhao, & dong, 2020). it seemed, at first, that the infection would last only a short time. initially, therefore, the lockdown was imposed for two weeks, but it soon became clear that it would need to be prolonged. despite the uncertainty, however, the university decided to immediately adopt remote teaching-learning and smart working practices, whilst measures were taken to minimize the disturbance for students and academic staff. it was necessary, for example, to define reliable procedures to ensure the continuation of regular lectures and the exchange of information, and to organize end-of-course and graduation exams. http://www.gov.pl/web/coronavirus https://gis.gov.pl/ https://www.gov.pl/web/nauka/rekomendacja-ministra-nauki-i-szkolnictwa-wyzszego-w-zwiazku-z-sytuacja-zagrozenia-epidemiologicznego-w-kontekscie-pracownikow-uczelni https://www.gov.pl/web/nauka/rekomendacja-ministra-nauki-i-szkolnictwa-wyzszego-w-zwiazku-z-sytuacja-zagrozenia-epidemiologicznego-w-kontekscie-pracownikow-uczelni https://www.gov.pl/web/nauka/rekomendacja-ministra-nauki-i-szkolnictwa-wyzszego-w-zwiazku-z-sytuacja-zagrozenia-epidemiologicznego-w-kontekscie-pracownikow-uczelni https://nawa.gov.pl/en/ 41 the rector of san made a series of decisions following the mshe recommendations. on march 14, the administrative offices were closed, and all employees were urged to work from home using microsoft teams. all didactic activities were switched to distance learning, selecting, also for this, the microsoft teams platform to organize and conduct online lessons. on march 28, the procedures for sitting bachelor’s and master’s exams were established. teaching staff experience at the beginning of june, 20 academic teachers from the warsaw campus of san were interviewed by telephone regarding their experiences of remote working.1 the interviews were based largely on multiple-choice questions with a few open questions. respondents were aged between 30-60 years old, and were mostly female (80%). they were encouraged to comment on their experience, focusing on the perceived advantages and disadvantages. furthermore, they were asked to give their suggestions in the event that the university has to continue holding lectures online for the next academic year. all respondents asserted that, in the beginning, it was difficult for them to switch to online teaching. most (80%) complained that they had had little time to organize their teaching activities. many also decried their own scant technical knowledge (40%) and their personal difficulties in using the online learning platform (35%). overall, 70% expressed ) opinion that the online platform was not appropriate for hosting large groups of students (more than 15). table 1 shows the main issues encountered by teaching staff in their remote teaching activity. table 1. teaching staff difficulties in ert (own source) issues high moderate low none lack of technical knowledge 10% 30% 40% 20% initial lack of preparation in using the online learning platform (microsoft teams) 20% 50% 20% 10% difficulties in using the oline learning platform (microsoft teams) 10% 25% 30 35% little time to organize lectures 50% 30% 10% 10% suitability of the platform for many students (more than 15) 10% 20% 20% 50% the majority of respondents (90%) reported that they experienced problems with the internet. most respondents (80%) found online teaching to be more time-consuming compared to traditional teaching, with many claiming that an online lesson requires twice the amount of time a traditional one does. most of respondents (75%) were satisfied with the learning outcomes of their students and 90% of them claimed that would like to improve their own competence in online teachinglearning, and declared themselves willing to participate in initiatives organized by the university for this purpose. they also recognized that online teaching-learning could enhance learning flexibility and support individual learning according to an individual student’s capabilities and availability. 1 during the period 1st to 10th june, 20 academic teachers from the warsaw campus of the university of social sciences were contacted by telephone to comment on their experience of compulsory online teaching. 42 respondents (90%) pointed out that the primary disadvantage was the difficulty of interacting with students. they said that students were passive, and often they switched off the webcam claiming it slowed down the internet speed. many of the respondents (70%) decried their initial lack of preparation in using online learning platforms. in fact, microsoft teams was completely unknown to 80% of respondents. all respondents complained about the amount of time needed to implement and conduct lessons via the online teaching-learning platforms. they also had problems with the procedures established for the exams, and were convinced that many students cheated (65%). many respondents (80%) suggested improving the exam procedures in the event that remote teachinglearning continues in the next academic year. they were ready to participate in the analysis for the design of the new online teaching-learning procedures (75%). interestingly, some teachers (30%) expressed the desire to continue their theoretical lectures online regardless of the outcome of the pandemic emergency. students’ experience from the 1st to 6th of june, 20 students studying in warsaw were interviewed via telephone, using a structured questionnaire. respondents were aged 18-22 years old, and were equally divided with 50% males and 50% females. they were asked to comment on the advantages and disadvantages of online learning during the suspension of face-to-face classes. moreover, they were also urged to express their opinion about the extension of remote teaching-learning to the next academic year. many students (45%) responded that remote learning allowed them to save money on lodgings. most of respondents (80%) appreciated teachers’ flexibility and their availability for additional online meetings, and stated that they were satisfied with the level of engagement of teachers (90%). all expressed their appreciation for the work of administrative staff. in fact, they noted that they had had no problems during the closure of the administrative offices. table 2 shows how students evaluated the availability/engagement of teaching and administrative staff. on the other hand, all the students felt that the main disadvantage was the interruption of social relationships. all the students missed their group mates and the contact with their teachers, whilst 45% complained of frequent problems with their internet connection and the resulting difficulty of participating in classes. they claimed that sometimes the internet connection broke down or was too slow. table 2. evaluation of availability/engagement of teaching and administrative staff during the ert (own source) availability/engagement very good good fair poor very poor teaching staff availability 35% 45% 15% 5% teaching staff engagement 40% 60% administrative staff availability 70% 30% administrative staff engagement 70% 30% moreover, 45% of students had encountered technical problems in using old computers and smartphones. they encountered some problems in using microsoft teams. the most common difficulties had been: 43  the program didn’t allow desktop sharing with their contacts;  it was impossible seeing the latest messages or threads;  the webcam or audio didn’t work properly;  the program didn’t respond. overall, all the students responded that they had had to spend much more time studying online compared to traditional learning. they also claimed that they had received much more individual homework, and felt tired after the academic semester. all the respondents confirmed that they would be open to continuing online didactic activity in the future, however, they would like more consideration to be given to their needs, above all in regards to the amount of homework, which should be less. moreover, all of the students interviewed agreed that the university should provide them with laptops if online learning is to be introduced in the longer term. they also suggested that the university organize seminars on the use of the educational platforms. erasmus students’ experience twelve students participating in the erasmus+ program at the warsaw campus of san were asked to comment on their online learning experience through a questionnaire administered by telephone. they were aged 18-22 years old, with 58% coming from spain and the others from turkey. naturally, all of the students felt hugely disappointed since they had come to poland to learn about the polish culture, meet new people, and visit other european countries while staying in warsaw. unfortunately, the covid-19 emergency had started just after their arrival in warsaw, and the lockdown had left them locked in the university dormitory. all of the students reported missing their families and worrying about them. they said that it was tough to have to spend all of their time in a dormitory in a foreign country. all of them noted that they had received a great deal of support from the university, which ensured that they were provided with information, administrative help, and didactic activities. their coordinator was regularly in contact with them, checking how they were dealing with the situation every day. all of the students attended regular classes via microsoft teams, and communicated with teachers by email. they hoped that the situation would be over soon, and that they could get a new erasmus experience in the near future. some reflections in poland, the adoption of massive online teaching-learning during the lockdown was an unheard-of experience. although all higher education institutions had installed learning management systems (lms), such as blackboard, moodle, and coursera, online learning had not previously been widely followed. according to research by statistica, in 2019, only about 5% of the polish population as a whole had participated in an online course, and 10% had used some form of online training materials (figure 1). the situation is a little different if we take students into account. about 15% of students had attended an online course. slightly more than 30% of them had used online training materials, while 23% had had contact with the teacher/instructor through educational websites and portals. figures 2, 3, and 4 show how the students into account used the online resources before the ert. 44 figure 1 online education in poland in 2019 (source: https://www.statista.com/statistics/1121976/poland-online-education/). figure 2. participation in an online course before the ert (own source) figure 3. use of online training materials before the ert (own source) 15% 35% 50% 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% full participation occasional participation no participation 30% 47% 23% 0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35% 40% 45% 50% regular occasional never https://www.statista.com/statistics/1121976/poland-online-education/ 45 figure 4. contact with a teacher/instructor through educational websites and portals before the ert (own source) however, lmss have often been used far below their potential to supplement traditional teaching, e.g., to share course materials, post announcements, and submit assignments. in fact, lmss have only recently begun to be used to provide effective interactive functionalities. the forced distance-learning has induced experimentation with the use of virtual communication, such as video conferencing and virtual meetings. lmss are now increasingly being integrated with various platforms for distance teaching-learning activities, such as microsoft teams, zoom, gotomeeting, and skype. from our research, it emerges that most teachers adopted the same modality they use in normal face-to-face teaching to the emergency remote teaching. many of them ignored the fact that online learning has been investigated over the years, with results that have clearly distinguished between distance learning, distributed learning, blended learning, online learning, mobile learning, and other learning approaches. in fact, these studies into online education over the last decades have resulted in numerous theories, models, standards, and evaluation criteria being developed, primarily focused on the design and quality of online courses (arghode, brieger, & mclean, 2017; cook & grant-davis, 2020; lee, 2017; nortvig, petersen, & balle, 2018). in short, after a semester of remote teaching-learning and smart working, the san experience has confirmed what we already knew from previous research. effective results for online learning programs depend on their careful design and planning. effective online education also requires investment. teachers need to be taught how to design and deliver online learning modules, and a robust online learning environment should be implemented. delivering traditional lessons online can be quick and low cost, but it is not the right way. on the contrary, becoming an expert in online teaching and learning requires application and time. indeed, although the students and teachers interviewed generally agreed to continue with remote teaching-learning, they all clearly underlined the need to be trained in the effective use of the educational platforms. they expect that the university will organize educational events to fill this gap. another, final, aspect concerns the need to provide psychological support to students to help them to overcome the lack of socialization in order that they stay mentally and emotionally healthy. 23% 35% 42% 0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35% 40% 45% regular occasional never 46 conclusion the threat of covid-19 has presented higher education institutions with an opportunity to experiment with remote teaching-learning on a large scale. in this regard, one ought not to forget that the primary objective has not been to create a robust educational infrastructure but, rather, to provide a temporary solution that would allow normal didactic activities to continue. from our research, some key questions have emerged which need to be analyzed if we are to avoid the potential pitfalls that may arise with online learning:  is the technological infrastructure in place sufficient to handle the needs of remote teaching-learning?  what is the capacity of support staff to handle the needs of remote teaching-learning?  how can the capacity of teaching staff to design and run online courses be developed?  how can the current didactic procedures, e.g., end-of-course and graduation exams, be adapted to respond to the challenges of an online environment? we have to underline that the question “what were the factors that influenced the overall satisfaction in the ert experience?” did find an answer. the limited number of responses didn’t allow to build significant conclusions. however, our research shows teaching staff and students gave a positive evaluation of the ert experience and, accordingly, we can argue that this experience will influence their opinion on online learning. hopefully, the covid-19 threat will soon be only a memory. nevertheless, it would indeed be a lost opportunity if we return to traditional teaching and learning practices as they were before the virus, and forget all about the experience, and the clear potential benefits, of remote teaching-learning. in this regard, we agree with sun, tang and zuo: though covid-19 has had a severe impact on normal educational progress, universities may take this unforeseen opportunity to detect deficiencies and speed up reform of online education through innovative course content, state-of-the-art technology and efficient management. we have to turn this emergency into an occasion to further promote international collaboration and share experiences, knowledge and resources to build global online education network. 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(2020). coronavirus pushes education online. nature materials, 19(6), p. 687-687. available at: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41563-0200678-8; last accessed 07.09.2020. https://report.educationcommission.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/learning_generation_full_report.pdf https://report.educationcommission.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/learning_generation_full_report.pdf https://www.iau-aiu.net/covid-19-higher-education-challenges-and-responses https://www.iau-aiu.net/covid-19-higher-education-challenges-and-responses http://www.psyking.net/htmlobj-3839/case_study_methodology-_rolf_johansson_ver_2.pdf http://www.psyking.net/htmlobj-3839/case_study_methodology-_rolf_johansson_ver_2.pdf https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/23634 https://www.researchgate.net/profile/xiaofan_zhao2/publication/340113425_experts%27_conservative_judgment_and_containment_of_covid-19_in_early_outbreak/links/5e79a400299bf1b2b9ac1335/experts-conservative-judgment-and-containment-of-covid-19-in-early-outbreak.pdf https://www.researchgate.net/profile/xiaofan_zhao2/publication/340113425_experts%27_conservative_judgment_and_containment_of_covid-19_in_early_outbreak/links/5e79a400299bf1b2b9ac1335/experts-conservative-judgment-and-containment-of-covid-19-in-early-outbreak.pdf https://www.researchgate.net/profile/xiaofan_zhao2/publication/340113425_experts%27_conservative_judgment_and_containment_of_covid-19_in_early_outbreak/links/5e79a400299bf1b2b9ac1335/experts-conservative-judgment-and-containment-of-covid-19-in-early-outbreak.pdf https://www.researchgate.net/profile/xiaofan_zhao2/publication/340113425_experts%27_conservative_judgment_and_containment_of_covid-19_in_early_outbreak/links/5e79a400299bf1b2b9ac1335/experts-conservative-judgment-and-containment-of-covid-19-in-early-outbreak.pdf https://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/full/10.2105/ajph.2020.305721 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41563-020-0678-8 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41563-020-0678-8 6 adverse childhood experiences in psychoactive substance use disorders: a structured literature review sabīne bebere1, jeļena vrubļevska1,2 1riga stradins university, faculty of medicine, latvia 2department of psychiatry and narcology, riga stradins university, latvia abstract. adverse childhood experiences include psychological, physical, and sexual forms of abuse, as well as dysfunction in the home, including substance abuse among family members, and mental health problems in the family. these experiences are among the most intense and frequent sources of stress that children can experience early in life, and they also increase their risk of various behavioural disorders and substance abuse. aim: the study aimed to investigate the prevalence and potential impact of childhood adverse experiences in connection to alcohol and other psychoactive substance abuse and addiction. methods: a structured literature review was conducted, and an electronic search of the pubmed database was performed. the review process initially identified 653 articles, of which 11 were included in the review. results: smokers and alcohol users are more likely to report an adverse childhood experience compared to people who do not report harmful habits. parental divorce was one of the most common negative experiences that affected 17-59.5% of the respondents. the results of the adverse childhood experiences survey are a potentially significant predictor of risky behaviour. keywords: adverse childhood experience, alcohol use, mental health, psychoactive drug use, substance use to cite this article: bebere, s. & vrubļevska, j. (2023). adverse childhood experiences in psychoactive substance use disorders: a structured literature review education. innovation. diversity, 2(6), 6-16. doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2023.1.7054 introduction adverse childhood experience (ace) includes psychological, physical, and sexual forms of abuse, as well as dysfunction in the household, including having a family member with a substance use disorder or mental health problem. these experiences can put the person at risk of various behavioural disorders and substance misuse (chang, jiang, mkandarwire, shen, 2019; shin, mcdonald, conley, 2018; hughes et al., 2019). there is growing evidence that adverse childhood experiences are associated with negative mental and physical health outcomes, unhealthy and risky behaviours, increased healthcare use and even premature death (almuneef, elchoueiry, saleheen, al-eissa, 2017; musa, peek-asa, jovanović, selimović, 2018). these experiences are also one of the factors that can negatively affect an overall person's self-efficacy (berent, podgórski, kokoszka, 2018). ace such as substance-abusing parents, emotional neglect, and physical and sexual abuse are associated with opioid dependence and the earlier age of onset of injecting drugs (stein et al., 2017). socio-economic changes in the country may contribute to an increased incidence of adverse childhood experiences. studies are showing that housing insecurity, defined by a severe rent burden, was associated with increasing trends in child abuse and neglect during the covid-19 pandemic (barboza, schiamberg, pachl, 2021). this article aimed to explore, through a structured review of the literature, the prevalence and potential impact of adverse childhood experiences in the general population and both inpatients and outpatients with the use and addiction of alcohol and other psychoactive substances. https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2023.1.7054 7 in march 2022, an electronic search of publications was performed using endnote software, and articles were selected from the pubmed database. publications published in the last five years (2017-2022) were reviewed. criteria for inclusion of publications: adults (age 18+), includes people with alcohol and other psychoactive substance abuse and addiction, includes adverse childhood experiences, primary publications, publications in english, publications issued in the last five years, full text available. methodology the systematic review of the literature in this study was based on prisma 2020, and the diagram (figure 1) is intended to represent the selection of articles and the flow of information throughout the review (page et al., 2021). figure 1 selection of publications based on prisma 2020 (page et al., 2021) the search engine was searched using the keywords 'adverse childhood experience' or 'ace' and 'substance use' or 'substance abuse' or 'alcohol use' or 'alcohol dependence' or 'psychoactive drug use' or 'psychoactive substance abuse' or 'drug addiction' or 'opioid use' or 'opioid addiction' or 'mental health'. since the pubmed database begins the selection of 8 adults aged 19 years, in order not to lose data on patients aged 18 years, additional criteria were used: adult: 19+ years, adolescent: 13-18 years. the literature review process identified 653 articles; no duplicates were found. after checking titles and abstracts, 589 articles were excluded. 64 articles were considered eligible, of which 53 were further excluded based on the inclusion criteria. some of the reasons for exclusion were lack of open access (n= 24), use of other scales in adverse event analysis (n= 12), and indirect use of the ace scale (n= 6). 11 articles from peer-reviewed journals were included in the qualitative analysis (table 1). table 1 countries of origin and population sizes of publications author country population considered count (n) almuneef et al. (2017) saudi arabia general population 10 156 berent et al. (2018) poland hospitalised patients 196 chang et al. (2019) china general population 1501 fernandes et al. (2021) india general population 9010 hughes et al. (2019) 10 european countries (romania, moldova, russia, poland, serbia, lithuania, montenegro, czech republic, ukraine, macedonia) general population 14 661 jung et al. (2020) usa general population and outpatients 25 552 and 1303 kiburi et al. (2018) kenya hospitalised patients 134 merrick et al. (2017) usa outpatients 7465 musa et al. (2018) bosnia and herzegovina outpatients 400 shin et al. (2018) usa general population 336 stein et al. (2017) usa hospitalised patients 457 results adverse childhood experiences (ace) scales in the 10-question analysed studies, the adverse childhood experiences questionnaire was used to describe experiences (some studies looked at additional events), as was used a questionnaire developed by the world health organisation (who). four studies almuneef et al., 2017, fernandes et al., 2021, chang et al., 2019, kiburi, molebatsi, obondo, kuria, 2018 used the ace-iq (adverse childhood experience international questionnaire), which was designed by who and included 43 questions on adverse childhood experiences, including questions on ethnicity and sociodemographic. the who questionnaire divides the questions on adverse childhood experiences into domains. alumneef et al. (2017) had one domain of adverse experiences as one item in their work. 9 four other studies hughes et al., 2019, jung et al., 2020, musa et al., 2018, stein et al., 2017 used the 10-question ace survey as a baseline. in these cases, one question is one point, and the score was analysed in the context of addiction or other mental health disorders. two studies (chang et al., 2019; fernandes et al., 2021) categorised adverse childhood experiences into specific categories or levels, where more than one experience could fall under. fernandes et al. (2021) categorised adverse experiences according to a socio-ecological model: at an individual level (child maltreatment), microsystem (family) level, exosystemic (community) level, and macrosystem (collective) level. chang et al. (2019) grouped experiences into negligence (physical or emotional), abuse (physical, emotional, or sexual), family dysfunction (parents separated or divorced, substance and mental health problems in the family, criminal activities in the family), collective violence (stalking, domestic violence, witnessing violence). three studies (berent et al., 2018; merrick et al., 2017; shin et al., 2018) added additional questions on traumatic events that occurred before the age of 18, e.g., berent et al. (2018) asked whether the respondent witnessed a family member's suicide attempt, experienced the death of a family member, or witnessed the death of a stranger. a study by merrick et al. (2017) asked an additional question about experiencing spanking. shin et al. (2018) the added events were caregiver verbal abuse of the caregiver, property crime and gang violence, and they created four classes that included the likelihood of adverse experiences: low ace class (class 1), dysfunction in home/community violence (class 2), emotional ace (class 3), high/multiple ace (class 4). shin et al. (2018), the first class was the control group, and the other classes were compared to it. as the literature review included studies representing a sufficiently broad and diverse range of people, it was possible to observe that the number of ace scores varied between the respondent groups. data on the frequency of ace points can be seen in table 2. table 2 frequency of ace in the populations covered in the articles author country ace points almuneef et al. (2017) saudi arabia ≥ 1 (80%) ≥ 4 (29%) berent et al. (2018) poland 3 to 10 (median 3) chang et al. (2019) china ≥ 1 (66,2%) ≥ 4 (5,93%) hughes et al. (2019) 10 european countries (romania, moldova, russia, poland, serbia, lithuania, montenegro, czech republic, ukraine, macedonia) ≥ 1 (46,2%) ≥ 4 (5,6%) kiburi et al. (2018) kenya ≥ 1 (92,5%) merrick et al. (2017) usa ≥ 1 (>80%) musa et al. (2018) bosnia and herzegovina 3 (8,4%) ≥ 4 (15%) stein et al. (2017) usa 1-3 (36,8%) ≥ 4 (48,6%) 10 common adverse childhood experiences of the 11 studies reviewed, 7 provided specific data on the most common adverse experiences (figure 2). in the remaining studies, adverse experiences were assessed within groups or by sex, therefore, no single event was identified within a population. figure 2 common adverse childhood experiences in the reviewed populations musa et al. (2018), the most common aces were emotional abuse, reported by 24.5% of respondents, and emotional child neglect, reported by 25.6%, as well as physical abuse, reported by 10.3%, and physical neglect, reported by 11% of respondents. kiburi et al. (2018), living with one or no parents was the most common adverse experience (50%), affecting 46.6% of men and 75% of women. domestic violence was the next most common experience (49%). berent et al. (2018), where the study population was alcohol-dependent hospitalised patients admitted to a psychiatric ward for psychotherapy or treatment of alcohol withdrawal syndrome, the most common adverse experience was the use of alcohol and/or drugs in the household. this ace item was reported by 60% of female patients and 42% of male patients. the next most frequent ace item for women was psychological abuse, which 50% of women. for men, the next most frequent experience was estrangement from parents, with 36% (berent et al., 2018). hughes et al. (2019), parental divorce was the most common adverse experience, reported by 17% of respondents. the study highlighted the interconnectedness of negative experiences, emotional abuse co-occurred the majority of the time with physical abuse, while 4 out of 10 respondents who experienced domestic abuse typically coexisted with alcohol abuse, at home, physical abuse and parental divorce (hughes et al., 2019). stein et al. (2017), parental divorce remained the most common adverse childhood experience, supported by 59.5%. living with someone who uses alcohol and/or drugs was the next most common experience (51.4%), and 47.5% of patients experienced being frequently cursed at or humiliated. 11 fernandes et al. (2021) observed that in the general population, the prevalence of adverse childhood experiences among young adults was 39.8% emotional abuse, 28.4% physical abuse, and 3.1% sexual abuse. merrick et al. (2017), the most common adverse childhood experience was spanking, reported by 54.8%. the next most frequent experience, out of the core questions, was using alcohol, drugs, or both in the household, which was noted by 28.3% (merrick et al., 2017). the association of adverse childhood experiences with psychoactive substance use and mental health problems musa et al. (2018) indicated that patients with adverse childhood experiences are more likely to engage in risky behaviours (early sexual initiation, alcohol and drug use, and relationship violence) compared to patients without such experiences. according to hughes et al. (2019), more men than women reported current smoking, early drinking, problematic drinking and drug use. on the contrary, there were more reports of suicide attempts among women (hughes et al., 2019). to fernades et al. (2021), women were more likely than men to report ace at the child, family and community levels, and substance use (tobacco, alcohol, cannabis) was reported more frequently by men than women (86.78% vs. 13.22%). kiburi et al. (2018) observed that polysubstance use existed among the patients surveyed, 26.9% indicated that they used 4 different substances over a three-month period. chang et al. (2019) reported that higher ace scores are associated with more frequent lifetime drinking, chronic diseases, depression, and the development of posttraumatic stress disorder in adulthood. a study by merrick et al. (2017) suggests that there is a graded doseresponse relationship between ace and the probability of experiencing drug use and moderate or heavy alcohol use. the risk of multiple events will exceed the risk from a single adverse childhood experience (merrick et al., 2017). alcohol use disorders and adverse childhood experiences: the study by jung et al. (2020) analysed data from two independent surveys, nesarc-iii (national epidemiological survey on alcohol and related conditions-iii) and niaaa (national institute on alcohol abuse and alcoholism). the study looked at the impact of ace on high-intensity binge drinking. jung et al. (2020), the prevalence of ace in the nesarc-iii section ranged from 1.3 to 1.5 times more frequent in high-intensity drinkers compared with non-excessive drinkers. in the niaaa section, the frequency of adverse childhood experiences increased similarly across all levels of alcohol use, varying from 2 to 5 times more frequently for extremely high-intensity drinking. jung et al. (2020) the results for ace were split. in nesarc-iii experiences from non-binge level to high-intensity drinking: verbal abuse ranged from 26.57% to 38.59%, emotional neglect from 29.16% to 34.17%, physical abuse from 18.87% to 29.04%, physical abuse from 18.68% to 26.26%, and sexual abuse from 5.71% to 7.44%. in the niaaa, from non-binge level to high-intensity drinking: emotional neglect from 19.19% to 42.69%, emotional abuse from 16.08% to 39.73%, physical abuse from 5.53% to 28.69%, sexual abuse from 5.03% to 19.19% and physical neglect from 3.54% to 18.40%. according to almuneef et al. (2017), the likelihood of substance use differed between genders, with 12% of men and 5% of women reporting regular alcohol use. men with 4 or more points compared to those with 0 points had a 9.2-fold higher risk of heavy drinking, and women had a 3.9-fold higher risk of heavy drinking (almuneef et al., 2017). chang et al. (2019), current alcohol users were more likely to report domestic violence compared to non-users, and psychiatric disorders in the family were associated with a 2.78-fold higher risk of lifetime alcohol use. participants who reported experiencing parental divorce had a 2.4 times greater risk of engaging in alcohol use. the risk of alcohol use was 9.2 times higher 12 for respondents who reported 4 or more ace items than for those who reported 0 items (musa et al., 2018). merrick et al. (2017), heavy drinking was associated with all adverse events except having an incarcerated family member and parental divorce, and patients with 6 or more ace scores were 2.84 times more likely to report moderate to heavy drinking. a study by hughes et al. (2019) published that individuals with 4 or more ace scores compared to individuals without adverse experiences were 4 times as likely to report problematic drinking. shin et al. (2018) observed that compared to a low ace class, a high/multiple ace class was associated with increased drinking problems. a study by berent et al. (2018) revealed neglect, trauma, physical, and psychological abuse, and witnessing someone's death play a significant role in the development of harmful habits in patients with alcohol dependence. kiburi et al. (2018), alcohol was the most used substance, reported by 82.1% of respondents; experiencing violence in a household increased the lifetime risk of alcohol use. substance use disorders and adverse childhood experiences: according to musa et al. (2018), emotional abuse was associated with a 2.8-fold increased risk of drug use, and emotional neglect was associated with a 3.4-fold increased risk, and by comparing respondents, those with 4 or more ace scores were associated with 15.9 times the risk of drug use than those with 0 scores. almuneef et al. (2017) observed that men are more likely to use illicit substances; 11% of men and 5% of women reported using drugs. women who reported 4 or more ace items were 3.8 times more likely to use drugs than women who reported 0 items. for men, the risk of drug use was 9.7 times higher for those with 4 or more ace scores (almuneef et al., 2017). according to merrick et al. (2017), compared to patients who did not report adverse experiences, individuals with 6 or more ace scores were at a 3.73 times higher risk of drug use. opioid use disorder and adverse childhood experiences: stein et al. (2017) study observed that a one-point increase was associated with a 1.10-fold increased lifetime risk of opioid overdose and a 1.11-fold increased likelihood of recent drug injection. for people with opioid use, the number of confirmed aces was correlated with 3 components of opioid use: age of onset, continuous use of injecting drugs and lifetime overdose (stein et al., 2017). tobacco use and adverse childhood experiences: smokers, compared to non-smokers, reported physical abuse, physical neglect, and childhood sexual abuse (chang et al., 2019). almuneef et al. (2017), 37% of the respondents reported tobacco use, of whom more than half remained men, although the risk of smoking is lower compared to alcohol or drug use. kiburi et al. (2018), childhood emotional abuse increased the lifetime risk of tobacco use by 22.8 times and the current risk of tobacco use by 5.3 times. living in a household where someone has a mental health disorder increased the risk of tobacco use by 5 times (kiburi et al., 2018). other mental health problems and adverse childhood experiences: a study by musa et al. (2018) observed that patients who experienced emotional neglect were at a 2.6 times greater risk of experiencing relationship violence, and those who experienced emotional abuse were at a 2.3 times greater risk. according to merrick et al. (2017), individuals who reported experiencing emotional abuse as a child had a 5.59 times higher risk of attempting suicide. in a study by almuneef et al. (2017), compared to women who reported 0 ace, women with 4 or more points had a 7-fold increased risk of developing depression, while this risk increased 3.1 times among men. in the chang et al. (2019) study, participants who reported 4 or more ace scores were at a 5.4 times higher risk of developing depression compared to participants who did not have adverse experiences. the study by hughes et al. (2019) observed that individuals with higher ace scores were 17 times more likely to report suicide attempts compared to participants without adverse experiences. 13 kiburi et al. (2018) observed that sedative use was associated with experiencing physical abuse, emotional abuse and living with someone with a known mental health disorder. patients who had 5 or more ace were 15 times more likely to use sedatives compared to patients without adverse experiences (kiburi et al., 2018). discussion the studies observed both the impact of a single adverse childhood experience and the impact of a combination of events on adult mental health. similarly, to merrick et al. (2017) and other studies, shin et al. (2018) speculated that the presence of multiple adverse childhood experiences is a more important predictor of substance use risk than the presence of a specific experience. this finding suggests that the burden of multiple events is heavy and complex, making a person susceptible to mental health disorders, risky behaviours, and substance use. domestic violence and parental divorce were among the most common risk factors for alcohol use. such events in childhood are emotionally difficult if the child does not have a support system to cope with the experience. alcohol and other substance use can be thought to be linked to possible self-medication due to anxiety or emotional disturbance. the study by musa et al. (2018) and merrick et al. (2017) observed that the risk of drug use increased with experiencing emotional abuse. experienced parental substance use is also a risk factor for substance use; children were exposed not only to an adverse situation but also to a negative role model, which they perceived as the norm as they grew up and thus remained susceptible to starting harmful habits. although the risk of smoking was lower compared to other disorders, it was associated with a sufficiently high score for adverse childhood experiences. events associated with smoking included emotional abuse, living with someone with a mental health disorder (kiburi et al., 2018), and physical abuse (chang et al., 2019). women (almuneef et al., 2017) were more likely to report a mental health disorder and were at higher risk of developing depression, while men were more likely to report substance use because of adverse experiences. this suggests that men use substances to cope with emotional burdens, whereas women internalise their experiences more, which may contribute to the development of anxiety and depression. a study by hughes et al. (2019) observed that women were more likely to have attempted suicide than men. reviewed studies suggest that societal gender expectations should be taken into consideration; in some cultures, substance use, or smoking could be acceptable among men but not women. fernandes et al. (2021) and almuneef et al. (2017) pointed to possible differences in responses to experiences, and women might choose not to report experiences or not to acknowledge substance use. practical relevance: the problem of substance use is widespread throughout the world, and studies have observed the impact of ace on substance abuse, pointing out the need to screen for these adverse events, further identifying risk factors, and mitigating their impact on people's mental health (kiburi et al., 2018). assessing adverse experiences can help facilitate patient-centred treatment, as understanding at least some of the causes of the patient's condition can help to think about new or different therapeutic approaches. supportive relationships in childhood are seen as a key foundation for resilience that can help to prevent the impact of ace in later life. children exposed to traumatic events can benefit from support from extended family, communities, and social services (hughes et al., 2019). the role of schools in protecting children was seen during the covid-19 pandemic. some studies concluded that child abuse decreased during the homestay period due to less contact with educational institutions and other people. schools were closed and school staff were less 14 likely to observe the impact of negative events on children (platt, guedert, coelho, 2020; tierolf, geurts, steketee, 2021). limitations and recommendations: the results of this study must be seen in light of some limitations. first, publication bias should be considered. only the pubmed database, one of the largest research databases in healthcare, was used to identify articles, and other sources, including grey literature, were not used. authors of unavailable articles were not approached, which makes the data less informative. after article selection, fewer than 20 articles were available for the literature review, which is a notable limitation as the data pool remains relatively small. second, the literature review had sufficiently broad inclusion criteria, hence the heterogeneity of the data analysed. the general population was represented in about half of the studies, so data on hospitalised patients are less representative, and the patient populations considered were heterogeneous, which may have affected the reliability of the results. third, the studies used both the who questionnaire and the 10 core ace questions, and added questions to the core questions; for this reason, it cannot be excluded that the value and reliability of the results may be undermined. an important limitation of the study was the lack of patient interviews. further research on adverse childhood experiences will require patient interviews and analysis of experiences, and research in this area in latvia would be welcome, as it is not correct to generalise data from studies in other countries. studies have observed cultural differences in the frequency of ace and substance use, as well as in the willingness to report these events. the significance of the results of this research may be diminished in different cultures. conclusions the review of the literature suggests that there is a link between adverse childhood experiences and alcohol and other psychoactive substance addiction. adverse experiences are also associated with other mental health disorders and negative physical health outcomes. smokers, alcohol users, and sedative and opioid users are more likely to report an adverse childhood experience than non-smokers or non-users. the results of the ace questionnaire are a potentially important predictor of risky behaviour that should be considered in the treatment of addictions and other mental disorders, as well as in the prevention of these events. acknowledgement i am grateful to all those with whom i have had the pleasure to work during this project. i would especially like to thank dr jeļena vrubļevska. as my teacher and mentor, she has helped me more than i could ever give her credit for here. references almuneef, m., elchoueiry, n., saleheen, h. n., & al-eissa, m. 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(2021). domestic violence in families in the netherlands during the coronavirus crisis: a mixed method study. child abuse & neglect, 116(pt 2), 104800. pubmed. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chiabu.2020.104800 https://doi.org/10.1590/1984-0462/2021/39/2020267 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chiabu.2020.104800 fostering external and internal sustainability within the english for academic purposes course in the covid-19 pandemic andreas ahrens1, jelena zascerinska2, anastasija aleksejeva3 1hochschule wismar university of applied sciences technology business and design, germany 2, 3centre for education and innovation research, latvia abstract. the paper aims to explore sustainability from both the external and internal perspectives underpinning the implementation of the empirical study within an english for academic purposes course at a master level in the covid-19 pandemic. the research is based on the methodology of the development of the system of the external and internal perspectives. the exploratory type of the case study was employed. the interpretive paradigm was used in the research. the observation was conducted on the 23rd august 2020. the sample was composed of the 10 international students of the master programme “information and electrical engineering” at hochschule wismar, germany. the theoretical research defines the external and internal sustainability. the empirical finding is that the covid-19 pandemic has influenced the organizational aspect of the english for academic purposes course (timetable, classroom arrangements, group work organization). another finding is that the implemented english for academic purposes course is partially sustainable and requires its dynamic equilibrium and localized robustness to be adjusted. implications for higher education aimed at increasing both the external and internal sustainability in education imply the implementation of the combination of evaluation, namely external evaluation, mutual evaluation, and self-evaluation, jointly carried out by all the process participants. keywords: covid-19 pandemic, english for academic purposes course, external perspective, internal perspective, international students, master degree, sustainability. to cite this article: ahrens, a., zascerinska, j., & aleksejeva, a. (2021). fostering external and internal sustainability within the english for academic purposes course in the covid-19 pandemic. education. innovation. diversity, 2(2), 6-15. doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2021.1.5412 introduction the covid-19 pandemic has tremendously impacted the sustainability of many people life. a lot of people had to adjust themselves to the overnight transformations in their working life, family conditions, and social environments including higher education. higher education has been significantly adapting to the new conditions created by the covid-19 pandemic. in higher education, the covid-19 pandemic was a cause of universities’ lockdown, rapid shift from on-campus education to digital studies, unprecedentedly fast transfer of printed teaching materials to their digital format, etc. nevertheless, sustainability remains an important parameter in education in general and an english for academic purposes course as part of higher education at master level. sustainability refers to stability (emas, 2015). sustainability is characterized by a dynamic equilibrium and localized robustness, applied to the current status of the affair (antonini, 1999). sustainability dynamics is influenced by fluid conditions (antonini, 1999) or, in other words, factors (ahrens & zaščerinska, 2014a). the methodological foundation of the present research is formed by the systemconstructivist theory. the system-constructivist theory implies that the world is constructed in modules (maslo, 2006). new constructivism supposes that any understanding is not separated from the observer, and reality is socially constructed (maslo, 2006). constructing is a creative process that includes a diversity of meaning understanding to offer a variety of https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2021.1.5412 7 opportunities to construct mankind development (maslo, 2006). constructive process is always situative (lamberigts & dīpenbroks, 2004). cognitive process is considered by the pedagogical theory of social constructivism to be a component of the construction process: a perception is not right or wrong but whether it is relevant to a place or conditions (maslo, 2006). the systemconstructivist theory emphasizes that human being’s point of view depends on the subjective aspect (zaščerinska, 2010). everyone has his/her own system of the external and internal perspectives (zaščerinska, 2010). this system of the external and internal perspectives is a complex open system (zaščerinska, 2010). experience plays the central role in a construction process (maslo, 2007). the present work is based on the methodology of the development of the system of the external and internal perspectives as demonstrated in figure 1 (ahrens & zaščerinska, 2010). figure 1 development of the system of the external and internal perspectives (ahrens & zaščerinska 2010) the methodology of the development of the system of the external and internal perspectives proceeds from the external perspective through the phase of the unity of the external and internal perspectives (the system of the interacting phenomena) to the internal perspective as illustrated in figure 2 (ahrens & zaščerinska, 2012a). figure 2 phases of the development of the system of the external and internal perspectives (ahrens & zaščerinska, 2012a) the published research has established the inter-connections between sustainable development and higher education putting the emphasis on a student, individual and personality (ahrens & zaščerinska, 2012a; ahrens & zaščerinska, 2012b; pappas & pappas, 2015), thereby from the internal perspective. the external perspective of sustainability has not attracted a lot of researchers’ attention. however, the external and internal perspectives are inter-connected: sustainable personality is a person who is able to develop the system of the external and internal perspectives, and, in turn, the system of the external and internal perspectives becomes a main condition for the sustainable personality to develop (ahrens & zaščerinska, 2010, p. 180). consequently, sustainability has to be considered as the system of the external and internal perspectives. the enabling research question is: how to foster sustainability from both the external and internal perspectives in higher education? the paper aims to explore sustainability from both the external and internal perspectives underpinning the implementation of the empirical study within an english for academic purposes course at a master level in the covid-19 pandemic. 8 the present research was of the qualitative nature. the applied research methods included the use of theoretical as well as empirical methods. the theoretical methods implied the analysis of theoretical sources and theoretical modelling (ahrens, zascerinska, & melnikova, 2019). the case study research was applied as "case studies […] are generalizable to theoretical propositions and not to populations or universes. in doing a case study, your goal will be to generalize theories (analytical generalization) and not to enumerate frequencies (statistical generalization)" (yin, 2003, p. 10). case study research is a qualitative research design (kohlbacher, 2005). the exploratory study was implemented within the empirical analysis. the empirical study was carried out with the 10 international engineering master students of the english for academic purposes course within the master programme “information and electrical engineering” at hochschule wismar, germany. the data were collected via observation. the gathered data were interpreted and summarised. conceptual framework the relationships between sustainability and education are often defined as education for sustainable development (esd). against this background, education for sustainable development is differentiated from sustainable education in this work. by sustainable education, english for academic purposes course is meant in the present research. in turn, education for sustainable development focuses on student’s knowledge, skills and attitudes. as reflected in figure 3, the methodology of the system of the external and internal perspectives implies that sustainable education, namely english for academic purposes, refers to the external perspective, and education for sustainable development, namely student’s knowledge, skills and attitudes, relates to the internal perspective. figure 3 the inter-relations between the research methodology as well as sustainable education and education for sustainable development (the authors) student’s knowledge, skills and attitudes within a master degree programme are delivered via a course. the english for academic purposes course within the master programme “information and electrical engineering” is based on the educational process (zaščerinska, 2009a) or, in other words, activity. the educational process proceeds from teaching in phase 1 through peer-learning in phase 2 to learning in phase 3 (zaščerinska, 2011). each phase of the educational process is separated from the previous one, and the following phase is based on the previous one (zaščerinska, 2011). phase 1 is aimed at a safe environment for all the students. this phase is organized in a frontal way involving the students to participate. phase 2 is designed for the students’ analysis of an open professional problem situation and their search for a solution based on students’ peer-learning (zaščerinska & ahrens 2010, p. 185). phase 3 emphasizes the students’ self-regulation with the use of assessment of the process and self-evaluation of the results. the students present their self-evaluation by the end of each class. students gradually proceed from the external regulation and evaluation in phase 1 through mutual evaluation in phase 2 to self-regulation and self-evaluation in phase 3 (ahrens & zaščerinska, 2012a). both the english for academic purposes course as well as student’s knowledge, skills and attitudes are closely related to evaluation (zaščerinska, 2013). evaluation consists of 9 external evaluation, mutual evaluation, and self-evaluation (zaščerinska, 2013). evaluation includes a variety of forms: questionnaire, interview, focus group interview, etc. evaluation is measured via attitude. attitude can be differentiated into positive, neutral or negative (ahrens & zaščerinska, 2014b). the methodology of the system of the external and internal perspectives allows establishing the inter-connections between the external and internal perspectives as well as students’ negative and positive attitudes/impressions/emotions, respectively as depicted in table 1. table 1 the inter-relations between the external and internal perspectives as well as students’ negative and positive attitudes/impressions/emotions the negative attitude is considered as the external perspective, while the positive impressions as the internal perspective. this can be explained as following: if students have not enriched their knowledge, skills and attitudes, then, they express a negative attitude, and the english for academic purposes course needs an adjustment that will ensure a dynamic equilibrium and localized robustness of the course. if students have developed their knowledge, skills and attitudes, then, they show positive emotions or, in other words, attitude (ahrens & zaščerinska, 2014b), and the english for academic purposes course has demonstrated its sustainability. methodology the methodology of the present empirical study was led by the enabling study question: what is the international engineering students’ evaluation of the english for academic purposes course? the empirical study was aimed at evaluating the english for academic purposes course of the master programme “information and electrical engineering” at hochschule wismar, germany. it should be pointed that the english for academic purposes is defined as content and research integrated studying (zaščerinska, 2008). the definition of english for academic purposes as content and research integrated studying provides us with two main topics to be covered within an english for academic purposes course: a subject content (engineering, medicine, nature, etc) and language research skills (zaščerinska, 2008). two main topics, namely a subject content (engineering, medicine, nature, etc) and language research skills, include sub-topics as demonstrated in figure 1. figure 1 the relationship between english for academic purposes, its two main topics and sub-topics (the authors) 10 the sub-topics for the english for academic purposes course were selected, based on the authors’ research results, and logically introduced by the authors of the present contribution: introduction into presentation preparation (zaščerinska, 2009b, p. 160), academic communication (gruenwald, ahrens, zaščerinska, melnikova, & andreeva, 2018), passive voice (zascerinska, aleksejeva, zascerinskis, gukovica, & aleksejeva, 2020), presentation skills via making three presentations on students’ native place, a researcher biography, and students’ term/course papers (ahrens & zascerinska, 2020), problem solving (zaščerinska & zaščerinskis, 2012), information and ideas, reading sub-skills, writing own biography (ahrens, zaščerinska, & melnikova, 2019), academic writing with the focus on master thesis and scientific publication (ahrens & zascerinska, 2020). the present empirical study was carried out on the 23rd august 2020. the time of the implementation of the english for academic purposes course was between the 1st and 2nd waves of the covid-19 pandemic. due to the restrictions set by hochschule wismar, namely to keep the distance of two meters between two students as well as other similar limitations, the organisational structure of the english for academic purposes course was adapted in accordance with the new regulations. the english for academic purposes course was implemented only on saturdays and sundays. a typical saturday (on saturday, the students could buy a lunch from a supermarket as all the shops are open for customers in germany) was scheduled such as lecture 1 09:00–10:30am, lunch time 10:30–11:00am, lecture 2 11:00– 12:30pm, lecture 3 12:45–14:15pm. a typical sunday (on sundays all the shops are closed with the exception of mcdonalds, etc) was planned as following: 09:00–10:30am – lecture 1, 10:30–10:45am – lunch time, 10:45–12:15pm – lecture 2, 12:30–14:00pm – lecture 3. along with the classes on the weekends, the students had to follow the requirement to keep the distance of about two meters being in the classroom. as the key method for organizing students’ work in a language class is peer-learning or, in other words, group work, a language classroom traditionally chosen is of not a big size. in the covid-19 pandemic, in order to ensure the distance of two meters between the class participants, namely students and teacher, a big lecture hall was selected for language classes’ delivery. in a language class, two students usually sit next to each other at the same desk. against this, the international students had to take a desk alone. such an organization of the students in the classroom was not convenient to organize a group work among the students. for the implementation of the group work, the students had to increase the volume of their voices, to use a notebook for demonstrating what they wrote, even mobile phones were utilized for a discussion via sending a message. the exploratory type of the case study research has been applied (zainal, 2007) in the present empirical study as case studies have an important function in generating new research questions, hypotheses and building theory (kohlbacher, 2005). exploratory case studies set to explore any phenomenon in the data which serves as a point of interest to the researcher (zainal, 2007). the exploratory methodology proceeds from exploration in phase 1 through analysis in phase 2 to hypothesis/question development in phase 3 (ahrens, bassus, & zaščerinska, 2013). phase 1 exploration is aimed at data collection, phase 2 analysis focuses on data processing, analysis and interpretation, and phase 3 hypothesis development is oriented to the analysis of results of the empirical study and elaboration of conclusions and hypotheses for further research (hariharan, zaščerinska, & swamydhas, 2013). the interpretive research paradigm was used in the study. the interpretive paradigm is characterized by the researcher’s practical interest in the research question (cohen, manion, & morrison, 2003). the interpretive paradigm is featured by the researcher’s interest in a phenomenon. the interpretive paradigm is aimed at analysing the social construction of the meaningful reality. meanings emerge from the interpretation. the researcher is the interpreter (ahrens, purvinis, zaščerinska, miceviciene, & tautkus, 2018). 11 the observation was carried out for data collection. observation is a highly effective method of qualitative data obtaining (zaščerinska, 2013). observation makes use of a number of techniques, namely respondent interviewing and students’ self-analysis (mccall, & simmons, 1969, p. 1). moreover, observation contributes to a more adequate picture that emerges of the research setting as a social system described from a number of participants' perspectives (geertz, 1973). furthermore, hargreaves (hargreaves, 1967, p. 193) described advantages of participant observation as a research method for those carrying out studies in institutions in which they work: the method of participant observation leads the investigator to accept a role within the social situation s/he studies – s/he participates as a member of the group while observing it. in theory, this direct participation in the group life permits an easy entrance into the social situation by reducing the resistance of the group members; decreases the extent to which the investigator disturbs the 'natural' situation, and permits the investigator to experience and observe the group's norms, values, conflicts and pressures, which (over a long period) cannot be hidden from someone playing an in-group role (hargreaves, 1967, p. 193). the observation focused on what the students liked and did not like in the english for academic purposes course. the observation aimed at the evaluation combination, namely external evaluation, mutual evaluation, and students’ self-evaluation. the collected data were processed via the structuring content analysis and the summarizing content analysis (mayring, 2000). the structuring content analysis assists in categorising the data in accordance to the previously determined criteria (budde, 2005). in turn, the summarizing content analysis seeks to reduce the material in such a way that the essential contents are preserved, but a manageable short text is produced (mayring, 2004, p. 269). the sample was composed on the principles of sample appropriateness, sufficiency and confidence (ahrens & zaščerinska, 2015). the sample was composed of the 10 international engineering students of the master programme “information and electrical engineering” at hochschule wismar, germany. by international students, “a third-country national accepted by an establishment of higher education and admitted to the territory of a member state to pursue as his/her main activity a full-time course of study leading to a higher education qualification recognised by the member state, (…) which may cover a preparatory course prior to such education according to its national legislation” (mayer, yamamura, schneider, & müller, 2012) is meant. it should be noted that the master programme “information and electrical engineering” at hochschule wismar involves the students mostly from india. the master programme “information and electrical engineering” for international students is popular at hochschule wismar in germany, as it ensures such economic resources, that influence the regional economics, as labour and entrepreneurship (ahrens et al., 2018). all the students who participated in the empirical study have obtained a bachelor degree in electrical engineering in different universities of different regions of india. research results table 2 summarizes the results of the empirical study. table 2 results of the students’ evaluation of the english for academic purposes course positive attitude negative attitude internal perspective external perspective never radio type more focus on academic writing (than on presentation) informative content (by three students) more content on the master thesis well-organised group work (by two students) more time should be given for the course presentation preparation to avoid classes on saturdays and sundays 12 learnt new things in a professional way short period (for the course) limited period (by two students) presentation and structuring of master thesis are well explained vast topics included in short time the course should be more interactive break time (too early for lunch) source: by the authors n=10 the findings of the study were withdrawn via the implementation of the content analysis (ahrens, foerster, zaščerinska, & wasser, 2020). the data were categorized in accordance to the methodology of the system of the external and internal perspectives as revealed in figure 5. the structuring content analysis allows identifying that the students’ positive attitude refers to the internal perspective. the student’s positive evaluation, namely “learnt new things in a professional way”, validates our hypothesis that if students have developed or, in other words, learnt their knowledge, skills and attitudes, then, they show the positive attitude, and the english for academic purposes course has demonstrated its sustainability. in turn, the negative attitude is considered as the external perspective. this hypothesis also has found a validation as a couple of the students evaluated the course in the following way: “more focus on academic writing (than on presentation)”, “more content on the master thesis”, and “the course should be more interactive”. the last evaluation is in contradiction with the other student’s evaluation, namely “never radio type”. consequently, our hypothesis, namely if students have not enriched their knowledge, skills and attitudes, then, they express a negative attitude, is valid. the structuring content analysis has contributed to the finding that the english for academic purposes course needs an adjustment, that will ensure a dynamic equilibrium and localized robustness of the course, in regard to the students’ evaluations, namely to avoid classes on saturdays and sundays, vast topics included in a short period of time, and break time (too early for lunch). the sustainability of the english for academic purposes course could be increased via the re-consideration of the volume and segregation of the delivered topics during the course. the summarizing content analysis allows concluding that fostering of both the external and internal sustainability is based on the methodology of the development of the system of the external and internal perspectives. another finding is that both the external and internal sustainability are ensured via the implementation of the combination of evaluation, namely external evaluation, mutual evaluation, and self-evaluation. the evaluation is jointly carried out by the students and teacher. conclusions the theoretical research results in the definition of the external and internal sustainability. another finding is that both the external and internal sustainability are ensured via the implementation of the combination of evaluation, namely external evaluation, mutual evaluation, and self-evaluation, jointly carried out by all the process participants. the empirical study validated the finding that the positive attitude refers to the internal perspective, while negative attitude – to the external perspective. another finding is that the covid-19 pandemic has influenced the organizational aspect of the english for academic purposes course (timetable, classroom arrangements, group work organization). the interpretive paradigm applied to the empirical study allows drawing a conclusion that the implemented english for academic purposes course is partially sustainable and requires its dynamic equilibrium and localized robustness of the course to be adjusted. implications for higher education aimed at increasing both the external and internal sustainability include the recommendation to implement the combination of evaluation, namely 13 external evaluation, mutual evaluation, and self-evaluation, jointly carried out by all the process participants. the research has some limitations. the limitation is the inter-connections between the external and internal sustainability and the methodology of the development of the system of the external and internal perspectives. another limitation is the involvement of only one 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(2020). language guidelines on students‘ biography writing as a means of self-presentation for recruitment and employment. international applied research conference proceedings challenges and social responsibility in business, 12-21. https://doi.org/10.5430/ijhe.v4n1p12 http://www.eera-ecer.eu/fileadmin/user.../ecer2008_182_zascerinska.doc http://dx.doi.org/10.2304/csee.2010.8.2.152 20 guidance counselors’ professionalism and students’ consultation intention in secondary school: a serial mediation of interpersonal skills and empathetic disposition mfiarak à koko richard 1, mawang adama adèle2, kammoe youdom fernand felix3, makoudoum talla lucie4, djouhoua talla justine malthide5 1 researcher, nce/minresi, doctoral student in education, university of yaoundé i, cameroun 2 researcher, nce/minresi, doctoral student in history, university of maroua, cameroon 3 doctoral student in social psychology, university of yaoundé i, cameroun 4,5 doctoral student in education, university of yaoundé i, cameroun abstract: this study deals with the professionalism and students’ consultation intention of guidance counselors. the purpose of this study was to determine the influence of the quality of interventions on the students' intention to consult guidance counselors, via interpersonal skills and empathetic disposition. the data presented in this study were collected by means of a questionnaire from 388 students from three high schools in the city of yaoundé, cameroon. the mediation analysis carried out support the indirect effect of the quality of the guidance counselor's interventions on the students' consultation intention, through the successive mediators of relational qualities and empathic disposition. keywords: consultation intention, empathetic disposition, guidance counselor, intervention quality, interpersonal skills, professionalism. to cite this article: mfiarak à koko, r., mawang adama, a., kammoe youdom, f.f., makoudoum talla, l., & djouhoua talla, j.m. (2022). guidance counselors’ professionalism and students’ consultation intention in secondary school: a serial mediation of interpersonal skills and empathetic disposition. education. innovation. diversity, 1(4), 2030. doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2022.1.6895 introduction the economic, social and cultural development of any society is the conjugation of several factors such as the awakening of consciousness, the acquisition of knowledge, and in general, education (fonkeng, 2007). therefore, the development of humanity inevitably passes through education, which is the means for any society to ensure its sustainability. as old as human societies, education is a field that requires patience, attention, regularity and continuity. the issue of education is therefore vital at the individual, community and international levels. in cameroon, this determination was concretized by some consultations that led to the holding of the general forum on education in 1995. the resolutions led to the adoption in april 1998 of the law of education (ntebe bomba, 2008). this law demonstrates the state's desire to ensure the efficiency of its education system, which led it to make basic education compulsory and free (fonkeng, 2007). post-primary education has benefited from this commitment, with adjustments to ensure the quality of education in secondary schools. for fonkoua (2008), if the law of education stipulates that the teacher is the main guarantor of the quality of education, in order to accomplish his mission, he works in consultation with other partners, including guidance counselors who provide orientation and school psychology activities for students at all levels of education (ntebe bomba, 2008). however, it turns out that the latter and their missions are not always well understood by the educational community. it was observed that students still have difficulties in seeking the help https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2022.1.6895 21 of guidance counselors when they faced academic and personal (fonkoua & youtha, 2008; yahaya & bomda, 2014). for instance, a study carried out by fonkoua in 2007 revealed that guidance counselors do not exhibit the professional qualities that are expected from them in the school milieu. it is understandable why students put their trust in either parental guidance or their personal orientations and then what their peers tell them. the guidance counselor is only statutorily third in their orientation. meanwhile, the guidance counsellor, who works with students and the entire educational community, is supposed to mobilize a set of professional qualities (quality of his pedagogical intervention, interpersonal skills and empathetic disposition) to inform and guide students according to their aptitudes, interests and needs (yahaya & bomda, 2014). the purpose of the present study is to investigate students’ perceptions of guidance counsellor professionalism and how it affects consultation intention among students. the study aims to determine the relationship between the professional qualities of school guidance counsellors and their consultation intention by secondary students with interpersonal skills and empathetic disposition as mediators. the research method used was a survey study. this paper examines the relationship between intervention skills and consultation intention of secondary school students, mediated by interpersonal skills and empathetic disposition. we believe that if the guidance counsellor mobilizes good interpersonal skills, ensures the quality of his pedagogical intervention, demonstrates a certain adaptability in the school environment, and shows an empathetic disposition, he would arouse interest in guidance counselling activities among the students; and this would have the advantage of increasing the rate of intention to consult the guidance counselling services by the students for help (fonkoua & youtha, 2008; okéné, 2009; yahaya & bomda, 2014). literature review the major works on educational and vocational guidance approach professionalism in at least two directions (blanchard & gelpe, 2008; guichard & huteau, 2006). of course, competences concerning specific know-how will be necessary and will have to be renewed during the career (guichard, 2002). but other competences will also be indispensable, centered around their capacity to understand their environment in a broad sense and not only with the glasses of the guidance counselor (okéné, 2009). this is why this work of understanding will have to be organized more collectively in the guidance counselling service (guichard, 2002; pouyaud & cohen-scali, 2016). the guidance process is now largely incorporated into the general functioning of the school system (bomda, 2008; fonkoua, 2007; okéné, 2009; sikali, 2009). student support is increasingly assigned to schools (minesec, 2009). the figure of the student counsellor-psychologist is evolving and becoming smaller (fonkoua & youtha, 2008; sikali, 2009). for a long time, it has been hypothesized that the main target of the guidance counsellor is changing: it is shifting from helping the student and his parents to helping other professionals in the school to move towards educational and vocational guidance (fonkoua & youtha, 2008; yahaya & bomda, 2014). towards quality in guidance and counselling services: considered as the third pillar of the cameroonian education system after pedagogy and school administration, guidance and counselling has replaced purely academic and vocational guidance. it is defined by unesco (2002) as "an educational practice of a continuous type, aiming to help each individual to choose for himself the training most in line with his aptitudes, tastes and interests, to adapt to it and to solve his behavioral, psychological, relational, personal and social issues in view of his full personal development and his integration into active life, in conformity with the needs of the country and its prospects for economic, social and cultural progress". today, the guidance needs of students are diverse and depend on their psychological functioning, the resources available to them and the conditions of the environment around them (guichard, 2002; order of guidance counselors of quebec (occoppq), 2010; pouyaud & cohen-scali, 22 2016). helping them to transform an educational goal, such as finding a direction of study, into a set of actions to achieve that goal should be a fundamental concern for guidance counselling services and its professionals, the guidance counselors (yahaya & bomda, 2014). in the school environment, the guidance counselor who accompanies the young person in his or her self-discovery, in the concrete and active exploration of the world of training and work, in the support for the development of his or her autonomy, in his or her decisionmaking, in the confirmation of his or her career plan and in its realization, will have to sharpen his or her skills more in order to be up to the task of meeting the expectations of students and society (guichard, 2004). he knows what can inform the choices that the student has to make, both with regard to intrinsic elements such as his personality traits, beliefs, values and interests, and with regard to extrinsic aspects such as his family and social environment, his skills, his knowledge and the personal resources at his disposal. the guidance counselor must provide the student with this insight in relevant ways in order to enable him or her to better define him or herself, to better understand the various aspects influencing his or her choice and to help him or her find meaning in his or her learning so as to persevere in his or her academic path and, ultimately, to find his or her place in society (pouyaud & cohen-scali, 2016). the guidance counselor's assistance thus provides guidelines and benchmarks that enable students to engage in school and in the realization of their future plans (guigue, 2001). training and professionalism of the guidance counselor: according to fonkoua & youtha (2008), the guidance counsellor is a staff member with three skills: skills related to knowledge of the individual and groups, skills related to knowledge of the school and university environment, and finally skills related to knowledge of the economic world. entering the second cycle of higher education with a bachelor's degree, preferably in the humanities, the guidance counselor receives training based on fundamental knowledge (psychology, sociology, economics, pedagogy, administration and planning), practical knowledge (statistics, demographics, computer science), and finally professional knowledge (the practice of tests, interviewing, information, guidance and counseling techniques, ethics and deontology, a final thesis and professional internship) (yahaya & bomba, 2014). at first sight, he/she is trained to advise and to orientate at school, university and professional level, but he/she can be attached to structures using applied psychology such as the educational system, manpower services, various services of professional selection in public and private administrations and more precisely the services of human resources which are interested in the problems of socio-professional insertion (okéné, 2009). these are the issues of reciprocal adaptation related to work system and the improvement of skills during a career. from the psychological and individual point of view, the guidance counselor has a legitimate role in the structures interested in guidance problems such as school and vocational statistics services, school mapping services, educational planning services and the child welfare system (guichard, 2002; guichard & huteau, 2006). independent and mediating variables the guidance counselor (school psychologist) accompanies students in the construction of lifelong orientation skills (guichard & huteau, 2006; pouyaud & cohen-scali, 2016; yahaya & bomda, 2014). he/she ensures and coordinates the organization of information for students on self-discovery, careers and training, in conjunction with the educational teams. in other words, on a day-to-day basis, the counselor must welcome all students from the 6th grade upwards, help them sort through the numerous pieces of information they gather here and there, but above all listen to them, reassure them and motivate them (pouyaud & cohenscali, 2016). the essential skills required of guidance counselors are: adaptability, competence and creativity, interpersonal skills and empathy. intervention quality: intervention quality are tasks, exercises that can arouse the interest of students to immerse themselves in vocational activities when they meet the needs in line 23 with their personal and professional future project (pouyaud & cohen-scali, 2016). thus, if the guidance counselor is to be creative and relevant in his or her interventions to captivate the students, and get them to identify their needs of which they are previously unaware. if we admit that each student envisages his or her future to some extent, the guidance counsellor will not bring them anything new, but it is a relevant approach that will awaken in these students the desire to consult the counselor and to become actively involved in his or her guidance activities. studies carried out by guigue (2001) among secondary school students in france show that many of them say that schools do not provide them with any guidance at all in their choice of course of study and profession. they say that their orientation and their professional project are defined by themselves or by their parents without the notable help of the guidance counselor. for them, the latter are of no use in the schools and they state in their speech that they do not know what the guidance counsellor can do for them in terms of their academic and professional orientation (fonkoua & youtha, 2008; guigue, 2001). it is essential to be able to adapt and evolve the relevance of interventions (pouyaud & cohen-scali, 2016). be willing to work extra hours or take on new tasks when necessary. be able to revise one's judgment or opinions. questioning one's knowledge and beliefs. be willing to learn. be a good observer and listener. the guidance counselor must be adaptable to the school environment and be increasingly involved in finding new ways of doing things in order to reach the maximum number of students in their interventions (guigue, 2001). interpersonal skills: the effective guidance counselor is genuinely interested in the happiness and well-being of students. he or she feels deeply concerned, which builds confidence in the student being helped (guichard, 2002; guichard & huteau, 2006). even better, because the student feels valued and cared for, he or she feels valuable and begins to like him or herself. the counselor must be authentic. he or she must be open and sincere, and avoid any falsehoods or airs of superiority. relational authenticity means being spontaneous without being impulsive and frank without being cruel. it means that the counselor is truly transparent, not thinking or feeling one thing while saying another (okéné, 2009). relational qualities imply that the counselor has a humble spirit. a counselor who is arrogant, self-absorbed, or thinks he or she knows everything is likely to cause havoc. a proud and haughty spirit will turn off teens and cause more problems than it solves. a humble spirit, on the other hand, will seek to understand rather than be understood. the humble spirit will never be quick to give advice. instead, it encourages the student to seek his own answers and directions. he focuses the conversation on the mentality and sensibility of the person he is talking to, and does not draw attention at all to the talents, know-how or wisdom of the counselor (guichard, 2002). the empathetic disposition: the knowledge acquired in listening enables them to truly identify the profile of the students they meet, to have a real quality of listening in interviews, to have a fine perception of their expectations both in relation to the educational system and in relation to the help they can give them in their orientation process (guichard, 2002). the quality of the reception, the listening and the orientation process, which requires a great deal of empathy, could influence positively or negatively their behaviour with regard to the training activities and adapted services that the guidance counsellor provides within the institution (guichard & huteau, 2006). the guidance counsellor 's contribution is to break the ice between the learner and the guidance counselor. the guidance counsellor 's contribution is to break the ice between the learner and the guidance counsellor, because the guidance counselor should not be on the administrators' side, but on the students' side, so that the students are able to approach the guidance counselor easily and talk to it easily (pouyaud & cohen-scali, 2016). 24 dependent variable intentionality for consulting school counselors: intentionality is a psychological state that guides an individual's attention, experience, and actions in a process to achieve a specific goal. fishbein & ajzen (1975) have demonstrated the effect of the components of intention (attention, expectation and belief) on behavior. in addition, roy & savoie (2007) describe the construction of the consultation intention as the result of the interaction between the personality and the characteristics of the social context on the one hand and rational and intuitive reasoning on the other hand. in the fields of education and psychology, intention has another dimension. intention" is considered by krueger & carsrud (1993) to be a process that emerges with the needs, values, habits and beliefs of the individual. it expresses the intensity with which an individual is ready to try, the level of effort that he/she plans to invest, to adopt a behavior (ajzen, 1991). it is, according to bird (1992), dependent on contextual variables, the element that structures and guides the action. it is expected that the quality of the guidance counselor's interventions will influence the students' consultation intention, through the successive roles of relational qualities and empathic disposition. figure 1 conceptual research model methodology research tools the questionnaire consisted of 30 items and 7 factual questions (school attended, class attended, gender, age, etc.). participants were asked to respond using 5-point likert-type scales ranging from "never" to "very often", or from "strongly disagree" to "strongly agree". the internal consistency of the dimensions of each scale is assessed by the coefficient of cronbach's alpha (a). the use of different instructions minimizes response bias according to the recommendations of (podsakoff et al., 2003). data collection procedure participants were informed of their right not to participate in this study as well as the anonymous nature of the study. the students were also told that there were no right or wrong answers and that the data collected would remain confidential and would only be used for research purposes. the instruction on the questionnaire was: "the following statements are about opinions you may have about school and career services. indicate how much you agree with each one. the time limit for the questionnaire was 15 minutes. 25 methods of analysis the statistical analyses were conducted using spss software (version 26.0 for windows). in order to test all the hypotheses, several steps were followed. first, we analyzed first-order correlations to explore combinations between factors of guidance counselor professionalism and students' counseling intention in school counseling services. in the final part of the results, descriptive analyses were conducted on the relationship between the study variables, and mediation analyses were conducted to test the mediating effect of relational ability and empathy on the relationship between guidance counselor professionalism factors and students' intention to consult school-based guidance services. to conduct these mediation analyses, the procedure defined by preacher & hayes (2008) was used. following fig. 1, it consists in estimating parameters (a, b, c and c') that allow to differentiate the total effects from the direct effects of the predictor variable on the dependent variable. on the basis of these initial calculations, the indirect effects are estimated on a 95% confidence interval using a bootstrapping procedure on a probability sample of n = 10000. this procedure is commonly used and is robust to the possible biases of non-normal distributions of the data (preacher & hayes, 2008). participants to the study this study was conducted among ninth, tenth, and twelfth grade students in three public secondary schools (mendong and etoug-ebe bilingual high schools, and biyem-assi high school) in yaoundé, cameroon. after obtaining permission from school principals, students were invited to complete the questionnaires on a voluntary and anonymous basis during school hours. a total of 388 students completed the questionnaires, however 04 questionnaires were withdrawn from the study because they were incomplete. in fact, the study was conducted with a total of 384 high school students, of which 195 were boys and 189 were girls, with an average age of 17.13 years (sd = 1.84); 133 of them were in the ninth grade, 125 in the first grade, and 126 in the last grade. research results descriptive analysis the descriptive statistics for the different variables under study are presented in table 1. also included are means, standard deviations, internal consistency index (cronbach's α), and correlations among the study variables. the results of correlation analyses indicate that consultation intention, intervention quality, interpersonal skills, and empathetic disposition of the guidance counselor are all significantly and positively correlated. the relationships between intervention quality, interpersonal skills, empathetic disposition, and student consultation intention were measured using pearson correlations (table 1). to this end, table 1 presents the correlation coefficients between the components of our three variables. the measure of intervention quality was positively and significantly correlated with interpersonal skills (r = .341, p < .001), and empathetic disposition (r = .604, p < .001), as well as consultation intention (r = .337, p < .001). in addition, interpersonal skills were positively and significantly correlated with empathetic disposition (r = .661, p < .001) and consultation intention (r = .424, p < .001). finally, the measure of consultation intention correlated positively and significantly with empathetic disposition (r = .459, p < .001). 26 table 1 means, standard deviations, coefficient (α), and correlations among the study variables means (m) (sd) α 1 2 3 1 intervention 3,093 0,658 0,820 2 qrelation 2,698 0,732 0,791 0,341*** 3 empathie 2,904 0,727 0,832 0,604*** 0,661*** 4 consultation 2,615 0,524 0,784 0,337*** 0,424*** 0,459*** note : intervention: intervention quality; qrelation: interpersonal skills; empathy: empathetic disposition; consultation: consult intention; n = 382; ddl = 384; *** p < 0.001 mediation analysis we tested a serial mediation model with relational qualities and empathetic disposition, in the relationship between the quality of the guidance counselor's interventions and counseling intention. the analysis was performed using the process macro (model 6) of hayes (2018), with 10000 bootstraps. table 2 regression coefficients, standard errors, and summary of the tested research model of two serial mediators for students' consultation intention the quality of the guidance counselor's interventions had a significant and positive effect on interpersonal skills (a1 = .383; t = 7.094; p < .001). quality of guidance counselor interventions had a significant and positive effect on empathetic disposition (a2 = .512; t = 14.93; p < .001). controlling by the quality of guidance counselor interventions and empathetic disposition variables, the effect of interpersonal skills on students' counseling intention was significant and positive (b1 = .161; t = 3.762; p < .001). controlling by the variables of quality of guidance counselor interventions and relational qualities, the effect of empathetic disposition on students' counseling intention is significant and positive (b2 = .175; t = 3.437; p < .001). in addition, the direct effect of the quality of the guidance counselor's interventions on students' counseling intention was significant and positive (c = .270; p < .001). 27 figure 2 statistical plot of the tested search model of two serial mediators for student consultation intention the indirect effect of the quality of the guidance counselor's interventions on students' consultation intention, through interpersonal skills, is significant and positive (a1 x b1 = .062), with a 95% confidence interval excluding 0 (ci = [.025 to .105]). the indirect effect of the quality of the guidance counselor's interventions on students' counseling intention, through the counselor's empathetic disposition, is significant and positive (a2xb2 = .083), with a 95% confidence interval excluding 0 (ci = [.033 to .142]). finally, the indirect effect of the quality of the guidance counselor's interventions on students' counseling intention, through successive mediators of interpersonal skills and empathetic disposition, is significant and positive (a x b1 x b2 = .034), with a 95% confidence interval excluding 0 (ci = [.013 to .58]). this result indicates complementary mediation (hayes & preacher, 2014). conclusion and discussion the purpose of this study was to verify the influence of the quality of the guidance counselor's interventions on students' consultation intention, through the successive mediators of interpersonal skills and empathetic disposition. finally, these results are in agreement with the works of (fonkoua, 2009; fonkoua & youtha, 2008; guigue, 2001; pouyaud & cohen-scali, 2016), which insist on the quality of the pedagogical interventions as factors that can maintain the interest of the students for a better learning and therefore, a better success. in this sense, for sikali (2009), quality interventions are then tasks that can arouse the interest of students to immerse themselves in guidance activities when they meet their needs in line with their personal and professional future project. thus, if the guidance counsellor is to be creative and relevant in his or her interventions to captivate the students, and get them to identify their needs of which they are previously unaware. if we admit that each student envisages his or her future to a certain extent, the guidance counsellor will not bring them anything new, but he or she will propose a relevant approach that will awaken in these students the desire to consult the guidance counsellor and to become actively involved in guidance activities. in view of our results, we agree with pouyaud & cohen-scali (2016), who think that the non-realization of a quality of pedagogical interventions leads to multiple complaints and actions of claims that are manifested by stereotypes that border on the contempt of the 28 students towards the guidance counselors. also, in his study, sikali (2009) argues that many students do not consult guidance counselors because they do not find it interesting. this is because, in their words, "most guidance counselors are limited, stuck on courses of study that have outlived their usefulness and are contrary to the new expectations of the world," or "generally on little things like the timetable. this researcher noted that learners increasingly need information about the vocational training sought by companies. it is often noted that guidance counselors are unable to meet these needs. they are unable to mobilize all the resources necessary to create extrinsic motivation in students (guigue, 2001). however, although the investment in physical resources is virtually nil, the demand for guidance continues to grow. the provision of a stimulating environment for guidance counseling and research for students should all be geared towards ensuring quality in guidance counseling services. these findings emphasize the role of relational qualities in promoting adolescent counseling intention. indeed, according to guichard (2002), the effective counselor is genuinely interested in the happiness and well-being of his or her interlocutor. the counsellor must demonstrate relational authenticity, which implies being spontaneous without being impulsive or blunt, and not using cruel language. the majority of authors consider relational qualities as very important in the formation of intentions in clients in consultation. however, there is often a gap between relational quality and the actual experience of its manifestation. this is, in fact, an aspect that pouyaud & cohen-scali (2016) considers fundamental. insofar as counsellors are, according to them, most often full of theoretical knowledge, but in terms of the experience and experience that should accompany them, in this case their interventions, they are often lacking. relational skills require that the counsellor possess a humble spirit. an arrogant, egocentric or know-it-all guidance counsellor is likely to be a loss. a proud and haughty spirit will turn off teenagers and cause many more problems than it solves; and this is precisely what students' complaints are about as revealed in our pre-survey. a humble mind, on the other hand, will seek to understand rather than to be understood. the humble mind will never rush to give advice. instead, it encourages the student to seek his or her own answers and directions. previous studies have noted the importance of the empathetic qualities of the guidance counsellor in fostering students' intent to consult in guidance counselling services. the quality of reception and listening in the process of orienting students requires a great deal of empathy, and could positively or negatively influence their behaviour in relation to the training activities and adapted services that the guidance counsellor provides within the institution. the guidance counsellor's contribution consists in breaking the ice between the learner and him/her. the guidance counselor should not be on the side of the administrators, but on the side of the students, so that the students can approach him or her easily and talk with him or her. the young cameroonians who took part in this study showed little interest in consulting guidance counselors, contrary to what studies such as that of fonkoua & youtha (2008) might suggest. school and career guidance by parents seems to be preferred. on the other hand, our results show that the quality of interventions has a positive influence on students' intention to consult guidance counselors, via relational qualities and empathic disposition. this result reinforces those of pouyaud & cohen-scali (2016). this influence of the quality of interventions on students' consultation intentions means that the professional qualities of guidance counselors, and more specifically qualities such as relational ease and empathic disposition, is not neutral on young students' consultation intention. this analysis could be extended by seeking to identify the antecedents of these professional qualities in both consultation intention and actual consultation with guidance counselors. however, this study underscores the importance of taking into account the needs of students in order to provide them with appropriate guidance. to this end, we recall that the guidance needs model occoppq (2010) demonstrates that taking guidance needs into account is necessary for the adequate guidance of students. 29 finally, in view of the work carried out and 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(2014). le conseiller d’orientation en milieu scolaire au cameroun (1ère). l’harmattan. 53 mixed class teaching as an emerging trend accelerated by covid-19 jelena zascerinska1, anastasija aleksejeva2, mihails zascerinskis3, olga gukovica4, ludmila aleksejeva5, irina abjalkiene6 1,2,3,4,5,6 centre for education and innovation research, latvia abstract. the covid-19 pandemic has essentially accelerated the pace of the teaching transformation. mixed (also hyflex) class teaching has become indispensable in medical, engineering, teacher and other fields of education when only online teaching is not enough to ensure the continuity of the instruction. the research aim is to identify scenarios of mixed class teaching underpinning the elaboration of implications for higher education. the present research used both theoretical and empirical methods. the theoretical methods included the analysis of scientific literature, theoretical modelling, systematisation, synthesis, comparison, and generalisation. the empirical study carried out in june 2021 was exploratory. data were collected through the analysis of published studies. the collected data were processed via content analysis. the present research allows concluding that teaching has undergone significant changes in different historical periods. the findings of the empirical study facilitate the conclusion on the existence of two scenarios of mixed class teaching, namely hot (here or there) and coil (collaborative online international learning). both scenarios are oriented to students’ learning, teaching in these scenarios is neither segmented nor structured. the novel contribution of the research is revealed in the implications on mixed class teaching for higher education. future research work was proposed. keywords: covid-19, educational process, hyflex (hybrid flexible) class teaching, mixed class, on-campus students, remote students’ teaching, teaching sub-phases. to cite this article: zascerinska, j., aleksejeva, a., zascerinskis, m., gukovica, o., aleksejeva, l., & abjalkiene, i. (2021). mixed class teaching as an emerging trend accelerated by covid-19. education. innovation. diversity, 2(3), 53-65 doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2021.2.6720 introduction since many years, teaching remains an important part of education despite contemporary foci on peer-learning and learning in education and training (ahrens, zaščerinska, lange, & aļeksejeva, 2021). the covid-19 pandemic stimulated simultaneous delivery of a face-to-face course to on-campus and remote off-campus students (white, ramirez, smith, & plonowski, 2010) or, in other words, mixed class teaching, also known as hyflex (hybrid flexible) class teaching (aleksejeva, zascerinskis, abjalkiene, gukovica, zascerinska, & ahrens, 2021). analysis of the existing literature reveals exploratory and qualitative nature and focus of the previously done research (raes, detienne, windey, & depaepe, 2020). mostly, descriptions of students’ experiences, the organisational implementation and the technological design were investigated (raes, detienne, windey, & depaepe, 2020). empirical studies have only begun to emerge, and more research is needed into different pedagogical scenarios and their impact on student outcomes (raes, detienne, windey, & depaepe, 2020). the research aim is to employ theoretical and empirical methods for the identification of scenarios of mixed class teaching underpinning the elaboration of implications for higher education. the present research employs both theoretical and empirical methods. the theoretical methods include analysis of scientific literature, theoretical modelling, systematisation, synthesis, comparison, and generalisation. the empirical study was exploratory. data were https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2021.2.6720 54 collected through the analysis of published studies. the content analysis for processing the collected data was carried out. the novel contribution of the research is revealed in implications on mixed class teaching for higher education. conceptual framework education is widely recognised to be a process (ahrens, zaščerinska, lange, & aļeksejeva, 2021). this process is broadly defined as the educational process (zaščerinska, zaščerinskis, andreeva, & aļeksejeva, 2013). the other terms of the educational process include educational processes (smidt, 2015), educational practice(s) (murphy, 2013), educative process (judd, bagley, kilpatrick, moore, & chassell, 1923), education as process (creasy, 2018), the process of education (bruner, 1960), educational technology (thota, & negreiros, 2015), and similar. the educational process is implemented in a certain sequence as depicted in figure 1: from teaching in phase 1 through peer-learning in phase 2 to learning in phase 3 (ahrens & zaščerinska, 2010, p. 185). the educational process sequentially proceeds (zaščerinska, 2011, p. 105–106): phase 1 teaching is aimed at a safe environment for all the learners. in order to provide a safe environment, the essence of constructive social interaction and its organizational regulations are considered by both the teacher and learners. the present phase is organized in a frontal way involving the learners to participate. phase 2 peer-learning is designed for the learners’ analysis of an open academic problem situation and their search for a solution. the same materials can be prepared for all of the class/group learners. this phase involves the learners to act in peers. phase 3 learning emphasizes the learners’ self-regulation with the. use of assessment of the process and self-evaluation of the results. figure 1 the phases of the educational process (ahrens & zaščerinska, 2010, p. 185) the present research mainly focuses on teaching. teaching is the first phase in the educational process (zaščerinska, 2013). figure 2 reveals the relationships between education as the macro-environment, educational process as the mezzo-environment, as well as teaching, peer-learning and learning as the micro-environment. 55 figure 2 the relationship between education, educational process, teaching, peer-learning and learning (the authors) table 1 gives an overview on the teaching development in different historical periods. table 1 teaching development in different historical periods (the authors) historical period teaching definition a short description of teaching reference 40 000 years ago teaching by the people (people teaching) simple pedagogical views and ideas that were most fully manifested in labor activity, traditions, rituals, customs, games, holidays, oral folk speech amirov, kudashkina, & lipatova, 2017, p. 18 over 2000 years ago teaching as the effective strategy for learning what kind of learning is desired and toward what ends by the greek philosophers, socrates (469 –399 b.c.), plato (427 – 347 b.c.), and aristotle (384 – 322 b.c) hammond, austin, orcutt, & rosso, 2001, p. 3 500 a.d. to 1500 a.d. teaching at religious schools transmission-based teaching from the priest to the people monroe, 1925 15th to the 17th century, the renaissance teaching for thinking for thinking – the effort to understand ideas and use knowledge for broader purposes hammond, austin, orcutt, & rosso, 2001, p. 4 18th century teaching and learning the unity of teaching and learning zakirova, grigoryeva, & kayumova, 2018, p. 7 19th century teaching from the psychological perspective behaviorist vs. cognitive psychology: the scientific study of learning for searching the best approach to teaching hammond, austin, orcutt, & rosso, 2001, p. 5 20th century teaching and peer-learning teachers and peers assist learners in developing new ideas and skills vygotsky, 1934/1962 21st century teaching, peerlearning and learning the unity of teaching, peer-learning and learning ahrens & zaščerinska, 2010, p. 185 information and communication technology enhanced teaching teaching with the use of information and communication technology, digitalized teaching and similar zaščerinska, 2009; melnikova, grünwald, ahrens, pfaffenberger, & zaščerinska, 2017 the covid-19 pandemic in the 21st century mixed class teaching simultaneous teaching of a class of both on-campus and remote learners white, ramirez, smith, & plonowski, 2010 56 the covid-19 pandemic has essentially accelerated the pace of the transformation of the educational process (ahrens, & zascerinska, 2020). almost overnight, the pandemic has shifted the delivery of education to only online teaching (ahrens, zascerinska, bhati, zascerinskis, aleksejeva, 2021) done from home. with warnings of the next covid-19 wave and other impending pandemics, universities need to be prepared to deliver courses in alternative ways to ensure continuity of instruction (white, ramirez, smith, & plonowski, 2010). it should be pointed that not all teaching can be done fully online. for example, the shift to online platform poses serious challenges to medical education (jiang et al, 2020). expressly, most medical schools set students in physical settings for 1–3 years where their knowledge foundations are built; students’ physical presence in both inpatient and outpatient settings has been a successful practice of early clinical immersion experiences and the clerkship curriculum (jiang et al, 2020). the second half of medical school education requires students to participate in clinical rotations, sub-internships, and/or research projects (jiang et al, 2020). the same refers to many other educational fields. among many, there is teacher education, engineering education, maritime education, and others, too. figure 3 illustrates a simultaneous delivery of a face-to-face course to on-campus and remote off-campus students (white, ramirez, smith, & plonowski, 2010) or, in other words, mixed class teaching. figure 3 mixed class including both on-campus (f2f) and remote individual students (upper pictures) and the platform visible for the students (lower pictures) (raes, detienne, windey, & depaepe, 2020) for comparative purposes, table 2 demonstrates the differences in the use of the selected terms containing “mixed”, “class” and “teaching” and similar terms. 57 table 2 use of selected terms containing “mixed”, “class” and “teaching” (the authors) term term’s meaning reference mixed teaching mode the mix of online and offline teaching xie, 2020 hybrid teaching mode sun, 2020 blended method setyawan, 2019 teaching mixed ability classes students with mixed abilities in a class djurayeva, 2021 teaching of a mixed aged / level class students of different ages / levels in a class smit & engeli, 2015 mixed classroom a class environment in a formal education setting that includes both heritage-learners (hl) and secondlanguage learners (l2) morgan, 2017 mixed (also known as hyflex) class teaching teaching as part of the educational process in formal education settings that is simultaneously addressed to both – on-campus and remote learners aleksejeva, zascerinskis, abjalkiene, gukovica, zascerinska, & ahrens, 2021 by a scenario, an approach to assess the future is meant (sardesai, stute, & kamphues, 2021). it should be noted that approach means a set of theoretical principles (karapetjana, 2008). a principle is defined as a shared combination of beliefs and assumptions that determine researchers' attitude to the world, their behaviour’s norms and activities (zaščerinska, ahrens, & bassus, 2015). also, a principle is a condition of activity (beļickis et al., 2000). a condition means a circumstance from which the implementation of a process, process or activity depends (beļickis et al., 2000). in the present research, mixed class teaching depends on the interrelationships between the teacher and learners. for the purposes of the present research, the use of the theoretical methods applied to the work of sardesai, stute, and kamphues (sardesai, stute, & kamphues, 2021), allows the authors of this contribution to define a pedagogical scenario as the description of an educational situation (environment) casually inter-related with the dynamic process of teaching. it should be pointed that a pedagogical scenario focuses on the creation of a coherent process that is adjusted to the learners’ needs (zogla, 2018). teachers and learners follow different aims and motives, use different background knowledge and tools, and still their attempts have to be met (zogla, 2018). this “joint venture” allows for transitions from a normative to a learner learning-centred process with the learners’ meaningful participation in creating, conducting and evaluating the process where the learner has to achieve; that is leading to learners’ autonomy in learning and development, as well as to teachers’, learners’, and other stakeholders’ overcoming the growing complexity and transferring their way of thinking (zogla, 2018). educational situation (environment) is based on social interactions (ahrens, foerster, zaščerinska, & wasser, 2020). by interaction, obvious or non-obvious influence on each other in the process of implementing a joint activity (ņikiforovs, 1994) is understood. the normative scenario focusing on “how can a specific goal be achieved?” (boerjeson, hoejer, dreborg, ekvall, &. finnveden, 2006) will be considered in the present work. the overall goal of education is the enhancement of learner’s experience, namely knowledge, skills and attitude (ahrens, zaščerinska, hariharan, & andreeva, 2016). the educational process is discussed to be effective to reach this goal (hariharan, zaščerinska, & zaščerinskis, 2014). the educational process is conventionally organized as a lecture, class, or lesson in education (zaščerinska, 2013). in its turn, class is based on the system of learners’ groups 58 (zaščerinska, 2013). organization of teaching as part of the educational process depends on the class’s structure (zaščerinska, 2013): if teaching is the only form within the class, the organization of mixed class teaching coincides with the lecture’s structure, if mixed class teaching does not coincide with the class’s structure, the class is part of teaching. in the present research, the organization of teaching does and does not coincide with the class structure (zaščerinska, 2013). it depends on a number of lectures in the semester, learners’ age, learners’ level of education, etc. hence, teaching is defined as a class component and a certain system with its own structure (zaščerinska, 2013). teaching as the 1st phase in the educational process has a particular significance as teaching facilitates teachers’ and learners’ creation of new products, new patents, new entrepreneurial activities and new jobs (ahrens et al, 2021). teaching in formal education is defined as a purposefully organized process of teacher’s sharing experience (knowledge, skills and attitudes) with learners (zaščerinska & ahrens, 2013). teaching in phase 1 was differentiated into two sub-phases (zaščerinska, 2013): teaching in phase 1.1. and teaching with the elements of peer-learning in phase 1.2. as illustrated in figure 4. figure 4 the relationship between teaching and its two sub-phases (the authors) methodology methodology is defined as a system of principles, practices, and procedures applied to any specific branch of knowledge (karapetjana, 2008). the course of the implementation of the empirical study shows how the steps of the process are related following a logical chain. the empirical study was enabled by the research question: how to organise mixed class teaching? the purpose of the study was to analyse mixed class teaching experiences. it should be noted that experiences at different universities follow different traditions, approaches, cultural contexts (zogla & lubkina, 2020). the empirical study was carried out in june 2021. the empirical study was exploratory. here the exploratory relates to being open at the outset of the study (ahrens, zascerinska, bhati, zascerinskis, & aleksejeva, 2021). the exploratory methodology was chosen (ahrens, foerster, zaščerinska, wasser, 2020), as on the one hand, the addressed phenomenon, namely mixed class teaching, requires more research into different pedagogical scenarios and their impact on student outcomes (raes, detienne, windey, & depaepe, 2020), and on the other hand, an exploratory study is characterised by a high degree of flexibility as well as a lack of formal structure and aims to identify the boundaries of the social environment, namely mixed class teaching, based on social interactions. 59 data were collected through the analysis of published studies on the theme of the present research, namely mixed class teaching. data were collected through reviewing, analysing, comparing and synthesising experiences from observations and interviews as well as in the literature on the theme in “an integrated way such that new frameworks and perspectives on the topic are generated” (torraco, 2005, p 356). the content analysis for processing the collected data was carried out. the content analysis was differentiated into structuring content analysis and summarising content analysis (mayring, 2014). structuring content analysis means data categorising based on the previously defined criteria (budde, 2005). summarising content analysis tends to preserve the essential contents in a manageable short text (mayring, 2004). the processed data were interpreted. the researcher is the interpreter (ahrens, purvinis, zaščerinska, micevičienė, & tautkus, 2018). the interpreter reveals his/her interest in a phenomenon (zascerinska, aleksejeva, zascerinskis, gukovica, & aleksejeva, 2020) as well as practical interest in the research question (cohen, manion, & morrison, 2003). the interpretive paradigm is aimed at analysing the social construction of the meaningful reality (zascerinska, aleksejeva, zascerinskis, gukovica, & aleksejeva, 2020). meanings emerge from the interpretation (zascerinska, aleksejeva, zascerinskis, gukovica, & aleksejeva, 2020). figure 5 highlights the key steps of the empirical study and the sequence of their implementation. figure 5 the key steps of the empirical study and the sequence of their implementation (the authors) results of the empirical study the analysis of the published studies reveals the comparison of two scenarios, namely the remote classroom and the hybrid virtual classroom (raes, detienne, windey, & depaepe, 2020) as displayed in figure 6. figure 6 two models of synchronous hybrid learning (raes, detienne, windey, & depaepe, 2020) 60 the picture on the left in figure 6 depicts what is called the remote classroom, whereas the picture on the right depicts the hybrid virtual classroom (raes, detienne, windey, & depaepe, 2020). both learning settings have in common that both on-site or ‘here’ students and remote or ‘there’ students are simultaneously included (raes, detienne, windey, & depaepe, 2020). this kind of learning and instruction is also framed as here or there (hot) instruction (zydney, mckimm, lindberg, & schmidt, 2019). the difference between the remote and the hybrid virtual classroom involves the location where students follow the lecture or class (raes, detienne, windey, & depaepe, 2020). in the remote classroom setting, one group follows the course on campus and another group follows the course synchronously from another campus (the remote location and students are displayed on the screen depicted in the left corner of figure 6) (szeto & cheng 2016). in the hybrid virtual classroom, one group follows the course on campus and simultaneously individuals follow the course remotely from the location of their choice (butz, stupnisky, pekrun, jensen, & harsell, 2016). this method of teaching offers even more flexibility because it gives learners, as well as students who are, for example, abroad or ill for a longer period of time, the opportunity to participate in the actual lesson and interact at a distance with all students and the teacher from a place of their own choice (raes, detienne, windey, & depaepe, 2020). another scenario received the name collaborative online international learning (coil) (ahrens et al, 2021). coil connects students and professors in different countries for collaborative projects and discussions as part of their coursework. coil collaborations between students and professors provide meaningful, significant opportunities for global experiences built into the programs of study. coil enhances intercultural student interaction through proven approaches to meaningful online engagement, while providing universities a cost-effective way to ensure that their students are globally engaged. coil offers a creative, relevant, accessible way of engaging in international teaching and learning (ahrens et al, 2021). partners working on coil programmes can share content and methodology, in mutually beneficial ways (ahrens et al, 2021). collaboration of students from a university in the usa and a partner university in south africa served as the coil illustration (ahrens et al, 2021). empirical study’s findings the structuring content analysis of the data collected within the present empirical study allows identifying the scenarios of mixed class teaching reflected in table 3. table 3 scenarios of mixed class teaching (the authors) scenario sub-scenario a short description of the scenario hot (here or there) remote classroom one group follows the course on campus and another group follows the course synchronously from another campus hybrid virtual classroom one group follows the course on campus and simultaneously individuals follow the course remotely from the location of their choice coil (collaborative online international learning) students and professors in different countries are connected for collaborative projects and discussions as part of their coursework table 4 highlights the differences between the scenarios of mixed class teaching. the structuring content analysis of both scenarios – hot and coil – does not allow segmenting the organisation of teaching. in the hot scenario, a group follows the course (szeto & cheng 2016; butz, stupnisky, pekrun, jensen, & harsell, 2016), while the coil scenario 61 puts the emphasis on students’ learning as it is highlighted in the name of the scenario. consequently, both scenarios are aimed at students’ learning. table 4 scenarios of mixed class teaching (the authors) scenario subscenario mixed class teaching components teacher students language of instruction hot (here or there) remote classroom one teacher in one of the campus classes 2 groups of students from 2 different locations one official language (used by the study programme) for the teacher and learners hybrid virtual classroom one teacher in the campus class one group of students in the campus class, the others remotely from the location of their choice one official language (used by the study programme) for the teacher and learners coil (collaborative online international learning) a couple of teachers from different countries students are from at least 2 countries, each of 2 students’ groups is in the campus class, these 2 students’ groups are connected via the internet. an international language is used for both teachers’ and students’ communication in the coil class the summarizing content analysis results in the finding that in both scenarios (hot and coil) social interactions between the teacher and students as the basis of mixed class teaching are not structured. conclusions the theoretical findings of the present research allow concluding that teaching has undergone significant changes in different historical periods. another conclusion based on the concepts’ comparative analysis is drawn on the differences in the use of the selected terms containing “mixed”, “class” and “teaching” and similar terms. the findings of the empirical study facilitate the conclusion on the existence of two scenarios of mixed class teaching, namely hot and coil. both scenarios are oriented to students’ learning, teaching in these scenarios is not segmented and structured. the structure of mixed class teaching is to be based on social interactions between the teacher and students, namely, two sub-phases of teaching. implications for higher education imply that mixed class teaching is part of the educational process. the contemporary emphasis on peer-learning and/or learning in the modern education has to be shifted to the consideration of the educational process as a whole: the educational process is composed of the defined phases, namely teaching, peer-learning and learning. these three phases of the educational process, namely teaching, peer-learning and learning, proceed in a certain sequence: from teaching through peer-learning to learning. teaching is the first phase in the educational process that increases the importance of the implementation of teaching within the whole educational process. in mixed class teaching, the inter-relationship or, in other words, social interaction between the teacher and learners is structured: teaching consists of two sub-phases, namely teaching and teaching with the elements of peer-learning. 62 the present research has some limitations. a limitation is the theoretical interconnections between mixed class teaching and scenarios. another limitation is that the data were collected through the analysis of published studies on the theme of the present research, namely mixed class teaching. also, the methods of data processing, namely the structuring content analysis and the summarising content analysis, serve as a limiting parameter in this research. future work will be aimed at expanding the theoretical interconnections of the present research, namely mixed class teaching and scenarios. discovery of other scenarios of mixed class teaching will be continued. modelling of mixed class teaching is proposed, too. also, the search for methods of data collection and processing will be widened. empirical studies focused on the analysis of mixed class teaching implemented in two sub-phases, namely teaching and teaching with elements of peer-learning, will be carried out. comparative studies of different countries are of great research interest. acknowledgement the presented work has been carried out within the project nphz-2021/10050 “stem coil for greener sustainable ecosystems: igniting global classrooms” supported by nordplus horizontal 2021. references ahrens, a., & zaščerinska, j. 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(2018). science of pedagogy: theory of educational discipline and practice. journal of teacher education for sustainability, v20, n2 p31-43 2018. zogla, i. & lubkina, v. (2020). doctoral student’s research competence. education content research and implementation problems, volume 1, 42-55. https://doi.org/10.17770/er2020.1.5317 zydney, j. m., mckimm, p., lindberg, r., & schmidt, m. (2019). here or there instruction: lessons learned in implementing innovative approaches to blended synchronous learning. tech trends, 63, 123–132 https://doi.org/10.1007/s11528-018-0344-z https://doi.org/10.1007/s11528-010-0418-z http://www.ijmef.org/allissues.aspx https://doi.org/10.17770/er2020.1.5317 https://doi.org/10.1007/s11528-018-0344-z title of the paper. 31 relationship between academic self-efficacy and cognitive load for students in distance learning inguna griskevica 1, martins iltners 2 1 liepaja university institute of educational sciences, latvia 2 rīga stradiņš university liepaja department, latvia abstract. the covid-19 global pandemic has forced the education process worldwide to change its form to distance learning. this empirical study contributes to recently limited knowledge about the remote learning process. the study aimed to determine how academic self-efficacy is related to subjective cognitive load to predict achievement results in different forms of distance learning. the research method used was a quasiexperimental pilot study. the research questions were: (1) what is the relationship between academic selfefficacy, subjective cognitive load, and achievement results in teacher-directed distance learning? (2) what is the relationship between academic self-efficacy, subjective cognitive load, and achievement in student-directed distance learning? (3) what is the difference between teacher-directed and student self-directed distance learning settings regarding relationships between academic self-efficacy, subjective cognitive load, and achievement results? the measurement of academic self-efficacy and subjective cognitive load in the context of task assessment results were compared in different distance learning settings in two independent groups of 9th graders. the results suggest a significant relationship between subjective cognitive load and achievement results in student self-directed but non-significant between all variables in teacher-directed distance learning settings. in contrast, settings themselves demonstrated no influence on any measured factors. keywords: academic self-efficacy, achievement, distance learning, subjective cognitive load. to cite this article: griskevica, i. & iltners, m. (2021). relationship between academic self-efficacy and cognitive load for students in distance learning. education. innovation. diversity, 2(2), 31-40. doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2021.1.5426 introduction the pandemic caused by the covid-19 virus has forced schools worldwide to change their form of education. according to unesco (united nations educational, scientific and cultural organization), more than 1.2 billion learners in 186 countries switch to distance learning (li & lalani, 2020). on november 12, 2020, the latvia education law amendment came into force defining that distance learning becomes “a part of the full-time education process” (education law amendment, 2020, article 1.1.). the oecd meta-analysis study indicates that there is currently a lack of sufficient research worldwide on the impact of technology on the learning process (gottschalk, 2019). due to the changes that covid-19 has forced, it is fundamental to study and understand the impact of psychological aspects in distance learning. the study aims to determine the relationship between academic self-efficacy and subjective cognitive load in the prediction of achievement results in different forms of distance learning. the research method used was a quasi-experimental pilot study. this paper examines the relationship between academic self-efficacy, subjective cognitive load and achievement results in teacher-directed and student self-directed distance learning settings. the specific objective of this study was to investigate whether relationships in these two instructional settings differentiate. the study sought to answer the following specific research questions: (1) what is the relationship between academic self-efficacy, subjective cognitive load, and achievement results in teacher-directed distance learning? (2) what is the relationship between academic self-efficacy, subjective cognitive load, and achievement https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2021.1.5426 32 results in student self-directed distance learning? (3) what is the difference between teacherdirected and student self-directed distance learning settings according to relationships between academic self-efficacy, subjective cognitive load, and achievement results? literature review digital technology and the world wide web have changed the way people learn and acquire new information. recently, education underwent enormous changes due to the impact of changing habits in contemporary communication driven by digital technology (griskevica, 2018, 2020; hooft, 2018; howe & strauss, 2000). as a result of intelligent device functions development, learning materials can be accessed anywhere, anytime. however, scientists debate how such easy and fast access to a wide range of information affects people's ability to learn (lodge & harrison, 2019). although many published studies describe the relationship between cognitive abilities and education (griskevica, 2016, 2017; liou & bulut, 2020; sternberg, 2020), it has been suggested that cognitive functions in the digital environment interact differently with learning processes than in the traditional general environment (lodge, kennedy, & lockyer, 2016; lodge & horvath, 2017; martin, sun, & westine, 2020; pigott & polanin, 2020; sahni et al., 2021). it has been reported that the digital environment can increase the cognitive load and inhibit learniing. the studies show that the flow of information in cyberspace attention and memory processes impact differently than in physical space (firth et al., 2019; palghat, horvath, & lodge, 2017). due to the covid-19 pandemic sudden introduction of distance education into the general learning process, it has become one of the unique challenges for all its participants. some investigators have named it a "spontaneous experiment" because the urgent implementation of the digital learning forms was required in the ongoing education process, while research findings of the impact of the digital environment on learning are still unclear (zavizion et al., 2020, p. 4). factors influencing the learning process, such as teacher-directed and student self-directed distance learning settings, are considered more important than the digital environment (kümmel, moskaliuk, cress, & kimmerle, 2020). the authors identify two orientations in the exploration of education-learning settings: individual and social in the context of which the teacher-directed and student self-directed distance-learning settings can be understood. studies with an individual orientation explore individual learners mental representations and knowledge acquisition in digital learning environments. studies with a social orientation, explore learners’ participation in the social system and application of the learning materials in collaboration. the last decade has seen a growing trend towards investigation the influence of academic self-efficacy on student achievements in remote learning settings (honicke & broadbent, 2016; huang, 2012; yukuselturk & bulut, 2007; joo, lim, & kim, 2013). since the term self-efficacy was reported in social learning theory, it indicates a function of selfregulation that can influence a person’s behavioural and cognitive processes (bandura, 1991, 2001). although meta-analysis demonstrates that self-efficacy is related to academic performance in the long term (talsma, schüza, schwarzerc, & norrisa, 2018), the results are not unambiguous, and correlation has not been determined between these entities (bouffard & couture, 2003; crippen, biesinger, muis, & orgill, 2009; harackiewicz, barron, carter, lehto, & elliot, 1997; yusuf, 2011; wahabi, 2009). questions have been raised alongside the necessity to clarify the relationship between academic performance and academic selfefficacy in the context of different distance learning settings (cho & shen, 2013; yokoyama, 2019; wilde & hsu, 2019). regarding cognitive processes, investigations demonstrate that higher levels of general self-efficacy correlate with the cognitive abilities that motivate oneself to attain the 33 goal (bandura, 1994, 1998; bouffard & bouchard, 2005). since the reported theory of the subjective cognitive load (sweller, 1993, 1998), recent evidence suggests that academic selfefficacy and subjective cognitive load could exist a straight correlation within the academic environment (vasile, marhan, singer, & stoicescu, 2011; huang & mayer, 2019). several researchers have recognized that cognitive loads are among the most influential factors with a critical role in distance learning outcomes (curum, & khedo, 2020; stiller & bachmaier, 2018). the cognitive load theory states that instructional methods are essential to decrease extraneous cognitive load so that available cognitive resources can be entirely devoted to learning (de jong, 2010; chandler & sweller, 1992; sweller, 2005). cognitive overload is understood in terms of how information is processed during learning and relates to the amount of information that working memory can hold at one time. a review of performed studies on the relationship between self-efficacy and academic performance in online learning states the fact that there are extremely little published data about their influence on cognitive processes (curum & khedo, 2020; yokoyama, 2019). although studies demonstrate that cognitive overload lowers educational performance, few published studies have examined the consequences of cognitive overload in distance learning settings (alyushin & kolobashkina, 2019; mierlo, jarodzka, kirschner, kirschner, & kirschner, 2014; sweller, van merrienboer, & paas, 2019). these findings suggest that more exploration of human collaboration influence the learning process in e-learning is needed (baum & mcpherson, 2019; mackenzie, 2019; zhampeissova et al., 2020). methodology research tools in the study, academic self-efficacy was measured by an adapted version of the general self-efficacy scale (schwarzer & jerusalem, 1995; bulina, 2009), which was modified for the academic field dimension (cronbach's α is .81). the modification and adaptation of the scale for academic self-efficacy measurement were performed according to the authors' recommendation (schwarzer, 2014). the scale is one-dimensional and consists of ten statements with four possible answers on a curved scale for each. there are ten statements in each: the respondent's task is to give his / her assessment on a 4 point likert-type scale of the extent to which he/she agrees with each of the statements from 1 (strongly disagree) to 4 (strongly agree). scoring sums up all ten items to generate the final composite score from 10 to 40. the designed scale is for adults and adolescents from the age of 14. the scale is used and adapted in 32 languages (schwarzer, 2014). it aims to determine how an individual perceives self-perceived self-efficacy in coping with daily difficulties to persevere, engage in challenging and complex situations, and successfully recover from failures to achieve their goals (schwarzer & hallum, 2008). subjective cognitive load was measured by the subjective cognitive load measurement scale (paas et al., 2003; 2010). on a curved scale from 1 to 9, the scale assesses how high the cognitive load was perceived during the task: 1 (very, very low mental strain) up to 9 (very, very high mental strain). the scale proves to be a reliable and valid estimator (ayres, 2006) of overall cognitive load. the scale's design does not interfere with the learning process (paas, ayres, & pachman, 2008). achievement was assessed according to the english language achievement test elaborated by the teacher according to the learning curriculum of the 9th grade. the test was developed from the task samples of the state examinations on the national center for the education republic of latvia website (national center for the education republic of latvia, 2020). all together test consisted of four tasks from which two focused on reading skills and two on language understanding. the answers were rated on a likert scale from 1 (very, very 34 poor) to 10 (excellent), while in case of failure to complete the test, the students received nv (no rating). data collection procedure the identical tasks and measurement procedures were performed simultaneously (90 minutes) in different distance learning settings. the teacher-directed distance learning settings were defined as when the teacher is present on the screen and interacts with students. the student self-directed distance learning settings were defined as ones where the teacher has prepared instructions and students work independently without teacher presence online. the procedure was performed in online settings, and the sequence of the study was the following: students completed the measurement of the modification of the general self-efficacy scale for the academic dimension (bulina, 2009; schwarzer & jerusalem, 1995; swarzer, 2014), then tasks and tests of the current english language lesson, then subjective cognitive load measurement scale (paas et al., 2003; 2010; paas, ayres & pachman, 2008), after the lesson the teacher evaluated achievement results. methods of analysis multiple linear regression was carried out to investigate the relationship between academic self-efficacy (scale 10-40), achievement results (scale 1-10) and cognitive load (scale 1-9). the r-squared (r2) equation was used to evaluate the model fit. to report each predictor's slope of influence, the standardised coefficient beta-coefficient () was calculated with a statistical significance p-value. the individual predictors were examined with student t criteria with statistical significance p-value as predictors in the model. the scatterplot of standardised predicted residuals showed that the data met the homogeneity assumptions of variance and linearity. the residuals were approximately normally distributed. empirical data statistically analyses were performed with spss (statistical package for the social science v. 26.0). the study sample the proximity principle made sampling. participants came from the same educational establishment and were randomly divided into two independent groups (group 1, n =30, male 50% and group 2, n =30, male 50%) aged from 15 to 16 (m = 15.02, sd = .05). the two groups were aligned by gender and average achievement results in the subject. research results in order to answer the first research question, a multi-factor linear regression was used to predict achievement results based on their academic self-efficacy and subjective cognitive load in teacher-directed distance learning settings. a non-significant regression equation was found f(2, 27) = 1.600, p < .221, with an r2 of .106. the individual predictors were examined further and indicated that cognitive load (t = -.224, p = .825) and self-efficacy (t = -1.695, p = .102) were nonsignificant predictors in the model. it means that by increasing the subjective cognitive load and academic self-efficacy by one unit, the achievement assessment decreases non-significantly. this means that academic self-efficacy and subjective cognitive load did not influence achievement results. values of beta-coefficients () and their statistical significance (p) is shown in table 1. 35 table 1 indicators of the contribution of academic self-efficacy and subjective cognitive load in predicting the achievement results in the regression model for teacher-directed distance learning settings factors beta -coefficients () significance (p) academic self-efficacy .024 .825 subjective cognitive load -.251 .102 significance level p≤ .05 *, p≤ .01 ** in order to answer the second research question, a multiple linear regression was used to predict achievement results based on their academic self-efficacy and subjective cognitive load in student self-directed distance learning settings. here a significant regression equation was found with subjective cognitive load f(2, 27) = 4.363, p < .023, with an r2 of .244. the individual predictors were examined further and indicated that just a cognitive load (t = 2.314, p = .029) was a significant predictor in the model. it can be seen from the data in table 2 that by increasing the subjective cognitive load by one unit, the achievement results on average will decrease by .472. this means that 24% of achievement results are influenced by subjective cognitive load. table 2 indicators of the contribution of academic self-efficacy and subjective cognitive load in predicting the achievement results in the regression model for student self-directed distance learning settings factors beta-coefficients () significance (p) academic self-efficacy .028 .353 subjective cognitive load -.472 .029* significance level p≤ .05 *, p≤ .01 ** in order to answer the third research question, a multiple linear regression was used to predict achievement results based on a different type of distance learning settings. after adjustment of academic self-efficacy and subjective cognitive load by changing various distance learning settings, results did not show statistically significant differences in achievement results p > .05. the group factor demonstrated no statistically significant influence on achievement results, not on academic self-efficacy and subjective cognitive load. the mean values of each measured factor are displayed in table 3. table 3 mean values of the academic self-efficacy, subjective cognitive load and achievement results for students in both distance learning settings factors distance learning settings group 1 (n = 30) group 2 (n = 30) together (n = 60) academic self-efficacy 30.17 30.60 30.38 subjective cognitive load 5.07 4.73 4.90 achievement results 6.67 6.50 6.58 significantce level p≤ .05 *, p≤ .01 ** in summary, these results suggest a significant relationship between subjective cognitive load and achievement results in student self-directed but non-significant between all 36 variables in teacher-directed distance learning settings. in contrast, settings themselves demonstrated no influence on any measured factors. discussion this study set out to assess the importance of a science-based approach to distance learning and clarify how motivational and cognitive aspects may interplay in this learning environment. surprisingly, no differences were found between teacher and student selfdirected remote learning settings in mean values of academic self-efficacy, cognitive load and achievement assessment measures. meanwhile, the study results indicated that in student selfdirected distance learning settings, subjective cognitive load impacted the achievement of assessment results. contrary to expectations, this study did not find a significant difference between self-efficacy and achievement results in both distance learning settings. although cognitive loads are recognized as an essential part of distance learning (stiller & bachmaier, 2018), there is still little information about its relationship to selfefficacy (yokoyama, 2019). contrary to expectations based on some published research (talsma et al., 2018; huang & mayer, 2019), this study did not find a significant relationship between academic self-efficacy and achievement results. these results agree with the findings of other studies, in which the relationship between academic self-efficacy and performance was questioned or even not found (crippen et al., 2009; cho & shen, 2013; wilde & hsu, 2019). a possible explanation for this might lie in the difference between learning and performance goals. it is reported that this contrast exists between the goals of the effort and the evaluation of the achievement process by itself (bouffard & bouchard, 2005). these results agree with the findings of other studies that demonstrate strong evidence of unclear correlations between perceived competence and achievement goals in school settings (bouffard & couture, 2003; harackiewicz, et al., 1997). these results support the idea that self-efficacy has an indirect effect on achievement motivation and self-learning strategies in academic accomplishments (yusuf, 2011; wahabi, 2009). the current study does not support findings that postulate a forthright correlation between academic self-efficacy and cognitive load in the learning environment (vasile et al., 2011). this study confirms that subjective cognitive load is mainly associated with the achievement of educational goals in the contexts of distance learning (zhampeissova et al., 2020). the cognitive load has been recognised as a significant factor that influences achievement results in the digital environment learning processes (al-hunaiyyan et al., 2017). this study's observed results could be attributed to the idea that educational programs in a remote learning environment are more effective if the cognitive load is optimal (curum & khedo, 2020). according to recent reports, inadequately designed educational content exceeding possible for perception elements can lead to overload and poor achievement results (alyushin & kolobashkina, 2019; sweller et al., 2019). the evidence from this study suggests that subjective cognitive load has more impact on performance in such distance learning settings where there is no direct teacher guidance. these results are consistent with those aptitude-treatment interaction studies, which suggest that in particular circumstances teacherdirected instruction reveals advantages (chen &chen, 2018; mackenzie, 2019; martin et al., 2020). some of these findings demonstrate that in distance learning settings, specifically students with lower reasoning ability benefit from the teacher-directed instructions (sahni et al., 2021; zhampeissova et al., 2020; ziegler et al., 2020). summarising this study has identified the differences in two web-based tutoring versions of instructions. these findings should improve predictions of the impact of the training task's design form on the distance learning settings' learning process. further studies, which take the studied variables into account, will need to be undertaken. however, more 37 research of the larger sample on this topic needs to be conducted before the association between self-efficacy, subjective cognitive load, achievement results, and distance learning forms is more clearly understood. conclusions this study set out to assess the effects of different distance learning conditions on how knowledge is acquired. the present study was designed to determine the relationships between self-efficacy, subjective cognitive load and the achievement results in remote learning settings. during this quasi-experimental pilot study the identical tests were given to two randomly divided groups in two distance-learning settings where one performed tasks under the own guidance, but the other under the guidance of a teacher. this study has found that generally, there were no significant differences between these two groups in measurements of self-efficacy, subjective cognitive load and achievement results. in teacher-directed distance learning conditions, investigations did not find significant relationships between the studied variables. while interestingly, multiple regression analysis revealed that the cognitive load was a significant predictor in the student self-directed learning settings. the tendency showed that by increasing the subjective cognitive load in student self-directed learning settings, the assessment results would decrease. an implication of this is the possibility that students in self-directed distance learning settings may perceive the tasks more difficult than in teacher-directed settings. these data suggest that the perception of the cognitive load has significant implications on the achievement results and in this respect, the role of teacher presence or non-presence may be critical. surprisingly this study could not state any contribution of academic self-efficacy on subjective cognitive load and achievement. these results offer a framework for further exploration of the role of perceived self-efficacy in learning. if the subjective cognitive load is more connected with persistence, self-efficacy is more consentient with social learning skills. this study highlights the meaning of motivation over self-perception factors in the learning process. overall being limited to a pilot study with a small sample, the study only aimed to look at the distance learning conditions. the present study's key strength was the quasiexperimental condition imposed by covid-19, making the design possible. returning to the question posed at the beginning of this study, it is now possible to state that academic selfefficacy by changing various distance learning forms does not significantly impact achievement results. still, the question raised by this study is how subjective cognitive load displays in different distance learning settings and that more exploration of human collaboration role in the e-learning 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(2020). the benefit of combining teacherdirection with contrasted presentation of algebra principles.european journal of psychology of education. advance online publication. doi: https://psycnet.apa.org/doi/10.1007/s10212-020-00468-3 https://isiarticles.com/113096.pdf https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sbspro.2011.02.059 https://so06.tci-thaijo.org/index.php/ijbs/article/view/2152 https://www.researchgate.net/deref/http%3a%2f%2fdx.doi.org%2f10.1186%2fs41239-019-0158-x?_sg%5b0%5d=cyzv_tvwc_ekobjny4dquf_lh3uan1gdgasoykqectsd4cwubac-tjoipvyou8s6cqodimm_58xdq7zmcgafnb7h-q.o82rqo70v-ibkrfn2smztwsvo90pmsn5qdbrwhtllliffztdsogv1v4cjlfp2uhtnb8earmkhtoq4ze8j0texa https://www.researchgate.net/deref/http%3a%2f%2fdx.doi.org%2f10.1186%2fs41239-019-0158-x?_sg%5b0%5d=cyzv_tvwc_ekobjny4dquf_lh3uan1gdgasoykqectsd4cwubac-tjoipvyou8s6cqodimm_58xdq7zmcgafnb7h-q.o82rqo70v-ibkrfn2smztwsvo90pmsn5qdbrwhtllliffztdsogv1v4cjlfp2uhtnb8earmkhtoq4ze8j0texa https://www.researchgate.net/deref/http%3a%2f%2fdx.doi.org%2f10.1016%2fj.sbspro.2011.04.158?_sg%5b0%5d=1wvcx1fpis_qhn-7uinj79pg9-chihier6cjk4obdwoesypwzc-so_r7pxbfg93xy1ttiud6w1o0adquga9gb_ebqg.o4zoeqm8yrjmqyh6fzoc8fbapjo1g6ws4_mcoqkvalkdgxrzegveyiruux4daga2tgvnpn74if-zaqaztppjfw https://doi.org/10.26641/2307-0404.2020.2.206260 https://doi.org/10.26641/2307-0404.2020.2.206260 https://www.online-journals.org/index.php/i-jim/article/view/18439 https://www.online-journals.org/index.php/i-jim/article/view/18439 https://psycnet.apa.org/doi/10.1007/s10212-020-00468-3 37 academic staff development as an enabler to good teaching practices at a higher education institution in the eastern cape, south africa zwelijongile gaylard baleni1, andrea mqondisi buka2, clever ndebele3 1,2,3walter sisulu university, south africa abstract. higher education (he) institutions have to provide support to academic staff development (asd) through policies, funding and strategies that afford lecturers opportunities to attend asd disciplinary-based and professional training. upgrading the nature of teaching and learning is a key strategy in he and that responsibility lies with higher education institutions that identify with the innovative nature of teaching and learning. good teaching is not an accident, it is achieved through continuous engagement and enhancement of lecturers on both content and innovative pedagogical skills. such skills need to be horned continuously to close gap in lecturers’ gap and pedagogical content knowledge (pck) suits that approach. this study was grounded on principles of pedagogical content knowledge (pck). it was conducted in one university campus comprising of two sites in the eastern cape in south africa. a purposive sample of 51 academics was used for data collection. content analysis was used to identify emerging themes from the interview responses. the findings showed that lecturers regard asd as enhancing quality teaching and empowering lecturers to improve their lecturing skills and responsibilities. keywords: academic staff development, good teaching, pedagogical content knowledge. to cite this article: baleni, z.g., buka, a.m., ndebele, c. (2022). academic staff development as an enabler to good teaching practices at a higher education institution in the eastern cape, south africa. education. innovation. diversity, 2(5), 37-46. doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2022.2.6905 introduction the purpose of this article is to investigate whether academic staff development in pedagogical content knowledge enhances good teaching. data was collected using face-to-face and telephonic interviews, qualitative research methods. the age long practice in the university teaching generally has focused on delivery of academic contents in ways that suggest that the cognitive academic contents in various fields are the only important consideration. according to ajibade, adeleke, and oyetoro (2020), this practice has, really, produced academic giants in different disciplines who may have adequate content knowledge and research skills but who may lack other components of teaching needed to produce all-round professionals who possess pedagogical content knowledge that would help in impacting others positively. these academic giants include seasoned, research respected professors who are specialists in their disciplines. they might have published books and articles that carry a lot of content knowledge (ck) but they lack the pedagogical knowledge (pd). berrett (2012) opined that professors who do not have an understanding of pedagogy may think about the content students should learn, but not the cognitive capabilities they should develop. it is difficult to blame such lecturers as they are totally oblivious that something more than content knowledge would be required of them as university teachers who are meant to contribute maximally to students’ all-round development in the highest educational echelon. this means that some lecturers might not notice their pedagogy gap in their teaching approach until they are confronted by issues like curriculum design, assessment, technology integration into teaching and feedback. although training of lecturers started in 1980s, research generally shows that gaps in pedagogical training still exist among teachers in colleges and universities (biku, demas, woldehawariat, getahun, & mekonnen, 2018; negassa & engdasew, 2017; tsegay, zegergish, & ashraf, 2018). efforts at addressing these gaps in ability to exhibit pedagogical skills in instructional delivery have continued to receive attention as various heis and governments of https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2022.2.6905 38 some countries like south africa through che guidelines. heis have to improve the quality of teaching as universities begin to realise that the possession of a doctoral degree may not be a proxy for teaching competence (henard & leprince-ringuet, 2008; okolie, igwe, nwajiuba, mlanga, binuomote, nwosu & ogbaekirigwe, 2020). he institutions have introduced policies and strategies like short courses in teaching as well as sending their academics to other heis to register and study he teaching qualifications like pgdip (higher education) to close the pck gap. negassa and engdasew (2017) in their own evaluative study of a pedagogical skills training for teachers in adama science and technology university, ethiopia, also reported positive effects on the participants’ teaching skills in using lesson planning, active learning, continuous assessment and classroom management. literature review almarghani and mijatovic (2017) argue that many higher education institutions (heis) are pressurised to develop good quality university education. these pressures emanate from the competition on the market of he facilities, national initiatives for quality assurance and accreditation, and the ever-changing pre-requisites from employers and industry. therefore, hei should plan and offer credible programmes or short learning programmes to continuously upskill their academic troops. nasser-abu and alhija (2017) ascertain that the terms like ‘good’, effective’, ‘excellent’, ‘quality’ teaching are applied interchangeably when referring to student learning. generally, the literature displays there is no agreed-upon definition of good teaching, nor are there wellestablished resources for quantifying it (nasser-abu & alhija, 2017) but below are some of the definitions or interpretations of good teaching from literature. hativa (2015) defined two general dimensions of good teaching. the first common dimension is cognitive and re-counts to cooperating the learning content to students. the cognitive dimension consists of three subdimensions (hatiya, 2015) to which she brings up as: course and lesson organisation, clearness, and interest/intellectual challenge. the second common dimension is affective good teaching which refers to generating optimistic classroom atmosphere (hatiya, 2015). two subdimensions entitled as responsivity (interaction with students) and showing respect, (support and empathy with students) define the second dimension. hatiya (2015) claims that this inconsistency is based on the fact that good teaching is context based whereby good lecturers might do different things in varying he institutions with a variety of students for different goals. in this study the term ‘good teaching’ is used. mcmillan and gordon (2017) define good teaching as characterised by lecturer eagerness and zeal; is student centred; is experientially based, participative, and intended to create basic reasoning, reflection, and critical thinking abilities; causes students to extend their applied comprehension; is prefaced on a sufficiently planned, significant educational programme that adjusts results, teaching and learning techniques, and appraisal; creates students’ fitness through useful input and includes on-going lecturer reflection. the question then is how does academic staff development (asd) enhance such good teaching and furthermore do the lectures at the chosen hdi know what good teaching entails. elsewhere, hénard and rosereare (2012) viewed good teaching as the effective use of pedagogical techniques to produce learning outcomes for students. hativa (2015) provided a similar definition that also centres on teaching outcomes. hativa (2015) emphasised that good teaching supports high-quality learning and that in addition to developing a consideration of the subject matter, an assortment of skills and capabilities, as well as assertiveness, are advanced through good teaching. thus, teaching ought to accomplish multi-dimensional tenacities in addition to learning. chikari, rudhumbu and svotwa (2015), further points out that despite the fact that a few lecturers have more distinctive talent than others, all successful teaching is the consequence 39 of studying, reflecting, practice, and hard work, therefore teaching well is not a coincidence it should not be accidental. excellent lecturers are made, not born; they become excellent through investment in their teaching abilities (european science institution (esf), 2012). european commission (2013:13) states: “a good teacher, like a good graduate, is also an active learner, questioner and critical thinker”. it is a waste of time, determination, and institutional assets to leave lecturers to learn by trial and error. in this way, staff associated with teaching and supporting student learning should be qualified, supported, and sufficiently resourced for that teaching. teachers learn best through professional development that addresses their needs (meissel et al., 2016) so that fills in the gaps in the skill sets of new teachers, and to continue to develop the expertise of teachers (evers et al., 2016) throughout their career. professional development is necessary to keep the teacher up-to-date with the continuously changing practices, and student needs. each academic needs to be supported, get relevant academic and professional qualification that will strengthen his/her discipline knowledge plus the pedagogy on how to facilitate teaching effectively. somewhere, vorster and quinn (2017) ascertain that good teaching involves becoming more acquainted with who your students are, providing for the genuine adapting needs of the students in front of you and not the magically decidedly ready students you might want, drawing in information students bring into the course, utilising instructional methods that give students a chance to connect effectively in learning and to interface their current information to new information, drafting them into the skill levels and methods of "being" of control, utilising solid, substantial and reasonable techniques to evaluate their students, and more. good teaching requires having both a strong discipline identity and a strong pedagogic identity, with the understanding that strong pedagogy is grounded in a deep understanding of the discipline. this is aligned with pck chosen theoretical framework. academics work with knowledge as the basis of their identity. identity is embedded in the discipline (or disciplines) as a knowledge learner, a knowledge producer, and as a knowledge disseminator. these are not binaries. academic identity is not a static construct; it is fluid and of a hybrid nature. the identity of an academic in he ought to be rated with both academic qualifications and professional competence. they might be expects in their disciplines but further training in the pedagogy is always crucial to keep them abreast of new learning process strategies. identity changes over time, as work foci and values (the personal project) and external influences (e.g. marketisation) change and as a career progresses, or even as the notion of ‘discipline’ changes. therefore as the identity changes, academics need guidance and proper training on how to align their teaching approaches to the students and curriculum demands. academics necessarily need to work across these knowledge areas in different ways at different points in their careers. the pck combo intertwines pedagogy with content knowledge and moulds a competent academic with good, effective teaching. pedagogy builds the how to facilitate curriculum in the lecturer. furthermore, the fact that good teaching needs to be research-informed is one example of the interplay between being a good teacher and a good researcher. both are equally important, interdependent and both roles need to be developed, valued, rewarded, and incentivised. in terms of curriculum transformation, effective teaching requires that lecturers have a good understanding of the interplay between knowledge and power, and the ability to question ‘what knowledge’, ‘whose knowledge’ and ‘who is served’ through knowledge selection into the curriculum. cameron and woods (2016) cite an ongoing cooperative study in australian universities (australian university teaching criteria and standards project) (autcsp 2014) which offers a valuable structure to characterise national teaching measures and principles. its seven models are portrayed and conceptualised as a network to give instances of execution at every one of five degrees of vocation movement. in sweden, lund university has distinguished three overall standards of 'good' teaching, portrayed as 'educational capability', which they have used to https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/2158244016662901 https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/2158244016662901 40 perceive and remunerate phenomenal teaching practice. lund university's origination of an 'educational academy' (olsson, martensson, & roxa, 2010) is a structure that is utilised to assess teaching ability. these great teaching standards have been utilised to conceptualise principles that empower lecturer improvement professionals to help lecturers in developing their mastery. these principles empower lecturers to be deliberate and centred in building up their skills and furnish assessors with strategies to survey the degrees of the educational capability of each lecturer. also, in south africa, the council for higher education (che) and the higher education learning and teaching association of southern africa (heltasa) introduced national excellence in teaching and learning award in 2010 and even the university understudy does offer vice chancellors’ teaching excellence awards since 2012. the national awards are issued yearly to deserving applicants across all higher education institutions in south africa, one of their aims is to show support at a national level for excellence in teaching and learning in higher education. kember and wong (2000) outlined what poor teaching is. they inferred good and poor teaching within four quadrants moulded by the junctures of students’ philosophies about learning (passive vs. active) and their perception of their teacher’s beliefs about teaching (traditional/transmissive vs. non-traditional). teaching is perceived as poor when students’ beliefs concerning learning and their perception of their teacher’s beliefs about teaching were dissenting (kember & wong, 2000). theoretical framework pedagogical content knowledge (pck) was chosen as the theoretical framework for this study because pck is associated with the teacher’s learning organisation in the classroom, which challenges their creativeness in altering the teaching resources (kulsum, 2017). the pck is defined as the basic skill for lecturers so that they improve their teaching excellence and approach (kultsum, 2017). according to an, kulm and wu (2004) the significance of pck is comprised of three parts namely knowledge of content, curriculum and teaching. teaching is a multifaceted perceptive action where the teacher is expected to apply knowledge from various fields (barnett & hodson, 2001; cochran, et al., 1993): (a) subject matter knowledge, (b) pedagogical knowledge, and, (c) pedagogical content knowledge (pck). hence knowledge of content alone is not enough to teach effectively. according to shulman (1986, 1987) cited in hancherngchai (2018), the concept of pedagogical content knowledge (pck) as a new realm of teacher knowledge has been a useful framework for discovering the teachers’ needs and content improvements. shulman (1987) presented pedagogical content knowledge (pck) as a key part of the knowledge base of teaching, that is comprised of (a) subject matter knowledge, (b) curricular knowledge, (c) pedagogical knowledge (d) knowledge of students, (e) knowledge of the context, and (f) knowledge of educational goals. he conceptualised pck as containing influential subject matter specific correlations, illustrations, models, demos and other techniques of constructing the module logical to other people where both the content and pedagogical knowledge are incorporated. ever since shulman, many researchers have investigated pck and it has been construed in diverse ways (gess-newsome, 1999; cochran, et al., 1993; grossman, 1990). grossman (1990) expounded on shulman’s work, by theorising pck as an outcome of alteration of information from three areas: (a) subject matter knowledge and beliefs, (b) pedagogical knowledge and beliefs, and, (c) knowledge and beliefs about context. individually, these knowledge areas portray pck as improvement and in turn affects the three underwriting areas while franke and fennema (1992) denoted pck as teachers’ knowledge of teaching processes such as operational approaches for planning, lecture room practises, behaviour managing 41 systems, lecture room organization procedure, and inspiration procedures. magnuson, krajcik and borko (1999), adding on grossman’s effort, termed pck for teaching as comprising of five parts: (a) orientations toward teaching, (b) knowledge and beliefs about the curriculum, (c) knowledge and beliefs about instructional strategies, (d) knowledge and philosophies about students understanding of explicit subject topics, and (e) knowledge and theories about assessment in that theme. hancherngchai (2018) contends that content knowledge is a necessary but not the only condition for good teaching because lecturers also need to choose appropriate examples and exercises in the correct sequence so that students are guided in their learning. the pck notion explores the teaching strategies, approaches, and procedures that assist a lecturer to teach more effective but these should be contextualised to relevant national qualification framework (nqf) level of the course/module taught. lastly, coenders (2010) describes pck as knowledge for teaching. daries (2017) supports shulman (1987) conception as he also explains pedagogic content knowledge as an amalgamation of content and pedagogy into a consideration of how curriculum matters or themes are designed, characterised, and modified to the diverse benefits and capabilities of students. kultsum (2017) elaborates that pck is the basic skill for lecturers so that they improve their teaching excellence and approach. this means pck will enhance lecturers to combine content with effective and innovative teaching approaches relevant to the national qualification (nqf) level and students’ cognitive levels. the innovative teaching skills are taught in the staff development training. pck also develops lecturers to design curriculum inclusive of diverse and integrated assessment to accommodate diverse students attributes. such an approach results into future ready graduates for the market with the required applied competences namely foundational, practical and reflexive skills (saqa, 2012). the pck concept may be interpreted differently by different people, but it is generally agreed that this amalgamation of knowledge affects how teachers teach and how students learn (berry, loughran, & van driel, 2008). for all the topics they teach, discipline teachers should have a well-developed pck not restricted to ck hence the need for continuous training on pedagogical skills. pck is developed by integrating its contributing parts, reflecting on them, and active processing. teaching experiences shape and develop pck (clermont, borko, & krajcik, 1994; van driel, et al., 1998). furthermore, according to kulsum, (2017). pck is also associated to the teacher’s learning organisation in the classroom, which challenges their creativeness in altering the teaching resources. methodology qualitative research method was used where face-to-face and telephonic interviews were conducted. the study was conducted in one campus comprising of two sites. the 1st site offers qualifications ranging from a certificate to advanced diploma while the second site offers undergraduate degrees and post graduate degrees up to doctoral level. a purposive sample of 51 academics who attended academic staff development workshops inclusive of seven (7) who also completed the post graduate diploma in higher education (pgdip(he). only 27 academics responded to the invite for interviews which ultimately were used for data collection. the interview questions were guided by the following key statements which were also used as themes: a. the training has improved my teaching knowledge b. participating in the training programme has enhanced my teaching methods c. the training was aligned with my teaching needs d. the core areas which were more relevant towards my teaching e. the new skills acquired in the training cannot be practiced in my lecture rooms before the interview started, i addressed the participants about why she/he was chosen as part of the sample, of their rights to withdraw anytime, the purpose of the study and that their 42 identity will be kept a secret in this study. each interview was conducted i a room where no one could hear what was discussed. the questionnaires were sent to participants using google docs to their private emails and responses never had their names. the consent form addressed the principles suggested by neuman (2014). all willing participants signed the consent form to ensure the fair distribution of risks involved in this study and the promise of respectful treatment of participants, which involves maximising good outcomes, and minimising risks. the interviews were recorded to ensure trustworthiness of data. content analysis was used to identify emerging themes from the responses. results and discussion there were 27 participants composed of 55% females and 45% males. their age groups start from 30 -39 years (29%); 40-49 years (43%); 50 -59 years (23%) and the above 60 years group (8%). their academic qualifications are 12% phd, 67% masters and 21% below masters qualification. participants who possess a post graduate diploma in higher education (pgdip(he) were 14%, 31% have other teaching qualifications which are not at higher education level and the majority 55% participants have no teaching qualifications. the training has improved my teaching knowledge most respondents contend that asd enhancement is for lecturers who were never trained to teach; therefore, it is intended to capacitate them with the understanding that it will help them to meet basic requirements to lecture in he institutions. some respondents related the issue of asd with improvement of teaching and stated that asd was the advancement of ability to teach effectively. most of the interview participants felt that asd is relevant to their teaching and career profession. participant 13 voiced that it is a career change where she learnt the pedagogy of teaching and learning. comments from some participants are listed below: “the training has improved my teaching knowledge”; “participating in the training programme has increased my motivation as a lecturer” participating in the training programme has enhanced my teaching methods the response by p2 and p10 highlights the fact that participants acknowledge the importance of training of academics without a teaching qualification to equip them with pedagogical content knowledge in addition to the disciplinary expertise they already have. remarkably, the talk of strengthening pedagogical content knowledge is predominant in the interview information, particularly from five members. most likely it is because all hold pgdip qualification and the other is an academic developer. p3 contends that such exposure engages one to reflect as they lecture in he and further recognises that asd enables lecturers with teaching aptitudes to guide he students in a manner that is unique. p5,p11,p12, p15 referred to enabling of academics when she described asd as an engagement of lecturers on teaching abilities and that it underpins and develops them as better-prepared lecturers in offering excellent teaching. the training discourse also arose from the interview data. participant p3 stressed that asd was regarded as a technique to train academics and professors in lecturing expertise, signifying that professors were knowledgeable experts in their disciplinary fields but require to be trained as university teachers. respondents also see the outcome of asd as leading to improvement and upgrade of the teaching and learning competencies within the departments. for example, p2 contended that 43 consistent refresher workshops and courses are essential for academic staff advancement as they result in improved teaching tactics. p8 explicated that asd programmes are important in the acquisition of teaching skills. these respondents’ perspectives are aligned with quinn (2012) and d'andrea and gosling’s (2001) observations. in their case studies in south africa and the uk, these authors correspondingly ascertained that academic staff development (asd) was concomitant with the development of teaching and learning in the he sector. surprisingly, some studies (mizell, 2010) assert that there is no convincing proof to agree with this. interestingly, the information from the interview reveals that academic staff development’s focus is on teaching abilities and methods. data also showed that using workshops and seminars is the foremost technique in training such competencies. results categorically display that asd can be anticipated in relation to its purpose, its methods, its empowering aspect and development. university teachers’ development is one of the central dialogues that arose and it characterises asd. the staff development programmes lend authority to endowing lecturers with pedagogical strategies in teaching undergraduates. volbrecht (2003) stated that lecturers’ development via asd should conscientise them to confront he curriculum problems. furthermore, feiman-nemser (2001) emphasised that academic staff development raises the lecturers' cognisance of he encounters that impede excellence. it also transpired that academic staff development is linked to induction and training, in that order. there is a growing perception that lecturers’ status as discipline or subject experts is inadequate; lecturers require investment and upskilling in the expertise and skill of teaching. nevertheless, induction and upskilling are restricted in comparison to asd that might be wide-ranging in freedom and perception (feiman-nemser, 2001). in reality, some experts caution that we should not adopt skills training only, as an asd approach (feiman-nemser, 2001) due to the connotations related to it, which include becoming proficient in practical ability, which is a confined interpretation of asd. instead, asd ought to be correctly conceptualised as scholarship of teaching and learning (sotl) with an objective of preparing lecturers to grow as reflective specialists (bath & smith, 2004). some of these comments were: “the programme has helped me to carry out my teaching duties effectively. it has also helped in relating with my students. “it has improved my perception about teaching and handling student-lecturer relationship. “it has helped me a lot in the area of evaluation of learning outcomes especially setting of questions and organisation of my lectures. empowering lecturers to improve their lecturing skills and responsibilities, which encompasses preparation, lecturing, and handling students' assessments “capacitation to teach is an add-on to my experience “lecturers need to be trained since they hold only discipline-based degrees. “it is a ladder to my promotion as these courses like an assessment in he count as criteria for promotion” the training was aligned with my teaching needs congruent to this rationale, lecturers considered professional development appropriate if it considered their exact requests and apprehensions or if their learning practice and their departmental tasks are included within the asd activities (hunzicker, 2010). wood, et al. (2011), in their study, also concluded that lecturers need discipline-specific approaches in teaching to develop the mathematics profession in australia. some of these comments were “asd addresses my teaching needs, but follow-ups are needed to address certain grey areas when in practice. “it is very relevant because it helps in developing necessary skills required in 44 teaching in the university especially for those who did not go through teacher training programme and do not have previous teaching experiences. it compliments my mind-set and commitment to nation-building through capacity building and mentoring of future academics”. core areas that were more relevant towards my teaching participants identified aspects they felt were relevant and could empower them if training was provided. most participants identified curriculum development and design as a core area for training needs for any lecturer. the reasoning is that they feel the basics to teach depend on the plan, structure, and design of the curriculum as lecturers strive to constructively align their teaching. this is aligned with biggs’ (2003) model of constructive alignment which mcmahon and thakore (2006) defines as coherence between assessment, teaching strategies, and intended learning outcomes in an educational programme. some participants identified technology integration into teaching and learning as requiring serious attention through asd to reinforce academics’ viability. she proposed that technology ought to be incorporated into teaching, concentrating on the substance and teaching approach of the technology. while some participants, like p3 and p5 were concerned with content-based needs, p4 was worried about how academic professional development addressed students' diversity. in signifying student centredness, p6 recognised that asd supported them in realising the diversity of students, recognise the students and their prospects thus leading lecturers to comprehend the differences of their students and reasons for creating opportunities and consultation sessions for students. chabaya (2015) emphasises a similar argument that an equipped professional course reflected reservations equally for the lecturers and students in its plan. merriam (2001) believes that the students’ criticism formulated a decent basis of acknowledging students' desires to contribute to asd projects and to enrich them to be more significant. the new skills acquired in the training cannot be practiced in my lecture rooms “the new skills acquired in the training could not be practiced in my lecture room” i am generally concerned about my inability to implement the innovative practices learnt during the programme”. it provides the opportunity to meet other early career teachers/researchers in the university. after analysing data from the interviews, the following findings emanated:  lecturers in the study regard asd as enhancing quality teaching; empowering lecturers to improve their lecturing skills and responsibilities which encompass preparations, lecturing and handling students' assessments. as almarghani and mijatovic (2017) argue, many he institutions (heis) are pressurised to develop good quality of university education, quality teaching can be achieved through transforming the lecturers’ teaching aptitude, skills, and approaches. transformation without empowerment is not possible. these are critical theory characteristics that are also asd drivers towards effective lecturer career and classroom practice. asd is defined as an engagement of lecturers with teaching abilities; it underpins and develops them as better prepared lecturers in offering excellent teaching. the need for training on pck becomes implicit here.  curriculum development and design are core areas for training needs for any lecturer. hence it is not surprising that the respondents classified curriculum issues as a core attraction to their attendance of asd. the reasoning is that lecturers consider the basics to teach depend on the plan, structure, and design of the curriculum as lecturers strive to constructively align their teaching. this is aligned 45 with biggs’s (2003) model of constructive alignment. due to the current transformation and changes in teaching and learning in he, lecturers need adequate technical skills to enable them to integrate technology in curriculum development and teaching as technology has become an enhancer to teaching and learning in he (balyer, özcan, & yildiz, 2017).  there was also a mention of the importance of aligning module content to pedagogical content knowledge one area of need for asd. asd is characterised by academics as career-changing where they learn the pedagogy of teaching and learning, and most are encouraged to attend if the topic/area of the training is relevant to their teaching. wood, vu, bower, brown, skalicky, donovan, loch, joshi, and bloom (2011) in their study, also established that lecturers need discipline-specific approaches in teaching to develop their subject-specific profession. in critical realist philosophy.  another finding from the study is that attendance is for personal growth, as more responses showed that lecturers do plan towards their future careers in the teaching profession. this is consistent with mariss (2011), who advocates that for staff development to be effective, two components, namely, one's professional development and the institutional development process, are crucial. they are motivated as they become confident to assist students’ wellbeing. when lecturers are confident in both content and pedagogical knowledge, they become empowered to teach effectively. they easily contextualise their teaching tools and constructively align their teaching with assessment of learning. conclusion there is evidence that lecturers see asd as enhancing their teaching for effective delivery, develops their skills (constructive alignment, assessment, credits), and knowledge of teaching and learning (learning theories, teaching methods, student engagements in class). asd empowers lecturers as he professionals to teach better and obtain better professional qualifications like pgdip (higher education) and seta accredited courses. all these professional qualifications enhance promote and result to good teaching practices. finally, lecturers are made, not born, hence there is great support from the academics for well organised, quality training, professionalising, and upskilling initiatives to develop good university lecturers. for this hei to transform its academics, there is a need for strengthening its asd approach. references ajibade, y.a., adeleke, m.a. & oyetoro, o.s. 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(2011). professional development for teaching in he. international journal of mathematical education in science and technology, 42(7), 997-1009. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/0020739x.2011.608864 https://ijhem.com/cdn/article_file/i-3_c-21.pdf https://doi.org/10.1080/713696142 http://archives.esf.org/fileadmin/public_documents/publications/professionalisation_academics.pdf http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/ejtd-03-2015-0023 http://ojslib3.buu.in.th/index.php/hrd/article/view/5900 https://www.oecd.org/education/imhe/qt%20policies%20and%20practices.pdf https://www.oecd.org/education/imhe/44150246.pdf https://doi.org/10.1023/a:1004068500314 https://dx.doi.org/10.2991/icirad-17.2017.11 https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ej874250 https://doi.org/10.1080/07294360.2016.1236781 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tate.2016.05.013 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.stueduc.2016.10.006 https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ej1155591.pdf https://doi.org/10.1108/jarhe-02-2019-0049 https://doi.org/10.1108/jarhe-02-2019-0049 https://people.ucsc.edu/~ktellez/shulman.pdf https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ej1168039 http://www.educationaschange.co.za/ https://doi.org/10.1080/0020739x.2011.608864 6 exploring lecturers’ resistance to academic staff development at a higher education institution in the eastern cape, south africa zwelijongile gaylard baleni1, andrea mqondisi buka2, clever ndebele3 1,2,3walter sisulu university, south africa abstract. higher education institutions and specifically lecturers must stay pertinent and informed of the changes in the academic world. the necessity for staff development programmes in higher education institutions is in accordance with the acknowledgment that transformation for academics is crucial and they need to continually consider their practices to stay pertinent in their disciplines and in teaching and learning issues. using karl marx critical theory, this article explores some dialogue that build lecturers’ assertiveness towards teaching and learning in their fields of study. it strives to explore academics' struggle to engage in initiatives on professionalising academic training. lecturers might interpret academic staff development initiatives as dictatorial and these result in unwanted consequences for both academics and the institution. the study used the 2017-2018 campus academics statistics on academic staff development (asd) workshops to sample participants. questionnaires were sent through google docs to 80 participants. the findings show that there is resistance to undertake professional development courses because of departmental cultures and traditions are detrimental to academic staff development; workload; undervaluing teaching and learning; workshop emphasis on the theoretical features of teaching than practical examples as well as lack of motivation and incentives among others. a well-planned and continuous asd creates better impact on encouraging and professionalising academics on innovative pedagogies. keywords: academic staff development, culture, resistance. to cite this article: baleni, z.g., buka, a.m., & ndebele, c. (2022). exploring lecturers’ resistance to academic staff development at a higher education institution in the eastern cape, south africa. education. innovation. diversity, 1(4), 6-19. doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2022.1.6738 introduction the purpose of this article is to explore lecturers’ attitudes towards academic professional development and to investigate why some lecturers are less interested to enroll for academic professional development. there a various definitions of academic staff development in literature. some definitions are put in the following paragraph. academic staff development is an on-going process of educating, enhancing, learning and support activities that assist lecturers to develop their pedagogy within the university in which they are working (severino, 2016) while quinn (2012) reputes academic staff development as a series of formal and informal activities that aim to contribute towards lecturers’ capabilities as scholarly university educators. its key determination is to enhance the lecturers’ awareness of the different responsibilities they need to perform in contributing to their students learning success and the execution of the university’s strategic plans (boughey, 2007). these definitions of academic staff development show encompass improvement or strengthening of knowledge and skills for academics that lead to quality teaching and learning, what herman, bitzer and leibowitz (2018) refer to as teaching content knowledge (tck) and pedagogical content knowledge (pck) but with more emphasis on pck because university teachers are subject specialists already in their respective disciplines. pedagogical content knowledge (pck) is very crucial in classroom teaching. in the learning and teaching process, pck comprises the lecturers' competency in facilitating the theoretical methodology, interpersonal consideration and adaptive cognitive of the module content. the majority of academics in higher education maneuver contending desires. contending desires incorporate the burden to create income-generating research, scaffold students for future https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2022.1.6738 7 jobs, facilitate different student cohorts, produce techno-skilled students, and fulfil the university and national strategic goals towards quality and liability (ghenghesh & abdelmageed, 2018). the necessity to empower and uphold scholarly development in university educators is inescapable and perceived universally (clarke & reid, 2013; barefoot & russell, 2014). although higher education institutions have put the focus on scholarly development, they face the test of uplifting the excellence and position of teaching in spite of pockets of resistance to change and with some doubting professional development programmes (clarke & reid, 2013). universities have to handle the enactment of academic staff development programmes as all academics hypothetically require continuous upskilling and updating on the subject content and pedagogy (geldenhuys & oosthuizen, 2015). concerns of disjuncture between the content of training and lecturers’ working contexts have been reported in various settings. these disjunctures disrupt the expected outcomes of asd that is enhanced pedagogical skills as lecturers lose interest in innovations once they do not supplement their teaching practice. there needs to be a formal well-structured asd procedures that encompasses diverse approaches towards academic staff development, it might be discipline-based or departmental based approach. lewin and stuart (2016) studied educational changes in developing countries and highlighted the threat of applying ordinary training models that disregard academics’ explicit restrictions, shortfalls and fundamental motivation. universities must be flexible in affording academics opportunities to grow both professionally and within their disciplines. in south africa, higher education has undergone significant change since 1994 when the country transitioned to democracy. these changes have taken place in policy, legislation, enrolment numbers and the composition of institutions to ensure that higher education in the country is coherent. these changes also improved access to higher education which resulted in considerations of the role of the lecturers from developing the ‘underprepared’ student towards developing teachers (volbrecht, 2003; boughey 2007). many of the national imperatives play out quite differently across the system, resulting in substantial institutional diversity. historically, this institutional diversity has legacy provided perspectives on how opportunities for lecturers’ professional development emerged and continue to emerge. dhet (2013) reports that in 2011, there were 938 200 students enrolled in higher education in south africa supported by 16 935 academic staff. despite the growth in student enrolments, however, academic staff numbers have been relatively stable over time. teaching and learning conditions are clearly affected by this finding. according to cloete, sheppard and bailey (2015), the proportion of permanent academic staff with a doctorate was only 35% in 2012. due to massification as well as lecturers’ shortages who can undertake all responsibilities related to teaching, including doctoral supervision, the likely outcome is a shortage of academics who can fulfil those duties were substantial (che, 2016). in addition to the requirement for more staff to attain higher qualifications, there is the potential conflict between what staff had to do as researchers and as university teachers, which might impact on the quantity of time the lecturer could dedicate to each. with the increasing demands on academic staff of teaching, research, publication, institutional transformation, community engagement, and hard management, the plan for staff development has found it difficult to find coherence. it is thus difficult for academic developers and university managers to agree on the primacies of academic staff development. despite global trends influencing academic staff development in south africa, the local perspective contributed greatly in determining its process, significance and range. thus, south african higher education institutions show significant differences in pursuing and implementing academic staff development. in pursuit of enhancing university teaching, a national workshop on strengthening university teaching was jointly convened by the council on he (che) and the department of he and training (dhet) in 2017 (che, 2018) where a 8 national framework was developed. the purpose of this framework is to guide universities in developing and implementing strategies to enhance university lecturers, to enable institutional strategies to align with national strategies, and so to maximise the impact of initiatives across the sector. however each hei has autonomy to develop its own academic staff development strategy, policies and procedures. literature review professional development and professional attitude are crucial for everyone (ndebele & maphosa, 2014) and, for all professional members to progress in their career, professional development is a necessity. hence, higher education institutions worldwide need to have frameworks set up to guarantee they raise the quality of teaching to stay competitive in the commercial place. these desires affect the way lecturers intellectualize their teaching duties and participate in teaching development. according to lipsett, (2005), lecturers ought to professionally enhance their learning and teaching methods, targets and plans. it is significant for institutions to connect academic staff with new methods of teaching, so that they move away from traditional teaching towards learner-focused learning and improve the student learning experience. a significant method to realize such change is through sorting out staff development training (deaker, stein, & spille, 2016). staff development is an approach institutions use to change lecturers’ attitudes, convictions, and discernments as well as to upgrade their teaching abilities and their students' academic accomplishments (blandford, 2000). it will likewise assist lecturers in remaining updated with the latest pedagogical strategies, which thusly will contribute fully towards the accomplishment of objectives of the institution. consequently, as these workshops, seminars and innovations enhance academic skills and performance of academics in their core disciplines, they also prompt lecturers to strive towards achievement of the institution’ s vision and mission (asfaw, argaw, & bayissa, 2015; kumarm & siddika, 2017). such asd augments the lecturers’ full potential, supports them to realize their pedagogic precincts, and guide them through the facilitation of information and skills grown from academic developmental programmes conducted in higher education sector (balyer, özcan, & yildiz, 2017). hence, bingwa and ngibe, (2021) insist that universities must contemplate academic staff professional development vital and as a perilous constituent towards quality teaching and learning. with all that supporting evidence of academic staff development benefits, resistance within academics to attend academic staff development exist (ndebele & maphosa, 2014). ghenghesh, and abdelmageed, (2018) pointed out that the two key causes for academics to attend staff development are to achieve innovative knowledge and skills and for personal academic growth. conversely, the two external factors that constrained them from attending all the workshops were time conflict between their schedule and timing of workshops and workload. quiin (2012) divided discourses of resistance into 4 categories: i. disciplinary lecturers repel teaching development since it is a specialized field and they believe that their content-specific knowledge is ample grounding towards facilitating a module. a phd is automatic confirmation of teaching competence. ii. student deficit (underprepared students) – lecturers assume that students are underprepared for university, as a result they resist academic staff development because the students admitted by institutions are the challenge to teach not academics (ghenghesh & abdelmageed, 2018). skillsstaff development focuses on teaching methodological skills. lecturers resist staff development because they view asd as unnecessary as teaching as a scholarly set of pedagogical skills; understanding of relevant learning theories and techniques 9 and as such not aligned to content facilitation. iii. performativity – research is rated higher than teaching as a result, asd is not valued because research is one of the highly recognised criteria for promotion and integrity; whereas academic development activities are just for compliance on institutional quality control. iv. concept of ‘border crossing’ effect by van schalkwyk and mcmillan the belief is that academic developers cannot be jack-of-all-trades and use the concept of one size fits all. academics maintain that they need discipline entrenched teaching training not generic ones. v. academic developers’ practitioner qualifications – academic developers’ not holding doctoral degrees lowers the integrity of their efforts in training senior academics. academic developers and the institutions need to strategise on how to incentivize academic staff development attendance. in fact not attendance only but completion of the course and implementation of new strategies. motivation and passion are vital reasons that drive a person to take actions (sasson, 2011). generally, once your motivation is low you become unreceptive and blame all around you. on the contrary, a person who is highly motivated is more energetic and optimistic. usually, lecturers resist transformation, enhancement or proposals for the development of their competencies, creating a challenge to implement academic development initiatives (bamber, 2008). it might be that they feel not motivated towards attending academic staff development or there are other factors within their environment that hinder their zeal for professional development. reasons why low uptake of asd the reasons for lack of enthusiasm and zeal in professional development training can be deficient self-confidence on skills, fearing disappointment, low self-esteem, no interest, indolence, non-consciousness of the significance of academic staff development, anxiousness or jumpy feeling, nonexistence of enticements, lecturers’ conservativeness, clash with work timetable, household tasks and lacking nuts and bolts (muzaffar. & malik, 2012). german educators highlighted why they lack interest in professional development workshops as influenced by professional development, which they felt were not adequate for them and conflicted with their work schedule, as well as programme that are impromptu resulting into an unproductive exercise. (muzaffar & malik, 2012). muzaffar & malik (2012) also identified that professional courses, which exclude the opinions of participants, especially their necessities, are probably going to encounter truncated inspiration and also result in non-obligation in attending such courses nor execute learned ideas. professional development trainings, which are more theoretical than practical, also are not motivating. pedrosa-de-jesus, guerra and watts (2017) also argue that some aspects which might impede individual professional progress are: institutional interferences like teaching loads, administration of learning and teaching, class sizes, limited teaching assets, qualification necessities, and additional personal dynamics for instance superiority of academic role, self-efficiency and group-value and self-reliance, and distinct personality. some negative views on asd like some lecturers feeling that they are masters and specialists in their disciplines as a result they take teaching for granted. they see asd as a university fuss and waste of their research time. they also believe that their high qualifications are enough to scaffold students to pass espec ially the experienced academics who claim to have taught so many years with good student success rates. professors regarded themselves as experts in their disciplines and noticed no gain in taking part in asd initiatives. lecturers have a negative mind-set towards asd programmes. the main reason of this negative mind-set is that academics undermine teaching; they view it as ordinary. this concurs with what lipsett, (2005) found on the professionalisation of teaching 10 in higher education institutions in south africa. they established that the dialogue about teaching in universities regarded teaching as a common sense occupation as a result anyone in possession of doctoral qualification should teach effectively, an assertion also stressed by (ndebele & maphosa, 2014; pedrosa-de-jesus, guerra, & watts, 2017). studies of teacher development programmes across the us, uk, canada and australia likewise support this discourse. yet, such an assumption might be detrimental to constructively aligned teaching and assessment especially in student-centred approaches. how to motivate them to take part in workshops all lecturers ought to be mindful of how critical proficient development preparing is, for their effective career (ndebele & maphosa, 2014). much accentuation ought to be on practical implementation than the theoretical perspectives. lecturers ought to be remunerated for great occupations. motivations or jolts ought to be presented amid professional improvement trainings. there ought to be legitimate one-on-one monitoring of their teaching implementations after workshops. lecturers have to be empowered and persuaded amid trainings. theoretical framework the critical theory originally started in europe (sullivan, 2021). critical theory, a western-marxist-motivated development theory, is primarily linked with the work by the frankfurt school (sullivan, 2021). drawing especially on the idea of karl marx and sigmund freud, scholars maintain that an essential objective of critical theory is to comprehend and to help defeat the social structures through which individuals are ruled and mistreated. critical theory is inspired greatly by marx's theoretical formulation of the relationship between economic base and ideological superstructure and focuses on how power and domination operate. the work of the frankfurt school members, including max horkheimer, theodor adorno, erich fromm, walter benjamin, jürgen habermas, and herbert marcuse, is considered the heart of the critical theory (crossman, 2019). critical theory is a social theory adapted for critiquing and transforming society as an entirety (crossman, 2019) and in education is about questioning how our educational system can best offer education to all people. critical theory provides a basis for conceptualisation and it also provides a guide for social change. it is underpinned by values such as empowerment, emancipation, transformation, and contradiction. however, for this paper only empowerment, transformation and emancipation will be used. in the field of education, empowerment is often associated with the classic work by freire (1979, 1986). in the process of improving lecturers’ teaching skills, they are empowered to be good lecturers. these lecturers through asd will be motivated to teach effectively as they will be confident i.e. self-efficacy is enhanced. when an individual feels empowered, he/she has a greater sense of intrinsic motivation and selfconfidence; alternatively, a feeling of disempowerment can result in decreased levels of motivation and self-confidence. empowerment leads to transformation. critical theory is applicable to asd as it advances transformation and change, which are the aims of developing academics towards being quality university teachers. empowerment is the trademark of academic staff development and without it, there is no transformation in he to discuss. scherer (2008) claims that emancipation concerns critically analysing, resisting, and challenging structures of power. according to clouder (2010), reflective practice promotes professional development through critical analysis of contextual issues of power and inequality, diversity and inclusion which manifest themselves in he (karban & smith, 2010). chabaya (2015) also supports that reflective practice as part of critical theory is accepted as a key component of professional development. the implication is that asd ought to empower academics to be critical and independent thinkers who will engage in 11 critical inquiry. for academic staff development, critical theory is useful because lecturers that are trained come from different disciplines. their levels of professional training in teaching differ so critical theory will assist this study to critic how it is implemented to cater for their individual needs and not as one size fits all. methodology the researcher used quantitative approach to attain the objective of the study. quantitative research is grounded on positivism that believes logical clarification to be nomothetic (creswell & guetterman, 2019). the approach was chosen because it determined the contemporary convictions and assertiveness of the lecturers with respect to their professional advancement preparations. furthermore, it portrays and investigates people’s personal and mutual communal activities, convictions, contemplations, and recognitions factually (creswell & guetterman, 2019). the population for the study composed of lecturers who attended academic staff development in 2017-18 and the targeted sample size was 80 although 51 only responded. the researcher used simple random sampling to select participants for the study. data was collected using questionnaires. the questionnaires were sent through a link of google docs to the lecturers from various departments. a questionnaire is regulated interviewing, wherein every participant responds to the same questions with the similar selections in responding to them (hofstee, 2018). they are a cheap, easy, and efficient method of accessing a large number of participants (maree, 2016). google docs make interface much easier as it automatically creates graphs and even clusters common info. the participant’s responses were analysed from the graphs created by google docs as the graphs shows responses as percentages or numbers. results and discussion the results were analysed from the graphs as generated by google docs as follows: in the figure 1 below, the majority, 63%, are females, while 37% are males. figure 1 gender distribution the age distribution of the participants in figure 2 below, shows that the majority, 43% is 40-49 years old, followed by 30-39 years old. the lowest group is below 30 years old academics. this shows that this institution has functional staff age groups who, if retained and properly professionalised, could be of great benefit to the academic enterprise of the institution. the senior citizen group, 60 years and above, is minimal in the sample, but they might not be the true reflection of this hei academic profile. the mixture of the age group is useful in collecting data on how academics in this institution conceptualise asd. 12 figure 2 age distribution this might show a variety on what motivates them as qualifications are concerned in figure 3, 69% possess masters qualifications, a basic entry-level for the employment of a lecturer in he. only 3% of the sample have phd qualifications. this scarcity of highly qualified academics might hinder quality, especially for postgraduate qualifications. such a situation contradicts what baraiya and baraiya (2013) advocate, that lecturers with appropriate qualifications contribute a crucial part in excellence and improvement of teaching in their institutions. the primary concern, though, is the bachelor of technology, honours, bachelors group of lecturers (28%) who are below the norm that a lecturer must teach a qualification if she/he is one nqf level above it. there is no academic staff that has national diploma qualification in the sample; hence, in fig 4.3 it does not appear, even though it has its legend in the graph. figure 3 highest qualifications distribution the following figures, 4 and 5 show a very alarming situation for this institution where only 33% were trained as lecturers. this means that most of these academics were never professionally trained to teach. the question of being trained as lecturers and what teaching qualification the participants had was not surprising, though concerning. of the 33% of the participants who were trained as lecturers, only 14% own post graduate diploma in he, a higher education recognised teaching qualification. the rest of those trained to teach qualify to teach at levels below nqf level 5. the sample has lecturers who possess primary higher certificate (ph), (2.5%) and primary teachers’ certificate (ptc), (2.5%) indicating that part of these lecturers are the old stock. they were trained as teachers long time ago. considering the nqf level descriptors, pedagogies, and andragogy of teaching, this 86% of untrained lecturers need to be upskilled for the he teaching strategies. several studies have determined that lecturers with teaching qualifications are rated higher by the student than lecturers who are under-qualified (cilliers & herman, 2010; weurlandeer & stenfors-hayes, 2008). the upper evaluations have been identified with improved teaching approaches. donnelly (2006) states that the three principles that impact affect lecturer conduct following investment in a scholarly professional programme were the improvement of new instructional methodologies, the usage of new teaching approaches, and the adjustment in convictions about teaching and learning 13 hypotheses. figure 4 trained as a teacher figure 5 highest teaching qualifications figure 6 below shows that 43% of the participants have 0 years or less teaching experience while 22% have taught for 16-20 years and only 2% have taught more than 26 years. the number of teaching experience might not match age group because some academics join higher education late in their careers, some are even pensioners from lower department of education levels like further education level. the low number of experienced (26 years) can affect mentoring of junior staff and these might be those lecturers who find it hard to accept innovations in their teaching philosophies. fig 6: lecturing experience in he 14 figure 7 teaching needs apparently, academic staff development workshops are crucial for effective persistence in any profession. the figure 7 above shows that the majority of the lecturers view academic staff development as a necessity. it was also noticed from responses that the non trained academics are more interested in attending workshops than the teacher trained ones. however those trained as teachers even though they were not trained to teach in higher education are reluctant to attend since they take for granted that the same aspects of teaching are workshopped. their argument is that teaching theories are the same no matter what level of education ignoring the national qualification framework (nqf) level descriptors guide them on what learning students should get at each level. one response further elaborates recommending follow-ups after the workshops as a serious consideration. this response is from the 60 and above group who might have observed that lecturers although trained do not bother to implement innovative approaches. figure 8 institutional environment constraints asd respondents identified various constraints that discourage their attendance of academic staff development initiatives. workload for example requires departmental conversation on who and how academics can be allowed space to develop themselves towards being better university teachers. by and large, workloads are cock-eyed in the direction of research as lecturers progress, since numerous hei have a tendency to esteem highly research and its outputs more than teaching throughputs (mccomb, eather & imig, 2021). as a result, academics respond better to research workshops than learning and teaching based ones. resisting to undertake academic staff development is caused by lecturers holding in low esteem the teaching duties as their fundamental key performance activity (kpa). once an institution emphasizes research at the expense of teaching (ndebele & maphosa, 2014), as a result it paints a picture that teaching and learning are not considered central core business of the university (ndebele & maphosa, 2014). the new academics especially are pressurized to choose between research and teaching and unfortunately they feel research is more crucial as it is linked with their recognition, prestige 15 and status as university academics within their disciplines. the scholarship of teaching and learning (sotl) would be a solution to integrate teaching and research to drive scholarly teaching as lecturers will publish while they are also being enhanced on their pedagogical knowledge. figure 9 departmental cultures constrain asd attendance the responses indicate that departmental cultures and traditions are detrimental to academic staff development as 39.2% plus 54.9% support this statement. if there is no conducive working culture in departments, transforming teaching will lead to just an obedience culture that might result to no implementation thereafter in class. obstacles within a department tend to discourage innovations and professional development of academics as they feel alienated from discipline colleagues. they end up looking at pedagogical training as unnecessary. this tends to be influenced by old folks in the discipline who believe their old teaching methods have worked effectively as reflected by their graduate outputs. initiatives like a professional learning community are shot down and disengaged warhurst, (2006), as a result the envisaged impact towards learning and teaching differ significantly. figure 10 asd enhances quality teaching asd workshops transform the teaching approaches, assertiveness and teaching philosophies. figure 11 asd transforms teaching approaches 16 academic staff development workshops empower lecturer’s philosophies of teaching, their assertiveness and their teaching approaches since the majority of them agreed. only 14% of them felt it never influenced their teaching philosophies. this means those academics who attend asd workshops see value in them as their pedagogical knowledge improves. the pgdhe attendees especially those that were never trained as teachers even appreciate more as they now understand education terminology like graduate attributes, outcomes and assessment criteria. they now feel confident to align and ink them in their teaching. figure 12 lecturers enroll for asd for the sake of certification most respondents settled that ordinarily lecturers partake in the academic staff development workshops for certification, a finding aligned with (muzaffar & malik, 2012) research of six universities in pakistan. this might be influenced by a variety of reasons like university requirements for promotion and professional development points required in some professional bodies. it is unfortunate that the certificate alone never upskills an individual without him/her making an effort to implement learnt strategies. figure 13 asd workshops emphasize the theoretical features of teaching than practical examples most respondents (45% + 41%) agreed that asd workshops have big theoretical portion than practice. this approach to asd might lead to their lack of interest in the professional development as lecturers want to be empowered towards better classroom strategies. the 14% of responses that disagreed with this statement value asd and they believe practical examples are useful for their professional development. 17 figure 14 the lack of enough motivations and incentives for lecturers results in poor enthusiasm and passion 31% and 59% responses indicate that there are no incentives or stimuli in the professional development workshops as a result lecturers are not motivated to attend them. while 10% of them showed disagreement with this statement. the university’s management ought to eradicate these barriers to enable a conducive climate and stimulate academics towards being enhanced university teachers. conclusion the constraints to academic staff development attendance might have a negative impact on academics’ teaching innovations. each discipline and department needs to motivate its staff by continuously engaging them on their developmental needs and plans. to respond to the low number of teacher trained academics, the institution must periodically develop lecturers’ pedagogical skills and strategies to keep them updated with worldwide courses like post graduate diploma in higher education, sector education and training authority (seta) accredited qualifications and other workshops ought to be linked to compensation, advancement and contract prerequisites for lecturers to be motivated to register and complete them. for instance, all new academics can be forced to complete a certain professional qualification to qualify for being permanent or to be promoted. training on various pedagogical techniques are strategic in drawing consideration to innovative classroom improvements, however it is regularly challenging to pull in active staff individuals to these programs (pesce, 2015). it is imperative that institutions have a thorough understanding of what draws academics to professional development programmes, as well as the academics' assertiveness and what they prefer so as to implement engagement strategies that will lead to better learning experiences. the lecturers’ needs based on various evaluation of their teaching should guide their training needs and as such guide the institution on who to invite for which workshop or course. higher education institutions must put an incredible emphasis on refining the skills and proficiencies of academics to succeed in quality facilitation and throughput rates (bingwa & ngibe, 2021). a well-planned and continuous academic staff development schedule makes better impact on encouraging and professionalising academics on innovative pedagogies than impromptu training. an annual schedule of asd events should be drawn up to allow academics to align their professional development needs with them. this will develop a conducive and healthy institutional environment that expedites professional, scholarly growth of lecturers. during workshops, incentives and rewards like useful teaching tools can be given out for good interactions/completing tasks early to entice academics to attend regularly. proper framework should also be designed for 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(2021). tourism of families with the disabled children or with special needs in poland of recent decades. innovation. diversity, 2(3), 6-15. doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2021.2.6717 introduction there are currently around 650 million people with disabilities in the world, of which around 4.5 million only in poland. due to the difficult financial situation of families, mostly caused by the fact of staying with a disabled child for life at home of one of the parents, the vast majority choose solely domestic trips. according to research made by t. skalska, in 2004 around 21% of people with disabilities travel in poland, while according to our research, at least once a year, 60% of families go away, and only 12.7% twice (skalska, 2004). most often these are trips within the regions of poland, travels abroad are declared by about 10% of respondents. in relation to healthy (normative) poles, people with disabilities travel three times less than the former. their participation in international travel is fourteen times smaller (analiza…, 2007). for many people, rehabilitation trips remain the only chance to see the baltic sea, mazurian lakes… etc. or the capital of the tatra mountains zakopane. there is no publicly available statistics on travel in poland people with disabilities, and tourism preference studies are carried out sporadically and to a narrow extent, which makes it difficult to generalize the issue. from the point of definition of disability, we treat discrepancies of variety of definitions more freely. we are aware of plethora of arguments and disputes over definition of disability. therefore, we will use such terms as ‘intellectual impairment’, ‘intellectual disability’, ‘developmental disability’ and ‘mental retardation’ interchangeably in the context of intellectual and mental disability. on the other side towards physical disabilities we are prone to use more open and larger approach. there are two terms in english for a person with a disability and handicap. the first is a person with disability, and the second is a handicap person. the former emphasizes the physical dimension more and is rather a medical term. the second term emphasizes impairment in the sense represented by functioning, and therefore emphasizes the social aspect. in practice, there are no major differences between them and both terms are used interchangeably (majewski, 1980). after professor of jozef sowa, we are following his more open definition of disability: “a person with disability is someone in whom the damage and reduced fitness level of the organism made it difficult, limited or impossible to perform life and professional tasks and https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2021.2.6717 15 fulfill social roles, taking into account their age, gender and environmental, social and cultural factors (sowa, 1999). people with physical disabilities should be constantly rehabilitated. parents of such children must take care of the most common breathing and relaxation exercises, equivalent or improving, to facilitate the functioning of healthy people in the world. exercise in water or an hippo therapy, which often take place outside the place of residence, usually during the break school time can be helpful in rehabilitation too. for recent 40 years there have been tries to help disabled people to fulfil their sightseeing and tourist dreams, offering various forms of touristic activity. it is tourism that builds emotional bonds with the landscape, with poland, with people who wander and people inhabiting the regions of visit. on the tourist route, everyone is equal in the face of nature and other people. due to a given disability, people with disabilities have special needs regarding holidays, which mainly correspond to the accessibility of transportation, accommodation, sights, infrastructure, tourism services (pühretmair, 2006). the material below is based on some parts of the report of international project elise (the eliminating social exclusion), which was conducted by partners from poland, greece, turkey, spain, latvia and bulgaria in 2019-2022. based on the desk research and also collecting experience of foreign partners of the elise project (erasmus plus) and comparing with polish experience in this field there were presented some conclusions and propositions of good practises and main problems of polish families who have been trying lately to travel with the disabled children. regulations available to support the travel needs of families with the disabled children and adults in the polish law there are some regulations which refer mostly to the group of people with disabilities but there is no a particular law or bill which might regulate situation of such people in the circumstances of travelling. for instance the polish constitution states in general way about human rights of everyone without discrimination: everyone is equal before the law. everyone has right to equal treatment by public authorities (the constitution of the republic of poland of april 2, 1997, art. 32. 1). no one may be discriminated against in political or social life or business for any reason; (the constitution of the republic of poland of april 2, 1997, art. 47). everyone has the right to the legal protection of private and family life, honor and good name and to decide about your personal life; everyone has the right to health protection… (the constitution of the republic of poland of april 2, 1997, art. 68.1). there is also in the international law an important convention named the rights of persons with disabilities which was adopted on december 13, 2006 by the united nations general assembly (convention.... 2006) and later implemented by many of 192 member countries, including poland. poland also accepted the charter of the rights of persons with disabilities of august 1, 1997 (mp of august 13, 1997, no. 50, item 475), which states that people with disabilities are persons whose physical, mental or mental fitness permanently or periodically hinders, limits or prevents daily life, education, work and social roles in accordance with legal and customary standards. this is the law approach towards definition of the disabled persons which not always complies with the latest established definitions in a scholar literature. many years ago in poland there was implemented the legal act (journal of laws of 1997, no. 123, item 776, as amended) which had been in some parts referring to the required conditions for the all groups of people with disabilities which would ease and help the functioning better in society. it was called: the act of 27 august 1997 on professional and social rehabilitation and employment of people with disabilities (journal of laws of 1997, no. 123, item 776, as amended). 16 relating to children with some degrees of disabilities in poland there was implemented on january 1, 2002, a disability certificate (rozporządzenie ministra pracy i polityki społecznej..., 2002) for children under 16 years old for the purposes of obtaining nursing allowance, permanent allowance for caring of a child with social assistance, rehabilitation and treatment purposes. more detailed laws regulating issues and problems of movement or technical which may affect tourism of the disabled people (including children) in poland can be found in some minor acts. the disability certificate contains indications regarding, among others, the need to supply orthopedic items, auxiliaries and technical aids, facilitating functioning, the need for permanent or long-term care or assistance of another person in connection with the significantly limited possibility of independent existence, the need for permanent participation in every day of the child's care giver in the process of his treatment, rehabilitation and education, meeting the conditions specified in art. 8 clause 1 of the act of 20 june (ustawa o ruchu drogowym..., 1997). such an assistance should include also help during the movement because of the touristic causes. there are also in poland some other more detailed documents referring to such a special group of poles, an example of such a solution is the regulation of the minister of economy and labor from 2004 devoted to giving categories to hotel facilities (rozporządzenie ministra gospodarki i pracy z dnia 19 sierpnia..., 2004). this document introduces, among others rules for making such facilities available to people with disabilities. the problem of tourism of people with disabilities was also raised, albeit only to a small extent, as a part of the draft tourism development strategy for 2007–2013 (strategia rozwoju turystyki na lata 2007-2013, 2005). written for the broader concept of the national development plan, the document prepared by the tourism department of the ministry of economy sat directions for the harmonious and coherent development of tourism as one of the branches of the polish economy. by the way of regulations of such areas in poland as public transportation there are some references to situations of the disabled like in the act no. 02.179.1495, with further amendments issued as “regulations of the minister of infrastructure from 25th october 2002 on the types of documents confirming the right to use concessionary public transport services” (rozporządzenie...., 2002). poland also accepted the regulation (ec) of the european parliament and of the council eu no. 1107/2006 of 5 july 2006 on the rights of persons with disabilities and persons with reduced mobility traveling by air (rozporządzenie (we) nr 1107/2006). many issues regarding the provision of buildings and space for people with disabilities in poland are governed by the provisions of the construction law and the law on spatial development. however, people with limited mobility themselves specify the requirements that their environment should meet to remove barriers. for recent years the majority of public buildings (including schools) have been adjusted to such physical requirements of people with disabilities including students and kids too. the problems of people with disabilities in the context of tourism, though, appear in the most important document of programming polish development tourism for the coming years, however, still it does not treat it as a separate area of issues. 17 identifying the primary and secondary needs for the families with the disabled children and adults m.a. devine has shown that 28% of the us population of people with disabilities travel outside of their own territory (disability and development report…, 2004 ). the distances that families with members carrying disabilities can get through for tourist purposes depend on the type of child dysfunction. m. milewska showed that 20% of people with physical disabilities travel in poland. a much larger difference occurs in the case of mentally ill people, because according to m. milewska they travel the least often, which was not confirmed in the presented work (milewska, 2008). needs of the disabled people are generally the same as for the healthy part of the population, but they require support in a creative way to fulfill specific social roles in the best of their abilities. it is widely believed that people with disabilities in poland have been ones of the most marginalized groups and have been constantly experiencing restrictions on access to any field of social life. the level of participation of people with disabilities in tourism is also marginal, despite its undeniable values and positive rehabilitation effects. adults with disabilities belong to active participants of society, making a significant contribution to its development. on the other hand, a medical model instead defines disability through the lens of health, perceiving it as a disease, which is under the control of doctors and rehabilitation specialists. among adults who are categorized as the disabled there are some who declaring their stay outside of the place of residence, only 30% of them took part in tourist and leisure trips, 28% in health care, while most trips concerned visits of relatives and friends. due to the type of disease, people with cardiovascular diseases travel most often (21%), while the least people with mental retardation and mentally ill (15%), as well as people with hearing impairment (milewska, 2008). beside issues of adults we should also take into account a tourism of disabled children. this sort of tourism should be treated as part of the rehabilitation with elements of therapy for disabled people, whose main goal is to restore maximum physical, mental, social and professional fitness and adapt to normal life. tourism of people with various disabilities should be treated not only as active leisure, but also as therapeutic and educational measure, enabling everyone to handle it at various, often harsh conditions. some data referring to question about the means of transportation during such touristic trips indicate that respondents definitely most often choose a car and then rail as a means of transport during travel in poland. parents of children with physical disabilities do not use buses and planes at all, choosing trips within a given region of poland (poland is divided into administrative regions which are called by term of a ‘voivodship’) most often (51.7%). a similar destination is preferred by parents of children with multiple disabilities (65.4%), while parents of blind or deaf children travel throughout the country (over 60% of respondents). probably for financial reasons, the vast majority of poles go with the child only once a year. for parents of mentally handicapped children 43.8% declare that they travel less than once a year (milewska, 2008). regardless of the type of child disability, most often decide on trips which are organized on their own. an organized travel is popular among families with a blind child (18.5%), while specialized camps dedicated to particular disability among children with physical disabilities (17.9%). active recreation is preferred by families with deaf children (60%) and mentally retarded children (51.4%), while most families passively rest with children with motoric dysfunction (71%) and multiple disability (65.4%) (milewska, 2008). other data indicate that parents of disabled children most often use the offer of private accommodation. guest houses are also popular because of specific touristic market in poland still strongly based on private 18 guest houses. parents of deaf children choose to send them to holiday homes and campsites (20% of parents surveyed each), while parents of blind and disabled children use rather hotels (24.1% and 15.2%, respectively). most obstacles related to the lack of infrastructure adaptation during trips are declared by parents of children with physical disabilities (80%), multiple disabilities (63%) and blind children (44.4%). the problem of parents with a mentally retarded child is usually intolerance (56.3%). parents of deaf children in general, 60.0% have no major objections during traveling (milewska, 2008). rehabilitation visits are most popular among families of children with motoric dysfunction (92.6%) and multiple disability (76.9%). in the case of deaf children, 80.0% of them do not use the option of going to such visits (milewska, 2008). another factor hindering the tourism of children with hearing impairments is the problem of focusing attention, arousing curiosity, eyes arousing interest. camps or other forms of organized tourism for children may not be suitable for deaf children because it is more difficult for them to make any interpersonal contacts. they often have egocentric habits that make it difficult to function in a group. vision disability, according to (kędzierska, 2007), has a medical, social, psychological and didactic dimension. the sight itself should be considered in the categories of cognitive, practical activity, spatial orientation, emotions and interpersonal communication. a tourism adapted to the needs of the blind people is a demanding challenge for the organizers. in the case of the blind people and partially sighted children, it should be taken into the consideration that any form of activity should be combined with rehabilitation that will facilitate their efficient life in society. the tourist accommodation must meet the following requirements for persons, including families with blind and visually impaired children:  open spaces and paths free of obstacles,  explicit and accurate descriptions of the environment to help experience surroundings and obstacles,  well-lit and high contrast marking,  the possibility of touching objects in the immediate surroundings,  acoustic signals for obstacle or dangerous determination place,  the use of documents and forms in braille,  information on cds, dvds, floppy disks etc. or in the alphabet braille,  an assistant available to assist you in special cases. due to the fact that tourist information is often distorted, most respondents individually organize their family trips (over 81%). the obtained results indicate that the goal of 50% of travel was passive rest, while active holidays were declared by 29% of respondents. the most therapeutic, from the point of view of rehabilitation, is the form of active tourism that has a positive effect on health, develops physically, aesthetically and morally. according to the research of k. kaganek and h. stanuch, the most favorable for people with visual disability is the cognitive factor, which is confirmed by the results of the study. in their research 35.7% of respondents declared "visiting" among families with blind children (kaganek & stanuch 2005). still there can be observed many wrong ideas about deaf adults and children in society. the consequence of this situation of misunderstanding is a tendency to avoid hearing contact with hearing impaired people and vice versa. such reluctance of the sides is due to the stage of fright and fear of talking to someone who does not know the language of another person. people who are deaf and hearing-impaired, despite the accepted opinion, are disturbed by noise as much as people who can hear. a deaf person with a damaged middle ear is sensitive to noise and vibrations, and the hearing impaired people do not have good sound selection skills and may pick up the wrong sounds in the situation of unexpected noise. 19 the time of hearing loss has a huge impact on the socio-psychological situation of people with hearing disabilities apart from the popular stereotypes. children who lost their hearing after the age of 5, i.e. after completing language learning, are able to use audio speech. those who have lost their hearing in older age, but have not mastered sign language are suspended between the world of hearing and deaf people (milewska, 2008). they are not identified with any of the groups. the deaf people who were born with such disability, called culturally deaf, they create their own social group. they easily make contacts with each other and exchange information, because of different communication they think specifically. therefore, this is a reason for their perception as a mentally retarded group. thus, such reasoning is obviously wrong (milewska, 2008). hearing impaired people are sometimes treated as nervous and aggressive ones. they often give the impression that they are disregarding the interlocutor. it includes those who communicate effectively with hearing people by reading speech from their mouths. they make breaks in the conversation because they are no longer able to focus their eyes and attention on the interlocutor's lips.in this context of internal conditions it makes deaf people feel better to deal and communicate in a similar environment. the conversation does not require much effort from them and is more pleasant (milewska, 2008). this approach further isolates this group of disabled people from the rest of society. integration of the deaf and hearing impaired should therefore consist in accepting the need to have their own environment, and rehabilitation should lead to equal opportunities for hearing-impaired people. people with intellectual disabilities, often showing intellectual retardation, must learn basic life activities, cannot play, often have to learn to live together and work with peers, hence the important role of rehabilitation sessions or integration camps. it should be remembered that children/adults with intellectual disabilities in their environment expect friendly guides, guardians and visual signals that will diversify their impressions. the most dangerous for this group of disabled people is noise disturbing, distracting and disrupting the reception of signals coming from the outside. however, sport and tourist activity of the disabled faces a number of barriers. research conducted in a group of people with various dysfunctions show that one of the most important barriers to tourist activity are organizational difficulties and lack of information (skalska, 2004). among dozens of travel websites operating on the internet, none of them treat people with disabilities as customers with different needs. they are missing in them also information on travel amenities and the availability of hiking trails. on the other hand people with disabilities can increasingly engage in water sports, such as canoeing and sailing, and winter sports (trekking, ski-mountaineering). there is a little known about this, but people with disabilities have been practicing even the most difficult types of qualified tourism in poland for many years, such as skydiving, diving, sailing or canoeing (szczuciński, 2005). plethora of research done in poland throughout the period of 2007-2015 among adults with disabilities indicate similar group of answers. for instance the vast majority of respondents do not feel a fear around them that could be another barrier in tourist and in recreational activity. a significantly higher percentage of the unemployed and inactive respondents in the study group in relation to the group of working people considered communication difficulties as a serious limitation (żbikowsk & soroka 2011). factors such as: fear of people, lack of help on the part relatives, the lack of facilities associating people with disabilities do not significantly discourage people with disabilities especially in the lublin region (the south-east part of poland) from tourism and recreation (żbikowski & soroka 2011). to sum up research made in this particular region of poland (lubelskie region) we may conclude that: the largest percentage of respondents do not feel fear of people with whom they would come into contact during travelling, sport and recreation, which indicates the openness of people with disabilities 20 and the desire to make new contacts during active rest. the attitude of people with disabilities should be assessed positively, which is characterized by great interest in tourist activity and recreational, and the possible lack of help from the loved ones is not a main obstacle in their intentions to implement real actions. the disabled people living in the lubelskie voivodeship (a south-east part of poland) considered as insignificant or insignificant barriers to participation in tourism and sport and recreational activities identified during the research. this is an optimistic phenomenon from the perspective of the development of the tourist and recreation market, which should focus its offer more on the segment of the disabled market. good practices and initiatives. propositions of improvements in poland mostly a third sector of ngos is trying to response to challenges of social tourism. also implementing a results of the eu pro-social projects. for example: a project named "in the world beyond silence and darkness" conducted in 2012 by foundation "zdążyć z pomocą” (“be on time with help…”) – a foundation for children in cooperation with pttk (“the polish society of national tourism”) became the organizer of anti-discrimination training for tourist guides. project "in a world outside of silence and darkness" was not only raising qualifications and acquiring new ones skills, but also broadening the guides' view on the problems of the blind and visually impaired people. conclusions of mentioned project direct to some proposals of sustainable development of tourism of people with disabilities through individual elements of travel in poland: table 1 proposal of sustainable development and good practices of tourism of people with disabilities through individual elements of travel in poland elements of travelling now needed to do/ future 1. access to touristic information. city guides, internet, folders, leaflets more details on the maps, more widespread. 2. travel preparation specialized travel agencies, organizers increasing the number and scope of activities 3. external communication good and bad situation increasing accessibility to railways, ferries, bus transport and aviation 4. internal communication depends on personal and local circumstances this element requires enhancing 5. travel destination, (open air, museums, monuments) it depends on type of disability more detailed information 6. accommodation, housing variety of offers more detailed information on special equipment in accommodation 7. feeding good conditions there is a need of detailed information 8. functionality barriers and limitations in connection with a particular type of disability abolition of barriers and limitations source: author’s proposition. so far in poland there have been completed some programs dedicated to families with members carrying disabilities. next examples may be added, for instance: "tourism for all" implemented by the “polish tourist and country fans' society” with the support of the government program of civic initiatives fund. as part of the pilot project 21 carried out in łódź city, the masovian region and the podlaskie region, the availability of various types of facilities is checked: accommodation, catering, cultural, sports, but also tourist routes, national and landscape parks or means of transport. an important element of the project is a website containing lists of facilities adapted to the needs of people with disabilities, which can be searched in terms of their location or type of amenities offered (grabowski, milewska, stasiak 2007). another example of internal institutional initiatives in poland a project called „let's take the first step” was run and implemented by the state vocational university of john paul ii in biała podlaska city a training system for the environment cooperating with disabled people. one of the main goals of the project was: 1. to break stereotypes in perceiving the role of people with disabilities in society by carrying out information and education campaigns that promote a change in the way people with disabilities are perceived as defective citizens; 2. preventing social exclusion of people with disabilities by overcoming problems associated with limiting access to public services and restrictions on the possibility of professional activation. although the project is mainly aimed at improving the situation of people with disabilities on the labor market, its impact on other areas of life of people with disabilities cannot be excluded (grabowski, milewska, stasiak 2007). there are also some infrastructure improvements widely introduced in polish hotels like for example for adults and kids with physical limitations, especially using wheelchairs. for instance a cable-car or city buses that can be entered stepless is a requirement of use for about 10% of the population. for approximately 30 – 40% a stepless access simplifies the use and for 100% of the population it is an argument of comfort. a higher number of accessible facilities and services make traveling easier and increase the comfort factor when enjoying holidays (pühretmair, 2006). in these days majority of polish public transport must have a special area for those passengers with special needs. in addition, people with limited mobility in cities can also use cabs (taxi) today. vehicles specially adapted for them are available to this group of people, however, the fact of disability should be reported at the time of ordering. many privileges for a person with disability give possession of card parking. it is a document that all countries belonging to the european union recognize, and which allows parking in designated places and inaccessible to people with disabilities. however, in some countries the parking card entitles people with disabilities to other types of concessions and when they stay abroad, they must comply with the regulations in force in that country. below we enclose also some advices for young, children and their families who deal with some problems during travelling: when giving directions, do not use terms that are understandable only for the sighted person; when talking turn always to the blind person instead of a person accompanying him/her; when in a room with a visual disability try to put all objects in their place or inform them about any changes; express your gestures in words, e.g. willingness to shake hands (do not grab the hand beforehand); warn about your willingness to help; choose the option of help accepted by a blind person; when you're in a hurry, don't offer your help so that you don't have to leave such person unattended; helping the blind, warn about obstacles, change of direction; giving a chair, do not place a blind man on it, but place his hand on the backrest; plan your time well, without leaving too much for unorganized activities – the blind people in a new place feel insecure. 22 another large group of the disabled are deaf adults/children. their activities should be supported, unrestricted access to mass media should be provided as well, and they should be provided with appropriate technical means supporting the hearing process. however, they must not be forced to teach speech and make deaf people like hearing people. it is also necessary to prepare social services for contact with deaf people, e.g. by learning sign language loop should be european standard. the tourist base should be properly technically prepared to support the hearing impaired and deaf people and use such solutions as (budny, 2003):  information in writing (brochures, guides, guides) on the adaptation of the facility to service guests with hearing disabilities;  phones with audio-visual function;  facilities using bluetooth technology, signaling devices and vibrations;  alarm systems with audio-visual function;  teachers sign language interpreters;  telephones, videophones with the teletexting option,  television broadcast with the option of sign language translation,  textual information on all relays (devices) tv / video. information for the deaf and hearing impaired guests should be mainly provided by means of signs, symbols, pictograms. into good practices dealing with deaf children, youngsters or adults belong also: if a hearing impaired person takes part in the mixed group, break the conversation from time to time and explain to a such person what has been said so far; in this way you free her from loneliness and isolation; remember that reading from your mouth is more tiring than normal listening, especially for a kid; for this reason, take breaks while talking so that a person can relax from constant concentration; speak calmly, not too quickly, speak accurately; sentences must be short and unambiguous, and questions should contain interrogative pronouns (who, what, when, why, where, how much, etc.); make sure that the conversation is accompanied by natural gestures; appropriate facial expressions and gestures make it easier to understand or guess the meaning of our speech; do not approach the deaf person suddenly from behind so as not to frighten him; do not approach too close when talking the best distance is one meter; while talking, direct your face towards the deaf person so that he can read your mouth from the movement; participants should always be placed facing the object in question (during travelling the guide and translator are standing backwards). for children with intellectual disabilities and some neurotic disorders intellectual disability may vary, depending on dynamics of nervous processes. due to the many activities they perform routinely, may require assistance or a longer adjustment period in a new and unknown environment. during travelling is advised strongly to remember that some matters may be delicate. i.e. in catering also the menu card should be properly structured. if individual dishes are sketched or a photo is posted, the disabled consumer can easily choose the menu according to own preferences; an hippo therapy may be a very good form of recreation for intellectually disabled people. the use of appropriate positions and exercises during hippo therapy eliminates increased muscle tone. contact with an animal teaches especially children sensitivity and friendship, affection and showing feelings. 23 people with intellectual disabilities are unable to receive visual experience outside the bus window. for this reason, when we want to say something about a place, we should stop. similarly to other disabilities, the position of participants on the bus should be planned for intellectual disabilities. additional disorders such as epilepsy, anxiety, etc. are also included. there is important to encourage people with disabilities to carry on with their daily duties, help them focus their attention and mobilize them to act by giving very specific tasks to perform; conclusion to sum up our conclusions on still evolving and so important issue there are some updated advices for parents and families with children of special needs or disabilities. the main traveling impact/issues for such families might be:  changes in routine;  tackling unexpected events;  finding the appropriate accommodation structures;  manage the children behavior;  interacting with normal people;  crowd;  new noises and sights. planning travel in these days is an action that encompasses all the travel components and can be affected by traveling relationships. when a family plans travel should define a strategy to minimize the primary impacts/issues that can occur. to achieve a such goal, it is important to define travel in all its aspects. on this purpose, can be useful the following travel descriptors:  trip origins;  trip destinations;  distance;  travel time;  travel duration;  trip purpose;  mode for trip;  number of persons. lists of services that support families of children with asd are also necessary. furthermore, the best practices to tackle the various issues should be identified. best practices are also relevant to define the policies to support the traveling of families with children with asd. the principles underlying good practice should form the conceptual basis for policies. educational support is an important element of the model. educational actions are needed to sustain families as well as to stimulate awareness and inclusion from “normal” people. new technology plays a crucial role in providing information to families. nevertheless, appropriate strategies should be identified in order to screen information available on the internet and select only reliable sources. during a current situation of semi or full lockdowns in poland which heavily effect tourism branch, there should be raised some governmental programs dedicated to families with disabled kids to encourage to individual tourism. maybe there should be prepared some money transfers (ie. an alternative form of “polish family support program 500+” dedicated to families with the children with disabilities or disorders) to such families with special 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(2011). bariery uczestnictwa osób niepełnosprawnych w turystyce i rekreacji w kontekście ich sytuacji ekonomicznej. instytut turystyki i rekreacji państwowa szkoła wyższa im. papieża jana pawła ii w białej podlaskiej. http://isap.sejm.gov.pl/isap.nsf/docdetails.xsp?id=wdu20041881945 http://isap.sejm.gov.pl/isap.nsf/docdetails.xsp?id=wdu20021791495 http://isap.sejm.gov.pl/isap.nsf/docdetails.xsp?id=wdu20021791495 http://isap.sejm.gov.pl/isap.nsf/docdetails.xsp?id=wdu20021791495 https://www.ulc.gov.pl/pl/prawo/prawo-uni-europejskiej/prawo-ue-akty-prawne/prawa-pasazerow/3324-rozporzadzenie-we-nr-1107-2006-parlamentu-europejskiego-i-rady-z-dnia-5-lipca-2006-r-w-sprawie-praw-osob-niepelnosprawnych-oraz-osob-o-ograniczonej-sprawnosci-ruchowej-podrozujacych-droga-lotnicza https://www.ulc.gov.pl/pl/prawo/prawo-uni-europejskiej/prawo-ue-akty-prawne/prawa-pasazerow/3324-rozporzadzenie-we-nr-1107-2006-parlamentu-europejskiego-i-rady-z-dnia-5-lipca-2006-r-w-sprawie-praw-osob-niepelnosprawnych-oraz-osob-o-ograniczonej-sprawnosci-ruchowej-podrozujacych-droga-lotnicza https://www.ulc.gov.pl/pl/prawo/prawo-uni-europejskiej/prawo-ue-akty-prawne/prawa-pasazerow/3324-rozporzadzenie-we-nr-1107-2006-parlamentu-europejskiego-i-rady-z-dnia-5-lipca-2006-r-w-sprawie-praw-osob-niepelnosprawnych-oraz-osob-o-ograniczonej-sprawnosci-ruchowej-podrozujacych-droga-lotnicza https://www.ulc.gov.pl/pl/prawo/prawo-uni-europejskiej/prawo-ue-akty-prawne/prawa-pasazerow/3324-rozporzadzenie-we-nr-1107-2006-parlamentu-europejskiego-i-rady-z-dnia-5-lipca-2006-r-w-sprawie-praw-osob-niepelnosprawnych-oraz-osob-o-ograniczonej-sprawnosci-ruchowej-podrozujacych-droga-lotnicza http://isap.sejm.gov.pl/isap.nsf/docdetails.xsp?id=wdu19970980602 16 translingualism across languages: a textual analysis of languages interaction malephole sefotho1, erasmus charamba2, genevieve quintero3 1north-west university (mafikeng campus), school of languages, department of english, south africa 2university of the witwatersrand, south africa 3 university of the philippines, humanities department, mindanao, philippines abstract. the myth of a pure form of language is so deep-rooted in many people that, even though they accept the existence of different languages, they cannot accept the reality that there is no language that is fully independent of other languages. people believe that there is language contamination across languages and most of the time it is their own language contaminated by others. this confirms the colonial principle of compartmentalization or distribution of languages. even in the post-colonial era, language isolation remains a serious challenge, especially in bi/multilingual classroom settings, where learners are discouraged to translanguage or code-mesh languages. it is against this background that this paper examines adaptation of several vocabularies and concepts from other languages in developing a language, usually through merging of cultures or colonization. this study looks at examples in southern africa and the philippines of existing fusion that has taken place between those languages and other surrounding languages. therefore, this study argues that boundaries between languages are fluid not fixed. the boundaries do not exist. they are therefore uncalled for because they destabilize the fluidity between languages, yet there is autonomous fusion between languages. we further argue that indigenization of languages can work well in translanguaged classrooms where learners are allowed to utilize indigenized versions of loan words to express ideas and concepts. this can encourage a more liberal use of language and self-expression in formal classroom settings. keywords: code-meshing; colonization; fluidity; language; multilingualism; translanguage. to cite this article: sefotho, m., charamba, e., & quintero, g. (2023). translingualism across languages: a textual analysis of languages interaction. education. innovation. diversity, 2(6), 6-16. doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2023.1.6968 introduction the world has become a single global continent due to free movement that exists within and across countries. this, as a result, has influenced the linguistic boundaries that have been created within or between nations. a body of research has, therefore, questioned the existence of these boundaries that have been created between languages and argue that there is fluidity and flexible movement of languages (wei, 2018). this means there is flexibility among languages used by people of different cultures and identities. the more people become in contact with other, the more there is cultural and language interactions (hoffer, 2002), which will eventually give rise to new vocabularies and new cultures. this flexible movement between languages is regarded as translanguaging (garcia, 2014). translanguaging, therefore, implies an approach that allows natural interaction and overlap of languages “inclusive of all communication styles, registers, and repertoires that characterize multilingual communication” (makalela, 2015, p. 202) to fit different contexts. however, there has always been a belief to some people that there is a linguistic purism (baioud & khuanuudt, 2022). this ideology is a deeply rooted belief/myth in some people that there is a pure form of language which has not borrowed words from other languages. in support with this view, schneider (2007, p. 21) argues that “while some branches of linguistics, in particular historical linguistics in models like the family tree, have emphasized the purity and homogeneity of languages, the ubiquity of language https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2023.1.6968 17 contact in almost all cultures around the globe has recently been recognized and established, and language contact theory has come to be a growing sub-discipline of linguistics”. there are many people who, while accepting the existence of different languages, cannot accept the “contamination”/fusion of their language with others (wei, 2018). this is brought up by the different interpretations that is given to a language as an entity that can be isolated or given a particular name and demarcated from others, not considering its functions and characteristics. chomsky refers to language as “the inherent capability of the native speakers to understand and form grammatical sentences,” and further considers “the sentence as the basis of language” (chomsky, 2000). his definition portrays the structure of a language not what a language is. this shows how difficult it is to define a language and why people tend to look at the structures of the language more than what is meant to be (winkler, 2015). on the other hand, lyons (1981) perceives languages as being the system of communication among human being in a particular society or context in which they belong. these could involve people of the same or different language backgrounds. this definition highlights language as the system that is used by human beings for communication purposes, and it implies the contextual use of a language to fit different context. it confirms that language should not be looked from the lens of its structures but what people do with it (makalela, 2015). researchers, in the 21st century, further describe language within the lens of translingualism, as a dynamic process (garcia & wei, 2014) and a non-linguistic means of communication, which involves interaction between human beings to express ideas/thoughts. for this study, translingualism is therefore viewed as a strategic practice of mixing different language varieties or registers (gevers, 2018). this practice allows fluidity among different languages and encourages drawing from all the languages for the purpose of effective communication. verbal communication, whether spoken or written, entails the ability to express concepts or ideas utilising the structure of a language. some linguists argue that language is an ongoing process of languaging which “is shaped by people as they interact in specific social, cultural, and political contexts” (mazak & herbas-donoso, 2015, p. 700). the descriptions given to language in the 21st century,’ therefore, go beyond considering language as an isolated code but a process which is determined by the interaction among people, free from the linguistic boundaries that were originally created between nations, people, and also within nations there may be (perceived) boundaries. from these explanations, it can be concluded that language is basically a dynamic process for making meaning (wei, 2018) and a major tool for communication determined by the needs and social context in which it is used. these could be based on daily social communication, job related issues, social mobility, health, or education needs. all these may determine the choice and use of language which, in turn, will require understanding. the choice and use of language are pivotal to people’s definition of themselves in relation to the whole world. consequently, language has forever been at the center of multiple contending social forces in the post-colonial global south (wa thiong’o, 1986). however, colonialism viewed language in a different perspective because language was then used by some nations as a tool of ascendance, and colonization to consolidate power and create governable, submissive subjects. during colonization, white minority governments have wielded language policy in education, business, and government as an instrument of political maneuvering, and this is key to the transformation agenda of former colonies in general and the global south in particular. thus, several post-colonial scholars are of the view that the colonial practice of imposing the former colonizers’ languages onto their respective former colonies, even forbidding the use of the colonized people’s native languages has serious ramifications on the people’s true freedom and constitutionalism (lovesey, 2012). thus, in decolonising the mind, ngũgĩ wa thiong’o sees language as the enabling condition of human consciousness, advancement, and freedom and thereby advocates for linguistic decolonization in the work and 18 education spaces (wa thiong’o, 1993) where language overlap is allowed and not compartmentalized. in his pedagogical model of critical pedagogy, paulo freire whose work on language was hugely influenced by existentialism, held the experiential conviction that people ought to draw lessons from their past to determine their future and create human values (freire, 2007). based on this view, a reflection of the past shows that some communities within the global south are multilingual characterized by complex and rich linguistic repertoires, which are very much intertwined. however, the coming of colonial rule witnessed dilution of local languages with those of the colonizers, which were regarded as prestigious and not to be “contaminated” with the local languages (makalela, 2017). makalela further argues that, in addition to diluting local languages, colonialism separated those local languages and isolated them into compartments that were believed to be completely disconnected from the idea of making those languages independent and exclusive. thus, language was not considered as a process of communication which permeates across the so-named linguistic compartments (2017). a language is a product of adoptions of words, vocabularies, concepts, and thought processes from other languages, usually through acculturation and colonization. for example, the english language is a product of many foreign vocabularies, loan words, word formations through combinations of affixes (hellenic, romance, and other language families) thereby creating words we now consider as english. a similar phenomenon is evident in other languages in the world, in colonized countries. for example, in those countries that were colonized by european countries, they adopted european languages’ terms. the adopted vocabulary was modified to suit usage in their own culture/context, and nativized/indigenized them, embracing the borrowed term as their own. this nativization or indigenization is evident, for instance, in the change in spelling and pronunciation, although the meaning is similar to its original source. this indigenization of languages automatically works in a translingual environment where people utilize indigenized versions of words from other languages as tools for communication and self-expression. languages in various pre-colonised countries have been developed and used for communication purposes within and across people or countries regardless of the demarcations that were created. the development of vocabulary in these languages have been influenced by different factors such as colonial languages or languages from neighboring countries. this is normally seen from the phonological similarities in words that have evolved in those languages. it becomes difficult to imagine a particular language being independent without borrowing or using words from another language. colonization is partly responsible for the emergence of new vocabulary in a language that evolved from the interactions between the native languages and the colonizers’ language. in the same way, the interaction of different cultures resulted to the borrowing, adopting, and exchange of new words and vocabulary nuances. these processes have rendered languages as culturally inclusive, diverting from what could be its pure form. this paper, therefore, intends to identify translingualism that took place among neighboring languages. in analyzing this translingualism, the paper looks at adoption of several vocabularies and concepts among languages through colonization, borrowing and merging of cultures. the focus was on some languages in the philippines, south africa, and zimbabwe as purposively selected examples of existing fusion of languages that has taken place between different languages or among surrounding language demarcated areas. origins and influences of the filipino language in the philippines, tagalog now known as filipino, is the official language taught in schools and understood and spoken by more than 60 million people. the other language used 19 as medium of instruction in schools is english. in 2012, the department of education implemented the mother tongue based-multilingual education (mtb-mle) policy which mandates the use of “local mother tongues as the language of instruction in kindergarten to year three (k -3), with the official languages, filipino and english, being introduced as the language of instruction after grade three” (assessment, curriculum and technology research centre,https://actrc.org/projects/understanding-best-practices-in-mtb-mle-in-the-philippines/). after the third grade, the philippine learners are taught english and filipino. both languages become the medium of instruction up to the higher education levels. like english, filipino is recognized as the formal language for education and business in the country. “the origins of this language date back to more than 1,000 years ago. it is an austronesian language belonging to the malayo-polynesian subfamily, with outside influences from malay and chinese, and later from both spanish and american english through several centuries of colonial rule” (jelinek, merialdo, roukos & strauss, 1991). they point out that the current form, structure, and most especially the vocabulary of this language is the result of the intermingling of several nations that resided in the philippines. this shows that this language is not exclusive but built up of several languages. to further explain how the filipino language came into existence, panganiban (1952, p. 58) indicates that: the modernization of the filipino language may be said to have begun during the time of the spaniards, when spanish friars engaged in missionary work in the islands supplanted the old tagalog characters with the roman letters presumably to facilitate their work of evangelization… loan words, from the other philippine dialects, from the malay and sanskrit, and from the spanish and the english, have found their way into the tagalog vocabulary either through the natural process of assimilation or through purposeful adoption. the filipino language adopted words from other languages, such as spanish, english, and japanese, nations who have colonized and occupied the philippines for many years, even centuries in the case of spain. colonization paved the way to the borrowing of words from the colonizers’ vocabulary. this phenomenon of borrowing and adopting foreign vocabulary into the indigenous language such as tagalog became a contributing factor to the development of the filipino language. for instance, some spanish words were integrated into the filipino language with modifications in spelling and pronunciation. the same can be said with english and japanese words. languages in south africa in south africa, there are eleven official languages and several other non-official languages which were historically used by the people, not necessarily separated through their demarcated settlements in the country. it was only during the apartheid era that those settlements were created to separate people in their different languages. history presents two factors in the separation of people according to their languages which led to people being placed according to their so named compartments of different languages. these two are the missionary linguists who put the languages into writing as early as the 1820s and the apartheid policy of separate development legislated in the twentieth century (makalela, 2015). the rise of afrikaner nationalism in south africa in the year 1948 saw the missionary linguistic separation entrenched in tandem with the apartheid government’s adoption of a separate development ideology which ensured that black africans were separated into homeland reserves based on perceived language differences (landsberg, krüger, & swart, 2011). this was broad about by the implementation of what was regarded as the ‘separate development policy. this policy was meant “to divide black south africans along tribal lines https://actrc.org/projects/understanding-best-practices-in-mtb-mle-in-the-philippines/ 20 in order to reduce their political power. the african (bantu) groups were separated into homelands, or bantustans, consigned there to become separate ‘nations’’(saho.2019). this perpetuated and ensured that south africans who spoke different languages stay in separate quarters resulting in the legal division of the languages into ten homelands: sepedi (leboa), xitsonga (gazankulu), venda (republic of venda), setswana (republic of bophuthatswana), isindebele (kwandebele), isizulu (zululand), isixhosa (ciskei and transkei), siswati (kangwane), and sesotho (qwaqwa) (butler, rotberg, & adams, 1978). this complexity of several languages in south africa resulted in having eleven official languages of which english and afrikaans became the most dominant languages in official settings more than the other languages. the separation of different languages served the interests of the colonists and the apartheid era, and their understanding was that there will not be any interaction or mixing between the languages, possibly between the speakers of the languages. however, the vocabulary status quo in the different languages proves that there has been overlaps among the languages and there is more overlap of the english and afrikaans languages on the indigenous languages as there is among the indigenous languages themselves. despite the separation among the people, there are some words that remained the same or similar in the different indigenous language varieties and afrikaans and english, which are normally used as medium of instructions in schools and official languages in the workplace. this implies that it is not only in the education sector where indigenous languages overlap with the colonial languages but even at the workspace. wherever there is a need of communication among people in different languages’ ‘boundaries’, there is always a diffusion between those languages. schneider (2007, p. 23) points out that “the diffusion of these linguistic forms proceeds through ‘‘imperfect replication,’’ i.e. speakers potentially copy each other’s’ linguistic choices (if these are found to be communicatively successful); in so doing they reproduce, transmit, and at the same time continuously recreate and ‘‘appropriate’’ elements of a language variety. this replication operates not only vertically (i.e. with an offspring generation copying their parent generation’s usage) but also horizontally (with speakers who interact with each other continuously influencing each other)”. the more the people interact in their different languages and communicated with other, the more the overlap/diffusion emerged. this supports the argument that there are no created boundaries in languages as languages are what they are used for and not only the structures within them. among the eleven official languages, there are three languages which belong to the sotho cluster. these are southern sotho (sesotho), western sotho (setswana) and northern sotho (sepedi). “these languages were separated by the apartheid government and codified by different missionaries despite their high degrees of mutual intelligibility” (sefotho & makalela, 2017, p. 42). disconnected work among various missionary groups from different european countries resulted in the roman catholic missionaries working in the southern part of south africa, the london missionaries in the west and the lutherans in the north. these missionaries created different orthographic systems that were consequently conceived as representing three distinct sotho languages namely sepedi, known as northern sotho (by the german lutheran missionaries), setswana as the western sotho (by the london english missionaries) and sesotho, normally referred to as southern sotho (by the roman catholic missionaries). however, the focus language for this study is purposively sesotho in the southern part of south africa. languages in zimbabwe zimbabwe was colonized by britain in the 1880s and became southern rhodesia. other kingdoms that made up southern rhodesia include the mapungubwe, mutapa, rozvi and the 21 ndebele kingdoms. the inhabitants spoke shona and ndebele, two of the many bantu languages found in the region. the bantu language family contains many langauges spoken by the bantu peoples throughout sub-saharan africa. the coming of missionaries and colonizers saw the introduction of foreign languages in the country. historically, a minority of white zimbabweans spoke afrikaans, greek, italian, polish, english, and portuguese, among other languages, while gujarati and hindi could be found among the country’s indian population. the country’s local languages were not spared dilution by the colonizers’ languages. this resulted in the establishment of several language varieties. since the adoption of its 2013 constitution, zimbabwe has sixteen official languages and more than 20 minority languages. the official languages are chewa, chibarwe, english, kalanga, khoisan, nambya, ndau, ndebele, shangani, shona, sign language, sotho, tonga, tswana, venda, and xhosa. the country’s main languages are shona, spoken by roughly 70% of the population, and ndebele, spoken by roughly 20% (charamba, 2020). like most countries in the region, english is the country’s lingua franca, used in government and business and as the main medium of instruction in institutions of education. it is not surprising that it has an influence on the vocabulary of some of the local languages. the brief discussions showed the permeable and flexible movement and overlap of languages among people which most develop into new vocabularies in the languages translingual between languages. translanguaging theory challenges the monoglossic language ideology and separation/boundaries among languages. when one looks at the term translanguaging, it is a combination of two words, ‘trans’ which means movement and ‘languaging’ which refers to language practices (sefotho, 2019). this signifies the relationship between the language that is used and the social practices of the language users in using such a language or languages (makoni & pennycook, 2007). the explanation indicates a flexible movement between languages which is determined by the way/ways language users employ linguistic practices for communication purposes in different contexts. therefore, this study is underpinned by translanguaging theory which views language not as an isolated entity but a complex interrelated discursive practice, or a resource that is used by people for communication and that cannot be assigned to one or another traditional definition of a language (wei, 2018). language is no longer viewed as an isolated entity or separate codes that were historically structured according to different areas/ nations, but as part of language users’ practices in effective communication in different contexts. “translanguaging theory advocates for a transglossic or dynamic processes of using languages and allowing integration between languages without any created boundaries to enhance understanding … and furthermore, building their conceptual and linguistic knowledge” (garcia, 2009, p. 291). translanguaging shows that the mingling and fusion between languages do not dilute what is named as a particular language, but it enriches one another with innovation and creativity of new vocabulary. researchers argue that the use of more than one language is needed to give a complete meaning and one language is not enough (creese & blackledge, 2010; makalela, 2015) and, therefore, question the idea of linguistic boundaries that were socially and politically created (wei, 2018; makalela, 2015). they also argue that the use of languages is fluid and cannot be separated into compartments. it is, therefore, a fact that the integration will involve invention of new terms or vocabulary that is understood by people using the language and this also allows fluid movement between the languages. this movement is what researchers refer to as translanguaging which accommodates the mingling of all linguistic resources that one has. it is a theory that advocates for interconnectivity and interdependence among languages and not language isolation (kleyn & garcia, 2019). in addition, mazak and herbas-donoso (2015) challenge the monoglossic ideology of languages being viewed as having boundaries and claim that languaging practices between languages are fluid, interconnected, and dynamic during the process of communication between 22 the users. thus, the set of practices used by people of different cultures and linguistic background result in invention of new vocabulary that reflects fluidity between languages and close integration of the languages, and this results in development of new borrowed or intermingled vocabulary in languages (kim, 2015). the issue of language integration is supported by what makalela (2019) emphasises when talking about the blurred boundaries between languages; he says languaging is what people do with the language not looking at what languages are. he points out that language is not an entity but a representation of the society. the names that are given to what we refer to as languages are just “labels assigned by linguists to sets of structures that they have identified” (wei, 2018, p. 19). as such, there is no speech community that can claim to own certain words, as those were formed by social and cultural practices in communication beyond the issue of boundaries among languages. wei (2018) further indicates that, contact between people of different backgrounds and cultures allows language users to penetrate through their languages’ codes and form new coordinated and meaningful structures that allow them to engage meaningfully in effective communication with the people they are in contact with. furthermore, schneider, (2017, p. 22) acknowledges the idea that “language evolution, and the emergence of contact-induced varieties, can be regarded as speakers making selections from a pool of linguistic variants available to them in a contact setting. this ‘‘feature pool’’ consists of the sum total of the individual forms and variants that each of the speakers involved, with different language backgrounds and varying linguistic experiences, brings to the contact situation”. innovation and creativity of new or socially constructed words evolve from the interaction between people in contact and for communication purposes. this is supported by language in contact framework which was originally proposed by thomason (2001). she indicates that where there is contact among people, there is normally an indirect correlation between their extralinguistic causes and linguistic consequences (schneider, 2007). people communicating with each other, eventually adopts each other’s language and this results into a contact language (wheeler, 2015), that is suitable and understood by the communities involved for ease of communication. language in contact “is … the contact of one community with another, and the effect that contact has on their respective language behaviour” (wheeler, 2015, p. 76). the translingual situation among languages is the confirmation of interdependency and a rejection of the purity of languages. this becomes an indication that the socially and politically defined boundaries (otheguy et al., 2015) do not really make sense or meaning where people of different cultures mingle or get in contact with each other. this is reflected in different context in the world, globally. methodology the study follows a qualitative research design, relying on textual analysis on the available literature through the influence of foreign languages on three named languages: sotho, shona and filipino. textual analysis is a methodology that involves understanding a language, respective symbols, and/or pictures present in the analyzed texts in order for one to gain information regarding how people communicate life and life experiences. it entails the rhetorical concepts that are used to analyze the features of given texts. visual, written, or spoken messages provide cues to how the message may be understood among speakers (hawkins, 2017). often, the relayed messages are understood as influenced by and reflective of larger social structures. there are four major approaches to textual analysis: rhetorical criticism, content analysis, interaction analysis, and performance studies. to explore the sense-making phenomenon more fully under investigation, textual analysis and ethnography were combined 23 in which use was made of observations and listening as respective speakers conversed, noting similarities in the languages. “tagalizing” foreign loan words in the philippines the philippines shares a colonial past with the southern african countries. three countries colonized and occupied the philippines influencing its culture, including the development of its language. from 1565 to 1898, the country was a colony of spain. the united states then came to colonize the country after it won the spanish-american war in 1898. masanga (2021) pointed out that “the main goal of the united states in the philippines was to turn the country into a self-sufficient capitalistic democracy.” this new colonizer, who controlled the country from 1898-1941, created infrastructure “that would improve the literacy and economy of the country. as a result, literacy doubled to about half by the 1930s and a fourth of the educated population could speak english. this was a massive influence for the filipino culture, as english became the dominant language alongside the official filipino language of tagalog.” masanga (2021, p.3) further noted that “once world war ii hit, the plans for the philippines to finally gain independence went downhill as japan invaded the philippines and took control. there isn’t nearly as much cultural influence that the japanese occupation had on the philippines as spain, or the united states had. this is because japan did not offer any support to the philippines during the short time they occupied the philippines during the war, as these were times of conflict”. the filipino language incorporated spanish loanwords as a result of almost half a century of contact with the spanish colonizers and the language they speak. in their review of a pilipino-english dictionary, llamzon and thorpe (1972) point out that 33% of word roots are of spanish origin. in a presentation during the 11th international austronesian and papuan languages and linguistics conference, baklanova (2019) shared her findings “that spanish-derived words constitute 20% of the lexicon used” in filipino. she gave an example in the sentence below in which spanish–derived words are in italics (original in parentheses): tagalog: "puwede (puede) ba akóng umupô sa silya (silla) sa tabi ng bintana (ventana) hábang nása biyahe (viaje) táyo sa eroplano (aeroplano)?" translation in english: ("may i sit on the chair near the window during our voyage in the aeroplane?") she further pointed out that, “the adoption of the abakada alphabet in 1940 changed the spelling of most of the spanish loanwords present in the filipino language. the loanwords derived from the spanish language have their original spellings indigenized according to the rules of the abakada alphabet.” this is an indigenised latin alphabet used by the filipinos. table 1 shows some loan words from the spanish language. these are among the common words in the filipino language: 24 table 1 filipino words derived from the spanish language filipino/tagalog spanish english agila aguila eagle asukal azukar sugar barako verraco manly biyahe viaje journey bisita visita visitor disgrasya desgracia misfortune diyaryo diario newspaper engkanto encanto fairies estudyante estudiante student kabayo caballo horse keso queso cheese kutsara cuchara spoon kuwarto cuarto room kuwento cuento story mantika mantieca oil meryenda merienda snack pila fila queue sinturon centuron belt sibuyas cebolla onion trabaho trabajo job aside from spanish loan words, the filipino language assimilated english vocabulary and adopted the words into the language, again using the abakada alphabet. because the united states made the development of the educational system a priority in the philippines, the teaching and learning of the english became an important part of the new curriculum. filipino became more enriched by the english vocabulary it adopted. here are some examples: table 2 common english loan words in filipino filipino/tagalog english abnormal abnormal aborsiyon abortion adik addict babay bye badyet budget bayolente violent bertdey birthday boksing boxing boykot boycott dyipni jeepney gimik gimmick iskolar scholar iskwater squatter isnab snob tambay stand by isyu issue kulto cult peke fake trapik traffic tsansa chance 25 aside from spanish and english, the filipino language also adopted words from japanese. despite the short period of its occupation in the philippines, the japanese have also influenced philippine culture. one of these evident influences is the adoption of japanese words in filipino. table 3 common japanese loan words in filipino tagalog/filipino japanese english dahan–dahan だんだん dandan slowly, gradually haba 幅 haba width or breadth kaban– sack of rice 鞄 kaban bag, satchel kampay 乾杯 kanpai cheers! katol 蚊取線香 katorisenkou mosquito coil jack-en-poy じゃんけんぽん jankenpon rock-paper-scissors tamang-tama 偶々 tama-tama coincidentally toto おとうと otōto younger brother karaoke カラオケ karaoke a form of musical entertainment. usually social in nature for filipinos source:http://filipiniana101.blogspot.com/2014/03/list-of-japanese-loan-words-in-tagalog.html. this nativisation/indigenisation of foreign vocabulary in filipino is evident in the change in spelling and pronunciation, although the meaning is similar to its original source. spanish, american english, and japanese have enriched the filipino language. despite being the language of the colonizers, these languages have become nativized and indigenized, making them filipino. the diffusion of languages is noticed in other parts of the world. this study also discusses evolution of words in the sesotho language in south africa through linguistic diffusion with other languages based on people’s interaction. the evolution of some words in the sesotho language – lesotho/south africa as has been mentioned earlier, regardless of the separation of people in their respective languages, the need to communicate effectively remained an important aspect in peoples’ lives. separation of languages, therefore, was not an issue and people had to find means of communication through adoption of words from the different involved languages, of which we refer to as a ‘translingual’ approach. translingual approach is a term that “perceives a synergy between languages which generates new grammars and meanings (canagarajah, 2015:5). this resulted in diffusion between the languages for ease of understanding, communication and meaning making. the following are examples of words that were formed from the mingling of the basotho people working in the farms or in the mines with afrikaans speaking people. they are found in a corpus that we classify as “no-man’s language”, that is, neither sesotho, afrikaans, nor english words but words that show diffusion among languages; not necessarily forming a new language but mingling of all the languages for ease of communication and understanding. http://filipiniana101.blogspot.com/2014/03/list-of-japanese-loan-words-in-tagalog.html 26 table 4 adoption of afrikaans and english words to sotho sotho afrikaans english buka boek book fariki vark pig haraka hark rake hempe hemp shirt keiti/ heke hek gate kereke kerk church kharafu graaf spade kichene kombuis kitchen lebenkele winkel shop letamo dam dam pene pen pen pere perd horse sekolo skool school sepekere spyker nail setulo stoel stool sopho sop soup tafole tafel table tapole aartappel potato tonki donkie donkey tsoekere suiker sugar the above selection of words shows the similarities in the vocabulary of the words between, afrikaans, english and sesotho. this is due to the interaction that took place between people who were native speakers of the languages. the end results would be the invention of new vocabulary words deriving from these interactions or communication through borrowing. this linguistic fusion has not happened only in the south african region but even in other countries. zimbabwe is one of such countries that was considered in this study and the focus was on the shona language. features of the shona language zimbabwe african languages are classified into four major linguistic families or phyla, which are afro-asiatic, nile saharan, niger-congo and khoisan. historically, the bantu languages are closely related and have a unique feature in the harmonic concord (wentzel, 1981). while indoeuropean languages usually show gender differences, number differences (singular or plural), and agreement by means of suffixes, bantu languages use prefixes and the harmonic concord, for example the root word for a person is ntu (wentzel, 1981). in zimbabwe in general, language is constantly a dominant question in postcolonial studies and a lot of campaigns have been held with efforts to advocate for the promotion of a multilingual approach that promotes inclusivity of languages. most studies that deliberate on colonialism tend to concentrate on europe’s economic exploitation of africa and its resources leaving out other aspects. it is crucial that when studying colonialism scholars zero in on aspects such as cultural and linguistic practices that were brought by the advent of colonialism. colonialism in zimbabwe gave birth to linguistic and cultural hierarchies. the language of the colonizer became the formal and official language of communication, thus it was used in all administrative purposes as well as medium of instruction 27 ahead of indigenous languages (charamba, 2019), and these are used for instructional purposes in the first and second grades only. in these different indigenous languages, there is a high degree of similarity, including the grammar and structure, and a substantial sharing of root words, especially if one takes account of simple sound shifts. for example: table 5 similarities between shona and venda shona venda english nyama nama meat mwana ṅwana child, baby madekwana madekwana evening mutsvuku mutswuku red one mwedzi ṅwedzi month rufu lufu death mbiri mbili two chikoro tshikolo school zvikukwana zwikukwana chicks musikana musidzana girl tenga renga buy source: wentzel, 1981. the history of the venda starts from the kingdom of mapungubwe that stretched from the soutpansberg in the south (south africa), across the limpopo river to the matopos in the north (zimbabwe). at a very early stage in the study of the bantu language situation pointed towards an affinity of venda with shona as is clear from the examples given. looking at examples in the table above, one can see the similarities between some of the words. for example, mutsvuku (shona) and mutswuku (venda); mbiri (shona) and mbili (venda); or rufu (shona) and lufu (venda). in some cases, though the orthographies differ, the phonetic sounds and meanings are the same. for example, tshikukwana (venda) and chikukwana (shona) referring to a chick. in venda, for instance, a language owing much of its parentage to shona, valorization in the case of bilabial consonants occurs. venda is spoken in the northern part of south africa around mesina whereas in zimbabwe, it is common in the southern area of the limpopo river where shona is also dominant. to the north of the limpopo where venda is spoken, mainly in the beitbridge district of zimbabwe, there is also daily contact with shona dialects. evidently, venda and shona share linguistic features and there has been some influence on these languages from the nguni languages. conclusions findings show that there is fluid fusion between languages especially from neighboring languages. some words that have emerged from the selected languages show identities and origins from other languages and how those words became part of the new languages. this is an indication that there is no independent language, but one language is being built from other surrounding languages. therefore, this paper argues that boundaries between languages are fluid, not fixed and they, actually, do not exist. this indigenization of language can work well in multilingual and multicultural communities, workplaces, and classrooms where multilinguals are allowed to utilize indigenized versions of loan words such as english words to express ideas 28 and concepts. this will encourage a more liberal use of languages as tools for communication and self-expression in an otherwise formal settings such as classroom and communal settings. in the global south context, translingual practices have always been observed presenting a case for use of translingual communication that blurs boundaries between different languages (charamba, 2020). the global south with more than 1,500 languages is one of the most linguistically complex regions in the world. while many studies on multilingual and multicultural practices have critiqued monolingual bias in the global south classrooms (kiramba & smith 2019), very few frameworks have been developed to account for ontological, epistemological, and methodological framing of these practices (monteagudo & muniain, 2019; paquet & levasseur, 2019). through an analysis of southern africa’s historical past, makalela (2017) makes a case for ubuntu (‘i am because you are’ and ‘you are because i am’) translanguaging as an alternative conceptual framework to understand the linguistic diversity of the global south, and how it can be used as a pedagogic strategy to increase access to knowledge among multilingual and multicultural students. this translanguaging model based on ubuntu principles shifts the gaze from language divisions to complex repertoires that are fluid in everyday meaning-making instructional and societal practices. recommendations there is a need for more involvement and acceptance of what has traditionally been viewed as non-linguistic means and urges us to overcome the “lingua bias” of communication. language should be used as a resource for communication. educators should also accept the “contamination” among the languages and stop 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(2015). understanding language: a basic course in linguistics. bloomsbury publishing. http://www.jstor.org/stable/41377439 44 school governing body chairpersons’ perception on their accountability in the running of schools hennades tabe, tabe1; christo van wyk2 & clever ndebele3 1, 2 faculty of education, north west university, private bag x2046, mmabatho 2735, mafikeng south africa 3 directorate of learning and teaching, mthatha campus, walter sisulu university, private bag x1, mthatha 5117 south africa3 abstract. the concept of accountability has been portrayed as vital and pertinent in the field of public administration in general and education management in particular for several years. this is important at a time that stakeholders like educators have misconceptualised the purpose of accountability to mean inspection or the lack of trust which makes them uncomfortable. this study sought to develop a conceptual framework of school governing body (sgb) chairperson’s perception of their accountability in selected schools with the purpose of facilitating learning and teaching outcomes. a qualitative paradigm using a multiple case study design was adopted. data were collected through in-depth individual interviews with 3 chairpersons. the participants were purposively selected because of our discernment that as representatives on the school governing boards, they were accountable to parents as part of their managerial responsibilities. thematic analysis of the data was used to identify emerging themes and categories. the findings reveal clarity on the practice of accountability in the broad spectrum of school management and administration as well as with policy making and implementation. keywords: accountability; education management; responsibility; school base management; sgb chairpersons; school governing board. to cite this article: tabe, h.t., van wyk, c., & ndebele, c. (2022). school governing body chairpersons’ perception on their accountability in the running of schools. education. innovation. diversity, 1(4), 44-56. doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2022.1.6740 introduction the concept of accountability has been portrayed as vital and pertinent towards the improvement of public service like the educational sector for many years (steiner, kaiser, tapscott, & navarro, 2018). coupled with this development, the dawn of democracy in south africa heralded a new culture and approach to service delivery that has taken the form of decentration with accountability at the centre stage of education management (nxumalo, gilson, goudge, tsofa, cleary, barasa, & molyneux, 2018). implicit in this new culture is the acknowledgement that public service must be re-engineered to meet the imperatives of an emerging developmental state. to this effect, accountability and responsiveness have become central organising principles for service delivery (nxumalo et al., 2018) in what seakamela, (2011) previously describes as the lack of trust in the ability of schools to meet the needs of society. subsequently, different meaning and purpose of accountability have been linked to different people depending on the context to which it is applied with different objectives. at its most basic, accountability means to hold someone to account or to have the obligation to deliver an account as well as being able to do so. according to west, mattei, and roberts (2011), accountability is a circumstance under which individual stakeholders are liable to review performance and the application of sanctions if their decisions and actions fall short of satisfying those with whom they are in an accountability relationship. another description is that to be accountable is to be required to explain or justify one’s action or behaviour. these perhaps explain why hall, frink, and buckley (2015) say that accountability https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2022.1.6740 45 remains a fundamental element of every community and the organisations that operate within them with both constructive and destructive tendencies. in effect the whole idea about accountability should be use for the right reasons which amongst others is to improve on the welfare of the organisation which of course is part of the responsibility of the sgb. in an earlier confirmation to the relevance of accountability, young (2016) alludes that school governing bodies (sgbs) in the case of england have substantial control and responsibilities regarding the education of learners. thus, with such responsibilities conferred on the sgbs through decentralisation, they deserve to account to a designated authority. nonetheless, young (2016) mention that despite increased school autonomy, sgbs are increasingly constrained in considering the aims of education, as their focus is now placed on the intrinsic and or extrinsic goods of effectiveness which according to ryan (2019) are very complex and could result in a series of challenges. these challenges of accountability to sgb among others include the lack of technically qualified human cadres (personnel) who are needed for the implementation of accountability, rarity of training programs that are directed to the implementation of accountability in work, limited availability of appropriate measures to measure performance (kentab, 2016), the manipulation of accountability requirements and less rational decision making (ryan, 2019) notwithstanding, accountability has a whole range of benefits and interests which include working on improving the performance and encouraging employees to participate more in the making of administrative decisions. just like in politics and the legal sector, those charged with the responsibility of managing other public sectors like the school principal (skedsmo & huber, 2019), is equally expected to give an account or be answerable to the public or community which it serves. with learner performance being one of the key areas of concern for stakeholders in schools of africa, smith and holloway (2020) are of the concern that the process of evaluating school performance based on learner performance measures narrowly defines educator quality. hence, the drive to raise standard by school authorities according to lewis, and hardy, (2015) has therefore resulted in a more tightly curricula frameworks and testing regimes measured by test scores though not limited to those. regarding school properties which is amongst the jurisdiction of sgb chairpersons, wellington (2015) earlier explain that if learners for instance, contributes to any form of destruction, a strategy for the collection of damages would be initiated which may include withholding the learners report until the required compensation is made. such decisions have proven to be problematic to the sgbs because in some instances, they are challenged by parents of these learners in favour of their loved ones (maphosa & shumba, 2010). seemingly, this could further become a huge set back to the very measure(s) of accountability to which the sgb is bound to protect. in consideration with the above scenario, qualitative case study approach was adopted for the study involving experienced sgb chairpersons through face to face interviews. the objectives of the study among others include the following:  to ascertain the connotation and notion of accountability to the sgb chairpersons in secondary schools of south africa.  to ascertain the pattern of accountability as implemented by sgb in secondary schools of south africa.  to ascertain the magnitude of accountability in secondary schools of south africa.  to ascertain specific responsibilities by sgb chairpersons regarding accountability. review of literature 46 in addressing the literature on accountability in schools, the authors took into considerable the fact that a greater part of the existing review covers mostly europe and america as indicated by various authors (wellington, 2015; west et al., 2011; suspitsyna, 2010). this is opposed to africa and south africa in particular where most of the existing literature centres around school governance and public service delivery (nxumalo et al., 2018; steiner et al., 2018; heystek, 2011). according to suspitsyna (2010) for more than a decade, quality assurance and accountability have reigned over education policy agendas on a vast geographic territory like the united states of america (usa) characterised by the production of policies and practices that are aimed at controlling and managing educational quality. in recent times across africa, accountability has mostly been associated to service delivery in public institutions and organisation like the school (nxumalo et al., 2018). such institutional changes according to skedsmo and huber (2019) result from concerns relating to performance, fairness, and efficiency of the education system to which key reform elements such as standardised testing, monitoring, evaluation, and accountability become a necessity. expounding from an educational management perspective the authors believe that school principals for instance are exposed to new controls and regulations, growth, increasing competition, technological developments, and changes in the work force. in the middle of these changing circumstances, the sgbs still have that responsibility to ensure that learner performance amongst other things is improved with or without which they would be called to account. in south africa, the implementation of no fee policy for schools and the move towards school based management (sbm) reform in education has been a concomitant development in the south african educational system that has necessitated the increased need for accountability from school authorities. such institutional changes and or development which according to skedsmo, and huber (2019) are unavoidable, is like wilkins (2015) allusion that since the 1980s in england, state schools have been required to ensure maximum transparency and accountability through the use of indicators (also known as performance matric) resulting from the private sector and globally circulating discourses of good governance. the move towards sbm or democracy in the school governance of sa is further reiterated in moorosi, bantwini, molale, and diko (2020), when they posit that the south african schools act (sasa) of 1996 provided for democratic governance of schools and targeted redress as one of the policies ushered in by the new democratic dispensation to bridge the gap of inequalities. though this was partly done with the intension to ensure uniformity in a school context, it implementation varies from one school location to the other. this is important as heystek (2011) clarifies that the decentralisation of powers to the schools communities does not in any way means that the schools have become autonomous but rather, it assumes that the school community is in a better place to make certain decisions about the school. hence, it would work well for school communities where both the smt and sgbs comprises of educated individuals. moreover, the task team report on education management development (rsa, 1996b) and the legislation such as the south african school act (rsa, 1996a) advocates the establishment of a democratic system of school governance in the form of sgb. the body comprises of stakeholders including parents, school principals (ex-officio member), educators, learner representatives and non-members of staff who administer the management of schools (bagarette, 2014), with parents constituting most of the members. hence, the introduction of sbm and a related change such as the introduction of sgbs can be regarded as issues that have many sides to investigate. this article is further inspired by moorosi et al. (2020) in their study on school governance where they reveal that sasa propagates the establishment of sgbs whose role among others include budgeting, maintenance of school property, the implementation of policy and the authority to employ teaching 47 and non-teaching staff. executing these task involves the sharing of responsibilities with other stakeholders including parents, with considerable powers on improving the quality of education in the hands of the sgb. this by implication means that managerial hierarchies in the form of managerial leadership (romme, 2019) as well as understanding the concept of accountability and its implementation are core components of school governance that should be investigated. the degree to which sgb chairpersons are required to render an account is indeed a central issue for investigation through their perspective. the nature and purpose of educational accountability when the historical development of accountability in education is reviewed, it must be kept in mind that in general terms, it has to do with a state of being answerable for something to someone (spaull, 2013). although the idea of accountability would denote different meanings depending on the context, in practice ‘being accountable’ means performing certain functions to the satisfaction of a person or interest group whilst complying with the standards set by a higher authority in a managerial leadership fashion (romme, 2019). applying these principles to a school as an organisation, it must be emphasised that schools are by nature highly structured organisations with clear positions of hierarchy and accountability. notwithstanding, fidan and balci (2017) believe that a school system is closely linked to the reality that they are complex organisations, in an ever changing and complexifying environment, peopled by complex individuals, often drawn from a range of cultures that are working towards the goal of achieving effective learning outcome. according to seakamela (2011) and bush (2008) over countries like zambia and tanzania suggest that the educational system is faced with a “wholesale systematic decay” to which parents pay very little attention to the educational success of their children while relaying heavily on the effort of the educators. in the case of south africa, the dawn of democracy indicated a new culture and approach to learning and change in service delivery which no doubt warrants severe accountability actions to be taken. one of these changes was witnessed upon the institution of democracy in 1994 where the autonomy was shifted partially, if not completely to the schools through the creation of sgbs and smts (rsa, 1996b). inherent in this new culture is the acknowledgement that education had to be re-engineered to meet the imperatives of an emerging developmental state which amongst others include the need for stakeholders to be accountable over public funds that has been entrusted on them (godwin, ntayi, & munene, 2021). unfortunately, heystek (2011) posits that over three decades down the line, there is yet to be any clear evidence in the link between the sovereignty of schools and improved quality education. an earlier postulation by fleisch (2006) clarifies that over 20 theories have been developed to explain why pressure or accountability is an agent of change in schools with very poor performance. it seems therefore that pressure and threat of redeployment of stakeholders for poor performance and ultimately closure of schools might result in high stake accountability in schools. on the contrary, steiner et al. (2018) refute that the persistent call for more accountability in the public sector in general has placed education systems, particularly those in developing countries like sa, under intense public scrutiny because effective schooling is an imperative for a democratic society. thus, expectations for greater accountability from sgb chairpersons might lead to increased monitoring and evaluation of the schooling system through the development of indicator systems. hence, attempts to address accountability related problems according to steiner et al. (2018), have rather been characterised by the lack of accountability and blame shifting, while the system remains badly in need of professional management and support from all interested parties. 48 this is closely linked to a previous remark by seakamela (2011) that governments in many countries responded to accountability pressures by taking the lead in setting goals, establishing priorities and building frameworks for accountability while at the same time shifting authority and responsibility for key functions to school level as defined by democratic principles. the ability of schools to develop the curriculum and improve learning and teaching to achieve school objectives no doubt depends on the availability of resources (mestry & bisschoff, 2009). the main objective of sgbs and their chairpersons is therefore on their capacity to share the limited finances between human and physical resources at schools aimed at achieving effective educational goals which often necessitate the need for decentralisation. thus, hooge, burns, and wilkoszewski (2012) indicates that decentralisation does not only mean more local governmental control of schools but also more control of education by local non-governmental actors like statedependent private schools and/or school governing boards. mestry and ndhlovu (2014) in fact stated with reference to section 34 of the sasa that it is the responsibility of the sgbs to supplement state funding through school fees and other fundraising initiatives which they deem necessary. this is with the assumption that officials like the managers, leaders and other professionals who are closest to local operations know best what should be done and to take full initiatives and control to exercise discretionary power. theoretical framework according to wellington (2015), a theory in educational research is only worthy of the name if it helps us to explain phenomena as well as aids our understanding of these phenomena. therefore, a theory must be capable of bringing out certain hidden inferences in the educational environment to facilitate learning and teaching. amongst other theories used in educational management and leadership research, the participative and or collegial leadership theory was selected as the most pertinent for this article. though similar, various researchers have identified this theory differently as follows; while naidu, joubert, mestry, mosoge, and ngcobo (2012) talks about collegial theory, bush and middlewood (2013) talk of participative theory. according to naidu et al (2012) in their collegial theory, it requires determining policies and making decisions through a process of discussion leading to consensus. whereas bush and middlewood (2013) say that participation simply means the opportunity of engaging staffs in the process of decision making. one underlying issue as gathered by these authors is on the fact that all the authors above talk about the importance of engaging stakeholders by taking into consideration their ideas and suggestions to arrive at a common value as defined by the mission and vision of the school. furthermore, both versions of the theory draw our attention to the view that the power of leadership should be distributed or shared amongst some, if not all stakeholders in the organisation who are believed to have a mutual understanding about the objectives of the institution. but not without an effective empowerment of school principals in the case of public schools towards decision-making in the middle of radical social, political, and economic changes in the country (mestry, 2017). practically, and in relation to this article of accountability, the relevance of the theory lies on the bonding amongst stakeholders in a collaborative fashion as emphasis by shaked (2018) where it is believed that it would help to alleviate pressure from senior leaders like principals and the sgb chairperson. because the introduction of a new democratic dispensation in south africa as earlier observed brought about new educational laws that made way for school based management, it follows that managerial hierarchies as well as the execution of responsibilities between different stakeholders and the state are core components of accountability 49 that should be investigated. notwithstanding, such democratic dispensation further warrants a kind of participative leadership which according to rolková, and farkašová, (2015) entails encouragement to participate, collaboration, encourage the flow of ideas in decision making, and guidance. though seem controversial, this theory according to bagarette (2014) can be very instrumental in organisations like the school where a high level of accountability is needed in the learning and teaching process as well as the school governance thereof. methodology the article adopted a qualitative case study approach involving township secondary schools of the north west province of south africa. there is equally a trace of the ethnographic component following lengthy period of interaction with the participants. the authors found the approach to be relevant because it enabled us to collect rich qualitative data based on the sgb chairpersons understanding and implementation of school governance through accountability in their various schools. according to creswell (2009), case studies are strategies of inquiry in which the researcher explores in-depth a programme, event, activity, process, of one or more individuals, as it is the case of this article involving three experienced sgb chairpersons from three purposively selected township secondary schools. these sgb chairpersons ranged from the most educated to the uneducated individuals. our selection process was both deliberate and flexible as emphasised by hennink, hutter, and bailey (2011) because it involved people of specific characteristics and experience of the topic, hence can provide detailed understanding on our research concern. data collection was done through individual face to face interviews with all three participants who were encouraged to tell their stories regarding accountability issues in the running of schools. beside interview, participant observation was equally performed. this was done by attending three crucial sgb monthly assessment meetings where the authors spend ample time with participants at the various sites, to understand assumptions, values, beliefs, and experience of the sgb chairpersons in school governance and accountability. each interview that lasted for at most an hour and at least forty minutes was transcribed verbatim. the inductive data analysis approach which is thematic in nature was adopted based on the following steps: aggregation of data according to questions, identification of patterns in the data, categorisation and open coding of data in terms of common emerging themes. also, because observation was used, the triangulation of data which entails enhancing the understanding of a phenomenon was used during the discussion phase to ensure a valid and reliable conclusion of results. findings and discussion the results were presented under the various themes with direct quotations from one participant to the other, accompanied by a discussion of the findings. theme 1: the connotation and nature of accountability in schools the different sgb chairpersons were asked to describe the meaning of the concept accountability based on their various understanding. from the results obtained, 2 sgb chairpersons collectively describe the concept accountability to mean giving feedback over a task that has been entrusted on you to perform. similarly, another opinion was shared by relating the response to the performance of given responsibilities in preparation for any future questioning. a direct quotation from the participants read as follows: accountability means performing expected 50 duties as per your contract and also ensuring that you do all those activities that are being assigned to you diligently (cp1). also, that accountability refers to individuals or people at the workplace having to perform certain responsibilities that carries along the mission and vision of the school (cp2). and lastly, that accountability is the act of making sure that your activities as a leader aligns with vision and mission of the school (cp3). arguably like the view of young (2016), sgbs in england have substantial control and responsibilities regarding the education of learners. this by implication means that accountability involves three key aspect namely people, responsibilities, and reporting in what spaull (2013) simply describe as a state of being answerable for something to someone. with such huge responsibilities delegated to them, sgb chairpersons are therefore expected not only to report back to the board members, but also owe a responsibility to report to the community through responsible authorities like the sgb chairpersons in a collective fashion by involving everyone in the decisionmaking process. a further examination of the different views above in cognisance with observation during our visit to the study sites, reveals that as far as accountability is concern every sgb member has a task to perform, as well as knows what is expected of them. but reporting back when called to do so often makes them uncomfortable as they often see the leader under whom they are expected to report back to be bossy or rather too demanding. however, because the use of terminologies is largely guided by the idea the authors intend to disclose, participants were asked to identify other possible concepts which to them have similar meaning and which would make them more comfortable in place of accountability. participant cp3 revealed saying “responsibility is a concept closely related to accountability because, once you are responsible over something, you must be able to account over any decision that you take. thus, responsibility can be use in place of accountability”. similarly, participant cp1 affirmed that the concept answerability is closely related to accountability as earlier suggested by spaull (2013). this is because a school is a public entity entrusted upon a group of stakeholders, who are expected to report back or be answerable to the public when called upon to do so. it was therefore considered to be preferable as opposed to accountability which according to cp1, “it makes one seems as though you have committed a crime”. whichever way the authors look at it, accountability is accountability and requires some form of a participative effort from the entire sgb board in what bush and middlewood (2013) says that opportunities must be given to other members of the board including principals to engage in the process of decision making. despite the misconception however, it was deduced from the study that the essence of accountability in schools is to guide through an effective monitoring system of particularly the annual teaching plan and learner performance as opposed to implementing harsh punishment upon committing an offense. theme 2: the pattern of accountability in schools the sgb chairpersons were asked to describe or demonstrate how the concept accountability is practiced in their various school environment. based on the data obtained, it appears accountability in schools be it private or public is in the form of hierarchies. participant cp2 says that “there is a financial committee in the school that consists of the financial secretary, the deputy principal, and the treasurer of the sgb”. an evaluation of participants’ views from the empirical study suggested that though sgb chairpersons have other responsibilities, their main interest is in finance. as explain by participant cp1, “at the beginning of the financial year, the sgb committee 51 looks at the needs of the school and place them in order of preference”. this is followed by the allocation of funds to the various sectors according to the need. at this level, the financial secretary is responsible for all financial records that must be directed to the sgb says participant cp1. this is in confirmation of mestry and bisschoff (2009) earlier confirmation that the sgbs have as part of their responsibility to share the limited finances obtained as indicated in section 34 of the sasa between human and physical resources at schools with the aim of achieving effective educational goals. therefore, in monitoring or keeping sgb chairpersons accountable for a successful financial management, participant cp1 says: they (sgbs) are expected to report as per the expenditure plan in their monthly and quarterly report which determines whether or not there is an over or under expenditure. observation in some instances pointed to the degree of reporting that is expected in the domain of finance for proper accountability. thus, a further demonstration that where there is responsibility, there must be accountability. acording to skedsmo and huber (2019), in applying these core principles of accountability to an educational system, it must be remembered that schools are by nature highly structured institutions with clear positions of hierarchy within the members. one of the participants (cp2) during interview explained that: it is critical for the sgb to adopt a school development plan that would determine what is expected of every stakeholder towards the development of the school. therefore, whoever is assigned for the collection of fees for example, is highly accountable to the sgb board that oversees the finance. while affirming the above view, cp1 said “if at the end of the year these financial duties are not well executed those placed in charge must be held to account”. this is in line with skedsmo and huber (2019) view that concerns relating to performance, fairness, and efficiency brought about key reform elements such as standardised testing, monitoring, and accountability in the education system must be fully implemented. this explains why heystek (2011) says that policy implementation for quality education in the case of quintile 1-3 schools is usually in the hance of the principals in an attempt to ensure maximum implementation, rather than leaving decision making in the hands of parents who are illiterate. however, to us, attaining these reforms must not be the point of departure alone. rather, the point of departure should be on the need to make all sgb persons either educated or not to feel involved by means of participation in the policy making processes as well as creating awareness in respect to their responsibilities which entails training. in relation to inclusiveness of stakeholders participant cp1 therefore reveals that “as an sgb person, you have to account for all these tasks on or before due date as stipulated by policy. but not without the learners playing their part in the process by doing their assignments and studying for exams”. an indication that accountability has no limit but rather comprises of the entire team that must be done in the form of hierarchy or managerial leadership fashion ranging from the top involving the department to the bottom involving the school management team. theme 3: the magnitude of accountability in schools in a school as an organisation, specific tasks are often given to specific stakeholders either as a group or as individuals. the sgb chairpersons were asked to identify who they considered as key role players and the degree of accountability at the various schools they are involved. according to the interview with participant cp1: every stakeholder in the school including learners, are key players in the day to day functioning of the school with different areas of responsibilities. 52 in fact, it emerged that every stakeholder has a role to play as far as learning and teaching is concerned and must be accountable to someone. however, failure to perform is tantamount to disciplinary actions, which unfortunately is often considered as the last option especially if it is not for the interest of the learners. findings from a one-on-one interview with participant cp3 reveals that stakeholders are usually given the opportunity to make amends of their mistake rather than an immediate punishment. while acknowledging this view, business day (2012) explain that attempts to address such problems have rather been characterised by the lack of accountability and blame shifting, while the system remains badly in need of professional management and support from all interested stakeholders. furthermore, the sgb chairpersons equally acknowledged that they are aware of their responsibilities as well as the repercussions for failing to comply which is the same for all the stakeholders. regarding the issue of learner security in and out of the school premises, it is well defined by rsa (1996b) and understood by the stakeholders that it is the responsibility of the educators based on the stipulations of loco parentis to look after learners that have been entrusted under their care by parents. findings reveal that there have been cases or situations in which principals and educators are taken to court by parents for failing to provide adequate security over a particular learner while in order instances it was resolved amicably. regarding this, participant cp2 says: we had a case some three years ago where a court case was opened against one of our educators. fortunately, because of my influence in the community as the sgb chairperson, i invited the parent over in the presents of the educator and the matter was resolved. an important role demonstrated by the sgb chairperson in this instance is the right to be heard which was offered to both parties. in other instances, as deduced from the data it could become more problematic if the learner suffers physical injuries that can cause disability or even death. to these sgb chairpersons therefore, every effort is made to ensure that all problems are resolve at the level of the school governing board before they escalate. in line with the above analysis, the authors believe that smith and holloway (2020) were to a greater extent correct in their disclosure that the process of evaluating school performance based on learner performance measures narrowly defines educator quality. thus, educators play a multifunctional role which range from ensuring that the school climate is good enough for learning as well as classroom management. consequently, besides the role of the collegial theory in ensuring learner’s safety through participation, the above explanation further display the role of an effective and efficient leadership role. theme 4: other leadership responsibilities (educator recruitment) following the decentration of the south african education system, in which the powers over decision making was entrusted on the school (hooge et al., 2012; mestry & ndhlovu, 2014), it follows that the sgb has as part of their responsibilities to recruit educators. like in the other areas of responsibility, it was unanimously revealed that the sgb is responsible to see that the process of recruitment is done accordingly, whether assigned by the department of education or for their own personal need as an independent organisation. affirming this view participant cp1 says that: because of my level of exposure, connection, and level of accountability to parents as a former principal, i am sometimes entrusted with the authority to hire an educator payable by the sgb in collaboration with the principal. under such circumstances one would assume that the sgb in collaboration with the principal is at the centre of educator’s employment and of making sure that every classroom has an educator 53 through self-generated funds. however, it remains the responsibility of the department of education to advertise the position(s) either through government gazette, newspapers and various online platforms, while as part of the smt, the sgb does the screening and shortlisting which are then referred back to the department for appointment (cp2). this is like seakamela (2011) earlier explanation that the governments in many countries respond to accountability pressures by taking the lead in setting goals, establishing priorities, and building frameworks for accountability while at the same time shifting authority and responsibility for key functions to school level. this is important for a managerial leadership system which is characterise by hierarchy as it would clearly define the different levels of accountability for every stakeholder. another notable remark is on the criteria involved in the recruitment process of educators. participant cp3 on a very serious note emphasised saying “as far as accountability is concern, people can sometimes abuse their powers or bypass authorities to attain the said objectives or goals of the school”. for example, participant cp1 says: at some point of the recruitment process at our school, only male educators are hired with no major challenge from the department or community because it is a constructive discrimination. this by implication means that if the objective of learning and teaching is to achieve a successful outcome, then the department must worry not about how it is attained. unfortunately, the authors hold that though some form of collaboration or partnership is displayed through mutual agreement, this is an act of unfairness through gender bias which must be condemn because the school as an organisation is guided by principles like fairness as indicated in the south african school act 84 of 1996 (rsa,1996b). this however affirms the postulation by heystek (2011) that the issue of decentralisation or participative leadership in schools would work better for schools with more educated members of staff. however, the department has an obligation to ensure that even in township areas such as those in this case study with high illiteracy rate, the parents get the help they deserve. as deduced from the data the sgb is responsible for the payment of educators hired by them through fun raising which is often very challenging for quantile 1-3 schools. this was confirmed from two separate interviews where on the one hand participant cp3 revealed that “the budget allocated by the doe does not allow for extra employees that are brought on board for temporal teaching”. while participant cp1 from a quintile 5 school says “we are self-sufficient in our school. beside the allocation received from the government, we also raise funds through the sgb in various forms because we have a lot of educators paid by us”. therefore, in both instances, the sgb would be compelled to raise funds in different forms as stated in section 34 of the sasa 84 of 1996 (mestry & ndhlovu, 2014). in trying to demonstrate the severe nature of the problem particularly for quintile 1-3 schools, cp3 says: hired educators usually go unpaid for some time while the sgb negotiate with the national treasury for their payments to be made. unfortunately, this usually does not end well as employees through their different unions embark on strikes actions even before negotiations are made for their payments which often result in very tense situations among stakeholders. incorporating this idea with the collegial theory would mean bringing other community members including part time educators on board by means of participation in the decision making and implementation process, thereby easing the pressure on the sgb chairpersons. conclusion and recommendations 54 this study on the accountability of sgb chairpersons was conducted in selected township secondary schools in the north west province of south africa. for almost three decades into democracy, the governance of south african schools has undoubtedly been characterised by decentralisation, with maximum authority delegated to the parents through the sgb. the degree of influence or relationship to which parents have on the educational outcomes of schools though according to heystek (2011) is almost invisible, has proven to vary from one school type (quintile system) as well as environment to the other. thus, warrants a high level of accountability to higher authorities. this is because no single sector or unit of a school as an organisation can work in isolation. it logically follows that every stakeholder including the learners and non-teaching staffs should be held accountable for their deeds and misdeeds. in a school as an organisation, the principal is often considered to be the accounting officer base on their leadership role. however, the process of accountability would be more productive in a school environment where there is a high level of participation by the governing bodies (parent component inclusive) who have been granted full autonomy as indicated in the sasa 84 of 1996 to hold other members of the smt to account. unfortunately, most of the township schools in the area under study falls between quintile 2 and 3 where the parents are mostly illiterate and unavailable to take responsibilities. hence, resulting to instances where the parents either out of trust, or lack of the zeal to take responsibility, delegate their authority to the school principal or sgb chairperson over pertinent decision making. moreover, in analysing the data from both literature and the empirical findings, it could be deduced that accountability would mean taking responsibility over resources that have been given to the school authorities who in return would give an account to a higher authority about how these resources were used. thus, the assumption that responsibilities must be given to an individual before they could be held to account. most often than not, educators are held accountable in respect to the implementation of the curriculum as well as learner performance thereof. however, traces of accountability on the side of other officials like the sgb chairpersons can equally be found, considering that it is their responsibility for instance to provide funds for privately hired educators. subsequently, other stakeholders like the department through monitoring must ensure that all due processes of educator employment are followed in order to ensure fairness. it is then in their best interest to ensure that for any drastic measure like suspension and dismissal to be taken against educators who failed to perform their responsibilities, the interest of the learners must first be taken into consideration. as a recommendations, it goes without saying that even in the presence of a high level of poor performance that warrant some degree of accountability, reflective rather than retributive actions could be taken in the form of motivation of stakeholders. also, there is clearly a huge need to educate employees on the purpose of accountability, thereby avoiding a possible miscontextualisation and resistance. whether responsibility or answerability which are all synonyms of 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(2016). asking the ‘right’ questions: the constitution of school governing bodies as apolitical. journal of education policy, 31(2), 161-177. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/02680939.2015.1062145 https://doi.org/10.1177%2f105268461802800404 https://doi.org/10.1007/s11092-019-09305-8 https://doi.org/10.1007/s11092-020-09342-8 https://doi.org/10.1108/ijpsm-05-2018-226 https://doi.org/10.1080/02680930903548411 https://doi.org/10.1080/00071005.2010.529416 https://doi.org/10.1080/02680939.2014.941414 https://doi.org/10.1080/02680939.2015.1062145 30 collaborative educational robotics for the inclusion of children with disabilities andromachi nanou1, dimitris karampatzakis2 1,2 department of computer science, international hellenic university, greece abstract. this literature review aims to collect systematically peer-reviewed research articles published in scientific journals that focus on the participation of children with disabilities in collaborative educational robotics activities. after systematic research, using three major digital scientific libraries, we full-screened eleven research studies that were implemented in inclusive or special settings and published during the period 2010-2022. these articles were selected as they described in detail the psycho-pedagogical methods that were used by the researchers to foster the participation of children with disabilities in collaborative educational robotics activities. the psycho-pedagogical methods have been categorized and presented critically in relation to the research methods and results. finally, the discussion section of this review highlights the need of promoting collaborative methods in the context of inclusive educational robotics environments. keywords: educational robotics, inclusion, collaboration, autism, developmental intellectual disabilities, neurodevelopmental disorders. to cite this article: nanou, a. & karampatzakis, d. (2022). collaborative educational robotics for the inclusion of children with disabilities. education. innovation. diversity, 1(4), 30-43. doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2022.1.6899 introduction educational robotics (εr) is a promising field with great educational challenges. er introduces children from an early age to programming, engaging them in stem scientific concepts within an authentic and motivating educational context (yuen et al., 2014). through er students improve creativity, logical reasoning, critical thinking (blanchard et al., 2010; miller et al., 2008; yuen et al., 2014), problem-solving, social interaction, collaboration, and teamwork (benitti, 2012). in the field of er specific types of robots are being used. these are robots that can easily be programmed by children, themselves, in order to complete specific tasks or solve problems in the context of short scale projects (pivetti et al., 2020). students that are being engaged in er projects work together in four main tasks: on designing, building, coding, and testing the educational robots (yuen et al., 2014). therefore, er activities create a context in which students collaborate, sharing thoughts and synthesising ideas to enrich their solutions. more experienced can help less-experienced ones. sufficient scaffolding by the teacher or by the more experienced peers support students to use higher-order cognitive processes in the zone of proximal development (vygotsky, 1978). it is well documented that collaboration is connected with higher levels of achievement and positive attitudes to the learning and knowledge requirements process (bruffee, 1995). even programming is more effective when it is collaborative (mcdowell et al., 2002). students, through collaboration, acquire social skills such as explicit, and implicit communication, monitoring, and coordination, and commitment to the common goals, persistence, and patience (johnson & hyde, 2003). joint attention, request for help, management of conflict interventional introduction and social relations, as reported by icfcy, are the prerequisites for the effective collaboration (the international classification of functioning, disability and health for children and youth). social skills have never been as important as they are in the 21st century, where mediated communication is established, and collaboration networks determine an individual's professional and social success. https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2022.1.6899 31 the occurrence of possible difficulties in social skills can adversely affect the personal development and the social and/or professional relationships of the individual. social dysfunctions are often more pronounced in people with mental, cognitive, or developmental disabilities, diagnosed with neurodevelopmental disorders (nd) (autism spectrum disorder (asd), intellectual disability (id), down syndrome (ds), attention deficit hyperactive disorder (adhd) learning disabilities (ld)) and social phobia. these conditions limit the ability to participate adequately and satisfactorily in social and learning environments (bishop, 2010). the increasing research interest in how the er collaborative projects could facilitate the social interactions or motivate and enhance the collaboration of children with nd in special or inclusive educational settings is ascertained (werry et al., 2001; wainer et al., 2010; lindsay, 2011; tsiomi & nanou, 2020; nanou et al., 2022; yuen et al., 2014). it is not only that er reveals hidden potentials and skills (karna-lin et al., 2006), but also that supports and motivates the manifestation of social behaviours for children with disabilities in a variety of communication contexts. the characteristics and the role that the educational robots (ers) are here to play, the learning objectives of the educational processes and the quality of the interactions that children with disabilities develop when they participate in the collaborative er activities are the focus of research internationally (huskens et al., 2013; huijnen et al., 2019, werry et al., 2001; wainer et al., 2010; lindsay, 2011; tsiomi & nanou, 2020; nanou et al., 2022; yuen et al., 2014). the strong research interest regarding the role of educational robots in the enhancement of social skills is developed in addition by the need to utilise er in inclusive environments as, since 2000, the inclusive education through which the 21st-century skills are equally cultivated for all students has been promoted internationally (unesco, 2016). the present review aims to seek, through the international literature, remarkable research outcomes on the use of er technologies as facilitators for social interaction of children with mental, cognitive, or developmental disabilities (nd) in er collaborative educational settings and record the psycho-pedagogical methods that are being used to foster collaborative behaviours. this review aims at answering the following research questions: 1. are there any published researches on collaboration of children or adolescences with nd during er activities? are those researches implemented in inclusive or special environments? 2. do they present adaptations to foster participation in er? 3. do they present psycho-pedagogical methods to foster collaboration in er? related work most of the researches on the social skills’ development of children with disabilities had been conducted by the researchers of social assistant robots (sar). sar factions as social mediators to promote social interaction of children with autism or intellectual disabilities (hedgecock et al., 2014). they support children with autism to initiate social interaction with a parent, a sibling, or a therapist (fridin & yaakobi, 2011), they are being used to access children's imitation ability or to teach simple coordinated behaviours (billard et al., 2007). social assistant robots, in general, support vulnerable groups, ranging in age, impairment, or need, through social interaction (feil-seifer & matarić, 2005). the goal of sar is to create the best circumstances for human-robot interaction for the purpose of giving vulnerable groups assistance or progress in learning or rehabilitation etc. there are a lot of literature reviews on the use of sar for therapeutic reasons (papakostas et al., 2021). in the field of er, systematic research reviews have been conducted to collect and analyse how the educational robots are being used in special educational for children with autism (pennisi et al., 2016) or other kind of disabilities (miguel cruz et al., 2017). a more recent 32 review focused on collecting and analysing research focuses on er projects for children with neurodevelopmental disorders (pivetti et al., 2020). a most current review focus on er researches that present results concerning inclusion of children with disabilities (syriopouloudelli et al., 2021). in order for er to be accessible to children with nd, specific collaborative methods have to be designed, implemented, and assessed. it is well documented that collaborative robotics projects motivate students not only to participate in stem activities and learn scientific concepts, but to develop collaborative behaviours and peer interaction. as established, there is a need to concentrate on research on er with the aim of social skills development and especially collaboration skills of children with autism as er activities are mainly collaborative (yuen et al., 2014). very few studies focus on robotics as a facilitator for social interaction among students with nd in special or inclusive settings (nanou et al., 2022; wainer et al., 2010). there is a lack of a systematic review of research focused on the use of educational robots as facilitators for social interaction and collaboration with participating children with nd. research methodology this literature review was based on the methodology of grant & booth (2009), to answer the research questions with the specific aim to collect the research on er collaborative projects with the participation of children with nd (asd, id, ds, and adhd, ld) that were published in peer-reviewed scientific journals after 2010 till 2022. the review research has been conducted from january 2022 to april 2022 in multiple digital libraries including web of science (webofknowledge.com), scopus and google scholar. the keywords “intellectual and developmental disability”, “educational robot(s)”, and “collaboration” were applied in the textsearch fields (i.e., title, abstract, keywords, full text), using several logical combinations of “and” and “or”. figure 1, depicts the selection process, showing each stage of the research procedure. in total, 1063 references were found. after the removal of 250 duplicates remained 813 articles for the first screening. three main inclusive criteria were applied:  the study must be published in peer-reviewed journals in english  the study must be dedicated to nd  the study must focus on the use of one or more ers (programmable by children) figure 1 the selection process and each stage of the review 33 we started by first screening the articles by their titles and abstracts based on the inclusion criteria. after the first screening, 720 articles were rejected and 93 remained for full-text screening. in the full screening, we applied two main inclusion criteria:  the study must take place in a special or inclusive educational setting  the study must include an er collaboration experiment or evaluated model of or a design of an associated product for use by participant/s in teamwork after a thorough reading, 82 articles were rejected, and 11 research studies remained for the review that met the inclusion criteria. results in further analysis, as presented in table 1, we reviewed eleven (11) research studies according to the following methodological elements, type of intellectual or developmental disability, setting (special/inclusive), age range, er kit, the aim of the research, adaptations, duration of the intervention, psycho-pedagogical method of team collaboration, research methods, and results. the eleven research articles that were selected for analysis constitute empirical research on collaborative er projects that were conducted with the participation of a group of children or adolescents with all kinds of nd, aged 5-17 years old. five of the selected research studies (45%) took place in inclusive settings, two in inclusive schools (n=2, per=18%), two in inclusive after school clubs (n=2, per=18%) and one in a summer school club (n=1, per=9%). six of them (n=6, per=54%) took place in special education settings, two in special schools (n=2, per=18%), two in hospitals (n=2, per=18%), two in after school clubs (n=2, 18%). table 1 research teams in relationship with the participants, the setting, and the aim of the research study r e s e a r c h t e α m t y p e o f d is a b il it y in c l u s iv e a p p r o a c h r a r t ic ip a n t s / g r o u p s a g e r a n g e s e t t in g e r k it a im nanou et al., 2022 asd level2/td yes four (4) td and two (2) asd level 2 /3 children one td and asd 10–11 years old after school club lego nxt 2.0 mindstor ms present effects of sass training in the participation of children with level 2 asd as “suppliers”, in teamwork with typical peers during the inclusive er activities 34 r e s e a r c h t e α m t y p e o f d is a b il it y in c l u s iv e a p p r o a c h r a r t ic ip a n t s / g r o u p s a g e r a n g e s e t t in g e r k it a im chaidi et al., 2021 all kinds yes twelve (12) children formed in two groups of six. 9-12 years old primary general school lego boost kit the project aims to introduce "coding and robotics" to primary school students with fewer opportunities. di lieto et al., 2020 all kinds yes 187 children with typical developme nt and 42 children with sn (in total 13 classes from nine schools) in groups of 5 or 6 children mean age 6 years old general school bee-bot and probot to verify the efficacy of the erlab on executive functions in children with special needs for the first time by using an rct within their school environment fachantidis et al., 2020 asd and intellectual disabilities yes twentytwo (22) students (14 boys and 8 girls) who were in the same class. 21 were typically developing children and one presented with asd / small groups 9-10 years old general inclusive school lego based robot whether intervention using er in general classroom, will improve the level of educational adjustment of a child with asd, help develop communication and social skills and lead to a reduction in undesirable behaviors bargagna et al., 2019 down syndrome (ds) no eight (8) children / 3 children per group 5-12 years old er laborator y (erlab) bee-bot to evaluate er training feasibility, adapting methodology and previously 35 r e s e a r c h t e α m t y p e o f d is a b il it y in c l u s iv e a p p r o a c h r a r t ic ip a n t s / g r o u p s a g e r a n g e s e t t in g e r k it a im experimented activities to promote executive functions in ds children lindsay et al., 2019 all kinds no ten (10) children working in pairs 6-9 years old special / pediatric hospital lego wedo 2.0 how a group-based robotics program for children with disabilities impacted their stem activation ten (10) children working in group of 2 or 3 10-14 years old lego mindstor ms albo-canals et al., 2018 severe asd with cognitive impairmen ts no twelve (12) participant s / 2 children per group 6-14 years old special school kibo program mable toy robot the feasibility of using the kibo robot as an engaging platform to positively impact social and emotional development in children with asd lindsay & lam, 2018 asd, physical disability (cerebral palsy, duchenne muscular dystrophy, etc.), brain injury no twentyone (21) children / 2 children per group / 2 children per group 6-8 years old special /pediatric hospital lego mindstor ms and wedo to explore types of play, solitary, parallel, and cooperative play lindsay & hounsell, 2016 various no ten (10) children working in pairs or groups of three 6–8 years old special /pediatric hospital lego wedo 2.0 to understand the development and implementation of an adapted robotics program to enhance the participation of 36 r e s e a r c h t e α m t y p e o f d is a b il it y in c l u s iv e a p p r o a c h r a r t ic ip a n t s / g r o u p s a g e r a n g e s e t t in g e r k it a im various no ten (10) children working in groups of 3 or 4 9–14 years old lego mindstor ms youth with disabilities while fostering an interest in stem yuen et al., 2014 high functionin g asd (level1) yes ten (10) typical and two (2) asd in groups with 2 or 3 12-14 years old stem educatio n center after school lego nxt 2.0 mindstor ms to evaluate the extent to which students with asd interact with their peers more during structured versus unstructured settings. wainer et al., 2010 high functionin g asd (level1) no eight (8) children / 2 or 3 children in a group 8–14 years old after school club lego mindstor ms nxt to promote social interaction of middle school children with asd, foster collaboration and investigate how er could mediate social interaction if collaborative behaviour could be generalized independently of the number of participants, in most of the research, (9/11, per=81%) they were divided into groups of 2 or 3 children. an exception was the two of the selected research studies that were conducted in school settings where the participants were divided into groups of 6 children. the groups in inclusive settings were in an analogy 1:2 (1 child with disabilities/2 typical development), or 1:1 (1 dis/1 td). only two of the selected researchers addressed preschool children, (n=1, per=18%) while the other ten addressed primary school children (6-14 years old). concerning the kind of robot, two research teams used bee-bot (n=2, per=18%), three used lego wedo (n=3, per=27%), one the kibo (n=1, per=9%), and the other five the lego mindstorms (n=5, per=45%). concerning the aim of the studies seven (63%) were focused on social skills and especially, collaboration (n=2, 18%), participation (n=2, per=18%), interaction (n=1, per=9%), emotional 1 (n=1, 9%), and communication (n=1, per=9%). the next four researchers (36%) addressed the investigation of the teamwork and collaboration in cognitive domains such as executive functions (n=2, per=18%), stem (n=1, per=9%), and coding (n=1, per=9%). 37 the mean time of the collaborative er projects duration was 14 h, sd 5,9. in more detail, in three articles (36%) the authors implemented er projects for 16,5-18 h, in four (36%) for 10-12 h, in one for 27 h, in another one for 8h, and only one for 39,5h (7,5 hours of training were held in class while 32 hours took place online). the longest er projects took place in inclusive schools with the use of the lego mindstorms kit and the shortest in disabled preschoolers (ds) with the bee-bot. in the exception of three of the selected research articles, where the staff was not specified, an expert in er was included in the support team of the children in the inclusive or special setting, in parallel with the teachers or the therapists, in order for the er activities to be performed. volunteers and therapists or teachers supported the er education of the children with disabilities at schools inside the hospital or in the afterschool activities. concerning the methods of collaboration among the members of the group of participants in er activities, two of the selected studies (18%) emphasize the need to be introduced specific rules necessary for group collaboration, and in two studies (18%) there are not any methods that were introduced as their aim was to observe how the interaction and collaboration will be developed spontaneously between the members of the group while playing or programming of εr tools, while in the remaining three (27%) of the selected research studies more general indirect methods are described. indirect methods of collaboration that are being presented in three studies (27%) are presented below:  small groups division or one to one collaboration (3/3)  gradually integration from one-to-one interaction with the adult mediation to bigger groups (1/3)  group thinking (1/3)  adult mediation for relational reinforcement (3/3)  direct methods of collaboration are described as being implemented in the five of the selected articles (45%) assigning of specific roles from the beginning of the teamwork. planner for reading the instructions, searcherfor finding peace, builder for constructing the er model. in another study, the roles had different names were changed to engineer supplier and builder, but their work was the same (3/5):  collaboration script (1/5)  sas strategy for successful collaboration between specific roles (the supplier and the builder) (1/5)  prompts to enhance turn-taking (2/5)  prompts to assigning roles (1/5)  staying on task (2/5)  changing roles (1/5)  six of the selected studies (54%) describe how the activities and the er equipment were adapted in order to be accessible to children with nd and enhance their successful inclusion. these adaptations concern:  structuring of the lessons (5/5)  systematic cycles of start-pause-end of activities considering low attention spans (3/5)  reduction of possible sources of distraction (1/5)  an easier narrative context (1/5)  adapted bee-bot card keys (special larger sensors, switched on/off sensors of 65 mm diameter (jelly bean), were inserted in the place of the original ones) (2/5)  time was progressively increased (1/5)  frequent breaks were proposed (1/5)  token economy strategies (2/5) 38  relational reinforcements (1/5)  jelly bean sensors could be temporarily put off-line, thus limiting the choices of planning and making the activities simpler (1/5)  specific goals for each lesson with an emphasis on cooperation (2/5)  bigger monitors (2/5)  tablets (2/5)  adequate space around the tables (1/5)  blended learning accessible for children with disabilities (1/5) concerning the methodology and the results of the research studies 10/11 (90%) based their results on qualitative methods direct observations with two observers, and use of interrater validity tools, or videotaped sessions to assess collaboration, and interviews with parents and staff and six research studies additionally used pre-post er intervention assessments methods. only in one research study, did there was not a specification of the research methodology. most of the articles (10/11, 90%) presents improvements in social skills, in collaboration teamwork, in social inclusion, in social interactions improvement, in communication and cooperation skills. it is documented that the sense of teamwork during the er activities created a context of sharing the material, improved the cooperative play and collaborative learning, and fostered interactions/collaborations with other children. concerning the research methodology, 10/11 (90%) describe in detail the efficient description of the use of the statistical method of interrater agreement when the observation method was used for data selection and the triangulation methods of reliability. only in one of the selected articles, there is a detailed description of the educational processes and the aims of the educational intervention, but the results are described without a detailed description of the methodology. in all the research studies, the limitation of the existence of the control group was mentioned. the outcomes of our review work related to the methodology and the results of each research team are presented in table 2. table 2 research teams in relationship with the research methodology and the results research teαm preand postassessment qualitative methods of assessment during the er activities results nanou et al., 2022 autonomous participation in the er activities observation of the application of sass / 2 observers in each child protocol / cohens kappa the barriers of the participation of the children with autism in teamwork with their typical peers in er reduced. chaidi et al., 2021 not specified (ns) not specified (ns) socialized and felt accepted, thus boosting their self-esteem di lieto et al., 2020 standardized neuropsychological tests and qualitative measures of roboticprogramming skills teachers’ qualitative observations social inclusion efficient learning motivation and interest in activities and in social interactions fachantidis et al., 2020 sociometric test frequency of behaviour videotaped + 2 observers / interrater agreement. interview with the mothers improvement in communication and cooperation skills, in focus and completion of the tasks, accepted by 2 classmates 39 research teαm preand postassessment qualitative methods of assessment during the er activities results bargagna et al., 2019 pre and post assessments, standardized tests not specified (ns) sense of teamwork among peers and supported imitation learning a qualitative enhancement of passive visuospatial memory span (ns changes) lindsay et al., 2019 questionnaire on steam activation/participation parent'svinterviews improvement in steam activation albo-canals et al., 2018 no observational checklists/video recordings of all the sessions / ptd engagement checklist create a context of sharing the material, as we wanted to validate the usefulness of kibo by itself lindsay & lam, 2018 no direct observations / four researchers / play skills / disruptive behaviours interviews with parents and staff 10/21 children manifested cooperative play by the last two weeks of the programme, the majority (62–71%) of the children shared. lindsay & hounsell, 2016 pre-post surveys observation protocols, interviews with parents and staff enjoy and learn terminology, and have experience with programming and building robot yuen et al., 2014 no observation of social interaction / visual analysis / interobserver agreement collaborative learning environments increased the duration of social interaction for two middle school students with asd wainer et al., 2010 no observation of social interaction / interobserver agreement / structured interviews improved their interactions / collaborations with other children discussion this review provides answers to the research questions that were set at the beginning of this work. concerning the 1st research question, we retrieved few peer-reviewed articles published in scientific journals since 2010 with a focus on collaborative methods in er activities for children with nd. the lack of research studies in this specific domain was recognised by the first studies in the field (wainer et al., 2010; yuen et al., 2014). it must be underscored that 12 years later (2022), little progress had been made in the specific research domain. although it is strongly documented that er projects are collaborative in nature (yuen et al., 2014) and er has already been introduced into the classroom, from kindergarten through high school (nanou et al., 2022) we have few scientific results about how groups of people with disabilities in special or inclusive er settings work together, and how collaboration and collaborative working might be supported. the lack of research results in the field deprives the scientific community of evidence-based empirical data that are necessary for the enhancement 40 of equal participation of children with disabilities in er putting them at risk of not achieving their goals and not being able to engage in er school or afterschool activities. it is encouraging that almost half of the research studies that met the criteria had been conducted in inclusive settings. particular attention should be paid to the last four research studies from 2020 to 2022 (chaidi et al., 2021; di lieto et al., 2020; fachantidis et al., 2020; nanou et al., 2022) that were selected by our research review on collaborative er projects are in inclusive settings and the most three in public schools. one was conducted in an afterschool inclusive setting. as the learning environment, all over the world, comes more inclusive it is hopeful that research on inclusive practices concerning er collaborative activities has started to attract the interest of the researchers in the field (chaidi et al., 2021; fachantidis et al., 2020; nanou et al., 2022; tsiomi & nanou, 2020). lego mindstorms, lego wedo, bee-bot and in one study kibo educational robotics kits were used in collaborative er activities. these kits are potentially suitable for children with disabilities and especially for autism. one of the greatest advantages of lego mindstorms and wedo for the participation of children with asd, is that the model structure for the assembling step by step is represented in the detailed manual that is being included in the kit. these detailed visually structured manuals describe all the facilitated play options, step by step (lauwaert, 2008). through the detailed manuals, the structured activities are visually organized and presented in a planned, sequential, and logical way. this kind of manual is effective in facilitating the constructing play of children with asd (hampshire & hourcade, 2014). beebot is a referee significand device promoting interest and interaction with adults and peers. children can easily control the bee-bot using the buttons at its back (bargagna et al., 2019). concerning the 2nd research question for the adaptations of the equipment or the place, it was found only six of the selected studies (54%) described in detail the adaptations of the er activities to be accessible to children with disabilities and enhance their successful inclusion. these adaptations include a) structuring of the lessons through b) use of token economy strategies c) through the assignment of specific goals for each lesson with an emphasis on cooperation, d) bigger monitors, c) tablets, d) systematic cycles of start-pause-end of activities considering low attention spans e) adapted bee-bot f) card keys, are being described adaptations by more than one researches. as for structuring referred by five of the six research studies (albo-canals et al., 2018; lindsay, 2011; lindsay et al., 2019; lindsay & hounsell, 2017; nanou et al., 2022). concerning the 3rd research question on the specific methods that are being used to foster collaboration only five of the 11 researchers describe specific methods in order for the collaboration to be developed. three of the five research studies (fachantidis et al., 2020; lindsay & lam, 2018; nanou et al., 2022) use the method of specific role assigning but only one supported scaffolding of the process of collaboration using a specific strategy (nanou et al., 2020). according to (yuen et al., 2014) children with developmental disabilities without proper scaffolding little interaction can develop with peers and gain little from the collaboration. although scaffolding, derived from the zone of proximal development, (vygotsky, 1992) has been recognized as the most effective approach and it is known that there is a need for instructional support for both team learning outcomes and individual learning outcomes to be of high quality (kollar et al., 2006) research studies had a little focus on how collaboration could effectively be supported. further designs of collaborative robotics projects that include students with asd would integrate more scaffolds to encourage more intergroup communication and interaction, increase student-initiated participation, and improve collaboration. 41 conclusion this work collected peer-reviewed research articles published in scientific journals that focus on the participation of children with neurodevelopmental disorders in collaborative and inclusive educational robotics activities. after a systematic review, using three major digital scientific libraries, we selected eleven research articles published in scientific journals for full review. these articles satisfy most of our criteria and use qualitative methods of research with sufficient description of the research procedure, tools, and methods of data collection. in this review, the proposed methodologies in literature are categorised and presented critically. the research concerning the adaptations and the psycho-pedagogical methods that foster collaboration of children with nd in er activities is limited till now. we highlight the need of promoting collaborative methods in the context of inclusive er environments as the results are promising for the development of collaborative skills of children with mental, cognitive, or developmental disabilities, especially in inclusive context. additionally, to the psychopedagogical collaborative methods, the design of educational robots with emphasis on inclusive characteristics could foster the inclusion of children with disabilities in er and support their accessibility to 21rts century's’ 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(2014). collaborative robotics projects for adolescents with autism spectrum disorders. journal of special education technology, 29(1), 51–62. doi: https://doi.org/10.1177/016264341402900104 https://doi.org/10.17770/sie2020vol4.5147 http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0024/002432/243279e.pdf https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?oqtwnu https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?oqtwnu https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?oqtwnu https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?oqtwnu https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-44617-6_6 https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?oqtwnu https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?oqtwnu https://doi.org/10.1177/016264341402900104 34 the sas strategy training for children with asd in inclusive educational robotics activities andromachi nanou1, evaggelia tsiomi2, andreas oikonomou3, dimitris karampatzakis4 1,2,4 department of computer science, international hellenic university, greece 3department of education, school of pedagogical and technological education, greece 1,2 interdisciplinary network for special and intercultural education, greece abstract. educational robotics in inclusive learning environments creates a wide area of research where innovative teaching practices and theoretical approaches are developed and investigated in order for the new growing educational challenges to be met. in this context, an educational intervention research was carried out using mixed research methodology. the aim of the research was to investigate the effect of the“sas strategy training” a strategy that developed to foster the participation of children with autism, at level 2, in inclusive teamwork with peers during construction and programming lego mindstorms. 2 children, 10-11 years old, diagnosed with autism, at level 2, participated in two inclusive educational robotics teams with typical peers. τhe sas strategy has been integrated in the collaboration script that was designed to support the interaction between the team members during their collaboration on programming lego mindstorms. the “sas strategy training” had encouraging results in reducing the barriers of the participation of the children with autism in teamwork with their typical peers. critical questions, reflections and new research horizons emerged. keywords: inclusion, participation, educational robotics, lego mindstorms, collaboration scripts, autism. to cite this article: nanou, a., tsiomi, e., oikonomou, a., & karampatzakis, d. (2021). the sas strategy training for children with asd in inclusive educational robotics activities. education. innovation. diversity, 2(3), 34-52. doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2021.2.6723 introduction educational robotics (er) is an innovative and promising discipline with a focus on how robots can foster or support human learning processes in formal or informal learning environments (barker & ansorge, 2007). er studies interests in those kinds of robots that children can manipulate and interact with for educational purposes. the educational robots receive instructions designed and executed through algorithms by the children themselves, to control the behaviour of the robot and complete a specific task (pivetti et al., 2020). although the literature reveals a lot of difficulties that are being raised for the effective integration of er in curriculum, this trend in education have been already introduced into the classroom, from kindergarten through high school, as the design, assembly and programming of er require the use of principles from different sciences such as engineering, computers, mathematics, and physics. er supports the learning processes in different ages and enhance of various skills such as logical reasoning, critical thinking, and creativity (blanchard, freiman, & lirrete-pitre, 2010; miller, nourbakhsh, & siegwart, 2008), problem solving, social interaction and teamwork (benitti, 2012). recently, new research outcomes demonstrated that er bridges gaps that lead to risks of social marginalization and subsequent risks of early school leaving by improving learning motivation, interest in learning itself and engagement of children with disabilities in active learning processes (daniela & lytras, 2019). the last ten years, much work has been conducted to investigate the effectiveness of er engagement of children with disabilities (pivetti et al., 2020; sannenan et al., 2020; tsiomi & nanou, 2020; hinchliffe, saggers, chalmers & hobbs, 2016; yuen, mason & gomez, 2014; https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2021.2.6723 35 wainer et al., 2010;). the interest of many of the authors focused on which kind of robots, which educational methods and specific collaborative or cooperative strategies promote the engagement of children with asd or with other kinds of disabilities and foster the learning possess the emotional, cognitive, or social skills. most of the research work had been conducted in special educational settings. although er is being applied in inclusive learning environments, very little research has been conducted in this field (hinchliffe, saggers, chalmers, & hobbs, 2016; tsiomi & nanou, 2020). as the learning environment all over the world becomes more inclusive, there is a need to develop successful inclusive practices and theories within the inclusive context in all fields in formal and non-formal education (seale et al 2014; nanou et al., 2020; nilholm, 2021). the aim of the present study is to investigate the effectiveness of an educational intervention focused on teaching children with autism spectrum disorder (asd) at level 2, a specific strategy, under the name search and share strategy (sass), to foster their participation in teamwork with peers during inclusive er constructive and programming activities with lego mindstorms. the proposed strategy was devised to solve the problem of how children with asd could be fostered to participate in teamwork during er activities. this problem emerged after our previous research work in the field of inclusive er where children with asd were included (tsiomi & nanou, 2020). sass training that was based on the structured teaching (mesibov & howley, 2003) extends legoff's method of assigning specific roles to children with asd in teamwork during lego constructing play. the sass training had been applied in two teams of three 10-11 years old children where two children with autism were included. the participation of children with asd had been assessed by participant and independent observers, through observation protocols and research diaries. a rubric used for the description of the sass usage by children with autism. data analysis followed a mixed research methodology. literature review in inclusive environments, it is important for all students to participate and to learn according to their needs. children with asd included in formal or non-formal educational environments have the same desire in using er technologies and to participate, as their typical peers, in the educational process. participation is the key to childhood development and the "best predictor" of learning for children with autism (iovannone, dunlap, huber, & kincaid, 2003). according to the psychosocial approach, the participation has two dimensions: attendance and involvement. attendance is related to the objective dimension of the concept and takes on the meaning of "i'm here". the involvement, however, has emotional components such as motivation, involvement, perseverance, and sociability in the sense of interaction and interconnection and. on a personal level the content of involvement means engagement (immset al., 2017). according to researchers’ statement “sustainable learning can occur only when there is meaningful engagement. the process of engagement is a journey which connects a child and their environment (including people, ideas, materials and concepts) to enable learning and achievement”(carpenter, carpenter, egerton, & cockbill, 2016). engagement “in the person level is the internal state of individuals involving focus or effort: (page 20) (imms et al., 2017).the engagement of children in er designing, assembling, programming, testing, debugging, and modification activities presupposes effective collaboration and teamwork. participants in an er activity are invited to collaborate on the design and construction of a robot that is required to carry out a project. collaboration requires students to be active and involved (yuen et al., 2014; tsiomi & nanou, 2020). however, children with asd face barriers in communication and socialization that negatively affect their social interactions and participation in activities of day life. people with 36 asd are less engaged in social or physical activities compared to their typically developing peers (askari et al. 2015, simpson, imms, & keen, 2021). research and clinical data have shown that teamwork between typical and non-typical students does not usually lead to substantial learning outcomes if specific rules are not agreed between the team members (bell, 2004; hewitt, 2005; liu & tsai, 2008). the effective engagement of children with asd in an er learning environment depends on the degree of the structuring of the learning environment (mesibov & howley, 2003). structure is oriented by specific collaboration scripts and rules being defined to support teamwork. it is strongly recommended, except in the er environment, that the interactions between students must be structured (dillenbourg, 2002). according to the research findings, when the teamwork in inclusive er learning environments is structured using specific collaborative or cooperative strategies, the participation of the children with asd is increased. more specifically, it was documented by previous research in inclusive er settings, that specific cooperative strategy for structuring the activities and the processes of sharing ideas had positive results in fostering the participation of children with asd and social interactions of typical and non-typical peers (tsiomi & nanou, 2020; tsiomi, pashalidou & nanou, 2020). additionally, one of the best outcomes concerning the participation of children with asd in teamwork during lego construction play have been documented after the assigning of specific roles to each child with asd in the team (legoff, 2004). legoff, in order to promote teamwork during lego construction play, structured the teamwork process, assigning different responsibilities between children with asd (e.g., a child is given a set of instructions and acts as “engineer”; another child has the necessary pieces to make the set and acts as the “supplier”; and another child is the “builder”, who is assigned the task putting the pieces together, following the instructions of the engineer). positive results concerning the participation and social interaction of children with asd peers have been documented (legoff, 2004; pang, 2010). in inclusive er learning environments, where children with asd are included, specific strategies have to be developed in order for the learning environment, the learning processes and the collaboration to be structured. during er activities with peers the collaboration process (e.g. verbal interaction, active gesturing, physical contact) is important to be structured if our intent is children with asd to gain social interaction and skills (yuen et al., 2014). teamwork strategies are strongly recommended to be presented by visual stimuli in order for the participation of children with asd to be effective (tsiomi & nanou, 2020; albo-canals et al., 2015). specific strategies that could impose a specific structure on how children with asd could interact with peers during teamwork inclusive educational robotic activities need to be developed especially for children with asd in level 2 that need substantial support for effective collaboration (american psychiatric association, dsm 5, 2013). the aim of this study this study aims at investigating the effects of sass training in the participation of children with level 2 asd as “suppliers”, in teamwork with typical peers during the inclusive er activities with lego bricks and er lego mindstorms. research questions more specifically, with our intervention we try to give answers to the following questions: 1. will the sass training reduce the barriers and increase the successful participation of children with asd in level 2 in the teamwork with peers a) during the construction activities with lego blocks? b) during the design of the lego mindstorms robot? and c) during programming activities of lego mindstorms robot? 2. will the children with asd learn to use the sass autonomously in teamwork with their peers? 37 methodology research methodology educational intervention is chosen as the most suitable research method. educational intervention is a qualitative study that involves the design, implementation and evaluation of a proposal or curriculum in a particular course and can be related to either the content or the teaching process. requires measurements before and after the intervention. comparing the results of the measurements before and after the educational intervention, the researchers test the success or failure of the educational intervention (damaskinidis & christodoulou, 2019). educational intervention gives answers to educators, questions like: «what works, in what context, with which groups, and at what cost» (hutchinson. 1999). it is also based on detailed and well-timed planning, in a way that accurately records all the steps of the educational process; measurements are provided before and after the intervention so that an improvement can be calculated (hutchinson, 1999). place, schedule, and educational equipment the educational intervention took place at the “tokei maru school for all”, located in triandria thessaloniki, greece. it lasted at 12 meetings of er activities (m1-m12) once a week, and for a period of three months. each meeting had a duration of 90 minutes. the schedule (day and time) of each meeting was fixed. the er equipment consisted of two kits of νχτ lego mindstorms kits were used, one for each team. the children followed an assembling process through the lego mindstorms manual using two 10 inch tablets. the practice in robotics was done on a track (2,40m x 1,20m) intelligently designed for er activities with lego mindstorms. participants 6 children separated in two teams, team a of three boys and team b of three girls, 10-11 years old, were selected to participate in the activities of the inclusive er educational programme. in each group a child with asd was included. all children participated with the permission of their parents in the after-school activities of “tokei maru school for all”. the children with asd did not have any experience in lego mindstorms constructing and programming activities. they were selected to join this activity because they had a keen interest in structured lego play. the children with typical development were selected because they were interested in joining robotic activities. they were experienced in er and familiar in collaboration with asd children at “tokei maru” before. table 1 teams of participants in relationship with researchers participants researchers name role in the team diagnosis observers coordinator a a.1 architect typical 2 1 a.2 supplier asd a.3 builder typical b b.1 architect typical 2 b.2 supplier asd b.3 builder typical the children with asd were both diagnosed by the greek public educational and counselling support center. according to their psychiatric evaluation their functionality was detected at level 2. asd people diagnosed with level 2 have moderate symptoms, showing deficits in verbal and non-verbal social communication skills and limited ability to start social interaction. they need substantial support (american psychiatric association dsm 5, 2013). 38 according to the diagnosis, the boy, named christos, found it difficult to adapt to new social situations and environmental changes. although he had extensive vocabulary, he rarely participated in dialogue. he responded effectively to instructions when presented to him visually. he responded with one word in the dialogue context. he was very skilled in constructive play with blocks. the girl, lina, needed substantial support in social interaction. she used to speak with short sentences. her expressive vocabulary was limited to everyday situations. she responded in the dialogue slowly and she used to discuss specific topics. although she loved art and constructive play with lego, she kept her interest for a limited time, and she was working slowly. educational methodology in the context of educational intervention, the inclusive er programme followed a specific collaboration script (kollar, fischer, & hesse, 2006). the collaboration scripts are scaffolds that shape the collaboration by structuring the interaction process in computer supported collaborative learning. scaffolding supports learners to accomplish tasks that they are not able to accomplish on their own and it is derived by vygotsky as a concept of the zone of proximal development (vygotsky, 1992; wood et al., 1976).the collaboration script of this educational intervention followed five components: i. the learning objective: the children with asd learn to participate as “suppliers” in teamwork with peers during er inclusive activities ii. the type of activities: designing and programming the nxt lego mindstorms into its basic movements, going forward and performing a square to reach specific lego objects in the track. the nxt lego mindstorms were selected as an educational tool that functions as a magnet of interest, to enhance the participation and collaboration between children at each team. the nxt lego mindstorms facilitate the construction play with structured blocks and computational bricks that allow users to create their own robots (lauwaert, 2008). the assembly kit contains building block pieces and a programmable control unit that can enable one to build several robots. it allows users to assemble robots, program the movement, interface sensors and motors without focusing on technical details. the process of assembling and making the robot work involves basic understanding of physical and design principles and elementary programming skills (afari & khine, 2017). νχτ platform provides students with the opportunity to "test their programming skills" as what they are programming through the lego mindstorms robot. they can visually understand "what works" and "what does not work" and "why". lego mindstorms robots provide students with the opportunity to understand fundamental computer programming concepts that are, by their very nature, abstract (afari & khine, 2017). one of the greatest advantages of the lego mindstorms for the participation of children with asd is that the model structure for the assembling step by step is being represented in the detailed manual that is being included into the kit. these detailed visually structured manuals describe all the facilitated play options, step by step (lauwaert, 2008). through the detailed manuals the structured activities are visually organized and presented in a planned, sequential, and logical way. this kind of manual is effective in facilitating the constructing play of children with asd (hampshire & hourcade, 2014). although structured block play with lego is suitable for individual play of children with asd in collaborative robotic projects specific strategies must be developed and taught in order everyone in the team has its role and to keep the collaboration process. collaborative robotics projects require students to work together to solve a robotic task. for example, students can work together to design and build a robot that will find an object, pick it up, and 39 move it to another location (yuen et al., 2014. children with asd face difficulties in initiating or responding to social interactions and need the support of specific strategies to collaborate with peers (silva et al., 2020). the implementation phases of sass during the 12 meetings (m1-m12) are the following: ● phase α: construction activities with lego blocks (m1-m3), ● phase b: robot design (m4-m5), and ● phase c: programming (m6-m12). the er program activities in each meeting is presented below: ● m1: assessment meeting on lego construction without the intervention or the support of special educators. ● m2-m3: lego construction using lego educational material. ● m4-m5: robot design: construction of the nxt lego mindstorms using the sass with optical verbal or physical guidance. ● m6-m8: programming 1st mission, moving front and going back. each team works on a tablet. children with asd are being asked to transfer the blocks to the tablet following the standard image on colour printed cards, using the sass with optical, verbal or physical guidance. ● m9-m11: programming 2nd mission, go forward, come back and turn four times like a square.children with asd are being asked to transfer the blocks to the tablet following the standard image on colour printed cards, using the sass with optical, verbal or physical guidance. ● m12:assessment meeting on programming 1st and 2nd missions without intervention or the support of special educators. iii. the sequence component: the sequence in the script specifies the activities learners should perform and when they should perform them (kollar, fischer, & hesse, 2006).in order for the sequence component to be followed the search and share strategy (sass) steps were designed to structure the er activities in this educational intervention. the sass was devised based on the experience gained by our action research that is conducted for many years with children on the autism spectrum (tsiomi & nanou, 2020) as well as study of the relevant literature and especially the legoff method (legoff, 2004). the sass determines the specific steps that a child with asd must follow to participate as a productive “supplier” while working with the “architecture” and the “builder” in the er team. the children have to share bricks during lego construction or robot design and share information during programming of the robot lego mindstorms. figure1 the five steps of the sas strategy the sass consists of five steps, as illustrated in figure 1.the steps are presented visually to prepare more precisely the children with asd to use the sass during the a,b and c phase of the programme. the steps are: (1) come the child is invited by the teacher to come to the training area, 40 (2) look the child is verbally encouraged by the teacher to focus on the desired point of construction, (3) look for the child is encouraged by the teacher to seek to find the necessary piece either with physical or verbal guidance, (4) find the child finds and confirms with the requested piece, (5) give the child gives the piece and focuses on the assembly process. iv. the role distribution component: specific roles addressed to the participants during the teamwork in er activities. these roles had specified according to legoff’s work on construction play with lego (legoff, 2004) (see table 1) v. the representation component: this component refers to the type of representation of the components of the script. in our educational intervention emphasis had been given to the representation of the sass which constitutes the sequence component of the script. as the sass training addressed to the children with asd the visual representation had been chosen (see figure 1). data collection data concerning the participation of the children with asd after the sass training during the phases (a, b, c) were collected through observation methods and tools. observation consists of the main method of data collection in er activities (bernstein, mutch-jones, cassidy, & hamner, 2020). two observers, special pedagogues, observed the asd children’s participation in the two teams (4 observers in total). the independent observer (io) was to observe the participation processes of the children with asd in each team without taking part in the robotic activities. the participant observers (po) was the one that supported the children with asd in each group to efficiently use the sass. participatory observation combines participation in activities under study by maintaining a professional distance that allows appropriate observation and data recording. both the observers used structured and unstructured observation methods and tools for data collection. work diary was used as an unstructured observation method. work diaries were used by both the participant and independent observer of each team just after the end of each meeting in order their observations and interpretations were recorded. in addition, they recorded methodological notes about her role in the context, her relations with the other researchers, participants, her personal impressions and feelings or practical issues arising in the field (feldman, altrichter, posch, &somekh, 2018; willig, 2008). at the end of each activity, a feedback discussion is held between the observers and special educators to evaluate the educational process. rubric for the assessment of autonomy in the use of sass by children with asd a unique rubric has been designed for the specific research as a tool for the assessment of the level of autonomy in the implementation of the sass by the children with asd in teamwork during the constructive and programming robotic activities. rubrics are effective and efficient tools that are being used for the objective evaluation of a range of performances or activities in any subject area (stevens & levi, 2005). the level of autonomy in the usage of every step of the sass was being accessed by both the coordinator and the independent observer at each group at the beginning of the constructing or programming process in all meetings (m1m12). the rubric that has been designed for the purpose of the research aims at evaluating the degree of autonomy in participation of the children with asd in each of the five sass steps: 1) come, 2) look, 3) look for, 4) find, and 5) give. the coordinator of both teams and the independent observer of each team had to assess the participation in each process using a scale 41 of grades 0-5 that represent the levels of autonomy in the implementation of the strategy. more specifically (0) declares the absence of participation, (1) the intention of participation, (2) the participation with physical guidance of a special educator, (3) the participation after verbal reminders, (4) the participation with visual reminders, and (5) the autonomous participation. the designing of the rubric followed the scaffolding processes derived by vygotskyan concept of the zone of proximal development (vygotsky, 1992). how data was classified and analysed for data analysis mixed methods were used. according to creswell and clark (2007), "data analysis in mixed methods consists of analysing the qualitative data using quantitative methods" (p.128). categorical productive approach was chosen for qualitative data analysis (isaris & purkos, 2015). the reason that the productive rather than the inductive approach in categorical analysis was chosen dictated by the aim of the research, which was to find out specific reactions, that could be given information concerning the participation of children with asd as suppliers in the inclusive educational robotics program and how this participation achieved. the research data recorded by the observers in their diaries were analysed in content units that focus on participation and have been categorized according to two thematic categories: observation of the barriers in participation. these specific thematic categories were predefined to focus and highlight data that are related to the issues being investigated by the research questions (isaris & purkos, 2015). in order for the 1stand 2nd research questions to be answered the barriers and successes in participation of children with asd as they were recorded in the research diaries were counted. research findings 1st research question will the sass training reduce the barriers and increase the successful participation of children with asd in level 2 in the teamwork with peers a) during the construction activities with lego blocks? b) during the design of the lego mindstorms robot? c) during the programming activities of lego mindstorms robot? the data concerning the 1st research question came up by the categorical analysis of the observations included into the research diaries of both the participant observer (po) and the independent observer (ιο) during the a, b and c phase. after the categorical analysis, 110 content units were identified through the research diaries of both the participant (60 units) and the independent observer (50 units) concerning the participation of the boy with asd in teamwork with peers during the three phases (a, b and c) of the sass training. 17 content units into the independent observer’s diaries have been categorized as barriers and 43 as successes of participation. 14 content units into the participant observer’s diaries categorized as barriers and 36 as successes in participation of the boy with asd. the agreement between the two observers (ιο and po) was checked with the cohen's kappa index. specifically, regarding the the boy's participation barriers, the index for the weaknesses of cooperation took a value of 0.660 which ranks the agreement between the observers in a significant agreement (above average) at the level of importance p = 0.001 and for the successes with a value of 0.4 which classifies it as a moderate agreement between the observers with a significance level p = 0.002. figure 2 presents the average of the observed barriers and successes of the boy during the 12 meetings. 42 figure 2 the average of the observed barriers and successes of the boy's participation in each session until the completion of the 12 meetings of the boys' group concerning the participation of the girl with asd in teamwork with peers, 126 content units were identified through the research diaries of both the participant (62 units) and the independent observer (64 units) during the three phases (a, b and c) of the sass training. the independent observer recorded 28 barriers and 34 successes while the participant observer recorded 34 barriers and 30 successes. the agreement between the two observers (ιο and po) was tested with cohen kappa index, showed for each category of semantic coherence above average relevance at the significance level p = 0.001. regarding the barriers, the cohen kappa index for the weaknesses of cooperation took a value 0.571, which ranks the agreement of the observers at the upper levels of mediocrity at the level of significance p = 0.001 and regarding the successes of participation, took a value 0.564, which also ranks the agreement between observers at the upper level of the median, in terms of significance, p = 0.001. figure 3 presents the average of the observed barriers and successes of the girl’s participation during the 12 meetings. figure 3 the average of the barriers and successes recorded by the observers of girl's participation during the meetings (m1-m12) 43 differences in the participation between the boy, christos and the girl, lina, were determined, with the girl facing more barriers, especially in the programming phase (c). more specifically, during the phase (a) in constructing play with lego, both the girl and the boy were facing barriers at the same degree. in the second phase (b) during robot design the barriers were decreased. but in phase (c) during the programming, barriers for the boy were reduced, while for the girl was increased. the barriers and the successes of participation of both children with asd, christos and lina, while using sass in teamwork are described in detail with the comments of the observers as they were recorded into their dairies. the data from the observations of a and b phases are presented concerning the boy first and the girl next. during m1 more barriers than successes were recorded in the boy’s participation. christos entered the tokei maru with his personal lego toys and played alone only with them throughout the meeting. he chose not to participate in the teamwork with peers. while he was talking to himself he was looking at the team working. although the boys asked him to participate he preferred to stay alone. during m2, boys asked christos to join their team from the beginning of the meeting. although he approached the team, he didn’ stop playing with his own lego constructions. he was helped by the special pedagogue to come close to the team, but he had a parallel construction play. the independent observer noted in her diary; “christos looked like not want to participate.the boys had understood that he was really good at construction so they tried to find some ways to interact with him” when the boys asked him to present his lego constructions he responded: “τhese are my constructions. they are vehicles” during m3, robot design phase (b), christos, under the guidance of the special pedagogue, put his personal lego toys in a box and left them visible. special pedagogue helped and ensured that he could have visual contact with his toys any time during the meeting. the team of boys sat at the table and the special pedagogue presented visually the sass describing the steps one by one. the independent observer noted: “the boys helped to put on the table the pictures of the sass steps and the starting letters of each step that on the pictures because christos could recognize the alphabet letters” they started assembling the robot in which christos participated following the sass steps with the help of the special pedagogue and with the support of the other boys. the sass pictures were sent to his parents by email so that christos could study the pictures and be better prepared. during m4, christos’ participation progressively increased with longer duration. christos had learned the routine of entering the room, putting his personal toys in the transparent box and sitting at the table with his team members where the sass pictures were put. at first, he started to follow the steps with physical guidance by the special pedagogue. the participant observer wrote in her diary: “the mindstorms manual and the construction of the collaboration process through the sass strategy, helped him to organize his participation during the robot design and to contribute as a member of the team” in the m5 it is noted that he was upset when he entered the room. although he was confused, he participated in the construction of the robot. he helped his team to find the correct pieces with the guidance of the special pedagogue. concerning the participation of the girl with asd, lina, during m1, more barriers than successes were recorded. from the first time lina joined the girls, the members of her team talked with them asking their names. thus, while responding to the call of her team members to focus her gaze and attention on the book of orders for lego construction, she participated only in the role of the observer without proceeding with the search and finding of the appropriate block. 44 during m2 and m3 after she was taught the steps of sass by pictures with the support of the special pedagogue her participation became more successful. the participatory observer, special pedagogue, noted the barriers that lina was face: “she looked at the brick shown to her in the guide, raised her hand to look for the pieces but reassembled her hand as if unsure. she needed physical guidance to complete the steps" the sass pictures were, also, sent to her parents, so that lina could study them before the next meeting. at m4 and μ5 lina was involved in the process of assembling the robot. according to both the independent and the participant observers, lina participated successfully during the robot design (phase b). the reason was due to the robot components that were settled in the specific places in the kit. this arrangement of the components in the kit made it easier for lina to search and locate the blocks the team was looking for. throughout the process the support of the special educator was necessary, especially when lina lost her concentration. during the phases a and b of the sass training there was progressive closeness and success in involving children in assembly teamwork. findings from the phase c are presented below for both the boy and the girl: during m6, christos' participation improved. although the means of implementation were changed and a tablet with the programming software was added through the nxt platform, the participation of the child continued, and in fact because he had a special interest for digital media, his participation was of better quality. he was significantly helped by the sass pictures that were put during the meeting on the table. during the step give of sass christos had to put in the "programming frame" the programming blocks using the touch screen of the tablet. the team decided how many blocks christos had to put in the “programming frame” and he became the “supplier” of the blocks during programming. during m7, christos' participation continued to be active. he managed to put all the blocks even though they were increased. in the m8, christos made his routine at the entrance, placing his toys in the box. this time he approached his group alone after the children's call. he follows the steps of the sass with minimal guidance from the special pedagogue. he successfully transferred the blocks and when he completed his mission, he gave the tablet to the next one. in m9 they programmed robots to move on. christos followed the steps of the sass and transferred the appropriate blocks. however, because these were more, they needed verbal guidance from the special educator. he was enthusiastic about the robot's movement. the children completed the arrangements for the robot's movement and christos watched the team in programming tests. during m10-m11 he entered with great enthusiasm. he followed his routine and approached the team alone. he followed the steps of the sass and the cooperation was constructive. the support of the special pedagogue was deemed necessary in the steps that christos seemed to have difficulty in (numbering the necessary blocks for programming). in the last meeting christos followed the verbal guidance of the special pedagogue to stay in his team and work together placing the blocks. the special pedagogue's notes in her diary “christos could be taught how to adjust the other parameters in order to control the movement of the robot”. on the other hand, during m6-m7, a decrease in lina's successes was observed according to both the observers. this change was attributed to the activities of programming during the phase c. during this phase the teamwork was differentiated. as a result, it was difficult for lina to participate especially during the 7th meeting. according to the observers, lina’s behaviour was affected negatively by the constant movements of the girls of her team, who were moving all the time while programming and testing their robot on the track. these new conditions in their collaboration were unexpectedly differentiated according to the previous m2-m5 collaboration conditions, in which less movement was required. even when the special pedagogue showed lina the steps of the programming process visualized, she found that lina had a difficulty in concentrating. the special pedagogue, as she realized that difficulty, asked 45 the girls of her team to stay at the table, next to lina, in order to complete the programming in a specific place. in the following meetings (m8-m9) the planning process was visually structured to facilitate lina's participation. except for the sass pictures, pictures of the exact number of blocks that lina had to transfer to the canvas-programming surface were placed on the table. the construction positively affected lina's participation, which seems to have increased according to the observers of cooperation possibilities. lina started following the team on the track and participating by giving the command with the support of her team girls in the robot to move. although her participation was mechanistically she understood the process and her role in the team, as “supplier”. lina found it difficult to participate in the programming process during the next meetings. the independent observer notes: “the programming process was complex as it required eight blocks that lina had to measure and place on the canvas in a row”. the comparison of the successes and barriers of participation of both boys and girls between the 1st and the 12th meeting when there was no support by special pedagogues is presented in figure 4. τhe barriers in participation for both the boy and the girl were reduced from m1 to m12. although the boy, during m1 had no success in his participation as he worked alone, at the final meeting m12, his participation was totally successful, according to both observers. christos was accepted as a member of the er team and participated in the process of construction and programming of lego mindstorms, using the sass. on the other hand, the girl, lina, although from the first meeting she had positive interaction with the girls' team, needed strong support from the special pedagogue to participate effectively in the programming phase. at the last meeting m12 faced barriers using the sass but she managed to collaborate with the guidance of the other girls of her team. of course, as one observer points out, it was obvious that her participation was achieved without the corresponding understanding of concepts and programming algorithms, concepts that the other members of the team understood. figure 4 the successes and the barriers of participation of both boy (a) and girl (b) at the m1 and m12 with no support of special pedagogue the sass training as pilot intervention showed that inclusive er teams could be effective under identifying and specific roles and collaboration scripts that determine the steps of collaboration. the process of deepening concepts to participate effectively at the cognitive level remains to be further explored in mainstream research. 2nd research question will the children with asd increase the level of their autonomous implementation of the sass as suppliers in their teamwork? 46 the level of autonomy differentiated between the two children and between sass steps. figures 5 and 6 presents the levels of the boy’s and girl’s with asd autonomy in the implementation of the sass during the er m1-m12 figure 5 levels of the boy’s with asd autonomy (0-5) in the implementation of the sass during the er m1-m12 as presented in figure 5, christos at the first meeting of his team, rated 0 which means the absence of participation in teamwork. at m2-m3 at all the steps of sass declared an intention to participate in the teamwork by approaching the team or looking at the manual but his participation was unsure (rated 1 or 2). in the next, m4, he managed to follow the first two steps of the strategy (come and look) with his own effort and the other steps (find and give) with visual support and vertical prompts by the special pedagogue (rated 4). during m5 he needed support by physical guidance by the special pedagogue as he was disrupted, according to the observation diaries (rated 1 and 2). but in the next meetings (m6-m8) the physical guidance of the special educator was reduced. christos could follow the steps of sass with virtual support. in the phase of programming (m8) he was able to independently conquer the first steps of the strategy (come, look, look for) but he needed visual and verbal support to find, give steps of sass. finally, during m9-m12 although the tasks for programming were more complex, the boy supplied the programming blocks in the canvas himself with only visual support. in the last two meetings, even if the task was more complicated, christos followed sass steps with visual prompts and/or verbal guidance. 47 figure 6 levels of the girl’s with asd autonomy (0-5) in the implementation of the sass during the er m1-m12 as presented in figure 6, lina's first meeting with the girls' team had positive results concerning the first two (2) sass steps. lina rated 5 to the first two sass steps (come, look) as she independently approached and stayed close to the team without guidance. this was a stable characteristic of her participation in all the meetings. in contrast to christos, she needed more support to apply the last steps of the strategy. more specifically during all the meetings graded 1 or 2 concerning the look, look for, find and give of sass steps, which means that she followed the sass to participate with physical guidance by the special pedagogue. this was the same also for the robot assembly meetings (m4-m5) and for the programming meetings. the need for guidance was ensured also by the observations of her participation according to which lina was delayed and the special pedagogue with physical guidance helped her to be more effective. only in the last meeting she completed the sass steps with the visual support and verbal guidance with the support of her team in the last two sass steps. conclusions and discussion the analysis of the findings leads to the following conclusions although the children with asd with the need of substantial sup.port that were included in the two er teams with typical peers during the educational intervention that was carried out, managed to "be on their roles" in teamwork as “suppliers” and to start functioning autonomously with the visual support of the sass. it is documented therefore, that sass training fostered the participation of the two children with asd in level 2 in er inclusive activities. sass training took place in authentic inclusive settings. it has to be mentioned that the children with asd haven’t got any special intervention before but were taught the sass in real time with their typical peers. by the observation of the children in the authentic learning environment drew to the conclusion the assignment of specific roles of the children in teamwork, the determination of the specific steps that the “supplier”could be followed as these steps were determined by the sass, the representation type and the support of special pedagogues created the circumstances of promoting the participation of both children with asd in the construction and programming phases of the er lego mindstorms activities. the support of special pedagogues progressively minimized. 48 the educational robots, lego mindstorms, functioned as "collaborative motivators". the choice of lego mindstorms as the er education kit was derived mainly because of their dominant acceptance and use in educational institutions. also, lego mindstorms has a widespread active community and supporting educational material. learning practices through lego (only bricks) and lego mindstorms (er) especially for children with autism spectrum disorders (asd) are getting strong attention by education and academic society. lego, as structured, rule-based play, had strong evidence in facilitating social interaction and participation of children with asd in team work with peers (legoff, 2004; legoff & sherman, 2006). the model structure for the assembling step by step as it was being represented in the detailed manual, proved an effective educational material suitable for children with asd and challenging at the same time for typical children. the detailed visually structured manuals that are being described by (lauwaert, 2008) proved very effective in inclusive settings where children with asd are being included. lego mindstorms nxt canvas was helpful for the children with autism to participate in the programming phase. their participation during the programming phase fostered by using sass as searching and sharing the blocks in the programming canvas. sass in block programming has the meaning of search and sharing information ( programming blocks), while at constructing phases has the meaning of search and share the real blocks. sass gave children the opportunity to participate actively and to be engaged in construction and in programming with peers just after 11 meetings. the sass was used as a common communication code between the team members, and this gave them the confidence to continue their collaboration. according to the observations of the observatory "the children of typical development knew what to do to cooperate". the sass essentially contributed to leading and integrating the children into the teamwork so that the collaboration becomes more effective. the educational intervention that was carried out continues the research on educational methods and strategies that can be applied in inclusive er learning environments. although the level of function of children that participated in this research was lower than the ones that had participated in inclusive er in australia (hinchliffe et al., 2016), benefits documented by the research findings. one of the main limitations of our educational intervention is the lack of control groups that could be left without intervention. in the inclusive settings it is not recemented, not an intervention without support to be applied. the absence of a control group is a usual methodological weakness in er activities and especially in special or inclusive settings. according to the most recent review (pivetti et al., 2020), eleven from thirteen research works in the field of er programs addressed to people with disabilities didn’t test their results in comparison with a control group. the lack of control group is expected due to the difficulties in the availability of participants. in these educational interventions the designing of research follows the restrictions of occasional participation. as the field is new and the interest of researchers is really strong the research is under the circumstances of occasionality. of course, the interpretation of the results has to take into consideration the specific limitations till the circumstances be more mature (e.g., er be implemented in all populations in formal and non-formal education and their utilization will be spread in all educational settings).the other limitation is the small number of participants. in order for the results to be reliable the sass has to be taught to more children with asd in inclusive settings. although the participation of the children with asd was encouraging, future research has to focus on educational interventions that could foster the automatization of the sass in their teamwork as suppliers. also, the investigation of functioning under differentiated roles (e.g., as builders) could be promising and helpful in promoting the participation of children with asd in er programmes. also, future research has to investigate educational methodologies and 49 strategies to increase the engagement of children with asd in programming er. the investigation of the subjective aspect of participation due to the imms et al. (2017) model would be measured under the self assessment approach in order the engagement of persons with asd to be globally estimated. we do not know how the process of learning could go on if the research had the opportunity to deeply focus on programming. children with autism at level 2 may have the opportunity to understand fundamental computer programming concepts with the support of specific educational strategies as many researchers highlight for typical children (afari & khine, 2017). references afari, e., & khine, m. s. (2017). robotics as an educational tool: impact of lego mindstorms. international journal of information and education technology, 7(6), 437–442. https://doi.org/10.18178/ijiet.2017.7.6.908 albo-canals, j., fernández-baena, a., boldu, r., barco, a., navarro, j., miralles, d., raya, c., & angulo, c. 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(1976). the role of tutoring in problem solving. journal of child psychology and child psychiatry, 7 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.14697610.1976.tb00381.x https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-7610.1976.tb00381.x https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-7610.1976.tb00381.x title of the paper. 20 examining inclusion and exclusion in higher education: a case study of blind students at a rural based south african university clever ndebele1, milton gadisi2 1walter sisulu university, directorate of learning and teaching mthatha campus, south africa 2university of venda, centre for higher education teaching and learning south africa abstract. this study sought to examine barriers to learning for blind students at a rural based south african university. premised on the qualitative design, data were collected through semi-structured individual interviews with 5 blind students, two academic support staff and four lecturers who were identified through purposive sampling. emerging themes from the data were identified through content analysis of the verbatim responses. the study found that reasonable accommodation was not provided for blind students in the lecture halls at the university under study. the study further found that, study materials and computers in the university library and mainstream computer laboratories were not adapted for blind students. third, lecturers were not trained to teach blind students with some lecturers using powerpoint presentations while teaching when blind students could not access the screens. the study recommends universal design for all learning facilities, thorough training for all staff teaching students with disabilities and the development of a disability policy in the university. keywords: blind, braille, reasonable accommodation, disability, universal design. to cite this article: ndebele, c. & gadisi, m. (2022). examining inclusion and exclusion in higher education: a case study of blind students at a rural based south african university education. innovation. diversity, 2(5), 21-36. doi: https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2022.2.6945 introduction the recognition of the rights of people with disability has been on the united nations agenda for a while (un convention on the rights of the child (uncrc, hereafter) 1989; un standard rules on the equalisation of opportunities for persons with disabilities (unsreopd, hereafter) 1993; un convention on the rights of persons with disabilities (uncrpd, hereafter) 2006). several countries, including south africa, have ratified some of these conventions and started putting in place legislation to accommodate learners with disability. legislation in the uk requires all public authorities, including higher education institutions, to actively promote equality of opportunity for people with disabilities (goode, 2007; richardson, 2015; vickerman and blundell 2010). in brazil, the educational integration of persons with disabilities (visual, auditory, physical and intellectual) has increased (de camargo et al., 2013). australia, the united states of america and israel, have legislation concerning the integration of students with disabilities into higher education (fuller, bradley and healey 2004). recently, the united arab emirates in the middle east made efforts to promote the rights of people with disabilities (alhammadi, 2016). in australia, policy initiatives and legislation ensure that students with disability are presented with an equitable experience in, and access into, higher education (dryer et al., 2016). in zimbabwe, disability policies are in place although outdated (chikukwa & chimbwanda, 2013). findings from the literature indicate that despite a growth of interest in widening access, participation and inclusive higher education, the voices of disabled students themselves have hardly been heard (fuller, bradley, & healey, 2004; vaccaro, kimball, ostiguy& wells, 2015; moriña, 2019). furthermore, while legislation has been enacted the https://doi.org/10.17770/eid2022.2.6945 21 world over as shown in the preceding paragraphs to enable access for students with disabilities, little research seems to have been conducted on the category of blind students and their experiences of the higher education context. studies conducted seem to either focus on students with disabilities in general or where research focus is on visually impaired students, blind students and partially sighted students are lumped together. (see for example, fuller, bradley, & healey, 2004; whitburn, 2014; seyama. morris, & stilwell, 2014; cunnah, 2015; kendall, 2016; patterson & loomis 2016; moriña, 2019; kim & kutscher, 2020). it is incumbent upon universities to guarantee the necessary conditions and opportunities to ensure that all students can engage and learn. in this regard, it is useful to listen to the voices of the students (moriña, 2019). this will help institutions of higher education better understand how they can support collegiate success among students with disabilities (kim & kutscher, 2020). sachs and schreuer (2011) aver that the opportunity that legislative changes present for the inclusion of students with disabilities in higher education institutions, and the resources dedicated to that purpose, call for an in-depth examination of the results to determine how these students participate in academic and student life at university. the massification of higher education in south africa following the advent of democracy meant that populations previously disadvantaged under apartheid now had access to education. in south africa, the ministerial statement on the implementation of the university capacity development grant program 2021-2023 (dhet, 2020) concludes that the system has not yet been able to transform sufficiently to effectively and equitably support the success of previously marginalised groups. disaggregation of the student data in the ministerial statement is only by race and gender. no statistics are given on the retention, throughput and graduation rates of students with disabilities. it is against this background that this study, grounded in the qualitative paradigm, used individual semi-structured interviews conducted with five blind students who were studying at the rural based university to examine the issue of inclusion and exclusion of students with disabilities in higher education. the population of this study consisted of all registered students with disclosed disabilities, all academic support staff in the disability unit and all lecturers teaching blind students. purposive sampling was used to identify the blind students through available university records. interpretative phenomenological approach (ipa) was used to engage participants to understand their lived experiences from their perspectives. the study seeks to contribute to the debate on the plight of students with disabilities with a specific focus on blind students in rural disadvantaged contexts. review of literature conceptualising disability the south african white paper on the rights of persons with disabilities (wprpd, 2015) conceptualises disability as a complex and evolving concept and argues that defining it must take into account that, “current definitions of disability have evolved over time, and reflect a more progressive view of disability than was the case in the past” (p.17). among the various attempts to conceptualise disability, two dominant models have emerged, the medical model and the social model of disability. the medical model focuses attention on the nature of the person’s impairment and the degree to which this impairment may or may not prevent the person from carrying out various tasks or participate in activities in ways regarded as normal (howell, 2005). this model sees disability as inherent in the individual, rather than as a social condition vested in the social milieu (ndlovu & watson, 2016). the model focuses on individual deficit or impairment, and attributes any restriction that the individual confronts in his or her everyday life as the 22 inevitable and tragic consequence of that impairment (hammell, 2006; ohajunwa, mckenzie, & lorenzo, 2015). the emphasis is on the impairment rather than the abilities the person might possess. the disability rights movement rose against the medical model arguing that the circumstances of people with disabilities and the discrimination they face are socially created and have little to do with the impairments of people with disabilities (howell, 2005). this gave rise to the alternative social model of disability. rather than focusing on individual impairment, this model focuses on the physical and social barriers which exclude people with disabilities and renders them powerless and voiceless (watson, 2004). as armstrong, armstrong and spandagou (2011) show, a person’s impairment is not the cause of disability, but rather disability is the result of the way society is organised, which disadvantages and excludes people with impairments. the solution to the problems of disabled people in this paradigm therefore lies in restructuring society in order to accommodate them. south african legislation, for example, the white paper on the rights of persons with disability (wprpd, 2015) is aligned to the social model of disability. visual impairment visual impairment relates to those students who are categorized as legally blind, having a visual acuity of 6/60 or less in the better eye, and/or a visual field of less than 10 degrees (permvattana, armstrong, & murray, 2013). according to shepherd (2001), the visual system can be considered as the dominant sensory modality in humans as almost half the brain is devoted to sight, and about 70% of the total capacity of the brain devoted to processing sensory information is devoted to handling visual information. chikukwa and chimbwanda (2013) define visual impairment or low vision as, “a severe reduction in vision that cannot be corrected with standard glasses or contact lenses and reduces a person's ability to function at certain or all tasks” (p.4). the level of visual impairment ranges from severe short-sightedness to blindness (ghafri, 2015). most learning typically occurs visually. the challenge facing visually impaired students is that the enormous amount of learning that normally takes place via vision must now be achieved using other senses and methods. the focus of this paper is on the challenges faced by blind students at a rural based south african university. legislative framework on education for people with disabilities in south africa following the demise of apartheid, several pieces of legislation have been promulgated to advance the rights of people with disabilities in south africa. these include the constitution of the republic of south africa (crsa, hereafter) (1996), the white paper on an integrated national disability strategy (inds, hereafter) (1997), the national plan for higher education (nphe, hereafter) (2001), white paper 6 on special needs education: building an inclusive education and training system (snebiets, hereafter) (2001), the white paper for post-school education (pset, hereafter) (2013) and the white paper on the rights of people with disability (wprpd, hereafter) (2015). the south african legislation as explained in the paragraphs that follow, steers people away from the medical conception of disability discussed in a previous subsection, which focuses on individual impairment or deficit and instead focuses on the elimination of physical and social barriers that exclude people with disabilities and renders them powerless and voiceless a tenet of the social model of disability. the crsa (1996) declares all people as equal and outlaws discrimination on any basis and guarantees the right to quality services for persons with disabilities. the 23 entrenched bill of rights (br) of the crsa (1996) subsection 3, states that no person may unfairly discriminate directly or indirectly against anyone. the inds (1997) acknowledges that the majority of people with disabilities in south africa have been excluded from the mainstream of society and have thus, been prevented from accessing fundamental social, political and economic rights. the strategy cites several factors as having contributed to the neglect of people with disabilities, among them the political and economic inequalities of the apartheid system; social attitudes, which have perpetuated stereotypes of people with disabilities as dependent and in need of care; and a discriminatory and weak legislative framework that has sanctioned and reinforced exclusionary barriers. another piece of legislation, nphe (2001) advocates for an increase in the number of non–traditional students entering higher education particularly women and people with disabilities. the plan requires universities to indicate in their three-year plans, strategies, time-frames and targets to increase the enrolment of students with disabilities. the year 2001 saw the publication of the education white paper 6: snebiets which further outlined measures to include students with disabilities in the education system. the pset (2013), like the other pieces of legislation refers to the issue of inclusive education for all. the white paper argues that the achievement of greater social justice is closely dependent on equitable access by all sections of the population to quality education and points out that, “the post-school system must respond to the special education and training needs of various social groups such as the youth, the disabled…” (p.10) the most recent legislation on the issue of disability is the wprpd (2015). the vision of the wprpd is the creation of a free and just society inclusive of all persons with disabilities as equal citizens. this is aligned to the social model of disability, which argues that the solution to the problems of people with disabilities lies in restructuring society in order to accommodate them. in this regard, the wprpd (2015) commits duty bearers to realising the rights of persons with disabilities by:  accelerating implementation of existing legislation that advocates equality for persons with disabilities;  taking calculated action to ensure that their rights as equal persons are upheld;  removing discriminatory barriers to access and participation;  ensuring that universal design informs access and participation in the planning, budgeting and service delivery value chain of all programmes (p.11). it can be seen from the above discussion, though not necessarily the case for all 26 universities, that the south african higher education system provides support for students with disabilities within the diversity rights framework (matshedisho, 2007) guided by national legislation and underpinned by the principle of fundamental human rights for all. most public universities in south africa have an office responsible for students with disabilities commonly referred to as a disability unit (du). the philosophy behind establishing the dus according to tugli et al. (2013) is to promote the equal participation of people with disabilities in all spheres of university life and to eliminate unlawful disability discrimination, including disability related harassment. these units, however, although in existence, do not always result in quality support for the students with disabilities. results from a study by naidoo (2010) on factors affecting the academic development of students with disabilities at the university of kwazulu-natal show that the lack of staff in the disability unit and the disproportionate ratio of staff to students; lack of resources and lack of funding from the university negatively affected the efforts of the disability unit to offer support to students with disabilities. similarly, a study by tugli et al. (2013) revealed that the disability unit at the university of venda was understaffed (only two staff members) and the 24 staff felt overworked and overwhelmed. concern about disability units programmes being isolated or disability issues not being integrated into core areas of the institution’s functioning emerged in the findings of a study by howell (2005). similarly, in a pilot study on challenges faced by students with disabilities at four universities in the western cape province in south africa, the department of social development (dsd, hereafter) (2015) reports that students complained of the long time it took to get braille material due to staffing constraints in the disability units. thirty-two percent of their participants indicated that they encountered barriers in accessing learning materials in accessible formats. the report noted: “these barriers include absence of braille and large font material; delays in getting material transcribed or adapted into accessible formats; test scripts and old examination papers only available in small print; reference material in libraries needed for assignments and other projects not available in accessible formats.” (p. 47). in the same vein, the foundation of tertiary institutions of the northern metropolis (fotim, hereafter) (2011) identified under-funding as a key constraint in the funding of several disability units. with inadequate budgets, such units cannot adequately cater for disabled students. another major challenge facing visually impaired students in south africa is stigmatisation and alienation faced if students disclose their condition. according to findings of the dsd (2015), participants who chose not to declare disability gave reasons relating to societal negative perceptions including labeling, alienation, attitudinal problems and stereotyping. some of these reasons for non-disclosure as the dsd (2015) shows, are indicative of the prejudicial nature of society towards persons with disability. study context and objectives this study sought to examine barriers to learning for blind students at a south african university. the specific objectives of the study were to: identify challenges faced by blind students at a rural based university; examine ways in which blind students mitigate these challenges and explore ways of ensuring reasonable accommodation for blind students in higher education.the institution studied is a small to medium-sized, comprehensive university located in a remote rural area and draws most of the students from previously disadvantaged rural schools. the institution has a disability unit established in 2001 to integrate services for students with disabilities. the unit has three staff members and an intern and supports students with the following disabilities: visual, hearing, physical, speech impairments, chronic illnesses (e.g. epilepsy), painful conditions (e.g. back injuries & carpal tunnel syndrome), psychological disabilities (e.g. bipolar disorder & severe anxiety/depression), learning disorders and temporary disabilities (e.g. broken limbs). according to statistics from the disability unit, 118 students disclosed their disabilities in 2014 and of these 52 were partially sighted while five were blind while in 2022, a total of 99 students disclosed their disabilities15 as partially sighted and one as blind. four of the five interviewed participants became blind later in their lives while one participant was born blind. four of the participants were in their undergraduate studies, one each in levels one, two, three and four of their studies while one of the participants was a postgraduate student. with regards to gender, four participants were male while one was female and all the participants were black. research methodology grounded in the qualitative paradigm, individual semi-structured interviews were conducted with five blind students who were studying at the rural based university in south 25 africa. the population of this study consisted of all registered students with disclosed disabilities, all academic support staff in the disability unit and all lecturers teaching blind students. purposive sampling was used to select participants for the study and is based on the assumption that a researcher wants to discover and gain insight, and thus, selects a sample from which the most can be learned (yssel, pak, & beilke, 2016). records in the disability unit were used to identify the blind students. the two academic support staff in the disability unit and four lecturers who had blind students in their classes were also included in the sample for triangulation of data. in this study, the researchers wanted to gain insight into the challenges faced by blind students in navigating the higher education landscape, hence purposefully selecting those affected by the impairment (blindness). this produced rich data. the interpretative phenomenological approach (ipa) was used both during the interviews and the data analysis process. ipa is a qualitative approach which aims to provide detailed examinations of personal lived experience (smith and osborn 2015). ipa approach argues that good research interviewing recognises that the course and content of an interview cannot be laid down in advance (smith, flowers, & larkin 2009; alase, 2017). according to tuffour (2017), the aim of ipa is to look in detail at how someone makes sense of life experience, and to give detailed interpretation of the account to understand the experience. ipa has a commitment to understanding particular experiences in context (rose et al. 2019). such experiences cannot be predetermined. rather than a rigid interview schedule that would be followed religiously therefore, a prompt sheet with a few main themes for discussion with the participants was produced to guide a loosely structured interview process (biggerstaff and thompson 2008). the theme statements were developed after a thorough review of literature sources that speak to the experience that is being studied, that is, blind students in higher education in rural contexts. the prompt sheet checklist ensured that while participants were given the freedom to take the lead in the conversation, the data gathered would still speak to the purpose of the research. the interview schedule was merely the basis for kick-starting the conversations with participants. as jeong and othman (2016) show, it is important that ipa researchers as a rule, utilise the open-ended question formula. during the interviews, the researchers did not only listen to what the participants described about their experiences, but also focused on the interpretation of those experiences through probing, and asking critical questions to the participants, as suggested by mavhandumudzusi (2016). in addition to field notes taken during the interview, all interviews were recorded and transcribed verbatim in order for both researchers to be able to participate in the process of analysis. coding was first conducted by each researcher individually and then in a joint discussion leading to a decision on core themes as suggested by berggren, rowan, bergbäck and blomberg (2016). interviews of each participant were analysed individually, to identify emerging themes. following this, the researchers looked for common patterns across the analysed cases. this resulted in restructuring and relabeling the original individual themes into few overarching themes (lourens & swartz 2016a). ethical considerations working with people with a range of special needs demands sensitivity and an increased awareness of the great vulnerability of many of these research participants (magwa & magwa 2015). appointments were made with each of the blind students individually where the research project and its purpose was explained to them. participants were informed that their participation in the study was entirely voluntary and that they could withdraw at any time without consequence. further, they were informed that confidentiality and anonymity would be maintained and that their identities would not be disclosed as pseudonyms would be 26 used. participants gave informed consent. the five students were then given alphabetic name codes; blind student a (bsa), blind student b (bsb), blind student c (bsc), blind student d (bsd) and blind student e (bse). academic support staff (as) were coded numerically as as1 and as2 while lecturers (l) were coded as l1, l2, l3 and l4. ethical clearance was sought from the research ethics committee of the university following the university’s ethical clearance application procedures and was granted under reference number chetl/11/01/e0811. results and discussion the results are presented and discussed according to the following emerging themes: challenges related to mobility and accessibility, instructional challenges, assessment practices, lack of knowledge, interaction with non-disabled students, academic support from the disability unit and academic support from the library. samples of verbatim responses from the participants are used in the discussion of each identified theme. the choice of which participant to quote in each instance was guided by both the typicality of the response with regards to the theme identified and the need to represent all participants as much as possible in the quoted responses. challenges relating to mobility and accessibility one of the themes that emerged from the data was in relation to accessibility and mobility around campus due to carelessness in infrastructure development and negligence by fellow students and academics. the following were examples of responses on the issue: • changes along the route to places of choice are intermittently changed without our knowledge. we end up falling on trenches(bsa) • i once fell into the ditch and luckily it was not so deep. i could not proceed to my class that day as i was mildly injured (bsd). • it is not easy to move on the paths of the university because there are light poles erected on the middle of the paths (bse). • no. there are a lot of disturbances. people drive around the campus as if they are on a freeway. people park everywhere. security staff are not consistent in monitoring this challenge (l3) • no. it is horrible. university community parks the cars everywhere and they drive so fast on the campus roads. this is not good for those students with disabilities (as1). the results show that new infrastructure development projects around the university were not communicated to the students leading to challenges for blind students as shown in the responses above. the student concerns are corroborated by both the academic support staff (as1) and the lecturers (l3). more stringent security measures would go a long way in helping curb careless driving and undesignated parking in the university. the issue of mobility and accessibility is also reported in the literature. howell and lazarus (2003) argue that barriers for students with disabilities are exacerbated by higher education institutions in south africa that remain largely physically inaccessible to many disabled students, especially physically disabled and blind students. lourens and swartz (2016a) found that simply getting around campus was a challenging task for the students who spoke of threats of motor vehicles and obstructions in the environment such as holes in sidewalks, low-hanging branches and road works. similarly, a study by chikukwa and chimbwanda (2013) in zimbabwe, found that totally blind students faced problems of construction work (trenches dug up everywhere), parked cars and water puddles. in this regard, amendments to campus design that are not only 27 visually impaired student-friendly, but also environmentally friendly are warranted (berggren et al. 2016). this, according to (uncrpd) (2006) means the design of products, environments, programmes and services should be usable by all people, to the greatest extent possible, without the need for adaptation or specialised design. one student however, felt accessibility was better for blind students compared to physically disabled students although he had problems with elevators as shown in this response: • access into buildings is better to blind students because we can manage to go to the other floors of the building using steps. the lift in the main administration is not user friendly to the blind person as the buttons are not clearly marked in braille and there is no voice synthesizer to help the blind user (bsb). from the analysis of the except above, it is indicative that students with sight challenge emphasise the need for good access into buildings. however, the access in existence is not user friendly to students with sight problems because there are no braille signs and audio configuration to assist in effective usage by the blind. instructional challenges one issue identified by academic staff and lecturers was the issue of accessibility to learning and teaching in the lecture halls as a result of lack of universal design in the construction of lecture rooms:  chairs in these lecture halls are located far from the white board making it difficult for visually impaired to see what is written. most students with visually impairment just go to classes only to listen to the lectures (ads1)  the sitting arrangements are in a form of a stadium and it is difficult for a blind student to walk through. chairs are built in and in a form of a row and it becomes difficult for a blind student to walk through to the chair (l4)  some lecture halls are not conducive for teaching visually impaired students. for example, lecture halls a and e. the board is far from the seats (l2) such infrastructure design issues identified by lecturers in the responses reveal lack of universal design planning in the furniture installation in the lecturer rooms. ensuring that universal design informs access and participation in the planning, budgeting and service delivery value chain of all programmes (wprpd, 2015) will ensure that all categories of students are catered for. negative attitudes of lecturers and insensitivity to the needs of blind students during the actual learning and teaching process were major issues raised by the blind students, for example:  some lecturers are arrogant. they do not provide pamphlets and they tell us to consult with other students. i followed one lecturer the other day and he told me; ‘you disabled students like to be treated special. he is not god. i had to quit the module’ (bsb).  as a lecturer i have never given such students special handouts, except that they write their tests and examinations in disability unit where they are well-catered (l2).  my students get materials like other students. i don’t differentiate them because i was not orientated or trained to care for the students with disabilities (l4).  they send materials to us and we adapt them according to the needs of students. the challenge only pops up if a student did not divulge his/her disability to the lecturer (as1). there was justification by those lecturers who refused to give blind students materials so that they could take them for adaptation, for example converting material to braille arguing that this amounted to special treatment. this argument y lecturers, in our view, cannot 28 be accepted as this is a category of students that does indeed need special treatment. the significance of the lecturer as partner in the success of the blind student is also evident from the student responses. this reproduction of negative attitudes in higher learning emanates from people viewing disability negatively (ndlovu and walton 2016) and could be attributed to the medical model of disability, which sees disability as inherent in the individual, rather than as a social condition. ryan (2011) as cited in dryer et al. (2016) conducted research into the knowledge, attitudes and experiences of staff within australian universities. this research suggested that universities need to be more informed, and consistent with legislation in the area of disability as staff at times held negative or hostile attitudes towards students with disabilities. similarly, chikukwa and chimbwanda (2013) in their study found that some lecturers were reluctant to modify their classroom procedures, giving students only partial accommodations. they further argue that given the significance of lecturer attitudes to the success of blind and visually impaired students, it is important to understand the significance of attitudes of not only the lecturers but also of peers and other campus administrators to the success of these students. studies in the literture emphasise the importance of lecturer preparation programmes to provide extended experiences for future lecturers to facilitate conceptual shifts and improve attitudes about assisting students living with disabilities (barton-arwood, lunsford, & suddeth, 2016; zongozzi, 2022) as the social model of disability argues, a person’s impairment is not the cause of disability, but rather disability is the result of the way society is organised, which disadvantages and excludes people with impairments (armstrong, armstrong and spandagou 2011). assessment practices another major finding under instructional challenges related to assessment with regard to whether or not the assessment practices used accommodated the condition of blind students. all the five students were positive although they alleged that there was poor planning at times; • blind students write their tests and examinations in the adapted exam lab in the disability unit. test papers are either brailed or given in an electronic format. with the aid of screen reading software, i find it very easy to read and write (bse). • i had to write a little bit late sometimes when the lecturer could not provide an electronic question paper to the exam department. the exam had to be scanned, edited and brailed while waiting in the exam room (bsc). • the university staff seem to believe that students with disabilities should only be assisted in the disability unit. even lecturers, when they have challenges with disabled students, they send them to the disability unit (as1). the disability unit should be lauded for ensuring assessment accommodation for the blind students. the unit seems to be aligned to the social model of disability, which focuses on removing the physical and social barriers which exclude people with disabilities (watson, 2004). adapting the assessment instruments for students with disabilities also resonates with one of the requirements of the wprpd (2015) which legislates for the removal of discriminatory barriers to access and participation. academic support staff in the disability unit, however, expressed concern at the fact that academics were abrogating their responsibilities and dumping interventions related to students with disabilities on the disability unit rather than co-owning the student support. it is significant to note that the findings of this study contradict those of vickerman and blundell (2010) where 11.1% of disabled students indicated that their assessments did not cater for their needs, compared with 29 3.6% of their non-disabled peers. the results further contradict those of dryer at el. (2016) which showed that students with disability were often challenged by assessment practices. the issue raised in the last response above however, about examinations and tests being adapted while the students were already waiting in the examination room to write, points to poor coordination between the lecturers, the examinations department and the disability unit. the disability unit, the lecturer who sets the examinations paper and the examination department need to liaise with each other to ensure that all examinations have been adapted for disabled students before the examination date. lack of knowledge the need for training of staff who work with disabled students came out strongly in the findings of this study. this appeared in responses from both students, academic support staff and lecturers as shown in these responses:  lecturers do not really know how to assist a blind student. they demonstrate, project their powerpoint presentations and write on the board forgetting that a blind student cannot see and needs special attention (bsc).  in the class, the lecturer writes a lot on the board and narrates so little of what they have written. sometimes they will just point at facts on the board saying this and that, when you combine this and that you get this (bsa).  new staff should be inducted on how to interact with disabled students. unfortunately, we have a backlog due to the pandemic (as1).  lecturers should be trained to take care of students with disabilities (l4). with regards to the lecturers’ capacity to help blind students, the results from all the categories of participants (students, lecturers and academic support staff) indicate that lecturers were not conversant with how to deal with these students. the way they presented their materials in class did not accommodate the needs of blind students. there was, however, one student who was positive and who stated that her lecturers were friendly and understanding as shown in this response: my lecturers are friendly. they never ask questions that demand me to draw. i request all the slides from the lecturer immediately after lesson. sometimes they give me hard copies which i take to the disability unit for scanning, editing and brailing (bse). as shown in the responses, projecting power point presentations on the screens and writing on the whiteboards did not accommodate blind students if this was not accompanied by verbal reading of what was on the slides. whatever is projected or written on whiteboards should also be read out aloud to accommodate this category of students. the issue of lack of knowledge and training of lecturers is reported in the results from a study by mushome and monobe (2013) which revealed that lecturers found teaching visually impaired students a problem as they had never been trained to teach this category of students. chikukwa and chimbwanda (2013) also found in their study that most lecturers lacked special training in handling students with disabilities even though they had first degree qualifications and even postgraduate degrees in special needs education. if academics are to respond effectively to the needs of the visually impaired student, they will need to invest time in relevant staff development (shepherd, 2001). as vickerman and blundell (2010) show, “whilst equality legislation is an important part of the jigsaw, it is vital that this is matched by the education and training of higher education (he) staff to respond proactively to the diverse needs of the disabled students they support” (p.28). on the issue of policies, citing the university of south africa (unisa), zongozzi, (2022 argues that, “although unisa appears to have good disability policies in place, the problems mentioned so far seem to stem from poor 30 implementation of these policies” (p.1653). it is noteworthy however, that one of the five blind students interviewed was positive and stated that her lecturers were friendly and understanding. interaction with non-disabled students one of the obstacles faced by people with disabilities in general and blind students in particular as shown in the results of this study is stigmatisation and isolation by abled people. the blind students in this study felt that their abled counterparts rejected them and did not want to associate with them. this rejection and isolation by non-disabled students was expressed as follows: • some abled students do not like to form a group with a disabled student. they have negative perceptions that maybe we shall be a burden to them (bsd). • the abled students do not easily fuse with disabled students. when lecturers require us to form groups, they isolate us (bsb). • they don't want to help them. they say there are getting marks from something that they didn’t work for (l3). • all disabled students are side-lined by the able students. the able students do not want to create friendship with the disabled students (l1). • the university is not good for the formation of diversity groups since students are not trained for this kind of formation (as1). the rejection and isolation by abled students was expressed in cases where abled students did not want to form groups with students with disabilities when group work tasks were assigned. the sentiments from the blind students are echoed by the academic support staff (as1) and the lecturers (l1 and l3). the argument for student training in issues of diversity suggested by one of the lecturers is indeed laudable. not all non-disabled students were labelled as having negative attitudes towards blind students. one blind student had not experienced any problems interacting with non-disabled students while one lecturer had witnessed cases of abled students assisting a blind student in her class: • i make friendships with my classmates. i do not have problems when it comes to formation of groups in the class (bse). • yes, my students always assist the visually the impaired student, they always assist her with finding venues, with recording presentations for her and in case she doesn’t come to class they always update her (l4). such social stigmatisation, discrimination, isolation and stereotyping of disability can also contribute to depression and withdrawal of some students with disabilities (tugli et al. 213). fvazza et al. (2016) aver that, children with disabilities are among the world’s most stigmatised and excluded population because of limited understanding and knowledge about persons with disabilities. such stigmatisation and labelling, as the literature shows, might result in students concealing their disabilities where these are not easily visible. yssel, pak and beilke (2016) found that one barrier was reluctance on the part of students to disclose their disabilities and be labelled. citing jacoby and austin (2007), vickerman and blundell (2010) suggested that having a disability can increase the perception that they are devalued and stigmatised, and as such, this may be why some students were concerned about disclosure in case it results in negativity and lack of access. a study by lourens and swartz (2016b) found that some partially sighted students, whose impairment was less obvious, went to great lengths to conceal their visual impairment in order to gain acceptance and inclusion into non-disabled peer groups. the fact that not all 31 abled students were labelled as having negative attitudes towards blind students shows that there are some students who are accommodating. academic support from the disability unit results show that the disability unit was seen as a valuable resource centre for the blind students. two students spoke positively about the disability unit. factors external to the disability unit that negatively affected efforts to support blind students were identified by academic support staff: • the disability unit is the only accessible building in the campus. the staff is very helpful but the library staff are not competent enough to assist us (bsd). • the disability unit staff are trying their level best but the staff is inadequate to cater for us effectively (bsb). • as a unit we provide them with assistive devices on loan as soon as a challenge is identified. the problem is only their personal adapted devices that are purchased by their bursaries. you will find that the unit initiate the procurement process of assistive devices this year and they are only to be purchased two years later. sometimes the devices are purchased when the student has dropped out or completed the degree (as1). • when the unit has secured some funds from department of higher education for the improvement of its services, it becomes rocket science to release such funds. something should be done to alleviate such delays (as2). timely provision of learning and teaching resources is critical for all students and even more critical for students with special needs such as blind students who do not have alternative access to learning without such resources. procurement delays as identified by the academic support staff have to be rectified to promote equity of outcomes for blind students. all lecturers were not sure of the provision of devices because this responsibility was vested in the disability unit. one student had issues with the operating hours of the disability unit. unlike the university library that closed in the evening, the disability unit closed early leaving these students without access to adapted resources as shown in this response: • the main challenge happens after the disability unit is locked when the admin staff go home because we will not have access to the adapted lab. there are no internet cables in the hostels. if installed, we will be able to access the network licensed job access with speech (jaws), the screen reading software (bse). this lack of after-working-hours access could be because of the reported shortage of staff in the unit. such staff shortages are not peculiar only to this institution. naidoo (2010) also reported that lack of permanent staff at the du at the university of kwazulu-natal resulted in delays in students receiving study and examination related materials. while according to tugli et al. (2013) the philosophy behind establishing the dus is to promote the equal participation of people with disabilities in all spheres of university life, it appears from the results that at the university under study, blind students had no access once disability unit staff left at the end of their normal working day. lack of ‘after-working hours’ access seems novel and peculiar to this study as such a concern could not be found in the literature reviewed. blind students received disability grants, which they used to procure laptops for their studies. the students, however, lamented the lack of internet services in the residences, which rendered their devices useless as shown in these responses:  there is no internet access in the residence (bsa). 32  from 2010 we were given laptops that cannot access internet as there is no wifi in the campus (bsc).  as1 no. there are no adapted labs in the residence. visually impaired students have to travel to the library to study in the evening. the university should build labs that are adapted. this will help students not to travel long distances at night. this calls for the need for planning for an after-hours service for these blind students. a shift system could be introduced or alternatively arrangement could be made to have a security officer man the disability unit adapted lab after working hours. the university could also consider installing wifi in residences as the students lamented the lack of internet services in the residences, which rendered their laptop devices useless in accessing information. alternatively, accessible computers should be made available in the usual computer rooms that the general student population uses so that students with disabilities can access these after the disability unit has closed. it was worrying to note that three out of the four lecturers had not bothered to check what conditions were like in the residences for blind students as they either were not sure or confessed to never having been to student residences. academic support from the library two of the students, as shown in the verbatim quotes below, felt the library was not conducive enough for them citing lack of resources and moody unapproachable staff: • there are no electronic or braille books in the library. as from 2013, an adapted lab was established but still running short of important tools such as pearl reading cameras, ipal solo standalone reading device and many more (bsa). • in the library, they have a school representative who assists me whenever i am looking for references but the staff members are often moody and unapproachable. there are no electronic books (bse). • the library is very good inside because there is a ground floor where the blind students can walk freely and have access of computers and internet (l3). • the lab for disabled students in the library is too small with little resources (as1). • blind students need a dedicated human support. blind students need someone to direct them in the library (as2). while lecturers viewed the availability of an adapted computer laboratory section in the library as adequate, academic support staff felt the adapted section could be enlarged. in unison with students, as shown in the responses, academic support staff felt resources for blind students in the library were inadequate. close collaboration between the library and the disability unit could be one way in which adapted resources could be incorporated into the library budget. students with disabilities, including blind students, like any students need access to library resources to complete assigned tasks. although an adapted lab had been built in the library, it had not been equipped with requisite resources. it should be noted that there was dearth of literature relating specifically to blind students. studies reviewed referred generically to visually impaired students who would include partially sighted students. this study therefore, contributes to the debate by foregrounding the plight of totally blind students. a study exploring the use of the library by visually impaired students (sehić & faletar, 2014) found that in most cases, these students visited libraries only after all other options had been exhausted because their experience had taught them that their academic libraries did not possess adequate technology and resources needed for their studies. in this regard, eskay and chima (2013) assert that the education system in developing countries not fully embraced or adopted the technology associated with special library services for the visually impaired 33 students. this is evidenced in the lack of production and distribution facilities for reading materials for these students. ekwelem (2013) advises that as more people with disabilities attend higher education institutions, it is incumbent upon library management to provide the same level of service to them as is provided to users without disabilities. in the current case study, close collaboration between the library and the disability unit could be one way in which adapted resources can be incorporated into the library budget. with regard to attitude of library staff, while this study found that some library staff were moody and unapproachable, in contrast, a study by sehić and faletar (2014) found that students were treated with respect by library staff and did not discriminate against them. the students added that library staff were open, helpful and in most cases, available to spare some extra time for blind students. the issue of context could also be a contributing factor as there was a dearth of literature on blind students in higher education from rural contexts of africa. conclusions and recommendations it can be concluded from the results of this study that considerable strides have been made towards accommodating the needs of students with disabilities in line with the social model of disability-both in relation to inclusive policy legislation in south africa and efforts by the disability unit at this university. tenets of the medical model can however still be seen in the lack of adequate institutional arrangements around universal design and in the way lecturers and students without disabilities treat students with disabilities. the study found that reasonable accommodation was not provided for blind students in the lecture halls at the university under study as study materials in the library were not properly adapted, computers in the university library and mainstream computer laboratories were not accessible to blind students and lecturers were not trained to teach blind students. some lecturers used powerpoint presentations while teaching when blind students could not access the screens. the study recommends universal design for all learning facilities which, according to uncrpd (2006) means the design of products, environments, programmes and services to be usable by all people, to the greatest extent possible, without the need for adaptation or specialised design. adapted computers should be made available in the usual computer rooms that the general student population uses so that students with disabilities can access these after the disability unit has closed for the day. the study further recommends thorough training for all staff on teaching students with various disabilities. a short term recommendation offered while the university is still looking for resources to hire more staff is that a shift system be introduced or alternatively, arrangements be made to have a security officer stationed at the adapted lab after working hours. the university should also consider installing wifi in the residences. in addition, it is recommended that the disability unit, the lecturers and the examinations department need to liaise with each other to ensure that all examinations have been adapted for disabled students before the examination date. the study further recommends improvement in the university’s procurement 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