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Democratic Pedagogy
No full textThe ideas contained in this paper were first formulated as part of a chapter in my doctoral dissertation, which was completed in 1997. Some years later I added to my initial thoughts, scribbled some notes, and presented them at the 12th Annual Philosophy in Schools Conference, held in Brisbane in 2002. This presentation surfaced as a paper in Critical & Creative Thinking: the Australasian Journal of Philosophy in Schools (Burgh 2003a). Soon thereafter I revised the paper (Burgh 2003b) and it appeared in abridged form in the Asia-Pacific Philosophy Education Network for Democracy (APPEND) Philosophy Series, Volume 4: Philosophy, Democracy and Education, edited by Philip Cam. It was once again revised, but also expanded, and appeared in Chapter 5 of Ethics and the community of inquiry: Education for deliberative democracy, a collaborative authorship with Terri Field and Mark Freakley (2006). Some sections have been further revised and appear in other publications (Burgh 2009, 2010; Burgh & Yorshansky 2011). These revisions would suggest that my thoughts on these matters are constantly changing. To some degree this is true, but each time the changes have built on previous ideas rather than new ideas replacing old ones. I welcomed the invitation to revise the original paper, which includes sections not included in later versions. However, with almost 11 years passing since the original publication, I found myself deleting sections and replacing others. Subsequently, this paper is a culmination of all the revisions and incorporates ideas from each
Confirmation or Challenge: The Impact of the Teaching of Religion in the Tertiary Curriculum
No full textThis paper reports on a research project which explored the views of students of Religion Studies in a secular Australian university, the University of South Australia. The aim of this project was to identify the backgrounds and motivations of Religion Studies students, and to investigate their perceptions of the impact of their studies on their knowledge, understanding and attitudes. The research was qualitative, with data collected via linked surveys and focus group discussions. The study suggests that Religion Studies at a tertiary level promotes an understanding and appreciation of religions and cultures generally, which may lead to a greater understanding of and empathy towards people of different religions. However, the academic study of religion does not necessarily translate into a fundamental shift in existing personal religious beliefs, or lack thereof
Academic integrity and community ties at a small, religious-affiliated liberal arts college
No full textWhile the increased incidence of academic integrity violations in university classrooms has been well documented over the past several decades, inconsistent attention has been given to small liberal arts colleges in terms of both cheating practices and attitudes towards cheating. This study aims to address this disparity by focusing on academic integrity at Concordia College in Moorhead, Minnesota; a small undergraduate institution with a strong church affiliation. We hypothesise that institutional practices and the small-college culture that are unique to smaller colleges like Concordia act to limit the incidence of academic integrity violations. Our case study makes use of data collected from two student surveys - one conducted in 2008, and a follow-up survey conducted in 2010. Variables representing a range of internal and external factors that contribute to cheating were incorporated into a regression model designed to measure the impact of contextual influences that are potentially unique to students at a small, church-affiliated liberal arts college. Given our findings, we conclude that the college would be wise to consider adopting a traditional honour code system
Fact, Value and Philosophy Education
No full textIn Fact, value and philosophy education I tried to show how philosophy can help to overcome the fact-value divide that continues to plague education. In attempting this, I applied John Dewey’s suggestion that philosophy may help to integrate beliefs about matters of fact with values in society at large, to the curricular division between subjects that deal with knowledge of matters of fact and those that are largely devoted to subjective understanding and personal expression. The paper centres on the claim that philosophical dialogue about what we should believe and value can help to effect a mutual adjustment between our reason and our sentiments and bring us to think as whole human beings. It argues the case by first looking at the use of reflective practical reason to effect a change in our desires and conduct when we deem them to be undesirable. The use of reason to provide us with courses of action and other practical remedies to deal with what we see as defects in our character suggests that our cognitive and affective powers are capable of working together through mutual adjustment. By extension, I argue that reason can help us to examine the moral dimension of problems and issues in various areas of study, while making our understanding of them responsive to our feelings. The introduction of an educational means to give effect to this mutual adjustment brings us back to the role of philosophy. Philosophy provides the opportunity for reasoned dialogue that brings the factual material that students encounter into connection with what they are learning to value. It brings a normative cast to the study of history, society, literature, art, science and technology and enables the knowledge that students gain through their studies to be applied to matters of value. In general, it brings moral sensitivity to all kinds of subject matter and enables students to apply their knowledge and intelligence to the formation of values. In the years since I wrote this piece, I had the privilege to assist with the initial draft of documents on ethical understanding as a general competence in the Australian national curriculum and of constructing and implementing a pilot program for ethical inquiry in New South Wales primary schools, which led to ethics becoming an option for students who do not attend religious instruction. In different ways, both experiences brought home to me the importance of incorporating considerations of value throughout the curriculum and the value of philosophical inquiry as a means of doing so. Reflection on these experiences resulted in my book Teaching Ethics in Schools (ACER Press 2010)
The Other Dimension of Caring Thinking (with a new commentary by Phillip Cam)
No full textLife comes from physical or biological survival. But the good life comes from what we care about, what we value, what we think truly important, as distinguished from what we think merely trivial. What we care about is the source of the criteria we use to evaluate ideas, ideals, persons, events, things, and their importance in our lives. And it is these criteria that determine the judgments we make in our everyday lives. In the second edition of Thinking in Education, Matthew Lipman (2002) has indicated the importance of fostering critical, creative and caring thinking in children, if one is to prepare them to make better judgments and live qualitatively better lives. He tells us that caring thinking is appreciative thinking, active thinking, normative thinking, affective thinking and empathetic thinking and then goes on to list a number of mental acts under each of these categories. Maybe it is because ‘caring thinking’ is not as common a term as ‘critical thinking’ and ‘creative thinking’ in everyday educational language that we stop for pause when we hear it. However when we read what Lipman says about caring thinking, we find ourselves nodding and saying to ourselves, ‘Yes, that makes sense. To think caringly means to think ethically, affectively, normatively, appreciatively and to actively participate in society with a concern for the common good’ (Lipman 2002, p. 271). In a real sense what we care about is manifest in how we perform, participate, build, contribute and how we relate to others. It is thinking that reveals our ideals as well as what we think is valuable, what we are willing to fight and suffer for
A fair go for world affairs: A critical inquiry into the teaching of International Humanitarian Law in an initial teacher education program.
No full textWith the implementation of the Australian Curriculum, the learning area of Society and Environment has been greatly impacted. What has been considered a multidisciplinary learning area is now known as Humanities and Social Sciences with prescribed content, teaching and learning approaches and achievement standards. This paper describes an investigation into the development of pre-service teachers’ pedagogical interests in society and environment as they transition into more disciplinary ways of knowing. An issues-based approach has been used to explore and develop pre-service teachers’ pedagogical interests and practice. The study found that a focus on contemporary issues helped to develop pre-service teachers’ emancipatory interests that were further extended through a school-based inquiry. Such contemporary issues could be found in the identified themes documented in Shape of the Australian Curriculum: History (National Curriculum Board (NCB), 2009). This finding suggests that a study of contemporary issues aligning with identified themes in the Australian Curriculum History paper can achieve the emancipatory interests that were previously embedded in the society and environment curriculum learning area
Responses to student plagiarism in higher education across Europe
No full textA significant amount of research has been undertaken in response to high levels of student plagiarism in higher education institutions (HEI). New models have emerged over the last decade for strategies and systems for detection, penalties and mitigation, based on deeper understanding of the underlying reasons behind student plagiarism. Most research has been initiated by academics from English speaking countries, particularly from the UK, North America and Australia.
When the proposal for the Impact of Policies for Plagiarism in Higher Education across Europe (IPPHEAE ) project was developed during 2009 very little research had been conducted about the policies for academic integrity adopted by HEIs in the majority of countries in Europe. IPPHEAE, funded by the European Commission (2010–2013), included a comparative study of policies and procedures in place in HEIs across 27 European Union (EU) member states for handling aspects of academic integrity, focusing specifically on bachelor and master’s levels. The survey instruments were on online questionnaires, student focus groups, structured interviews and analysis of documentary evidence, designed with a view to capture a range of quantitative and qualitative responses from different perspectives.
Almost 5,000 responses were captured for the survey, mainly from online questionnaires, made available in 14 languages. Different questions were asked of students, teaching staff and senior managers, to determine how well institutional procedures were understood, to what extent they were operating as intended and whether there was consistency of outcomes within and between institutions. Interviews with researchers and people associated with national bodies and agencies responsible for higher education (HE) quality or academic integrity explored broader perspectives on issues such as national policies and how responses to plagiarism aligned with policies for quality and standards.
This paper presents results from the survey that focus specifically on institutional policies, highlighting examples of good practice and also areas of concern. The findings suggest that different approaches should be adopted according to the maturity of existing policies and systems in all the countries surveyed, to promote more effective assurance of quality, standards and academic integrity
The Educational Role of Philosophy (with a new commentary by Phillip Cam)
No full textThe history of the relationship between philosophy and education has been a long and troubled one. In part, this stemmed from the problematic nature of philosophy itself, but this difficulty was compounded by controversy as to the age at which training in philosophy should begin. Although Socrates seemed indifferent to whether he conversed philosophically with young or old, his pupil, Plato, was inclined to restrict philosophy to mature students, on the grounds that it made the younger ones unduly contentious. Since philosophers in those days had the reputation of being ‘friends of wisdom,’ and since being a friend of wisdom seemed to require extensive experience, it came to be taken for granted, generation after generation, that philosophy was not for the young. It has sometimes been made available, on a limited basis, at the secondary school level, but almost never to students in the lower grades. To the suggestion that this prevented children from having access to ideas, theories and abstract concepts, the stock response was that children were mired in the ‘concrete’ level of experience and had no interest in abstractions. To the report that very young children almost invariably greeted opportunities to discuss philosophy with joy and delight, the standard reply was that this proved that the children could not be doing philosophy, since the study of philosophy is a serious and difficult matter. The recent career of philosophy in elementary and secondary education has been a matter of overcoming precisely these objection and misconceptions. Unfortunately, a listing of the advantages to be derived by the young from the study of philosophy—its strengthening of reasoning and judgment, its fostering of concept-formation skills, its clarification of values and ideals—is likely to obscure the intrinsic satisfactions that children derive from their classroom communities of philosophical inquiry. But even here there are signs of change, and a new appreciation of the educational possibilities of philosophy is at last beginning to surface in the schools
Philosophy and Childhood
No full textThe following paper was written in 1999, as the opening speech at the Hobart FAPCA (Federation of Australasian Philosophy for Children Associations now FAPSA) National Conference. I was, at the time, Chair of FAPCA. The keynote speaker at the conference was Professor Gareth Matthews from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, and author of, among other books, The Philosophy of Childhood. As the paper was written as a speech, and not as an academic article, I did not cite all the points made in full academic mode. Rather, for publication in Critical and Creative Thinking, I added a list of further reading which gives details for all the articles and books mentioned in the speech. At the time, I had just completed my PhD (the thesis is cited in the further reading), and taken up the position of International Baccalaureate Coordinator at The Friends’ School in Hobart. Subsequently in 2001, a revised and abridged version of the thesis was published by Routledge under the title Philosophical Discussion in Moral Education, and readers who are interested in following up some of my points made in the paper can find more detail there
Editorial, Volume 10(1): Special Issue
No full textWelcome to a Special Issue of the International Journal for Educational Integrity: Best papers from the Plagiarism Across Europe and Beyond Conference, Brno, Czech Republic, 12–13 June 2013. The IJEI acknowledges the generous collaboration and collegial support of the organisers of the conference, particularly Tomas Foltýnek (Conference Convenor) and Irene Glendinning, Project Leader of the Impact of Policies for Plagiarism in Higher Education across Europe Project (IPPHEAE). Selected 'best papers' were submitted to the IJEI for consideration and additional double-blind peer review. As a result of subsequent revisions, the papers in this issue are substantially different from the original versions presented at the Czech conference.
We open the issue with an overview and summary of results from the IPPHEAE by Project Leader Irene Glendinning from Coventry University, UK. Funded by the European Commission (2010–2013), the IPPHEAE is possibly the broadest study of academic integrity in Europe ever conducted, with a comparative study of academic integrity policies and procedures in higher education institutions (HEIs) across 27 European Union member states.
The project used online questionnaires, student focus groups, structured interviews and analysis of documentary evidence to determine how well institutional procedures were understood, to what extent they were operating as intended and whether there was consistency of outcomes within and between institutions. Almost 5,000 responses were received in 14 different languages. Participants included students (at undergraduate and masters' levels), teaching staff and senior managers. Glendinning presents results from the survey that focused specifically on institutional policies and highlights examples of good practice as well as areas of concern. In keeping with international research from other settings and locations, the IPPHEAE findings indicate that there is no 'one size fits all' approach to academic integrity policy and practice. Each country and indeed each HEI needs to develop a tailored approach according to individual context, and taking into account the maturity of existing policies and systems.
IPPHEAE project partners Tomáš Foltýnek and Jirí Rybicka from Mendel University, Czech Republic, and Catherine Demoliou from the University of Nicosia, Cyprus, use data obtained from the project survey to address the question: 'Do students think what teachers think about plagiarism?'. The researchers compare and contrast the overall data on students' and teachers' attitudes to academic writing, their perceptions of plagiarism and plagiarism penalties, and their knowledge of institutional policies/ procedures on plagiarism. Results indicate that there is a discrepancy in understanding between these two key stakeholder groups relating to how students learn about academic integrity, the challenges of academic writing, the causes of student plagiarism, identifying plagiarism, appropriate penalties for plagiarism, and knowledge of institutional policy. The authors contend that teachers' attitudes may require reflection and realignment to ensure they have a better understanding of students' educational needs and perceptions of plagiarism so that appropriate support can be offered.
In the third paper, Rui Sousa-Silva from Universidade do Porto, Portugal, uses a forensic linguistics approach to analyse real-life plagiarism cases by higher education students. The author compares suspected plagiarised strings of text against the most likely original text, and demonstrates that strategies other than literal borrowing (wordfor- word text) are being increasingly used by students to plagiarise. Sousa-Silva provides examples to illustrate why existing automated text-matching software may fail to detect these cases of plagiarism. The paper concludes that while text-matching software is able to detect literal, verbatim plagiarism, it should not necessarily be considered a good 'plagiarism detection system' particularly when other strategies are used, such as translation, word substitution or reordering. The author also reminds us of the need for manual analysis by a 'human detector' to ensure that any accusations of plagiarism take into account both the linguistic and educational complexity underlying textual similarities. Finally, Sousa-Silva calls for more research and improvements in computational linguistics and natural language processing to increase the accuracy and reliability of the machine-detection procedure.
In addition to the burgeoning international research on student plagiarism, Erja Moore, from Karelia University of Applied Sciences, Finland, suggests that accuracy of referencing might be another useful aspect to explore when examining students' writing practices. Moore analyses both the accuracy of referencing and plagiarism in 91 electronically published theses published in the Finnish Theseus database. In-text citations were compared to references, and in the case of frequent inaccuracy a Google search was used to scrutinise possible plagiarism. The accuracy of referencing was categorised into four classifications: accurate, some inaccuracy, constant inaccuracy and misleading referencing/plagiarism. Moore provides useful examples of inaccuracy, misquoting and plagiarism and also points to 'secondary source plagiarism', which occurs when text with accurate citations and references is copied from the original source and presented as the student's own.
The analysis in Moore's study indicated that nearly one third (31%) of theses had major referencing inaccuracies, or referencing which could be categorised as misleading or plagiarised. It is clear from this study that constant inaccuracy and misleading referencing are categories that overlap with plagiarism. The results of Moore's study require careful consideration because they demonstrate that in Finnish higher education theses containing major inaccuracies have been accepted and published.
The title of the conference Plagiarism Across Europe and Beyond points to the widespread interest in the topic of plagiarism, well beyond Europe. Robert Craig and David Dalton, from the Petroleum Institute, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, investigated the perceptions of first-year students concerning the proportion and frequency of cheating among their peers, as well as the main reasons for cheating behaviour. Their findings demonstrated that at the start of the undergraduate programme, three quarters to four fifths of the students viewed copying as serious or very serious, but after only one semester this percentage had dropped considerably for some areas. The data established that there was a clear problem in need of a remedy.
The authors provide details of how the Communications Department of the Petroleum Institute facilitated a new, enquiry-based approach which facilitated student engagement, ownership and buy-in and which ultimately had a mitigating effect on copying and plagiarism. The authors make recommendations based on the experiences of their successful programme. In particular, they advocate for crossdepartmental collaboration, a consistent institutional voice on academic integrity, and curriculum based on experiential and enquiry-based learning.
Taking the lessons on academic integrity in the UK to countries outside Europe is the central theme in the final paper by Stephen Gow, University of York, UK. Gow's research was based on interviews with ten Mainland Chinese master's students who had studied at a UK university and then returned to work at joint-venture educational institution in Shanghai. Gow examined participants' accounts of plagiarism and compared and contrasted the experience of plagiarism in Chinese and British educational contexts. He anticipated that the study would uncover the extent to which returnee scholars transmit academic integrity and the concept of plagiarism when returning to work in transnational education in China.
The findings, using the qualitative methodology of interpretative repertoires, suggest that the participants used UK institutional vocabulary and developed a strict approach to plagiarism and academic integrity during their master's courses and in their subsequent educational careers. Furthermore, the participants in the study were able to "act as linguistic and cultural interpreters, promoting institutional relationships", despite some of the complexities of living, studying and working in two such different cultural and educational environments. Gow suggests that having moved between and adapting to these contexts, with appropriate support these returning Chinese graduates have the potential to act as a cultural bridge for academic integrity within internationalised higher education.
I trust you will discover new insights in this Special Issue of the International Journal for Educational Integrity as it provides a broad range of perspectives on academic integrity in the many contexts of Europe, and well beyond.
Tracey Bretag, IJEI Editor
June 201