University of Guelph hosted OJS journals
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Conceptualisations of power in ICT integartion within Zimbawe\u27s pre-service teacher education
No full textThe integration of technology in pre-service teacher education curriculum has become a global imperative, leading institution of teacher education to rethink their curriculum. However, there are various dynamics challenging its effective and efficient implementation. Research has shown that the unavailability of technology tools, lack of skills and the digital divide are among the major challenges affecting the integration of technology in teaching and learning. Apart from these challenges, it is critical that we view the challenges of ICT integration in pre-service teacher education from the perspective of power dynamics. Using Foucault’s concept of power/knowledge, this paper conceptualises how the relationship between power and knowledge/skills negatively impacts and limits the possibilities for technology integration into the pre-service teacher education curriculum. The author uses data collected through four focus group discussions comprising of 36 pre-service teachers in total and interviews with eight teacher educators to frame this conceptualisation of power. Regardless of existing and known challenges, there are underlying challenges related to power that need to be addressed. There are cases where lack of resources and policy directives are viewed from the point of ‘dominance display’ rather than the need to transform educational practice. While power is important in shaping structures and processes, it can also be limiting depending on how it is perceived. Embedding technology within the pre-service teacher curriculum in order to develop teachers who possess digital pedagogy skills and a digital culture aligned to technology-driven education can be improved through the dismantling of various power dynamics. In this paper, I argue that challenges to the development of digital pedagogies in pre-service teacher education curriculum are a question of contentions of power
The roles of departmental heads in leading the adoption of digital culture in African higher education institutions
No full textThe adoption of digital culture in African higher education institutions (HEIs) is critical for advancing teaching, research, and institutional efficiency. However, while much focus has been placed on infrastructure and student readiness, the pivotal role of departmental heads in driving digital transformation remains underexplored. This study aimed to investigate the roles departmental heads play in leading the adoption of digital culture in African HEIs. Guided by an interpretivist paradigm and a qualitative research approach, data were collected through semi-structured interviews with ten departmental heads, five junior lecturers, and five senior lecturers across various institutions in South Africa. Using thematic analysis, some key roles emerged: strategic leadership and vision setting, capacity building, resource mobilisation, policy implementation, innovation leadership, and student-centred transformation. These findings highlight how departmental heads act as both enablers and mediators of digital culture, bridging institutional policy with day-to-day academic realities. Despite facing infrastructural and cultural challenges, effective leadership at the departmental level was found to be essential for fostering a sustainable digital environment. The study recommends targeted leadership development programmes, policy integration of digital responsibilities, incentive structures, cross-departmental collaboration, infrastructure investment, and support for innovation. In conclusion, empowering departmental heads is crucial to embedding digital culture and achieving long-term digital transformation in African HEIs. Their strategic leadership serves as a cornerstone for cultivating inclusive, resilient, and future-ready academic institutions
Tasting the ‘Forbidden Fruit’: Artificial Intelligence, digital inequality, and compensatory capital among South African university students
No full textThis paper explores how students from socioeconomically marginalised backgrounds in South Africa’s higher education system engage with Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies such as ChatGPT amid institutional ambivalence and digital inequality. Using the metaphor of tasting the forbidden fruit, the study conceptualises students’ interaction with AI as a paradoxical act of necessity and defiance, both restricted and liberating. Drawing on a qualitative narrative approach, ten first-year students from an urban university shared life-story reflections on their experiences of digital precarity, adaptation, and agency. Guided by the theoretical lens of compensatory capital, the analysis reveals how students mobilise material resourcefulness, cognitive adaptability, and relational solidarity to transform AI from a prohibited tool into a means of academic empowerment. The findings demonstrate that AI functions as both a pedagogical equaliser and a symbol of inequality, reflecting the moral and structural tensions that define South Africa’s digitalised learning environments. By foregrounding students’ lived experiences, the paper shifts the focus from institutional policy debates toward the micro-politics of digital survival and human resilience. It concludes that equitable AI integration in higher education requires a socially just, humanised approach, one that recognises students not as passive consumers of technology but as active co-creators of digital knowledge and possibility
Digital Culture: Post colonial Africa’s weapon for enhancing social justice
No full textThe 21st century has witnessed higher education shifting from the traditional interaction to then utilisation of digital tools, communication technologies as instructional tools giving birth to concepts like digital culture and digital literacy among others. Digital culture and digital literacy are concepts that merit scholarly attention examining whether they contribute to social justice in higher education (HE). The purpose of the paper is to examine the nuanced nexus between digital culture, digital literacy and social justice. The paper examines how digital culture promotes social justice in African universities through access, representation, participation, equality, and inclusiveness. The paper utilizes Amartya Sen\u27s capability approach and John Rawls\u27 theory of justice as equality as the anchor pins to understand the actions, HE digitally in promoting social justice. The study concluded that the implementation of digital culture is a daunting task, but HE in Africa is attempting to promote social justice in digital form. The complexity is influenced by numerous factors such as, capabilities, functioning\u27s rurality, colonialism, and epistemicide, among others, which will be explored in the subsequent sections. Despite the subtle yet devastating consequences of social justice, it was concluded that digital literary and culture are currently essential in achieving social justice in HE. The paper recommended that governments should continue to promote theory and practice of social justice in the wider world by investing in higher education digitally
Developing a people-centered digital culture in a South African Higher Education Institution: An analysis of student sentiments during an educational crisis
No full textThe Covid-19 pandemic forced many higher education institutions (HEIs) to introduce temporary measures to minimise the learning losses resulting from institution closures, something which affected learning environments globally. Some of the measures introduced by HEIs included emergency remote teaching (ERT) to minimise the time lost in the academic project. Many students faced huge challenges with adapting to the digitalized way of learning. Students’ biggest challenges were insufficient resources and fear of failure. This study conducted a sentiment analysis on opinions shared by students from a South African public university on the introduction of ERT. Guided by a framework for developing a people-centred digital culture, the study analyses how the management of the educational crisis by the HEI led to the emergence of a people-centred digital culture at the onset of ERT. The study applied a qualitative methodology grounded in an interpretivist-constructivist paradigm. Through reflexive thematic analysis, qualitative data (sentiments) collected from an online social network (Twitter) were analysed qualitatively by the researchers to produce themes addressing issues that can be considered by HEIs in developing their digital cultures in an educational crisis. These findings revealed how students’ reaction to the institution\u27s transition to a digital culture within an education catastrophe may be utelised to develop student centred technological development. Furthermore, their sentiments reveal a process that may lead to the development of a digital culture that can balance sound teaching and learning with digital technology and student care. HEIs can leverage student experiences shared on online social networks to strengthen their strategies in developing and sustaining people-centred digital cultures during and beyond an educational crisis.
 
Participatory Evaluation of Ecosystem Transformation: Lessons for Rural Advisory and Extension Services
No full textThe Old Growth Forest was an inclusive model-in-the-making that combined community-based engagement, education, land and restoration. The programming was based on 4 pillars: Knowledge – techniques, plant names, etc.; Beauty of the land – aesthetic/wellbeing (deep land connections); Mystery – discovery/learning- nature and living ecology; and Gratitude – affective/spiritual engagement. This paper summarizes the introduction of utilization-focused developmental evaluation (UFDE), a collaborative approach that allows project partners to co-design and take ownership over evaluation, in this case of an experimental approach to conservation extension. UFDE is an established decision-making approach. It offers a variation known as Developmental Evaluation that provides a rigorous learning platform to document an experiment, in this case, a model-in-the-making of inclusive ecological education and restoration that has many potential applications in extension. Four evaluation purposes and nine key evaluation questions were co-developed. A major finding was that the power of community-based ecological restoration provides the following pro-environmental behaviour benefits: develops sense of community and of place and deeper engagement; promotes conservation ethic; reconnects with the environment; heals ecosystem segments; builds a sense of ownership of the ‘commons’ and eco-literacy – presents a problem + solution + tangible results; acts are powerful environmental activities, and tools for sparking and sustaining passion. Utilization-focused, developmental evaluation was an effective, inclusive and collaborative decision-making framework for community engagement and landscape changes that can be adapted in many other disciplines. The findings were consistent with the behaviour wheel model that highlights the interconnections between capability, motivation, opportunity with external factors contributing to this key extension approach
Farmer-led research to support the adoption of agro-ecological practices in Ontario
No full textPeer-learning programs offer an effective approach to promoting agro-ecological systems that support resilience and profitability while addressing challenges like climate change. As a specific type of peer-learning, farmer-led research (FLR) values farmer knowledge as formal knowledge by supporting practical on-farm research and farmer-to-farmer knowledge sharing. Through FLR, farmers use scientific methods to address their on-farm curiosities and challenges in ways that are compatible with the scale and management of their operations—and share their findings freely with other farmers. With its flexible and participatory nature, evidence shows that FLR contributes to the adoption and improvement of agro-ecological management practices across a range of contexts. Engagement in FLR initiatives has also been linked to positive social outcomes, including community building and enhanced capacity for leadership. In this paper, we present a case study of the Ecological Farmers Association of Ontario’s (EFAO) FLR program, which is currently one of few FLR initiatives in North America. Using a participatory, mixed-methods research approach, we conducted a survey, workshops and interviews to collect data from EFAO farmer-members including those participating in EFAO’s FLR program and those not involved in the program. The results highlight how EFAO’s FLR program is enabling farmers to feel more knowledgeable, confident and motivated to adopt and/or improve agro-ecological practices, in part by supporting them in building robust social networks that align with their farming priorities. Given the decline of publicly funded agricultural research and extension in Ontario and the cost-effectiveness of farmer-led research, limited public and private funds can be strategically invested to yield significant impacts in supporting farmer-led research programs. These programs can effectively drive the adoption of innovative agro-ecological agriculture across a wider range of farms
The WELL-E Approach to Data-Driven Inclusive Innovation: Working with and for the Canadian Dairy Industry
No full textEvolving theoretical frameworks of responsible inclusive innovation argue systems change must properly address real-world stakeholder needs and create positive impacts for society and environment. Our team works to integrate stakeholder and domain expert knowledge with cutting-edge AI methods for the improvement of animal and human welfare. WELL-E, a Digital Living Laboratory, is currently running at two research facilities: a university training environment and a vocational training environment for incarcerated persons, creating a community of practice allowing co-creation of technology, knowledge, and information with farmers, educators, researchers, and extensionists. At the university environment, we have been working with staff to co-develop new practices for animal housing and management. Our next major project is working directly with the vocational training environment to construct of a new dairy to test cutting-edge technologies and practices for the deployment of responsible AI tools on farms, empowering end users to be at the forefront of these innovations. While our team’s research on developing new knowledge has led to major changes in practice, we have since been working with farm staff on how best to introduce increased movement opportunities (group size, handler methods, etc.), ensuring its swift adoption across Canada. Vocational farm staff have been working directly with WELL-E to build training curriculum on stockmanship and clerical work (data entry, use of sensors), as well as to pilot new tools and technologies. Our collaborative approach promotes responsible and inclusive innovation through integration of new knowledge and technologies to the dairy industry and empowers end users to be at the forefront of positive welfare developments, ensuring their sustainability and reinforcing the importance of stakeholder participation in innovative scientific research
The Bare Sensitivity That Lies at the Heart of Improvisation
No full textBenjamín Mayer-Foulkes reflects on how Ajay Heble has impacted his life and work with 17, Instituto de Estudios Críticos, Mexico
Improvising Friendship
No full textJesse Stewart reflects on his friendship with Ajay Heble, including reflections on the various projects on which they\u27ve collaborated over the years