Research productivity plays an important role in the prestige and reputation among higher education institutions. However, the time spent to do research among Filipino academics is the most pressing issue since they can barely meet the requirement for research productivity. Further, the lack of time for data gathering aggravated the drawbacks for research productivity. Data gathering is at the core of almost all research activity, the absence of factual and reliable data will lead to an invalid and illogical inference. In research years, there has been a massive agglomeration of data in large volumes coming from diverse sources pertaining to almost all facets of human activity which is worthy of investigation- known today as Big Data. This research has two (2) main objectives; the first is to find out the underlying reasons why Filipino academics are not enthusiastic to do research. The second is to evaluate the value of big data utilization for research productivity based on the assessment of the faculty members. This research used the Rasch model to measure the responses of Filipino academics with regards to their reasons for not doing enough research work as well as on their assessment for value creation of big data utilization using a polytomous item response selection scale.

Some evaluation has been carried out in Vocational High Schools (VHSs), but most of it focuses on the documents or passive data rather than the processes happening in VHSs. Thus, this research focuses on the evaluation of VHS performances where the process is initiated with identifying the constructs and developing the instruments of performance evaluation for VHSs with Technology and Engineering expertise programs. Based on the problems found in the field, before conducting the evaluation, the researcher needs to, at first, develop the instrument of evaluation through three stages of development. The first stage is analyzing the concepts related to the evaluation by examining the factors affecting VHS performances. In the second stage, instrument development and instrument analysis (content validation) are conducted with the help of experts. The third stage is performance evaluation in VHSs located in Yogyakarta. The evaluation employs a set of instruments developed by the researchers. This research has produced a set of instruments for performance evaluation, which can be used extensively in VHSs. Based on the evaluation, it is found that the aspects of general management and academic management of the VHSs being studied are considered “Good”.

In Nazarbayev Intellectual Schools, international teachers, who were in mentorship positions were interviewed for their experiences with mentee resistance to mentoring. In this paper, the authors investigate aspects of the perception of resistance to mentoring in the program for long-service teachers. It is the aim of this paper to explore the definitions that mentors attach to resistance, based on their experiences in one NIS School. The questions to be answered were how the mentors defined mentoring, and how the mentors experienced resistance from their mentees. Semi-structured interviews were conducted face-to-face. The mentor responses were captured on a dictaphone, and transcribed later. Eleven teachers participated in the interviews. The definitions of mentoring resistance were examined in seven categories as hesitation, stagnation, body language, fear, unavailability, and mistrust of the mentor. Stagnation was the largest category, displayed by unwillingness to try new things, unwillingness to see own limitations, close mindedness, unwillingness to see own weakness, and passivity in action.

The objectives of this research included to study the effects of democratic parenting and teaching activities on global citizenship according to logical reasoning in making decisions on political attitudes among 2,286 students from 80 classrooms. The research instruments included 1) a set of rating- scale questionnaires for students with 92 items, having the reliability as 0.968 and 2) a set of rating- scale questionnaires for teachers with 23 items, having the reliability as 0.893. The results of the multilevel structural equation model analysis revealed that the factor of political attitudes was the most important in describing each student's global citizenship with the explanation of the variance with democratic parenting and the analysis of applying the reasons in students’ decisions was as 68.50%. Teaching activities affected positively on global citizenship both directly and indirectly through statistically significant factors with and together explained the variance of the global citizenship of each student by 84.00%. These findings highlight the importance of developing and fostering political attitudes that affect students' global citizenship through parenting and teaching activities covering the development of relevant factors as discussed in the Discussion and Implementation Part.

Boarding schools are the common ‘out-of-home’ placements for adolescents, due to various historical, religiously orthodox, and traditional reasons and due to dysfunction within families. The purpose of the current study is to examine the relationship between a free versus an enforced decision to enroll in a boarding school in terms of personal well-being among emancipated graduates. Ninety alumni graduates (aged range 20-41) of out-of- home boarding schools in Israel were recruited during 2019. Participants were administered a self-report anonymous questionnaire consisting of the following measures: Free versus enforced decision to enroll in a boarding school, retrospective satisfaction with the boarding school, personal well-being and traumatic events. Results indicated that a free decision to enroll in an out-of-home boarding school was associated with current satisfaction with social relationships but not with quality of life. Additionally, the longer the period spent in a boarding school, the higher was the satisfaction from the period at school. Older graduates reported less satisfaction from school retrospectively. It was concluded that involving the adolescent in life changing decisions such as leaving home to a boarding school is likely to influence the person's well-being during and after emancipation.

Student learning in higher education is influenced by parental involvement, peer support, and lecturers' perceptions of agreeableness. This research aims to examine the correlation between parental involvement, peer support, and the perception of personality agreeableness of lecturers on self-regulated learning (SRL) students. This research is a correlational field research model with a quantitative approach. The respondents of this research were 250 students of Yogyakarta State Islamic University who were obtained using a purposive random sampling technique. Data collection uses a scale of SRL, parent involvement, peer support, and perception of the agreeableness personality of the lecturer. Regression analysis is used as a data analysis technique. The results showed that there was a positive and significant correlation between parental involvement with SRL, peer support with SRL, personality perception agreeableness lecturers with SRL, and parental involvement, peer support, and perceptual personality agreeableness of lecturers together with SRL with an effective contribution (R2) of 15.1%. It was concluded that the involvement of parents, peer support, and perception of personality agreeableness of lecturers related to SRL of students. Therefore, to see student SRL can be seen based on the involvement of parents, peer support, and students' perceptions of the personality agreeableness of their lecturers.

This study examines the basic underlying structure of burnout experiences among teachers in Malaysia by discovering the challenges which lead them to experience burnout. Using interpretative phenomenological analysis, the current study explores the coping strategies that these teachers used to remain in their profession. Ten teachers from two public high schools participated in the study. The data was collected through in-depth semi-structured interviews and analysed using the constant comparison method. The findings revealed challenges that cause teachers to experience burnout, which are student misbehaviour, insufficient parental collaboration, occupational stress in the teaching environment, and negative emotions. The themes related to the coping strategies used to remain in the teaching profession are understanding teaching and learning, positive approach, individual factors, and support system. This paper lists some recommendations for managing the issue of teacher burnout and facilitate teacher retention is proposed, which includes providing training and development activities for teachers, increasing salaries, helping teachers develop coping strategies, and creating adequate support systems.

Absenteeism is of great concern for K–12 school students in the United States. The aim of this study is to evaluate effects of parental participation types in absenteeism of Elementary and Secondary Education (K-12) students in the United States. We analyze the data of the U.S. Department of Education (Hanson et al., 2019), in relation to students, schools and parents’ characteristics, along with various parental involvement activities, for exploring how these factors influence K-12 students’ absenteeism in the United States. We employ Chi-square tests for the significance of relationships between parental involvement types and absenteeism of K-12 students. We also undertake multiple logistic regression analyses to evaluate the significance and odds of K-12 students’ absenteeism due to parental involvement activities and other underlying factors. The results of bivariate analyses suggest that parental involvement types are significantly associated with K-12 absenteeism (chi-squared p-value<0.05). Multiple logistic regression analysis reveals that only a subset of underlying parental activities is significantly related to higher odds of absenteeism as measured by estimates of odds ratios (OR) and 95% confidence interval estimates. It also suggests that parental education, ethnicity and poverty adjusted for other factors also significantly affect absenteeism.

Science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) education is regarded as one of the formulas to embracing many of our imminent challenges. STEM education benefits the learners by encouraging interest in STEM disciplines. This daunting task needs everyone’s concerted efforts in creating and innovating mathematics teachers’ classroom practices Therefore, a systematic review was conducted to identify best practices for STEM education following the guidelines of the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) by Moher et al. (2015). The reviewed articles were published from 2016 to 2020 and accessed using the Scopus and Web of Science (WoS) databases. Three themes for best practices were identified namely (a) core competencies encompassing 21st-century teaching skills; (b) instructional designs; and (c) requisite STEM execution. Results of PRISMA determined the dominant STEM practices were critical thinking, communication, collaboration, problem-solving, research-based pedagogy, problem-based learning and project-based learning, technological integration, accessibility, professional development and learning support, evidence of effectiveness, access to materials and practitioner support, and scalability. Mathematics teachers should determine the best STEM practices to employ even though there is a lack of studies on integrated STEM domains. When more students are interested in venturing and exploring into the field of STEM, the high demand for STEM related careers could be met by the younger generation.

Students drop out of schools for many reasons, and it has negative effects on the individual and society. This paper reports a study using data published in 2015 from the Educational Longitudinal Study conducted by the National Center for Education Statistics to analyze the influence of parental involvement on low-achieving U.S. students’ graduation rates from high school. Findings indicate that both students and parents share the same perspective on the need for parental involvement in their academic progress. For low-achieving high school students, parental involvement in academic work is a positive factor influencing students’ graduation from high school.

Writing is very important for learners; it is a dynamic and creative skill. Although studies on students’ problems when writing a dissertation among Native Speakers (NS) are widely done, studies on English as a Foreign Language (EFL) are limited, especially those which examine problems faced while writing dissertations among Ph.D. EFL learners, in particular, Jordanian Ph.D. candidates. Studies on the supervisors' perspectives of writing a dissertation are scarce among EFL learners, particularly Arab learners. This study aims at focusing on supervisors' perspectives of writing dissertations among Jordanian Ph.D. students who are studying abroad. This study is a qualitative case study. The researchers interviewed nine Malaysian supervisors who supervised 21 Jordanian Ph.D. candidates. The results show that six main themes emerged from the supervisors' perspectives, and they are grammatical mistakes, lack of vocabulary and verbs reporting, personal effects, lack of motivation, writing apprehension, and the problem with generic thesis structure. This paper contributes with a comprehensive analysis of the theoretical perspectives on problems Ph.D. students face when writing a dissertation. The study also fills in the gap in the field of supervisors' perspectives of writing a dissertation. Based on the results found, the researchers suggest a number of recommendations and further research that might help supervisors understand the reasons behind such difficulties.

The study aims to find out the influence of Mistake-Handling Activities to determine mathematical definitions knowledge, which can be regarded as a component of mathematics content knowledge, of teachers on the development of teachers in providing mathematical definitions. Within this framework, Mistake-Handling Activities were carried out with five volunteer mathematics teachers. Written opinions and semi-structured face-to-face interviews were used as data collection tools. During the application, focus group interviews were carried out, and the application was enhanced with discussions. The data were analyzed using the document review method, and codes, categories, and themes were also determined. The results revealed that Mistake-Handling Activities yielded certain emotional advantages such as increasing teachers’ interest and curiosity, critical thinking, self-confidence, awareness, and offering different viewpoints as well as yielding cognitive advantages such as recognizing their shortcomings, acknowledging the importance of knowing the definition of a concept, and using the definition.

Misconceptions are one of the biggest obstacles in learning mathematics. This study aimed to investigate students’ common errors and misunderstandings they cause when defining the angle and the triangle. In addition, we investigated the metacognition/ drawing/ writing/ intervention (MDWI) strategy to change students’ understanding of the wrong concepts to the correct ones. A research design was used to achieve this goal. It identified and solved the errors in the definition of angle and triangle among first-year students in the Department of Mathematics Education at an excellent private college in Mataram, Indonesia. The steps were as follows: A test instrument with open-ended questions and in-depth interviews were used to identify the errors, causes, and reasons for the students’ misconceptions. Then, the MDWI approach was used to identify a way to correct these errors. It was found that students generally failed in interpreting the concept images, reasoning, and knowledge connection needed to define angles and triangles. The MDWI approach eliminated the misconceptions in generalization, errors in concept images, and incompetence in linking geometry features.

Problem-solving process requires information processing, and the information processing is related to working memory capacity (WMC). This study aims to determine the effect of WMC on students' mathematical abilities and to describe the ability of the students with high and low WMC in solving mathematical problems. This research used mixed method with Sequential Explanatory Design. The quantitative data were collected through the provision of OSPAN tasks and math tests to 58 students aged 15-17 years, while the qualitative data were collected through interviews based on mathematical problem-solving tasks. The results showed that WMC had a significant effect on students' mathematical abilities (R=0.536; p=0.000). Researchers found differences in students' mathematical problem-solving abilities with high and low WMC. Students with high WMC can remember and manage information well which supports the determination of more advanced problem-solving strategies and have better attention control so that they find varied appropriate solutions. Students with low WMC experienced decreased attention control as the complexity of the tasks increased, missed important information in problem solving strategies, and did not recheck their work, leading to wrong solution/answer. The mathematical performance of students with high WMC outperformed the mathematical performance of students with low WMC.

This research is a developmental research aiming at developing a good mathematical test instrument using polytomous responses based on classical and modern theories. This research design uses the Plomp model, which consists of five stages, (1) preliminary investigation, (2) design, (3) realization/construction, (4) revision, and (5) implementation (testing). The study was conducted in three vocational schools in Lampung Province, Indonesia. The study involved 413 students, consisting of 191 male and 222 female students. The data were collected through questionnaire and test. The questionnaire was used to identify the assessment instruments currently employed by teachers and to be validated by the experts of mathematics and educational evaluation. The test used an open polytomous response test numbering of 40 items. The data were analyzed using both classical and modern theories. The results show that (1) the open polytomous response test has a good category according to classical and modern theory. However, the discrimination power of test items in classical theory needs several revisions, (2) the assessment instrument using the polytomous response of open multiple choice can guarantee information on the actual competence of students. This is proven by the fact that there is a harmony between the analysis result obtained from classical and modern theory from the students' arguments when giving reasons for their choices. Therefore, the open polytomous response test can be used as an alternative to learning assessment.

Mathematics anxiety in initial teacher education is a growing issue that reflects on teacher quality and their student’s maths anxiety and abilities. Previous studies have presented a range of different perspectives to mathematics anxiety. We aimed to explore further the reasons of mathematics anxiety in preservice teachers and suggest some intervention strategies in reducing maths anxiety for initial teacher education systems. We used a mixed methodology in this research analysing both qualitative data along with some quantified data derived from qualitative data sources. The findings provide insights to causes of maths and test anxiety along with some intervention strategies that teacher educators can use in their future teaching.

In all years of the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) in primary mathematics education, Finland ranked in the lower places (44-61) in the dispersion index (the difference in scores between the 95th percentile and the 5th percentile), while Israel ranked in the upper places (1-3) in the same index. In the last PISA test, Israel ranked first (among the 78 participating countries) in grade differences, while Finland ranked 61st. The score for dispersion in Israel is 356 points, the highest among the countries and economic entities of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). Based on these results, this comparative study between Israel and Finland was conducted to investigate the most important sociological factor in the Pisa test that influences most student achievements in mathematics in Finland and Israel, as well as the reasons for the differences in achievement between mathematics scores. The results of this study show that the differences in achievement in Israel are due to students' socio-economic status and the sector. In contrast, Finland's first sociological factor influencing student performance is socio-economic status. Nevertheless, it has a more negligible influence than in Israel. The second factor is student motivation.

This descriptive research study aimed to assess the management of the existing policies, guidelines, and procedures on the implementation of the interdisciplinary approach in performance-based assessment (IAPA) before and during Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) as a basis for proposing improvements for its implementation in the “new normal”. 30 senior high school science teachers and school leaders from 5 private and 5 public schools in Metro Manila, Philippines, participated in this study. The participants assessed the management of existing policies, guidelines, and procedures on the IAPA’s implementation using a survey questionnaire and identified its strengths and weaknesses using an interview guide. The researchers developed the instruments used for data collection but subjected to experts’ validation and reliability test. Results reveal that the management of IAPA was effective and that it benefits students and teachers in many ways. However, it has also weaknesses, which are associated with the role of school leaders in the implementation of the policies, guidelines, and/or procedures, especially during the new normal education setting. The study provides suggestions for improving IAPA implementation in the new normal covering both the face-to-face and online learning modalities

The pandemic era has caused changes in the learning system. The situation demanded online learning and triggered students to have learning difficulties. The research aims to examine the impact of social media, social environment, and student learning potential on student learning difficulties. This study utilizes a quantitative approach. The respondents were university students experiencing online learning in West Java, Indonesia. A questionnaire validated by four experts was distributed to 539 of them. Accommodating structural equation modeling (SEM) by evaluating the measurement and structural models was used in data analysis. This study revealed that the instrument had good construct validity and reliability. A good instrument will produce a good measurement process so that the instrument can get the data needed. Hypothesis testing shows that high media activity can inhibit students from learning. However, social media activity directly influences learning difficulties. Meanwhile, the variables of learning potential and social environment positively influence student learning difficulties directly or indirectly. There are a few things to note on learning potential, social environment, and social media to delve into their influences on students' learning difficulties.

Crises like COVID-19 affect organizations as well as employees' well-being. Leaders, in this sense, have a critical role to play in reducing the challenges and promoting a healthy workplace. With employees feeling overwhelmed and anxious to cope, leaders should provide the appropriate support and guidance. This quantitative study examined the relationship between different leadership styles, which are participative, directive, supportive, and Laissez-Faire, and teachers' well-being in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The study adds insights into the UAE's public school context, where 101 teachers were surveyed following a snowball sampling technique. Findings revealed that Laissez-Faire and directive styles were the most dominant among the four leadership styles examined. In terms of the relationships between leadership styles and well-being, correlation and regression analyses were done through SPSS, and findings from the Generalized Linear Model analysis revealed that although the four styles correlated positively with well-being, the participative leadership style had the most decisive influence. The results showed that none of the demographics had any significant influence on well-being, and no differences in well-being in terms of demographics were reported.