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The Rethinking the public in Higher Education: Communitarian Engagement vs. Service-Based dependency
79-108Views:41There has been structural change in higher education due to the impact of institutions built or maintained in private public partnership. The aim of the paper is to give a deep insight into how these institutions could accomodate or shape the public higher education sector’s discouses, spaces, procedures. The research used mixed method to approach this complex question from a multidisciplinary perspective (sociology, education). Within this framework two residential halls were chosen and 17 interviews were carreid out with all relevant figure of the management. Due to the analytical tools of Maxqda 12 the qualitative results will be presented giving an insight into the differing discourses and practices of the public vs. private-public management. Based on the analysis of the managerial interviews it is safe to state that the public management struggles to balance a communitarian, democratic discourse and objectives with the requirements of efficiency and accountability. The presence of private-public management unintendedly shapes its public counterpart. The institutional analysis revealed that due to the swiftly changing institutional and policy environment residential halls are forced to be efficient leading to difficulties in managerial legitimacy and questions concepts such as community, conformity, commitment and action. Under the circumstances of increasingly growing institutional service-based dependency and control, academic consumers, institutions and students alike, paradoxically avoid integrating into macro groups. As a consequence, the institution encourage and educate student into a particular type of citizenship based on communication and consumerism rather than consensus.
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The civil activity of higher education students and the correlation of their chances of dropping out
141-156Views:48Our research question is that volunteering and civil organization membership of higher education students are able to protect against dropping out from higher education or even divert from effective learning and hinder persistence. The positive or negative effect of civil activity of students is measured by quantitative multivariable method, and the question is whether there is there a clear effect of civil activity on persistence, after allowing the effect of other socio-demographic variables. The results show, that civil activity of students neither protect against dropping out nor hinder persistence in our sample. There were several variables which affected civil activity, and the good relationship with parents is protecting the most against dropping out from higher education, but the fact, that civil activity is neither divert from effective learning, and nor hinder persistence means that it is important to improve civil activity of higher education students due to its’ several positive effects.
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Family plans and career plans among higher education students in the field of social sciences based on a pilot study in Eastern Hungary
71-93Views:68Our paper explores the family and career plans of social sciences students at Hungary’s second largest university based on a questionnaire-based pilot study. Nowadays, careers include more than the traditional vertical promotion within an organisation, as seen from the emergence of the self-directed “protean” career type, which prompts organisations to adapt to individuals’ values, attitudes, and own career definitions. In addition, the Kaleidoscope Career Model sets out that individuals adapt their career goals to their life stages. Thus, students’ career and family plans matter to prospective employers. Our results show that a modern self-directed career type has emerged among students, for whom it is a priority to meet their own expectations. In several cases, starting a family is preceded by career goals. Furthermore, despite the “feminine” nature of social sciences, our pilot study shows that male students in the field still tend to conform to traditional gender roles regarding the importance of family and career. Our research implies that prospective employers need to adapt their HR strategies to young people’s family and career plans. Moreover, organisations should support students in gaining relevant work experience and in achieving their subsequent career plans.
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Studying further in higher education as a human capital investment
134-144Views:68In our paper, we examine the motives of further studies in higher education among higher education students, as well as how socio-demographic variables modify these motives. Our research method is quantitative. We used a research database gathered in the historical Partium region in 2014 (N = 1792). The theoretical backgrounds of our research are the human capital theory and Bourdieu’s capital conversion model. Based on ten motives of further studies, we made a cluster analysis and examined the relationships of these clusters and the socio-demographic background variables. Our finding is that the most important motive of further studies among students was expanding knowledge. Therefore, the motive of getting higher wages in the future, which is the central aspect in the human capital model, proved to be of minor importance. Based on the capital conversion theory students wanted to gain cultural and social capital when they decided to study further, as both can be profitable for them in the future. However, while the motives of further studies were affected by the social background of students, contrary to our hypothesis, financial motives were not more important for those students coming from disadvantage backgrounds than for other students
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College and university students’ attitudes towards democracy in Hungary
47-69Views:32The existence of education for democracy has positive impact on citizens’ political knowledge
and the identification with the democratic values. In the process of civic education, the
universities and high schools play an important role. Many scholars argue that the high schools
have a civic mission to serve a public good or the university is the civic mission itself. To examine
democratic citizenship among high school and university students we use a dataset composed of
three surveys (2011/2012, 2013, 2015) of 4800 Hungarian students. We build on the literature
about the empirical and theoretical framework of democratic citizenship to answer the question
if 25 years after the collapse of communism we can witness the emergence of a new generation
of democrats in Hungary? Have young people successfully come to terms with their countries' authoritarian past and developed a commitment to democracy as a system of rule? Are they
ready to defend it in the face of challenges? Based on the empirical framework of citizenship we
derive a number of significant lessons from the Hungarian case, with important implications
about the ability to teach the norms and responsibilities of democratic citizenship in the world’s
emerging democracies. -
The Career-building effect of volunteering in higher education
146-160Views:70Nowadays the motives for volunteering are changing among higher education students, and
besides traditional altruistic motives, career-building motives also appear (the acquisition
of work experience and professional knowledge, professional development, networking,
the presentation of voluntary work in the resume). In this paper, we use data from a survey
conducted in five Central and Eastern European countries (N=2,199) to examine through linear
regression analysis the factors affecting the strength of career-building motives and to analyse
through a logistic regression model the determinants of whether or not volunteering is related to the field of study. Our hypotheses are formulated based on the literature. Our results show
that career-building motives are more pronounced among women and students who have a
close relationship with external friends outside the university, study outside Hungary, and study
something other than engineering, computer science or science. Voluntary work is more likely to
be related to the field of study among teacher education students, students with an unfavourable
financial situation, those who study in Romania, and those who have a close relationship with
faculty. -
A Hidden Stream in Medical Education
56-78Views:40The general aim of medical education is the same as in the case of any other ones: creating a professional person from a lay one. A special characteristic of this education is a deep rift between the lay and the professional perspective. One of the main trends of this trait is the discrepancy between the open and the hidden curricula. The contents of the hidden curricula, in many cases, cannot support the main messages of the formal one, on the contrary, they provide a different or even contradictory set of norms, values,
attitudes. One of the main consequences of these discrepancies is that some medical students have been becoming more cynical since their entrance into medical education. The open curricula emphasize empathy, alleviating pain and suffering, the importance of trust and fidelity, and that the well-being of patients is one of the most important priorities. The hidden curricula at the same time emphasize objectivity, detachment, caution, and being suspicious against emotions. One of the outcomes of these eventually contradictory tendencies is that the ’wounded healer’ is not a precondition for becoming a healer, like in archaic times, but a by-product of medical education. -
Similarities and Differences of Students’ Labour Market Paths Graduated in the Field of Social Science
109-140Views:38We study graduate trainees’ (short) paths of four „social courses” and their transition from higher education to the labour market. We have thought in cases of the chosen social courses, that differences can become perceivable besides similarities. It has also been assumed that sociologists of the four chosen professions can be characterized by a diverse labour market behaviour from the other ones. It can be partially explained by the objectives, the content of their courses and the flexibility of the prospective institutional system. Compared to the above in cases of other social courses a diverse picture has been experienced by us based on the socio-demographic background and experience in labour market, expectations and satisfaction. Social workers and socio-politicians’ socio-demographic indicators are quite similar just like the socio-politicians and sociologists’ indicators are. This may be due to the effect of the level of master/academic education. We analyse the results of Graduate Tracking System (GTS) 2015 data collection in our presentation. The research was carried out by the Educational Office in co-operation with higher education institutions in the form of an online questionnaire. We sorted the respondents of the four chosen courses (828) out of all graduated (20 579).
