The third edition of this award-winning Handbook continues the mission of its predecessors: to provide a comprehensive compendium of research in all aspects of distance education, arguably the most significant development in education over the past three decades. While the book deals with education that uses technology, the focus is on teaching and learning and how its management can be facilitated through technology. Key features include: Comprehensive coverage that includes all aspects of distance education, including design, instruction, management, policy, and a section on different audiences. Chapter authors frame their topic in terms of empirical research (past and present) and discuss the nature of current practice in terms of that research. Future research needs are discussed in relation to both confirmed practice and recent changes in the field. Section one provides a unique review of the theories that support distance education pedagogy. Section six includes a unique review of distance education as a component of global culture. This book will be of interest to anyone engaged in distance education at any level. It is also appropriate for corporate and government trainers and for administrators and policy makers in all these environments. Recipient of the 2013 IAP Distance Education Book Award

Information--regular, systematic, reliable--is the life-blood of democracy and the fuel of effective management. Surely today there is no problem with information, for this is the age of information overload. It pours onto our computer screens and out of our printers. Indeed, many governments claim, often with some justification, to be more open and transparent than ever before. But what if the life-blood is contaminated, or the fuel polluted? Then the body politic sickens and the engine of public management runs rough. It is the vital issue of the quality of the information we receive that this book addresses. Quality Matters compares approaches across different jurisdictional settings and across three different types of information evaluation. The chapters describe and analyze quality assurance in a number of countries and within a variety of international organizations. These have been selected either because they are widely considered to be leaders in evaluating information or because they have experience with assuring quality information that can instruct others. Contributors are from Australia, Canada, the European Union, France, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom, United States, and the World Bank. This pioneering study analyzes practices for assuring the quality of evaluation, performance auditing, and reporting in the face of political, organizational, and technical obstacles. A final chapter addresses the extent to which quality assurance systems become bothersome rituals or remain meaningful mechanisms to ensure quality control. This well-structured volume will be of particular interest to policymakers and adds much to the literature on program evaluation and performance auditing.

Quality Matters in Children's Services brings together authoritative research to explore critical concerns for those working with vulnerable children, young people and their families. Subjects covered include reunification, stability and wellbeing, kinship care, educating vulnerable young people, child protection, domestic violence and parental substance misuse, the participation of disabled young people and advocacy services. Mike Stein discusses key issues for policy and practice in the development of quality services including identifying and sustaining quality through involving stakeholders, integrated working and quality services, the development of policies, procedures and organisational processes and carrying out quality assessments, training and workforce reform. This book is essential reading for practitioners, senior staff, commissioners, managers and anyone involved in developing quality children's services.

?All That Matters About Quality I Learned In Joe?s Garage: High Quality Made Simple? is the second book in the Joe?s Garage series, following the international bestseller ?All I Need To Know About Manufacturing I Learned In Joe?s Garage.?Joe?s neighbors and colleagues once again gather in Joe?s garage for a home project. This time they are engaged in an ambitious endeavor requiring top quality as well as high productivity and low cost. The story covers the entire life cycle of a product, from an idea in someone?s mind to disposition after the product?s useful lifetime. It covers product planning, design, production, delivery, maintenance, and support. The book dramatically illustrates how to achieve high quality while simultaneously excelling in operations cost and schedule performance.The book is written in the same easy-reading style as the first Joe?s Garage book. It is a classic teaching fable that can immediately improve the work quality of any organization or individual. The book includes a Reader?s Guide, a recap of key points and terms, and a comprehensive index.

Effective Online Teaching is an essential resource that offers a clear understanding of how cognition and learning theory applies to online learning. This much-needed resource provides specific strategies for incorporating this knowledge into effective learner-centered teaching that gets results. The book includes strategies on motivation, tailored instruction, interaction, collaboration, monitoring and communication, time and information management, student concerns, and legal and ethical issues. Designed as a text for online instructors, the chapters can be used for self-directed learning or in a formal training setting in concert with the companion Training Manual and CD. "Tina Stavredes has done something sorely needed in the online teaching world she has successfully combined solid theory and research with the practical application of instructor training. Both the book and the training manual are a 'must' for any online education organization. Bravo!" Dr. Darcy W. Hardy, assistant vice provost for Technology Education Initiatives, University of Texas at San Antonio, and chair emerita, United States Distance Learning Association "Drawing from years of experience and solidly grounded in an understanding of the adult learner and learning, Stavredes offers dozens of helpful instructor strategies, activities, and resources to support adult learners' success in an online environment. Effective Online Teaching and its accompanying training manual is a 'must-have' set for online instructors in higher education, corporate, and government settings." Sharan B. Merriam, professor emeritus of adult education, University of Georgia, and coauthor, Learning in Adulthood "An eminently practical book that provides clear and unpretentious explanations of the learning theories that are essential knowledge for every online teacher, together with equally uncluttered and easy-to-follow guidance about how to apply this knowledge to achieve excellent teaching." Michael Grahame Moore, Distinguished Professor of Education, The Pennsylvania State University, and editor, The American Journal of Distance Education

The definitive career guide for grad students, adjuncts, post-docs and anyone else eager to get tenure or turn their Ph.D. into their ideal job Each year tens of thousands of students will, after years of hard work and enormous amounts of money, earn their Ph.D. And each year only a small percentage of them will land a job that justifies and rewards their investment. For every comfortably tenured professor or well-paid former academic, there are countless underpaid and overworked adjuncts, and many more who simply give up in frustration. Those who do make it share an important asset that separates them from the pack: they have a plan. They understand exactly what they need to do to set themselves up for success. They know what really moves the needle in academic job searches, how to avoid the all-too-common mistakes that sink so many of their peers, and how to decide when to point their Ph.D. toward other, non-academic options. Karen Kelsky has made it her mission to help readers join the select few who get the most out of their Ph.D. As a former tenured professor and department head who oversaw numerous academic job searches, she knows from experience exactly what gets an academic applicant a job. And as the creator of the popular and widely respected advice site The Professor is In, she has helped countless Ph.D.’s turn themselves into stronger applicants and land their dream careers. Now, for the first time ever, Karen has poured all her best advice into a single handy guide that addresses the most important issues facing any Ph.D., including: -When, where, and what to publish -Writing a foolproof grant application -Cultivating references and crafting the perfect CV -Acing the job talk and campus interview -Avoiding the adjunct trap -Making the leap to nonacademic work, when the time is right The Professor Is In addresses all of these issues, and many more.

Updated and completely restructured edition! Originally one of the first book-length treatments of continual improvement principles applied to organizing and operating the educational system. With special emphasis on the quality philosophy of Dr. W. Edwards Deming, the text adapts Deming's systems flowchart, Plan-Do-Study-Act cycle, and "14 Points" to the problems and processes of education. Presents education as a transformative process and covers expectations, roles, and inhibiting factors for parents, students, teachers, and administrators. Examines education's customers, differing definitions of quality with respect to education, and the failure of well-intentioned reform efforts such as the "National Education Goals" (also known as "Goals 2000") of the late 1980s. Includes chapters on programs for gifted and talented students, values education, and curriculum and other standards. Presents strategy ideas and discusses leadership required to develop and sustain quality education.