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1. Spatio-Temporality and Tribal Water Quality Governance in the United States

   https://doi.org/10.3390/w11010099  

   Cavazos Cohn, Teresa; Berry, Kate; Powys Whyte, Kyle; Norman, Emma (January 2019, Water)

   Hydrosocial spatio-temporalities—aspects of water belonging to space, time, or space-time—are central to water governance, providing a framework upon which overall hydrosocial relations are constructed, and are fundamental to the establishment of values and central to socio-cultural-political relationships. Moreover, spatio-temporal conceptions may differ among diverse governing entities and across scales, creating “variability” through ontological pluralism, as well as power asymmetries embedded in cultural bias. This paper explores spatio-temporal conceptions related to water quality governance, an aspect of water governance often biased toward technical and scientific space-time conceptions. We offer examples of different aspects of spatio-temporality in water quality issues among Tribes in the United States, highlighting several themes, including spatiotemporal cycles, technological mediation, and interrelationship and fluidity. Finally, we suggest that because water is part of a dynamic network of space-times, water quality may be best governed through more holistic practices that recognize tribal sovereignty and hydrosocial variability. 

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2. A Culturally-Aware AI Tool for Crowdworkers: Leveraging Chronemics to Support Diverse Work Styles

   https://doi.org/10.1145/3686899  

   Toxtli, Carlos; Curtis, Christopher; Savage, Saiph (November 2024, Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction)

   Crowdsourcing markets are expanding worldwide, but often feature standardized interfaces that ignore the cultural diversity of their workers, negatively impacting their well-being and productivity. To transform these workplace dynamics, this paper proposes creating culturally-aware workplace tools, specifically designed to adapt to the cultural dimensions of monochronic and polychronic work styles. We illustrate this approach with CultureFit, a tool that we engineered based on extensive research in Chronemics and culture theories. To study and evaluate our tool in the real world, we conducted a field experiment with 55 workers from 24 different countries. Our field experiment revealed that CultureFit significantly improved the earnings of workers from cultural backgrounds often overlooked in design. Our study is among the pioneering efforts to examine culturally aware digital labor interventions. It also provides access to a dataset with over two million data points on culture and digital work, which can be leveraged for future research in this emerging field. The paper concludes by discussing the importance and future possibilities of incorporating cultural insights into the design of tools for digital labor. 

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3. From graphs as task to graphs as tool

   https://doi.org/10.1002/tea.21930  

   Stephens, A Lynn (May 2024, Journal of Research in Science Teaching)

   Abstract It is widely recognized that we need to prepare students to think with data. This study investigates student interactions with digital data graphs and seeks to identify what might prompt them to shift toward using their graphs as thinking tools in the authentic activity of doing science. Drawing from video screencast data of three small groups engaged in sensor‐based and computer simulation‐based experiments in high school physics classes, exploratory qualitative methods are used to identify the student interactions with their graphs and what appeared to prompt shifts in those interactions. Analysis of the groups, one from a 9th grade class and two from 11th/12th grade combined classes, revealed that unexpected data patterns and graphical anomalies sometimes, but not always, preceded deeper engagement with the graphs. When shifts toward deeper engagement did occur, transcripts revealed that the students perceived the graphical patterns to be misaligned with the actions they had taken to produce those data. Misalignments between the physical, digital, and conceptual worlds of the investigations played an important role in these episodes, appearing to motivate students to revise either their experimental procedures or their conceptions of the phenomena being explored. If real‐time graphs can help foster a sense in students that there should be alignments between their data production and data representations, it is suggested that pedagogy leverage this as a way to support deeper student engagement with graphs. 

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4. Understanding the Conceptions of Engineering in Early Elementary Students

   https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci12010043  

   Lampley, Sandra A.; Dyess, Sarah Roller; Benfield, Michael P.; Davis, Andrew M.; Gholston, Sampson E.; Dillihunt, Monica L.; Turner, Matthew W. (January 2022, Education Sciences)

   There is a demand for more STEM professionals. Early elementary students’ conceptions about engineering can influence whether or not they explore STEM career paths and ultimately select an engineering career. This study examined the conceptions elementary students have regarding the work that engineers perform. The research questions were the following: (1) what images do early elementary students associate with engineering and engineers, (2) do these associations vary from grade to grade, (3) are there gendered differences in these associations, and (4) how do the associations from this sample compare with the associations from the broader (grades one–five) Cunningham, Lachapelle, and Lindgren-Steider (2005) sample? Survey data from 1811 students in grades one–three were analyzed by comparison analysis and cluster analysis and then compared to the initial Cunningham et al. (2005) study. The results indicate two ways elementary students envision engineering: (a) creating designs or collecting and analyzing data, and (b) utilizing equipment to build and improve things. Comparison with the Cunningham et al. (2005) study suggests that there may be shifts in the way elementary students perceive engineering. Since these shifts could be attributed to a variety of factors, future work that determines what learning experiences might be contributing to students’ conceptions about engineering is recommended. 

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5. Reconsidering College Student Employability: A Cultural Analysis of Educator and Employer Conceptions of Workplace Skills

   https://doi.org/10.17763/1943-5045-88.4.483  

   BENBOW, ROSS J.; HORA, MATTHEW T. (December 2018, Harvard Educational Review)

   null (Ed.)

   In this research article, Ross J. Benbow and Matthew T. Hora explore the employability narrative, a view that focuses on whether colleges and universities provide students with the skills they need to be productively employed after graduation. Using sociocultural theory to problematize this narrative and qualitative methods to fore-ground the experiences of postsecondary educators and employers, the authors investigate conceptions of essential workplace skills in biotechnology and manufacturing fields. Their results show that though work ethic, technical knowledge, and technical ability represent core competencies valued across these communities, considerable variation exists in how members of different disciplinary and occupational subgroups value and conceptualize important skills. They found that respondents' conceptions of skills were also strongly tied to geography and organizational culture, among other contextual factors. With these results in mind, the authors conclude that skills are best viewed as multifaceted and situated assemblages of knowledge, skill, and disposition—or cultural models—and urge the adoption of more nuanced views among educators, employers, and policy makers that take into account the cultural and contextual forces that shape student success in the workplace. 

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