The purpose of this study was to assess the extent to which parents are involved in curriculum implementation in secondary schools in Anambra State of Nigeria as perceived by male and female principals. A research question and a hypothesis were formulated to guide the study. The survey research design was used. Participants were 257 secondary school principals. A 16-item researcher-developed questionnaire, designed on a 4-point scale, was used to collect data. Structured interviews were also used. Mean scores, content analysis, frequencies and t-test were used for data analysis. Findings indicated that in the opinions of male and female principals, there was a little extent of parental involvement in curriculum implementation. This indicates that irrespective gender, the principals in this study held a similar view of a little extent of parental involvement to curriculum implementation in schools. For this trend to improve, school principals and teachers need to make efforts for reaching and involving members to support curriculum implementation. They should design and implement strategies that will result in improved involvement, and at the same time, balance involvement vis-à-vis educators' professional autonomy.

Globally, the post graduate education landscape simultaneously undergoes rapid and tremendous changes with emphasis on research through equipping students with the necessary skills and knowledge to foster the growth of independent, creative and lifelong researchers. Among the resources to facilitate this aim, mentoring plays a vital role. This paper investigated the characteristics of research mentoring provided to postgraduate students in universities in Southern Nigeria. Two research questions were used. Proportionate stratified sampling technique was used to select 180 post graduate students for the study. A 27-item questionnaire was used to collect data which was analysed using frequencies and percentages. Findings indicate that research mentoring across institutions was characterized by supervisor's criticisms without providing insights, setting of unrealistic deadlines and expectations, and erosion of students' self-esteem. Focus on improving technical research skills, communicating high expectations, self-monitoring processes, encouraging active knowledge construction process, widening networks for research improvements, and supervisor-supervisee brainstorming were almost lacking. The observed characteristics would not in any way serve as catalysts for research as they are most unlikely to promote quality post graduate research. Recommendations were made to propose curricular enhancement strategies to reinvigorate research mentoring for quality postgraduate research.

In line with global challenges, the education system in Nigeria is advocating a shift from teacher to studentcentered instructional methods such as Guided Inquiry. This study sought to examine the effects of the guided inquiry method (GIM) on students' achievement in Social Studies curriculum in Anambra State relative to location and ability. It was guided by two research questions and two null hypotheses. The study was a quasi experimental design. Sample involved 160 JSS III Social Studies students selected through stratified random sampling technique from four randomly drawn secondary schools in Anambra State. A 20-item Social Studies Test was used to collect pre-test and post-test data for the study. The data obtained from the students were analysed using mean scores, standard deviation, t-test and the analysis of co-variance. Findings indicated that there were significant improvements in the mean scores of high and low ability learners in urban and rural school locations taught Social Studies with the Guided Inquiry method. This implies that irrespective of ability and school location, the guided inquiry method is more effective in raising students' achievement in selected concepts of Social Studies curriculum more than the lecture method. Based on these findings, it was recommended among other things that in order to enhance students' learning in Social Studies, new activity-based instructional strategies such as GIM should be adopted in secondary schools especially in teaching the subject to Junior secondary school students irrespective of their ability levels and school location.

Plagiarism is a threat to students' empowerment in higher education in a knowledge economy. In this paper the phenomenon of students' plagiarism in higher education institutions and how it disempowers the advancement of global knowledge by students, are discussed. The paper begins with a description of the meaning, forms and reasons for plagiarism among students. It goes further to discuss some strategies for evaluating and detecting plagiarism in students' works using Information technology. Finally some knowledge empowerment strategies are presented to show how lecturers could tackle plagiarism by empowering students to be genuine in receiving and producing information for constructing new knowledge.

A structured questionnaire, designed on a 5-point scale, was used to collect data. Findings indicated that some of the challenges faced by the teachers include how to: improvise materials to arouse and sustain learners' optimism and enthusiasm; access expert assistance and technical support; stay informed of innovative developments; have confidence to share ideas with other teachers; interpret research and statistical data; diplomatically handle students' resistance; align improvised materials with curriculum guidelines and timelines; and develop materials to cater for individual learner's needs in overcrowded classrooms. Some strategies bothering on teachers' self and group professional development, training, and Internet literacy were identified as capable of enhancing improvisation. These strategies if implemented might provide the teachers with opportunities to develop more improvisation insights for engaging young people in the highest quality learning activities.