Supervision

The present study was an attempt to explore the effect of clinical supervision on EFL teachers’ level of burnout. For this purpose, a total number of 80 male and female EFL teachers within the age range of 26 and 47 who were working at a language school in Tehran participated in this study. Forty teachers in the experimental group underwent a clinical supervision program which comprised the three steps of pre-observation conference, observation, and post-observation feedback conference while the other 40 teachers who were in the control group were subjected to the conventional supervision program of the language school. The program for both groups spanned a total period of 12 weeks. Prior to the program, the Maslach Burnout Inventory questionnaire (MBI) was used to measure the level of all of the teachers’ burnout as the pretest and again at the end of study, both groups took the MBI questionnaire as the posttest. The analysis of the test scores using a test of analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) revealed that the clinical supervision program had lowered significantly the participants’ burnout. As a result of this study, the researchers suggest that ELT establishments take into consideration the practice of clinical supervision to enhance their teachers’ performance.

Forty general English teachers at the university level attended three supervisory sessions. The qualitative data were collected through a triangulation of various techniques, including: pre/post-supervision semi-structured interviews, classroom observation checklists, reflective journals, field notes, and transcriptions of audio-recorded data from supervisory meetings. Thematic analysis was used to identify recurring themes at each layer of the onion model. The Chi-square analysis revealed a significant difference between teachers’ attitudes and strategies before and after the supervisory meetings. The results demonstrated that teachers experienced a process of growth with a developmental trajectory from the outer layers to the inner layers of the onion model fostering the core qualities of self-confidence, self-efficacy, self-awareness, and autonomy. Furthermore, the analysis indicated that the supervisor played a significant role in teachers’ development by using supervisory strategies such as: empathetic listening and accepting the problems, empowerment by activating core qualities, giving attention to inner obstacles, giving balanced attention to cognition, emotion, and motivation, and help to get autonomy in core reflection. The findings support making deliberate efforts to establish regular supervisory practicum meetings as part of academic professional culture, and the core reflection approach as a valuable strategy.

Once the responsibilities of central bank increases, developing good governance for achieving its different aims to satisfy the required statutory power becomes more complicated. In the case of the central bank of Islamic republic of Iran - as monetary policymaker and supervisor-this issue is valid as well. Considering the necessity of independency, accountability, and transparency for developing good governance to achieve required statutory power, current laws on the central bank and banking, and the bills on these laws have been evaluated. Since these bills have not been developed based on the importance of the main pillars of central bank governance regarding its core functions and the current laws do not support these pillars as well, we cannot expect that the central bank attains required statutory power. Hence, these bills should be modified to consider these pillars and enhance the level of central bank’s governance and its statutory power. JEL Classification: E52, E58.

As an inseparable part of teachers’ education career, practicum supervision can function as a double-edged sword that can generate pedagogical improvement or even make the worse worst in the class depending on the time and manner of its implementation. Given its significance and crucial role in EFL contexts, supervision has captured the attention of some scholars in this line of research. However, few studies (if any) have focused on EFL teachers’ beliefs about instructional supervision and its role in pedagogical development considering their experience level. To fill this lacuna, the current study examined the perceptions of 100 Iranian EFL teachers with different experience levels toward various supervisory practices and their contribution to teacher pedagogical growth using an Instructional Supervision Questionnaire (Kayaoglu, 2012). Furthermore, a semi-structured interview was carried out with 10 EFL teachers taken from the same sample. The results of analyses indicated that both novice and experienced teachers had a negative view concerning the existing supervision system in Iran. Additionally, no significant difference was found between the novice and experienced EFL teachers’ beliefs about classroom supervision (p > .05). The qualitative findings also revealed that both novice and experienced EFL teachers considered supervision as bureaucracy, fault-seeking, confidence-minimizing, and with little to no instructional worth. They also had similar beliefs as per the characteristics of an effective supervisory act. Moreover, supervision was perceived useful only when teachers were novice instructors, but ineffective as they became experienced.

The asymmetry of information between managers and shareholders significantly affects the company's investment decisions and exacerbates the problems of agency. It seems that these problems in developing markets such as Iran are more than developed markets. This research is an exploratory study, and it aims at reviewing the theory of agency in Iran. In the present study, based on the research paradigm, first, data acquisition strategy is selected based on a qualitative approach, and then qualitative study and analysis, quantitative approach, and factor analysis approach have been used to confirm the validity of the extracted model. Statistical analysis of research data shows that among the hypotheses of agency theory, risk aversion, supervision, and reward are revised dimensions in Iran like examples of developing countries.The results confirm the existence of assumptions; 1. Conflict of interests of manager and owner, 2. Information asymmetry, 3. Reverse choice, 4. Ethical risk, 5. Maximizing the expected utility, 6. Forcing and 7. Failure to confirm the assumption is the ability to predict the future and receive information. due to the existence of information asymmetry, higher investment risks of minority shareholders and transparency problems, the lack of ability to predict the future and receive information is necessarily confirmed.

Supervising teachers, as a basic component of an  educational plan,  has positive effects on teachers’ classroom behaviors. Following the tenets of  Sociocultural theory of mind, this qualitative  study  delvd into  the perception of EFL teachers regarding their worldviews of what supervision is and what it must be like. For this purpose, 25 participants (10 supervisors,10 in-service teachers, and 5 pre-service teachers) were recruited and interviewed. Their responses to a semi-structured interview were recorded by mobile phone, transcribed, and then translated into English for ease of interpretation. To analyze the data, thematic analysis was used. The emerged themes showed that the participants preferred supervision with feedback which is constructive, timely, with effective solution in challenging situations, effective in identifying tecaher’s strengths and weaknesses, suggestive and non-judgemental. They also believed that supervision must be with no imposition, with prior notice, with a checklist, in a relaxed atmosphere, with a competent supervisor and without supervisor presence.  Criticizing the running model of supervision, they believed that the feedback offered is judgemental and inappropriate, offers no solution to the problems, and has no purpose for improvement.  Finally, some valuable implications for TTC holders, supervisors, and on-the-job mentors, and also several recommendations for further research are presented.