Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to give ideas and suggestions to avoid some typical problems of qualitative articles. The aim is not to debate quality in qualitative research but to indicate some practical solutions.Design/methodology/approach: The paper discusses the design of qualitative research and the structure of a qualitative article giving some methodological suggestions to make it better for the reader and the reviewer.Findings: The paper finds that the main criteria to getting published are that the article must be transparent regarding the process followed in the research and it must well structured so it can be understood by readers.Originality/value: If these guidelines are followed the review process of articles will be smoother and the number of rejected papers should decrease. The paper will benefit young researchers who can find suggestions on writing a paper for the Journal of Workplace Learning.

The purpose of this study is to provide a general overview of the issue of equity in education.The aim is to obtain a historical-chronological description of equity in theory, policies and practices.The analysis has shown how equity is widely discussed in the international debate. Different conceptions can be detected, namely: a) equity as inclusion; b) equity as meritocracy.It seems to be necessary to continue the debate in order to focus on coherent and shared policies, practices and observations concerning scholastic systems

The adequate development of the numeracy skills is a target of the fourth of the Sustainable Development Goals and is considered the basis for a financial literacy: both are competences needed for successful social and professional inclusion. Building on these goals, we carried out a unidimensional Mathematical Competence Scale (MCS) for primary school. The aim of this study was to present the psychometric properties and the validation process of MCS, designed basing on Item Response Theory. The final version of the scale, which measures different domains of mathematical knowledge (Data Analysis and Relationships, Geometry, Dimensions and Measurements, Numbers and Calculations), was validated on the entire population of 2935 fourth graders in Ticino Canton, Switzerland. The results reveal the high level of correlation between the six mathematical dimensions and confirm the assumption of a latent “mathematical construct”. However, even the multidimensional model could be considered a good model because it fitted the data significantly better than the one-dimensional model. In particular, the differences of the deviance between the two models are significant (χ² (20) = 642.66, p < 0.001). Moreover, findings show a significant gender effect and a positive correlation between students’ actual school performance during the same academic year and MCS scores. MCS allows a reading of the learning and teaching process in the perspective of the psychology of sustainability and sustainable development and helps a teacher to sustain student talent through the development of numeracy skills; in fact, the scale is intended both as an assessment tool and an innovative approach for shaping the development of curriculum, and therefore has potential to serve as a bridge between empirical research, classroom practice and a positive (school and professional) career development.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to ascertain the most relevant quality factors and communication activities that are suitable as competitive levers in dentistry. Design/methodology/approach – The research is based on a model that highlights the reciprocal influence between patient satisfaction and dentist reputation. The model points out that experience/behaviours, explicit communication and word-of-mouth are antecedents of both patient satisfaction and dentist reputation. This research is based on interviews with senior dentists, focus groups with patients and a survey of dentistry patients. Findings – The most important quality factors for patient satisfaction are the doctor-patient relationship and the clarity of information about treatment and cost. Key communication levers are first, the implicit communication that arises from successful treatment and overall service quality; second, the explicit communication that arises from interpersonal relations with the dentist and the staff, and the referrals of previous patients. Practical implications – In order to gain competitive advantages, dentists should achieve an average level of patient satisfaction for “given” and “secondary” factors; to pay careful attention to “strategic factors”; and to explicitly communicate “opportunity factors” since patients are usually unaware of their value. Furthermore, dentists should emphasize interpersonal, experiential and third-party communication with patients. Originality/value – The paper puts forward a model that integrates previous service quality and reputation management models, and makes suggestions for the improvement of service quality management and communication in dentistry.