Search results

This study examines the experiences of five German primary schools implementing Lesson Study over a five-year period. When lesson study is to be implemented in Germany, teachers are typically skeptical and do not believe that it will work in their schools. Although four of the schools from our project consider the implementation at their school to be quite successful and report many positive effects, in this article, we focus on the difficulties and strategies for overcoming them. We also report the schools’ recommendations for other schools wishing to implement lesson study.

Using maximum variation sampling, we conducted semi-structured interviews with ten German primary teachers and principals from five schools taking part in the nationwide LemaS project. The interviews were recorded, transcribed and analyzed using qualitative content structuring analysis.

The study identified several challenges, ranging from fundamental criticism of lesson study to a lack of resources. All but one school found ways to navigate these challenges. The main themes for success included fostering motivation for lesson study and adequate support from the school leadership.

This study offers examples of strategies of schools to overcome typical hurdles when implementing lesson study. We also present a list of ten recommendations derived from the interviewees that can serve as pragmatic guidelines for practitioners and researchers willing to implement and sustain lesson study.

This study captures the experiences of both teachers and school leaders, providing practical insight for schools wishing to implement the lesson study in a sustainable way.

This study aims to examine the perception of public works experts on the application of artificial intelligence (AI) as a tool to potentially increase the rationality and transparency of public works.

This paper is based on an exploratory quantitative design. It uses an original survey on the use of AI in public works, targeting public works experts from Peru. Data was analyzed using structural equation modeling.

Findings reveal public works experts’ interest in AI, highlighting its potential to improve transparency and efficiency, although labor changes are anticipated. AI monitoring could impact economic and quality control areas, vital in the fight against corruption. Infrastructure, government policies and financial resources emerge as fundamental enablers.

The advent of advanced AI systems has raised promises to help fight corruption through new monitoring capabilities that enhance transparency and rationality. However, few studies have assessed the impact of AI on public works. This paper contributes to this gap by testing a framework that explores how public works experts perceive the use of AI, considering their perceptions, expectations, perceived challenges and opportunities over public works’ rationality and transparency.

The purpose of this study is to envision the possible path to regulation of the coca leaf and its derivatives. There are a range of possible coca derivatives that could be considered for the broader market and which could be conceived of as risk and harm reduction interventions, as well as have other nutritional and industrial uses.

The methodology consists of a historical analysis of the advances in alternative uses of the coca leaf within a commercial market in Colombia as a means of providing greater economic capacity to communities that cultivate the plant, while exploring the nutritional and industrial benefits of the plant.

Low-risk products, such as coca leaf and coca tea, could be regulated under the same criteria as coffee or other caffeinated beverages. With a more diverse range of products on the market, consumers can make more informed decisions about their consumption, particularly regarding the associated risks and the effects they desire.

The legal regulation of coca leaf products implies the creation of a regulatory government agency specialized in the subject, as well as monitor and evaluate the cultivation and processing of products. The production of the coca leaf would still be in the hands of the cultivating communities but would fall under the control and monitoring of the government.

The legal regulation of the coca leaf could have strong impacts on cultivating communities to guarantee their human rights and provide greater protection. Various industries have expressed an interest in using coca leaf derivatives and could represent economic opportunities for communities that cultivate.

Minimal work has been done on the regulation of coca leaf although there are some international examples that could be relevant in Bolivia and Perú. There is a need to continue exploring the multiple uses of the leaf to reach greater international consensus on its rescheduling.

Share repurchase programs are the most important form of payout, yet the implications of incomplete share repurchase programs have not been examined in previous literature. This study tests whether incomplete share repurchase programs are seen as a positive or as a negative signal by investors.

The perception of incomplete share repurchase programs by algorithmic traders, institutional investors and analysts is analyzed with structural equation models, seemingly unrelated regressions, propensity score matching and buy-and-hold abnormal returns on data from share repurchase programs in the United States. In contrast to previous literature, algorithmic trading is appropriately estimated as a latent variable, leading to more reliable results. Furthermore, decisions about share repurchases and dividends are appropriately modeled simultaneously and iteratively, based on findings from previous literature.

The results show that sophisticated investors such as algorithmic traders, institutional investors and financial analysts avoid incomplete share repurchase programs over a long-term investment horizon. Thus, incomplete share repurchase programs are interpreted as negative signals. Additional analyses reveal that share repurchase programs are not completed due to insufficient cash flow, as a result of financial difficulties. Overall, this implies that financial managers should be careful to announce share repurchase programs they know cannot be completed, similar to dividends that cannot be maintained over a long-term horizon.

This study is the first to consider incomplete share repurchase programs. The findings are of interest to scholars and practitioners, as this study goes beyond narrow repurchase program announcement windows, and instead focuses on the longer-term investment horizon over the life of the share repurchase program, which is often ignored in prior research.

Amidst the growing awareness regarding the social accountability of corporates, the study has attempted to investigate how firm characteristics like size and performance influence corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities in India.

236 Indian firms listed on the National Stock Exchange (Nifty 500 index) have been selected for the empirical analysis. The independent variable firm size has been defined through total assets, operation scale and resource access. Another important factor, firm's performance, is also considered as the independent variable. CSR, the dependent variable, has been measured using Bloomberg's Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) disclosure scores.

Findings of the dynamic panel data analysis have revealed an inversed U-shape relationship between companies' size and CSR, i.e. CSR participation is positively related with small-sized firms, but as the firms become larger in size, their relationship with CSR becomes negative. A negative relationship has also been found between firm performance and CSR, while the age of the firm exhibits a positive association with CSR participation.

Poor performance of the larger firms suggests that government regulatory bodies need to take strict steps to enhance supervision. Clear regulations are required to be framed and enforced upon large companies to promote consistent participation in CSR. The present study has endeavoured to offer a distinct viewpoint by considering firm size and CSR to be related in a non-linear manner and has brought forward relevant information from the perspective of an emerging economy like India.

This study aims to show the factors that influence the intention of Generation Z Muslims to buy halal food products through ShopeeFood.

This study used quantitative methods. The analytical technique used is partial least square-structural equation modeling with 230 respondents as a sample of Generation Z Muslims in West Java, Indonesia. This research was conducted in June 2022 by distributing questionnaires via Google Forms and social media.

The results showed that perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness, attitudes, subjective norms, perceived behavioral control, religiosity and intention to buy halal food through ShopeeFood in Generation Z Muslims in West Java were in the high category. However, subjective norms and perceived behavioral control are the only ones that positively and significantly affect purchase intention.

ShopeeFood is expected to be able to identify and take advantage of the high level of intention of Generation Z Muslims to buy halal food through ShopeeFood. ShopeeFood can socialize and increase consumer attention that ShopeeFood is different from other online food delivery services. ShopeeFood can require merchants to display transparency in the composition of food products.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is perhaps the first study in the context of Generation Z Muslims in West Java, Indonesia, that deals with the perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness, attitudes, subjective norms, perceived behavioral control and religiosity on the intention to buy halal food through ShopeeFood. The study’s findings are essential in Islamic marketing and technological acceptance (ShopeeFood Apps).

The purpose of this paper is to provide a deeper understanding of the spatio-temporal behaviour of cruise passengers at a given destination using the city of Hamburg as a use case.

Big data in the form of passive location events from smartphones were analysed to determine the spatio-temporal behaviour of cruise tourists. The data were filtered using a definition created specifically for determining the signals of cruise passengers and were analysed using spatial statistics and network analysis methods.

In Hamburg, cruise passengers have a relatively small area of activity that is concentrated in the city's core tourist area. Foreign cruise passengers are less spatially concentrated than German passengers. Foreign passengers generate most of their visits at the airport and in the city's shopping areas, while German passengers are most frequently seen at the railway station and at the city's maritime experience locations.

Although numerous publications have examined the spatio-temporal behaviour of cruise passengers at the destination, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, no studies have used big data sources for this purpose. This paper uses passive location events from smartphones to determine the routes taken by cruise tourists in Hamburg, shows the strengths and weaknesses of this data source and suggests how cruise tourists can be defined from the data.

The purpose of this paper is to study the relationship between the attitudes of principals, municipality-specific aspects of reform implementation, and principals’ resistance to change.

The collected data are based on a multi-level structure. The levels of analysis are at the school level (school principal) and at the municipality level. Therefore, the research question posed in this study is examined using a quantitative multi-level analysis.

The results show that both the personal attitudes of school principals and adjustments made by the school presidency of the municipality affect the school principals’ willingness to change.

The study’s focus on schools limits the ability to generalize the results to apply to other organizations. Nevertheless, schools are an important object of study for change management research because they share crucial organizational characteristics with other organizations in the public sector.

Studies that have looked at the change reactions of leaders in the public school sector have rarely examined individual and collective factors together. We focus on both, since the municipalities in many countries have a certain amount of leeway in implementing reforms, meaning that their involvement is of central importance for a successful change process.

This study aims to develop a methodology that extracts an architectural concept from a biological analogy that integrates forms and kinetic behavior to identify whether complex forms work better or simple forms with proper kinetic behavior for improving visual comfort and daylight performance.

The research employs a transdisciplinary approach using several methods consisting of a biomimetic functional-morphological approach, kinetic design strategy, case study comparison using algorithmic workflow and parametric simulation and inverse design, to develop an interactive kinetic façade with optimized daylight performance.

A key development is the introduction of a periodic interactive region (PIR), which draws inspiration from the butterfly wings' nanostructure. These findings challenge conventional perspectives on façade complexity, highlighting the efficacy of simpler shapes paired with appropriate kinetic behavior for improving visual comfort. The results show the façade with a simpler “Bookshelf” shape integrated with a tapered shape of the periodic interactive region, outperforms its more complex counterpart (Hyperbolic Paraboloid component) in terms of daylight performance and glare control, especially in southern orientations, ensuring occupant visual comfort by keeping cases in the imperceptible range while also delivering sufficient average spatial Daylight Autonomy of 89.07%, Useful Daylight Illuminance of 94.53% and Exceeded Useful Daylight Illuminance of 5.11%.

The investigation of kinetic façade studies reveals that precedent literature mostly focused on engineering and building physics aspects, leaving the architectural aspect underutilized during the development phase. Recent studies applied a biomimetic approach for involving the architectural elements besides the other aspects. While the biomimetic method has proven effective in meeting occupants' visual comfort needs, its emphasis has been primarily on the complex form which is difficult to apply within the kinetic façade development. This study can address two gaps: (1) the lack of an architectural aspect in the kinetic façade design specifically in the development of conceptual form and kinetic behavior dimensions and (2) exchanging the superficial biomimetic considerations with an in-depth investigation.

The regulation of the construction industry remains a significant obstacle to economic progress in developing nations. Therefore, this study aimed to assess the efficacy of the legislative framework in the construction industry, focusing on Eswatini. The construction industry plays a critical role in the upliftment of the economy and an effective and efficient legislative framework is essential to ensure that as a developing country, Eswatini derives maximum benefits from the sector.

A phenomenological research design was used to explore stakeholders’ perceptions about the purpose of the legislative framework in the Eswatini construction industry and to establish the effectiveness of the current legislative framework in fulfilling its mandate. The data were collected using semi-structured interviews with open-ended questions. A total of 45 participants occupying different positions within the construction industry were selected using purposive sampling. The data were analysed thematically.

The results reiterate that the legislative framework’s purpose is to regulate, control and guide sectoral operations, including enforcing compliance with statutes and payment of construction levies. However, the legislative framework does not effectively fulfil its purpose of addressing stakeholder needs. Overall, the findings indicate shortcomings and inefficiencies within the framework aimed at regulating the construction industry of Eswatini. The inefficiencies have a great potential of defeating the purpose of the entire framework.

Regarding implications for future research, the current study has set a new pathway for legislative framework analysis and evaluation. Therefore, future research on the topic can build on the current study and compare the legislative frameworks across developing countries. The purpose would be to establish the similarities and differences, and to identify strengths and weaknesses, possibly leading to established principles of what works in a given context. Other studies on the topic could focus on benchmarking against developed countries on how they measure the efficacy of the legislative framework within their constriction industry.

Based on the preceding, these findings may apply to similar developing countries at a similar stage of construction industry development. However, the findings should be considered within the limitations of the study. The focus was on developing countries, particularly the Eswatini context. Each country presents a unique context and challenges, so the findings should be cautiously generalized.

While other studies in different contexts focus on developing legislative frameworks, the current study evaluated an existing legislative framework using defined criteria. The current study made a unique contribution by streamlining the features of effective and ineffective legislative frameworks. Hitherto, such information was scattered in literature but has been consolidated and applied empirically. Thus, the study has set benchmarks for analysing and evaluating legislative frameworks in developing countries.