Search results

This study seeks to investigate the availability of creationist and intelligent design (ID) books in UK public libraries, whether any materials held are obtained as a result of donation or purchase, and whether such materials, if available, are classified as religion or science.

A Freedom of Information Request (FOI) was sent to a subset of all the public library authorities in the UK. The FOI requests took the form of three queries/questions asked of the library service of each local authority. From a list of 218 library authorities, 68 were contacted either by email or by online contact form.

There was a relatively low level of reported donations of creationist and ID materials in UK public libraries. However, a high number of library authorities did have creationist and intelligent design materials on their catalogues via their own procurement mechanisms. There was no consistent nationwide pattern with regards to how these materials were classified and there was a wide geographic variation reported, with difficulties evidenced in whether to present creationist and intelligent design texts to the public as religious texts or science texts.

The paper presents results from a subset of local authorities in the UK, thus cannot claim to be anything more than indicative of the sample.

The paper suggests that library authorities may need to be more consistent in how they present controversial materials to users.

The paper is the first to examine the issue of creationist materials in UK public libraries and how they are processed.

This article examines the history of social work research within the UK from a perspective of evidence‐based practice, as originally advocated in the 1990s. It reviews the progress made to date in relation to the use of experimental studies in the field of children and families, and the reasons why this remains limited. It sets this in the broader context of evidence‐based practice and the education and training of qualifying and post‐qualifying social workers, including postgraduate training.

Sexual harassment and discrimination are continuing and chronic workplace problems (Quick & McFadyen, 2017) that affect the health, well-being and socio-economic future of victim/survivors (Blau & Winkler, 2018). Despite this, management and leadership education have been primarily addressing this workplace issue from a legal responsibility perspective and using preventative strategies such as promoting the value of equity, diversity, inclusion and belongingness and explaining the importance of safe, healthy and respectful workplaces. While the establishment of policies, human rights training and disciplinary procedures are undeniably important, rarely do business educators prepare future managers to engage with employees in trauma-informed, compassionate and respectful ways. The co-authors have used a collective restorying process to engage in co-designing a workshop for early career managers and students of management and leadership. The workshop includes iterative exploration of the language and authentic performativity of unbiased compassion while engaging in collective reflexivity. The basis of the workshop centres the research proposition that to support a claimant the manager must performatively lead with authentic compassion while using unbiased language in order to assure procedural justice while mitigating procedural trauma. Early career managers, and hence their organizations, are ill-equipped to deal with workplace investigations of sexual harassment and discrimination. By collectively exploring and practicing unbiased compassion, managers will not only be more prepared to respond to a claim of sexual harassment or discrimination, but they will also reduce employee's felt sense of procedural trauma and increase the organization's likelihood of due diligence.

The global electronic equipment industry has evolved into one of the most innovative technology-based business sectors to transpire in the last three decades. Much of its success has been attributed to effective supply chain management. The purpose of this paper is to provide an examination of external risk factors associated with the industry’s key suppliers through the creation of Bayesian networks which can be used to benchmark external risks among these suppliers.

The study sample consists of the suppliers to seven of the leading global electronic equipment companies. Bayesian networks are used as a methodology for examining the supplier external risk profiles of the study sample.

The results of this study show that Bayesian networks can be effectively used to assist managers in making decisions regarding current and prospective suppliers with respect to their potential impact on supply chains as illustrated through their corresponding external risk profiles.

A limitation to the use of Bayesian networks for modeling external risk profiles is the proper identification of risk events and risk categories that can impact a supply chain.

The methodology used in this study can be adopted by managers to assist them in making decisions regarding current or prospective suppliers vis-à-vis their corresponding external risk profiles.

As part of a comprehensive supplier risk management program, companies along with their suppliers can develop specific strategies and tactics to minimize the effects of supply chain external risk events.

This study examines the performance consequences of aligning the competitive strategy of quality differentiation with each of the four fundamental industry life cycle stages: introduction, growth, maturity, and decline. Reports results from a questionnaire survey of CEOs in a mid‐western state in the USA. The findings suggest that small manufacturing firms can achieve a sustainable competitive advantage vis‐à‐vis quality differentiation across three stages of industry evolution: introduction, growth, and maturity.

This paper gives a comparative analysis of the foundation of sinology in two Canadian universities. Despite not having diplomatic exchanges, Canada's new relationship with the People's Republic of China (PRC) ignited a China interest in the Canadian academe. Through York University and the University of Guelph (U of G)'s experiences, readers will learn the rewards and challenges that sinology brings to Canadian higher education.

This paper offers an overview of the historical foundation of sinology in the Canadian academe. Who pushes through this process? What geopolitical developments triggered young and educated Canadians to learn about China? This paper assesses York and Guelph's process in introducing sinology by relying on university archival resources and personal interviews. Why was York University successful in its mission, which, in turn, made into a comprehensive East Asian Studies degree option in 1971? What obstacles did the U of G face that prohibited it from implementing China Studies successfully?

After 1949, Canada took a friendlier relationship with the PRC than its neighbor in the south. As China–Canada relations unfolded, Canadian witnessed a dramatic state investment in higher education. The 1960s was a decade of unprecedented university expansion. In the process, sinology enjoyed its significant growth, and both York University and the U of G made their full use of this right timing. However, China Studies at the U of G did not take off. Besides its geolocation disadvantage, Guelph's top-down managerial style in the 1960s, which resulted in collegial disillusionment, was also a significant barrier to this program's success.

Before the Internet age, universities were the first venues for most Canadians to acquire their initial academic knowledge of China. After the Second World War, sinology became popular among students as China became one of the world's “Big Fives”. More Canadians became romanticized with Maoism while opposing America's containment policy. York and Guelph exemplified this trend in Canadian history. Contrary to popular belief, historian Jerome Chen did not establish York's China Studies. Likewise, an ex-US diplomat John Melby did not bring China into Guelph, sinology arrived due to individual scholastic initiatives. Visionaries saw envisioned China's importance in the future world community.

IN 1946 there was in the British Isles a clear image of librarianship in most librarians' minds. The image depended on a librarian's professional environment which was of the widest possible range, not less in variation than the organisations, institutes or types of community which required library services. Generalisations are like cocoanuts but they provide for the quickest precipitation of variant definitions, after the stones have been thrown at them. A generalisation might claim that, in 1946, public librarians had in mind an image of a librarian as organiser plus technical specialist or literary critic or book selector; that university and institute librarians projected themselves as scholars of any subject with a special environmental responsibility; that librarians in industry regarded themselves as something less than but as supplementing the capacity of a subject specialist (normally a scientist). Other minor separable categories existed with as many shades of meaning between the three generalised definitions, while librarians of national libraries were too few to be subject to easy generalisation.