Search results

Computer‐based video facilitates the creation of ‘movies’ recording actions on a computer screen complete with a voice‐over by the tutor. This paper describes the application of computer‐based video technology for point of need instruction on database searching. The Lotus ScreenCam software was used, being both inexpensive and readily available as part of the Lotus SmartSuite bundle. Initially, eight short movie clips were created, covering the techniques for searching PsycLIT on CD‐ROM and the ISI citation indexes via the BIDS gateway. The movie clips were made available on library PCs where students search these databases. The paper first examines educational theory to identify the role of computer‐based video within the educational framework. The movies created at Cardiff University are then described and the issues in design and implementation discussed. Finally, the effectiveness of this method of database searching instruction is explored and compared with more traditional point‐of‐need instruction techniques such as the handout, computer‐based tutorials and staff assistance.

This paper describes a comprehensive user survey carried out in an Irish higher education academic library (Waterford Institute of Technology library service) as part of a strategic initiative to engage with library users.

Two major user groups – full‐time undergraduate students and academic staff – were surveyed. The survey instrument was a hardcopy questionnaire. The paper outlines the relative merits of different survey types and the reasoning behind the final choice of survey instrument.

The main results of the survey are synopsised. The paper also includes selected free‐text comments made by survey respondents and the library's response to the results in terms of how issues highlighted will be addressed.

The survey focused on two specific user groups, which leaves scope for future research by this institution into how the library is used by other types of users, such as distance learners.

The survey was a good way of communicating with users. This was the first time such a project has been undertaken at WIT and WIT library service will continue to survey users on a regular basis and to use the results to inform service delivery.

As the first comprehensive survey to be undertaken in the Institute of Technology sector in Ireland, the paper is of potential value to library practitioners in this, or indeed in other sectors, who are considering doing a survey of their users.

Librarians have long been part of a group of professionals that took responsibility for the reliability of information and protected their users from the bad epistemic consequences caused by inaccurate information. Now users are acquiring information from the internet and using it to make important decisions. This method of acquisition is threatening the epistemological protection librarians have provided. The problem is one of verifiability, the users do not have a way to verify whether information is accurate or inaccurate. The verification is even more difficult with disinformation. The purpose of this paper is to explore possible alternatives to this problem and recommend using a new multi‐literacy instructional method as the solution.

A review of current literature confirmed the problem of disinformation and this paper examines possible solutions to controlling disinformation and makes suggestions on how we, as librarians, can use instruction to protect internet users from the harmful effects of using the false information.

Research found that disinformation is a widespread problem and its use has epistemic consequences that are harmful to internet users. The paper proposes a new method of instruction using a combination of learning paradigms to help users protect themselves from disinformation.

The paper presents a new instructional method that may help in identifying disinformation and help internet users avoid the bad epistemic consequences of using disinformation.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the professional context of the educator and architects who designed and conceived Woodleigh School in Baxter, Victoria, Australia (1974-1979) and to identify common design threads in a series of schools designed by Daryl Jackson and Evan Walker in the 1970s.

The research was derived from academic and professional publications, film footage, interviews, archival searches and site visits. Standard analytical methods in architectural research are employed, including formal, planning and morphological analysis, to read building designs for meaning and intent. Books, people and buildings were examined to piece together the design “biography” of Woodleigh School, the identification of which forms the basis of the paper's argument.

Themes of loose fit, indeterminate planning, coupled with concepts of classroom as house, and school as town, and engagement with a landscape environment are drawn together under principal Michael Norman's favoured phrase that adolescents might experience “a slice of life”, preparing them for broader engagement with a world and a community outside school. The themes reflect changing aspirations for teenage education in the 1970s, indicating a free and experimental approach to the design of the school environment.

The paper considers, for the first time, the interconnected role of educator and architect as key protagonists in envisioning connections between space and pedagogy in the 1970s alternative school.

Of all the major, global professional sports where women have made inroads, striving toward equality in terms of status, earnings and media attention, tennis stands at the forefront. This chapter traces this historical development, outlining the sport's earliest socio-cultural features that afforded the inclusion of female players and charting the progress of notable women who thrust tennis into the limelight and turned themselves into commodities – the essence of professionalisation. Suzanne Lenglen blazed the trail by becoming, in 1926, the principal attraction in the sport's inaugural professional tour. Female players were encouraged to cast aside the shackles of restrained femininity and chart their own courses in a sport still dominated by men and played according to male standards. The rise of ‘Open Tennis’ in 1968 removed the playing restrictions and stigma of professionalism, but by opening up to the male-dominated corporate world, unsurprisingly it was the male players who initially competed for the lion's share of new money. Billie Jean King's efforts to galvanise her fellow female professionals to compete on a rogue tour sponsored by Virginia Slims left them ousted by the sport's main officials, but the tour's commercial success propelled them toward equality in terms of prize money and status. Still more or less a white, middle-class-dominated pursuit, the arrival of Venus and Serena Williams in the late 1990s turned tennis toward new markets, and the sport's significance for women remains apparent in the fact that its leading players are the most recognisable and well-paid of all professional female athletes.

The following bibliography focuses mainly on programs which can run on IBM microcomputers and compatibles under the operating system PC DOS/MS DOS, and which can be used in online information and documentation work. They fall into the following categories:

This chapter, together with those that follow, builds upon the ideas presented in the previous volume in this series (Maginn, Thompson, & Tonts, 2008). There we outlined our vision for a ‘pragmatic renaissance’ in contemporary qualitative research in urban studies. We argued that to survive as an effective and frequently used tool for policy development, a more systematic approach is needed in the way that qualitative-informed applied urban research is conceptualised and undertaken. In opening this volume we build on these initial ideas using housing as a meta-case study to progress the case for a systematic approach to qualitative research methods. We do this to both stimulate broad debate about the ways, in which qualitative research in urban/housing scholarship might be of greater use to policymakers and practitioners, as well as to suggest a way forward in realising the ‘pragmatic renaissance’.

Quality 4.0 incorporates the role of automation and digitization and provides competitive advantage for organizations by enhancing customer experience and increase profitability. The purpose of this study is to critically examine the organizational readiness factors for the successful implementation of Quality 4.0 implementation and assess their importance.

This study applies a quantitative research methodology to examine readiness factors of Quality 4.0 in organizations by 147 senior management professionals in various organizations including manufacturing and service companies in America, Asia and Europe participated through an online survey.

The readiness factors for Quality 4.0 were critically ranked amongst manufacturing and service organizations by senior management professionals from three continents. Five significant reasons for non-adoption of Quality 4.0 were lack of resources, inability to link Quality 4.0 with the corporate strategy and objectives, lack of understanding of benefits, high initial investment and the current quality management strategy and methods are already delivering good results hence unsure of the need for Quality 4.0. The handling of big data in quality management was the most important factor for adopting Quality 4.0, irrespective of the size and nature of the organization. More accuracy and less errors and improved decision-making the factors of adopting Quality 4.0 in service sector were not significant for manufacturing sector. Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) reported that costs and time savings over the long run were not so significant.

This study is focussed on the significance of pros and cons of adopting Quality 4.0 in organizations. Senior managers in both large and SMEs can benefit immensely from understanding before investing heavily towards implementing Quality 4.0. The importance of identified organizational readiness factors for the successful adoption of Quality 4.0 can be used as indicators to understand how ready an organization is to implement Quality 4.0. The top three readiness factors for the successful adoption of Quality 4.0 were identified as: top management commitment, leadership and organizational culture. Improved understanding of the readiness factors can be highly beneficial to senior quality professionals in both manufacturing and service companies in the journey towards successful implementation of Quality 4.0.

This is the first empirical study on assessing Quality 4.0 readiness factors at an intercontinental level and therefore serves as a foundation for many future studies. The study provides a theoretical foundation for the Quality 4.0 in terms of organizational readiness for successful adoption and overcoming implementation challenges. During the planning, implementation and progress review of Quality 4.0, review the readiness factors while planning and resourcing a Quality 4.0 implementation strategy to ensure effective performance.