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The paper studies how the International Federation of Accountants (IFAC) positioned itself in the process through which capacity building in developing countries was interpreted and enacted within the global development aid agenda from 1999 to 2016.

The paper is an in-depth case study drawing on a comprehensive analysis of publications, reports and archival materials.

The paper unveils how IFAC shaped the interpretation of capacity building and its associated practices in a manner aligned with its expansionary aims thereby transforming itself into a prominent actor within, what we term, the capacity building issue-based field. It unpacks the strategies pursued by IFAC as it mobilised economic, social and cultural resources in support of its global capacity building ambitions for the accountancy profession. It reveals how key interactions between actors in the international development exchange field and the professional exchange field of accounting underpinned IFAC’s infiltration of, and impact on the evolution of, the capacity building issue-based field. We show how IFAC increased its influence in this field despite initially operating on the periphery of the global development aid agenda.

The paper reveals how the global accountancy profession’s engagement with the capacity building activities of international development agencies became central to its commitment to serving the public interest. Our analysis suggests that deeper explorations of capacity building by the global accountancy profession in specific developing countries are required in order to determine whether these efforts have effectively catered to the needs of the citizens of those countries.

The work of professional accountancy organizations (PAOs) operating at the global level in the area of capacity building has been addressed in a fragmented fashion in prior research. This paper presents a unique analysis of developing alliances between the global accountancy profession and international aid agencies aimed at supporting the globalising efforts of IFAC within the realm of capacity building in international development aid. Theoretically, the paper advances prior work exploring the evolution of issue-based fields, in particular the role of inter-field relations in interstitial spaces within these processes.

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the feasibility, and effectiveness, of using Headsprout Early Reading (HER), an online computer program, to teach basic reading skills to adult offenders with mild intellectual disabilities (IDs) in a secure hospital.

A single subject pre-post-test design replicated across two participants was used. Two standardized literacy tests were completed at baseline, half way through the intervention, and at the end of the intervention period. A measure of reading self-concept was also completed. An additional component to this research design was the inclusion of two “treatment as usual” (TAU) control participants who did not complete the program.

Results are positive in terms of the feasibility of running the program, improved reading skills, and self-concept scores for both “intervention” participants compared to the “TAU” participants.

HER was originally developed for typically developing children, and has been found to be effective for children with IDs and developmental disabilities. This is the first study to evaluate this program with an adult population.

Research into culture within intellectual disability services, has predominantly focussed on small group homes in Australia. The current investigation aimed to explore the transferability of the dimensions of culture identified in the literature, to a residential Intellectual Disability service in the UK. The purpose of this study was to better understand the impact of informal culture upon the behaviour of direct care staff, particularly around managing behaviour that challenges.

Semi-structured interviews were conducted with direct care staff. Interview transcripts were analysed thematically using template analysis.

Themes regarding leadership, perceptions of managers, team functioning, and relationships between direct care staff and service users, were identified, corroborating the existing literature. Additional themes relating to being aware of the risks posed by service users, and the emotional impact of behaviour that challenges, also emerged.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first qualitative study to explore informal culture within a community residential Intellectual Disability service in the UK.

Quality assurance (QA) at one University has evolved over the past 15 years through emerging National and European standards, various leadership initiatives and through the engagement of key stakeholders in co-designing and implementing internal QA processes. In 2000, the QA process was focussed mainly on quality review (QR) that involved extensive reporting of information. It was characterised by stakeholders as a largely reactive culture, treated with scepticism by faculty staff and that struggled to convince both management and faculty that QA provided value. In 2016, QR is now leaner, more evidence based and focussed around creativity and enhancement. In addition to QR, additional QA processes now incorporate a variety of activities including benchmarking, structured policies and procedures and research assessment. QA is also part of a tripartite approach that links quality, strategy and performance together, with quality focusing on assuring an appropriate standard of excellence, strategy guiding faculty towards a vision of the future and performance providing evidence of quality enhancement and strategy execution. The paper provides a case study of the transformation of QA at the University.

The research uses a case study approach. It documents a methodology used to engage a wide number of stakeholders in a self-evaluation process and the results of that process, i.e. enhancements to the internal review process and various policies and procedures.

There are early indications that the University’s internal QA has migrated towards a more responsive culture and is increasingly endorsed by the various internal and external stakeholder groups.

This paper presents the evolution of QA and potential lessons for the wider Higher Education Institutions (HEI’s) sector.

This paper provides a case study of changes to QA processes at one university that has risen significantly in various university rankings since. Some evidence is provided to show that quality initiatives have contributed to overall performance.

This study explores one-to-one LEGO® Serious Play® in positive psychology coaching (1-1 LSP in PPC) as an intervention to help emerging adults (EAs) in higher education develop a growth mindset.

This is a qualitative single-participant case study of an EA undergraduate student's experience with 1-1 LSP in PPC to help him navigate uncertainty about making a decision that he felt would influence his future career.

1-1 LSP in PPC enabled the participant to create a metaphoric representation of how a growth mindset operated for him, promoting self-awareness and reflectivity. The LEGO® model that the participant built during his final session acted as a reminder of the resources and processes he developed during coaching, which helped him navigate future challenges.

This study contributes to the emerging literature on the impact of using LSP as a tool in one-to-one coaching in higher education. The participant's experience demonstrates that 1-1 LSP in PPC may be an effective way to support positive EA development. More research is needed to explore its potential.

This study provides a possible roadmap to incorporate 1-1 LSP in PPC into coaching in higher education as a reflective tool to build a growth mindset in EA students.

Because most undergraduates are EAs navigating the transition from adolescence into adulthood, universities would benefit from adopting developmentally informed coaching practices. 1-1 LSP in PPC may be an effective intervention that provides the structured and psychologically safe environment EAs need to develop lasting personal resources.

University–industry projects provide special challenges in understanding and expressing the values required of project management (PM) in delivering stakeholder benefits. This paper presents a framework for understanding, identifying and managing the values of PM in major university–industry R&D projects.

The value framework identifies for each of the key stakeholders, the key PM values that may require to be managed and are largely derived from research literature. Empirical research then explores, prioritises and selects key PM values that need to be managed for a specific project. A large case study is used involving one university and one industry collaborating on a multi-million Euro initiative over six years. Empirical research was conducted by researchers who observed at close quarters, the challenges and successes of managing the competing values of key stakeholders.

The value framework takes a stakeholders' perspective by identifying the respective PM values for each of six stakeholders: university–industry consortium, university, industry, R&D external entities, funding entity and society.

The research was performed using only one case study which limits the generalisability of its findings; however, the findings are presented as a decision support aid for project consortia in developing values for their own collaboration.

Guidance and decision support are provided to multi-stakeholder research consortia when selecting values that need to be managed for achieving tangible and intangible project benefits.

The paper demonstrates a proposed framework for designing and managing the value of PM in large multi-stakeholder university–industry R&D projects.

Since the development of the COVID-19 vaccinations, questions surrounding race have been prominent in the literature on vaccine uptake. Early in the vaccine rollout, public health officials were concerned with the relatively lower rates of uptake among certain racial/ethnic minority groups. We suggest that this may also be patterned by racial/ethnic residential segregation, which previous work has demonstrated to be an important factor for both health and access to health care.

In this study, we examine county-level vaccination rates, racial/ethnic composition, and residential segregation across the U.S. We compile data from several sources, including the American Community Survey (ACS) and Centers for Disease Control (CDC) measured at the county level.

We find that just looking at the associations between racial/ethnic composition and vaccination rates, both percent Black and percent White are significant and negative, meaning that higher percentages of these groups in a county are associated with lower vaccination rates, whereas the opposite is the case for percent Latino. When we factor in segregation, as measured by the index of dissimilarity, the patterns change somewhat. Dissimilarity itself was not significant in the models across all groups, but when interacted with race/ethnic composition, it moderates the association. For both percent Black and percent White, the interaction with the Black-White dissimilarity index is significant and negative, meaning that it deepens the negative association between composition and the vaccination rate.

The analysis is only limited to county-level measures of racial/ethnic composition and vaccination rates, so we are unable to see at the individual-level who is getting vaccinated.

We find that segregation moderates the association between racial/ethnic composition and vaccination rates, suggesting that local race relations in a county helps contextualize the compositional effects of race/ethnicity.

LifeMatters is a cognitive behavioural coaching programme that provides tools and techniques for developing and applying five areas of life skill competency: taking care of the body, feeling positive, thinking wisely, acting wisely, and taking care of the spirit. The purpose of paper is to evaluate the viability of the LifeMatters programme with a cohort of secondary school students (12-15 years) in Ireland.

Open-ended feedback obtained from 196 participants who completed an open-ended questionnaire. These responses were subjected to a thematic analysis. Subsequent quantitative analysis of the resulting categorical data were carried out using correspondence analysis.

Categorical analysis produced statistically significant sex and age differences showing that males and females differed in their experience of the programme. Girls benefited more from a focus upon stress and self-confidence whereas boys benefited more from a focus on relationship building.

This study demonstrates the viability of the LifeMatters programme for secondary school students as an aid to develop life skills. It highlights the different needs of boys and girls in this area.

Learning pedagogies increasingly involve a synthesis between traditional lectures and the use of case studies and project based group work. The Internet provides new opportunities to this learning approach. Internet applications can be developed for project based assignments, which are cheap and easy to deploy. They offer students interactive assignments and the opportunity to benchmark with other assignments online. Teachers have opportunities to review assignments online and offer project groups online advice and assessment. This paper presents a pedagogical approach to teaching innovation management that uses both traditional and online learning and assessment techniques.