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Communication Solutions (CS), a woman-owned business, experienced fast growth at its inception, and then found itself slowing after the mid-2000s recession. The firm provides consulting services, primarily to government agencies. The owners have brought the business to sales of about $10.5 million in 2012, but revenues declined following that peak year because of cutbacks in government spending and founder Jennifer Madison’s detachment from the business. Even though they recognize that it may not be an ideal time to sell, they are tired of running the business and want to sell now, as long as they can pay off their debts.

This case was researched through multiple interviews with Mark and Jennifer, who provided all of the financial data and background. All financial statements given in the case provide actual CS numbers. The name of the company and the names of the owners have been changed, at their request to disguise the company. At the time this case was written, the owners were in negotiation with a potential bidder, and did not want their names or their company name to be used. Market information and information about comparable companies was researched using publicly available financial data bases.

This case has the potential to be used in a variety of classes, depending on what the instructor wishes to emphasize. The author uses the case as a valuation case in a corporate finance class (suitable for undergraduates or MBAs), allowing students practice in discounted cash flow valuation and comparable multiples valuation. It could be used in an investments class which teaches business valuation, particularly in teaching valuation using market multiples. The case could be used in an entrepreneurial finance class. The author uses this case to illustrate the difficulties of business valuation with messy (but real) data.

This case explores small business valuation and exit strategies for founders. Students can put themselves in the position of small business owners who are ready to exit. Students should value the firm using discounted cash flow and multiples valuation, which includes making assumptions about the future growth of the firm. While there is likely to be reasonable agreement on the “as is” valuation, there may be great variation concerning the assumptions and valuations of the company as it could be. Students can discuss (and implement) adjustments made when using large company comparables to value a much smaller company.

Quantifies the US Federal Government’s stance on pesticides and the prosecution of the laws governing their use. Discusses the Health and Society laws regarding pesticides and the use of agricultural chemicals. Concludes that the USA has much to thank pesticides for, but that they are also a threat to the health and safety of people and the environment, if used indiscriminately or without control.

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the impact the University of North Carolina at Greensboro’s (UNCG) Library and Information Studies Academic and Cultural Enrichment (ACE) Scholars Program has had on promoting diversity and adding value to the library and information studies profession.

This paper is presented as a case study in which three iterations of the ACE Scholars Program are discussed, including program design and suggested impact the program has had on educating and engaging diverse individuals for careers in the library and information studies professions.

Nearly 50 ACE Scholars program participants, representing ethnically, racially and socioeconomically diverse backgrounds, have graduated from UNCG with their Master of Library and Information Studies degrees since 2011. In the five years since the first ACE cohort graduated, Scholar alums continue to impact the Library and Information Studies (LIS) profession through their professional roles as well as through their community engagement, professional association memberships and leadership roles, professional presentations and numerous publications.

This paper presents a model that has helped to promote diversity in the LIS field in way that can be adapted by other graduate programs that are preparing individuals for successful and engaged careers as library and information studies professionals.

In 1920 Margaret Sanger called voluntary motherhood “the key to the temple of liberty” and noted that women were “rising in fundamental revolt” to claim their right to determine their own reproductive fate (Rothman, 2000, p. 73). Decades later Barbara Katz Rothman reflected on the social, political and legal changes produced by reproductive-rights feminists since that time. She wrote: So the reproductive-rights feminists of the 1970s won, and abortion is available – just as the reproductive-rights feminists of the 1920s won, and contraception is available. But in another sense, we did not win. We did not win, could not win, because Sanger was right. What we really wanted was the fundamental revolt, the “key to the temple of liberty.” A doctor’s fitting for a diaphragm, or a clinic appointment for an abortion, is not the revolution. It is not even a woman-centered approach to reproduction (2000, p. 79).

This article provides a resource for traders and other market participants by providing an overview of certain automatic circuit breaker mechanisms and discretionary powers that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) and the U.S. president, as applicable, can exercise to pause or stop the trading of individual securities or trading activities across exchanges during extreme market volatility, each of which can cause interruptions to trading activity.

This article surveys automatic and discretionary mechanisms to halt trading activity under extreme market conditions. In particular, the article examines automatic cross-market circuit breakers, limit up-limit down pauses, the alternative uptick rule, as well as discretionary authority to stop short selling of particular securities and to stop trading across exchanges.

The article concludes that market participants must be cognizant not only of automatic cross-market circuit breakers, but also several other forms of potential market disruptions that may occur due to increased market volatility during the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond.

By exploring various mechanisms that respond to market disruption, this article provides a valuable resource for traders and other market participants looking to identify and respond to potential interruptions to their trading activity.

The aim of this paper is to better understand European consumers' behaviour in relation to Short Food Supply Chains (SFSCs), so as to provide insights to support their development as part of a sustainable food system. Specifically, it aims to analyse consumer purchase patterns, motivations and perceived barriers and to identify patterns of behaviour amongst different consumer groups.

An online consumer survey was conducted in 12 European countries (n = 2,419). Quantitative data analysis, including principal component analysis (PCA) and cluster analysis, was undertaken using SPSS.

Four consumer clusters are named according to their behavioural stage in terms of SFSC engagement: Unaware Unengaged, Aware Unengaged, Motivationally Engaged and Executively Engaged. Unaware Unengaged and Aware Unengaged are in the non-engagement phase of behaviour. Motivationally Engaged are motivationally activated to engage in the behaviour but fail to do so consistently. Executively Engaged is the fully engaged cluster, being motivated to act and purchasing local food on a frequent basis. The results show an interesting interplay between motivations and barriers, i.e. higher scores for motivations and lower scores for barriers do not necessarily translate into higher purchase frequency.

The research gleans insights into the contextual factors that may inhibit SFSC purchases in different consumer segments. It offers practical implications for policymakers and others seeking to develop SFSCs as part of a sustainable food system.

The purpose of this paper is to examine restrictions placed by the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) on executive compensation during the financial crisis. Since it remains unclear if TARP restored public confidence in financial institutions, the authors also analyze what effect such regulations had on investors’ confidence in the information provided by earning with respect to executive compensation during this critical period.

To test the assertions, the authors employ an Earnings Response Coefficient model, which captures the association between firms’ earnings surprise (ES) and perceived earnings informativeness. The authors implement both a long- and short-window test to obtain a better understanding of the effects of TARP on financial institutions’ earnings informativeness. The authors use the long-window approach to gather evidence about whether and how financial institutions’ ES are absorbed into security prices conditional on both their participation in TARP and their compliance with TARP’s compensation restrictions. The authors attempt to establish a stronger causal link by also using a short-window approach.

The authors find that firms paying their CEOs above the TARP threshold show higher earnings informativeness. Financial institutions that paid their CEOs above the TARP threshold achieved better performance during their participation in TARP. The authors also find that a decrease in total compensation while participating in TARP is associated with improved earnings informativeness. Lastly, separating total compensation into its cash and stock-based components, the authors find that firms improve earnings informativeness when they increase (decrease) cash (performance) compensation during TARP. However, overall earnings informativeness decreases during and after TARP relative to the pre-TARP period.

The research suggests that executive compensation incentives affect earnings informativeness and that tradeoffs are made between direct and indirect costs in retaining executives. The results have implications for policy makers, investors and researchers because the results allow policy makers and regulators to improve on how they design and implement accounting, market and finance regulations and reforms. Investors may potentially use the results when evaluating firm experiencing financial and, in some case, political distress. It also helps firms and offering optimal compensation contracts to create proper incentives for executives and ensure that managerial actions result in successful firm performance.

The study shows how firms react to changing regulations that affect executive compensation and earning informativeness. The results of the study allow regulators to potentially design more effective regulations by targeting certain aspects of firms’ operation such excessive risk-taking behavior and rent extraction opportunities.

There are very few studies that deal with how firms react to regulation that affect executive compensation. The authors provide evidence regarding what effect TARP and its compensation restrictions had on financial institutions’ earnings informativeness. The evidence in the study will further regulators’ understanding of whether TARP improved investors’ confidence in financial institutions. The paper also contributes to the understanding in how changes in executive compensation in times of high political scrutiny affect investors’ perceptions of firm performance.

We began this chapter with storied experiences of relationships with children and youth and of questions around tensions they can experience as they make home, familial, community, and school transitions. These questions included: Why do we do it this way? Who decides? Can’t I think about what's best for my child? For Aboriginal children? As Khea, Jennifer, and Brenda Mary storied the experiences noted earlier, and as we collectively inquired into their stories, attentive to the intergenerational narrative reverberations of colonization made visible, it was their attentiveness to the particular life of a youth, Robbie; of a child, Rachel; and of a grandchild that we were first drawn. Their deep yearnings for something different in schools also turned our attention toward the counterstories to live by which they were composing. Across Khea's, Jennifer's, and Brenda Mary's earlier storied experiences the counterstories to live by around which they were threading new possible intergenerational narrative reverberations were focused on understanding children and youth as composing lives shaped by multiple contexts, that is, lives shaped through multiple relationships in places in and outside of school. This need for understanding the multiple places and relationships shaping the lives of children and youth as they enter into schools is, as shown in the earlier noted stories, vital in Aboriginal families and communities given the ways in which the narrative of colonization continues to reverberate in present lives.