The CNAA document on its revised regulations for the award of degrees (July 1971) prompted considerable discussions among the polytechnics and technical colleges, but there is one…
Abstract
The CNAA document on its revised regulations for the award of degrees (July 1971) prompted considerable discussions among the polytechnics and technical colleges, but there is one aspect of course development which should be receiving immediate attention — general studies.
Kate Darian-Smith and Nikki Henningham
The purpose of this paper is to examine the development of vocational education for girls, focusing on how curriculum and pedagogy developed to accommodate changing expectations…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the development of vocational education for girls, focusing on how curriculum and pedagogy developed to accommodate changing expectations of the role of women in the workplace and the home in mid-twentieth century Australia. As well as describing how pedagogical changes were implemented through curriculum, it examines the way a modern approach to girls’ education was reflected in the built environment of the school site and through its interactions with its changing community.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper takes a case study approach, focusing on the example of the J.H. Boyd Domestic College which functioned as a single-sex school for girls from 1932 until its closure in 1985. Oral history testimony, private archives, photographs and government school records provide the material from which an understanding of the school is reconstructed.
Findings
This detailed examination of the history of J.H. Boyd Domestic College highlights the highly integrated nature of the school's environment with the surrounding community, which strengthened links between the girls and their community. It also demonstrates how important the school's buildings and facilities were to contemporary ideas about the teaching of girls in a vocational setting.
Originality/value
This is the first history of J.H. Boyd Domestic College to examine the intersections of gendered, classed ideas about pedagogy with ideas about the appropriate built environment for the teaching of domestic science. The contextualized approach sheds new light on domestic science education in Victoria and the unusually high quality of the learning spaces available for girls’ education.
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Amy Beardmore, Penny Beynon, Christine Crabbe, Carol Fry, Jan Fullforth, Jeremy Groome, Eddy Knasel, Jill Turner, Christopher Orlik, Matthew Jones and Jo White
International attention is increasingly turning to the challenge of creating age-friendly environments. This study aims to examine the application of asset-based approaches in…
Abstract
Purpose
International attention is increasingly turning to the challenge of creating age-friendly environments. This study aims to examine the application of asset-based approaches in undertaking community development projects with older people. The paper intends to share the learning that may be useful when designing community development projects for older people in the future.
Design/methodology/approach
This study followed a multiple project case study design, with a focus on project delivery practices. It was undertaken as a co-production exercise involving university researchers and trained older volunteer community researchers (CRs). Over 18–24 months of qualitative research was conducted in relation to six area-based urban projects between 2018 and 2020.
Findings
There were five leading themes as follows: mapping and building on assets in highly localised settings; creating governance and direction through steering groups; developing activities with diverse groups of older people; reaching isolated and lonely older people; building local capacity to embed sustainability.
Practical implications
The effectiveness of assets-based approaches in promoting age-friendly agendas appears to be contingent on the values, skills, capacity and resourcing of delivery agencies, alongside wider public sector investment in communities. Diversity and inequalities amongst older people need to be taken into account and community development that specifically focuses on older people needs to be balanced with the whole population and intergenerational practice.
Originality/value
This paper provides an empirical account of the practical application of assets practices specifically in the context of the age-friendly community agenda. The co-production method brings together insights from academic and volunteer older CRs.
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Alicia Sepulveda and Matthew Birnbaum
Coaching in higher education has become increasingly common across the United States. Our qualitative study explores the perceptions of coaches and advisors, as they consider…
Abstract
Purpose
Coaching in higher education has become increasingly common across the United States. Our qualitative study explores the perceptions of coaches and advisors, as they consider academic coaching as a role distinct from academic advising.
Design/methodology/approach
Our study adopts a qualitative research approach. Two focus groups were conducted with 14 coaching and academic advising professionals.
Findings
Our findings identify at least three major themes when considering academic coaching as a role distinct from academic advising: (1) Potential role overlap, (2) Caseload disparities and (3) Philosophical differences. The indiscriminate use of the title of “coach” contributed to confusion, ambiguity and tension.
Practical implications
Without a clear understanding of the coach role as a distinct type of support in higher education, confusion and ambiguity are likely to continue.
Originality/value
No studies have explored the perceptions of coaches and advisors, as they consider academic coaching as a role distinct in the United States.
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A qualitative, feminist, case study methodology was used to research the feminist leadership of three women principals of coeducational secondary schools. Information was…
Abstract
A qualitative, feminist, case study methodology was used to research the feminist leadership of three women principals of coeducational secondary schools. Information was collected by interviewing and observing the three feminist principals, interviewing 24 staff, and collecting documents. Research indicated that being student focused was central to the practice of feminist educational leaders. This thesis explored how they were able to remain student focused in a New Zealand, neo‐liberal, education context with increased financial, accountability and marketing responsibilities. By resisting and appropriating the opportunities and demands created by the reforms, the feminist principals were, to some extent, able to resist the pressure to be less student focused. However, in doing so they worked very long hours. Their personal value systems and the school context were also important influences on their practice. There were both commonalities and diversity among the women’s leadership.
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Jill Kickul and Matthew A. Liao‐Troth
It has been argued that the social and informational cues within the work environment need to be investigated to better understand and identify a nomological network underlying…
Abstract
It has been argued that the social and informational cues within the work environment need to be investigated to better understand and identify a nomological network underlying the psychological contract construct. This study is one of the first to investigate how employees may use social and informational messages and cues in the work environment to formulate and place meaning behind their employee employer exchange relationship. We present a model that examines specific dimensions of employees’ psychological climates that may serve as a basis for understanding their contract with their organization. Three hundred and seventy employees from a variety of organizational settings completed measures of their climate (role characteristics, job characteristics, workgroup and social environment, leader behaviors, and organizational and subsystem attributes) as well as their perceptions of their psychological contract. The model and proposed relationships were tested through a series of hierarchical regression analyses. Results revealed that role characteristics were associated with the workload and clarity components of the contract while job characteristics were related to the work variety, work importance, and autonomy contract factors. Workgroup and social environment dimensions were related to the contract components of social interaction and work conditions and leader behaviors were associated with the feedback contract factor. Finally, organizational and subsystem attributes were linked to the compensation, benefits, security, advancement, development opportunities, fairness, and interpersonal factors of an employee’s psychological contract. Study contributions and limitations as well as directions for future research are discussed.
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As a network analyst, I am fascinated by social interactions. The ways in which people connect with one another and exercise power and authority by deploying different forms of…
Abstract
As a network analyst, I am fascinated by social interactions. The ways in which people connect with one another and exercise power and authority by deploying different forms of capital. This piece returns to the underlying and changing kinship network structure of the village of Ambridge over time, explores the role of ‘kin-keeping’ as deployed by the matriarchs Peggy and Jill. I am most interested in the ways in which gender as performed by the women of the village intersects with abundance or lack of other forms of capital, and how far inequalities persist and why. It is clear that there is an intergenerational power dynamic at play in the spreading or hoarding of the various dimensions of power layered together and how forms of capital intersect for protection or precarity. Social and cultural capital at birth in the village is defining in terms of both ‘serious’ life outcomes as well as how more minor infractions and foibles are viewed. Further, I return to discuss how my various network-based predictions have fared over time. The Headlam Hypothesis and the fate of Ed Grundy – King of Ambridge are revisited and their durability explored.
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Interrogating the networks in Ambridge can lead to a focus on kinship and familial relationships or various other forms of power and authority. This chapter focusses on the ways…
Abstract
Interrogating the networks in Ambridge can lead to a focus on kinship and familial relationships or various other forms of power and authority. This chapter focusses on the ways that civil society networks are mobilised in the village, exploring how far they are orientated towards social stability and maintenance of the status quo or towards social change. These motivations have been subjected through the collection of vignettes into an innovative social forces analysis through which the internal and external motivations of women in volunteer and informal roles are categorised as being characterised by, variously, self-reliance solidaristic activism as characterised by Lady Bountiful/NIMBYism and lastly benign (p)maternalism. These motivations are all seen in the high levels of subtly gendered activity undertaken in the informal realm (beyond the structures of family or contractual relationships) whereby community power can truly be viewed as a form of ‘women’s work’.
David B. Menkes and Gillian A. Bendelow
Police in England and Wales are empowered, under Section 136 of the Mental Health Act 1983 (s136), to detain individuals thought to be a danger to themselves or to others. Use of…
Abstract
Purpose
Police in England and Wales are empowered, under Section 136 of the Mental Health Act 1983 (s136), to detain individuals thought to be a danger to themselves or to others. Use of this authority is widespread, but varies across districts and attracts controversy because of inconsistent application and the fact that it requires police to make judgements about mental health. The purpose of this paper is to examine police attitudes to and criteria for using s136.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors conducted focus groups with 30 officers in urban and rural areas of three different regions across England and Wales. Group interviews were audio-recorded, transcribed, and analysed using open and axial coding.
Findings
Use of s136 authority has major implications for police work; liaison with mental health services is seen as desirable but often ineffective due to resource constraints and the latter's lack of availability. The decision to invoke s136 depends on social context and other particulars of individual cases.
Research limitations/implications
Although the findings have limitations with respect to generalisability across the whole of the UK, there are patterns of responses which have major implications for policy recommendations.
Practical implications
Police decisions to apply s136 reflect an implicit values-based classification of and response to emotionally disturbed behaviour, in light of available institutional and social supports.
Social implications
Tasked primarily with protecting the public and keeping the peace, police “diagnoses” of risk often contrast with that of mental health professionals.
Originality/value
A highly original piece of research which has attracted further funding from BA/Leverhulme.