Mandi MacDonald, Andrew Dellis, Shanaaz Mathews and Jenna-Lee Marco
This paper aims to describe the challenges and potential benefits of moving a mentoring programme for young people in care and care leavers to an online mode of delivery in…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to describe the challenges and potential benefits of moving a mentoring programme for young people in care and care leavers to an online mode of delivery in response to the South African Government’s efforts to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus disease COVID-19.
Design/methodology/approach
A descriptive account incorporating reflections from staff responsible for the move to e-mentoring and from South African and UK researchers undertaking an exploratory study of mentoring vulnerable youth at the time when COVID-19 restrictions were imposed.
Findings
E-mentoring can provide an effective means to maintaining the essential elements of a well-established mentoring programme for young people in care and care leavers under government enforced “lock-down”. E-mentoring presents particular challenges and benefits in the South African context. Youth in care and care leavers have unequal access to a digital infrastructure, but this can be overcome by investment in resourcing, equipping and training carers, mentors and mentees. The geographical reach offered by online platforms gives young people access to a more diverse pool of mentors.
Originality/value
Both care leaving services and the use of e-mentoring to meet the needs of vulnerable young people are emerging areas of practice and research interest. This paper brings the two areas together in the context of South Africa under COVID-19 “lock-down” through describing the response of one mentoring programme and highlighting the benefits and challenges.
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Jocelyn Jones, Mandy Wilson, Elizabeth Sullivan, Lynn Atkinson, Marisa Gilles, Paul L. Simpson, Eileen Baldry and Tony Butler
The rise in the incarceration of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander mothers is a major public health issue with multiple sequelae for Aboriginal children and the cohesiveness…
Abstract
Purpose
The rise in the incarceration of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander mothers is a major public health issue with multiple sequelae for Aboriginal children and the cohesiveness of Aboriginal communities. The purpose of this paper is to review the available literature relating to Australian Aboriginal women prisoners’ experiences of being a mother.
Design/methodology/approach
The literature search covered bibliographic databases from criminology, sociology and anthropology, and Australian history. The authors review the literature on: traditional and contemporary Aboriginal mothering roles, values and practices; historical accounts of the impacts of white settlement of Australia and subsequent Aboriginal affairs policies and practices; and women’s and mothers’ experiences of imprisonment.
Findings
The review found that the cultural experiences of mothering are unique to Aboriginal mothers and contrasted to non-Aboriginal concepts. The ways that incarceration of Aboriginal mothers disrupts child rearing practices within the cultural kinship system are identified.
Practical implications
Aboriginal women have unique circumstances relevant to the concept of motherhood that need to be understood to develop culturally relevant policy and programs. The burden of disease and cycle of incarceration within Aboriginal families can be addressed by improving health outcomes for incarcerated Aboriginal mothers and female carers.
Originality/value
To the authors’ knowledge, this is the first literature review on Australian Aboriginal women prisoners’ experiences of being a mother.
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Purpose – Research shows that new graduates of Master of Library and Information Science (MLIS) programs often fail to understand and appreciate the connection between library…
Abstract
Purpose – Research shows that new graduates of Master of Library and Information Science (MLIS) programs often fail to understand and appreciate the connection between library science theory and practice. In other fields, culminating experiences often serve the function of combining theory and praxis for students. While notably different from the current structure of the MLIS curriculum, other disciplines provide a model for how the culminating experience component of a degree program can be facilitated successfully. This chapter examines the culminating experiences of other fields in order to provide guidance for how American Library Association-accredited MLIS programs could adopt or integrate similar programs.
Approach – The study explores four culminating experiences commonly used in other fields: fieldwork, apprenticeships and residencies, service-learning, and creative exhibitions. For each culminating experience, recommendations for potential applications to MLIS curricula are provided.
Findings – Culminating MLIS experiences that bring students into the communities they will serve – for example, fieldwork, residencies, and service-learning – may better prepare them for the new world they will face as LIS professionals and may better introduce them to the experiences of their patrons. Exploration of these alternative culminating experiences may help students bridge the gap between theory and practice during and beyond their MLIS degree programs.
Originality/Value – A thorough literature review revealed no similar examination of culminating experiences in MLIS programs’ curricula in particular. Combined with other studies that make recommendations for updating the MLIS curriculum, this exploratory study can serve as a useful resource for MLIS programs hoping to redesign their curricula.
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Reimara Valk, Mandy van der Velde, Marloes van Engen and Betina Szkudlarek
The purpose of this paper is to explore the influence of cultural identity change, organizational and social support and cultural distance on repatriation experiences of Indian…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore the influence of cultural identity change, organizational and social support and cultural distance on repatriation experiences of Indian international assignees.
Design/methodology/approach
Semi‐structured interviews were held with 19 Indians on international assignment in The Netherlands and 11 Indians repatriated from The Netherlands. Respondents were asked to reflect on their cultural identity changes and the effects of social support, organizational support and cultural distance between the host and the home country on their international assignment and repatriation experiences. Iterative thematic analyses revealed five central themes: cultural identity independence; knowledge utilization and organizational learning; social network support; global career prospects in the Indian economy; work‐life balance.
Findings
Cultural identity changes ranged from low adaptation to Dutch culture and happiness on return to India through to high cultural flexibility and readiness to move to another sojourn. The majority of respondents reported great appreciation by their supervisors and co‐workers and utilization of their knowledge gained in The Netherlands. These factors, in addition to good career prospects and social support from their informal networks, contributed positively to their repatriation experiences.
Originality/value
This study challenges the frequently reported negative repatriation experiences of sojourners from the West.
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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…
Abstract
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.
THE Newcastle school, like most others, was established after the second world war to provide full‐time education in librarianship as an alternative to the part‐time system which…
Abstract
THE Newcastle school, like most others, was established after the second world war to provide full‐time education in librarianship as an alternative to the part‐time system which until 1946 was the only one available to the majority of librarians. At first most of the students were returning servicemen whose library careers had been interrupted by the war and they were followed by students direct from libraries, universities and schools. From a handful of students and one full‐time member of staff in the first year the school has grown steadily until there were 53 students and five staff during the session 1962–3 which was the last course held for the Registration Examination.