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Aarhus Kommunes Biblioteker (Teknisk Bibliotek), Ingerslevs Plads 7, Aarhus, Denmark. Representative: V. NEDERGAARD PEDERSEN (Librarian).

The study here responds to the view that the crucial problem in strategic management (research) is firm heterogeneity – why firms adopt different strategies and structures, why heterogeneity persists, and why competitors perform differently. The present study applies complexity theory tenets and a “neo-configurational perspective” of Misangyi et al. (2016) in proposing complex antecedent conditions affecting complex outcome conditions. Rather than examining variable directional relationships using null hypotheses statistical tests, the study examines case-based conditions using somewhat precise outcome tests (SPOT). The complex outcome conditions include firms with high financial performances in declining markets and firms with low financial performances in growing markets – the study focuses on seemingly paradoxical outcomes. The study here examines firm strategies and outcomes for separate samples of cross-sectional data of manufacturing firms with headquarters in one of two nations: Finland (n = 820) and Hungary (n = 300). The study includes examining the predictive validities of the models. The study contributes conceptual advances of complex firm orientation configurations and complex firm performance capabilities configurations as mediating conditions between firmographics, firm resources, and the two final complex outcome conditions (high performance in declining markets and low performance in growing markets). The study contributes by showing how fuzzy-logic computing with words (Zadeh, 1966) advances strategic management research toward achieving requisite variety to overcome the theory-analytic mismatch pervasive currently in the discipline (Fiss, 2007, 2011) – thus, this study is a useful step toward solving the crucial problem of how to explain firm heterogeneity.

The main focus of this study is preschool teachers’ own learning from a specific course aimed to develop their knowledge of how to use learning study (LS) in preschool. The study included 24 qualified and experienced preschool teachers who took part in the course. The course was funded by the Swedish National Agency for Education and the teachers were chosen by their municipal employers. An analysis is made of their experiences of the in-service course on LS and variation theory. The 24 preschool teachers were divided into seven groups, each of which implemented one LS. A total of 162 preschool children participated. After the course, the participants were asked, “How do you think LS can contribute in preschool?” Their answers were analyzed, and six qualitatively different categories were found, capturing their different perspectives. In the studies reported in this chapter, the results of the children's learning outcomes are also briefly reported to offer readers a background understanding of the teachers’ experiences. The children's learning outcomes did all show an improvement. In describing their experiences of the in-service training using LS, all of the 24 participating preschool teachers reported that their understanding of children's learning had changed and improved. They specifically mentioned having a stronger focus on content than before, seeing the difference between learning and method by separating them, and focus on the learning of a defined content in the first place.

This study examines the construct of respect, its manifestations in teacher-student relationships, and it relationship to ethics of care and sustainable development. The study found that students place a high premium on being respected by their teachers and measure expressions of respect chiefly through the attention received through listening. Students’ perspectives on the quality of the schools’ leadership and the teaching and learning environment were found to be shaped by their assessments of the degree to which they feel respected. In a number bivariate correlations, the study found strong, positive correlations between the variable ‘listening’ and other variables that characterize the teacher-student relationship, in particular respect for teachers and principals and comfort with the teaching and learning environment.

The study makes the case that the act of showing respect is a critical component of the ethics of care and sustainable development. The study recommends that one strategy that teachers and educational administrators should adopt in seeking to strengthen teacher-student relationships, exert positive influence on students’ behaviours and academic performance, and thus ensure the sustainability of healthy social environments is to invest in the creation of organizational cultures and administrative systems and processes that create the avenues through which respect for students can be demonstrably seen.

The main purpose of this study is revival of vernacular architecture of Zegalli houses, which can be beneficial in several aspects of sustainable architecture, and therefore, its reuse in contemporary architecture can be strongly recommended. Zegalli houses, in northern Iran, are almost-entirely wooden vernacular houses, which beside to having several aspects of sustainable architecture, have shown good resistance against past earthquakes. Their relatively good seismic performance is mainly because of their specific timber foundation, which creates a kind of rocking/rolling isolation, as well as their light weight and diagonally braced stiff walls.

In this paper, first the architectural features of Zegalli houses, particularly energy efficiency, sustainability and eco-friendliness are described. Then, their structural system, focusing more on their foundation, is discussed. Finally, a simplified model of the house, developed in a powerful finite element analysis program, is introduced, and sample results of a series of time history analyses (THA), employing three-component accelerograms of three selected earthquakes, are presented.

Results of THA show that the rocking/rolling behavior of foundation timbers in various levels significantly reduces seismic response of the house, leading to its stability against earthquakes with peak ground acceleration up to 0.25 g.

Regarding the architectural and structural merits of Zegalli houses, they can be considered as sustainable vernacular architecture, and therefore, architects and civil and structural engineers are encouraged to reconsider the use of these houses, with some modifications, in future developments.

3D dynamics analysis of Shikilli foundations of Zegalli houses is done for the first time in this study.

IT is seldom that I can bring myself to write anything for publication, and as I had a longish article on “The education of librarians in Great Britain” printed as recently as 1964 in the Lucknow Librarian (which is edited by my friend Mr. R. P. Hingorani) I had not contemplated any further effort for some time to come. But as THE LIBRARY WORLD evidently wishes to cover all the British schools of librarianship it would be a pity for Brighton to be left out, even though, coming as it does towards the end of a gruelling series, I can see little prospect of this contribution being read. Perhaps, therefore, I need not apologise for the fact that, as my own life and fortunes have been (and still are) inextricably bound up with those of the Brighton school, any account which I write of the school is bound to be a very personal one.

The purpose of this paper is to share a lecturer’s viewpoint on using mobile phone, as an academic tool, in the lecture room.

Students were encouraged to use their mobile phones and find information during the author’s class discussions, at the University of the West Indies – Mona Campus. At the end of the semester, the author asked the students if they found mobile phone, a distraction, in their learning process and did they enjoy using them. These questions were asked to understand their perspective, about mobile phone usage during class discussions.

The finding is that respondents did not see mobile phone usage in lecture room as a distraction as they learn and they also enjoyed using them.

Students’ opinion on using mobile phone as an academic tool at the University level has not been explored before in Jamaica. This viewpoint provides the lecturers and university management an opportunity to rethink the existing rules, towards mobile phone usage in class, in an effort to enhance teaching and learning in the Caribbean context particularly in Jamaica.

“WHAT a place to be in, is an old library! It seems as though all the souls of all the writers, that have bequeathed their labours to these Bodleians, were reposing here, as in some dormitory or middle state. I do not want to handle, to profane the leaves, their winding sheets… I seem to inhale learning, walking amid their foliage.” Thus wrote Charles Lamb, of the Bodleian Library, which is the largest library to bear the name of a private benefactor, and amongst British libraries, is second only in importance to the British Museum.