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The purpose of this paper is to provide a commentary on, “Afraid to leave the house: issues leading to social exclusion and loneliness for people with a learning disability”.

This paper considers the impacts of cuts to services, support and care that people with learning disabilities experience and the effects these cuts can have on social inclusion and positive social networks. Ways in which these impacts can be overcome are considered.

Listening to the voices of people with learning disabilities can provide opportunities for positive change which meet the needs of people with learning disability and society more widely.

The commentary uses evidence to consider the effects of cuts to services on the lives of people with learning disability and to provide possible solutions.

The purpose of this paper is to describe the process of developing a contemporary competency framework for admiral nurses in dementia care.

Information and evidence was gathered from research and policy literature regarding competencies to deliver advanced practice within dementia care. An online survey completed by 75 admiral nurses with follow-up interviews clarified current practice across the range of service contexts in which they work. A focus group (FG) of people living with dementia and family carers, and a reference group of practitioners helped to develop a competency framework which was refined through FGs with admiral nurses working in different areas.

The literature review, survey and interviews provided a framework grounded in up-to-date evidence and contemporary practice. There was broad agreement in the literature and the practitioners’ priorities regarding the core competencies of advanced practice, with constructive suggestions for making the framework useable in practice. This resulted in a robust framework articulating the competencies of admiral nurses which could be used for continuous professional development.

Engaging the admiral nurses ensured the competencies were contemporary, succinct and applicable within practice, and also cultivated a sense of ownership. Developing the competency framework with the admiral nurses not for them provides an approach which may have value for professionals undertaking a similar process in their specialist area. It is anticipated the competency framework will provide further evidence of the benefits of specialist nurse support for families affected by dementia.

Post-diagnostic dementia care is often fragmented in the United Kingdom, with great variation in provision. Recent policies suggest moving towards better community-based care for dementia; however, little is known on how this care is delivered. This study aimed to map the post-diagnostic dementia support provided in England a decade after the introduction of a National Dementia Strategy.

A mixed-methods e-survey (open Nov 2018–Mar 2019) of dementia commissioners in England recruited through mailing lists of relevant organisations was conducted. The authors descriptively summarised quantitative data and carried out thematic analysis of open-ended survey responses.

52 completed responses were received, which covered 82 commissioning bodies, with representation from each region in England. Respondents reported great variation in the types of services provided. Information, caregiver assessments and dementia navigation were commonly reported and usually delivered by the voluntary sector or local authorities. Integrated pathways of care were seen as important to avoid overlap or gaps in service coverage. Despite an increasingly diverse population, few areas reported providing dementia health services specifically for BME populations. Over half of providers planned to change services further within five years.

There is a need for greater availability of and consistency in services in post-diagnostic dementia care across England.

Post-diagnostic dementia care remains fragmented and provided by a wide range of providers in England.

Women roared into the Ambridge Cricket Team in March 2017. Their debut was initiated by a shortage of male players and a belief that the team was at risk, rather than an inherent desire to include women in the game. The approach of the women very much reflected the sentiments of the Helen Reddy ‘I am Woman’ song of the 1970s, ‘I am woman, hear me roar in numbers too big to ignore’, which became an anthem for empowerment of women in that generation. This chapter describes the context of cricket and sport in England and a synopsis of the 2017 storyline surrounding the Ambridge Cricket Team. A comparison of the storyline with the wider context shows the experience in Ambridge is similar to other places in England and elsewhere.

The purpose of this paper was to ask librarian Rachel Mulvihill (Head of Teaching and Engagement) and colleagues at University of Central Florida libraries about the Foundations of Excellence Transfer Initiative, an extensive, university-wide self-study program examining their transfer student needs for success and retention. University librarians participated in Foundational Dimensions groups in the first year of the program and with action groups in the second year.

This is an interview.

Participation in campus-wide initiatives to reach transfer students improved the libraries’ image in the university system, strengthened inter-department connections and supported the success of transfer students. Developing personal connections with transfer students and understanding your school’s transfer population needs and dialogues with feeder school can help libraries better support their student populations.

The integration of library staff into a system-wide transfer-student assessment program is rare, if not unique.

Although existing research demonstrates that the health and wellbeing of prison staff is affected by many factors, the current academic evidence base for effective support is limited. The aim of this study was to explore the experiences of prison staff who had been involved in the Spark Inside Prison Staff Coaching Programme to understand the perceived benefits of this intervention.

An exploratory approach using in-depth semi-structured interviews with 17 staff who had experienced coaching was used.

Perceived benefits included personal and professional growth, a positive sense of self and improved relationships. A positive influence on health and wellbeing and staff retention was noted.

The research details the perceived benefits of coaching for prison staff and adds to the evidence base about what interventions can usefully support the health and wellbeing of correctional staff. The findings have implications for prisons as well as broader occupations who experience challenges with staff retention.

Ridley Scott’s 1982 cinematic production of Blade Runner, based loosely on a 1968 story by Philip Dick (Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?), is read within a general context of critical theory, the purpose being twofold: first, to highlight the film’s fit with, and within, several issues that have been important to critical theory and, second, to explore some questions, criticisms, and extensions of those issues – the dialectic of identity/difference most crucially – by speculations within and on the film’s text. The exploration is similar in approach to studies of specific films within the context of issues of social, cultural, and political theory conducted by the late Stanley Cavell. Interrogations of dimensions of scenarios and sequences of plotline, conceptual pursuit of some implications, and assessments of the realism at work in cinematic format are combined with mainly descriptive evaluations of character portrayals and dynamics as these relate to specified thematics of the identity/difference dialectic. The film puts in relief evolving meanings of prosthetics – which is to say changes in the practical as well as conceptual-semantic boundaries of “human being”: what counts as “same” versus “other”? “domestic” versus “foreign”? “integrity” versus “dissolution”? “safety” versus “danger”? And how do those polarities, understood within a unity-of-opposites dialectic, change, as human beings are confronted more and more stressfully by their own reproductions of “environment” – that is, the perspectival device of “what is ‘text’ and what is context’?” – and variations of that device by direct and indirect effects of human actions, as those actions have unfolded within recursive sequences of prior versions of perspectival device, a device repeatedly engaged, albeit primarily and mainly implicitly, as a “prosthetic that could not be a prosthetic.”

With the development of new public libraries such as the Idea Stores in Tower Hamlets and Discovery Centres in Hampshire, it has been debated whether the inclusion of non‐book materials and activities illustrates the death of public libraries by the marginalisation of books. This paper aims to investigate these assumptions by examining the use of space in public library buildings for book and non‐book purposes over time.

The methodology involves a survey of secondary data on library buildings and the comparison of floor plans, observations and stock statistics of libraries in the two authorities over time.

This study concludes that the inclusion of non‐book space is not a new trend in library buildings and that books still have a significant role in terms of floor space and stock in new libraries even with the increased addition of non‐book space, illustrating less dramatic changes than suggested by some commentators. These trends in fact indicate a diversification of public libraries and their buildings not their imminent death.

Although this research was only able to study a few examples of libraries, this alternative method of investigating space could be repeated in future research.

The study of use of space in libraries is important as it has implications for the library profession and the design of future library buildings. This methodology provides a different way of studying the issues of space.

This paper aims to contribute to the special issue theme by analysing intentional non‐consumption through anti‐consumption and consumer resistance lenses.

A total of 16 in‐depth interviews with women who intentionally practise non‐consumption for sustainability were completed.

Two major themes where identified: I versus them: the careless consumers, and The objective/subjective dialectic in mundane practices.

While it is tempting to delineate one concept from another, in practice, both anti‐consumption and consumer resistance intersect and represent complementary frameworks in studying non‐consumption.