Asylum seekers and refugees’ perspectives and experiences of what makes Glasgow welcoming

This article explores how asylum seekers and refugees experience “welcome” in Glasgow, a city recognised for its proactive approach to migration amid the UK's polarised discourse. Through semi-structured interviews, the study examines three key aspects: encounters with institutional support, the role of community spaces in fostering a sense of welcome, and the impact of interpersonal interactions on evolving experiences of welcome. The findings reveal that personal histories, daily interactions, and the broader socio-political context shape perceptions of welcome, highlighting its complex and dynamic nature

Collaboration for musical learning

The purpose of this chapter is to enhance understanding and knowledge of the various possibilities and opportunities that collaboration can bring into secondary school music education. The chapter positions collaboration as a way of enhancing experience, learning and teaching for all involved. The benefits and challenges of collaboration are raised, situated within the wider context of music education policy and the complexities of individual teacher background, values and identity. Examples are provided of with whom a secondary school music teacher might collaborate , including collaborations within a teacher’s school, with feeder primary schools, instrumental teachers, musicians and higher education institutions. The reader is encouraged to thoughtfully consider the potential and scope of collaborations within their own context, and to take the first steps in the collaborative planning process. Models and theories are offered to frame the concept of collaboration, and conditions that can be put into place for collaborations to thrive are suggested

The professional journeys of music teachers

This chapter will explore the professional journeys and experiences of music teachers in both primary and secondary contexts in England. These journeys and experiences can be rewarding but complex, and full of tensions and challenges. The chapter will embrace my passion for storytelling and use this to articulate the individual values, experiences and aspirations that contribute to shaping the wider phenomenon of music education in practice. Listening to the voices of other music teachers can shed light on the diversity of experience, shared concerns, and hopes for the future of music education.More specifically, this chapter presents the findings of a small-scale study that explores the stories of eight music educators. Each educator has a story to tell that reveals their passion for music education, and the celebrations and tensions they have experienced. Themes that emerge from these narratives represent key debates and issues shaping school music education and the experience of music teachers, today. Implications for policy and practice arising from these stories are then outlined

Gender and the Youthification of German Television:Zeit der Geheimnisse and Generational Change in High-End TV Drama

The production of high-end television drama is booming in Germany. What is noticeable in these dramas are the representational changes as far as women are concerned: female characters are no longer relegated to the status of best friend or love interest but emerge as in charge of their own destiny. Examining these changes in the socio-political and historical context of Germany’s changing gender relations (for which Angela Merkel’s chancellorship was a turning point) as well as changing industrial practices in Germany, the chapter uses the case study of Zeit der Geheimnisse/ Holiday Secrets (Netflix, 2019) to trace how these representational changes have occurred. It argues that a combination of the interest of young adult German viewers in imported US TV dramas, the increasing transnationalisation of the German television industry, and a production context in which high-end television drama is treated as similar to cinema have encouraged and assisted the development of television drama that not only speaks to younger viewers, both within Germany and internationally, but also imagines women in ways that acknowledges the gender perspectives, aspirations, and increased agency felt by young adult German women today

Image-Based Android Malware Detection Using Deep Learning

The Android operating system (OS) dominates the mobile phone OS industry, with over 70% of the market share. With the growth of Android OS-based smartphones, it has become a prime target for mobile malware attacks. Minimal alterations in malware samples can easily evade traditional detection methods such as signature-based detection. In contrast, artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML)-based malware detection has proven more effective, as it can detect zero-day malware. Previous studies have shown that AI/ML-based malware classifiers trained on categorical features are vulnerable to adversarial evasion attacks. Therefore, in this study, we transform the features extracted from Android apps into image-based data and investigate the performance of Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs), Inception Networks, and Residual Networks (ResNet) on this data. We employ 41,382 Android malware samples belonging to 240 malware families and 36,755 benign apps to train and test the models. Our experiment results show that CNNs outperform Inception Networks and ResNet with up to 99% classification accuracy. Furthermore, our analysis also indicates that CNNs trained on image-based Android malware and benign data outperform various Android malware detection techniques proposed in the literature

Defectology as a theory of inclusion?

This chapter reconsiders the foundational Vygotskyan concept of defectology in order to explore key inhibitors to inclusionary practices in education: definitions of inclusion; policy and political contexts; attitudes towards inclusion; lack of engagement with theory. This analysis is primarily applied to Armenia, a post-Soviet country which utilizes terms such as ‘inclusion’ and ‘integration’ in educational policies whilst maintaining structures that categorise disabled children in terms of defects. The use of the expression ‘defect’ relates only in part to impairment in such a system and stems largely from a legacy that evaluates people in relation to their usefulness to society. What is described as defectology was a political and ideological response in the former USSR to the valorisation of labour, whereby the unproductive disabled were marginalised and othered, rather than a representation of the ideas of Vygotsky. Re-examining these ideas, in the context of Armenia, provides the basis for a re-alignment of inclusive practice away from the dichotomy of espousing inclusion whilst delivering practice based on an exclusionist version of a misunderstood theoretical position

Exploring the validity of smartphone based single camera markerless motion capture technology to quantify knee range of motion in patients with knee osteoarthritis

Background: Single camera markerless motion capture technology offers a potential means of assessing joint function in patients with musculoskeletal disorders/diseases. The aim of this study was to determine the validity and within-session reliability of sagittal plane knee joint kinematics quantified using the Deep Vision platform in patients with knee osteoarthritis. Methods: Sagittal plane knee joint kinematics were quantified using a 3D motion capture system, the msk.ai Deep Vision platform and Kinovea in fifteen patients with knee osteoarthritis. Bland Altman plots with 95 % limits of agreement were used to assess validity and within-session reliability, with mean differences and limits of agreement explored relative to ± 5° and 10° clinically meaningful thresholds, respectively. This is based on the assumption that changes in joint angles greater than 5° are clinically meaningful. Results: Mean differences and 95 % limits of agreement were within the clinically meaningful thresholds when using the Deep Vision platform to quantify peak knee flexion and extension, and range of motion. Mean differences were within the clinically meaningful threshold for Kinovea based assessments, but 95 % limits of agreement exceeded the ± 10° clinically meaningful threshold for peak flexion and range of motion. All assessment methods displayed mean differences and 95 % confidence intervals within the clinically meaningful thresholds on average when comparing across repetitions to quantify within-session reliability. Conclusion: The findings of the study demonstrate that the msk.ai Deep Vision platform provides a valid and reliable means of quantifying peak knee flexion, extension and range of motion. Contribution of the Paper: • The Deep Vision platform, a smartphone based markerless motion capture technology, provides a valid means of measuring knee range of motion. • The Deep Vision platform displays high reliability when measuring knee range of motion.</p

Exploring the Contrasting Sources of Stress and Job Satisfaction across three different areas of UK Statutory Social Work

The UK social work workforce is in a state of crisis, characterised by high vacancy and agency rates, staff sickness and turnover. As such, recent years have seen an increased focus on how the job satisfaction of UK social workers can be better understood and improved, as well as how the factors underpinning workforce instability can be addressed. Previous research has largely failed to compare the contrasting sources of stress and job satisfaction amongst UK social workers. This article reports on the qualitative component of a mixed method study. Drawing from focus groups and interviews with 35 UK social workers, the article considers the different contributors to stress and job satisfaction of social workers across three fields of statutory practice. It considers how the perceived public perception of the role; adequacy of resources; and consistency of workspace are impacting upon practitioners’ sense of stress and job satisfaction. Implications include the need to promote opportunities for social workers to explain the features of their role to members of the public; the importance of ensuring adequate resources to meet the individual needs of service users; and the potential negative impact of agile working arrangements