Co-designing Speakers Corner

“What might a twenty-first century Speakers’ Corner look like and how should the design process ensure that local people can contribute?” The paper considers this question through describing a three year collaboration between MA Creative Practice for Narrative Environments (MACPfNE) at CSM, and the Speakers’ Corner Trust (SCT). SCT is a charity promoting public debate and active citizenship to revitalise civil society in the UK. It pursues its aims by forming local Committees which ‘own’ and steer the establishment of Speakers’ Corners as platforms for public engagement. MACPfNE is an innovative course that encourages multidisciplinary collaboration and the use of narrative as a tool to develop user focused environments. Working closely with SCT, MACPfNE staff and students developed a methodology whereby communities co-create their own physical manifestation of Speakers’ Corner to suit needs and environment. The methodology and its theoretical foundation were developed through a series of live projects, including: a generic mobile Speakers’ Corner prototype, tested at the Global Forum for Freedom of Expression in Oslo; the co-design with local school children, followed by implementation of London’s second Speakers’ Corner in a community park in North London; and a pilot project to co-design Speakers’ Corner in every school playground

Creativity in the Philosophy Class. Concrete Research

The issue of creativity among teachers and pupils in terms of the dialogical praxis represented a real challenge concerning the research that we have done in high school classes in which philosophy is being taught. We have come to the conclusion that there is a direct linking between the diversity of the dialogical forms which pupils and teachers use and the forms of expression of creativity that are used during philosophy classes. Philosophical themes seem more attractive and interesting if the working methods in classes are modified and if pupils have to evaluate critically their own knowledge. (DIPF/Orig.)Die Kreativität der Schüler und Lehrer in der Methode dialogischer Praxis während des Philosophieunterrichts von Oberschulklassen stellte im Kontext dieser repräsentativen Untersuchung eine Herausforderung dar. Unsere Feststellungen zeigen die direkte Verknüpfung zwischen der Vielfalt dialogischer Formen, welche die Schüler und Lehrer übernommen haben und den Formen und Ebenen der Kreativität der Schüler während des Philosophieunterrichts. Philosophische Themen gewinnen an Attraktivität, wenn die Arbeitsmethoden in der Klasse dahin gehend geändert werden, dass die Schüler gefordert sind, ihre Kenntnisse kritisch zu bewerten und ihre Position aus einem philosphischen Blickwinkel zu überprüfen. (DIPF/Orig.

Information systems evaluation methodologies

Due to the prevalent use of Information Systems (IS) in modern organisations nowadays, evaluation research in this field is becoming more and more important. In light of this, a set of rigorous methodologies were developed and used by IS researchers and practitioners to evaluate the increasingly complex IS implementation used. Moreover, different types of IS and different focusing perspectives of the evaluation require the selection and use of different evaluation approaches and methodologies. This paper aims to identify, explore, investigate and discuss the various key methodologies that can be used in IS evaluation from different perspectives, namely in nature (e.g. summative vs. formative evaluation) and in strategy (e.g. goal-based, goal-free and criteria-based evaluation). The paper concludes that evaluation methodologies should be selected depending on the nature of the IS and the specific goals and objectives of the evaluation. Nonetheless, it is also proposed that formative criteria-based evaluation and summative criteria-based evaluation are currently among the most and more widely used in IS research. The authors suggest that the combines used of one or more of these approaches can be applied at different stages of the IS life cycle in order to generate more rigorous and reliable evaluation outcomes

Does University Research Improve University Teaching?

The Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) and the Quality Assurance Agency (QAA) generated a natural experiment in which UK universities strove to achieve the best results they could for their research and teaching. A review of the two exercises and a discussion of the relationship between university teaching and research appear in James (2005). This paper presents an analysis of the results for departments in Management and Economics.University research; university teaching; Economics teaching; management education; Research Assessment Exercise; Quality Assurance Agency

ABSTRACTS: AN EVOLVING PUBLIC POLICY EDUCATION

Agricultural and Food Policy,

Victims’ experiences of short-and long-term safety and wellbeing: findings from an examination of an integrated response to domestic violence

Introduction This paper examines victims’ short and long-term experiences of safety and wellbeing after being supported through a six week police-led integrated response to domestic violence in Caboolture, Southeast Queensland. The overarching objective of this integrated response was to create safer home environments for women and children affected by domestic violence. The response was run as a pilot project from January 2010 until December 2011 and received subsequent funding for continuation after the initial pilot period. Findings presented in this paper are based on the last six months of the pilot period and illustrate women’s perceived safety and wellbeing during and after their initial state of crisis

Small Satellite Industrial Base Study: Foundational Findings

This report documents findings from a Small Satellite (SmallSat) Industrial Base Study conducted by The Aerospace Corporation between November 2018 and September 2019. The primary objectives of this study were a) to gain a better understanding of the SmallSat communitys technical practices, engineering approaches, requirements flow-downs, and common processes and b) identify insights and recommendations for how the government can further capitalize on the strengths and capabilities of SmallSat offerings. In the context of this study, SmallSats are understood to weigh no more than 500 kg, as described in State of the Art Small Spacecraft Technology, NASA/TP-2018- 220027, December 2018. CubeSats were excluded from this study to avoid overlap and duplication of recently completed work or other studies already under way. The team also touched on differences between traditional space-grade and the emerging mid-grade and other non-space, alternate-grade EEEE (electrical, electronic, electromechanical, electro-optical) piece part categories. Finally, the participants sought to understand the potential effects of increased use of alternate-grade parts on the traditional space-grade industrial base. The study team was keenly aware that there are missions for which non-space grade parts currently are infeasible for the foreseeable future. National security, long-duration and high-reliability missions intolerant of risk are a few examples. The team sought to identify benefits of alternative parts and approaches that can be harnessed by the government to achieve greater efficiencies and capabilities without impacting mission success

Interconnection Networks for Scalable Quantum Computers

We show that the problem of communication in a quantum computer reduces to constructing reliable quantum channels by distributing high-fidelity EPR pairs. We develop analytical models of the latency, bandwidth, error rate and resource utilization of such channels, and show that 100s of qubits must be distributed to accommodate a single data communication. Next, we show that a grid of teleportation nodes forms a good substrate on which to distribute EPR pairs. We also explore the control requirements for such a network. Finally, we propose a specific routing architecture and simulate the communication patterns of the Quantum Fourier Transform to demonstrate the impact of resource contention.Comment: To appear in International Symposium on Computer Architecture 2006 (ISCA 2006