Social Value of the Child: A Resource for Enhanced Social Experience and Social Resilience in Pro-baby Global South

Children's participation in economic activities has been documented as an inseparable part of the family support network in childhood studies. Children as an integral part of the parents' world contribute to enhanced social experiences, the continuity of the societal system, and the holistic well-being of the family. In the pro- baby global south children are political, economic, cultural, and social (PECS) resources that contribute to the parents' empowerment, prosperity, and status. This paper pursues the following research question: How does the social value of the child contributes a resource to enhance parents' social experiences and shape their social resilience? To explore the social value of the child in relation to the social experiences of parents (and childless couples). Revisited ethnographic data (interviews and fieldnotes) and reviewed my published work on the social value of the child (2022, 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016).This ethnographic research was conducted in rural Punjab, Pakistan. Using the concept of 'social resilience' as atheoretical lens, the qualitative analysis of the findings provided four thematic categories: 1) Social support and visibility2) Access to resources 3) Social network and relationship 4) Social security and stability. I extend the concept of social resilience beyond its limited application in disaster studies and elaborate it as a social construct embedded in the contextualized social experiences. A description of parents’ social experiences and social value of the child provides an understanding of social resilience to avoid possible psychosocial 'crises' that are seen as consequences of ‘childlessness’

Brooking no excuses: university staff and students are encouraged to develop their engagement

Brooking no excuses: university staff and students are encouraged to develop their engagement This paper will explore the internal and external factors that have prompted the University of East Anglia's decision to give Public Engagement into a more central role within the Universities Corporate Plan. It will illustrate how the SEARCH Action Learning Programme facilitated the design, implementation and delivery of new Staff and Student Development Programmes that aim to provide the confidence, skills and mentorship that will encourage staff to develop their engagement activities. We will use a SWOT analysis to discuss the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of the Public Engagement Practitioner. As part of this, we will explore how many of the issues we face as Science communicators with the public are similar to issues encountered by Communicators within the Arts and Humanities disciplines. Finally we will outline and detail our future plans, opportunities and vision that will enable us to move this agenda forward

Unmet goals of tracking: within-track heterogeneity of students' expectations for

Educational systems are often characterized by some form(s) of ability grouping, like tracking. Although substantial variation in the implementation of these practices exists, it is always the aim to improve teaching efficiency by creating homogeneous groups of students in terms of capabilities and performances as well as expected pathways. If students’ expected pathways (university, graduate school, or working) are in line with the goals of tracking, one might presume that these expectations are rather homogeneous within tracks and heterogeneous between tracks. In Flanders (the northern region of Belgium), the educational system consists of four tracks. Many students start out in the most prestigious, academic track. If they fail to gain the necessary credentials, they move to the less esteemed technical and vocational tracks. Therefore, the educational system has been called a 'cascade system'. We presume that this cascade system creates homogeneous expectations in the academic track, though heterogeneous expectations in the technical and vocational tracks. We use data from the International Study of City Youth (ISCY), gathered during the 2013-2014 school year from 2354 pupils of the tenth grade across 30 secondary schools in the city of Ghent, Flanders. Preliminary results suggest that the technical and vocational tracks show more heterogeneity in student’s expectations than the academic track. If tracking does not fulfill the desired goals in some tracks, tracking practices should be questioned as tracking occurs along social and ethnic lines, causing social inequality