A Quantitative Study on Operational and Organizational Stress on Game Wardens

There has been a notable gap in research concerning stress among game wardens within the law enforcement field. Game wardens encounter operational and organizational stressors similar to those faced by traditional law enforcement officers. Previous research on stress in game wardens has predominantly focused on operational stress, the transition of their duties towards more traditional law enforcement roles, and various stress-inducing factors. This quantitative study utilized the Police Stress Questionnaire (PSQ) survey to analyze both operational and organizational stress in Maine Game Wardens. The research aimed to address two primary research questions: firstly, examining organizational and occupational stress utilizing the PSQ, and secondly, investigating whether a game warden\u27s years of experience correlates significantly with organizational or occupational stress in Maine Game Wardens. The study involved current Maine Game Wardens who participated through in- person, paper surveys. A 100% response rate was achieved from the surveyed Game Wardens, with approximately sixty out of a hundred Maine Game Wardens completing the survey. Through statistical analyses using the One-Sample t-tests and One-Way ANOVA, it was established that organizational stress exerts a slightly impact than operational stress, with years of service in the field notably influencing stress levels—specifically, the period of 11-20 years of service showing the most significant impact. While this research contributes to the existing body of knowledge on stress among game wardens, further research is warranted to gain a deeper understanding of stress influences within this population

Space Astronomy for the mid-21st Century: Robotically Maintained Space Telescopes

The historical development of ground based astronomical telescopes leads us to expect that space-based astronomical telescopes will need to be operational for many decades. The exchange of scientific instruments in space will be a prerequisite for the long lasting scientific success of such missions. Operationally, the possibility to repair or replace key spacecraft components in space will be mandatory. We argue that these requirements can be fulfilled with robotic missions and see the development of the required engineering as the main challenge. Ground based operations, scientifically and technically, will require a low operational budget of the running costs. These can be achieved through enhanced autonomy of the spacecraft and mission independent concepts for the support of the software. This concept can be applied to areas where the mirror capabilities do not constrain the lifetime of the mission.Comment: 4 pages, accepted in February 2012 for publication in A

Employment conditions in the scottish social care voluntary sector : impact of public funding constraints in the context of economic recession

This report uses data to assess the impact of public funding constraints on employment conditions in the Scottish social care voluntary sector, in the context of the recent economic recessionand future public expenditure cuts

State of the water sector report 2015

The Australian Water Association and Deloitte are pleased to present the State of the Water Sector Report 2015. The Report is the only one of its kind, reporting on the trends and insights of water sector professionals about their own industry. The survey results reveal attitudes and behaviours relating to a range of topics affecting the industry. This year marks the fifth year that the survey has been run and, as such, a summary of trends across the five years has been included in this year’s report. Trends observed over the last five years operational efficiency first emerged as an issue affecting the water sector in 2013, due to growing concerns about the need to control costs and demonstrate value for money, both within the sector itself and for customers. This rose to become the primary issue and area of concern in 2014 as operational costs continued to rise and new capital investment costs were being passed on to customers. In 2015 operational efficiency remains the second biggest issue for the industry, with efficiencies still to be gained through asset management, process improvement and works management and systems improvement. Skills shortages, and talent attraction and retention were of significant concern when the survey commenced five years ago, with the issue of ageing workforces in particular seen by many as a looming threat for the industry. However, in more recent years these concerns have almost halved due to a reduction in demand for additional staff and the greater availability of skilled labour, given construction activity in the mining industry has eased. Unconventional gas came onto the industry’s radar in 2012. last year, 70% of respondents stated that they believed unconventional gas had a significant to moderate effect on the overall management of ground- or surface water. In 2015, 55% of respondents stated that produced water from unconventional gas activities can be treated to a suitable quality for irrigation and other purposes, nevertheless highlighting some concerns in relation to the oil and gas sector impact. Although climate change was identified by 86% of respondents last year as posing a significant or moderate risk to sustainable management of water, sustainability is rated as less important than in previous years, with it being ranked as one of the top issues for the sector in 2011. This may be due to broader changes in community sentiment regarding environmental issues, and more benign weather conditions. While the sector believed security of supply was being managed well, climate change, as well as population growth, is viewed as one of the greatest challenges over the next five years. from a price and regulatory perspective, satisfaction with the role of economic regulators continues to increase slowly, and an increasing proportion of respondents support regulators making deterministic decisions on prices, rather than just monitoring prices. However, a price monitoring role is still favoured by more than three times as many respondents as deterministic pricing. 2015 Key issues The price of water and water regulation Water sector professionals’ perceptions of customer beliefs Sources of water Digital technology Asset management and operational efficiency -- State based reports are also available at AWA\u27s websit

Adding a Little Gold to the Golden Years: Should the European Union Prohibit Compulsory Retirement as Aged-Based Discrimination in Employment?

On October 2, 1997, the Member States of the European Union signed the Treaty of Amsterdam which amended the European Community Treaty (ECT). Among the Amsterdam Treaty\u27s most important new provisions was ECT Article 13, which authorized the Council of Ministers, acting unanimously, to take appropriate action to combat discrimination based on sex, racial or ethnic origin, religion or belief disability, age or sexual orientation. The Council acted with surprising rapidity to adopt Directive 2000/78, which prohibits discrimination in employment on all the listed bases (except for racial or ethnic origin, which is covered by Directive 2000/43). Since December 2, 2003, the end of the period for Member State implementation of Directive 2000/78, the Court of Justice has issued numerous judgments interpreting and applying the Directives provisions. By far the largest number have concerned the Directives prohibition of discrimination in employment based on age. To date there has been relatively little American (or indeed EU) academic commentary upon the Court\u27s judgments. This article is accordingly timely in its presentation of the terms of Directive 2000/78, and its critical examination of the Court judgments concerning the prohibition of discrimination in employment based on age. Moreover the article compares the impact of the Directive and the Court judgments with the prohibition of discrimination in employment based on age through the U.S. Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA), initially adopted in 1969. As amended in 1984, the ADEA totally prohibits employers from setting a compulsory retirement date, except where advanced age tends to impair an employee s occupational qualifications essential for performance in a particular profession or job. In Part I, the article describes the operational provisions of Directive 2000/78 relevant to the prohibition of age-based discrimination. The principal focus of the article, in Part II, is a description and critical examination of the four Court judgments reviewing national rules that authorize employers to set an age (usually sixty-five) for the compulsory retirement of employees. Part III supplements this with a description and critical examination of national compulsory retirement rules for certain specific professions or occupations (e.g., airline pilots, policemen, firemen, judges, prosecutors). Because the Court of Justice\u27s judgments have held that national rules authorizing employers to set a compulsory retirement age do not violate Directive 2000/78, a natural question is whether this judicial conclusion can be considered to be appropriate, as compared to the total prohibition of compulsory retirement in the U.S. After considering the significant difference between the limited social impact of the prohibition of compulsory retirement in the U.S., as contrasted with the significant adverse social impact of prohibiting compulsory retirement in many EU Member States, the article concludes that substantially higher unemployment rates among young people under thirty in some EU States justify their governments\u27 rules that authorize employers to set a compulsory retirement age. Accordingly, the Court\u27s judgments that permit national rules to authorize compulsory retirement in order to open employment opportunities for younger workers can be evaluated as appropriate and justified

Development of a whole life cycle cost model for electrification options on the UK rail system

Projects to deliver Overhead Line Equipment (OLE) electrification on the UK rail infrastructure system presents technical challenges which the rail industry in Britain have not traditionally had to consider. Whole Life Cycle assessment provides decision makers with cost estimates for the installation phase and over the entire service life of the system, including disposal. The OLE projects face a particular problem when analysing the best option for overbridges. Much of the rail infrastructure has not traditionally had to consider overhead clearances and therefore many of the bridges are only a little taller than the rolling stock. In addition to the difficulties in assessing the Life-Cycle costs of assets that have historically been used in very limited scales, the Whole Life Cycle assessment must consider the various engineering options that are available for projects. The three competing options (bridge rebuild, track lowering, reduced clearance) are all going to have very different capital expenditure (CAPEX) and operating expenditure (OPEX) costs. This work presents a model created to predict these costs over the anticipated assessment period. The developed model predicts capital expenditures, maintenance and service disruption costs and links them to the three major assets options involved in OLE underbridges