Legal Approaches to Combating Sex Trafficking: A Compilation of Research and a Comparative Analysis of the Most Effective Means of Reducing Trafficking Globally

This research explores the relationship between three important factors necessary for reducing sex trafficking globally through a comparative analysis of four specific countries and their success in addressing these factors. The three factors that will be discussed in their relation to sex trafficking are government cooperation, border control, and illegalization of prostitution. These factors were chosen based on how consistently they showed up in research done for this thesis. The countries chosen for analysis-Sweden, the Netherlands, Thailand, and Singapore- were chosen based on region, trafficking levels, and unique facts that stood out as potentially significant. As will be discussed, Sweden recently developed a significant anti-prostitution law that affected its levels of trafficking over the past fifteen years, making it an important country to include in a comparison of effective reduction methods. The Netherlands and Thailand both remain two of the worst countries for sex trafficking statistically, although their levels of government cooperation contrasted dramatically. The final country, Singapore, was chosen for its strict legal system and weak border control, making it a unique country to compare with the other three mentioned

DELIVERY AND ASSESSMENT OF A SYSTEMS ANALYSIS COURSE DURING COVID-19

In this paper, we review and reflect on our experience in the teaching of a Systems Analysis (SA) course in Semester 1, 2020, in Victoria, Australia, during COVID-19 lockdown. The SA course is a second-year course for all Bachelor of IT programs in our university, and it ran on three campuses and online. Students work in groups of three to analyse and document the system requirements of Australia Post. This paper describes the design of an SA course, how all students moved to online mode and the design of the final assessment to replace the traditional face-to-face exam in response to COVID-19 lockdown. We also describe the content of the course, method of instruction, assessment tools, the learning outcomes during online, what we have learned from running this course, recommendations for future offerings and how others can adapt and apply the practice

Seeking approval from universities to research the views of their staff : do gatekeepers provide a barrier to ethical research?

A “gatekeeper” controls access to an organization; “gatekeeper approval” is often needed before external research can take place within an organization. We explore the need for gatekeeper approval for research with university staff employing, as a case study, a project which collected data in Australia. This case study addresses known issues, seemingly rarely addressed in the literature. The Human Research Ethics Committee (HREC)'s requirement for approval from individual universities to approach their staff brought significant consequences, exacerbated by the lack of university procedures for such approvals. Simultaneously, since invitations could legitimately be distributed via other avenues, such approval was superfluous. We recommend the HREC's blanket requirement for institutional approval instead be considered on a case-by-case basis depending on the risk of the research, and perhaps waived for low-risk research where participants are able to provide informed consent, and that universities establish processes to deal with requests from external researchers. © The Author(s) 2022

Burnout, stress and resilience of an Australian regional hospital during COVID-19: a longitudinal study

Abstract Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has placed huge strain on hospital staff around the world. The aim of the current longitudinal study was to investigate the resilience, stress and burnout of hospital staff located at a large, regional hospital in Victoria, Australia during the COVID-19 pandemic over time via cross-sectional surveys. The surveys were disseminated six times from August 2020 to March 2021, with the first three data collection points distributed during a state-wide lockdown. A total of 558 responses from various professional roles within the hospital over the survey period were included in the sample. Analysis of variance indicated significant main effects for the psychological variables across time, age, and workload. Hospital staff reported an increase in burnout levels throughout the eight-months. Significant negative relationships were observed between resilience and burnout, and between resilience and stress. A backward regression highlighted the contribution of resilience, stress, age, and nursing roles on burnout. Hierarchical regression analysis indicated that resilience contributed to the stress-burnout relationship. This study strengthens the evidence between resilience and burnout among healthcare workers and hospital staff and highlights the need for psychological wellbeing programs to be implemented for hospital staff impacted by a prolonged worldwide pandemic

Review and reflection – engaging first year mathematics students as self-reflective learners

Mathematical competency and confidence can be built through scaffolding of learning tasks followed by frequent opportunities for students to test their knowledge and skills after each topic. Students who enter University STEM disciplines with inadequate mathematics backgrounds for the courses they are undertaking are often apprehensive about undergoing formal testing of their mathematical skills. Many introductory and bridging mathematics courses therefore take a portfolio based approach to continuous assessment, with students submitting completed class work but with often minimal formal testing. It is also desirable for first year students to develop self-reflective study skills appropriate for effective learning in a university environment. As part of an Essential Maths for Science unit, continuous testing of students’ skills in a non-threatening and self-reflective setting was implemented. Students were given the opportunity at the end of each segment of content to undertake a review task, focussing on the skills they should be able to demonstrate at that point. These were administered in tutorial sessions and were similar in content to a topic test but students were given the opportunity to ask questions and clarification from the tutor and consult their notes. Students were otherwise encouraged to work under test conditions without any peer collaboration. The task concluded with a self-reflective Likert scale survey of each of the mathematical skills covered by the questions allowing students to rank their self-confidence with each mathematical skill. Students were also given the opportunity for open ended responses about the skills they found easiest and most difficult. Samples and results from these review and reflection tasks will be presented and the usefulness of such a testing regime discussed. Student reflection around confidence and ability provides constructive feedback for both students and teaching practitioners

Farmer satisfaction with policing in rural Victoria, Australia

Recognising that the impacts of acquisitive crime on farms are both economic and social, the Victorian Farm Crime Research Project is an ongoing endeavour to examine farm crime in Victoria. Specifically, the Project is considering attitudes of farmers and farming communities to criminal justice responses to farm crime; assessing existing policing practices and analysing alternatives; and determining a suite of strategies for prevention and control of crime against farms and for improvement of service delivery by the criminal justice system in Victoria. A quantitative survey of Victorian farmers was conducted between August 2017 and November 2018. This paper reports on and assesses results from the survey, providing results of parametric testing on a series of Likert scale questions which enable an analysis of farmer attitudes to rural policing, crime and victimisation. Overall farmers' attitudes to rural policing are generally positive. There is a perception, however, that the policing focus is not aligned with farming communities' priorities and that the police are under-resourced. Farmers who have been a victim of theft have less positive thoughts on police in the local area. People who are members of local community organisations have higher opinions of local police. It argues that there needs to be a synthesised campaign to build stronger relationships between police and farm communities, and that this can be achieved primarily through enhanced resourcing of local police in rural areas of Victoria and the resourcing of team of fulltime rural crime investigators

The probability isotherm: An intuitive non-equilibrium thermodynamic framework for biochemical kinetics

Widespread error exists in the ‘thermodynamics’ and/or ‘bioenergetics’ sections of most biochemical textbooks. Three typical examples are drawn from a premier pedagogical source and shown to encapsulate (1) confusion about entropy and reversibility, (2) confounding of coupled reactions with sequential reactions in misguided attempts to show how exergonic reactions might drive endergonic reactions, and (3) confusion about the proximity to equilibrium of living processes. A fresh approach is developed, based on the Second Law imperative that free energy be dissipated (identical to the requirement that entropy be created). This approach identifies a Probability Isotherm, being a probabilistic expression of the Second Law, relating molar free energy dissipation to the overall ratio of probability of forward reaction to backward reaction. By equating the Probability Isotherm to the Van’t Hoff Isotherm, the overall probability ratio may be decomposed into an intrinsic probability ratio (the equilibrium constant) and an extrinsic probability ratio (dependent on composition). The Probability Isotherm is manifest kinetically as the Rate Isotherm, also thermodynamically determined even for kinetically complex reactions. The concept of ‘bound energy’ is introduced to complement ‘free energy’ in reconciling the Second Law imperative for free energy dissipation with the First Law requirement for total energy conservation

Is the evolution of biochemistry texts decreasing fitness? A case study of pedagogical error in bioenergetics

The initial impetus for this research was the discovery by the authors of a variety of common and consistent errors and misconceptions in pedagogical literature on the topic of thermodynamics in Biochemistry. A systematic survey was undertaken of material on thermodynamics in Biochemistry textbooks commonly used in Australian Universities over the period from the 1920s up to 2010. Four common areas of error and misconception were identified, and a number of factors associated with the initiation and propagation of troublesome pedagogical material through successive editions of Biochemistry textbooks were recognised. These factors included the introduction of multiple authors and also often the departure of the original author of a particular textbook. The very nature of Biochemistry as a rapidly expanding discipline leads to the constant introduction of new material in textbooks and the contraction of older material such as thermodynamics. Material is also often fragmented into a number of smaller sections in modern textbooks. Moreover, less development is likely to be applied to this older material, with considerable reuse of material from previous editions. The lessons learned from charting these particular errors in thermodynamics in Biochemistry textbooks may provide insight into how troublesome pedagogical material evolves in other disciplines

Engaging first year students through a cross-disciplinary forum

First year teaching staff from a range of science disciplines at Federation University worked together to design and facilitate a series of activities to explore and develop learning skills for incoming first year Science and Engineering students. The activities were designed to address core generic skills applicable to science and engineering students in a range of disciplines and were aligned with graduate attributes. Staff developed the workshops in line with individual subject and assessment requirements so that students could benefit from specific skills at appropriate points in the semester. This took the form of a “First Year Forum”: a weekly workshop, facilitated by a range of staff members from library support staff, first year teaching staff and statisticians. The workshops aimed to develop skills in academic writing, research, time management and data handling. Some of the workshops were specifically aligned with assessment tasks, while others concentrated on familiarising students with generic skills that would be useful to them throughout their degree. The final session was a “Revision Trivia session” which built on cross-discipline team work that had been fostered throughout these sessions. This paper will outline the program and its integration into the first year curriculum of the school