The performance management and appraisal in higher education

The performance appraisal (PA) is one of the performance management tools that is widely used to measure the productivity of academic employees in different contexts. Therefore, this paper has two main objectives. Firstly, it critically reviews the extant literature on performance management, including; Kaplan and Norton’s Balanced Scorecard Approach, among others. Secondly, it presents a qualitative research that explores the performance appraisal system in a higher education institution. The researcher has conducted semi-structured interview sessions with academic employees to analyse their opinions and perceptions toward their annual PA. The research participants revealed the costs and benefits of their PA exercise. They were aware that their educational leaders could pragmatically employ the PA’s metrics to improve their performance outcomes, in terms of stakeholder engagement, internal processes, organisational capacity and innovation, among other areas. This research implies that the PA instrument could lead to significant benefits for both the institution as well as for the personal development of individual academics.peer-reviewe

Professional contexts for modern languages:work experience and academic reflection in a multilingual context

In the second year module ‘Professional Contexts for Modern Languages’ at Lancaster University, students take 20-25 hour placements, and using a multimodal forum, they articulate their challenges, development and understanding of the varying contexts in which they are working. In summative assessment, students across languages and types of activity communicate and learn from each other so as to foster a broad, cross cultural understanding of language-based professional and business contexts (mainly in educational, digital marketing and translation sectors both in the UK and abroad). The module establishes a mutually productive engagement between a university languages department, faculty employability and central careers staff, the Lancaster University Students Union (that source teaching placements) and local and European employers. Inspired by a vision of modern languages degrees as fostering a global mind-set and cultural intelligence, the course allows us to rethink language learning within a framework of skills for employability

The wicked problem of social cohesion: Moving ahead

Despite the amount of attention given to social cohesion, divisions within many societies are becoming wider due to various factors including religious and far-right extremism and economic austerity. Given its ‘wickedness’, social cohesion has been researched from various dimensions. However, in order to develop an effective solution-based programme, these multi-facets need to be brought together for a clearer way forward. This research aims to bring together multiple disciplines in order to propose a way forward in the social cohesion discourse in two ways: by developing a common conceptualisation of social cohesion and identifying an effective approach to operationalise social cohesion. This research adopted a critical qualitative research approach and used three expert discussion forums consisting of academics and practitioners from multiple disciplines. The research identifies contact theory and participatory approaches as providing an effective way forward for social cohesion. Social cohesion is conceptualised in the form of factors needed to build a cohesive society as well as outcomes of a cohesive society. Using the social marketing approach of down- mid- and up-stream strategies and interventions, this research proposes a bottom-up approach to addressing the wicked problem of social cohesion. Social cohesion has been discussed by various academics and practitioners from multiple disciplines. This paper developed a common conceptualisation of social cohesion based on a review of multi-disciplinary literature combined with discussions with experts from academia and practice. Relating this to the down-, up- and mid-stream social marketing, this paper also identified participatory approach, based on contact theory, as an effective way in which social marketers can achieve downstream social marketing objectives

The corporate governance reporting in the European Union

The latest European Union’s (EU) guiding policies are encouraging big businesses and state-owned organisations to disclose their environmental, social and governance (ESG) performance. Many European member states have transposed the EU’s directive 2014/95/EU on non-financial reporting. This directive has presented a significant step forward toward the as its “comply or explain” approach has encouraged organisations to disclose a true and fair view on their organisations’ financial and ESG capitals. Hence, this paper makes specific reference to some of the corporations’ best practices as it identifies areas for improvement in corporate governance issues. It explains how three major European banks are following the recommendations of their national regulatory institution, as they have reviewed the roles and responsibilities of the corporate boards and management. In many cases, they have anticipated the regulatory, legal, contractual, social and market-driven obligations. This contribution contends that there are significant implications for financial services corporations who intend following the right path toward responsible corporate governance and ethical behaviours.peer-reviewe

Transnationalism and Social Work Education

Transnational movements, networks, and relationships are everywhere in this “world on the move” (Williams & Graham, 2014, p. i1). Transnational peoples maintain relationships of interdependence and support with families and communities in their places of origin, often returning regularly, while starting new lives and making new connections. Transnationalism is characterized by mobilities and networks, by social integration, and by extended and extensive relationship ties of family, neighborhood, religious faith, or combinations thereof (Valtonen, 2008). While disciplines across the world including sociology, human geography, and cultural anthropology engage with the implications of transnationalism (Bauböck & Faist, 2010), social work in England and mainland Europe has not achieved similar levels of engagement. As Cox and Geisen state: “the social world is being transformed by migration and social work is playing catch-up” (2014, p. i162)

Webometric analysis of departments of librarianship and information science: a follow-up study

This paper reports an analysis of the websites of UK departments of library and information science. Inlink counts of these websites revealed no statistically significant correlation with the quality of the research carried out by these departments, as quantified using departmental grades in the 2001 Research Assessment Exercise and citations in Google Scholar to publications submitted for that Exercise. Reasons for this lack of correlation include: difficulties in disambiguating departmental websites from larger institutional structures; the relatively small amount of research-related material in departmental websites; and limitations in the ways that current Web search engines process linkages to URLs. It is concluded that departmental-level webometric analyses do not at present provide an appropriate technique for evaluating academic research quality, and, more generally, that standards are needed for the formatting of URLs if inlinks are to become firmly established as a tool for website analysis

Literature in language learning in the UK context: from current A-levels to university

The aim of this paper is to look at the impact of recent reforms to the General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) and Advanced Subsidiary (AS) curriculum in the UK, which included the teaching of literature in the language classroom in an attempt to make the study of languages more attractive and to better prepare students for university. The delivery of the new GCSEs and A-Levels has served to highlight new challenges, which are hampering the intended purpose of the reforms: language GCSEs and A-Levels are perceived as more difficult than other subjects and severe grading has been confirmed. Moreover, most teachers do not view the compulsory literature element positively. Conversely, academic studies confirm the value of literature in the study of languages and various initiatives demonstrate the attractiveness and effectiveness of literature in terms of increasing motivation and enhancing language skills. In this paper, we suggest some final proposals to improve this situation

Heights of occupied patient beds: a possible risk factor for inpatient falls

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/72643/1/j.1365-2702.2007.02086.x.pd