Tertiary education policy: a case study of student interpretations and personal effects for school leavers : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Education, Education Department, Massey University

Tertiary education policy is produced in a political context with the purpose of bringing about specific planned effects. The manner in which individuals actively process policy messages within their own particular context of experience results in policy effects at times differing from projected effects for various individuals. The thesis is based on a case study research project which examines the decision making processes of ten senior secondary school students from a single secondary school in their final year of schooling. The research aims to identify the messages that students receive from Government tertiary policy and to evaluate the extent to which these messages are incorporated into individual decision making. Additional factors which influence the post school destination eventually chosen by students are also discussed. The personal effects of tertiary education policy differ from its ostensibly stated effects for most students. It is suggested that principles of 'fairness' and 'greater personal choice' are not realised for the majority of students. Instead, the position, disposition and communication effects of each student are shown to influence their post school destination. While all students respond to aspects of policy in the manner that it is envisaged that they would, the agency of individuals in making rational decisions within the structures of their own circumstances means that policy effects differ for each student

Keep Tinkering: The Optimist and the Death Penalty

When it comes to capital punishment, it may make sense to be a little bit defeatist. Like abortion, the death penalty is a topic about which you have to presume that you are never going to change anyone else’s mind. Whether the other person views it as a necessary part of the justice system or as a moral outrage, odds of changing the other person’s mind through reasoned discourse are slim

A review of the biology and management of horseshoe crabs, with emphasis on Florida populations

In Florida, some horseshoe crabs are fished for eel bait, but they are fished principally by the marine-life industry, which collects the animals live for resale as aquarium, research, or educational specimens. The regulations for the horseshoe crab fisheries are developed by each state in compliance with the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) Horseshoe Crab Management Plan. This report was written to provide information on the biology, stock status, and management of horseshoe crabs and the implications relevant to the request for an increased bag limit by harvesters in the marine-life industry

Predicting Outcomes in Investment Treaty Arbitration

Crafting appropriate dispute settlement processes is challenging for any conflict-management system, particularly for politically sensitive international economic law disputes. As the United States negotiates investment treaties with Asian and European countries, the terms of dispute settlement have become contentious. There is a vigorous debate about whether investment treaty arbitration (ITA) is an appropriate dispute settlement mechanism. While some sing the praises of ITA, others offer a spirited critique. Some critics claim that ITA is biased against states, while others suggest ITA is predictable but unfair due to factors like arbitrator identity or venue. Using data from 159 final cases derived from 272 publicly available ITA awards, this Article examines outcomes of ITA cases to explore those concerns. Key descriptive findings demonstrate that states reliably won a greater proportion of cases than investors; and for the subset of cases investors won, the mean award was US$45.6 million with mean investor success rate of 35%. State success rates were roughly similar to respondent-favorable or state-favorable results in whistleblowing, qui tam, and medical-malpractice litigation in U.S. courts. The Article then explores whether ITA outcomes varied depending upon investor identity, state identity, the presence of repeat-player counsel, arbitrator-related, or venue variables. Models using case-based variables always predicted outcomes whereas arbitrator-venue models did not. The results provide initial evidence that the most critical variables for predicting outcomes involved some form of investor identity and the experience of parties’ lawyers. For investor identity, the most robust predictor was whether investors were human beings, with cases brought by people exhibiting greater success than corporations; and when at least one named investor or corporate parent was ranked in the Financial Times 500, investors sometimes secured more favorable outcomes. Following Marc Galanter’s scholarship demonstrating that repeat-player lawyers are critical to litigation outcomes, attorney experience also affected ITA outcomes. Investors with experienced counsel were more likely to obtain a damage award against a state, whereas states retaining experienced counsel were only reliably associated with decreased levels of relative investor success. Although there was variation in outcomes, ultimately, the data did not support a conclusion that ITA was completely unpredictable; rather, the results called into question some critiques of ITA and did not prove that ITA is a wholly unacceptable form of dispute settlement. Instead, the results suggest the vital debate about ITA’s future would be well served by focusing on evidence-based insights and reliance on data rather than nonreplicable intuition

Metopolophium festucae cerealium (Hemiptera: Aphididae) : a new addition to the aphid fauna of North America

Metopolophium festucae cerealium (Stroyan) (Hemiptera: Aphididae) was found in wheat fields in the Pacific Northwest in 2011 and 2012. This is the first record of M. f. cerealium in North America. This subspecies can be a serious pest of cereal crops