Action Steps and Tools for Managing a Statewide Curriculum Development Process

Practical aspects of curriculum development, especially that involving multiple authors, often are overlooked, but they are critical to moving a curriculum from concept to finished product. The Ohio 4-H Camping Design Team developed a competency-model-based curriculum for training the state\u27s 4-H teen camp counselors. The team incorporated action steps and associated management tools to facilitate the curriculum development process. Action steps included establishing a timeline, using a template, tracking progress, and conducting an internal review. The action steps and tools the team used can be replicated by others developing curricula, training programs, and other resources for Extension audiences

Developing a Promotional Video

There is a need for Extension professionals to show clientele the benefits of their program. This article shares how promotional videos are one way of reaching audiences online. An example is given on how a promotional video has been used and developed using iMovie software. Tips are offered for how professionals can create a promotional video and share it with audiences

Old-Fashioned Bus Trips: New Age Professional Development

Two 4-H Camp–related bus tours offered new nontraditional professional development (PD) experiences that better align Extension\u27s PD opportunities with the organization\u27s experiential education pedagogy. Creating quality PD opportunities for employees is important because such experiences can affect overall work performance, community connections, and employee retention. Trip results showed that 100% of the participants agreed or strongly agreed that they built stronger relationships with Ohio 4-H colleagues and gained programming ideas during the PD experience

Adding a Youth Flavor to Extension\u27s Programs

Youths not only participate in Extension services but also can be equipped as facilitators to extend information about a critical topic to new audiences. Our interdisciplinary team of Extension professionals created a program to equip youths as peer educators, increase youths\u27 awareness and understanding of a new topic (local foods), promote youths\u27 positive development, and establish a model for involving teens in existing Extension programs. Other Extension professionals can use the program\u27s model, amending the topic area as needed, to promote positive youth development outcomes while engaging youths in helping with Extension\u27s mission

It pays to be nice, but not really nice: Asymmetric evaluations of prosociality across seven cultures.

Cultures differ in many important ways, but one trait appears to be universally valued: prosociality. For one’s reputation, around the world, it pays to be nice to others. However, recent research with American participants finds that evaluations of prosocial actions are asymmetric—relatively selfish actions are evaluated according to the magnitude of selfishness but evaluations of relatively generous actions are less sensitive to magnitude. Extremely generous actions are judged roughly as positively as modestly generous actions, but extremely selfish actions are judged much more negatively than modestly selfish actions (Klein & Epley, 2014). Here we test whether this asymmetry in evaluations of prosociality is culture-specific. Across 7 countries, 1,240 participants evaluated actors giving various amounts of money to a stranger. Along with relatively minor cross-cultural differences in evaluations of generous actions, we find cross-cultural similarities in the asymmetry in evaluations of prosociality. We discuss implications for how reputational inferences can enable the cooperation necessary for successful societies

Are Volunteers Competent in Positive Youth Development? Perceptions From Three Stakeholder Groups

Some youth organizations entrust adult volunteers with delivering programs and forging relationships with youth clientele. As a result, volunteers should be competent in certain knowledge, skills, and abilities that catalyze positive youth development processes to occur. This research expands upon the results of an initial study designed to address shortcomings of a volunteer competency framework. Our objective for this study was to assess and compare the discrepancies between importance and ability-to-perform ratings of adult volunteers across 6 competency areas from the Volunteer Research Knowledge Competency Taxonomy. Over 10,000 youth professionals, adult volunteers, and families of youth members responded to an online survey. Respondents rated the importance of, and volunteers’ performance in the 6 competency areas; they also provided input about the modalities they preferred for delivering training and resources. Performance means varied across the 3 groups: Volunteers’ overall performance means were the highest, followed by families, and then professionals. Mean weighted discrepancy scores were calculated to compare the importance and performance rankings across respondent groups. Based on the scores, future volunteer trainings and resources should be prioritized around the competency areas of organization, positive youth development, program management, and communication. Volunteers also preferred more self-directed approaches for future trainings. Results from this study suggest that the volunteer competency taxonomy is still a valid framework and affirms other youth worker competency frameworks. The results also help establish a baseline of data that can be used to see if future training interventions and resources are perceived as effective

The impact of business outsourcing on corporate real estate in India

Driven by Western companies\u27 requirements for efficiency and effectiveness, a trend towards outsourcing of business activities to India and other low-cost countries commenced in the early 1990s and has continued to grow at a surprisingly fast pace. In a relatively short timeframe India has become a global hub for back-office services, although the effect on the urban cities is yet to be fully comprehended. As American and European companies continue to relocate their information technology services and other back office works to the subcontinent, there has been a considerable flow-on effect on Indian corporate real estate. This paper addresses two key questions. Firstly, the factors important for Western companies\u27 outsourcing of organisational activities to India, and secondly, the effect of business outsourcing on corporate real estate locational requirements in India. A survey of corporate real estate representatives in India and the UK was conducted with the results providing an insight into the present state and possible future direction of outsourcing for India. This research presents a unique insight into the impacts of Western business outsourcing on corporate real estate in India, and presents findings that are useful to both organisations seeking to relocate business activities to India and for property market analysts looking to understand drivers behind this sustained demand for Indian corporate real estate

Assessment of dizziness among older patients at a family practice clinic: a chart audit study

BACKGROUND: Dizziness is a common complaint among the elderly with a prevalence of over 30% in people over the age of 65. Although it is a common problem the assessment and management of dizziness in the elderly is challenging for family physicians. There is little published research which assesses the quality of dizziness assessment and management by family physicians. METHODS: We conducted a retrospective, chart audit study of patients with dizziness attending the Sunnybrook Family Practice Center of Sunnybrook and Women's College Health Sciences Center (SWCHSC) in Toronto. We audited a random sample of 50 charts of patients from 310 eligible charts. Quality indicators across all dizziness subtypes were assessed. These quality indicators included: onset and course of symptoms; symptoms in patients' own words; number of medications used; postural blood pressure changes; symptoms of depression or anxiety; falls; syncope; diagnosis; outcome; specialty referrals. Quality indicators specific to each dizziness subtype were also audited. RESULTS: 310 charts satisfied inclusion criteria with 20 charts excluded and 50 charts were randomly generated. Documentation of key quality indicators in the management of dizziness was sub-optimal. Charts documenting patients' dizziness symptoms in their own words were more likely to have a clinical diagnosis compared to charts without (P = 0.002). CONCLUSIONS: Documentation of selected key quality indicators could be improved, especially that of patients' symptoms in their own words

People's Perception of Domestic Service Robots: Same Household, Same Opinion?

The study presented in this paper examined people’s perception of domestic service robots by means of an ethnographic study. We investigated initial reactions of nine households who lived with a Roomba vacuum cleaner robot over a two week period. To explore people’s attitude and how it changed over time, we used a recurring questionnaire that was filled at three different times, integrated in 18 semi-structured qualitative interviews. Our findings suggest that being part of a specific household has an impact how each individual household member perceives the robot. We interpret that, even though individual experiences with the robot might differ from one other, a household shares a specific opinion about the robot. Moreover our findings also indicate that how people perceived Roomba did not change drastically over the two week period