Evaluation practices in community music: a constructionist approach to exploring community musicians’ perspectives

Within UK community music, evaluation has become an essential element of professional practice, however, it is an aspect of their work that many community musicians find challenging. Although exploration of community music evaluation in published literature is limited, it has identified problems and tensions, but with minimal investigation of community music practitioners’ perspectives. This study explores community musicians’ constructions of evaluation practices, including how they negotiate evaluation and what influences evaluation in their work, to reach a deeper understanding of evaluation in community music for the benefit of the whole community music sector. With a qualitative, constructionist methodology, theoretically informed by discourse analysis and positioning theory, 16 one-to-one online semi-structured interviews with community musicians were analysed using reflexive thematic analysis, leading to a series of findings. Although interviewees often constructed evaluation in the singular, it is a multifarious morass of intentions, purposes, methods, methodological standpoints and practices, with most valuing reflective forms of evaluation that focus on the quality of their practice above other forms. The metaphor of multiple dimensions characterises different aspects of evaluation – what it is, why community musicians do it, how they do it, and the affect of evaluation – which, along with a typology of different positions community musicians take towards evaluation and factors that influence the differing positions, provides a new conceptual framework for understanding evaluation in community music. The thesis argues that evaluation should be understood as multiple contextually situated practices which acknowledge the complexity of community music. The research calls for all those in the community music sector (project managers, evaluators, commissioners, funders and policy makers) to give greater consideration to community musicians’ perspectives, enabling more agency, control and influence over evaluation in their work; thereby contributing to greater professional satisfaction for community musicians who are a vital workforce as community music has become an important complement to music education and creative health and wellbeing. The research advocates for a grassroots community of practice regarding evaluation to enable utilisation of the findings in the UK community music sector and for a more cohesive view of evaluation to be developed

The relationships between golf and health:A scoping review

OBJECTIVE: To assess the relationships between golf and health. DESIGN: Scoping review. DATA SOURCES: Published and unpublished reports of any age or language, identified by searching electronic databases, platforms, reference lists, websites and from consulting experts. REVIEW METHODS: A 3-step search strategy identified relevant published primary and secondary studies as well as grey literature. Identified studies were screened for final inclusion. Data were extracted using a standardised tool, to form (1) a descriptive analysis and (2) a thematic summary. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION: 4944 records were identified with an initial search. 301 studies met criteria for the scoping review. Golf can provide moderate intensity physical activity and is associated with physical health benefits that include improved cardiovascular, respiratory and metabolic profiles, and improved wellness. There is limited evidence related to golf and mental health. The incidence of golfing injury is moderate, with back injuries the most frequent. Accidental head injuries are rare, but can have serious consequences. CONCLUSIONS: Practitioners and policymakers can be encouraged to support more people to play golf, due to associated improved physical health and mental well-being, and a potential contribution to increased life expectancy. Injuries and illnesses associated with golf have been identified, and risk reduction strategies are warranted. Further research priorities include systematic reviews to further explore the cause and effect nature of the relationships described. Research characterising golf's contribution to muscular strengthening, balance and falls prevention as well as further assessing the associations and effects between golf and mental health are also indicated

An analysis of need assessment in the mental health context

Need assessment methods grew out of the Community Mental Health Centre movement. Developed during a time of rapid expansion of service, there was a focus on providing services matched to the unique needs of a community. In the following years need assessment further developed as a technology and a search began for a "best model'. This paper argues that a "best model' is illusionary, a "best fit' being a more desirable goal. As fiscal constraints have reduced the resources available to consumption Ministries such as Health, need assessment has been increasingly used an allocative tool. Users of the tool, it is argued, must therefore choose their model with care and an understanding of the values and concepts inherent in each model is seen as necessary for intelligent choice. Finally, an examination of the British Columbia mental health context offers an analysis of some of the factors which have and will affect the use of need assessment in this ProvinceMedicine, Faculty ofPopulation and Public Health (SPPH), School ofGraduat

A comparison of lactate concentration in plasma collected from the toe, ear, and fingertip after a simulated rowing exercise

Objective—To examine the validity of using blood taken from the toe for the assessment of plasma lactate concentration in rowers. To achieve this, values were compared with those taken from the fingertip and earlobe. Methods—Nine subjects exercised at two separate submaximum workloads on the Concept II rowing ergometer. The loads, each lasting four minutes, elicited mean (SD) heart rate responses of 160.1 (8.5) and 180.1 (5.7) beats/min, which corresponded to 76.4 (6.1)% and 91.9 (4.7)% of the estimated heart rate maximum of the subjects. Blood was simultaneously removed after the cessation of exercise by three experimenters and was analysed for plasma lactate concentration. Results—At 76.4% of estimated heart rate maximum, the mean (SD) plasma lactate concentrations sampled from the fingertip, toe, and earlobe were 6.36 (1.58), 5.81 (1.11), and 5.29 (1.24) mmol/l respectively. At 91.9% of estimated heart rate maximum, respective values were 8.81 (2.30), 8.53 (1.37), and 8.41 (2.35) mmol/l. No significant differences (p>0.05) were found between any of the sites at either work intensity. Conclusions—The toe may offer a practical alternative for assessing the concentration of lactate during rowing, having the advantage that repeated blood samples can be removed without interruption of the rowing action. Key Words: blood sampling; lactate; ergometer; rowin

An introduction to sports physiology A home study pack providing sports people with an introduction to how the body works during exercise

SIGLEAvailable from British Library Document Supply Centre- DSC:q95/32368 / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreGBUnited Kingdo

Golf science research at the beginning of the twenty-first century.

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