Exemplary Legal Writing 2018: Five Recommendations

A brief review of five recommended exemplary legal books published in 2018

Integrated Assessment Modelling of Complexity in the New Zealand Farming Industry

As New Zealand farming industry pursues more productivity this has implication for environment and makes land use and agricultural policy decision processes more complex for which integrated assessment modeling (IAM) can support. The purpose of this review paper is to propose means through which IAM can be improved specifically to minimize uncertainties and increase relevance, reliability, and utility of outputs of different models. Literature suggests that the general motivation for land use change is that farmers do consider the environment, but need to maintain profitability. There are handful decision support tools for land use and land policy decisions but one common feature of most of the models is that each seems suitable for only a part of the complexity. An appropriate framework for linking different models in an integrated assessment is still needed. As integrated assessment often goes beyond an individual researcher‘s role, research institutions need to align their research portfolio across the dimensions of the complexity by creating an appropriate mechanism to integrate individual research into integrated assessments while individual researchers need to present modelling results in a compatible format for integration into another model‘s application.integrated assessment, modeling, complexity, farming industry, New Zealand, Agribusiness, Land Economics/Use,

The American Electorate in Black & White: A Measure of Candidate Selection and Policy Preferences

Introduction: In American society various social and antipoverty policies remain highly controversial among American voters. As one might expect, the relevance of race in relation to such policies can also be quite controversial. Incorporated within this research is an investigation of political attitudes and policy preferences of American voters. Using a variety of dependent variables, I gauge the effects of respondents’ race, ideology and party identification on policy preferences and other behavior patterns as they relate to political preferences. This measure of attitudes will contribute to a further understanding of race, social and antipoverty policies, and the ways in which these variables interact within the American political system. Both affirmative action and welfare spending are hot-button political topics among both white and black Americans, though not necessarily for the same reasons. Affirmative action programs tend to lack the support of white voters, as a vast majority of white Americans believe that preferential treatment of minorities is unfair to whites (Swain, 2006). In opposition, as beneficiaries, black voters are more likely to be supportive of such policies. Overall, blacks also tend to be more favorable of redistributive programs than whites; this means that there exists a higher likelihood that black voters will be supportive of social initiatives that include efforts such as increasing state welfare spending than will white voters (Swain, 2006). In addition to further understanding policy preferences, Americans’ overall perceptions on candidate electability are also worth additional investigation when attempting to gauge the effects of race on political processes. Not only are racial differences significant in terms of their impact on formal political participation within the American political system, but these differences are also closely intertwined with the distribution of power in the United States (Dalton & Klingemann, 2007). Therefore, I conduct further analyses regarding the likelihood of white voters to display racial resentment attitudes and assign positive traits to minority candidates for office

The challenges of girl-child education and alternative jobs in Nigeria

The real life experiences of Nigerian girl children indicate that the current Global Economic Crisis (GEC) has worsened their situation. This study examines the effects of GEC on the education of the girl-child and their engagement in alternative jobs. Data were obtained from 1,200 female children between 6–14 years of age, selected with a purposive random sampling-technique, who were engaged in hawking in three Nigerian states. About twenty parents were also selected to go through in-depth interview sessions. They responded to a semistructured questionnaire. Findings show that 45% of girls had recently dropped out of school and engaged in hawking to enhance their lives and that of their family household, making an average daily gain of one U.S. dollar. They hawk in crowded markets, hotels and at busy road junctions. There are reported cases of child-sexual abuse. Four percent of girls performing paid housework were impregnated, resulting in clandestine abortions. An improvement in the socioeconomic conditions of parents and a social protection policy for girl-children are recommended

The Transformation of Aesthetics in Architecture From Traditional to Modern Architecture: a Case Study of the Yoruba (Southwestern) Region of Nigeria

Aesthetics is the philosophical study of art and natural beauty and it is indicated by the feelings of pleasure or displeasure which comes from visual and aural elements and artifacts. Hence, aesthetics depends on animate or inanimate organization which can be perceived either subjectively or objectively. This aesthetic element is uniquely present in the traditional buildings and modern buildings of southwestern part of Nigeria. This study is set out to evaluate and bring into lime light the aesthetic characteristics of traditional buildings and that of the modern buildings, how one style or aesthetic element gradually prevail over or transform to another, reasons and consequences of one completely predominating another in Yoruba region of Nigeria. Moreover, this study therefore, is divided into four parts, which are: (a) overview of the history of modern and traditional Architecture of Yoruba land (b) aesthetic characteristics or indicators of traditional and modern architecture in Yoruba land, (c) the differences between the aesthetic of both style of Architecture and what is responsible for this change or transformation in their aesthetic value. The research concludes with recommendations of synchronizing both style of architecture design in getting an optimum aesthetic value, and offers a room for further research and development of a consistent and notable architectural typology for southwest Nigeria

Professional Learning Communities in the Expanded Learning Field

This white paper uses twelve evaluation reports of the Professional Learning Community (PLC) initiatives, as well as interviews with PLC participants and facilitators, to better understand how the PLC model is used in the Expanded Learning field, to demonstrate the benefits to participating staff and expanded learning programs, and to share best practices for youth-serving organizations interested in using PLCs

Mentorship Alliance between South African Farmers: Implication for Sustainable Agriculture Sector Reform

South Africa's agricultural sector is characterized by a skewed participation of the population. There are vastly white commercial farmers and black subsistence farmers. This is attributed to the past government's intervention in the economy, which lead to exclusion of and discrimination against the blacks regarding access to land. The new government is committed to redressing this imbalance through agricultural reform and development strategies namely land, agrarian, trade and market reforms. One of the government's primary policy thrusts is to provide access to agricultural land for people not adequately represented in the agricultural sector. However, the government lacks sufficient resources to provide land and support services to the farmers been settled. This study is motivated by the insights to explore the complementarities of white established commercial farmers on one hand and the black newly emerging farmers' characteristics and the need for a framework within which the stakeholders can contribute to the success of the reforms. The study contributes to the discussion regarding mentorship between these farm types, by addressing an identified knowledge gap with respect to the objective, implementation and reward for mentorship. Mentorship alliance that can transform the South Africa's agricultural sector into a more efficient and competitive sector and enhance the success of South African economic reforms, is conceptualized. The mentorship is expected to be loosely structured, without the complicated legal and contractual processes involved in corporate business alliances. However, it is hoped that the alliance would be a precursor for highly committed joint ventures in the industry.E6, O1, Q15, P0, L12, Agricultural and Food Policy, Farm Management,

Performance Evaluation of 24GHz Spectrum Indoor Wireless Radio Links

Wireless communication systems are susceptible to propagation impairments such as scattering, interference, multipath fading, and delay spread. Furthermore, unlike wired networks in which signals propagate in a confined media characterised by high quality system performance and high data rates up to 10Gbps, wireless signals propagate through the air and are as a result prone to security attacks. As WLANs are becoming vital tools to meet the demand for wireless internet services, it becomes imperative to study novel approaches for achieving good access and high data rate transmission. The conventional WLAN network standards by IEEE802.11 family are characterised by maximum data rate of 54Mbps. This is below the required bandwidth for channel intensive applications such as multimedia services, uncompressed video streaming, fast file uploads and downloads. Also, the numerous subscribers competing for seamless wireless internet connection has overcrowded the network channels in microwave bands, resulting in poor performance and degradation of the entire WLAN networks. As much as 1Gbps and higher data rates communication are attractive for several application described above, this technological goal can only be realised by engaging millimetre wave (MMW) spectrum. The Spectrum bands at 24GHz, 28GHz, 38GHz and 60GHz are currently being focused on to support shorter-range, high-speed communication systems. These bands are capable of the Gb/s throughput as required by bandwidth intensive and multimedia consumer-oriented applications . The potentials of 24GHz spectrum for gigabits data rate delivery performance in real time applications was investigated in this work