Using Critical Discourse Analysis to Address the Gaps, Exclusions and Oversights in Active Citizenship Education

There is great concern that active citizenship policies, curriculum and/or pedagogy are not working effectively, and many researchers are seeking ways to engage students more in public affairs and political realities. In this dissertation, I explore the captivating universe of active citizenship education and the discourses that propel it, using critical theory, documentary method and critical discourse analysis. I analyze over 400 documents that directly or indirectly relate to citizenship education to determine where we have been, where we currently are, and where we ought to go with active citizenship education. As a result of my research, I discovered that the discourses that originally constructed notions of the citizen, citizenship and the rights of the citizen (e.g., Socrates, Michavelli, Rousseau, Jefferson, Roosevelt, and Martin Luther King, Jr.) differed, but they often shared themes of self-reflection, critique, and emancipation. Unfortunately, these fundamental pillars fell increasingly by the wayside when, for example, globalization spun its web (e.g., mass migration, the Internet, access to faster systems of travel and free trade). Correspondingly, neoliberal discourse penetrated local, state and global systems, and citizenship education like many other aspects of society was altered. A newly designed ‘global’, ‘unregulated’, ‘knowledge society’ claimed a new vision for civil society and thus citizenship and citizenship education. Such discourses became imbedded not only in the corporate world but also in public institutions – education was not immune to this. I discovered that although universal discourses such as sustainability, cooperation, and human rights are promoted in secondary citizenship education via social studies curriculum, little of this discourse is instituted in policy, curriculum and pedagogy. Students are not being given many classroom opportunities to become reflective, engaged and empowered citizens with the capacity to shape society and challenge institutionalized oppressions such as racism, poverty, sexism, ageism, and classism. Based on moral, ethical and democratic imperatives, I present recommendations on how to move forward to create the citizenship education programs youth deserve. I provide guiding principles, a navigational illustration, and an exemplar of what a revised citizenship education curriculum might look like

Introducing Flexibility into an IS Curriculum

This paper deals with the problem of enabling and encouraging diversity and the development of specialist skills in undergraduate teaching. It describes an innovation in which a flexible curriculum component was added to the course structures of two IS-related programmes at a large Australian university. The paper concludes that the approach which it describes can help to accommodate diversity in student interests and aptitudes, and prepare students for a range of possible professional career paths, while also providing them with the greater depth of specialist knowledge which makes them more immediately useful members of the work force

Skin conductance responses of problem and non-problem gamblers to large and small magnitude wins

Abstract presented at the 23rd Australasian Society for Psychophysiology Conference, 20-22 Nov 2013, Wollongong, Australi

On orbital allotments for geostationary satellites

The following satellite synthesis problem is addressed: communication satellites are to be allotted positions on the geostationary arc so that interference does not exceed a given acceptable level by enforcing conservative pairwise satellite separation. A desired location is specified for each satellite, and the objective is to minimize the sum of the deviations between the satellites' prescribed and desired locations. Two mixed integer programming models for the satellite synthesis problem are presented. Four solution strategies, branch-and-bound, Benders' decomposition, linear programming with restricted basis entry, and a switching heuristic, are used to find solutions to example synthesis problems. Computational results indicate the switching algorithm yields solutions of good quality in reasonable execution times when compared to the other solution methods. It is demonstrated that the switching algorithm can be applied to synthesis problems with the objective of minimizing the largest deviation between a prescribed location and the corresponding desired location. Furthermore, it is shown that the switching heuristic can use no conservative, location-dependent satellite separations in order to satisfy interference criteria

Engineering calculations for communications systems planning

The single entry interference problem is treated for frequency sharing between the broadcasting satellite and intersatellite services near 23 GHz. It is recommended that very long (more than 120 longitude difference) intersatellite hops be relegated to the unshared portion of the band. When this is done, it is found that suitable orbit assignments can be determined easily with the aid of a set of universal curves. An attempt to develop synthesis procedures for optimally assigning frequencies and orbital slots for the broadcasting satellite service in region 2 was initiated. Several discrete programming and continuous optimization techniques are discussed

RESILIENCY OF WOMEN SURVIVORS OF THE TSUNAMI 2004 IN SOUTH INDIA

This is a research study on wives of the fishermen who lost their lives in the Tsunami of 2004. It utilizes the qualitative and some Quantitative data. It focuses on the strengths based approach. The study presents an understanding of the survivors’ thoughts on their resiliency and provides suggestions for improving social work practice and education. Resiliency is not a new concept. Researchers have tried to understand this human tendency to strive for a healthier and more positive development for approximately the last 50 years. The strengths perspective in the practice of social work has been a long-standing form of approach of social workers towards helping clients. By examining the subjects’ thoughts on their resiliency, it is possible to develop theory and prove the existing theories in terms of this strength based approach in social work. This study in a way is a follow up of the disaster close to eight years after the event. Researchers often place emphasis, and focus their research and discussions on the disaster itself and its immediate impact on the community (Kalayjian, 1999) rather than what happens after that. This study bridges the gap in knowledge by identifying how women survivors of the Tsunami have exhibited resilience in south Indian villages

Alternative mathematical programming formulations for FSS synthesis

A variety of mathematical programming models and two solution strategies are suggested for the problem of allocating orbital positions to (synthesizing) satellites in the Fixed Satellite Service. Mixed integer programming and almost linear programming formulations are presented in detail for each of two objectives: (1) positioning satellites as closely as possible to specified desired locations, and (2) minimizing the total length of the geostationary arc allocated to the satellites whose positions are to be determined. Computational results for mixed integer and almost linear programming models, with the objective of positioning satellites as closely as possible to their desired locations, are reported for three six-administration test problems and a thirteen-administration test problem

Matching-stimulus-interval affects the N2 and the P3: a principal components analysis

Abstract presented at the 23rd Australasian Society for Psychophysiology Conference, 20-22 Nov 2013, Wollongong, Australi

The role of service areas in the optimization of FSS orbital and frequency assignments

A relationship is derived, on a single-entry interference basis, for the minimum allowable spacing between two satellites as a function of electrical parameters and service-area geometries. For circular beams, universal curves relate the topocentric satellite spacing angle to the service-area separation angle measured at the satellite. The corresponding geocentric spacing depends only weakly on the mean longitude of the two satellites, and this is true also for alliptical antenna beams. As a consequence, if frequency channels are preassigned, the orbital assignment synthesis of a satellite system can be formulated as a mixed-integer programming (MIP) problem or approximated by a linear programming (LP) problem, with the interference protection requirements enforced by constraints while some linear function is optimized. Possible objective-function choices are discussed and explicit formulations are presented for the choice of the sum of the absolute deviations of the orbital locations from some prescribed ideal location set. A test problem is posed consisting of six service areas, each served by one satellite, all using elliptical antenna beams and the same frequency channels. Numerical results are given for the three ideal location prescriptions for both the MIP and LP formulations. The resulting scenarios also satisfy reasonable aggregate interference protection requirements