Grundbildung und Beschäftigungsfähigkeit von Geringqualifizierten: Betriebliche Anforderungen und arbeitsmarktpolitische Rahmenbedingungen

In Deutschland sind derzeit etwa 7,3 Millionen Erwerbstätige beschäftigt, die über keinen Berufsabschluss verfügen und vielfach als Ungelernte oder Geringqualifizierte bezeichnet werden. Die meisten Erwerbstätigen, die dieser Personengruppe angehören, haben Schwierigkeiten, die Mindestanforderungen an Lese- und Schreibkompetenzen zu erfüllen, die in einer modernen Arbeitswelt gestellt werden. Sie unterliegen daher einem hohen Risiko, arbeitslos zu werden oder zu bleiben. Beschäftigungspolitisch gesehen, lenken die drohenden und in manchen Bereichen bereits spürbaren Fachkräfteengpässe den Blick auf die Gruppe der un- und angelernten Erwerbspersonen und die Frage, ob und wie diese für eine moderne Arbeitswelt fit gemacht werden können. Der Ansatz der arbeitsplatzbezogenen Grundbildung spielt jedoch kaum eine Rolle in der betrieblichen Weiterbildung. Diese ist in der Regel weiterhin vorrangig tätigkeits- und anlassbezogen. Fast ein Drittel der Unternehmen sind allerdings bereit, Geringqualifizierte durch Angebote in der Grundbildung am Arbeitsplatz zu fördern. Gleichwohl besteht weiterhin großer Bedarf an Strategien, wie betriebliche Weiterbildung und arbeitsmarktpolitische Instrumente eine mangelnde Grundbildung kompensieren können

Arbeitsplatzorientierte Grundbildung für Geringqualifizierte - Ergebnisse einer IW-Unternehmensbefragung

Die aktuelle Diskussion um die Sicherung des Fachkräftenachwuchses lenkt den Blick zunehmend auf die qualifikatorischen Potenziale an- und ungelernter Mitarbeiterinnen und Mitarbeiter. Da es diesen aber an einer Berufsausbildung und zumeist auch an schulischer Grundbildung mangelt, steht die betriebliche Weiterbildung vor einer besonderen Herausforderung. Ein erfolgversprechender Ansatz, Geringqualifizierte adressatengerecht zu fördern, ist die arbeitsplatzorientierte Grundbildung. Eine im Rahmen des AlphaGrund-Projekts vom Institut der deutschen Wirtschaft Köln (IW Köln) durchgeführte repräsentative Unternehmensbefragung gibt erstmals Aufschluss über das Grundbildungsangebot im Rahmen der betrieblichen Weiterbildung für geringqualifizierte Beschäftigte sowie über künftige arbeitsmarktpolitische Erfordernisse in diesem Weiterbildungssegment. Danach haben rund 80 Prozent der Unternehmen, die Geringqualifizierte beschäftigen, in den letzten fünf Jahren mindestens eine Weiterbildungsmaßnahme für diese Zielgruppe angeboten. Bei knapp einem Drittel der Unternehmen handelt es sich um eine Maßnahme zur Förderung der arbeitsplatzorientierten Grundbildung. Diese wird auch weiterhin Thema der betrieblichen Personalentwicklung sein. So sehen mehr als ein Drittel der Unternehmen einen steigenden Bedarf an arbeitsplatzbezogener Grundbildungsförderung für An- und Ungelernte

Testing Three Measures of Verbal–Visual Frame Interplay in German News Coverage of Refugees and Asylum Seekers

Drawing from framing theory, this article operationalizes and tests three ways to measure how verbal and visual modalities interplay in audiovisual messages to produce meaning. The measures include (a) a ratio of verbal to visual frames; (b) an association rules learning (ARL) procedure; and (c) in-depth analysis of the full audiovisual material. As a step toward validating the measures, they were applied to a sample of German television news stories (n = 98) about refugees and asylum seekers. Though the three measures produced varied results, verbal–visual frame redundancy and congruence were consistently more common than mismatches. Measures differed in the level of effort required to implement them, sample sizes they could handle, and the informative value of results. Future studies are advised to combine the ARL procedure with an in-depth analysis

Oat Yields Depend on Seed Quality, Too!

Cost of the seed itself is a minor part of the cost of producing a crop. Once planted, it costs just as much to produce and harvest a poor crop as a good one. It\u27s part of good management to start with high-quality seed

Presence and television.

Film and a number of emerging entertainment technologies offer media consumers an illusion of nonmediation known as presence. To investigate the possibility that television can evoke presence, 65 undergraduate students were shown brief examples of rapid point-of-view movement from commercially available videotapes on a television with either a small screen (12 inches [30.5 cm], measured diagonally) or a large screen (46 inches [116.8 cm]). Participants\u27 responses were measured via a questionnaire and a computer-based recording of arousal (electrodermal activity). Viewers of both televisions reported an enjoyable sense of physical movement, excitement, involvement, and a sense of participation. Furthermore, as predicted, participants who watched the large screen television thought the movement in the scenes was faster, experienced a greater sense of physical movement, enjoyed the movement to a greater extent, found the viewing experience more exciting, and were more physiologically aroused. Practical and theoretical implications are discussed

The effects of under-sleeper pads on sleeper-ballast interaction

Under-sleeper pads (USPs), typically made from polyurethane, are used by railways in certain parts of the world to reduce ballast settlement and consequently lengthen the ballast tamping cycle. The rationale behind this relatively new addition to the conventional ballasted track structure is that the pad increases the contact area between the angular ballast particles and the underside of the concrete sleeper, with the effect that ballast breakdown and total track settlement are reduced. This paper describes two experiments on the effects of USPs on four aspects of sleeper–ballast interaction, namely contact area, contact pressure, ballast settlement and ballast breakdown. Static and dynamic tests up to 1 million loading cycles were performed under controlled laboratory conditions on concrete sleepers with and without USPs. Sophisticated pressure sensors revealed an increase in contact area from 12% to 35% for static loading tests, and from 8% to 20% for dynamic tests, with a resulting 70% reduction in contact pressure. In addition, a 44% reduction in ballast settlement and a 23% reduction in ballast breakdown were achieved by the introduction of USPs. In conclusion it is argued that the introduction of USPs specifically on heavy-haul lines would offer significant advantages with respect to ballast settlement and breakdown. These advantages are most likely to lengthen general ballast tamping and screening cycles, resulting in significant life cycle cost savings.Transnet Freight Rail is gratefully acknowledged for financial support to the Chair in Railway Engineering at the University of Pretoria.http://www.journals.co.za/ej/ejour_civileng.htmlam2016Civil Engineerin

Cascading the use of Web 2.0 technology in secondary schools in the United Kingdom: identifying the barriers beyond pre-service training

This paper reports on research that took place at Nottingham Trent University and Sheffield Hallam University, United Kingdom, over two years. The research focuses on the use of Web 2.0 technology, specifically web logs, with pre-service teachers, both during their university programme and the first year of teaching as full-time newly qualified teachers (NQTs). The purpose of this research was to add a developing body of knowledge by identifying whether technology used by pre-service teachers during their training course can be cascaded into their practice once qualified. Key findings identify a number of enablers and barriers to cascading technology in the classroom; these include curriculum time, pupil skills and support. The research concludes that early professional support and development should be on-going and assumptions about new teachers as champions of cascading innovative use of Web 2 technologies into their practice as NQTs may be over optimisti

Comparison of the Achilles Express Ultrasonometer with Central Dual-Energy X-Ray Absorptiometry

Presented at the American College of Clinical Pharmacy 2005 Spring Practice and Research Forum, Myrtle Beach, SC, April 10–13, 2005.Yeshttps://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/manuscript-submission-guideline

A Telephone- and Text Message-Based Telemedicine Concept for Patients with Mental Health Disorders: Results of a Randomized Controlled Trial

Background: A telemedicine care concept based on telephone contacts and individualized text messages was developed for patients with mental disorders to continue treatment after therapy in a psychiatric day hospital. The primary objective of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of the telemedicine interventions. Methods: The study had a 3-armed, randomized design with 2 intervention arms (intervention 1: telephone contacts; intervention 2: telephone contacts and short text messages; both took place over a period of 6 months and in addition to usual care), and a control group with usual care. Primary outcomes were 18-item Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI-18) scores for anxiety, depression and somatization. All participants were recruited from psychiatric day hospitals. The study was registered in the German Clinical Trials Register (DRKS00000662). Results: 113 participants were analyzed 6 months after starting the intervention. The average BSI-18 anxiety score after 6 months was -2.04 points lower in intervention group 2 than in the control group (p value: 0.042). The difference in BSI depression score between these two groups was marginally significant (p value: 0.1), with an average treatment effect of -1.73. In an exploratory sensitivity analysis restricted to the 75% of patients with the highest symptom scores at baseline, intervention group 1 yielded a significant effect for anxiety and depression compared to the control group (p = 0.036 and 0.046, respectively). Conclusions: Telemedicine provides a novel option in psychiatric ambulatory care with statistically significant effects on anxiety. A positive tendency was observed for depression, especially in cases with higher symptom load at baseline

Determination of vancomycin and gentamicin clearance in an in vitro, closed loop dialysis system

Background\ud The purpose of this study was to evaluate the feasibility of utilizing an in-vitro, closed loop hemodialysis system as a method to assess drug clearance. Secondarily, this study tested the influence of variables (blood flow rate, dialysate flow rate, and type of filter) in the hemodialysis procedure on the clearance of vancomycin and gentamicin.\ud \ud Methods\ud An in-vitro, closed loop hemodialysis system was constructed. The vancomycin (30 mg/L) and gentamicin (25 mg/L) were added to a simulated blood system (SBS). Four conditions (C1-C4) were tested by defining the filter (Polyflux 170H or F180) and the blood and dialysate flow rates (BFR and DFR). All hemodialysis sessions were 3 hours in length and each condition was completed in duplicate. Dialysate effluent was collected in a 50 gallon polyethylene drum. Samples were collected (in duplicate) from the SBS and the dialysate effluent at baseline and at the end of the hemodialysis session. Samples were analyzed for vancomycin and gentamicin with an ultrahigh performance liquid chromatography/tandem mass spectrometry method.\ud \ud Results\ud A total of eight 3-hour hemodialysis sessions were conducted. For all tested conditions (C1-C4), vancomycin was undetectable in the SBS at the end of dialysis. However, total vancomycin recovery in the dialysis effluent was 85±18%, suggesting that up to 15% may have adsorbed to the dialysis filter or tubing. Gentamicin clearance from SBS was >98% in all tested conditions. Average gentamicin recovery in the dialysate effluent was 99±15%.\ud \ud Conclusion\ud Both vancomycin and gentamicin were readily removed by high-flux hemodialysis under all conditions studied. No significant differences in drug clearance were observed between conditions used in this in vitro study. The clinical implications of changing these hemodialysis parameters are unknown