Peeling back the layers: Deconstructing information literacy discourse in higher education

The discourses of information literacy practice create epistemological assumptions about how the practice should happen, who should be responsible and under what conditions instruction should be given. Analysis of a wide range of documents and texts emerging from the Higher Education (HE) sector suggest that information literacy (IL) is shaped by two competing and incongruent narratives. The outward facing narrative of information literacy (located in information literacy standards and guidelines) positions information literacy as an empowering practice that arms students with the knowledge and skills to battle the complexity of the modern information world. In contrast, the inward facing narrative (located in information literacy texts) positions students as lacking appropriate knowledge, skills and agency. This deficit perception, which has the capacity to influence pedagogical practice, is at odds with constructivist and action-oriented views that are espoused within information literacy instructional pedagogy. This presentation represents the first paper in a research programme that interrogates the epistemological premises and discourses of information literacy within HE

Multipurpose design for fish passage at road crossings on a north Queensland stream

The development of infrastructure designs to meet multipurpose goals relating to utilitarian needs and the biophysical and sociocultural environment is a crucial aspect to the creation of sustainable engineering solutions. Practitioners and managers involved in infrastructure design\ud for road-waterway crossings such as culverts and causeways, must now go beyond conventional design practices dealing merely with flood capacity, structure integrity and stream stability, to consider protection of aquatic habitat and, in many cases, provisions for upstream migration of fish. This paper deals with several designs for fish passage remediation on an intermittent stream in north-eastern Australia, where a variety of box culvert, pipe culvert, causeway and diversion drainage structures are used. The multipurpose planning and design requirements for development of the drainage crossings and fish passage facilities is discussed, and the characteristics of the fishways for various road crossing and stream types are described. Key points for multipurpose infrastructure design are highlighted to assist practitioners and managers in meeting diverse technical requirements

Blind prescribing: A study of junior doctors' prescribing preparedness in an Australian emergency department

Objectives: The present study examined junior residents' and registrars' preparedness to prescribe in an Australian ED. It measured the medication knowledge of participants and identified antecedent factors relevant to prescribing practice. Methods: This is a prospective, exploratory study of the prescribing practices of 40 junior doctors. Data collection consisted of a participant questionnaire with three parts. Part A comprised demographic information; Part B comprised questions regarding prescribing practices; and Part C was an objective assessment of the doctor's knowledge of the most recently and most commonly prescribed medications. Results: One hundred percent (n = 40) of doctors in the study had inadequate knowledge about at least one medication when an accuracy threshold o

The Effects of pH on Beta-Endorphin and Morphine Inhibition of Calcium Transients in Dorsal Root Ganglion Neurons

During inflammation, immune cells migrate into inflamed tissue and release opioid peptides that activate opioid receptors on peripheral sensory neurons to reduce pain. A characteristic of the inflamed environment in which these opioids act is acidic pH. Activation of opioid receptors leads to a decrease in the calcium component of neuronal action potentials. We investigated the hypothesis that inhibitory effects of opioids on intracellular calcium transients in dorsal root ganglion neuronal cultures are potentiated at acidic extracellular pH. Intracellular calcium responses to stimulation with capsaicin were measured in untreated neurons or after preincubation with beta-endorphin or morphine. beta-Endorphin significantly inhibited calcium responses to 300 nmol/L capsaicin at the lowest experimental extracellular pH (6.1, 6.5, and 7.2), whereas morphine inhibited capsaicin (300 nmol/L) responses significantly at pH 6.1 with a trend of inhibition at pH 6.5. The effect of pH on morphine inhibition of K+-evoked calcium responses was also assessed. Morphine inhibition of calcium responses was significantly enhanced at pH 6.8 compared with pH 7.2 and pH 7.6. The inhibitory effects were reversed by naloxone, an opioid receptor antagonist. In conclusion, low extracellular pH potentiated beta-endorphin and morphine inhibition of calcium transients and might contribute to improved opioid efficacy during inflammation

Copyrights and creative commons licensing: Pedagogical innovation in a higher education media literacy classroom

This article examines the role of copyrights in contemporary media literacies. It argues that, provided they are ethical, young people’s engagement with text should occur in environments that are as free from restriction as possible. Discussion of open culture ecologies and the emergent education commons is followed by a theorisation of both literacy and copyrights education as forms of epistemology: that is, as effects of knowledge producing discourses and practices. Because Creative Commons licenses respect and are based on existing copyright laws, a brief overview of traditional copyrights for educators is first provided. We then describe the voluntary Creative Commons copyright licensing framework (“some rights reserved”) as an alternative to conventional “all rights reserved” models. This is followed by an account of a series of workshop activities on copyrights and Creative Commons conducted by the authors in the media literacy classes of a preservice teacher education program in Queensland, Australia. It provides one example of a practical program on critical copyrights approaches, which may be adapted and used by other school and higher education institutions

Literacies and libraries - Archives and cybraries

As spatial repositories of dominant and marginalised, residual and emergent cultures, libraries remain key elements in the educational production and reproduction of knowledge and power. As working shrines for those canonical texts of modernity — the dictionary and the encyclopaedia — libraries are sites par excellence for applications of new literacies. This paper aims to redress their omission from the literature on literacy and education. Following a critique of current definitions of information literacy, the paper argues for a critical information literacy for navigation through textual and ideological complexity, diversity, ambiguity, and multiplicity