Community pharmacy as an effective teaching and learning environment: Student perspectives from a UK MPharm programme

Introduction: In order to increase new pharmacists' preparedness for clinical practice, pharmacy education in the United Kingdom (UK) is moving towards a five-year integrated degree incorporating the pre-registration year into the undergraduate programme. The purpose of this research is to explore masters of pharmacy (MPharm) student attitudes towards experiential learning and assess community pharmacy as a teaching and learning environment. Methods: MPharm students (n=857) at one UK pharmacy school were invited to complete an online questionnaire. Responses were statistically analysed while open comments were thematically analysed. Results: Students were positive about placement organisation, with over 80% agreeing the pharmacist and support staff were enthusiastic and well-prepared. However, 62% of respondents felt they were unable to interact with patients on placements and instead spent time completing pre-determined learning tasks. Seventy-seven percent felt these tasks limited real “hands-on” experiences. Although 78% of respondents believed placements provided a valuable learning experience, only 18% thought placements prepared them for post-graduate employment. Conclusions: Community pharmacy environments are often busy and unpredictable, and experiential learning should be designed to allow better exposure to clinical practice with less predefined learning. Placements should allow for more collaborative working between universities and employers and incorporate the use of learning standards. This would represent a move towards a five-year integrated degree and a better understanding of the associated challenges involved

The genomic Make-Up of a Hybrid Species - Analysis of the Invasive Cottus Lineage (Pisces, Teleostei) in the River Rhine system

In the past years a new invasive lineage of sculpins (Cottus species complex) has been studied that is currently expanding in the Lower River Rhine. Molecular analysis showed that this lineage has originated through hybridization of Cottus perifretum from the River Scheldt and Cottus rhenanus from the Lower River Rhine system. The emergence of the hybrid lineage is correlated with new habitat adaptations that allow the expansion along river habitats that have previously not been used by Cottus. Thus the question arises, if the hybridization event facilitated the invasion of and the adaptation to such a new environment. To start tackling this question an estimate is required how much each of the parental species contributed to the hybrid genome and which chromosomal fragments became fixed. Several genomic resources had to be developed in order to map the ancestries of chromosomal fragments in the hybrid genome. As a basic genomic resource for Cottus a genetic map based on already established microsatellite markers was created. This map was compared with the physical maps of sequenced fish genomes and a high degree of conserved synteny between Cottus and Tetraodon nigroviridis and between Cottus and Gasterosteus aculeatus could be detected. These model fish genomes could then be used as a reference in the further analysis of the Cottus genome. Finally, a set of ancestry-informative markers was developed in order to determine the ancestries of chromosomal fragments in the hybrid lineage. These tools allowed to map the hybrid genome and to assess the contribution of each parental species to the hybrid lineage. 25 genomic fragments could be identified that were fixed for material from only one parental species and thus might harbor genes that are relevant for the specific adaptations in the hybrid species

Teensites.com: A Field Guide to the New Digital Landscape

A 2001 report from the Center for Media Education, provided here as background to work produced by Kathryn Montgomery after coming to American University and CSM (see http://www.centerforsocialmedia.org/resources/publications/ecitizens/index2.htm -- Youth as E-Citizens'), surveys the burgeoning digital media culture directed at -- and in some cases created by -- teens.This report surveys the burgeoning new media culture directed at -- and in some cases created by -- teens. TeenSites.com -- A Field Guide to the New Digital Landscape examines the uniquely interactive nature of the new media, and explores the ways in which teens are at once shaping and being shaped by the electronic culture that surrounds them

Multiplicative structure in equivariant cohomology

We introduce the notion of a strongly homotopy-comultiplicative resolution of a module coalgebra over a chain Hopf algebra, which we apply to proving a comultiplicative enrichment of a well-known theorem of Moore concerning the homology of quotient spaces of group actions. The importance of our enriched version of Moore's theorem lies in its application to the construction of useful cochain algebra models for computing multiplicative structure in equivariant cohomology. In the special cases of homotopy orbits of circle actions on spaces and of group actions on simplicial sets, we obtain small, explicit cochain algebra models that we describe in detail.Comment: 28 pages. Final version (cosmetic changes, slight reorganization), to appear in JPA

Transforming identities: accounting professionals and the transition to motherhood

This paper investigates the experience of motherhood and employment within the UK accounting profession by examining the oral history narratives of a small group of accountants who have recently become mothers and returned to work, thereby undertaking a process of redefinition and transformation of the self. Drawing from contemporary theories on identity, it considers how individuals make sense of the different social identities, which they take on over their life course, and to what extent social, institutional and cultural factors shape and restrict the ways in which the self is experienced. The paper extends the use of oral history methods in accounting research, arguing for the use of narrative to conceptualise identity formation, and also explores the implications for both the self and the accounting profession of interconnections and juxtapositions between the ostensibly private sphere of the home and the public sphere of employment

Souvenir

A collection of autobiographical essays Souvenir, a collection of autobiographical essays rooted in the present, investigates travel, staying put, and how it is that our experience of being here right now includes so much of being elsewhere at another time. Rhett reconciles present to past in serious encounters with birth and death, alongside lighter observations. In a world that makes no sense except the sense we make of it, Souvenir plays with the dynamics of home and away to represent the fullness of daily life. [From the publisher]https://cupola.gettysburg.edu/books/1068/thumbnail.jp

Conception: A Personal History

November 19 is Remembrance Day in Gettysburg, the day that Lincoln dedicated part of the battlefield as a cemetery for the Civil War dead in 1863. That year in July the dead lay on the battlefield, on the farmers’ fields planted with crops and in the summer-green woods where they had taken positions behind boulders and tree trunks. Some lay covered with dirt, and others just lay bare to the weather. When land for a cemetery was set aside, the townspeople moved the dead to proper graves. As a citizen of Gettysburg more than a century later, I carry no responsibilities as burdensome as moving thousands of dead bodies for burial. My children and I climb the steep trail of Round Top, scaling the hill’s crowning boulders and dropping down behind them, pushing leaves off of low plaques to learn which soldiers fought where. We acquaint ourselves with the town’s history—I was impressed to hear that the main building on the Gettysburg College campus had been a Civil War hospital. Later I realized that nearly every building standing in 1863 had been, of necessity, a hospital, too. A colleague who commuted here from Maryland once asked, “How can you live in that town? You’re living on the most blood-soaked piece of ground in America.” But this place doesn’t feel blood-soaked. The former hospital buildings are bed-and-breakfasts, or dormitories, or offices. The battlefields roll out like velvet, their hems bordered with silent cannons and marble monuments. Although there was so much death, to my mind it’s safely tucked into the past. [excerpt