Shaping screen talent: conceptualising and developing the film and TV workforce in Scotland

Together with “creativity”, the concept of “talent” has emerged within UK and global policy discussions as being central to unlocking economic success within the creative industries. At a crucial time of political and technological change, Scotland finds itself competing within a highly competitive global market to identify, attract and retain creative talent and strengthen its skills base. As such, developing “talent” is a key aspect of the Scottish Government’s Strategy for the Creative Industries. However, while creativity has been interrogated across academic disciplines in recent years, talent remains under-theorised within the academy and lacks a clear definition across policy and industry. Taking the screen industries as its focus, this paper draws on empirical data derived from a series of knowledge exchange workshops funded by the Royal Society of Edinburgh designed to initiate dialogue between academics, policy-makers and stakeholders within Scotland and beyond. In doing so, it scopes out some of the key ways in which screen “talent” is conceptualised by these groups and raises questions regarding how particular understandings may impact on policies designed to identify, attract and retain a diverse range of skilled workers within the sector. We argue that greater precision should be used in policy discourse to emphasise the importance of developing particular and discrete craft skills rather than privileging a workforce that is highly flexible and mobile. We also suggest that policy-makers and educators must acknowledge and encourage transparency regarding the precariousness of building a career within the screen industries

Distribution of the birds of the Philippines: biogeography and conservation priorities

The Philippine islands hold a concentration of species diversity and endemism of global importance, yet few studies have analyzed biogeographic patterns or attempted to prioritize areas for conservation within the archipelago. We analyzed distributions of 386 species on 28 Philippine islands and island groups, documenting intense concentration of species richness, especially of endemic species, on the two largest islands, Mindanao and Luzon. Factors identified as influencing species richness included island area, maximum elevation, and Pleistocene patterns of connection and isolation. Reserve systems were developed based on heuristic complementarity algorithms, and compared with the existing Integrated Protected Areas (IPAS) system in the country, showing that IPAS is an impressive first step towards protecting avian diversity in the country. Addition of presently proposed reserves on Palawan and Mindoro would make IPAS a near-optimal reserve design, at least at the level of island representation. Important challenges remain, however, with regard to design of reserve systems within islands to represent complete island avifaunas

Evolution of the Cancer Registrar in the Era of Informatics

The cancer registrar reports accurate, complete, and timely abstracted cancer data to various healthcare agencies. The data are used for understanding the incidence of cancer, evaluating the effectiveness of public health efforts in the prevention of new cases and improving patient care outcomes and survival. There are increasing demands placed on registrars for additional data points with real-time submission to reporting agencies. To that end, registrars are increasing the use of informatics to meet the demand. The purpose of this article is the role of the registrar in the collection and reporting of critical cancer data and how registrars are currently using informatics to enhance their work. This article describes how informatics can be leveraged in the future and how registrars play a vital role in meeting the increasing demands placed on them to provide timely, meaningful, and accurate data for the cancer community

Advancing Our Understanding of the Inheritance and Transmission of Pectus Excavatum

Pectus excavatum is the most common congenital chest wall abnormality expressed in children, yet its inheritance is poorly understood. Here we present the first comprehensive assessment of the inheritance of this disorder. After evaluating 48 pedigrees and 56 clinical traits of probands and family members, we find strong evidence of autosomal recessive, genetic control for this disorder. Additionally there is likely more than one pectus disease-associated allele, as well as a relatively large number of disease allele carriers in the human population. Some clinical traits appear important and may serve as reliable indicators for predicting the likelihood of pectus excavatum in children before severe symptoms present. Quantifying sex-ratio bias in probands demonstrates a highly significant male bias associated with pectus excavatum. When combined with pedigree data, sex-bias is indicative of sex-linked, sex-limited, and/or epigenetic control such as X-inactivation, reiterating a point made with pedigrees alone, which is that more than one mutation is likely responsible for this disorder

Benefits of a Multi-institutional, Hybrid Approach to Teaching Course Design for Graduate Students, Postdoctoral Scholars, and Leaders

In this study, graduate students and postdoctoral scholars participated in a hybrid, multi-institutional workshop series about course design. Trainees developed college courses based on their research expertise, posting works-in-progress to a shared, online drive for peer review and collaboration. Learners also met weekly with local facilitators at their institution. The program led to similar learning outcomes as when the program was previously run in a face-to-face only format at one institution. However, the multi-institutional design led to additional benefits, especially for leaders at each institution, who described a rich learning community in their collaborative work

Can voicing conflict within experiential learning groups facilitate connection? : Building and developing effective multi-disciplinary team-working skills

This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Reflective Practice on 24 November 2016, available online at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14623943.2016.1251408. Under embargo. Embargo end date: 24 May 2018.In the UK, Clinical Psychologists (CPs) work in a variety of settings within the National Health Service (NHS), often within Multi-Disciplinary Teams (MDTs). Problem-Based Learning (PBL) within CP training at the University of Hertfordshire (UH) offers unique opportunities to combine scientist-practitioner and reflective-practitioner models to learn about group dynamics from the personal experience of working within an experiential learning group. Further, given Trainees work three days per week on placement within MDTs in the NHS, the learning gained within a ‘safer’ PBL context can be utilised within these clinical settings. For two years, Trainees at UH have to work in small PBL groups with five or six members learning to work together to achieve a goal (four assessed presentations) negotiating their own personal and professional journey, as well as a group journey. Consequently, PBL offers trainees opportunities to learn (1) how individuals work within a group; (2) how personal experiences influence this process; (3) how others influence them and are influenced by them; and (4) how a group of diverse individuals conceptualise, understand and convey case vignettes to an audience. Within these groups, many Trainees learn to speak out, reflect, listen attentively, empathise, validate and accept diverse experiences. Further, when differences dominate they often learn to negotiate these, finding a way to maintain effective team working in order to complete the presentation. Focusing on the conflict that can occur within (any) group, this paper explores themes from the reflective narratives of six trainees: parallels and differences between MDTs and PBL groups, striving for and achieving authenticity; and conflict as a ‘swear’ word. We conclude that exploring the role PBL can play in training individuals to work effectively in teams may be of benefit within the training of other professional groups.Peer reviewedFinal Accepted Versio

Editor's Choice - Bypass versus Angioplasty for Severe Ischaemia of the Leg (BASIL) Prospective Cohort Study and the Generalisability of the BASIL-2 Randomised Controlled Trial

OBJECTIVE: The Bypass versus Angioplasty in Severe Ischaemia of the Leg-2 (BASIL-2) randomised controlled trial has shown that, for patients with chronic limb threatening ischaemia (CLTI) who require an infrapopliteal (IP) revascularisation a vein bypass (VB) first revascularisation strategy led to a 35% increased risk of major amputation or death when compared with a best endovascular treatment (BET) first revascularisation strategy. The study aims are to place the BASIL-2 trial within the context of the CLTI patient population as a whole and to investigate the generalisability of the BASIL-2 outcome data.METHODS: This was an observational, single centre prospective cohort study. Between 24 June 2014 and 31 July 2018, the BASIL Prospective Cohort Study (PCS) was performed which used BASIL-2 trial case record forms to document the characteristics, initial and subsequent management, and outcomes of 471 consecutive CLTI patients admitted to an academic vascular centre. Ethical approval was obtained, and all patients provided fully informed written consent. Follow up data were censored on 14 December 2022.RESULTS: Of the 238 patients who required an infrainguinal revascularisation, 75 (32%) had either IP bypass (39 patients) or IP BET (36 patients) outside BASIL-2. Seventeen patients were initially randomised to BASIL-2. A further three patients who did not have an IP revascularisation as their initial management were later randomised in BASIL-2. Therefore, 95/471 (20%) of patients had IP revascularisation (16% outside, 4% inside BASIL-2). Differences in amputation free survival, overall survival, and limb salvage between IP bypass and IP BET performed outside BASIL-2 were not subject to hypothesis testing due to the small sample size. Reasons for non-randomisation into the trial were numerous, but often due to anatomical and technical considerations.CONCLUSION: CLTI patients who required an IP revascularisation procedure and were subsequently randomised into BASIL-2 accounted for a small subset of the CLTI population as a whole. For a wide range of patient, limb, anatomical and operational reasons, most patients in this cohort were deemed unsuitable for randomisation in BASIL-2. The results of BASIL-2 should be interpreted in this context.</p

How valid are assessments of conception probability in ovulatory cycle research? Evaluations, recommendations, and theoretical implications

Over the past two decades, a large literature examining psychological changes across women's ovulatory cycles has accumulated, emphasizing comparisons between fertile and non-fertile phases of the cycle. While some studies have verified ovulation using luteinizing hormone (LH) tests, counting methods – assessments of conception probability based on counting forward from actual or retrospectively recalled onset of last menses, or backward from actual or anticipated onset of next menses – are more common. The validity of these methods remains largely unexplored. Based on published data on the distributions of the lengths of follicular and luteal phases, we created a sample of 58,000+ simulated cycles. We used the sample to assess the validity of counting methods. Aside from methods that count backward from a confirmed onset of next menses, validities are modest, generally ranging from about .40–.55. We offer power estimates and make recommendations for future work. We also discuss implications for interpreting past research

Language attitudes and use in a transplanted setting: Greek Cypriots in London

In this paper we explore language attitudes and use in the Greek Cypriot community in London, England. Our study is based on an earlier survey carried out in Nicosia, Cyprus and we compare attitudes to language and reported language use in the two communities. We thereby highlight the significance of sociolinguistic variables on similar groups of speakers. We further extend our investigation to include codeswitching practices in the London community. \ud Analysis of language attitudes and use within the Greek-Cypriot population of London, and comparisons with findings in Nicosia, reflect symbolic forces operating in the two contexts. Despite obvious differences between the two communities, (most obviously the official languages and distinct cultural backgrounds of the two nations), the Greek Cypriot Dialect continues to play an active role in both. English is however the ‘default choice‘ for young Cypriots in the UK and Standard Modern Greek occupies a much more limited role than in Cyprus. It is argued that differences in language attitudes and use can be interpreted in light of different market forces operating in the nation (i.e. Cyprus) and the Diaspora (i.e. UK)