Spot the Difference! Visual plagiarism in the visual arts.

Over recent years there has been considerable investment in the use of technology to identify sources of text-based plagiarism in universities. However, students of the visual arts are also required to complete numerous pieces of visual submissions for assessment, and yet very little similar work has been undertaken in the area of non-text based plagiarism detection. The Spot the Difference! project (2011-2012), funded by JISC and led by the University for the Creative Arts, seeks to address this gap by piloting the use of visual search tools developed by the University of Surrey and testing their application to support learning and teaching in the arts and specifically to the identification of visual plagiarism. Given that most commonly used search technologies rely on text, the identification and evidencing of visual plagiarism is often left to the knowledge and experience of academic staff, which can potentially result in inconsistency of detection, approach, policies and practices. This paper outlines the work of the project team, who sought to investigate the nature, scope and extent of visual plagiarism in the arts education sector

Invariant visual object recognition : biologically plausible approaches

Key properties of inferior temporal cortex neurons are described, and then, the biological plausibility of two leading approaches to invariant visual object recognition in the ventral visual system is assessed to investigate whether they account for these properties. Experiment 1 shows that VisNet performs object classification with random exemplars comparably to HMAX, except that the final layer C neurons of HMAX have a very non-sparse representation (unlike that in the brain) that provides little information in the single-neuron responses about the object class. Experiment 2 shows that VisNet forms invariant representations when trained with different views of each object, whereas HMAX performs poorly when assessed with a biologically plausible pattern association network, as HMAX has no mechanism to learn view invariance. Experiment 3 shows that VisNet neurons do not respond to scrambled images of faces, and thus encode shape information. HMAX neurons responded with similarly high rates to the unscrambled and scrambled faces, indicating that low-level features including texture may be relevant to HMAX performance. Experiment 4 shows that VisNet can learn to recognize objects even when the view provided by the object changes catastrophically as it transforms, whereas HMAX has no learning mechanism in its S-C hierarchy that provides for view-invariant learning. This highlights some requirements for the neurobiological mechanisms of high-level vision, and how some different approaches perform, in order to help understand the fundamental underlying principles of invariant visual object recognition in the ventral visual strea

Performance management of National Sports Organisations: a holistic theoretical model

Purpose Organisational performance of sport organisations has been studied over the last three decades. However, little attention was paid towards performance management (PM) compared to performance measurement. The purpose of this paper is to close this research gap by establishing a holistic perspective for PM of National Sports Organisations (NSOs) that accounts for their uniqueness, the interdependence of their operating systems and their relationship with their environments. Furthermore, this paper presents a holistic model of PM for NSOs. Design/methodology/approach The model was developed from a literature review process and uses the macro, meso and micro framework to describe external and internal environmental influences that affect the PM of NSOs. Findings The NSO’s ability to respond to the dynamics of their external environment by implementing organisational processes that account for the resources available and their structural designs influences their PM. Furthermore, the ability of the individuals within NSO to create enabling environments for PM influences organisational efficiency and effectiveness. Research limitations/implications This paper contributes to sport management literature on the PM of NSOs, and informs sport managers on ways to improve organisational performance by implementing holistic approaches to PM. Originality/value This is the first study that takes a holistic approach to PM of NSO and depicts the specific elements that play a crucial role in managing NSO’s multi-dimensional performance

Regionalisation - Change in the Amateur Swimming Association

At the ASA Annual Council in 2002, a paper was presented which dealt with the government’s commitment to the regionalisation of government in England. This paper set out an intention to decentralise Sport England. The most significant impact of this to swimming was that most funding would subsequently be devolved to, and allocated by, the Sport England regions. ASA Council recognised that the ASA districts were not aligned to Sport England regions and in order to maximise direct and indirect benefits of funding, it was felt necessary to review the Boundaries of the then existing districts. The review process led to a proposal of 8 new regions. These were: South East South West East London East Midlands West Midlands North East North West It was proposed that each of the new regions would be coterminous with a Sport England region with the exception of the North East Region which would reflect two. A 12 month ‘shadowing period’ was proposed and regionalisation became operation on October 1st 2005. This report sets out the process followed and evaluates this process and the initial impacts of regionalisation from a variety of stakeholder viewpoints. It is recognised that regionalisation is in its infancy and the intention is not to determine whether regionalisation has been successful, rather to provide an evaluation of the process followed

Keeping swimmers swimming: The capacity of swimming clubs

The Department of Culture Media and Sport has signed a Public Service Agreement (PSA) with Sport England with explicit targets to increase participation in sport and active recreation. Sport England is now directing funding towards organisations and programmes which help to meet the relevant PSA target. As a consequence, the asa has worked towards increasing the number who participate in active sports at least 12 times a year by 3 per cent, and increasing the number who engage in at least 30 minutes of moderate intensity level sport, at least three times a week by 3 per cent. It is not anticipated that this PSA target will change significantly moving into the next funding agreement 2009 –13

How sports get chosen for the Olympics

First paragraph: A spokesperson for the ancient sport of jousting recentlymade a casefor its inclusion in the Olympic Games based on the technical skills and physical prowess required to be successful. She suggested these were as high or higher than many sports already included in the programme. If only it was that simple.  Access this article on The Conversation website: https://theconversation.com/how-sports-get-chosen-for-the-olympics-6291

Stakeholder Satisfaction with the ASA

Stakeholder satisfaction is of natural concern to all organisations that wish to function effectively. It is of greater concern to those organisations, such as NGBs who need to consider the satisfaction of both member and non-member groups as this often leads to diverse and conflicting stakeholder objectives. It is therefore important that solid research evidence is available regarding stakeholder satisfaction in order for the ASA to understand stakeholder requirements and to plan effectively. In order to do this, the ASA commissioned the Institute of Sport and Leisure Policy at Loughborough University to carry out a five year longitudinal assessment of satisfaction with the services of the ASA. This report sets out the findings of the first stage of the research, which primarily constitutes a benchmarking of levels of member satisfaction in order to identify areas for development and to provide a standard against which to assess future levels of satisfaction. The report begins with an introduction to the concept of satisfaction and how it is formed and then presents the methods followed in this first phase. This is followed by a presentation of the results of the initial work on expectations and the results of the membership survey. Recommendations from this are presented and the report concludes with an outline of the work for the next two years

Despite some progress, the Olympics is still an uneven playing field

First paragraph: In just a few days, over 200 nations will gather in Rio for the opening ceremony of what is, without doubt, the biggest sporting party in the world. The greatest athletes will be gearing up to demonstrate their abilities and countries will be eager to see if their investment in elite sport over the last four years pays off and produces medals.  Access this article on The Conversation website: https://theconversation.com/despite-some-progress-the-olympics-is-still-an-uneven-playing-field-6285

The Modern Gay & Lesbian Civil Rights Movement in the United States

Historians and classroom teachers have long avoided researching and teaching society about the modern Gay and Lesbian Civil Rights Movement in the United States. This research examines parts of the movement and is divided into three parts. The first part involves examining the national movement beginning in 1950 with the establishment of homophile organizations to the period of Gay Liberation in the 1970s. Second, the movement is studied in Rochester, New York through the examination of issues between 1971 and 1975 of the gay and lesbian publication The Empty Closet. Lastly, the information and discoveries made in the first two parts are used in part 3 to show how gay and lesbian history can be taught effectively in a high school social studies classroom using several teaching strategiesSUNY BrockportEducation and Human DevelopmentMaster of Science in Education (MSEd)Education and Human Development Master's These