Friendship Workshop as an intervention model to promote empathy: A program review

The purpose of this study was to research if the Friendship Workshop, a classroom intervention program, would enhance the empathy development in 68 students within four kindergarten/Grade 1 classes. The quasi-experimental quantitative approach incorporated a pre/post assessment design using the Empathy Quotient (EQ) to assess parent/guardian and teachers’ perspectives of their children and students, respectively. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze the results to determine if the Friendship Workshops intervention’s efficacy strengthened the students’ empathy after the children experienced it for 6 months. The data review indicated that 81% and 60% of the students demonstrated an increase in empathy from the teacher and parent/guardian perspective, respectively. In addition, further review of the responses for students who demonstrated a decrease in empathy based upon the EQ scores rendered insight that over half of the students showed an increase in four specific statements suggesting improvement in some elements of empathy despite the decreased overall score. Recommendations for further research, and potential professional development for teacher preparation programs, school leaders, and experienced teachers are provided, given the overall potential of the Friendship Workshop approach on empathy development and the focus on emotional vocabulary development, emotional recognition, and emotion regulation. There is a potential for increased empathy to impact implicit bias, thus prejudice development; therefore, further merit should be granted to the prospective impact of the Friendship Workshop approach within classroom environments

Refugee Policy: A Cruel Bipartisanship

Facing the media after a reported 5.6 per cent swing against him in the Brisbane seat of Dickson, Australian Minister for Immigration and Border Protection Peter Dutton defiantly declared that the Coalition was ‘a victim of our own success’.1 ‘The fact that we stopped boats and got children out of detention’, Dutton asserted, meant the ‘issue’ of ‘border protection’ and people arriving in Australia unauthorised by boat to seek asylum ‘had gone off the radar’ (quoted in Hutchens 2016). The minister’s assertion was certainly provocative, if a little misleading. While Australia’s policies towards refugees and asylum seekers did not appear to feature prominently in the 2016 election campaign, this was largely due to a confluence of circumstances, not all of which were of the Coalition’s making. These circumstances primarily included the bipartisan support for the three key pillars of Australia’s increasingly draconian deterrence model (namely, boat turn backs, regional processing and the mandatory detention of certain asylum seekers) and the exceptional government censorship of information from inside immigration detention centres and the official secrecy surrounding the implementation of Australia’s military-led Operation Sovereign Borders (OSB). This meant that the Coalition and Labor had both orchestrated a situation where there seemed to be little political mileage to be gained from foregrounding the issue of Australia’s refugee laws and policies during the campaign. Instead, the election contest predominantly played out across more traditional issues of economic and social policy, such as job creation and the funding of healthcare. Despite being a highly volatile political issue, refugee policy could rarely be seen to determine the outcome of elections—perhaps with the exception of the Coalition’s major 2001 electoral victory in the wake of the Tampa affair. Since 2004, fewer than 10 per cent of surveyed voters have ranked the issue of ‘refugees and asylum seekers’ as the ‘most important non-economic issue’ in federal elections (McAllister and Cameron 2014: 21). Despite the lack of prominence given by the two major political parties to the issue of refugee policy relative to previous election campaigns, it nonetheless surfaced at key moments to reveal its political potency. For example, some minor political parties, certain media outlets and community activist groups were particularly vocal on the issue. This chapter argues that these moments attest to both the anxious nature of Australian nationalism and multiculturalism, and the increasingly prominent deep discursive linkages between asylum seekers, terrorism and the securitisation of migration and borders

Small scale fracture of multi metal carbide coatings

The micromechanical behavior of sputtered multi metal carbide (Hf-Nb-Ta-Zr)C coatings was investigated. A equiatomic high entropy alloy (Hf-Nb-Ta-Zr) and high density graphite were used as targets to reactively sputter carbide coatings on Si (100) with a silicon nitride buffer layer at different substrate temperatures (RT, 300, 450, 600 and 750 0C). Energy and wavelength dispersive x-ray spectra confirmed that the metal compositions were equiatomic with a carbon content close to stoichiometric value. X-ray diffraction revealed that a single phase with a rocksalt structure was obtained for all deposition conditions. Furthermore, XRD measurements highlighted that crystallinity improved markedly with increasing deposition temperatures and the magnitude of compressive stresses reduced, concomitantly. For the highest temperature, tensile stresses of 500MPa was noted. Optical microscopy also revealed extensive mud cracking of the film deposited at 750°C, consistent with high tensile stresses. Microstructures characterized by transmission electron microscopy revealed columnar grains with nanocrystalline dimensions. Coatings deposited at 600°C showed the highest hardness and indentation modulus of 32 and 350 GPa, respectively, measured with the continuous stiffness mode. Focused ion beam machining is used fabricate micro cantilever which are tested in situ in a SEM to evaluate fracture properties of these complex carbide coatings. Nanoindentation based toughness measurements are underway to compare toughness estimates these two techniques

Microstructure, grain boundary evolution and anisotropic Fe segregation in (0001) textured Ti thin films

The structure and chemistry of grain boundaries (GBs) are crucial in determining polycrystalline materials' properties. Faceting and solute segregation to minimize the GB energy is a commonly observed phenomenon. In this paper, a deposition process to obtain pure tilt GBs in titanium (Ti) thin films is presented. By increasing the power density, a transition from polycrystalline film growth to a maze bicrystalline Ti film on SrTiO3 (001) substrate is triggered. All the GBs in the bicrystalline thin film are characterized to be Sigma 13 [00 01] coincident site lattice (CSL) boundaries. The GB planes are seen to distinctly facet into symmetric {(7) over bar 520} and {13 (4) over bar0} and asymmetric {10 (1) over bar0} // {11 (2) over bar0} segments of 20-50 nm length. Additionally, EDS reveals preferential segregation of iron (Fe) in every symmetric {(7) over bar 520} segment. Both the faceting and the segregation are explained by a difference in the CSL density between the facet planes. Furthermore, in the GB plane containing Fe segregation, atom probe tomography is used to experimentally determine the GB excess solute to be 1.25 atoms/nm(2). In summary, the study reveals for the first time a methodology to obtain bicrystalline Ti thin films with strong faceting and an anisotropy in Fe segregation behaviour within the neighbouring GB facets. (C) 2022 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd on behalf of Acta Materialia Inc

Translocal legalities: local encounters with transnational law

Recent scholarship on transnational law has emphasised how the proliferation and fragmentation of normative orders, legal forms, and transnational actors are transforming the nature and authority of law in the contemporary global context. This Introduction presents what we term translocal legalities— emergent forms of normativity that are constituted through grounded encounters with local and transnational legal practices, discourses, subjectivities, and forms of resistance. By coining this new term, we seek to shift the gaze of transnational legal scholarship away from a top-down mapping of the structures of global law. Centring our analysis on the phenomenology of the encounter, we develop an analytical and empirical approach to understanding these encounters by focusing on how law is constituted not solely within traditional legal organisations and institutions, but through the everyday practices, discourses, and subjectivities of those mediating local, national and transnational norms.Effective Protection of Fundamental Rights in a pluralist worl

Early stage phase separation of AlCoCr_0.75Cu_0.5FeNi high-entropy powder at the nanoscale

High entropy alloys are generally considered to be single phase material. This state is, however, typically a non-equilibrium state after fabrication at high cooling rates. Phase constitution after fabrication or heat treatment is mostly known for isothermal annealing only and for casts as well as rapidly quenched alloys. Knowledge on early phase separation stages of high entropy alloys and their mechanisms are missing so far. Here, we present results on phase separation at intermediate cooling rates, by characterization of gas atomized powder of the AlCoCr0.75Cu0.5FeNi alloy. Although investigation by X-ray diffraction and Electron Backscatter Diffraction indicates a single-phase nature of the powder particles, aberration-corrected scanning transmission electron microscopy and atom probe tomography reveal a nanoscale phase separation into Ni-Al-rich B2 and Fe-Cr-rich A2 regions as well as a high number density of 3.1x1024 Cu-rich clusters per m3 in the B2 matrix. The observed phase separation and cluster formation are linked to spinodal decomposition and nucleation processes, respectively. The study highlights that adequate characterization techniques need to be chosen when making statements about phase stability and structural evolution in compositionally complex alloys.Comment: 33 pages, 12 figure

Combining high strength and moderate ductility in wear resistant coatings: a MO2BC study

Wear resistant coatings employed in cutting and forming applications usually require the combination of high stiffness and high hardness, as these properties often enable low wear rates. Moreover, moderate ductility is often desirable as crack formation can lead to early service failure. Traditionally, the combination of high stiffness and high ductility has been considered as self-excluding. However, recent investigations based on correlative experimental and theoretical research suggest that this empirical relationship can be overcome by a new generation of hard coating materials. For example, ab initio calculations have predicted Mo2BC to exhibit a high stiffness in combination with moderate ductility [1]. The material crystallizes in an orthorhombic structure (space group Cmcm), in which B atoms are positioned in Mo6B trigonal prisms and C atoms are at Mo6C octahedral sites in alternating sequence (unit cell is shown in Fig. 1a). The calculated bulk modulus of 324 GPa for Mo2BC surpasses the one of Ti0.75Al0.25N (178 GPa) [2], often referred as benchmark coating, by more than 50%. In addition, Mo2BC has been also predicted to be moderately ductile based on its ratio of bulk to shear moduli (B/G) and the calculated positive Cauchy pressure [3]. Please click Additional Files below to see the full abstract