Introduction to A Research Agenda for Small and Medium-Sized Towns.

Exploring current debates on the topic, this book maps out an agenda for theory, research and practice about the role and function of small and medium-sized towns in various contexts and at different territorial scales. Chapters highlight new insights and approaches to studying small and medium-sized towns, moving beyond the ‘urban bias’ to provide nuanced thought on these spaces both in terms of their relation to larger cities, and in terms of implications related to their size

Expressing oneself in order to participate: tacit knowledge, learning and the Metaplan

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L’expérience du réseau ENSI de l’OCDE - L’école comme modèle de communauté apprenante

Communautés locales et globales Les communautés locales ont été confrontées ces dernières années à des changements qui ont concerné toute la société. La globalisation, la mondialisation, la société moderne du risque – selon la définition de Beck (1986) - ont profondément changé les réseaux de relations qui caractérisaient les communautés. Ces changements amènent à une réflexion sur les nouveaux rôles et les nouvelles responsabilités que les communautés doivent assumer. En Europe, en moins d’u..

Éducation relative à l’environnement et recherche-action

Reconnaissant l’avènement d’une culture de la complexité, le présent article montre l’importance et l’intérêt de la recherche-action pour le développement de l’éducation relative à l’environnement (ERE) en milieu scolaire avec en appui, le projet ENSI - ENvironment and School Initiatives (OECDCERI, 1991). Le défi de la complexité L’éducation relative à l’environnement et l’éducation pour une société responsable demandent un saut culturel, un changement profond de point de vue, directement lié..

Indicateurs de qualité pour l’éducation relative à l’environnement : une stratégie évaluative ?

Les indicateurs de qualité ont surtout été utilisés dans la recherche éducative internationale dans un paradigme positiviste. Si une telle approche évaluative peut être utile pour l’évaluation des programmes et des projets d’éducation relative à l’environnement (ErE), elle demeure toutefois limitée. Cet article explore les possibilités que les indicateurs de qualité offrent à l’évaluation en ErE, non seulement pour l’évaluation des résultats, mais aussi pour l’orientation et la conduite des projets. Entre autres, les indicateurs peuvent mettre en évidence les caractéristiques « émergentes » et non prévues d’un projet d’ErE. L’auteure insiste sur la prise en compte du caractère qualitatif des processus éducatifs ainsi que des stratégies d’auto-évaluation et d’évaluation participative.Quality indicators have been adopted in international educational research mainly as tools within a positivist research paradigm. Their approach to evaluation can be seen as consistent with some evaluation needs of Environmental Education (EE) programs and projects. This paper explores the possibilities offered to EE by the use of quality indicators, not only to evaluate results but also to orient and steer the projects. The indicators can also highlight the “emerging” and unexpected characteristics of EE projects. The author insists on taking into consideration the qualitative nature of educational processes together with the strategies of self-evaluation and participative evaluation

Learning for an unpredictable future : what competences for educators

In 2011 the UNECE produced a document, "Learning for the future"aiming to identify a framework of core competences for ESD educators. In 2015, the Erasmus plus project "A Rounder Sense of Purpose" started a reflection on the UNECE document aiming to transform that document in an effective tool to be used for building, assessing, awarding the competences educators need, in formal and informal education, in order to face a rapidly changing world. While the UNECE document, and the RSP project, are addressed to ESD educators, the authors of this communication propose to apply the RSP competences model to all educators, across different levels and disciplines. Preliminary results from experimenting the model across different cultural and educational contexts will be presented during the Conference

Sound recognition and localization in man: specialized cortical networks and effects of acute circumscribed lesions

Functional imaging studies have shown that information relevant to sound recognition and sound localization are processed in anatomically distinct cortical networks. We have investigated the functional organization of these specialized networks by evaluating acute effects of circumscribed hemispheric lesions. Thirty patients with a primary unilateral hemispheric lesion, 15 with right-hemispheric damage (RHD) and 15 with left-hemispheric damage (LHD), were evaluated for their capacity to recognise environmental sounds, to localize sounds in space and to perceive sound motion. One patient with RHD and 2 with LHD had a selective deficit in sound recognition; 3 with RHD a selective deficit in sound localization; 2 with LHD a selective deficit in sound motion perception; 4 with RHD and 3 with LHD a combined deficit of sound localization and motion perception; 2 with RHD and 1 with LHD a combined deficit of sound recognition and motion perception; and 1 with LHD a combined deficit of sound recognition, localization and motion perception. Five patients with RHD and 6 with LHD had normal performance in all three domains. Deficient performance in sound recognition, sound localization and/or sound motion perception was always associated with a lesion that involved the shared auditory structures and the specialized What and/or Where networks, while normal performance was associated with lesions within or outside these territories. Thus, damage to regions known to be involved in auditory processing in normal subjects is necessary, but not sufficient for a deficit to occur. Lesions of a specialized network was not always associated with the corresponding deficit. Conversely, specific deficits tended not be associated predominantly with lesions of the corresponding network; e.g. deficits in auditory spatial tasks were observed in patients whose lesions involved to a larger extent the shared auditory structures and the specialized What network than the specialized Where network, and deficits in sound recognition in patients whose lesions involved mostly the shared auditory structures and to a varying degree the specialized What network. The human auditory cortex consists of functionally defined auditory areas, whose intrinsic organization is currently not understood. In particular, areas involved in the What and Where pathways can be conceived as: (1) specialized regions, in which lesions cause dysfunction limited to the damaged part; observed deficits should be then related to the specialization of the damaged region and their magnitude to the extent of the damage; or (2) specialized networks, in which lesions cause dysfunction that may spread over the two specialized networks; observed deficits may then not be related to the damaged region and their magnitude not proportional to the extent of the damage. Our results support strongly the network hypothesi

Gender medicine: an up-date

Women get sick more, use more health services, take more drugs, and have a higher frequency of serious adverse reactions. Despite this, the drugs we use are little studied in women: both clinical studies and pre-clinical experiments are carried out predominantly in males and the young. Before 1990, no more than 26-30% of women were usually enrolled in a trial, so we lacked the statistical power of showing the efficacy and safety of the drugs being studied in the whole population. The gender blindness (transposition of the male studies in female populations) resulted in a lack of awareness of the differences between males and females, and this prevented both genders from receiving the best possible care. This gender bias also, to a lower degree, hurts men: depression, migraines, osteoporosis have not been studied properly in males. Although the process is slow, the scientific community has begun to pay more attention to direct and indirect influences that gender exercise on biological mechanisms, and this includes both internal and external cultural and environmental factors. Therefore, the differences between the old, the young, children, and pregnant women (considered the third gender group) will become increasingly more important as care becomes more personalized. The first course of gender medicine was established only in 2002 at Columbia University, New York, USA. The World Health Organization has incorporated gender medicine into the Equity Act. This implies that the treatment given must be the most appropriate and best suited the individual patient's gender. The Committee on Women's Health of the Ministry of Health in Italy was established in 2007. Institutions now pay great attention to the importance of this clinical perspective and are sensitive to the need for change. This review focuses on specific open questions regarding gender: pharmacology, clinical trial recruitment, cardiovascular prevention, stroke, osteoporosis, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, depression, and discusses presentations made to the 1st course of gender medicine organized as part of the 18th National Congress of the Federation of Associations of Hospital Doctors on Internal Medicine (FADOI), 2012