The Formulation, Implementation, and Evaluation of Educational Planning in Public School Districts of Tennessee

The legislature of the State of Tennessee enacted The Public Education Governance Reform Act of 1984 as the first step in a restructuring and reform program for Tennessee education. One of the major elements of this piece of legislation was that the state board of education would ... develop and maintain current a master plan for the development of public education, grades kindergarten (K) through twelve (12). A regulation was passed by the Tennessee State Board of Education mandating that each local board of education in the state should develop and implement a five-year educational plan to include a mission statement, goals, objectives, and strategies. The first plan was due September 1, 1990. The plan was to be evaluated annually. Direction was not given as to process, evaluation, or expected outcomes. In the absence of specific guidelines from the state, there was little understanding of the process followed by local school systems in Tennessee as they completed the educational planning process. The purpose of the study was to describe the process used by Tennessee school districts in the formulation, implementation and evaluation of a state mandated five year educational plan. A review of the literature on educational planning did not reveal a definitive planning process or model. There was no grand scheme or master plan on the state or national level which looked at the whole in an attempt to put all the various restructuring or reform components together to form a complete educational plan. Data were gathered using a survey instrument which covered seven research questions relating to the planning components found in the most accepted models in the literature. All Tennessee school systems were given an opportunity to participate in the study. The data suggest that local school systems did not receive sufficient information, training, and preparation materials to prepare an effective five-year educational plan. The educational plan was developed mainly by the local school boards and central office staffs in each school system. An accepted planning model as found in the literature was not used by the majority of the school systems, nor was any attempt made to correlate the local plan with the state master plan. Sufficient information from the local community to project a vision for the school system or identify present or future trends in the schools and community was not collected prior to the development of the plan. Implementation of the local plan was by top management in most systems. A formal evaluation process to measure success or failure in reaching the declared goals and objectives was not in place. Institutions of higher education were not given an opportunity to participate or have influence on the process of training, implementation, and evaluation of the local and state educational plans

“My way of giving something back”: Patient and carer experiences of involvement in medical education

Background: Patient involvement initiatives in medical education traditionally focus exclusively on the rationale, need, and potential benefits to learners in developing patient-centred practice. Objectives: This study explores the impact of involvement on patient educators working in medical education. Method: A mixed methods approach was used to generate data for content analysis. Participants completed a questionnaire (n= 49) and were then invited for a follow-up interview (n=20), both methods explored views on involvement, motives for taking part and the impact involvement has had on their lives. Results: Participants reported that they valued opportunities to take part in medical education. This provided a means to reflect on their health condition and patient experience; had perceived and real benefits for their health and wellbeing and provided an opportunity to educate students in ways which participants felt had wide-ranging benefits. Conclusions: There is a need to further develop theoretical understandings of patient involvement in medical education. In adopting a Bourdieuian analysis of involvement the results of this study suggest there is a need both to prepare patient educators for involvement and to provide on-going support to enable individuals to realise the benefits of involvement, which are not automatic

Disposable electrochemical flow cells for catalytic adsorptive stripping voltammetry (CAdSV) at a bismuth film electrode (BiFE)

Catalytic adsorptive stripping voltammetry (CAdSV) has been demonstrated at a bismuth film electrode (BiFE) in an injection-moulded electrochemical micro-flow cell. The polystyrene three-electrode flow cell was fabricated with electrodes moulded from a conducting grade of polystyrene containing 40% carbon fibre, one of which was precoated with Ag to enable its use as an on-chip Ag/AgCl reference electrode. CAdSV of Co(II) and Ni(II) in the presence of dimethylglyoxime (DMG) with nitrite employed as the catalyst was performed in order to assess the performance of the flow cell with an in-line plated BiFE. The injection-moulded electrodes were found to be suitable substrates for the formation of BiFEs. Key parameters such as the plating solution matrix, plating flow rate, analysis flow rate, solution composition and square-wave parameters have been characterised and optimal conditions selected for successful and rapid analysis of Co(II) and Ni(II) at the ppb level. The analytical response was linear over the range 1 to 20 ppb and deoxygenation of the sample solution was not required. The successful coupling of a microfluidic flow cell with a BiFE, thereby forming a “mercury-free” AdSV flow analysis sensor, shows promise for industrial and in-the-field applications where inexpensive, compact, and robust instrumentation capable of low-volume analysis is required

Motivations, expectations, and experiences of expatriate academic staff on an international branch campus in China

This article explores the experiences of non-Chinese academic staff working on an international branch campus in China. The article presents findings from an interview study that explored the expectations of expatriate staff and what motivated them to want to work abroad. The second part of the article reports on whether and how these expectations and motivations were fulfilled. The findings suggest that, although staff found many benefits from working on the international branch campus, they were insufficiently prepared for the structural and cultural differences inherent in working as an academic in China. The authors argue that more of the academics’ initial expectations and motivations could have been realized if better staff induction and ongoing collective professional development had been in place. In particular, university-level discourse communicated through policy and marketing texts, which promoted the vision of one inclusive and diverse international university community, militated against attention being paid to the structural, political, and cultural differences inherent in working as an academic in China. The authors argue that professional development that acknowledges the differences, difficulties, and disjunctions that staff are likely to encounter in their work is important in building successful international branch campuses both at the level of the organization and of the individual

Non-invasive biophysical measurement of travelling waves in the insect inner ear

Frequency analysis in the mammalian cochlea depends on the propagation of frequency information in the form of a travelling wave (TW) across tonotopically arranged auditory sensilla. TWs have been directly observed in the basilar papilla of birds and the ears of bush-crickets (Insecta: Orthoptera) and have also been indirectly inferred in the hearing organs of some reptiles and frogs. Existing experimental approaches to measure TW function in tetrapods and bushcrickets are inherently invasive, compromising the fine-scale mechanics of each system. Located in the forelegs, the bushcricket ear exhibits outer, middle and inner components; the inner ear containing tonotopically arranged auditory sensilla within a fluid-filled cavity, and externally protected by the leg cuticle. Here, we report bush-crickets with transparent ear cuticles as potential model species for direct, non-invasive measuring of TWs and tonotopy. Using laser Doppler vibrometry and spectroscopy, we show that increased transmittance of light through the ear cuticle allows for effective non-invasive measurements of TWs and frequency mapping. More transparent cuticles allow several properties of TWs to be precisely recovered and measured in vivo from intact specimens. Our approach provides an innovative, noninvasive alternative to measure the natural motion of the sensillia-bearing surface embedded in the intact inner ear fluid

Transnational higher education partnerships and the role of operational faculty members: developing an alternative theoretical approach for empirical research

For too long, transnational higher education (TNE) has been linked to discourse predominately focused upon strategic implementation, quality assurance and pedagogy. Whilst these aspects are important when designing and managing overseas provisions, there is a lack of research focusing on the social interactions that influence the pace and development of TNE partnerships. This gap is particularly evident at the operational phase of TNE partnerships. This conceptual article therefore offers an alternative way in which to research TNE partnerships, in relation to the interactions of faculty members delivering at the operational level. It provides an integrated theoretical framework, comprising of three different theoretical approaches in order to provide a conceptual tool in which to investigate and evaluate TNE partnership development. The article concludes that by understanding how relationships develop between faculty members tasked with delivering TNE, international partnerships can be significantly strengthened in terms of their progression and value