Between a rock and a hard place? Curriculum for excellence and the quality initiative in Scottish schools

With the Scottish government renewing the pledge to implement A Curriculum for Excellence (2004) the schools’ sector arguably faces a period of radical reform that could fundamentally affect the nature of pedagogy and schooling. This paper explores the disjunction in national policy that is foregrounded by this particular initiative. Curriculum for Excellence (CfE) can be seen as an attempt to move the Scottish approach to school improvement away from an alignment with the tenets of ‘hard’ managerialism and the requirement for conformity with centrally determined procedures and practices. It can be interpreted as using a ‘softer’ version of the discourse, where notions of organisational learning and contextualised development are seen as the basis for securing better performance. As such the implementation of CfE might be construed as incompatible with the approach to school improvement embedded in the Quality Initiative in Scottish Schools. This paper argues that the key to curricular reform lies with increasing the capacity for teacher, as well as student, learning in schools and that this requires a major revision of our approach to accountability. Given the recent OECD report on schooling in Scotland, the outcomes of the Crerar review of audit and inspection and the signing of the Government Concordat with local authorities, this is an ideal time for rethinking how we set about achieving quality assurance

A Productive Relationship? Testing the Connections between Professional Learning and Practitioner Research

This article is written in response to a recent report on a review of teacher education in Scotland undertaken by Graham Donaldson (2010). In particular it questions the recommendation that engaging teachers in professional enquiry and research-informed teaching is the way forward for developing the professional capabilities required of "21st Century teachers". The report reflects an increasing emphasis in the literature on school effectiveness and improvement of the need to further teachers' professional learning and of a pedagogic pressure for equipping them to adopt constructivist approaches to teaching that are based on research evidence about how children and young people learn best. Practitioner research is seen by policy makers as an important strategy for achieving these objectives. This article, based on a series of empirical studies, sets out to identify some of the issues revealed by the attempt to use practitioner research as a vehicle for affecting classroom practice within the context of a policy initiative to support the development of accomplished teaching. It argues that, if such a strategy is to be effective, it is important to conceive of it in systemic terms and to confront the challenges involved in developing the sets of networked relations that will be essential if such a strategy is to prove worthwhile

Strategies for School Improvement: Transferring the Concept of Organizational Learning from an Oil Refinery to a Local Authority Education Department

In March 2004, Burnham Council, a Local Authority in central Scotland, adopted a new strategy for school improvement which involved transforming the Authority and its 93 schools into a learning organization. Despite the popularity of the concepts of ‘learning organization’, ‘learning community’, ‘learning school’ and the like in the school improvement literature, there are relatively few documented accounts of attempts to create learning organizations in the educational service. The aim of the present paper is to analyze the development and implementation of Burnham’s organizational learning strategy, focusing on its impact on professional practice at all levels within the Authority. In so doing, we hope throw light not only on this approach to school improvement, but also to clarify the concept of organizational learning itself, and examine how comfortably it sits with the values of a public service and a caring profession. Given the origins of the organizational learning concept in the for-profit sector, as well as the continuing concern in some educational quarters about the desirability of importing business methods into education, the present paper pays close attention to the transferability of the learning organization concept across the private-public sector divide. It analyzes the process by which the Authority formed its initial concept of organizational learning and drew up its strategy of school improvement through organizational learning, whilst in a second paper (Reeves and Boreham, 2004) we analyze the way in which the Authority’s 93 schools, its senior management team, its education officers, its educational psychologists and many others worked together to create a shared vision.

A Productive Relationship? Testing the Connections between

ABSTRACT This article is written in response to a recent report on a review of teacher education in Scotland undertaken by Graham Donaldson (2011). In particular it questions the recommendation that engaging teachers in professional enquiry and research-informed teaching is the way forward for developing the professional capabilities required of "21 st Century teachers". The report reflects an increasing emphasis in the literature on school effectiveness and improvement of the need to further teachers' professional learning and a pedagogic pressure for them to adopt constructivist approaches to teaching that are based on research evidence about how children and young people learn best. Practitioner research is seen by policy makers as an important strategy for achieving these objectives. This article, based on a series of empirical studies, sets out to identify some of the issues revealed by the attempt to use practitioner research as a vehicle for affecting classroom practice within the context of a policy initiative to support the development of accomplished teaching. It argues that, if such a strategy is to be effective, it is important to conceive of it in systemic terms and to confront the challenges involved in developing the sets of networked relations that will be essential if such a strategy is to prove worthwhile

A Systematic Review of the Effectiveness of Text Message Reminders on Asthma Medication Adherence

Objective: Cell phone text messaging reminders offers the promise of an efficient technology for the management of chronic diseases, such as asthma. This review aims to evaluate the effectiveness of text message reminders in improving medication adherence for asthma compared to usual care. Methods: Randomized controlled trials assessing the effect of text message reminders on adherence to asthma medication were identified from PubMed, Medline, Web of Knowledge EBSCOhost, OvidSP, PsycINFO, and Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials and Cochran Health Technology Assessment databases. Literature searches were restricted to the English language, and no restrictions were imposed on the year and country of publication. Results:  Five studies that were deemed relevant to the systematic review were identified from the literature search. Findings on whether text message reminders improve medication adherence were mixed. However, the review indicates that text-messaging interventions were effective as a means of addressing forgetfulness by reminding patients to take their medications. Conclusion: This review adds to the body of literature reviewing the effectiveness of emerging technologies in the management of diseases. Despite the fact there is limited evidence across the population of studies to support the effectiveness of text message reminders, such technology represents an important tool to achieve optimal medication adherence among asthmatics.   Article Type: Student Projec

Evaluation of novel epibatidine analogs in the rat nicotine drug discrimination assay and in the rat chronic constriction injury neuropathic pain model

Nicotine is the primary psychoactive component responsible for maintaining tobacco dependence in humans. Chronic pain is often a consequence of tobacco-related pathologies, and the development of a dual therapeutic that could treat chronic pain and tobacco dependence would be advantageous. Epibatidine reliably substitutes for nicotine in the drug discrimination assay, and is a potent analgesic, but has a side-effect profile that limits its therapeutic potential. Thus, considerable efforts to produce epibatidine derivatives are underway. Here we tested three epibatidine derivatives, 2′-fluoro-3'-(4-nitrophenyl)deschloroepibatidine (RTI-7527-102; i.e., RTI-102), 2′-fluorodeschloroepibatidine (RTI-7527-36; i.e., RTI-36), and 3'-(3″-dimethylaminophenyl)-epibatidine (RTI-7527-76; i.e., RTI-76) in both the rat nicotine drug discrimination assay as well as in the rat chronic constriction injury (CCI) of the sciatic nerve neuropathic pain model. Male and female Sprague-Dawley rats were trained on a fixed-ratio 10 schedule to discriminate nicotine (0.32 mg/kg base) from vehicle. All compounds dose-dependently substituted for nicotine, without significant decreases in response rates. In the discrimination assay the rank order potency was RTI-36 > nicotine > RTI-102 > RTI-76. Evidence suggests the α4β2* subtype is particularly important to nicotine-related abuse potential. Thus, here we utilized the antagonist dihydro-β-erythroidine (DHβE) to examine relative β2 subunit contribution. DHβE (3.2 mg/kg, s.c.) antagonized the discriminative stimulus effects of nicotine. However, relative to antagonism of nicotine, DHβE produced less antagonism of RTI-102 and RTI-76 and greater antagonism of RTI-36. It is likely that at nicotinic receptor subunits RTI-102, RTI-76 and RTI-36 possess differing activity. To confirm that the full discriminative stimulus of these compounds was due to nAChR activity beyond the β2 subunit, we examined these compounds in the presence of the non-selective nicotinic receptor antagonist mecamylamine. Mecamylamine (0.56 mg/kg, s.c.) pretreatment abolished nicotine-paired lever responding for all compounds. In a separate cohort, male and female Sprague-Dawley rats underwent CCI surgery and tested for CCI-induced mechanical allodynia via the von Frey assay. Each compound produced CCI-induced mechanical allodynia reversal. RTI-36 displayed higher potency than either RTI-102 or RTI-76. These novel epibatidine analogs may prove to be useful tools in the fight against nicotine dependence as well as novel neuropathic pain analgesics

The potentially morally injurious nature of encountering children during military deployments: A call for research

Armed forces personnel are a population at risk for exposure to potentially traumatic and morally injurious events because of the high-risk nature of military operations. One potentially morally injurious event (PMIE) could be when military personnel encounter children during deployment. These encounters may lead to acute and chronic psychological, behavioural, and social consequences, culminating in moral injury and other adverse mental health problems. According to anecdotal evidence, military personnel reported feeling torn, morally and ethically, in their decisionmaking when they encounter children in the line of duty. The decision to engage or kill a child may be difficult to reconcile with one’s moral and ethical code, and decisions may have deadly consequences for oneself and others. To date, however, no reliable data exist as to the impact that encountering children during deployment may have on psychosocial and spiritual well-being. In this article, additional research into this domain is encouraged by providing a rationale for studying encounters with children during deployment through the lens of a PMIE, as well as r