Review of the National Award for Special Educational Needs Coordination Provider Group quality assurance processes

This report examined the quality assurance (QA) processes set up by the Award Provider Group when National Award for SEN Coordination oversight and funding (for teacher training) were withdrawn by the Department for Education in 2014. We interviewed 22 members of the Provider Group, including individuals from long-term and new (post-2014) providers. Data analysis showed that the QA processes worked well, providing the rigour and checks that the Provider Group were seeking. Members’ commitment to and belief in the importance of the National Award have led to the generation of a collaborative approach between competitors, and this is proving to be innovative, dynamic and supportive. However, to ensure they can continue to maintain the integrity and improve the quality of the National Award, the QA processes would benefit from: revisions to the Quality Standards Framework; creating an external reference group; involvement with external professional bodies such as the Chartered College of Teaching; continuing to publish a list of approved providers; public endorsement from an outside agency such as the DfE

Class of 2010: a qualitative longitudinal study of an English secondary school that became an academy

This project was a qualitative longitudinal research study into cultural and structural change in an English secondary school. The schools’ consistent underperformance led to its conversion to ‘academy’ status as part of a development under the Labour administration of 1997-2010. The Labour policy for academisation was designed first, to challenge the culture of underachievement in areas of high deprivation and secondly, to encourage schools to play a part in local community regeneration. Our research began at the point of conversion to academy status, and we have subsequently visited the school each year to interview senior leadership, teaching staff and a sample of pupils to investigate their views on continuity and change within the institution and the impact on their own roles. Wider context for the research has been provided by annual publicly-available performance data and academy documentation. In this case-study report we consider research design and some methodological issues that we encountered during the data collection. We show how trust is an essential ingredient between researchers and participants for the project to yield rich and interesting data

School gardens and the school food plan: contributing to a culture of healthy living

Significantly revised and updated the second edition now includes 7 brand new chapters on: · Methods of Assessment and Evaluation · Global perspectives on Outdoor Learning · Developing whole school approaches to indoor and outdoor ..

Exploring schools' use of natural spaces

This chapter focuses on the changing ways in which schools are using natural spaces as part of their pupils’ learning experience. We suggest that learning in natural spaces has undergone something of a renaissance in recent times, and explore the reasons that this might be so. We then examine ways in which schools and other practitioners are using outdoor spaces for play, for non-curricular and for curricular learning. The chapter draws on a range of countries for examples that show how a nation’s cultural ideas about the outdoors can be incorporated into a country’s outdoor learning, and how other ideas travel across boundaries to be interpreted in different practical ways. Within these sections, we consider different theoretical underpinnings that inform learning outside. Finally, the benefits of and challenges to outdoor learning are considered

Natural Connections Demonstration Project, 2012- 2016: Final Report

This report presents the key findings from the Natural Connections Demonstration Project, that aimed to encourage teachers to take curricular learning outdoors. The project was commissioned by DEFRA, Natural England and Historic England, and delivered by a team at Plymouth University. 125 schools contributed to the evaluation which found that: 1. schools most likely to engage with outdoor learning displayed strong leadership and were open-minded about trying new things 2. schools reported a statistically-significant increase in the amount of time spent on outdoor learning activity across the project 3. Schools adopted many different models of outdoor learning 4. Schools invested time, goodwill, energy and funding in outdoor learning 5. Over 90 per cent of responding schools agreed that outdoor learning was useful for curriculum delivery 6. Outdoor learning had positive impacts for teachers and pupils 7. the project model of distributed independent brokerage was found to have the capacity to unlock latent demand for outdoor learning in schools, and to support schools in embedding low-cost outdoor learning practice

Racism, Prevent and education: insisting on an open space

In this article we first discuss the Brexit referendum and its links to changes in the nature of racism in England, drawing on Burnett’s (2013) work to demonstrate how ‘local conditions, national politics and global conditions’ have prompted violent racism in new areas of the country. Within this atmosphere of heightened tension, anti-Muslim abuse and attacks have risen over the past two years, with a proportion of these incidents taking place in universities. We then examine the implications of the counter-terrorist Prevent agenda, arguing that educators’ statutory duty to ‘have due regard to the need to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism’ is in considerable tension with the university statutory duty to uphold freedom of speech/academic freedom; this ‘duty of care’ effectively requires university staff to act as agents of the state. We argue that this threatens to damage trust between staff and students, restrict critical enquiry and limit discussion, particularly in the current circumstances of sector insecurity that have arisen from a combination of neoliberal policies and falling student numbers. We then examine disturbing trends that characterise students as vulnerable and university life as potentially damaging to well-being, and how these link to anti-extremism dialogue that is expressed in epidemiological and therapeutic language; the vulnerable are framed pathologically, as ‘at risk’ of radicalisation. Developing the argument on how these conditions present a threat to freedom of speech/academic freedom, in the final section we argue that universities must keep spaces open for uncertainty, controversy and disagreement

Hydrodynamic simulations of the interaction between giant stars and planets

We present the results of hydrodynamic simulations of the interaction between a 10 Jupiter mass planet and a red or asymptotic giant branch stars, both with a zero-age main sequence mass of 3.5 M⊙. Dynamic in-spiral time-scales are of the order of few years and a few decades for the red and asymptotic giant branch stars, respectively. The planets will eventually be destroyed at a separation from the core of the giants smaller than the resolution of our simulations, either through evaporation or tidal disruption. As the planets in-spiral, the giant stars’ envelopes are somewhat puffed up. Based on relatively long time-scales and even considering the fact that further in-spiral should take place before the planets are destroyed, we predict that the merger would be difficult to observe, with only a relatively small, slow brightening. Very little mass is unbound in the process. These conclusions may change if the planet's orbit enhances the star's main pulsation modes. Based on the angular momentum transfer, we also suspect that this star–planet interaction may be unable to lead to large-scale outflows via the rotation-mediated dynamo effect of Nordhaus and Blackman. Detectable pollution from the destroyed planets would only result for the lightest, lowest metallicity stars. We furthermore find that in both simulations the planets move through the outer stellar envelopes at Mach-3 to Mach-5, reaching Mach-1 towards the end of the simulations. The gravitational drag force decreases and the in-spiral slows down at the sonic transition, as predicted analytically

Diatom beta-diversity in streams increases with spatial scale and decreases with nutrient enrichment across regional to sub-continental scales

Aim To quantify the relative contributions of local community assembly processes versus gamma-diversity to beta-diversity, and to assess how spatial scale and anthropogenic disturbance (i.e. nutrient enrichment) interact to dictate which driver dominates. Location France and the United States. Time period 1993-2011. Major taxa studied Freshwater stream diatoms. Methods beta-diversity along a nutrient enrichment gradient was examined across multiple spatial scales. beta-diversity was estimated using multi-site Sorensen dissimilarity. We assessed the relative importance of specialists versus generalists using Friedley coefficient, and the contribution of local community assembly versus gamma-diversity to beta-diversity across spatial scales, with a null model. Finally, we estimated the response of beta-diversity to environmental and spatial factors by testing the correlations between community, environmental and geographical distance matrices with partial Mantel tests. Results beta-diversity generally increased with spatial scale but the rate of increase depended on nutrient enrichment level. beta-diversity decreased significantly with increasing nutrient enrichment level due to the loss of specialist species. Local assembly was an important driver of beta-diversity especially under low nutrient enrichment. Significant partial Mantel correlations were observed between diatom beta-diversity and pure environmental distances under these conditions, highlighting the role of species sorting in local assembly processes. Conversely, in heavily enriched sites, only spatial distances were significantly correlated with beta-diversity, which indicated a substantial role of dispersal processes. Main conclusions Nutrient concentration mediated the expected increase in beta-diversity with spatial scales. Across spatial scales, beta-diversity was more influenced by local assembly processes rather than by gamma-diversity. Nutrient enrichment was associated with an overall decline in diatom beta-diversity and a shift in assembly processes from species sorting to dispersal, notably due to the elimination of some specialists and their subsequent replacement by generalists.Peer reviewe

Interferometry for polarization mode dispersion measurements in single fibres

We present two interferometric techniques for the measurements of the polarization mode dispersion of standard (i.e. circular) single-mode fibers. The first method uses an interferometric loop and works in the frequency domain. The second uses a polarization maintaining Michelson interferometer and works in the time domain. Their output are related by a Fourier transformation. Both techniques provide information about the entire statistical distribution of the polarization mode delays. Also, both techniques can be applied to the characterization of installed lines. The setups are presented, the principle of the measurements are discussed and examples of results are shown

From Bipolar to Elliptical: Simulating the Morphological Evolution of Planetary Nebulae

The majority of Proto-planetary nebulae (PPN) are observed to have bipolar morphologies. The majority of mature PN are observed to have elliptical shapes. In this paper we address the evolution of PPN/PN morphologies attempting to understand if a transition from strongly bipolar to elliptical shape can be driven by changes in the parameters of the mass loss process. To this end we present 2.5D hydrodynamical simulations of mass loss at the end stages of stellar evolution for intermediate mass stars. We track changes in wind velocity, mass loss rate and mass loss geometry. In particular we focus on the transition from mass loss dominated by a short duration jet flow (driven during the PPN phase) to mass loss driven by a spherical fast wind (produced by the central star of the PN). We address how such changes in outflow characteristics can change the nebula from a bipolar to an elliptical morphology. Our results show that including a period of jet formation in the temporal sequence of PPN to PN produces realistic nebular synthetic emission geometries. More importantly such a sequence provides insight, in principle, into the apparent difference in morphology statistics characterizing PPN and PN systems. In particular we find that while jet driven PPN can be expected to be dominated by bipolar morphologies, systems that begin with a jet but are followed by a spherical fast wind will evolve into elliptical nebulae. Furthermore, we find that spherical nebulae are highly unlikely to ever derive from either bipolar PPN or elliptical PN.Comment: Accepted for publication in the MNRAS, 15 pages, 7 figure