Fashion Education In Sustainability In Practice

This paper sets out the experiences of and critical reflections on devising and delivering a Masters level fashion education course in sustainability at London College of Fashion, UK. The course, first established in 2008, has been created from a collaborative, participatory, ecological paradigm and draws on an approach to fashion education that is oriented towards process, action and creative participation in all aspects of the transition to sustainability: social, environmental, economic. This stands in contrast to conventional educational models that concentrate on product or outcome and the preparation of students for economic life. The paper describes the Masters course’s broad disciplinary approach and its theoretical framework, drawn from design for sustainability. Through reference to student work, the paper goes on to set out some of the opportunities and challenges that working in this way has presented, including among others; bridging of epistemological differences at an institutional level; new roles for designers working within a framework of sustainability; and emerging ways to visualize the process and practice of sustainability

A bibliography and webliography of Arab Chicago

This Lab Note reflects the first stage of a three-year research project known as eChicago. This project is funded by the Institute for Museum and Library Services and the full title of the project is Chicago community informatics: Places, uses, resources. Our interest here is to examine the population of Chicago, in particular a subset of ethnicities and community areas, and analyze how these communities are navigating the digital age. Stage one is to understand the communities today and discover how they are represented in cyberspace. Thus our initial products include a webliography/bibliography on each community.published or submitted for publicatio

Shared talent: an exploration of the potential of the 'Shared Talent' collaborative and hands on educational experience for enhanced learning around sustainability in fashion practice

Shared Talent is a fashion for sustainability framework, developed by Dilys Williams to facilitate a means for fashion designers to exchange expertise with other protagonists across the supply chain, transcending traditional divisions, be they linguistic, geographic, or discipline based. In 2009, Shared Talent India brought together a diverse group of like-minded designers to share their ideas about fashion, challenge their motivations as designers, and question how they create collections. Equipped with research carried out through Shared Talent 1 and 2, and geographically specific research in a number of locations across India, their collaborative concepts were realised with beautiful results. Through partnership between Defra’s led Sustainable Clothing Roadmap and the Indian Government under the UK:India Sustainable Development Dialogue, Shared Talent India explored and shared knowledge on sustainable design practice with established and emerging designers, makers and NGOs. Participants included twelve designers, based both in the UK and India, suppliers and communities of Indian textile producers, buyers and undergraduates from London College of Fashion, Pearl Academy of Fashion Delhi, and Amsterdam Fashion Institute. The research outcomes aim to innovate towards improved ecological, ethical and cultural criteria in selecting and creating collections, and a means to connect designers and buyers to more sustainable textiles in India. Outputs are available as an open-source online resource to help fashion designers, researchers, students, entrepreneurs and businesses to establish strategies for sourcing sustainability from India; the resource is a culmination of the collaboration and includes contribution by key project team members, project managed by Alex McIntosh and led by Dilys Williams

Libraries as Bridges across the Digital Divide: Partnerships and Approaches Used in the U.S. Technology Opportunities Program, 1994-2005

The purpose of the poster is to show how libraries used government funds and community partnerships to close the digital divide in the United States. Part of the mission of libraries is to bridge the digital divide. As an answer to the digital divide, the U.S. government started a grant program in 1994. Over ten years, the Technologies Opportunities Program (TOP) awarded $230 million to 600 communities to promote network technology and community partnership. The digital divide is a rich concept rather than a simple binary divide. It?s something that is nuanced, multidimensional and ever-changing. Everyone is immersed in the digital divide in one respect or another because none of us are on the same plane of learning and expertise. We have learned much from the plethora of research that has taken place in communities in the United States and abroad. This study sheds like on the digital divide and how libraries have addressed it. Of the 600 projects funded by TOP, 25 were library-led: approximately 10 took place in public libraries, three in academic libraries, and 12 in library networks or other settings. This research uses the TOP Data Archive, which we created with the help of others including the U.S. Department of Commerce itself, to examine these 25 projects. We have constructed tables and word clouds to find trends and analyze the projects and partnerships and will use established network analytical methods as well. Interviews with key leaders in each of the projects will help ascertain how each project developed over time. Our governing theory is that social capital and social networks contribute to ICT use. Our questions include: How did the partnerships between the library and other organizations affect each project? How did they define success, and did they achieve it? Our first finding is that libraries adapted the grant program to their own strategic activities and did not set library work aside. Second, the libraries took three main approaches: to build computer networks with wires and fiber-optics, to build the human-computer infrastructure known as a Freenet, or to create new library programs to help their community use technology. We will also present data on the programs and the size and shape of the partnerships that carried them out. Our research has found a total of 80 partnerships across 25 separate library-led TOP projects. Each project had an average of 4.3 partnerships; with the maximum being 11 and the minimum number of partnership being one. Our analysis included a typology of partners: education, corporations, government, and organization. Educational partners include schools, colleges, universities, and other educational organizations. Corporate entities are defined as businesses or companies. Government partners maybe municipal, city, state or national government entities. Lastly, organization is a broad category that fits every type of non-profit organization, whether it be community, environmental, educational, etc. There are also four sub-categories: library, health, art, and communications. Library partners may be local, state, college, or university libraries. Health institutions are any health organization, whether government or community, or hospitals. Art partners involve art museums, local art organizations, etc. Lastly, communications partners are communication corporations, TV or radio stations, or government communication entities. The categories will allow us to investigate the relationship between the type of partners in each project and the scope and outcome of each project. The data includes 33 education partners, 28 government, 23 organization, 8 libraries, 8 communications 6 corporation, 5 health, and 3 art. In December and January we will use NetDraw to create a visual representation of the egocentric network of a library and its partners, and look for patterns. We will also carry out telephone interviews with the leaders of each project. The phone interviews will tell us about long-term projects outcomes and how the partnerships advanced or impeded each project. This poster will provide insights and suggestions to libraries that are working on the digital divide or on building partnerships. Since the U.S. has yet to catch up with the rest of the world in terms of broadband speed and utilization, the government has started another round of grants called the Broadband Technology Opportunities Program; our findings will also inform that work. Libraries have the responsibility to serve increasingly disparate populations and our poster provides an analysis of an important group of library projects which have never been presented to an international audience. This topic will be of interest to many people in the library profession, especially those dedicated to serving the public through the use of innovative technology. Relevant links: TOP archive at the University of Michigan: http://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/f/findaid/findaid-idx?c=sclead&idno=umich-spc-Power-Top Broadband Technology Opportunities Program: http://www.ntia.doc.gov/broadbandgrants

What is Community Informatics in Japan? A look at 12 cases

In this paper, we are concerned with the applicability of the concept of Community Informatics (CI) rooted in North American studies to a different context, Japan. Despite the fact that CI is a relatively new filed of study, and Japan???s intensive use of mobile information and communication technologies (ICT) are a common area to find in articles, Japanese CI practices are little known. Among major academic journals that CI scholars appear, there have none of CI articles by Japanese scholars published so far. These draw our attention. We review cases in Japan that apply and adapt information and communications technology (ICT) to local community settings. Applying Williams and Durrance???s framework encompassing community informatics practices, twelve community projects and groups were identified in the study (2007). The projects are categorized into four types based on different conceptions of ICT use in fulfilling community needs and objectives (Williams and Durrance, 2007). These are community groups, organizations, and projects that rely on (1) actual places, i.e., public computing places and cyber cafes, (2) virtual spaces, i.e. , community networks and online resources, (3) some combination of those two, and (4) organic, that is, borne out of community efforts not particularly concerned with technology but which now involve ICT. We chose an opportunistic sampling technique in order to find cases that fit in those four types of CI models. For the very first step, we draw on a small number of articles by Japanese scholars on the utilization of social network service developed by municipal offices using open source software for community development (Toyama, 2007; Shoji, 2007)

Volume 3.0: Centre for Sustainable Fashion: tactics for change

Documenting the debates raised at the Fashioning the Future Summit, a milestone event run by the CSF in October 2008, and strategising to propose new possibilities for the fashion sector which minimise the negative social, environmental and cultural effects of our practices and maximise connection, innovation and positivity. The keynote speeches from Michael McDonough, Anthony Kleanthous and Sungjoo Kim are also available to view

No. 41: The Quality of Migration Services Delivery in South Africa

The South African Department of Home Affairs (DHA) is responsible for the implementation and management of migration policy and legislation, as well as the registration of births, marriages and deaths and the issuing of identity documents and passports. It is often criticised in the media and in private conversation for being administratively inefficient, cumbersome and unwieldy. South African and foreign customers reportedly regularly complain about the poor quality of services delivered by the Department. Such evidence and media reporting underpins the widelyheld belief that the Department is not easily accessible, is unresponsive to the needs of its customers, is riddled with corruption and, to the extent that systems are in place to provide efficient and quality services, is poorly managed. In recent years, the DHA has also been plagued by a number of incidents of corruption and mismanagement and a protracted and controversial process of drafting new immigration legislation. At the same time, several incidents were reported that suggested there was significant tension between former IFP Home Affairs Minister Buthelezi and the ANC Director-General of Home Affairs. These factors contributed to the general sense that the Department was in disarray, and had not made any progress in improving its ability to deliver services in a timely manner, or towards living up to the criteria set out in the Departmental Standards brochure published in 1997. The Southern African Migration Project (SAMP) therefore proposed to test current per ceptions of the Department through a study of the quality of services delivered: the Services Quality Survey (SQS) project. In SAMP’s view, the value of implementing such a project lies in assessing and comparing the views, preferences and expectations of service consumers with those of the service providers. By developing an understanding of the constraints that hinder performance and the factors that enhance performance, the results of the SQS are intended to be used as a baseline against which to assess and benchmark current performance and service standards, and to set realistic targets and objectives to improve service delivery in the future. In the SQS project, interviews were conducted with Departmental officials, citizens and non-citizens nationwide using structur ed questionnaires. The questionnaires administered to citizens and non-citizens were largely the same, though non-citizens were also asked about their country of origin, their reason for entering the country, and how frequently they visited South Africa. The questionnaire administered to officials included questions about length of service, job satisfaction, knowledge of policies and legislation administered by the Department, national ser vice standards principles such as Batho Pele, and internal Departmental regulations and procedures. Inter views with officials, citizens and non-citizens were conducted in and around the offices of the Department that had been pre-selected in each province. At the completion of the fieldwork component of the survey, 179 officials, 2 120 citizens and 968 non-citizens had been interviewed. The SQS first sought to establish the level of familiarity that officials have with key legislation, policies administered by the Department and their impact on service delivery, as well as knowledge of internal Departmental policies and regulations: Nearly 40% of officials indicated that they were “unfamiliar” with the Immigration Act of 2002. Of these, 66% had been employed by the DHA for six years or more. An even higher 60% of officials said they were unfamiliar with the Refugees Act of 1998. This included officials at offices where staff were most likely to come into contact with asylumseekers: 53% of officials at Border Posts and 55% at Airports. Officials are more familiar with the national Batho Pele Principles of 1998, perhaps due to widespread advertising and visibility in DHA Offices. Nearly 90% were familiar with the Batho Pele principles. However, when asked to list some of Batho Pele’s most important principles, many were unable to mention them directly. With regard to the Home Affairs Turnaround Strategy launched in October of 2003, only 40% of officials had heard of the Strategy. One of the central aims of the SQS was to compare customer perceptions about the DHA with those of officials working within the Department. Amongst the most frequent anecdotal complaints heard about the DHA is that office locations are inaccessible, infrastructur e and physical conditions are poor, and resources, in terms of facilities and available equipment, are limited. When asked about proximity to, and accessibility of, DHA offices, the majority of citizens (86%) reported that it took less than one hour of travel to arrive at the office where the interview took place. The majority of citizens either traveled by taxi (42%), drove in their own car (19%) or walked (19%) to the office. Amongst non-citizens, 94% of those visiting an office, as opposed to passing through a border post or airport, were able to reach the DHA in one hour or less. Some 83% of non-citizens interviewed at a Regional Office and 73% of those at District Offices were able to reach the DHA in one hour or less. A second common complaint about the DHA is a lack of good customer service, often linked to negative attitudes of officials at the front line of interactions with the public. As one of the main focuses of the Survey, officials and customers were asked about their perceptions and experiences of service delivery in the DHA. In answering a range of questions about customer service, the majority of respondents were surprisingly positive: they felt that they were treated fairly, there was little discrimination in terms of how different groups were treated, and officials were interested in hearing what they thought. Officials and customers sampled were asked a series of questions closely linked to the Batho Pele Principles, which address service delivery issues such as consultation on service quality and choice, information, access, courtesy in treatment, transparency, redress, and value for money. Here, while it was apparent that officials and customers were aware of the Batho Pele programme, familiarity with its principles, and the extent to which the Department was implementing these principles, was not as good. To further understand how DHA customers are treated, specific questions were asked about perceptions of the attitudes of Departmental staff. Official, citizen and non-citizen respondents were asked whether DHA staff within the office where the interview took place were: friendly or unfriendly, attentive or inattentive, cooperative or uncooperative, patient or impatient, helpful or unhelpful, considerate or inconsiderate, polite or impolite, at ease or anxious, honest or misleading, trusting or suspicious, knowledgeable or not knowledgeable, and interested or not interested in their jobs. Across the citizens and non-citizens sampled, the results of the survey show that customers felt the attitudes of DHA staff were extremely positive overall. Interestingly, officials themselves were somewhat less positive about the attitudes of DHA staff. Customers were asked a series of questions on their experiences with service delivery at the DHA on the day they were interviewed, as this was thought to have a likely impact on whether respondents viewed the Department positively or negatively overall. Rates of satisfaction with the customer service received were also consistently high, with 87% of citizens and 92% of non-citizens reporting that they were satisfied with the level of service they had received. Similarly, 85% of citizens and 92% of non-citizens responded that they were satisfied with their overall experience as a customer at the Department of Home Affairs on the day they were interviewed. In addition to examining satisfaction levels on the day they were interviewed, customers and officials were asked more generally about their opinions on the current performance of the DHA. Again, in terms of overall performance, efficiency, fair treatment and general satisfaction with service delivery, the majority of customers expressed positive views. Similarly, in terms of levels of corruption and trustworthiness, very few customers and officials believe that corruption is a widespread problem. At the same time, customers and officials expressed a low level of tolerance for practices that might constitute or lead to corruption, though non-citizens appear to have a slightly higher level of tolerance for such practices. Very few respondents reported actual experiences of corruption, either directly or indirectly. In overall terms, the survey results suggest that perhaps the DHA is not in such a crisis in terms of service delivery, customer relations, and attitudes of staff. The customers sampled were positively disposed towards the Department, and were optimistic regarding its ability to continue delivering quality services. It is not possible to explain exactly why these findings are so inconsistent with media depictions, anecdotal evidence of broader public opinion, and the negative assessment made by the Director-General himself. However, it is important to understand the contextual factors that may have contributed to shaping the opinions and perceptions of the respondents. Further, the positive results of the survey do not mean that there are no problems or issues to be addressed within Home Affairs. Although the results of the survey indicate a higher quality of service delivery than perhaps originally anticipated, the question to ask is whether there are measures that the DHA can take to further enhance the positive perceptions of its customers and officials and to improve service delivery. Finally, the results presented in this report provide baseline data and a benchmark against which to measure the future performance of the Department, particularly in terms of levels of customer satisfaction with service quality. One of the key recommendations made in this report is that consideration should be given to administering a similar survey at regular intervals as a means of continuous assessment and as a basis for ongoing efforts to improve performance and the quality of services

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Exploring the Efficacy of a Lumbo-Pelvic-Hip Injury Reduction Strategy in Professional Rugby Union

Objectives: The aim of this study was to implement a complete sequence of prevention (Van Mechelen, et al 1987) to reduce lumbo-pelvic-hip (LPH) injuries in a professional men’s rugby union team and examine its effectiveness. A secondary aim was to examine, on completion of the tailored program, the players’ perceptions of injury reduction programmes. Design: Insider action research using an ecological mixed methods design. Methods: In season 1 baseline injury surveillance data was collected to establish the extent of the LPH injury problem. In season 2 and 3, a preseason screening battery of hip and groin strength measures were administered pre and post the completion of a Yo-Yo IR1 test. Based on the change scores of the strength measures, the players were prescribed a tailored preventative exercise program that was followed during their lower limb strength sessions throughout the season. As part of the end of season 2 review, players were anonymously questioned on injury reduction programmes and their implementation. Injury surveillance data was prospectively recorded throughout. Results: The use of a tailored injury reduction programme aimed at reducing LPH injuries in professional rugby union successfully reduced total severity of injuries (936d v 417d in season 3). Average severity was significantly reduced across the three seasons (78d v 12.6d in season 3). Prevalence also reduced (21% v 13% in season 3) when compared to the baseline season 1. Players reported that they are confident in their ability to engage with injury reduction programmes providing it was individualised, written by the medical team/strength and conditioning staff in conjunction with the players themselves and performed under supervision by the medical team. Conclusions: A tailored LPH injury reduction programme can reduce total severity, average severity and prevalence of LPH injuries. Players’ reported that injury reduction programmes 4 are socially appropriate, important and expected in an elite environment. Insider action research should be considered when looking to implement injury prevention research in the real world setting