Assessing self-responsibility in employability competencies development among Australian engineering students: introductory report

Self-responsibility study initially outlined the importance of ‘self-directed Adult learning’ either as the method or the outcome of education. Attention was given to the different interest of individual’s in accepting responsibility for their professional development. In this regard, several sources reveal the need for learners to take their own responsibility for developing employability competencies development. However, the concern must be expressed at the incompleteness of research into the personal responsibility for competency development

Student Self-Responsibility in the Indonesian Distance Education System

An ongoing concern in the distance education system in Indonesia is students' lack of commitment to ‘independent study'. The purpose of this paper is to review conceptual frameworks that could empower Indonesian students to accept responsibility for their learning at a level to address the learning challenges of distance education.  The review shows that to meet quality and equity expectations in online distance education, independent study modes should promote students' self-responsibility based primarily on both autonomy and capability.  The findings have the potential to add new perspective to education through supporting teaching and learning approaches in an online distance education class to enhance self-responsibility.  The paper suggests that students would take more control of independent learning if they accepted primary responsibility to determine their learning needs, resources, activities and outcomes.  To do this they need to view themselves as active agents with power to take independent choices that can result in creating their own approaches to resolve their learning limitation

Human resource development in construction organisations: an example of a 'chaordic' learning organisation?

Purpose/ Methodology/Approach The concept of the Learning Organisation (LO) is associated with an advanced approach to Human Resource Development (HRD) characterised by an ethos of self-responsibility and self-development. The learning climate that this engenders is supported by temporary organisational structures responsive to environmental change. This paper presents case study research of the HRD strategy, policy and practice of a large UK-based construction contractor in relation to the concept of LO. Findings The analysis suggests that the organisational project-based structure and informal culture combine to form a ‘chaordic LO’. A ‘Chaordic enterprise’ comprises a complex organisation that operates in a non-linear dynamic environment. However, it appears that this approach has evolved unintentionally rather than as a result of targeted Strategic Human Resource Management (SHRM) policies, which in turn reflects a genuine commitment to advanced HRD. Originality/value of paper The findings render previous assertions that the industry fails to invest in its employees highly questionable. They suggest a need for further research to reveal how such approaches can be captured in replicate in the future

The role of protest scenario in the neural response to the supportive communication

People are capable of understanding the suffering of distant others and of their personal responsibility in this suffering. The communication of harm and self-responsibility in the suffering of others leads to greater moral sensitivity. Two studies were carried out to test our hypotheses. In Study 1 we analyse the emotional response to the scripts using a correlational study. In Study 2 we use functional MRI to investigate brain activation associated with the communication of harm and self-responsibility in a moral scenario on supportive communication. Direct comparison between donor and protest scenarios yielded a significant activation in the left amygdala usually associated with moral emotions. Responses in supportive communication scenarios show that donors can feel personally involved in a moral issue if they perceive the harm and their selfresponsibility. Our results suggest that the creation of a communications structure based on social condemnation increases moral sensitivity to poverty

A right to a risk filled life : understanding and analysis of the risk discourse for consumers in mental health : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Social Policy at Massey University

This thesis documents the perspective and discourse of risk for eleven people who identify as someone with lived experiences of mental illness and mental health service use. The thesis followed a participatory methodology and involved consumers in both formulating and conducting the research. Following qualitative research methods some key findings included that there was a correlation between increased exposures to risk during increased acute unwellness; increased exposure to risk because of service use; that the people interviewed wished to have some control and self-responsibility in managing risks, that life was full of risk and that this was quite usual; and importantly, that risk was experienced as a stigmatizing phenomena for the participants. The stigma of risk was such that participants had to develop significant coping strategies to manage others perceptions and deal with the experience of having normal behaviours and emotions considered by others as abnormal and risky. The thesis makes recommendations for consumers, services and mental health service staff and for policy makers. Many of the recommendations consider how understandings of risk and approaches to risk management could alter or increase consumer safety and wellbeing. The thesis additionally includes an analysis of the participatory process that was followed with recommendations made encouraging an increased frequency and strengthened quality of consumer participation in research

Are Property Rights Relevant for Development Economics? On the Dangers of Western Constructivism.

Although the importance of property rights as the engine of growth remains beyond dispute, this article tries to show that the crucial issue is not so much the definition of the allegedly ‘optimal’ property right system, as the understanding of the ideological elements that justify property rights in the first place – entrepreneurship and self-responsibility. Unless one clearly perceives the nature of the ideological structure that legitimises the rules of the game in a given society, it is virtually impossible to understand why growth-conducive property-right systems fail to emerge and be accepted. Put differently, property rights are certainly necessary for growth. But they are no tools for policy-making. Getting them right – or transferring them from other contexts - is not enough, especially if their assignment and enforcement remains a top-down process, whereby local politicians or international technocrats suggest and enforce institutional arrangements experienced elsewhere.

How do facilitators of group programmes for long-term conditions conceptualise self-management support?

Objectives: Increasing self-management skills in people with long-term conditions is widely advocated in policies and guidelines. Group programmes are a common format; yet, how self-management support objectives are enacted in their delivery is poorly understood. Our aim is to explore the perspectives of group programme facilitators. Methods: We undertook thematic analysis of transcribed data from in-depth semi-structured interviews with health professional facilitators (n = 13) from six diverse self-management support group programmes (of obesity, diabetes and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease). Results: Facilitators viewed group programmes as responses to health system pressures, e.g. high patient demand. They focussed on providing in-depth education and instruction on physical health, risks and lifestyle behaviour change and emphasised self-responsibility for behaviour change whilst minimising goal setting and support amongst group participants. There were tensions between facilitators’ professional identity and group leader role

Health and safety in the United Kingdom higher education libraries: a review of the literature

The focus of this article is to review the literature relating to health and safety in UK Higher Education libraries. This will include an overview of the literature on accident theories and also the human element. Various key findings emerge from this analysis. Personal safety is achieved through self-responsibility, following guidelines and having a working knowledge of reporting procedures. A safety culture in the work environment is developed through a proactive approach on the part of management, the provision of information, training, and carrying out safety inspections. These inspections are aimed at preventing the environment from creating a situation where an accident could occur. There can never be a work environment in which no accidents will occur and best practice can only minimize the risk of accidents

Sustaining Indigenous futures? Welfare reform and responsibility for the other

Debates about the provision of welfare over the past decade have been founded upon an increasing concern with the responsibilities of welfare recipients. In Australia, as elsewhere, the emphasis has been on recipients’ responsibility to rise above their circumstances (no matter how constraining) in order to ‘give something back’ to society. This practice of ‘responsibilisation’ has recently been extended to parents and residents of certain remote Northern Territory and Far North Queensland communities, in response to an inquiry into the protection of Aboriginal children from sexual abuse (Northern Territory Government 2007). Parents and community members have an enforceable obligation to control and civilise their own conduct as well as that of their children (see Yeend & Dow 2007). The approach to welfare reform in Indigenous communities introduced by the former Howard Government is punitive and paternalistic. Aboriginal parents and community members are subject to a new income management regime in cases of child neglect or by reason of geographical location. Indeed, in seventy-three designated Northern Territory communities the reforms are obligatory and indiscriminately applied to all residents (Altman 2007, p. 311). Income management diverts all or part of a person’s hitherto inalienable benefit payments to a special account for the provision of priority needs. Worryingly, specific details about the circumstances that trigger subjection to income management—for those who do not inhabit prescribed NT communities—and the precise meaning of priority needs are not spelt out in legislation. The bill also eschews the principle of antidiscrimination (Yeend & Dow 2007, pp. 7, 4). Influential Indigenous leader Noel Pearson (2000) has long supported this kind of intervention as part of a broader solution to community dysfunction, child abuse and neglect. Indeed, the legislation implements Cape York welfare reform trials that extend income management and other measures to specified Far North Queensland communities based on recommendations put forward by Pearson and the Cape York Institute (2007). Pearson’s support for welfare reform is, however, grounded in albeit a contested positive alternative vision of reciprocal responsibility, economic development and selfdetermination. Broadly bipartisan support indicates that the latest welfare reform measures are likely to have a significant effect on the future of Indigenous citizenship. While the Howard Government has recently been replaced by a more progressive Labor government, the new government remains committed to the changes in their current form until a review scheduled for mid-2008. The review, as well as the more collaborative approach of the current government, renders careful critical analysis and public scrutiny of Indigenous welfare reform an urgent and productive task. Drawing on the work of Emmanuel Levinas (1969), this paper questions the normative assumptions underpinning these changes. Negatively, I question two frameworks for thinking about responsibility that inform Indigenous welfare reform; namely, protection and mutual obligation. Positively, I argue for an alternative approach to welfare reform that both foregrounds a sense of responsibility for the other and sustains alterity

Improving the Quality of Teaching Internships with the Help of the Platforms

This article presents an empirical study on the perceptions of university students toward the development of the teaching practicum, using the CourseSites platform as a communication and support tool for their training. The opinions of the students were collected through a questionnaire. The sample consisted of 1500 students who were registered in the degrees of Early Childhood Education, Primary Education and Pedagogy (2008-2018). A descriptive, inferential and multi-level analysis was conducted, which confirmed that future teachers had activated their professional competences, as they had the chance to share their internship experiences with their faculty members and with their own classmates