Inter-project learning: processes and outcomes of knowledge codification in project-based firms

In this paper, we argue that the literature on knowledge codification has been overly concerned with the economic properties of its outcomes, neglecting the importance of its underlying learning processes. Following Zollo and Winter [Organisation Science, 2001, in press], the paper distinguishes three learning processes: experience accumulation, knowledge articulation and knowledge codification and suggests a framework to analyse the learning abilities of project-based firms. We propose that mechanisms for inter-project learning draw upon these learning processes and can be found at various levels of the project-based firm. Using empirical evidence from six case studies, we discern three empirical patterns, that we defined learning landscapes, of such mechanisms. Implications for the literature and practice of knowledge codification are discussed.     

Behavioural and emotional problems in hearing impaired children: a preliminary study of teacher and parent ratings

A case study of what appears to be an inclusive classroom in Sweden is reported. The group of children in the class studied was very heterogeneous: five of the 15 children had a disability diagnosis at the time of the study. One aim of the study was to develop a methodology which can be used in order to investigate in what sense classrooms are ‘inclusive’, especially as regards the point of view of the pupils. It is argued that an explicit definition of characteristics of inclusive classrooms and clear‐cut methods to study those characteristics are necessary prerequisites in order to reach valid conclusions concerning what teaching strategies are central to inclusive processes. The data consist of interviews with the teachers and children involved, sociograms, a questionnaire answered by the children, notes from participant observations and poetry by the children. The analyses suggest that the classroom seems to be inclusive, although it is emphasised that this is not an all‐or‐none phenomenon, especially children's experiences are complex phenomena. It is argued that the teachers try to create a learning community where differences are valued. Six teacher strategies emerged from the data.     

Distance and intrastate college student migration

Most studies of student migration focus on interstate migration of college students, largely because the aggregate data typically used are limited in geographic specificity to states. However, interstate migration is only a small part of the total student migration. Public institutions generally get most of their students from within their state; for example, 88 percent of first-time freshmen who enrolled in University System of Georgia institutions in 2002 graduated from Georgia schools. Such intrastate migration is seldom considered. This paper examines intrastate college student migration, using data for Georgia. Aside from such traditional measures of benefits and costs like tuition, financial aid, and school quality, a crucial explanatory variable in our analysis is the distance from a student's home to the different Georgia state institutions. Our empirical results indicate that student intrastate migration is strongly discouraged by greater distance, but with effects that differ across types of higher education institutions.     

Mentor Programmes-A Shortcut for Women's Academic Careers?

This article reports on a formal mentoring project that ran for eighteen months at the University of Uppsala, in Sweden. It investigates the experiences of fourteen women academics at junior and mid-level who were paired with senior academics. Mentoring occurs informally in academic as well as in other types of organizations, yet little in terms of hard evidence is known about its effects. In this case, the investigators wished to learn if mentoring in an academic context could contribute to a narrowing of the gender gap in Swedish higher education. The conclusion was that mentoring makes enough of a difference to the junior faculty concerned that it should be undertaken openly and made available to all junior faculty members wishing to be mentored.     

Doubly Dominated

Based on comprehensive surveys in 2005 and 2013 among journalists, professional critics, and artists in Norway, this article analyses the cultural journalists’ position within the fields of journalism and culture. Although increasingly adhering to journalistic ideals and becoming more similar to other journalists through education and social recruitment, cultural journalism is still not the place to gain prestige and honour in the journalistic field. As cultural journalists tend to be recruited more from journalism schools than from higher education in the humanities, they also lack the skills and knowledge to be properly recognized within the cultural field. Cultural journalists seem to occupy a subordinated position in both fields—they are doubly dominated. The analysis also shows increasing differences between cultural journalists and professional critics. Cultural journalists are more anti-elite and populist in their view on culture than critics (and artists), and they are more likely than these groups to be supportive of the idea of culture as a private realm of leisure that should be guided more strongly by economic interests. There are signs of a division of labour where critique and high culture are left to professional critics, while employed cultural journalists with less formal competence adopt an advisory role in the realm of popular culture. With increasing coverage of popular culture and traditional criticism under pressure, these are signs of a less-critical cultural journalism that falls short of the idea of a cultural public sphere as a site for acquiring intellectual and cultural resources to (better) cope with the complexities of modern life.