Teacher efficacy of English teachers in urban and suburban schools

To investigate the context-related teacher efficacy (TE) of experienced teachers in Taiwan, this study examined elementary English teachers more than a decade after a major educational reform to determine whether their TE levels were affected by school location (e.g. urban vs. suburban). The 438 responses to the adapted Teacher Efficacy Scale revealed stronger efficacy regarding the teachers’ personal ability to teach less-motivated students and less confidence regarding the management of school- and government-related concerns. However, school settings did not show a significant effect on the efficacy levels of experienced English teachers. Although caution must be practiced in interpreting results related to school settings and TE, the findings from the current study are generalizable to contexts in which English is spoken as a foreign language. The results also urge much caution when making interpretation on results relating to school settings and TE.     

JOHN DEWEY ON LISTENING AND FRIENDSHIP IN SCHOOL AND SOCIETY

In this essay, Leonard Waks examines John Dewey's account of listening, drawing on Dewey's writings to establish a direct connection in his work between listening and democracy. Waks devotes the first part of the essay to explaining Dewey's distinction between one‐way or straight‐line listening and transactional listening‐in‐conversation, and to demonstrating the close connection between transactional listening and what Dewey called “cooperative friendship.” In the second part of the essay, Waks establishes the further link between Dewey's notions of cooperative friendship and democratic society with particular reference to machine‐age technologies of mass communication. He maintains that while these technologies provide the means for extending communications throughout modern industrial nations, they simultaneously undermine the conditions fostering face‐to‐face listening‐in‐conversation. It remains an open question, Waks concludes, whether new educational arrangements incorporating interactive digital communication technologies will embody and promote transactional listening‐in‐conversation and revitalized democratic community.     

黄石市中小企业信息化的SWOT分析报告

中小企业信息化对于提升企业竞争力、促进国民经济发展具有非常重要的意义。本文针对湖北老工业城市——黄石的中小企业信息化建设现状进行SWOT分析,从政府主管部门、中小企业自身、集群信息技术服务公共平台三个角度,提出适合黄石中小企业信息化建设健康发展的改进建议。     

技术截断下的中国民营汽车企业能力升级研究:以奇瑞、比亚迪和吉利为例

对新兴经济技术转移的截断效应往往阻碍了通过合资方式完成的技术能力升级,而有些民营企业却能够成功升级,这正是我国汽车行业正在经历的一个现实。从近期我国一些民营汽车企业技术快速发展的现实入手,分析在国际化中奇瑞、比亚迪和吉利三个企业的技术获取和能力成长路径,以阐释企业如何克服截断效应,实现能力的快速积累与发展。分析显示:在不同的能力成长阶段,根据自身能力特点充分利用国际技术来源是企业技术成长的主要途径。带给企业的启示就是要具有创新欲望,在国际合作中保持主动权,并拥有国际化视野,实现国际化中的技术能力升级。     

DEWEY'S THEORY OF THE DEMOCRATIC PUBLIC AND THE PUBLIC CHARACTER OF CHARTER SCHOOLS

In this essay, Leonard Waks reconsiders the issue of the public character of charter schools, that is, schools funded through public taxation but operated by non‐state organizations such as nonprofit and for‐profit educational corporations and nongovernmental public interest organizations. Using John Dewey's conception of a democratic public as a framework, Waks examines the following questions: (1) Are schools chartered and funded by government, but operated by nonprofit nongovernmental organizations, ever appropriate instruments of a democratic public? (2) If so, what criteria might distinguish those that are appropriate from those that are not? (3) How might public education be re‐institutionalized so as to include the charter schools that are appropriate? Waks concludes that Dewey's theory of democratic publics can play a useful role in thinking about how to balance the democratic benefits of charter schools for the various subcommunities of our society with the democratic requirement of broad public discourse and intergroup education.