Visitor expenditure within a mountain bike event portfolio: Determinants,outcomes, and variations

Gradually community and scholarly support for large-scale sport events is declining as sustainability and efficiency are becoming primary concerns. Thus, a drive for the creation of small-scale event portfolios that comply with a community’s resources and infrastructure is developing. In the current study, a portfolio of four small-scale mountain bike events located in the Northwest United States were investigated to better understand their impact on the local economy. An online survey was conducted after each event that assessed visitor spending, travel behavior, and participant demographics resulting in a total sample of N?=?614. Through general linear modeling, chi-square testing, and multiple regression each of the four events were compared with each other and determinants of visitor expenditure were tested. The results demonstrated the four events significantly differed in regards to total expenditure, daily expenditure, daily expenditure per person, trip duration, amount of travel party event participants, travel distance, age, income, and lodging type/location. Overall expenditure and daily expenditure per person were found to be significantly determined by participant travel distance, travel party size, trip duration, and income. Managerial implications derived from these results for destinations and event organizers are discussed.     

They think all of this is new: Leveraging librarians' project management skills for the digital humanities

ABSTRACT

This article will explore how to develop the holistic project management planning (PMP) mindset in different parts of the library when undertaking digital humanities (DH) projects. PMP skills do exist within libraries and librarians, but organizational alignment typically does not allow for the most effective applications of librarians' PMP skills to DH projects. This article will explore how the skills of public services librarians, technical services librarians and administrative librarians align with the PMP phases and the challenges that each kind of librarian has to overcome in completing successful DH projects.     

A comparative analysis of national media responses to the OECD Survey of Adult Skills: policy making from the global to the local?

The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development’s (OECD) Programme of International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC) is put forward as a landmark development in the lifelong monitoring and international comparison of education. The first round of PIAAC’s Survey of Adult Skills compared performance in literacy, numeracy and problem solving in technology-rich environments across 24 countries. However, the translation of any OECD agenda into national policies is mediated by many actors, including the media. This paper examines and compares how the national media of Japan, England and France reported on the PIAAC results of their countries and the extent to which these reports mirror key messages from the OECD’s Country Notes. It begins to trace how the OECD PIAAC agendas materialise into national policies. Although their role in this initial period was limited, we argue the roles of the media together with other policy actors must be monitored as they interact to shape possibilities for sustainable adult education policies.     

Analysis of Propagation Plans in NSF-Funded Education Development Projects

Increasing adoption and adaptation of promising instructional strategies and materials has been identified as a critical component needed to improve science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education. This paper examines typical propagation practices and resulting outcomes of proposals written by developers of educational innovations. These proposals were analyzed using the Designing for Sustained Adoption Assessment Instrument (DSAAI), an instrument developed to evaluate propagation plans, and the results used to predict the likelihood that a successful project would result in adoption by others. We found that few education developers propose strong propagation plans. Afterwards, a follow-up analysis was conducted to see which propagation strategies developers actually used to help develop, disseminate, and support their innovations. A web search and interviews with principal investigators were used to determine the degree to which propagation plans were actually implemented and to estimate adoption of the innovations. In this study, we analyzed 71 education development proposals funded by the National Science Foundation and predicted that 80% would be unsuccessful in propagating their innovations. Follow-up data collection with a subset of these suggests that the predictions were reasonably accurate.     

Developing the capacity of farmers to understand and apply seasonal climate forecasts through collaborative learning processes

Purpose: This paper documents and evaluates collaborative learning processes aimed at developing farmer’s knowledge, skills and aspirations to use seasonal climate forecasting (SCF). Methodology: Thirteen workshops conducted in 2012 engaged over 200 stakeholders across Australian sugar production regions. Workshop design promoted participant interaction, stimulated discussion, collected farmer experience of regional climate variability, improved understanding of climate drivers and increased participant skill in interpreting SCF linked to management decisions. Post-workshop surveys collected quantitative and qualitative data for statistical analysis and manual thematic coding. Findings: Over 68% of participants identified improved decision-making and risk reduction as the main benefits of using SCF products. High median self-evaluation ratings for gains in skills, knowledge and understanding of climate forecasts and perceived benefits in using climate forecasts in on-farm decision-making were found across stakeholder groups. No significant differences in self-evaluation rating gains were found between farmers, extension officers and millers, suggesting extension officers are less than optimally informed and skilled to support farmers in understanding and applying SCF. Practical Implications: Developing the capacity of extension officers to understand and interpret SCF may increase adoption of improved climate risk management in farmer networks. Theoretical implications: Collaborative learning activities in the agriculture sector, designed using experiential learning principles and evaluated using a logical framework, provide a robust model for improving the capacity of farmers to manage climate risk. Originality/Value: This paper contributes an example of evaluation of collaborative learning in facilitated agriculture climate risk workshops and discusses the value of learning through small group discussion.     

Collaborative research in contexts of inequality: the role of social reflexivity

This article reports on the role and value of social reflexivity in collaborative research in contexts of extreme inequality. Social reflexivity mediates the enablements and constraints generated by the internal and external contextual conditions impinging on the research collaboration. It fosters the ability of participants in a collaborative project to align their interests and collectively extend their agency towards a common purpose. It influences the productivity and quality of learning outcomes of the research collaboration. The article is written by fourteen members of a larger research team, which comprised 18 individuals working within the academic development environment in eight South African universities. The overarching research project investigated the participation of academics in professional development activities, and how contextual, i.e. structural and cultural, and agential conditions, influence this participation. For this sub-study on the experience of the collaboration by fourteen of the researchers, we wrote reflective pieces on our own experience of participating in the project towards the end of the third year of its duration. We discuss the structural and cultural conditions external to and internal to the project, and how the social reflexivity of the participants mediated these conditions. We conclude with the observation that policy injunctions and support from funding agencies for collaborative research, as well as support from participants’ home institutions are necessary for the flourishing of collaborative research, but that the commitment by individual participants to participate, learn and share, is also necessary.