Tapping into existing information flows: The transformation to compliance by design in business-to-government information exchange

Transforming Business-to-Government (B2G) information exchange is a next frontier for reducing government spending while improving performance. This paper examines two different B2G information exchange architectures that reflect continuing transformations that empower some government agencies to do better compliance monitoring tasks with fewer resources. The win for the reporting companies is the lower cost of compliance. Instead of focusing on collecting compliance information from individual companies, the government agencies in this study focus on collecting information on the supply chain level, allowing for automated data reconciliation. Our findings reveal that pushing controls (automated checks) upstream (in company software and data sources) results in more efficiency, higher information quality and reduces redundant controls. The examined architectures exhibit high levels of compliance by design, meaning that many control objectives are by default encompassed in the design. This requires a well-aligned combination of data standardization (using shared syntax and semantics) and automated information processing (using an intelligent gateway between businesses and government agencies). However, achieving such an alignment is a difficult challenge; especially when taking into account that such transformations require solid governance, trust and high initial investments — prerequisites that are rare in many public-private partnerships.     

Country Briefing: Special education in Denmark

Denmark is a country with a relatively high expenditure on education, and was one of the first countries in the Integration movement. Now the country is including all but 1.25 per cent of all pupils in a comprehensive school. The 1.25 per cent are attending special schools or special classes. To make this possible, 13 per cent of all students in regular schools on a yearly basis receive special needs education support as a supplement to regular education. Special education within the regular school system has existed for 99 years, and special teacher training has a 66-year history, originating in training of speech therapists. At present, the prevalence of special needs education is between 25 and 35 per cent, and this gives rise to questions about the relation between special needs education and differentiation of instruction which, in turn, has implications for training of teachers in special needs education.     

Behavioural disorders in Danish schools: a quantitative survey

Behavioural problems in schools have been a topic of political debate in Denmark recently. The last time the topic was in the news was before the establishing of special educational provisions for pupils with social and emotional disorders in the 1960s. As a result of the recent debate, a national survey was made. It shows that the incidence of serious problems is 10 per cent. Comparisons with earlier studies indicate that there is an increase in behavioural problems during the first years of primary schooling. A multivariate analysis shows that pupils gender, the degree of urbanization, teacher experience and geographical location are significant predictors of disturbance, while school size, class size, teacher age and gender are insignificant.     

Tailor-made: Towards a pedagogy for educating second-career teachers

Many countries suffer from teacher shortages. One possible solution to this problem is to recruit second-career teachers. These second-career teachers form an intriguing group. They bring an abundance of previous experiences into a new, professional domain. The purpose of this study is to identify pedagogical principles that support the training of second-career teachers. Special attention is given to the transfer of previous experiences obtained in different professional contexts. The literature on alternative certification programmes is reviewed from a pedagogical perspective. The results indicate that second-career teachers differ from first-career teachers in several respects. These differences appear to be related to their previous experiences. The differences also appear to influence their professional development. The study suggests that a tailor-made pedagogy for second-career teachers is needed, along with certain programme features, which take into account the specific needs of this group of students. Four design principles were identified, i.e.: addressing expectations, addressing challenges related to the transition to teaching, addressing transfer and developing a theory of practice.     

The language and literacy development of young dual language learners: A critical review

The number of children living in the United States who are learning two languages is increasing greatly. However, relatively little research has been conducted on the language and literacy development of dual language learners (DLLs), particularly during the early childhood years. To summarize the extant literature and guide future research, a critical analysis of the literature was conducted. A search of major databases for studies on young typically developing DLLs between 2000 and 2011 yielded 182 peer-reviewed articles.     

The Tasks of the Class Teacher: Tradition and Renewal – An Evaluation of Development Projects Carried out in the Danish Folkeskole

This paper firstly outlines some of the problems children can experience as a result of transferring from primary to secondary school. It then goes on to describe an initiative by the West Midlands Quaker Peace Education Project, Blessed William Howard Roman Catholic School in Stafford and its feeder schools to coordinate a secondary school preparation project. This involved special training for all primary pupils about to enter the school and a group of sixth formers.     

Additional cross-cultural validity testing of the Intercultural Development Inventory

Intercultural competence/sensitivity is increasingly recognized across the global spectrum of educational institutions, corporations, government agencies and non-government organizations as a central capability for the 21st century. The Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI) is an assessment tool that measures the level of intercultural competence/sensitivity across a developmental continuum for individuals, groups, and organizations and represents a theoretically grounded measure of this capability for perceiving cultural differences and commonalities and modifying behavior to cultural context. This study represents additional cross-cultural validity testing of the IDI, building on the previous work of Paige, Jacobs-Cassuto, Yershova, and DeJaeghere (2003) and Hammer, Bennett, and Wiseman (2003). The 50 items from IDI v2 were administered to 4763 individuals from 11 distinct, cross-cultural samples. Confirmatory factor analysis confirms the following basic orientations toward cultural difference originally explicated by [Bennett, 1986] and [Bennett, 1993] in the Developmental Model of Intercultural Sensitivity (DMIS): Denial, Defense, Reversal, Minimization, Acceptance, and Adaptation. In addition, it also identifies Cultural Disengagement as an additional scale within the IDI; but one that is not located along the developmental continuum. Second, the inter-scale correlations support the theoretically proposed, developmental formulation from Denial through Adaptation. Third, the current analysis offers strong support for an overall Developmental Orientation (DO) scale and an overall Perceived Orientation (PO) scale. Fourth, Minimization is found to be a transitional orientation toward cultural differences and commonalities, between the more monocultural (ethnocentric) orientations of Denial and Polarization (Defense, Reversal) and the more intercultural mindsets of Acceptance and Adaptation. Fifth, readability analysis indicates the IDI is appropriate for high (secondary) school students (age 15 or above) or individuals with a 10th grade reading level. Finally, criterion validity of the IDI was assessed. The results indicate that the IDI has strong predictive validity toward bottom-line goals within organizations; namely, the achievement of diversity and inclusion goals in the recruitment and staffing function. These findings complement previous results that demonstrated that the IDI also possesses strong content and construct validity across culture groups.