Hospitals and consumer health information in New Zealand: the role of the library

A research project was conducted with the primary objective of finding out what New Zealand hospitals are doing about providing consumer health information to patients, and specifically, the role played by hospital libraries. A database was compiled of all New Zealand hospitals, both public and privately funded. An individual responsible for consumer health information was identified at each hospital and a questionnaire sent directly to them. A 64% response rate was achieved, representing 196 hospitals. Fifty‐four hospitals reported having an in‐house Library or Information Centre for patients, but the materials and services provided varied widely. Results from this survey show that the provision of consumer health information in the hospital sector in New Zealand is ad hoc, and libraries are not necessarily involved.     

Voices from Manukau: recruitment and success of traditionally under represented undergraduate groups in New Zealand

This paper describes a research project, “Voices from Manukau”, that investigated the impact of a joint initiative by a university and an institute of technology in New Zealand. The purpose of the initiative was to increase the participation of students traditionally under represented at tertiary-level study, particularly Māori (indigenous people) and individuals from Pacific Island nations. Many of the participants were adults who had not experienced high levels of success during their compulsory period of education and they lived in low socio-economic areas. We found that participation of under-represented groups increased. The “Manukau” students were as successful as other undergraduate students studying at the university. Of particular interest was the high level of success of Māori and Pacific Island students.     

EVALUATING FOR COURSE IMPROVEMENT: A CASE STUDY

This paper describes a method of evaluating courses in which taking action is integral, that is, one in which the adoption of desirable change is built into the process of evaluating. This method starts from participants’ definitions of evaluation‐worthy issues and through a number of procedural stages enables them to refine, prioritize and reach a consensus on these issues. The process of evaluation is designed to motivate participants to improve their practice, the practice being teaching for tutors, learning for students and managing for course leaders. By improving this practice it is expected that appropriate change in the structure, content and operation of the course will occur. The arguments are illustrated by reference to the evaluation of a course leading to a post graduate Certificate in Education (PGCE).     

Speech and language therapy provision for children using augmentative and alternative communication systems

A proportion of children with physical impairments experience significant difficulties in communicating with others and may be recommended augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) systems such as speech synthesizers and symbol charts to support ‘natural’ communication skills. However, AAC systems are often under-utilized. Parents have identified barriers to AAC system use to include the organization of speech and language therapy. Speech and language therapists are developing services to school-aged children in response to changes in education, health reforms and models of speech and language development. However, there is little evidence for commissioners of children's services about what constitutes ‘enough’ or ‘good’ speech and language therapy. This paper examines speech and language therapy provision to 23 children using AAC systems in six London authorities. Research strategies include documenting the amount, type, organization and objectives of provision. Evidence for collaboration between school staff and therapists is explored, analysis is made of child characteristics associated with provision and criteria for decision-making documented through interviews with therapists. However, little conjunction exists between what therapists said guided their decision-making concerning provision and observed provision. For the children surveyed in this study it seems that that provision in amount of therapy is related to educational placement rather than individual needs.     

A Typology of Parental Involvement in Education Centring on Children and Young People: Negotiating familialisation,institutionalisation and individualisation

This article explores the widespread emphasis on parental involvement in education from the perspectives of children and young people. In contrast to the conceptualisation of children as variable social actors, policy initiatives to link home and school more effectively, and research-generated typologies of parental involvement, unthinkingly familialise and institutionalise children by ignoring any part they may play in parental involvement in their education. Drawing on data from our study of children's understandings of home-school relations, we develop and elaborate a typology that centres on the complex ways that children and young people talk about creating, acceding to, and resisting their parents' involvement in their education. The socially patterned differences between the children and young people's understandings and experiences demonstrate how the broad social processes of familialisation, institutionalisation and individualisation are, in fact, concretely lived and negotiated in variable ways. Nevertheless, there are also some commonalities in children and young people's resistance around notions of privacy.     

Educational change in post-conflict contexts: reflections on the South African experience 20 years later

ABSTRACT

Reflecting on South African experience, this paper develops an analytical framework using the work of Henri Lefebvre and Nancy Fraser to understand why socially just arrangements may be so difficult to achieve in post-conflict reconstruction. The paper uses Lefebvre's analytic to trace three sets of entangled practices (perceived–conceived–lived) as evident in education in post-apartheid South Africa in order to illustrate the complexity that is entailed in a particular moment of social reconstruction. Coupled with this approach, It draws on Fraser's analytic to show how the different forms of social injustice and their different remedies (redistribution–recognition–representation) may easily shift and slip in times of complex change. The paper shows that post-conflict reconstruction in education requires a number of different social practices that are not easily orchestrated.     

Dangerous activities within an invisible playground: a study of emergent male football play and teachers’ perspectives of outdoor free play in the early years of primary school

This research was carried out during a study which focused upon the rough and tumble play of children in the early years department of a suburban primary school in northern England. The child sample’s playtime activities were ethnographically observed over a period of 18 calendar months, during which time interviews were also carried out with the children’s class teachers and several other adults taking part in the children’s daily school routines. It was found that the narratives created by a cohort of four‐and‐a‐half‐ to six‐and‐a‐half‐year‐old boys around their football (soccer) play were socially and symbolically complex, providing evidence that such play is a highly valuable developmental activity. However, the interview data indicated that owing principally to very low adult:child ratios in playground supervision, the focus of the adults was strongly directed towards negative aspects of outdoor free play.