An investigation on the unwillingness of nodes to participate in mobile delay tolerant network routing

Message routing in mobile delay tolerant networks inherently relies on the cooperation between nodes. In most existing routing protocols, the participation of nodes in the routing process is taken as granted. However, in reality, nodes can be unwilling to participate. We first show in this paper the impact of the unwillingness of nodes to participate in existing routing protocols through a set of experiments. Results show that in the presence of even a small proportion of nodes that do not forward messages, performance is heavily degraded. We then analyze two major reasons of the unwillingness of nodes to participate, i.e., their rational behavior (also called selfishness) and their wariness of disclosing private mobility information.     

Planning for the Internationalization of a Postgraduate Professional Degree Programme in Library and Information Science

The School of Library and Information Science of the University of South Florida, that has been a pioneer in distance education, has decided to internationalize its offerings with Ibero-America in mind. This article describes some of the steps the School has taken in order to prepare itself for the challenges, particularly cultural and linguistic ones, posed by international students. Given that the level of performance of both traditional and distance students seems to be about identical, the School of Library and Information Service is looking forward to a successful and culturally enriching experience.     

Are teachers’ approaches to teaching responsive to individual student variation? A two-level structural equation modeling

In the framework of teacher’s approaches to teaching, this study investigates the relationship between student-related variables (i.e., study time, class absence, domain knowledge, and homework completion), students’ approaches to learning, and teachers’ approaches to teaching using structural equation modeling (SEM) with two independent data samples. The participants were 61 biology teachers and their corresponding 1,518 high school students (12th grade). The first sample was used to fit the model, and the second sample was used to analyze the consistency of the data derived from the first sample. Using a two-level SEM analysis, we established whether the effects found at the individual level varied significantly at class level. The students’ approaches to learning were related to the teachers’ approaches to teaching as a function of the hypotheses established in the model, although the effect size was smaller than expected. However, approximately 48 % of the variance of the surface approach and 46 % of the deep approach sat at class level. At the individual level, the results of this study suggest that students’ approaches to learning significantly explain their teachers’ approaches to teaching and, thus, constitute important contextual variables. At the class level, the way students learn appears to be closely associated with class-related variables. Our data stresses the importance of promoting educational opportunities (e.g., school-based courses) for teachers to reflect upon the teaching methodologies used in class.     

Historians, archivists, and social activism: benefits and costs

This article explores how activism by historians and archivists relates to and affects their work and how their work affects their activism. The findings are based on a survey of 195 historians (including educators) and archivists who self-identified as “someone who takes part in activities that are intended to achieve social or political change, especially someone who is a member of an organization.” The respondents participate in a wide variety of causes. Typically, their activities as activists reflect their professional skills and concerns, with a large majority involved in collecting and preserving the records of activist organizations. The article examines the benefits and costs for employers of employee activism, concluding the benefits outweigh the costs. The article also examines how activism affects the relationship between employers and their activist employees. While many activists receive recognition and other benefits from their employers for their activism, a minority suffers negative consequences up to and including firing and a substantial number feel inhibited from activism by their employers. The article also explores the effects of activism for the different occupational groups, determining that they are relatively similar but with some differences.     

Cognitions,Emotions, and Applications: Participants' Experiences of Learning about Strengths in an Academic Library

This study examined academic library employees' experiences during “strengths education,” a process of learning about individual strengths during a positive psychology intervention. Participants took the Clifton StrengthsFinder test, attended a workshop, and then were interviewed about what they considered to be the effects of the strengths training. The focus of the qualitative analysis was the interviewees' statements about the intrapersonal and interpersonal effects of learning about their strengths. We categorized and coded these statements as cognitions formed, emotions experienced, and applications envisioned. Our findings raise interesting implications for job satisfaction and employee self-esteem, especially during times of change.     

Controversy and Challenge: British Funding Increases Nationally,But Not to National Museums

The United Kingdom's economic backdrop, according to Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown, has never looked better. Massive amounts of new funding are being invested in the National Health Service, Education and Social Services—tens of billions of pounds. Investment in the U.K.'s 10‐year Science and Innovation strategy has risen to over £3 billion per annum. Investment in Arts Council Funding will have increased 69 percent in the eight years since 1997, to over £410 million per annum by 2005–2006. And attendance at national museums and galleries has increased over 60 percent since admission charges were ended in 2001–2002. But in the field of science and technology there is a scattering of less‐well‐known data. More than 30 departments of chemistry and physics have closed at universities around Britain in the last few years. The take‐up rate of students entering science and mathematics, and subjects leading to technological, engineering, and medical degrees, among certain socio‐economic groups, has been falling dramatically. Even wealthy industries such as the oil and gas sector cannot attract young people—especially young women—to engineering, despite the fact that engineers with less than a decade of experience earn an average of U.S. $75,000 a year, and when fully experienced, an average of U.S. $127,000 a year. Overall, it seems that the ability of the public to interrogate issues driven by changes in science and technology, and their level of trust, are effectively decreasing.     

Developing Diversity Through Specialisation in Secondary Education: Comparing approaches in New Zealand and England

The paper compares approaches to curriculum specialisation in secondary education in New Zealand and England. In both countries there have been movements towards increased specialisation, though these have been quite different in form and scope. In both countries specialisation cannot be divorced from broader education policies designed to increase devolution and choice and the paper discusses these contexts before analysing the different approaches to specialisation and attempting an explanation. The authors draw on findings from research undertaken in New Zealand schools. The paper identifies three dimensions that have played a part in influencing curriculum specialisation in both countries. These are opportunity, source of impetus and support. It is argued that while local initiative is possible in New Zealand, central planning and guidance is inadequate. In England while central planning is strong and support is available, it is far from clear that real specialisation is encouraged by existing curriculum and assessment frameworks. In these circumstances in both countries it seems likely that vertical, rather than horizontal, diversity will continue to hold sway.