Diversity of occupational orientations in Sales vocational education and training

The article examines the ways students in the school-based part of the vocational education and training (VET) in Sales begin to make sense of the world of work they are about to enter. Drawing on a qualitative study of upper-secondary Sales VET students in Norway, a four-fold typology of orientations to retail work is analysed: first, the disoriented Drifter who is restless and eager to move on to other activities or drifts on to retail apprenticeship without developing any substantial interest; second, the product-oriented Consumer is driven by a strong personal interest in the line of products, for example fashion, music, cars or electronics, and the sense of lifestyle they convey; third, the service-oriented Professional reasons on the basis of satisfaction deriving from the act of providing service to customers; and fourth, the career-oriented Aspirer who is motivated by career advancement opportunities within the retail sector. The article aimed to extend understandings of the initial process of becoming by elucidating the students’ subjective accounts of their diverse paths into retail work within the weakly established Sales education, approaching a labour market sector depicted in terms of low-skill and high turnover.     

Does IQ matter in adolescents' reading disability?

We studied the connection of IQ, reading disability (RD) and their interaction with reading, spelling and other cognitive skills in adolescents with average IQ and RD (n = 22), average IQ, non-RD (n = 71), below average IQ and RD (n = 29), and below average IQ non-RD (n = 33). IQ was not connected to reading and spelling in subjects without RD, but a connection to non-word spelling in subjects with RD existed. IQ and RD showed a connection to other cognitive skills (IQ to working memory, verbal memory and syntactic skills, RD to poor performance in text reading and rapid naming and both of them to reading comprehension, phonological and arithmetic skills), but no interaction existed. Our results are consistent with those of earlier studies showing that IQ does not play a significant role in the presentation of RD. However, adolescents with below average IQ and RD seemed to have much broader deficits in academically important skills such as arithmetic and reading comprehension than the other groups.     

The limits of socialisation

The article deals with the question of living with others, one of the most significant relationships of human life, and challenge the common understanding of the origins of living with others, where a human being is not just becoming a social but also a moral being through social institutions of societies. This common understanding of a social relationship, fostered and nurtured by a given society, places the responsibility for the possibility of living with others on the other. Drawing on the work from the sociologists Zygmunt Bauman and George Simmel and the philosophers Emmanuel Levinas and Knud Løgstrup we argue that the possibility of living with others is based on the rights of the other rather than of the rights to determine whom the other is.By focusing on the relation between the individual and the society on the one hand, and the connections between being moral and being social on the other hand, we suggest that the process of socialisation is devastating not only for human beings individuality and his or her moral capacity but also for a responsive educational praxis. We explore the ways in which an understanding of socialisation as the making of the social being is intimately linked to how institutional education ‘thinks itself.’ This exploration is followed by a critical discussion of the limits of socialisation, and therefore also the limits of education. By considering some of the problems about the making of the social being we arrive at the conclusion that there is the possibility for education to be somewhere else rather than within socialisation. This conclusion leads us to explore the possibilities for an educational praxis that embraces the other without holding the individuals otherness against them.     

Do grades in higher education matter for labour market rewards? A multilevel analysis of all Norwegian graduates in the period 1990–2006

This paper examines the effects of grades from higher education on labour market outcomes. Economic theory predicts that grades are rewarded in the labour market because employers regard them as an expression of valuable skills or a signal of other sought after attributes. Social closure, however, may give reason to expect no effects. Whether good grades are rewarded in the labour market is thus uncertain. This paper addresses this question by examining whether employers tend to reward good grades in the form of employment and higher income. Previous research has demonstrated that the returns to education vary according to structural–institutional labour market settings. We examined the interaction effects between grades and field-specific characteristics and between grades and sector by analysing data on all graduates in these educational programmes at Norwegian universities and university colleges from 1990 through 2006. The education data are linked with multiple other data sources such as the national tax register and the national employment register. We find that good grades have positive effects on both income and employment and that these effects are influenced by both the type of education and sector.     

Mothers of children with mild neurological disabilities: Adaptational outcomes

The relations of stress and coping over time were investigated among mothers of children (N=36) with mild neurological disabilities and mothers of matched non-disabled (ND) children (N=36). Separate stress groups were formed with respect to changes in adaptational outcomes for the mothers of disabled and ND children. Mothers of disabled children with better adaptational outcomes had considered their self-esteem higher and used problem-focused coping and social support more often than mothers of disabled children with worse adaptational outcomes. Decrease of negative affects seemed to presuppose use of problem-focused coping more often mothers of disabled children than for those of ND children.     

School Health Promotion to Increase Empowerment,Gender Equality and Pupil Participation: A Focus Group Study of a Swedish Elementary School Initiative

A school health promotion project was carried out in an elementary school in Sweden where active participation, gender equality, and empowerment were leading principles. The objective of the study was to understand challenges and to identify social processes of importance for such a project. Focus group interviews were conducted with 6 single-sex groups (7–12 year olds) in grade 1–2, grade 3–4, and grade 5–6 on 2 occasions. The analysis used a grounded theory approach. The analysis identified the core category “normalization processes of violence and harassment.” It is argued that school health promotion initiatives need to be aware of normalization processes of violence and, which may be counter-productive to the increase of empowerment and participation among all pupils.     

Enacting the role of special needs educator – six Swedish case studies

With the increasing focus on inclusion, special needs educators (SNEs) are now expected to share responsibility for pupils with teacher colleagues and to lead school development, but it is a challenge to enact this role in schools. The aim of the study was to explore how professional roles of Swedish SNEs are enacted in local school contexts. From a survey of SNEs in 10 Swedish municipalities, six participants whose work tasks were expected to correspond to the degree ordinances for their university training were chosen. The participants were followed at work, and data were collected through observation of the participants at work, participants’ diaries and interviews with the participants, their teacher colleagues and their school principals. The analysis involved both quantitative and qualitative methods. First, based on the researchers’ observations of the participants at work, categories of SNEs’ tasks were discerned, and the amount of time devoted to those categories of tasks was summarised. Second, case study narratives of the SNEs’ work were constructed to describe how the participants, their teacher colleagues and their school principals view the SNE role and to describe how the work is enacted in various school contexts. The results revealed seven categories of work tasks practised to varying degrees by the six SNEs. The case study narratives exposed large variation in how the SNEs conceptualised their role and how it evolved in relation to local school contexts. The results of the study are discussed with regard to the role of the SNE in relation to policies of inclusion.     

ISEI,ISCED, HOMEPOS,ESCS

Ziel dieses Beitrages ist es, verschiedene Indikatoren der sozialen Herkunft bei der Quantifizierung von sozialen Disparit?ten zu vergleichen. Im Mittelpunkt steht dabei der in PISA eingesetzte Index für den Economic, Social and Cultural Status (ESCS). Dieser umfasst sozio?konomische und kulturelle Ressourcen des Elternhauses und deckt damit das theoretische Konstrukt umfassender ab als andere Indikatoren der sozialen Herkunft. Anhand der internationalen Schülerdaten aus PISA 2003 und aus der nationalen Erg?nzungsstudie (PISA-E) wurden Regressionsanalysen mit verschiedenen Herkunftsindikatoren gerechnet. Neben dem ESCS wurden als Pr?diktoren der sozio?konomische Status (HISEI), der h?chste Bildungsabschluss umgerechnet in Bildungsjahre (PARED) und ein Index für h?usliche Besitztümer (HOMEPOS) berücksichtigt. Es zeigt sich, dass der ESCS in allen Bildungssystemen deutlich mehr Varianz in der mathematischen Kompetenz aufkl?rt als die Einzelpr?diktoren HISEI, PARED oder HOMEPOS. Auch in einer anschlie?enden Analyse zu sozialen Disparit?ten der Bildungsbeteiligung lieferte der ESCS differenziertere Befunde als der HISEI. Insgesamt wird der ESCS als valider und theoretisch umfassender Index der sozialen Herkunft eingesch?tzt.     

Traceless enzymatic protein synthesis without ligation sites constraint

Protein synthesis and semisynthesis offer immense promise for life sciences and have impacted pharmaceutical innovation. The absence of a generally applicable method for traceless peptide conjugation with a flexible choice of junction sites remains a bottleneck for accessing many important synthetic targets, however. Here we introduce the PALME (protein activation and ligation with multiple enzymes) platform designed for sequence-unconstrained synthesis and modification of biomacromolecules. The upstream activating modules accept and process easily accessible synthetic peptides and recombinant proteins, avoiding the challenges associated with preparation and manipulation of activated peptide substrates. Cooperatively, the downstream coupling module provides comprehensive solutions for sequential peptide condensation, cyclization and protein N/C-terminal or internal functionalization. The practical utility of this methodology is demonstrated by synthesizing a series of bioactive targets ranging from pharmaceutical ingredients to synthetically challenging proteins. The modular PALME platform exhibits unprecedentedly broad accessibility for traceless protein synthesis and functionalization, and holds enormous potential to extend the scope of protein chemistry and synthetic biology.