Dutch Cooperation Schools as Democratic Communities: A Constructive Perspective from Dewey’s View on Democracy in Education

In this article, the authors reflect on the results of their previous research at cooperation schools in the Netherlands, where students and teachers from nonaffiliated and Christian backgrounds come together. Dewey’s perspective on educating democratic values is combined with empirical results of this research, answering the question what Dewey’s concept contributes to the reflection on the relation between values and religious education at these schools. This article shows that this reflection and the implementation of value-based religious education offers opportunities for schools that face the challenge of practicing encounter between students from different backgrounds.     

Investigation into Nonperiodic Lamé Functions and Application to Electromagnetic Problems

An investigation into nonperiodic Lamé functions is presented. Those functions are given in series form for the even and odd Dirichlet and Neumann problems. Results are shown for the eigenfunctions and eigenvalues. An application of the Lamé functions in an analytic study of electromagnetic diffraction by a perfectly conducting elliptic cone is presented.     

Language delays, reading delays, and learning difficulties: interactive elements requiring multidimensional programming

Researchers have hypothesized four levels of instructional dialogue and claimed that teachers can improve children's language development by incorporating these dialogue levels in their classrooms. It has also been hypothesized that enhancing children's early language development enhances children's later reading development. This quasi-experimental research study investigated both of these hypotheses using a collaborative service delivery model for Grade 1 children with language difficulties from a socially and economically disadvantaged urban community in Australia. Comparing the end-of-year reading achievement scores for the 57 children who received the language intervention with those of the 59 children in the comparison group, the findings from this research are supportive of both hypotheses. The interrelationships between learning difficulties, reading difficulties, and language difficulties are discussed along with children's development in vocabulary, use of memory strategies and verbal reasoning, and the need for multidimensional programming.     

Genetic and environmental influences on early literacy

Prereading and early reading skills of preschool twin children in Australia, Scandinavia and the United States were explored in a genetically sensitive design (max. N=627 preschool pairs and 422 kindergarten pairs). Analyses indicated a strong genetic influence on preschool phonological awareness, rapid naming and verbal memory. Print awareness, vocabulary and grammar/morphology were subject primarily to shared environment effects. There were significant genetic and shared environment correlations among the preschool traits. Kindergarten reading, phonological awareness and rapid naming were primarily affected by genes, and spelling was equally affected by genes and shared environment. Multivariate analyses revealed genetic and environmental overlap and independence among kindergarten variables. Longitudinal analyses showed genetic continuity as well as change in phonological awareness and rapid naming across the 2 years. Relations among the preschool variables of print awareness, phonological awareness and rapid naming and kindergarten reading were also explored in longitudinal analyses. Educational implications are discussed.     

The RKW: A new approach towards technology transfer. methods for the promotion of innovation in small- and medium-sized companies

The ‘Rationalisierungskuratorium der Deutschen Wirtschaft’ (RKW) is a German management institute and productivity centre. The RKW analyses and promotes rationalisation measures, assists mainly small- and medium-sized enterprises in the rationalisation of firms and plants, and supports adaptation, cooperation and expansion efforts, as well as the introduction of new processess and products.RKW services — provided by the central office in Frankfurt a.M. and the regional centres in the Länder — are not so much dependent on progress in the fields of science, research and technology, but rather on the analysis and determination of short-term and long-term development trends and of the demand situation of companies and branches of industry, and on the transfer into practice of new knowledge pertaining to rationalisation.The main instruments of the services of the RKW are consulting operations on selected problems of individual enterprises in connection with work in the fields of information, documentation, management training, inplant training, and systematic performance control. The horizontal and vertical organisation and coordination of these measures are an example for integrated technology transfer where scientific and technical knowledge, products, and inventions are not only transferred in a onw-way process from science into the economy but where, through organisational changes in connection with supporting and integrating measures, both areas interact with each other. In this respect the RKW differs from other institutions such as the National Research Development Corporation in the UK or the NASA Technology Utilization Program in the USA.     

From Obstacle to Growth Dewey's Legacy of Experience‐Based Art Education

In the last decades theories that emphasise visitors’experience as the key element in the process of meaning‐making have influenced art education in museums considerably. However, there is remarkably little evidence in practice that museums shape their exhibits and educational tools by the actual experiences of visitors. Because museum education is still too much knowledge‐based, people often do not come to understanding or engagement of thinking. This article demonstrates this inconsistency and its consequences based on visitors’conversations during a museum visit while looking at contemporary art. In order to engage visitors into their own thinking and create lasting experiences, the article also investigates Dewey's ideas about experienced‐based education and inquiry learning. The study especially shows that experiences felt as obstacles for interpretation are extremely suitable to stimulate, deepen and improve visitors’engagement in the inquiry cycle.     

Challenging the “deficit model” of innovation: Framing policy issues under the innovation imperative

As innovation is increasingly becoming an imperative for policymakers around the globe, there is a growing tendency to frame policy problems as problems of innovation. This logic suggests that we are unable to address grand societal challenges and ensure economic competitiveness because our societies, institutions, scientific activities or individual predispositions are not sufficiently geared towards innovation. In this paper, we analyze this “deficit model” of innovation in which a lack of innovation is routinely invoked as the main obstacle to social progress. Drawing parallels to research on the deficit model of public understanding of science (PUS), we develop a theoretical framework that captures the dynamics and normative implications of deficit construction, highlighting five salient dimensions: problem diagnoses, proposed remedies, the role of expertise, implied social orders, and measures of success. We apply this framework to three empirical case studies of recent innovation strategies in Luxembourg, Singapore, and Denmark. Attention to this deficit framing around innovation is important, we argue, because it is an essential part of how innovation transforms societies in the 21st century: not only through new technological possibilities or economic growth, but also by shaping public discourse, narrowing policy options, and legitimizing major institutional interventions. The implied pro-innovation bias tends to marginalize other rationales, values, and social functions that do not explicitly support innovation. It further delegates decisions about sweeping social reconfigurations to innovation experts, which raises questions of accountability and democratic governance. Experiences from the history of PUS suggest that, without a dedicated effort to transform innovation policy into a more democratic, inclusive, and explicitly political field, the present deficit logic and its technocratic overtones risks significant social and political conflict.     

Assessment Practices and Students Knowledge Profiles in a Problem-based Curriculum

Learning Environments Research - Since the mid-1980s, many new terms have enriched the assessment literature, such as performance assessment, authentic assessment, direct assessment and...     

Sustainable transition of electronic products through waste policy

The European Union's Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) directive makes a challenging case for transition theory and its different aspects, as it represents an ongoing and still open-ended case. At present the objectives of the directive are not met: the amount of electronic waste is increasing, and the resulting waste is poorly managed. With its starting point in the multi-level perspective of transition theory, this case study analyzes how the outcome of the WEEE directive is constituted in the interplay between the somewhat detached regimes of electronics and waste management. The two regimes are described and analyzed together with the underlying regulatory principle of extended producer responsibility, which has guided the design of the directive. Conflicting interpretations of sustainability, in combination with a simplistic understanding and agency introduced from the top-down, has eliminated waste minimization as the main outcome of the directive. The concluding discussions raise the issues of the role of sustainable niche initiatives in electronics compared to multi-regime interaction. Guiding visions may need to be supplemented with other alignment devices in order to support co-evolution of regimes and coherent actions within transition processes.     

Effect of stroke rate on the distribution of net mechanical power in rowing

The aim of this study was to assess the effect of manipulating stroke rate on the distribution of mechanical power in rowing. Two causes of inefficient mechanical energy expenditure were identified in rowing. The ratio between power not lost at the blades and generated mechanical power (P(rower)) and the ratio between power not lost to velocity fluctuations and P(rower) were used to quantify efficiency (e(propelling) and e(velocity) respectively). Subsequently, the fraction of P(rower) that contributes to the average velocity (chi(boat)) was calculated (e(net)). For nine participants, stroke rate was manipulated between 20 and 36 strokes per minute to examine the effect on the power flow. The data were analysed using a repeated-measures analysis of variance. Results indicated that at higher stroke rates, P(rower), chi(boat), e(propelling), and e(net) increase, whereas e(velocity) decreases (P < 0.0001). The decrease in e(velocity) can be explained by a larger impulse exchange between rower and boat. The increase in e(propelling) can be explained because the work at the blades decreases, which in turn can be explained by a change in blade kinematics. The increase in e(net) results because the increase in e(propelling) is higher than the decrease in e(velocity). Our results show that the power equation is an adequate conceptual model with which to analyse rowing performance.