Distribution of influence,communication, and relational mentoring in the US superintendency

We report on how fifty superintendents (chief executive officers of public school systems, each invited by a researcher to participate) from seven states in the US talked in eight focus groups of their perspectives on their influence as leaders, their efforts to communicate with stakeholders, and how they learn from these stakeholders. We maintain that our participants’ revelations suggest that three definitions must be expanded to fit their work. First, influence or authority must be seen not merely as vested in the superintendent; rather, these superintendents described their leadership in terms of working with and through others. Second, organizational communication for these superintendents is more than the district’s leader communicating his or her perceptions and wishes to others; it is more relational, in which a variety of actors communicate their perspectives to one another. Third, this type of inter‐professional leadership leads logically to relational mentoring, where learning does not pass merely from expert to novice; rather, superintendents described their roles in terms of various parties learning from and teaching one another. We discuss implications of these insights for practice, research, and preparation.     

The Financing of Extension Services: A Survey Among Rural Youth in Greece

Abstract

Since its establishment in the early 1950s, the Greek Extension Service has undergone considerable changes. Especially after 1981, a bureaucratic–administrative role related to the implementation of the CAP has been undertaken. In parallel, in the international scene, governments have started experimenting with various cost-recovery mechanisms for extension. In front of such challenges, at both national and international levels, the current work intends to explore the willingness of young rural inhabitants to pay for advisory services. Drawing data from a large-scale survey and utilising probit analysis, the decomposition of the marginal effects of a series demographic, socioeconomic and spatial characteristics and information needs upon willingness to pay for extension is presented. The results show that under preconditions cost-recovery mechanisms may be employed in Greece; furthermore, it is argued that the Extension Service has to be restructured–reoriented.     

Out in school: talking about sexual orientation and challenging homophobia across the Key Stage 4 curriculum

Rates of sexually transmitted infections and teenage pregnancy amongst the under-16s are causing increasing concern. There is limited evidence about the sexual behaviour and sex education preferences of this age group, especially of those from Black and minority ethnic groups. This study aimed to provide data on early heterosexual risk behaviour, and to examine preferences for the content and delivery of sex and relationships education (SRE), across ethnicity, gender and school year to inform priority setting and sex education strategies. A cross-sectional study of 3334 13–17-year-olds from 10 English urban and suburban secondary schools was conducted. Multivariate analysis was performed to examine the independent effect of demographic variables on sexual experience and preferences for sex education. A number of important differences in the sexual experience and condom use of males and females across the ethnic groups were identified. Differences in preferences for the content and delivery of sex education were also identified, particularly between male and female pupils. The findings indicate the potential for quite wide variation in sexual experience and preferences within school classrooms. The challenge for educators is therefore to develop SRE curricula that are inclusive within the constraints of school teaching.     

引进国际职业标准升级传统会计专业的若干思考——以青岛职业技术学院中爱合作会计专业为例

作为直接服务于经济建设和社会发展的教育类型,高职教育必须与经济社会发展接轨,在人才培养理念、内容和标准上同步做出适应性的改革与升级。就传统会计专业而言,随着行业发展趋势和经济发展形势的要求,在人才培养的目标、规格定位和培养内容、方式等方面同样需要适应性的转型和升级。青岛职业技术学院采取以中外合作办学项目为平台,引入国际先进会计标准等优质教育资源升级改造传统会计专业课程体系和标准,实践证明,这是一条直接可行、经济有效的路径。     

从薄弱到优质——以大连市第71中学和西岗区大同小学转化经验为例

在大连市西岗区教育局"新优质学校"项目推进过程中,涌现出大连市71中学和大同小学两所典型学校。这两所学校实现由薄弱到优质的成功经验,对于薄弱学校又快又好发展,推进区域教育均衡发展,促进教育公平,具有启示和借鉴作用。     

Film Biographies

A PRIVATE VIEW by Irene Mayer Selznick (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1983---$16.95)

A PASSION FOR FILMS: HENRI LANGLOIS AND THE CINEMATHEQUE FRANCAISE (New York: The Viking Press, 1983---$16.95)

MOVIE STAR: A LOOK AT THE WOMEN WHO MADE HOLLYWOOD by Ethan Mordden (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1983---$19.95)     

Bridging memory-based collaborative filtering and text retrieval

When speaking of information retrieval, we often mean text retrieval. But there exist many other forms of information retrieval applications. A typical example is collaborative filtering that suggests interesting items to a user by taking into account other users’ preferences or tastes. Due to the uniqueness of the problem, it has been modeled and studied differently in the past, mainly drawing from the preference prediction and machine learning view point. A few attempts have yet been made to bring back collaborative filtering to information (text) retrieval modeling and subsequently new interesting collaborative filtering techniques have been thus derived. In this paper, we show that from the algorithmic view point, there is an even closer relationship between collaborative filtering and text retrieval. Specifically, major collaborative filtering algorithms, such as the memory-based, essentially calculate the dot product between the user vector (as the query vector in text retrieval) and the item rating vector (as the document vector in text retrieval). Thus, if we properly structure user preference data and employ the target user’s ratings as query input, major text retrieval algorithms and systems can be directly used without any modification. In this regard, we propose a unified formulation under a common notational framework for memory-based collaborative filtering, and a technique to use any text retrieval weighting function with collaborative filtering preference data. Besides confirming the rationale of the framework, our preliminary experimental results have also demonstrated the effectiveness of the approach in using text retrieval models and systems to perform item ranking tasks in collaborative filtering.