Romanian Private Higher Education Viewed from a Neo‐institutionalist Perspective

Following a rapid overview of the genesis of private higher education in Romania after the Revolution of December 1989, the author proceeds to analyse the phenomenon in terms of John Meyer's neo‐institutionalist perspective. Citing, in particular, Meyer's theses regarding the isomorphism of organizations with their respective environments, she credits much of the early success of private Romanian higher education institutions in getting started to their close copying of the structure, offerings, and procedures of public higher education in addition to unsatisfied public demand for higher education. She further shows how private higher education institutions have adapted to the requirements of accreditation and state funding possibilities. She fears, however, that the continuing demographic downturn in Romania along with the creation of extra tuition fee‐paying openings at the public universities may finally doom private higher education.     

Pre-game perceived wellness highly associates with match running performances during an international field hockey tournament

This study examined the associations between pre-game wellness and changes in match running performance normalised to either (i) playing time, (ii) post-match RPE or (iii) both playing time and post-match RPE, over the course of a field hockey tournament. Twelve male hockey players were equipped with global positioning system (GPS) units while competing in an international tournament (six matches over 9 days). The following GPS-derived variables, total distance (TD), low-intensity activity (LIA; <15?km/h), high-intensity running (HIR; >15?km/h), high-intensity accelerations (HIACC; >2?m/s²) and decelerations (HIDEC; >?2?m/s²) were acquired and normalised to either (i) playing time, (ii) post-match RPE or (iii) both playing time and post-match RPE. Each morning, players completed ratings on a 0–10 scale for four variables: fatigue, muscle soreness, mood state and sleep quality, with cumulative scores determined as wellness. Associations between match performances and wellness were analysed using Pearson’s correlation coefficient. Combined time and RPE normalisation demonstrated the largest associations with Δwellness compared with time or RPE alone for most variables; TD (r?=??0.95; ?1.00 to ?0.82, p?=?.004), HIR (r?=??0.95; ?1.00 to ?0.83, p?=?.003), LIA (r?=??0.94; ?1.00 to ?0.81, p?=?.026), HIACC (r?=??0.87; ?1.00 to ?0.66, p?=?.004) and HIDEC (r?=??0.90; ?0.99 to ?0.74, p?=?.008). These findings support the use of wellness measures as a pre-match tool to assist with managing internal load over the course of a field hockey tournament.

Highlights

• Fixtures during international field hockey tournaments are typically congested and impose high physiological demands on an athlete. To minimise decrements in running performance over the course of a tournament, measures to identify players who have sustained high internal loads are logically warranted.

• The present study examined the association between changes in simple customised psychometric wellness measures, on changes in match running performance normalised to (i) playing time, (ii) post-match RPE and (iii) playing time and post-match RPE, over the course of a field hockey tournament.

• Changes in match running performance were better associated to changes in wellness (r = ?0.87 to ?0.95), when running performances were normalised to both time and RPE compared with time or RPE alone.

• The present findings support the use of wellness measures as a pre-match tool to assist with managing internal load over the course of a field hockey tournament. Improved associations between wellness scores and match running performances were evident, when running variables were normalised to both playing time and post-match RPE.

     

A Three-Axis Model for Conceptualizing the Relevant Elements Involved in Cross-Cultural Training

Up to one-third of Americans who take foreign assignments are unsuccessful, largely because of either the lack of experience in, or training for, intercultural living or working. This lack of success is indeed problematic at a time when American businesses must seek global markets. The poor success rate has precipitated increased interest in cross-cultural training. Much of the reported cross-cultural training is experiential, however, and is therefore limited in transferability to other situations. The experiential base often provides no analytical structure for developing training programs for other situations. This article reviews both research and experiential literature and presents a three-axis matrix as an analytical base for developing cross-cultural training. The axes systematically focus attention on differences in culture, function (task roles), and situations.     

The development and piloting of the ISPCAN Child Abuse Screening Tool—Parent version (ICAST-P)

ObjectiveChild maltreatment is a problem that has longer recognition in the northern hemisphere and in high-income countries. Recent work has highlighted the nearly universal nature of the problem in other countries but demonstrated the lack of comparability of studies because of the variations in definitions and measures used. The International Society for the Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect has developed instrumentation that may be used with cross-cultural and cross-national benchmarking by local investigators.Design and samplingThe instrument design began with a team of expert in Brisbane in 2004. A large bank of questions were subjected to two rounds of Delphi review to develop the fielded version of the instrument. Convenience samples included approximately 120 parent respondents with children under the age of 18 in each of six countries (697 total).ResultsThis paper presents an instrument that measures parental behaviors directed at children and reports data from pilot work in 6 countries and 7 languages. Patterns of response revealed few missing values and distributions of responses that generally were similar in the six countries. Subscales performed well in terms of internal consistency with Cronbach's alpha in very good range (0.77–0.88) with the exception of the neglect and sex abuse subscales. Results varied by child age and gender in expected directions but with large variations among the samples. About 15% of children were shaken, 24% hit on the buttocks with an object, and 37% were spanked. Reports of choking and smothering were made by 2% of parents.ConclusionThese pilot data demonstrate that the instrument is well tolerated and captures variations in, and potentially harmful forms of child discipline.Practice implicationsThe ISPCAN Child Abuse Screening Tool – Parent Version (ICAST-P) has been developed as a survey instrument to be administered to parents for the assessment of child maltreatment in a multi-national and multi-cultural context. It was developed with broad input from international experts and subjected to Dephi review, translation, and pilot testing in six countries. The results of the Delphi study and pilot testing are presented. This study demonstrates that a single instrument can be used in a broad range of cultures and languages with low rates of missing data and moderate to high internal consistency.     

Online Distance Education at the Universiti Sains Malaysia,Malaysia: Preliminary Perceptions

Availability of technology is no longer an issue, but in view of the promise of distance education and the development of electronic communication and network, the distance learning programme at the Universiti Sains Malaysia is directing its virtual multimedia course delivery via online education. The instructional design aspects of a multimedia course topic are presented. The results of a preliminary perceptions towards online education in distance learning conducted at the recent launching of online education in USM revealed that students perception is still focused on accessibility and presentation rather than pedagogical techniques and interactivity.

L'éducation à distance en ligne à l'Universiti Sains Malaysia :Perceptions preliminairs

La disponibilité de la technologie n'est plus un problème mais devant les promesses de l'éducation à distance et le développement des réseaux électroniques de communications, le programme d'enseignement à distance de l'Université Sains Malaysia oriente ses cours virtuels multimédia via l'éducation en ligne. Cet article présente les aspects de l'élaboration éducative d'un sujet du cours multi-media. Les résultats des perceptions préliminaires vers l'éducation en ligne dans l'enseignement à distance conduit lors du lancement du « on-line education » dans l'USM a révelé que la perception des étudiants est toujours concentrée sur l'accessibilité et la présentation plutôt que sur les techniques pédagogiques et l'interactivité.

Online Fernstudien an der Universität Sains Malaysia, Malaysia: Vorläufige Auffassungen

Verfügbarkeit von Technik ist heute kein Thema mehr. Im Hinblick auf die Aussichten von Fernstudien und der Entwicklung elektronischer Kommunikation und Netzwerken führt die Universität Sains Malaysia die Zulieferung ihrer Fernstudienprogramme mit virtuellem Multimediamaterial online durch. Die Gesichtspunkte für ein Multimediakurs-Thema werden dargestellt. Die Ergebnisse einer vorläufigen Meinungsbildung in Richtung Online-Unterweisung im Rahmen der kürzlich erfolgten Einrichtung von Online Education in USM offenbarte, dass im Zentrum der Wahrnehmung der Studenten immer noch mehr der Zugang und die Darstellung denn die pädagogischen Techniken und möglichen Interaktivitäten stehen.     

An investigation into the factors affecting knowledge management adoption and practice in the life insurance business

Knowledge management (KM) is crucial for organizations to enhance competitive advantage. While the issues of KM have been widely discussed by numerous researchers, there is a paucity of studies pertaining to KM adoption and practice for the life insurance industry. Therefore, this paper aims to investigate the main factors affecting the life insurance business in adopting and applying KM. An exploratory field study utilizing an inductive methodology involving a multiple-case study approach was undertaken by conducting interviews with 10 key knowledge workers from life insurance enterprises in various stages of KM development and use. We utilized content analysis techniques to identify the factors with their associated variables and further developed a research model. This study offers a comprehensive model for future KM research and provides managerial implications for organizations, particularly life insurance enterprises, to better realize the worth of KM and the possible impediments involved in the processes of adopting and implementing KM.     

The year’s work in international librarianship: 1969

The paper sets out to determine the social origins and professional status of librarians in Ghana with a view to understanding them as a professional group of working individuals. It examines the personal characteristics such as age, sex and marital status of the librarians. Parental influences on the choice of profession, as well as the status of individual librarians in their organizations and institutions are investigated. The results of this study indicate that most librarians in Ghana come from working class homes and that librarians in Ghana are satisfied with their status in their organizations and institutions.