A principal at work : a story of leadership for building sustainable capacity of a school

This study explores through a lifestream narrative how the life experiences of a female primary school principal are organised as practical knowledge, and are used to inform action that is directed towards creating a sustainable school culture. An alternative model of school leadership is presented which describes the thinking and activity of a leader as a process. The process demonstrates how a leader's practical knowledge is dynamic, broadly based in experiential life, and open to change. As such, it is described as a model of sustainable leadership-in-process. The research questions at the heart of this study are: How does a leader construct and organize knowledge in the enactment of the principal ship to deal with the dilemmas and opportunities that arise everyday in school life? And: What does this particular way of organising knowledge look like in the effort to build a sustainable school community? The sustainable leadership-in-process thesis encapsulates new ways of leading primary schools through the principalship. These new ways are described as developing and maintaining the following dimensions of leadership: quality relationships, a collective (shared vision), collaboration and partnerships, and high achieving learning environments. Such dimensions are enacted by the principal through the activities of conversations, performance development, research and data-driven action, promoting innovation, and anticipating and predicting the future. Sustainable leadership-in-process is shared, dynamic, visible and transparent and is conducted through the processes of positioning, defining, organising, experimenting and evaluating in a continuous and iterative way. A rich understanding of the specificity of the life of a female primary school principal was achieved using story telling, story listening and story creation in a collaborative relationship between the researcher and the researched participant. as a means of educational theorising. Analysis and interpretation were undertaken as a recursive process in which the immediate interpretations were shared with the researched participant. The view of theorising adopted in this research is that of theory as hermeneutic; that is, theory is generated out of the stories of experiential life, rather than discovered in the stories.

The determination of three selected sites for the construction and operation of a low level radioactive waste storage and burial facility

Radioactive wastes are by-products of the use of radiation technologies. As with many technologies, the wastes are required to be disposed of in a safe manner so as to minimise risk to human health. This study examines the requirements for a hypothetical repository and develops techniques for decision making to permit the establishment of a shallow ground burial facility to receive an inventory of low-level radioactive wastes. Australia’s overall inventory is used as an example. Essential and desirable siting criteria are developed and applied to Australia's Northern Territory resulting in the selection of three candidate sites for laboratory investigations into soil behaviour. The essential quantifiable factors which govern radionuclide migration and ultimately influence radiation doses following facility closure are reviewed. Simplified batch and column procedures were developed to enable laboratory determination of distribution and retardation coefficient values for use in one-dimensional advection-dispersion transport equations. Batch and column experiments were conducted with Australian soils sampled from the three identified candidate sites using a radionuclide representative of the current national low-level radioactive waste inventory. The experimental results are discussed and site soil performance compared. The experimental results are subsequently used to compare the relative radiation health risks between each of the three sites investigated. A recommendation is made as to the preferred site to construct an engineered near-surface burial facility to receive the Australian low-level radioactive waste inventory.

Robot building for preschoolers

This paper describes Electronic Blocks, a new robot construction element designed to allow children as young as age three to build and program robotic structures. The Electronic Blocks encapsulate input, output and logic concepts in tangible elements that young children can use to create a wide variety of physical agents. The children are able to determine the behavior of these agents by the choice of blocks and the manner in which they are connected. The Electronic Blocks allow children without any knowledge of mechanical design or computer programming to create and control physically embodied robots. They facilitate the development of technological capability by enabling children to design, construct, explore and evaluate dynamic robotics systems. A study of four and five year-old children using the Electronic Blocks has demonstrated that the interface is well suited to young children. The complexity of the implementation is hidden from the children, leaving the children free to autonomously explore the functionality of the blocks. As a consequence, children are free to move their focus beyond the technology. Instead they are free to focus on the construction process, and to work on goals related to the creation of robotic behaviors and interactions. As a resource for robot building, the blocks have proved to be effective in encouraging children to create robot structures, allowing children to design and program robot behaviors.

Scaffolding children’s robot building and programming activities

Since 2001 the School of Information Technology and Electrical Engineering (ITEE) at the University of Queensland has been involved in RoboCupJunior activities aimed at providing children with the Robot building and programming knowledge they need to succeed in RoboCupJunior competitions. These activities include robotics workshops, the organization of the State-wide RoboCupJunior competition, and consultation on all matters robotic with schools and government organizations. The activities initiated by ITEE have succeeded in providing children with the scaffolding necessary to become competent, independent robot builders and programmers. Results from state, national and international competitions suggest that many of the children who participate in the activities supported by ITEE are subsequently able to purpose- build robots to effectively compete in RoboCupJunior competitions. As a result of the scaffolding received within workshops children are able to think deeply and creatively about their designs, and to critique their designs in order to make the best possible creation in an effort to win.

Model interoperability in building information modelling

The exchange of design models in the design and construction industry is evolving away from 2-dimensional computer-aided design (CAD) and paper towards semantically-rich 3-dimensional digital models. This approach, known as Building Information Modelling (BIM), is anticipated to become the primary means of information exchange between the various parties involved in construction projects. From a technical perspective, the domain represents an interesting study in model-based interoperability, since the models are large and complex, and the industry is one in which collaboration is a vital part of business. In this paper, we present our experiences with issues of model-based interoperability in exchanging building information models between various tools, and in implementing tools which consume BIM models, particularly using the industry standard IFC data modelling format. We report on the successes and challenges in these endeavours, as the industry endeavours to move further towards fully digitised information exchange.

Spatial variability of soil carbon in forested and cultivated sites: Implications for change detection

The potential to sequester atmospheric carbon in agricultural and forest soils to offset greenhouse gas emissions has generated interest in measuring changes in soil carbon resulting from changes in land management. However, inherent spatial variability of soil carbon limits the precision of measurement of changes in soil carbon and hence, the ability to detect changes. We analyzed variability of soil carbon by intensively sampling sites under different land management as a step toward developing efficient soil sampling designs. Sites were tilled crop-land and a mixed deciduous forest in Tennessee, and old-growth and second-growth coniferous forest in western Washington, USA. Six soil cores within each of three microplots were taken as an initial sample and an additional six cores were taken to simulate resampling. Soil C variability was greater in Washington than in Tennessee, and greater in less disturbed than in more disturbed sites. Using this protocol, our data suggest that differences on the order of 2.0 Mg C ha(-1) could be detected by collection and analysis of cores from at least five (tilled) or two (forest) microplots in Tennessee. More spatial variability in the forested sites in Washington increased the minimum detectable difference, but these systems, consisting of low C content sandy soil with irregularly distributed pockets of organic C in buried logs, are likely to rank among the most spatially heterogeneous of systems. Our results clearly indicate that consistent intramicroplot differences at all sites will enable detection of much more modest changes if the same microplots are resampled.

Benchmarking framework to measure extent of ICT adoption for building project management

This project discusses a component of the research study conducted to provide construction organizations with a generic benchmarking framework to assess their extent of information communication technology (ICT) adoption for building project management processes. It defines benchmarking and discusses objectives of the required benchmarking framework and development of the framework. The study focuses on ICT adoption by small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in the construction industry and with respect to SMEs it is important to understand processes, their indicators, and measures in the local context. Structure of the suggested benchmarking framework has been derived after extensive literature survey and a questionnaire survey conducted in the Indian construction industry. The suggested benchmarking process is an iterative process divided into four stages. It can be implemented at organization and industry levels for rating the construction organizations for ICT adoption and performance measurement. The framework has a generic structure and can be generalized and applied for other countries with due considerations.