Results from Australia's 2014 report card on physical activity for children and youth

Background: 

Towards global benchmarking of food environments and policies to reduce obesity and diet-related non-communicable diseases : design and methods for nation-wide surveys

Introduction: 

Medulloblastoma Down Under 2013 : a report from the third annual meeting of the International Medulloblastoma Working Group.

Medulloblastoma is curable in approximately 70% of patients. Over the past decade, progress in improving survival using conventional therapies has stalled, resulting in reduced quality of life due to treatment-related side effects, which are a major concern in survivors. The vast amount of genomic and molecular data generated over the last 5-10 years encourages optimism that improved risk stratification and new molecular targets will improve outcomes. It is now clear that medulloblastoma is not a single-disease entity, but instead consists of at least four distinct molecular subgroups: WNT/Wingless, Sonic Hedgehog, Group 3, and Group 4. The Medulloblastoma Down Under 2013 meeting, which convened at Bunker Bay, Australia, brought together 50 leading clinicians and scientists. The 2-day agenda included focused sessions on pathology and molecular stratification, genomics and mouse models, high-throughput drug screening, and clinical trial design. The meeting established a global action plan to translate novel biologic insights and drug targeting into treatment regimens to improve outcomes. A consensus was reached in several key areas, with the most important being that a novel classification scheme for medulloblastoma based on the four molecular subgroups, as well as histopathologic features, should be presented for consideration in the upcoming fifth edition of the World Health Organization's classification of tumours of the central nervous system. Three other notable areas of agreement were as follows: (1) to establish a central repository of annotated mouse models that are readily accessible and freely available to the international research community; (2) to institute common eligibility criteria between the Children's Oncology Group and the International Society of Paediatric Oncology Europe and initiate joint or parallel clinical trials; (3) to share preliminary high-throughput screening data across discovery labs to hasten the development of novel therapeutics. Medulloblastoma Down Under 2013 was an effective forum for meaningful discussion, which resulted in enhancing international collaborative clinical and translational research of this rare disease. This template could be applied to other fields to devise global action plans addressing all aspects of a disease, from improved disease classification, treatment stratification, and drug targeting to superior treatment regimens to be assessed in cooperative international clinical trials.

Improving schools: productive tensions between the local, the systemic and the global

This unique book explores school improvement policy – from its translation into national contexts and school networks to its implementation in leader and teacher practices in individual schools and classrooms within this network of schools and its impact on students’ learning. It draws on multiple conceptual and theoretical resources to explore the complexities attached to a school improvement process in a network of schools in Australia. These conceptual and theoretical resources include discourse, practice, representation and network, concepts common to both policy research as well as studies of leadership and classroom practice. They lead to a more detailed understanding of the intersections between educational policy and intervention processes, and the complex reality of school processes and teaching practices. In the book we trace the implementation of school improvement policies through its multiple phases, levels and contexts. Our data-collection and analysis methods draw on a variety of perspectives in the way different players perceive their roles and the nature of the initiative and the ways in which these intersect. The research findings are used to seek productive approaches to school improvement that combine policy integrity with local flexibility. The book contributes to the school improvement literature through its exploration of tensions between global and systemic settings and local practices and histories.

Is change in global self-rated health associated with change in affiliation with a primary care provider? Findings from a longitudinal study from New Zealand

To investigate the association of self-rated health and affiliation with a primary care provider (PCP) in New Zealand.
Methods

We used data from a New Zealand panel study of 22,000 adults. The main exposure was self-rated health, and the main outcome measure was affiliation with a PCP. Fixed effects conditional logistic models were used to control for observed time-varying and unobserved time-invariant confounding.
Results

In any given wave, the odds of being affiliated with a PCP were higher for those in good and fair/poor health relative to those in excellent health. While affiliation for Europeans increased as reported health declined, the odds of being affiliated were lower for Māori respondents reporting very good or good health relative to those in excellent health. No significant differences in the association by age or gender were observed.
Conclusions

Our data support the hypothesis that those in poorer health are more likely to be affiliated with a PCP. Variations in affiliation for Māori could arise for several reasons, including differences in care-seeking behaviour and perceived need of care. It may also mean that the message about the benefits of primary health care is not getting through equally to all population groups.

Physical activity of children: a global matrix of grades comparing 15 countries

The Active Healthy Kids Canada (AHKC) Report Card on Physical Activity for Children and Youth has been effective in poweringthe movement to get kids moving by influencing priorities, policies, and practice in Canada. The AHKC Report Card process wasreplicated in 14 additional countries from 5 continents using 9 common indicators (Overall Physical Activity, Organized SportParticipation, Active Play, Active Transportation, Sedentary Behavior, Family and Peers, School, Community and Built Environment,and Government Strategies and Investments), a harmonized process and a standardized grading framework. The 15 ReportCards were presented at the Global Summit on the Physical Activity of Children in Toronto on May 20, 2014. The consolidatedfindings are summarized here in the form of a global matrix of grades. There is a large spread in grades across countries for mostindicators. Countries that lead in certain indicators lag in others. Overall, the grades for indicators of physical activity (PA) aroundthe world are low/poor. Many countries have insufficient information to assign a grade, particularly for the Active Play and Familyand Peers indicators. Grades for Sedentary Behaviors are, in general, better in low income countries. The Community and BuiltEnvironment indicator received high grades in high income countries and notably lower grades in low income countries. There wasa pattern of higher PA and lower sedentary behavior in countries reporting poorer infrastructure, and lower PA and higher sedentarybehavior in countries reporting better infrastructure, which presents an interesting paradox. Many surveillance and researchgaps and weaknesses were apparent. International cooperation and cross-fertilization is encouraged to tackle existing challenges,understand underlying mechanisms, derive innovative solutions, and overcome the expanding childhood inactivity crisis.

Understanding global student mobility: exploring new ways of capturing international experiences using in-county overseas students

Australian universities have large numbers of overseas students who do not engage meaningfully with local students about their international experience. The objective of this research, an initiative that was part of a project funded by Australian Government Office for Learning and Teaching (OLT), entitled the Global Canopy, was to develop pedagogy to promote local students’ awareness about international study based on an in-country teaching program. The research study aimed to develop new knowledge about how domestic students understand global mobility through interacting with international students enrolled in the same university. The initiative included two workshops that brought together a number of project team members, three overseas students and academic staff mentors, representatives from Deakin Global Student Mobility office, and 31 undergraduate domestic students. Data was collected from a series of in-depth interviews with students involved in the program. Initial findings suggested that the workshops were successful, with 12 undergraduate students enrolled in winter schools in India after completion of the program. The paper concludes with lessons learned from the initiative and calls for exploring new ways of identifying international experiences that can be facilitated within discipline curriculum of the home university.

The baby makes 3 plus project in the Great South Coast region: final report from the external evaluator, January 2016

This report presents the evaluation of the Baby Makes 3 Plus project in the Great South Coast region of Victoria. Baby Makes 3 Plus was one of 12 projects funded by the Department of Justice and Regulation in Victoria under initiative to support primary prevention and early intervention-focused partnership projects to address violence against women and children. The project provided the Baby Makes 3 relationship education program to new parents across the region, and conducted a variety of training to increase the skills of Great South Coast early years practitioners (the Plus component of the project). The three key objectives of the project were:• To increase the capacity of first time parents to build equal and respectful relationships in response to the lifestyle and relationship changes that follow the birth of a child.• To increase the capacity of health professionals and organisations to promote equal and respectful relationships during the transition to parenthood.• To building capacity to identify women at risk of experiencing family violence through a gender equity component of in-service training.

Women’s health Goulburn North East community crime prevention plan – regional preventing violence against women and children strategy: summative evaluation report from the external evaluator, February 2016

This report presents the external evaluation of the Hume Regional Preventing Violence Against Women Strategy. This is one of 12 projects funded by the Department of Justice and Regulation in Victoria under its initiative to support primary prevention and early intervention-focused partnership projects that seek to prevent violence before it occurs or address the key contributing factors of violence against women and their children. The focus is on changing behaviours and attitudes that allow violence against women and children to continue. The lead agency in the project was Women’s Health Goulburn North East (WHGNE).The Hume regional strategy The focus of the project was to develop and implement a coordinated regional strategy that addresses the determinants of violence against women and builds the capacity of communities to take action to prevent such violence. At the outset it was envisaged that a key component of the strategy would be to undertake preventive activities that respond to identified gaps in the region.The first version of the strategy was completed in September 2013 and formally launched in November 2013. In October 2013, Courageous Conversations was identified as the brand to be used for activities in the strategy, including a charter and other resources. As the project evolved, the strategy was revised to reflect differing levels of engagement and progress with the different parts of the work and to identity explicitly the activities associated with the brand. A revised version of the regional strategy was produced in September 2014, with four aims:• promoting equal and respectful relationships between men and women;• working across local government, workplaces and sporting settings to coordinate a region-wide approach to preventing violence against women;• bringing about structural and systemic organisational change to promote gender equitable and non-violent cultures;• build the capacity of leaders in preventing violence against women.Different components of the activities carried out under the strategy included: partnership and capacity building; building gender equity in organisations; gender equity and masculinities training; bystander training; knowledge dissemination and the Courageous Conversations website.

The First International Conference of the Nobel Women's Initiative : women redefining peace in the Middle East and beyond

The Nobel Women’s Initiative (NWI) was formed in August 2006. It was a response to a suggestion by Iranian laureate Shirin Ebadi that women recipients of the Peace Prize should collectively endeavor to use the power and influence concomitant with being Nobel laureates to advance the cause of women internationally, by bringing their voices and experiences to the direct attention of the international community and media sources. NWI represents an attempt to help fill a gap that mars the present system of international relations. Over the past half-century, global standards have developed in earnest. One of these standards is women’s equality with men. Despite the codification of this precept in international law, gender discrimination against women remains a globally unresolved problem. Women are seriously underrepresented at local, national, regional, and international levels of governance, and their voices and experiences remain marginalized from negotiations toward conflict resolution and the formation of viable democratic institutions.