Integration of information literacy training into engineering and technology education

Information literacy has become an important skill for undergraduate students due to societal changes that have seen information become a valuable commodity, the need for graduates to become lifelong learners, and the recognition that information literacy is an underpinning generic skill for effective learning in higher education. This paper describes a sequence of purposefully designed activities to help students learn and practice information literacy skills that were integrated into a first-year engineering and technology study unit as a core element of the unit syllabus. A formal evaluation of these activities was planned and undertaken in semester 1 2003.

Politics and technology : friends or enemies of the story?

Taking its cue from the conference at which it was presented, this article considers both old stories and new ways, and addresses the question of the impact not only of new technology but also of politics upon 'the story'. Fundamental is the question of whether politics and technology might be considered friends or enemies of the story. Drawing on her long term experiences as an interviewer, the author interrogates particular oral history projects undertaken into children's play lore and play ways, to show how children's games and play time activities have been politicised. Locating her analysis in an international context of US legislation and British and Australian research, the author examines how play itself has become the plaything of both politicians and fear. She then examines the impact of high fidelity recording equipment and the universal accessibility of material located on the internet to address the question of technology as friend of the story, ultimately concluding that the story and the question will both go on.

Visual guidance during competition performance and run-through training in long jumping

To ensure precise foot placement on the take-off board, long jumpers visually regulate their stride pattern during their run-up. A relationship between how much visual guidance they use and the horizontal distance they jump has not, however, been quantified. Run-up precision is often practiced using run-throughs, which exclude the take-off and, therefore, the high physical stress of the complete long jump. The validity with which this common training method simulates the long jump approach remains, however, to be verified. Four state-standard long jumpers and two heptathletes completed two sessions, each comprising six run-throughs and six competition long jumps. A 50 Hz video camera was manually panned from an elevated platform to film each trial, to enable subsequent gait characteristic evaluations. Linear regression analyses identified that a longer visual regulation phase, measured in time, distance or number of strides, was a key predictor of long jump distance. The number of strides that were visually regulated during the long jump approach was, accordingly, positively correlated with long jump distance (r = 0.67, p = 0.001). The amount of visual regulation used during run-throughs was, however, less than half (p = 0.001) of that observed during long jump approaches. Our results should compel long jump coaches to supplement run-through training with additional visual guidance exercises, to encourage their athletes to visually regulate more of their long jump approach.

Corporate social responsibility : corporate reputation, business performance and public liability

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) may be viewed as a business strategy rather than a philanthropic concept. The increasing use of CSR as a corporate core strategy, in reaction to consumers‘ growing sentiments, can influence aggregate consumption and consumers‘ quality of life. As such, CSR would be of interest to the policy makers and may become subject to corporate governance and control mechanism. CSR is largely unregulated. Reliance on corporations‘ self-restraint and voluntary initiatives is inadequate to protect the society and avoid the disadvantages that may emerge from the potential deceptive practices in using a CSR strategy. This study investigates the evidence of economic benefits as incentives to corporations for using CSR. CSR is measured in terms of the firm‘s relationships with primary stakeholders. A model is constructed to identify the primary stakeholders and to estimate the association between CSR, corporate reputation and business performance. Policy implications of CSR are discussed.