Education Planning Evolution for Forest Engineering in Spain

Forest engineering in Spain has a long tradition and active presence in the engineering field. It is also one of the first educational institutions that shaped the Spanish technological panorama in the mid nineteenth century. The actual situation of the forest systems in Spain is the result of 166 years of observation, research, education and the application of specific techniques and principles that forest engineers acquired with the successive study plans that were implanted in educational institutions. In this paper, the planning historical process of education in Forest engineer is analyzed, differentiating between four historical periods. The analysis of the stages focuses on the contents of the study plans, the orientation towards educational objectives, the duration of the studies and the causes for the modifications that had an impact on the evolution through time within the framework of the acquired experience and the technological advances

Empowerment Evaluation in Spain: The Critical Friend Role in Working with Rural Communities

Rural communities in Cuenca (Spain) are characterized by a great social dislocation, mostly due to the low population density in these areas. In this way, the existence of groups of citizens able to be active agents of their development process is a critical aspect for any community-based development process in this Spanish region. The Institute of Community Development of Cuenca (IDC) has been working with this type of groups for the last 30 years focusing on the organizational empowerment of the rural communities. Main tools in this process have been the empowerment evaluation approach and the critical friend role when helping the groups to achieve their objectives and reinforcing them. This chapter analyses the empowerment process and how the critical friend role is nourished by the facilitator figure.

Planning model for Peruvian university system

This paper arises from observing the effect that the education policy has had on the European Higher Education Area that promotes the primary objective of this research: the preparation of a planning model that contributes, based on the European experience, the basic elements for the quality of higher education in Peru. To appraise the timeliness and usefulness of the aforementioned model, the scope of the Spanish model is selected and specifically adapted to the Peruvian model, which can be considered a testing laboratory due to their historical, cultural and social similarities and in which the model offers a response to the society's need for quality education.

An approach to verbal humor in interaction

I propose a method to study interactional ironic humorous utterances in Spanish. In GRIALE research group consider this method can be applied to humorous ironic utterances in different textual genres, from the violation of conversational principles. Futhermore, we present the General Theory of Verbal Humor proposed by Attardo that it will be taken in our analysis. Therefore, I study irony and humor in examples of conversations from Peninsular Spanish real sample corpuses (COVJA, Corpus de conversaciones coloquiales [Corpus of Colloquial Conversations] and CREA, Corpus de Referencia del Español Actual [Reference Corpus of Present-Day Spanish]). In this article, I will focus on the application of this theory to humorous ironic statements which arise in conversation and examine the effects caused by them, which will additionally verify if irony and humor coexist in the same conversational exchange with a communicative aim and conversational strategies.

COMENEGO (Corpus Multilingüe de Economía y Negocios): a metadiscursive analysis approach

This paper describes a stage in the COMENEGO project, which is creating comparable corpora of Business texts in order to distribute them among translation practitioners so that they can use this resource when translating economic, business or financial texts. This stage consists of discursive analysis of a pilot specialised corpus initially compiled in French and Spanish. Its textual resources are classified in different categories which need to be confirmed so that they can be useful when including them into the virtual platform which will allow users exploit the corpus and filter their searches according to their specific needs. The aim of this paper is to propose a discursive analysis approach based on the concept of ‘metadiscourse’ (Hyland, 2005).

The curricular value of mathematics in non-mathematics degree

Higher education should provide the acquisition of skills and abilities that allow the student to play a full and active role in society. The educational experience should offer a series of conceptual, procedural and attitudinal contents that encourage “learning to know, learning to do, learning to be and learning to live together”. It is important to consider the curricular value of mathematics in the education of university undergraduates who do not intend to study mathematics but for whom the discipline will serve as an instrumental. This work discusses factors that form part of the debate on the curricular value of mathematics in non-mathematics degrees.

Do first-year university students understand the language of mathematics?

The aim of the project is to determine if the understanding of the language of Mathematics of students starting university is propitious to the development of an appropriate cognitive structure. The objective of this current work was to analyse the ability of first-year university students to translate the registers of verbal or written expressions and their representations to the registers of algebraic language. Results indicate that students do not understand the basic elements of the language of Mathematics and this causes them to make numerous errors of construction and interpretation. The students were not able to associate concepts with definitions and were unable to offer examples.

Do you feel what I feel? : emotional development in children with ID

Do you feel what I feel? Emotional development in children with ID is a study that has emerged as a need to deepen the knowledge on this area. It has focused in a case study methodology with the use of three validated instruments to a sample of thirty-four children, twenty attending the 1st cycle and fourteen attending the 2nd, in two school groupings of Castelo Branco city. Seventeen of them have mild intellectual disability and seventeen are “normal”, aged between 8 and 14. The research has been developed in order to give answers to questions related with the way that children with intellectual disability (ID) express, identify and regulate their emotions. The results suggest that children with intellectual disability identify emotions, in a general way, the same way that “normal” children do, nevertheless, there are some difficulties in the understanding and organization of coping strategies.

Eyewitness testimony

Eyewitnesses have always played a fundamental role in the legal process. However, eyewitness evidence is not always as reliable or as accurate as one might hope, given the weight that decision-makers often ascribe to it. In this article, we review some of the many factors that can determine the reliability of witness testimony, including factors that are, and those that are not, within the control of investigative and judicial processes. In doing so, we consider how policies might assist in ensuring that witness testimony can play the most effective and informative role in the legal process as possible.

Strategic Directions of Hotel Industry Expectations

A factor analysis is presented which indicates that among 20 potential strategic issues reated by hotl industry executives three fundamental strategic directions exist. The author summarizes an empiracle study that queried these individuals' beliefs regarding strategic issues they rated at most important.

How Commerce Trumped Art at Miramax

Louis Proyect documents the role of corporate decision-making and profit in the undermining of ostensibly "independent" cinema. He focues on Miramax and its history of tampering with the work of writers and directors.

The Occupy Movement: Two Steps Forward, One Step Back

The op-ed evaluates the successes and limitations of the Occupy Movement in the United States. Ronald W. Cox argues that the Movement was inspirational in directing media focus to the trends of growing inequality and the privileges and power of the one percent. The critique of establishment parties and progressive organizations was a key part of the Occupiers efforts to rethink the meaning of social change. The limitations of the Movement became evident, however, in its extremely decentralized structures that emphasized consensus over majoritarian decision-making, and in its refusal to acknowledge and hold accountable its own leaders.

The Corporatization of Higher Education

This essay reviews recent books and articles that examine the politics and economics of the restructuring of public universities in the United States. The author weaves the arguments together to point to several prominent trends: increased corporatization of university governance and increased dependence on the market for resources previously provided by the state, reduction of full-time faculty in favor of instructors and adjuncts, dramatic growth of administrative personnel, and mounting student debt. The history of these developments is explored by examining the roots of the political attacks on the public university.

The Relevance of Marxist Academics

This commentary examines the relationship between a Marxist scholar and the institutional and societal environment of the university. The focus is on how a Marxist academic navigates the social, economic and political aspects of the university while attempting to maintain a commitment to class analysis and Marxism as political practice.