Formal development and quantitative verification of dependable systems

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A Case Study of the Implementation of Experiential Education in Yukon K-12 Schools

This qualitative case study explored the process of implementing Experiential Education (EXED) in Yukon Territory Kindergarten to Grade 12 (K-12) schools with a particular focus on investigating: (a) understandings of EXED and the drivers behind its implementation, (b) factors contributing to EXED’s suitability for Yukon schools, and (c) factors supporting and challenging the implementation of EXED in Yukon schools. Data collection involved interviews with Yukon Department of Education (YDE) staff members, principals and teachers, document collection, and reflective note collection. Findings indicated that EXED was understood as more of a methodology than a philosophy for teaching and learning. EXED implementation was primarily driven by bottom-up (school/ teacher) initiatives and was secondarily supported by top-down (YDE) efforts. The process of implementation was supported by three main factors and was challenged primarily by six factors. The results also pointed to three factors that made EXED suitable for implementation in Yukon schools.

Investigating the Relationships Between Teacher Identity Norms and Collaboration

The purpose of this study was to investigate how teacher identity norms relate to teacher collaboration among the practices of elementary teachers in Ontario. Using quantitative research methods, the data indicated two clusters of teacher identity norms. The norm cluster of innovation, interdependence, and cooperation showed positive correlations with collaboration and the norm cluster of conservatism, individualism, and competition showed negative correlations with collaboration. The two clusters of norms also correlated with each other. The data showed that teachers highly valued collaboration as part of their teaching practice but did not always experience it in their school setting. The analysis suggested that if schools reinforce norms of innovation, interdependence, and cooperation, collaboration will be nurtured. Further, the data showed that if norms of conservatism, individualism, and competition are continued in school cultures, then collaboration will not be sustained. As a broad educational reform agenda, teacher collaboration is used (a) to support school cultures, (b) to change teaching practices, and (c) to implement policy-based initiatives. This research is expected to benefit teachers in its capacity to inform policy makers concerning the highly complex nature of teacher collaboration and some of the factors that impact it. With an understanding of the relationships between teacher identity norms and collaboration, it may be possible for policy makers to provide appropriate support structures that reinforce collaboration in teachers' practices as well as predict potential levels of collaboration within school cultures.

La mobilisation sociale dans un contexte de gouvernance au Québec et en Irlande : le rôle des organismes communautaires dans l'élaboration des politiques pour lutter contre la pauvreté

Cette thèse porte sur le rôle des organismes communautaires entre 1994 et 2002 dans l’élaboration de politiques pour lutter contre la pauvreté au Québec et en Irlande et ce, dans un contexte de gouvernance. Au cours de années 1980 et 1990, des gouvernements, dont ceux du Québec et de l’Irlande, ont fait appel à des organismes communautaires pour que ceux-ci participent à la gestion des services sociaux ainsi qu’à la formulation des politiques sociales. Cette participation s’est inscrite dans le cadre de nouveaux arrangements politiques, soit des nouvelles formes de gouvernance alors que les gouvernements éprouvaient des difficultés à remédier à l’accroissement des inégalités sociales. Cependant, il demeure difficile de discerner en quoi l’établissement de ces nouvelles formes de gouvernance a façonné le rôle des organismes communautaires dans l’élaboration des politiques pour lutter contre la pauvreté. De plus, les partenariats sociaux en Irlande relèvent d’un processus davantage institué que la concertation au Québec, ce qui a entraîné des différences au plan des mobilisations sociales. L’objectif de cette thèse est donc celui de mieux cerner le lien entre les nouvelles formes de gouvernance et la mobilisation sociale des organismes communautaires dans l’élaboration de politiques pour lutter contre la pauvreté. L’hypothèse mise en avant est que l’efficacité de l’action collective dépend de la manière dont les organismes communautaires s’y prennent pour pallier l’incertitude qui caractérise les modes de gouvernance. Sur le plan théorique, cette thèse mise sur les interactions entre acteurs et, plus particulièrement, sur la formation de réseaux de politiques publiques. Cela implique plus précisément de cerner comment les acteurs coordonnent des activités entre eux et se rallient autour d’un même thème, comme celui de la lutte contre la pauvreté. Lorsque la coordination des activités est forte et que le ralliement autour d’un même thème est important, on parle de coalition de cause. La nécessité de former une coalition se produit dans le contexte d’un champ institutionnel incertain, comme c’est le cas pour les mécanismes de concertation au Québec. Mais le caractère incertain du champ institutionnel entraîne aussi des divergences à l’intérieur de la coalition instaurée à cette occasion, ayant pour effet d’affaiblir la mobilisation sociale. Ainsi, l’interprétation que font les organismes communautaires des nouvelles formes de gouvernance façonne la manière dont ces organismes vont définir la lutte contre la pauvreté et élaborer leurs stratégies. Sur le plan méthodologique, le choix des cas de l’Irlande et du Québec repose dans les différences qui existent en termes de gouvernance et ce, alors qu’ils partagent de fortes similarités. Tant l’Irlande que le Québec sont caractérisés par des économies de marché ouvertes, des régimes d’État-providence de type libéral ainsi que l’emprise, par le passé, de l’Église catholique dans les services sociaux. Cependant, ces deux cas diffèrent en ce qui concerne le rôle de l’État, le système électoral, le statut juridico-politique, le caractère de leur économie et la place occupée par le milieu communautaire par rapport à l’État. Ces différences permettent de rendre compte du moins en ce qui concerne le Québec et l’Irlande, de la manière dont l’action collective découle de la relation entre les stratégies des acteurs et le contexte dans lequel ils se situent. Cette thèse montre comment, dans un processus davantage institué, comme c’est le cas des partenariats sociaux en Irlande, la mobilisation sociale s’avère plus efficace que lorsqu’elle se situe dans le cadre d’un processus moins institué, comme ce qu’on peut observer avec la concertation au Québec. Bien que, dans les deux cas, l’influence du milieu communautaire en matière des politiques sociales demeure mitigée, la mobilisation sociale des organismes communautaires irlandais s’est avérée plus efficace que celle de leurs homologues québécois eu égard de la formulation de politiques pour lutter contre la pauvreté. Au Québec, bien que les organismes communautaires sont parvenus à former une coalition, soit le Collectif pour une loi sur l’élimination de la pauvreté, leur mobilisation s’est trouvée affaiblie en raison de la prédominance de divergences entre acteurs communautaires. De telles divergences étaient aggravées en raison du caractère incertain du champ institutionnel lié à la concertation. En Irlande, bien que les organismes communautaires ont dû faire face à des contraintes qui rendaient difficiles la formation d’une coalition, ceux-ci ont pu néanmoins se mobiliser autrement, notamment en raison de liens formés avec des fonctionnaires dans le cadre des ententes partenariales.

The Pursuit of Alternatives

Stories of peoples’ struggles across the globe are testaments to their determination to resist exploitation and injustice, and to imagine and construct their own narratives of economic and political difference. These stories of emancipatory moments demonstrate that something radically different in terms of dominant socio-economic relations and mental conceptions of the world may arise out of and beyond capitalism. The Pursuit of Alternatives: Stories of Peoples’ Economic and Political Struggles Around the World presents a fresh and new perspective on how the ‘process of becoming’ alternatives might take place based on peoples’ lived experiences. The chapters here, by labour activists and academics, explore how various forms of peoples’ economic and political initiatives and struggles in six countries – Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Nigeria, the Philippines, and South Korea – might become ‘actually existing’ spaces and moments for the development of critical consciousness and transformative capacities which are both central in challenging the dominant social, economic and political relations. The stories in this book bring to light today’s language of peoples’ struggles; what inspires people to create their own emancipatory moments and spaces for transformative self-change. While this book does not aim to propose an alternative to capitalism per se, it makes a stimulating contribution to the continuing debate on what alternatives to capitalist relations and arrangements might look like by grounding these alternatives in the everyday lives and struggles of workers, women, aboriginal peoples, the unemployed, and the poor.

A unified approach to the recognition of complex actions from sequences of zone-crossings

We present a method for the recognition of complex actions. Our method combines automatic learning of simple actions and manual definition of complex actions in a single grammar. Contrary to the general trend in complex action recognition that consists in dividing recognition into two stages, our method performs recognition of simple and complex actions in a unified way. This is performed by encoding simple action HMMs within the stochastic grammar that models complex actions. This unified approach enables a more effective influence of the higher activity layers into the recognition of simple actions which leads to a substantial improvement in the classification of complex actions. We consider the recognition of complex actions based on person transits between areas in the scene. As input, our method receives crossings of tracks along a set of zones which are derived using unsupervised learning of the movement patterns of the objects in the scene. We evaluate our method on a large dataset showing normal, suspicious and threat behaviour on a parking lot. Experiments show an improvement of ~ 30% in the recognition of both high-level scenarios and their composing simple actions with respect to a two-stage approach. Experiments with synthetic noise simulating the most common tracking failures show that our method only experiences a limited decrease in performance when moderate amounts of noise are added.

Calibration and evaluation of individual-based models using Approximate Bayesian Computation

This paper investigates the feasibility of using approximate Bayesian computation (ABC) to calibrate and evaluate complex individual-based models (IBMs). As ABC evolves, various versions are emerging, but here we only explore the most accessible version, rejection-ABC. Rejection-ABC involves running models a large number of times, with parameters drawn randomly from their prior distributions, and then retaining the simulations closest to the observations. Although well-established in some fields, whether ABC will work with ecological IBMs is still uncertain. Rejection-ABC was applied to an existing 14-parameter earthworm energy budget IBM for which the available data consist of body mass growth and cocoon production in four experiments. ABC was able to narrow the posterior distributions of seven parameters, estimating credible intervals for each. ABC’s accepted values produced slightly better fits than literature values do. The accuracy of the analysis was assessed using cross-validation and coverage, currently the best available tests. Of the seven unnarrowed parameters, ABC revealed that three were correlated with other parameters, while the remaining four were found to be not estimable given the data available. It is often desirable to compare models to see whether all component modules are necessary. Here we used ABC model selection to compare the full model with a simplified version which removed the earthworm’s movement and much of the energy budget. We are able to show that inclusion of the energy budget is necessary for a good fit to the data. We show how our methodology can inform future modelling cycles, and briefly discuss how more advanced versions of ABC may be applicable to IBMs. We conclude that ABC has the potential to represent uncertainty in model structure, parameters and predictions, and to embed the often complex process of optimizing an IBM’s structure and parameters within an established statistical framework, thereby making the process more transparent and objective.

Uma ferramenta de gestão em apoio a negociações complexas no setor brasileiro de telecomunicações

O propósito deste Estudo de Caso é descrever, comparar e interpretar informações que nos permita confirmar a importância da utilização de uma ferramenta de gestão durante os processos de negociação. Com a ajuda destas ferramentas, negociadores poderão maximizar as probabilidades de sucesso em suas negociações, dada a visão estratégica que estas oferecem nos estágios de preparação, desenvolvimento e conclusão das negociações. Quando utilizada adequadamente, a ferramenta dará aos negociadores uma visão mais ampla em cada etapa, muito além de somente pontos técnicos e/ou comerciais inerentes a um determinado projeto, os quais comumente são considerados. Para suportar este Estudo de Caso, foi realizada uma Pesquisa Qualitativa junto a profissionais de vendas de várias Empresas do Setor de Telcomunicações no Brasil, a qual vem apoiada por material teórico de autores de referência, objetivando confortar a percepção limitada pelas próprias características da pesquisa qualitativa. Este estudo avalia, diagnostica e recomenda soluções de gestão de negociações, à luz da técnica da criação de consensos suportadas e conduzidas pela ferramenta MNC (Matriz de Negociações Complexas), tendo como base os resultados finais de uma negociação comercial ocorrida em finais de 2003 entre duas grandes multinacionais do Setor de Telecomunicações e cujo principal objetivo na época era a obtenção de um contrato para expansão e modernização de uma Rede CDMA WLL de Telefonia Fixa Celular pertencente a uma Operadora. No decorrer da negociação a qual é abordada como exemplo, não foram utilizadas técnicas semelhantes àquelas sustentadas pela MNC, importante ferramenta de gestão de negociação, a qual já vem sendo utilizada inclusive pelo CDES (Conselho de Desenvolvimento Econômico e Social) do Brasil, nem tampouco nenhuma outra ferramenta de gestão. Este trabalho objetiva demonstrar que sua aplicação na organização, acompanhamento, diagnose, condução e conclusão de negociações, quaisquer que sejam estas, pode aumentar a probabilidade de êxito, trazendo para as Organizações, Instituições ou para aqueles que a adotarem, maior eficácia na condução e alcance dos resultados finais almejados. É apresentada uma análise diagnóstica dos parâmetros envolvidos na negociação em questão, passando por aqueles que estavam em desacordo com a ferramenta como o Contexto, as Opções, a Comunicação, o Relacionamento, as Concessões, o Facilitador, etc., e que foram considerados inconsistentes ou que eventualmente tenham passado despercebidos pelos negociadores, apresentando como conclusão os resultados comparativos entre a negociação utilizando-se os parâmetros da MNC e aqueles obtidos sem a utilização dos mesmos. Este estudo procura sustentar que a adoção desta ferramenta possui grande importância para a melhoria de desempenho durante os processos de negociação, não significando todavia, uma garantia de êxito sobre todas as negociações nas quais os negociadores estiverem envolvidos. Autores como Roger Fisher e Willian Ury (1981) sustentam que as pessoas negociam para obter um resultado melhor do que o que obteriam caso não negociassem. Desta forma, pode-se notar que de maneira direta ou indireta, no decorrer de nossas vidas sempre estivemos e a cada dia novamente estaremos nos deparando com a necessidade em participar de algum novo processo de negociação, diariamente, desde o mais básico ao mais complexo. A negociação passa a ser para o indivíduo uma ciência extremamente necessária e ao mesmo tempo complexa, atraente e sedutora, cuja percepção da necessidade de desenvolvimento dessas habilidades pode muitas vezes passar despercebida por muitos no transcorrer de suas vidas. As conclusões deste estudo de caso têm a intenção de demonstrar também que o sucesso de uma negociação nem sempre se resumirá em atingir os objetivos inicialmente propostos na MNC. Outros aspectos considerados por esta metodologia, se melhor ou pior aplicados, também poderão contribuir para o eventual sucesso ou fracasso de uma negociação.

Utility Harmonic Impedance Measurement Based on Data Selection

Determination of the utility harmonic impedance based on measurements is a significant task for utility power-quality improvement and management. Compared to those well-established, accurate invasive methods, the noninvasive methods are more desirable since they work with natural variations of the loads connected to the point of common coupling (PCC), so that no intentional disturbance is needed. However, the accuracy of these methods has to be improved. In this context, this paper first points out that the critical problem of the noninvasive methods is how to select the measurements that can be used with confidence for utility harmonic impedance calculation. Then, this paper presents a new measurement technique which is based on the complex data-based least-square regression, combined with two techniques of data selection. Simulation and field test results show that the proposed noninvasive method is practical and robust so that it can be used with confidence to determine the utility harmonic impedances.

Towards a spatial understanding of trade-offs in sustainable development: A meso-scale analysis of the nexus between land use, poverty, and environment in the Lao PDR

In land systems, equitably managing trade-offs between planetary boundaries and human development needs represents a grand challenge in sustainability oriented initiatives. Informing such initiatives requires knowledge about the nexus between land use, poverty, and environment. This paper presents results from Lao PDR, where we combined nationwide spatial data on land use types and the environmental state of landscapes with village-level poverty indicators. Our analysis reveals two general but contrasting trends. First, landscapes with paddy or permanent agriculture allow a greater number of people to live in less poverty but come at the price of a decrease in natural vegetation cover. Second, people practising extensive swidden agriculture and living in intact environments are often better off than people in degraded paddy or permanent agriculture. As poverty rates within different landscape types vary more than between landscape types, we cannot stipulate a land use–poverty–environment nexus. However, the distinct spatial patterns or configurations of these rates point to other important factors at play. Drawing on ethnicity as a proximate factor for endogenous development potentials and accessibility as a proximate factor for external influences, we further explore these linkages. Ethnicity is strongly related to poverty in all land use types almost independently of accessibility, implying that social distance outweighs geographic or physical distance. In turn, accessibility, almost a precondition for poverty alleviation, is mainly beneficial to ethnic majority groups and people living in paddy or permanent agriculture. These groups are able to translate improved accessibility into poverty alleviation. Our results show that the concurrence of external influences with local—highly contextual—development potentials is key to shaping outcomes of the land use–poverty–environment nexus. By addressing such leverage points, these findings help guide more effective development interventions. At the same time, they point to the need in land change science to better integrate the understanding of place-based land indicators with process-based drivers of land use change.

Correlation Dimension of Complex Networks

We propose a new measure to characterize the dimension of complex networks based on the ergodic theory of dynamical systems. This measure is derived from the correlation sum of a trajectory generated by a random walker navigating the network, and extends the classical Grassberger-Procaccia algorithm to the context of complex networks. The method is validated with reliable results for both synthetic networks and real-world networks such as the world air-transportation network or urban networks, and provides a computationally fast way for estimating the dimensionality of networks which only relies on the local information provided by the walkers.

Being, Belonging, and Connecting: Filipino Youths' Narratives of Place(s) and Wellbeing in Hawai'i

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 2016-04

A First Step Towards Synthesising Rubrics and Video for the Formative Assessment of Complex Skills

Abstract. The performance objectives used for the formative assessment of com- plex skills are generally set through text-based analytic rubrics[1]. Moreover, video modeling examples are a widely applied method of observational learning, providing students with context-rich modeling examples of complex skills that act as an analogy for problem solving [1]. The purpose of this theoretical paper is to synthesize the components of video modeling and rubrics to support the formative assessment of complex skills. Based on theory, we argue that application of the developed Video Enhanced Rubrics (VER) fosters learners’ development of mental models, quality of provided feedback by various actors and finally, the learners mastery of complex skills.

Evaluation of creative problem solving abilities in undergraduate structural engineers through interdisciplinary problem based learning

For a structural engineer, effective communication and interaction with architects cannot be underestimated as a key skill to success throughout their professional career. Structural engineers and architects have to share a common language and understanding of each other in order to achieve the most desirable architectural and structural designs. This interaction and engagement develops during their professional career but needs to be nurtured during their undergraduate studies. The objective of this paper is to present the strategies employed to engage higher order thinking in structural engineering students in order to help them solve complex problem-based learning (PBL) design scenarios presented by architecture students. The strategies employed were applied in the experimental setting of an undergraduate module in structural engineering at Queen’s University Belfast in the UK. The strategies employed were active learning to engage with content knowledge, the use of physical conceptual structural models to reinforce key concepts and finally, reinforcing the need for hand sketching of ideas to promote higher order problem-solving. The strategies employed were evaluated through student survey, student feedback and module facilitator (this author) reflection. The strategies were qualitatively perceived by the tutor and quantitatively evaluated by students in a cross-sectional study to help interaction with the architecture students, aid interdisciplinary learning and help students creatively solve problems (through higher order thinking). The students clearly enjoyed this module and in particular interacting with structural engineering tutors and students from another discipline

“I know, therefore I adapt?” Complexities of individual adaptation to climate-induced forest dieback in Alaska

Individual actions to avoid, benefit from, or cope with climate change impacts partly shape adaptation; much research on adaptation has focused at the systems level, overlooking drivers of individual responses. Theoretical frameworks and empirical studies of environmental behavior identify a complex web of cognitive, affective, and evaluative factors that motivate stewardship. We explore the relationship between knowledge of, and adaptation to, widespread, climate-induced tree mortality to understand the cognitive (i.e., knowledge and learning), affective (i.e., attitudes and place attachment), and evaluative (i.e., use values) factors that influence how individuals respond to climate-change impacts. From 43 semistructured interviews with forest managers and users in a temperate forest, we identified distinct responses to local, climate-induced environmental changes that we then categorized as either behavioral or psychological adaptations. Interviewees developed a depth of knowledge about the dieback through a combination of direct, place-based experiences and indirect, mediated learning through social interactions. Knowing that the dieback was associated with climate change led to different adaptive responses among the interviewees, although knowledge alone did not explain this variation. Forest users reported psychological adaptations to process negative attitudes; these adaptations were spurred by knowledge of the causes, losses of intangible values, and impacts to a species to which they held attachment. Behavioral adaptations exclusive to a high level of knowledge included actions such as using the forests to educate others or changing transportation behaviors to reduce personal energy consumption. Managers integrated awareness of the dieback and its dynamics across spatial scales into current management objectives. Our findings suggest that adaptive management may occur from the bottom up, as individual managers implement new practices in advance of policies. As knowledge of climate-change impacts in local environments increases, resource users may benefit from programs and educational interventions that facilitate coping strategies.