Test and evaluation system for multi-protocol sampled value protection schemes

Proposed transmission smart grids will use a digital platform for the automation of substations operating at voltage levels of 110 kV and above. The IEC 61850 series of standards, released in parts over the last ten years, provide a specification for substation communications networks and systems. These standards, along with IEEE Std 1588-2008 Precision Time Protocol version 2 (PTPv2) for precision timing, are recommended by the both IEC Smart Grid Strategy Group and the NIST Framework and Roadmap for Smart Grid Interoperability Standards for substation automation. IEC 61850-8-1 and IEC 61850-9-2 provide an inter-operable solution to support multi-vendor digital process bus solutions, allowing for the removal of potentially lethal voltages and damaging currents from substation control rooms, a reduction in the amount of cabling required in substations, and facilitates the adoption of non-conventional instrument transformers (NCITs). IEC 61850, PTPv2 and Ethernet are three complementary protocol families that together define the future of sampled value digital process connections for smart substation automation. This paper describes a specific test and evaluation system that uses real time simulation, protection relays, PTPv2 time clocks and artificial network impairment that is being used to investigate technical impediments to the adoption of SV process bus systems by transmission utilities. Knowing the limits of a digital process bus, especially when sampled values and NCITs are included, will enable utilities to make informed decisions regarding the adoption of this technology.

'Which is the best Doctor Who story?' : a case study in value judgements outside the academy'

One of Cultural Studies' most important contributions to academic thinking about culture is the acceptance as axiomatic that we must not simply accept traditional value hierarchies in relation to cultural objects (see, for example, McGuigan, 1992: 157; Brunsdon, 1997: 5; Wark, 2001). Since Richard Hoggart and Raymond Williams took popular culture as a worthy object of study, Cultural Studies practitioners have accepted that the terms in which cultural debate had previously been conducted involved a category error. Opera is not 'better' than pop music, we believe in Cultural Studies - 'better for what?', we would ask. Similarly, Shakespeare is not 'better' than Mills and Boon, unless you can specify the purpose for which you want to use the texts. Shakespeare is indeed better than Mills and Boon for understanding seventeenth century ideas about social organisation; but Mills and Boon is unquestionably better than Shakespeare if you want slightly scandalous, but ultimately reassuring representations of sexual intercourse. The reason that we do not accept traditional hierarchies of cultural value is that we know that the culture that is commonly understood to be 'best' also happens to be that which is preferred by the most educated and most materially well-off people in any given culture (Bourdieu, 1984: 1- 2; Ross, 1989: 211). We can interpret this information in at least two ways. On the one hand, it can be read as proving that the poorer and less well-educated members of a society do indeed have tastes which are innately less worthwhile than those of the material and educational elite. On the other hand, this information can be interpreted as demonstrating that the cultural and material elite publicly represent their own tastes as being the only correct ones. In Cultural Studies, we tend to favour the latter interpretation. We reject the idea that cultural objects have innate value, in terms of beauty, truth, excellence, simply 'there' in the object. That is, we reject 'aesthetic' approaches to culture (Bourdieu, 1984: 6; 485; Hartley, 1994: 6)1. In this, Cultural Studies is similar to other postmodern institutions, where high and popular culture can be mixed in ways unfamiliar to modernist culture (Sim, 1992: 1; Jameson, 1998: 100). So far, so familiar.

Indigenous knowledge and effective parent / school partnerships : insights and issues from 4 school case studies

Towards the last decade of the last millennium, Indigenous knowledge has been central to scholarly debates relating to decolonising knowledge on a global level. Much of these debates were advanced by Indigenous scholars in colonised countries particularly Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the United States. Indigenous scholars argue for the location of Indigenous knowledge as the epistemological standpoint (Battiste, Bell and Findlay, 2002; Kai’a, 2005; Nakata 2002, 2007) for intellectual engagements and methodology for resisting colonial constructions of the colonised other (Rigney, 1997; Smith, 1999, 2005). However, the challenge to engage Indigenous knowledge to inform research and educational processes, in many respects, is still a contested debate in western-oriented universities and institutions of higher education. The place of Indigenous knowledge in Australian secondary and primary schools remains vague, while efforts to embed Indigenous perspectives in the curriculum continue to be made by both government and private educational providers. Educational funding for Indigenous education continues to operate from a ‘deficiency’ model, whereby educational outcomes are often measured against set criteria, reflecting a pass/fail structure, than a more comprehensive investigation of educational outcomes and quality of learning experiences. Teacher knowledge, effective parental and community engagement into students’ learning and students’ experiences of schooling continue to be secondary to students’ final results. This paper presents preliminary findings of Parent School Partnership Initiative (PSPI) project conducted by the Oodgeroo Unit at the Queensland University of Technology in partnerships with the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Education Focus Group for the Caboolture Shire, in South East Queensland. The state government sponsored initiative was to examine factors that promote and enhance parent/school engagement with their students’ schooling, and to contribute to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students’ learning and completion of secondary schooling within the participating schools in a more holistic way. We present four school case studies and discuss some of the early findings. We conclude by arguing the importance of the recognition of Indigenous knowledge and its place in enhancing parent – schools partnerships.

Diversification and value-at-risk

A pervasive and puzzling feature of banks’ Value-at-Risk (VaR) is its abnormally high level, which leads to excessive regulatory capital. A possible explanation for the tendency of commercial banks to overstate their VaR is that they incompletely account for the diversification effect among broad risk categories (e.g., equity, interest rate, commodity, credit spread, and foreign exchange). By underestimating the diversification effect, bank’s proprietary VaR models produce overly prudent market risk assessments. In this paper, we examine empirically the validity of this hypothesis using actual VaR data from major US commercial banks. In contrast to the VaR diversification hypothesis, we find that US banks show no sign of systematic underestimation of the diversification effect. In particular, diversification effects used by banks is very close to (and quite often larger than) our empirical diversification estimates. A direct implication of this finding is that individual VaRs for each broad risk category, just like aggregate VaRs, are biased risk assessments.

The level and quality of Value-at-Risk disclosure by commercial banks

In this paper we study both the level of Value-at-Risk (VaR) disclosure and the accuracy of the disclosed VaR figures for a sample of US and international commercial banks. To measure the level of VaR disclosures, we develop a VaR Disclosure Index that captures many different facets of market risk disclosure. Using panel data over the period 1996–2005, we find an overall upward trend in the quantity of information released to the public. We also find that Historical Simulation is by far the most popular VaR method. We assess the accuracy of VaR figures by studying the number of VaR exceedances and whether actual daily VaRs contain information about the volatility of subsequent trading revenues. Unlike the level of VaR disclosure, the quality of VaR disclosure shows no sign of improvement over time. We find that VaR computed using Historical Simulation contains very little information about future volatility.

Diffusion of corporate governance practices : the Dutch response to pressures for shareholder value

As part of a larger literature focused on identifying and relating the antecedents and consequences of diffusing organizational practices/ideas, recent research has debated the international adoption of a shareholder-value-orientation (SVO). The debate has financial economists characterizing the adoption of an SVO as performance-enhancing and thus inevitable, with behavioral scientists disputing both claims, invoking institutional differences. This study seeks to provide some resolution to the debate (and advance current understanding on the diffusion of practices/ideas) by developing a socio-political perspective that links the antecedents and consequences of an SVO. In particular, we introduce the notion of misaligned elites and misfitted practices in our analysis of how and why differences in the technical and cultural preferences of major owners will influence a firm’s adoption and (un)successful implementation of an SVO among the largest 100 corporations in the Netherlands from 1992-2006. We conclude with a discussion of the implications of our perspective and our findings for future research on corporate governance and the diffusion of organizational practices/ideas.

Controlling chaos? The value and the challenges of applying complexity theory to project management

The literature abounds with descriptions of failures in high-profile projects and a range of initiatives has been generated to enhance project management practice (e.g., Morris, 2006). Estimating from our own research, there are scores of other project failures that are unrecorded. Many of these failures can be explained using existing project management theory; poor risk management, inaccurate estimating, cultures of optimism dominating decision making, stakeholder mismanagement, inadequate timeframes, and so on. Nevertheless, in spite of extensive discussion and analysis of failures and attention to the presumed causes of failure, projects continue to fail in unexpected ways. In the 1990s, three U.S. state departments of motor vehicles (DMV) cancelled major projects due to time and cost overruns and inability to meet project goals (IT-Cortex, 2010). The California DMV failed to revitalize their drivers’ license and registration application process after spending $45 million. The Oregon DMV cancelled their five year, $50 million project to automate their manual, paper-based operation after three years when the estimates grew to $123 million; its duration stretched to eight years or more and the prototype was a complete failure. In 1997, the Washington state DMV cancelled their license application mitigation project because it would have been too big and obsolete by the time it was estimated to be finished. There are countless similar examples of projects that have been abandoned or that have not delivered the requirements.

Maximising the manufacturer performance value through lean initiatives using cost based model

Numerous tools and techniques have been developed to eliminate or reduce waste and carry out lean concepts in the manufacturing environment. However, appropriate lean tools need to be selected and implemented in order to fulfil the manufacturer needs within their budgetary constraints. As a result, it is important to identify manufacturer needs and implement only those tools, which contribute maximum benefit to their needs. In this research a mathematical model is proposed for maximising the perceived value of manufacturer needs and developed a step-by-step methodology to select best performance metrics along with appropriate lean strategies within the budgetary constraints. With the help of a case study, the proposed model and method have been demonstrated.

Home literacy education of Taiwanese Australian families : a sociological analysis

This research investigates home literacy education practices of Taiwanese families in Australia. As Taiwanese immigrants represent the largest ¡°Chinese Australian¡± subgroup to have settled in the state of Queensland, teachers in this state often face the challenges of cultural differences between Australian schools and Taiwanese homes. Extensive work by previous researchers suggests that understanding the cultural and linguistic differences that influence how an immigrant child views and interacts with his/her environment is a possible way to minimise the challenges. Cultural practices start from infancy and at home. Therefore, this study is focused on young children who are around the age of four to five. It is a study that examines the form of literacy education that is enacted and valued by Taiwanese parents in Australia. Specifically, this study analyses ¡°what literacy knowledge and skill is taught at home?¡±, ¡°how is it taught?¡± and ¡°why is it taught?¡± The study is framed in Pierre Bourdieu.s theory of social practice that defines literacy from a sociological perspective. The aim is to understand the practices through which literacy is taught in the Taiwanese homes. Practices of literacy education are culturally embedded. Accordingly, the study shows the culturally specialised ways of learning and knowing that are enacted in the study homes. The study entailed four case studies that draw on: observations and recording of the interactions between the study parent and child in their literacy events; interviews and dialogues with the parents involved; and a collection of photographs of the children.s linguistic resources and artefacts. The methodological arguments and design addressed the complexity of home literacy education where Taiwanese parents raise children in their own cultural ways while adapting to a new country in an immigrant context. In other words, the methodology not only involves cultural practices, but also involves change and continuity in home literacy practices. Bernstein.s theory of pedagogic discourse was used to undertake a detailed analysis of parents. selection and organisation of content for home literacy education, and the evaluative criteria they established for the selected literacy knowledge and skill. This analysis showed how parents selected and controlled the interactions in their child.s literacy learning. Bernstein.s theory of pedagogic discourse was used also to analyse change and continuity in home literacy practice, specifically, the concepts of ¡°classification¡± and ¡°framing¡±. The design of this study aimed to gain an understanding of parents. literacy teaching in an immigrant context. The study found that parents tended to value and enact traditional practices, yet most of the parents were also searching for innovative ideas for their adult-structured learning. Home literacy education of Taiwanese families in this study was found to be complex, multi-faceted and influenced in an ongoing way by external factors. Implications for educators and recommendations for future study are provided. The findings of this study offer early childhood teachers in Australia understandings that will help them build knowledge about home literacy education of Taiwanese Australian families.

Reframing the development of corporate learning

Due to increasing recognition by industry that partnerships with universities can lead to more effective knowledge and skills acquisition and deployment, corporate learning programmes are currently experiencing a resurgence of interest. Rethinking of corporations’ approaches to what has traditionally been classed as ‘training’ has resulted in a new focus on learning and the adoption of philosophies that underlie the academic paradigm. This paper reports on two studies of collaboration between major international engineering corporations and an Australian university, the aim of which was to up-skill the workforce in response to changing markets. The paper highlights the differences between the models of learning adopted in such collaboration and those in more conventional, university-based environments. The learning programmes combine the ADDIE (analysis, design, develop, implement and evaluate) development and workplace learning models. Adaptations that have added value for industry partners and recommendations as to how these can be evolved to cope with change are discussed. The learning is contextualised by industry- based subject matter experts working in close collaboration with university experts and learning designers to develop programmes that are reflective of current and future needs in the organisation. Results derived from user feedback indicate that the learning programmes are effectively aligned with the needs of the industry partners whilst simultaneously upholding academic ideals. In other words, it is possible to combine academic and more traditional approaches to develop corporate learning programmes that satisfy requirements in the workplace. Emerging from the study, a new conceptual framework for the development of corporate learning is presented.

Multicast traffic filtering for sampled value process bus networks

Ethernet is a key component of the standards used for digital process buses in transmission substations, namely IEC 61850 and IEEE Std 1588-2008 (PTPv2). These standards use multicast Ethernet frames that can be processed by more than one device. This presents some significant engineering challenges when implementing a sampled value process bus due to the large amount of network traffic. A system of network traffic segregation using a combination of Virtual LAN (VLAN) and multicast address filtering using managed Ethernet switches is presented. This includes VLAN prioritisation of traffic classes such as the IEC 61850 protocols GOOSE, MMS and sampled values (SV), and other protocols like PTPv2. Multicast address filtering is used to limit SV/GOOSE traffic to defined subsets of subscribers. A method to map substation plant reference designations to multicast address ranges is proposed that enables engineers to determine the type of traffic and location of the source by inspecting the destination address. This method and the proposed filtering strategy simplifies future changes to the prioritisation of network traffic, and is applicable to both process bus and station bus applications.

Parent decisions regarding paid work and care of the child

Australia has witnessed a continual increase in maternal employment over the past two decades, which has placed focus on child care- its effects on the child and on early childhood education and care policy and provision. The engagement of women in the paid workforce contributes to national economic development, and is recognised in government policy incentives such as cash subsidies and tax relief for child care fees. These incentives are targeted towards mothers, to encourage them to engage in paid work. Making a contribution to the family’s economy and to a mother’s economic self sufficiency are two key drivers for women’s engagement in satisfying paid work. Many women also seek to maintain a personal investment in the development of their career, simultaneously ensuring that the child is experiencing suitable care. Policies that support women’s choices for satisfying workforce engagement and care arrangements are prudent for ensuring productivity of the economy as well as for enhancing the wellbeing of parents and children (OECD, 2007). Policies that provide family friendly employment arrangements, paid parental leave, and child care support, directly affect maternal employment decisions. Availability of family friendly employment policies is viewed as one way to not only promote gender equity in employment opportunities but also support the wellbeing of children and families (OECD, 2007). Yet there are not comprehensive and coherent policies on work and family in Australia. Australia is due to implement its first paid parental leave scheme in January, 2011. At the time of the data collection of this research, June 2007 to December 2008, Australia had no statutory provision for paid parental leave. To date, most research has focused on the consequences of paid work and care decisions made by women. Far less is known about the processes of decision-making and reasons underlying women’s choices. Investigation of what is most salient for women as they make decisions regarding engagement in paid work, and care for their child is important in order to inform policy and practices related to parental leave, family friendly employment and care for the child. This prospective longitudinal research was of 124 Australian expectant first-time mothers who completed questionnaires in their third trimester of pregnancy, and again at six and twelve months postpartum. First-time expectant mothers' decisions regarding engaging in paid work and selecting care for their child represent those of a group who are invested in motherhood and have usually had direct experience of engaging in paid work. They therefore provide an important insight into society’s idealised views about motherhood and the emotional and social uncertainty of making personal decisions where the consequences of such decisions are unknown. These decisions reflect public beliefs about the role of women in contributing to the country’s productivity and decisions about providing for the economic and emotional care needs of their family. As so little is known about the reasoning and processes of decision-making of women’s choices regarding paid work and care of the child this research was designed to capture expectant first-time mother’s preferred options for engaging in paid work and the care of their child, and investigate their actual decisions made at six and 12 months postpartum. To capture preferred options, decisions and outcomes of decisions regarding paid work and care of the child a prospective longitudinal research design was utilised. This design had three important components that addressed key limitations in the extant literature. First the research commenced in pregnancy in order to investigate preferences and beliefs about paid work and care and to examine baseline data that may influence decisions made as the women returned to paid work. Second the research involved longitudinal tracking from the antenatal time point to six and 12 months postpartum in order to identify the influences on decisions made. Third the research measured outcomes of the decisions made at each time point. This research examined the intentions, preferences, beliefs, influences, and outcomes of the decisions about engagement in paid work and choice of care. The analyses examined factors predicting return to paid work, the timing of return and extent of engagement in paid work; the care for the child; satisfaction with paid work; satisfaction with care for the child, motherhood and fulfilment; and maternal wellbeing at six and 12 months postpartum. The factors of interest were both rational/economic (availability and extent of paid and unpaid maternity leave; flexible work patterns) and emotional/affective (career satisfaction, investment in motherhood, and concern with quality of care for the child). Results indicated a group preference, and realisation for, return to paid work within the first year after the birth of a child but with reduction in hours to part-time. Most women saw paid work not only as a source of income but also as source of personal satisfaction. There were four key themes arising from this research. First, the women strived to feel emotionally secure when deciding about engaging in paid work and care of the child. To achieve emotional security women made their decisions for paid work and care of the child differently. A woman’s decision for maternal employment is a function of her personal beliefs, preferences and context regarding paid work and care of the child. She adjusts her established work identity with her new identity as a mother. The second key theme from this research is that the women made their decisions for maternal employment in response to their personal context and there were different levels of opportunities between the women’s choices. There is inequity of entitlement regarding work conditions associated with a woman’s education level. This has implications for the woman’s engagement in paid work, and her child’s health and wellbeing. The third key theme is that the quality of the child’s care mattered to the women in the research. They preferred care provided by parents and/or relatives more than any other types of care. The fourth key theme identified that satisfaction and wellbeing outcomes experienced as a result of maternal employment decisions were a complex interaction between multiple factors that change across time with the ongoing development of the mother’s identity, and the development of the child. The implications for policy within Australia are that the employment of mothers in the workforce necessitates that non-parental care becomes a public concern, where there is universal access to good quality affordable care for every child, not just for those who can afford it. This is equitable and represents real choice while supporting the rights of the child (Thorpe, Cloney & Tayler, 2010), protecting and promoting the public interest (Cleveland & Krashinsky, 2010). Children’s health and wellbeing will be supported (Moore & Oberklaid, 2010) while children are in non-parental care, and they will be exposed to environments and experiences that support their learning and development. The significant design of the research enabled the trajectories of first-time expectant women to be tracked from the antenatal point to 12 months postpartum. But there were limitations: the small sample size, the over-representation of the sample being highly educated and the nature of a longitudinal research that is set within the economic, social and political context at that time. These limitations are discussed in relation to suggestions for future research.