Drivers of teaching effectiveness : views from accounting educator exemplars in Australia

This paper summarizes the views, obtained via a survey instrument created by the authors and reported in studies by Stout and Wygal, of 22 accounting educator teaching exemplars from Australia. Each of these individuals has been cited for teaching excellence through receipt of one or more formal teaching awards. The paper responds to calls in Australia for increased attention to the dimensions of teaching effectiveness and to initiatives in the United States calling for a broader sharing of information among members of the academy regarding the characteristics of teaching effectiveness. Little direct evidence from the field of accounting education is available to date regarding such characteristics or antecedents of teaching effectiveness in the student learning environment. Our research therefore extends in a fundamental way the work of Stice and Stocks and Stout and Wygal. Specifically, perceptions from a sample of award-winning non-US faculties regarding the ‘drivers of teaching effectiveness’ in accounting education are recorded and analyzed. In decreasing order of perceived importance, drivers of teaching effectiveness are: having a student focus; commitment to teaching (as a profession); high levels of preparation/organization; the ability to link subject matter to the practice environment; and, instructor skills and attributes. This paper adds to our understanding of the drivers of teaching effectiveness and begins the process of creating a worldwide knowledge base in accounting education. The paper should be of interest to accounting faculty members interested in improving their teaching effectiveness and/or mentoring junior faculty members.

Developing an analytical framework to assess the uncertainty and flexibility mismatches across the supply chain

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to discuss how decisions regarding organisational flexibility can be improved through targeted resource allocation, by focusing on the supply chain's level of uncertainty exposure. Specifically, the issue of where and in what ways flexibility has been incorporated across the organisation's supply chain is addressed. Design/methodology/approach: A two-phase methodology design based on literature review and case study was used. Using 83 journal articles in the areas of uncertainty and flexibility an analytical process for assessing uncertainty-flexibility mismatches was developed. Furthermore, results from ten interviews with senior/middle managers within the Australian manufacturing sector were used to provide preliminary insights on the usefulness and importance of the analytical process and its relationship with organisational practice. Findings: The paper emphasises the importance of having a systematic and encompassing view of uncertainty-flexibility mismatches across the supply chain, as well as the significance of socio-technical engagement. The paper both conceptually and empirically illustrates how, using a structured analytical process, flexibility requirements across the supply, process, control and demand segments of a supply chain might be assessed. A four-step analytical process was accordingly developed and, its application, usefulness and importance discussed using empirical data. Practical implications: The analytical process presented in this paper can assist managers to obtain a comprehensive overview of supply chain flexibility when dealing with situations involving uncertainty. This can facilitate and improve their decision-making with respect to prioritising attention on identified flexibility gaps in order to ensure stability of their performance. Originality/value: The paper presents a supply chain-wide discussion on the difficulties that uncertainty brings to organisations, and how organisational flexibility might serve to moderate those challenges for supply chain management. It discusses how to identify the flexibility gap and proposes an original analytical process for systematic assessment of uncertainty-flexibility mismatches. © Emerald Group Publishing Limited.

'The first time' performance and workshop

'The First Time' is a performance about twelve beginning teachers' first experiences, and is constructed from data generated throughout 2011 for my PhD through a theatre-based research approach. ‘The First Time’ is performed by teachers - most of whom are drama teachers - in order to sensitively represent the real stories of the research participants. 'The First Time' centers around first experiences in teaching, and while it is primarily about beginning teachers' experiences, the idea of firsts in teaching is a universal one, and one through which teachers share their experiences, knowledge and understanding of the ways of becoming a teacher. The workshop includes a performance of 'The First Time' and a discussion of the themes that have been raised through the staging of this performance - such as beginning teacher's experiences, performing the stories of real people, teachers' experiences as performers, and the uses of theatre-based research methods. The workshop also includes the opportunity for participants to experiment with the theatre-based research method.

Firsts: Performing ways first-year teachers experience identity transformation

Presentation and discussion on theatre-based research methodology at 'Realising the Potential of the Arts as Method and Methodology Inaugural Arts as Method(ology) Research Group' Symposium

The First Time

This symposium begins with a performance of an ethnographic play, The First Time by Michelle Ludecke.The symposium aims to communicate recent research in teacher education and focuses the experiences of becoming a teacher across borders through innovative arts-based research. Three supporting papers develop the argument that teacher education research requires a response that addresses the complexity, contradictions and nuance of the lived experiences of beginning and experienced teachers alike. Graduates teachers will be leading generational change in teachers work and lives into the twentieth first century. But to have them lead they must stay in the profession. What will be the future research and policy responses?

Glomerular hypertrophy in subjects with low nephron number: contributions of sex, body size and race

Background. We have shown that low nephron number (Nglom) is a strong determinant of individual glomerular volume (IGV) in male Americans. However, whether the same pattern is present in female Americans remains unclear. The contributions of body surface area (BSA) and race to IGV in the context of Nglom also require further evaluation. Methods. Kidneys without overt renal disease were collected at autopsy in Mississippi, USA. The extremes of female Nglom were used to define high and low N glom for both sexes. Nglom and IGV were estimated by design-based stereology. A total of 24 African and Caucasian American females (n = 12 per race; 6 per Nglom extreme) were included. These subjects were subsequently matched to 24 comparable males by age and Nglom and to 18 additional males by age, Nglom and BSA. Results. IGV average and variance were very similar in female African and Caucasian Americans with high and low Nglom. Males with low Nglom from both races showed greater IGV average and variance than comparable females matched by age and Nglom. These differences in IGV between sexes were not observed in Caucasian Americans with low Nglom that were matched by age, Nglom and BSA. In contrast, glomeruli from African Americans were larger than those from Caucasian Americans, especially in subjects with high Nglom. Conclusions. While female Americans with low Nglom did not show glomerular hypertrophy, comparable males with low Nglom showed marked glomerular hypertrophy that was closely associated with high BSA. Glomerular size in African Americans may be confounded by multiple additional factors. © The Author 2014. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of ERA-EDTA. All rights reserved.

Using video to promote pre-service teachers’ thinking about their transition to teaching

This paper reports on research investigating the use of video representations of first-year teachers’ experiences in undergraduate teacher education workshops that focus on the transition to teaching. The use of the video is a responsive act that draws on the notion of looking back, where graduates in their first year of teaching ‘speak to’ current students. Scenes from video footage of the theatre-based research performance The First Time shaped workshop activities and discussions in the unit. Themes ranged from pedagogical to practical, covering topics such as teacher identity discourses; epiphanic and revelatory moments of transition to becoming a teacher; and preparing for job applications and interviews. Data from the researcher’s journal, Student Evaluation of Teaching and Units (SETU) comments, and semi-structured interviews with undergraduate students upon completion of the workshops are framed within a phenomenographic paradigm. The aim in phenomenography is to describe variations of conception that people have of a particular phenomenon (Sin, 2010), in this case the video as a tool to promote critical thinking about the transition to teaching. The researcher explored her own, and participants’ experiences, and identified a range of conceptual meanings of the phenomenon. These were classified into categories according to their similarities and differences concerning the effectiveness of this specific video in assisting undergraduates in their transition to teaching. Early results reveal some similarities and many variations among participants as to the effectiveness of the video as a tool. Their conceptions of the phenomenon are individual and relational, and as such are quite varied. Emergent varied themes include: ‘I know what it is that I need to learn’; ‘Is this theory or practice?’; and ‘I don’t do drama’. Emergent similarities include: ‘Preparing for the unexpected’.

Indigenous knowledge and climate change: settlement patterns of the past to adaption of the future

For centuries the Aboriginal Peoples of Australia have been confronted with major ecological, geological and climate events, and had to adapt home shelters and settlements to seasonal variations. Many of these changes have been captured in the cultural traditions of the indigenous people reflecting a harsh coastal environment. Weather patterns and climate change were gauged by the occurrence of the tidal changes, landscape changes, recurring weather events and the acknowledgement of six seasons. Community settlements got established and relocated to adapt to the patterns of nature. This paper investigates if this ancient knowledge can provide answers for adaptation of coastal settlements to a changing climate. Drawing upon recent published literature on predicted coastal climate change impacts in the different regions of Australia, and the review of indigenous settlement planning according to a six season cycle, the author explores traditional knowledge as input to a potential Design Based Adaptation Model for coastal settlements along the Australian coast.

Drivers of teaching effectiveness: Views from accounting educator exemplars in Australia

This paper summarizes the views, obtained via a survey instrument created by the authors and reported in studies by Stout and Wygal, of 22 accounting educator teaching exemplars from Australia. Each of these individuals has been cited for teaching excellence through receipt of one or more formal teaching awards. The paper responds to calls in Australia for increased attention to the dimensions of teaching effectiveness and to initiatives in the United States calling for a broader sharing of information among members of the academy regarding the characteristics of teaching effectiveness. Little direct evidence from the field of accounting education is available to date regarding such characteristics or antecedents of teaching effectiveness in the student learning environment. Our research therefore extends in a fundamental way the work of Stice and Stocks and Stout and Wygal. Specifically, perceptions from a sample of award-winning non-US faculties regarding the 'drivers of teaching effectiveness' in accounting education are recorded and analyzed. In decreasing order of perceived importance, drivers of teaching effectiveness are: having a student focus; commitment to teaching (as a profession); high levels of preparation/organization; the ability to link subject matter to the practice environment; and, instructor skills and attributes. This paper adds to our understanding of the drivers of teaching effectiveness and begins the process of creating a worldwide knowledge base in accounting education. The paper should be of interest to accounting faculty members interested in improving their teaching effectiveness and/or mentoring junior faculty members. © 2014 © 2014 Taylor & Francis.

Educating for futures in marginalized regions: a sociological framework for rethinking and researching aspirations

'Raising aspirations' for education among young people in low socioeconomic regions has become a widespread policy prescription for increasing human capital investment and economic competitiveness in so-called 'knowledge economies'. However, policy tends not to address difficult social, cultural, economic and political conditions for aspiring, based in structural changes associated with globalization. Drawing conceptually on the works of Pierre Bourdieu, Raymond Williams, Arjun Appadurai and authors in the Funds of Knowledge tradition, this article theorizes two logics for aspiring that are recognizable in research with young people and families: a doxic logic, grounded in populist-ideological mediations; and a habituated logic, grounded in biographic-historical legacies and embodied as habitus. A less tangible third 'logic' is also theorized: emergent senses of future potential, grounded in lived cultures, which hold possibility for imagining and pursuing alternative futures. The article offers a sociological framework for understanding aspirations as complex social-cultural phenomena, and for capacitating emergent and hopeful aspirations through school- and community-based research and dialogue. © 2013 Philosophy of Education Society of Australasia.

Acute psychophysiological relationships between mood, inflammatory and cortisol changes in response to simulated physical firefighting work and sleep restriction

This study examined how changes in wildland firefighters' mood relate to cytokine and cortisol levels in response to simulated physical firefighting work and sleep restriction. Firefighters completed 3 days of simulated wildfire suppression work separated by an 8-h (control condition; n = 18) or 4-h sleep opportunity (sleep restriction condition; n = 17) each night. Firefighters' mood was assessed daily using the Mood Scale II and Samn-Perelli fatigue scale. Participants also provided samples for the determination of salivary cortisol and pro- (IL-6, IL-8, IL-1β, TNF-α) and anti-inflammatory (IL-4, IL-10) cytokine levels. An increase in the positive mood dimension Happiness was related to a rise in IL-8 and TNF-α in the sleep restriction condition. A rise in the positive mood dimension Activation among sleep restricted firefighters was also related to higher IL-6 levels. An increase in the negative mood dimension Fatigue in the sleep restriction condition was associated with increased IL-6, TNF-α, IL-10 and cortisol levels. In addition, an increase in Fear among sleep restricted firefighters was associated with a rise in TNF-α. Elevated positive mood and immune activation may reflect an appropriate response by the firefighters to these stressors. To further understand this relationship, subsequent firefighting-based research is needed that investigates whether immune changes are a function of affective arousal linked to the expression of positive moods. Positive associations between negative mood and inflammatory and cortisol levels to physical work and restricted sleep provide useful information to fire agencies about subjective fire-ground indicators of physiological changes.

Using hermeneutic phenomenology to investigate how experienced practitioners learn to communicate clinical reasoning

This paper is primarily targeted at doctoral students and other researchers considering using hermeneutic phenomenology as a research strategy. We present interpretive paradigm research designed to investigate how experienced practitioners learn to communicate their clinical reasoning in professional practice. Twelve experienced physiotherapy practitioners participated in this research. Using hermeneutic phenomenology enabled access to a phenomenon that is often subconscious and provided a means of interpreting participants’ experiences of personal learning journeys. Within the philosophy underpinning hermeneutic phenomenology, researchers need to design a research strategy that flows directly from the research question and goals of the research project. This paper explores such a strategy.

Viability of tallow inclusion in Atlantic salmon diet, as assessed by an on-farm grow out trial

The results of a recent increase in research interest directed at the inclusion of tallow in fish feed formulations are suggesting tallow is viable as a potential substitute for other alternative lipid sources such as poultry by-product oil. Although strong growth performance data has been shown, reservations still exist regarding reduced digestibility and the potential impacts this could have on performance over the duration of a grow-out period in low temperature conditions. Also little information is yet available on the potential effect of dietary tallow inclusion on final product quality. A large scale farm based study testing the inclusion of tallow at 40% inclusion, partially replacing poultry by-product oil, in commercial diets of Atlantic salmon over a winter grow-out period in southern Tasmania, Australia was conducted. Tallow inclusion had no impact on growth performance or nutrient digestibility. Tallow resulted in a slight improvement in fillet quality exhibiting a significant reduction in n - 6 PUFA and the n6:n3 ratio, and an increased n - 3LC-PUFA tissue deposition. Consumers were unable to display any preference in liking between 3 salmon products (cold smoked, hot smoked, and cooked) as a result of tallow inclusion. This study demonstrates the viability of partial inclusion of tallow in Atlantic salmon diets over a winter grow-out period. Statement of relevance: Improved knowledge of alternative dietary energy sources (oils and fats) to be used in aquafeed, (replacing the increasingly expensive, and diminishingly available, fish oil) is a key area of research towards improved environmental sustainability and economic viability of the aquaculture sector. Following a promising laboratory based, research scale, in vivo trial aimed at assessing the viability of tallow in salmon feed, a larger and longer duration farm-based trial was implemented to validate initial findings. Consumer test of final products (fresh-cooked, hot smoked and cold smoked fillets) showed no modification of sensorial attributes. Tallow is hereto shown to be a highly viable alternative oil for the salmon aquafeed industry.