Students with AD/HD-related behaviours : Saudi mainstream teachers' knowledge and attitude towards inclusion

This study investigated Saudi mainstream primary teachers' knowledge of AD/HD and their attitudes towards the inclusion of students with AD/HD-related behaviours. The study also explored the relationships among teachers' attitudes towards inclusion, knowledge of AD/HD, efficacy beliefs for teaching students with behavioural problems, and relevant background factors such as teacher age, training and experience, and class size. In the first phase of the study, more than 200 Saudi teachers completed a four-part self-report questionnaire while in the second, 8 teachers completed semi-structured interviews. Findings from both phases of the study indicated that although teachers' knowledge of AD/HD was somewhat limited, they generally held positive attitudes towards the inclusion of students with AD/HD-related behaviours in regular classrooms. Additional significant influences on teachers' attitudes included class size as well as teachers' training and self-efficacy beliefs.

Much confusion about inclusion in Australia's largest education system

Over the last three decades, growing international recognition of the right of students with a disability to attend their local school has prompted change in the formation of education policies, schooling structures and pedagogical practice. Inclusion, as the movement has become known, has since been taken up and developed to different degrees in different regions and to differing degrees of success. Yet, despite sincere attempts to better include students with physical, sensory and intellectual disabilities, new and different forms of exclusion have arisen since the late 1990s; particularly for students with social, emotional and/or behavioural difficulties. In this lecture, Dr Linda Graham reports on findings from a three year ARC Discovery project to consider the impact of inclusion on the New South Wales government schooling sector, Australia’s largest education system.

Inclusion of tapered tubes in enhancing the crash performance of automotive frontal structures

This paper treats the design and analysis of an energy absorbing system. Experimental tests were conducted on a prototype, and these tests were used to validate a finite element model of the system. The model was then used to analyze the response of the system under dynamic impact loading. The response was compared with that of a similar system consisting of straight circular tubes, empty and foam-filled conical tubes. Three types of such supplementary devices were included in the energy absorbing system to examine the crush behavior and energy absorption capacity when subjected to axial and oblique impact loadings. The findings were used to develop design guidelines and recommendations for the implementation of tapered tubes in energy absorbing systems. To this end, the system was conceptual in form such that it could be adopted for a variety of applications. Nevertheless, for convenience, the approach in this study is to treat the system as a demonstrator car bumper system used to absorb impact energy during minor frontal collisions.

Leader-follower interactions : relations with OCB and sales productivity

Purpose Based on substitutes for leadership theory, the aim of this study is to examine followers' learning goal orientation as a moderator of relationships among transformational leadership, organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) and sales productivity. Design/methodology/approach Data came from 61 food and beverage attendants of a casino, and were analyzed using regression analyses. Findings Transformational leadership was positively related to both OCB and sales productivity. Learning goal orientation moderated the relationship between transformational leadership and OCB, such that transformational leadership was more strongly related to OCB among followers with a low learning goal orientation than among followers with a high learning goal orientation. Research limitations/implications Limitations of the study include the small sample size and cross-sectional research design. Practical implications Organizations could train supervisors to practice a transformational leadership style and to take followers' learning goal orientation into account. Originality/value The findings of this study suggest that, with regard to OCB, a high learning goal orientation of followers may act as a “substitute” for low levels of leaders' transformational leadership.

Follow the leader if you can, hedge if you must

Follow-the-Leader (FTL) is an intuitive sequential prediction strategy that guarantees constant regret in the stochastic setting, but has poor performance for worst-case data. Other hedging strategies have better worst-case guarantees but may perform much worse than FTL if the data are not maximally adversarial. We introduce the FlipFlop algorithm, which is the first method that provably combines the best of both worlds. As a stepping stone for our analysis, we develop AdaHedge, which is a new way of dynamically tuning the learning rate in Hedge without using the doubling trick. AdaHedge refines a method by Cesa-Bianchi, Mansour, and Stoltz (2007), yielding improved worst-case guarantees. By interleaving AdaHedge and FTL, FlipFlop achieves regret within a constant factor of the FTL regret, without sacrificing AdaHedge’s worst-case guarantees. AdaHedge and FlipFlop do not need to know the range of the losses in advance; moreover, unlike earlier methods, both have the intuitive property that the issued weights are invariant under rescaling and translation of the losses. The losses are also allowed to be negative, in which case they may be interpreted as gains.

Neoliberal social inclusion? The agenda of the Australian Universities Community Engagement Alliance

University–community engagement (UCE) represents a hybrid discourse and a set of practices within contemporary higher education. As a modality of research and teaching, ‘engagement’ denotes the process of universities forming partnerships with external communities for the promised generation of mutually beneficial and socially responsive knowledge, leading to enhanced economic, social and cultural developments. A critical discourse analysis (Fairclough 2003. Analysing Discourse: Textual analysis for social research. London: Routledge) of the Australian Universities Community Engagement Alliance’s (AUCEA) ‘Position Paper’(2008 Universities and community engagement (Position paper 2008–2010)), as reported in this article, suggests that its uneasy synthesis of neoliberal, social inclusion and civic engagement discourses into a hybrid UCE discourse semantically privileges neoliberal forms of engagement. Perhaps, as a result, the AUCEA seems to have missed an opportunity to influence the Australian ‘widening participation’ debate on securing access and opportunity for marginalised students at universities and building social and cultural capital within their communities of origin.

Profile of a narcissistic leader : coffee’s for closers only

Purpose In the past, leadership scholars have tended to focus on leadership as a force for good and productivity (Ashworth, 1994; Higgs, 2009; Padilla, Hogan, & Kaiser, 2007). However, recently attention has been given to the ‘dark side’ of leadership (see Higgs, 2009; Judge, Piccolo, & Kosalka, 2009). The aim of this chapter is to explore dark leadership from the perspective of the narcissistic leader using a fictional character from a popular film. Methodology/approach Using the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 4th edition, 1994 (DSM-IV) (American Psychiatric Association, 2000) as an operational definition of narcissistic personality disorder we explore the psychology of the narcissistic leader through a fictional character study in a popular film. Findings We have created a psychological profile of a narcissistic leader which identifies specific behavioural characteristics within a toxic organizational culture. Social implications This study has implications for employees within any organizational culture. It is significant because it can illustrate how dark leadership can impact negatively within organizations. Originality/value The use of actual living persons on which to base case study material in the study of dark leadership is problematic and constrained by ethical issues. However, the use of characters in fiction, such as contemporary film and drama, represents an excellent source of case study material. Given that little empirical works exists on narcissistic leaders and leadership, the chapter adds originality and value to the field.

Inclusion?

Whilst inclusive education is a relatively recent advance in our thinking about schooling and pedagogy, it is rapidly establishing movement simultaneously reflected in and refracted by education policy, research, and scholarship. This is manifest in the proliferation of policy texts and programmes generated by education jurisdictions globally and locally, and in the burgeoning number of scholarly texts, academic conferences, and research grants dedicated to inclusive education.

Leader vision and diffusion of HR policy during change

Purpose – This paper utilizes diffusion of innovation theory in order to investigate and understand the relationships between HR policies on employee change-related outcomes. In addition, the aim is to explore the role of leader vision at different hierarchical levels in the organization in terms of the relationship of HR policy with employee change-related outcomes. Design/methodology/approach – This quantitative study was conducted in one large Australian government department undergoing major restructuring and cultural change. Data from 624 employees were analyzed in relation to knowledge of HR policies (awareness and clarity), leader vision (organizational and divisional), and change-related outcomes. Findings –Policy knowledge (awareness and clarity) does not have a direct impact on employee change-related outcomes. It is the implementation of policies through the divisional leader that begins to enable favorable employee outcomes. Research limitations/implications – Future research should employ a longitudinal design to investigate relationships over time, and also examine the importance of communication medium and individual preferences in relation to leader vision. Originality/value - This research extends the application of diffusion of innovation theory and leader vision theory to investigate the relationship between HR policy, leader vision, and employees’ change-related outcomes.

Learning about inclusion from developing countries : using the index for inclusion

There is a need for a more critical perspective and reporting about the value of taking a model of inclusion developed in western countries and based upon the human rights ethos applying it in developing countries. This chapter will report firstly on how the Index for Inclusion (hereinafter referred to as the Index) was used in Australia as a tool for review and development; and secondly how the process of using the Index is adjusted for use in the Pacific Islands and other developing nations in collaborative and culturally sensitive ways to support and evaluate progress towards inclusive education. Examples are provided from both contexts to demonstrate the impact of the Index as an effective tool to support a more inclusive response to diversity in schools.

Schooling elsewhere: Rurality, inclusion and education

Over its history, the International Journal of Inclusive Education has had a strong record of naming, critiquing and redressing the ways in which particular social locations shape experiences of inclusion and exclusion in education. In this special issue, we continue this tradition taking as our focus those who live outside the metropolitan mainstream. To date, rural schools and the communities of which they are part have often been overlooked by researchers of inclusive education. This is not to suggest that the rural has been ignored entirely in research on inclusivity and schooling. For example, a number of studies have included rural case studies as part of broader research on subjects such as educational disadvantage and experiences of poverty (Horgan 2009), inclusivity and early childhood services (Penn 1997), constraints to inclusive educational practice (Shevlin, Winter, and Flynn 2013) and the efficacy of inclusivity training programmes for teachers (Strieker, Logan, and Kuhel 2012). Such work provides a critical reference point for this special issue as it has demon- strated that the educational landscape may be very differently experienced in the rural compared to the urban. Illustrative is Wikeley et al.’s (2009, 381) assertion that working class Irish youth living outside the urban sphere are ‘doubly disadvantaged’ in terms of accessing out-of-school activities and Milovanovic et al.’s (2014, 47) claim that for young children in the Western Balkans, there is a ‘dearth of pre-school provision in rural areas’. As well as highlighting cleavages of disadvantage as they exist between urban and rural schools, work in this journal has also revealed disadvantage that exists within rural schools. This scholarship has explored how particular social locations, such as disability, ethnicity, sexuality, gender and class intersect with rurality to produce very different educational biographies. For example, it may be class, as Holt (2012) found in her study of young rural women’s transition to a city university, or it may be gender, as Tuwor and Sossou (2008) posited in their work on the schooling of girls in West Africa.

Sport development programmes for Indigenous Australians : innovation, inclusion and development, or a product of ‘white guilt’?

Under the legacy of neoliberalism, it is important to consider how the indigenous people, in this case of Australia, are to advance, develop and achieve some approximation of parity with broader societies in terms of health, educational outcomes and economic participation. In this paper, we explore the relationships between welfare dependency, individualism, responsibility, rights, liberty and the role of the state in the provision of Government-funded programmes of sport to Indigenous communities. We consider whether such programmes are a product of ‘white guilt’ and therefore encourage dependency and weaken the capacity for independence within communities and individuals, or whether programmes to increase rates of participation in sport are better viewed as good investments to bring about changes in physical activity as (albeit a small) part of a broader social policy aimed at reducing the gaps between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians in health, education and employment.

Towards inclusion: Provision for diversity in the transition to school

Policies of inclusion challenge the construct of readiness and require schools to prepare for the diversity of children as they transition to school. However, there is limited empirical evidence concerning how this challenge is met. This paper presents two Australian studies that investigate inclusive practices in the transition to school. Study 1 examined the predictors of child outcomes across a sample of 1831 children in 39 schools. The results indicate that both quantity and quality of programme provision influenced outcomes and that programme effects were particularly potent for children with diverse abilities and backgrounds. Study 2 focuses on pedagogy in three of the schools to highlight how this provision can be achieved. Results show that provisions were reactive, that saliency of children’s needs directed school practices and that professional knowledge impacted on measures of quality. Inclusive processes accounting for both child progress and broader family and teaching influences are necessary for improved transition to school.

If you're going to be a leader, at least act like it! Prejudice towards women who are tentative in leader roles

Role congruity theory predicts prejudice towards women who meet the agentic requirements of the leader role. In line with recent findings indicating greater acceptance of agentic behaviour from women, we find evidence for a more subtle form of prejudice towards women who fail to display agency in leader roles. Using a classic methodology, the agency of male and female leaders was manipulated using assertive or tentative speech, presented through written (Study 1, N = 167) or verbal (Study 2, N = 66) communications. Consistent with predictions, assertive women were as likeable and influential as assertive men, while being tentative in leadership reduced the likeability and influence of women, but not of men. Although approval of agentic behaviour from women in leadership reflects progress, evidence that women are quickly singled out for disapproval if they fail to show agency is important for understanding how they continue to be at a distinct disadvantage to men in leader roles.