Meeting Learning Needs Case Study

Meeting Learning Needs: Case Study In this rationale I intend to discuss â€Å"Why we do what we do† when it comes to Inclusion and Special Educational Needs (SEN). This will be a case study of a pupil with SEN attending the school in which I work. It will first outline the nature of the pupils Special Educational Needs and then critically examine how these needs are being met. The role of multi-agency approaches in providing support to the pupil and parental involvement will also be analysed. All children, wherever they are educated, need to be able to learn, play and develop alongside each other within their local community of schools† (Dfes 2004 p5), going further to state that â€Å"inclusion is about much more than the type of school that children attend: it is about the quality of their experience; how they are helped to learn, achieve and participate fully in the life of the school† (p25). http://sen. ttrb. ac. uk/ViewArticle2. aspx? ContentId=15915 (Access ed on 20/01/11) The case study I carried out was on Billy who is 9 years old, Billy was diagnosed with Autism at the aged 4 shortly after he started mainstream school in reception. Autism is a type of disability. There are many people with autism in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. 1 out of every 100 people has autism. You cannot always tell that someone has autism just by looking at them. Autism lasts for all of a person's life. But they can still do a lot of things and learn a lot of skills. The three main areas of difficulty which all people with autism share are sometimes known as the ‘triad of impairments' which are Social Communication, Social Interaction and Social Imagination. The triad of impairments is the term that describes the difficulties that people with autism experience in differing degrees. Because all people are different, the way autism affects them is also different. To enable the setting to remove Billy’s barriers to learning we firstly arranged a meeting at his home with him and his parents and the Special Needs Coordinator (SENCo). At the meeting we discussed Billy’s learning and personal needs, at first we concentrated on Billy’s routine at home enabling us to see how he dealt with everyday issues. It is vital that we alleviate confusion and give Billy a sense of security. This will be done by preparing Billy whenever possible if his routine is going to be broken, someone will talk him through what is going to happen. We also intend to invite Billy into the setting to meet his new teacher, and will be providing him with photographs of the settings and his support workers to facilitate him in familiarise himself with his new setting. We have taken photographs to allow us to personalise the learning spaces with pictorial sequences, rule reminders, schedules and labels. A space in the classroom will be made available for Billy to work with his one-to-one support and peers where possible. By using these strategies Billy’s learning can be structured to support his need for routine. ‘Being clear and consistent is supportive to all learners in the classroom but will be essential for the child with an autistic spectrum disorder’ G, Knowles, Supporting Inclusive Practice (p. 16) I feel that it is very important that all children have the right to be included in mainstream school and where possible they should be able to meet there learning needs and the targets set in the National Curriculum. One of the fundamental principles of the Special Education Needs Code of Practice is ‘the needs of children and young people with Special Educational Needs are identified and assessed quickly and matched by appropriate provision’ (Department for Education and Skills, 2001 p. 9). I believe that it should be a collaboration between the teachers, the parents of the child and the child themselves who decides whether they would benefit from being in mainstream school or not. Extensive research studies have been undertaken to determine the effectiveness of integrating and including students with severe disabilities. Tornillo (1994) feels that, ‘teachers are required to direct inordinate attention to a few, thereby decreasing the amount of time and energy directed toward the rest of the class. Indeed, the range of abilities is just too great for one teacher to adequately teach. Consequently, the mandates for greater academic accountability and achievement are unable to be met’. http://www. sedl. org/change/issues/issues43/concerns. html (accessed on 30/01/11) During my research into Inclusion in mainstream school I found that, some parents of students with more severe disabilities are concerned about the opportunities their children will have to develop basic life skills in a regular classroom setting. They are also cautious about inclusion because of fears that their children will be ridiculed by other students. Its at this point I feel it necessary to state that Inclusion is not about making sure all children are taught the curriculum in the classroom, it is making sure that all individuals be they disabled or non disabled have access to the curriculum, and that learning is facilitated to suit their learning needs. The next step to facilitate Billy’s learning needs is to draw up an Individual Education Plan (IEP). An IEP describes the educational program that has been designed to meet that child's unique needs. ‘An Individual Education Plan is an assessment, planning, teaching and reviewing tool which records specific learning goals, teaching requirements and review arrangements to help a pupil with SEN which are ‘additional to and different from’ those of most pupils, to make progress in key areas of learning’ (Dovestone, Cullingford-Agnew, 2006, p. 23). Each child who receives special education and related services must have an IEP. Each IEP must be designed for one student and must be a truly individualized document. The IEP creates an opportunity for teachers, parents, school administrators, related services personnel, and students (when age appropriate) to work together to improve educational results for children with disabilities. The IEP is the cornerstone of a quality education for each child with a disability. As stated in the SEN Code of Practise (2001) where possible, children and young people with SEN should participate in all the decision-making processes that occur in education including the setting of learning targets and contributing to IEPs, discussions about choice of schools, contributing to the assessment of their needs and to the annual review and transition processes. Following the initial meeting we arranged for Billy and his parents to visit the setting for a day allowing them the opportunity to assess the setting. All areas of the school were made accessible to them so they could see how Inclusion of all students is important too us as a setting. It is essential that Billy’s parents are involved in every stage of Billy’s integration into the setting as stated in the SEN Code of Practice(2001) ‘It is vitally important that schools welcome and encourage parents to participate from the outset and throughout their child’s educational career at the school’. In my setting we encourage parents to come to us with any questions or concerns they may have about there child/children and we persevere to accommodate their needs. It is vitally important for parents to be involved with every stage of their child’s education as Parents are the most important people after the child. ‘They know there child best and know what they want out of the staff and the school. ’ (As stated in my settings Inclusion Policy) It is our responsibility as a setting to ensure that parents are aware of the Partnership with Parents (PwP). PwP aims to ensure that parents are able to play an informed part in any decisions about the educational provision made to meet their child SEN and to build partnerships between parents, the Local Education Authority (LEA) and schools. WORD COUNT 1343 Reference List and Bibliography Department for Education and Skills. (2001). Special Educational Needs Code of Practice. London: DfES. Dovestone, M, Cullingford-Agnew, S. (2006) Becoming a Primary Higher Level Teaching Assistant: Primary Special Educational Needs. Exeter: Learning Matters Ltd. http://www. sedl. org/change/issues/issues43/concerns. html (accessed on 30/01/11) http://sen. ttrb. ac. uk/ViewArticle2. aspx? ContentId=15915 (accessed on 20/01/11) Knowles, G. (2006) Supporting Inclusive Practise. David Fulton Publishers Ltd. London

James Dean as the Iconic Rebel Figure Essay

The Oxford English Dictionary defined a rebel as â€Å"a person who resists authority, control, or convention† . These are the characteristics of James Dean’s screen personas in Nicholas Ray’s Rebel Without a Cause and Elia Kazan’s East of Eden. In a time where conformity was a dominant ideology in society, rebellion became a way to display your own individuality. Rebel Without a Cause and East of Eden both respectively deal with the vexing problem of the asocial youth who remain stubbornly delinquent against the nuclear family. Each respective film touches upon the puzzling subject of the 1950s, which is juvenile delinquency. The films also provide ammunition for the ideological rebellious behavior for teens to parody. Rebel Without a Cause and East of Eden are both concerned with young people â€Å"estranged from their communities and struggling to define themselves differently than the norm† . James Dean was an attractive rebel figure because he represented the raw-nerved emotions of being an adolescent while he also asserted a romantic, mythic notion about, which became attractive to audiences young and old. Dean’s upfront sexiness and relentless desire to imbue honor make Rebel Without a Cause and East of Eden films that withstand generational changes and remain prevalent within teenage society today. James Dean as the archetype for the ‘rebel’ character personified a decade of defiance, and his screen portrayal of the iconic rebel sparked a cult following that superseded his life. The continued relevance and renowned status of Dean’s screen persona is prevalent because of its â€Å"sympathetic treatment of adolescent anguish† that each director concentrated on. The enigmatic nature of the rebel icon made it easy for the viewing audience to grab hold and manifest their personal principles onto it. Dean was catapulted to a cult figure as he evoked the submerged pain and spoke for a generation of people who had sense of being stifled and smothered by values that were imprisoned by. Furthermore, Dean molded the formation of the â€Å"tough-but-tender† iconic teen rebel in the 1950s, and became a commodity and the legendary figure of teenage angst. Dean’s unbridled emotions both on and off screen became essential in both Rebel Without a Cause and East of Eden as they channeled the teenager in all of us . The 1950s were a time when teenagers were struggling with their own identity and this idea of conformity was oppressive to their individual growth. James Dean epitomized the ‘rebel’, as his inability to stick to confined conformity both on and off screen was a major asset during 1950s filmmaking. The rebel character that was present in both films was an attempt to glorify individuality. Dean’s protagonist characters in each respective film were alienated, vulnerable and antisocial, which were standard traits of the common rebel. The 1950s became an era where individualism had to be tempered to suit the demanded conformity. The ‘rebel’ icon as a whole offered refuge in a time where adolescents were trapped in environments created by political and social forces beyond their control, which impeded their ability to make their own choices or realize their aspirations. Filmmakers like Ray and Kazan attempted to assert their individuality by creating these rebellious characters that went against the accepted norms and fought for what they wanted to achieve. Ray was acutely aware that the recognitions of the attractive young rebel would intonate a large following, and casting the Hollywood bad-boy, James Dean, created a synergy between Dean’s screen persona, Jim Stark, and his real life counterpart. With his magnificent confusion, pained fragility, and unwavering sexiness, Dean became the template for teenage rebellion. Rebel Without a Cause exemplifies a thinly veiled attempt to search for authority that catapults into an attempt to search for an identity for oneself. On the other hand, in Kazan’s films, he exploited Dean’s screen persona as the rebel anti-hero in American movies, democratizing and linking the rebellious behavior to root in American values . This was also seen in Rebel Without a Cause; however, this idea was predominant within East of Eden. By Kazan doing this, Dean as a rebel character, but also the film East of Eden became symbolic visions and vehicles of change. The integrity of the family formed the backbone conformity in the 1950s and non-conformity based on a non-traditional family was something that had not been fully explored. The non-traditional nuclear family is something that was taboo; however, both Ray and Kazan deal with them in their respective films. In Rebel Without a Cause the use of gender-role reversal is apparent; and within East of Eden, the idea of an absentee mother is present. These non-traditional nuclear families pave the way for the rebel character that Dean personifies on screen. Dean is used as a sentimentalist with a yearning to refurbish the struggling nuclear family. Since the nuclear family played such an influential role, Hollywood saw it as worth saving and worth reconstructing. During this decade, the nuclear family dominated, so it was important to reconstruct the failing nuclear family in order to promote the conformity the government and society sorely desired; in cases where the nuclear family could not be restored, sickness or injury became the typical Hollywood scapegoat. While the nuclear family plays an important role in understanding the rebel character, the family plays a background role within the film itself. The nuclear family within Rebel Without a Cause features gender role reversal where Dean’s father is a weak pushover and is controlled by his overpowering wife, that ultimately forces Dean to react in a rebellious manner. These non-traditional gender roles confuse the teenage characters and propagate the rebellious characteristics as a mean for garnering attention. In order to right these wrongs, Jim adopts a surrogate family, whereby Judy is his wife, and Plato becomes the adoptive son. Since there is a lack of a traditional nuclear family, the escape to the abandoned mansion removes Dean from the â€Å"compromises of the real world† whereby he is able to live with Judy and Plato in an â€Å"idealized version of family life†, which is when he comes to the realization that he no longer needs to â€Å"equate masculinity with violent rebellion† and perpetuates his reintegration into society. Additionally, Elia Kazan was fascinated with James Dean’s personal struggles, which helped him connect to his rebellious character as Cal in East of Eden. Kazan used Dean’s personal problems to his advantage, exploiting them and creating a tumultuous nuclear family that mimicked the biblical tale of Cain and Abel. The â€Å"love and hate† plotline that deals with forbidden love and explosive passions is reticent of the well-known biblical tale. Cal – defiant, disobedient, and uncompromising – provokes the central conflict within the film, which impersonates his biblical counterpart Cain. Cal himself is stuck between the â€Å"brooding coast of his mother’s sin† and the â€Å"sunlit valley of his father’s righteousness†, which adjusts and brings to light the coexistence of good and evil within all of us. Cal and Aron are primary demonstrations of this good versus evil idea, as they are fighting for their father’s affections, which is a paralleled allegory of the biblical tale. However, it is also applicable to the 1950s when the film was created, and can be further adapted to fit modern society, which is why East of Eden is a timeless film. Dean’s character Cal exhibits a multitude of self-destructive behavior. As a traditional rebellious character, Dean exhibits free will and the capacity to forgive even though he begrudges his father and brother throughout the diegetic. Cal is embittered with the idea that his father favors Aron, his â€Å"perfect† twin brother. Further, Cal attempts to win his father’s undying affection by farming beans and selling them for a large profit. If Cal shows his father that he can create a successful business and repay him monies lost, he would be showered with the affection he feels deprived from. Cal’s plan backfires and instead resorts to â€Å"killing† his brother by destroying his integrity in order to gain his father’s affection and adoration. However, this plan fails and ultimately causes his father’s demise. The theme of reconciliation appears in East of Eden when Dean offers to take care of his invalid father shows his father that his intentions, while misguided, were pure and only used as a guise for his father to notice all his hard work. Dean’s concern with masculinity and manhood is at the forefront of Rebel Without a Cause. Dean exhibits â€Å"moral and psychological vertigo as he teeters on the brink of manhood† , and is concerned with masculinity as there has been an apparent lacking representation of manhood within his home life. Dean is searching for a strong and upright male figure with whom he can identify with, which was a customary representation during the 1950s. Instead of being a strong role model, Dean’s father portrayed as a craven subordinate who succumbs to the over-demanding ways of his boisterous wife. For a struggling teen, these ideals prove to be less than appropriate, which launches Dean into rebellion, in hopes of finding the role model he desperately needs and desires. In the absence of a credible adult guidance, especially from his father, Dean questions his masculinity. Furthermore, Dean equates manhood with honor. This theme of masculinity and honor is present in both Rebel Without a Cause and East of Eden. In Rebel Without a Cause Dean plays the role of the informer, which is an honorable characteristic . Informing is construed as the highest act of courage, and displays a defining moral choice. Having this moral compass helps to shape and define the man that Dean will turn in to, which is a dependable figure as he attempts to salvage Pluto’s insanity and Judy’s insecurities. Dean screen persona is concerned with not only preserving his honor, but also with surviving and thriving in a world that embodies teenage confusion. Ultimately, Dean’s reconciliation with hegemony makes a rebel honorable, possible by the virtue of its own authority and â€Å"unimpaired by psychosis, alienation, or a romanticized futility†. While Dean is a rebel within East of Eden by defying his father’s orders, he has honorable characteristics when dealing with his manhood. Integrity and honor are integral parts to Dean’s persona as he attempts to save his father and salvage his well being after an ill-advised investment. The rebel character that became a figure of non-conformity, and rugged individualism became not only a culture but also became a political stance as a way to stray from American hegemony. Ray uses Dean as a dissent of social control, in order to promote the independence that became synonymous with rebellious behavior. There was a pressure to conform that was thrust upon the young adolescents, who were already facing a confusing time during their formative years. Dean as a ‘rebel’ is espoused as the cause of the protestor and stultified the inherently violent social system. The rebel sparked debate and offered a different perspective that would not have been possible with a completely conformist hegemonic society. In order to stray from a completely hegemonic society, and defy global homogenization, America can turn iconography against itself. This was a message the Ray attempted to portray by having the rebellious characters fight each other even though ultimately they believed in the same things. Psychological and social issues became prevalent and defined the two types of rebels that were present within Rebel Without a Cause. Firstly, there is the rebel that James Dean personified with displays of reconciliation and reintegration into society; and secondly, there is a character such as Plato who was a clear representation of irreconcilable rebellion. Dean is able to be readmitted into society as his disaffection was not profound in the first place, and was used as a mechanism of expression and attention in the wake of the absence of a strong father. Additionally, Dean’s rebelliousness was sentimentalized, which furthered his reintegration. On the other hand, irreconcilable rebellion is equated to insanity, which cannot be accommodated in society, thusly forcing Plato’s death and the end of the film. While psychological issues can be discusses and presented within a film, insanity is not accepted during the 1950s, so to respond to this, it is imperative for Plato to die. With the death of Plato and the re-integration of Dean’s character, there is a theme of rehabilitation. Moreover, â€Å"once the abyss of personal isolation is bridged, rebelliousness ceases† and those who cannot experience rehabilitations have no place within the film diegetic. This was seen with Plato who was shot down, and Buzz who died during the â€Å"chicken run† he challenged Dean to. Kazan’s representation of the rebellious character in East of Eden was seen as a function of a lack of love and meaningful contact, which is why Cal’s forbidden relationship with Abra became central within the narrative. Dean’s screen persona is searching for the â€Å"authentic self† and his masculine identity, which leads him to his mother as well as his reliance on Abra. Further, Abra is the catalyst for the reconciliations between Cal and his father as she promotes the loving relationship the Cal lacks with his father. East of Eden deals with moral values in a generation where teenagers begin to question their father’s generation. Abra became a representation of purity and simplicity that helped bridge the tumultuous relationship between father and son during the period of intense personal moral dilemma for the teenage rebel. All in all, â€Å"the young rebel character that is firmly ingrained in our cultural imagination carries its traces to the Hollywood screen rebels of the fifties, none more than James Dean† . Both Rebel Without a Cause and East of Eden are dealing with the protagonist’s movement into moral orientation and their journey into self-identification, and present themselves as remedial, therapeutic, and redemptive, which explain symptoms with implied cures. Over the decades the rebel has been a particularly ambiguous icon, where the meanings often contradict one another; however, the use of James Dean as an iconoclastic rebel defined term and created the archetypal ‘rebel’ character. During the 1950s, every aspect of emerging teen culture was viewed as threatening and incomprehensible; however, the rebel character was used for teens to expand their personal boundaries during a time when the cultural landscape was largely undefined.

The Battle of Peleliu Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

The Battle of Peleliu - Research Paper Example It is believed that the lessons learned from the attack despite of great loss assisted in the invasions of Philippines and Japanese later. The point behind unattended state of the island was the consideration of least strategic worth of the place in the war, even then the marine regiment sacrificed 1800 soldiers in five days to Japanese defenders. The aim behind mentioning this statistics is to reinforce the idea that undue bloodshed and upheaval was the prime feature of World War II. The referred battle of Pelelieu is the least recognized war of history with the massive bloodshed for a point of no strategic worth. The literature witnesses the fact that Major General Rupertus was given the task id invading the island with no evident objective and supporting information. The initial plan of invasion comprises of the action plan of three days. The fundamental target was to occupy the 30 foot coral promontory that holds the central place of Island by it cost them around 1200 precious lives to reach that point because of the fact that the moment they tried to enter the island, troops were attacked by Japanese defenders with hailstorm of mortars, artillery, grenades, and machine gunfire. (Ian) The man power of American troops consists of young marines not more than the age of 21. There was no aircraft support to secure their back nor was the essential supply of water at ease. It was almost after five days of constant battle that finally situation was under control. The big share of the success was earned by Colonel Chesty Puller being called afterwards the glory hound because of regular encouragement for fighting relentlessly. It was later acknowledged that the island had more than 500 caves used as hiding place of defenders of Japanese that secure them from fire and render a safe position to target the marine troops.(FT) However, the point behind such a sacrifice of time, energy and resources for a point of no strategical importance is what I tried to

Russian Lit Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Russian Lit - Essay Example This is the tragedy of their love. The Theme of Love in The Lady with the Little Dog. The Lady with the Little Dog is one of Anton Chekhov’s most popular short stories and also one of the greatest love stories in literature. The entire narrative revolves round the theme of love. The protagonists, Dmitri Gurov and Anna Sergeyevna, are married and have their own separate, routine family lives that are not particularly cruel or intolerable. As such, their passion is not something which automatically deserves approval. However, the compassion and tenderness with which the author delineates the love between Dmitri and Anna arouses the reader’s sympathy and justifies their common search for a meaningful relationship. Their passion transforms the cynical Dmitri into a true lover and a more compassionate man. The Lady with the Little Dog is a story of illicit passion and the conclusion is ambiguous. There is no ‘they lived happily ever after’ at the end. Their inab ility to overcome the clandestine nature of their meetings lends a tragic note to the narrative. They are doomed to live apart. The protagonists’ love arises from a shared need, transforms Dmitri’s cynicism into true passion, and leads to their living double lives which cannot be reconciled with social norms. Dmitri and Anna come to Yalta with the shared experience of loveless married lives. Both have been married early in their respective lives: obviously in marriages which have been arranged for convenience, according to the custom in the Russia of those days. Dmitri is afraid of his wife and does â€Å"not like to be at home† (Chekhov, p. 361), while Anna despises her husband for being â€Å"a lackey† (Chekhov, , p.365). Both of them are obviously in search of romance and have come to Yalta prepared to actively seek out and enjoy new experiences and pleasures. Dmitri is lured by the â€Å"tempting thought of a swift, fleeting love affair,† (Chek hov, p.362) and Anna yearns for â€Å"something better --- a different life† (Chekhov, p. 366). Anna is aware of Dmitri’s motive in pursuing her, but does nothing to discourage him. In spite of her moral qualms, and the comparative innocence of her character, she voluntarily surrenders to her passion. They deliberately embark on a one week fling, which they fully expect to be a temporary indulgence. However, contrary to their expectations, the beautiful surroundings, their common needs, and their shared celebration of â€Å"this sweet delirium, this madness,† (Chekhov, , p.368), take root as enduring love. Dmitri enters into his relationship with Anna in the same spirit of cynicism with which he has always dealt with women in the past: despising them as â€Å"an inferior race!† (Chekhov, , p.362). Being unfaithful to his wife is nothing new to him. He is bored and irritated by Anna’s remorse and her continuous fear of being despised by him for bein g a â€Å"trite, trashy woman† (Chekhov, , p.366). He admits that she is deceived in thinking him to be â€Å"kind, extraordinary, lofty† (Chekhov, , p.368). He is ready to put Yalta behind him and move on with life in Moscow. He is totally unprepared to find that his memory of Anna â€Å"followed him everywhere like a shadow and watched him† (Chekhov, , p.369). What begins as just a search for another conquest ends with making a new man of him. He realizes that â€Å"there was no person closer, dearer and more important to him in the whole world† (Chekhov, , p.372). He complacently thinks it is she who loves him and continues

Critically discuss the relevance of the ownership structure of a firm Coursework

Critically discuss the relevance of the ownership structure of a firm and examine how this impacts on both the short-term and long-term strategies that are employed by business - Coursework Example At several instances, it is noted that the ownership structure of a firm has been affecting its steady growth and development at large. Moreover, the ownership structure of the firm is observed to function by developing the image and enhance the strategic development of the firm in both short and long terms (Jensen & Meckling, 1976). With this regard, the paper intends to elaborate on the relevance of the ownership structure followed in The Lego Group. The Lego Group is a private sector company founded in the year 1932. In accordance with its vision, the company’s business was majorly engaged in the development of the children’s cognitive skills through playing. The company has developed its image as a global enterprise over the tenure of 80 years and has developed itself, on of the leading manufacturer of toy in the world (1The LEGO Group, 2014). To develop a better understanding about the ownership structure of the company, a detailed analysis of its provisions and performances have been conducted in the following sections. Ownership structure provides a framework for the process of control and helps in developing a system of management of the firm. Ownership structure is therefore defined as the equity structure that depicts the holding rights of a company. This structure further defines the authority that a particular person has on an organisation. Moreover, the ownership structure depicts managerial abilities to control the different operations of the management and enhance the system overall, to suffice the changing needs of the contemporary business environment and adjust with the same, maintaining efficiency. Contextually, the ownership structure helps in identifying the corporate governance and in developing guidelines that in turn tends to shape the internal climate of the company influencing the investors’ confidence level as well as ensuring transparency in

Women in 20th century America Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Women in 20th century America - Essay Example Hence, the number of working women has increased since the last quarter of the 20th century. Women in 20th century America were more dedicated towards their families than they are today. In the colonial times, women would help their husbands with agricultural work, knit, sew etc. Also it was part of the mother’s job to make sure that she would effectively pass on all of her skills to her daughters so that she would in turn make a good wife/ mother. As time progressed, and the industrial revolution took place, changes occurred gradually. There were changes in methods of work, transportation etc. Consumer goods were now readily available which meant that the things that the women were required to do before were no longer required. This meant that there was more time for family. There was also a rise in perception of the people towards education and its importance. Unmarried females from the middle class got jobs and worked. More women were going for higher education. In the time of the World War II, more women got employment, whether they were married or not. In the later years, the rise in feminism in the 1960’s led women to organize for equal rights. In the 1960’s to 1970’s era there were much more women employed as ever before.

Memory, Thinking, and Intelligence Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Memory, Thinking, and Intelligence - Essay Example These are analytical, experiential and practical intelligence. The above listed behaviours for both academic and everyday intelligence fit into Sternberg's theory. Academic intelligence corresponds with both experiential and componential intelligence, as defined by Sternberg. Experiential intelligence essentially refers to the capacity to comprehend tasks, even novel ones, and execute them efficiently. In relation to academic intelligence, it references the capacity to assimilate knowledge, comprehend abstract terms and apply that knowledge, including the translation of the abstract into the practical. As regards componential intelligence, it essentially refers to problem-solving which, in itself, is predicated on the intellectual analysis of the problem and the selection of the optimal solution. In others words, insofar as the behaviours listed for academic intelligence ultimately derive from the capacity to assimilate and apply new knowledge, they correspond to Sternberg's theory of intelligence. As regards the behaviours listed for everyday intelligence, they correspond with Sternberg's experiential and practical intelligence.

The Relative Effects Motivation and Performance Essay

The Relative Effects Motivation and Performance - Essay Example The performance bonus is defined as the form of additional compensation which is paid to an employee in the organization or a reward for the accomplishment of specific performance targets. It is an additional compensation to his regular salaries or wages and is awarded based on his performance ratings during his performance appraisals or analysis of the projects conducted by the employee. On the other hand performance of an employee can be measured both as per quantitative as well as qualitative aspects. Performance of his work can be measured in terms of the quantity of work he has delivered within a stipulated time and also the quality or standard of that work. The research seeks to bring about a relationship between the performance or productivity of the employee and the bonus paid to that employee. A positive relationship would reflect positive impacts of bonus payments on an employees’ performance and productivity at the workplace, and vice versa. Brief Summary of the Org anization or IndustryThe project analyses the HR aspects of AMZ Limited, which is a manufacturing organization in UK. It is the producer of household appliances in the country. The company provides annual bonuses to its employees based on the performance ratings of employees declared through their systematic performance appraisal structure in the organization. Ratings are provided according to the accomplishment of monthly targets set by the employees. Bonuses are directly linked with the monthly targets of employees.... The research question is as follows: Can performance bonuses in organizations bring about positive impact on the motivation level of employees and their performance and productivity in the organization, AMZ Limited? (Draper, 2004, p.4-5). Hypothesis A statistical testing of hypothesis would be conducted for the research. The null and alternative hypothesis that would be chosen for the study are provided below: H0- Implementing performance bonus in AMZ Limited enhances and improves performance, productivity and motivation level of employees. H1- Implementing performance bonus in AMZ Limited does not bring about any enhancement or improvement in the performance, productivity and motivation level of employees in the organization. Background Theory Performance bonus is defined as the form of additional compensation which is paid to an employee in the organization or a reward for the accomplishment of specific performance targets. It is an additional compensation to his regular salaries o r wages and is awarded based on his performance ratings during his performance appraisals or analysis of the projects conducted by the employee. On the other hand performance of an employee can be measured both as per quantitative as well as qualitative aspects. Performance of his work can be measured in terms of the quantity of work he has delivered within a stipulated time and also the quality or standard of that work. The research seeks to bring about a relationship between the performance or productivity of the employee and the bonus paid to that employee. A positive relationship would reflect positive impacts of bonus payments on an employees’

The Feminist Sociological Perspective in Germinal Essay Example for Free

The Feminist Sociological Perspective in Germinal Essay The feminist analysis has made a major contribution to social theory, making sociologist aware of issues that were previously ignored. Many aspects of what were considered to be â€Å"private life,† associated with male/female relations in household, family, and other social relationships have been transformed. Many parts of society have experienced changes as a result of increased involvement of women in public life. In the 19th century, women were viewed differently than they are now, and those differences play a major part in the roles women played in the literature of their time. Germinal is a novel about the birth of political ideas and social movement in a society. In Zola’s Germinal, women fit into two different major categories. The maternal role of motherly conduct, and women striving for equality amongst the men, The maternal role is the most important role. The mothers in Germinal are very consistent people, and the constants in the society holding the people together. The most obvious mother role is that of La Maheude. She is a typical example of many of the traits of common maternal influence, and she gives the readers an idea into an average family of colliers in late nineteenth century France. â€Å"It wasnt something you thought about, a child just came along, naturally. And when it was grown, it brought in some money and generally kept things going. In their house for example, they could have managed if it werent for Grandpa, who was getting all stiff and for the fact that out of the whole bunch of them only her eldest daughter and two of her sons were yet old enough to work down the mine. (Page 94) When the children are young, it is the duty of the mother and her influence during such an easily influenced stage to shape hard-working and trust-worthy breadwinners. As a mother, La Maheude has this important job in providing for her family by creating new sources of income, and by shaping the next generation into society. Many women in Germinal are taken advantage of when it comes to the influence of their male counterparts. Catherine and Chaval for instance have a relationship where the male believes women are lower than them in status. This aggressive attitude is a clear understanding in the first sexual advances of Chaval to Catherine with his sexual advances. Though Catherine is young, and far from ready for a relationship she is forced into a very intense relationship with Chaval. Her inability to resist such advances from a male shows her true weakness in life. Though the women who work in the mines are supposed to be the representation of the strongest women in the story, in reality Zola has given them fallout in their inability to resist their superiors in the males. At La Mouquettes they were short of bread too: this was her dinner, and she had insisted on wrapping it in a cloth for him, kissing him passionately as she did so(Page 266). La Mouquette is a character that sleeps around for enjoyment instead of personal gain. When the colliers are at their worst, she even offers food to her present love interest in Etienne. This gives her a perspective that is unique, besides the history of her family as it differed from the miners. She adds emotion and charity to the novel. It may not always be recognized, but women have a very important role in society. In the novel Germinal, women are the caretakers of the house and they are the beat in the heart of all the children. They are inspirational women that inspire the children to become something in life. They are degraded in so many ways by the males in the novel; trading sex for food and abusive relationships. Many parts of society have experienced changes as a result of increased involvement of women in public life.

Ikea Essay Example for Free

Ikea Essay Ltd. is a furniture operations company that offers â€Å"quick assembly† furniture with 15% lower price than its competitors. IKEA’s success brought imitators, such as Sears. In order to analyze IKEA’s competitive position in the Canadian Furniture Industry as well as Sears competitive threat, a model of competitive rivalry was used. IKEA and Sears both compete against each other in multiple markets across Canada, they both have market commonality and resource similarity. The Sears catalogue has almost the same format of an IKEA catalogue, and they both offer knock-down, self-assembled line products which allows the customers to create particular designs. In addition, the price for Elements’ products in Sears seemed almost identical to IKEA prices. They both go closely to the supplier in marketing, research, design and development, production standards and production planning. Some of the suppliers of the Elements line for Sears were from Sweden, which is the same as IKEA, but it didn’t show that they had any suppliers in common. It’s evidently that both of the market commonality and resource similarity are very high between those two companies. The market commonality and resource similarity can influence the drivers of competitive behaviour. The awareness of IKEA to recognize the degree of imitation by Sears is very high. High awareness enables IKEA to understand the consequences of Sears’ actions and responses. IKEA has a high motivation to respond Sears’s imitation. In order to protect IKEA’s position in the furniture market, IKEA has a philosophy to dealing with the copyright. IKEA would like to make a new model to replace the stole one rather than bring a lawsuit. Furthermore, IKEA has the ability to attack or respond to Sears’ actions. Since they both hold the similar resources, the ability to attack and respond is similar. IKEA should consider all important issues before taking action or respond to Sears. First-mover incentives, organizational size, and quality are the three factors that IKEA may take action to its competitors. As a first mover, IKEA’s business approach was fundamentally different from the traditional Canadian retailers. IKEA focus on â€Å"quick assembly† furniture and allow the customers assembled at home. Due to this reason, its price is 15% below the lowest prices for traditional furniture. The size of IKEA Canada is relatively small than Sears. The smaller size enables IKEA to launch competitive actions to defend their market position. The quality of IKEA’s product can be guaranteed. As one of the competitive strategy, IKEA had nearly 100 production engineers to assist suppliers in every way to low costs, introduce new technology, and design. The company has a philosophy to â€Å"create a better everyday life for the majority of people. † In order to defend its market position, IKEA may response Sears’ imitation in the following ways. IKEA may implement some strategic action, such as new innovation, to replace the stolen model from Sears. IKEA may lower its price, always by 10 to 15 percent on a particular item, than Sears. If IKEA can’t do it, IKEA may just drop the item and select some other one, to compete against Sears. Sears is one of Canada’s largest merchandising operations, and offering a wide range of medium price and quality goods. IKEA can predict that Sears with relatively lower market dependence are less likely to respond strongly to attacks threatening their market position.

Information Systems On Delta Airlines

Information Systems On Delta Airlines Headquartered in Atlanta, USA, Delta Airlines is by far the worlds largest airline by fleet size, destinations as well as passenger revenue. Delta airlines, founder and included in the SkyTeam airline alliance, encompasses a broad domestic and international travel network, with it unsurpassed global network. The largest operational hub of Delta airlines is the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta Internal Airport and the Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport. Serving more than 170 million passengers every year, and counting, Delta together with its Northwest subsidiary as well as the Delta Connection carriers fly to as many as 355 destinations covering 66 countries, across 6 continents (Delta 2009) (StealingShare). Delta accomplished its merger with the Northwest Airlines on October 29, 2008, with the main aim of forming the globes largest commercial carrier. Then, in February 2009, it started merging ticket counters and gates at airports at which both Delta and Northwest operated, and received permission from the Federal Aviation Administration to commence its operations under a single certificate. This consolidation was finished in February 2010. With the successful incorporation of the Northwest acquisition, investments of Delta Airlines, in newer products and network backed by continued efforts for strengthening its balance sheet, the company is favourably positioned to gain full benefit of the economic recovery. Northwest acquisition is estimated to generate about $2billion as annual revenue and price synergies by 2012(Delta 2009) (Travel Video News 2010). Evaluation: Ever-increasing competition throughout the airline industry is causing the development of new applications of information systems and technology. This includes a new strategic focus on electronic commerce or e-commerce at Delta Airlines. Deltas mid-tier operation information systems has been presented as a scheme for leveraging its operational online transaction processing system (OLTP) infrastructure, in order to be an active part of the emerging world of e-commerce and enable new applications. The basic approach is to insert minimally intrusive taps within the OLTP systems to track transactions as they occur for reproducible reply in the mid-tier operational information system (OIS). For the existing environment, a hybrid approach can be developed and evaluated, Conventionally, large enterprise computing at organizations like Delta is based on the usage of clusters of mainframes that run patent information systems software. A goof evidence of this statement is that Delta works depending on the cluster of IBM S/390 mainframe machines that run system TPF or Transaction Processing Facility. Such traditional OLTPs often support applications which automate most of the airlines operational services. Further, the TPS systems architecture has shown high degree of scalability and availability, with the system operating successfully since the last 30 years and withstanding the Y2K bug scare (Delta 2009). Technically, it is difficult to change the functionalities of these existing OLTP applications in order to accommodate a varying business. Several applications were deployed in assembly language and have evolved since then. The applications were originally designed for executing specific business models and providing little flexibility to support newer business models as well as processes. Particularly, these applications sustain ownership of fixed data sets, and their legacy data formats do not allow creation of new relationships to application data. Also, new business models and processes lead to new applications, many of which leverage the Internet, thereby resulting in exposure of legacy systems to unanticipated transaction volumes (Vasilecas et al 2006). As a response to these drawbacks, Delta pursued a novel strategy of adding mid-tier enterprise information systems known as operation information systems, (OIS). In essence, the pool of information in the current OLTP systems is gathered by grabbing strategic transactions when they occur in soft real-time. The transactions are then duplicated and consistently reproduced in the newly formed OIS. This new environment sees the mapping of data stemming from the transactions into alternative acquirable formats, which bears a correlation with initial unrelated information, together with information from sources apart from the OLTP systems. Furthermore, the immediate mutual-relation triggers events that are extracted from the transaction records. This susceptibility allows for a totally new category of real-time event based applications, which aim at radically improving the effectiveness of airline operations. Moreover, the new mid-tier OIS, considered along with the legacy OLTP system, is said to be the foundation on which Delta generates new applications and enhances its existing business operations, such as improvement of the Customer Experience. The primary factor to their ever-growing success is the development of new mission-driven software and hardware infrastructures supporting these efforts (Vasilecas et al 2006). The architecture of the operation information systems has evolved on a whole, since the scalability and availability requisites have changed. Earlier, the system represented a concept that gained instant success and was implemented far-ahead of its designed capability. The currently executed system has been technically refined to fulfil the scalability and availability requirements (HubPages 2008). From a perspective, relative to data warehouses that generally store enormous bulk of historical information, an operational information system contains only the basic subset of information needed for day-to-day operations. While the size of the operational working set is relatively smaller, the collection of operation flows from internal as well as external sources may lead to operational data stores of terabytes in value. Maintaining such databases and the analytical processing of the data are two primary and basic tasks of the mid-tier OIS. Additional tasks are acquisition, derivation, broadcasting events having low latencies and in soft real time. Taking into account the demands of these tasks, a crucial observation indicates that the order of magnitude of the information from where applications events are obtained is possible to be reduced, mainly by emphasizing on the data required for operational decisions and actions. Hence, event latencies and throughput are improved by spec ifying a derivation subset termed as the Derivation Working Set. The DWS comprises of minimal amount of data required to derive the events needed for the OIS applications. Moreover, performance of data storage as well as data access for derivation of events is significantly enhanced as this working set can be executed as a main-memory database which is organized for accommodating event derivation and initial state queries (Oleson et al) (Mendelson Brynjolfsson 1993). A window scheme is used for operating the DWS, in which the content appears and disappears from the DWS based on relevance of information. Particularly, this set holds all state of current interest to be able to be rapidly accessed by relevant business process. For example, information regarding a flights arrival is stored in the DWS until the flight has departed, immediately after which business logic is added to the DWS indicating that the data in regards to a certain flight section has been finished. Further, the lifetime or window of the data in the DWS depends on the business operations for a certain business domain. Such as years of experience in using flight information results in identification of a window of flight data coupled with behaviour for a number of days in the past and days in the future. Furthermore, lifetimes are different across business domains, and are not dynamic like the lifetimes of event arrivals. For example, a flight exits from a gate and starts taxiing, so the boarding process for that flight is not relevant anymore and may be discarded into the operational data store (ODS), and also to the data warehouse (Oleson et al). Since an existing deployment crosses 10,000 machines, displaying flight status information, the greatest profile service of the OIS infrastructure is the soft real time delivery support of event information to numerous subscribing passengers. Further, real-time applications for event trigger the re-thinking of business processes and motivate to revolutionize the operations of the airlines. For example, when gate agents are supplied with alert displays which give the current view of relevant flight information, such as seat maps inside the flights they work for. The conventional request/reply approach is restricted as agents spend maximum time operating at the computer terminal, generally sending answers to customer questions. These heads up displays inform both the customers as well as the agents freeing the agents to spend their time in responding to more crucial issues, such as facilitating the boarding procedure (Travel Video News 2010) (Vasilecas et al 2006). For achieving high scalability and lower latencies, the liberalization of the reliance of every event transmission is dependent on the application characteristics. Although some applications need tight assurances, others may run successfully under relaxed rules, known as the reliability spectrum. For exploiting this spectrum, the usage of a mixed sender and receiver-driven multicast protocol is capable of providing dramatic enhancements in the latency as well as communication scalability of an EDE. The Event Driven Engine (EDE) is the major data provider and consumer for extra services related to the operational subsystem, like the Internet-based reservation and flight schedule and information services, which is the reservation system employed by external systems of a business to business model. Eventually, the EDE can directly distribute events to display points like the flight displays at airports, leading to the need for greater scalability in terms of amount of displays for certain event output streams emitting from the EDE. The earlier EDE design employed a commercial relational database for internalizing the transaction records and depicting the operation working set. The initial purpose was to enable quick, flexible queries coupled with distribution of low latency event. Nonetheless, as the operational working sets are growing to Terabyte magnitudes, experts and the management of Delta instantly realized the competition among sustaining massive databases and rapid event derivation from this database. After using this deployed architecture, disk-resident relational data provided inadequate performance only to handle all of the work needed for the OIS infrastructure. Furthermore, not only the OIS should process the variable peaks of 12 million source message per day, but also must the OIS additionally derive a minimum of that many application friendly events to a deployment of approximately 10,000 workstations (Oleson et al). This desired amount of workstations is anticipated to increase dramatically in the future. The explosion of initial state queries take place as computers dynamically subscribe, which in turn require initial states. This initial state, for FIDS (Flight Information Display Systems) applications, resulting in XML result set of 5 MB exerts a massive load on the system. Worst case scenario will be all current 10,000 machines might come on-line at the same time requiring 10,000 queries. Further, this situation is worsened by the presence of additional external systems, such as passenger-booking traffic through the Internet, thereby resulting into the addition of much more information flows as well as resulting analysis tasks such as small flows like automatic passenger paging services, multimedia flows, etc (Mendelson Brynjolfsson 1993). Therefore, Delta discontinued offering further support to the feature of analytical queries of the OIS and started to maintain a lower in-memory depiction of the working set. Again, the relational database representation was used to recover this evaluated state during failures. However, frequent failures in the system could result into businesses facing substantial downtime. For this, the time to substitute the running cache from the many terabyte RDMS is approximately 45 minutes. Furthermore, the client connectivity for the existing system depends on a hierarchical fan out on the basis of TCP socket concentrators. Delta was able to identify that this scheme adds unnecessary moving parts and inserts latency while events traverse the hops. Additionally, Deltas requirements along with experiences in constructing a commercially embraced OIS infrastructure have greatly prompted the existing academic research. The present scalability challenges and future scalability projections demand clean slate scheme for researching more desirable and favourable architectures for an operational information system (Oleson et al). Several applications operate successfully during incidents of message loss and take advantage of relaxed reliability protocols. This feature does not entail that the applications will have inconsistent views of information. This feature also proves that natural alternative means exist to guarantee the application information integrity. Furthermore, the most fundamental characteristic needed here is the ability to identify event loss and the capability of re-synchronizing a client application on detection of message loss. And this functionality is offered by the FIDS application of the OIS, where if a message loss takes place, the FIDS client re-synchronizes by asking for an initial state and starts receiving events that can update that state. In essence, the reliability/performance tradeoffs of sender- vs. receiver-initiated multicast protocols are widespread, which offer stronger vs. weaker throughput vs. reliability, wherein attributes of both kinds of protocols are utilized for gaining a compromise for demanded reliability coupled with greater throughput. The receiver, in this protocol, controls and detects lost messages via sequence number analysis, while the sender is responsible for buffering the messages to accommodate retransmission requests (Mendelson Brynjolfsson 1993). Toward that end, the research as well as commercial opportunities have been presented by operational information systems (OIS) along with their strategic importance to Delta Airlines. Tapping the legacy operational systems is an interesting approach used by the research study to developing new systems employed by Delta. Further, desired representations of operational information can be reproduced for new, mid-tier OIS. The basic idea is to build additional systems across which new business applications are developed, without threatening the existing systems and their normal operations. The evaluation of OIS then focuses on efficient, scalable and low latency processing together with the distribution of events, by evolving the existing communication/ event infrastructures and OIS event processing as well as storage engines (StealingShare).

French Nuclear Testing :: essays research papers

In June, French President Jacques Chirac revealed that nuclear tests would be conducted in the Pacific at the Mururoa coral atoll. These tests, Chirac, stated, would consist of eight nuclear explosions in a tunnel 1,800 to 3,000 feet below Mururoa beginning in September up until May 96. Chirac declares that these tests are necessary for computer simulation in the future. France has been bombarded with criticism, not only from environmental activists, but also from political standpoints. Japan and Australia officially protested French experiments and have convinced other Asian and Pacific nations to agree. New Zealand and Chile have recalled their ambassadors from France and the Japanese are presently protesting outside of their French embassy. 56% of the citizens in France polled oppose the tests and 60% want Chirac to reconsider his position. Stung by the criticism, France may cancel one out of the eight scheduled nuclear tests. Even the renowned Jacques Cousteau has publicly asked Chirac to rescind the tests. Cousteau has even resigned from the government agency Council for the Rights of Future Generations, in protest. France, along with the United States and Great Britain, has not signed a treaty completely prohibiting the detonation of any nuclear device in the South Pacific. Many of the protesting nations located in the Pacific have signed and support this treaty . Also, France has not followed the initiative of most of the nations of the developed world in signing a 1971 treaty prohibiting "the emplacement of nuclear weapons ... on the ocean floor and in the subsoil thereof." Besides public and international disapproval, France may suffer other side effects because of the nuclear testing. The explosive power of the blast is just less than 20 kilotons (20,000 tons of TNT). The bomb on Hiroshima was 15 kilotons. New Japanese research shows that bomb radiation increases risk of long term cancer. Radiation causes ionization in the molecules of living cells. The ions formed can react with the atoms in the cell causing damage. Cells that are changed permanently may produce abnormal cells when they divide, perhaps become cancerous. Not only are there health risks, but the French economy just lost a contract to build 40 jets and French goods are being boycotted by a number of nations. Environmental agencies warn of the damage to the life and rock around the blast atoll. Defense Minister Charles Milton said, "Nuclear Tests should not be mixed up with the question of arms and industry contracts. French Nuclear Testing :: essays research papers In June, French President Jacques Chirac revealed that nuclear tests would be conducted in the Pacific at the Mururoa coral atoll. These tests, Chirac, stated, would consist of eight nuclear explosions in a tunnel 1,800 to 3,000 feet below Mururoa beginning in September up until May 96. Chirac declares that these tests are necessary for computer simulation in the future. France has been bombarded with criticism, not only from environmental activists, but also from political standpoints. Japan and Australia officially protested French experiments and have convinced other Asian and Pacific nations to agree. New Zealand and Chile have recalled their ambassadors from France and the Japanese are presently protesting outside of their French embassy. 56% of the citizens in France polled oppose the tests and 60% want Chirac to reconsider his position. Stung by the criticism, France may cancel one out of the eight scheduled nuclear tests. Even the renowned Jacques Cousteau has publicly asked Chirac to rescind the tests. Cousteau has even resigned from the government agency Council for the Rights of Future Generations, in protest. France, along with the United States and Great Britain, has not signed a treaty completely prohibiting the detonation of any nuclear device in the South Pacific. Many of the protesting nations located in the Pacific have signed and support this treaty . Also, France has not followed the initiative of most of the nations of the developed world in signing a 1971 treaty prohibiting "the emplacement of nuclear weapons ... on the ocean floor and in the subsoil thereof." Besides public and international disapproval, France may suffer other side effects because of the nuclear testing. The explosive power of the blast is just less than 20 kilotons (20,000 tons of TNT). The bomb on Hiroshima was 15 kilotons. New Japanese research shows that bomb radiation increases risk of long term cancer. Radiation causes ionization in the molecules of living cells. The ions formed can react with the atoms in the cell causing damage. Cells that are changed permanently may produce abnormal cells when they divide, perhaps become cancerous. Not only are there health risks, but the French economy just lost a contract to build 40 jets and French goods are being boycotted by a number of nations. Environmental agencies warn of the damage to the life and rock around the blast atoll. Defense Minister Charles Milton said, "Nuclear Tests should not be mixed up with the question of arms and industry contracts.

Bankruptcy Essay -- essays research papers fc

Over the years, the process of declaring bankruptcy has become incredibly simple. Because of this change, the number of people declaring bankruptcy is at an all time high. Today, bankruptcy is a common thing among companies and individuals alike. The American bankruptcy law allows people to avoid paying their debts by offering the debtors a discharge without a harsh consequence. By not having repercussions for their actions, bankruptcy filers often plan future bankruptcies, allowing them to steal even more money from creditors with no punishment. There are 13 different chapters in the bankruptcy system with the principal chapters being 7,11, and 13. You can only file for bankruptcy under these three chapters, the others are there to explain how the system works. Under Chapter 7, a person’s debts are wiped away while under chapters 11 and 13, debts are frozen while the debtor figures out a way to repay them. The people filing Chapter 7 are stealing money from creditors who are trying to help them. It is one’s moral duty to pay back his debts and one should be disgraced and embarrassed if they borrowed money they cannot pay back. Over 1,400,000 people filed for bankruptcy in 1998 under Chapter 7, Chapter 11, and Chapter 13. 75% of them were under Chapter 7, leaving â€Å"retailers, bankers, and credit-card companies† with $40 billion in unpaid debts (Kopecki 5) (Pomykala 16). The use of different reforms could cut down on the number of Chapter 7 filings and put responsibility back on the debtor. Declaring Chapter 7 bankruptcy is ethically and morally wrong and through different reforms this current â€Å"right† would be considered a crime. Bankruptcy was slowly transformed through history from being a crime committed by debtors into a social welfare program. In the past, bankruptcy offenders were severely punished. â€Å"Before the mid-19th century, bankruptcy was a crime† (Pomykala 16). There were many ways to punish those who committed this heinous act. The Pennsylvania Bankruptcy Act of 1785 allowed the flogging of these offenders while their ear was nailed to a post and afterwards the ear was cut off. Similar to Hester Prynne’s punishment of wearing a scarlet â€Å"A† on her chest for â€Å"adulteryâ€Å", people who committed the act of bankruptcy were â€Å"branded on the thumb with a â€Å"T† for â€Å"thief† (Pomykala 17). Various punishments like these served as a warning to future violators. B... ...uer, and Robin Leonard. How to File for CHAPTER 7 BANKRUPTCY. Berkeley: Nolo 1999. Feltman, Peter. â€Å"Bankruptcy Bill Closer to Enactment.† Bankruptcy Debate Continues 12 Dec. 2001. . Hanson, Randall K., â€Å"A new chapter in bankruptcy reform.† Journal of Accountancy Feb. 1999. Irons, John S., â€Å"Private Debt: Two Views on Debt.† About.com 12 Dec 2001 Jasper, Margaret C., Bankruptcy Law for the Individual Debtor. New York: Oceana 1997. Kopecki, Dawn, †More American Debtors Turn to Chapters 7 & 13. (bankruptcy law makes discharging debt easy).† Insight on the News 22 Mar. 1999. Pearce, John A. II, Samuel A. DiLullo, â€Å"When a strategic plan includes bankruptcy.† Business Horizons Sept.-Oct. 1998. Pomykala, Joseph S., â€Å"BANKRUPTCY LAWS: The Need for Reform.† USA Today Nov. 1999 Pomykala, Joseph. BANKRUPTCY REFORM: Principals and Guidelines (Revised Edition) Regulation Vol. 20, No. 4, 1997. Warner, David, † Bills seek to slow bankruptcy filings. (Congress introduces legislation to make bankruptcy laws more strict).† Nation's Business Mar. 1999

Progression of music

In this literature review we will be looking at reading based around the idea of progression within music. Comparisons between different pieces of text regarding the current position of music, and If possible, the future of music and how it can progress. The main books in discussion will consist of, â€Å"Simon Reynolds:Retaining†, â€Å"David Gauntlet:Making Is Connecting†, Tall:The Political Economy of Music. A lot of the quotes that will be in discussion will revolve around the theme of â€Å"post repetition†.This Is a theory regarding the structure or stage of current music, an Idea Tall briefly discusses In context with three other previous stages he believes to have occurred. This also explains the choice to discuss â€Å"Retaining†, the themes from this book tie in with the concept of repetition and revolves around firm beliefs that current music, and also society are trapped in the past. However â€Å"Making is connecting† takes a more subje ctive role in the discussion as it is primarily based around the individual creator in the sense of their feeling and creativity, and does not so much Involve the influence of any capitalist ideas.We will first draw some theories from Tails. Draws up the comparison of Music running alongside society, and at points beyond. In short, Tall draws the comparison in which music runs along side social order and how the mindset of society, at any given time, is reflected onto the art of music. Not Just in the literal sense as would be applied to such era's as Punk, but in the progression of music over time. â€Å"its styles and economic organization are ahead of the rest of society because it explores, much faster than material reality can, the entire range of capabilities in a given code. (Tails,1977) Here Tall is referring to music as a sped up representation of society at any given time. This is why his current claim on post repetition is interesting as any other stage or progression in music, according to Tails, could replicate that of societies in the future. The question regarding this is whether it is possible for music or society, to considerably progress onto what could be seen as another stage of progression. If the idea of post-repeating is feasible, then it could be seen that society, let alone music, are currently trapped in a repeating existence that isn't regressing, only expanding.However for the time being it is more important to look back if there is any chance of looking forward. This is where Italy's four stages of music form in â€Å"Political Economy of Music†, and during the last stage, the idea of post repeating is bought about. â€Å"Sacrifice† refers to the point in musical history where no sound was recorded, written, and the art of music was completely detached from anything physical. It was simply Just an oral process. Music was simply a way of transferring current cultural and social feelings from one person to another. â⠂¬Å"Representing†This term refers to the first printed music, 1500-1900 AD. Printed music was the first form of music that was seen as a commodity, it could be seen as the first time any form of technology had an influence upon human emotion. Tall refers to this period as Representation because the performer would have to represent and play the music that was printed for an audience. â€Å"Repeating† The term repeating refers to the time period of around 1900 to the present. The term is applied by Tall to any recorded sound of broadcasted sound which was made possible by technological advancements.Even though this meant music as an industry could really excel and prophet, the first mindset of music being a commodity was established the moment it could be written and performed. However, according to Tails, the stage of repeating completely took over and made the ideas behind representation, now irrelevant. â€Å"The advent of recording thoroughly shattered representatio n. First produced as a way of preserving its trace, it instead replaced it as the driving force of becomes a simulacrum of the record: an audience generally familiar with the artist's recordings attends to hear a live replication†¦For popular music, this as meant the gradual death of small bands, who have been reduced to faithful imitations of recording stars. For the classical repertory, it means the danger†¦ Of imposing all of the aesthetic criteria of repetition?made of rigor and cold calculation?upon representation. † (Tails,1977) â€Å"Post Repetition† The term post repetition was a term Tall briefly refers to as the next state from Repeating, this is also backed up by Italy's Chapter on Composing and how this new process is not undertaken for exchange or use value.Even though Italy's theories, as well as many other philosophers surrounding he subject, can be seen ambitious and at some times overly vague, this idea of a post repetition makes sense and wou ld revolve around society at this moment and how we are progressing. This is why it is of interest as to whether music can genuinely progress, or whether we are infinitely trapped within a post era where Italy's terms of exchange time and use time, are becoming ever more irrelevant. Tall labels â€Å"Exchange-Time† as the time one would spend earning the spend listening to the bought item.The ideas of exchange time and use time, are now seen as words which don't bear relevance to a vast amount of current music. With the massive surge of the internet and accessibility, the value of music has morphed, and also the intentions of the people making it. This new activity is NOT undertaken for its exchange or use value. It is undertaken solely for the pleasure of the person who does it (its â€Å"producer†). Such activity involves a radical rejection of the specialized roles (composer, performer, audience) that dominated all previous music. Data†, 1977) We will now rela te this to and investigate current musical practice and the mindset of the â€Å"Producer†. Simon Reynolds book â€Å"Retaining†, and â€Å"Making is connecting† by David Gauntlet both investigate these ideas. Retaining is written by Reynolds with belief that the progression of music is now non existent and modern music of the popular culture is based upon regurgitation of past trends/ideas/styles. We live in a society that is obsessed with it's own past, instead of moving into a new future.Reynolds does also include mostly all aspects of daily life into his theories and how our society is looking back instead of looking forward. Artifacts of its immediate past, but there has never before been a society that is able to access the immediate past so easily and so copiously. (Reynolds, 2011) Here we see Reynolds referring to the society we are currently surrounded by, as one â€Å"obsessed† with it's own past. He also gives appreciation to the fact that we l ive in a world where modern phenomenon's, such as the internet and media , give society the power to access the immediate past so easily and freely.This is key to part of the reasoning as to why Reynolds believes as a whole that we are living in a â€Å"Retraining†, a world that is looking backwards instead of forwards. It is a pretty indisputable fact, that due to the surge of technology and the lily advantages in our life, we have access to the things we never would have had before. However Reynolds follows up on this point, putting the obsession of the past, into the reasoning that it is because we are nostalgic and almost envious of it. Is nostalgia stopping our culture's ability to surge forward, or are we nostalgic precisely because our culture has stopped moving forward and so we inevitably look back to more momentous and dynamic times? † (Reynolds, 2011) stopped moving forward in general, whether or not he is finding reason through nostalgia. A lot of Reynolds b eliefs come through in forms of musical practice's such s sampling, covering artists, anniversary concerts, greatest hits albums, generally repetitive process'. We live in a pop age gone loco for retro and crazy commemoration† (Reynolds,2011) â€Å"Could it be that the greatest danger to the future of music culture is it's past†. (Reynolds, 2011) These are quotes from the very first page of the introduction and sum up his beliefs straight away. He goes as far to say that the end of pop culture will not come with one big bang, but it is through a gradual process which we are already living in. â€Å"This is the way that pop ends, not with a BANG but with a box set whose Ruth disc you never get around to playing†. Reynolds, 2011) He then, shortly after, puts the reasoning upon the producer; â€Å"The very people you would've once expected to produce (as artists) or champion (as consumers) the non-traditional and the groundbreaking – that's â€Å"The avian- grade is now an air ©re-grade. † (Reynolds, 2011) These quotes are portraying the â€Å"modern producer† as the fundamental reason as to why music isn't progressing. This, to Reynolds, could be seen as an environmental issue due to the fact our society is constantly exploring the past and repeating itself.He described the process of the modern producer as airier-grade† meaning it is the producer themselves who are trapped in the past. However, as previously mentioned, a lot of the reasoning as to why we may be living in a culture where we are looking back, is due to the fact we can. Technology and the way we have advanced as a culture has enabled us to store huge amounts of digital artifacts through mediums such as; ‘pods, computers, phones, sound-systems, cad's, records, the internet.We can also experience music and media in ways like never before; stereo 5:1, 3-D image/sound, and not to mention all the ways in which to do so prior to these. To Reynolds, the abilities to store and look back, are what we have become victim to. â€Å"We've become victims of our ever-increasing capacity to store, organism, instantly access, and share vast amounts of cultural data. Not only has there immediate past, but there has never before been a society that is able to access the past so easily and so copiously. Reynolds, 2011) This quote is mainly focused on the fact we are able to easily access, store, share data like never before. However Reynolds does use the phrase, â€Å"we've become†, this could suggest that our access to all this data as only become a robber of recent time. Reynolds never seems to really pick at the upraise of vinyl, tape, or the initial upraise of cad's. The start of the sass's is when he believes our modern culture and popular music industry lost all forward thinking and started seeking past ideas and past trends. Instead of being the threshold to the future, the first ten years of the twenty-first century turned o ut to be the ‘Re' Decade. † (Reynolds, 2011) Here this quote describes the start of the sass's, as being the start of a retro decade instead of being the start of new original ideas. Perhaps the first time popular culture fully shifted it's attention to the past. This brings up the question as to whether technological advancements such as Amp's, I Pods and the mass growth of file-sharing are the reason as to why we are so sentimental and look back for inspiration in modern music practice.Or is it more to do with the â€Å"producer†, rather than the ways of consumption. Has the person creating and making the material lost the will to look forward If Italy's point of music's â€Å"styles and economic organization†, being â€Å"ahead† of the rest of society then then what would be the outcome of the sass's â€Å"Re-decade† as Reynolds dubbed it? Could that be the point our society has truly reached a form of creative standardization. Where new id eas and creative instinct is solely based upon repetition of past ideas.This could be what Tall would've been suggesting through the idea of â€Å"Post Repetition†. There is no forward movement in the progression of music as an art anymore, only the ways in which we experience it. However back to the point of the producer, â€Å"Making is connecting†, written by David Gauntlet investigates the process of creativity and can be related to how this has an effect on current musical practices and the position of popular culture on modern music and inevitably the question of progression. Making is connecting† is fundamentally about how people make things to engage with the world around them, and build connections with others through this process. Gauntlet believes that due to the benefits of popular culture in terms of the internet, file sharing, and platforms that enable people to share their creative work, we are seeing a shift in mentality. Gauntlet describes this a s a shift from a' â€Å"Sit back and be told culture†, to a â€Å"making and doing culture†. (Gauntlet 2009)

The Effects of Evolving Technology on Business Industries

The only thing in this world that is constant is change. This is a pretty well known saying which existed as long as I can remember. Looking back 50 years and more from today, I can recall how we used to tackle in class about how people have lived centuries ago. Globalization is the result of humans’ endless search for improvements and technological innovations. It is an integration of economy, labor and technology all over the world, even across international borders. This movement has increased the flow of capital, goods, competition and labor across borders which, in turn, had deeply changed the true meaning of citizenship. Today, the upsurge of developments in technology has an undeniable effect on how organizations function within and with other institutions. For an organization, its success and failure greatly depends on how the organization was structured to work. The drive to improve peoples living pattern is still the same drive or factor which triggers international firms to globalize their operations and with that, today’s latest technology makes the company’s and consumers life easier It enable companies to reduce cost by using powerful equipment and machineries while consumers can have easier access to the newest products in the market. The evolution of a new technology poses both threats and opportunities within the industry dynamics and alters the competitive forces. Industry leaders face the possibility of losing their number one spot and being replaced by new entrants and underdogs (because barriers to entry may be lowered). Therefore, technology transformations may provide major shifts in industry dynamics. Depending on its organizational capabilities, it may be good or bad to make drastic adjustments to the existing organization when a disruptive innovation occurs. Disruptive change occurs so intermittently that there is no routine response to them. How to adjust its new product development process depends on the organizations capabilities. Capabilities are its resources, processes (how they transform resources to products), and corporate values. While resources are adaptable to change, processes are not as flexible, and values are even less flexible. Therefore, when a disruptive technological change takes place, a company must look to its capabilities. If the change requires a tremendous amount of financial resources that the company does not have, then they obviously cannot invest in the change, on the flipside, if a large capital firm faces the same change, the investment in the disruptive technology may be so small that it is not worth their more valuable time. The same scenario goes for processes and values. Large firms may be so large, that altering their processes to suit a change may be too burdensome whereas smaller firms may have a much easier time making adjustments in their processes. In addition, it is more likely that a smaller firm’s values may be more flexible for disruptive change than large companies whose longstanding values are not easily adaptable. To overcome the natural inertial found in most large organizations, managers may create new structures within the organization where new processes can be developed. This involves taking out employees with the required capabilities and drawing a new boundary around them. When the organization’s values may not be compatible with the new processes, firms may create a whole new business venture which is wholly owned by the firm but located in a new location with the people and other resources necessary to create an environment conducive to the new process. And last, when a firm doesn’t have the supporting values, resources or processes for sustaining a new process, it may acquire another firm which does. Several factors may impact particular stages in the evolution of a new technology. For example, technological advances, changes in what consumers want or need, and changes in regulations may trigger a technology evolution. In addition, industry transformations often feed of environmental changes. However this necessary transformation, once triggered, does not actually begin until managers notice this need and act upon it. Once acting, managers seek to experiment, and this experimentation deeply impacts the industry as it helps shape what the new industry structure will be. Consequently, as experiments fail, the number of firms in the industry generally is cut in half, but occasionally may increase. An industry’s response to a new technology determines when and how the technological transformation will occur. Without managerial insight and decision making related to the technology, the current industry structure will persist. Managers are essentially the ones investing in these new technologies and they choose how and when to market them to the public, and therefore have ultimately the initial control over the transformation. If the industry as a whole does not respond favorably to the technology, they may not choose to invest and market it, therefore stunting its evolution. On the contrary, if they respond favorably, it helps accelerate the evolution of the transformation. If the industry as a whole is indecisive meaning some favor some do not and some are on the fence, the transformation may only see moderate growth, and depending on which direction opinions are swayed (for or against the technology), the transformation may be completed or the evolution may never meet its peak. One of the first innovations of technology was the mainframe system and it was during the 1960’s that computers and such started to impart in organizations and firms. The classic ways of hierarchal management systems started to disintegrate during these times. Through technological change, globalizing the operations of an international company could put up a plantation where they can reduce their labor cost. Not denying the fact that different people from different countries have different tastes, international companies could also personalize their products according to the consumers or markets preferences without eliminating their standards and trademark. Before, information control was basically handled by those in managerial positions in a linear manner according to rank. With these systems of technology, information was handled as such that company transparency is relatively existent for those who can get hold of certain information. The onslaught of developments in technology has triggered organizational structure alterations. These changes can be illustrated by considering two key variables: the location of information and the location of decision rights in the organization (Brynjolfsson E. and H. Mendelsson). With the innovative technological systems today, important information can now possibly be available to all employees or workers in an organization at all level. Before, information handling and privilege was limited to the persons that directly handle them. Now, the responsibility of handling information is left to information technologists or technicians. The technicians then put data or information into databases which are accessible to all components of the organization For example, an organization can have a website, regularly maintained and updated by professional information technologists. Here, employees, managers and customers alike, can log on to the website and access whatever information they needed. Furthermore, having websites is also a great advantage since helpful feedbacks are easier to get from both customers and employees. The growing need for technology innovations paves way to strengthening certain industries in a corporate world; like data management services, computer engineers, information technologists, software designers or engineers and so on and so forth. Although there are still organizations or companies that are hesitant to use information technology, a growing number of organizations are opening to the possibility of restructuring their organizations to accommodate the privileges of using the modern information systems of today. Seeing as technology innovation not only saves time and money; it is also efficient and very flexible with respect to the organization that opts to infuse it in their existing structure. Not only does it revolutionize an organization from within. Through the substantially used World Wide Web, organizations can communicate and cooperate with other organizations in a faster, more efficient and cheaper way. Today, with the use of virtual offices, it is possible to close deals and agreements from participating people around the world without physically meeting each other. Nowadays, as more organizations focus on the importance of information flow, organizational structures continue to change into more complex systems.   As a result, there is also a continuous drive to make more improvements and advancement in the field of technological innovation. Nowadays, laptop and desktop have been swamped by new connectivity options. There are various of USB devices like Digital cameras, iPods, PDAs, FireWire, thumb drives and MP3 players; with current technologies such as Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and infrared (IrDA). With all these growing popularity of mobile gadgetry facilitating flexible working, evidently employees could work on the move. Endpoint systems today are easily available. They are user friendly and normally come with more than one feature. With all these conveniences, it also means that employees could be carrying around large amounts of sensitive information unaware of the potential risks. Not only can confidential data be lost, employees could also unwittingly introduce malware onto the network while uploading work from portable devices. However, together with this mobility in work, come various viruses which will bust your files as well as your gadgets. The influence of technology made a very big impact in the lives of people of today’s generation as well as totally changes the definitions of some of the world’s necessity, comfort and luxury. Whether it is a thing or a hobby, the identification of these classes has been change as time goes by. A car which was once called a luxury has been changed overtime and has now become a necessity. Televisions which was once only owned by royal families and other prominent people has now become a household item of which it already has become a necessity for it is where people get ideas of what is happening around them. Even though cars and televisions made living mush more accessible than before, the public is increasingly concerned about global warming and the negative environmental impacts of vehicles. (Clean Cars Alliance) Simple living as it is, our grandfather’s grandfather would ride on horses, plant trees and vegetables, raise cows, pigs and chicken, living under one roof with a family, sitting warm in front of the fireplace. These are the few comforts that men used to acquire. Back then, when a person owns a car, another home, have jewelries, it has been said that the person had lived luxuriously. But today, when technologies have changed, some of the past decades luxuries had become today’s necessities such as cars, cellular phones, different gadgets. Not only material things are affected but also of a man’s way of living. In, conclusion technology impacts should be seen as they truly are and not covered up by the media or industry, and even if they are individuals should be educated enough to realize the positives and negatives. If a company wishes to pursue becoming the industry technological standard, they must first be aware of the competitive strategies they can adopt to increase the probability of success. First, it is important to understand the need for a strong installed base. The installed base is the amount of customers/users of a particular piece of equipment or product that is necessary for the technology. Increasing the installed base for the technology is key, because a large installed base means there will most likely be a greater availability and widespread use of compatible products/software/applications. If the installed base for your technology is large and there is a large availability of applications or widespread use of compatible products, then your technology is another step closer to becoming the standard. With that, your technology is more valuable to consumers since they can use it in more places. A greater installed base, more available compatible products and providing greater value to the consumers leads to greater demand for the technology. As this continuous cycle keeps increasing the demand for your technology, it is well on its way to becoming the industry standard. A manager should ask several questions. First, it is important to know if a technology standard is needed or even desired in the industry. Second, it is important to perform market research to learn what customers want or need, this will help make the technology the standard if it satisfies the customer. Third, it is important to understand the market as a whole paying particular to competitors. Pursuing a technology standard makes sense for a firm when there is no current standard and one is desired by the industry. In addition, for some companies, becoming the industry standard may be essential in maintaining their leadership position and ensuring their existence in the long run.   There are different avenues that one can receive formal and informal education dealing with technological literacy, but there is always room for improvement, much like with technology itself. Going back to the saying that the only thing in this world that is constant is change, we understand that change is inevitable. And just like the billiard balls, it is change which moves people to experiment and innovate, making the world more comfortable and luxurious, yet complicated. Change, constant as it is, has the power to move, improve and change lives. Where men once lives only with necessities, change have been able to make men of today experience luxuries and comforts by making it today’s necessities. With this, the luxuries of the past has been a need of today, making the luxurious living from the past a more simple and yet more challenging living of today REFERENCES Brynjolfsson E. and H. Mendelsson.â€Å"Information Systems and the Organization of Modern Enterprise†. Center for Coordination Science. June 1993. Massachusetts Institute of Technology and The Center for Coordination Science. 19 December 2006 Clean Cars Alliance. 23 November 2006 < http://www.cfenv.org/air/cars/index.htm> â€Å"Organizational Structure†.Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. 18 April 2006. Wikimedia Foundation Inc. 19 November 2006 .      

Inside James Diyson

In â€Å"Inside Dyson: a distinctive company? †, Shepherd et al. (2011) gives details of the secret of Dyson’s success – the company specializing in innovative, design-heavy vacuum cleaners and other household appliances. The successes and failures of Dyson’s design efforts (from their successful vacuums to the 3-in-1 vacuums that did not test well with customers) are explored, as well as their unique perspective on business, which puts quality and innovation above anything else. 1. Using frameworks from the chapter, analyze the strategic capabilities of Dyson. The strategic capabilities of Dyson revolve primarily around a resource-based view of the strategy with a heavy focus on engineering design; they spend a tremendous amount of time developing and engineering prototypes for household products that seek to provide a twist to the typical device (e. g. , vacuum cleaners that provide smooth turning around the corners, oscillating fans that â€Å"multiply† air, etc. ) This creates a niche in what can be an overly-saturated market. Providing a unique spin of this sort on a product can offer tremendous advantages. Combine this with state-of-the-art, sleek design elements and bright, colorful exteriors, and Dyson creates a number of high-end, well-sought-after appliances. Dyson invests heavily in Chinese and Asian manufacturing in order to make their products cheaper, so that they can maintain profit margin benchmarks. This emphasis on design in their organizational planning means not as many products being manufactured. But what they do sell they sell to a target market at higher prices. Given the innovation that is present in Dyson’s business strategy, it is quite clear that their strategic capability is high, even though the risks can be high as well due to the experimental and ‘out there’ nature of their products which may be too daunting for normal consumers. 2. To what extent do you think any of the capabilities can be imitated by competitors? The primary niche that Dyson follows is superior design. As a result, it can be quite difficult to replicate the specific strategic capabilities. Their focus on innovation revolves around them being the only ones around to actually try to change the way the vacuum or other appliance is designed. The level of specialization is what attracts customers to them. In order to provide legitimate competition to Dyson, superior engineering designers would have to be hired, and a much greater focus on innovation would have to be attempted. Otherwise, Dyson’s dominance in the high-end, experimental house-ware market remains unchecked by competitors. Competitors are already trying to imitate their products with the USA Wind Tunnel vacuums and Mjele swivel-head vacuums. Yet the patents Dyson has placed on their product prevents other companies from outright stealing of their ideas. 3. Which of Dyson’s distinctive capabilities may become threshold capabilities over time? The existence of high-value specialties will likely become a threshold capability for Dyson as the time goes on. Threshold capabilities are what is required to remain in the market. Currently, what is allowing Dyson to maintain its high prices is the high quality of the design and engineering present in their products. Compared to other consumer-level appliances of this kind, Dyson stands out as a distinctive product from a marketing standpoint. Emphasizing the new and innovative stuff allows the consumer to feel as though they are receiving a brand new, insightful product, leagues ahead of the competition. For Dyson to change its business model in any way towards increasing volumes of standard products would be to tarnish its image, nearly irreparably. What is maintaining Dyson’s primary conceit is the design innovation, which is a clear threshold capability. 4. Bearing in mind your answers to questions 1 and 2, how crucial is Sir James Dyson to the future of the company? What might be the effect of his resignation or the sale of the company? Given the importance of James Dyson, it would certainly be a blow if he were to leave or sell the company. James Dyson is a prominent public figure and the best spokesperson in commercials Dyson company could have. For many consumers, there is a certai n security in seeing the actual representative or president of the company speak to them directly and explain the features of the Dyson vacuum; if that was not happening, it is possible that†¦