Thesis (M.A.)--Lancaster Bible College, Graduate School, 2000. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 59-61).

Under neoliberal inspired educational decentralisation, the government of Zimbabwe transferred powers previously vested in the higher tiers of the education system to individual schools and local communities through school development committees. The study was therefore undertaken in order to investigate factors that influence the implementation of educational decentralisation by school development committees. A qualitative research approach that focused on purposively sampled participants was chosen for this study. The study was carried out in the interpretivist research paradigm which facilitated access to semi-structured interviews and focus group discussions from two different cases whose contexts varied substantially. One is an affluent school (Oxford) and the other is a poor school (Havana)1 . Data obtained from the foregoing methods were triangulated with review of documents. Data analysis was qualitative using a thematic approach to elucidate emerging patterns. Findings suggest that shifting power and authority to schools increased roles and responsibilities for school heads, teachers and school development committee members in both schools. One of the findings is that the professional expertise and socio-economic status of parents and school development committee members of Oxford Primary School curtailed any autocratic tendencies by the school head. The study also found that the introduction of neoliberal market orientation into the school sector created new roles, such as that of entrepreneurial manager for school heads. Another compelling finding is that the neoliberal-induced withdrawal of government education grants affected the financial position of Havana Primary School more negatively than that of Oxford Primary School. This has led to a highly differentiated structure of schooling between the two schools which institutionalised educational inequality and widened disparities. The findings are particularly relevant for policy makers as they provide insights into educational decentralisation. The research’s original contribution is that it has to some extent, through practice-based findings at the micro-level, focused on the specific factors related to the implementation of educational decentralisation according to the lived experiences of various education practitioners; thus providing an in-depth 1 Havana and Oxford Primary Schools are pseudonyms.understanding of processes. Even though the prescripts from which educational decentralisation is crafted are the same, its implementation differed across two public schools by virtue of their unique contexts. The research has shown that educational decentralisation as a government policy has not fostered equality and the protection of vulnerable children from discrimination. The research highlights the seriousness of implementing educational decentralisation in order to increase participation in decision-making by stakeholders in the education enterprise. Specifically, this research could be taken forward through a series of new projects that would consider educational decentralisation and its effects on the professional roles of district school inspectors, school heads, and teachers / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2021. / Education Management and Policy Studies / PhD / Unrestricted

Contextual experience with the practical application of accounting standards is important for independent audit committee members to effectively monitor managers’ financial reporting estimates and the audits of those estimates. Basic knowledge of accounting standards can be acquired by reading public documents and some degree of information regarding firm-specific application of standards can be obtained from public disclosures. However, real-world, contextual experience may best be obtained through performing or monitoring the reporting tasks themselves. This dissertation investigates how a firm’s (focal firm) financial reporting monitoring activities are affected by its audit committee members’ contextual experiences gained through connections, either as managers or audit committee members, with other firms (links or interlocks). I specifically estimate whether contextual experience with significant judgments and estimates, measured as interlocks with firms that likely performed extensive impairment analyses in the prior year (distressed firms), affects the likelihood of focal firm decisions to write off goodwill after controlling for economic indicators of impairment, managerial incentives to misreport, and ability of managers to exercise discretion. I find that the likelihood of write-off is significantly greater for firms with links to distressed firms than firms without links, consistent with audit committee contextual experience influencing financial reporting outcomes. The distressed firm interlock effect is significantly greater when the contextual experience at the linked firm is in the performance of estimates as a manager in contrast to the monitoring of estimates as an audit committee member. However, in a subset of large firms with ExecuComp data, I find that the overall probability of write-off is decreasing across quartiles of managerial incentives to misreport and received interlocks are only marginally significant in the second quartile, indicating that contextual experience may not be an effective monitoring mechanism when managerial incentives to misreport are high. Combined results suggest that contextual experiences obtained through audit committee network associations do affect focal firm financial reporting outcomes and are most influential when the contextual experience is as a manager, rather than a monitor. However, such monitoring mechanisms appear to be primarily imitative and may not be effective deterrents against managerial misreporting at large firms when managerial equity-based incentives are strong. / text

Masters in Public Administration - MPA / The empowering of local governments in South Africa as engines of national development has been plagued with problems and imbalance related to the ethic and the functioning of the local government machinery itself. The said imbalances are being reinforced by a lack of understanding and consensus as to what democracy is and how it should work. The consequences are widespread corruption and distortions of government priorities; both of which undermine the ability of governments to improve broad-based economic growth and social well-being. The central problem addressed in this study investigates the extent to what the City of Cape Town’s accountability mechanism support good governance and develop institutional development and service deliver. The researcher is of the opinion that municipalities in their daily endeavours should now be at the sustainable phase which would mean that all policies, systems and procedures are in place for good governance. The researcher further assumes that municipalities should be at this stage capacitated and therefore, are able to fulfil basic institutional mandate of providing basic services and facilitating economic development. This is a wide subject that different researchers will undertake and provide potential solutions. But for the purpose of this research the following are posited to prevent some developmental issues: Firstly, a wall-to-wall local government, i.e., a constitutional guarantee that there shall be local government through the jurisdiction of the country. This suggestion has waken up the importance to emphasize the distinction and independence of each local government. The only challenge within and between local government, is seen by a politico-administration dichotomy which historically has always been an issue in public administration. As a matter of facts, there is interpenetration between the role of political and the one of administrative leadership as one can’t separate them in practice since officials also play important role in policy development. The effectiveness of Ward Committees for institutional development in reflecting on the best practice at the operational level rests on the need to capacitate the said formed ward committees in terms of skills equipping to maintain a world class service standard. The author posits that, this will do away with incompetence at local level and will promote efficiency and effectiveness in the fulfillment of daily tasks. Furthermore the following should be considered: 1.There should be a provision of adequate resources; this will enable officials to perform their tasks. 2. There should be a display of less politics or noninterference from politicians in the administration; this will avoid encroachment and mismanagement while enhancing proper accountability principles. Secondly, local government should maintain democratic elections, i.e., an electoral system that mixes proportional representation with ward representation as the best basis for local government councils. A wide array of information collected on this level from respondents posited that local government should only have ward representation although full time councillors found it difficult to perform both functions because of high demand from the community and from their job. This should maybe be rated at 90% to 10% rather than 50%.Finally, emphasis should be on financial decision-making power i.e., municipalities should be creatures of the Constitution rather than creatures of statue. The formal local government only entrusted service delivery powers to local government. Municipalities were not developmental in nature. However, the current local government is expected to be developmental. This turns its focus on top of its daily routine, to economic development. It is only then that one can maintain that local government powers are relevant to the development mandate.

Thesis (Ed.D.)--Boston University / PLEASE NOTE: Boston University Libraries did not receive an Authorization To Manage form for this thesis or dissertation. It is therefore not openly accessible, though it may be available by request. If you are the author or principal advisor of this work and would like to request open access for it, please contact us at open-help@bu.edu. Thank you. / The purpose of this study was to test the following hypotheses: 1. There are differences in the concepts of role ascribed to school committee members by the registered voters of Massachusetts and by the School Committee Members of Massachusetts. 2. Differences in the concepts of role ascribed to school committee are determined, in part, by a person's age, sex, income, political affiliation, occupation, education, geographic location and the size of the community in which he resides. [TRUNCATED] / 2031-01-01

Thesis (MPH)--University of Limpopo, 2010. / Background The National Health Research Ethics Council (NHREC) of South Africa (SA) is mandated to oversee health research ethics activities within the country. The oversight role is achieved through registration and auditing of Health Research Ethics committees (RECs). This study indicates that 22 RECs are registered with the NHREC. Purpose This study examines compliance levels of registered RECs with the SA DOH national health research ethics guidelines regarding composition and operational procedures as well as highlight commonalities and differences. Methods Secondary data of 22 RECs registered with NHREC were used to examine the level of compliance related to composition and operational procedures disaggregated by REC. Data were processed using Statistical Package for Social Scientists (SPSS). Categories of systematic compliance, non-systematic compliance and non-compliance were used to determine RECs compliance levels with the standards specified in the DOH national ethics guidelines in research. Results Registered RECs in South Africa have an average membership of 16 ranging from 6 to 35. The RECs membership on gender has a 6% marginal difference and is dominated (68%) by scientists or clinicians. Majority (82%) of RECs have lay persons and 77% legal representatives. Eighty six percent of RECs xvi complied with operational procedures as stipulated by DOH national health research ethics guidelines. Conclusions Most RECs in SA registered with NHREC have a functional structure and are well organized. However, RECs demonstrated a non-systematic compliance with composition and procedures of DOH national guidelines. Most RECs based at public hospitals, government department and private organizations experienced high variations. Disparities related to gender, professional identity, legal and lay representations are noticeable and could be easily addressed.

Democracy depends upon the competition between candidates or ideas. However, practices or procedures sometimes preclude the consideration of the full range of options. Can campaign spending predict who wins elections? What explains why incumbent electoral security is only rarely threatened? Can committees or individuals in Congress stifle the will of a legislative majority? Essay #1. Politicians spend vast sums of money in order to win or retain a seat in Congress; does it predict who will win? In this essay I present a forecast model for elections to the US House of Representatives that specifically includes a measure of campaign spending.The advantages of the new model are that it relies on publicly available data, its results are easy to interpret, and the forecasts are comparable to other models.Essay #2. For a variety of reasons, incumbents expect to win reelection. There are few explanations for why that advantage occasionally seems to disappear. In this essay, I synthesize the literature on incumbency advantage, congressional redistricting, and voter behavior. I present evidence from the 2006-2010 election cycles suggesting that congressional districts drawn with the expectation of consistent partisan loyalty rates left incumbents susceptible to national tides brought about by temporary asymmetric departures from partisan voting norms. Essay #3. Although there is a large literature devoted to analyses of legislative committee gate keeping, Crombez, Groseclose, and Krehbiel (2006) argued that formal gate keeping is explicitly ruled out in most deliberative bodies. In this essay, I examine the historical development of rules and procedures in the US House of Representatives which explain the lack of formal gate keeping rules. I present evidence of non-majoritarian outcomes in the House despite it being a majoritarian body. I conclude the essay by suggesting a new definition of gate keeping based on the ability to alter the probability of proposal success on the floor instead of the formal ability to kill legislation. / Government

Creditor committees have been characterized as the “watchdogs” of the bankruptcy reorganization process of large companies. Not only do creditor committees have broad statutory powers to oversee the debtor and its management, but they also play a key role in preventing abuses by professionals and other participants in the often complex corporate bankruptcy process. Furthermore, recent research has provided evidence of abusive fee practices in large corporate bankruptcy cases which point to failures in the oversight mechanisms of the process. This dissertation examines the role of creditor committees in the bankruptcy process and in selected outcomes of this process, with a focus on fees paid to bankruptcy professionals. Based on a unique data set comprised of 1,037 bankruptcy cases over the period 1999-2008, the research first examines committee characteristics along three separate dimensions of analysis: individual characteristics of members serving on committees; changes of committee composition over the life of the committees; and social characteristics of committee interlocks. The Calpine bankruptcy case is used throughout this dissertation to illustrate the research. This research finds a dense network of interlocks that dominates large cases, with financial industry members being significantly more likely to serve on multiple committees than non-financial industry members. Analysis of the data shows that over 50% of creditor committees are never amended and there are no systematic recompositions of the remaining committees. A test of small-world topology in the member creditor committee network fails to show a strong small-world structure in the member social network once it is corrected for imposed network topology. This dissertation then employs econometric models to evaluate whether creditor committee variables help explain professional fees in large bankruptcy cases. It finds a statistically significant and positive relationship between the social centrality measure of the creditor committee case and the professional fees paid. This finding points to potential conflicts of interest among the repeat creditor committee players and their constituents. The research fails to find a significant relationship between the presence of financial firms in creditors’ committees and professional fees paid in the case. The dissertation concludes with policy recommendations and suggestions for further research. / text

Aim: To determine the resources and needs of local Ethics Review Committees in South Western Nigeria. Method: This is a questionnaire-based descriptive study, where data was collected from the chair and administrators of eight Ethics Review Committees (ERCs) in South Western Nigeria. Findings: This study found that six of the ERCs reviewed were established 5 years ago and 75% of them were registered with NHREC. Of the ERCs reviewed, 75% are aware of the national ethics code (NHREC code). The majority of these ERCs (75%) had professionals, including doctors and scientists, as well as laypersons and nonscientists as members. Meetings were held once a month and when needed for 37.5% of the committees, while 25% of the ERCs usually meet every 2 months. Only a third (37.5%) of the ERCs pay their members. The majority (87.5%) of the ERCs have standard operating procedures (SOPs) and review an average of 6–10 or 10 protocols per month. Most of the ERCs (87.5%) need research ethics training regarding risk-benefit assessment, scientific design and HIV vaccine trials. Half of the ERCs reviewed have funding and financial support and 50% charge a fee for reviewed protocols. All the ERCs have computers, office space and stationery, while 50% lack access to a library. None of the committees studied have a bank account and facsimile, while 50% do not have internet access, telephone and photocopy machines Outcome: The majority of ERCs in South Western Nigeria have an adequate number of members, are familiar with international ethics guidelines and are registered with the NHREC. They also have adequate physical resources, but lack internet access and a library. Ongoing training of members is a challenge, as well as providing training programmes for new members and monitoring of research. / Thesis (M.Soc.Sc.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2011.

The purposes of the study were to determine what perceptions, if any, were held by the state representatives of six selected special interest groups regarding the perceived influence each group has had on public school curricula and the attitudes held by the representatives regarding the selection of materials and content for public school curricula.The population contacted consisted of the 289 state level representatives of the groups; 103 representatives returned completed questionnaires. The six selected special interest groups were the NAACP, ACLU, MM, PP, LWV, and NOW.FindingsThe NAACP, ACLU, PP, LWV, and NOW reported similar attitudes regarding several topics, such as the inclusion of sex education in public school curricula, the exclusion of both scientific creationism and the concept that some values are absolute and must be obeyed, and the inclusion of the concept that parents should not decide what students read in school. The MM respondents held that sex education should be eliminated from public school curricula, scientific creationism, and the teaching of some absolute values should be included in the public school curriculum. MM respondents also held that parents should decide what the student may read in school.NAACP, PP, LWV, and NOW respondents judged that the respective organizations have brought about change in the public school curricula. The respondents for the other organizations made no claims of influence.ConclusionsDue to the population of the study, no attempt was made to generalize from the respondents to the total organizations. Generally, the respondents reported attitudes and perceptions in keeping with stated organizational policy; differences occurred in the reported degree of agreement or disagreement on various topics.