The following thesis is an implementation study of an international non-governmental organization working in the field of inclusive education in Battambang, Cambodia. More specifically the study’s intent was to examine the political, economic and socio-cultural challenges experienced by the organization’s volunteers as they worked with local education partners in implementing inclusive education initiatives. Consideration was given to general education with emphasis on the implementation of gender mainstreaming initiatives at the primary level. Data was collected through participant interviews, formal observations, Follow-up questions completed by participants and various documents from the organization. The findings from the study revealed significant inconsistencies between the organization’s policy in gender equality and what was being implemented at the local level. Volunteers received little or no training in gender responsiveness, reported feelings of incapacity to engage in gender issues and failure to identify gender inequality in their development work. The volunteers and their working relationships with local education partners were a major theme in the findings; in particular the political challenges in navigating the agendas of various stakeholders. The organization’s support, information and expectations of volunteers were other issues raised by participants in the study. Among the economic challenges to implementation were working within the confines of international funding, the development of the organization’s budget, limited human resources, economic sustainability of programing and no funding for gender initiatives. Cultural challenges include volunteers’ perceptions of local views on education, the relationship between community and schools, gender equality embedded in the culture, school directors ‘losing face’ and awareness regarding gender issues.

Physical activity (PA) and physical fitness (PF) are regarded as important elements of a healthy lifestyle (Sallis & Patrick, 1994:304; Saxena et al., 2002; Beets & Pitetti, 2004:1796). Literature revealed that adolescents are more inclined to be physically inactive and spent time on sedentary activities, such as watching television (Wang & Biddle, 2001:1; Marshall et al., 2002:413; Neumark-Sztainer et al., 2003:803; Hancox et al., 2004; Malina et al., 2004:479). Adolescents from low socio-economic communities also experience various other barriers, such as performing income-generating activities and family duties (Prista et al., 1997:455; Kriska, 2000:50), time constraints (Saxena et al., 2002), too much homework (Deflandre et al., 2004:31) and distances from sports facilities (Nahas et al., 2003), which prevent them from being physically active. Stunting, defined as height growth retardation, is also a condition that is associated with poor socio-economic status (SES) and various studies showed an occurrence of up to 19% in children (Kruger et al., 2004:566; Cameron et al., 2005:414). Although different intervention studies were conducted to improve stunting, none were based on physical activity intervention (Lunn, 2002:109; Walsh et al., 2002:6). The first aim of the study was to determine the physical fitness status and physical activity levels of 15-year-old adolescents from a previously disadvantaged community. Secondly, to determine what factors would be regarded as either barriers or motivators for 15-year-old adolescents from this previously disadvantaged community for improving their physical activity and participation in sport and for determining their perception of their own physical activity level. The next aim was to analyse the physical activity choices and aerobic endurance of these 15-year-old adolescents and the effect of a physical activity intervention programme (PAIP) on their physical activity choices and levels and aerobic endurance. The last aim of the study was to examine the effect of a PAIP on the physical fitness of stunted 15-year-old adolescents. Two high schools (an intervention school [school 1] and a control school [school 2]) in a previously disadvantaged community near Potchefstroom, South Africa, participated in this study. The learners in the control school had a slightly better socio-economic status, determined by income per capita. All Grade 8 learners in School 1 and 2 were requested to participate in the research. Two hundred and fifty-two (N=252) Grade 8 learners (116 boys and 136 girls) in School 1 and N=66 Grade 8 learners (21 boys and 45 girls) in School 2 parents/guardians granted informed consent to participate in the study. The PAIP was conducted for an hour twice a week for 19 weeks directly after school hours for learners from School 1. No physical education classes or organised sport were part of the school curriculum during the intervention. A pre-test/post-test study design was used. Standard anthropometrical procedures were used to determine body mass, stature and four skin folds. The Fitnessgram (Meredith & Welk, 1999:9) and additional fitness tests were used to determine the physical fitness levels of the participants. The Previous Day Physical Activity Recall (PDPAR) (Trost et al., 1999:342) was used to determine the physical activity levels and television watching hours during one day of the week and weekend respectively. Biological maturity status was determined by means of the 5-stage Tanner scale (Faulkner, 1996:237). The questionnaire of Rowland (1990) which deals with barriers to physical activity and participation in sport was also used. A few of the questions were adjusted and additional questions from Meredith and Welk (1999:50) were added. Demographic information on the SES (income per capita, housing, water and electricity) of the participants, as well as information on how far learners walked to school and how long it took, was also determined. The data was analysed by means of descriptive statistics, correlational analysis, frequency and rank ordering, t-testing followed by Tuckey post hoc analysis, One-and Two-way Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA) and Tuckey-Kramer multiple comparisons. The Statistica for Windows and SAS computer programmes were used to analyse the data according to the above-mentioned aims of the study. A p-value smaller or equal to 0.05 was accepted as significant. The results of the study indicated higher mean physical fitness values in the intervention group compared to the control group. Both boys and girls in the intervention group and boys in the control group were moderately active, while only the girls in the control group showed low levels of physical activity. Longer commuting distances were found in the intervention group, while more hours of television watching were found in the control group. The aerobic fitness, flexibility and body composition of group 1 and 2 fell within the healthy fitness zone (HFZ), while their strength fell outside the healthy fitness zone, and showed negative relationships with aerobic fitness and flexibility. Television viewing time and commuting distances to school appeared to have a moderate influence on the moderate to low physical activity levels of the total group, and physical activity showed a relationship with higher fitness values. Regarding the second aim, too much homework, lack of money and family responsibilities were indicated as barriers to being physically active, while encouragement of parents and friends to participate with, were found to be motivational factors. After participation in the physical activity programme it was found that the learners' perceptions had changed and they had better knowledge of the intensity of physical activity. The results analysed for the third aim of the study indicated disappointing results regarding the effect of the intervention programme and no significant improvement was found, because of poor attendance to the programme. The learners had to be categorised in different attendance groups of the intervention programme. The group with the highest attendance (>70%) of the programme seemed to sustain their aerobic fitness the best. From the activities that were included in the physical activity programme, it was established that netball and soccer had a small effect on the physical activity choices of the group after participating in the programme. The results of the fourth aim revealed that stunted girls, who participated regularly in the programme, showed better improvement in aerobic fitness and hand grip strength after participating in the activity programme compared to non-stunted girls, while the lean body mass and flexibility on the right side of the body had improved in stunted boys. The stunted boys and girls also showed improvement in different physical fitness variables compared to non-stunted boys and girls. It can be concluded from the results of this study that participating in an after school physical activity programme is not the answer to improving the physical activity of children living in low SES environments. Such programmes are, however, needed but should be implemented during school hours. The physical activity programme, however, had a positive effect on both the physical fitness (excluding strength) and aerobic fitness as well as on their perception of physical activity and physical fitness of the adolescents, and showed some effect on the fitness of stunted adolescents. Intervention strategies should however be developed to overcome the barriers that prevented children from low SES communities from being physically active. It is also important to empower these adolescents with knowledge and skills to enable them to maintain and increase their physical activity levels. Key words: Physical fitness, physical activity, adolescence, socio-economic status, boys and girls, barriers, motivators, stunting / Thesis (Ph.D. (Human Movement Science))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2008.

In a series of performative and narrative pieces, readers of this autoethnographic text are invited into the story of a young girl experiencing grief and loss, as expressed through her journals, poetry, and letters, and their corresponding events, written between the ages of 11-18 years. From present day, back through time, and forward again, encircled with clinical practice accounts, an alternative perspective of younger people’s experience of grief and loss is taken up, emphasizing one young girl’s construction of a life after her father’s sudden death.

By the mid-nineteenth century academics began to replace the accomplishments in schooling for middle and upper class girls in Britain. Immigrants brought both models to Vancouver Island. Angela College, a religious school clinging to the past, represents the old; Norfolk House, an urban largely day school, and Queen Margaret’s, a country boarding school with some day students, illustrate the two types of the new, reformed schools. This study draws on personal accounts, archival records, and contemporary newspapers to show that parents chose private schools for reasons of ethnic preservation, upward social mobility, and dissatisfaction with local public schools. A comparison of the founding, governance, finance, buildings and grounds, curriculum, headmistresses and teachers, students, parents, and succession plans revealed similarities and striking differences. Parental preference for strong leadership, scholarship, and character-development enabled Norfolk House and Queen Margaret’s to survive; the lack thereof combined with poor management doomed Angela College to failure.

A substantial number of adolescent girls are insufficiently active to achieve the health benefits and well-being associated with physical activity (PA). Physical education (PE) classes can provide part of the solution, yet most girls opt out of PE when it is no longer mandatory. Improvements in PE course content and learning environments can motivate adolescent girls to participate. Self-determination theory (SDT) provides a framework to examine the motivational processes of girls in PE. This qualitative case study explored female students’ motivation towards physical activity in one elective PE 10-12 course tailored to meet their interests and needs. A secondary objective was to determine if the pre-requisites and outcomes of their motivation were consistent with the constructs of SDT. Emerging themes reflected the elements of SDT. The students expressed that their needs were supported by the teacher through the PE course content and learning environment. Many stated that they felt motivated because they now enjoyed PE. Positive outcomes included PA participation, positive affect towards PE and PA, meaningful learning, and a sense of well-being. This study provides physical educators with insight to improve physical activity motivation and participation of female students in elective PE.

The sociocultural economic, and political participation of girls has become a prevalent focus of policy. research, and practice. Despite their increasing visibility in the demographic composition of Canadian society. however, racialized minority girls remain largely invisible in these debates. Monolithic discourses of girl power. 'at risk' girls. youth participation and feminist activism do not account for the complex and uneven ways in which minority girls engage as knowledge producers, advocates, and community participants within cultural contexts that foster the depoliticization and social exclusion of young women of colour. Minority girls face intersecting barriers to civic participation and social inclusion `on their own terms' related to race. gender. age, citizenship. language, class and religion, among other factors. As rapid global change reconfigures girls' local realities and thus their practices of engagement, our traditional models and discourses of participation must be expanded. To problematize the relations of power under which minority girls constitute their practices of engagement and community building. I constructed a transdisciplinary conceptual framework grounded in postcolonial and transnational feminist theories. The research examined minority girls' practices of 'transformative engagement' (TE) in a collaborative, community-based, feminist Participatory Action Research project entitled "It's About Us." The study was based in Victoria. British Columbia. a predominantly Euro-Western Canadian city. "It's About Us" responded to minority girls' requests for a minority- and girl-centered epistemic space from which to explore their experiences of gendered racialization. Expressive methods including popular theatre. photography. and art served as vehicles for their engagement. The iterative feminist research design yielded data garnered from focus groups. theatre sessions. and scripts. participant-observation, journaling and photo-ethnography. This design provided the enabling conditions to deepen and sustain the girls' practices of oppositional agency and thus the emergence of transformative engagement. I developed an Interpretive Spiral Model (ISM) to extricate the difficulties of translating a feminist conceptual framework into a sustainable girl-centered project. My findings characterize transformative engagement as a multisited. precarious, generative form of praxis, rather than a formulaic process with guaranteed outcomes. I propose that the facilitation of transformative engagement entails four intersecting strategies: border crossing into exclusionary spaces. resources. and lines of power; developing safe, strategic communities of belonging: producing disruptive. critical knowledge; and engaging in public and social action. Overall. the girls' strategies of transformative engagement reveal a spectrum of subversive, deeply contextualized, multifaceted feminisms congruent with their own needs and experiences. The transformative engagement process resulted in multiple successful outcomes including theatre and conference presentations, media and website productions, and, most notably, contribution to the creation of a network of over 100 racialized girls and women called Anti-dote. The research findings illustrate how girl-centered. feminist action research can provide avenues to support minority girls' unique practices of resistance and social change. and feature their voices more prominently in community, policy, research, and practice.

Social networking sites are the contemporary agora: where individuals share their lives, understand the world, exchange cultural artefacts and tend to relationships. Yet, these sites are paradoxically lauded for their ability to connect lives and disparaged for the effect they have on the quality of language and relationships. Covered extensively across disciplines, including inquiries into identity and gender politics, social networking sites remain under investigated in linguistics. Here, the interplay of identity, gender, and language in a group of adolescent girls on Facebook is explored in the sociolinguistic tradition. This research demonstrates how a discourse analytic framework can determine some aspect of identity from an individual’s online interactions, including gender as constrained by historical and cultural discourses. A collaborative methodology navigates the difficulties of collecting data online, the complexities of gender and identity, as well as provides a commentary on the need for reform in ethical protocol for online research. / Graduate

The Ministry of Child and Family Development (MCFD) plays a critical role in creating assessment tools, producing policies endorsing ‘best practices’, assuring and alleging equity and safety in its child welfare practices that affects the lives of vulnerable children in government custody. Regardless of their efforts, reports of sexual violence against children in government custody continue to emerge. The overrepresentation of Aboriginal girls in the foster system saturates the industry with Aboriginal female children vulnerable to sexual violence and creates the conditions for long term suffering as a result of child sexualized abuse at the hands of ministry caregivers. In this study a qualitative interview method was used to speak to key informants who are Aboriginal female survivors of the foster care system to explore the effects of and responses to sexual abuse in the foster care system in BC. This research specifically looks at the lives and health of Aboriginal girls who have experienced sexualized violence in foster care. It looks at their accomplishments and successes regardless of the sexualized violence and of the social responses they received regarding the sexualized violence. The research also explores the challenges the girls and women have experienced as a result of the sexualized violence. In addition, this research makes recommendations around professional and therapeutic intervention and prevention. / Graduate / 0452 / 0534 / 0453 / rachelle_dallaire@yahoo.com

Conduct disorder is the second most common psychiatric disorder in adolescent girls. In a secondary analysis of an existing data set from a study of pregnant adolescent girls, recruited from three different sites in a Canadian city (N = 252), possible predictors of conduct disorder were examined. The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) Diagnostic Interview Schedule (DIS) was used to measure conduct disorder. To investigate possible risk factors, three instruments were used: (1) Childhood Trauma Questionnaire (CTQ), (2) Parental Bonding Instrument, and (3) Knowledge of Infant Development Inventory (KIDI). In a stepwise regression analysis, conduct disorder was found to be significantly associated with four risk factors: high levels of overall abuse as children, placement in foster care, few years of schooling and lack of paternal care. A possible preventive program, to encourage girls with conduct disorder to stay in school and cope with past histories of abuse, is discussed.

This study attempts to examine the architecture in Turkey during the Early Republican period as part of the social, economic and political context of the modernization process of the newly founded state, focusing on the case of the ismet PaSa Girls&amp / #8217 / Institute in Ankara. Firstly, the education of woman in general and the Girls&amp / #8217 / Institutes in particular are scrutinized in order to analyze the changes in the social role of women in the context of modernization in the Early Republic. Secondly, the relationship between women and the built environment is examined with reference to the changes women experienced in this context. The architectural context of the period is analyzed to examine the buildings of the Girls&amp / #8217 / Institutes as contemporary examples of the creation of a modern built environment in Turkey. Lastly, the building of the ismet PaSa Girls&amp / #8217 / Institute is examined in detail, by also making comparisons with other contemporary school buildings in Ankara. The building, which was constructed as a modernist school building by the foreign architect Ernst Egli in the center of Ankara, is evaluated as the representation of modern women and modern architecture for the new nation-state. So, the aim of this study is to assess the ismet PaSa Girls&amp / #8217 / Institute in Ankara as the example of contemporary educational institutions as well as of contemporary architecture in Turkey, corresponding with the attempt of the new nation-state towards modernization.