Federally qualified health centers (FQHCs) provide essential contraceptive services to low-income individuals; yet, access to all method options, notably intrauterine devices (IUDs) and implants, may be limited at non-Title X FQHCs. The South Carolina (SC) Choose Well initiative is a statewide contraceptive access initiative that was launched in 2017 and extends into 2022. Choose Well established a collaborative network between training and clinical partners and is aimed at facilitating implementation of contraceptive care best practices through capacity-building and training of clinical and administrative staff in partner organizations. The initiative provided funding for workforce expansion and contraceptive methods. We examined perceptions of staff from Choose Well-participating FQHCs regarding contraceptive access during the first 2 years of the initiative, including factors that facilitated or posed access challenges as well as sustaining factors. This study informs the process evaluation of Choose Well while providing data critical for uncovering and scaling up contraceptive access initiatives. Interviews were conducted with FQHC staff ( = 34) in 2018 and 2019 to assess Choose Well implementation and were recorded, transcribed, and double-coded at least 80% interrater reliability or consensus coding. Data were analyzed according to clinical and administrative factors influencing contraceptive access. Increased capacity for contraceptive counseling and provision through training and external funding for IUDs and implants were the most noted clinical factors facilitating access. Streamlining workflow processes was also a facilitator. Buy-in and engagement among staff and leadership emerged as a facilitator at some clinics and as a barrier at others. Policy/structural factors related to costs of devices and insurance coverage were identified as threats to sustainability. The Choose Well initiative contributed to the perception of an increase in contraceptive access at participating FQHCs in SC. Statewide contraceptive access initiatives have the potential to support FQHCs in meeting their clients' contraceptive needs. Organizational buy-in, sustainability of funding, and training are key to realizing the full potential of these initiatives.

Title II of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) is intended to increase student academic achievement through strategies such as improving teacher quality and increasing the number of "highly qualified teachers" (HQTs) in the classroom. This Federal policy relies on educational research that demonstrates a connection between student achievement and teacher quality. Although NCLB considers each route that teachers may take to meet HQT requirements as equivalent, research demonstrates that some routes may foster higher student achievement than others; those teachers, who met HQT requirements through these routes, are referred to in this study as "research-based HQTs" (RB-HQTs). The quantitative phase of this mixed methodology explores how northern California secondary mathematics teachers in suburban, urban, and rural schools meet "highly qualified teacher" requirements. The subsequent qualitative phase explores the challenges and promising practices in retention and recruitment of RB-HQTs used by those mathematics departments identified as having a "common" or "distinguished" profile of each respective suburban, urban, or rural sub-sample. This study identifies and reports eight strategies used by mathematics departments that have demonstrated success in retention and recruitment of RB-HQTs. The eight identified strategies, when implemented individually or collectively, may increase the proportion of RB-HQTs and improve student academic achievement in each mathematics department across northern California secondary schools, be it suburban, urban, or rural.

[pt] Esta tese de doutorado foi realizada no programa de Pós-Graduação em Serviço Social da Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio de Janeiro (PUC-Rio), na linha de pesquisa Violência, Direitos, Serviço Social e Políticas Intersetoriais, vinculada ao grupo de pesquisa do CNPq Estado, Sociedade, Políticas e Direitos Sociais (GESPD). Teve como objeto de estudo a análise dos usos dos conceitos de acolhimento e escuta qualificada no SUAS. O objetivo geral da pesquisa foi identificar os sentidos atribuídos aos conceitos de acolhimento e escuta qualificada na política de Assistência Social por profissionais da esfera municipal e teve como objetivos específicos: analisar as noções de acolhimento e escuta qualificada nos textos da Assistência Social e nos referenciais teóricos da literatura especializada; identificar nos discursos sobre a prática dos trabalhadores pesquisados a compreensão dos conceitos acolhimento e escuta qualificada; e, identificar as atribuições e competências profissionais no trabalho com famílias quando se requisitam acolhimento e escuta qualificada nos serviços socioassistenciais de proteção básica e especial. O percurso metodológico contou com o levantamento bibliográfico e com a recuperação das indicações de manuais e cadernos de orientações de serviços socioassistenciais que determinam o fazer profissional nas duas estratificações de proteção social da assistência social. Além da pesquisa documental e bibliográfica, a busca por elementos empíricos foi realizada em pesquisa de campo com profissionais que atuam no SUAS do município de Niterói/RJ, durante o ano de 2022. Para este encontro com os trabalhadores foi escolhida a metodologia qualitativa interativa, materializada em formações de grupos de trabalhadores de todos os níveis de escolaridade e diferentes lotações na proteção social básica, especial e coordenações. Ainda como elemento facilitador no trabalho com os grupos, foram utilizados textos da literatura brasileira, com leituras coletivas, registrando em áudio as percepções dos trabalhadores sobre os contextos, personagens, autores e as respectivas aproximações desses com a realidade diária do SUAS no município e comas demandas e requisições profissionais no trabalho com famílias. Com isso, buscouse oportunizar o uso da literatura como intermediária entre os saberes dos participantes dos grupos durante a pesquisa de campo. Assim, acredita-se que a pesquisa pode contribuir para uma perspectiva menos convencional no campo das análises de políticas públicas. A construção dos capítulos partiu do reconhecimento desta política social enquanto política pública setorial no quadro de estruturação das respostas estatais às expressões da Questão Social no Brasil, buscando as contradições de sua vinculação histórica aos elementos de formação do Estado brasileiro, que mantém os atributos conservadores de sua origem colonial. Para fortalecer este argumento a pesquisa levantou as principais mudanças institucionais da política no período entre1988 e 2022, demonstrando as alterações normativas e organizacionais, percebidas como alterações incrementais, que mantiveram as características de particularização do cuidado familiar como abordagem de enfrentamentos das desigualdades inerentes a um sistema de produção macroeconômico. Esta abordagem temporal da política considerou sua implementação em diferentes períodos e governos partir de uma análise institucionalista histórica, entendendo esta como uma das muitas possibilidades de análises sobre políticas públicas. Ao buscar compreender a trajetória de alterações na Assistência Social deste período, interessou especialmente pela incorporação de conceitos originados em outras políticas setoriais, como a saúde por exemplo. Observando assim, mais que uma intenção de buscar no Sistema Único de Saúde (SUS) um modelo para sua estrutura organizativa, a Assistência Social absorveu alguns conceitos emblemáticos para a definição de qualidade dos serviços sem as devidas mediações necessárias, visto os objetos diferentes de intervenção, sendo dois desses conceitos problematizados nesta pesquisa. Deste modo, os estudos levaram a problematizar o conceito de competência profissional, presente no discurso neoliberal, para localizar as requisições institucionais direcionadas aos trabalhadores do SUAS. Identificamos nos documentos uma investida para que os trabalhadores executem as ações de acolhimento e escuta qualificada como ações inerentes a qualquer trabalhador do SUAS, independentemente da formação acadêmica, originando assim, a questão central desta tese. O que é escuta qualificada e acolhimento e como esses dois conceitos são compreendidos pelos trabalhadores da Assistência Social no trabalho com famílias nos diferentes serviços socioassistenciais? Como resultados, e não respostas finalísticas, elencamos três principais achados. Primeiro, a pesquisa salientou que as contradições históricas do país precisam ser mais bem compreendidas para o desvelamento das limitações e constrangimentos atuais da Assistência Social. Em segundo confirmou que o uso da interlocução entre política pública e literatura promove digressões e significantes em uma relação dialética que aproxima a prosa literária das cenas do cotidiano das unidades socio-assistenciais. A experiência permitiu um movimento essencial para o estranhamento entre ditos conhecimentos técnicos predeterminados pelas cartilhas de atuação dos profissionais, a partir do poder da literatura de ofertar um lugar indireto aos saberes. E em terceiro, expôs a necessidade urgente, não alcançada por esta limitada pesquisa, de descortinaras demandas explicitas e as respostas concretas que esta política oferta. Para tal, aponta como possível caminho a problematização de conceitos que vem formatando e limitando as possibilidades de intervenção das diversas categorias profissionais que compõem o SUAS. / [en] Nuclear power in Brazil has a long and rich history, including complex international trade agreements, technological dominance, military secrets, and a major radiological accident. However, it has received little attention from Brazilian Geography, which could broaden the debate on the subject beyond the traditional technical-economic perspectives. We applied the relational theory of place, the typology of energy landscapes, and the concept of nuclearity to describe the sociospatial transformations that occurred after the establishment of the Nuclear Power Station in Angra dos Reis, as well as the connections of this enterprise with the nuclear fuel cycle. We used mixed methods that include: document analysis; semistructured interviews with experts; analysis of historical series of images, including the application of Remote Sensing and Geoprocessing techniques; and exploratory and confirmatory fieldwork. We presented the initial milestones in the siting of nuclear reactors around the world, to put in context Brazilian studies that led to the selection of Praia de Itaorna, Angra dos Reis (RJ), to receive the first nuclear power plant in the country. This choice made Itaorna a nuclear place. The installation of the Nuclear Power Station in 1970 and its slow and discontinuous expansion over the next five decades led to a series of alterations in the composition of the place and in its degree of nuclearity. During this period, the domain of meaning remained stable, while the domains of nature and social relations had significant changes, indicating landscape transformations. These must be understood within a broader context of socio-spatial transformations in the municipality of Angra dos Reis, which includes the rise (petroleum terminal and Nuclear Power Station) and fall (charcoal forests) of energy landscapes. The Nuclear Power Station became a landmark, modified the coastline, and created an exclusion area that allowed, to a certain extent, the regeneration of the surrounding vegetation. On the other hand, it stimulated the growth of a population center in Mambucaba that reduced the vegetation there. The energy landscape of the Nuclear Power Station is characterized by high energy density, spatial dominance, and temporal permanence. The establishment of the Nuclear Power Station took place simultaneously with the establishment of the Nuclear Fuel Factory (Resende – RJ) and the Planalto de Poços de Caldas Mining Plant (Caldas – MG). These three places are connected through the nuclear fuel cycle and their existence depends on flows of materials (mainly uranium), people and financial resources, which are (or were) established between them. This interdependence differentiates nuclear energy landscapes from others, such as those formed by hydroelectric plants or wind farms. The three nuclear landscapes have high energy density. Among them, the Mining Plant causes the deepest transformation, has greater spatial dominance and temporal permanence, while the Fuel Factory is located at the other extreme. The relational theory of place, the typology of energy landscapes, and the concept of nuclearity proved to be a robust theoretical basis for the study of socio-spatial transformations in the nuclear fuel cycle and constitute promising tools to be applied to energy planning.

Система обучения является важным компонентом управления человеческими ресурсами с целью создания платформы управления человеческими ресурсами для долгосрочного развития компании, формирования талантливой команды, постоянного повышения эффективности работы компании и сотрудников, а также содействия достижению стратегические цели компании. Изучая курсы, связанные с человеческими ресурсами, автор выбрал подходящую компанию, чтобы проанализировать проблемы в системе обучения компании и предложить соответствующие предложения по улучшению. X Company — это компания-посредник в сфере недвижимости, имеющая опыт работы на государственных предприятиях и обладающая богатыми социальными ресурсами, но ее доля на рынке относительно невелика. Существует значительный разрыв между текущей ситуацией и стратегическими целями, и компании необходимо срочно повысить свою основную конкурентоспособность, чтобы адаптироваться к потребностям стратегических открытий. Интеграция различных ресурсов для повышения основной конкурентоспособности, наиболее важными являются человеческие ресурсы. Поэтому развитие и культивирование талантов имеет особое значение. Однако обучение в компании X находится на ранней стадии, и система обучения не является надежной и имеет множество проблем. Поэтому создание стратегически ориентированной системы подготовки кадров имеет большое практическое значение для достижения стратегических целей предприятия и долгосрочного развития. / The training system is an important component of human resource management, with the aim of building a human resource management platform for the company's long-term development, building a talent team, continuously improving the performance of the company and employees, and promoting the achievement of the company's strategic goals. Through studying courses related to human resources, the author chose a suitable company to analyze the problems in the training system of the company and propose relevant improvement suggestions. X Company is a real estate intermediary company with a background in state-owned enterprises, with abundant social resources, but its market share is relatively small. According to the company's five-year development strategic plan, we aim to become the most competitive real estate agency in South China and plan to achieve an overall listing within 5 years. There is a significant gap between the current situation and strategic goals, and the company urgently needs to enhance its core competitiveness to adapt to the needs of strategic discovery. Integrating various resources to enhance core competitiveness, the most important is human resources. Therefore, the development and cultivation of talents is particularly important. However, X Company's training is in its early stages and the training system is not sound, with many problems. Therefore, establishing a strategic oriented human resource training system is of great practical significance for the achievement of enterprise strategic goals and long-term development.

Text in Afrikaans / "Free people expect much from their police. In such societies the police stand at the point of balance on the one hand securing human rights on the other exercising their lawful powers given to them by Governments in the name of the people, to protect people and their institutions" (J Alderson Human Rights and Police Rights. Publication of the Council of Europe.) This is no small expectation. It means that the police are expected to maintain and secure the principles of democracy and human rights, the principles upon which our Constitution is based. At the same time it is the duty of a police service to maintain law and order which sometimes require the exercise of power and the use of force which on the face of it may appear to violate human dignity and certain rights and freedoms which a police force is expected to maintain in a democratic society. The manner of exercising that power has an impact on the credibility and effectiveness of the police. Human rights law internationally accepts that a police service needs to be given the power to, at times restrict certain individual freedoms in the interests of the security of the community at large. These restrictions may take place only in a constitutional way. If it takes place in an unconstitutional way the courts must have the right to exclude evidence which is unconstitutionally obtained. At this stage the courts have to formulate such a qualified exclusionary rule, but the ultimate goal must be to include such an exclusionary rule in a future Constitution. / Department of Criminal & Procedural Law / LL.M.

The body of literature clearly articulates the unique needs of newly qualified teachers and the challenges they experience during their early career years. In addition, literature advocates for implementation of induction programmes to enable a smooth transition of the beginners into the profession. This empirical phenomenological study explored the induction experiences of newly qualified primary school teachers in Zimbabwe in an attempt to gain insights into the everyday issues they contend with. Purposive sampling was employed to select twenty participants who comprised of ten newly qualified teachers, five beginners whose experience in the field ranged from one to three years and five mentors. Data were collected mainly through three semi-structured interviews with newly qualified teachers and mentors, reflective essays written by beginners who were not so new in the profession and a focus group discussion with selected beginners. The protocol used for data explication was a simplified version of Hycner’s (1985) framework for phenomenological analysis suggested by Groenewald (2004). The findings yielded six themes and revealed that: new teachers experienced adaptation challenges relating to forging of new relationships, location of schools and nature of host communities; induction was largely informal and incidental, and the induction supports experienced by the new teachers were limited; the beginners had various teaching and social concerns that needed to be addressed; and, while the new teachers had derived some lessons from their first year of teaching, these were outweighed by their concerns and might not have made a significant impact on their classroom practices. The data also revealed that the partnership between teacher education institutions and schools in providing for teacher professional development was weak. The study concluded that the absence of a policy on induction in the country has resulted in lack of appreciation of the centrality of induction on the teacher development continuum and the haphazard manner in which issues of induction are being handled. The main recommendations from the study were that a policy on induction should be put in place, that schools are empowered to provide induction and induction supports that are amenable to the country’s context be fully exploited. / Curriculum and Instructional Studies / D. Ed. (Didactics)

South Africa comes from an apartheid local government system that was structured to divide the citizens socially, economically, spatially and racially to ensure that only a small minority of South Africans benefited from the development and the resources of this country. Since 1994 government departments have undergone a number of transformation processes. The Employment Equity Act 55 of 1998 and affirmative action became instrumental in ensuring racial and gender representation within the local government structures. This study investigates the perceptions of racism, nepotism, fraud and other related problems which were perceived as a hindrance towards the effective implementation of affirmative action. The main findings of the study confirm that the implementation of affirmative action in municipalities is not effective due to lack of commitment from top management. It is anticipated that the implementation of Local Government Systems Amendment Act 7 of 2011, will enforce service delivery within municipalities. / Public Administration & Management / M. Tech. (Public Management)

In South Africa the Center for Child Youth and Family Studies is training practitioners yearly to work as play therapists from a gestalt approach. Once these practitioners successfully complete their training and qualify they could begin practicing play therapy from a gestalt approach. Each of these recently qualified play therapists is then responsible for organising and committing to their own supervision. Therapists who do not attend supervision risk stagnation and burn out due to a lack of positive interaction in relation to receiving knowledge and support from those more experienced in gestalt play therapy and from their peers. At present there is a perceived lack of supervision resources based on a gestalt approach particularly for those recently qualified play therapists working from a gestalt approach that are geographically distant from the areas where training takes place. This study sought to answer the question of what supervision resources are currently available to recently qualified play therapists working from a gestalt approach in South Africa. In order to answer this question combined quantitative and qualitative research approaches were used. An internet survey questionnaire was completed by recently qualified play therapists working from a gestalt approach which formed part of the quantitative section of the research. Structured interviews were conducted via Skype with professionals experienced in the field of Gestalt therapy theory and supervision from a gestalt approach and this formed part of the qualitative section of the research. Overall the results from the merged data indicate a lack of supervisors qualified to give supervision based on a gestalt approach. This factor contributes to the overall lack of supervision resources based on a gestalt approach for recently qualified play therapists working from this approach. Geographical distance from supervision resources places financial and time constraints on recently qualified play therapists that prevent them from accessing supervision based on a gestalt approach. Despite this results indicate those recently qualified play therapists working from a gestalt approach are attempting to meet their responsibility and requirement for supervision. / Psychology / M. Diac. (Play Therapy)

LEGAL REGULATION OF ALTERNATIVE INVESTMENT FUNDS IN THE CZECH REPUBLIC ABSTRACT The purpose of my thesis is to analyze the impact of the recently adopted groundbreaking European regulation of alternative investment funds into the Czech legal environment of collective investments. The respective chapters provide an analysis of the most important aspects of regulation of alternative investment funds, which I consider as crucial for collective investment undertakings and its (even only potential) investors. In a large portion of the thesis I focus on the definition of alternative investment funds to clarify the possible modes of operation and distinguish them from their earlier regulated standard counterparts. In the first of eight chapters I introduce this topic in the historical context, which provides a brief excursion into the progress of regulation of collective investment at the European and Czech level, and further explain the reasons which led to creation of a unified regulation for collective investment business. The second chapter describes the current regulatory framework in accordance with the European regulation, based primarily on the Alternative Investment Fund Managers Directive (AIFMD) and its subsequent transposition into the Czech Act on Investment Companies and Investment Funds (ICIFA)....

The body of literature clearly articulates the unique needs of newly qualified teachers and the challenges they experience during their early career years. In addition, literature advocates for implementation of induction programmes to enable a smooth transition of the beginners into the profession. This empirical phenomenological study explored the induction experiences of newly qualified primary school teachers in Zimbabwe in an attempt to gain insights into the everyday issues they contend with. Purposive sampling was employed to select twenty participants who comprised of ten newly qualified teachers, five beginners whose experience in the field ranged from one to three years and five mentors. Data were collected mainly through three semi-structured interviews with newly qualified teachers and mentors, reflective essays written by beginners who were not so new in the profession and a focus group discussion with selected beginners. The protocol used for data explication was a simplified version of Hycner’s (1985) framework for phenomenological analysis suggested by Groenewald (2004). The findings yielded six themes and revealed that: new teachers experienced adaptation challenges relating to forging of new relationships, location of schools and nature of host communities; induction was largely informal and incidental, and the induction supports experienced by the new teachers were limited; the beginners had various teaching and social concerns that needed to be addressed; and, while the new teachers had derived some lessons from their first year of teaching, these were outweighed by their concerns and might not have made a significant impact on their classroom practices. The data also revealed that the partnership between teacher education institutions and schools in providing for teacher professional development was weak. The study concluded that the absence of a policy on induction in the country has resulted in lack of appreciation of the centrality of induction on the teacher development continuum and the haphazard manner in which issues of induction are being handled. The main recommendations from the study were that a policy on induction should be put in place, that schools are empowered to provide induction and induction supports that are amenable to the country’s context be fully exploited. / Curriculum and Instructional Studies / D. Ed. (Didactics)