The focus of this study was perceptions of professional school counselors' (PSC) graduate preparation in their roles as school counselors. The relationships examined were PSCs' roles and the number of hours completed in the school counselors' graduate programs, PSCs' roles and the level of their professional identity, and PSCs' roles and the number of school counseling specialty courses completed in their school counseling graduate programs. The American School Counselor Association (ASCA, 2005) and the Council for Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs (CACREP, 2001) have established standards for school counselors to master in their programs. These standards were used to develop the 30 roles identified in this study. Graduate programs referred to the number of hours PSCs completed in their graduate school counseling programs. Professional identity was defined as the certifications and licensures, the memberships in professional organizations, and the number of professional conferences and workshops PSCs attend. Specialty courses included school counseling courses taken by PSCs in their school counseling graduate programs. PSCs perceived themselves to be somewhat prepared in their overall preparation in their roles as school counselors. Results of the correlations between PSCs' perceptions of their preparation in their roles and the number of hours completed in the school counseling graduate programs, the professional identity of PSCs, and the number of specialty coursed completed were statistically significant but not practically significant. PSCs perceived themselves to need additional preparation in serving students with learning differences, seeking funding sources, and using technology. The factor analysis supported the construct validity of the survey instrument. It validated the roles of PSCs as outlined by ASCA standards (2005) and CACREP standards (2001). The factors included (a) Factor 1, Tasks/Advocacy/Professional Identity, (b) Factor II, Personal/Social/Career, (c) Factor III, Academics, and (d) Factor IV, Cultural/Legal/Ethical Issues. In conclusion, PSCs need additional training in student learning differences, seeking funding sources for school counseling programs, and on-going training in technology. PSCs want the term "educator" to be included in their description of their professional identity. PSCs also want additional specialty courses added to their curricula. They believe that the focus should be on the specialty of school counseling rather than a mental health focus.

The purpose of this study was to determine the relationship between female counselors’ work-family conflict and their demographic (i.e., ethnicity, age, educational level, and annual household income), occupational (i.e., ethnicity, age, educational level, and annual household income), and family (i.e., marital/partner status; number of children at home under the age of 18; age of youngest child; care of elderly, ill, or disabled family members; source of support; and support) characteristics. Super’s (1990) Life-Space Life-Span theory provided a framework to understand female counselors’ engagement in multiple roles in work and family and the conflict that can result in two directions: work interfering with family (WIF), and family interfering with work (FIW) (Frone, Russell, & Cooper, 1992). Female counselors were contacted through electronic email communication in which they received a link to access the online survey that totaled 51 questions. Female counselors from the state of Louisiana and Alabama participated in the survey for a sample size of 266. Pearson’s correlation indicated significant relationships for WIF and the following variables: (a) annual household income, (b) hours per week spent in employment, (c) counseling license, (d) workplace flexibility, (e) autonomy, (f) marital/partner status, and (g) source of support. For FIW, significant relationships were found for the following variables: (a) autonomy; (b) number of children at home under the age of 18; (c) age of the youngest child; (d) care of elderly, ill, or disabled family members; (e) hours per week spent in home chores and errands; and (f) support. Autonomy and hours per week spent in employment significantly predicted female counselors’ WIF scores. Autonomy; age of the youngest child; care of elderly, ill, or disabled family members; and support predicted female counselors’ FIW scores.

Abstract The aim of this study has been to present the percieved influence of Facebook usage among young adults. Five subjects, two men and three women aged 20-25, was the respondents of qualitative, semistructured, interviews with an emphesis on social phenomenons that might affect psychosocial health. After applying coding and thematc analasis to the collected data, the findings were analyzed using socialpsychological theory and theory of identity and earlier findings on the subject. The results show that the interviewed young adults tend to express that Facebook usage is affecting their health in different ways, that Facebook as such has both positive and negative sides and lastly that the individuals’ usage and represenatation on Facebook can be linked to different roles and that the process of representation on Facebook can affect the identification process.

Master of Public Health - MPH / Background: The appointment system learning initiative (ASLI) was introduced in 2016 as a way of implementing appointment systems in the City of Cape Town, in response to lengthy waiting times at PHC facilities It was intended as a safe space for learning, and piloted facility-generated planning in which knowledge was shared in workshops over 18 months. Variability in how well appointment systems had taken root was noted at the second feedback workshop. Currently, there is little information on the experiences, perceptions and roles of managers with regard to the initiative, or what unforeseen issues may have had an impact. Aim: This study aimed to reach an understanding of how the Appointment Systems Learning Initiative approach and its implementation was experienced by participating facility and PPHC managers at City Health facilities in Cape Town. This includes an exploration of the roles and experiences of health managers, including their perceptions of the benefits and challenges of the process. Methods: A qualitative, exploratory design was used. Individual, semi-structured interviews were conducted with a sample of twelve facility managers and two PPHC managers. Manager’s roles were analysed deductively according to Mintzburg’s 2009 framework, while other data analysis was inductive. Ethical clearance was obtained from UWC BMREC prior to commencement. Informed consent was obtained from participants and confidentiality was preserved at all stages of research. Results: Managers viewed the learning experience positively and felt that facility-generated planning was preferable to hierarchical imposition of programmes. They found it motivating to learn how other facilities had solved problems and designed their systems. Contextual changes to the health system affected ASLI by increasing the pace and prescriptiveness of implementation, and impeded the capacity for PPHC managers to offer support. Facility managers fulfilled critical leadership roles according to Mintzberg’s model, but the way in which they carried out roles such as delegation, team building or communicating may have affected implementation. Challenges included issues with human resources, insufficient time available for managing implementation, lack of preparation beforehand, insufficient support and contextual changes. Benefits included shorter working hours for staff, better organisation in facilities, shorter waiting times and improved satisfaction for end-users.

Thesis advisor: Lisa Cuklanz / For my Communication Honors Program thesis for Boston College, I plan to analyze gender roles and how gender is constructed in recent children’s films produced by Disney. Since the Disney Corporation is so prominent in today’s culture and thus influential to its audience, this topic of study is very important. It impacts many people including its main target audience—children. Existing research proves that children develop their gender schemata early in life. Furthermore, the media they interact with influences children and their concepts of gender. Therefore, the way that Disney portrays gender in its children’s movies is worth analyzing since it can impact the way children develop and view gender and stereotypes. / Thesis (BA) — Boston College, 2013. / Submitted to: Boston College. College of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Communication Honors Program. / Discipline: College Honors Program. / Discipline: Communication.

ABSTRACT WOULD NOT LOAD ON DSpace.

Digital transformation is an area of research that has received a lot of attention in recent years. When talking about it in the context of entrepreneurship, digitalization is changing business interactions as well as completing different tasks. Since the businesses are not working in isolation, but can be rather seen as part of complex ecosystems interacting with different stakeholders, there is an unexplored research area regarding digitalization of ecosystems. The purpose of this research is to extend the literature on value creation and delivery within complex multi-stakeholder ecosystems using digital platforms and the change in the roles and responsibilities of stakeholders. The empirical research is based on qualitative approach utilizing case-study to investigate how the roles and responsibilities of an ecosystem have changed via semi-structured interviews. The findings indicate that digitalization changes the ecosystem by optimizing the existing interactions between different stakeholders as well as enabling stakeholders to take new roles on the digital platforms. Roles were impacted in terms of power and leadership over the ecosystem, but to a larger extent there was a shift in how stakeholders carried out their responsibilities. Additionally, digital technologies change the responsibilities by automation as well as taking over certain roles in the form of machine learning algorithms.

Mudanças ocorreram na composição familiar, surgindo as famílias homoparentais, ou seja, casais de pessoas de mesmo sexo que criam filhos. Diante dessa nova realidade cada vez mais visível, tornam-se necessárias a revisão e reconsideração dos conceitos de maternidade e paternidade. Dessa forma, o presente trabalho visa o estudo da homoparentalidade, examinando de que forma os papéis e funções parentais vêm sendo partilhados e regulados pelos membros do casal de pessoas de mesmo sexo que criam filhos. Para tal, foi utilizado o referencial teórico da Psicanálise em Freud e Lacan. Além disso, buscou-se aporte em estudos socioantropológicos da sexualidade, a partir da articulação teórica dos conceitos de homossexualidade, família tradicional e homoparental, função materna e paterna do ponto de vista psicanalítico e sua diferença em relação aos papéis (sociais) parentais. Papel e função parental foram as categorias eleitas para análise de fragmentos de discursos de homossexuais com filhos, colhidos em um estudo socioantropológico / Changes have occurred in household composition, the emerging same-sex families, or same-sex couples raising children. Given this new reality increasingly visible, become necessary to review and reconsideration of concepts of motherhood and fatherhood. Thus, this research aims at studying the homoparenthood, examining how parental roles and functions are being shared and regulated by the members of the pair of same-sex couples raising children. To this end, we used the theoretical framework of psychoanalysis in Freud and Lacan. In addition, we sought input from socioanthropological studies on sexuality, from the theoretical articulation of the concepts of homosexuality, traditional and homoparental family, maternal and paternal functions of the psychoanalytic point of view and its difference in relation to the roles (social) parents. Parental role and function categories were chosen for analysis of fragments of speeches by homosexual persons with children, gathered in a socio-anthropological study

The Wilms' tumour suppressor gene Wt1 is a key regulator of embryonic development and tissue homeostasis. In humans, mutation in the gene may lead to childhood kidney cancer, severe glomerular kidney diseases, gonadal dysgenesis and, in rare cases, heart diseases. The importance of WT1 in embryonic development is related to its crucial function in the regulation of two cellular plasticity processes: the epithelial to mesenchymal transition (EMT) and the reverse process, the mesenchymal to epithelial transition (MET). WT1 expression persists during the waves of EMT and MET that generate certain mesodermal tissues. In fact, WT1 is a major regulator of both transitions and it is essential for the survival of mesenchyme progenitors. Furthermore, it has been proposed that WT1 is required for the derivation of progenitors from different mesothelia, possibly through an EMT. Progenitors expressing WT1 are believed to differentiate into different cell types, giving rise to coronary vasculature, adipocytes and hepatic stellate cells. In my PhD I aimed to investigate the instructive role of different WT1 isoforms. To address this, the first goal was to generate a single plasmid that would accommodate all necessary components of an inducible system, in order to derive cellular models for the inducible expression of WT1 single isoforms. Second, I aimed to understand the processes that the single variants were sufficient to drive. Therefore, I started with the establishment of two cellular models for the inducible expression of the main four isoforms of WT1 (with or without the exon 5 and/or the KTS, here referred as +/+, +/-, -/+ and -/-). I cloned different plasmids carrying doxycycline inducible WT1 isoforms and derived single stable clones in two epithelial kidney cell lines that do not express WT1: the MDCK and the IMCD3 cells. I then analysed the expression profiles of the clones, using either microarray or RNA sequencing, and performed cellular assays to characterize the cells after WT1 induction. Overall, WT1 induction did not affect cell growth, cell cycle, cell migration or anchorage independent growth, suggesting that the expression of WT1 in these two cell lines does not change their oncogenic potential. The expression analysis of the MDCK cells suggested that the induction of WT1 isoforms activates an inflammatory response, leading to the overexpression of several cytokines. Moreover, the -/+ isoform speciffically caused the upregulation of fibrotic markers and the rearrangement of the actin cytoskeleton. Interestingly, the expression of the mesothelial marker UPK3B increased following the induction of the -/+ isoform. Because the expression of the -/+ variant led to the most signifficant isoform-specific changes in both cell lines, I focused on this isoform for the validation of the transcriptomic data of the IMCD3 cells. I confirmed that the induction of WT1 -/+ in the IMCD3 cells leads to the upregulation of fibrotic markers, increases cell adhesion and activates the AKT and MAPK pathways. Moreover, there was a significant overexpression of different mesothelial markers and, importantly, of key regulators and markers of developmental processes, such as adipogenesis, skeletal and cartilage development, as well as angiogenesis. I then dissected the timing of expression of some specific markers and regulators, analysing the levels of the genes at different time points after WT1 -/+ induction. The preliminary results intimate that WT1 -/+ might induce epithelial cells in the direction of cartilage-skeletal tissue and fat, possibly through a mesothelial intermediate. The data also suggest that the induction of this isoform initiates an EMT, possibly followed by an MET, as the levels of expression of the differentiation markers and regulators increase. To validate the proposed instructive role of WT1, it will be of crucial importance to determine both RNA and protein levels of markers and regulators at even later time points, both in IMCD3 cells and in a model of inducible embryonic stem cells, which is currently under development. In the future, it will be important to address the relevance of these findings in vivo and to dissect the molecular mechanisms.

Multi-agent systems (MAS) are emerging as a promising paradigm for conceptualizing, designing and implementing large-scale heterogeneous software systems. The key advantage of looking at components in such systems as autonomous agents is that as agents they are capable of flexible self-organization, instead of being rigidly organized by the system's architect. However, self-organization is like evolution-it takes a lot of time and the results are not guaranteed. More often than not, the system's architect has an idea about how the agents should organize themselves-what types of organizations they should form. In our work, we tried to solve the problem of modelling organizations and their roles in a MAS, independent of the particular agent platform on which the MAS will eventually run. First and foremost, we have proposed a metamodel for expressing platform-independent organization models. Furthermore, we have implemented the proposed metamodel for the Jade agent platform as a module extending this framework. Finally, we have demonstrated the use of our module by modelling three specific organizations: remote function invocation, arithmetic expression evaluation and sealed-bid auction. Our work shows how to separate the behaviour acquired through a role from the behaviour intrinsic to an agent. This...