The purpose of this essay has been to answer the question of whether or not administrators of economic support perceive that their professional status is ranked lower than that of their coworkers in other fields of the social services. We set out to study whether or not their comparative status differed depending on their use of standardized assessment instruments and if their experience with regards to professional status differed depending on the size of the municipality they worked in. We also wanted to determine in what way (if any) the comparative status manifests itself and what factors influences it. We’ve utilized method triangulation in order to answer the questions posed in our purpose. The quantitative study was conducted using a questionnaire and the qualitative with three interviews. Both studies were conducted in the county of Värmland, Sweden. The three municipalities, in which the interviews was conducted, varied in size which was a part of our selection process due to the fact that we believed that the size would affect the views regarding professional status. The result of our study shows that how administrators view their comparative ranking differs depending on the size of their respective municipalities. Administrators in the larger municipalities perceive their status to be low in comparison to other fields while administrators in smaller municipalities doesn’t perceive any noticeable difference. The administrators don’t feel that their status is dependent on the lack of standardized assessment instruments within their field but rather the way economic support is taught at the Swedish universities. Within this study we conclude that administrators working in the field of economic support in municipalities with more than 10 000 inhabitants perceive that their field is ranked lower when compared to other fields within the social services.

This research explores literacy as a medium for deepening student's awareness of their world and the impact of the Ontario Secondary School Literacy Test (OSSLT). Standardized testing is analyzed as a fundamental paradigm to our school culture. Ethnography is explored as a method for describing one group of students and their teacher as they prepare for the OSSLT. The findings conclude that the test occupies time, dominates definitions of literacy and undermines student and teacher agency. The conclusion considers reasons for why we seem to accept a testing paradigm that may be a direct affront to democratic practice in schools.

Policy guidelines of the Education Quality and Accountability Office (EQAO) state that accommodations and participation decisions on the Ontario Secondary School Literacy Test (OSSLT) do not threaten validity. However, these issues are contentious in American large-scale testing. New approaches integrate test access, administration, accommodation and participation within a unified fairness and validity construct. The current study, based on demographic and outcome data for the entire population of OSSLT-eligible students from 2006 to 2009, demonstrates changing patterns in accommodations and participation decisions across schools and years. In particular, English language learners are found to be considerably underrepresented among students receiving special needs accommodations. This has implications for the valid interpretation and fair use of test scores. Recommendations are proposed for improving fairness, consistency, and validity in administering accommodations and participation.

Policy guidelines of the Education Quality and Accountability Office (EQAO) state that accommodations and participation decisions on the Ontario Secondary School Literacy Test (OSSLT) do not threaten validity. However, these issues are contentious in American large-scale testing. New approaches integrate test access, administration, accommodation and participation within a unified fairness and validity construct. The current study, based on demographic and outcome data for the entire population of OSSLT-eligible students from 2006 to 2009, demonstrates changing patterns in accommodations and participation decisions across schools and years. In particular, English language learners are found to be considerably underrepresented among students receiving special needs accommodations. This has implications for the valid interpretation and fair use of test scores. Recommendations are proposed for improving fairness, consistency, and validity in administering accommodations and participation.

Stages in Drosophila development denote the time after fertilization at which certain specific events occur in the developmental cycle. Stage information of a host embryo, as well as spatial information of a gene expression region is indispensable input for the discovery of the pattern of gene-gene interaction. Manual labeling of stages is becoming a bottleneck under the circumstance of high throughput embryo images. Automatic recognition based on the appearances of embryos is becoming a more desirable scheme. This problem, however, is very challenging due to severe variations of illumination and gene expressions. In this research thesis, we propose an appearance based recognition method using orientation histograms and Gabor filter. Furthermore, we apply Principal Component Analysis to reduce the dimension of the low-level features, aiming to accelerate the speed of recognition. With the experiments on BDGP images, we show the promise of the proposed method.

This study explored the effect of directions on the Least Preferred Coworker (LPC) scale; specifically, this study tested whether thinking of a generalized least preferred coworker (General LPC) would yield lower scores compared to thinking of a specific least preferred coworker (Specific LPC). The data supported this hypothesis as responses to the General LPC yielded more critical LPC scores than did responses to the Specific LPC. The hypothesis that thinking of a generalized least preferred coworker would yield more stable result than would thinking of a specific least preferred coworker was not supported. Finally, the hypothesis that LPC scores would shift categories (e.g., shifting from task-oriented to relations-oriented) more when thinking of a specific least preferred coworker than when thinking of a general least preferred coworker was not supported. This study provides supportive evidence of the importance of using the original test directions during test administrations.

The effectiveness of the GRE was measured through a mixed-methods study. Quantitative data was studied to determine a relationship between GRE scores and the completion of higher education. Students and employers were surveyed to clarify a link between the content the GRE measures and the skills that are needed in graduate school and the workforce. In addition, students were asked if test administration, time-constrained questions, and question bias had any effect of their GRE score. Together, these findings were inconclusive and do not suggest that the GRE is effective or ineffective in its measurement of potential graduate students in relation to test content, test administration, and question bias, time-constrained questions, and the accurate measurement of psychometrics.

This research explores literacy as a medium for deepening student's awareness of their world and the impact of the Ontario Secondary School Literacy Test (OSSLT). Standardized testing is analyzed as a fundamental paradigm to our school culture. Ethnography is explored as a method for describing one group of students and their teacher as they prepare for the OSSLT. The findings conclude that the test occupies time, dominates definitions of literacy and undermines student and teacher agency. The conclusion considers reasons for why we seem to accept a testing paradigm that may be a direct affront to democratic practice in schools.

This thesis is one part of a lean project initiated by Luvata Sweden AB in Finspang casting department. The primary goal of that project is to increase the production efficiency, reduce costs and improve the quality of the copper coil. The aim of this thesis is to develop standardized work in casting department at Luvata Sweden AB Finspang. The research is based on lean thinking and organized in three steps. FIRST STEP: This step implies value stream mapping (VSM) of the current manufacturing process. VSM technique is applied in order to create an overview of the entirety production flow in a casting department, to visualize non-value added activities and to identify process wastes. SECOND STEP: By using lean tools as: Waste Management, SMED and Visual Management, thesis work intends to clean the production process. 7 Wastes or seven forms of Muda were studied at Luvata Finspang. The source of 5 wastes were identified and reduced/eliminated. SMED (single minute exchange of dies) analysis was carried out for a changeover during a casting montage in order to reduce the changeover time and streamline the montage process. Spaghetti diagram was applied particularly to inspect the best location for all montage materials, equipments and tools in a casting floor. Ensuring the efficient implementation of Waste Management and SMED practices Visual Management technique was used. This mean expresses the information about production process, its real-time status and results in a way that could be understood by operators in a shop floor. It is important to clean a production process before the standardized work can be developed, since the purpose of standardized work is to represent the best practice: method and sequence for each process. THIRD STEP: The last thesis step focuses on developing standardized work sheets as a steering tool for operators to follow the best practice while executing their tasks in each work center (melting, casting, rolling) and during the casting montage. The standardized work sheets are designed to show the approved way to perform the specific procedures and are expected to motivate operators to perform theirs job in the common way. That would consequently reduce high variation in operators performance. It would probably take several years before any reasonable improvements could be observed. However the developed standardized work sheets are already placed in the shop floor and successfully used by operators this is my small contribution to a big improvement project!

In today’smanufacturing climate there is an increased focus on the use of the principles that form the foundation for the Lean manufacturing philosophy to create efficient and effective companies. Within Lean there is a great focus on identifying and eliminating waste. One of the seven wastes that Lean thinking strives to eliminate is the keeping of unnecessary inventory. The purpose ofthis study is to discover areas of improvement in a production flow and to give suggestions on these through finding and eliminating waste in the production environment. The production flow has been mapped using value stream mapping and has been analyzed accordingly. The specific production flow that has been mapped is located to a plant in the southern parts of Sweden and is operating within the plastic industry. At this plant, a specific product family has been mapped from raw material to shipment. In parallel with the empirical work literature studies have been conducted. The literature studies have sought to create a theoretical support for the result of the study. The current state at the factory has been mapped to create an understanding for the authors and the reader but also to give the study credibility with the company.  At the company observations and interviews have been conducted, mainly within two areas; the extrusion and the conversion into sheets. In addition to this thorough observations and calculations of inventory levels have been made, mainly in the semi-finished goods inventory. As the current state has been mapped thoroughly an analysis of the value stream has been conducted. Two areas have been focused upon in the analysis; the semi-finished goods inventory and the sheeting process. The observations and the analysis have shown disorganization in the inventory which causes materialto be forgotten and obsolete. In the sheeting process the analysis has shown that the lack of work instructions leads to variations in the cycle time and to variations in the mode of work. The inconsistency in the way work is conducted makes it difficult to obtain a common standard on quality. The analysis has resulted in an action plan which will lead to improvements in the production flow. In connection to this a future state map has been developed illustrating the desired state. The points of action are focused on the semi-finished goods inventory and the sheeting process. The major changes are the implementation of a FIFO-lane to increase the structure in the inventory and the development of work instructions for the sheeting process. The method used has been discussed and also the results obtained in the study and the compliance of the results with the purpose and thesis questions have been discussed. The study has also lead to suggestions for further studies that the company should investigate.