nicht vorhanden

The purpose of this study was to find an explanation for why Amnesty International in Sweden has seen an increasing number of members, while the number of participants at the national annual meeting has decreased. The method of the study was done with an inductive approach in which the problem has affected the choice of theory and empirical data. The empirical data has been collected through both qualitative and quantitative method in which the analysis was implemented with support by statistics and interviews. To strengthen the arguments in the paper, sociological theories on organizations are used and also theories about social movements. The conclusion of the study is that Amnesty International Sweden has undergone a transformation towards a decentralized organization because it is not longer relevant for people who are members to achieve the purpose of the organization to participate at the annual meeting. This because that these members accesses the recourses they want to achieve by working on a local level. The main conclusion of this study is that Amnesty has moved towards being an organization that to some extent are working as a social movement, where there is no longer any clear link between local work and the central board of Directors.

The year 2013 was the third year of HZDR as a member of the Helmholtz Association (HGF), and we have made progress of integrating ourselves into this research environment of national Research centers. In particular, we were preparing for the evaluation in the framework of the so-called program oriented funding (POF), which will hopefully provide us with a stable funding for the next five years (2015 – 2019). In particular, last fall we have submitted a large proposal in collaboration with several other research centers. The actual evaluation will take place this spring. Most of our activities are assigned to the program “From Matter to Materials and Life” (within the research area “Matter”). A large fraction of this program is related to the operation of large-scale research infrastructures (or user facilities), one of which is our Ion Beam Center (IBC). The second large part of our research is labelled “in-house research”, reflecting the work driven through our researchers without external users, but still mostly utilizing our large-scale facilities such as the IBC, and, to a lesser extent, the free-electron laser. Our in-house research is performed in three so-called research themes, as depicted in the schematic below. What is missing there for simplicity is a small part of our activities in the program “Nuclear Waste Management and Safety” (within the research area “Energy”).

The Institute of Resource Ecology (IRE) ISone of the eight institutes of the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR). The Research activities are mainly integrated into the program “Nuclear Safety Research (NUSAFE)” of the Helmholtz Association (HGF) and focused on the topics “Safety of Nuclear Waste Disposal” and “Safety Research for Nuclear Reactors”. Additionally, various activities have been started investigating chemical and environmental aspects of processing and recycling of strategic metals, namely rare earth elements. These activities are located in the HGF program “Energy Efficiency, Materials and Resources (EMR)”. Both programs, and therefore all work which is done at IRE, belong to the research sector “Energy” of the HGF. The research objectives are the protection of humans and the environment from hazards caused by pollutants resulting from technical processes that produce energy and raw materials. Treating technology and ecology as a unity is the major scientific challenge in assuring the safety of technical processes and gaining their public acceptance. Namely, we investigate the ecological risks exerted by radioactive and non-radioactive metals in the context of nuclear waste disposal, the production of energy in nuclear power plants and in processes along the value chain of metalliferous raw materials. A common goal is to generate better understanding about the dominating processes essential for metal mobilization and immobilization on the molecular level. This in turn enables us to assess the macroscopic phenomena, including models, codes and data for predictive calculations, which determine the transport and distribution of contaminants in the environment.

The modeling results of current global aerosol models agree, generally within a factor of two, with the measured surface concentrations of black carbon (BC) and sulphate (SF) aerosols in rural areas across the northern continents. However, few models are able to capture the observed seasonal cycle of the Arctic aerosols. In general, the observed seasonality of the Arctic aerosols is determined by complex processes, including transport, emissions and removal processes. In this work, the representations of aerosol deposition processes (i.e., dry deposition, in-cloud and below-cloud scavenging) within the framework of the Canadian Global Air Quality Model – GEM-AQ are first enhanced. Through the enhancements in GEM-AQ, the seasonality of the Arctic BC and SF is reproduced, and the improvement in model performance extends to the rest of the globe as well. Then, the importance of these deposition processes in governing the Arctic BC and SF seasonality is investigated. It is found that the observed seasonality of the Arctic BC and SF is mainly caused by the seasonal changes in aerosol wet scavenging, as well as the seasonal injection of aerosols from surrounding source regions. Being able to reproduce the seasonality of the Arctic BC, the enhanced GEM-AQ allows more accurate assessment of the contributions of anthropogenic sources to the BC abundance in the Arctic air and deposition to the Arctic surface. Simulating results on regional contributions to the Arctic BC show a strong dependence on altitude. The results reinforce the previous finding of Eurasia being the dominant contributor to the surface BC in the Arctic, and suggest a significant contribution from Asian Russia. In addition to the seasonality of the Arctic aerosols, the inter-annual variation in the Arctic BC surface concentration is also investigated. To complement the 3-D GEM-AQ model, the atmospheric backward trajectory analysis, together with estimated BC emissions, is implemented as a computational effective approach to reconstruct BC surface concentrations observed at the Canadian high Arctic station, Alert. Strong correlations are found between the reconstructed and the measured BC in the cold season at Alert between 1990 and 2005, which implies that atmospheric transport and emissions are the major contributors to the observed inter-annual variations and trends in BC. The regional contributions estimated annually from 1990 through 2005 suggest that Eurasia is the major contributor in winter and spring to the near-surface BC level at Alert with a 16-year average contribution of over 85% (specifically 94% in winter and 70% in spring). A decreasing trend in the Eurasian contribution to the Arctic is found in this study, which is mainly due to regional emission reduction. However, the inter-annual variation in the North American contribution shows no clear trend.

Many accountability systems use data from large-scale assessments to make judgements about school performance. In Ontario, school performance is often assessed using the percentage of proficient students (PPS). The purpose of this study was to shed light on the degree and frequency of changes from year to year in the percentage of proficient students, at a school, in the areas of reading, writing and mathematics for both grades 3 and 6 in Ontario from 2006 to 2010. A second purpose was to assess the influence of cohort size on the variability in scores from year to year. Once schools not having data for 5 consecutive years and outliers were omitted secondary data analysis was used to examine nearly 3000 schools in each subject and grade. For the first part of the study, descriptive statistics and frequencies were the main method of examination. In the second part of the study, variance scores and correlations were used in order to understand the relationship between changes in PPS and cohort size. Findings revealed that changes in school scores from year to year are very large for many schools. Approximately 50 percent of schools experienced changes in PPS greater than 10 percent in any given year. When examining how often, from 2006 to 2010, a school experienced a similar amount of change – generally, both the smallest and largest change categories had a larger percentage of schools experiencing a similar amount of change for two and three years. Very seldom did schools experience the same degree of change in PPS across all 5 years. Results from correlations revealed a significant and inverse relationship between average cohort size and variability in PPS. Considering over 80 percent of schools have 60 or fewer students in a cohort the unpredictability in PPS may prove to be quite frustrating to schools and confusing to stakeholders. Annual PPS scores appear to be a poor indicator of real school performance, and their use to rank or rate schools should be avoided. Recommendations are made about using PPS to report school level results for EQAO, schools and the public.

Many accountability systems use data from large-scale assessments to make judgements about school performance. In Ontario, school performance is often assessed using the percentage of proficient students (PPS). The purpose of this study was to shed light on the degree and frequency of changes from year to year in the percentage of proficient students, at a school, in the areas of reading, writing and mathematics for both grades 3 and 6 in Ontario from 2006 to 2010. A second purpose was to assess the influence of cohort size on the variability in scores from year to year. Once schools not having data for 5 consecutive years and outliers were omitted secondary data analysis was used to examine nearly 3000 schools in each subject and grade. For the first part of the study, descriptive statistics and frequencies were the main method of examination. In the second part of the study, variance scores and correlations were used in order to understand the relationship between changes in PPS and cohort size. Findings revealed that changes in school scores from year to year are very large for many schools. Approximately 50 percent of schools experienced changes in PPS greater than 10 percent in any given year. When examining how often, from 2006 to 2010, a school experienced a similar amount of change – generally, both the smallest and largest change categories had a larger percentage of schools experiencing a similar amount of change for two and three years. Very seldom did schools experience the same degree of change in PPS across all 5 years. Results from correlations revealed a significant and inverse relationship between average cohort size and variability in PPS. Considering over 80 percent of schools have 60 or fewer students in a cohort the unpredictability in PPS may prove to be quite frustrating to schools and confusing to stakeholders. Annual PPS scores appear to be a poor indicator of real school performance, and their use to rank or rate schools should be avoided. Recommendations are made about using PPS to report school level results for EQAO, schools and the public.

No description available.

Thesis (M.P.H.)--University of Michigan, 1944.

Thesis (M.P.H.)--University of Michigan, 1944.