Retaining and developing high potential managers as part of a leadership pipeline is a critical aspect for business, and understanding not only the strengths these managers bring, but also how they derail and how interventions could be tailored to avoid derailment, or at least lessen the impact, is imperative for sustainable growth. The aim of the research is to highlight differences, if any, between gender and generations, in order to ascertain whether unique developmental programmes or derailment interventions would be required based on an individual's gender and age.

Typescript (photocopy). / Digitized by Kansas Correctional Industries

This thesis explores how the Omani primary school system responds to pupils' differences. The study took place within a centralised school system, which has a high level of government commitment to meet the international agenda with regard to Education for All and, more recently, the Sustainable Development Goals. Influenced by the thinking of the Index for Inclusion, the study generated a series of 'signposts', which were grouped under the themes of policy, practice and culture, which guided data collection, data management and the presentation of the findings. Qualitative data were generated via a multi-method approach that included documentary analysis, interviews with senior policy makers, school administrators, teachers, pupils, and parents. Data collection also included general and classroom observations, as well as a participatory photography exercise with eight pupils who were believed to be facing forms of exclusion. These data were analysed using thematic analysis, informed by literature relevant to the study focus, the series of signposts, and the researcher's insider knowledge as an experienced member of the Ministry of Education in Oman. The findings confirm that current national policies in Oman are committed to ensuring that all children have access to schools. However, despite these good intentions, there are various context-specific barriers that impede the system from responding to pupil differences. These barriers were identified as stemming from a confusion in understanding about certain key concepts arising from international trends, such as 'all', 'diversity', 'inclusion' and 'quality'. This confusion, combined with certain structural barriers related to communication, collaboration and leadership, makes it difficult to implement international thinking across the system. In addition, attitudes and assumptions about the abilities of some groups of learners proved to be further major barriers when responding to pupils' differences. Together, these barriers create a context of inequality of opportunity for various pupils and appear to restrict their future life chances in comparison to those of their classmates. Drawing on these findings, a context-specific model of conceptual, structural and attitudinal barriers is proposed as a way forward for the Omani school system to better understand the barriers faced in responding to pupils' differences. This model is seen as a contribution to knowledge with regard to responding to pupils' differences that may be relevant to other national contexts, particularly those with centralised educational systems.

This thesis focuses on the ways in which ‘underachievement' is constituted for boys identified as ‘underachieving' at Stone Acre, a non-selective school in a selective Local Authority in England. It explores how performance pressures, the school processes of the curriculum, selective grouping practices and teachers' understandings of gender all shape boys' experiences of learning. It argues that these layers also interconnect with school type and ethos. In seeking to bring these less visible readings of the policy frameworks and school level processes by which gendered learning outcomes occur, to the surface, this study contributes to the debate around boys' ‘underachievement' in the English school system. The research was conducted as a case study and adopted elements of an ethnographic approach. It is grounded in the work of Connell (2012, p.1677) who understands masculinities as being continuously produced in interaction with social structures and the body as encountering ‘gender regimes'. Data were gathered through a five-stage process that involved paired interviews with six boys in Year 10 (age 15) and identified at the start of the research as ‘underachieving' against the key performance benchmark: attainment at GCSE level. Additional data were collected from other sources including observations of the boys during lessons and individual interviews with eleven teachers. A key conclusion of the study was that boys identified as ‘underachieving' against key performance indicators are not learning in a gender-neutral space. Some teachers were found to have essentialist understandings of masculinities that were powerful in shaping the spaces in which the boys learned. Accountability pressures were identified as having contributed to the creation of a regulatory system that shaped the practices of teachers in both positive and negative ways. Stone Acre's school ethos and school-based approaches to teaching and learning were also found to have mitigated the boys from some of these pressures. Looking beyond the boys towards the system within which boys identified as ‘underachieving' experience their learning, this thesis demonstrates the complex, shifting and contextualised nature of the factors involved and the need for more structural readings of these.

No description available.

Previous route description experiments conducted by psychologists show there are differences between males and females in the use of landmarks when describing routes. Previous research has shown that females used landmarks and egocentric forms of turn descriptors more often than males for route descriptions. This method is known as route knowledge in the spatial knowledge literature. Males, conversely, were seen to use fewer landmarks and more cardinal direction descriptions and standard distances when describing routes. Spatial knowledge literature terms this method survey knowledge. The current experiment tested the hypothesis that sex is not the determinant of landmark usage for route descriptions but different cartographic methods depicting the same locale determine whether landmarks are described. Two quasi-experiments were conducted using different map types. Results of the experiments show that map type, not sex, influences landmark usage for route descriptions. / 10000-01-01

The purpose of study was to examine similarities and differences in experiences between male and female high school principals and district administrators in addition to similarities and differences in leadership style and skills. This was an in-depth study with participants working in the same district and matched with descriptors such as age, similar position, and time served. Therefore the statement of the problem for the present study is what similarities and differences in experiences exist between male and female high school principals and district administrators in addition to similarities and differences in leadership style and skills. Two male high school principals, one female high school principal, and one female district supervisor participated. Only top-level administrative positions were considered. The participants were interviewed and asked to take a survey on their leadership skills and their leadership style. All of the participants had experience as high school teachers with varying levels of teaching experience. There was a fairly small range of assistant principal experience. The participants reported having people who had been an influence in their decision to become administrators and someone who had mentored them. Barriers did not seem present in obtaining positions for either the male or female participants. Barriers that were listed involved issues that arose in their job such as implementing multiple new programs.

Visual and metric analysis both provide accepted methods for sex determination in humans. Visual ascertainment uses differing morphological traits in males and females to establish sex. Researchers have continually sought accurate methods of sexing long bones when skulls or pelves are absent or fragmented. These long bone elements may not have sexually distinct characteristics, but tend to survive in the field quite well. Metric analysis depends on size dimorphism between males and females to correctly assign sex. Metric methods fail where the sexes overlap or when skeletal elements cannot be assigned to their correct biological population. Under these conditions, visual ascertainment is extremely useful. It relies on descriptive features, not size, to interpret the shape variations between male and female elements. For example, physiological soft tissue variations in the "carrying angle'" of the arm at the humero-radioulnar junction are known to be sexually dimorphic; therefore, the hard tissue features of the distal humerus also should be sexually dimorphic. I observed six distinct visual characteristics of the distal humerus to determine sex in a blind study conducted on 649 individuals sampled from diverse biological populations. In addition to visual assessment, I collected four humeral measurements to determine whether quantitative analysis would be a better indicator of sex than non-metric analysis. I used nonparametric statistical methods to examine· the significance of each morphological feature and its relationship to known sex. All characteristics showed a high association with sex, and the relationships between sex and each characteristic were statistically strong. The final predictive quality of this method was 84% regardless of population; I concluded that my visual method is a dependable sex predictor among diverse populations. Every biological group varied considerably in size dimensions, but exhibited common morphological features of the distal humerus. This confirms that visual techniques provide accurate results regardless of biological affiliation. In many cases, visual assessment was as accurate or more accurate than metric analysis. Therefore, the distal humerus and its unique physical features provide an alternative method to previously used quantitative techniques in the determination of sex.

We have constructed a new finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) method in this project. Our new algorithm focuses on the most important and more challenging transverse electric (TE) case. In this case, the electric field is discontinuous across the interface between different dielectric media. We use an electric permittivity that stays as a constant in each medium, and magnetic permittivity that is constant in the whole domain. To handle the interface between different media, we introduce new effective permittivities that incorporates electromagnetic fields boundary conditions. That is, across the interface between two different media, the tangential component, Er(x,y), of the electric field and the normal component, Dn(x,y), of the electric displacement are continuous. Meanwhile, the magnetic field, H(x,y), stays as continuous in the whole domain. Our new algorithm is built based upon the integral version of the Maxwell's equations as well as the above continuity conditions. The theoretical analysis shows that the new algorithm can reach second-order convergence O(∆x2)with mesh size ∆x. The subsequent numerical results demonstrate this algorithm is very stable and its convergence order can reach very close to second order, considering accumulation of some unexpected numerical approximation and truncation errors. In fact, our algorithm has clearly demonstrated significant improvement over all related FDTD methods using effective permittivities reported in the literature. Therefore, our new algorithm turns out to be the most effective and stable FDTD method to solve Maxwell's equations involving multiple media.

There were three underlying purposes to this study: 1) To test the main effect of gender on work -> family and family -> work conflict; 2) To re-examine the predictors of inter-role conflict used by Frone, Russell, and Cooper (1992) (i.e., job involvement, job stress, family involvement, and family stress); and 3) To investigate the importance of using personality characteristics as predictors of how individuals deal with inter-role conflict. A questionnaire was assembled, consisting of: a work -> family conflict spillover scale, a family -> work conflict spillover scale, a job involvement scale, a family involvement scale, a job stressors scale, a family stressors scale, and two sub-scales from the California Psychological Inventory (i.e., the Managerial Potential scale and the Work Orientation scale) . Questionnaires were completed by 134 employees of a civil service agency. Results indicated that gender was not a significant predictor of either work -> family or family ->work conflict. Job stress was found to be a significant predictor of both work -> family, and family ->work conflict. Where as family stress was found to be a significant predictor of family -> work conflict only. Job involvement was found to be a significant predictor of work -> family conflict for managers only. When all predictors were assessed simultaneously, Work Orientation was the only variable found to be a significant predictor of work -> family conflict. The results from this study clarify and add to Frone, Russell, and Cooper's (1992) study of the work-family interface.