While undergraduate enrollment of all racial groups in United States higher education institutions has increased, 6-year graduation rates of Blacks (39%) remain low compared to other races; Asians (69%), Whites (62%), and Hispanics (50%; NCES, 2010). Women’s graduation rate is higher than men’s; 58% compared to men’s at 53% in public institutions (IPEDS, 2011). Retention literature does not address the perceptions of Black ethnic groups’ experiences in college, particularly in Hispanic serving institutions. Informed by Tinto’s (1975, 1987, 1993) student academic and social integration model, Guiffrida’s (2003, 2004, 2005, 2006) model of relationships while at college, and ex-post facto research design, the study investigated personal and institutional factors that relate to Black students’ self-efficacy and persistence to the senior year in college. Data about Black ethnic undergraduate seniors’ (N = 236) academic and social experiences in college were collected using the Student Institutional Integration Survey (SIIS), an online questionnaire. Descriptive statistics were used to collect background information about the sample, correlation was calculated to indicate the degree of relationship between the variables, and multiple linear regressions were used to identify variables that are predictors of self-efficacy of persistence. Independent samples t-test and analyses of variance were computed to determine whether differences in perceptions of personal and institutional factors that relate to self-efficacy of persistence to the senior year in college could be identified between gender and ethnicity. Frequency was summarized to identify themes of participants’ primary motivation for finishing undergraduate degree programs. These themes were: (a) self-pride/personal goal, (b) professional aspiration/career (c) motivation to support family, (d) desire to have financial independence/better job, (e) to serve community, (f) opportunity to go to college, (g) being first-generation college student, and (h) prove to family the value of higher education. The research findings support the tenets of academic and social integration theories which suggest that students’ interaction with peer and faculty, relationships with family and friends, and involvement in institutional activities and organizations influence their persistence in college. Implications based on the findings affect institutional policy, curriculum, and program improvements that relate to Black undergraduate students’ academic and social support.

Magister Curationis - MCur / The re-engineering of the healthcare landscape requires Higher Educational Institutions (HEI) to employ teaching and learning approaches that would produce graduates, who could respond to the transformative initiatives within the healthcare system. Graduates are required to become involved in a service-learning project, as part of their learning experience, within the Masters of Nursing in Advanced Psychiatric Nursing programme. Their learning and teaching activity is intended to prepare them to become competent advanced psychiatric nurse specialists, who are able to address social transformation.

Philosophiae Doctor - PhD / Incivility is rudeness, disrespect, disregard for others or their opinions, and a barrier to social interaction that could be associated with stress. The lack of regard for others creates a disrespectful, conflicting, and stressful environment, which could be perceived as an attack on the individual‟s dignity, or sense of self-worth. According to reports, such behaviour could be increasing and affecting the welfare of educators, students, and the overall educational process. Nursing education has not been exempted from this behaviour. Therefore, incivility is a nursing problem, which affects all those involved, from the academics, students, clinicians, patients and families.

Women produce 80% of the food in sub-Sahara but solely own a meager 1% of the land they cultivate. Since the mid-90 century, this issue has been illuminated in the international community and launched a trend of land tenure reform, particularly in sub-Sahara, where numerous countries have substantial rural populations. The trend is situated in the importance of inclusive land rights for the rural population because of the mitigating effect it has on conflict and on the promotion of gender equality. The purpose of this study is through semi-structured interviews and focus groups, contribute to identifying and explaining the current main obstacles that persist for rural women of Liberia to benefit from the Liberian Land Rights Law of 2018 after the new law has been passed and the implementation has begun. The study shows that the three main obstacles that persist for women are the patriarchal power relation, the lack of awareness, and the lack of local institutions. Where the law has been implemented, it certainly promotes equality between the genders, but there is still a long and rough road before the Liberian people can cross the finish line of full implementation and gender equality regarding land.

Magister Commercii (Industrial Psychology) - MCom(IPS) / Robbins and Judge (2013, p. 13) define an organisation as a “consciously coordinated social unit, composed of two or more people, that functions on a relatively continuous basis to achieve a common goal or set of goals.” Since an organisation’s effectiveness is the result of the level of individual and collective employee performance (i.e. teams and organisational units) and their success in attaining these shared goals, organisations have realised the potential of people as a source of competitive advantage (Pfeffer, 1994). The financial services industry has become fiercely competitive and is largely dependent on the collection of individuals working together to create the services that clients demand and are willing to pay for. South Africa has one of the best-developed financial sectors in the world and competition between the four major banks and insurance providers is fierce (Bhorat, Hirsch, Kanbur & Ncube, 2014). Since companies in the financial sector provide more or less the same services, they depend on their workers to transform scarce resources into valued services that clients demand.

Syftet med studien är att undersöka om placerade ungdomar får den information de har rätt till och om de upplever att de får sin röst hörd. Forskningen om barn och unga som är placerade i samhällsvård visar att ungdomarna upplever att de inte blir lyssnade på och att de inte känner sig delaktiga i de processer som rör dem. För att kunna besvara studiens syfte har semistrukturerade intervjuer gjorts. Nio intervjuer har genomförts med ungdomar mellan 18-21 år som alla varit placerade på HVB-hem eller på institution. Resultaten visar att ungdomarna inte får den information de har rätt till vid en placering och att de inte upplever att deras handläggare är lätta att få tag på.

The context of working and living in a care institution is accepted as challenging for all concerned, yet there is a dearth of studies into the stress experiences of caregivers. This study investigated caregivers’ stress and coping in an institution where care was provided to children affected by HIV and AIDS. The study was informed by a qualitative and case study design within an interpretivist paradigm. In addition, it was guided by a theoretical framework derived from Folkman and Lazarus’ (1984) transactional model of stress and coping. A focus group discussion and individual interviews were utilised to gather data, and to clarify and probe responses on caregivers’ experiences of stress. Thematic analysis of the data yielded the most significant themes and subthemes from caregivers’ subjective experiences and perceptions of the stress that they experienced in their daily work situation. The results of the study indicate that caregivers’ stress experiences need to be addressed if caregiving is to be provided effectively. This will require not only training and management support for caregivers in institutional context (e.g., to deal with challenges such as appropriate discipline for the children under care), but also personal support and counselling for caregivers in order to enable them to assess the signs of burnout and cope with stress effectively. / Dissertation (MEd)--University of Pretoria, 2013. / gm2014 / Educational Psychology / unrestricted

Public research institutions (PRIs) are tasked with generating new knowledge, as well as adding value to existing knowledge in order to come up with innovations that can contribute to national competitiveness. To this end, government provides discretionary or parliamentary grants to allow the public research institutions to execute their mandates by carrying out exploratory activities and exploitative activities in research and development.The study aimed to establish the role of the parliamentary grant in supporting the research and development endeavours of a public research institute, with a particular focus on the management of exploration and exploitation tensions in investing the parliamentary grant. The sustainability of the PRI was sus assessed using operating profits as a proxy. The relationships between levels of investment in exploratory and exploitative actives were assessed, as was the role of the innovation system in influencing the sustainability of the PRI. We use the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) the largest scientific research entity in South Africa, and its operational units as a case study.Consistent with information that is available in the literature, the data from this study shows that the discretionary grant plays a critical role as a funding stream for public research institutes, contributing to the effective execution of research and development activities of the entity. The discretionary grant is key in seeding new national competencies, and is a key initial investment in enabling the PRI to establish itself, generate outputs and outcomes that herald its competencies and thus position itself to earn other forms of income.The discretionary grant is invested for exploratory and exploitive activities. Exploratory activities generate new knowledge, which is necessary for competitiveness. Exploitative activities utilise existing knowledge to provide innovations that find utility in industries and the public sector. The manner in which the investment is split between exploration and exploitation was shown to be critical to the long term sustainability of the enterprise. Skewing investment in either exploration or exploitation alone is detrimental to sustainability.The optimal split of the discretionary grant between exploration and exploitation was found to be dependent on several factors, to include, the technology bases of the industries in which the entity operates and the connectivity and paths of knowledge flow in the innovation systems nationally and globally.Inability to earn other forms of income is in itself a threat to the long term sustainability, particularly in fiscally constrained environments that are typical of emerging economies. The ability to earn external income provides options for investment of the PG in building its capability base. Notable here is the fact that the absorptive capacity of the industry sector in the first place, the innovation system in which the entity operates and the connectedness of the entity within the system appear to have important influences on ability to earn other forms of income. In such cases, strategic decisions have to be made on whether the sector remains strategic enough for the country in deciding on continued investment.While the information derived from this study is very specific to the CSIR, a combination of the data and information in the literature provides insights that are applicable to other public research institutes, particularly in developing economies. / Dissertation (MBA)--University of Pretoria, 2012. / Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS) / unrestricted

Since the inception of the first modern Canadian carceral structure in 1835, the prison library has existed. The condition of the prison libraries in Canadian federal institutions, as well as the diversity and quantity of their content has changed dramatically over the course of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The modern-day federal prison library mirrors, in many ways, its “outside” Canadian public library counterpart. This thesis does not attempt to dispute or affirm the likeness between the Canadian prison and public library. Instead, in this thesis, I examine the evolution of the library from a space that reinforced hegemonic carceral control to a space where inmates could seek refuge and sanctuary. The first half of the thesis charts the emergence of the library as a, what I have termed, space mercy. This conceptualization of the library is inspired by Douglas Hay’s concept of mercy, in criminal law, as an ideological tool to reinforce hegemony. In the second half of the thesis I present a case study of the William Head Institution on Vancouver Island. Through the consulting of inmate publications, interviews, questionnaires, and other primary source material I posit that the prison library has evolved into a site of sanctuary. This term is taken from Laura Madokoro’s public history project Sites of Sanctuary. The site of sanctuary differs from the space of mercy in a number of ways and marked a distinct shift in the function and use of the prison library, by inmates, in Canada’s federal carceral institutions. / Graduate / 2021-07-20

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