In British Columbia, approximately 11,750 adults with severe addictions and/or mental illness are homeless. People who live with mental illness or the ill social or physical effect of substance use represent a sub population of people who experience homelessness. Many factors have contributed to poverty and homelessness among people who are mentally ill and to the neglect of their physical and mental health needs. A key factor has been the policy decision to de-institutionalize mental health services in British Columbia from the hospital to the community setting. Individuals living with mental illness were discharged from the hospital into the community, where housing is expensive and individuals have limited opportunities to earn an adequate income. Moreover, the community setting lacked the infrastructure to support and promote the health of severely mentally ill individuals. In the studied region, Assertive Community Treatment (ACT) teams have been established to work with individuals to break the cycle of homelessness, mental illness, and addiction as well as to support the improvement and maintenance of the mental and physical health of these individuals living in the community. Among the criteria for care by these regional teams is chronic homelessness caused by the barriers of mental health and addiction. In this grounded theory study, I explore how four regional ACT teams support their clients to maintain housing. In addition to examining the successes and challenges experienced by ACT team members, I consider the strengths of the team as they attempt to provide a supportive infrastructure that enables clients to maintain housing. Data were collected from four ACT teams in the region. The data collection involved two focus group discussions, three observational sessions with team members in the field, twelve one-on-one interviews, and a review of documents and reports. Data collection and analysis occurred concurrently, and guided further interviews. Through systematic analysis a theory was constructed form the data. In this study, I explore and analyze the issues that team members encounter and how they resolve them. I also take into account the beneficial outcomes of their complex work to produce a grounded theory explaining how ACT teams assist clients in maintaining housing. The knowledge gained during this study can be used to inform practice guidelines and policy development for the ACT teams. This study also contributes to the evolving body of knowledge that may strengthen provincial initiatives to break the cycle of homelessness. This work also contributes to current discussions on how to provide optimal housing support to individuals with severe mental illness and/or addiction issues. / Graduate / 0569 / 0573 / 0347 / shonalalonde@gmail.com

<p>The purpose of this essay is to find out how gender upholds in a classroom, both by students as well as the teacher. The procedure has been to observe the relationship between students and also the teachers. The observations is analysed according to theories of gender and a discussion about why gender is maintained follows. The conclusion of the result is that gender is being preserved in different ways, but also the contrary – students and the teacher oppose it. The students maintain the conception about boys being takers of spatial and verbal area whereas girls many times get in the background due to the competion in the classroom. Gender is also preserved by students true the norm always being pointed out. The teacher mainly conserves the conception about boys and their verbal and central spatial place in the classroom that their behaviour gives them, in the same time the conception about girls being silence, nice and helpful is maintained. At the same time as gender is being conserved there are examples of the contrary where girls for example oppose the idea of the silence, nice and helpful girl or where the masculine and the feminine picture gets dualistic.</p>

The purpose of this essay is to find out how gender upholds in a classroom, both by students as well as the teacher. The procedure has been to observe the relationship between students and also the teachers. The observations is analysed according to theories of gender and a discussion about why gender is maintained follows. The conclusion of the result is that gender is being preserved in different ways, but also the contrary – students and the teacher oppose it. The students maintain the conception about boys being takers of spatial and verbal area whereas girls many times get in the background due to the competion in the classroom. Gender is also preserved by students true the norm always being pointed out. The teacher mainly conserves the conception about boys and their verbal and central spatial place in the classroom that their behaviour gives them, in the same time the conception about girls being silence, nice and helpful is maintained. At the same time as gender is being conserved there are examples of the contrary where girls for example oppose the idea of the silence, nice and helpful girl or where the masculine and the feminine picture gets dualistic.

Managing supply chain relations has evolved over a decade and many companies have given importance to regulate their relations in supply chain relations to stay competitive in the market. In this context of adjusting relations among supply chain members, central point of discussion is the role of power. Power can be a component that persuades one member of supply chain to do certain things that he/she wouldn’t agree on doing it voluntarily. The implication of that power among supply chain members is called as power relations. These power relations between the supply chain members need to be sustained under circumstances of whether the power is balanced or not balanced between the two actors. The key research questions are formulated as followed, What is the perspective of the supply chain members regarding to the role of power relations among supply chain actors? How do the cost, transparency, reliability and flexibility help to sustain the power relations in supply chain? In order to answer these questions, structured literature review was conducted. The conceptual model to sustain the supply chain relations included four main components that were cost, transparency, reliability and flexibility.  Interviews were conducted in three companies located in Sweden, Turkey and India. The company profiles regarding to power relations in this dyadic relationship were the main concern. The three cases tested were supplier dominancy, mutual dependency and subordinate buyer. In this thesis, we accomplished how supply chain members sustained their relations under the influence of power practices among supply chain members. We concluded our thesis study, showing the inter-connection in between these four elements to enable the sustainability of power relations. Moreover, we inferred that even though power seems to be a negative concept, the companies are able to maintain their power relations through awareness of existing power. In addition to that, the companies don’t give equal importance to each four elements though each element is present to maintain the power relations in their dyadic supply chain relationship.

The relationship between organizations and their customers is a critical issue when establishing a long-term relationship. It is difficult for organizations to really manage and main-tain the relationship with their customers as some organizations fail to build up relationships. The process of learning and adapting to other customers is costly and time intensive. This is an issue that needs to be taken into consideration. Another aspect that needs to be looked at is the way organizations can set up a plan to build a competitive advantage. With this, most organizations do tend to loose their customers due to the inability to use their resources well and also managing them effectively. This paper examines the relationship between the supplier and the customer and the possibilities of managing and maintaining the customer relationship. Qualitative analysis is used in this paper since it is the appropriate method to meet our purpose. There were two companies interviewed from the logistic industry and mechanical industry. Finally, our result in this paper indicates that in order to maintain customers, it is vital for organizations to meet their needs. As a result, satisfaction and loyalty is the ultimate goal for organization to maintain their customers. This is the way of avoiding key and non-key customers from leaving and also strengthening the relationship.

<p>The relationship between organizations and their customers is a critical issue when establishing a long-term relationship. It is difficult for organizations to really manage and main-tain the relationship with their customers as some organizations fail to build up relationships.</p><p>The process of learning and adapting to other customers is costly and time intensive. This is an issue that needs to be taken into consideration. Another aspect that needs to be looked at is the way organizations can set up a plan to build a competitive advantage. With this, most organizations do tend to loose their customers due to the inability to use their resources well and also managing them effectively.</p><p>This paper examines the relationship between the supplier and the customer and the possibilities of managing and maintaining the customer relationship.</p><p>Qualitative analysis is used in this paper since it is the appropriate method to meet our purpose. There were two companies interviewed from the logistic industry and mechanical industry.</p><p>Finally, our result in this paper indicates that in order to maintain customers, it is vital for organizations to meet their needs. As a result, satisfaction and loyalty is the ultimate goal for organization to maintain their customers. This is the way of avoiding key and non-key customers from leaving and also strengthening the relationship.</p>

Sweden has a complete public oral hygiene system while there are still problems existing on young people which are caused by their individual habits. In the research, the main reason was found having connections with lack of daily tooth brushing. With the development design for behavior change, this research was trying to find how design can change when it was related to young people’s oral care behavior at home. As a result, a service design concluding a reward system was put forward to motivate young people to maintain a good tooth brushing habit.

The past decade has witnessed a proliferation of internet use for socialising with dedicated websites such as Facebook, and also for maintaining relationships using computer mediated communication. Individuals can extend the boundary associated with traditional forms of communication, and use technology to meet strangers online to share interests, or maintain existing relationships remotely. One of the most significant functions of computer-mediated communication (CMC) is its contribution to the evolution of social communication. CMC is “communication that takes place between human beings via the instrumentality of computers” (Thurlow, Lengel, & Tomic, 2004). As a consequence of the convenience and flexibility that this channel provides, CMC can be effectively used to orchestrate a variety of communication situations. Furthermore, social networks sites are becoming the choice in which individuals are maintaining relationships or meeting new people. The potential distinctions between these relationships and their offline counterparts remain contradictory. Online relationships may face different challenges, such as anonymity, restricted interaction (Walther, 1992), and the lack of physical presence. For example, sharing activities online such as playing games or visiting Web sites together differs from offline activities, such as going to the movies or dining together. These observations question whether CMC relationships have any parallels with real world relationships. Dunbar (1992) structured real world relationship by strength of ties and formulated the social brain hypothesis (SBH). This work uses the SBH as an interpretive lens in analyzing CMC relationship ties. Thus, a major focus of this work is to investigate implications of the SBH (Dunbar, 1992) within the context of CMC usage. It is recognised that CMC allows for the maintenance of a large number of friendships. Thus potentially, the use of CMC could alter the SBH ratios. Within the main findings consistency with SBH was found. Furthermore, CMC has many parallels with real world communication methods. Face-to-face communications were strongly preferred for maintenance of strong ties. Also phone usage was analysed and identified as an indicator of strong tie relationships, for both local and distant communications. The findings also address questions on displaced communities communication habits and their use of CMC. The phone was found to be most popular media and culture had a strong influence on communication content. The research used a mixed method approach, combining data collection via questionnaires, semi structured interviews and a diary study completed by participants. Based on the findings, a framework is proposed categorising groups on their level of real world socialising and CMC use. There are four essential contributions impacting on current theory. The findings offer new knowledge within the research of CMC and relationship maintenance theory. In our understanding these exploratory questions have not yet been addressed and therefore the findings of this research project are significant in their contributions.

This dissertation addresses several aspects pertaining to polarization in optical fibers and optical waveguide devices. In particular, the analysis and design of fibers that maintain polarization over long lengths, provide zero polarization-mode dispersion, and function as polarizers or mode filters are presented. First, optimum designs for high-birefringence as well as single-polarization single-mode fibers are studied. For high-birefringence fibers, several index profiles were obtained that provided high birefringence while achieving zero or very small dispersion in 1.3 μm and 1.55 μm windows. Also, few index profiles were found that resulted in single-polarization single-mode operation with zero or very small dispersion at about 1.3 μm and 1.55 μm. A wavelength range of 100 nm to 500 nm was achieved for truly single-mode operation. Second, a comprehensive analysis of polarization-mode dispersion in a multiple-clad fiber due to ellipticity of fiber cross-section is carried out. The analysis results are then used to design large effective area single-mode dispersion-shifted fiber that provides zero polarization-mode dispersion at the wavelength 1.55 μm. Effective area on the order of 122 μm² with mode-field diameter of about 10 μm have been attained for this design. Tolerance analysis on the transmission parameters due to ±1% and ±2% variations in the radii of the fiber layers is carried out. Finally, a wedge-shape dielectric waveguides bounded by conducting planes is introduced and analyzed. Conductor and dielectric losses for the fundamental mode in waveguides with wedge angle of π/n; n ≥ 1, and 2π/3 as a special case with noninteger azimuthal number have been evaluated. These waveguides generally support fewer number of modes for smaller wedge angles and the modes cannot be of TM type. They find applications as mode filters and polarizers.. / Ph. D.

Summary/ Resumé Title of the diploma thesis: Issues and Particularities of Maintenance Obligations within the Czech and Italian Legal Systems My diploma thesis deals with maintenance obligations as the title itself says. Maintenance obligations is a very wide topic in family law so I have focused the thesis on the more specialized areas. Before describing the structure of the thesis I would like to try to explain the motive for choosing this topic. I have studied in Italy in the scope of the international programme for students, and have also gained work experience there. I wanted to try to improve not only my knowledge of Italian language itself but also my theoretical knowledge of foreign law. A comparative thesis seemed to fulfil these demands of mine. Maintenance obligations is a current topic of interest. We all are the subjects of this obligation and other duties connected to it for our entire lives even if such obligation is imposed on us against our will. A couple of weeks before the end of the last year there was a media case, the Italian ex prime minister was sentenced to pay an astronomical amount of maintenance to his ex wife. After this widely publicised case it seems expected by the general public that Italian ex wives will receive such financial support. I have divided my thesis into several...