The storing of food is a common behaviour in the American kestrel ( Falco sparverius), a small, cavity-nesting falcon whose prey is comprised mainly of insects and small mammals. It may be a mechanism by which breeding birds ensure a sufficient food supply crucial to reproductive success. / In 1996, caching behaviour of 10 single females, 10 single males and 20 paired captive American kestrels was recorded over the breeding season at the Avian Science and Conservation Centre of McGill University. / Cache site preference and seasonal influence on caching frequencies were studied in 8 hand-raised, male kestrels in summer, fall and winter from 1996--1997. Caching frequency during the three seasons was significantly different with most occurring in fall, fewer in winter, and still fewer in summer. / Memory for locations of cached prey was tested in 7 hand-raised males, three days after a caching event, from July to September 1997. The birds located their own caches significantly better than those caches placed by the experimenter. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)

Filter-feeding black fly larvae in lake outlet streams convert suspended bacteria and algae into benthic biomass, available to fish. Positive correlations between larval abundance and both bacterioplankton and phytoplankton were significant at the p < 0.10 level among 5 outlet streams of varying trophic status in the Eastern Townships of Quebec, and either food type alone explained &sim;28% of the variance in larval abundance among streams (Chapter 1), suggesting bacterioplankton and phytoplankton to play similar roles in larval distribution. However, when larvae were removed from 3 of 6 oligotrophic outlet streams examined in the Mauricie region of Quebec, calculated ingestion rates revealed larvae to ingest roughly 20 times more phytoplankton carbon than bacterial carbon (Chapter 2). Phytoplankton ingestion rates were high enough to satisfy daily carbon requirements, but bacterivory was low (Chapter 2), indicating that bacterial biomass contributes little to black fly diets in most systems, and will be less useful than phytoplankton biomass when using food to predict larval distribution. The majority of bacteria in streams form a carbon link to fish through sediment food webs, rather than through black fly larvae.

Educational institutions in Quebec face a wide variety of challenges as major restructuring efforts take place. Schools must develop strategies to manage these increasing demands in an effective manner. / The purpose of the study was to contribute to the understanding of school administrative teams and to shed some light on the nature and function of these teams through a study of their administrative team meetings. / As a qualitative descriptive study, this research involved 24 secondary school administrators. Data collection techniques included postal surveys to gather initial descriptive data, followed by telephone interviews that allowed for more in-depth discussion of issues faced by the principals and their administrative team. / The findings provide strong evidence of the complexity of the nature of secondary school principals, work and the importance of working collaboratively with their administrative colleagues. / The study has implications for the preparation of aspiring educational administrators, as well as those who currently hold these roles in today's schools.

This descriptive case study was an investigation of the transition to university, with a focus on academic experiences in the first semester of the 1992--93 academic year at a Canadian research university. To guide the study, a conceptual framework of the transition to university was created by combining elements of relevant theoretical models in the counseling and higher education literature. A purposive sample of eight first year students was selected, equally distributed in terms of gender, entry status (high school vs. college), and actual or contemplated program of study (English vs. Physics). Data were collected by means of semi-structured interviews conducted at four points in the academic year. These were supplemented by class schedules, university documents, and classroom visits. Analysis of the interview data was conducted using the NUD&middot;IST software package. / The results of the study suggest that students are strangers, in a strange land during their first semester at university. As they encounter successive sets of academic challenges throughout the semester, they are "learning the ropes" of functioning in this unfamiliar territory. In so doing, students are acquiring the experiential knowledge base that will allow them to survive in university. The results support the study's conceptualization of the transition to university, but also suggest that figure research in this area requires a more fine-grained and comprehensive model of the academic environment as experienced by students. Towards this end, the basic elements of an ecological perspective on the academic world of university students are presented. Areas of needed research related to the academic transition experiences of first year students are identified, and recommendations are made for improving orientation and academic advising, as well as course design and instructional practices.

This study places the evolution of journalistic ethics in Quebec between 1960 and 1990 in its socio-political context. The thesis starts with a discussion of the philosophical and legal foundations that are the basis of journalistic activity. It then features a social history of Quebec journalism which allows an analysis of the various interacting factors that have influenced the ethical and deontological issues raised during that period. These factors develop along four main axes: socio-political and historical events, press organizations, the journalistic community, and professional practices. / From this analysis, the author is able to draw a theory of displacements that is submitted as an interpretative model to explain the evolution of journalistic ethics in Quebec between 1960 and 1990. This theory shows that the main characteristics of this evolution lie in a series of progressive changes (1) in the levels of responsibility towards ethics, which engenders a general abandonment of such responsibilities; (2) in the definition of fundamental principles on which the press operates, namely freedom of the press, public right to information, and Social Responsibility, which is doubled by a relative failure of the self-regulation model of press ethics management; and (3) in many areas related to journalists' role and status, namely autonomy, adversary positions, social involvement, conflicts of interests and the definition of news itself.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.