Southwest University, a pseudonym for a Tier One 4-year public institution in the Southwest United States, introduced major curricular reforms in 2005. The most prominent of these reforms was a course required of all first-year students with the goal of transforming them from high-school students to college students. Research for this dissertation asked a group of first-year students about their experience in all of their courses but focused on the perceptions of this new first-year course. Currently, universities are devoting a great deal of resources and energy to curricular reform, but students are not often asked how they experience those curricular changes. First-year students discussed the role this course played in their first-year college experience. In order to assess student perceptions and reactions to the course, first-year students were interviewed twice. Additional qualitative data in the form of surveys and journals were also analyzed with an inductive analytic approach to provide supportive evidence for the themes that emerged in the interviews. The findings suggest that student perceptions of the course were positive and that the course had helped them achieve their first-year goals. However, the findings also suggest that additional research or a cost-benefit analysis of the program needs to be conducted to determine if the high cost of the program is worth the outcomes it is achieving. / text

published_or_final_version / Comparative Asian Studies / Master / Master of Arts

published_or_final_version / abstract / toc / Politics and Public Administration / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

No description available.

What factors explain pension reform decisions in countries with generous public pension systems and an ageing population? To answer this question I analyze four countries with some similar characteristics: (1) a well expanded and fragmented public pension system that follows the traditional Bismarckian structure of different funds for specific occupational categories; (2) a public pension system with high degrees of coverage and based on the pay-as-you-go (PAYG) principle in which current workers pay for current retirees; (3) increasing public pension spending levels that towards the 1990s made the public pension system unsustainable. The four selected countries differ along one significant dimension. Two of them are newly industrialized countries and in Latin America: Argentina and Uruguay. The other two countries are industrialized economies of the European Union: Italy and Spain.I hypothesize that while international and domestic factors matter in explaining pension reform, the former will play an indirect role by stressing the need to make the pension system more sustainable to put public finances in order. Thus, I contend that domestic economic and political factors will determine the reform outcome.I find support for my theory in the analysis of the four countries. International and supranational organizations played a role in supporting policymakers' reform efforts and highlighting the necessity to reduce pension liabilities in the long run to put public finances in order. However, these organizations did not determine the reform outcome. Instead, I find that domestic economic and political factors explain the final reform decision. On the economic side, the maturity of the pension system - represented by the magnitude of pension promises to future retirees - and the state of public finances, determined policymakers' first choice for reform; which ranged from proposals to change the parameters of the public pillar to that pillar's structural reform together with the introduction of a private pillar of individual accounts. Once this choice was made, the reform was negotiated with those with a special interest in the pension system: pensioners and labor. Thus, these actors' organizational strength and preferences explains the type of specific pension reform finally adopted in each country.

This longitudinal study has examined an Australian primary school's change processes as it has striven to transcend government-mandated environmental education in New South Wales. Woodridge Primary School initiated "Environment Woodridge", a comprehensive reform effort, in March of 2003. Since then the staff have worked to integrate programmatic, concept-based, experiential environmental learning throughout core curriculum.Eight years of change processes have been examined through three visits to the school over the span of three years. Woodridge Primary School is a friendly place where collaborative decision-making has paved the way for many successful initiatives bringing the school much recognition. The school's dedicated teachers, who have proven themselves skilled change agents, together with an enthusiastic and driven principal, have a definite vision for their school. Beyond manifesting a caring atmosphere where technology and the environment are major foci, the Woodridge staff has worked to maintain their identity as a unique and progressive school.Several researchers feel that the application of ecological understandings to school change processes will bring more fruitful reform efforts (Cooper, 1993, Fullan, 1997, Sarason, 1971, Selby, 2000). This research offers a new ecological framework for examining school culture and change processes. The interaction of energy flow, the cycling of mater, interrelationships, and change allow a natural system to flourish. Thus, these concepts were applied to the study of this school.Earthkeepers, the first program to be implemented in the Environment Woodridge reform effort, received tremendous support and created quite a buzz among the community when it was initiated in 2003. However, in 2006, energy surrounding the program had dissipated, the principal was the only member of the staff driving the program, and curricular integration and application of Earthkeepers concepts was falling away. The ripple effects caused by a government-mandated reform had thwarted Earthkeepers curricular integration. Further, Woodridge teachers felt that the increasing pressure of mandated reforms had made it difficult for them to maintain their own vision of the school. This research offers an in-depth examination of how a successful school has dealt with the impacts of mandated monoculture.

Patent trolls have changed the innovation and patent policy landscape. This thesis is an empirical event study that focuses on two landmark cases of patent troll litigation, RIM v. NTP and eBay v. Mercexchange, to determine whether pro-troll litigation outcomes significantly impact the market values of the firms in the high-tech industries they target. I find that the Supreme Court ruling in eBay v. Mercexchange did seem to significantly impact a proportion of firms in the market. The decisive factors in distinguishing affected vs. unaffected firms include a firm's R&D to Sales ratio, market value, and NAICS code specification.

This thesis undertakes an in-depth study of the Mount Frere land claim. The study focuses on the impact of unsettled land claims in small rural towns of the former Bantustan on local spatial planning. There is no known evidence of similar studies done in small rural towns, therefore the study will contribute to the construction of body of knowledge. The study takes a case study method to analyse the impact of unsettled land claims. The analysis provides a platform for drawing possible policy recommendations in respect of urban land claims in small rural towns of the former Bantustans. The thesis central argument is that the delay of settling the land claims in the small rural towns of the former Bantustans has a negative impact on the local spatial planning. The poor local spatial planning results in an uncoordinated development which constrains development in general. The study argues that the law as it stands does not clarify the role of local municipalities during the process of land claim. The study will further argue that land restoration may not always be the appropriate relief for the claimants in the case of urban land claims in small towns. In the case of Mount Frere the municipality appears to have taken a confrontational approach towards the claimants as witnessed by the number of court cases opened against the claimants. This resulted on a breakdown of trust between the municipality and the claimants. The role of the land claims commission also appears to have contributed to the problems of delayed settlement of the claim. The municipality wants to oppose restoration but the municipality seems to be unaware of section 34 of the Restitution of Land Rights Act. It is argued that there is little focus on the land claims in the rural small towns of the former Bantustans and as such this is retarding development and investment on infrastructure and local economic development. The delayed settlement has also made land invasion and illegal sale of land to be rampant and benefiting individuals and not all the claimants in the process. / Thesis (M.T.R.P.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2011.

Since housing choice and strategy are the result of both an individual’s financial capability in a particular life stage, as well as overall political-economic circumstances, the study of housing behavior has been used to emphasize processes of urban development and social change. However, housing behavior in the Chinese context has not attracted much research attention. Although many studies have been done on various topics surrounding China’s housing reform, only several quantitative studies have touched upon the topic of individual housing behavior. All of the existing literature is based on statistics before 1998 when work-unit housing distribution was officially repealed. This thesis offers an update of qualitative information on how young white-collar workers approach homeownership after 1998. Ten young homeowners from Beijing, together with some practitioners in the housing market and two governmental officials were interviewed. Based on the information offered by the interviewees, this thesis examines how state policies, market situations, family structure, and special characteristics of Beijing as a capital city impact the housing choices and strategies of young homeowners.

On April 17, 1982, the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms was proclaimed into force. By including a set of constitutionally entrenched core legal rights (i.e. ss. 8, 9, and 10(b), and a remedial mechanism designed to enforce those rights (i.e. s. 24(2)), the Charter had the potential to alter certain repressive elements of the criminal justice system that had endured in Canada for over a century. Despite this potential, both the core legal rights and s. 24(2) were drafted using vague terminology. As a result, the Charter ‘s ability to succeed where previous attempts at instituting effective due process protections for Canadians had failed would depend largely on the judiciary’s ability to satisfactorily craft such protections out of imprecise statutory language. This thesis will argue that the Supreme Court of Canada has created a test for the exclusion of unconstitutionally obtained evidence under s. 24(2) that fails to adequately protect the core legal rights of the socially, racially and economically marginalized individuals to whom the Canadian criminal justice system is disproportionately applied. In advancing this argument, the relevant jurisprudence and academic literature will be analyzed according to a methodology inspired by the Critical Legal Studies movement. The issue of exclusion will be examined in its social context, primarily by analyzing the current system of Canadian criminal justice and acknowledging its over-application to the socially disenfranchised. It will be argued that the Supreme Court’s test for exclusion has developed as it has because of the judiciary’s subconscious tendency to interpret unclear constitutional provisions in keeping with the dominant conservative ideology, a method that favours maintaining the social status quo. The purpose of this thesis is to set out a framework for a reform of the Charter ‘s exclusionary mechanism. This new approach will attempt to situate social context at the forefront of the s. 24(2) decision-making process. It will be argued that the concept of “disrepute” within s. 24(2) must be redefined so that it captures investigatory practices made possible by unjust social, racial and economic divisions that render certain groups powerless, and thus more vulnerable to police surveillance.