Qualified Public Support for Bilingual Education: Some Policy Implications

1990 ◽  
Vol 508 (1) ◽  
pp. 119-134 ◽  
Author(s):  
LEONIE HUDDY ◽  
DAVID O. SEARS
Keyword(s):  
Bilingual Education ◽  
Minority Groups ◽  
Public Support ◽  
Language Instruction ◽  
Policy Implications ◽  
Foreign Language Instruction ◽  
Minor Role ◽  
Political Debate ◽  
Language Minority Students ◽  
A Minor

Bilingual education has become politicized. It is surrounded by controversy, the outcome of which may play a greater role in deciding its future as an educational program than its educational successes. To better understand this political debate and its possible outcome, the present article examines attitudes toward bilingual education among the Anglo majority, in terms of general support levels, the origins of support, and its future trajectory. We find that currently the majority feels moderately positive toward bilingual education. Opposition is greatest among those who have generally negative attitudes toward minority groups and immigrants and who oppose special favors for them and among those who oppose increased government spending and spending on foreign-language instruction. Anglos' actual personal experience with bilingual education plays only a minor role. Opposition is greater among the well informed, suggesting that opposition may increase further as the issue attains greater national visibility. Opposition is also likely to increase if bilingual education is presented as promoting linguistic and cultural maintenance among language-minority students rather than as a mechanism for teaching English.

E-Government in the UK

2011 ◽  
pp. 548-553 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. Hudson
Keyword(s):  
Information Society ◽  
Prime Minister ◽  
Policy Implications ◽  
Green Paper ◽  
Minor Role ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Parliamentary Committee ◽  
The Government ◽  
The Uk ◽  
A Minor

Like many of its western counterparts, the United Kingdom (UK) government has a long history of using IT in the administration and delivery of public services. Indeed, as early as 1959 mainframe computers were introduced in order to automate some routine aspects of public administration (Margetts & Willcocks, 1992, p. 329). However, it was not until the late 1970s and early 1980s—as the UK rose to the forefront of the emerging microcomputer industry—that IT featured in policy discourse in anything other than an extremely minor fashion. Even then—despite the appointment of Kenneth Baker as the government’s first Information Technology Minister in 1981—the issue did not feature prominently and there was nothing approaching the equivalence of the neighbouring French government’s review of the long-term social and economic policy implications of L’Informatisation d’Societe commissioned in 1976 by President Valéry Giscard d’Estaing (Nora & Minc, 1980). In fact, one former government minister claimed in his diaries that Baker’s appointment to the government had more to do with finding a minor role for a politician piqued at his omission from the Cabinet than with Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s belief in the importance of IT related issues (Lawson, 1992). However, the agenda began to gather some pace following Thatcher’s departure in 1990. Under the helm of Prime Minister John Major, the Conservatives introduced a number of important policies—including a series of industrially focused information society initiatives aimed at boosting the use of ICTs by business. In addition, prompted perhaps by the popular emergence of the Internet, other branches of government began to show a greatly increased interest in the issue. For instance, a Parliamentary committee—the House of Lords Science and Technology Committee (1996)—produced a major report on the implications of the information society for government. In addition, the publication of a major study on the same issue by the European Union (1994) added weight to the emerging agenda. Shortly before losing power in 1997, the Major government produced what was arguably the UK government’s first systematic consideration of the implications of ICTs for government when it published an exploratory Green Paper titled Government.Direct (CITU, 1996). Though it came too late in the life of the government to advance its ideas any further than the discussion stage, it at least served to heighten the prominence of the agenda (Hudson, 2002).

E-Government in the UK

2011 ◽  
pp. 172-178
Author(s):  
John Hudson
Keyword(s):  
Information Society ◽  
Prime Minister ◽  
Policy Implications ◽  
Green Paper ◽  
Minor Role ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Parliamentary Committee ◽  
The Government ◽  
The Uk ◽  
A Minor

Like many of its western counterparts, the United Kingdom (UK) government has a long history of using IT in the administration and delivery of public services. Indeed, as early as 1959 mainframe computers were introduced in order to automate some routine aspects of public administration (Margetts & Willcocks, 1992, p. 329). However, it was not until the late 1970s and early 1980s—as the UK rose to the forefront of the emerging microcomputer industry—that IT featured in policy discourse in anything other than an extremely minor fashion. Even then—despite the appointment of Kenneth Baker as the government’s first Information Technology Minister in 1981—the issue did not feature prominently and there was nothing approaching the equivalence of the neighbouring French government’s review of the long-term social and economic policy implications of L’Informatisation d’Societe commissioned in 1976 by President Valéry Giscard d’Estaing (Nora & Minc, 1980). In fact, one former government minister claimed in his diaries that Baker’s appointment to the government had more to do with finding a minor role for a politician piqued at his omission from the Cabinet than with Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s belief in the importance of IT related issues (Lawson, 1992). However, the agenda began to gather some pace following Thatcher’s departure in 1990. Under the helm of Prime Minister John Major, the Conservatives introduced a number of important policies—including a series of industrially focused information society initiatives aimed at boosting the use of ICTs by business. In addition, prompted perhaps by the popular emergence of the Internet, other branches of government began to show a greatly increased interest in the issue. For instance, a Parliamentary committee—the House of Lords Science and Technology Committee (1996)—produced a major report on the implications of the information society for government. In addition, the publication of a major study on the same issue by the European Union (1994) added weight to the emerging agenda. Shortly before losing power in 1997, the Major government produced what was arguably the UK government’s first systematic consideration of the implications of ICTs for government when it published an exploratory Green Paper titled Government.Direct (CITU, 1996). Though it came too late in the life of the government to advance its ideas any further than the discussion stage, it at least served to heighten the prominence of the agenda (Hudson, 2002).

scholarly journals To Europe or Not to Europe? Migration and Public Support for Joining the European Union in the Western Balkans

2019 ◽  
Vol 54 (2) ◽  
pp. 559-584 ◽  
Author(s):  
Artjoms Ivlevs ◽  
Roswitha M. King
Keyword(s):  
European Union ◽  
Public Support ◽  
Institutional Development ◽  
Minor Role ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Western Balkans ◽  
Individual Support ◽  
Using Data ◽  
A Minor ◽  
The Eu

For decades, countries aspiring to join the European Union (EU) have been linked to it through migration. Yet little is known about how migration affects individual support for joining the EU in prospective member states. We explore the relationship between migration and support for EU accession in the Western Balkans. Using data from the Gallup Balkan Monitor survey, we find that prospective and return migrants, as well as people with relatives abroad, are more likely to vote favorably in a hypothetical EU referendum. At the same time, only people with relatives abroad are more likely to consider EU membership a good thing. Our results suggest that migration affects attitudes toward joining the EU principally through instrumental/utilitarian motives, with channels related to information and cosmopolitanism playing only a minor role. Overall, we show that migration fosters support for joining the EU in migrants’ origin countries and that joining such a supranational institution is likely to foster political and institutional development of migrants’ origin countries.

Tweetalige Ontwikkeling en Tweetalig Onderwijs

2011 ◽  
Vol 86 ◽  
pp. 61-70
Author(s):  
Rick de Graaff ◽  
Sharon Unsworth ◽  
Sophie ter Schure
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Language ◽  
Bilingual Education ◽  
Teaching Practice ◽  
Research Policy ◽  
Language Instruction ◽  
Foreign Language Instruction ◽  
Afternoon Session ◽  
Research Questions ◽  
Future Policy ◽  
New Research

The topic of bilingualism in education continues to generate much debate. Issues under discussion include for example how best to support the Dutch language development of multilingual children and how to successfully implement bilingual secondary education and early foreign language instruction. This paper reports upon the symposium Bilingual Acquisition and Bilingual Education which brought together key players in this debate from the fields of research, policy and teaching practice to exchange ideas and insights with a view to formulating recommendations for future policy on multilingualism as well as generating new research questions. In the morning session, the discussion concerned recent results from research on multilingual acquisition and education in a variety of contexts, and in the afternoon session, the focus lay on issues concerning policy and teaching practice. This report consists of a summary of the main issues discussed there and ends with a list of points for future attention.

scholarly journals The home bias and the local bias: A survey

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eduard Gaar ◽  
David Scherer ◽  
Dirk Schiereck
Keyword(s):  
Home Bias ◽  
Minor Role ◽  
Retirement Savings ◽  
Journal Articles ◽  
Political Debate ◽  
Private Households ◽  
Long Run ◽  
Investor Behaviour ◽  
A Minor ◽  
Rational Behaviour

Abstract The home bias like the disposition effect is a well-researched economic phenomenon in investor behaviour which has been examined in finance journal articles for decades. While there is little doubt about the existence of the bias, its magnitude varies across countries and investor groups. The home bias has to be regarded as a multifactorial phenomenon, a combination of numerous causes which all synergistically contribute. In contrast to other biases the home bias can at least partially be explained by reasons beyond irrational investor behaviour. While institutional restrictions play a minor role, informational asymmetries and superior information of domestic investors are important factors. Thus, the performance of investments may well benefit from a home bias, and the bias then no longer would be a puzzle but rather rational behaviour as a lower diversification level may lead to higher returns. The contemporary understanding of the home bias gains in relevance as the ongoing political debate in Germany has to clarify an institutional framework for long-run retirement savings plans of private households based on equity investments.

The Effect of Path Length and Display Size on Memory for Spatial Information

2012 ◽  
Vol 59 (3) ◽  
pp. 147-152 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katherine Guérard ◽  
Sébastien Tremblay
Keyword(s):  
Path Length ◽  
Potential Role ◽  
Spatial Information ◽  
Recall Performance ◽  
Minor Role ◽  
Length Effect ◽  
Serial Memory ◽  
Fixed Reference ◽  
A Minor

In serial memory for spatial information, some studies showed that recall performance suffers when the distance between successive locations increases relatively to the size of the display in which they are presented (the path length effect; e.g., Parmentier et al., 2005) but not when distance is increased by enlarging the size of the display (e.g., Smyth & Scholey, 1994). In the present study, we examined the effect of varying the absolute and relative distance between to-be-remembered items on memory for spatial information. We manipulated path length using small (15″) and large (64″) screens within the same design. In two experiments, we showed that distance was disruptive mainly when it is varied relatively to a fixed reference frame, though increasing the size of the display also had a small deleterious effect on recall. The insertion of a retention interval did not influence these effects, suggesting that rehearsal plays a minor role in mediating the effects of distance on serial spatial memory. We discuss the potential role of perceptual organization in light of the pattern of results.

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