A Case on University and Community Collaboration

Author(s):  
S. Ann Becker ◽  
Robert Keimer ◽  
Tim Muth

Small businesses are viewed as the backbone of America and integral in the recovery of any economic downturn. Creative approaches to university and community collaboration are being explored to achieve high rates of success in launching, sustaining, and growing small businesses. One such approach, the Entrepreneurial Training Services (ETS) program, is being studied by Sci-Tech University as a means of technology innovation and regional economic development. The ETS Program has several unique features including: the entrenchment of a large number of adults in the program, an intensive training approach that is implemented in a short time frame, personalized mentoring offered to each entrepreneur in the program, and the leveraging of resources with a large, diverse group of community partners. The case profiles the region using Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats (SWOT) Analysis, identifies an ETS framework on which the program is based and explains the process of implementation. The case concludes with challenges facing the university and local community in offering the ETS Program to a large and diverse group of entrepreneurs. It also summarizes benefits and successes from initial implementation efforts.

2012 ◽  
pp. 947-969
Author(s):  
S. Ann Becker ◽  
Robert Keimer ◽  
Tim Muth

Small businesses are viewed as the backbone of America and integral in the recovery of any economic downturn. Creative approaches to university and community collaboration are being explored to achieve high rates of success in launching, sustaining, and growing small businesses. One such approach, the Entrepreneurial Training Services (ETS) program, is being studied by Sci-Tech University as a means of technology innovation and regional economic development. The ETS Program has several unique features including: the entrenchment of a large number of adults in the program, an intensive training approach that is implemented in a short time frame, personalized mentoring offered to each entrepreneur in the program, and the leveraging of resources with a large, diverse group of community partners. The case profiles the region using Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats (SWOT) Analysis, identifies an ETS framework on which the program is based and explains the process of implementation. The case concludes with challenges facing the university and local community in offering the ETS Program to a large and diverse group of entrepreneurs. It also summarizes benefits and successes from initial implementation efforts.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ian Levenfus ◽  
Enrico Ullmann ◽  
Edouard Battegay ◽  
Macé M. Schuurmans

Clinical prediction scores support the assessment of patients in the emergency setting to determine the need for further diagnostic and therapeutic steps. During the current COVID-19 pandemic, physicians in emergency rooms (ER) of many hospitals have a considerably higher patient load and need to decide within a short time frame whom to hospitalize. Based on our clinical experiences in dealing with COVID-19 patients at the University Hospital Zurich, we created a triage score with the acronym AIFELL consisting of clinical, radiological and laboratory findings. The score was then evaluated in a retrospective analysis of 122 consecutive patients with suspected COVID-19 from March until mid-April 2020. Descriptive statistics, Student's t-test, ANOVA and Scheffe's post hoc analysis confirmed the diagnostic power of the score. The results suggest that the AIFELL score has potential as a triage tool in the ER setting intended to select probable COVID-19 cases for hospitalization in spontaneously presenting or referred patients with acute respiratory symptoms.


Author(s):  
Megan Adams ◽  
Tim Brooks ◽  
Angela Fitzgerald ◽  
Sindu George ◽  
Rebecca Cooper

Abstract In Australia, schools and faculties of education are mandated to abide by a policy requiring preservice teachers (pst s), to complete supervised professional placement (pe) in schools. The pe are drawn upon to meet the assessment criteria for degree completion. Two strategies are reported that supported individuals and education institutions to meet policy requirements while in lockdown. First, technology was used to overcome the challenge of providing pe for hundreds of pst s by supporting online learning experiences. In the second, visual technologies were used to support pst s to meet the needs of an assessment criterion. Findings indicate that innovative solutions to challenges with pe and related assessments at the university can be mobilized in a short time frame using visual technologies. Further findings indicate that, in unprecedented times, policies developed for use in different contexts can be met with innovative collaborative efforts with a focused goal that transcend seemingly insurmountable challenges.


2020 ◽  
Vol 59 (2) ◽  
pp. 135
Author(s):  
Larry Cooperman

Information literacy is one of the most important aspects of librarianship. If students do not understand how to find and successfully use library resources, of what use and purpose is a library? In the past (and mostly to this day), live instructional classes were the norm for introducing students to library resources, but for convenience and reach of a wider audience, more and more information literacy sessions are being held online. However, these sessions only last an hour or two. With such a short time frame, how can instructional librarians make an impact on their audience? Editors Sarah Steiner and Miriam Rigby, an instruction librarian at Western Carolina University and a social sciences librarian at the University of Oregon respectively, have created a one-volume library instruction book with enough information on this topic to cover multiple volumes. Throughout its nineteen chapters, Motivating Students on a Time Budget explores diverse tools to foster motivation and learning for library instruction students, for both in-person and online library instruction.


Multilingua ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 39 (5) ◽  
pp. 587-595 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yongyan Zheng

AbstractThis paper examines the multilingual translation efforts of a group of university student volunteers during the COVID-19 outbreak in Shanghai. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews of the volunteer team leader, team members, and a local community health worker. Findings identified time constraints, limited language proficiency, and limited technical knowledge as the major challenges confronting the university volunteers. In order to overcome the challenges, they worked in close collaboration and used translingual and network strategies to facilitate prompt and high-quality crisis translation. Findings suggest that foreign language university students in local universities may serve as readily available multilingual resources and can be mobilized in prompt response to the grassroots multilingual needs of the local community in times of crisis. The paper ends with implications for measures and strategies to enhance effective emergency language service and crisis communication for global multilingual cities.


Materials ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (14) ◽  
pp. 3872
Author(s):  
Klytaimnistra Katsara ◽  
George Kenanakis ◽  
Zacharias Viskadourakis ◽  
Vassilis M. Papadakis

For multiple years, food packaging migration has been a major concern in food and health sciences. Plastics, such as polyethylene, are continuously utilized in food packaging for preservation and easy handling purposes during transportation and storage. In this work, three types of cheese, Edam, Kefalotyri and Parmesan, of different hardness were studied under two complementary vibrational spectroscopy methods, ATR-FTIR and Raman spectroscopy, to determine the migration of low-density polyethylene from plastic packaging to the surface of cheese samples. The experimental duration of this study was set to 28 days due to the degradation time of the selected cheese samples, which is clearly visible after 1 month in refrigerated conditions at 4 °C. Raman and ATR-FTIR measurements were performed at a 4–3–4–3 day pattern to obtain comparative results. Initially, consistency/repeatability measurement tests were performed on Day0 for each sample of all cheese specimens to understand if there is any overlap between the characteristic Raman and ATR-FTIR peaks of the cheese with the ones from the low-density polyethylene package. We provide evidence that on Day14, peaks of low-density polyethylene appeared due to polymeric migration in all three cheese types we tested. In all cheese samples, microbial outgrowth started to develop after Day21, as observed visually and under the bright-field microscope, causing peak reverse. Food packaging migration was validated using two different approaches of vibrational spectroscopy (Raman and FT-IR), revealing that cheese needs to be consumed within a short time frame in refrigerated conditions at 4 °C.


Agronomy ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (11) ◽  
pp. 673 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Clifton-Brown ◽  
Kai-Uwe Schwarz ◽  
Danny Awty-Carroll ◽  
Antonella Iurato ◽  
Heike Meyer ◽  
...  

Miscanthus, a C4 perennial grass native to Eastern Asia, is being bred to provide biomass for bioenergy and biorenewable products. Commercial expansion with the clonal hybrid M. × giganteus is limited by low multiplication rates, high establishment costs and drought sensitivity. These limitations can be overcome by breeding more resilient Miscanthus hybrids propagated by seed. Naturally occurring fast growing indigenous Miscanthus species are found in diverse environments across Eastern Asia. The natural diversity provides for plant breeders, the genetic resources to improve yield, quality, and resilience for a wide range of climates and adverse abiotic stresses. The challenge for Miscanthus breeding is to harness the diversity through selections of outstanding wild types, parents, and progenies over a short time frame to deploy hybrids that make a significant contribution to a world less dependent on fossil resources. Here are described the strategies taken by the Miscanthus breeding programme at Aberystwyth, UK and its partners. The programme built up one of the largest Miscanthus germplasm collections outside Asia. We describe the initial strategies to exploit the available genetic diversity to develop varieties. We illustrate the success of combining diverse Miscanthus germplasm and the selection criteria applied across different environments to identify promising hybrids and to develop these into commercial varieties. We discuss the potential for molecular selections to streamline the breeding process.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aristides Moustakas

Abstract Disease spread is a complex phenomenon requiring an interdisciplinary approach. Covid-19 exhibited a global spatial spread in a very short time frame resulting in a global pandemic. Data of new Covid-19 cases per million were analysed worldwide at the spatial scale of a country and time replicated from the end of December 2019 to late May 2020. Data driven analysis of epidemiological, economic, public health, and governmental intervention variables was performed in order to select the optimal variables in explaining new Covid-19 cases across all countries in time. Sequentially, hierarchical variance partitioning of the optimal variables was performed in order to quantify the independent contribution of each variable in the total variance of new Covid-19 cases per million. Results indicated that from the variables available new tests per thousand explained the vast majority of the total variance in new cases (51.6%) followed by the governmental stringency index (15.2%). Availability of hospital beds per 100k inhabitants explained 9% extreme poverty explained 8.8%, hand washing facilities 5.3%, the fraction of the population aged 65 or older explained 3.9%, and other disease prevalence (cardiovascular diseases plus diabetes) explained 2.9%. The percentage of smokers within the population explained 2.6% of the total variance, while population density explained 0.6%.


2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 243-262
Author(s):  
Haley J. Nutt

This article provides a descriptive study of the FSU Rock Ensemble to demonstrate the value of providing inclusive popular music-based ensemble learning and opportunities in higher education. Beginning with an autoethnographic study of my experiences as a drummer in – and eventually director of – the non-auditioned ensemble, followed by a consideration of the attitudes articulated by several other drummers who recently participated in the ensemble, I analyse how musicians learn a traditionally non-academic music in an academic space. I conclude with a critical assessment of challenges that the group faced, with the hope that such considerations are useful for universities interested in establishing similar ensembles. Overall, the inclusive nature of the Rock Ensemble facilitated interactions that I argue are advantageous within the current climate of North American higher education, allowing students, drummers and non-drummers alike, unprecedented opportunities to perform music they love, forge new relationships and engage with the local community.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Lwando Mdleleni

Purpose This paper aims to explore the role of university in promoting, generating and sustaining social innovation (SI). It aimed to understand how higher education institutions have extended their contribution beyond the traditional function of teaching and research to perform in socio-economic problem-solving. It looks at the kinds of contributions which universities potentially make to SI processes, and the effects that this has on the direction and magnitude of SI, and by implication social development. This was done by drawing lessons from a SI project that the University of the Western Cape has been involved in, i.e. Zenzeleni Networks Project. Design/methodology/approach To address the research question with this framework, the author adopted an exploratory research design using a case study. This research is qualitative, exploratory and descriptive, based on a case study built with secondary data. Findings This paper submits that universities can potentially function as key role players in promoting SI initiatives and fostering social transformations. Universities contribute with different kinds of resources and inputs to foster new SI ideas. Originality/value The paper suggests that socially innovative university projects may contribute to community social sustainability maintaining social cohesion by increasing social capital and providing resources for the empowerment of the marginalised communities. In so doing, they contribute to overcome social exclusion and promote more sustainable forms of development at community level. More research is needed on how universities can build community networks with local community partners, who can use the insights of academic research to replicate interventions and move to scale.


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