Exploratory Analysis of Entrepreneurship Education in the Jamshoro Public Universities: A Descriptive Study

The purpose of this study is to explore entrepreneurship education courses offered by public universities of the Jamshoro higher education institutions (HEIs). It examines the scope and the existing status of entrepreneurship in the Jamshoro public universities. Data were based on secondary data taken from official websites, prospectus, departmental reports and universities’ policy documents of the public universities of the Jamshoro Higher, included three public universities by examining their curricula and exploring the status of entrepreneurship of the selected sample from these universities. The results of this study indicated the public universities of the Jamshoro higher education city, just one core course on entrepreneurship was offered to some departments. Furthermore entrepreneurship programs were extremely rare. As a result, this research may encourage policymakers and universities to develop an effective and appropriate syllabus to fill the gap in existing curriculum of not only entrepreneurship but other courses as well.

Self-inflicted. Deliberate. Death-intentioned. A critical policy analysis of UK suicide prevention policies 2009-2019

Purpose With encouragement from the World Health Organisation, national suicide prevention policies have come to be regarded as an essential component of the global effort to reduce suicide. However, despite their global significance, the construction, conceptualisation and proposed provisions offered in suicide prevention policies have, to date, been under researched; this study aims to address this gap. Design/methodology/approach we critically analysed eight contemporary UK suicide prevention policy documents in use in all four nations of the UK between 2009 and 2019, using Bacchi and Goodwin’s post-structural critical policy analysis. Findings The authors argue that across this sample of suicide prevention policies, suicide is constructed as self-inflicted, deliberate and death-intentioned. Consequently, these supposedly neutral definitions of suicide have some significant and problematic effects, often individualising, pathologising and depoliticising suicide in ways that dislocate suicides from the emotional worlds in which they occur. Accordingly, although suicide prevention policies have the potential to think beyond the boundaries of clinical practice, and consider suicide prevention more holistically, the policies in this sample take a relatively narrow focus, often reducing suicide to a single momentary act and centring death prevention at the expense of considering ways to make individual lives more liveable. Originality/value UK suicide prevention policies have not been subject to critical analysis; to the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study represents the first attempt to examine the way in which suicide is constructed in UK suicide prevention policy documents.

The TL;DR Charter: Speculatively Demystifying Privacy Policy Documents and Terms Agreements

Privacy policy and term agreement documents are considered the gateway for software adoption and use. The documents provide a means for the provider to outline expectations of the software use, and also provide an often-separate document outlining how user data is collected, stored, and used--including if it is shared with other parties. A user agreeing with the terms, assumes that they have a full understanding the terms of the agreement and have provided consent. Often however, users do not read the documents because they are long and full of legalistic and inconsistent language, are regularly amended, and may not disclose all the details on what is done to the user data. Enforcing compliance and ensuring user consent have been persistent challenges to policy makers and privacy researchers. This design fiction puts forward an alternate reality and presents a policy-based approach to fording the consent gap with the TL;DR Charter: an agreement governing the parties involved by harnessing the power of formal governments, industry, and other stakeholders, and taking users expectation of privacy into account. The Charter allows us as researchers to examine the implications on trust, decision-making, consent, accountability and the impact of future technologies.

Eye health promotion-oriented policy statements in various national and provincial health policy documents in South Africa

Background: There are many fragmented public health policies that give directives towards various aspects of healthcare needs and implementation. However, none of these policies make specific reference to eye health promotion (EHP) as an enabler for individuals to take control of the determinants of their eye health (EH) needs.Aim: The current study sought to identify EHP messages in the various available policy documents at both national and provincial health department levels with a view to assessing awareness on the available gaps for the development of an integrated EHP policy in South Africa.Setting: The study used documents provided by the National Department of Health and those that were available online from various other provincial Departments of Health in the country.Methods: Content analysis of EH policies requested from the Directorate of Chronic Diseases, Disabilities and Geriatrics was conducted. Various other health policies that were enacted post-1994 and endorsed by the National and Provincial Departments of Health were also considered for analysis.Results: Twenty-four documents were considered for content analysis. The national guidelines on eye healthcare made reference to EH activities such as immunisation of children, vision screening of the elderly, vitamin A supplementation and maternal services to detect sexually transmitted diseases, amongst others. Of the 20 national and provincial health documents analysed, only four made reference to EH. None of these documents made any specific reference to EHP.Conclusion: Although four national guidelines contain content related to EHP, the fragmentation and lack of integration with other health policy documents may lead to eye healthcare messages not being prioritised for dissemination even where they are highly required. Also, public eye healthcare services in general will continue to lag behind as is the case in most provinces in South Africa.

Digital Competencies in Online Education

The chapter will explore some aspects of online education such as digital skills, digital competences, and innovations in education, which the COVID-19 pandemic put into the foreground of the processes of learning and education at universities. The ability to apply digital skills and develop them into digital competencies is a basic prerequisite for learners and educators. The author analyses and evaluates the current state and challenges posed by online education, especially at colleges and universities. The concepts and terminology in the field of education in cyberspace, models of digital competencies of educators, scientific and educational policy documents defining the requirements for university teachers in online education were considered. The investigation was supported by the results of a questionnaire survey. The author points out the possibilities and ultimate requirements of online education at universities in terms of students, teachers, innovations, evaluation, advantages, and barriers in online education.

Applying ethical theories to the Iranian health system governance: a critical empirical assessment

The policies of health systems are inspired by ethical priorities. A critical review of policies can reveal the ethical theories/justice schools behind them. This study aimed to identify the ethical theory(ies) underpinning the Iranian health system governance over the past 50 years. This was a qualitative study conducted in two stages during 2019. First, we identified and constructed the key concepts and distinctive notions of prominent ethical theories/justice schools. Then, we spotted and selected 24 strategic laws and policy documents in the Iranian health system governance during the past 50 years and analyzed their content to surmise their underlying ethical theory. The results showed that the dominant theory affecting the policies of the Iranian health system governance over the past 50 years was egalitarian liberalism and then objective utilitarianism and relativist communitarianism. Retrospective empirical application of ethical theories to health system governance is methodologically doable, and this application reveals the mood or priorities of the politics. Also, highlighting the underpinning ethical theories of health system governance as well as the gap between ambitions versus realization are insightful and may prospectively empower and strengthen egalitarianism

Natural Phenomena and Youth Conflicts

The study conducted exploratively from an analytical desk review perspective sought to establish climate change-induced conflicts on the youths in Zimbabwe and how they may be addressed. This is against a background where most studies around climate change often fail to focus on its effects on the youth and how it drives the latter to engage in conflicts. Data was drawn from both archival material and policy documents. The study was guided by a concept of human security, which looks at climate change as a threat to the youth, resulting in conflicts. The study established what it calls climate conflicts. It also noted that climate change does not lead to conflicts. Rather it is the result of climate change complimented by other factors that the risk of climate-induced conflicts by youths may arise. It also concluded that all the climate change effects cascade to youths' opportunities for jobs and development.