sustainable change
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2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Maria Spante ◽  
Anita Varga ◽  
Linnéa Carlsson

Purpose This study aims to depict how a change laboratory (CL) promotes sustainable professional practice at the workplace to tackle unequal access to educational success. Design/methodology/approach The empirical findings are from a CL focusing on school professionals’ agency and a follow-up study one year after the CL. Findings The study shows how the staff gained insight that professional agency is a collective and relational practice. Furthermore, the staff explored how to make a difference with viable means to create new workplace models for students’ success despite experiencing a conundrum. Research limitations/implications This study examined participants’ perspectives in workplace change and provided support for further research examining how professionally and collectively designed models gain sustainability in schools. Practical implications This study provides empirical data of how professional agency for change driven by collective visions can be accelerated with the interventionist method CL among school professionals. Social implications This study emphasizes the value of professional collective learning at the workplace, driven by several professional groups in school, and the need to follow up to detect sustainable change. Originality/value This study emphasizes the value of professional collective learning at the workplace, driven by several professional groups in school, and the need to follow up to detect sustainable change.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charlotte Rae ◽  
Martin Farley ◽  
Kate Jeffrey ◽  
Anne E Urai

Our planet is experiencing severe and accelerating climate and ecological breakdown caused by human activity. As professional scientists we are better placed than most to understand the data that evidence this fact. However, like most other people, we ignore this inconvenient truth and lead our daily lives, at home and at work, as if these facts weren’t true. In particular, we overlook that our own neuroscientific research practices, from our laboratory experiments to our often global travel, help drive climate change and ecosystem damage. We also hold privileged positions of authority in our societies but rarely speak out. Here, we argue that to help society create a survivable future, we neuroscientists can and must play our part.In April 2021, we delivered a symposium at the British Neuroscience Association (BNA) meeting outlining what we think neuroscientists can and should do to help stop climate breakdown. Building on our talks, we here outline what the climate and ecological emergencies mean for us as neuroscientists. We highlight the psychological mechanisms that block us from taking action, and then outline what practical steps we can take to overcome these blocks and work towards sustainability. In particular, we review environmental issues in neuroscience research, scientific computing, and conferences. We also highlight the key advocacy roles we can all play in our institutions, and in society more broadly. The need for sustainable change has never been more urgent, and we call on all (neuro)scientists to act with the utmost urgency.


2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (2/3) ◽  
pp. 920-933
Author(s):  
Rocío Calvo ◽  
Samuel Bradley

For the last several years, the Boston College School of Social Work (BCSSW) has worked to deconstruct the hidden nature of whiteness rooted in theories, methods, and practices of education. To that end, the BCSSW created two strategies designed to foster systemic change: the Latinx Leadership Initiative and the Equity, Justice, and Inclusion Initiative. This study uses narrative analysis to examine these initiatives as catalysts of sustainable change. We dive deep into: (1) strategies designed to disrupt a White supremacy approach to the explicit and implicit curriculums; (2) activities to engage stakeholders on dismantling institutional racism. Our ultimate goal is to draw lessons that may be useful to the profession. To that end, we discuss knowledge gained concerning academic innovation, shared governance, and alternatives to an Eurocentric epistemological approach to social work. We also include implications for the profession concerning the incorporation and validation of non-White ways to understand human development, health, disease, diagnostics, and interventions; and present some of the strategies we developed to de-center whiteness and support BIPOC students in a White-majority institution of higher education.


2021 ◽  
pp. 194-216
Author(s):  
Wilhelm Östberg ◽  
Joseph Mduma ◽  
Dan Brockington

We studied livelihood changes and poverty dynamics over a twenty-five-year period in two villages in central Tanzania. The villages were, from the early 1990s and 2000s, strikingly poor with between 50 per cent and 55 per cent of families in the poorest wealth groups. Twenty-five years later much has changed: people have become substantially wealthier, with 64 per cent and 71 per cent in the middle wealth groups. The new wealth had been generated locally, from farming, particularly of sunflowers as a cash crop. This goes against a conventional view of small-scale farming in Tanzania as being stagnant or unproductive. The area of land farmed per family has increased, almost doubling in one village. People have made money, which they invest in mechanized farming, improved housing, education of their children, livestock, and consumer goods. Improved infrastructure and local entrepreneurs have played key roles in the area’s transformation. Locally identified wealth rankings showed that most villagers, those in the middle wealth groups and above, can now support themselves from their land, which is a notable change to a time when 71 per cent and 82 per cent in each village respectively depended on casual labour for their survival. This change has come at a cost to the environment. By 2016, the village forests have largely gone and been replaced by farms. Farmers were concerned that the climate was turning drier because of deforestation. Satellite data confirms extensive forest loss in this location. Studying the mundane—the material used in roofs, the size of farms, and so on—made it possible to trace and understand the radical transition the area has experienced.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (18) ◽  
pp. 10003
Author(s):  
Efraïm Hart ◽  
Giliam Kuijpers ◽  
Glenn Laverack ◽  
Fedde Scheele

Health systems all over the world are in a process of transition and may even need a paradigm shift for sustainable development. This is where activism may play a role. This study focused on why some physicians become activists and how these physicians have either achieved successes or failed to do so. This study is inspired by grounded theory. Semi-structured, in-depth interviews were conducted to evaluate the experiences of seven purposefully sampled physician-activists from the Netherlands. Our research suggests that activism originates from an awareness of problems in the area of health inequalities, resulting in moral discomfort combined with a strong drive to speak up against perceived failings, even when personal risks may be involved. Activists that were most successful in achieving political and health changes meandered effectively along the borders of the system, taking care to preserve ties with supporters within that system and, at the same time, taking a relatively isolated position while using strategies to oppose the system. Diverging too much from the system resulted in measures taken by the system to silence them. Successful activism may be regarded as a social and professional skill that may be learned.


2021 ◽  
Vol 108 (Supplement_6) ◽  
Author(s):  
D S Sahni ◽  
P Kosk

Abstract Aim Clinical governance states that blood results should be flagged during ward rounds to enable better assessment of inpatients. As per our institutional Protocol, each patient is assigned a blood sheet which should be updated every day with outstanding bloods flagged with a circle. The aim of the audit was to evaluate the quality of blood result sheets and to discuss results in order to enhance patient care. Method Data was collected from the Urology ward at Glasgow Royal Infirmary continuously during November 2020. We reviewed the flagging of abnormal bloods and whether clear documentation of baseline eGFR was included. Intervention was carried out by series of discussion with the nursing and the medical staff along with display posters throughout the ward and staff rooms. Results Overall, first cycle assessed 65 folders and second assessed 79. We noticed that the flagging of outstanding blood results increased from 70% to 74%. Documentation of baseline eGFR raised from 32% to 44%. Initially, only 73% of results were appropriately placed in the correct patient nursing folder which improved and reached 100% on review. Conclusions The first cycle of the audit demonstrated serious breach of protocols which could delay and affect patient care. The re-audit cycle post intervention illustrated that active efforts on the part of medical and nursing staff can significantly improve the outcomes. However, sustained intervention in the form of audits and induction program is needed to bring a sustainable change in the departmental practice.


2021 ◽  
Vol 108 (Supplement_6) ◽  
Author(s):  
C Desai ◽  
A Bruce ◽  
S A Ehsanullah ◽  
U Otite ◽  
S Ahmad

Abstract Introduction The British Association of Urological Surgeons (BAUS) released guidance in 2018 regarding the optimum management of acute ureteric colic: a condition which can present as a surgical emergency. Our aim was to review the current practice at our hospital in diagnosing and managing acute ureteric colic and ultimately, implement sustainable change to address any areas of limitations. Method The following data was retrospectively collected for of all patients admitted with acute ureteric colic: investigations performed, medications administered, details of surgical intervention and follow-up. 1st Cycle: March 2017 to February 2018. Intervention: Teaching sessions delivered to staff (including doctors and nurses) in the A&E and urology department. 2nd Cycle: January 2019 to December 2019. Results 268 patients presented to A&E with ureteric colic – 18% increase from previous year. On admission: 60.4% of patients had serum calcium checked, 97.7% had a CT KUB performed within 24 hours and 67.2% were given NSAIDs; this is a 20.4%, 0.4% and 5.2% increase from the previous year, respectively. Only 31.3% of patients had an acute surgical intervention. The average wait time for clinic follow-up was reduced to 41 days following departmental education, but only 26.4% of patients were seen within the BAUS advised 4-week timeframe. Conclusions Re-audit showed distinct improvement in the management of acute ureteric colic. Thus, departmental education strategies have had a positive impact. It is recommended that the reservation of one daily elective theatre slot for an emergency operation and a computerised clinic booking system will further optimise our management in line with BAUS guidance.


Author(s):  
Tasdidaa Shamsi

Factory level workers help empower workers at shop floor level about health and safety. This is even better when owners work with them as a team. Training should not be about giving directions. Education has to be coupled with advocacy, training and empowerment. The empowerment of workers is for sustainable change focussing on long term betterment. The goal is capacity building and to make a skilled advocate. The final outcome is for structural provisions to improve and workplace practices to change. The medical services for the workers should also be in the agenda. Gender should be highlighted and women’s health and safety should be in the fore-front. The empowered workers can now speak up for themselves. There is a diversification with different sectors. Everyone should be equipped with International occupational safety and health (OSH) standards.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (16) ◽  
pp. 9251
Author(s):  
Wolfgang Brozek ◽  
Christof Falkenberg

The threat of zoonoses (i.e., human infectious diseases transmitted from animals) because of industrial animal farming may be receiving less attention in society due to the putative wildlife origin of COVID-19. To identify societal responses to COVID-19 that do address or affect the risk of future zoonoses associated with industrial animal farming, the literature was screened for measures, actions, proposals and attitudes following the guidelines of a scoping review. Forty-one articles with relevant information published between 1 January 2020 and 30 April 2021 were identified directly or indirectly via bibliographies from 138 records retrieved via Google Scholar. Analysis of relevant content revealed ten fields of policy action amongst which biosecurity and change in dietary habits were the dominant topics. Further searches for relevant records within each field of policy action retrieved another eight articles. Identified responses were furthermore classified and evaluated according to groups of societal actors, implying different modes of regulation and governance. Based on the results, a suggested policy strategy is presented for moving away from food production in factory farms and supporting sustainable farming, involving the introduction of a tax on the demand side and subsidies for the development and production of alternative meat.


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