Minding the Gap: An Exploratory Study Applying Theory to Nonprofit Board Management of Executive Transitions

VOLUNTAS: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations - Nonprofit boards of directors are responsible for overseeing executive transitions, and the practitioner literature is...     

Into the Lion's Den:

The need to "couple," to have that special person with whom we share not only sexual intimacy but a past, present, and future, is not limited to the "straight" world. Raised by heterosexual parents, gays (male homosexuals) desire that same type of intimacy. Given that intimate relationships provide a very necessary function for the larger community of heterosexuals, those relationships should provide the same function for gays. This paper examines the differences and similarities between long-term gay and heterosexual intimate relationships, and the support each of those types of relationships receives from the community in which they exist.     

“An Instrument for Reaching Into Experience”: Progressive Film at the Rockefeller Boards, 1934–1945

The emergence of progressive filmmaking in the interwar period is often associated with John Grierson, the British documentary movement and the influence it traced abroad. This paper argues, however, that more particular attention needs to attend the specific context for progressive filmmaking in the United States. To make this argument, this paper foregrounds two strands of progressive filmmaking that were pursued alongside, and often in tension with each other at the Rockefeller Boards between 1934 and 1945. The Rockefeller Boards pursued both a version of social‐realist documentary in the Griersonian tradition as well as a project focused on “human relations” films. As this paper suggests, the human relations project contrasted with Grierson's social documentary by linking film to a particular kind of psychological interior; a self not oriented to the social world but to the internal spaces of psychological and personality development. This implies a complex process of cultural diffusion in which Grierson's model was filtered through, and ultimately displaced by, a set of concerns and preoccupations unique to the American context.     

Into the divide: community identities and the visualisation of place

This article discusses the experience of place in a profoundly divided urban area of Sheffield. At a time when the gap between affluence and poverty has reached its widest point since the 1960s, this article explores the relationship between individuals and their sense of place and of the trenchant divisions separating communities. The study employs various methods but centres upon the use of hand-drawn maps; creating a dialogue between the interviewers and a number of local residents. These maps and the accompanying commentaries demonstrate the diverse individual sense of a particular place and a dialectical sense of space. The resulting picture is one of both the persistence of historical divisions, suggesting regulation and control through planning and policing, but also of complex entanglements of social identities, habitus and place which defy easy categorisation.     

Mothers and their adolescent daughters: Transitions and transformations

Throughout adolescence the mother-daughter relationship reflects the tension between the tasks of separation and the need to renegotiate connection. This dilemma may be at the source of frustration in the mother-daughter relationship during adolescence. Theoretical perspectives, with emphasis on feminist theories, and clinical vignettes will be highlighted to illustrate the interface between individual development and the transformations in the mother-daughter pair.is on the faculty of the Institute of Clinical Social Work, Chicago and in private practice in Evanston, Illinois. Marcia Kornfeld Spirais on the faculty of the Institute of Clinical Social Work, the faculty of Loyola University and in private practice in Wilmette, Illinois.     

Partnership Transitions and Mental Distress: Investigating Temporal Order

The study uses 15 waves of the British Household Panel Survey and the General Health Questionnaire to investigate changes in mental distress over several years surrounding transitions both into and out of marital partnerships (marriages and cohabitations) using fixed effects models. Entering marital partnerships is associated with reduced distress in separated or divorced individuals but not with those not previously married. Partnership dissolution is associated with very high levels of distress, but most people experience levels of distress a few years after leaving a partnership similar to that of a few years before leaving. These results vary, however, between married and cohabiting individuals, between fathers and mothers, and between age and gender groups.     

Sociology of School Boards: A Social Capital Perspective

School boards have received little attention in sociology of education. Drawing on organizational sociology, a model of school board social capital is proposed that treats brokerage (external ties) and closure (internal ties) as the key dimensions of board functioning. The model brings together insights from limited research on school boards concerning members' internal and external ties and recasts them as the building blocks of a unifying theoretical framework. It also proposes specific performance outcomes at the district level. The model is tested using the data from a representative sample of Pennsylvania districts. The analysis not only explores brokerage and closure patterns among school boards, but also examines their implications for academic outcomes. Findings suggest that eighth grade reading and mathematics performance are highest in districts, where boards exhibit high levels of both brokerage and closure, and lowest in districts, where brokerage and closure are both low.     

Turning Sexual Science Into News: Sex Research and the Media

In this article we report on the findings of a two-part project investigating contemporary issues in sexuality researchers' interaction with journalists. The goal of the project was to explore best practices and suggest curricular and training initiatives for sexuality researchers and journalists that would enhance the accurate dissemination of sexuality research results in the media. We present the results of a survey of a convenience sample of 94 sexuality researchers about their experiences and concerns regarding media coverage and a summary of the main themes that emerged from an invitational conference of sexuality researchers and journalists. In addition, we present some preliminary recommendations for training and best practices. Topics assessed include reporting accuracy; sex researchers' comfort with various topics, media, and journalists; researchers' perceptions of the purpose and content of articles; concern about the impact of media coverage; and training for sexuality researchers.     

Four Books on Nonprofit Boards and Governance

Governing Boards, by Cyril O. Houle. San Francisco: Jossey- Bass, 1997. 223 pp., $21.95 paper. Boards That Make a Difference: A New Design for Leadership in Nonprofit and Public Organizations, by John Carver. 2nd ed. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1997, 241 pp., $28.95 cloth. Perfect Nonprofit Boards: Myths, Paradoxes, and Paradigms, by Stephen R. Block. Needham Heights, Mass.: Simon & Schuster, 1998, 149 pp., $21.95 paper. Nonprofit Boards: Roles, Responsibilities, and Performance, by Diane J. Duca. New York: Wiley, 1996, 192 pp., $29.95 cloth.     

Roles and Responsibilities of Community Nonprofit Boards

In this study, roles and responsibilities associated with nonprofit boards of directors were supported by a framework inclusive of Strategic Activities, Operations, and Resource Planning roles. This framework can be valuable for paid staff and volunteers in understanding the broad scope of the work of nonprofit boards and practical applications such as agenda setting for board meetings and designing board training and development activities.     

Different Transitions: Timetable Failures in the Transition to School

The aim of this article was to show how transitions are constructed, and to discuss different ways of making the transition from the preschool class to first grade. The analysis is grounded in ethnographic fieldwork. Temporality is used to understand expectations about how transition should be made. The results reveal that some children made their transitions in ways that did not follow the expected timetable. These transitions can be understood as timetable failures, and needed to be made sense of by both children and teachers. These different transitions were an important part of the overall construction of transition.     

Boards of directors: control and decision making in Canadian corporations*

Les statuts légaux spécifient que les corporations doivent être dirigées par un conseil d'administrateurs. Cette étude examine le rôle des directorâts en pouvoir et en contrôle dans un échantillon de corporations manufacturières et découvre, en général, que les conseils n'ont aucune influence sur les prises de décisions. La possession corporative et la composition des conseils sont reconnus comme d'importants facteurs qui affectent les structures de contrôles. Si la possession est concentree sur une base origine-filiale, le contrôle tend àêtre levé par l'enchaînement de gérance. Quand la possession est largement concentrée chez les directeurs, ceux-ci sont en lieu de retenir le contrôle. Si la possession est établie par des actionnaires qui ne sont pas les directeurs, la directive aura des degrés variants de contrôle dans les prises de décisions, dépendant sur la concentration de cette possession. Si la directive contient des courtiers, il est plus possible d'y avoir une fonction de contrôle dans les prises de décisions que quand la corporation est composée entièrement d'initiés. Legal statutes specify that corporations shall be managed by a board of directors. This study examines the role of directorates in power and control in a sample of manufacturing corporations and finds, in general, that most boards are not influential in decision making. Corporate ownership and board composition are found to be important factors affecting control patterns. If ownership is concentrated on a parent-subsidiary basis, control tends to be exercised through management links. When ownership is largely by managers, they are likely to retain control. If ownership is by nonmanager shareholders, then the board will have varying degrees of control in decision making, depending on the concentration of that ownership. If the board contains outsiders, then it is more likely to have a control function in corporate decision making than when it is composed solely of insiders.     

Partnership Transitions and Maternal Parenting

We use data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (N = 1,975) to examine the association between mothers' partnership changes and parenting behavior during the first five years of their children's lives. We compare coresidential with dating transitions, and recent with more distal transitions. We also examine interactions between transitions and race/ethnicity, maternal education and family structure at birth. Findings indicate that both coresidential and dating transitions were associated with higher levels of maternal stress and harsh parenting; recent transitions had stronger associations than distal transitions. Maternal education significantly moderates these associations, with less educated mothers responding more negatively to instability in terms of maternal stress, and more educated mothers responding more negatively in terms of literacy activities.