Correlates of physical violence at school: A multilevel analysis of Australian high school students

Studies of school violence have been generally been informed either by social disorganisation or social control theory. However applications of social disorganisation theory to school violence sometimes make little attempt to control for individual differences in propensity to violent behaviour. This study of 2,616 Australian high school students uses multilevel modelling techniques to see whether various characteristics of the school (e.g. lack of clarity about school rules, school responsiveness to racism, school size, ethnic composition) are related to the risk of physical violence between students, once individual and family risk factors for violent behaviour have been taken into account. The results suggest that school characteristics and developmental factors both play an important role in shaping the risk of violence at school.     

Children's feelings of school competence and perceptions of parents' work in four socio-cultural contexts

Associations between perceived qualities of parents' work and children's sense of competence were examined in four dual-earner family contexts differentiated by social class, ethnicity, and language background. Measures of perceived general academic and mathematical competence, knowledge of parents' work situations, and family background were group administered to 226 fourth, fifth, and sixth graders. In three dual-earner family contexts, as spillover models would predict, children who felt more academically competent described their mothers' and fathers' jobs as having more positive and fewer negative qualities. However, in the fourth (dual-earner laboring-class Spanish-speaking) context, children who felt more academically competent described mothers' jobs in the least favorable terms. Findings underscore the need to consider whether developmental processes operate differently in different socio-cultural contexts and to consider both the problems and positive possibilities that may arise from specific conditions of parents' work.     

浅议学校社会工作视角下大学生思想政治教育工作

社会的发展使传统的大学生思想政治教育工作模式已逐渐不能适应和满足学生的需求。学校社会工作理念的引入,尤其是个案、小组工作方法在大学生思想政治教育工作实践中的运用可以有效促进资源整合,保证学生获得＂以人为本＂优质服务,赋予了大学生思想政治教育新的内涵,有效地帮助大学生解决各种困难和实际问题。并有助于开创大学生思想政治教育工作的新局面。     

北京“现代私塾”的现状与出路

"现代私塾"是伴随着国学热和读经运动、在家教育的国际趋势而发展起来的一种民间教育形式。本文在对北京十余家私塾进行访谈与问卷分析的基础上,对于私塾的现状进行了调查,了解到私塾在教学和经营各方面的情况,以及私塾所面对的问题,并对于私塾的未来发展提出了可行性建议。     

灾后学校社会工作介入研究——以“抗震希望学校社工志愿服务项目”为例

灾后学校面临一系列新的问题，需要社会工作的专业介入，对于介入策略，宏观层面要注意对学校社会工作价值观念、伦理守则的坚持与把握；中观层面要采取措施为志愿服务的连续性提供保障；微观层面要综合利用各种学校社会工作的方法。“抗震希望学校社工志愿服务项目”实施以来取得了很大成绩，但仍要在实践中探索适合灾后学校的服务模式。     

The impact of school autonomy and education marketization in the United Kingdom

The Education Reform Act 1988 in England proposed by the Conservative Party caused over 1100 public schools to “opt out” of local school authority control by becoming autonomous grant-maintained schools. Using a regression discontinuity design, this paper finds a causal effect of party control on school autonomy with British local election dataset. That is, a Labour party (not a Conservative party) win would consequently stimulate a considerable increase in local schools opting for autonomy. This could be the first empirical evidence of a remarkable cross-party consensus in education policy, which has so far been stressed only on theoretical grounds. Our findings not only improve the understanding of current government education policy but also suggest the role that government would play in future policy-making process.     

Relationship between sources of counseling self-efficacy and counseling self-efficacy among Malaysian school counselors

School counselors’ role in the formation and transformation of the Malaysian education system is indispensable. This study employs the Social Cognitive Theory to examine the relationship between the sources of counseling self-efficacy and the Malaysian school counselors’ counseling self-efficacy. The Sources of Counseling Self-Efficacy questionnaire and the Counseling Self-Estimate Inventory were used on 541 school counselors nationwide, as the respondents. The result reveals mastery experience has the strongest relationship with counseling self-efficacy. Recommendations on how to strengthen self-efficacy are proposed.     

Strategic public management for financial condition: Focus on fund balances of school districts

Scholars have emphasized the roles of strategic public management and the financial condition but little is known about the link between the two. Finding the missing link is the purpose of this study. By analyzing data from K-12 Texas school districts, this study investigates how top managers’ strategic efforts toward their superiors, subordinates, and external stakeholders affect the financial condition of school districts. The findings suggest that superintendents’ managing upward toward school boards increases fund balances, whereas managing downward toward school principals decreases fund balances. Apparently, the relationships between school boards, superintendents, and school principals contain different priorities and incentives that influence their behaviors in managing school district budgets.     

农民工子女教育模式探析——分析小组工作的成功策略

小组工作可以将同质性很强的农民工子女聚集起来，为农民工子女提供了情绪宣泄、互助合作、观察学习的机会，通过一系列活动方案的设计农民工子女形成合理认知，促进他们社会化的正常进行。     

村级治理中的村民代表--关于村民代表会议制度效能的讨论

村民代表会议制度是村级治理中民主决策、民主监督和民主管理的核心。正是村民代表的代表能力构成了特定的村庄基础。只有通过制度建设使村民代表会议制度提供给村民和村干部的收益大于建设所需的成本 ,村民代表会议制度才有良性发展的希望 ,其效能也会因此增强。     

Strengthening urban community governance through geographical information systems and participation: An evaluation of my Google Map and service coordination

It is increasingly common for urban planners and local policymakers to adopt interactive technologies, such as geographical information systems (GISs), to inform their decision making and to enhance performance. This paper aimed to assess the role that interactive technology can play in enhancing urban governance to meet social needs by improving local organisations’ capacities, client access, and service effectiveness and responsiveness, as well as community building. Using the previous research framework on mapping community capacity developed by Brudney et al. (Community Development Journal, 2016, 52, 354) and Çöltekin et al. (Cartography and Geographic Information Science, 2009, 36, 5–17), we examined a simulated online interactive map for service provision in Hong Kong and interviewed around 20 local community organisations and 100 local residents about their user experience, their willingness to support its long-term adoption and their challenges. Our findings reveal that local residents find the interactive map helpful, particularly in improving service access, whereas local organisations are more reluctant to adopt such technology due to high maintenance costs. The implications of our study include the need to develop incentives to encourage technology adoption, to improve the capacity of local organisations and to establish better links between community organisations and local residents to identify sustainable financing (through crowdsourcing) for GIS applications to improve urban community governance.     

Building state capacity for welfare governance: The pathway and development of child welfare system and social work in China

ABSTRACT

China’s dramatic socioeconomic transformation after the reform and opening up, coincided with changes in state-family relationship, has resulted in a large number of children at risk of care. In the past three decades, child welfare has been highly concerned by the government and society, and the child welfare system has substantially developed in the direction of establishing a moderately universal system. In this process, the development of child welfare and social work has shown a mutually reinforcing trend. This includes the professionalisation of child welfare services, the professional training of child welfare workers and the advancement of child welfare policies. The governance of child welfare is an essential component of national social governance. Its future development should be oriented towards a developmental and holistic approach of governance, and social work as an important institutional actor plays a critical role in promoting good governance of child welfare and beyond.