Student Bodies,Past and Present

Abstract

This article examines how the field of college health has evolved over time to address the needs of an increasingly diverse student population. The central argument is that college and university health programs developed in conjunction with shifting standards of medical care and public health practices in the United States. The author reviews the role of college health programs as public health agencies for campus communities, and describes contemporary public health challenges facing college campuses. She shows how the history of college health is intertwined with the history of diversity in higher education. In particular, the author outlines how the growth of health services made higher education accessible to women, racial minorities, veterans, and persons with disabilities.     

How far is England in the process of introducing a mandatory reporting system?

This article argues that England is in the process of introducing a mandatory reporting system, not based on the requirement to report child abuse but on the basis of ‘a cause for concern’ for a child's welfare. It describes Section 12 of the Children Act 2004, which is fundamental to the development, and the rationale upon which it is based. The second part of the article summarizes the key criticisms that have been made of mandatory reporting systems and discusses how these are likely to apply in the English situation. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A Systems Approach to Investigating Child Abuse Deaths

A new systemic approach to investigating child abuse deathsis proposed, drawing on the lessons learned in engineering.Investigations have traditionally taken the approach of concludingonce faults in professional practice are identified. Solutionstake the form of trying to control erratic practitioners: psychologicalpressure to achieve higher standards, increasing formalizationand guidelines to reduce the scope for individual fallibility,and stricter management surveillance. The inquiry into the deathof Victoria Climbie fits this model. However, thirty years ofsuch inquiries have not led to the expected improvement in professionalpractice. Indeed, the Climbie report describes several agenciesoperating at a very low level, and failing to implement themost basic elements of good practice. A similar history of failurein engineering has led to the development of a systems approach.Human error is taken as the starting point, not the conclusion,and the investigation tries to understand why the mistake wasmade, by studying interacting factors in the practitioners,the resources available and the organizational context. Theway this approach could be adopted in child protection workis outlined.     

Evaluating a multiple-family group access intervention for refugees with PTSD

The purpose of this study was to analyze the effects of a multiple-family group in increasing access to mental health services for refugees with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). This study investigated a nine-session multiple-family group called Coffee and Families Education and Support with refugee families from Bosnia-Herzegovina in Chicago. Adults with PTSD (n = 197) and their families were randomly assigned to receive either the intervention or a control condition. The results indicated that a multiple-family group was effective in increasing access to mental health services and that depression and family comfort with discussing trauma mediated the intervention effect. Further well-designed studies of family interventions are needed for developing evidence-based interventions for refugee families.     

Housing strategies in an uncertain market

The slump in house prices in the early 1990s created a degree of uncertainty in the housing market which contrasts markedly with the optimism of the 1980s. In particular, the market downturn made it sharply apparent that there could be losers as well as winners in the unstable housing market. This study looks at a sample of owner occupiers drawn from Glasgow and Bristol in 1995. While still endorsing home ownership as the major housing option and as potentially enabling in housing and neighbourhood terms, a note of caution is recognisable. Aspirations to climb the housing ‘ladder’ are tempered by fear of overextending financially and by the broader uncertainties that people perceive to be endemic in the labour market and the housing market. Strategies reflect both diverse personal histories and the adoption of defensive or risk reduction options. For many respondents maintaining current housing standards is more important than market advancement.     

Religious intermarriage in Canada, 1974-1982

"This paper reviews recent literature, with particular reference to Canada, on religious intermarriage. The importance of intramarriage in the cross-generation maintenance of subcultural values is emphasized. Recent trends in religious outmarriage and the major explanations and correlates of these trends are considered. Recent data published by Statistics Canada is examined for the nine year period between 1974-1982."     

Belonging on the Move: Market Rhetoric and the Future as Obligatory Passage

Recent neglect of the concept of belonging may be traced to its subsumption under matters of locality or kinship (concepts that have left its theorising rather static and underdeveloped), as well as to theoretical understandings which try to keep distinct a logic of belonging from a logic of the market. In reworking a sociological tradition that formerly associated the work of managers with a specific responsibility to induce conditions of belonging, at least within bureaucratic organisations, the present study examines closely the rhetoric deployed in a large private sector organisation alongside its invention of 'internal' markets. Adopting a consumption perspective, the paper argues that a 'rubbishing' of the past within organisations may be being aimed at undermining aspects of members' belonging, especially matters of tradition, loyalty and custom. In so much as these aspects once offered themselves as 'resources' for managers' accounts (to themselves, their colleagues and their superiors), their effacement as resources can be understood as helping reframe accounts in ways that not only colonise the present and characterise the future, but sustain ambiguities vital to the imposition of pseudo-market relations, such as those between 'purchasers' and 'providers'.     

Balancing parents' and very young children's rights in care proceedings: decision-making in the context of the Human Rights Act 1998

This paper explores whether the Human Rights Act 1998 has influenced the approach a range of professionals, including social workers, managers and children's guardians adopt when they examine and seek to balance the potentially competing rights of parents and children involved in care proceedings. Drawing on findings from an empirical study of the decision‐making process that influences the life pathways of very young children in care, it also explores some of the dilemmas professionals face in their day‐to‐day practice and examines whether parental rights are prioritized over children's rights in certain instances.     

A Feminist Trade Union Agenda? The Continued Significance of Class,Gender and Race

During the 1990s attempts to identify a feminist trade union agenda have focused on both the content and process of such a potential agenda. In a period in which trade unions have changed significantly, the general national agenda appears to be changing, acknowledging issues of importance to women. UNISON, Britain's largest trade union, has enshrined proportionality and fair representation in its constitution, developing national initiatives aimed at improving opportunities in work and in the union for women, black workers, manual workers, disabled workers, etc. who traditionally have been less well represented. Many issues affecting women generally have moved to centre stage, yet issues affecting women ancillary workers seem as excluded as ever. Through a study of cleaners in the National Health Service this article argues that workplace interests reflect wider social divisions, but in a variety of patterns depending on the social organization of work. Despite thewidening trade union agenda, particular interests — more specifically the workplace interests of working‐class women and black women — continue to be neglected.