Social work online: a recognition of experiences and practices in Italy

ABSTRACT

‘The Internet is the fabric or our lives’ [Castells, M. (2001). The Internet Galaxy: Reflections on the Internet, Business, and Society. Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. 1] – but which are the weaves that nowadays connect Italian social workers into such a fabric? Herein we aim at answering this question through a survey of on-line resources, nodes and practices of e-Social Work in Italy. We shall be discussing ICT impact on the Italian context, and the utilization of ICT by Italian social workers, in order to build up the internal and external factors that determine the current utilization levels of these emerging tools within the professional community. A review of the major on-line social work portals will identify their key features and peculiarities and aim to provide an overview of the substance and current on-line functions of Italian social work, with a summing-up of criticalities and opportunities that might prompt reflection on possible future developments.     

我国ICT企业技术创新效率的实证研究——基于DEA方法视角

利用数据包络分析法(DEA),针对选取的31家沪深两市上市ICT企业,测量了其在2011年至2014年间企业的技术创新效率.研究结果表明:总体上,ICT企业在2011年至2014年间的平均技术效率值分别为0.646、0.584、0.688和0.622,总平均技术效率值为0.635,这意味着相关企业在技术创新过程中的资源浪费程度接近40％.就企业个体而言,31家样本企业中只有4家(法拉电子、国电南瑞、华微电子和长城信息)表现最佳,连续四年技术效率值都为1,而其他无效率的ICT企业则在创新资源投入规模和资源的使用效率方面存在诸多问题,亟待改进管理现状.     

ICT对高等教育的影响刍议

时至今日,新信息与通讯技术已经无所不在,其作用也愈加明显,随之而来的是它的战略上的重要性也不断提高。如何来衡量高等教育中信息技术的战略价值是一个仍在讨论的话题。新信息与通讯技术仍处在它的发展前期,且在不断演变,高等教育须转变其核心学习环境。     

New Technology in Home Help Services — A Tool for Support or an Instrument of Subordination?

The implementation of information and communication technologies (ICT) is in line with a general transformation of the work of home help services in Sweden. One strong motivation behind the introduction of new technology was to change the ways of working towards greater efficiency in order to reduce costs and at the same time raise the value of care‐giving work. This article discusses the introduction of ICT in home help services as a part of the increasing rationalization of care‐giving work and its consequences for the workers. The results of an ethnographic study of the introduction of hand‐held computers in a working team in home help services in Sweden shows that the motives for the implementation of ICT run counter to the basic norms that are supposed to govern care‐giving work. The technology participates in reproducing the subordinate position of care‐giving work as well as that of the front‐line workers. The workers act according to personal decision‐making ability and show a form of limited resistance to the technology while, at the same time, taking part in their own subordination.     

Intercultural crossings in a digital age: ICT pathways with migrant and refugee-background youth

This article problematises the uptake and use of digital technologies by migrant and refugee-background young people, through the lens of a site-based arts pedagogy program, Culture Shack (CS), in Melbourne, Australia. It argues that online pedagogies including animation, Facebook, photoshop, mobile phones and Youtube can be used effectively for bridging cultural, gender and educational gaps, if the ways in which they are applied engage with communication preferences and discourses of culture, ethnicity and digital media technology – including issues related to technological determinism. Drawing on Dimitriadis’ attention to the power of public pedagogies and cyberculture theorists such as Leung and Nakamura, this article frames creative ICT use as not merely a tool but a contested, negotiated space in which young participants shape educational transits of being and becoming, and arts-based digital learning as twenty-first century global pedagogies.     

A Bayesian non-parametric modeling to estimate student response to ICT investment†

This paper estimates the causal impact of investment in information and communication technologies (ICT) on student performances in mathematics as measured in the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2012 for Spain. To do this we apply a new methodology in this context known as Bayesian Additive Regression Trees that has important advantages over more standard parametric specifications. Results indicate that ICT has a moderate positive effect on math scores. In addition, we analyze how this effect interacts with variables related to school features and student socioeconomic status, finding that ICT investment is especially beneficial for students from a low socioeconomic background.     

借鉴国外先进经验 推动上海健康服务业发展

健康服务产业是指与人类健康相关的产业的统称。由于提供卫生保健服务的成本逐年增高,发达国家信息及通讯技术（ICT）为开展个性化、以病人为中心的保健以及家庭保健提供了新途径,如电子病历、远程医疗、整合支付手段等,并出现了新的商业业态和商业模式。ICT广泛应用使医疗服务外包发展迅速,发达国家制定了与之相适应的许多政策措施,上海应充分借鉴美国等发达国家的先进经验,大力发展健康服务业。     

论出国留学生跨文化认知与交际能力的培养

中国留学生在海外留学期间,特别是初始适应时期(initialadjustmentperiod)所遭遇的困难和挫折主要起因于文化与文化差异。相关的研究和调查结果表明:出国留学生跨文化认知能力和交际能力培养方面的缺失,是导致他们在跨文化交往不同层面失败的主要原因之一。因此,跨文化认知和交际能力的培养对出国留学生跨文化交往的成功具有不容忽视的意义和作用。     

ICT for all? Access and use of Public ICT Sites in the UK

As part of their "information age' policy agenda, the UK government sees "universal' access to information and communications technology (ICT) being achieved via new and existing public sites, where shared access to new technologies can be made available at little or no cost. State-sponsored augmentation of public ICT access in the UK has involved a variety of initiatives, most notably the recent establishment of a network of over 7,000 "UK Online Centres' located in a variety of distributed sites such as libraries, museums and colleges. Whilst there have been a number of localized case studies of users of public ICT sites, there has been little large-scale "mapping' of how these facilities are being used (and not used) by the general public. Based on a randomized household survey with 1,001 individuals in twelve research areas in the West of England and South Wales - augmented with a "booster' sample of 100 interviews with individuals carried out in public ICT sites in these areas - the present paper seeks to explore: (i) who has access to what forms of public ICT sites; and (ii) who is (and who is not) making use of different forms of public ICT sites. The survey data suggest that, in terms of people's effective access to ICT, public access sites have a relatively slight profile when compared with household and wider family access - perceived to offer ready access to ICT by only a minority of respondents. Moreover, when the use of these public ICT sites is examined, there is little evidence of public ICT sites attracting those social groups who may otherwise be excluded or marginalized from the information age. Given these findings, the paper considers the influences underlying the currently modest impact of public ICT sites on the general population and suggests changes to current public ICT provision that may prompt wider usage of these sites.     

ICT与外语课堂教学整合

多媒体网络教学的ICT应用改变了教师的作用与功能、学生学习的方式,但这并不意味着它可以取代传统的课堂教学方式.在可预见的将来,作为一种非常有效的培养人才的教学结构,课堂教学仍然会是学校教学活动的主要方式.长期以来,课堂教学这一形式之所以能得到延续和发展,有其深刻的内在原因.应对其内在的机制和运作模式进行系统的研究,才能促进ICT与课堂教学的全面整合,整合的关键之处在于改革传统的课堂目标模式和评价体系,并在课堂教学的结构选型、实验室配置、教学资源组织三个方面进行统筹设计.