Implementation and process evaluation of a student "school-as-community" group. A component of a school-based drug abuse prevention program

Little documentation exists regarding the functioning of formalized adolescent groups as drug abuse prevention agents. Two studies are described that were conducted at high schools whose students are at high risk for drug abuse. Twenty-one schools were randomly assigned to one of three conditions: (a) standard care, (b) classroom drug abuse education only, or (c) classroom plus school-as-community. Results of the first study indicated that the school-as-community component--which involved weekly meetings and periodic events at seven schools--was implemented as planned, drug abused focused, and perceived as productive in discouraging drug abuse. In the second study, staff in the classroom plus school-as-community condition self-reported involvement in the greatest number of community activities across the school year, compared with staff from the other two conditions. These two studies support the feasibility of formalized groups of high-risk youth to promote drug-free events.     

New procedures of ergonomics design in a large oil company

This study presents the challenge involved in the negotiation and construction of a standard process in a major petroleum company that has the purpose of guiding the implementation of ergonomic studies in the development of projects, systemising the implementation of ergonomics design. The standard was created by a multi-disciplinary working group consisting of specialists in ergonomics, who work in a number of different areas of the company. The objective was to guide "how to" undertake ergonomics in all projects, taking into consideration the development of the ergonomic appraisals of work. It also established that all the process, in each project phase, should be accompanied by a specialist in ergonomics. This process as an innovation in the conception of projects in this company, signals a change of culture, and, for this reason requires broad dissemination throughout the several company leadership levels, and training of professionals in projects of ergonomics design. An implementation plan was also prepared and approved by the corporate governance, complementing the proposed challenge. In this way, this major oil company will implement new procedures of ergonomics design to promote health, safety, and wellbeing of the workforce, besides improving the performance and reliability of its systems and processes.     

Intimate Oppression

Book Reviews are in this Articles.
The Politics of the Family and Other Essays. By R. D. Laing.
The Leaves of Spring: a Study in the Dialectics of Madness. By Aaron Esterson.
The Death of the Family. By David Cooper.     

The polarisation and intensification of parental employment in britain: Consequences for children,families and the community

On the basis of an analysis of UK parental employment between 1984 and 1994, using data from the Labour Force Survey, the authors identify three important trends: increasing integration of women with children, particularly with young children, into the labour market; increasing differentiation in mothers' employment opportunities and growing polarisation in household employment patterns; and an intensification of paid work amongst employed parents, contributing to a growing concentration of work–both paid and unpaid caring work–among women and men in the so-called 'prime working years' of 25 to 50 years. The article considers some possible consequences of these trends for children, families and communities, including the polarisation of children's childhoods, family incomes and neighbourhoods, the increasing workload on individual parents and families, tension between parents over the division of child care and domestic tasks and the issue of lime. The article concludes that the current UK focus on policies to support working parents in 'reconciling employment and family responsibilities' begs the question of how far these, and other activities, are reconcilable–and if they are, under what conditions, what cost and to whom–and may fail to address the difficult, threatening and 'wicked issues' at the heart of the work-family relationship.     

THE ETHICS AND POLITICS OF MUTUAL OBLIGATION

Welfare schemes which require recipients of benefits to ‘give something back’ are often justified in terms of ‘fairness’ or fulfilling the ‘social contract’. The Australian Government's recent and proposed changes to unemployment benefits through the Mutual Obligation Scheme appeal to both justifications. However, insufficient attention has been paid the underlying ethical and political assumptions — a serious deficiency. given their role in legitimating harsh new penalties. There are two broad reasons the current trend to tie benefits to obligations is inappropriate. First, the unemployed have little choice about their contract. And second, there is insufficient mutuality shown towards the unemployed for the Scheme to be obligation‐generating. Rather than being a means of encouraging participation or mutuality, the Scheme is essentially punitive.     

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