Reflections of battlefield tourist experiences associated with Vietnam War sites: an analysis of travel blogs

The aim of this paper is to analyse online travel blogs in order to gain an understanding of the reflections held by battlefield tourists in Vietnam. A qualitative approach utilising thematic analysis was conducted on 20 travel blogs. The findings suggest that tourists can have a deeply reflective experience at sites of past warfare, which includes cognitive dissonance to the war narrative. Tourist experiences in Vietnam presented a connection to the dead (mortality mediation) and a connection to the living (local people). These outcomes led to the overall understanding of battlefield experiences in Vietnam: The meaning of life and humanity through connecting with people, and the passing of time through the writing of history.     

A pedagogic approach to enhance creative <Emphasis Type="Italic">Ideation</Emphasis> in classroom practice

The real intent for technology education is to prepare young people so that they may fully participate and function in human society. To achieve this aim, learners are guided towards the development of attributes that include perceptive, critical, creative and informed decision making. Although effective teaching strives to inspire the creative spark in every learner, there is little guidance to inform actual classroom practice. The selection of strategies and implementation methods that engender creative responses in students, is usually left to an individual teacher’s interpretation. A working knowledge of design processing provides a most advantageous methodology to guide teaching and learning as students develop ways “of knowing through thinking and doing,” Sharma and Poole (Des Manag Inst 20(4):64–74, 2010) within classroom design and technological practice. This article looks at the broad stage of Ideation in creative design practice, where designers instigate and generate ideas within their own practice. Insight and transferable skills are observed to inform classroom practice. One event from the ideation stage of design practice processing is selected to enhance student visual communication skills. A pedagogic approach is then shared to inform the implimentation of a teaching and learning strategy that has been trialled with design (aged from 12 to 18 years) and Initial Teacher Education adult students.     

Dividend policy and investment: Theory and evidence from US panel data

This paper examines the importance of dividend policy and liquidity constraints in the context of the firm's investment behaviour. While early financial literature has argued that dividend policy should be independent of firm investment decisions, recent studies indicate that linkages are probable in a world of imperfect capital markets. This study develops an alternative Q specification which incorporates the actual dividend payment of the firm in order to test the hypothesis of independence. Empirical results suggest that after controlling for the firm's dividend payment, liquidity constraints remain an important determinant of firm investment behavior.     

Technology Education in Ontario: Evolution, Achievements, Critiques and Challenges. Part 1: The Context

This article, in seven sections, describes the evolution of technological education in the Canadian province of Ontario. The first section clarifies the meanings of the terms technology and technological education. The second outlines significant events in the history of technical education in the province. The third examines some of the societal factors that have created a climate for change during the past two decades, while the fourth describes the broader context of recent curriculum developments. The fifth reports on the introduction in 1995 of The Common Curriculum and the publication of Broad-based Technological Education. The sixth provides a few case studies illustrating the variety of ways in which technology education is currently implemented. The seventh section offers an evaluation and critique of some aspects of provincial curriculum policy and practice. The article is published in two parts. Part 1, in this issue, contains the first five sections, which describe the current curriculum offerings and their evolution. Part 2, containing the remaining two sections and all references, will be published in the next issue. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Quality choice: Does it matter which workers own and manage the cooperative firm?

The information age and the spread of information technology has implications for organizational structure. Accordingly, the age-old issues of product and service quality are put into a new perspective. It is this new perspective that compels analysis and contrast of the joint quality and output choices of a labor-managed (LM) firm with those of its entrepreneurial (PM) twin. It is shown that the LM firm's behavior regarding quality and quantity depends on which workers own and manage the firm and on the way that marginal profit with respect to output is influenced by quality. Similarly, the effects of increases in either fixed costs or demand depend on who owns and manages the LM firm and on the relationship between marginal profit and quality. Thus, whether a cooperative will outperform or underperform its PM counterpart depends on the particulars of the situation. An earlier draft of this paper was presented at seminars at Academia Sinica in Taipei and the Chinese University of Hong Kong. The authors are grateful to the participants in those seminars and most especially to Professors C. C. Mai, Eden Yu, and Dr. Li Tianyou, as well as to an anonymous referee for their comments and helpful suggestions. The authors are responsible for the final version.     

Banking in a new world order

September 11, 2001 is the defining date of a new world order. Like all individuals and commercial activities in the U.S., American banks and other domestic financial institutions were affected by the events of the terrorist attacks and by the subsequent responses of the American government and business community. Some of the effects of the attacks were immediate and fleeting. Others, however, were likely to have altered the environment of the financial services industry, particularly banking, in the U.S. for the foreseeable future. This paper is an initial consideration of these more lasting effects.     

Dietary guidelines – a self-assessment

Abstract: Men and women were asked to rate food choices by the dietary guideline messages and by nutrient analysis as a pilot to study a contemporary audience who were not main food preparers.