Awareness Projects Research Articles

Fontes de Capital Social e a Educação para a Sustentabilidade: uma articulação promissora

Afirmar que a sociedade está vivendo o despertar da consciência socioambiental é arriscado, mas o número de ações e pactos neste cenário mostra-se cada vez maior. Neste contexto, identifica-se a importância de projetos e ações que visem o engajamento e a conscientização socioambiental por parte dos jovens, para que atuem como multiplicadores. Assim, este estudo tem como objetivo identificar aspectos relevantes para a execução e sucesso de projetos e ações que visem o engajamento e conscientização socioambiental de jovens. Para tanto, analisou-se uma equipe de universitários, participante da gincana “Impacto Zero” promovida no Brasil, em 2011, pela SWU (Starts With You) e outros parceiros. Trata-se de um estudo de caso, a partir de observação participante e entrevistas em profundidade com integrantes da equipe: estudantes, professor coordenador e equipe de apoio. Os resultados apontam diversas fontes de Capital Social presentes na atividade proposta, como a identidade dos membros com o tema Sustentabilidade, a solidariedade por parte da comunidade em ajudar a equipe, os esforços por parte da organização, a formação de novas redes, além da interação e associação entre redes já existentes. Portanto, associar Capital Social e Educação para a Sustentabilidade pode representar uma base sólida para promover conscientização socioambiental.

Optimizing a Hospital Anaphylaxis Protocol: Our Experience

Anaphylaxis is a severe, life-threatening, systemic hypersensitivity reaction that usually occurs rapidly after contact with an allergy-inducing substance. Due to the underdiagnosing, underreporting and malpractice associated with this condition, anaphylaxis awareness projects are now becoming a priority in some communities. The diagnosis of anaphylaxis is clinical, and intramuscular adrenaline is well known as the first-line treatment of choice for its management. The majority of anaphylaxis deaths occur in a hospital. Therefore, it is important to render hospitals safe places for severe allergic reactions. A hospital anaphylaxis protocol is also mandatory for a better outcome as recommended by guidelines. Consequently, our protocol was planned with the contribution of different specialties, including allergy, emergency medicine, nursing, nutrition and pharmacy. General knowledge was tested among different departments by self-administered questionnaires, and specific education programs were utilized to improve the success of the protocol. The least correctly answered questions were about the rapidity of the occurrence of anaphylaxis, the route of adrenaline administration and the method of adrenaline auto injector (AAI) administration. However, after education, the level of knowledge increased dramatically among caregivers. We propose that conducting regular education programs for healthcare workers and that implementing appropriate hospital anaphylaxis protocols prepared with multidisciplinary collaborations should be mandatory for the prevention, recognition and treatment of severe allergic reactions.

The Thin-Spined Porcupine, Chaetomys Subspinosus (Rodentia: Erethizontidae), within Protected Areas in the Atlantic Forest, Brazil: Local Knowledge and Threats

The thin-spined porcupine, Chaetomys subspinosus, is an endemic mammal of the Atlantic forest of northeastern Brazil. With its population declining, it has been listed as “vulnerable” in the Brazilian Red List. Its National Action Plan, published in 2011, intended to develop awareness projects about the species in local communities, to implement alternative income projects and protein consumption, and to evaluate hunting pressure. This study investigates rural residents' knowledge of the thin-spined porcupine and its uses within two protected areas. We also examine residents' behaviour and perceptions about wildlife conservation. One hundred twenty-five semi-structured interviews were conducted with rural residents of the Una Wildlife Refuge and the Serra do Conduru State Park. Local knowledge was higher among males with lower levels of formal education who were current or past hunters. Negative behaviour occurs among residents in both protected areas. There is a need for greater control of potential threats such as hunting, use of fire and deforestation, which are inconsistent with the existence of protected areas and conservation of the thin-spined porcupine. Information provided by this study can improve and promote actions within the National Action Plan for the conservation of C. subspinosus.

Impacts of the Broadband Telecommunication Opportunities Program in Michigan Urban Communities

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) was used to increase broadband adoption and utilization across the United States as part of the economic recovery after the 2008 recession. Part of this act implemented a program called the Broadband Telecommunication Opportunities Program (BTOP), which focused on expanding effective broadband utilization in underserved communities through the development of library-based public computing centers and other educational outreach. This paper reports the results of two waves of surveys of 400 participants each, spanning 18 months, which were conducted in urban communities in Michigan served by libraries participating in a $6M BTOP grant project to upgrade their public Internet resources. The surveys tracked perceptions of broadband services and their utilization in public libraries, residences, and other community locations. One of the major questions going into this project was whether or not urban poor residents were adopting and utilizing broadband through either a private connection or a public connection. If the former, then results would indicate a similar trend among urban poor as seen in the rest of the world. That is, home adoption of fixed landline broadband connections will be lower in our sample than in more wealthy areas, but mobile adoption of broadband devices and services would be increasing. The second question, with libraries across the U.S. losing funding and reducing hours, would be whether the implementation of programs and new computing centers from the ARRA BTOP increase broadband adoption and utilization leading to economic recovery in these urban poor communities?Over three-fifths of those surveyed as the project drew to a close were aware of the public computing center initiative at their local library, although only about one tenth were active participants. Among those using library computers at the time of the final survey, about a fourth indicated that they had noticed an improvement in library computing facilities. The above findings suggest that, while library access, public computing centers, and broadband awareness increases adoption of broadband at the home and mobile level. Thus, in order to increase broadband use among urban poor, other considerations may need to be adopted in addition to increased outreach and awareness projects about library broadband use.

Impact Assessment of Community Participation in Solid Waste Management Projects in Selected Areas of Faisalabad City

This paper attempts to determine the impact of community participation projects on the management of solid waste in some selected areas of Faisalabad, Pakistan. The government of the Punjab province initiated a project to upgrade the environment and solid waste management system in Faisalabad in different phases. This project was thought to be successful as it created a great sense of ownership among the residents of that particular society. With the help of questionnaire techniques, 800 households and shops in commercial areas were surveyed. The results showed that knowledge and awareness about the method of solid waste disposal changed greatly after a door-to-door campaign; at the same time, people gave good information regarding the in-house solid waste management of houses. Concerning the awareness projects on individual knowledge about health, the results have shown a highly significant impact of awareness campaigns on issues related to health awareness and practices for avoiding health diseases. Solid waste management became very common in the society after the initiation of the project. Daily visits of sanitary workers also motivated people to give waste to the sanitary workers rather than throwing it in the streets or along roadsides. The results have shown that the awareness campaign had a highly significant impact on the mindset of people. The behavior of people toward solid waste management has also been changed.

‘Community’ perceptions of a disaster risk reduction intervention at Santa Ana (Ilamatepec) Volcano, El Salvador

Recent years have seen an expanding array of studies by volcanologists to assess volcanic risk and hazard perceptions more accurately in at-risk communities. These studies reveal the importance of better understanding perception of risk, as it can directly or indirectly affect individual behaviour before and during volcanic crises. Perception studies to date, however, are predominantly quantitative in nature. The intricacies of community dynamics as well as the population's perceptions of development institutions themselves are rarely problematized. This paper presents results from a 5-month-long study conducted in Los Planes de La Laguna, a community impacted by the 2005 eruption of Santa Ana (Ilamatepec) volcano and Tropical Storm Stan in western El Salvador. This research investigated locals’ perceptions of a non-governmental organization (NGO) dedicated to reducing vulnerability to volcanic hazards. This study uses the qualitative methods of participant observation and in-depth interviews to investigate the effectiveness of NGO efforts to improve upon community hazard perceptions and overall preparedness. Somewhat contrary to the desired project outcomes, this research suggests that raised awareness and preparedness had been short-term, and that few NGO-initiated efforts continued even within a few months of their departure. Moreover, individuals allude to the frustrating, nebulous aspects of hazard awareness projects and the organizations administering them. This work explores the need to further investigate how project beneficiaries’ perceptions of disaster risk reducing institutions affect project outcome and overall risk perception. Broader implications include the need to qualitatively evaluate NGO strategies from the beneficiaries’ perspective.

P195 Outcomes in emergency admissions with lung cancer: a 1-year perspective from a teaching hospital

IntroductionNationally it is known that 23% of all cancers present as emergencies.1 Baseline data for all cancer-related admissions for 2008/2009 in the Trust demonstrated that patients with lung cancer had...

Local Initiatives to Link Farmers to Markets in Upland Laos

Upland communities in Laos have the benefit of access to relatively large tracts of land, compared with neighboring countries. Yet these communities use their resources mainly for subsistence production (Figure 1). Adding value to agricultural and forest products remains difficult: replacing products that are depleted in the wild with plantations takes time—often requiring a considerable initial investment in land preparation and maintenance—and there is little capital to invest in technology that could add value to products. In addition, poor road access keeps transport costs high and often it is difficult to store products and benefit from seasonal price changes. Underlying all these difficulties is a lack of information on markets: who are the customers, where are they based, how is the price set, what are the quality standards, how can we process, store, package, and handle products? Market awareness projects in northern Laos are showing that these sorts of challenges can be overcome.

Footsteps and memories: interpreting an Australian urban landscape through thematic walking tours

This article is concerned with the currently common deployment, under the rubric of cultural planning, of place‐making and local cultural heritage awareness projects. Such exercises sometimes seek to accommodate the impacts of de‐industrialisation and urban transformation by identifying and marking places of contemporary and historical significance, and interpreting them and their broader connections to people and to place. The article critically reflects upon a project conducted by the authors that developed two interpretive heritage walks in a large, working‐class suburb in Australia. This interpretive exercise afforded a valuable opportunity to investigate the contours of the place‐making process and its determinants. By tracing the development of the walks and their accompanying interpretive brochures, the article identifies and discusses a number of emergent key issues relating to social class, gender and ethnicity. In particular, it considers the interpretive opportunities and constraints presented by contracted cultural heritage research and its applications.

Getting the Message Across: Art and Craft in the Service of HIV/AIDS Awareness in South Africa

The struggle against the HIV/AIDS pandemic is one of the most serious challenges South Africa faces today. Great efforts have been and are being made to create awareness of the disease, utilizing a variety of strategies that range from straightforward educational messages in magazines, billboards, and radio/TV broadcasts, to more creative or artistic approaches in media such as film, drama, music, art, and crafts. Many of these projects (notably the Sarafina II drama production) have drawn criticism of some sort, usually focused on the perceived efficacy of the project, especially in relation to its cost or usage of resources. There sometimes appears to be an implicit expectation that HIV/AIDS awareness projects must state the “message” in simple, blunt, or easily comprehensible terms to “reach” people. This can be argued not only to be patronizing, but to disregard the complex ways in which visual stimuli are received and processed by diverse audiences. In this article, I will investigate three different creative visual art/craft initiatives that have been employed in South Africa in the past few years to create HIV/AIDS awareness. They comprise: first, HIV/AIDS community murals, sponsored by the Department of Health and painted primarily in townships and on university campuses throughout the country; secondly, a print portfolio/billboard project, involving local and international artists whose “fine art” prints are enlarged to billboard size and placed in high traffic areas in cities and townships; and thirdly, a craft project employing rural women in KwaZulu-Natal who produce beaded dolls, badges and wire baskets (imbenge) with an HIV/AIDS awareness message. The theoretical framework for this study is informed by semiotics and post-structuralism. It presumes that meaning is always constructed—both by the author/artist and by the recipient/viewer. Artists may want to convey clear educational messages, using seemingly unambiguous symbols and metaphors. However, as every signifier has multiple meanings, which constantly shift and slide, an artist cannot control how individual viewers will decode the message. In view of this, I will argue that it may be short-sighted to dismiss certain types of creative art projects around HIV/AIDS as incomprehensible or inaccessible and therefore ineffective in raising awareness of the disease and associated issues such as stigmatization.

Synergistic Literacies: Fostering Critical and Technological Literacies in Teaching a Legal Research Methods Course

[Extract] Public and professional discussion about the behaviour of lawyers is perennial to the point of cliché. Commentary about perceived inadequacies is also commonplace, but it is ordinarily based on anecdotal, though powerful, “war” stories. It seems, however, that legal educators and regulators must tackle the “ethics issue” with renewed vigour if legal institutions are to retain moral, and perhaps even spiritual, relevance. Ethics awareness projects are, of course, under way in many places (for example, the American Bar Association’s “Ethics 2000” programme); however, often they proceed with little direct information from the mass of legal practitioners as to their own perceived standards of conduct. As legal educators we can only design and teach ethics courses and help the legal profession describe the desirable attributes of the future lawyer using indirect information as to what is needed. My concern here is that legal ethics programmes, both in and after law school, may be proceeding on a comfortable, but possibly unfounded, assumption – that as legal educators or regulators we can simply appeal to the supposed better nature of our students and members in order to improve attitudes and, hence, behaviour. While, in my opinion, there is a link between lawyers’ attitudes/values and their behaviour, we first need to know about these attitudes and values.

Threats to the maleo Macrocephalon maleo and recommendations for its conservation

AbstractThe maleo Macrocephalon maleo (Megapodiidae; Galliformes) is a megapode, endemic to Sulawesi, Indonesia, that lays its eggs communally in geothermally or solar-heated soil. The majority of maleo nesting grounds are threatened to some degree and over one-third of known sites have been abandoned. Maleos are severely threatened by habitat degradation and uncontrolled egg-collecting. Hunting of adult birds is also contributing to their decline in some areas. Conservation measures implemented so far have not been sufficiently effective in preventing maleo population declines. In order to safeguard the maleo from further declines we recommend that the laws protecting the maleo and its habitat be strengthened as a matter of urgency and that long-term community conservation and environmental awareness projects be implemented. To achieve these goals we advocate the formation of a collaborative network of international NGOs, Indonesian conservationists, government departments and local communities.

Using a SANE Interdisciplinary Approach to Care of Sexual Assault Victims

Many hospitals have recognized the need to develop policies and procedures for female sexual assault victims' prompt access to emergency medical care and for collecting law enforcement evidence. At Lehigh Valley Hospital (Allentown, Penn), care in the emergency department (ED) for sexual assault victims was covered by oncall obstetricians and gynecologists. Although many aspects of rape management were in place, a busy ED with varying levels of physician response and exposure to the process of rape management contributed to a lack of standardized, objective, timely, and compassionate medical management of sexual assault victims. DEVELOPING THE PROGRAM: The Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner (SANE) interdisciplinary approach to care of sexual assault victims was implemented in May 1998. Community education and awareness projects emphasized prevention of sexual assault and domestic violence, as well as minimization of trauma for victims by promoting services that provide a supportive, caring, and healing environment. Comparing a baseline group of 130 sexual assault victims with 39 patients who were evaluated after the SANE approach was implemented indicated increased clinical interaction and significant improvements in quality indicators, such as completeness of evaluation and information gathered relevant to medical-legal issues. Law enforcement staff developed a more collaborative relationship with SANE examiners through the interdisciplinary team approach. Collaborative relationships were initiated with several other hospitals in the hospital's integrated delivery system to help offset some of the program's training, continuing education, and on-call costs and to allow for joint outcomes collection. The SANE program became a core ED service in July 1999.

Responding to challenges: the training and educating of the information professional for the next millennium

“… in most fields the issue of the professional competence and qualification of individuals is viewed as an integral part of the quality assurance of organisations and the services that they provide.” This view has long been embraced within the librarianship profession. Librarians and information professionals have a strong culture of responding to new opportunities in professional development to ensure that their skills meet the continually changing environments in which they work. This is illustrated by initiatives such as the Library Associations programme of Continuing Professional Development (CPD), Masters programmes for librarians entering management positions, increased availability of qualifications and training for paraprofessional staff and the adoption of the government instituted system of National Vocational Qualifications (NVQs) and Scottish Vocational Qualifications (SNVQs). Two further initiatives have been undertaken as a response to concern about the pace of change and the importance of sustaining an adequately skilled professional workforce. Firstly, the Library and Information Studies Training and Education Network (LISTEN), is working with employers, the profession and educational institutions to identify, CPD and post‐qualification competencies required when staff have been in post for several or more years. Secondly, the Electronic Libraries Programme (eLib) which aims to accelerate the development and uptake of the ‘electronic library’ has recognised the need for CPD and has funded a number of training and awareness projects including EduLib. This paper will examine the role, education and training of information professionals from two distinct points of view. First the paper will concentrate on initial undergraduate training which students receive at an established Department of Library and Information Studies — with particular regard to the training and education of business information in order to prepare students for the global business world. The second part of the paper will deal with an aspect of continuing professional development for which there is an increasing demand in academic libraries — teaching skills for librarians. The paper will focus on EduLib — a development project which aims to provide a nationally recognised and accredited network of trainers in academic libraries.

Environmental Awareness Projects for Children

(1972). Environmental Awareness Projects for Children. School Health Review: Vol. 3, No. 4, pp. 19-22.