Practice Partners Research Articles

Законодательство как фактор развития государственно-частного партнерства в сфере информационных технологий

Introduction. Public-private partnership (PPP) in world practice has established itself as an effective tool for interaction between business and government in the implementation of socially significant projects. The state got the opportunity to attract a private investor to solve strategic problems of social development. Information technology (IT) is no exception. In the context of globalization and digitalization of the economy, development of information technology sphere is becoming highly relevant, since it determines the level of information security and development of the country as a whole. Theoretical analysis. The main research method was the analysis of the basic laws governing public-private partnerships in the IT sphere both in Russia and abroad, which made it possible to identify the differences in the PPP legislation of different countries. Empirical analysis. The analysis of the legislation of different countries in the field of public-private partners in relation to the IT industry enabled the authors to divide countries into four groups, depending on the characteristics and level of its development. The first group of countries is characterized by the absence of a law on PPP at the state level, application of international legal norms and availability of methodological recommendations in the field of PPP. In the second group, countries have a fundamental law on PPP without specifying the spheres of its application, or a list of spheres has been formed and it includes the IT industry. In the third group, there is a general law on PPP with a list of specific areas that does not include the sphere of information technology. The fourth group of countries has no legislation on PPP. Results. The authors identified the problems of legislation in the field of public-private partnership in relation to IT projects. In particular, it was determined that Russian laws in the field of PPP have relatively more specificity in relation to IT projects than foreign ones. However, this is far from always being good and creates artificial restrictions for the development of this mechanism for attracting a private partner to finance IT projects that are significant for society. The highlighted shortcomings of the Russian legislation will help to improve efficiency and controllability of PPP projects in the IT sphere, when eliminated.

Assessment decision making in vocational education and training

Assessment decision making is a highly contextual phenomenon. In this paper, we explore this topic in vocational education and training (VET). Thirty-eight teachers from five Norwegian upper secondary schools were interviewed before and after an 18-month research–practice partnership. To understand assessment decision making in VET, we draw on two bodies of knowledge: (a) research on teachers' decision making in assessment and (b) conceptualizations of teachers' professional capital. Four main findings emerged from the analysis: three assessment-related dilemmas and one professional capital-related dilemma. We then discuss how these aspects of practice affect assessment decision making and the implications for developing VET teachers' decisional capital.

Retirement Center Worker Sleep Health Assessment During the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Sleep health disturbances can increase risks for workplace injury, error, and poor worker health. Essential workers have reported sleep disturbances since the COVID-19 pandemic onset, which may jeopardize their health and safety. The aims of this project were to assess sleep health among Continuing Care Retirement Community (CCRC) workers, examine potential differences between worker types, and describe the self-perceived impact of COVID-19 on workers' workload and sleep. Through an academic-practice partnership, this needs assessment used a cross-sectional design that collected self-report data during fall 2020 from CCRC workers. Guided by the Workplace Health Model, survey questions included work characteristics, sleep health, and COVID-19 impact on sleep and workload. Ninety-four respondents completed the survey across multiple departments. Respondents (n = 34, 36.2%) reported sleeping below recommended hours on workdays. The majority scored above the population mean on Patient-Reported Outcomes Measurement (PROMIS) measures of sleep disturbance (n = 52, 55.3%), sleep-related impairment (n = 49, 52.1%), and fatigue (n = 49, 52.1%). Differences in workday total sleep time and fatigue were noted among shift workers versus nonshift workers, with shift workers reporting less sleep and more fatigue. Shorter sleep duration was noted among respondents working shifts 10 or more hours compared with those working 8 hours. Pandemic-related workload increase was reported by 22.3% (n = 21) of respondents, with 17% (n = 16) noting more than one type of workload change. Since COVID-19 onset, 36.2% (n = 34) reported no sleep changes and 35.1% (n = 33) reported sleeping less. A medium, positive relationship was found between increased changes in work due to COVID-19 and increased difficulties sleeping (r = .41, n = 73, p = .000). Proper sleep health is essential to workplace safety and worker health. By assessing sleep health during a crisis, occupational health nurses can identify opportunities to support worker health and safety, through sleep education, monitoring for sleepiness and fatigue, ensuring countermeasures are available (e.g., caffeine), and assessing for opportunities to change organizational policies.

Nursing Students’ Duty to Care Amidst the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Cross-Sectional Survey

Background: Research examining undergraduate nursing students’ duty to care during the COVID-19 pandemic is lacking, thus presenting many challenges in nursing education. Significance: This research adds to the literature about nursing students’ duty to care and willingness to respond in the clinical setting early in the COVID-19 pandemic. This research will inform nurse leaders and regulators on ways to safely mobilize a nursing workforce to fill critical nursing roles needed during a pandemic. Methodology: This research study utilized a descriptive, cross-sectional design. The Nash Duty to Care Scale© was used to examine nursing students’ duty to care early in the COVID-19 pandemic at two nursing programs in New York. Results: Most of the nursing students (65.8%) reported a duty to care or a willingness to respond during the COVID-19 pandemic. Perceived obligation and perceived risk were the most predictive subscales between the low and high duty to care groups. Conclusions and recommendations: It is suggested that nursing schools maintain adequate emergency response resources (i.e. personal protective equipment and effective communication) for students in the clinical setting. Enhanced academic and practice partnerships with clear and specific nursing student policies and procedures are needed.

Stakeholder Analysis and Their Attitude towards PPP Success

The development of a wide range of infrastructure projects based on the idea of cooperation between the public and private sector, known as PPPs, contributes to fulfilling social and economic needs, rises the quality of life, and supports sustainable development. The expected results of these undertakings cannot be comparable; however, some PPPs are perceived as a success and some are not. The research is based on the stakeholder concept and the idea that different stakeholder groups present different attitudes to the success of PPPs and are motivated by different issues including economic, social, and environmental factors. Based on this assumption, a conceptual model of PPP stakeholders’ identification and classification according to the attributes of preferred benefits, related to dimensions of sustainable development and engagement, including time and scope perspective, has been derived and tested. This exploratory analysis improves and tests the benefit–engagement conceptual model of PPP stakeholders’ identification. This contributes to the theory and concepts of sustainable infrastructure investment and public–private partnership practice.

Equity and Social Justice in Research Practice Partnerships in the United States

Research–practice partnerships (RPPs) have grown rapidly in the last decade in the United States to challenge traditional notions of education research by emphasizing the importance of researchers and practitioners working together in a spirit of mutuality to develop research questions, collect data, implement interventions, and analyze and use findings. RPP scholarship in the United States has historically advocated for the need to pay more focused attention to issues of equity and justice. To address that need, this literature review examined how RPPs in the United States have addressed equity and justice in their work. Based on five dimensions of equity and justice that could be observed within the 149 examples of RPP work we reviewed, we identified 17 exemplar projects that explicitly and effectively forefront equity and justice in RPPs, what we call equity-focused. Implications suggest that researchers and practitioners who have initiated equity-orientated RPPs may reflect on the partnerships’ existing strengths, specifically related to the five interconnected features that characterize equity-focused RPPs, to sustain and advance equity and justice through RPPs.

Supporting the transition to practice: preceptor behaviors that foster a positive student preceptorship experience.

Preceptors support nursing students when transitioning to the professional nursing role. This study explored student perceptions of preceptor characteristics that promoted or hindered learning. A Likert-scale survey including two open-ended questions was sent to 571 nursing students completing a preceptorship experience. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze responses to the Likert-scale items. Qualitative analysis was completed on the two exploratory questions to extract themes. Students rated the preceptor between 4=Very Good and 5=Outstanding for all items. No significant differences in scores were found when comparing results between programs. Themes assisting in learning included: increasing independence gradually and pushing out of comfort zone. Themes identified that hindered learning included: doubting self and being pushed aside. Future implications include communicating preceptorship objectives and providing ways to apply research to practice. These findings can guide collaboration between academic and practice partners toassist with transition to practice.

Public-Private Partnership for the Development of Space Sector in the United States and Great Britain

The article provides an analysis of modern trends in building public-private partnership (PPP), gives an overview of key studies devoted to this subject in general and PPPs in the field of space activities in particular. The authors analyze the practice of public-private partnerships in the U. S. and Great Britain on the examples of specific mechanisms, their key features, advantages and disadvantages that determine the possibility of their application in different areas of government-business cooperation in the field of space exploration. In order to find possible ways for direct application or adaptation of this experience in Russia for organizing space exploration PPPs the researchers concluded that the level of high-tech production in this country is insufficient and significant administrative barriers for attracting private sector into the space industry are still present.

Learning at the Boundaries of Research and Practice: A Framework for Understanding Research–Practice Partnerships

Given the rapid growth of research–practice partnerships (RPPs), we need a framework that helps the field understand how RPPs can facilitate organizational learning in service of local educational improvement and transformation. Drawing on sociocultural and organizational learning theories, we argue that learning can happen for the organizations engaged in RPPs at the boundaries of research and practice. Such learning is evident when there are changes in collective knowledge, policies, and routines of participating organizations, with implications for longer-term outcomes of educational improvement and transformation locally and more broadly. The degree to which organizations can make use of the ideas from the RPP is dependent, in part, on the presence and design of boundary infrastructure and the preexisting organizational capacities and conditions. We conclude with implications for those engaging in RPPs and future research.

‘Every partnership [… is] an emotional experience’: towards a model of partnership support for addressing the emotional challenges of student–staff partnerships

ABSTRACT The practice of student–staff partnerships is fundamentally about relationships. As new partnerships are formed, and existing power relations challenged, people experience a range of emotions. Despite their importance, there are few studies that have systematically researched the emotional challenges of student–staff partnership. Through a humanistic approach focused on analysing participants’ experiences of partnership we found that varying degrees of hope, pride, anxiety, and frustration were experienced by both students and staff in a curriculum development partnership project. We argue that effective partnership practices should recognise and support the emotional wellbeing of student and staff partners. Drawing upon the effective characteristics of partnership support found in this research and the broader literature, we propose a flexible support model drawing on (1) peer support, (2) mentoring, and (3) independent reflective writing. Partnership practice that actively supports the emotions involved in working in the partnership may encourage more partnerships in the future.

Civilian-Military Collaboration before and during COVID-19 Pandemic—A Systematic Review and a Pilot Survey among Practitioners

Due to the similarity in skills and assets, Civilian-Military collaboration has emerged as one of the most reliable partnerships during the disaster and public health emergency management to address all necessary elements of surge capacity, i.e., staff, stuff, structure (space), and systems. This study aimed to evaluate this collaboration before and during the coronavirus 2019 pandemic. The outcomes of the systematic review revealed several published reports on successful civilian-military collaboration and proposed a need for further improvement. One hundred sixty-six individuals from 19 countries responded to nine questions, included in an online survey with the possibility to leave comments if necessary. The questionnaire referred to elements such as command and control, safety, communication, assessment, triage, treatment, and transport, as the crucial components of emergency management. The comprehensive examination of the survey results together with registered comments revealed a possible improvement in collaboration particularly on the strategic levels, i.e., meetings at the command-and-control level, safety, communication, and networking issues. While logistic collaboration seemed to be unchanged, the practical parts of the collaboration, i.e., clinical and non-clinical operational partnership (Triage and Treatment), mutual education, training, and operational understanding of each organization remained unchanged. In conclusion, although the current pandemic may have facilitated a more intense collaboration between civilian and military healthcare organizations, it lacks practical partnership and operative engagement, representing two crucial elements necessary for harmony and compatibility of both systems. Such collaboration may require a political will and perhaps a mutual civilian-military authority.

Do auditors’ incentives affect materiality assessments of prior-period misstatements?

We examine whether auditors' incentives affect materiality assessments of prior-period misstatements. Interviews with global network firm partners reveal consistency across firms in the process used to assess prior-period misstatements and highlight points in the process where judgments are most susceptible to auditors’ conscious or subconscious biases. In related empirical tests, we find that auditors assess misstatements as less material (i.e., misstatements are disclosed less prominently) when auditors face greater engagement risk (comprised of the risk of litigation and reputation loss) or have greater incentives to please important clients. These effects only occur when auditor incentives to avoid further litigation or client losses within an audit office are most salient and when the quantitative magnitude of the misstatement is in a range subject to greater professional judgment. Thus, we identify boundary conditions on the extent to which auditor incentives affect materiality judgments. Finally, additional tests suggest that neither local engagement partners nor professional practice partners are immune from these incentives. Our study should be informative to audit firms when designing and updating quality control structures.

Research practice partnership for schools and universities

ABSTRACT This paper aims to review the research paradigms of action research, narrative inquiry, and teacher research, mainly through the writings of John Elliott; F. Michael Connelly and D. Jean Clandinin; and Marilyn Cochran-Smith and Susan Landy Lytle respectively, for conceptual possibilities for fruitful schoolteacher and University researcher partnerships. This study seeks to survey the focal points relevant for the concerns of practice, theory and partnership to give the reader an introduction with an intention to further develop these practitioner research with the possibility of encouraging more fruitful School and University partnerships. This is with a view that teachers need to engage in educational research and that researchers’ perspectives can also contribute especially within partnerships. The literature review aims to survey the current stances of the research paradigms along with their features, research foci, methods, outcomes and others. These are then conceptualized for possible research--practice partnerships (RPP) within educational research in terms of definitions, conceptualizations, organizations, practice and enactment. The review also investigates possible partnership issues, problems and tensions of the research paradigms to suggest resolutions, guiding questions and recommendations for researchers and practitioners.

History of subjectivity in dispositif: changing arrangements of Vietnamese teachers’ meeting through lesson study for learning community

ABSTRACT This study examined research–practice partnerships (RPP) as a place where teachers (re)shape their discourses in a distinctive working arrangement through our case in Vietnam. In particular, it explored the concept of subjectivity in dispositifs, focusing on a heterogeneous ensemble of discursive and nondiscursive arrangements of collective activities formulating its members’ patterns of thought, practice, and identity. We present the historical roots of dispositif in Vietnamese schools and locate a new one in our RPP. There are two categories of dispositif in organizations from the Vietnamese public sector: assembly and gathering. We added a model of Lesson Study for Learning Community (LSLC) as a dispositif from Japan. The assembly is an authorized place for the members to convey information in a hierarchical order, while the gathering represents occasions for discussing issues in an egalitarian manner. The arrangements of discursive and socio-material conditions of the LSLC allowed the teachers to engage in equal and free discussions relying on their own emotions. Our case suggests that exploring dispositif of schools could improve the design of teacher professional learning through RPP.

How Learning Study could empower teachers to embrace education initiatives through research–practice partnership in Hong Kong

ABSTRACT The issue of the “research-practice gap” has been a long-standing concern in the education community. To tackle this issue, there is a growing interest in research–practice partnerships (RPPs) to connect research with practice by providing solutions for improving practice in schools. Although studies have reported that constructive relationship would produce positive outcomes, establishing long-term and mutually beneficial RPPs requires further investigation. In Hong Kong, the Learning Study (LS) approach with Variation Theory derived from phenomenology as the theoretical framework for pedagogical design has been adopted as a RPP model and has sustained for two decades. Like many RPPs models, LS approach has been facing different challenges when teachers are increasingly held accountable for meeting new demands from education reform. In this respect, this paper explores the challenges and strategies of the LS approach as a RPP model and its conditions of success. It reports a case study of how a group of English Language teachers adopting a LS approach while integrating education initiatives in their instructional design. The findings have identified trust building, teacher’s capacity building and visible outcomes as possible key factors of effective RPP model. This paper may shed light on the implementation of research–practice partnerships.

Research–practice partnerships through lesson study: learning through the three worlds of experiences

ABSTRACT Research practice partnerships through lesson study promises to deliver educational improvements in an era of evidence-based school and curriculum reforms. But learning from these experiences is not trivial but rather challenging in a complex ecology of classroom and school environments. So, how do researchers and practitioners learn from their experiences during their engagement in an RPP through lesson study? In this commentary, I introduce the idea of noticing possibilities from the three worlds of experiences – self, others, theories and observations – as the key to learn from these partnerships, as evidenced in the papers in this special issue.

Productive Tension in Research Practice Partnerships: Where Substance and Politics Intersect

The substantive and the political are part of most educational endeavors. Researchers tend to be cast as more powerful in interactions between research and practice. This structural historical hierarchy is at the backdrop of research-practice partnerships (RPP) and threatens to marginalize practitioners’ perspectives. Drawing on Bakhtin and Goffman and responding to a set of papers that transcend these structural constraints, I propose productive tension between alterity and affinity as a framework for analyzing and designing equitable and generative RPP. In broaching different design goals, set in different contexts, and employing different strategies, the papers in this special issue each depict a productive RPP in which all participants were able to contribute and influence each other, as well as advance efficacious and just educational programs. Part of RPPs’ contribution is having the values and practices of both research and practice intermingle and shape educational design and enactment. Therefore, what is needed is an interactional structure that invites participants to draw on their communities of affiliation while establishing a climate in which interactions operate on a level plane and each participant’s perspective is invited and valued, but open to face-saving modifications. I suggest that such conditions arise from a productive tension in the dialectic between alterity—the distinction between research and practice—and affinity—the kinship and identification with shared goals between research and practice.

The Revised AACN Essentials: Implications for Nursing Regulation

In April 2021, member deans of the American Association of Colleges of Nursing approved new standards for nursing education, with competency-based education as its foundation. The revised Essentials framework includes competencies organized within 10 domains at two levels of nursing education: entry level and advanced level. An advantage of this approach is greater clarity and confirmation regarding the knowledge and skills of nursing school graduates. Implementation of the new Essentials will occur over the next several years, and substantial changes to the curriculum, learning activities, and learner assessment is expected. The revision of the Essentials presents a significant opportunity for regulators to collaborate with schools and practice partners. To that end, this article provides an overview of the newly revised Essentials, discusses considerations and implications for nursing regulation, and puts forth recommendations for boards of nursing.

The 45 and Up Study: reflecting on contributions to global evidence using case studies on cardiovascular disease and smoking.

To describe the attributes that have underscored the success of the 45 and Up Study (the Study) and demonstrate its value by reflecting on two case studies: our research on socioeconomic inequalities in cardiovascular disease; and the harms of smoking. Type of program or service: The Study is the largest study of healthy ageing in Australia, and one of the biggest in the world; it recruited 267 357 participants aged 45 years and older from NSW, Australia from 2005 to 2009. For more than 15 years, it has provided high-quality evidence on a broad range of public health related issues. We reflect on its value using two research case studies. Four key attributes have enabled the success of the Study: its establishment as a collaborative resource, including early and ongoing engagement with researchers and policy and practice partners; its large scale, which makes it ideally suited to quantify associations between risk factors and health outcomes, including for high priority populations; high quality self-reported survey data; and linkage to routinely collected administrative data, including specialised data. Novel Australian findings on cardiovascular disease (CVD) and smoking illustrate how the Study has contributed to national and international evidence, informing policy and practice. Results on CVD demonstrated individual-level education-related inequalities in CVD incidence and mortality, and greater use of pharmacotherapy for secondary prevention of CVD, in people with low versus high socioeconomic status. In terms of smoking, Study data showed that current smokers have around three times the mortality of never-smokers; that even "light" smoking of <14 cigarettes per day doubles mortality; that quitting is beneficial at any age; that smoking increases the risk of multiple cancer types; and that smoking causes half of deaths in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander adults aged 45 years and over and more than one-third of all deaths in the population. This evidence has been used by more than 50 government and non-government organisations, including contributing to legislation, policy and national and international monitoring and reporting. The Study has fulfilled a vital role in public health research and practice in Australia, providing locally relevant data to enable research on health issues of importance, including health inequity. Through ongoing partnerships, the Study's data has contributed to international scientific evidence and been used to inform public health policy and practice. It has also been used as a focus for collaboration and capacity building.

ЕКОНОМІЧНІ МЕХАНІЗМИ СТИМУЛЮВАННЯ РОЗВИТКУ ВІДНОВЛЮВАНОЇ ЕНЕРГЕТИКИ В ЄС ТА УКРАЇНІ

The experience of the EU and Ukraine in stimulating the development of renewable energy is analyzed. Economic instruments that have become widespread in the EU are considered, namely, Feedin-Tariff, Feed-in-Premium, as well as systems of quotas and "green" certificates. An analysis of the effectiveness of these support tools was performed. It was found that EU countries are gradually abandoning support for the development of renewable energy in the form of Feed-in-Tariff and moving to more market-based support mechanisms, i.e., Feed-in-Premium and holding auctions for the distribution of support quotas. The advantages of the support mechanism in the form of auctions are shown, at the same time, certain problematic issues that may arise in case of poor design of auctions are indicated. It is noted that in order to achieve the effectiveness of the auction model of support for producers of "green" energy, it is necessary to introduce auction ceiling prices and ensure a high level of competition at auctions. Appropriate requirements for the financial capacity of bidders should be introduced as well as the duration of the project implementation period should be carefully selected. The state of affairs regarding the stimulation of the development of renewable energy in Ukraine was considered. It is emphasized that the introduction of the "green" tariff in Ukraine caused an increase in the share of renewable energy in the energy balance of the country, at the same time, due to the rapid development of renewable energy, the debts of the State Enterprise "Guaranteed Buyer" to the producers of "green" energy and problems with the balancing of the energy system arose. It is shown that in the near future it is planned, as in the EU member states, to more widely apply incentive tools that lead to competition between producers of "clean" energy and a reduction in the cost of renewable energy. It is noted that in Ukraine it is necessary to take into account modern global, in particular, European trends in stimulating the development of renewable energy and apply more diverse support mechanisms, for example, the spread of the practice of public-private partnership, flexible depreciation of capital investments in renewable energy, financial incentives for consumers to purchase equipment for generation of "green" energy, investment grants, etc.