Open Success Research Articles

Teacher perceptions of A-level music: tension, dilemmas and decline

AbstractA-level music, a qualification taken most often in English and Welsh school contexts around the age of 18, has been a long-standing feature of the musical training of many musicians. Historically bound up with Western European Art Music, the qualification has somewhat broadened its horizons in recent times, though with mixed success in opening up new ways of thinking about music. Recent research has highlighted the seemingly precarious nature of A-level music in many English schools. The reasons for this picture of decline are highly complex and difficult to disentangle, and are part of a much broader diminishing of creative subjects in the school curriculum. Decreasing numbers of A-level music entries run somewhat counter to popular policy discourse, which celebrates flagship announcements of £79 million given to Music Education Hubs in 2019–2020, and 2018 survey results that reported more than 700,000 children learning to play a musical instrument through music hub provision. However, behind these headlines, although there are many children having the opportunity to learn a musical instrument, few continue through to A-level and beyond. Despite its declining numbers, A-level music is recognised as a valuable qualification amongst music teachers, offering something distinct from graded music examinations and other Level 3 musical qualifications. This article presents the results of a recent nationwide survey of A-level music teachers to offer an insight into teacher perceptions of current A-level music specifications, the extent to which it prepares students for entry into higher musical education, and its appropriateness for aspiring young musicians.

Opening Up Military Innovation: Causal Effects of ‘Bottom-Up’ Reforms to U.S. Defense Research

When investing in research and development (R&D), institutions must decide whether to take a top-down approach â?? soliciting a particular technology â?? or a bottom-up approach in which innovators suggest ideas. This paper examines a reform to the U.S. Air Force Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program that transitioned from topics, which solicit specific technologies, to topics, which invite firms to suggest any new technology that may be useful to the Air Force. The reform seeks to address challenges facing military R&D, in particular a less innovative defense industrial base. We show that the Open program attracts new entrants, defined as younger firms and those without previous defense SBIR awards. In a regression discontinuity design that offers the first causal evaluation of a defense R&D program, we show that winning an Open award increases future venture capital investment, non-SBIR defense contracting, and patenting. Conventional awards have no effect on these outcomes but do increase the chances of future defense SBIR contracts, fostering incumbency. The bottom-up approach appears to be a mechanism behind Open's success. For example, winning has a positive effect on innovation even in less specific Conventional topics. The results suggest that government (and perhaps private sector) innovation could benefit from more bottom-up, decentralized approaches that reduce barriers to entry, minimize lock-in advantages for incumbents, and attract a wider range of new entrants.

Opening Up Military Innovation: Causal Effects of 'Bottom-Up' Reforms to U.S. Defense Research

Organizations investing in R&D must decide whether to solicit specific technologies or allow innovators to suggest ideas. Using administrative data, we study the “Open” reform to U.S. Air Force R&D procurement, which invited firms to suggest any new potentially useful technology. The new program was run simultaneously with the traditional top-down “Conventional” program. Our regression discontinuity design offers the first causal evaluation of a defense R&D program. We document benefits from winning an Open award for VC funding, military technology, and innovation, and no benefits from Conventional, which instead fosters incumbency. The bottom-up approach appears to help explain Open's success.

Financial Reform and Financing Decisions of Listed Firms in Zimbabwe

We examine the impact of the economic reform programme on the financing choices of Zimbabwean listed companies. Using the published accounts of a sample of companies, we show that listed firms rely heavily on external finance, especially short-term bank financing. We estimate an eclectic econometric model of firms' capital structure based on key predictions from the theory of finance, augmented by variables aimed at capturing the impact of Zimbabwe's reform programme. The analysis shows that an orthodox model has little explanatory power over firms' capital structure in the pre-reform period, but in the post-reform period it does better. The differences between the pre-reform and post-reform era suggest that the reforms achieved partial success in opening up the capital markets and improving the transparency of firm financing behaviour.

An Appreciation of the Contribution of Arthur Humes to Copepod Systematics

Arthur Humes had a long and distinguished career in biology. His first publication was in 1938 and his first paper on copepods was in 1941. Since then he has produced an incredible 252 publications on copepods. Arthur is best known to the members of The Crustacean Society as the founding editor of the Journal of Crustacean Biology but, in the copepod research community, he is recognised as being responsible for opening up one of the four main fields of copepod systematics: the taxonomy and biodiversity of copepods associated with, and parasitic on, marine invertebrates. Starting virtually from scratch, building a new field has required an immense volume of descriptive taxonomy. By providing this he has established the basic framework of knowledge on these groups— the knowledge base, which has, in recent years, provided phylogeneticists with an incredibly rich source of data. Arthur Humes’s success in opening up the field of invertebrate associates depended initially on his recognition that virtually any marine macroinvertebrate was a potential host to copepods. In 1993, in the Maxilliped lecture given when he was president of the World Association of Copepodologists, Humes calculated that associated copepods are known from only 1.14% of the 151,400 species of potential marine invertebrate hosts worldwide (Humes, 1994). On these calculations, the amount of descriptive taxonomy remaining to be done is enormous. HIS METHODS

New Land is not enough: Agricultural performance of New Lands settlement in West Africa

For centuries onchocerciasis, or river blindness, has contributed to the underpopulation of fertile river basins in much of the West African savanna. For this reason, an 11 -country program initiated in 1974 to control river blindness disease was expected to increase total crop production and improve living standards. Farm management data from 15 sites show that despite the control program's success in opening up new land, the farmers moving back into these areas were successful in increasing and stabilizing their incomes at only five of the 15 sites. Two of the major factors that explained these low success rates were the highly negative policy environment and lack of appropriate technology and supports for intensive cereal production in the drier semi-arid basins.

Changing trends in clinical investigation.

Changing trends in American medicine, medical education, and research have for many years been favorite subjects for messages from chairmen. Nevertheless, since this represents the Centennial Meeting of the Section on Experimental Medicine and Therapeutics, it seems timely to discuss briefly a few of the problems related to the dynamic developments in science in terms of their impact on investigation. The word clinical is derived from the Greek word klinikos which means bed; hence, Dr. Fuller Albright pointed out 15 years ago: Since animals do not sleep in beds, it is quite clear that 'clinical investigation' has primarily to do with the investigation of sick people and is concerned only secondarily, if at all, with sick laboratory animals. 1 One could argue the restrictions imposed by the above statement. Few would disagree that the greatest contributions from investigation have come from success in opening up new knowledge of

Changing trends in clinical investigation.

Changing trends in American medicine, medical education, and research have for many years been favorite subjects for messages from chairmen. Nevertheless, since this represents the Centennial Meeting of the Section on Experimental Medicine and Therapeutics, it seems timely to discuss briefly a few of the problems related to the dynamic developments in science in terms of their impact on investigation. The word clinical is derived from the Greek word klinikos which means bed; hence, Dr. Fuller Albright pointed out 15 years ago, Since animals do not sleep in beds, it is quite clear that 'clinical investigation' has primarily to do with the investigation of sick people and is concerned only secondarily, if at all, with sick laboratory animals. 1 One could argue the restrictions imposed by the above statement. Few would disagree that the greatest contributions from investigation have come from success in opening up new knowledge of