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This paper describes the work that was necessary to eliminate CFC (chlorofluorocarbon) cleaning solvents in the post‐soldering defluxing operation during assembly of printed wiring assemblies (PWA) in an off‐shore electronics manufacturing plant. The pressures—both external and internal—to utilise environmentally clean processes are becoming increasingly great in off‐shore manufacturing facilities, just as throughout the US. However, as will be shown in this paper, producers of electronic equipment must continue to ensure that a high level of product performance and reliability is not sacrificed when going to more environmentally favourable materials and processes. The study described here consisted of examining several water‐soluble flux materials, measuring ionic contamination levels of both Freon® TMS‐cleaned and water‐cleaned assemblies, and functional testing of the assembled devices at various levels of functional test severity. Materials, methods and actual physical data are presented in this paper.

This piece explores the philosophical origins of sense-making as defined in Brenda Dervin’s methodology.

This conceptual paper locates the origins of sense-making's rich ontological, epistemological and etymological heritage to the Classical Greece and the Pre-Socratic period. The Greek origins of sense-making‘s philosophical undercurrents surface again in Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit before the idea is picked up again in twentieth century philosophy and library science.

This is a conceptual paper and no empirical findings are presented.

This paper makes an original contribution to the study of information seeking and to sense making theory and methodology.

Much research into outcomes of doctoral learning focuses on employability, or the dearth of academic employment in relation to doctoral graduate expectations, emphasising precarity of academic future work. This new work begins with and moves beyond employment issues, highlighting professional practice and personal knowledge development and impact.

Much doctoral education research focuses on the academic identities of postgraduates, their change and alignment to the work and experience of being a doctoral student and beyond, in academic or other jobs. This longitudinal work explores professional and social impact from doctoral research and transformational changes experienced and reported by graduates in two projects. Based on narrative interviewing turned into case studies, it asks fundamental questions about the purpose and impact of postgraduate knowledge.

Respondents emphasised change in their sense of personal, academic and professional identity; immediate impact on professional practice leading to job change, status, changes in practices and longer-term impacts of further influences on professional practice, some international in reach.

This small-scale study has widespread implications for understanding the impact of postgraduate knowledge on professional practice and personal development.

The work could influence doctoral student intentions and the focus of doctoral programmes.

Postgraduate knowledge is seen as crucial in theorised and practical contributions to social development.

This longitudinal work generates new knowledge, answering questions: What is the purpose of postgraduate knowledge? Who benefits from results? What is the impact from the research? How are outcomes put into professional practice? It found significant developments in professional practice and personal development.

This paper reports findings on employee participation in decision making from a cross‐section of employees in the public, private and local government sectors in Western Australia. A contextual model of participation relevant to the prevailing industrial climate was developed, then tested using a structural equations modelling approach. Results suggest that participative decision making (PDM) directly contributed to task variety and autonomy, and through autonomy, task identity. Employees perceived that PDM contributed to performance effectiveness and led to greater gains in the workplace. An unexpected result was that these benefits did not contribute to increased job satisfaction or commitment despite PDM having a direct positive influence on job satisfaction, which in turn increases commitment. These findings support arguments that employees believe participation in decision making offers them substantial benefits, but suggests they are more ambivalent about increasing task demands and the gains they receive for this extra effort.

Serials constitute the largest portion of the reference collection budget. Rapidly increasing prices and new titles compound the problem of finding adequate funds. Many libraries can no longer afford to automatically order new editions of standard or “landmark” reference serials. Yet while the process of budgetary decision‐making is often distasteful, it can be beneficial. Critical discussions of titles can reveal forgotten features of serials or alternative sources of information.

This study aims to conduct the first original research on mass fatality management in nearly 30 years.

A qualitative research design captured local perspectives within a culturally‐appropriate context to examine roles and responsibilities of government officials within the State of Tamil Nadu and District of Naggapattinam (spellings reflect the most commonly‐used local choice), India. Research data were gathered in the context of the Indian Ocean Tsunami that claimed nearly 300,000 lives across approximately 13 nations.

Local officials and residents faced unprecedented challenges during the hours immediately following the tsunami. These included removing debris that covered bodies, body identification, health and sanitation issues, and the necessity of creating mass graves. The findings identify prior experience with disasters, familiarity with the local area, the quality of pre‐existing networks among officials, a strong desire to rescue those yet living and the presence of linkages between government and non‐governmental organizations as critical factors affecting an expedited management process.

Practical implications include the value of general disaster training that can transcend specific circumstances, the pre‐establishment of mutual aid agreements, strong lines of horizontal and vertical cooperation and inter‐organizational coordination and an understanding of local culture and customs.

The paper contributes to scant social science understanding of mass fatality management processes and furthers a line of inquiry applicable to a wide variety of hazards such as pandemics, terrorism and natural events.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the experiences of displaced female textile sector workers.

A qualitative approach to data collection and interpretation forms the methodological basis of the study. In‐depth interviews were conducted with 14 female employees who were laid off from a large textile manufacturing facility in a southeastern state. Participants were selected through the local community college where they returned to school after losing their jobs.

A phenomenological interpretation of the responses led to the development of three emergent thematic areas connecting similarities and differences that surfaced across the participants' narratives. Key issues within the thematic areas point to the need for each participant to come to terms with the job loss, both emotionally and financially, and to decide where she would go from there.

The study focuses on women employed at a single manufacturing facility and within a single state in the southeastern USA. Implications of the meanings of participants' experiences for their community and for the future of employment in the US textile sector are considered.

The study provides an interpretation of the impact of textile sector dynamics on the lives of displaced workers and the local community.

The paper offers insight into the human side of industry dynamics and declining manufacturing employment figures. It also sheds light on the extent to which some displaced textile sector workers have pursued the educational options made available through government programs designed to provide assistance with education and retraining.

Measurements of the distribution pattern of several nutrients (ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, and phosphate) and indicators (dissolved oxygen and conductivity) were conducted along the river Coco Solo on the Caribbean coast of Panama. The project investigated the extent to which mangrove forests could act as a vegetative buffer zone between disturbed freshwater sources and coastal water. Upriver freshwater samples were collected in known areas of human disturbance to assess levels of the nutrients near points of origin and exhibited elevated concentrations of nutrients. Samples were taken along the mangrove estuary to study the concentrations of nutrients as they moved through the estuary into the ocean. Expected and observed values were compared to see whether concentration levels of the chemicals exhibited normal dilution patterns. Graphs show that the nutrient levels at the estuary points are significantly lower than expected through normal dilution, indicating the removal of nutrients through another mangrove mediated method. In this way, mangrove forests can act as effective coastal buffers of anthropogenic effects to the ocean environment. Further studies must be done to determine the actual removal mechanisms of nutrients in the mangrove estuarine system.

IT IS A FACT of life that people enjoy forming groups and associations of their like‐minded fellows, and a further fact that most groups fragment themselves from larger groups in order to pursue progressively more specialised common interests.

This promises to be a most interesting meeting on Information and the Environment. We are all vitally concerned. Most of us live, if not in conurbations, at least in towns and thus the countryside is our antidote; our escape. So, we are all interested in the countryside, we are all interested in planning because it affects us all, and most of us are concerned about pollution if only because we hear so much about it.