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Are education systems converging toward a global model of teacher education or do local models tend to predominate in spite of attempts to reform them? How much do global, national, and local cultures shape and condition future teachers’ opportunities to learn to teach? How do these opportunities influence teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge? In this chapter we use data from the IEA’s first study of the effectiveness of pre-service teacher education in order to investigate teacher education policy, program structure, and outcomes. Using multilevel modeling we found that across countries individual characteristics have a similar and powerful influence on what future teachers come to know at the end of their pre-service programs. The effects of teacher education curriculum on future teachers’ mathematics pedagogical content knowledge reaffirm the prevalence of local cultures on the implementation of an increasingly globalized ideal. We conclude that while the provision of teacher education shares many common features in goals and structure across countries, it is strongly influenced by local conditions and norms, and by cultural notions of the knowledge that is considered essential – framing how quality is to be defined and operationalized – when learning to teach.

This chapter reflects on xCHANGE, a month-long festival marking International Women's Day (IWD) at Birmingham City University, UK. The author first problematizes expectations of IWD and then outlines the origins of the festival, detailing both practical aspects and program content. The chapter then considers the festival through a lens of “power geometry” (Massey, 1993) in which female academics are positioned in distinct ways in relation to flows and interconnections of power within the university. Does the xCHANGE festival disrupt or merely reflect this power geometry? Does it create conditions for women to thrive in academia?

Earthworks are the embankments and cuttings that allow a railway to maintain a certain line, level and grade through the landscape. Earth embankments consist of an engineered bank of earth that carries the railway above the natural ground. A cutting is used to carry the railway through ground with a natural level above the line of the railway. Modern (post 1960s) earthworks are carefully engineered to perform well. However, many railways run on earthworks that were constructed over 100 years ago without the use of mechanised plant. The quality of construction of older earthworks was often poor compared with present-day engineering practice. Ageing of the earthwork structures, and the greater demands of heavier and faster trains and climatic change, means that earthworks suffer ultimate and serviceability failures that can present operational difficulties. Older earthworks that fail or do not perform well require maintenance and repair, and sometimes complete replacement. This chapter explores the main engineering considerations for modern earthworks, and the challenges associated with older earthworks including their modes of failure and upgrade and repair.

This chapter presents the indirect preferences for all full rank Gorman and Lewbel demand systems. Each member in this class of demand models is a generalized quadratic expenditure system (GQES). This representation allows applied researchers to choose a small number of price indices and a function of income to specify any exactly aggregable demand system, without the need to revisit the questions of integrability of the demand equations or the implied form and structure of indirect preferences. This characterization also allows for the calculation of exact welfare measures for consumers, either in the aggregate or for specific classes of individuals, and other valuations of interest to applied researchers.

The purpose of this contribution is the investigation and the assessment of François Perroux’s book – Unités Actives et Mathématiques Nouvelles – Révision de la théorie de l’équilibre économique général (Perroux, 1975a) – in connection with the research program he initiated before and during the Second World War. Concerning the analytical relevance of this book there is no consensus. According to some economists it has to be considered as the masterpiece of Perroux’s intellectual project which provides an alternative approach to the usual theory of general economic equilibrium (GEE). Others think that today the book is almost entirely forgotten and it does not help really to improve Perroux’s general research project. We try to set here our own view combining two ways of proceeding in the investigation about the relevance of the book. The first one develops an analysis of Unités Actives as dispassionate as possible, avoiding taking into account the personality as well as the social and political views of François Perroux. The second favors a retrospective approach relating the 1975 book to the previous contributions of the author. The first three sections of our contribution are dedicated to Perroux’s contributions written before his attempt to “revise” the usual version of the GEE theory. The five following sections are devoted to the direct contents of the “revision” of this theory and tries to propose a global assessment of it.

Pew and Mavor (1998) called for an integrative representation of human behavior for use in models of individual combatants and organizations. Models with integrated representation of behavior have only been achieved at rudimentary levels according to those performing the studies (e.g. Pew & Mavor, 1998; Tulving, 2002) and those building the models (e.g. Warwick et al., 2002). This chapter will address aspects of cognitive performance that are important to incorporate into models of combat based on acceptance of theory, strength of empirical data, or for other reasons such as to bridge gaps where incomplete knowledge exists about cognitive behavior and performance. As a starting point, this chapter will assess which of Pew and Mavor’s recommendations are still appropriate as determined by a review of selected literature on cognition and its representation. We will also provide some review and extensions of key literature on cognition and modeling and suggest a way ahead to close the remaining gaps. Different aspects of cognition are described with recent findings, and most are followed by an example of how they have been represented in computer models or a discussion of challenges to their representation in modeling.

The subject matter of psychology can be illustrated by addressing the questions, ‘who am I?’, ‘what do I spend my time doing?’ and ‘reflecting on my life, where have I come from and where am I going?’. I am a human being and also more generally an animal. I am a biological entity and also a psychological entity. I have an identity and a personality. I am an individual and also a member of a social system. I am similar to other human beings but also different. In some respects I am normal and in other respects abnormal.

The railway track system is the platform by which loads from moving trains are transferred to the underlying soil or supporting infrastructure such as bridges. The most common type of railway track system is ballasted track, which has been in use for over a century. Ballasted track has proved versatile. It can be constructed using locally available materials and with modifications to the rails and sleepers, crossings transferring trains from one route to another can be created. The structure of a ballasted track system consists of two main parts. The upper portion, termed the superstructure, comprises the rails, fastenings and sleepers. It is formed of components whose shape, stiffness and strength are designed and closely controlled. Below the superstructure is the substructure, which comprises the ballast and sub-ballast. Although the materials used in the substructure may have been specified, their engineering properties and geometric placement are less well controlled. In this chapter, we will explore how a typical ballasted track system transfers load to the ground and the ways in which the track form deteriorates, requiring maintenance and eventually renewal.