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This study aims to critically examine the effects of COVID-19 social discourses and policy decisions specifically on older adult volunteers in the UK, comparing the responses and their effects in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, providing perspectives on effects of policy changes designed to reduce risk of infection as a result of COVID-19, specifically on volunteer involvement of and for older adults, and understand, from the perspectives of volunteer managers, how COVID-19 restrictions had impacted older people’s volunteering and situating this within statutory public health policies.

The study uses a critical discourse approach to explore, compare and contrast accounts of volunteering of and for older people in policy, and then compare the discourses within policy documents with the discourses in personal accounts of volunteering in health and social care settings in the four nations of the UK. This paper is co-produced in collaboration with co-authors who have direct experience with volunteer involvement responses and their impact on older people.

The prevailing overall policy approach during the pandemic was that risk of morbidity and mortality to older people was too high to permit them to participate in volunteering activities. Disenfranchising of older people, as exemplified in volunteer involvement, was remarkably uniform across the four nations of the UK. However, the authors find that despite, rather than because of policy changes, older volunteers, as part of, or with the help of, volunteer involving organisations, are taking time to think and to reconsider their involvement and are renewing their volunteer involvement with associated health benefits.

Working with participants as co-authors helps to ensure the credibility of results in that there was agreement in the themes identified and the conclusions. A limitation of this study lies in the sampling method, as a convenience sample was used and there is only representation from one organisation in each of the four nations.

The paper combines existing knowledge about volunteer involvement of and for older adults.

This study explores factors that influence the initiation of leadership coaching relationships that include externally employed coaches and school administrators.

This qualitative research study includes semi-structured interviews, observations and documents collected across three academic years within the context of a university-based leadership coaching program. Participants included six leadership coaches and six school administrators who participated in the program.

Qualitative analysis indicates that gender and race, prior professional experience, pre-existing professional relationships and the complexity of the district’s organizational structure influence the initiation of the coaching relationship.

Confidentiality restrictions imposed by the program limit opportunities for member checking and other forms of triangulation. Additional data collection using more expansive research methods would help address this limitation.

This study contributes to the sparse literature about leadership coaching with school administrators by describing how different factors influence initiation coaching relationships.

Recovery Colleges were developed to support the recovery of people with mental health difficulties through courses co-produced by professionals and people with lived experience. This study aims to examine the use of Recovery Colleges to support people with dementia.

A survey was circulated to UK Recovery College and memory service staff, exploring provision, delivery and attendance of dementia courses. Open responses provided insight into participant views about recovery in post-diagnostic support and the practicalities of running dementia courses.

A total of 51 Recovery College staff and 210 memory service staff completed the survey. Twelve Recovery College dementia courses were identified across the UK. Three categories emerged from the qualitative data: post-diagnostic support, recovery in the context of dementia, challenges and areas of innovation.

This study highlights the benefits and practicalities of running Recovery College courses with people with dementia. Peer-to-peer learning was seen as valuable in post-diagnostic support but opinions were divided about the term recovery in dementia.

The paper discusses a partnership between Huston–Tillotson University (HT), a Historically Black College and University (HBCU) and the Austin Independent School District (AISD), a minority-serving school district, both in Austin, Texas, with a grant provided by Apple Inc. (Apple). The purpose of the partnerships is that valuable relationships can increase the number of African American male teachers in primary and secondary education in minority-serving public schools. The African American Male Teacher Initiative (AAMTI) at HT was created as an innovative approach to recruit and select 20 African American males each year of a four-year grant provided by Apple.

This paper reviewed the literature on the lack and need for African American male public school teachers. Once the data is established during a three-to-four-year period, a mixed-method approach will be utilized to examine data retrieved from interviews, surveys, demographics of student participants, numerical data and retention and graduation rates. This will establish whether strategic partnerships can successfully increase the number of qualified African American males in public education.

This paper proposes and provides research evidence that African American male teachers can positively impact all students in the classroom setting.

There is limited data to test a hypothesis on the effectiveness of a partnership between the university and public school to increase the number of African American male teachers through recruitment – selection and retention efforts. Therefore, follow-up research is needed for the first graduating class of 2024.

The broader impact of this paper is to show that partnerships between universities and public schools with corporate sponsorship can positively increase the number of African American male teachers prepared to teach in public schools through strategic recruitment and selection efforts.

This paper can serve as a model for universities and school districts to implement. High placement of prepared Black male teachers in public schools can reduce the school-to-prison pipeline and juvenile homicides and defeat generational poverty.

Much research highlights the problems associated with a lack of African American male teachers. This paper includes the challenges but offers a sound basis for practical solutions.

As young individuals transition from educational settings to embark on their career paths, their expectations for their future careers become of paramount importance. Ng et al. (2010) examined the expectations of young people in post-secondary education in 2007; those colloquially referred to as “Millennials” or “GenY”. The present study replicates Ng et al.'s (2010) study among a sample of post-secondary students in 2019 (referred to as Generation Z or GenZ) and compares the expectations of young adults in GenY and GenZ.

This study employs a time-lag comparison of GenY and GenZ young career entrants based on data collected in 2007 (n = 23,413) and 2019 (n = 16,146).

Today's youth seem to have realistic expectations for their first jobs and the analyses suggest that young people continue to seek positive, healthy work environments which make room for work–life balance. Further, young people today are prioritizing job security and are not necessarily mobile due to preference, restlessness or disloyalty, but rather leave employers that are not meeting their current needs or expectations.

Understanding the career expectations of young people allows educators, employers and policymakers to provide vocational guidance that aligns those expectations with the realities of the labor market and the contemporary career context.

While GenY was characterized as optimistic with great expectations, GenZ can be described as cautious and pragmatic. The results suggest a shift away from opportunity, towards security, stability, an employer that reflects one's values and a job that is satisfying in the present.

The purpose of the paper is to investigate the marketing and communication activities carried out by small management consulting firms and how they relate to customers.

After the framing of the literature on the subject, the study is based on the results of a survey carried out through an online questionnaire. The sample under investigation is represented by 914 small consulting firms located in central Italy.

Results show that half of the sample carried out marketing and communication activities, mainly through the website and social media, while others participating in events as speakers at conferences. It also emerges that management consulting firms carry out activities aimed at maintaining relationship with customers even if they do not invest time in market research in order to find potential and new clients.

The study suggests that management consulting firms should adopt a systematic and strategic approach to communication and should develop a complete and integrated digital communication strategy, as well as to rethink the consulting business model.

There are no previous studies that provide insight into the everyday practice of marketing and communication of small management consulting services in today's dynamic and changing economic environment.

Our study examines the impact of career enhancing strategies (CES), supportive work relationships and family–work conflict (FWC) on subjective career success.

The data were sourced from 107 professionals, who were the members of an alumni LinkedIn group of the Masters Human Resource degree program from a university in the Midwestern United States. Multiple regression analysis was employed to test the study hypotheses.

Results indicate that both forms of CES – networking and mentoring – were positively associated with subjective career success, and there exists a positive association between perceived organizational support and subjective career success. Further, FWC moderates the relationship between subjective career success and mentoring and also moderates the relationship between subjective career success and perceived supervisor support.

Organizations should provide opportunities to employees for networking and institute formal mentoring programs to enhance employees' perceptions of subjective career success. It is also crucial for organizations to promote work–life balance initiatives that can help reduce the levels of FWC experienced by employees.

Our study makes important contributions to the extant literature by highlighting the importance of CES and supportive work relationships in ensuring subjective career success. It also identifies an important moderator, FWC, which can significantly impact subjective career success.

This study aims at investigating how hybrid intelligence might enhance employee engagement in breakthrough innovation. Specifically, it empirically examines the mediating role of self-extinction and moderating role of social intelligence.

This study, using the lens of socio-technical system (STS) theory, collected data from 317 employees through cross-sectional survey. The hypotheses were tested using MPlus 8.3 by applying Structural Equation Modelling (SEM).

The results support the proposed model, suggesting that hybrid intelligence fosters employees' breakthrough innovation engagement and such a relationship is fully mediated by self-extinction. Besides, the findings provide support for the positive moderating impact of social intelligence on such indirect relationships in a way that high social intelligence will further strengthen the relationship.

As a pioneering contribution, the study uncovers the social mechanism that underlies hybrid intelligence–breakthrough innovation engagement relationship via self-extinction. The research suggests managers leveraging employees' social intelligence for playing a critical role in countering the negative impact of self-extinction by enhancing the employees' engagement in the breakthrough innovation process.

Place-based, social studies teaching and learning has the potential to foster engaged citizens connected and committed to improving their communities. This study explored the research question, “In what ways do classroom and field-based experiences prepare teacher candidates (TCs) to make connections between place-based education and elementary social studies education?”

This qualitative case study examined how elementary TCs learned about, researched, curated and created place-based social studies educational resources related to community sites. Data collection included TCs’ Pre- and Post-Course Reflections as well as Self-Evaluations, which were analyzed using an inductive approach and multiple rounds of concept coding. Several themes emerged through data analysis.

The authors organized their findings around three themes: connections (i.e. place becomes personal), immersion (i.e. learning about place to learning in place) and bridge building (i.e. local as classroom). The classroom and field-based experiences in the elementary social studies methods course informed the ways in which TCs learned about and connected to the concept of place, experienced place in a specific place (i.e. downtown Statesboro, Georgia), and reflected upon the myriad ways that they could utilize place in their future elementary social studies classrooms.

TCs (as well as in-service teachers and teacher educators) must become more informed, connected and committed to places within their local communities in order to consider them as resources for elementary social studies teaching and learning.

This paper aims to explore the value that care from a primary mental health care nurse (PMHCN) can bring to people with mental health (MH) problems in health-care delivery.

This study used a focus group of 20 PMHCNs working in primary care (PC) health settings in Saudi Arabia before using thematic content analysis to describe and explore their views and experiences of the integration of MH care into PC units. The researchers used a semi-structured interview format, which began with open-ended probes and proceeded to use of theoretical sampling based on emerging data related to their experiences and perceptions in the integration process.

Four main themes were derived from the thematic analysis of interviews: collaboration, knowledge and experience, awareness and orientation care and influential role.

This study’s use of qualitative research methods has certain limitations, including the small sample size of 20 participants, which means that it may not be representative of all primary MH nurses in primary health-care centers in Saudi Arabia. To make the results applicable to a broader audience, the researcher sought to moderate this limitation by including participants with extensive experience in multiple settings and nurses of different ages.

The cost implications of the PMHCN service are not yet comprehensively understood, but it is apparent that this model is not only regarded extremely positively by MH practitioners but may also have significant benefits in terms of patient outcomes. The configuration of local services and relevant patient demographics will affect the extent to which this study’s findings are transferable. Meanwhile, further research in this area could seek to provide further evidence about the aspects of the PMHCN service model, such as secondary care referrals and waiting times, accident and emergency attendances and patient recovery rates and the impact of providing such a service on health-care practitioners as well as its cost-effectiveness.

This study’s findings suggest that PMHCNs believe that their care improves the quality of PC for patients in PC settings. Elements of the PC placement that professionals particularly valued include their ability to assist patients in their own community and the inclusion of volunteer stakeholders who act as preceptors. The participants expressed a need for improvement of policy related to referrals within the clinics.