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In 2013, the Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) for Durham, Ron Hogg, initiated a debate around the future of British drug policy. In June 2015, the Derbyshire PCC, Alan Charles, opened a similar debate with representatives from policing, third party support agencies, national advocates and academics to discuss the possibilities for change. This short paper presents the views and actions of senior figures in the police service and discusses motivations for pursuing change. The purpose of this paper is to introduce police and crime commissioners as “drug policy actors” (Seddon, 2011) and to highlight key areas for further academic enquiry.

This paper is based on press releases and media accounts of the recent activity of the PCCs in relation to national drug policy. This paper provides an academic viewpoint on recent events, supported by theoretical literature critiquing drug policy and contemporary policing.

This viewpoint articulates that motivations for pursuing a change in drug policy are based on both economic and ideological agendas of some PCCs. Irrespective of the motivation, pressure from PCCs and renowned Chief Constables may be more effective in initiating change than high-profile national campaigns and political debates.

This paper is the first of its kind to discuss the relationship between PCCs/local constabularies and drug policy reform. It provides a foundation for future research which could investigate views on alternatives to prohibition, specifically within the wider police force.

This chapter provides an overview of the LEGACY project in the UK and its evaluation, focussing on the effectiveness of the different methodologies used for measuring learning gain. The overall impact of the project on participating institutions and the higher education sector as a whole, in terms of capacity building and developing communities of understanding, is also reviewed.

Financial accounting to assess stewardship: the case requires students to evaluate Thompson’s stewardship of McDonald’s, in part based on the company’s financial accounting information. Financial reporting performs an important societal role by helping control agency problems that arise from the separation of ownership and management. Since external stakeholders cannot “observe directly the extent and quality of managerial effort on their behalf […] the manager may be tempted to shirk […] blaming any deterioration of firm performance on factors beyond his/her control” (Scott, 2014, p. 23). However, although financial reporting helps hold managers accountable to shareholders, accounting information is not fully informative about managerial effort. For example, while net income provides useful information regarding the CEO’s stewardship, it is also “noisy,” due to recognition lags and other factors (Scott, 2014, p. 364). Efforts undertaken by Thompson in a particular period, such as marketing expenditures, might reduce current earnings, yet boost future profitability. Additionally, Thompson’s predecessor’s past efforts might have positive or negative effects on current earnings. Evaluating stewardship effectively involves considerable judgment, in addition to knowledge of financial accounting. The implication of poor firm performance is that the CEO is ineffective at formulating and implementing strategies and policies to enhance firm value (Dikolli et al., 2014). Specifically, it appears that missing earnings benchmarks matter more for relatively inexperienced CEOs. Don Thompson’s tenure of 33 months at McDonalds is 42 percent lower than median CEO tenure documented in academic research, where the median tenure of chief executives documented in large sample empirical studies is about 57 months (Dikolli et al., 2014). The evidence suggests that the longer a CEO serves, the less likely he is to be dismissed for performance-related reasons. This appears to be the result of the resolution of uncertainty about CEO’s ability and leads to subsequent declines in the level of monitoring by the Board of Directors. Performance evaluation and bias: a significant body of research explores the extent to which female managers are assessed differently than their male counterparts (Powell and Butterfield, 2002). For example, female CEOs face more threats from activist investors than male CEOs. Therefore, even after women achieve the highest managerial rank, they experience more professional challenges than their male counterparts (Gupta et al., 2018). However, the question of whether black CEOs are assessed differently is more challenging to answer empirically as a result of a smaller sample size (only one percent of S&P 500 companies are run by black CEOs). Our case attempts to develop the inference that if female CEOs are subject to bias, analogous forces are likely at work when black CEOs are assessed. Recent evidence further suggests that business students sometimes demonstrate bias in making assessments (Mengel et al., 2018). The authors discuss these findings – as well as strategies for including them in the case discussion – in the “Teaching Strategy” section herein below.

The case was written from the public record surrounding the appointment of Don Thompson and McDonald’s company filings. The record includes articles from The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, as well as local and industry publications.

The case examines the role of financial accounting in evaluating CEO performance in the context of the appointment of McDonald’s first African-American chief executive and his subsequent two-and-a-half years on the job. The case deepens students’ understanding of the link between financial reporting and stewardship, while highlighting the subjectivity inherent in assessing managerial performance, particularly over relatively short time periods. As students analyze the case, they must consider the extent to which a firm’s results are attributable to luck vs skill. We use “skill” to refer to CEO effort and other controllable factors, while “luck” refers to exogenous factors, such as macroeconomic conditions. Assessing stewardship is of practical significance. It allows pay to be better aligned with performance and empowers stakeholders to identify when a change of leadership may be warranted. The case may also be used to spur reflection, in an applied context, on the importance of being alert to unconscious bias, even when evaluating seemingly objective financial reporting data. Recent research, discussed herein, suggests that business students sometimes exhibit bias when making assessments.

The case should be included in discussions of corporate governance, executive compensation and the role of accounting information in efficient contracting. It is appropriate in intermediate financial accounting courses for undergraduates, introductory graduate accounting courses, or other courses with an element of financial statement analysis. Standard introductory accounting textbooks offer helpful supplementary reading for students. Horngren et al.’s (2014) book, Introduction to Financial Accounting (12th ed.), Pearson, London, provides an overview of the income statement and its role in assessing performance (see Chapter 2) as well as a useful discussion on evaluating the components and trends of a business (see Chapter 12). More advanced students may benefit from the in-depth discussion of earnings quality, operating income and non-operating income found in Chapter 4 of Intermediate Accounting (9th ed.), McGraw Hill Education, New York by Spiceland et al. (2018).

I RECALL a seminar on the problems of teaching history where one speaker began by saying that until he was asked to prepare a paper, he had been cheerfully unaware any problems existed.

Within the past few years, responsible educators, librarians, parents, counselors, social workers, therapists, and religious groups of all sexual persuasions and lifestyles have recognized the need for readily available reading material for lesbian and gay youth. Unfortunately, this material is often buried, because it is embedded in larger works. To meet this need, I have compiled and annotated 100 of the best works for young homosexuals, bisexuals, and heterosexuals. I have also included a few of the best works currently available on heterosexuality as a much needed source of knowledge for all young adults whether they are gay or straight, whether they remain childless or eventually become parents.

This paper aims to compare biographical content for literary authors writing in English among Biography Reference Bank, Contemporary Authors Online, Wikipedia, and the web.

A sample of 500 names was gathered from curricula and textbooks used in English courses and searched in the Contemporary Authors Online portion of Literature Resource Center, Biography Reference Bank, Wikipedia, and the web; the results and content were compared.

Each source has core content plus its own unique offerings and specific challenges, as evidenced in searching, evaluative techniques such as authority and currency, and content.

This study can only offer a small part of the picture of what information resides where and a single snapshot in time.

This study will help librarians decide whether to subscribe to a biographical database. It also reinforces the need for evidence‐based practice in librarianship.

While the study is only a small part of the picture, it still makes use of a significant sample size to validate/refute assumptions about the availability of biographical information and the sources studied.

The purpose of this research is to examine the hypothesis that under‐representation of women in Australian universities reflects barriers in the academic promotion process.

This study uses three complementary approaches. Promotion policies and guidelines are examined using content analysis of documents from all Australian universities. A sample of 17 universities was selected for interviews with key gatekeepers to examine promotions practice. Data on promotions by level and gender were analysed for 16 of these universities 2000‐2002.

The analysis of promotions policies and guidelines established a range of practice. Policies supporting women's participation and success in promotions included explicit consideration of part‐time and non‐traditional careers, clear equity statements, and gender representation on promotions committees. Interviews emphasised the importance of support for and identification of female candidates, and the need for the establishment of institution‐wide and performance targets for senior managers. Implicitly, most interviewees accepted the premise that women experienced barriers in the promotion process, including reticence in applying and stereotypically gendered notions of merit. However, the analysis of promotions data showed a more encouraging picture. Application rates and success rates for women are similar to men's and, at professorial level, slightly higher. Nonetheless women remain under‐represented at senior levels, comprising only 16 per cent of the professoriate.

The study provided a report to the Australian Vice‐Chancellors' Committee (AVCC) with a number of recommendations for improving University promotions policies. These recommendations are available on the AVCC website and have applicability beyond the Australian university sector.

This study is an original study across all Australian universities which has international applicability and policy relevance.