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The purpose of this paper is the need to build a novel approach that would allow flexible modeling and solving of food supply chain management (FSCM) problems. The models developed would use the data (data-driven modeling) as early as possible at the modeling phase, which would lead to a better and more realistic representation of the problems being modeled.

An essential feature of the presented approach is its declarativeness. The use of a declarative approach that additionally includes constraint satisfaction problems and provides an opportunity of fast and easy modeling of constrains different in type and character. Implementation of the proposed approach was performed with the use of an original hybrid method in which constraint logic programming (CLP) and mathematical programming (MP) are integrated and transformation of a model is used as a presolving technique.

The proposed constraint-driven approach has proved to be extremely flexible and efficient. The findings obtained during part of experiments dedicated to efficiency were very interesting. The use of the constraint-driven approach has enabled finding a solution depending on the instance data up to 1,000 times faster than using the MP.

Due to the limited use of exact methods for NP-hard problems, the future study should be to integrate the CLP with environments other than the MP. It is also possible, e.g., with metaheuristics like genetic algorithms, ant colony optimization, etc.

There is a possibility of using the approach as a basis to build a decision support system for FSCM, simple integration with databases, enterprise resource planning systems, management information systems, etc.

The new constraint-driven approach to FSCM has been proposed. The proposed approach is an extension of the hybrid approach. Also, a new decision-making model of distribution and logistics for the food supply chain is built. A presolving technique for this model has been presented.

Relations in university settings are becoming more heterogeneous in terms of race, ethnicity, religion, nationality, class, and gender. In South Africa, transformation imperatives have radically changed the complexion of the country’s university campuses but have also entrenched political imperatives in its universities. As a consequence, the university is a highly politicised space. This is not new. What is new is a communication environment characterised by real-time, global networked digital communication and the uptake of digital media platforms (including social media platforms). We explore the effects of politicisation and new modes of communication using the case of a controversial article published in a South Africa journal and the ensuing polemic. Drawing on both institutional theory and Castells’ description of the network society, we conceptualise collegiality along two dimensions: horizontal collegial relations which exist for the purpose of knowledge creation and transfer which, in turn, depends on self-governance according to a taken-for-granted code of conduct; and vertical collegiality which describes collegial relations between academic staff and university management, and which is necessary for the governance of the university as a complex organisation. We conclude that the highly personal nature of communication that is propelled by digital communication has a direct impact on collegial relations within the university. The motivations of both university academic staff and management, as well as the public, extend beyond stimulating collective debate in the service of knowledge production to serving individual and/or ideological agendas as the communication of science becomes politicised. While issues pertaining to collegiality in South Africa may at first glance appear to be unique to the country, we believe that in a globally transforming academy, the South African case may offer novel insights and useful lessons for other highly politicised university systems.

Calls for the development and dissemination of evidence-based programs to support children and families have been increasing for decades, but progress has been slow. This paper aims to argue that a singular focus on evaluation has limited the ways in which science and research is incorporated into program development, and advocate instead for the use of a new concept, “scientific accompaniment,” to expand and guide program development and testing.

A heuristic is provided to guide research–practice teams in assessing the program’s developmental stage and level of evidence.

In an idealized pathway, scientific accompaniment begins early in program development, with ongoing input from both practitioners and researchers, resulting in programs that are both effective and scalable. The heuristic also provides guidance for how to “catch up” on evidence when program development and science utilization are out of sync.

While implementation models provide ideas on improving the use of evidence-based practices, social service programs suffer from a significant lack of research and evaluation. Evaluation resources are typically not used by social service program developers and collaboration with researchers happens late in program development, if at all. There are few resources or models that encourage and guide the use of science and evaluation across program development.

The TARGET approach aims at establishing a reflexive gender equality policy in research performing and research funding organisations. Monitoring has enormous potential to support reflexivity at both the institutional and the individual levels in the gender equality plan (GEP) development and implementation context. To exploit this potential, the monitoring system has to consist of meaningful indicators, which adequately represent the complex construct of gender equality and refer to the concrete objectives and policies of the GEP. To achieve this, we propose an approach to indicator development that refers to a theory of change for the GEP and its policies. Indicator development thus becomes a reflexive endeavour and monitoring a living tool. This requires constant reflection on data gaps, validity of indicators and the further development of indicators. Furthermore, we recommend the creation of space for reflexivity to discuss monitoring results with the community of practice.

A successful component of programs designed to deliver youth leadership develop programs are youth educators who understand the importance of utilizing research-based information and seeking professional development opportunities. The purpose of this study was to determine youth educator’s perceived confidence in leading youth leadership development programs. Study objectives included describing types of youth leadership development training received by youth educators, describing the number of hours of youth leadership development training received by youth educators, describing the perceived importance of youth leadership development training received by youth educators, describing youth leadership development training delivery mode preferences of youth educators, determining if the addition of hours of training received and the perception of the importance of youth leadership training improved the prediction of perceived confidence beyond that provided by differences in selected demographic variables (gender, age, years of service, education level, office location). The target population for this study was southern region 4-H youth development educators. Results of this study indicate that perceived importance of youth leadership development training is predictive of youth educator’s confidence level in teaching youth leadership development.

Youth leadership development programs are a cornerstone of many youth serving organizations. The importance of youth leadership development to the core goals of programs is illustrated by its explicit inclusion in program logic models as well as its implicit presence when older youth serve in teaching and mentoring roles for younger youth. The success or failure of a youth leadership development program may be linked to many factors, one of which is the educator who leads the program. Youth educators influence program success in many ways. The focus of this study is to explore educators’ prior experiences as well as their perceived confidence in delivering youth leadership development programming. Given the strong connections between a person’s beliefs and behaviors, it is important to understand youth educators’ beliefs within the context of their prior experiences (Ajzen, Joyce, Sheikh, & Cote, 2011). This study seeks to expand the literature about youth educators’ youth leadership development training beliefs. It has practical implications for developing professional development trainings for youth educators as well as theoretical implications for advancing a deeper understanding of educators’ core beliefs about training specifically related to youth leadership development.

Young incarcerated male offenders are at risk of poorer sexual health, adolescent parenthood and lack opportunities for formative relationship and sexuality education (RSE) as well as positive male role models. The purpose of this paper is to report the process of co-production and feasibility testing of a novel, gender-transformative RSE programme with young male offenders to encourage positive healthy relationships, gender equality, and future positive fatherhood.

Using a rights-based participatory approach, the authors co-produced an RSE programme with young offenders and service providers at two UK prison sites using a sequential research design of: needs analysis, co-production and a feasibility pilot. Core components of the programme are grounded in evidence-based RSE, gender-transformative and behaviour change theory.

A needs analysis highlighted the men’s interest in RSE along with the appeal of film drama and peer-group-based activities. In the co-production stage, scripts were developed with the young men to generate tailored film dramas and associated activities. This co-production led to “If I Were a Dad”, an eight-week programme comprising short films and activities addressing masculinities, relationships, sexual health and future fatherhood. A feasibility pilot of the programme demonstrated acceptability and feasibility of delivery in two prison sites. The programme warrants further implementation and evaluation studies.

The contribution of this paper is the generation of an evidence-based, user-informed, gender-transformative programme designed to promote SRHR of young male offenders to foster positive sexual and reproductive health and well-being in their own lives and that of their partners and (future) children.

This article proposes an architecture of an intelligent and autonomous recommendation system to be applied to any virtual learning environment, with the objective of efficiently recommending digital resources. The paper presents the architectural details of the intelligent and autonomous dimensions of the recommendation system. The paper describes a hybrid recommendation model that orchestrates and manages the available information and the specific recommendation needs, in order to determine the recommendation algorithms to be used. The hybrid model allows the integration of the approaches based on collaborative filter, content or knowledge. In the architecture, information is extracted from four sources: the context, the students, the course and the digital resources, identifying variables, such as individual learning styles, socioeconomic information, connection characteristics, location, etc. Tests were carried out for the creation of an academic course, in order to analyse the intelligent and autonomous capabilities of the architecture.

Purpose – The purpose of this study is to analyze and design a virtual collaboration information system of the Jamu supply chain network based on a fair adaptive contract to respond to stability challenges in business with an uncertainty environment condition.

Design/Methodology/Approach – System entity approach is used for the purpose of system analysis and then case, sequence diagram, class diagram, graph data modeling, and business process modeling and Notation verse 2 (BPMN2.0) are also used to design the system concept. Each process of the connecting event and gateways was arranged with relevant multicriteria decision approach, whilst an adaptive quantitative formulation based on prescriptive analytics was embedded to ensure a fair contract implementation during the terms for all sphere roles in supply chain.

Findings – The results and implications of this model emphasizes on the knowledge, competence, trust, and fair (KCTF) for actors’ adoption to improve supply chain stability and implementation.

Practical Implications – This led actors to collaborate their business in a more effective way.

Originality/Value – This model can reach more stability in the uncertainty environment.

This paper aims to present a preliminary experimental result on a large-scale experiment on a cyber-physical hybrid discussion support environment in a panel discussion session in an international conference.

In this paper, the authors propose a hybrid (cyber-physical) environment in which people can discuss online and also offline simultaneously. The authors conducted a large-scale experiment in a panel discussion session in an international conference where participants can discuss by using their online discussion support system and by physical communications as usual.

The authors analyzed the obtained date from the following three viewpoints: participants’ cyber-physical attention, keywords cyber-physical linkage and cyber-physical discussion flow. These three viewpoints indicate that the methodology of the authors can be effective to support hybrid large-scale discussions.

Online large-scale discussion has been focused as a new methodology that enable people to discuss, argue and make consensus in terms of political issues, social complex problems (like climate change), city planning and so on. In several cases, the authors found that online discussions are very effective to gather people opinions and discussions so far. Moreover, this paper proposes a hybrid (cyber-physical) environment in which people can discuss online and also offline simultaneously.

Involvement of parents/carers may increase effectiveness of primary school-based alcohol-misuse prevention projects through strengthening family-based protective factors, but rates of parental engagement are typically low. This paper reports findings from an exploratory trial of a school-based prevention intervention – Kids, Adults Together (KAT), based on the Social Development Model, which aimed to promote pro-social family communication in order to prevent alcohol misuse, and incorporated strategies to engage parents/carers. The purpose of this paper is to assess the feasibility and value of conducting an effectiveness trial of KAT.

The study was a parallel-group cluster randomised exploratory trial with an embedded process evaluation. The study took place in south Wales, UK, and involved nine primary schools, 367 pupils in Years 5/6 (aged 9-11 years) and their parents/carers and teachers. Questionnaires were completed by pupils at baseline and four month follow-up, and by parents at six month follow-up.

Overall KAT was delivered with good fidelity, but two of five intervention schools withdrew from the study without completing implementation. In total, 50 per cent of eligible parents participated in the intervention, and KAT had good acceptability among pupils, parents and teachers. However, a number of “progression to effectiveness trial” criteria were not met. Intermediate outcomes on family communication (hypothesised to prevent alcohol misuse) showed insufficient evidence of an intervention effect. Difficulties were encountered in identifying age appropriate outcome measures for primary school-age children, particularly in relation to family communication processes. The study was unable to find comprehensive methodological guidance on exploratory trials.

It would not be appropriate to conduct an effectiveness trial as key progression criteria relating to intervention and trial feasibility were not met. There is a need for new measures of family communication which are suitable for primary school-age children, and more guidance on the design and conduct of exploratory/feasibility trials.

KAT achieved high rates of parental involvement, and its theoretical framework and processes could be adapted by other interventions which experience difficulties with recruitment of parents/carers.