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Smartphones play an integral part in many children's lives. Their constant presence in various contexts and the multitude of affordances they present have a tremendous effect on how childhoods are lived today. One important aspect is the way children's interaction with smartphones can affect relationships and particularly generational relations. In this explorative study, we investigated Azerbaijani children's interaction with smartphones in the family and at school using the sociomaterial and relational approaches. Thinking relationally, we followed children's stories to unravel how smartphones can mediate different types of behavior and assist children in negotiating their place in generational order with the adults in their lives. Analyses suggest that smartphones can both present children with bargaining power to negotiate pleasure and fun as well as means to reinforce the generational order by children themselves. The findings point out that children often transfer social norms and expectations placed on them to the ways they use smartphones.

Studies have shown that science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) careers remain to be one of the areas where there is considerable job growth (Lacey & Wright, 2009; National Science Board, 2010; Singh et al., 2002). However, in many rural regions, science teachers still find it challenging to motivate adolescents to develop an interest in these fields or pursue opportunities in STEM at their schools or in their communities. In exploring a distinctive way to motivate students from rural regions to develop and maintain a STEM mindset, the authors provided students opportunities to participate in programs within their communities to increase their interests in STEM. The authentic STEM learning experiences, “at no cost” for the high school students, helped them focus on cognitive and social abilities as they engaged in experiences developing identities as pre-STEM professionals. This paper reports on how the authors were able to develop research through the support of the professional development system at the university.

The authors explored the experiences of the high school students and parents as they engaged in the Science Olympiad events, community volunteering and mentoring projects over three years in the southeastern United States. A total of 50 high school students participated from the Science Olympiad team from ethnic backgrounds: Hispanic/Latino Americans (55%), African Americans (10%) and White Americans/Caucasians (35%) participated. The high school students and parents were asked to participate by completing required permissions and also completing pre- and post-surveys to help understand their reasons for participating in the activities. At the end of the semester, an interview was conducted with participants to better understand their experiences with working on the team and their STEM perspectives. Parents and guardians of the high school students were also asked to share their thoughts about their children participating in these activities through indirect conversations. The school partnership teacher, also Science Olympiad co-coach, invited high school students to participate in additional STEM activities throughout the school year through the university partnership.

The pre- and post-survey responses provided insight to researchers about the “lived experiences” of the students as they developed a STEM mindset. Analysis of data indicates students’ interests in STEM and working with youth increased as a result of the STEM opportunities. To help in increasing their interests, additional opportunities are needed for these youth to engage in STEM tasks and mentoring. The professional development system (PDS) creates the space for these opportunities to take place, leading to new knowledge for learning and “boundary-spanning roles” for school-university faculty to discover and experiment new ideas that “transcend institutional settings” (National Association for Professional Development Schools, 2021).

Additional research is needed in helping high school students develop a STEM mindset as they participate in volunteer STEM experiences. The survey tools should be revised to address the specific STEM activities that the students participate in during the year. In addition to feedback from the youth and parents using focus group interviews or other defined survey instruments.

The school-university partners continue to explore the successes and challenges of the collaborative effort. Disruptions in the collaborative effort such as school closures due to severe weather and the pandemic have resulted in cancellations of STEM opportunities for high school students. Despite challenges, this collaborative effort continues with an additional focus on STEM learning.

Suggested research may involve investigating parental involvement strategies that increase the likelihood of actual high school student attendance during out-of-school time activities, such as community STEM fairs, competitions and summer STEM camps. Use of focus group interviews provided students setting to talk freely.

Through a new initiative established by the PDS at the university, “PDS Master Teachers,” the school-university faculty were invited to participate and engage in purposeful, intentional professional learning and leading to enhance the quality of the experiences for teacher candidates (Professional Development System, Watson College of Education at the University of North Carolina Wilmington, 2022). This innovative program inspired the school-university faculty to reflect on practice and create new approaches to expand STEM learning in the school and community. Through this collaborative effort, the following National Association for Professional Development Schools (NAPDS) Nine Essentials were addressed: Essential 2: Clinical Preparation; Essential 3: Professional Learning and Leading; Essential 4: Reflection and Innovation; Essential 5: Research and Results; and Essential 8: Boundary-Spanning Roles (National Association for Professional Development Schools, 2021). The University’s PDS comprehensive approach to professional learning and its dedication to providing a space for all to engage in reflective practices for professional growth provided the required support for this project.

This pilot study aims to examine the prevalence of test anxiety and its interplay with attitudes, confidence, efficacy, academic performance and socio-demographic factors within the domain of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) courses.

The authors employed a quantitative, cross-sectional design with 549 sixth-grade students from public lower secondary schools in Prishtina, Kosovo, using the Student Attitudes Toward STEM Survey (S-STEM) for middle/high schools and the test anxiety questionnaire.

Over 70% of Kosovo's sixth-grade students reported moderate to severe test anxiety. The age of students was found to be inversely related to academic performance in STEM. The father's employment was associated with favorable STEM attitudes, confidence, efficacy and academic performance. Having a personal study environment was connected with favorable STEM attitudes, confidence and efficacy in STEM, whereas access to technology was associated with positive academic performance. Test anxiety, academic performance and personal study space predicted students' attitudes, confidence and efficacy in STEM and 21st-century learning.

Educational institutions should prioritize student well-being. By addressing test anxiety, these institutions can create supportive learning environments that improve attitudes, confidence and efficacy in STEM fields. These efforts are crucial for STEM career development and student success in the 21st-century workforce.

The current study findings contribute to a deeper understanding of the factors influencing STEM student engagement and performance, highlighting the importance of addressing test anxiety for positive learning outcomes while emphasizing the need to consider socio-economic and contextual factors in education.

Change agents are individuals who can successfully transform aspects of how organisations operate. In education, teachers as change agents are increasingly seen as vital to the successful operation of schools and self-improving school systems. To date, however, there has been no systematic investigation of the nature and role of teacher change agents. To address this knowledge gap, we undertook a systematic review into five key areas regarding teachers as change agents. After reviewing 70 outputs we found that current literature predominantly positions teacher change agents as the deliverers of top-down change, with the possibility of bottom-up educational reform currently neglected.

In this introduction to our volume on growing up in Asian societies, we define the claim of this collection, explain the approach, and take stock of what it has been possible to achieve empirically and conceptually for the further global study of childhood and youth. Our aim was to understand and present the young generation in its intergenerational relations. The 16 studies, divided into four regional sections, show a broad spectrum of very different conditions in which this young generation lives, of expectations with which they are confronted, and of strategies for action that are open to them. And they show the overriding importance of the commitments and solidarities between different age groups across societies. We propose – in the sense of a theoretical conclusion – three concepts that should be central to the study of childhood and youth experiences: (inter)generational order, existential inequality, and voice. Whereby, the latter concept also has to take into account walls of silence. The three concepts have extended prior work of childhood and youth studies with new analytical power and empirical relevance, based on this most comprehensive collection to date on growing up in Asian societies.

Cyberattacks are becoming increasingly widespread, and cybersecurity is therefore increasingly important. Although the technological aspects of cybersecurity are its best-known characteristics, the cybersecurity phenomenon goes beyond the detection of technological impacts, and encompasses all the dimensions of an organization. This study thus focusses on an additional set of organizational elements. The key elements of cybersecurity organizational readiness depicted here are cybersecurity awareness, cybersecurity culture and cybersecurity organizational resilience (OR). This study aims to qualitatively assess small and medium enterprises’ (SMEs) overall level of organizational cybersecurity readiness.

This study focused on conducting a cybersecurity organizational readiness assessment using a sample of 53 Italian SMEs from the information and communication technology sector. Informed mixed method research, this study was conducted consistent with the principles of the explanatory sequential mixed method design, and adopting a quanti-qualitative methodology. The quantitative data were collected through a questionnaire. Qualitative data were subsequently collected through semi-structured interviews.

Although many elements of the technical aspects of cybersecurity OR have yielded very encouraging results, there are still some areas that require improvement. These include those facets that constitute the foundation of cybersecurity awareness, and, thus, a cybersecurity culture. This result highlights that the areas in need of improvement are exactly those that are most important in fighting against cyber threats via organizational cybersecurity readiness.

Although the importance of SMEs is obvious, evidence of such organizations’ attitudes to cybersecurity are still limited. This research is an attempt to depict the organizational issue related to cybersecurity, i.e. overall cybersecurity organizational readiness.

This paper aims to propose an interpretive framework to understand how machine learning (ML) affects the way companies interact with their ecosystem and how the introduction of digital technologies affects the value co-creation (VCC) process.

This study bases on configuration theory, which entails two main methodological phases. In the first phase the authors define the theoretically-derived interpretive framework through a literature review. In the second phase the authors adopt a case study methodology to inductively analyze the theoretically-derived domains and their relationships within a configuration.

ML enables multi-directional knowledge flows among value co-creators and expands the scope of VCC beyond the boundaries of the firm-client relationship. However, it determines a substantive imbalance in knowledge management power among the actors involved in VCC. ML positively impacts value co-creators’ performance but also requires significant organizational changes. To benefit from VCC via ML, value co-creators must be aligned in terms of digital maturity.

The paper answers the call for more theoretical and empirical research on the impact of the introduction of Industry 4.0 technology in companies and their ecosystem. It intends to improve the understanding of how ML technology affects the determinants and the process of VCC by providing both a static and dynamic analysis of the topic.

This paper presents a new and well-structured framework that aims to assess the current environmental impact from a Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions perspective. This tool includes a new set of Lean Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), which translates the well-known logic of Overall Equipment Effectiveness in the field of GHG emissions, that can progressively detect industrial losses that cause GHG emissions and support decision-making for implementing improvements.

The new metrics are presented with reference to two different perspectives: (1) to highlight the deviation of the current value of emissions from the target; (2) to adopt a diagnostic orientation not only to provide an assessment of current performance but also to search for the main causes of inefficiencies and to direct improvement implementations.

The proposed framework was applied to a major company operating in the plywood production sector. It identified emission-related losses at each stage of the production process, providing an overall performance evaluation of 53.1%. The industrial application shows how the indicators work in practice, and the framework as a whole, to assess GHG emissions related to industrial losses and to proper address improvement actions.

This paper scrutinizes a new set of Lean KPIs to assess the industrial losses causing GHG emissions and identifies some significant drawbacks. Then it proposes a new structure of losses and KPIs that not only quantify efficiency but also allow to identify viable countermeasures.

This study aims to investigate how organizational culture (OC) and transformational leadership (TL) affect corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance (environmental performance and social performance) and financial performance (FP) in the context of the Italian manufacturing sector. Grounded in resource-based view theory, this study explores how these factors influence sustainable firm performance.

Data gathered from 260 employees were analyzed to examine the multidimensional aspects of CSR, encompassing social and environmental sustainability.

The findings highlight the pressing need for sustainable firm performance in the existing environment, supporting the hypothesis that firms achieve sustainable and FP through the recognition of TL and OC. Moreover, a positive and significant relationship between CSR performance and FP was established, underscoring the strategic importance of integrating CSR initiatives into core business practices. This study offers valuable insights for both academia and firms, providing theoretical and practical implications that underscore the importance of cultivating a robust OC to drive performance enhancements.

This study is novel because it is one of the first, to the best of the author’s knowledge, to analyze the relationships between TL, OC and performance components associated with CSR.

This study investigates the role of “soft” factors of total quality management – in terms of empowerment and engagement of employees – in facilitating or hindering organizational performance of the university technology transfer offices.

The authors developed an Ordinary Least Squares (OLS), multiple regression model to test if empowerment and engagement affect organizational performance of the university technology transfer offices.

The authors found that “soft” factors of total quality management – in terms of empowerment and engagement – facilitate the improvement of organizational performance in university technology transfer offices.

The authors’ analysis shows that soft total quality management practices create the conditions for improving organizational performance. This study provides practical implications by showing that, in the evaluation of the technology transfer office, not only the “hard” variables (e.g. number of employees and employee experience) but also the “soft” one (e.g. empowerment and engagement) matter. Therefore, university technology transfer managers or university technology transfer delegates should take actions to promote not only empowering employees but also create a climate conducive to employees' engagement in the university technology transfer offices.

With regards to the differences in organizational performances of university technology transfer offices, several studies have focused their attention on technology transfer professionals in technology transfer offices, but only a few of them have examined the “soft side” of total quality management. Thus, this study examines the organizational goals of technology transfer offices through “soft” factors of total quality management in terms of empowerment and engagement employees.