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The purpose of this research is to assess whether differences occurred between directors and staff in community tobacco use prevention coalitions in Mississippi. Community coalitions, which are organizations working together for a common purpose involve representatives of diverse institutions focusing on issues in a local community. Because of their different roles, directors and support staff may view their coalition differently.

Thirty directors and 14 support staff of tobacco use prevention coalitions anonymously answered a lengthy questionnaire about their coalition personnel and functioning.

Both coalition directors and support staff agreed that their coalition had formal rules and effective management, reduced tobacco use, and benefited their region. In addition, directors and support staff reported high ownership, and positive opinions of member and personnel expertise. Further, directors and support staff favored taking tobacco industry money for themselves or their coalition. However, directors and support staff were neutral in satisfaction and in difficulty managing their coalition, and slightly negative in ratings of member‐member and member‐personnel communication, directors more negative than support staff on member‐personnel communication.

Strengthening communication seems to be a place where there is room for improvement in the present tobacco use prevention coalitions.

Presently, those actually working in a tobacco use prevention coalition were still idealistic about their efforts, but continued frustrations with communication may dampen their enthusiasm in the future.

To examine a tobacco prevention elementary school project completed in 2000 in one rural state in the southeastern USA.

Initially, 721 public school fourth through sixth grade teachers across Mississippi attended (for reimbursement) a tobacco prevention workshop that included curriculum‐integrated material; 658 completed a follow‐up questionnaire (91.3 percent return rate). In addition, 1,762 of their students completed an anti‐tobacco pre‐test and 1,723 (868 girls, 853 boys) completed an anti‐tobacco post‐test (97.8 percent return rate).

Students improved from pre‐ to post‐test; girls scored better than boys. African American students and teachers completed more lessons than White students and teachers. Sixth graders completed fewer lessons and scored lower than fourth and fifth graders.

The test had a yes‐no format and a low ceiling, so many students answered correctly at pretest. Also, teachers were mostly white women, though they were demographically similar to teachers across the state, other groups would expand generalizability. Further, a true control group could evaluate the possibility that results were due to a secular trend.

Not only were teachers positive about a tobacco prevention workshop that included curriculum integrated materials, but also their students scored healthier after having tobacco prevention lessons. Further, those who received the most lessons improved the most, indicating a dose‐specific learning curve.

A challenge for the future would be to assess whether these improvements continue over the long term, and translate into less willingness to experiment with and use tobacco.

To assess what volunteers‐ and ministers of faith‐based organizations (FBO) think about their own expertise in delivering a tobacco prevention initiative, the impact of such an initiative on youth, their potential for burnout in doing so, and their interest in other health initiatives.

A total of 149 volunteers and ministers attending a tobacco prevention workshop anonymously answered questions about its impact, and their own expertise, potential for burnout, and interest in other health initiatives.

Respondents strongly endorsed their personal expertise and the impact of tobacco prevention on youth. On burnout, ministers were significantly lower (an average answer of “don't know”) than teachers and others (an average answer of “disagree”); on other health initiatives, ministers were significantly more interested (an average answer of “strongly”) than teachers (an average answer of “moderately”). All were significantly more positive about offering other health initiatives if they had materials than if they had money.

Most respondents were African‐American, a higher percentage of ministers were men than among those in other positions, and all respondents came from a church that applied for, and received, a tobacco‐prevention grant – points that limit generalizability.

Those responsible for health initiatives would be well advised to direct their resources into developing appropriate materials rather than into paying people to deliver the programs.

Although FBOs provide fertile ground for health initiatives such as tobacco prevention, ministers may be more susceptible to burnout than volunteers.

This chapter concentrates on child rights institutions’ founding or organic laws that provide independence and powers to the national or local child rights institutions. This chapter analyzes the National Commission on the Rights of the Child Act (NCRCA, 2017) of Pakistan as a case. It employs the Paris Principles of 1993 and the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child’s General Comment No. 2 as a yardstick. This chapter also compares the NCRCA with the National Commission on Human Rights Act (NCHRA, 2012). It presents results from interviews of three Child Rights Movement Pakistan (CRM) members and a member of the National Commission on the Rights of the Child (NCRC). The analysis finds that the NCRC faces serious challenges in performing its duties and functions, which were already limited within the organic law. The NCRC is an advisory body whose only role is to suggest the federal bureaucracy when and if required. The NCRC has not been provided with funds and adequate resources. Even the NCRC members were not paid their salaries for many months. The analysis finds that the NCRC’s affairs are governed through the bureaucracy¹ (senior officials) within the Ministry of Human Rights, and the Human Rights Division. Rather than direct responsibility to the Parliament, the NCRC’s independence is undermined as its legislation directs. In the future, the NCRC will face challenges in advancing and protecting children’s rights because it does not have suo-motu (on its own) powers to intervene in matters affecting children. Therefore, it is indispensable to amend the NCRCA in consideration of the GC2 and the Paris Principles to bolster the institution’s independence and functions. These changes are essential to addressing violations of children’s rights and bringing about changes in the structures that affect children.

Past research has generally purported and tested for a positive linear relationship between psychological capital and organizational outcomes such as firm performance. Yet, recent conceptual work has started to recognize that for certain outcomes, too much psychological capital can be as detrimental as too little. In this study, the author hypothesizes that during a major crisis, organizational psychological capital (OPsyCap) may in fact exhibit an inverted U-shaped relationship with performance.

T leverages the revelatory power of a recent major crisis (the COVID-19 pandemic) to gather a pre-crisis and post-crisis matching sample of 952 earnings conference calls held by 476 S&P 500 firms with corresponding market performance data and use computer-assisted text analysis (CATA) methodology to assess OPsyCap from call transcripts.

T finds that OPsyCap has a statistically significant inverted U-shaped relationship with market performance after the crisis, but not prior—thereby suggesting that moderate OPsyCap is more beneficial to market performance than either insufficient or excessive OPsyCap in times of crisis.

Top managers should not display overly excessive psychological capital after a major crisis, as shareholders may interpret such cues as unwarranted optimism, overconfidence and an inability to accept the new reality brought about by the crisis.

This study's findings contribute to extant literature by being the first to empirically highlight a curvilinear relationship between psychological capital and an important outcome variable—market performance. Furthermore, this study's lack of results prior to a major crisis, but not after, may suggest a new boundary condition.

On February 18, 2021, the NASA Perseverance rover traveled 292.5 million miles, safely landing on Mars, proving the power of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) in accomplishing such a historical feat. Glaringly absent from the photos, tweets, and commentaries showing NASA's team celebrations, however, are African American males. Their absence gives rise to the question “Where are the Black males?” – not just in NASA's celebratory photos, but in STEM-related careers altogether. Perhaps even more important questions are “What K-12 systems are in place that exclude Black males from being prepared – academically and socially – for careers with NASA and the like? And what strategies are necessary to engage them in STEM education?”

In this chapter, the author offers a historical overview of the STEM contributions offered by Black males, while explaining the competition of academic identity and Black male identity in successful school experiences. Four K-12 education barriers that derail African American males from their STEM trajectory are highlighted. As a conclusion, strategies to engage Black males in developing and nurturing an early interest in STEM are offered.

This paper aims to examine the impact of demographic, technology, individual and organizational factors on perceived productivity of Egyptian teleworkers.

Data from 199 usable questionnaires are collected and analyzed by means of factor analysis and stepwise linear regression analysis.

The results highlight the crucial role of individual and organizational factors in influencing the perceived productivity of Egyptian teleworkers. In addition to the emergence of job security as a key determinant of perceived teleworking productivity, the role of satisfaction, commitment, work flexibility and management support is also emphasized. Surprisingly, the impact of demographic, attitudes and technological factors are barely observable.

The paper has important implications for managers and practitioners to boost teleworking productivity. Managers must ensure teleworkers' job security, work flexibility, and satisfaction. Also, addressing the efficient use of IT combined with user training should be based on clear understanding of teleworkers' need, knowledge and skills.

The paper is one of the first studies that examine determinants of perceived teleworking productivity. Also, the paper highlights teleworking productivity in an Arab world context, which is barely examined in teleworking research.