Intranet Resource for the Mechanical Engineering Department at Green Industries

The mechanical engineering department at Green Industries has grown substantially over the past several years to keep up with the company’s overall growth. With this growth has come a reduction in the ratio of experienced team members to new team members and a shortage of appropriate mentors to serve these new engineers. In order to provide all team members with the information they need to successfully design and develop new products, the department must find a more efficient way to transfer information to individuals when experienced mentors are not available. The purpose of this field project is to determine an accurate and timesaving method to transfer needed information to team members and save man months of development effort while working within the limitations of the current intranet system at Green. Team members and team leaders will work together in a collaborative effort to determine the content needed to achieve these goals. This project should also provide a process for all engineering departments within Green to use when looking to manage the information their associates need on a daily basis. A solution to this problem is to create the framework for a home page for the consumer mechanical engineering department at Green that can manage this information. This web resource will be the home page for team members and allow them to find all of the information they need on a daily basis in one location. It will also help organize and store some of the documents used within the department

Combining the contributions of behavioral economics and other social sciences in understanding taxation and tax reform

This paper extends previous work presented at the SABE/IAREP conference at St Mary’s University, Halifax (James, 2009). In the earlier paper it was shown that conventional economic theory is used to make the case for tax reform but does not always adequately incorporate all the relevant factors. However, an approach based on behavioral economics can make the difference between success and failure. In this paper the contributions of other social sciences are also included. Taxation is a particularly appropriate subject to explore the integration of the social sciences since they have all devoted considerable attention to it. It can be seen that different social sciences suggest a range of variables that might be taken into account in addition to those included in mainstream economics. Other social sciences also offer different methodological approaches and consider the possibility of different outcomes of the fiscal process. The paper concludes that it is not easy to integrate the social sciences in a single approach to the study of tax and tax policy. There may also be the risk of encouraging inappropriate integration - researchers operating outside their expertise can produce results that are not helpful. However, comparing the contribution of behavioral economics with those of the social sciences more generally, it can be seen that behavioral economics can offer a framework within which these areas can be examined. Indeed, it may be a useful channel to add the contributions of other social sciences to mainstream economic research

Attitudes Towards Shared Learning of Trainee Dental Technicians and Undergraduate Dental Students

The challenges of health care are increasingly complex and subject to frequent change. Meeting these demands requires that health professionals work in partnership with each other and the patient. One way of contributing to this is for students to learn together. However, effective teamwork requires an education system that helps to foster understanding among all those entering the health workforce. The purpose of this study was to investigate the attitudes towards shared learning of undergraduate dental students and trainee dental technicians in a university dental school/hospital in the United Kingdom. Twenty-five trainee dental technicians and 75 undergraduate dental students took part in the study over five academic years. Data were collected using structured questionnaires. A 100% response rate was achieved from the questionnaires. The results indicated the majority of students recognized the benefits of shared learning and viewed the acquisition of teamworking skills as useful for their future working lives, beneficial to the care of their patients, and likely to enhance professional working relationships. The study also found a positive association of being valued as an individual in the dental team by all student groups. Future dental curricula should provide opportunities to develop effective communication between these two groups and encourage teamworking opportunities. These opportunities need to be systematically developed in the dental curriculum to achieve the desired goals

Interactions in the dental team: understanding theoretical complexities and practical challenges

Background: Interdisciplinary collaboration and communication during dental training has become an increasingly influential idea within dental schools, both in the United Kingdom and European contexts. Research into this curriculum innovation has provided evidence to argue that benefits accrue both in terms of professional understanding and the development of dental professional learning dispositions. Objective: This study investigates the interactions within a trainee dental team. In particular, the paper reports the professional experiences and development of trainee dental technicians and undergraduate dental students during a prolonged shared learning exercise in a combined UK university dental school and hospital. Methods: Using a qualitative approach with a phenomenological framework, data sources included reflective diaries, focus group interviews and participant feedback. Results: Eleven major domains were identified that accurately characterised the participants' beliefs, thoughts and practices. The results indicate that both trainee dental technicians and undergraduate dental students were pragmatic but positive in terms of their expectations of shared learning. In particular, they regarded the exercise as useful in terms of communication and understanding each other's role. Evidence also indicated the presence of original elements such as crisis of confidence and feelings of awkwardness that do not arise in other studies. Conclusions: The implications for dental education are that for effective professional collaboration during training to take place a merger of interests among educators and policy developers in dental education must occur, and the challenges encountered within practice cultures must somehow be overcome. Therefore, more investment in evaluating research into interprofessional learning in dentistry would contribute to our knowledge about the place and role of interprofessional education in the professional dental curriculum and beyond