Browne, employability and the rhetoric of choice: student as producer and the sustainability of HE

This paper presents a critical reflection of the rhetoric of choice offered in the current system of HE. The theoretical foundation of the discussion draws on the work of Bauman (2007) as a support for a critical stance on the implementation of the recent reviews of HE, for instance by Browne (2010) and Dearing (1997). The concept and agenda of the student as ‘producer’, versus the student as consumer or even student as commodity, are further evaluated in the context of the ‘free’ market and the apparent 'industrialisation’ of HE, which has arguably brought graduate ‘employability’ to centre stage. The work goes on to discuss how student choice of course appears to go beyond judgments about potential job prospects. Along with this, it is argued that the values espoused by consumerism may well have a detrimental effect on the way that students develop the types of skills that employers say they want. Counteracting this, the student as producer is investigated as a means by which students become active producers of themselves as enterprising citizens, which also has benefit in respect of their future employability

Debating Student as Producer: relationships, contexts and challenges for higher education

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate Student as Producer, as a form of curriculum development in higher education based on the practice and principles of research-engaged teaching. The paper provides an account of my experiences embedding and adopting Student as Producer within my own research and teaching at the University of Lincoln, an institution which is recognised as being a pioneer in research-engaged teaching. My work includes, the role as guest editor for a special ‘Student as Producer’ edition of the journal Enhancing Learning in Social Sciences (ELiSS), teaching Criminology in the Professions, and working on funded research projects at Lincoln around aspects of the undergraduate student experience, e.g. student as partners and student engagement. As well as this focus on my own teaching practice the paper sets out the theory and concepts which underpin Student as Producer and the way in which it has responded to current government policy, in particular the notion of student as consumer

Graphene-Enabled Electrodes for Electrocardiogram Monitoring

The unique parameters of Graphene (GN), notably its considerable electron mobility, high surface area and electrical conductivity are bringing extensive attention into the wearable technologies. This work presents a novel Graphene-based electrode for acquisition of electrocardiogram (ECG). The proposed electrode was fabricated by coating GN on top of metallic layer of Ag/AgCl electrode using chemical vapor deposition (CVD) technique. To investigate the performance of the fabricated GN-based electrode, two types of electrodes were fabricated with different sizes to conduct the signal qualities and the skin-electrode contact impedance measurements. Performances of the GN-enabled electrodes were compared to the conventional Ag/AgCl electrodes in terms of ECG signal quality, skin-electrode contact impedance, signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and response time. Experimental results showed the proposed GN-based electrodes produced better ECG signals, higher SNR (improved by 8%) and lower contact impedance (improved by 78%) values than conventional ECG electrodes

The impact of in-season national team soccer play on injury and player availability in a professional club

This study investigated the impact of in-season national team duty on injury rates and player availability in a professional soccer club. Time-loss injuries and exposure time during club and national team duties were recorded prospectively over 5 seasons (2009–2014). A time-loss injury was sustained by 37.7% of squad members participating in national duty, all injuries occurring in match-play. The incidence (per 1000 h exposure) for national team player match-play injuries did not differ (P = 0.608) to that for all players in club competitions: 48.0 (95% CI 20.9–75.5) vs. 41.9 (95% CI 36.5–47.4), incidence rate ratio = 1.2 (CI: 0.8–2.4). The majority (58%) of national team injuries resulted in a layoff ≤1 week. Of all working days lost to injury generally, 5.2% were lost through injury on national duty. Injury incidence in the week following national duty was comparable (P = 0.818) in players participating or not: 7.8 (95% CI 3.6–12.0) vs. 7.1 (95% CI: 4.6–9.6), incidence rate ratio = 1.1 (CI: 0.7–2.7). While approximately 40% of participating players incurred a time-loss injury on national duty, no training injuries were sustained and injuries made up a negligible part of overall club working days lost to injury. Following duty, players had a similar injury risk to peers without national obligations