The getting of wisdom of a school leader

This study is an interpretive narrative that seeks understanding of self as a human being and as a school leader through examining my lived experiences over seventeen years. To interpret my reflections on these experiences, I retell and interrogate my narratives and some writings of contemporary authors on leadership and on the purposes of education. I develop propositions about leadership that provide me with preliminary understandings about leading others. After listening to various professional voices heard as I participated in local, state and national professional activities Australia-wide, I am compelled though to go beyond my propositions and subject them to more intense scrutiny, drawing on the works of philosophers such as Aristotle, Plato and Aquinas, to broaden and deepen my understanding of self as a school leader. I come to a desiring of a virtuous kind of leadership that is deeply moral and ethical. This eros, this passion for understanding, provokes a turning point in my study towards looking for guidance and inspiration from various religions such as Christianity, Islam, Buddhism and Hinduism, about possibilities for wisdom and virtue in leadership. Thus, my narrative, the getting of wisdom of a school leader, releases new insights about the role of self-knowledge, love and “the good” in leading education

Fracturing the Monolith: Could Military Defections End the Dictatorship in Myanmar?

Past episodes of mass uprising and successful transitions from dictatorial rule in Asia and the Middle East and North Africa offer several important lessons for Myanmar. Following weeks and months of popular demonstrations, the fall of presidents Ferdinand Marcos in 1986, Suharto in 1998 and Hosni Mubarak during 2011 Arab Spring, came only after the defection of senior military officers to the people’s cause. The chapter discusses a new political possibility which could be caused by emerging cleavages within and defection of the security forces. As the economic and political fractures in the monolith of Myanmar’s military worsen, the resistance movement is more likely to succeed if it is able to win-over junta softliners who may be open to a different way forward. A chance of an off-ramp depends on whether the democracy movement can offer segments of the security apparatus and current junta collaborators an agreement capable of securing defection

Fracturing the Monolith: Could Military Defections End the Dictatorship in Myanmar?

Past episodes of mass uprising and successful transitions from dictatorial rule in Asia and the Middle East and North Africa offer several important lessons for Myanmar. Following weeks and months of popular demonstrations, the fall of presidents Ferdinand Marcos in 1986, Suharto in 1998 and Hosni Mubarak during 2011 Arab Spring, came only after the defection of senior military officers to the people’s cause. The chapter discusses a new political possibility which could be caused by emerging cleavages within and defection of the security forces. As the economic and political fractures in the monolith of Myanmar’s military worsen, the resistance movement is more likely to succeed if it is able to win-over junta softliners who may be open to a different way forward. A chance of an off-ramp depends on whether the democracy movement can offer segments of the security apparatus and current junta collaborators an agreement capable of securing defection

The phytochemistry of several South African aloe species

Introduction: Despite the tremendous advances made with regard to synthetic organic medicinals within the last two decades, heavy reliance is still placed on plant products. This is especially true of the anthracene derivatives used medicinally as purgatives, and which are derived principally from senna, cascara, rhubarb, frangula and aloes. While particular attention has been paid to the chemistry of the former group in recent years, aloes has been largely neglected, possibly due to the fact that the Aloe species are confined largely to areas where extensive research facilities are lacking, such as Africa , India and the West Indies. Thus research in Europe has been confined largely to the lump aloes of commerce, derived from relatively few species. In 1953 a comprehensive report by Hodge (103) appeared on "The Drug Aloes of Commerce, with Special Reference to the Cape Species". Hodge observed that South Africa abounds in species just as abundant as A.ferox, (which is the prime source of Cape aloes), and advised that a systematic chemical survey might show certain of these to be not only higher yielders of bitter aloetic juice but also sources of a superior drug product. Consequently an investigation along these lines is presented here, and it is observed that several species apart from A.ferox not only contain aloin, but also yield a large volume of aloetic juice. Only pharmacologic studies can reveal if the juice of these species is as safe as that of A.ferox, but without doubt they could be used for the extraction of crystalline aloin. Concurrently, the distribution of the Aloe resins, said by some to be purgative themselves, has been studied. The investigation has revealed that the structurally similar compound homonataloin enjoys an equally wide distribution as aloin. However, almost invariably it is confined to small species yielding little aloetic juice, apart from which nothing is known regarding its pharmacologic properties. It is interesting to note that the resin distribution in the homonataloin-containing species is very similar to that of the aloin-containing species, but differs widely from. that of the species containing neither of these principles. Apart from aloin and homonataloin, aloinoside and chrysophanol also occur in Aloe species, and together with the resins, these indicate that when all the South African Aloe species have been investigated, they may well be of chemotaxonomic value. Within the comparatively short space of the last decade some work has been performed on aspects of the metabolism of such anthracene-containing species as Rheum, Rhamnus and Rumex. These investigations have shown that the anthracene derivatives are not merely waste products, but perform definite metabolic functions. The latter portion of this work has been devoted to this relatively neglected aspect of the Aloe species

Study protocol; thyroid hormone replacement for untreated older adults with subclinical hypothyroidism - a randomised placebo controlled trial (TRUST)

Background: Subclinical hypothyroidism (SCH) is a common condition in elderly people, defined as elevated serum thyroid-stimulating hormone (TSH) with normal circulating free thyroxine (fT4). Evidence is lacking about the effect of thyroid hormone treatment. We describe the protocol of a large randomised controlled trial (RCT) of Levothyroxine treatment for SCH. Methods: Participants are community-dwelling subjects aged ≥65 years with SCH, diagnosed by elevated TSH levels (≥4.6 and ≤19.9 mU/L) on a minimum of two measures ≥ three months apart, with fT4 levels within laboratory reference range. The study is a randomised double-blind placebo-controlled parallel group trial, starting with levothyroxine 50 micrograms daily (25 micrograms in subjects <50Kg body weight or known coronary heart disease) with titration of dose in the active treatment group according to TSH level, and a mock titration in the placebo group. The primary outcomes are changes in two domains (hypothyroid symptoms and fatigue / vitality) on the thyroid-related quality of life questionnaire (ThyPRO) at one year. The study has 80% power (at p = 0.025, 2-tailed) to detect a change with levothyroxine treatment of 3.0% on the hypothyroid scale and 4.1% on the fatigue / vitality scale with a total target sample size of 750 patients. Secondary outcomes include general health-related quality of life (EuroQol), fatal and non-fatal cardiovascular events, handgrip strength, executive cognitive function (Letter Digit Coding Test), basic and instrumental activities of daily living, haemoglobin, blood pressure, weight, body mass index and waist circumference. Patients are monitored for specific adverse events of interest including incident atrial fibrillation, heart failure and bone fracture. Discussion: This large multicentre RCT of levothyroxine treatment of subclinical hypothyroidism is powered to detect clinically relevant change in symptoms / quality of life and is likely to be highly influential in guiding treatment of this common condition. Trial registration: Clinicaltrials.gov NCT01660126; registered 8th June 2012

Clinician-facilitated physical activity intervention versus pulmonary rehabilitation for improving physical activity in COPD: a feasibility study

Pulmonary rehabilitation (PR) may not suit all individuals with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and may not result in increased physical activity. Higher levels of physical activity are associated with reduced mortality and morbidity. The aim of this study was to assess the feasibility of conducting a trial to investigate the effectiveness of a clinician-facilitated physical activity intervention (PAI) versus PR in improving physical activity in patients with COPD referred to PR. In this randomised controlled mixed methods feasibility study, all patients referred to PR who were eligible and willing were assessed at baseline and then randomised to the PAI or to PR. The assessments were repeated post-intervention and at 3-month follow-up. The main outcome was step count measured by Actigraph. Semi-structured interviews were conducted post-intervention. The N = 50 patients; mean (SD) age, 64.1(8.6) years, 24M were recruited and randomised; N = 23 (PAI) and n = 26 (PR): one patient was excluded from the analysis as that person did not meet the GOLD diagnostic criteria. Key feasibility criteria were met; recruitment was 11%, dropouts in PAI were 26% (n = 6) and 50% (n = 13/26) PR. Participants in both groups experienced a range of health benefits from their respective programmes. The PAI appears to be effective in increasing step counts in people with COPD: mean change (standard deviation) [confidence interval] for the PAI group was 972.0(3230.3)[–1080.3 to 3024.4], n = 12 and 4.3(662.7)[-440.9 to 449.5], n = 11 for the PR group. The PAI met all domains of fidelity. This study provides key information to inform a future-randomised controlled trial in physical activity