Wednesday, September 2, 2020

Blue Whales essays

Blue Whales expositions The Blue whale is the biggest animal of the ocean, truth be told, it is the biggest animal known to man. In spite of what a great many people think, despite the fact that Blue whales live in the ocean, they are warm blooded animals. They inhale air, have their infants brought into the world alive and can live somewhere in the range of 30 to 70 years. The Blue whale is a baleen whale, and as opposed to having teeth, Blue whales have around 300-400 baleen plates in their mouths. They fall under the class of the rorquals, which are the biggest of the baleen family. The logical name of the Blue whale is, Balsenoptera musculus. Catchphrases: Balaenoptera musculus, Suborder Mysticeti, balaenoptera intermedia, balaenoptera brevicauds, baleen whale, rorqual, calf, sulfur base, Sibbalds Rorqual, Great Northern Rorqual, gulpers, blowholes, lard, oil, keratin, krill, copepods, microscopic fish, orcas, jeopardized Whales are isolated into two gatherings, the baleen and the toothed whales. The blue whale is the biggest baleen whale and the biggest creature that at any point lived on Earth, including the biggest dinosaurs. Baleen are columns of coarse, bristle-like strands used to strain tiny fish from the water. Baleen is made of keratin, a similar material as our fingernails. They live in cases, the have two blowholes. The blue whale has a 2-14 inch (5-30cm) thick layer of lard. Blue whales (Balaenoptera musculus) are baleen whales (Suborder Mysticeti). They are one of 76 animal varieties and are marine warm blooded creatures. The Blue whale is known as a rorqual, a Norwegian word for wrinkle alluding to the creased grooves running from its jawline to its maritime. The creased throat grooves permit the Blue whales throat to grow during the immense admission of water during channel taking care of; they can hold 1,000 tons or a greater amount of food and water when completely extended (Small 1971). Blue whales have 50-70 throat grooves. Blue whales grow up to around 80 feet (25m) long all things considered, weighing around 120 tons. Th... <! Blue whales articles Conceptual The Blue whale is the biggest animal of the ocean, indeed, it is the biggest animal known to man. In opposition to what the vast majority think, despite the fact that Blue whales live in the ocean, they are warm blooded animals. They inhale air, have their infants brought into the world alive and can live somewhere in the range of 30 to 70 years. The Blue whale is a baleen whale, and as opposed to having teeth, Blue whales have around 300-400 baleen plates in their mouths. They fall under the classification of the rorquals, which are the biggest of the baleen family. The logical name of the Blue whale is, Balsenoptera musculus. Watchwords: Balaenoptera musculus, Suborder Mysticeti, balaenoptera intermedia, balaenoptera brevicauds, baleen whale, rorqual, calf, sulfur base, Sibbalds Rorqual, Great Northern Rorqual, gulpers, blowholes, lard, oil, keratin, krill, copepods, microscopic fish, orcas, jeopardized Introduction Whales are isolated into two gatherings, the baleen and the toothed whales. The blue whale is the biggest baleen whale and the biggest creature that at any point lived on Earth, including the biggest dinosaurs. Baleen are columns of coarse, bristle-like strands used to strain microscopic fish from the water. Baleen is made of keratin, a similar material as our fingernails. They live in units, the have two blowholes. The blue whale has a 2-14 inch (5-30cm) thick layer of lard. Blue whales (Balaenoptera musculus) are baleen whales (Suborder Mysticeti). They are one of 76 animal groups and are marine warm blooded animals. Foundation The Blue whale is known as a rorqual, a Norwegian word for wrinkle alluding to the creased grooves running from its jawline to its maritime. The creased throat grooves permit the Blue whales throat to grow during the immense admission of water during channel taking care of; they can hold 1,000 tons or a greater amount of food and water when completely extended (Small 1971). Blue whales have 50-70 throat grooves . Blue whales grow up to around 80 feet (25m) long all things considered, gauging abou... <!

Saturday, August 22, 2020

Organizational Effectiveness

Authoritative Effectiveness â€Å"Researchers examining what CEOs and chiefs do have highlighted control, advancement, and productivity as the three most significant procedures administrators use to evaluate and quantify how successful they, and their associations, are at making esteem (L. Galambos, 1988)†. Control is basic over the outer and interior condition by recognizing what the interest for a business is. A device to help settle on these choices with control is to lead a pattern investigation. An investigation will uncover designs be it inward or outside of an organization.To recognize current examples alongside the status of the association supervisors can decide how to rebuild the business in or to create item or administrations in the most productive manner conceivable. This may incorporate including extra abilities, advancements, or current resources for the present workforce anything that will deliver the best yield of an association in the most proficient manner. An association must be creative while acquainting their item or administrations with the market.This may expect the executives to request radical changes to the association by improving or evolving procedures, promoting, and simply secure the capacity to acclimate to any condition the association needs to go up against be it inward or outside. An association doesn't have to utilize the three strategies to survey and measure associations viability it would rely upon what needs consideration, yet it is in every case useful for an association to know the wellbeing of their association relating to the three measures. Table 1 (Jones. , 2010) L-3 correspondences. Income: Over $5 bil. Workers: Over 10,000 Fortune 1000, Fortune 500, Russell 3000 Industry: Aerospace and Defense , Consumer Electronics , Consumer Goods , Manufacturing SIC Codes: 3663 NAICS Codes: 334220 L-3 is a prime temporary worker in Command, Control, Communications, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (C3ISR) fr ameworks, airplane modernization and upkeep, and national security arrangements. L-3 is additionally a main supplier of an expansive scope of electronic frameworks utilized on military and business platforms.Our clients incorporate the U. S. Division of Defense and its prime temporary workers, U. S. Government knowledge offices, the U. S. Division of Homeland Security, U. S. Branch of State, U. S. Branch of Justice, partnered remote governments, household and outside business clients and select other U. S. administrative, state and nearby government offices (Company Profile, 2013)†. As of now L-3’s concern is to work in an effective way to keep up and increment their objective market.L-3’s comparable organizations are Raytheon Company, Lockheed Martin Corporation, Northrop Grumman Corporation, and The Boeing Company. They are goliaths in their field and are organizations that are veterans to the calling. With a greater part of veteran organizations, the difficult ies are comparative with L-3 the ceaselessly evolving condition. Model: the evolving innovation, changing objective markets causes the hesitance of progress in the interior societies of these huge organizations and L-3 isn't safe to this challenge.The best way to deal with use for L-3 is the measurements that would help improve authoritative viability. This is the inward framework approach see [ Table 1 (Jones. , 2010) ]. This technique incorporates improving the correspondence procedure between the degrees of the board. Raise issues in a convenient way to upper administration. The inward soundness of the organization is valuable data ( be it negative or positive) revives dynamic procedure which thusly permits the association to proceed with planed processes.One of the primary issues to address is the workforce to move into utilizing new apparatuses, forms, and simply taking a gander at the associations prerequisites diversely for the association is changing, nothing is steady with change. This steady change without preparing causes decline in inspiration, make clashes and surely forestalls L-3’s yield to its’ advertise, and at long last a deferral in yield to the market does upsets the outer situations. In this way, forms should be reconsidered and restructured.Replacing the maturing instruments with current apparatuses brings about a smooth out and robotizes forms. â€Å"The Benefits of Process Automation: Improved Efficiency. Numerous business forms length frameworks, offices, or even outside colleagues. Manual exertion, poor hand-offs between offices or accomplices, and the general failure to screen by and large advancement results is a huge waste for most procedures. Procedure robotization kills or altogether decreases these issues with a resultant decrease in labor hours, time range, and expanded throughput.Increased Productivity. Via robotizing forms that are right now being executed physically, people can work all the more proficiently a nd can take on new or extra outstanding tasks at hand. Procedure computerization permits us to meet people's high expectations of being approached to accomplish more with less. Shorter Cycle Times. Time is cash. Via computerizing forms, they are continued moving, hand-offs are encouraged, consistency is guaranteed, and process durations to finish the procedure are abbreviated. Getting the item or administration to the end client or to advertise snappier can bring about huge money related benefits.Consistent Process Implementation. Consistency originates from having an archived procedure that is comprehended and followed without fail. Procedure robotization makes the procedure straightforward and implements adherence to the procedure steps. This kills missed advances frequently found in manual procedures, bringing about steady, solid estimates that help with settling on choices and executing process enhancements. Corporate Governance and Compliance. Procedure consistence, administrat ive consistence, and corporate administration are ever expanding in importance.Organizations must exhibit consistency and show that successful controls and business screens are set up to guarantee forms are sound and will give budgetary responsibility, perceivability, and lessen hazard and extortion. Procedure robotization can assist your organization with consistence issues encompassing guidelines like the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, Combined Code for Corporate Governance, Bilanz Reform, and that's just the beginning. Resistance or absence of satisfactory controls can cost your organization huge time.Process robotization guarantees your procedures are followed as they are spread out. Capacity to Quickly Implement Change. Another advantage of computerized process is that the dependable, reliable data gave can empower you to perceive the requirement for change or improvement rapidly and afterward have the option to roll out that improvement and put it into impact in a quicker and more contro lled way than you could with a manual procedure. The capacity to change rapidly gives a significant business advantage. Improved Customer Service andSatisfaction. Clients are substantially more fulfilled when they get auspicious, top quality items and administrations. Procedure robotization empowers you to incorporate consistency with your items and administrations, encourage persistent improvement, and get the item or administration to your client quicker. Upbeat clients are rehash clients. Decreased Costs and Improved Profits. The entirety of the above advantages bring about direct main concern consequences of diminished costs, capacity to take on more work, and improved profitability.All things any organization is looking for (A. Moudry, 2013)†. To set up hierarchical viability, the board L-3 needs to concentrate on organizing their workforce, interior representative administration frameworks, and the association and capacities (counting the authoritative culture) to the ar rangement. This is a urgent point to any procedure and commitment from every included direct whether authoritative viability, the board is a triumph. References: A. Moudry, J. (2013, March 16). Genuine Benefits of Automated Processes.Retrieved from NEXTGENPINEW. COM: http://www. nextgenpinews. com/documents/Real%20Benefits%20of%20Automated%20Processes. pdf Company Profile. (2013, March 14). Recovered from L-3: http://www. l-3com. com/about-l-3/organization profile. html Jones. , G. R. (2010). The Organization and Its Environment. In G. R. Jones. , Organizational Theory, Design, and Change, Sixth Edition. Prentice Hall. Copyright  © 2010 by Pearson Education, Inc. L. Galambos. (1988). â€Å"What Have CEO’s Been Doing? †. Diary of Economic History, 18, 243â€258.

Friday, August 21, 2020

Dysfunctional Organizations Are Like Dysfunctional Families

Quality, timing, and cost will all generally be less good than arranged. Tasks will be routinely deferred, costs will routinely be reexamined upward, quality will be in danger of being overlooked in the journey for productivity and practicality, items will be in danger of numerous and additionally extreme imperfections, and consumer loyalty will fall behind increasingly fit and less broken contenders. Essentially, a useless family will have equal issues with accomplishing its goals.An unevenness of intensity is a continuous reason for brokenness in families. Envision: a family with a few youngsters leaves on a major venture, an outing to Ocracoke Island, for xample. On the off chance that one youngster is all the more requesting, poor, or in any case excellent, and the family has built up a useless standard of conduct focused on that kid, things will be upset and plans won't work out. The youngster may need to stop at each rest stop, and take quite a while getting over into the vehic le, deferring progress on the trip.The father may realize the ship plan for getting to the island, and know when the family should be at the dock, yet he will be unable to change the kid's conduct, nor the conduct of the mother who cooks an excessive amount to the requesting kid. Arbitrary and unforeseen deferrals brought about by the youngster, who has no comprehension of the limitations the dad faces, make them late and they miss the ship, acquiring extra expense of a night's stay on the territory. An unevenness of intensity is likewise an issue for huge companies.I have worked for organizations in which one top director or one capacity, item styling, for instance, can cause an about ideal corresponding to the useless family. The item styling bunch knows when they have to complete the plan, however their Job is to make the item look appealing, and they have so any individuals required, from numerous degrees of the association, that they can't complete it on schedule. Top administr ators get through the studio to take a gander at the new structure, at the same time, many having been architects and creators before, they each observe something they feel should be changed.Since they don't get through the studio until the plan should be almost finished, their recommendations set back the plan procedure, and the structure is late. The architects who need to incorporate the structure with utilitarian parts are left to play â€Å"catch-up† with their structures, including late changes, vertime, and a colossal measure of adjust to reevaluate monetary fgures, get reconsidered cites from providers, re-time the plans, and so on , and so forth. The providers, as well, need to change their arrangements and plans and renegotiate with their providers thusly, and are postponed as well.Packaging, promoting materials, deals and administration instructional courses, and numerous different endeavors are good to go back. Regardless of whether top administration is understan ding and â€Å"lets well takes sa'. n. y the board at the top, officials or guardians, to restrain broken conduct and keep things on target. In my five unique vocations I have seen this equivalent asic design rehashed again and again, getting just the standard method for working together for certain associations. The main relieving power I am aware of is having truly sa'. . y upper administration who see how such things occur and are happy to effectively work to evade them. A shrewd top administrator can get control over the overeager creators, for instance, and comprehend the standards of consistent losses and the need to comprehend when â€Å"roughly right† is sufficient. So also, the gifted parent can comprehend the issues brought about by preferring one youngster over nother, and cautiously deal with the conduct of the people in the family so that the familys overall objectives are met.Maybe it's Just my experience, however I have seen that such aptitude and adroit are v ery uncommon. Ethnic or national culture can be a noteworthy factor in occurrences of brokenness. Strikingly, the board sa'. n. y and child rearing aptitude are intensely affected by social variables. In Western societies where there is a solid worth set on uniqueness, administrators can obtain the â€Å"gunslinger† attitude, which makes them think they need to do everything themselves and be the best at everything.With such directors joint effort and correspondence can endure and, while they might be stars in their own right, the association can experience the ill effects of the contentions and messes that will result. Essentially, in a firmly patriarchic culture, the dad, feeling like he should be the all powerful position, may overlook the little youngster who hears the tire thundering as it begins to go level, and thus miss the ship because of a destroyed tire and the time required to fix it.Organizations can get useless by advancing the individuals who do incredibly well . A few organizations advance architects and fashioners who make incredible items to elevated level administration ositions, and afterward some marvel why the association does inadequately. I have frequently noticed that numerous architects take this profession course since they don't care for managing individuals, and would prefer â€Å"stick their head in a machine† and make it fill in as about impeccably as conceivable than haggle with other people.To take somebody who, by their temperament, slashes to Jobs that evade cooperation with individuals and put them in a Job that requires incredible relationship building abilities is requesting inconvenience. They won't just be awkward and despondent, yet they may not comprehend relational and authoritative conduct well, battle, and not do a generally excellent Job. Simultaneously, to return to building would be a horrendous downgrade and pay cut, so they are trapped, regularly for a considerable length of time, in a situation fo r which they are just barely suited.Many guardians, in the same way as other administrators, were never fit or decidedly ready for their jobs. Thus, numerous guardians become that unintentionally, maybe through absence of legitimate thoughtfulness regarding contraception, or through social goals †more seasoned relatives who anteroom hard for grandkids, for instance. A few guardians had extreme childhoods, for instance, and never got the opportunity to observe great child rearing as kids, yet they ften get themselves liable for a family with youngsters and (maybe) a mate, and even old guardians that need their care.In a general public with little spotlight on or social information around great child rearing, they will be seriously tested to run a family adequately or maintain a strategic distance from the errors that were executed on them as kids. Brokenness will in general stick around and follow associations and families. In this manner, in creep in after some time, and prolif erate forward starting with one age or system then onto the next. It is therefore that occasionally a governing body of an enterprise will excuse ot just a CEO yet a large number of his reports too, and acquire new administration ability from outside the organization to attempt to ingrain another culture.While this is uncommon and troublesome in a business association, it is considerably increasingly troublesome and problematic to a family, and normally includes social assistance associations and courts mediating in manners that might create better long haul results for the relatives. In the two cases the circumstance must be amazingly terrible before such changes can be Justified, and a lion's share of such circumstances most likely are rarely all around tended to.

Friday, May 29, 2020

Study On The Effects Of Ipo Underpricing Finance Essay - Free Essay Example

Underpricing is the difference between the issue price of a new share and the first trading price on the secondary market. It is a worldwide phenomenon of almost each capital market that has been well documented in different markets. Numerous empirical studies find evidence that the first trading price is about 20 per cent higher than the issue price of the shares on average.This phenomenon has been experienced in almost every country with a stock market, although the degree of underpricing varies from country to country. The study of Loughran, Ritter and Rydqvist (1994) confirmed this IPO underpricing phenomenon in 25 countries, with higher IPO underpricing in developing than in developed markets. For example, the level of underpricing in the US was 15.3% (for 10,626 IPOs during 1960-92), in France was 4.2% (for 187 IPOs during 1983-92) and in Malaysia was 80.3% (for 132 IPOs during 1980-91). Lowry and Schwert (2000) find that the number of IPOs and the average initial returns are highly auto correlated and that both price update and the initial return are predictable based on publicly available information. They suggest that these differences are highly significant and provide strong evidence favoring the asymmetric information theory. Su and Fleisher (1999) analyze Chinese IPOs during the period of 1985-1987 and find that the level of underpricing for a share is 948.6%. Arosio et al (2000) analyze a survey of Internet stock IPOs, listed on the Euros secondary Stock Exchanges and find an in itial average return equal to 76.43%. They document that this huge underpricing is strongly related to the information gathered during book-building activity in the pre-selling period, which drives the revision of the prospectus price range and signals the IPO quality to uninformed investors. Chowdhry and Sherman (1996) document that the average first-day return varies systematically with the mechanism used to price and distribute IPOs. Ritter (2001) points out that fixed price offerings are more underpriced than offerings built by the book. Ljungqvist et al (2000) analyze 2105 IPOs in 61 non-US markets during the period 1992-1999 and document that the direct costs of book-building are twice as large as direct costs for fixed-price offers, but the book-building leads to substantially less underpricing. On the other hand, Derrien and Womack (2000) analyze the French IPOs market during the period 1992-1998 and find that auctions IPOs are less underpriced (9.7%) than book-building I POs (16.9%). For Taiwan, Liaw et al (2000) find that the degree of underpricing for price-fixed IPOs is 34.6% and 7.8% for auctions IPOs. Kutsuna and Smith (2000) also point out that in Japan, auctions IPOs are less underpriced (11.50%) than book-building IPOs (70.81%). Several explanations are possible for these countrys differences. Institutional differences probably play an important role, as underwriters follow different price setting and allocation strategies across country. On the following table we can see a detailed list of different studies about this phenomenon in financial markets worldwide and the different levels of underpricing of the IPOs accordingly to country and period of time. Country Authors Sample size Period Underpricing Germany Ljungqvist 170 1978-92 10,9% Australia Lee, Taylor Walter 266 1976-89 11,9% Austria Aussenegg 67 1964-96 6,5% Brazil Aggarwal, Leal Hernandez 62 1980-90 78.5% Canada Jog 383 1971-948 43% Chilli Aggarwal, Leal Hernandez 19 1982-90 16,3% China Su and Fleisher 308 1987-95 948,5% United States Ritter 13,308 1960-96 15,8% Finland Keloharju 85 1984-92 9,6% France Derrien Womack 264 1992-98 13,2% Hong Kong McGuinness 334 1980-96 15,9% Italy Giudici Paleari 135 1985-98 23,9% Japan Hebner Hiraki 472 1970-91 32,5% Malaysia Paudyal, Saadouni Briston 95 1984-95 61,8% Mexico Aggarwal, Leal Hernandez 37 1987-90 33,0% New Zealand Firth 149 1979-87 25,8% Holland Eijgenhuijsen Buijs 72 1982-91 7,2% United Kingdom Levis 2,133 1959-90 12,0% Singapore Lee, Taylor Walter 128 1973-92 31,4% Suede Rydqvist 251 1980-94 34,1% Efficient Market Hypothesis (EMH) Formulated by Eugene Fama in 1970, the Efficient Market Hypothesis that suggests that at any given time price fully reflect all available information on a particular stock or market is highly controversial and often disputed theory concerning the market efficiency by the economists. Thus, accordingly to the EMH, no investor has an advantage in predicting a return on a stock price since no one has access to information not already available. A market is said to be efficient if prices adjust quickly and, on average, without bias, to new information. As a result, the current prices of securities reflect all available information at any given point in time. Consequently, there is no reason to believe that prices are too high or too low. For Fama, there are three primary conditions that must be true to validate the EMH: 1. There are no transaction costs in trading securities. 2. All available information is available to all market participants at no cost. 3. All actors on th e market fully agree on what the implications of current and future information has on the price of a security. The conditions above is a picture of the perfectly efficient market, but the capital markets worldwide today are so far away from the perfect market, which does not necessarily means that the securities traded on these market are wrongly priced. According to the kind of information available, we can distinguish three version of the EMH: The Weak Form The weak form is the degrees of efficient market hypothesis (EMH) that claims all past prices of a stock are reflected in todays stock price. Therefore, future prices cannot be predicted by analyzing price from the past. It is named weak form because prices are arguably the most public as well as the most easily available pieces of information. Thus, one should not be able to profit from using something that everybody else knows. However, while EMH predicts that all price movement in the absence of change in fun damental information is random many studies have shown a marked tendency for the stock markets to trend over time periods of weeks or longer. The Semi-Strong Form The Semi-Strong form suggest that only information that is not publicly available can benefit investors seeking to earn abnormal returns on investments; the current price fully incorporates all publicly available information (past prices, data reported in financial statements, earnings and dividend announcements, announced merger plans, the financial situation of companys competitors, expectations regarding macroeconomic factors as well as non-financial factors). Semi-strong efficiency of markets requires the existence of market analysts who are not only financial economists able to comprehend implications of vast financial information, but also macroeconomists, experts adept at understanding processes in product and input markets. The Strong Form In strong-form efficiency, share prices reflect all informati on, public and private, and no one can earn excess returns. Not even insider information could give an investor the advantage. This degree of market efficiency implies that profits exceeding normal returns cannot be made, regardless of the amount of research or information investors have access to. The main difference between the semi-strong and strong efficiency hypothesis is that in the latter case, nobody should be able to systematically generate profits even if trading on information not publicly known at the time. The rationale for strong-form market efficiency is that the market anticipates in unbiased manner future developments and therefore the stock price may have incorporated the information and evaluated in a much more objective and informative way than the insiders. However, the January effect, the weekend effect, the month effect, small firm effect and the IPO underpricing effect constitute some of the anomalies documented about the EMH. Some past events have feed arguments against the EMH; a look on the historical returns of some investment funds show that some investors, like Warren Buffet or Peter Lynch, have been beating the market year after year. The IPO underpricing anomaly shows that new shares appear to be issued with a discount on its true value. Ibbotson (1975) was the first to test this kind of anomaly, and after applying some test, he found that new issues were underpriced 16.8% in average. Later, this anomaly was also tested by Ibbotson and Jaffe (1975). This anomaly therefore constitutes the subject of this thesis; considering the Cyprus Stock Exchange. Valuation The valuation and pricing of an initial public offer is a difficult and contentious issue. Trying to gauge market sentiment and setting a price that does not spell disaster in terms of the desired objectives is a real challenge. IPOs will be valued using a variety of method. Studying 49 IPOs conducted in Brussels between 1993 and 2001, finance professors Marc Deloof and Wouter De Maeseneire and researcher Koen Inghelbrecht isolated the valuation models used to set initial share prices and determined which provide the most realistic snapshot of market prices. Underwriters in the study never employed just one valuation method. In all 49 of the IPOs studied, the underwriters used discounted free cash flow (DFCF); in 24, they also used the dividend discount model (DDM), and in 40, they added price-to-earnings, price-to-cash flow, or other multiples valuation methods. However, Kim and Ritter (1999) find only a modest ability to explain the pricing of IPOs using accounting multiple s, even when using earnings forecasts. Purnanandam and Swaminathan (2001) construct a measure of intrinsic value based on industry matched Price/Sales and Price/Ebitda from comparable publicly traded firms (comps) for a sample of over 2,000 IPOs from 1980-1997. They find that, when offer prices are used, IPO firms are priced about 50% above comparables, which is an enormous difference. The Capital Asset Pricing Model In 1964 William F. Sharpe published a theory that explains the relationship that exists between the risk and return expected. This model, the Capital Asset Pricing Model is applied to price securities that present risk. According to Investopedia, the CAPM says that the expected return of a security or a portfolio equals the rate on a risk-free security plus a risk premium. If this expected return does not meet or beat the required return, then the investment should not be undertaken. The security market line plots the results of the CAPM for all different risks (betas). In other words, it is an equilibrium model that explains how assets are priced in an efficient market, taking into consideration their risk, providing a benchmark for evaluating if securities are at a fair price given their level of risk, serving also as a tool for pricing new securities not traded before. The CAPM is one of the most used investment model to determine risk and return despite it is only valid unde r special set of assumptions; some being unrealistic, met or not valid (investor: are rational and risk-averse, are price takers; that means that it is impossible for them to influence prices, but they can lend and borrow unlimited amounts without interest rate risk, trade with no costs, perfect Competitive Markets). There are three steps to build an intuition for the CAPM model: We first consider an asset that has no volatility, no risk; with returns that do not vary with the market. As a result, the asset has a beta equal to zero, producing an expected return equal to the risk-free rate. Then, an asset with beta one should be considered. It has to move in lock-step with the market. The result of this perfect correlation with the market is a return on the asset equal to the return of the market. At the end, we think about an asset with a beta greater than one that experiences greater swings in periodic returns than the market. As a result, we would expect that this asse t will give returns superior to those of the market, as compensation for this extra risk. Investopedia present the following formula: Where: is the expected excess return on the capital asset is the risk-free rate of interest such as interest arising from government bonds (the beta coefficient) is the sensitivity of the expected excess asset returns to the expected excess market returns is the expected excess return of the market is sometimes known as the market premium or risk premium (the difference between the expected market rate of return and the risk-free rate of return). Using the Capital Asset Pricing Model  under the assumptions above it is possible to calculate the expected return of a stock. However, there are some concerns about the overall efficacy of the CAPM. Several academic researches in recent years have made the CAPM true predictive power questionable. When realized returns are compared to what the CAPM would have expected, the model is often incorrect. Many researchers believe that other risk factors have significant impact on expected returns in the market. Moreover, to correctly test how well the CAPM prices securities we must assume that the market is efficient, which means that we are testing two hypothesis simultaneously, which raise a doubt if the inconsistency is due to a bad asset-pricing asset model or due to a inefficient market. Furthermore, Richard Roll (1977) has claimed that the model cannot be tested since the market portfolio cannot be observed because it consists of all risky assets. He has said that the only way to test it is using a market index, what would be able to serve as a market portfolio, but the problem is that a market index does not include all risky assets. The Arbitrage Pricing Theory The Arbitrage Pricing Theory developed by Stephen Ross (1976) and based on the idea that identical assets in different market should be priced identically is often viewed as an alternative to the Capital Asset Pricing Model since the APT  has  more flexible assumption requirements. Tradetaxfree.com define the APT as an asset pricing  model  based on the idea  that an assets returns can be predicted using  the relationship between that same asset and many common risk factors;   it predicts a relationship between the returns of a  portfolio and the returns of a single asset through a linear combination of many independent macro-economic variables. Whereas the CAPM formula requires the markets expected return, APT uses the risky assets expected return and the risk premium of  a number of  macro-economic factors. Arbitrageurs use the APT  model to profit by taking advantage of mispriced securities. A mispri ced security will have a price that differs from the theoretical price predicted by the model. The economic factors in the model are not specified in the original APT model, but Roll and Ross (1980) have identified five factors that affect the price, as follow: changes in the expected inflation, unanticipated changes in inflation, unanticipated changes in industrial production, unanticipated changes in the default-risk premium and unanticipated changes in the term structure of interest rates. Since the anticipated factors are already reflected in the price of an asset, the unanticipated factors cause a change in the price of the asset. For example, if we consider a bond with a fixed coupon interest, which current price is the net present value of expected interest and principal payments, discounted at some rate that reflects the time value of the money, the uncertainty of these future cash flows and the expected inflation rate. If there is an unanticipated increase in inflatio n, what will happen to the price of the bond? It will go down, since the discount rate increases as inflation decreases. This mechanism is similar to all other economic factors in the determination of the price of an asset along the time. The APT Model is not without drawbacks. The sensitivities must be estimated, since the model is based on the sensitivities of expected returns to unanticipated changes in the factors; the best we can do is to look at historical relationships (like in the CAPM). Also, some financial researchers argue that a single factor, namely the market portfolio, does just as good a job in explaining security returns as the more complex multiple factor approach of the APT Model. Why Do Firms Go Public? A companys main motivation for going public is to raise funds. For a better understanding of the IPOs underpricing phenomenon, is important also to understand why firms go public. Basically there are two theories related to IPO underpricing that cover why do firm go public: Life Cycle Theories and Market Timing Theories. Life Cycle Theories According to the Life Cycle Theories, as a firm grows and become sufficiently large, it will reach the optimal conditions to go public. Some authors related this theory to the IPO underpricing. For Zingales (1995), for a potential acquirer, public targets are easier to spot than private targets. Entrepreneurs can facilitate the acquisition of their company for a higher value after the IPO. By going public, entrepreneurs can get a higher value for their company if it is acquired by diversified investors than if the company was privately owned and sold in an outright sale. For Chemmanur and Fulghieri (1999), Early in its lifecycle a fi rm will be private. As it grows and faces profitable investment opportunities, the costs of going public are worth incurring. It does so to allow for greater dispersion of ownership. Pre-IPO angel investors and VCs hold undiversified portfolios and, therefore, are not willing to pay as high a price as diversified public-market investors. The same subject is approached under another perspective by Maksimovic and Pichler (2001), providing another explanation. They point out that by going public, the owners of the company attract a market competition, generating an increased demand for the shares of the company, and consequently, increasing the value price of the company. By trading at a price under fair value for the company, it keeps competition at a low level. Market Timing Theories Lucas and McDonald (1990) while discussing about asymmetric information model state that firms postpone (seasoned) equity issue if they know they are currently undervalued. If there are common m isevaluations, aggregate issue volume will increase following bull markets. Welch and Ritter (2002) propose a semi-rational theory without asymmetric information to explain increased IPO volume following bull markets: Entrepreneurs sense of value derives more from their operations perspective and underlying business fundamentals than from public markets. Ljungqvist and Wilhelm (2002) also supported and confirmed it by measuring the underpricing of firms going public during the dot-com bubble. Explanations literature 3. Asymmetric Information Models 3.1 The Winners Curse The winners curse, developed by Rocks (1986) is probably the best-known asymmetric information model. The winners curse provides the explanation for the information asymmetry between the investors. In this model, some investors are assumed to be better informed about the shares real value than underwriter, issuing firm and other investors. Uninformed investors are the losers, as they do not know which issues will be underpriced and so they are allocated large fraction of overpriced shares while investors that possess information call only for good priced IPOs. Beatty and Ritter (1986), Barry and Jennings (1993) support this hypothesis by providing evidence from U.S. market. Rock assumes that all IPOs must be underpriced in expectation considering that the demand of informed investors is not enough to fill all shares on offer even at good price. He also assumes that firms going public benefit from underpricing. Underpricing ensure that uninformed investor will continue to partici pate and bring capital to the IPO market. However, underpricing is clearly costly to certain firm that going public; it results in a lost capital that could have been raised in the case if the offering price had been set higher. In wikipedia page about IPO, we have the example of theglobe.com IPO during the IPO mania of the late 90s internet era. Underwritten by Bear Stearns on November 13, 1998 the stock had been priced at $9 per share, and famously jumped 1000% at the opening of trading all the way up to $97, before deflating and closing at $63 after large sell offs from institutions flipping the stock . Although the company rise about $30 million from the offering it is estimated that with the level of demand for the offering and the volume of trading that took place the company might have left upwards of $200 million on the table. 3.2 Information Revelation Theories (or informational cascade (to check and choose)) Rocks (1986) winners curse has lead to book-building; method that give underwriters wide discretion over allocations. It refers to underwriters extracting indications of interest from investors. The formations collected are then used for set the offer price. Following the Rock assumption that some investors are better informed than the company and other investors, Benveniste and Spindt (1989), Benveniste and Wilhelm (1990), and Spatt and Srivastava (1991) demonstrate that underwriters now elicit information before setting the price of the share for company doing an IPO. They state that book-building can be such a technique under certain conditions. However, the underwriters have to manage to find a way to lead investors to reveal the truth information. Underwriters do not allocate shares or only few to any investor who bid conservatively after they have collected investors indications of interest. By doing so, they reduce the incentive for informed investor to misrepresent po sitive information. On the other hand, investors who reveal favorable information are rewarded with important allocations of shares. More investors bids, more the offer price goes up. However, to make sure to gather the truth from investor, the shares allocated need to be underpriced. Even though the shares are underpriced, the firm has benefit to take on these deals. By repeating this process, underwriters and investors achieve a reduced cost of information acquisition. Repetition also allows underwriters to bundle offerings across time. Some extension goes with the Benveniste and Spindt (1989) theory. Benveniste and Wilhelm (1990) examine the interaction of their theory with Rocks (1986) winners curse. They argued that if book-building succeeds in extracting the informed investors private information, the informational asymmetry among investors will be reduced. This, in turn, reduces the winners curse and thus the level of underpricing required to ensure the uninformed inves tors break even. Busaba et al(2001) demonstrate the level of required underpricing can be reduced by the underwriters in the case where reliable withdraw option is proposed on if the offering. Ljungqvist (2006) states, in the Benveniste and Spindt framework, investors incur no cost in becoming informed. If information production is costly, underwriters need to decide how much information production to induce. Sherman and Titman (2002) explore this question in a setting where more information increases the accuracy of price discovery, resulting in a trade-off between the benefit of greater pricing accuracy and the cost of more information production. In short, with book-building, a preliminary offer price range is set, and then underwriters and issuers go on a road show to market the company to prospective investors. This road show helps underwriters to gauge demand as they record indications of interest from potential investors. If there is strong demand, the underwriter wi ll offer a higher price. The information gathering perspective of book-building is certainly useful, but the theory also suggests that the information provided by one incremental investor is not very valuable when the investment banker can canvas hundreds of potential investors. Thus, it is not obvious that this framework is capable of explaining average underpricing of more than a few percent. 3.3 Principal-Agent Models Loughran and Ritter (2004) insist on the inconvenient of the book-building theories by examining the possibility of agency problems to occur between the underwriters and the issuing company. Early models linking agency conflict and initial public offering are more on the way that the informational advantage that underwriters have over issuing companies might allow them to not use the maximum of their capacity to promote and distribute the stock. Baron and Holmstrà ¶m (1980) and Baron (1982) build a model that focus on the banks benefit from underpricing. In that model, the issuer firms assign the pricing decision to the bank in order to generate efficient use of the banks superior information concerning the demand. Biais et al (2002) combine the agency cost setting of Baron (1982) with Benveniste and Spindts (1989) assumption that some investors hold pricing-relevant information worth extracting before the offer price is set. In such a setting, the investment banker could collu de with the informed investors, to the potential detriment of the issuing company. Biais et al (2002) derive an optimal IPO mechanism that maximizes the issuers proceeds. In this mechanism, the IPO price is set higher the fewer shares are allocated to (uninformed) retail investors. Allocating more to institutional investors when their private signals are positive (i.e. when the IPO price should be set higher) is consistent with Benveniste and Spindts information. 3.4 Signaling of Firm Quality Theory Allen and Faulhaber (1989), Welch (1989) et al (1989) consider underpricing of IPOs as a tool used by firms to signal their quality. Investors through underpricing become aware of the true value of firm so the market expects less money on the table in the future subscriptions. To distinguish themselves from the pool of low-quality issuers, high-quality issuers may attempt to signal their quality. In these models, better quality issuers deliberately sell their shares at a lower price than the market believes they are worth, which deters lower quality issuers from imitating. With some patience, these issuers can recoup their upfront sacrifice post-IPO, either in future issuing activity, favorable market responses to future dividend announcements, or analyst coverage. signaling models have in common that high quality firms demonstrate that they are high quality by throwing money away. One way to do this is to leave money on the table in the IPO. However, on theoretical grounds, it is unclear why underpricing is a more efficient signal than, say, committing to spend money on charitable donations or advertising. The evidence in favor of these signaling theories is, at best, mixed: there is evidence of substantial post-issuing market activity by IPO firms (Welch (1989)), and it is clear that some issuers approach the market with an intention to conduct future equity issues. However, there is reason to believe that any price appreciation would induce entrepreneurs to return to the market for more funding. Jegadeesh, Weinstein, and Welch (1993) find that returns after the first day are just as effective in inducing future issuing activity as the first-day returns are. Michaely and Shaw (1994) outright reject signaling: in a simultaneous equation model, they find no evidence of either a higher propensity to return to the market for a seasoned offering or of a higher propensity to pay dividends for IPOs that were more underpriced. Still, aside from the pers istence of the signaling explanation on the street, its most appealing feature is that some issuers voluntarily desire to leave money on the table to create a good taste in investors mouths. As such, it is relatively compatible with higher levels of IPO underpricing. If investors are more informed than the issuer, for example about the general market demand for shares, then the issuer faces a placement problem. The issuer does not know the price the market is willing to bear. In other words, an issuer faces an unknown demand for its stock. A number of theories model a specific demand curve. One can simply assume that all investors are equally informed, and thus purchase shares only if their price is below their common assessment. Observed (successful) IPOs thus are necessarily underpriced. There are, however, some overpriced IPOs going public, which would not be predicted because all investors are assumed to know that these would be overpriced. A more realistic assumption is that investors are differentially informed. Pricing too high might induce investors and issuers to fear a winners curse (Rock (1986)) or a negative cascade (Welch (1992)). 4. Institutional Explanations 4.1 Legal Liability Tinic (1988) states that IPOs are underpriced by firm in order to decrease the probability of lawsuit by investors. Indication of a legal liability can create negative impression for an IPO and can cause the failure of the issue. This idea goes back to Logue (1973) and Ibbotson (1975) whose believe companies intentionally sell their stock under the price to reduce the chance of lawsuits by future shareholders frustrated by the performance of their shares after the introduction. This theory concerns mostly the united state because differently to the IPOs underpricing, strict liability laws are not a worldwide phenomenon. Research have shown that law suit is not significant in some country. Tinic (1988), Hughes and Thakor (1992), and Hensler (1995) argue that intentional underpricing may act like insurance against securities litigation. Lawsuits are costly to the firms in term of legal fees, diversion of management time and potential damage to their reputation capital. Hughes and Thakor (1992) state that the change of law suit increases with offer price. 4.2 Price Stabilization Benveniste et al (1996) confirmed the price stabilization of Smith (1986) as a mechanism use by banks and investors. After a book-building, they could exaggerate the investors interest and overprice the IPO. For them, institutional investors who are active in book-building should be advantaged during the allocation. Chowdhry and Nanda (1996) instead consider retail investors as the principal beneficiaries of the price support. Schultz and Zaman (1994) and Hanley et al (1993) show evidence of general price support; and that price support seem to be accentuate for the weak IPOs. 5. Ownership and Control Two models analyze the link between underpricing of initial public offering and ownership and control. First, Booth and Chua (1996) and Brennan and Franks (1997) support the ownership dispersion hypothesis. They argue that firms are willing to underprice in order to have a diffuse ownership base and create a liquid market for their shares. Underpriced IPOs generate excess demand and create a large number of small shareholders. This is crucial for all IPOs as they aim for high participation of public in order to make difficult for outsiders to challenge management. They consider underpricing as a way to trespass managerial control by avoiding monitoring by an important outside shareholder. In contrary to the authors above, Stoughton and Zechners (1998) analysis suggests that underpricing is used to reduce agency costs by promoting monitoring. They observe in contrast to Booth, Chua, Brennan and Franks that the value can be ameliorate by allocating shares to a voluminous extern al investor that has the capacity to monitor managerial process. Stoughton and Zechner, model a book building regime with discretionary allocations; they assume managers keep intern the agency costs imposed to outside investors by lowering the price they are willing to pay for the shares. 6. Behavioral Explanations Loughran and Ritter (2002) suggest an explanation for IPO underpricing that emphasize on behavioral distortion between the decision-makers of the IPO Company, rather than between investors. They argue those issue firms accept the money left on the table during the large first-day returns because they summate the money loss due to underpricing with the wealth gain when prices rise in the after-market. They also assume that the decision-makers initial valuation beliefs are reflected in the mean of the indicative price range reported in the issuing firms IPO registration statement. This belief serves as a reference point against which the gain or loss from the outcome of the IPO can be assessed. The offer price for an IPO routinely differs from this reference point, either because the bank manipulated the decision makers expectations by low-balling the price range, or in reflection of information revealed during marketing efforts directed at institutional investors.

Saturday, May 16, 2020

Socrates View Of Love Essays - 1049 Words

A Different View of Love We have heard definitions of love through our lives that have been passed on for decades. Some of us have felt love, and some of us have been in love. But no one ever seems to question what love is, as if it is something that just plainly is. People tend to just go with it, and think that what they are feeling is really complete and substantial love. In Plato’s The Symposium, the reader is confronted with some very different views of love as brought to us by Agathon, Phaedrus and Socrates, to name a few. Each man at the dinner party has a different point of view on the issue of love. Some of the men are old lovers, and some are just friends, and each puts in his thoughts of love as the evening wears on.†¦show more content†¦What we don’t think of when we hear a statement like that is that in the future we may not experience what we did in the past. Having something, and loving it makes us feel like it will always be there for us and that we will have it at all times. Socrates believes that even if you have all you want at the present time, that in the future you will want it as well. He says this to Agathon, â€Å"You already have riches and health and strength in your possession, my man; what you want is to posses these things in time to come, since in the present, whether you want to or not, you have them.† (42). Socrates is seeming to disprove the age old philosophy of, we want what we cannot have because of that very reason we canno t have it. And once it is attainable it does not look so golden anymore. Socrates says that once we have something good we will always want it because it is beautiful. And if it is beautiful and good then it must be love, because all things that possess those two qualities have got to be love. This is where I see the problems in Socrates’ arguments. His explanations of love are in themselves correct and reasonable, but they get unclear as he goes on. By saying that a man who is strong will still want to be strong in his later life, and someone who is rich will still want to be rich he is correct because everyone wants the good things in life. What he does not explain in his argument is whyShow MoreRelatedSocrates s View Of Love2063 Words   |  9 PagesIn The Symposium, Love is described to be a goddess by the men who are praising her powers in several eulogies. However, Socrates proves that their claims are incorrect evaluations during his speech. Socrates chooses to analyze and discuss the truth of love through rhetoric rather than submit to the ‘illusionary’ art of poetry that the other men used. Although the context of Love is set up in the mythological sense, Socrates’ speech transcends the topic from merely describing the goddess’ p owersRead MoreSocrates And The Early Athenian Era845 Words   |  4 PagesSocrates, a well-known philosopher of the early Athenian era, is believed to be one of the wisest and virtuous philosophers of all time. This belief holds true in the encounters of Symposium by Plato, as depicted by Alcibiades during a symposium held by Agathon. Alcibiades, the last to speak at the symposium, derails from the topic of the night, love, and elicits much praise and gratitude for Socrates. Although Alcibiades did not witness the speech given by Socrates on love, he manages to depictRead MoreSocrates and Love Essay912 Words   |  4 PagesIn the Symposium, written by Plato, Socrates and others engage in a dialogue in the home of Agathon on love. 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From this point of view, it can be inferred that to teach someone you must have all the background andRead MorePlato s Symposium : The Nature Of Love1320 Words   |  6 PagesPlato’s Symposium explores the nature of love through several different telling’s of what love is by philosophers of the time. The speeches of Socrates, Alcibiades, and Aristophanes are of main focus, as their similarities and differences help the reader to decide the truth of the nature of love. Throughout the Symposium, the accounts of love vary from speaker to speaker. The speech given by Socrates differentiates from the viewpoints of Alcibiades and Aristophanes, as well as all of the other speechesRead MoreEuthyphro s Dilemma Of Plato s Euthyphro968 Words   |  4 PagesEuthyphro, Socrates discusses with Euthyphro about what the â€Å"piety† is. The conversation leads to what most modern philosophers now define as Euthyphro’s dilemma. It is stated that† Is something pious because the gods love it or the gods love it because it is pious?† This dilemma is also known as the â€Å"Divine Command Theory†, which has puzzled many Christian philosophers throughout the years. Socrates’ account seems to disagree with Euthyphro’s. This paper will argue against the dilemma in Socrates’ accountRead MoreEssay Platos Symposium1171 Words   |  5 Pagesof being/essence). This concept is key to the context of The Symposium: Love. It is important to note that as the speeches evolve throughout this particular work they parallel this concept. Plato has, in this writers opinion, reinforced his theory through the speakers by outlining the journey from the world of becoming (Phaedrus speech) to the world of being (Diotimas speech). This being so, Diotima and Socrates (the forms) will be the key focus for which all previous speakers will ascendRead MorePlato s The Trial And Death Of Socrates Essay1671 Words   |  7 PagesTrial and Death of Socrates presents the reader with complex competing conceptions of what should be considered â€Å"the good life†. According to Socrates, â€Å"the most important thing is not life, but the good life† (Crito, 48b). The majority, who live a non-philosophical life, believes the goods of life include wealth, reputation, and honor: all things that can easily be taken away or destroyed. On the other hand, Socrates lives a philosophical life filled with self-sufficiency. He views wisdom, truth, andRead MoreLove and Beauty1208 Words   |  5 PagesLove is neither wise nor beautiful, but the desire or pursuit of wisdom and beauty. Love is expressed via propagation and reproduction, as in the exchange and development of ideas. Socrates in the Symposium best expresses this belief. Socrates view of Love and Beauty was that one is the pur suit of the other, and that other is the greatest of all knowledge. Love is a driving force, a compulsion forward to a goal. Much as a moth is drawn to light, for its heat, people are lured to Beauty by LoveRead MoreThe Philosophy Of Human Nature1140 Words   |  5 Pagesof the Will The will, in its simplest form, is the ability for one to control one’s own actions. Through the will, the morality of the action is entirely decided by the doer. Augustine professes the will simply permits the doer to do evil. In Socrates’ assertion, free will is contingent on self-control because without it, one can find oneself enslaved to a material thing or desire. Based on reading and prior knowledge, it can be deduced that the only thing that can truly keep one from vice is

Wednesday, May 6, 2020

What´s Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder Essay - 852 Words

What is PTSD? Post-Traumatic Stress Di-sorder is a syndrome exp-erienced by many veter-ans, and is a priority of a plethora of psychological researchers. The Diag-nostic and Statistical Man-ual of Mental disorders lis-ts eight criterion for this widespread mental dis-ease, including a stressor, meddling symptoms, ev-asion, amendments in provocation and react-ivity, and a duration of symptoms for more than a month. PTSD is often characterized by disrupt-ions in sleep patterns, with the traumatic event fre-quently popping up in the veterans’ nightmares. PTSD has proven to be unpredictable, and there remain many ambiguous aspects to the disorder. It is thought that perhaps PTSD doesn’t even require experiencing a traumatic event. However,†¦show more content†¦Though 12.4% of healthy individuals showed signs of an abnormal MEG scan, 97.3% of the PTSD patients showed an abnormal neural communication pattern unique to PTSD (Storrs). Though the accuracy of the magnetoencephelo-graphy is astounding, the equipment is expensive, and not feasible for a majority of the hospitals around the United States. There have been multiple studies regarding the search for biomarkers for PTSD. In Dr. Charles R. Marmar’s fledgling study aimed at the identification of biomarkers for T.B.I. (traumatic brain injury) and PTSD, Marmar plans to look at 1,500 veterans with PTSD, TBI, or both, and examine their bodies for any biological indications of the presence of PTSD or TBI. These biomarkers would aid in the swift and accurate diagnosis of PTSD; psychologists would no longer be forced to rely purely on self-reports by the individual with PTSD. Treatments for PTSD and TBI could be refined with reliable biomarkers which would indicate the persistence or remission of PTSD in patients undergoing treatment. 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Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder is an anxiety disorder that some people get after seeing or undergoing a dangerous event. There are various symptoms that begin to show or actions that can gi ve a clear answer whether one may be diagnosed with this disorder. One of the many problems is that no age range is safe from suffering PTSD. One must ask themselves what set of events happened at that time to cause this disasterRead MorePost Traumatic Stress Disorder ( Ptsd ) Essay1401 Words   |  6 PagesAccording to the Mayo-Clinic Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, commonly known as PTSD is defined as â€Å"Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a mental health condition that s triggered by a terrifying event — either experiencing it or witnessing it. Symptoms may include flashbacks, nightmares and severe anxiety, as well as uncontrollable thoughts about the event† (Mayo Clinic Staff, 2014). Post Traumatic Stress disorder can prevent one from living a normal, healthy life. 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(BS-2) PTSD affected Najmah, because her dealing with hard losses. (BS-3) Nusrat and Najmah struggles with themselves, showing an internal conflict of Man vs Self. (TS) Throughout the book, Under The Persimmon Tree, the authorRead MorePost Traumatic Stress Disorder ( Ptsd )990 Words   |  4 PagesPost-Traumatic Stress Disorder Post-traumatic stress disorder is a common anxiety disorder characterized by chronic physical arousal, recurrent unwanted thoughts and images of the traumatic event, and avoidance of things that can call the traumatic event into mind (Schacter, Gilbert, Wegner, Nock, 2014). About 7 percent of Americans suffer from PTSD. Family members of victims can also develop PTSD and it can occur in people of any age. 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Tuesday, May 5, 2020

Mental Health Service Delivery and Philosophy System

Question: Discuss about the Mental Health Service Delivery and Philosophy System. Answer: Introduction: According to the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry(2015), the pre- deinstitutionalization and the introduction of the recovery framework in Australia have changed the mental health service delivery and philosophy. Deinstitutionalization is considered as a way to counter the effects of the former system which was institutionalization. It involves downsizing large psychiatric hospitals and shifting to alternative services in the community that ensure the interaction of the patients, their families, and their support systems. The recovery framework focuses more on ensuring the recovery of the patient and not just rehabilitating them. The paper seeks to address some of the effects that deinstitutionalization and the introduction of recovery framework have on the health of people with mental illness and on the consumer experience. Prior to deinstitutionalization, asylums were mainly used to treat and care for patients who had severe mental illness. These asylums were institutionalized settings whereby the patients were closed from the rest of society and had very limited access to the outside world. The patients engaged in scheduled activities that were closely monitored by the caretakers in these institutions. Their activities were organized in a series that was enforced by the officials and their lives were completely controlled by the institutional role. Therefore, with the use of asylums, patients with mental illness can receive treatment to enable them to live a better life (Allott, Loganathan Fulford, 2012). The recovery framework provides an important policy direction on the way to enhance mental health services delivery in Australia. The framework encompasses a range of approaches that guide those employed in the mental health service system towards a recovery-oriented practice and service delivery. It provides guidance on ensuring the recovery-oriented approaches are tailored towards responding to the diverse mental illness the patients have. The system provides services that ensure psychiatric treatment and recovery support for those with mental illness, their families, and their support networks. The recovery framework has received support from people who have lived with mental illness, their families, friends, and the non-governmental community health sector (Davies, Maggs Lewis, 2013). This support has facilitated the implementation of the framework in the Australian mental health services. The policies that have been put in place by the government ensure that priority is given t o the implementation of the framework. In this case, the government should formulate policies that will help mentally ill patients receive treatment in health services (Warburton, Baker, Kendall Crompton, 2016). Deinstitutionalization and introduction of the recovery framework have impacts on the health of people with mental illness and on the consumer experience. First, this provides the patient with a social role since they are able to interact with their friends and families within their communities. These patients no longer need to be confined in psychiatric hospitals since they can be given drugs or undergo therapy while they continue having the freedom of a normal social life. This freedom facilitates their recovery since they have a support system that ensures their recovery. Secondly; deinstitutionalization also prevents the patient from feeling stigmatized because of their mental illness. This system gives the patient an opportunity to interact with others within their community in a normal way that does not make them feel like they are so different from the other individuals in society. This also facilitates the recovery of the patients while reducing the possibility of them developing more mental health problems. Institutionalized patients have a tendency to develop institutional syndrome which makes these patients deficient in social and life skills. individuals who are institutionalized are more likely to develop more mental health problems. Deinstitutionalization and the recovery framework facilitate the recovery of an individual in a supportive environment that involves family, friends, and the community who have a huge role to play in an individuals recovery (Kliewer, Melissa Trippany, 2015). The recovery framework ensures that the patient is not only rehabilitated but also taken through medical processes that facilitate their recovery. Therefore, the recovery framework to be given to these patients should focus on stabilizing their condition in order tom live a healthy productive life. Despite the positive effects deinstitutionalization has had on mental health patients and their families, there are also some shortcomings of the same. This has led to some patients being homeless due to limited community-based care. These patients lack the required attention they need as they go about their daily activities since they do not have friends or family members who are willing to be their custodians throughout the day (Sanbrook Harris, 2013). Some of these patients end up homeless because their families may be unwilling to take care of them. This makes them feel unwanted and unappreciated hence they end leaving their homes and ending up in the streets because they also lack the right judgment to properly manage their lives on their own without the social support. Therefore, people with mental illness require support from family to reduce the suffering most of them go through (Ralph, 2013). In terms of consumer experience, deinstitutionalization and the recovery framework has been beneficial to the mental health patients and even to their families and the community. The recovery framework has a clear approach on how to handle the different mental illnesses in unique ways that ensure recovery (McGorry et al. 2015). The patients and their caretakers are given a clear outline on how to handle the specific mental illness and the patients are also able to receive adequate support from their support group since they are not confined and closed off from the social life (Marynowski-Traczyk, 2015). In conclusion, deinstitutionalization and the introduction of recovery framework have a massive effect on the health of people with mental illness and on the consumer experience. In as much as deinstitutionalization has become prominent, it might not be suitable for patients with acute mental illness and the ones who lack support. However, together with the recovery framework, it has greatly improved the services provided to those who are mentally ill. It has given these patients an opportunity to receive treatment as they progress with a normal social life. Reference Australian, Royal. "Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists clinical practice guidelines for the treatment of schizophrenia and related disorders."Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry39.1-2 (2015): 1-30. Allott, P., Loganathan, L., Fulford, K. W. M. (2012). Discovering hope for recovery.Australian Journal of Community Mental Health,21(2), 13-33. Chester, P., Ehrlich, C., Warburton, L., Baker, D., Kendall, E., Crompton, D. (2016). What is the work of Recovery Oriented Practice? A systematic literature review.Australian journal of mental health nursing,25(4), 270-285. Cameron, H., Athurson, K. Dr Helen Cameron, Dr Kathryn Arthurson, and Penny Worland, Housing Mental Health-Best Practices in Australia?. Davies, J., Maggs, R. G., Lewis, R. (2013). The development of a UK low secure service: philosophy, training, supervision and evaluation.Australian and New Zealand Journal of Forensic Mental Health,9(4), 334-342. Kliewer, S. P., Melissa, M., Trippany, R. L. (2015). Deinstitutionalization: Its Impact on Community Mental Health Centers and the Seriously Mentally Ill.South Wales Counseling Association Journal,35(1), 40-45. Ralph, R. O. (2013). Review of recovery literature.A synthesis of a sample of the recovery literature. Prepared for the National Technical Assistance Center for State Mental Health Planning and the National Association of State Mental Health Program Directors. Australia, VA. Marynowski-Traczyk, D. T. (2015). Emergency Department Registered Nurses conceptions of recovery for mental health consumers: a phenomenographic study. McGorry, P., Killackey, E., Lambert, T., Lambert, M., Jackson, H., Codyre, D. (2015). Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists clinical practice guidelines for the treatment of schizophrenia and related disorders.Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry,39(1-2), 1-30. Sanbrook, M., Harris, A. (2013). Origins of early intervention in first?episode psychosis.Austrian Psychiatry,11(2), 215-219.

Friday, April 17, 2020

New York Growth Essays - East Coast Of The United States

New York Growth For a number of reasons, business enterprise in New York grew by leaps and bounds between 1825 and 1860. New York's growth between the years 1825 and 1860 can be attributed to a number of factors. These include but cannot be limited to the construction of the Erie Canal, the invention of the telegraph, the developed of the railroads, the establishment of Wall Street and banking, the textile, shipping, agriculture and newpaper industries, the development of steam power and the use of iron products. On October 26, 1825 the Erie Canal was opened. The canal immediately became an important commercial route connecting the East with the Ohio and Mississippi Valleys. With tht time of travel cut to one-third and the cost of shipping freight cut to one-tenthof the previous figures, commerce via the canal soon made New York City the chief port of the Atlantic. The growing urban population and the contruction of canals, railroads and factories stimulated the demand for raw materials and food stuffs. In 1836 four-fifths of the tonnage over the Erie Canal came from western New York (North, 105). Much of this cargo was in the form of agriculture goods. The farmer become a shrewed businessaman of sorts as he tended to produce whatever products would leave him the greatest profit margin. The rise of the dairy industry was by far the most significant development in the agricultural history of the state between 1825 and 1860. Farmers discovered that cows were their most relliable money-makers, since both the domestic and foreign market kept demanding more dairy products (Ellis, 273). Price flucuations became increasingly important for the farming population between 1825 and 1860. Prices rose from the low level of the early 1820's until the middle 1830's and the farmer's shared in the general prosperity (271). Although the rapid industrialization and urbanization of New York had a great deal to do with the success of agricultural markets sporadic demand from aboard as a result of the Irish famine, the Crimean War and the repeal of the Corn Laws in England also contributed(North, 141). During this period Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York and Virginia, in that order were the leading wheat growing states. Between the years 1840 and 1850 New York ranked first in the production of beef. The absence of politic party differences on issues related to the the growth of democracy existed in regard to the foremost economic questions, there was absolutely no partisan division evident in the movement to incorporate new financial institutions; rather , the primary factors , which the legislators examined, concerned value, feasibility, profit and the location within the state. Dozens of turnpike proposals, most of which werebacked by the Republicans, passed the legislature; but the Federalists cooperated, seeing the chance for profits. Prominent Federalists like John Rutherfurd, John Neilson, William Paterson, John Bayard, and James Parker invested susstanial sums in the turnpike business. There were numerous Republicans who were also vitally interested in the turnpike business (Kass, 150). Bipartisan support also accompanied plans for the construction of bridges and canals. All of the parties contained a large number of adherents from from every level of economic well-being in society. This helps to expain the absence of any clear-cut party differences on the major economic issues of the such as the chartering of banks, the protestive tariff, internal improvements, the development of manufacturing, and the promotion of superior agricultural techniques. Each politcal faction had segments both pro and con on most of these questions, and, inall cases it was opprtunism, the desire for profits, which was decisive in determining one's political position on these economic issues(175). New York's economic growth can also be attributed to the invention of the cotton gin. Cotton had become a boom crop in the south, however, plantation owners were either too engrossed in the production of their crops or too unschooled in business techiniques to handle its distribution. Some just did not want to be bothered. This opened thee door for agents representing New York shipping firms who were only too happy to help them out - for a fee. This scheme not only earned the New York merchants a handsome profit but also solved the problem that without cotton the ship owner would be hards preesed to find adequate cargoes for their return voyages. And so it came about that New York in the nineteeth century became the nation's foremost shipper of cotton(Allen, 108-109). The cotton shipments entering New York harbor were brought to textile mills for processing. A group of New york capitalist estashlished the Harmony

Friday, March 13, 2020

Roles in Curriculum Development

Roles in Curriculum Development Free Online Research Papers Throughout the 20th Century curriculum development went through several phases as the nation embraced different philosophical views. Starting with Cremin at the turn of the Century, then into the progressive movement with John Dewey, early curriculum planning required that developers understand two things. First they needed to â€Å"understand all three focal points for curricula and, second, to bring them into some appropriate balance in making practical decisions† (Marsh Willis, 2003, p. 41). When J. Franklin Bobbitt published his book on curriculum in 1918 curriculum development entered a new era as, for the first time, much of educational leaders’ work focused exclusively on curriculum issues. This sentence is grammatically awkward. This focus would continue until after World War II as progressive educational philosophies dominated national thinking until the beginning of the Cold War. The launch of Sputnik changed the nation’s collective psyche and resulted in a dramatic shift in thinking about curriculum. The result would eventually be the release of A Nation at Risk, and with its release came a serious disconnect from how curriculum development had matured th roughout the 20th Century. â€Å"Its recommendations and example ignored the bottom-up, grassroots approaches to curriculum planning based on traditional American values of individual initiative† (Marsh Willis, 2003, p. 61). The report set a tone which has greatly influence the early years of the 21st Century as individuality and uniformity collide. How do educational leaders strike a balance between the two ideals? Perhaps the best way to accommodate these conflicting views is through the use of committees that accept the views and needs of all stakeholders in the curriculum development process. Good point Gone are the days of an expert developing and delivering newly developed curriculum. The developer will need a team to ensure the new curriculum meets all the requirements of the institution and the community it serves. Is this always the case? â€Å"Ideally, the design team will be composed of faculty who are responsible for the content of the program or course, a process person, and as needed, experts in assessment and technology† (Diamond, 1998, p. 23). The team, to be successful will require a combination of faculty, facilitators, evaluators, and support staff. Finally, political sensitivities must be considered. Parents, students, and administrators should all have a voice in this process to ensure acceptance and support from the local community, otherwise the proposals may well d ie, no matter how good the ideas may be. Roles in Curriculum Development Content. At the content level, curriculum development roles are primarily those of state officials and local administrators. Community members also have a stake in content, since graduates will make up the bulk of the local workforce. Effective leadership, motivation, and data analysis are vital in the content development stage (Stark, Briggs, Rowland-Poplawski, 2002). State officials charged with curriculum and instruction must use their positions wisely. Leading educational change takes committed, innovative leaders who are motivated by their own ideals as well as political mandates. Additionally, practical application of data and research are necessary to develop timely curricula objectives aligned with modern goals and agendas. How would you define modern goals and agendas? Would they relate to meeting criteria for federal funding? Would they relate to popular theories in pedagogy? Would they relate to agendas of special interests within the community? How would administrators deal with conflicting input from these groups? Administrators’ roles in content development involve substantive data collection in addition to ongoing training and resource support. School boards approve textbook expenditures and it often falls to administrators to make their case for purchase of required curriculum. The role of the administrator requires him to be knowledgeable about the content and goals of state and national standards and have the ability to communicate those needs to local stakeholders. Community members also have a role in the content of any given curriculum. Business leaders require a certain level of expertise in fields appropriate to the local community. New development in an area often depends largely on the quality of graduates found in local systems, providing impetus to real estate and development partners to ensure an adequate curriculum. State-level education officials, local administrators, and community members share the duties in their roles in curriculum development content. Process. At the process level, curriculum development roles are primarily those of facilitators, instructors, and support staff. Parents and students, however, play key roles. Facilitators include assistant principals, curriculum coordinators, and trainers. Teachers make up the bulk of instructors, but instruction is also a responsibility of media specialists and counselors. Support staff includes all facility-level personnel, such as food and maintenance service employees and office staff. Stark, Briggs, and Rowland-Poplawski posit three important questions in role consideration: 1) who takes responsibility, 2) specific activities of the role, and 3) curriculum expertise of the involved parties (2002). Although some system hierarchies specifically delineate a curriculum coordinator responsible for processing of objectives, many times staff find themselves as de facto processors of state goals. Teachers retain the majority of the curriculum processing role, since their daily duties center largely on their ability to convey and implement the state curricula. Marsh and Willis define teachers as the â€Å"filter through which the mandated curriculum passes† (2003, p. 195). No matter who ultimately develops the content of state curricular standards, teachers make daily lesson plans and choose activities and methods to implement those benchmarks to their students. Facilitators and support staff roles generally evolve to complement teacher directives. Parents and students play a key role in the process stage of curriculum development because they must learn and apply the objectives through their own methods and styles. Experts. Experts in the fields of development, technology, and evaluation make up the final component of curriculum development. Ideally, states use curriculum and instruction experts to develop a feasible curriculum that meets state and national guidelines. Technology has become increasingly important in not only making curricular goals assessable to all stakeholders but in allowing state agendas to serve as dynamic entities, providing flexibility as online, accessible documents. The role of evaluators is one of measuring progress and goal attainment within the curriculum, and also to convey those results to the professional and public communities. Good point The role of assessment has changed in recent years from one that measured content knowledge acquisition to the current focus on self-directed learning aptitude and understanding (McCormick Murphy, 2000). Despite what is being measured, however, the role of ongoing evaluation is vital to any curriculum development and implemen tation schedule. Regular assessment of student outcomes and staff support for directives allows state and local officials to address concerns early, before they become costly and time-consuming restraints. Responsibilities The responsibility of the educational leaders and stakeholders in curriculum vary depending on their role in the design process. Curriculum emerges from the attempt to match individual learning styles and interests with the type and amount of structure the individual needs to gain the knowledge, skills, and competencies associated with each goal of the specialization (Bruner, 2002). It is essential that each member of the team concentrates on the experience its members bring and on the skills they seek and need. Each person needs to be sensitive to the individual needs and the academic rigor that characterizes the curriculum and learning environment that encourages excellence by releasing the potential of its members instead of locking it in. The designs for curriculum decision-making that are put forward have only limited predictability. In this academic dimension, a student concentrates on analyzing and extending existing designs, and on internalizing a personal approach to curriculum decision-making. Priority is given to the advancement of existing knowledge and to the creation of new ways to view curriculum problems. Responsibilities include: Analyzing theoretical frameworks that underlie the methods used for curriculum development. Evaluating ideas of major theorists and their designs for developing curriculum. Developing skill in theory building. Identifying assumptions that guide various approaches to curriculum decision-making. Defining a specific meaning of curriculum in terms of its expressed, hidden, and emerging aspects. Interpreting associations between the historical development of the curriculum field and future priorities for curriculum improvement. Analyzing the impact of learning theories on curriculum development (Wiggins, McTighe, 1998) The educational leader has a responsibility of making the curriculum visible; academic skills and calculated risk are mixed with intuition and sensitivity and then applied to the task of writing an expressed curriculum (Buner, 2002). The development process demands the ability to translate ideas into actual decisions. The priority here becomes the integration of theory and practice. The site team must develop and apply their design(s) to specific school settings. Also, the curriculum developer perfects sensitivity to the values, contributions, and history of cultural groups typically neglected by conventional curricula (Billig, 2000). This dimension fosters skills for teaching others how to develop curriculum, and extends the concern of the curriculum worker into decisions that affect the hidden and ever emerging aspects of curriculum. The true leader knows that when they leave the curriculum design process and all other systems are still in tact. The organization should not fall ap art when they leave. That is the true test of leadership. That is when the leader knows they transformed the organization and left a legacy behind. To master skills for developing curriculum. The leader’s jobs include assessing individual, instructional, institutional, and societal needs. They must also develop and articulate specific departmental objectives for specific curricula (Wiggins, McTighe, 1998). They should monitor and screen selected objectives through examining various philosophies of education and learning theories. The leaders should also design instructional strategies and learning opportunities to implement formulated objectives. They have the responsibility of designing quantifiable evaluation procedures to measure student performance. Leaders should analyze the connections among curriculum, educational environment, and learning and design research based, effective curriculum materials (Wiggins, McTighe, 1998). They should then apply designs for curriculum development to actual writing of curriculum and consider leading others through the processes of curriculum development so to increase the effectiveness of school curriculum for meeting individual pupil needs. The ability to move theoretical ideas into curriculum practice demands knowledge about educational change, leadership behavior, and human relations (Billig, 2000). The responsibility of the leader is based on the emphasis that an evolution of a personal leadership style best suited to the individual and to the educational environment he or she works to improve. The leader should constantly evolve, grow, and learn ways to foster school reform, and to aid school personnel in finding desirable directions for change. Yes! To intervene appropriately in a classroom, school, or school system, curriculum leadership team needs to understand the process of planned educational change. Changes in the learning environment, unless carefully implemented and followed-up, seldom pass through the classroom door (Wiggins, McTighe, 1998). Because of the commitment to the process of planned change, students of curriculum studies develop a perspective of continual evaluation and improvement as a way of life for institutions and human beings. Over a period of time, a school, much like an individual, becomes characterized by certain modes of behavior which are like a personality. An organizational personality is infused with a system of values that reflects its history and the impact that various administrators, parents, teachers, and pupils have had on its development (Bruner, 2002). Effective analysis by educational leaders interested in improvement must include an understanding of past influences as well as current conditions of the school and compare various theories of educational change (Wiggins, McTighe, 1998). Professional Learning Community Leaders should form learning communities that identify their team’s leadership style collectively, analyze the influence of internal and external conditions on human behavior; identify the advantages and disadvantages of planned change, and develop procedures for diagnosing the constraining and facilitating forces existing in organizations (Diamond, 1998). They should constantly be proactive in identifying conditions in organizations that are hindering the learning process; and implementing strategies for involving teachers, parents, and pupils in curriculum decision-making. This is a great ideal, but how can the other stakeholders see that this can happen? Authority and Hierarchy In the realm of K-12 education, curriculum development usually becomes the responsibility of the school principal/director, leadership team, and community stakeholders. The leadership team could consist of various instructors across several disciplines within the school, leading teachers within the school, or even a combination of both. What must remain important is that all facets involved in curriculum development remain on one accord when developing curricula for the school. According to Marsh (2003), â€Å"If most schoolwide attempts at curriculum planning are to be successful, they require some form of involvement and commitment by the school principal. Numerous research studies point to the leadership of the principal as critical to constructive curriculum change in individual schools† (p. 207). The principal should provide the foundation for curriculum development and present the charge to the â€Å"curriculum team† or the educational faculty charged with develop ing the curriculum. Quoting studies by studies by Leithwood and Montgomery (1982), Leithwood and Stager (1989), Fullan (1988), and Heller and Firestone (1994), Marsh states that the goals that elementary school principals should pursue include the following: Principals should have a vision of what they want for their school in the years ahead. Principals should make their goals public to all concerned parties. They should ensure that their expectations are made known, particularly to teachers and to students. Principals should take action, directly or indirectly, to see that their goals are acted on and accomplished. Principals should develop and maintain good working relationships and a keen understanding of the work and progress of each teacher on their staff. (2003, p. 207) The principal, clearly, is responsible for the strength and continued welfare of the â€Å"curriculum team† and the team should rely on the principal for effective guidance and leadership. Teachers serving on the leadership team, charged with curriculum development, must strive to maintain the focus on the student. Diamond (1998), mentioned that a shift in the faculty role in the learning process has begun; the process should move from teacher-centered to learning-centered (p. 151). Teachers may tend to want the curriculum to suit their own needs. In shifting from teacher-centered education to learning-centered education, teachers must relinquish their â€Å"comfort zones† Is this a direct quote? Quotation marks should only be used for direct quotes with in-text citations. and perform in a manner that is more conducive to student learning. This can seem a daunting task for some teachers who have taught one way for an extended period. Truly progressive instructors, concerned about the educational welfare of their students will effect the changes, especially in the curriculum planning stage, in order to produce a more student-centered learning environment. Community stakeholders exhibit a vital role in curriculum development because the community stakeholders find themselves in a position to aid the school from an outside perspective. According to Marsh, Schools and districts are subject to curricular pressures from special interest groups both within the community and from further afield, especially over controversial issues that arise. Such issues might concern the inclusion of a particular book in a course or in the school library; the adoption of a new teaching method; or the introduction of curricular units dealing with sexuality, race, politics, or religion (2003, p. 206) Single space black quotes With this influence, community stakeholders wield tremendous influence over the ultimate decision on the direction of the curriculum (Billig, 2000). Parents as stakeholders possess ideas about what they deem appropriate for inclusion in the curriculum. The community wants to see the curriculum designed so that ultimately the students in the schools become interested in the industries within the general population. As a whole all entities exert influence in the development of the curriculum, but the ultimate goal must remain the effective education of all children within the school. Responsibility The responsibility of the educational leaders and stakeholders in curriculum vary depending on their role in the design process. Curriculum emerges from the attempt to match individual learning styles and interests with the type and amount of structure the individual needs to gain the knowledge, skills, and competencies associated with each goal of the specialization (Bruner, 2002). It is essential that each member of the team concentrates on the experience its members bring and on the skills they seek and need. Each person needs to be sensitive to the individual needs and to academic rigor that characterizes the curriculum and learning environment that encourages excellence by releasing the potential of its members instead of locking it in. The designs for curriculum decision-making that are put forward have only limited predictability. In this academic dimension, a student concentrates on analyzing and extending existing designs, and on internalizing a personal approach to curriculum decision-making. Priority is given to the advancement of existing knowledge and to the creation of new ways to view curriculum problems. Responsibilities include: Analyzing theoretical frameworks that underlie the methods used for curriculum development. Evaluating ideas of major theorists and their designs for developing curriculum. Developing skill in theory building. Identifying assumptions that guide various approaches to curriculum decision-making. Defining a specific meaning of curriculum in terms of its expressed, hidden, and emerging aspects. Interpreting associations between the historical development of the curriculum field and future priorities for curriculum improvement. Analyzing the impact of learning theories on curriculum development (Wiggins, McTighe, 1998). The educational leader has a responsibility of making the curriculum visible, academic skills and calculated risk are mixed with intuition and sensitivity and then applied to the task of writing an expressed curriculum (Bruner, 2002). The development process demands the ability to translate ideas into actual decisions. The priority here becomes the integration of theory and practice. The site team must develop and apply their design(s) to specific school settings. Also, the curriculum developer perfects sensitivity to the values, contributions, and history of cultural groups typically neglected by conventional curricula (Billig, 2000). This dimension fosters skills for teaching others how to develop curriculum, and extends the concern of the curriculum worker into decisions that affect the hidden and ever-emerging aspects of curriculum. The true leader knows that when they leave the curriculum design process, all other systems are still intact. The organization should not fall apart when they leave. That is the true test of leadership. That is when the leader knows they transformed the organization and left a legacy behind. The leader’s jobs include assessing individual, instructional, institutional, and societal needs. They must also develop and articulate specific departmental objectives for specific curricula (Wiggins, McTighe, 1998). They should monitor and screen selected objectives through examining various philosophies of education and learning theories. The leaders should also design instructional strategies and learning opportunities to implement formulated objectives. They have the responsibility of designing quantifiable evaluation procedures to measure student performance. Leaders should analyze the connections among curriculum, educational environment, and learning, then design research-based, effective curriculum materials (Wiggins, McTighe, 1998). They should then apply designs from curriculum development to the actual writing of curric ulum and consider leading others through the processe to increase the effectiveness of school curriculum for meeting individual pupil needs. These are excellent points, but can this be done in environments such as public education? The ability to move theoretical ideas into curriculum practice demands knowledge about educational change, leadership behavior, and human relations (Billig, 2000). The responsibility of the leader is based on the emphasis that an evolution of a personal leadership style best suited to the individual and to the educational environment he or she works to improve. The leader should constantly evolve, grow, and learn ways to foster school reform, and to aid school personnel in finding desirable directions for change. To intervene appropriately in a classroom, school, or school system, the curriculum leadership team needs to understand the process of planned educational change. Changes in the learning environment, unless carefully implemented and followed-up, seldom pass through the classroom door (Wiggins, McTighe, 1998). Because of the commitment to the process of planned change, students of curriculum studies develop a perspective of continual evaluation and improvement as a way of life for institutions and human beings. Over a period of time, a school, much like an individual, becomes characterized by certain modes of behavior which are like a personality. An organizational personality is infused with a system of values that reflects its history and the impact that various administrators, parents, teachers, and pupils have had on its development (Bruner, 2002). Effective analysis by educational leaders interested in improvement must include an understanding of past influences as well as current conditions of the school and compare various theories of educational change (Wiggins, McTighe, 1998). Professional Learning Community Leaders should form learning communities that identify their team’s leadership style collectively, analyze the influence of internal and external conditions on human behavior; identify the advantages and disadvantages of planned change, and develop procedures for diagnosing the constraining and facilitating forces existing in organizations (Diamond, 1998). They should constantly be proactive in identifying conditions in organizations that are hindering the learning process; and implementing strategies for involving teachers, parents, and pupils in curriculum decision-making. Conclusion Although many consider curriculum development to be somewhat akin to a black art, what has become clear throughout this paper is that it is anything but mysterious. What is a black art? It has been seen here that although proper curriculum cannot be developed without the careful input of experts, it also cannot be fully completed without the assistance of amateurs. Curriculum development is truly a team effort that functions best when all stakeholders in the process are fully included. Proper acceptance by the community in general is not possible if parents and students do not have a voice in the process. Experts may craft the technical aspects of the curriculum, but the community will test its feasibility. If the plan fails at any level of the process then the entire team must revisit the plan to determine why it failed. A strong team can move a curriculum development project with great speed and accuracy; a weak team effort will doom the overall process to failure. References Billig, S. (2000). The effects of service learning. The School Administrator, 5(7), 9-14. Bruner, J. (2002). The process of education. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press Diamond, R. M. (1998). Designing and assessing courses and curricula: A practical guide. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Marsh, C. J., Willis, G. (2003). Curriculum: Alternative approaches, ongoing issues (3rd ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson. McCormick, R. Murphy, P. (2000). Curriculum: The case for a focus on learning. Routledge International Companion to Education, 204-234. Stark, J. S., Briggs, C. L., Rowland-Poplawski, J. (2002). Curriculum leadership roles of chairpersons in continuously planning departments. Research in Higher Education, 43(3), 329-356. Wiggins, G., McTighe, J. (1998). Understanding by design. 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