University of Warwick Press: Journals
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An Islamic Game Theory approach for overcoming base erosion profit shifting challenges for the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC)
Get PDFBEPS (Base erosion and profit shifting) challenges have been present between the countries of the OIC for a considerable period of time, leading to significant tax losses to its societies. This has further led to challenges, as tax dues, demanded by Islamic law, are not collected. In this situation, corporations and individuals aim to exploit tax benefits in order to minimise their overall taxation. We here present a new framework integrating Game theory and Islamic values for addressing the challenges with BEPS for the OIC. The framework outlines seven key strategies in order to address BEPS issues, resolving the potential tax abuses by corporations while maintaining closer alignment with Islamic values. Furthermore, our framework provides a deep learning cooperative game theory model for the optimisation of the tax rates in the multilateral taxation agreement in order to create the most overall benefit for all participants of the OIC
Making engineering education more sustainable through community-based learning and teaching
Get PDFCommunity-based learning and teaching offers engineering students a transformative educational experience that extends beyond textbooks, labs and classrooms by engaging students in co-creation activities with local community as part of their formal learning. By immersing themselves in real-world community contexts, engineering students develop practical skills, cultivate a sense of social responsibility, and become well-rounded professionals prepared to tackle the intricate challenges of our ever-evolving world.
Community-based learning and teaching takes engineering education beyond the confines of ‘in-house’ produced project proposal briefs, leads to better opportunities for interdisciplinary learning (beyond engineering ‘subdisciplines’) and more opportunities for creativity and flexibility in how engineering problems are approached and solved.
As part of an institution-wide study, in this paper we share specific findings from engineering educators, as well as university-wide engagement professionals and those supporting teaching and learning (24 in total), on the barriers and opportunities to community-based learning and teaching approaches. Using semi-structured interviews, we used thematic analysis to generate a series of themes which aligned with four key beneficiaries within engineering education: academics, students and community partners and university.
Our findings reveal the values and expectations, employability benefits and infrastructural considerations to implement this type of learning as part of future-facing and sustainable curricula in engineering. This includes areas such as motivation, role of the community, partnership building, development of leadership skills and networking and financial planning and relationship management.
The findings also provide useful context-specific recommendations for educators seeking to develop their own sustainable approaches towards facilitating community-based learning and teaching in engineering disciplines.  
Using Code Snippets to Teach Programming Languages
Get PDFCoding is a fundamental skill required in the engineering discipline, and much work exists exploring better ways of teaching coding in the higher education context. In particular, Code Snippets (CSs) are approved to be an effective way of introducing programming language units to students. CSs are portions of source code of varying size and content. They can be used in a myriad of ways, one of which is to teach the code they contain as well as its function. To further explore the use of CSs, a pedagogical summer internship project was set up at the Warwick Manufacturing Group (WMG). The scope of the considerations for the study derives from an educational standpoint. Within the evaluations made, the focus was primarily given to pieces of information which proved to provide evidence pertaining to the methodology involved in either teaching or developing teaching materials. By taking the results produced into account from a pedagogical perspective, it was found that several qualities of popular code snippet tutorials which benefit or hinder the learning process, including code length, interactivity, further support, and quality of explanation. These qualities are then combined and used to present a plan for the design of an effective learning resource which makes use of code snippets
Education for Sustainable Development (ESD): A holistic approach to curriculum design, development and implementation using participatory and integrative methodologies
Get PDFIn response to the climate emergency and future Sustainable Development (SD) of our planet, HEIs must adopt integrated, holistic approaches to curriculum design that are primarily focused on developing graduates into more socially responsible, global citizens and engineers with sought-after sustainability competencies and skills, empowered to tackle complex local and global SD challenges. In line with our institutional strategic goals and commitments, we outline the use of innovative, participatory programme design methodologies involving internal and external stakeholders, in our approach to designing a new post-graduate course in Sustainable Engineering at Aston University that has the potential to fulfil these transformative goals, asking ourselves and all stakeholders throughout: “What content really matters?” “Are students doing something that is meaningful?” “How should it be taught?”. This work describes the implementation of our innovative ESD approaches to holistic curriculum design, development, implementation, and delivery. Using evaluation data from staff, students, and external stakeholders the effectiveness and impact of these programme design and delivery approaches are evaluated, and the findings are presented. Highlighted areas of good practice, as well as key lessons learned in our work can serve as potential signposts for other HEI adopters of similar or other ESD methodologies
Towards Skillful Engineers: A Competence Framework for Engineering Education
Get PDFThis research explores the definition of soft skills in engineering education literature and suggests a new framework for understanding the components of soft skills. The study reveals that there is a lack of consensus on what constitutes soft skills and how best to define the term in an engineering education context. The work also highlights the importance of a mutual understanding of the concepts shaping engineering soft skills to ensure meaningful measurement and attainment of competencies. The study aims to pave the way to develop relevant pedagogical interventions and assessment tools for engineering soft skills. The research methodology used in this work is a content analysis on reviewed citations, which extracts explicit definitions and components of soft skills in 93 reviewed publications. We conclude that a precise distinction between knowledge, attitude, personality traits, and skills is necessary to develop engineering soft skills further and align the expectations of the profession and engineering higher education institutions
Embedding Sustainability in Engineering Education World Café: Reflections for Future Practice
Get PDFWe present the reflective learning account from organising a World Café to share engineering educators’ practices in embedding sustainability education, addressing the question: is the World Café a good practical solution to share sustainability education practice in our post pandemic world? Conversations have the power to create change, in line with approaches such as Critical Pedagogy (Giroux, 2020). Our perspective as diverse engineering educators informed the workshop and our reflections and this is mirrored in our analyses. The World Café is a process which has been extensively used to encourage open communication and problem solving (Brown, Isaacs and World Café Community, 2005) and which we thought relevant to enhancing sustainability education practices. A commitment to education for sustainable development (ESD) is increasingly expected (UNESCO, 2023; AdvanceHE and QAA, 2021) and engineering educators are rising to the challenge. Learning from one another, educators shared their actions, plans and dreams around the three pillars of sustainability. Using a Word Café to discuss challenges around sustainability education proved successful. We recommend that engineering educators and conference organisers consider this approach in creating a sense of urgency around sustainability that instigates collaboration and acts as a catalyst for action. The approach can be taken further by using it as a data collection tool, co-creating knowledge from our practice.  
Prevalence of Clinical and Subclinical Cattle Mastitis and the Associated Risk Factors in Bomet County, Kenya
No full textA survey of mastitis in cattle was conducted in Bomet County of Kenya, using the California mastitis test (Pyörälä et al., 2003). A total of 75 bovines from 50 farms were sampled and the overall cow level prevalence of mastitis was 16 per cent. Out of the 75 bovines sampled, the prevalence of clinical and subclinical mastitis was 4 per cent and 12 per cent respectively. In the intensive system of livestock production, the prevalence was 13.3 per cent, while in the semi-intensive system of livestock production, the prevalence was 2.7 per cent. A questionnaire was also completed by 50 farmers to collect data on risk factors, which included udder hygiene, stage of lactation, parity and floor type of cow housing, breeds (among the breeds, Friesians had a higher prevalence than Ayrshire breeds). This study showed that penicillin and streptomycin (40 per cent) were the most used drug to treat mastitis. In conclusion, the overall prevalence could have been attributed to poor milking practices and inadequate methods applied by farmers in controlling mastitis on their farms due to lack of knowledge as noticed from the discussions with the farmers on mastitis control guidelines (Kerro Dego et al., 2020)
The growth paradigm and the failures of the alternatives within the system: notes towards a dystopian Marxism
Get PDFWe start with two main hypotheses: a) the tendency to overproduction and expanded reproduction is inevitable in a context of production based on competition and the search for profit; b) conflicts for resources and the tendential degradation of the quality of life are also inevitable and are only going to worsen as the expanded reproduction takes its toll on the environment and on the material conditions for the reproduction of capital. This paper explores some underlying phenomena to support these claims, such as the Jevons Paradox, the Tendency of the Rate of Profit to Fall, and the Energy Return on Investment. Finally, it discusses the failure of some of the alternatives to the Growth Paradigm: Sustainable Development, Green Growth, Circular Economy and Degrowth
Bridging Justice Struggles: A Political Ecology of Translocal Alliance Building against Extractive Industries
Get PDFWe investigate the idea of translocal bridge building – a concept related to ideas of network and alliance building – between environmental and social justice struggles. We examine the potentials and challenges of connecting place-based struggles against extractive industries. Moving beyond normative-idealized ideas of movement alliances, we theoretically root the paper in non-romanticizing accounts of justice networks. We empirically draw on the lead author’s research with groups struggling against extractive industries across Germany, the Netherlands, and Guatemala. Our argument is threefold. First, it highlights the potentials of bridging while at the same time raising issues of unequal power and difference, space, and scale among the actors in translocal and multi-scalar justice struggles. Second, the focus on bridge building and our role as bridge building researchers contributes to an understanding of the political and ethical possibilities and dilemmas of research that blurs the boundaries between research and activism. Third, we discuss how bridging may help generate counter-power but also risks perpetuating power imbalances. We suggest that our insights highlight the potentials and challenges for multi-scalar, multi-actor, translocal and cross-cultural alliances, and encourage researchers and social movements alike to explore the difficult yet insightful tensions of bridging spaces
Solidarity, Worldmaking and Inter-Connected Geographies of Authoritarianism: Trade Unions and the Multiple Trajectories of Chile Solidarity
Get PDFThis paper intervenes in debates around the relationship between solidarity and worldmaking in the context of decolonisation and the Cold War. While work on worldmaking has drawn attention to key aspects of solidarity formation in this context (e.g. Getachew, 2019; Kelley, 2019), to date it has offered a limited engagement with the role of labour in the articulation of such solidarities. Here, we demonstrate how such a focus on worldmaking can help to highlight the multiple political trajectories that have been shaped through articulations between Chile solidarity and labour internationalism. Drawing on recent work on the Chilean Left, which stresses such multiple trajectories (eg Schlotterbeck, 2017), we provide three engagements with the opposition to authoritarian politics in different geographical contexts, foregrounding the role of exiled trade unionists involved in the Committee of the Exterior of the Central Única de Trabajadores de Chile (CEXCUT). These cases are the contestation of links between the Pinochet regime and Eric Gairy’s dictatorship in Grenada by Caribbean left activists in the Oilfield Workers Trade Union in Trinidad and Caribbean Labour Solidarity (CLS) in Britain; the role of Luis Figueroa of the CEXCUT and other Chilean exiles in shaping links between opposition to Pinochet and struggles for democratisation in the immediate post-junta period in Greece; and the role of maritime workers in British port cities such as Liverpool in contesting trade with Chile. We argue that through examining the relations between different trajectories of solidarity and interconnected geographies of authoritarianism, an engagement with worldmaking practices can help move beyond narrowly statist and methodologically nationalist frameworks