NUI Maynooth Eprint Archive
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Building the Future from the Present: Imagining Post-Growth, Post-Productivist Ecosocial Policy
No full textThe environment remains on the margins of social policy. Bringing degrowth literature into conversation with social policy debates about decommodification, we argue that a re-imagined decommodification remains central to addressing the social-ecological challenges we face and to forging a post-growth, post-productivist ecosocial welfare state. We explore the implications of this for re-imagining and mapping three core areas of an ecosocial welfare state revolving around the work/welfare/care nexus: the redistribution of time across work and care; repurposing of active labour market measures; and reorienting cash transfers and services. In each case we discuss what decommodified social policy in the service of a post-growth, post-productivist future might entail. Acknowledging challenges, we identify how instances of prefiguration of policy programmes and experiments across various countries offer concrete compass points for further transformation and a necessary paradigmatic shift
‘I miss being honest’: sex workers’ accounts of silence and disclosure with health care providers in Ireland
No full textIn this paper, female sex workers tell stories of their interactions with health care providers (HCP) in four cities in the Republic of Ireland. While Irish society has made great progress in listening to the sexual stories of women that were historically silenced (e.g. stories of abortion, sexual abuse), sex workers have not benefited from this new climate. Regularly silenced by parliamentarians and non-governmental organisations who speak upon their behalf, sex workers are consigned within a narrative of victimhood and coercion. This paper draws from a participant action research study conducted in 2019–20 and explores women’s motivations in whether to disclose their sex work, and the strategies deployed to conceal it while seeking access to sexual health care. These strategies included traveling beyond their own communities for health care and STI home testing. The paper identifies women, particularly, migrants who felt their precarious position made it impossible for them to be truthful about their sex work to health care providers, exposing them to greater health risk. The paper understands this marginality within a context of structural violence where sex worker health is shaped by institutional power relations creating unequal health outcomes but is also challenged by stories of solidarity
The Future(s) of Web Archive Research Across Ireland.
No full textThe central aim of this thesis is to investigate the current state of web archive research in Ireland in line with international developments. Integrating desk research, survey studies, and case studies, and using a combination of research methods, qualitative and quantitative, drawn from disciplines across the humanities and information sciences, this thesis focuses on bridging the gaps between the creation of web archives and the use of archived web materials for current and future research in an Irish context. The thesis describes web archive research to be representative of the web archiving life cycle model (Bragg & Hanna, 2013) which is inclusive of appraisal, selection, capture, storage, quality assurance, preservation and maintenance, replay/playback, access, use, and reuse.
Through a synthesis of relevant literature, the thesis examines the causes for the loss of digital heritage and how this relates to Ireland and explores the challenges for participation in web archive research from creation to end use. A survey study is used to explore the challenges for the creation and use of web archives, and the overlaps, and intersections of such challenges across communities of practice within web archive research. A qualitative survey is used to provide an overview of the availability and accessibility of web archives based in Ireland, and their usefulness as resources for conducting research on Irish topics. It further discusses the influence of copyright and legal deposit legislation, or lack thereof, on their abilities to preserve digital heritage for future generations. An online survey is used to investigate awareness of, and engagement/non-engagement with, web archives as resources for research in Irish academic institutions.
Overall, the findings show that due to advances in internet, web, and software technologies, there is a need for the continual evaluation of skills, tools, and methods associated with the full web archiving lifecycle. As technologies keep evolving, so too will the challenges. The findings also highlight the need for creators and users/researchers to keep moving forward as collaborators to guide the next generation of web archive research. At the same time, there is also the need for the continual evaluation of legal deposit legislation in line with the fragility of born digital heritage and the technological advances in publishing and communication technologies
Same storm, different boats! The impact of COVID-19 on the wellbeing of school communities
No full textPurpose – The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted the functioning of education systems in a multitude of
ways. In Ireland schools closed on March 12th and remained closed for the remainder of the academic year.
During this time educators engaged with students, families and colleagues in new and diverse ways. The
purpose of this study was to explore educators’ experiences during the closures, particularly regarding the
impact of the pandemic on the wellbeing of students, school staff and wider school communities.
Design/methodology/approach – A series of one-to-one interviews, lasting approximately one hour, were
conducted in July 2020 with 15 education professionals online via Zoom or Microsoft Teams. Participants
occupied various roles (classroom teacher, school leader, special educational needs coordinator, etc.) and
worked in a diverse range of communities in Ireland. Qualitative data from interviews were transcribed and
emergent themes identified through an inductive followed by deductive analytic approach.
Findings – The interviews highlighted the central role that schools play in supporting their local communities
and the value teachers place on their relationships with students and families. Many teachers and school
leaders found themselves grappling with new identities and professional boundaries as they worked to
support, care for and connect with the students and families they serve. There was considerable concern
expressed regarding the plight of vulnerable or marginalised students for whom the school ordinarily offered a
place of safety and security.
Originality/value – The findings reveal how COVID-19 has exacerbated pre-existing inequalities and the
central role of schools in promoting the health and wellbeing of all its members
How can I better support oral language development through playful learning experiences in my Junior Infant classroom?
No full textThis thesis details the journey of a Self-Study Action Research project. Its aim was to find ways in which oral language could be effectively taught through playful learning experiences. At the beginning of the Action Research journey, I identified my values: communication, play and equality. I then examined my practice to see if I had any concerns. I identified that oral language needed to be developed in my class. I also recognised that the opportunities which I provided oral language experiences needed to be more engaging and playful. This led to the formulation of my research question,
‘How can I better support oral language development through playful learning experiences in my Junior Infant classroom?’
Self-Study Action Research was the most appropriate for this study. The focus of Self-Study Action Research is on oneself in relation to others and to your practice (Mc Donagh, 2021). The study involved 16 Junior Infant children, aged between four and six years old at the time of the research being carried out. The intervention took the form of the introduction of a puppet to the class with a cross-curricular planned approach to teaching targeted vocabulary and language. The research was conducted over three cycles, lasting three months. During the research I gathered a mix of qualitative and quantitative data and through thematic data analysis, I triangulated the results.
The findings suggest that the introduction of the puppet had an overall positive effect on the children’s motivation, listening, engagement and vocabulary. The intervention caused me to reflect on my value of play and created an opportunity for me to critically examine my own practice. Finally, and the most interesting and unexpected finding of
the introduction of the puppet to the classroom was its effect on a child with Selective Mutism. The introduction of the puppet acted as a vehicle for communication for him
The Role of Direct Instruction and Playful Learning Pedagogies in Effective Mathematics Teaching
No full textIn my research question I ask, “how can I enhance my teaching of mathematics by using a balance of direct instruction and playful learning pedagogical approaches?”. The rationale for this action research study stems from my personal value of providing high-quality teaching and learning in mathematics. As I reflected on my practice, I found myself struggling to balance a teacher-led direct instruction pedagogical approach while also upholding my values of providing active and playful learning experiences. My aim was to investigate if using a balance of these two, seemingly contrasting approaches, could work in harmony to enhance my teaching of mathematics.
The research took place in a vertical mainstream school with a sample of nineteen fourth class children aged nine and ten. I used an action research methodological approach and designed an intervention to teach a series of topics in mathematics using both playful learning and direct instruction. The topics taught included: 2D shapes, time, length, fractions, fractions and decimals and multiplication. I scaffolded new concepts and designed playful learning activities that would meet the learning needs of the children and engaged in dialogue with them about their experiences of both pedagogical approaches. Throughout the intervention data was collected using surveys, group interviews and personal reflections. This data was then analysed and three themes, playful learning, the role of the teacher and using a flexible approach, with associated findings emerged. The findings suggest that playful learning and direct instruction are effective pedagogical approaches to use in the senior primary classroom and that flexibly using a combination of both results in high-quality teaching and learning. As a result of the findings, I outline the implications for my personal practice and potential contribution to the wider Irish educational context such as curriculum development
Exploring the Work Values of Irish Youth: A follow up study of Growing Up in Ireland child cohort
No full textOur research investigates social, cognitive, and environmental factors that may be
associated with the work values of 17–18-year-olds in Ireland and examines if these
findings remain consistent at age 20. It also explores if both genders have diverse
work value preferences and scrutinizes the role of school type and career guidance
in influencing work values. The data is obtained from the Child Cohort of the
National Longitudinal Study of children, the Growing Up in Ireland (GUI) wave 3
and wave 4. We use visualizations to build an understanding of work value choices
and model results. Ordered heatmaps have been used for picking interesting features
and mapping the association between work values and potential factors influencing
these work values. Self-beliefs of adolescents about work, family, and religion, along
with cognitive scores, are found to be associated with work value selection, while
career guidance and school type have limited importance. The results reveal that
the two genders have different choices of work values. Work values can be broadly
classified as intrinsic which are bringers of inner peace and psychological satisfaction
like an interesting job and extrinsic which are led by external reward-based job
aspirations like high income. Our research indicates that girls tend to pick more
intrinsic work values compared to boys. Contradictory to the findings from other
similar studies carried out in different countries, job security was found to be a more
popular choice among Irish adolescent males compared to females, but became a
more desirable choice for females as the adolescents transitioned to adulthood
Towards the identification of novel sources of resistance in barley to Rhynchosporium commune.
No full textThe deployment of resistance genes (R genes) in breeding programmes has been shown to be a useful strategy to reduce farmer’s reliance on fungicides and offset the constant disease pressures on Ireland’s primary crops. However, the durability of varieties with R genes can be tenuous due to the ability of fungal pathogens to rapidly evolve and overcome the resistant phenotype. Recently, the use of susceptibility genes (S genes) has emerged as a viable alternative. While the products of S genes can be exploited by pathogens to promote infection, crops with specific, non-functional S genes have reported strong pathogen resistance. Barley is the primary Irish tillage crop and current varieties are susceptible to the pathogen Rhynchosporium commune. The goal of this project was to investigate the barley – R. commune interaction and identify and characterise the activity of candidate barley S genes. To achieve this, an in silico analysis first identified 682 potential barley orthologues to known S genes. In parallel, the temporal transcriptomic response of barley to two diverse R. commune isolates identified 245 of these genes associated with a response to R. commune. Three of these genes were brought forward with the aim of validating functionality via transient knockdown. This project has delivered important insights into early signalling events in barley in response to R. commune and provided a fundamental dataset on the transcriptomic response of barley after R. commune infection that will support future investigations into the barley x R. commune interaction
Visualisation Techniques for Interpreting Machine Learning Models
No full textWith the increase of complex Machine Learning (ML) models making decisions in
everyday life in a wide range of fields from economics to healthcare, the demand
for Interpretable Machine Learning (IML) techniques has grown. One method to
broaden the understanding of the behaviour of a fitted ML model is through the
use of informative visualisations. Visualisations can aid in interpretation and can
provide a more thorough examination into the nature of the predictions generated
from an ML model. This is of particular importance when using so-called blackbox
models, such as random forests or Bayesian Additive Regression Trees (BART)
models.
In this thesis, various IML approaches are proposed through the use of novel
visualisations for displaying different metrics and model summaries which can be
used for examining the behaviour of a fitted ML model. First, we present flexible
methods for investigating variable importance, interactions, and variable effects by
presenting a suite of visualisations that can aid in the interpretation of statistical
and ML models through the use of model-specific and agnostic methods. Following
from this, motivated in part by the lack of existing visualisation methods and by
the rise in popularity of this particular model, we develop novel visualisations for
examining BART models that include examining the tree structures and, through
the posterior distribution, the uncertainty surrounding predictions. Lastly, we
demonstrate and discuss our implementation of the R package software vivid
(Variable Importance and Variable Interaction Displays) which is used to explore
the behaviour of fitted ML models. Here, we focus on key package features and
general architectural principles used in vivid when designing informative IML
visualisations and provide a practical illustration of the package in use
Actions Lead to Results: How the Behaviors of Information Systems Professionals Influence the Success of Information Systems Departments
No full textThe growing complexity of systems, the increasing intensity of their use, and the greater prominence of technology in
supporting organizational activities has meant that information systems (IS) professionals in organizations have to go
beyond offering routine task-related support when working with their non-IS colleagues. For organizations to see IS
professionals as effective, they have to carry out empathic behaviors such as sharing their IT knowledge with their
non-IS colleagues and taking the initiative to minimize inconveniences during IS projects. Drawing from the
organizational citizenship behavior concept, we develop a multilevel research model to examine how behaviors that IS
professionals perform influence IS departments’ effectiveness. Using data from more than 1,000 respondents working
in the global finance industry, we conducted both cross-level and unit-level analyses and found results that support
our arguments. Our results deepen the extent to which we understand the role that IS professionals play in supporting
post-adoption IS use and digitally empowering business units while also performing their traditional roles