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International Banking in Global Perspective
No full textBanks play the most vital role in the economy by acting as financial intermediaries and providing the necessary credit to fund consumption and investment, thereby effecting real economic activity. Banks have been in existence for centuries and while the core of their function remains the same, their business model has changed dramatically over the years. Most notably, banking internationalisation has gained prominence in the last three decades.This book offers a comprehensive understanding of the business model, challenges and benefits of international banks.It features banks that are global and highlights their overseas activities. It documents the recent trends in international banking activity and serves as a one-stop-shop for students and scholars. Furthermore, in the post-financial crisis of 2007-09 there has been a surge in the FinTech industry where banks have sought an opportunity to expand and compete, the core of which is the provision of services via the newly established online technology as well as the green finance initiative. The book brings together the issues and opportunities ahead as global banks respond to market and environment conditions in these arenas.The text will be a useful resource for students, researchers and scholars of banking, international finance and international economics as well as students wishing to pursue a professional career in banking. Given the vital role banks play in the economy, their structure and activities are of great interest to policy makers also
Finding consensus on well-being in education
Get PDFResearch on well-being and concern over the well-being of students and teachers has grown dramatically in recent years. Researchers and reformers in positive psychology and education, self-determination theory, social and emotional learning, liberal-democratic political and educational philosophy, and neo-Aristotelian theories of flourishing and character education have played formative and intersecting roles in what is now an international movement to promote the lifelong flourishing of students as an alternative to a human capital and economic growth focus for education. This article defends this flourishing-focused reorientation of education policy and practice, using a value-led and evidence-informed methodology. It sorts through the conceptual disputes and clarifies the ethical considerations that should guide efforts to advance the well-being of students and teachers, assesses key claims and arguments, and brings together compatible aspects of the leading philosophical and psychological perspectives on flourishing as an aim of education. It identifies ethically and evidentially justifiable points of consensus on well-being and flourishing in education, presents a consensus model of relationships between educational environments, learning, and flourishing, and concludes with some recommendations for educational policy and practice
An ethical framework for coaching research among vulnerable groups: paving the way to a more inclusive approach
Get PDFScholarship on vulnerable groups in coaching is growing. Yet, there are no specific ethical frameworks focused on guiding researchers and practitioners in researching coaching amongvulnerable groups. This theoretical article addresses this gap by developing a framework to depict the multiple dimensions of ethical decision-making when working with vulnerable groups in coaching research. It contends that focus on the tensions emerging through the dual role ofpractitioner and researcher in coaching research is key to navigating ethical decision-making. The article also identifies ‘vulnerable groups’ as worthy of study within coaching research as a means to bolster the evidence base for coaching and to address scholarship’s biases towards moreprivileged groups
International Criteria for Reporting Study Quality for Sudden Cardiac Arrest/Death Tool
Get PDFBackgroundStudies reporting on the incidence of sudden cardiac arrest and/or death (SCA/D) in athletes commonly lack methodological and reporting rigor, which has implications for screening and preventative policy in sport. To date, there are no tools designed for assessing study quality in studies investigating the incidence of SCA/D in athletes.Methods and ResultsThe International Criteria for Reporting Study Quality for Sudden Cardiac Arrest/Death tool (IQ‐SCA/D) was developed following a Delphi process. Sixteen international experts in sports cardiology were identified and invited. Experts voted on each domain with subsequent moderated discussion for successive rounds until consensus was reached for a final tool. Interobserver agreement between a novice, intermediate, and expert observer was then assessed from the scoring of 22 relevant studies using weighted and unweighted κ analyses. The final IQ‐SCA/D tool comprises 8 domains with a summated score of a possible 22. Studies are categorized as low, intermediate, and high quality with summated IQ‐SCA/D scores of ≤11, 12 to 16, and ≥17, respectively. Interrater agreement was “substantial” between all 3 observers for summated IQ‐SCA/D scores and study categorization. Conclusions The IQ‐SCA/D is an expert consensus tool for assessing the study quality of research reporting the incidence of SCA/D in athletes. This tool may be used to assist researchers, reviewers, journal editors, and readers in contextualizing the methodological quality of different studies with varying athlete SCA/D incidence estimates. Importantly, the IQ‐SCA/D also provides an expert‐informed framework to support and guide appropriate design and reporting practices in future SCA/D incidence trials
Automatic scenario generation for efficient solution of robust optimal control problems
Get PDFExisting methods for nonlinear robust control often use scenario-based approaches to formulate the control problem as large nonlinear optimization problems. The optimization problems are challenging to solve due to their size, especially if the control problems include time-varying uncertainty. This paper draws from local reduction methods used in semi-infinite optimization to solve robust optimal control problems with parametric and time-varying uncertainty. By iteratively adding interim worst-case scenarios to the problem, methods based on local reduction provide a way to manage the total number of scenarios. We show that the local reduction method for optimal control problems consists of solving a series of simplified optimal control problems to find worst-case constraint violations. In particular, we present examples where local reduction methods find worst-case scenarios that are not on the boundary of the uncertainty set. We also provide bounds on the error if local solvers are used. The proposed approach is illustrated with two case studies with parametric and additive time-varying uncertainty. In the first case study, the number of scenarios obtained from local reduction is 101, smaller than in the case when all 2¹⁴⁺³×¹⁹² extreme scenarios are considered. In the second case study, the number of scenarios obtained from the local reduction is two compared to 512 extreme scenarios. Our approach was able to satisfy the constraints both for parametric uncertainty and time-varying disturbances, whereas approaches from literature either violated the constraints or became computationally expensive
Men in primary teaching and initial teacher education
Get PDFThrough examination of the year-long PGCE (Postgraduate Certificate of Education) UK teacher training programmes, a disparity can be recognised as existing between the numbers of male and female student teachers on initial teacher education (ITE) courses. Over five times more women than men embarked on primary ITE courses (teaching children between 3 and 11 years old) in September 2019 (DfE, 2019) and the number and proportion of men undertaking training has been falling over the last five years. Perhaps most significantly for ITE providers, a higher percentage of men than women fail to complete their training within the ten-month programme and thus to gain qualified teacher status (QTS). This paper sets out perceptions and potential experiences of male primary student teachers and the impact of intervention measures taken by two providers of ITE to address the issues to improve completion rates. The argument is made for promoting ongoing support combined with structured input and opportunities for male student teachers to discuss research and documented challenges faced by male teachers in an often female-dominated environment
'He is very happy. Yeah, he's actually laughing': A holistic insight into inclusive education in a Maltese primary school
Get PDFThis article presents specific findings from a Master’s degree thesis (Bugeja, 2023) that sought to investigate the inclusion of disabled students in a primary state school in the Maltese islands. The rationale underpinning the research was inspired by figures extracted from European Agency for Special Needs and Inclusive Education EASNIE (2019/2020), which indicated that 97% of disabled students attend mainstream schools. However, the rate of early school leavers among these students is significantly higher than that of their non-disabled counterparts (Gauci et al., 2021, citing latest EU data). Consequently, disabled students are inadequately prepared for the world of employment (Mugliette, 2020). In light of these concerning findings, the primary objective of this paper is to present the concept of inclusion in a primary state school from a holistic perspective, highlighting the protagonists of education, the students. A mixed-method approach utilising a qualitative-driven embedded design (Creswell & Plano Clark, 2011) was employed, involving triangulation through interviews, questionnaires and a focus group. The findings revealed prejudices among educators, who believed that not all students are eligible for inclusion, attributing learning failure to impairments. These biases were more nuanced in the feedback provided by the Learning Support Educators (LSEs), while all participating students concurred that all students, irrespective of their diversity, can learn together. Other findings indicated that the support system in place may hinder social inclusion, leading to integration rather than inclusion. These findings may be attributed to the lack of effective training in the field of inclusion, a predominant theme throughout the research. The study has conveyed a deeper understanding of the challenges posed by the inclusion of disabled students in the researched school. It also underscores the importance of training and strongly advocates for a shift among educators and parents/guardians from a deficitthinking approach to a rights-based perspective on inclusion
Effective vibrating barriers design for the Zoser pyramid using artificial neural network
Get PDFVibrating Barrier (ViBa) is a non-invasive strategy used to protect buildings, especially ancient and historic structures, from seismic wave vibrations. The ViBa is a spring-mass device installed at a separate location beneath the ground surrounding the structure in concern, for the purpose of reducing ground motion energy, without any intervention with the structure itself. The step pyramid of Zoser was one of the archeological monuments affected by the 1992 Earthquake in Egypt. In this work, a new approach of ViBa design is proposed to protect the step pyramid of Zoser using Artificial Neural Network (ANN). A numerical model was developed to test the predicted pyramid seismic behavior using the ANN-derived ViBa parameters. The ANN optimization approach shows a reduction in the peak step pyramid acceleration by 46 %. This reduction was obtained using tuning and optimization of the developed ANN
