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Study: Moms can be stressed when certain children care for them
(Medical Xpress)— Older mothers are more likely to be stressed when they receive help from an adult child who is not their preferred caretaker, according to new research from Purdue University.
"Most mothers have a preference for which child they turn to in a crisis, confide in and prefer as their future caregivers," said Jill Suitor, a professor of sociology. "And when mothers received care from the adult child who was not their first choice, they reported more depressive symptoms, such as sadness, loneliness and sleep disturbances. Although mothers appreciated and acknowledged efforts from caregivers who were not their first choices, these children were less likely to share the mothers' values and to have the personal characteristics important to the mothers in selecting preferred caregivers. This incompatibility can have some strong negative effects."
On the flip side, receiving care from a mother's preferred child did not affect the mom's psychological well-being, she said.
"We expected having that preferred child care for a parent would make a positive difference, but surprisingly it didn't," Suitor said. "And we also found that mothers' depressive symptoms were higher when they received care from the non-preferred child than when they received no care from their offspring."
Suitor, also a faculty member in Purdue's Center on Aging and the Life Course who studies parental favoritism with adult children, collaborated on this research with Megan Gilligan, a Purdue doctoral student, and Karl Pillemer, professor and director of the Cornell Institute for Translational Research on Aging at Cornell University. The research was funded by the National Institute on Aging and is online in The Gerontologist.
The findings were based on in-person interviews with 234 older mothers as part of a larger study of 566 multigenerational families that began in 2001 when the mothers were 65-75 and had at least two adult children still living. All of the mothers were interviewed again seven years later; the new research is based on the 234 women who reported they needed care within the previous two years because of serious injury or illness.
During the initial interviews, 75 percent of the mothers named a particular child they would prefer provide care if they became ill or disabled. This was compared to the children's actual roles seven years later after the mothers needed help. The reasons why preferred children sometimes could not care for their moms were because they moved away or had medical problems themselves.
Researchers also controlled for family size, and no differences were found based on number of children.
The researchers found that being cared for by a non-preferred child is stressful because the alternate caregivers did not possess the social and emotional characteristics that the mothers expected.
"This matters because it makes people comfortable, and this is especially important when people are under a lot of stress and in situations where they relinquish control to another person," Suitor said. "And who do you want to give up control to? To someone who has the same outlook on life and who you think is very much like you, and, therefore, can respond to your needs and be a source of reassuring support."
For example, one of the moms in the study said that her preferred caregiver, who lives far away, was her preference because they "can talk about anything. I think she understands me best." And while the mom acknowledged the daughter caring for her was helpful and reliable, she couldn't talk with her as openly. She "would get annoyed with me. Although, she's my rock here because she's the one that's here."
These findings are similar to previous work by Suitor and Pillemer that shows these factors are critical in relationships for spouses and adult siblings.
This connection also can be amplified as someone ages.
"As people become older and their health declines, they start placing greater emphasis on relationships with family and friends with whom they have a personal history or an especially close and comfortable relationship, and reducing contact with people with whom they are less comfortable," Gilligan said.
When asked about the implications of these findings, Suitor said making assumptions about which children mothers want as their caregivers may be problematic. Her previous studies on adult children and mothers show that the children accurately predict whether their mothers favor some children over others about 80 percent of the time, but they are correct only about half the time in identifying which child the mom favors regarding closeness, confiding in or for future care.
"We are not clinicians, but I think there are lessons that can be learned from this research that can be put to use in conversations that families have about advanced care planning," Suitor said. "Perhaps these conversations can be expanded to include which children mom would prefer provide her with care. Geography often plays a role in preventing the preferred child from providing care, but perhaps the adult children stepping into the role can call their brother or sister and say, 'I'm thinking about doing this for mom, what do you think?' Ideally, they can coordinate and avoid conflict."
The survey data is part of a 13-year project, the Within-Family Difference Study, led by Suitor and Pillemer to evaluate the role favoritism plays in adult and family relationships. The data for the project was collected in the Boston metropolitan area by the Center for Survey Research at the University of Massachusetts-Boston.
In the project's next phase, they plan to expand the study of causes and consequences of favoritism to three generations of the families they have been following. They also plan to extend the project by collecting data from several hundred multigenerational Hispanic families in the Chicago metropolitan area.
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Cactus Jack's Trail Rides
11100 South West 16th Ave
Ocala, FL 34480
ph: 352-266-9326
fax: 352-347-7896
Cactus Jack's Trail Rides
Horseback riding in Ocala Florida is FUN! We also offer horseback riding near Orlando at Rock Springs Run Reserve.
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See Florida's oak hammocks, pine forests, and green fields. Horseback riding is the best way to see the beauty of the Ocala area. This is truly Florida at its best.
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Pricing for Silver River State Park: Sorry....we are no longer riding at Silver River State Park as the trails have been a bit wet and the riding can damage the trails in the wet conditions.
New Cancellation policy:
$20 per person will be charged for cancellations made within 24 hours of your scheduled ride.
Same day cancellations and no-shows will be charged full price. We have to hire guides and haul horses to accomodate your ride. (Sometimes we turn other people away to take your group out.)
Thank you so much for a fun afternoon. My young cousin Jenna was so happy and she really enjoyed the relaxing ride. We had a great time and as a long time horse person I appreciate that fact that the horses were well trained and quietly gentle.
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Thank you for the wonderful ride today! We really enjoyed it.
On Saturday, my son Dakota and I came up for the ride. I wanted to tell you how incredibly impressed we were with Nicole.
She was such a delight and spent so much time on the ride talking with my son about every aspect of horses and riding, patiently and enthusiastically answering his questions. The horses are obviously so well taken care of, and the Greenway was beautiful, but Nicole really made the experience exceptional. Please be sure to pass this along to her and share how much we enjoyed the trip. We'll be back and will be sure to recommend it to everyone.
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Please feel free to call for more information. We can schedule your ride and match you up with a good horse for a great outdoor experience.
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Cactus Jack's Trail Rides
11100 South West 16th Ave
Ocala, FL 34480
ph: 352-266-9326
fax: 352-347-7896

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At every stage of your career, the Alliance has resources you need. Individual membership offers benefits for all who work (paid or unpaid) for the success of museums.
For more details, please see this benefits table. To join or renew online, please click a category below.
Staff, trustees, volunteers, independent professionals and staff at museum-related nonprofits. $90
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Pedro Bravo indicted for first-degree murder
Teen charged in disappearance of UF student Christian Aguilar
GAINESVILLE – Pedro Bravo, the teen charged in the disappearance of his friend and University of Florida student Christian Aguilar, was indicted Monday by an Alachua County grand jury for first-degree murder and kidnapping.
Aguilar's family, wearing T-shirts that read "Help find Chris" on the back, was inside the courtroom when the indictments were read.
Aguilar, 18, was last seen in Gainesville on Sept. 20. His body has not been found.
State Attorney Bill Cervone told The Gainesville Sun that even though Aguilar's body is still missing, there is strong evidence against Bravo.
"There will be a continuing effort to find him," Cervone said. "A kid his age does not fall off the face of the earth."
Aguilar and Bravo were friends from high school. Both attended Doral Academy in South Florida. The pair were last spotted at a Best Buy store.
According to Gainesville police, Bravo bought a shovel and duct tape several days before a fight he said he had with Aguilar. Bravo admitted to beating Aguilar unconscious and leaving him in a parking lot.
A massive search effort involving volunteers from Miami have been actively looking for Aguilar since his disappearance.
Copyright 2012 by Post Newsweek. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.


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Hi friends,
While I have enjoyed writing this blog very much I felt like it wasn't quite fitting me the way I wanted it to. I have regrouped, focused a bit more on living well rather than quite so random and I'm pleased to share my new blog The Pulse. I hope you'll follow me over there to enjoy great business features (with amazing offers for readers), new products, spotlights on foods, books, and other things meant to enrich your day to day life. I'm so excited! :D
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South African Journal of Education
On-line version ISSN 2076-3433
Print version ISSN 0256-0100
S. Afr. j. educ. vol.31 n.1 Pretoria Jan. 2011
Improving school governance through participative democracy and the law
Marius H Smit*; Izak J Oosthuizen**
There is an inextricable link between democracy, education and the law. After 15 yearsofconstitutional democracy, the alarming percentage of dysfunctional schools raises questions about the efficacy of the system of local school governance. We report on the findings of quantitative and qualitative research on the democratisation of schools and the education system in North-West Province. Several undemocratic features are attributable to systemic weaknesses of traditional models of democracy as well as the misapplication of democratic and legal principles. The findings of the qualitative study confirmed that parents often misconceive participatory democracy for political democracy and misunderstand the role of the school governing body to be a political forum. Despite the shortcomings, the majority of the respondents agreed that parental participation improves school effectiveness and that the decentralised model of local school governance should continue. Recommendations to effect the inculcation of substantive democratic knowledge, values and attitudes into school governance are based on theory of deliberative democracy and principles of responsiveness, accountability and justification of decisions through rational discourse.
Keywords: accountability; deliberativedemocracy; participation; school governance
Every democratic society faces the challenge of educating succeeding generations of young people for responsible citizenship. The present state of democratisation in South Africa has been likened to a teenager going through a rebellious growth stage of puberty as a result of historic shackles, inappropriate structures, erroneous conceptions of democracy and the sheer misapplication of the law (Wiechers, 2008). Chaskalson (2009) has acknowledged that the constitutional jurisprudence (i.e. case law and legal theory) has not developed a coherent system of democracy and that theories of democracy are not well developed. This is particularly evident in the education system where the whole-school evaluation programme has revealed that approximately 80% of the schools in South Africa are essentially dysfunctional (Taylor, 2006:2).
Our contention in this paper is that the crisis presently experienced in the education system is partly attributable to misconceptions of democracy, misapplications of legal and democratic principles, and systemic weaknesses in traditional models of democracy.
Based on the above problem statement, the purpose of this paper is to analyse and explain some phenomena relating to the process of democratisation from a multidisciplinary (viz. legal, educational and political theory) perspective, with particular reference to undemocratic trends apparent in school governance in the education system.
We applied three research methods to achieve the aims of this research. Firstly, a comprehensive literature review of political theory was conducted to conceptualise key tenets of democracy and to identify undemocratic trends by means of a historic-legal and comparative legal analysis of South African as well as foreign sources of law.
Secondly, advancing from a positivist paradigm, a quantitative study was undertaken to analyse variables, factors and indicators of democratic attitudes and opinions of public school governance. The survey was conducted in four phases. The target populations included the principals and school governing body chairpersons of primary, secondary, combined, special education and farmschools providing public education as well as senior education officials that were responsible for administration of school governance and school management in the 19 school districts1 of the North-West Province. All independent schools were excluded from thepopulation. This demarcation was necessary in order to focus on the aim of the study to research democracy at the meso level of public school education.
Initially 401 questionnaires were distributed by post to randomly selected school principals and school governing body chairpersons in public schools in North-West Province. By virtue of the random method the respondents were representative of the demographic diversity of the province, ranging from rural and farm schools to township and suburban (ex-model C) schools. However, as a result of the relatively poor rate of return (see Table 1), it was decided to switch to convenience sampling methods which comprised the collection of data during two workshops. The first workshop was arranged by the District Office of the Southern Region of the North-West Education Department and was attended predominantly by principals and school governing body chairpersons from township and rural schools.
The second workshop was arranged by the Federation of South African School Governing Bodies (FEDSAS) and was attended predominantly by principals and school governing body chairpersons of suburban (ex Model-C) schools in North-West Province. The final phase of data collection entailed the distribution of questionnaires by hand to all the senior education officials in the Education-Management-Governance-Development departments ("EMGD-Department") of all the Area Project Offices in North-West Province. The samples of school principals and school governing body chairpersons represented a broad socio-economic spectrum of public schools ranging from previously advantaged and disadvantaged urban, suburban and township schools to impoverished rural schools. It was expected that the respondents would be representative of diverse segments and perspectives on the issue of democracy in education. Ultimately, the four phases of sampling resulted in the distribution of 1,282 questionnaires and rendered a total of 456 responses as set out in Table 1.
The adequacy of the response rate was confirmed and the results were analysed with the assistance of the Statistical Consultation Services of the North-West University (Ellis, 2008).
Thirdly, advancing from an interpretivistic paradigma phenomenological qualitative study was undertaken after the quantitative study by conducting eight non-random interviews of purposely selected EMGD-officials of the North-West Department of Education until a level of saturation was achieved (Leedy & Ormrod, 2005:145). This qualitative study was undertaken in order to verify, confirm or refute findings of the quantitative study; determine and describe the participants' conceptualisation and understanding of democracy, establish the participants' views of democracy in education, explore and interpret certain bureaucratic phenomena, practices and trends in the education system of the North-West Province, and to ascertain or explain the underlying reasons and motives for these phenomena. In keeping with the interpretivistic approach, the transcripts of the interviews were analysed by means of open coding, axial coding and selective coding of the data (Merriam, 2008). The open-ended questions posed during the semi-structured interviews aimed to examine the participants' perspectives on phenomena such as conceptualisation of democracy, knowledge of Education Law and democratic principles, bureaucratic practices and reasons for poor parental participation. Cohen et al. (2001:103) explain that in purposive sampling, researchers handpick the cases or participants to be included on the basis of their judgment of their typicality. We purposely selected expert participants from the EMGD-officials most likely to have administration experience, actual knowledge of school governance and the phenomenon of democracy in the education system in the province.
Finally, the findings of the three methods were triangulated, evaluated and synthesised in order to develop a coherent theory of improving school governance by means of deliberative democracy and the law.
Democracy, education and the law
There is an inextricable link between democracy, education and the law. This interrelationship is evident from the Constitution, International Law and education legislation. The following examples catalog this interrelationship:
The founding provision of the Constitution (§1) confirms that South Africa is a democracy based on the rule of law;
Several of the fundamental rights enshrined in the Constitution, including the rights to education (§29); equality (§9), human dignity (§11); freedom of expression (§16); freedom of association (§18); freedom of religion, belief and opinion (§15); the right to use language and culture of choice (§30); and the right to belong to a cultural, religious and linguistic community have particular significance for education;
The Convention on Prevention of Discrimination in Education endeavours to respect the diversity of education systems and provides that the establishment or maintenance, for religious or linguistic reasons, of separate education systems which is in keeping with the parent's or legal guardian's education, does not constitute discrimination (§1).
Article 30 of the Convention provides that in those states in which ethnic, religious or linguistic minorities or persons of indigenous origin exist, a child belonging to such a minority or who is indigenous shall not be denied the right, in community with other members of his or her group, to enjoy his or her own culture, to profess and practise his or her own religion, or to use his or her own language;
African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child (SA, 2000) affirms the democratic values and provides in section 2 that the education of the child must be directed to the preservation and strengthening of positive African morals, traditional values and cultures; the preparation of the child for responsible life in a free society, in the spirit of understanding tolerance, dialogue, mutual respect and friendship among all peoples ethnic, tribal and religious groups;
The preamble of the National Education Policy Act (SA, 1996a) provides that legislation should be adopted to facilitate the democratic transformation of the national system of education into one that serves the needs and interests of all the people of South Africa and upholds their fundamental rights;
The directive principle in section 4(m) of the National Education Policy Act (SA, 1996a) contains the democratic requirement that the national Minister of Education must ensure broad public participation in the development of education by including stakeholders in policymaking and governance in the education system (SA, 1996a);
Section 4(b) of National Education Policy Act expressly contains the principle that policies should be developed to include the advancement of democracy in the education system;
The South African Schools Act ('Schools Act') gave formal effect to a participative form of democracy by redistributing power to local school governing bodies with the removal centralised control over certain aspects of educational decision-making and the establishment of co-operativegovernance between education authorities and the school community (Squelch, 1998:101; Oosthuizen et al, 2003:195). In principle these provisions were intended to establish a democratic power sharing and co-operative partnership among the state, parents, and educators (Karlsson, 1998:37);
In terms of the Schools Act, members of school governing bodies are democratically elected to represent parents, educators, learners and personnel of a school. School governing bodies have the democratic and statutory authority to adopt a constitution (§20); recommend appointment of staff (§20), determine the language policy of a school (§6), take measures to ensure learner discipline at schools (§8, §9), and control of school property and financial resources (§20, §21).
Consequently, it is evident that a number of legal instruments contain provisions that require democratic transformation through education, fundamental rights and the law. However, these legal instruments are silent on the nature, tenets and principles of democracy and do not stipulate the application of any particular model of democracy. This will be discussed in the next section.
Conceptualising democracy
Theories of democracy have evolved over the centuries from the model direct democracy in ancient Athens to the modern representative models of liberal democracy, republicanism, Schumpetarian elitism, participative democracy and deliberative democracy. There are differences between the main democratic theories. As such, no definition can include all the variations to satisfy the proponents of each theory. Briefly, in order not to digress unnecessarily, the main democratic theories are given in Figure 1.
The salient features, values, points of critique and disadvantages of each theory are depicted in Figure 2. In the interest of parsimony, these theories will not be discussed in detail as much scholarly research has been devoted to this topic (Chapman & Dunstan, 1990; Blaug & Schwarzmantel, 2000; Cunningham, 2002; Dewey, 1916, Fishkin & Laslett, 2003; Habermas, 1996; Held, 1987; Kotze, 2004; Kymlicka, 2002; Pateman, 1970; Popper, 1971; Schumpeter, 1943; Steyn, Du Plessis & De Klerk, 1999; Tarrant, 1989; Wiklund, 2005).
Myburgh (2004:12) reminds us that there is an ongoing ideological battle over the meaning of democracy. The South African Constitution includes an unequivocal commitment to representative and participatory democracy; incorporating the concepts of accountability, transparency and public involvement (SA, 1996a). Theoretically defined, participatory democracy refers to a form of direct democracy that enables all members of a society to participate in decision-making processes within institutions, organisations, societal and government structures. Adams and Waghid (2005:25) regard participation, community engagement, rationality, consensus, equality and freedom as the constitutive principles of the South African democracy. With the increasing decentralization of fiscal, political, and administrative responsibilities to local spheres of government, local institutions, and communities, the notions of participation and deliberation have emerged as fundamental tenets in the promotion of the local governance of schools (Grant Lewis & Naidoo, 2004:1). The policy of decentralization of education according to participatory democratic theory has become a key aspect of educational restructuring in the international arena (Aspin, 1995:30; Sayed 1999:141; Karlsson, 2002:327-336).
Deliberative democracy is the most recent theory that suggests an improved form of democracy through the implementation of deliberative principles based on Habermasian discourse ethics (Eriksen & Weigard, 2003:128). Theoretically defined, deliberative democracy refers to the notion that legitimate political decision-making emanates from the public deliberation of citizens. In other words, as a normative account of political decision-making, deliberative democracy evokes ideals of rational legislation, participatory politics and civic self-governance (Cunningham 2002: 163). Adams and Waghid (2005:25) regard participation, community engagement, rationality, consensus, equality and freedom as the constitutive principles of deliberative democracy in South Africa.
Proponents of deliberative democracy suggest that, in principle, deliberative democracy has applied the most attractive features of liberal and republican theories, and has avoided the shortcomings of the traditional theories. The four principles of deliberative democracy, viz. generality, autonomy, power neutrality and ideal role-taking, are standards whereby the applicability of deliberative theory can be measured (Eriksen & Weigard, 2003:128). The deliberative model of democracy maintains that citizens are treated equally when the exercise of political or bureaucratic power can be justified by reasons, which can be approved by all after adequate rational deliberation has taken place (Eriksen & Weigard, 2003:128).
Nevertheless, substantive democracy, however defined, has not been fully realised anywhere in the world because all the traditional models of democracy (i.e. liberal, republican, social and elitist) have inherent weaknesses and flaws such as the favouring of the rich and talented, the oppression of minorities, aggregation of self-interested decision-making, dominance of hegemonies, wasteful welfarism and corrupt or authoritarian elitism and bureaucracy are all embedded in the system (Cunningham, 2002:1-248). Of course, this also implies that all the weaknesses of the liberal, republican, social and elitist traditions of democracy are present in the South African political and social system. This will be investigated in the sections that follow.
Undemocratic features in the South African education system
Several undemocratic features are present in the system of school governance and will be discussed in more detail in this section.
Systemic weaknesses
Systemic weaknesses of the traditional models of democracy(i.e. liberal, republican, social and elitist) are evident from the following examples in the education system:
The former Model C schools (generally well-resourced and previously advantaged) are functioning and performing well with the present model of state-aided school governance, whereas most of the previously disadvantaged schools are dysfunctional (Taylor, 2006:3). Thus, liberal democratic features in our system inherently favour the previously advantaged schools;
Language rights of African learners as well as Afrikaans single medium schools are disrespected or disparaged by provincial officials. The quantitative study of this research revealed that the issue of centralisation of language policy for schools elicited effect sizes of large practical significance (phi coefficients: 0.54; 0.5; 0.71) and statistical significance (χ2 values: 0.0054) between all the sub-groups of the senior education officials; school principals and school governing body chairpersons. The Afrikaans sub-groups (81.5%) held strong views against centralisation of school language policy, whereas the majority of the Setswana et al. group were in favour of centralisation of language policies by the provincial education department. Thus, typical features of republican democracy, such as the emphasis on separation of state powers, inherently enables or masks oppression of minorities;
Alexander (2003:184) aptly criticised the wastage of the system as is evident from the annual poor matriculation results and the high drop-out rate. In 2005 the results were so poor that only 150,000 Grade 12 learners (representing 12.5% of the initial 1.2 million Grade 1 learners) achieved a matriculation pass that is of an acceptable standard (Gallie, 2007:5). Yet, despite these poor results, no vigorous disciplinary action was taken against incompetent or uncommitted educators. Thus, social democratic features inherent to the system causes wasteful welfarism;
There is a strong trend towards centralised control of education policy for transformation purposes (see discussion following). This causes conflict between the government (including provincial departments of education) and school governing bodies in matters such as the appointment of educators (Settlers Agricultural High School v The Head of Department:Department of Education, Limpopo Province, 2002), determination of language policies (Head of Department, Mpumalanga Education Department v Hoërskool Ermelo, 2009) and learners' admission policies. Thus, these indicators substantiate the contention that the elitist features of the system inevitably favour an authoritarian bureaucracy.
Therefore, the inherent weaknesses of the liberal, republican, social and elitist traditions of democracy are present in the education system and cause phenomena such as great disparities between schools, oppression of minorities, wastage of financial resources, elitist and bureaucratic attitudes.
Misconceptions of democracy
Due to the absence of a long democratic tradition and the democratic immaturity of the majority of South Africa's citizenry, many of the problems in the system of school governance can be attributed to ignorance and lack of knowledge of democratic principles. This is evident from a telling admission of a senior education official who stated:
We should have gone back to the communities to demobilise the people to change their mindset. To change their mindset by saying, now we are in a democracy now [sic]. From a revolutionary to a democratic mindset. (Interview 2, Ln: 171-175).
... the democratic immaturity of the parents is taking its course. But our children at the communities were not demobilised. After 1994, we should have put structures in place. (Interview 2, Ln: 204-207).
To give an example from the quantitative study, 60% of the senior education officials and 50% of the other participants misunderstood democracy to mean that the majority should always triumph regardless of whether fundamental rights are infringed. This is clearly erroneous as Tocqueville (1966:8) axiomatically stated that unbridled majority rule may become an oppressive 'tyranny of the majority' and that the majority of the self-governing citizens is always limited by the law of justice, which is established by the majority of all mankind. The erroneous majoritarian 'winner-takes-all' notion explains why many of the bureaucratic decisions are taken to enforce the government and ruling party's aim to transform education without due regard to fundamental rights and requirements of legality. Of the senior education officials, 91.2% incorrectly assessed their own knowledge of democratic principles to be good or excellent.
A second example is the finding that 57% of the respondents were ignorant of the principles of participatory and deliberative democracy as mechanisms to manage diversity and accommodate multiculturalism. In fact, the majority of the respondents favoured a bureaucratic method to manage multiculturalism. This does not accord with the principle that education and democracy are interconnected and that a democratic culture can only be developed by democratic education practices (Parry & Moran, 1994:48). Most of the stakeholders in education do not understand the differences between political and participatory forms of democracy. For instance, meaningful participation by parents in school governance is constrained if bureaucratic misapplications of democratic principles occur as a result of the restrictive paradigms that curtail the rights of school governing bodies to recommend the appointment of educators (Carnavon High School v MEC for Education, Northern Cape; Douglas Hoërskool v The Premier of the Northern Cape Province; Kimberley Girls High School v. Head of the Department of Education, Settlers Agricultural High School v. Head of Department of Education, Limpopo Province).
Misapplication of legal and democratic principles
The findings indicate a pattern of misapplication of the rule of law and principles of democracy such as enabling participation and tolerance of diversity of languages.
The first indication of a pattern of misapplication of democratic principles is the failure to apply the rule of law. This is evident from the reluctance of the departments of education (provincial and national) to address the inordinately political role that the dominant teacher's (SADTU) union plays. The qualitative evidence confirmed that "the dominant teacher organisation seems to think that it is running the system and teachers are not doing what they are expected to do" (Interview 6, Ln:38-39) and that this union is responsible for the politicised climate in dysfunctional schools (Interview 2, Ln:120-127). A senior education official explained the conduct of SADTU as follows:
Now, for the past two, three months, those educators which are members of a union which is affiliated to COSATU, were not in the classrooms. You must look at the results this year; I think it is going to be adversely affected. That is why I am saying, in one way or the other, this union is having a political mandate from the ruling party or their union federation. So, therefore, whenever they come to school they want to politicise everybody, even political leaders. That is why you find that the school governing bodies today are operating under very, very, tremendous [sic] pressure from the unions (Interview 2: Ln:120-127).
Although the participants were reluctant to name the union eo nomine, it is general knowledge that the dominant teachers' union, in terms of membership numbers and affiliation to the Confederation of South African Trade Unions (COSATU), is the South African Democratic Teacher's Union (SADTU).
Furthermore, 23.93% of the respondents indicated that unions often or always unlawfully interfere with the recommendations of school governing bodies to appoint educators. It was very clear from the interviews that the dominant teachers' union, viz. South African Democratic Teachers Union (SADTU) plays a very activist and disruptive role in many of the schools. The following statements give an indication of the extent of SADTU's disruptive role in the appointment processes and the politicisation of schools:
Participant B Interview 2
Yes, I must say this in confidence, if you look at schools where, for example, the majority of the members belong to one union, including the principal, and only two or three belong to another union ... During the strikes, if the strikes were organised by a union for a day or two or three or more, then the learners are not going to be taught during that period.
...Now, for the past two, three months, those educators which are members of a union which is affiliated to COSATU, were not in the classrooms. You must look at the results this year; I think it is going to be adversely affected. That is why I am saying, in one way or the other, this union is having a political mandate from the ruling party or their union federation. So, therefore, whenever they come to school they want to politicise everybody, even political leaders. That is why you find that the school governing bodies today are operating under very, very tremendous pressure from the unions. Because if you look at this year in terms of learners here, all the unions were involved. Now you can see that we are going in a direction where our education is politicised. (Ln: 111-129).
In addition, the disquieting statistic of Taylor (2006:2) that approximately 80% of the schools in South Africa are essentially dysfunctional, confirms that effective and proper education is not taking place in these schools. The question arises why the departments do not address this desperate situation more emphatically. Emphatic action against unlawful or undisciplined behaviour educators and union officials would include steps such as criminal prosecution and disciplinary action by the employer. Although it is obviously impractical to discipline all the dysfunctional educators, taking steps against the worst offenders would undeniably send a message that such behaviour will not be tolerated. Consistent and fair application of the law affirms the rule of law and act as a deterrent for unacceptable behaviour.
Taylor (2006:22) found that policies and administrative attempts to improve accountability, such as implementing Standard Based Assessment, capacity building measures and support packages, have had no effect on dysfunctional schools. Fleisch (2006:369-382) reported that the increased monitoring and surveillance that accompanied the Education Action Zone (EAZ) intervention programme for profoundly dysfunctional schools in the Gauteng province, resulted in substantial and consistent improvements. However, the EAZ strategy was criticised by SADTU as a crack unit to bully schools and as a result the imposition of bureaucratic accountability waned (Fleisch, 2006:371). In February 2006 both the national Minister and the Gauteng MEC for education threatened to close dysfunctional schools, but after protests from learners and certain unions, these forewarnings were not followed through (Taylor, 2006:22). Jansen (2007:5) advocated the reinstatement of the inspection system, strict contractual accountability for every educator and the replacement of school principals in dysfunctional schools.
Despite these recommendations the departments of education have been reluctant to take strong emphatic action to enforce compliance. This reluctance suggests a profound misunderstanding of the principle of the rule of law. In other words, it is contended that by overtly allowing anarchy (lawlessness) and systematised unprofessionalism to prevail in schools, the education departments exhibit a fundamental misunderstanding of the democratic imperative to apply the law with relentless rigour in order to maintain a state based on the rule of law. To put it differently, if the departments of education (and its officials) overestimate the political role that a teachers' union should be allowed to play, and if the departments of education misconceive the extent of the labour rights of educators, then the inevitable result is overpoliticisation of schools and systematised unprofessional conduct or dysfunctional behaviour by educators. Of course, a democracy is not anarchy, because the people agreed to and established the laws of the country.
The political action by labour unions during the struggle against apartheid was understandable, because the previous regime was not democratic. However, with the attainment of democracy, political activism should no longer be the role and function of unions and their power should be restricted to labour matters. Therefore, by erroneously endorsing, permitting or condoning political activism by educator unions in schools, the education departments are acting contrary to the democratic principle of the rule of law.
The second indication of a misapplication of democratic principles is the failure to promote linguistic diversity and mother tongue instruction. Despite the finding that 85.38% of the respondents agreed that home language education is in the best interest of the learners, the Setswana et al. language group was patently against the tolerance and accommodation of Afrikaans single medium schools. The examples of court cases (Laerskool Middelburg v. Departementshoof, Mpumalanga Departement van Onderwys, 2003; Governing Body of Mikro Primary School v. Western Cape Minister of Education, 2005; Laerskool Seodin v. Department of Education, Northern Cape Province, 2005; Hoërskool Ermelo v. Departementshoof, Mpumalanga Departement van Onderwys, 2009) and the statements by senior education officials in the qualitative study confirm the pattern of advancement of a policy to promote uniform English medium instruction at the expense of Afrikaans and African languages. Thus, the official policy of promotion uniformity at the expense of diversity, is a misapplication of section 30 of the Constitution and article 1 of the international treaty, the Convention on Prevention of Discrimination in Education, which stipulate the protection of diversity.
Bureaucracy constrains the authority of school governing bodies
Parry & Moran (1994:48) affirm that in principle the whole population must acquire a set of democratic and educational attitudes in order to minimise constraints to democracy in education. In accordance with this principle, it is suggested that a change in democratic attitudes is necessary for some education leaders and education officials. The examples of the following court cases provide substantiation of the fact that provincial and national administrators at times display attitudes averse or indifferent to the democratic principles of responsiveness, accountability and transparency. This constrains participation by school governing bodies.
The case of Settlers Agricultural High School v. Head of Department of Education, Limpopo Province, 2002 is illustrative of the manner in which the education officials bureaucratically disregarded the democratic authority of the school governing bodies. This matter involved the appointment of a principal to a vacant post. The school governing body had duly complied with all the legal procedures and recommended that Mr V, a white Afrikaans candidate, be appointed in first choice of preference. However, the Education Department appointed the second candidate on the shortlist, Mrs M., because the departmental employment equity plan favoured a black female candidate as an affirmative action appointment. The Education Department contended that it could not be expected to simply "confirm and rubberstamp" a recommendation of a governing body, but that it was obliged to take requirements of employment equity into consideration. The court rejected the arguments of the department and upheld the recommendation and contentions of the school governing body.
In Despatch High School v. Head of Department of Education, Eastern Cape, 2003 the Eastern Cape High Court voiced its displeasure at the way in which the education department in that province had dealt with a complaint against a principal who had stolen a school cellphone and had lied about it. The court specifically stated that the manner in which the respondent dealt with the concerns of the governing body regarding the continued presence of the principal at the school was far from satisfactory. The court faulted the Head of Department of Education for displaying indifference to the "understandable concerns" of the governing body. Had the Head of Department complied with the democratic obligation to be responsive to public involvement through deliberation, the need for the school to resort to litigation might well have been averted.
In the case of Suid-Afrikaanse Onderwysunie v. Departementshoof Departement van Onderwys, Vrystaat, 2004 (Translation: South African Education Union v Head of Department of Education, Free State province) the authority devised a scheme to dismiss 1,200 temporary educators (Beckmann, 2007:5). The administratively unjust and unlawful decision of the Free State education authority was set aside by the court. The judge, Hattingh J, castigated the officials of the Free State provincial department of education for ignoring the principles of legality and administrative justice in the way they treated the educators.
The case of Maritzburg College v. Dlamini, Mafa and Kondza, 2005 was a clear example of the unresponsiveness and poor quality of education administration at the provincial level. In this case, the school governing body held a proper and fair hearing and decided to recommend expulsion of two ill-disciplined learners to the Head of the Department of Education, KwaZulu-Natal. Despite numerous letters, telephone calls from the governing body and a meeting with the Head of Department, he failed to come to a decision on the expulsion of the learners for 21 months. Eventually, out of sheer desperation the school governing body approached the High Court for a declaratory order. The Court criticised the unresponsive bureaucratic attitude of the official and upheld the decision of the governing body. Punitive costs were awarded to the school.
Thesecases confirmthat bureaucratic unfairness, unresponsiveness, non-transparencyand injustice results in unduly constraining the authority of school governing bodies.
Poor parental participation the result of inadequate participation
Although many factors such as poverty, illiteracy, unemployment, low competency levels and lack of transport result in inadequate parental participation, poor parental participation is also partially attributable to undemocratic actions such as over-politicisation of school governing bodies, the increased centralisation and bureaucratic decision-making and misapplication of democratic principles. This statement will be validated in the following paragraphs.
Poor parental participation is often attributable to misunderstanding of participatory democracy. Arnstein (1969:217) described a "ladder of participation" in terms of which the higher level on the ladder corresponds with a higher level of participation (see Figure 3).
This ladder of participation affirms that certain forms of communication such as placation, consultation, informing, therapy and manipulation do not result in true participation. In fact, the symbolic forms of participation spuriously convey a false message of involvement, which ultimately discourages or dissuades parents. In order to promote involvement and improve education, education administrators, education leaders and school governing bodies should utilise multiplicitous modes of enabling real parental participation such as meetings, public hearings, public comment processes on policies, voting, campaigning, group activities, liaison with representatives and officials, protesting, petitioning, fund-raising, canvassing and boycotting (Parry & Moyser, 1994:46). School governing bodies should contribute to the democratisation of school education by exercising local authority on matters such as school finances, school ethos and culture, policydecisions about networksinvolvingprivate-public partnerships and collaboration with community organisations (Rossouw & Van Rooyen, 2007:20).
The findings of the qualitative study clearly confirmed that many school governing body members misunderstand the role of the school governing body to be a political forum where political rights are exercised (Interview 2, Ln:133-137; Interview 3, Ln:210-218 and Interview 6, Ln:20-36). The parents often misconceive participatory democracy for political democracy and as a result schools become a playing field to further political ambitions of the cadres of the ruling party and to politicise schools (Ln:210-218).
Increased centralisation and bureaucratic decision-making
Another reason for poor participation is the absence or gradual erosion of real participation. Many compromises regarding the powers of governing bodies have been significantly altered in an apparent reduction of powers of governing bodies through a series of amendments of the Schools Act (Beckmann, 2007:13).Thesesuggest a recentralisation of decision-making powers in respect of curriculum content, recommendations of staff for appointment, levying of school fees and the utilisation of school funds (Beckmann, 2007:14). Malherbe (2006:247) argued that the formal structures for co-operation and negotiation between the national and provincial spheres with regard to education have become "little more than a one-way traffic system" as a result of centralisingtendencies and policies of national government. Van Deventer (1998:51) contended that the extent of the state's prescriptive regulations and intervention of all aspects of admission, language, and religious policies, norms and standards for funding and financial administration, expulsion and code of conduct guidelines in reality does away with any real partnership or power-sharing.
Generally speaking it is advantageous to have an education system with both centralised and decentralised features. The centralisation of matters and policies of general purport such as curriculum content, assessment standards, school financing- and educator provision formulae enhances the effective functioning of the education system. However, this should be balanced with the necessity to decentralise decision-making power in order to accommodate local variations and the specific requirements of each school community. The trend towards increased centralisation of decision-making power of local school governing bodies is confirmed by this study as the majority of the senior education officials (73.3%), school principals (59.7%), and 50.7% of the school governing body chairpersons regarded the education system as simultaneously centralised and democratic. Increased centralisation by virtue of politically motivated assumption of local decision-making authority undermines the participatory design of the South African Schools Act.
Misapplication of democratic principles
The case of Head of Department, Mpumalanga Education Department v. Hoërskool Ermelo, 2009 involved a functional school governing body whose language and admissions policies conflicted with the central and provincial government's policies. The Department of Education removed the school governing body's function in terms of section 25 of the Schools Act in order to impose a change in language policy onto the school. Such instances of undemocratic misappropriation of the functions of school governing bodies by the Department of Education negate the democratic principles of subsidiarity and participatory democracy. In essence, the principle of subsidiarity entails that the responsibility and functions of lower spheres or levels in a systemor organisation must not be unlawfully usurped or misappropriated by higher levels of power (Carpenter, 1999:46). The Department of Education should, in principle, play a "subsidiary" role insofar as it should provide support and may only take over the functions of a school governing body if the latter is defunctive (Carpenter, 1999:46).
Parents, principals and administrators strongly in favour of decentralisation of school governance
In contrast to the argument by Soudien and Sayed (2004:106) that decentralisation has gone too far in the South African education system, the vast majority (96%) of the respondents to the quantitative study, including senior education officials, agreed that despite the shortcomings, parental participation improves school effectiveness and that the decentralised model of local school governance should continue. It should be borne in mind that the respondents were representative of the demography of North-West Province and included responses from rural, township, farm, and suburban schools. The majority of school principals (67.9%) and school governing body chairpersons (70.2%) were opposed to the suggestion that school governing bodies should be replaced by more centralised "Boards of Education"' in every district. The attitude of the majority of all the respondents was strongly against increased centralisation (88.9%), disagreed with suggestions to reduce parental participation (66.6%), and disagreed with the statement that the provincial education department should appoint educators (64.8%).
Democratisation of a society requires an inculcation of knowledge, values and attitudes into substantive democratic practice by means of education (Aspin, 1995:58). It was Thomas Jefferson, third American president, who said that if a nation expects to be uneducated and free, then it expects something that never was and never shall be (Blaug & Schwartzmantel, 2006). Dewey (1916:1-378), the pragmatist American philosopher and renowned educationalist, asserted that democracy shapes education and education, in turn, shapes democracy. This implies that the nature and practice of democracy in societal institutions, such as schools, must be congruent with the education that citizens receive; otherwise, the educative force of the real environment would counteract the effects of early schooling (Parry & Moran, 1994:48).
In order to address some of the undemocratic inclinations in the school governance system, it is contended that the theories of participative and deliberative democracy suggest outcomes that would improve the present system. Most of these recommendations are contained in the theory of deliberative democracy and are based on the democratic principles of responsiveness, accountability, common interest and justification of decisions through rational discourse. In this regard it is recommended that:
The democratic principle of the rule of law should be vigilantly applied by addressing anarchic conditions at dysfunctional schools. This applies especially to over-politicised schools suffering under the political dominance of SADTU and incompetent educators;
Inadequate knowledge of democratic principles constrains democracy. In order to allay the constraints of ignorance and misconceptions, over-politicisation of schools, absolute majoritarianism, homogenous hegemonyand single language dominance, it is recommended that education and training should be provided to all stakeholders in education. Universities, departments of education and school governing bodies all have a significant role to play in this regard;
Civic attitudes of democratic citizens should ideally include the virtues of responsibility, obedience to elected leaders in authority, adherence to the law, tolerance of individual autonomy and private freedoms, courage and loyalty in times of strife, interest and participation in community and state affairs by frequent debating and voting on issues. However, in the modern era, the content of what it means to be a good citizen has become shallow and the power of political and socio-economic rights does not go hand-in-hand with the inherent quality and commitment to noble civic attitudes (Cunningham, 2002: 111). To improve noble civic attitudes of democratic citizens the education and cultivation of an open, rational approach to deliberation is recommended. By contrast, a closed approach constrains democracy by strategically advancing discussions with incorrect attitudes and hidden political agendas. Such closed attitudes are not committed to finding collective solutions;
The deliberative remedies of structured accountability and shared responsibility aim to counteract self-interested decision-making by emphasising the common interest of all citizens. Structured accountability entails the establishment of formalised mechanisms and procedures such as inspections, audits, compulsory reporting and frequent feedback to the stakeholders to improve responsiveness;
Democratic values and attitudes such as respect for human dignity, the achievement of equality, the advancement of freedoms, tolerance, responsiveness and accountability cannot be instilled by merely enforcing policies and the law, but also need to be taught and demonstrated by example and application. It is essential to continuously cultivate values that are required for democracy to succeed. These values are:
- Rationality: procedures based on justifiable reasons in which the fundamental principles of morality are implicit;
- Equality: All people are presumed equal until justifiable and reasonable grounds are given for treating someone or some group differently;
- Freedom: All people are considered to be free until good reasons are given for constraints to be applied or liberty to be limited;
- Tolerance: The right to be different and for people to chose their own life-options is respected insofar as it does not unjustifiably or unreasonably infringe the rights of others;
- Respect: The dignity of all people and the communal and civic interests of society are considered more important than the self-interest of the individual.
The remedies to improve democratic values are the protection of constitutional rights through fair and just adjudication and the cultivation of tolerance for diversity. The commitment to fair governance should avoid enforced subjugation, irrationality, inequality, disrespect and bias;
In order to increase authentic parental participation it is recommended that the National Education and Training Council, which is a participative forum, must be populated by the Minister of Education. Also, additional deliberative and participatory forums such as parent forums and Area School Boards should be established and based on the open, rational approach of deliberative and participatory democracy.
Obviously, the implementation of these recommendations would entail that the education departments would have to commit to improving participation; addressing the tendency to centralise the education system and amending legislation to provide for additional deliberative forums.
This discussion has demonstrated that some of the challenges in the education system are partly attributable to misconceptions of democracy, misapplications of legal and democratic principles and systemic weaknesses in the traditional models of democracy. Democratisation of the education system should be improved by training all stakeholders in education, by improving authentic participation and by applying the principles of deliberative democracy. In order to improve school governance and the education system, it is recommended that inculcation of essential knowledge, values and attitudes to attain substantive democracy should be based on the theory of deliberative democracy and the principles of responsiveness, accountability and justification of decisions through rational discourse.
1. North-West Province is divided into the following administrative districts: 1 Brits 2 Temba 3 Mabopane 4 Moretele 5 Moses Kotane 6 Kgetleng River 7 Rustenburg 8 Kagisano Molopo 9 Gaseganyana 10 Greater Taung 11 Moshaweng 12 Taledi 13 Lichtenburg 14 Greater Delareyville 15 Zeerust 16 Setlakgobi 17 Matlosana/Klerksdorp 18 Maquassi Hills 19 Potchefstroom.
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Table of cases
Governing Body, Mikro Primary School, and another v. Minister of Education, Western Cape, and others. 2005 (3) SA 504 (C).
Ermelo High School and Another v. Head of Department, Mpumalanga Department of Education and others. Case No. 240/2009 CC.
Laerskool Middelburg v. Departementshoof, Mpumalanga Departement van Onderwys. 2003 (4) SA 160 (T).
Maritzburg College v. Dlamini NO, and others. 2005 JOL 15075 (N).
Minister of Education, Western Cape, and others v. Governing Body of Mikro Primary School, and another. 2005 (3) SA 436 (SCA).
Pearson High School v. Head of the Department Eastern Cape Province and others. 1999 JOL 5517 (Ck).
Seodin Primary School and others v. Northern Cape Department of Education and another. Unreported Case No. 117/2004 (NC).
Settlers Agricultural High School & the Governing Body Settlers Agricultural High School v. The Head of Department: Department of Education, Limpopo Province. Case No. 16395/02 (T).
Simela v. MEC for Education, Eastern Cape. 2001(9) BLLR 1085 (LC).
Suid-Afrikaanse Onderwysunie v. Departementshoof Departement van Onderwys, Vrystaat. 2001 (3) SA 100 (FS).
Marius Smit is an Associate Professor in the Department of Education Law at the North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, and an Attorney. His research interest focuses on education law and he is widely published in this field.
Izak Oosthuizen is Professor in the Faculties of Education, North-West University. His research focus has been on education law for the past 25 years.


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Lombard convention features love-in for stamp collectors
Once upon a time, stamp collecting was cool -- Beatle John Lennon and President Franklin Delano Roosevelt cool.
Now the hobby has gone cold.
"We lost a generation," says Kim Kellermann, the 55-year-old grandson and part of the third generation of family members running Rasdale Stamps in Westmont.
A half century after Lennon made his move from stamps to rock 'n' roll, the American Stamp Dealers Association is trying to bring back the cool through "The StampLove," a new campaign that heralds the joys of stamp collecting.
"There's just so much more to it," says ASDA Executive Director Amy Nicklaus, an energetic 33-year-old blond woman who acknowledges that her very presence shatters stereotypes about stamp collecting. "There are so many things about this hobby that are really, really cool."
All those things will be on display from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Friday through Sunday at the ASDA Midwest Stamp Show, which is free and open to the public at the Lindner Conference Center in Lombard. The show features dealers and collectors, free appraisals, chances to buy and sell, rare stamps worth tens of thousands of dollars and the unveiling of a new U.S. Postal Service stamp series celebrating modern art.
"I've been in this business since before I could ride a bike," says Kellermann, who still has some of the stamps he sorted and bundled for stamp shows when he was a boy.
At Rasdale, Kellermann handles U.S. stamps, while his brother, Kevin Kellermann, 52, is a licensed auctioneer and expert in foreign stamps. Their sister, Kristin Maravelias, 49, who has a law degree and lives in Mount Prospect, manages the office and handles the accounting. Their mother, Joanne, still was employed in the family business in 2011 when "she died working on her stamp collection" in her Lombard home, Kim Kellermann says.
Stamp collecting isn't as popular as it once was, but you wouldn't guess that by touring Rasdale Stamps, which expanded in 2012 and now boasts a 7,800-square-foot warehouse with two loading docks.
"There's still enough collectors out there," Kellermann says. Every three months, they open their warehouse at 35 Chestnut Ave. to between 100 and 150 dealers and collectors from around the globe for a massive stamp auction. The next is May 18.
Rasdale sells between 8 tons and 10 tons of stamps at every auction. Rasdale's best customer. a Chinese dealer who lives in New York, spends "well into the six figures," Kellermann adds.
Kellermann and his wife, Darlene Pylar, (whom he met at a stamp show) soon will depart on trips to Florida and Ohio to buy more stamps. Rasdale sells stamps on commission, usually between 15 percent and 20 percent of the winning bid. In 2004, the great-granddaughter of a collector who died in 1940 contacted Rasdale after finding a stamp collection inside two old steamer trunks in the basement. That collection sold for $1.7 million, Kellermann says. But most inherited collections aren't worth nearly as much the heirs expect, he adds.
"You mean he spent 40 years disappearing for hours and that's all it's worth" is a phrase Kellermann says he's heard many times. "It's my job to get their expectations back to reality."
The value of a stamp collection sometimes is purely personal.
"There's so much emotion," says Kellermann, who adds that people sometimes cry while selling stamp albums. "Part of them leaves when the stamp collection is sold."
Stamps can be the glue that holds families together, Nicklaus says.
"Before there were Xboxes, you spent time with your kids and this is one of the things you'd do," she says. "You'd talk about history, where you came from and what your values are."
Whether a collector focuses on 19th-century stamps from his ancestors' homeland or on the latest pop culture stamps featuring "The Simpsons," stamps help collectors understand a region, an era, politics and art, Kellermann says.
"You can literally own small pieces of history, small pieces of art," Nicklaus adds.
"There are myriad ways to collect, as many ways as there are people," Kellermann adds. "I've never touted stamps as an investment. It's a hobby. It takes time. It takes patience. Instant gratification? There isn't that with stamps."
He says he understands how young collectors fall away from the hobby as they get busy with romance, sports and school and then move onto work and maybe marriage and kids.
"But eventually," Kellermann says, "if they were seeded long ago, they start coming out in their late 40s and 50s."
Nicklaus can describe that transformation back into stamp collecting with a single word: "Cool."
Stamp Show in LombardWhen: from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Friday through Sunday.
Where: Lindner Conference Center, 610 E. Butterfied Road, Lombard.
Who: Hundreds of stamp dealers and collectors.
Cost: Free and open to the public.


text:
Category: Business Line, Companies, Events, Lockheed Martin, Marinette Marine, Press Releases, production program | RSS 2.0MARINETTE, Wis., Nov. 8, 2012 /PRNewswire/ — A Lockheed Martin (NYSE: LMT)-led industry team officially laid the keel for the U.S. Navy's seventh Littoral Combat Ship (LCS), the future USS Detroit. The event was part of a time-honored keel laying ceremony that took place at the Marinette Marine Corporation shipyard in Wisconsin.
The Lockheed Martin LCS team is building the futuristic Freedom-variant LCS for the U.S. naval fleet. With the first two ships delivered, two additional ships in production and two more in early material procurement, the industry team is addressing the Navy's need for an affordable, highly-networked and modular ship unlike any other in the world. This new class of combatants is designed to support a wide variety of missions including anti-submarine, surface and mine countermeasure warfare, shipping lane protection, and humanitarian aid.
"It's an honor to participate in this event for the future USS Detroit," said Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich. "The keel laying ceremony marks a great milestone for the program and the naval fleet. These ships are vital to our national defense strategy and their production contributes significantly to the Wisconsin and Michigan economies."
During the ceremony ship sponsor Barbara Levin authenticated the keel by having her initials welded into a sheet of the ship's steel. She was assisted by the Navy's Program Executive Officer – Littoral Combat Ships Rear Admiral James Murdoch.
"This ceremony marks the beginning of my commitment to supporting the future USS Detroit and the brave crews that will serve aboard her to defend our country," said Barbara Levin. "It is a very moving moment for me, as I am very proud to serve as the sponsor of this powerful ship which honors my native city."
The Lockheed Martin-led LCS team includes ship builder Marinette Marine Corporation, a Fincantieri company, naval architect Gibbs & Cox, as well as hundreds of domestic and international suppliers, including approximately 30 small businesses in Wisconsin and Michigan.
"Marinette Marine Corporation's shipbuilding expertise, coupled with Lockheed Martin's integrated and automated systems that bring the capability to fight, operate and support the ship, make the Freedom-variant LCS a powerful vessel," said Joe North, vice president of Littoral Ship Systems for Lockheed Martin's Mission Systems & Sensors business. "The LCS team continues to invest in shipyard improvements and has applied best practices to ensure we continue to be more efficient and more innovative with each new ship we build."
By 2013, industry investment will total approximately $94 million, which includes nearly $70 million to date from Marinette Marine Corporation's Italian parent Fincantieri-Cantieri Navali Italiani for shipyard improvements.
Lay the keel is a shipbuilding term that marks the beginning of the module erection process, which is a significant undertaking that signifies the ship coming to life. Modern warships are now largely built in a series of pre-fabricated, complete hull sections rather than a single keel, so the actual start of the shipbuilding process is now considered to be when the first module for the ship is erected in place and is often marked with a ceremonial event.
About Lockheed Martin
Headquartered in Bethesda, Md., Lockheed Martin is a global security and aerospace company that employs about 120,000 people worldwide and is principally engaged in the research, design, development, manufacture, integration and sustainment of advanced technology systems, products and services. The corporation's net sales for 2011 were $46.5 billion.
About Fincantieri
Fincantieri is one of the world's largest shipbuilding groups, which in over 200 years of maritime history has built more than 7,000 vessels. It is world leader in cruise ship construction and a reference player in other sectors, from naval vessels to cruise ferries, from megayachts to special high value-added vessels, and ship repairs and conversions. Headquartered in Trieste, the Group has over 10,000 employees and eight shipyards in Italy alone. Fincantieri operates in the United States through its subsidiary Fincantieri Marine Group (FMG). This company, which serves both civilian and government customers, including the U.S. Navy and Coast Guard, has three shipyards (Marinette Marine, Bay Shipbuilding, Ace Marine), all located in the Great Lakes region. Since 2002 Fincantieri has built or has orders to build more than 100 ships, worth a total of € 22 billion, and has developed numerous prototypes in each of its business segments.
For additional information about Lockheed Martin, visit: http://www.lockheedmartin.com/ms2/ and http://www.lmlcsteam.com
SOURCE Lockheed Martin
Photo courtesy of PR Newswire


text:
In a world with few examples, San Francisco and California forge ahead with policies for using open source software within government.
Photo: San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom
As state and local governments know too well, choosing open source software is kind of like being Lewis and Clark: There are a lot of unknowns, and policies for governing the open source "wilderness" aren't well defined -- if at all.
This is finally starting to change, thanks in part to leadership from San Francisco and the California state CIO's office, two of the first governments to adopt formal policies for the usage of open source software within state and local agencies.
The content of their policies are similar, but San Francisco's goes a step further than the state. Adopted Jan. 21, San Francisco's policy mandates that city agencies always consider open source options when buying new software. By contrast, the open source policy letter issued in January by California's Office of the State Chief Information Officer set a definition of open source software and designated it an "acceptable practice" -- bringing its usage by the state "out of the shadows," in the words of Chief Deputy CIO Adrian Farley.
The different approaches suggest there is still a long way to go until a commonly accepted best practice emerges for open source software in government.
"The state has stepped up. San Francisco has stepped up. We're looking to the federal government for a lot of the guidance," said Brian Purchia, deputy communications director and technology adviser for San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom. "But this is just the beginning. The potential is there for millions of dollars [saved] in software licensing costs. That's the reality."
Purchia contends that San Francisco's policy goes further than California's. "The state has done a good job in terms of at least saying that open source software should be left on the table," he said, "but in San Francisco, we're actually making it a part of the policy. It will be evaluated on an equal field with private software."
For all software purchases in excess of $100,000, San Francisco's policy requires agencies to consider open source solutions on equivalent ground as proprietary software products. City officials, including CIO Chris Vein and an interdepartmental IT committee, worked together on the policy language.
For the past six months, Mayor Gavin Newsom has pushed San Francisco city agencies to use open source as part of a citywide transparency initiative. In one example, many of the city's newest Web sites -- including DataSF and RecoverySF -- are built on open source platforms.
On a video update posted last week to YouTube, Newsom said he prefers open source because it can speed up procurements and can be cheaper. "This is a policy that didn't necessarily get a lot of attention, but I think is a big deal for taxpayers in the city and for those that believe in open source, open data and more transparency of government," Newsom said.
Like the mayor, California's IT leadership recognizes that open source could be a money-saver. But it's apparent that the state isn't touting open source with quite as much gusto as Newsom. "It's not like we're giving agencies carte blanche to throw up any kind of OSS (open source software) that they want," Farley told Government Technology last month. California's policy "normalizes" the state's use of open source software, giving "a framework for departments to use OSS out of the shadows, more or less," he explained.
The state's more cautious approach likely stems in part from wariness about security. Mark Weatherford, the state's chief information security officer, recently wrote in a blog post on Govtech.com that he has been on both sides of the argument about open source.
"There are arguments against using OSS, but I've heard the 'there's no guarantee of future support' line so many times it makes me want to cry," Weatherford wrote. "How many times and how many endless hours have you spent on hold with tech support without getting the help you needed? At least with the open source community one of the nice things is the worldwide support available almost any time of day. So while there are some criticisms, there's also some valid business rationale for using OSS."
The same arguments that are floated against open source -- you don't know the coder who's working for you, uncertain quality assurance, irregular schedules for version updates - no doubt could prove troublesome for governments that come to rely upon open code.
Purchia said San Francisco's leadership was mindful that there's some element of risk -- no software is 100 percent secure. And the city's IT officials brought up the security question.
"But from our perspective, from what we've seen over the past few years, open source software is more secure than a lot of the private software out there," he said.
Time will tell if San Francisco and California are doing the right thing, and if government's use of open source turns out to be a more secure option. In any case, the two governments seemingly are unafraid to lead the way forward.
Government Technology Staff Writer Russell Nichols contributed to this story.


text:
KDevelop 3.4 Brings Many New Features
KDevelop 3.4 has been released, bringing many new features to KDE's Integrated Development Environment. The first major release in over a year closes more than 500 bugs. There is an impressive list of additional features including improved Qt 4 support, new debugging abilities, more attractive default user interface layout and improvements for C++, Ruby and PHP support. Packages are available for Kubuntu and openSUSE with unofficial builds for several others on the download page. Update: The developers have put together a slideshow to showcase the new features.
You rock!
the new Kdevelop is great.... thanks so much! I am excited about what is planed for Kdevelop 4...please rock on! The only thing I am worried about is a potential fork of the project
please don't do this because of a name!
By MK at Sat, 2007/01/27 - 6:00am
Re: You rock!
By David at Sat, 2007/01/27 - 6:00am
Re: You rock!
Very good point. You guys have to work it out without causing any fork. Forks are OK when they are beneficial, in this case, I don't see any from renaming.
KDev for Kdevlop. indicative, meaningful, & short,
Get a resolution without any forking PLEASE!!! Otherwise you are wasting your novel efforts for nothing.
By Abe at Sat, 2007/01/27 - 6:00am
Re: You rock!
Wow, what a lame name. Koncrete. The IDE for 10-year-old-boys-who-enjoy-stupid-names. WTF?
By AC at Sat, 2007/01/27 - 6:00am
Re: You rock!
By Colin at Sun, 2007/01/28 - 6:00am
Re: You rock!
Please don't worry. If you look at the thread, you'll find out that nobody wants to fight to the death for just a name. We'll have the name issue sorted out as soon as we finish the rework of the core platform stuff. "Koncrete" wasn't the first proposed name and it won't be the last one.
About the fork... Judging from the replies to the email and IRC conversations I can assure you that nobody from current KDevelop contributors supports the idea of a fork.
By Alexander Dymo at Sat, 2007/01/27 - 6:00am
Re: You rock!
I don't like the name Koncrete... it just doesn't sound any better than KDevelop. Why not try to come up with something like the other main KDE 4 projects: Plasma, Phonon, Solid, Decibel.
By ac at Sun, 2007/01/28 - 6:00am
Great release
Thank you to all the people who continue to put work into this great software. Really great release.
By ac at Sat, 2007/01/27 - 6:00am
Definitely true!
The configuration of this release just got soo clean.. :)
I notice it in many places, the class browser with bold method names, the RMB settings of the output display, and global settings. It's great to see so many improvements there.
By Diederik van de... at Sun, 2007/01/28 - 6:00am
Digg the story!
Don't forget to digg the story and help spread the good news:
By Tsiolkovsky at Sat, 2007/01/27 - 6:00am
Re: Digg the story!
By Mark Kretschmann at Sat, 2007/01/27 - 6:00am
Loving the Qt4 support
The Qt4 support is great. I've just started working on a new Qt4 project and KDevelop is making it really easy.
By james at Sat, 2007/01/27 - 6:00am
Support for interface/ source/ directories
It seems that the "New class" tool still do not allow to place .h and .cpp in two different directories.
By and. at Sat, 2007/01/27 - 6:00am
This looks very good. this is the first kdevelop version that actualy starts for me, lets me create a new project with a sample application and run it. all this withou crashing!! i always wanted to start coding for kde, but until now kdevelop was too buggy for me. now i will take a closer look at it
By Beat Wolf at Sat, 2007/01/27 - 6:00am
Re: Great!
Oops, honestly it should have worked before too ;) Don't forget to post a bug report if you see crashes in the future please. Our bug squad (Andreas and Jens) are eager to see new bugs :)
By Alexander Dymo at Sat, 2007/01/27 - 6:00am
for the best IDE on unix systems.
By David at Sat, 2007/01/27 - 6:00am
Re: Tanks...
wow, you want to give them tanks? that may be dangerous if they start playing around :-)
Nevertheless, hooray for the kdevelop team!
By infopipe at Sun, 2007/01/28 - 6:00am
Re: Tanks...
Thanks too for such a great release!
By Sebastian Sauer at Sun, 2007/01/28 - 6:00am
We also prepared a little presentation for some of the new features and improvements:
By Alexander Dymo at Sat, 2007/01/27 - 6:00am
Re: Showcase
Thanks for the informative presentation, and keep up the great work! KDevelop is my favourite IDE thanks to you guys and girl(s).
By Claire at Sun, 2007/01/28 - 6:00am
500 bugs closed is impressive, and you managed to include quite a few useful additions while you were at it :) Good work guys, if only we had such a dedicated team ferretting out the bugs for other major KDE projects, we'd, well, be alot less buggy :D
By Ben Axnick at Sun, 2007/01/28 - 6:00am
What about the Python support in KDevelop? How good is it? Usable?
By Florian at Sun, 2007/01/28 - 6:00am
Re: Python
For a good python IDE use eric3. KDevelop can't compete with it.
By Andreas Pakulat at Sun, 2007/01/28 - 6:00am
Re: Python
"For a good python IDE use eric3. KDevelop can't compete with it."
I don't agree that we should leave PyKDE support to Eric3 (or Eric4). It doesn't have the concept of project types where you can create a standard sort of project such as a python KDE part or a python KDE application, in the way you can with KDevelop. I agree Detlev Offenbach is doing a brilliant job, but it would be very good if we could have some serious python support in KDevelop4 too. I believe there has been some separate work with python KDE project templates, such as python kparts or python kde kicker applets, but that has never been integrated with an IDE - and I believe it is really important that we should do something about that for KDE4.
By Richard Dale at Sun, 2007/01/28 - 6:00am
Re: Python
I personally disagree. It's true that eric3 has a lot more features related to Python, but I still use KDevelop instead because eric has (IMO) a very cluttered interface that makes working with the program hard.
By Luca Beltrame at Tue, 2007/01/30 - 6:00am
Re: Python
Since the ruby will be support seriously, why the python not?
Rails? Python have the similar things like dijango and turbogears. Of course python has PyQt like RubyQt. I don't know musch about ruby, but I think python is qt-friendly at least like ruby. maybe better: i use some native kde apps programed with python but seems no one is programed by ruby.
By JackPhil at Wed, 2007/02/21 - 6:00am
Its about time !
Boy, I have mixed feelings about the KDevelop team and KDevelop.
I tried KDevelop for a project a couple years ago and it was very buggy. Support and interest and dealing with these issues was non existant. I wasted a ton of time with KDevelop !
Shortly thereafter I moved to Eclipse and I haven't looked back. The only thing that Eclipse doesn't do for me that KDevelop does is visual Qt development, but that is a pretty major thing !
I don't know what to think about this release. I don't doubt they fixed 500 bugs because there was a ton of them !
I'll have a look at the new release of KDevelop, but its going to have to really wow me to earn back my trust.
By me at Sun, 2007/01/28 - 6:00am
Re: Its about time !
Well.. since you no doubt made bug reports for the issues you found (right?), it should be trivial for you to find out if the problems are fixed or not...
By teatime at Sun, 2007/01/28 - 6:00am
Re: Its about time !
I also got frustrated with KDevelop and tried eclipse (mainly for the code completion). However it was unbelievably slow! Also KDevelop 3.4 is significantly less buggy than previous releases (although a few new ones seemed to have creeped in).
On the plus side, the code formatter is a lot more useful, and the UI is a whole lot cleaner.
By Tim at Sun, 2007/01/28 - 6:00am
Re: Its about time !
>a few new ones seemed to have creeped in
As for code completion, as long as you use code completion databases only for libraries you use, it's amazingly fast. I prefer to have kdelibs, qt and libstdc++ completion only and experience no slowdowns.
As about completion quality, David Nolden put a lot of effort to make it complete every time and everywhere. So I highly recommend 3.4 as it is certainly better.
By Alexander Dymo at Sun, 2007/01/28 - 6:00am
No autocompletion?
I just installed new KDevelop 3.4 from Debian unstable. It autocompletes nothing.
MyClass o;
cout.(nothing happens)
std::(nothing happens)
std::vector v;
What's wrong? (I have CTags installed)
By zack at Tue, 2007/01/30 - 6:00am
Re: No autocompletion?
Make sure you created code completion databases as described in http://www.kdevelop.org/mediawiki/index.php/FAQ
By Alexander Dymo at Tue, 2007/01/30 - 6:00am
Re: No autocompletion?
Thanks. I had to manually create/add database from /usr/include/C++ to have completion for STL.
cout.(still nothing)
Anyway, thanks for this vast improvement over previous versions. However, in MSVC I do not need to maualy create any databases - it is being created automaticaly according to what headers are included in the project. Is it so difficult to parse the project and create needed databases automatically?
And, IMO standard C/C++ library should be autocompleted by default.
By zack at Tue, 2007/01/30 - 6:00am
Re: No autocompletion?
There's an option to parse the included headers for autocompletion, but that feature is very time and memory consuming in KDevelop3.
For KDevelop4 this is a major point that we want to tackle.
Last but not least: Adding a database for the standard C++ lib is a bit of a problem, because its headers might lie anywhere on the system, for example here it is /usr/include/c++/, on gentoo its somewhere deep under /usr/lib/
By Andreas Pakulat at Tue, 2007/01/30 - 6:00am
Re: No autocompletion?
>its headers might lie anywhere on the system
By Dom at Sat, 2007/03/24 - 5:00am
Re: No autocompletion?
It's necessary to close and reopen the file after auto-completion was enabled to make it trigger automatically. This is a bug that is fixed in svn.
By David Nolden at Sat, 2007/03/31 - 5:00am
What about Mono and C# support?
Today, I can use MonoDevelop for Mono developing, but it is not good as KDevelop.
By Aceler at Mon, 2007/01/29 - 6:00am