Visioning for the Future: What Can Educational Leaders Do to Build a Shared Commitment to Interagency Collaboration?
Interagency collaboration is being touted as a means for schools to address the increasing social, emotional and health care needs of students. In this article, we contend that if interagency collaboration is to become more than a buzzword, then school leaders must work diligently to build a shared commitment to the school's vision by engaging service providers in sustained and collective discussions and decisions about the school's direction. Two promising approaches for building this shared commitment—strategic planning and collaborative visioning—are highlighted, including a discussion of how several newly-formed collaboratives are confronting the cultural, procedural/regulatory, and personal barriers that prohibit meaningful interagency collaboration.
A Typology of Partnerships for Promoting Innovation
As educational partnerships and collaboratives have become more popular in the last several decades, researchers and practitioners have sought to understand why these arrangements flourish or flounder. Taking into consideration the contextual factors affecting partnerships, we have conceptualized a framework of the types of partnerships that can develop between a school system and an external resource agency. The framework reflects the dynamic nature of partnerships, including the growing complexity of interorganizational arrangements that exist as partnerships move from a cooperative to a collaborative relationship. We conclude by discussing the value and utility of this framework as school districts and external agencies consider establishing short- or long-term partnerships.
Protection of the Marine Environment: The International and National Regulation of Deep Seabed Mining Activities
This chapter provides an overview of the international and national regulatory framework pertaining to deep seabed mining activities. It begins by discussing the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, the backdrop for all marine activities – be they national or international – and examines the obligations of states to protect the marine environment from the harmful effects arising from deep seabed mining. Next, the chapter examines the international regime for deep seabed mining (i.e. “activities in the Area”), explaining the “common heritage of mankind” status of the Area (i.e. the international seabed); the functions of the International Seabed Authority (ISA), the international organization established to govern deep seabed mining in the Area; and the concept of state sponsorship of non-state entities (i.e. private actors) for deep seabed mining in the Area. The chapter follows with a discussion of the development of national legislation to regulate deep seabed mining, examining efforts in the Pacific region where many prospective deep-sea mining sites are located. This includes a look at the legislative regimes of several Pacific Island nations, namely, Papua New Guinea, Tonga and the Cook Islands, for whom deep seabed mining may soon become a reality – as well as New Zealand and Japan, countries with comparatively developed rule of law and legislative regimes that have undertaken or considered deep seabed mining in their national waters. Overall, the chapter critically describes and evaluates the current regulatory status in the international and national seabed areas and highlights some salient gaps that require urgent attention in order to ensure marine environmental protection and mitigate impacts on humans.