Resources, unit costs and the curriculum : an analysis of changing priorities in local education authority secondary schools in England
There are major variations in education provision between areas yet their analysis remains undeveloped. This thesis examines variations in resources and the curriculum in English education in the early 1980s. It argues that these variations are one of the major outcomes of the relationships between actors in the education service established in the post-war era. Despite their importance, the patterns of provision have been subject to little previous systematic empirical assessment. The first part of the thesis develops a framework for analysis of the relationships between actors in education: central government, local authority and school. This framework provides the structure for the empirical analyses which follow. A hierarchical research design is adopted which facilitates the examination of the effect of each level on the distribution of resources and their translation into curricula. Four contrasted case studies were selected for analysis. The results of original surveys are drawn upon to examine the management context. The second part of the thesis presents an original analysis of the impact of changes to the system of central grants to local authorities. National data sources are used to examine in detail the impact of these changes on secondary education expenditure. The focus then shifts to examine the distribution of resources within the four case study areas and their relationship to the socio-economic characteristics of school catchments and 'technical' factors such as size. Having established the patterns of resource distribution, the thesis moves to an original examination of the translation of these resources into curricula. The curriculum profiles of the case study authorities are compared, and, for two areas, changes over time are analysed. In the final section, the thesis examines variations in the curriculum between schools, examining their relationship to school background factors and resource levels.
Beyond Westminster and Whitehall
For a decade now, Rod Rhodes has been writing about central-local relations. His latest endeavour is his most ambitious work to date, though it builds solidly on his previous output. It is ambitious in the sense that he attempts to move his analysis beyond the exploration of centre-locality linkages to encompass the whole sweep of Sub-Central Government including quangos and the health service, and to the explanation of who gets what public services, when, and how? The structure of the book is straight forward, with major chapters on theory, structure, process and outcomes. Chapter one finds the author doing what he does best, critically reviewing theoretical developments, and justifying his own choice of a neo-pluralist intergovernmental relations model. In so doing, he responds robustly to criticisms of his original 'power-dependence' framework (Rhodes 1981), but incorporates some of these into a theoretical reconstruction. In particular, he recognises the failure of the model to distinguish between levels of analysis, and a number of other weaknesses, namely: At the micro-level, the model does not present an adequate account of inter-organisational political processes and of ways in which they are related to inter-organisational processes. The conception of the role of central government does not reflect the centre's hegemonic or structural power. At the micro-level, the explanation of the changing role of government was implicit and ambiguous. The model lacked a historical dimension. The model failed to explain variations between policy areas. -The model, although it employed a broad definition of intergovernmental relations, paid limited attention to territorial representations. (pp. 44-45)
A GIS based transportation model for solid waste disposal--a case study on Asansol municipality.
Uncontrolled growth of the urban population in developing countries in recent years has made solid waste management an important issue. Very often, a substantial amount of total expenditures is spent on the collection of solid waste by city authorities. Optimization of the routing system for collection and transport of solid waste thus constitutes an important component of an effective solid waste management system. This paper describes an attempt to design and develop an appropriate storage, collection and disposal plan for the Asansol Municipality Corporation (AMC) of West Bengal State (India). A GIS optimal routing model is proposed to determine the minimum cost/distance efficient collection paths for transporting the solid wastes to the landfill. The model uses information on population density, waste generation capacity, road network and the types of road, storage bins and collection vehicles, etc. The proposed model can be used as a decision support tool by municipal authorities for efficient management of the daily operations for transporting solid wastes, load balancing within vehicles, managing fuel consumption and generating work schedules for the workers and vehicles. The total cost of the proposed collection systems is estimated to be around 80 million rupees for the fixed cost of storage bins, collection vehicles and a sanitary landfill and around 8.4 million rupees for the annual operating cost of crews, vehicles and landfill maintenance. A substantial amount (25 million rupees/yr) is currently being spent by AMC on waste collection alone without any proper storage/collection system and sanitary landfill. Over a projected period of 15 yr, the overall savings is thus very significant.