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We examined students' perspectives on well-being and youth engagement in schools using a Youth Participatory Action Research approach. Students (N = 11) trained as peer researchers and then interviewed their peers. Interviews (N = 21) were analyzed using reflexive thematic analysis and six themes were developed: desire for versus reality of a healthy school, insufficient school strategies to promote well-being and mitigate harm, listening to and actioning students' ideas, diverse opportunities for student engagement, pre-conceived ideas of student capability, and importance of a support role. Through this project, we peered deeper into students' viewpoints about well-being and youth engagement in their schools.

This paper investigates research quality criteria in the Creative Arts (CA). The CA has been introduced into the higher education and research sector over the last three decades. It is thus a relatively new research field and there is little empirical knowledge on how outputs in this field should be evaluated. Our study applies a mixed-method approach to assess the relevance of quality criteria used in performance-based research funding systems (PRFSs) in 10 countries. The results of a qualitative analysis of interviews with artists-academics (N = 67) and Joint Correspondence Analysis show that when art is evaluated in the context of academic research, both the traditional indicators of artistic quality as well as the cognitive and research-related aspects of the arts are believed to be significant. The JCA analysis also showed that the majority of our respondents found both extrinsic quality criteria (related to reputation and prestige) and intrinsic criteria (related to cognition and development) relevant.

This article provides a comprehensive analysis of the evaluation of the arts within performance-based research funding systems (PRFSs). Previous literature on PRFSs has overlooked the arts and focussed primarily on outputs in relation to the sciences and humanities. We develop a typology of how artistic outputs are evaluated within 10 countries' PRFSs, operating in Australia, the Czech Republic, Italy, Lithuania, New Zealand, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain, and the UK, and identify three different types of artistic evaluation systems. The study compares evaluation methods and provides a classification of quality criteria used by evaluation panels. We conclude with a discussion of the challenges specific to different types of systems.

Our study examines the discursive construction of academic subjectivity within the context of the current reforms of academia, driven by the forces of economization and metricization. We focus in particular on the construction of two models of top researchers. Drawing from the theory of Pierre Bourdieu, we call these models 'autonomous' and 'heteronomous'. We investigate 22 in-depth interviews and construct the ideal types of two discursive strategies that Polish senior academic officials use to build the respective models. We also inspect the empirical signs of a tension between those strategies, as well as three ways to deal with limited levels of this tension: using disclaimers, leaving the tension unaddressed, and attempting to reconcile the two strategies. Further, we demonstrate how a high-level tension results in a discursive split, which can be hypothetically linked to the divided habitus of some Polish academics.

In studying the performance of academic systems, one often tries to find out--by inspecting some well-defined parameters--how specific changes in the legal system influence the volume and quality of desired outputs, such as publications, patents, or alumni. This mechanistic approach neglects the fact that the main actors in this spectacle are not passive, but have their own priorities, and actively self-organize in response to any changes in their professional environment. In this contribution, we investigate such collective social behavior using the data for academic promotions in Poland in the years 2011 to 2020. Focusing on degrees higher than the PhD, we analyzed over 12,500 "habilitation" (= higher doctorate) and over 3,000 professorship applications, extracting personal data on academic promotion panel membership along with official roles on the panels. These details were then linked with data on the personal make-up of three consecutive terms of the central body overseeing academic promotions in Poland, "Centralna Komisja do Spraw Stopni i Tytulów" ("Central Board for Degrees and Titles"). As a result, we were able to identify a privileged group of individuals who controlled a substantial majority of academic promotions beyond the PhD degree by virtue of being part of the Central Board. We found that this relatively small group of academics held dominant control over academic promotions by repeatedly serving on promotion panels. Thus, despite the well-meaning intentions of the reformists who had designed it, the Polish system of academic promotions in the past decade can hardly be regarded as based on pure merit.

On June 24, 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its decision on "Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization." By voting to uphold Mississippi's law banning most abortions after 15 weeks, the Court overturned "Roe v. Wade," eliminating the federal standard protecting a woman's right to abortion and reversing nearly 50 years of legal precedent. The ruling returned regulation of abortion to the states, which are responding by implementing bans or protecting access to abortion. As political and legal conflicts escalate and individual horror stories emerge, the dangerous mirage presented by this misguided legal fix to a long-standing vexing issue will come into sharper relief. The "Dobbs" ruling is creating a new uncertain and treacherous landscape for women and health care professionals to navigate.

The study investigates the process of creating evaluative homogeneity within a performance-based research funding system. It does so in reference to the experience of creating a national journal ranking in Poland in 2019. It refers to the cases of two disciplines: biology and history. The use of this case is justified by its unique character, that is creating the ranking through means of both bibliometric indicators and expert panels. We therefore asked: What guided the actors who participated in the process of creating the ranking through the use of bibliometric indicators when introducing changes to its initial form? To answer this question, a mixed-methods approach was used. First, we conducted a quantitative analysis of changes made to the ranking during the consecutive steps of its creation. Second, we conducted a qualitative analysis of semi-structured interviews regarding actors' motivations. By reflecting on the qualitative analysis along with the results of the quantitative part, this study reveals the extent to which actors impacted the form evaluative homogeneity took within the system. It further argues that this is dictated by how actors position themselves in relation to two opposing forces: those favouring the homogenization of research and those maintaining its heterogeneity. As these forces remain imbalanced, the study concludes with a call for further exploration of the interplay between the forces of homogenization and heterogenization and how the tensions between them are mediated within a performance-based research funding system.

This study focuses on the evaluation of artistic disciplines (visual and performing arts) within performance-based university research funding systems. It offers an analysis of the Polish academic research evaluation system and investigates its effects on the scholarly productivity of artists-academics. Poland has adopted a performance-based research funding system that includes evaluation of artistic productions (without considering them as 'research') and developed a comprehensive quantification of artistic achievements. We analyse data from the Polish Current Research Information System on 136,894 outputs submitted by 93 art faculties for two evaluation exercises (in 2013 and 2017). Our findings demonstrate a change in scholarly productivity of artists-academics towards publication practices characteristic for science-oriented disciplines. We also find that art departments located in universities exhibit a greater tendency for changing publication practices than departments located in independent art schools. The findings from this study demonstrate that both: (1) the designs of national research evaluation systems and (2) the structures of higher education may influence scholarly outcomes in practice-based disciplines.

This article discusses the use of bibliometric indicators for the assessment of individual academics. We focused on national indicators for the assessment of productivity in Polish higher education institutions. We analysed whether institutions (N = 768) adopted national templates for their own sets of criteria for intra-institutional evaluations. This study combined an analysis of internal policy documents with semi-structured interviews with deans from institutions in different fields of science. Our findings showed that, despite their high levels of institutional autonomy, the majority of institutions adopted the national criteria for the evaluation of individual academics. This article concludes with recommendations for reducing the negative consequences of local use of national indicators for the assessment of researchers.

Polish higher education provides a particular example of a system that, until very recently, has been largely reform-resistant as it has a long-standing tradition of bottom-up 'academic self-governance' at both the system and the institutional levels. This article explores the process of the structural reforms of the higher education system, commonly known as 'Law 2.0' (the original term being "Ustawa 2.0") which proceeded between 2016 and 2018. By doing so, it examines in detail the process of policy formation that has been often advertised as a 'reform different than others' due to paying special attention to mechanisms of engaging various stakeholders (mostly internal) and an intellectual contribution from the academic community. This study is conceptual by nature but empirically focused. The paper claims that the major reasons for failure were a radical shift in policy process and a departure from the well-entrenched patterns of policy formation and the highly politically sensitive nature of the content of the reform.

This study investigates what names of metrics or databases researchers use to present their research portfolio and how their use is influenced by the field. I have analysed the data comprising 3,695 self-presentation documents (82,710 pages) from various academic promotion procedures in Poland. My study aims to determine the differences in the use of scientometrics indicators across all fields of science. I have used 21 codes (metrics and databases' names) for coding all documents, analysed the patterns of scientometric indicators use, and found out that there is a significant relation between publication patterns and patterns of scientometric indicators use. My analyses reveal that researchers in 'Hard Sciences' (except for mathematics) very often use metrics to describe their output, researchers in 'Soft Sciences' (except for economics) only occasionally use metrics, and scholars from 'Arts' hardly ever use metrics. My most noteworthy finding highlights that patterns of scientometric indicators use are related to the publication patterns in the given field. I conclude with several recommendations for various research policies and show what metrics could be used and expected in promotion procedures in various fields.

This article provides an overview of national bibliographic databases that include data on research output within social sciences and humanities (SSH) in Europe. We focus on the comprehensiveness of the database content. Compared to the data from commercial databases such as Web of Science and Scopus, data from national bibliographic databases (e.g. Flemish Academic Bibliographic Database for the SSH (VABB-SHW) in Belgium, Current Research Information System in Norway (CRISTIN)) are more comprehensive and may, therefore, be better fit for bibliometric analyses. Acknowledging this, several countries within Europe maintain national bibliographic databases; detailed and comparative information about their content, however, has been limited. In autumn 2016, we launched a survey to acquire an overview of national bibliographic databases for SSH in Europe and Israel. Surveying 41 countries (responses received from 39 countries), we identified 21 national bibliographic databases for SSH. Further, we acquired a more detailed description of 13 databases, with a focus on their comprehensiveness. Findings indicate that even though the content of national bibliographic databases is diverse, it is possible to delineate a subset that is similar across databases. At the same time, it is apparent that differences in national bibliographic databases are often bound to differences in country-specific arrangements. Considering this, we highlight implications to bibliometric analyses based on data from national bibliographic databases and outline several aspects that may be taken into account in the development of existing national bibliographic databases for SSH or the design of new ones.

We examined students’ perspectives on well-being and youth engagement in schools using a Youth Participatory Action Research approach. Students (N = 11) trained as peer researchers and then interviewed their peers. Interviews (N = 21) were analyzed using reflexive thematic analysis and six themes were developed: desire for versus reality of a healthy school, insufficient school strategies to promote well-being and mitigate harm, listening to and actioning students’ ideas, diverse opportunities for student engagement, pre-conceived ideas of student capability, and importance of a support role. Through this project, we peered deeper into students’ viewpoints about well-being and youth engagement in their schools. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pharmacy-based immunization services have expanded since the mid-1990s but still face multiple challenges. Amendments to the Public Readiness and Emergency Preparedness (PREP) Act broadened patient-care scope and the pool of eligible pharmacy personnel who could administer vaccinations. The expiration of these amendments in 2024 may threaten recent gains in vaccine and other health care access newly available through pharmacies. This study aimed to elicit community chain pharmacists' perspectives on immunization time demands, corporate guidance, data flow and information technology, workflow and workforce issues, and other newly provided services. A survey questionnaire was developed, pretested, and electronically administered in mid-2022 to a randomly sampled national database of pharmacists maintained by the American Pharmacists Association. Descriptive analyses of survey responses were performed and findings used to identify salient themes. The survey collected 742 responses from a sample of 7845 community chain pharmacists (9.5% response rate). During the 2021-2022 influenza season, pharmacies administered on average 114 vaccinations daily (range 3-1000), mostly by appointment (51%). Pharmacists expressed somewhat greater preference for administering vaccinations (39%) than dispensing prescriptions (36%), and most (92%) considered it at least as important as other practice responsibilities. However, only 27% of pharmacists had adequate staff support and 67% spent more time addressing patients' vaccination confidence issues than before the pandemic. Most respondents (67%) had access to their patient's vaccination status, but only 51% said their company's computer system gave easy access. Only 49% considered corporate immunization feedback effective at enhancing their practice. Provision of nonvaccine services has expanded. Frontline community chain pharmacists reportedly preferred administering vaccinations over dispensing prescriptions. The pandemic resulted in an increased responsibility among pharmacists as immunizers. Notwithstanding recent progress, pharmacists continue to face staffing, corporate guidance and feedback, information management, and other structural and process barriers to optimally provide comprehensive immunization services. Survey findings support making permanent and expanding the emergency authorities that pharmacists gained under the PREP Act. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the impact of Lebanon's civil war (1975-1991) on disparities in education among the country's main religious sects and across various regions. District of registration is adopted as a proxy for religious affiliation through a novel, detailed classification to assess sectarian differentials by region and regional differentials within each major religious group. Findings show that the civil war helped close the gender gap in education across various sects/regions, presumably because many young men joined militias. However, the education of Muslims still lags behind that of Christians. Intra-sectarian disparities remain very pronounced, especially among Sunni Muslims. The article shows that Lebanon's regional and sectarian inequalities that pre-dated the civil war have been largely maintained. The civil war and its aftermath, however, have led to some shift in the balance of power and to some changes in the ranking of particular sects and regions. Drawing upon the work of Weber and Lenski, the authors argue that sectarian/regional inequalities in education in Lebanon are the product of disparities in economic power and differential access to the state resources among the various regions and sects. They conclude by discussing the future of educational inequalities in Lebanon. (Contains 5 figures, 3 tables and 6 notes.)

Over a decade ago the newsletter of the American Historical Association "Perspectives" carried a long lead article entitled "Teaching 'Eastern Europe' without the Iron Curtain." Referring to the challenge posed by the revolutions of 1989 in Eastern Europe to the teaching of European history, the author, Larry Wolff, saw it as "an opportunity to think critically about the ways in which the Cold War has shaped the way we teach the history of Eastern Europe." He argued that the very notion of Eastern Europe was historically dubious, invented in the age of the Enlightenment "as a politically charged, cultural construction." The Cold War and the Iron Curtain gave this division of Europe "an air of geopolitical inevitability, encouraging historians to interpret earlier periods in terms of the same distinction between Western and Eastern Europe." A year after the publication of Wolff's article in "Perspectives" and four and a half years after the dramatic fall of communism in Poland, a paper surveying the treatment of Poland in historical texts, presented at the American Historical Association's annual meeting in January 1994, still found numerous omissions and distortions. With eight countries of Eastern Europe now in the European Union, and five years after three of them joined NATO, what do recently published Western Civilization textbooks say about Eastern Europe? Using modern Polish history (the Enlightenment to the present) as a test case, this article seeks to answer that question by surveying six representative textbooks. (Contains 159 notes.)