Risk investment in Construction industry Essay

Risk investment in Construction industry - Essay Example In addition, a case study in China’s construction industry is included to demonstrate the effectiveness of risk management. Although the Chinese construction industry has organised a risk management campaign, the anticipated continuous improvement in risk alleviation fails to be realised in the industry. There are some obstacles to the successful implementation of risk management practices in a planned economy including those stemming from both within (internal) and outside (external) an organisation. This study aims to unveil these major obstacles by a survey analysed with the proper methodology. These obstacles include the mandatory requirement by the government; acute competition in the construction market; commitment and leadership of top management; bidding policies; labor training; unique specialties of the industry; statistical methods; organisation structures and teamwork; and resource input. The study reveals that such actions should be implemented that affects the industry’s external factor, in which, it is more crucial than internal factors in hampering the successful progress of the co nstruction industry in Asia, specifically in China. Based on the analysis of risk management approaches and the pitfalls of quality certification in the construction industry of China, this paper proposes that active implementation of a risk management system is more effective than passive implementation in the pursuit of continuous risk management for quality improvement. The construction industry plays a very important role in the national economy in both developed and developing countries (Miles and Neale, 1991). There is normally a vigorous demand for construction in industrialisation and urbanisation, which is reflected from the sizeable proportion of added value of the construction industry in the gross domestic product (GDP) (Hillebrandt, 2000). In the period of economy take-off in Japan from 1956 to 1973, the percentage of the

Discuss Reproductive Alternatives Research Paper

Discuss Reproductive Alternatives - Research Paper Example Georgia Reproductive Specialists (n.d.) stated, ‘The procedure, called Transvaginal Oocyte Retrieval, requires neither hospitalization nor general anesthesia. In order to prepare a proper environment in the woman and to increase the chances of recovering several healthy and mature eggs, the woman will undergo about two weeks of intensive preparation. This will include hormonal therapy with "fertility drugs." Blood tests and ultrasound scans of the ovaries are used to determine the optimal time to retrieve the eggs from the ovary. This optimal time is just before ovulation when the oocytes are almost ready for fertilization. At the proper time, an outpatient procedure under local anesthesia will allow the females eggs to be visualized by ultrasound and retrieved from the ovary by placing a needle through the vaginal wall. Usually, the eggs will develop into cleaving pre-embryos, whose cells divide 2 or 3 times to become preimplantation embryos (pre-embryos). Using a special cath eter, the couples pre-embryos will be passed through the vagina and into the uterus at the time the pre-embryos would normally have reached the uterus (2+ days after retrieval). After the pre-embryo placement in the uterus, the patient will lie quietly in a bed for about an hour, and then will return home.’ The process of Transvaginal Oocyte Retrieval can actually bring about emotional stress and even anxiety. Like other alternatives, it does not guarantee a hundred percent accuracy. It is also said to have serious side effects, however, drawbacks can be prevented once those are immediately detected. Another option that is becoming popular is the surrogate mothering. Malpani, Annirudha and Malpani, Anjali wrote, ‘The word "surrogate" means substitute or replacement and a surrogate mother is one who lends her uterus to another couple so that they can have a baby. In the West where fewer and fewer babies are offered for adoption, surrogacy is gaining popularity, despite

The Life Of John C Calhoun History Essay

The Life Of John C Calhoun History Essay Throughout his lifetime, John Caldwell Calhoun achieved many different titles. He had experience as a statesman, a political philosopher, a secretary of war, a secretary of state, a member of the Senate, a member of Congress, the leading champion of Southern rights, and even Vice President of the United States (USGenWeb 1). No matter what position he held, his views and dreams for the South stayed consistent. During his career as vice president, he constantly pushed Jackson to help keep the South alive (Bartlett 26). Calhoun spent much of his life promoting growth of the South. John Calhoun was born on a South Carolina farm in 1782. His father, Patrick Calhoun, was a very religious man who treated his son very badly. He was a judge, owned countless slaves, and had also served in the South Carolina legislature (Capers 4). John, however, graduated from Yale in 1804 and studied law at Tapping Reeves in Litchfield, CN (Capers 9-11). In 1811, John married a distant cousin and had 9 children. Calhouns marriage brought him great fortune. As a result, Calhoun built a plantation called Fort Hill in 1825 (Bartlett 39). As time went by, Calhoun began involving himself with political philosophy, ideas, and business more often. He was later referred to as a thinking machine, always speaking in a very fast, serious manner (Niven 49). In 1808, John Calhoun was elected to the State legislature of South Carolina, beginning his career in politics. Two years later, he was elected to the Unites States House of Representatives. Henry Clay selected Calhoun to be the chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee. He, among others, strongly encouraged the War of 1812. Calhoun urged the House to build a strong army. Even after the war, his efforts towards achieving a stronger military continued (Niven 98). Over time, however, it seems as though the level of importance of a strong military in Calhouns mind decreased significantly. In 1846, John Calhoun refused to vote in favor of the declaration of war against Mexico. Eventually, the idea of peace entered Calhouns mind as right and therefore determined war as, in his words, a positive evil (Cralle 277). In 1817, Calhoun went into James Monroes Cabinet as a nationalist. In Monroes Cabinet, he was the secretary of state until 1825 (Capers 61). Calhoun later served as vice president to John Quinsy Adams from 1825 to 1829. He was later elected vice president again under Andrew Jackson (USGenWeb 1). Both of his terms as vice president to the Unites States is what he is best known as. During the time of Calhouns term as vice president to Andrew Jackson, the Nullification Crisis surfaced. This time period is directly linked to the Tariff of Abominations along with the resulting chaos that that followed (Bartlett 102). Calhoun wished to run for president after Jacksons term was over, but during Jacksons first term, he and Calhoun had many conflicts. Jackson was furious when he discovered that Calhoun had criticized his invasion of Florida in 1818. Also, John C. Calhoun had his thoughts and beliefs concerning the Tariff of Abominations expressed in The South Carolina Exposition and Protest. This was later referred to as Calhouns Exposition. Although Calhoun had written this document anonymously, the author of the document was still clear to many. In this document, Calhoun warned that if the Tariff of Abominations was not rejected, South Carolina would break away. It was also stated by Calhoun that if it was decided that a Federal document was unconstitutional, any st ate held the right to nullify the document. This idea was later named Calhouns Doctrine of nullification. Calhoun made a clear attempt to convince others that the Tariff of Abominations was a direct attack on the South (Niven 180-181). In 1832, Calhoun resigned as vice president and soon after got elected into the senate. He used this opportunity to defend South Carolina. In that same year, South Carolina announced that the Tariff of Abominations was null in void in that state. When the other Southern states did not follow South Carolinas example as originally planned, Henry Clay proposed a compromise designed to lower the tariffs over a long period of time (USGenWeb 1). While in the Senate during the 1830s, Calhoun began attacking abolitionists and demanding that revolts against slavery in the North be stopped. He also did not want abolitionist petitions to be acknowledged by Congress (Bartlett 210). John Calhoun defended both slavery and the South with all of his might. Calhoun was soon after known to be the most popular slavery defender by many people (Bartlett 235). Although he made his plans of being chosen to run in the presidential election in the letters he had written to his friends, few people expected Calhoun to carry out the attitude of a candidate (Bartlett 237). The closer it got to the presidential race, the more Calhoun would go out of his way to not only impress the people, but also to gain their respect. In one of his attempts, he became a member of the Irish Immigrant Society of New York. He did this as a way of expressing the pride that he felt for his heritage and his father who had been an Irish immigrant himself (Bartlett 238). This proved to win the attention of many working class citizens of New York. Calhoun declared his candidacy in 1843 but later withdrew from the race. Instead, he took on the role as secretary of state under John Tyler who only had one year before his term was completed (Niven 264). Congress had adopted Texas into the Union by 1844. As a direct result, the slavery area of the United States grew. This helped maintain the sectional balance within the Union (USGenWeb 1). By the following year, Calhoun had rejoined the Senate. During his time in the Senate, Calhoun had opposed the Wilmot Proviso after first opposing the war versus Mexico. The Wilmot Proviso had been created to prevent slavery from occurring within any territory taken from Mexico during the war. Calhoun knew that a war between America and Mexico was a bad idea. He feared that if a war was declared with Mexico, America would enter under the wrong circumstances (Bartlett 341). While in the Senate, Calhoun was successful in limiting the frequency of discussions held in Congress regarding slavery. Maintaining the same attitude towards slavery, when the Compromise of 1850 idea was introduced, Calhoun not only voted against it, but made it publicly known that he saw it as disgraceful (Niven 293). The Compromise of 1850 stated that Southerners rights to bring their slaves into other Union territories were not guaranteed. When the Compromise of 1850 was adopted, Calhoun was no longer alive. Calhoun appeared in Congress for the last time on the seventh of March. On that particular day, he listened to the sectional peace appeal made by Daniel Webster and approved. In the last month of his life, Calhoun had countless discussions with his fellow Southerners. He made his growing fear for the future of the South very clear. Nothing short of the terms I propose can settle it finally and permanently. Indeed, it is difficult to see how two peoples so different and hostile can exist together (Capers 252). On the night before his death, Calhoun said to his friends, If I had my health and strength to devote one more hour to my country in the Senate, I could do no more than in my whole life (Capers 253). Calhouns dedication to the Union was undeniably sincere. The countless efforts put forward, and the measures taken by Calhoun to support and protect the South are without a doubt deserving of respect. In Washington D.C, John Caldwell Calhoun was pronounced dead on March 31, 1850.

A Knowledge Entry System for Subject Matter Experts :: essays research papers

The High Performance Knowledge Bases (HPKB) project demonstrated that the teams of knowledge engineers working together could create knowledge bases (KBs) roughly at the rate of 10K axioms/year for a pre-specified task and evaluation criteria. The HPKB effort showed that it is possible to create KBs by reusing the content of knowledge libraries, and it demonstrated reuse rates ranging from 25% to 100%, depending on the application and the knowledge engineer. It was acknowledged that the ability of a subject matter expert (SME) to directly enter knowledge is essential to improve the KB construction rates. The SRI team is developing a system for direct knowledge entry by SMEs as an integrated team of technology developers. The SRI team includes Boeing, Information Sciences Institute (ISI) at University of Southern California, Northwestern University, Pacific Sierra Research (PSR), Stanford University, University of Massachusetts at Amherst, University of Texas at Austin, and University of West Florida. Knowledge Systems Laboratory at Stanford, Pragati Systems, and Massachusetts Insititute of Technology joined the team after the contract award. The claim of this effort is that SMEs, unassisted by AI technologists, can assemble models of mechanisms and processes from components. These models are both declarative and executable, so questions about the mechanisms and processes can be answered by conventional inference methods (for example, theorem proving and taxonomic inference) and by various task-specific methods (for example, simulation, analogical reasoning, and problem-solving methods). A related claim is that relatively few components, perhaps a few thousand, are sufficient for SMEs to assemble models of virtually any mechanism or process. We claim that these components are independent of domain, and that assembly from components instantiated to a domain is a natural way for SMEs to create KB content. The research in this project exploits and extends previous work in the HPKB project, as well as work in process description languages, qualitative physics, systems dynamics, and simulation. One scientific innovation, and the principal extension to Cyc and the "HPKB standard" of knowledge bases, is the idea of declarative and executable models (DEMs) assembled from components. The declarative aspect of DEMs supports conventional inference, whereas the executable aspect supports reasoning by simulation. For example, the declarative part of a model of aerosols is sufficient to answer questions like, "Will a 5-micron filter afford protection against this aerosol?" while the executable part is necessary to model the dispersal pattern of the aerosol.

Sociology Global Socio Cultural Responsibility

They will do this for two rounds. After the have made their lists, with the entire class, I will ask the students for some of the similarities they found and some of the differences and make a list of these. Than we will discuss the similarities and differences they gathered. Which differences were most common among people, which differences were most/ least important, were the differences physical characteristics. Period #3 Needs: The last period I will explain the meaning of responsibility in a community.I will also have the students do a community building activity that will help them understand the concept and importance of social responsibility in there community. I will than explain the importance of being aware of global issues that take place and how as a class they can contribute to helping others even f they are not located close to them. The community building active ¶y' will start after I explain the importance of community and what it means. Ill divide the students int o small groups of three and provide them with presented scenarios to act out. The skits will provide them with examples of ways to help another student. An example would be a student helping another student with something because they may be disabled. After the groups have practiced their skits I will ask for two volunteers to perform their skit in front Of the class. I will than ask them questions such as, how was this group lawful to another student who was different? If you were in the situation would you do the same thing?Next I will ask the students to raise their hands and give me ideas of things they could do to help members in the class, in school or in the community. Some ideas would be picking up trash, cleaning the white boards or donating olds clothes they don't need anymore. To end the lesson on Global Socio-cultural Responsibility I would ask the students to review what we went over: the three qualifications of social responsibility, the aspects of cultural responsibil ity and how they demonstrated a sense of Ewing a responsible member of a community in the classroom.Last I will talk to my students about setting up a Penal. Assignment #1- Part #2 period #1 First lets start off with the question of what is social responsibility? These two words explain the idea that every person is responsible for society as a whole, not just individually, not just in the state of Florida or even the United States but all around the world. This means that each day we need to act and behave in the most appropriate ways that help us all be better people but we also need to consider how Our actions and behaviors affect the rest of society coolly and globally.How can you be a socially responsible student? The following are three qualities that describe a socially responsible second grade student at Sarasota Elementary: 1 . Someone who contributes positively to the classroom and school community An example would be holding the door open for your classmates on the way to lunch or helping pick up trash around the classroom. 2. Solves conflicts in peaceful ways An example would be a student who uses kind words to speak to another student if they happen to get into an argument. . Values diversity Diversity means a variety of something. Valuing diversity means we need to be aware of all of the differences among our classmates and other people in the world. The important thing to remember is that these differences are what make us who we are and we should be open to different things and never tease someone if they seem different from what we are used to. Showing that you value diversity is very simple!Here are a few ways you can show that you appreciate the differences that makes each of us special: never make fun of people who are different from you in any way, next time you go out to dinner with your parents ask them if you can go somewhere with food room another culture, treat everyone how you would like to be treated and last believe in yourself and be proud of the different things that make you who you are! Period #2 Second we will discuss the cultural part of Global Socio-Cultural Responsibility. What does the word culture mean?Culture means the different attitudes, behaviors, knowledge, values, traditions and customs that a society or a social group all share. These differences come from all around the world and are the â€Å"glue† that keeps a group of people together. Pizza is a food item that is part of the Italian culture, SST. Patrick Day is a national loudly and part of the Irish culture and the American flag is part of the American culture. For all of us to have cultural responsibility we have to honor diversity in our world.Honoring diversity means that instead of focusing on the flaws, we need to focus on the good. In order to honor diversity among cultures we need to be aware of how some members of cultural groups might feel about certain issues like, family, religion or traditions. Period #3 The last part towards understanding Global Socio-cultural Responsibility is realizing the importance of community. Community is a group of people ho acknowledge the deep connections they have with one another, respect each others differences, and work as a group in making decisions.A community of people also has a common purpose and each person is responsible for his or her own actions but when you are part of a community it is important that everyone supports each other's growth. As a class, we can all create our own community. This might all be a lot to take in but in light of what we have learned today I think it would be a very fun and good idea for each of you to start writing to a Penal. This will help you learn about other ultras and other countries and allow you to be more globally aware of things that are going on in places other than just here in the united States.It will be a good way for you to really learn the true differences of other students your age plus it's always nice to have another friend! Assignment #2 From age three to eighteen attended private Catholic schools. Attending a private Catholic school for almost my entire life, up until right now, I was always very sheltered. There wasn't really any racial diversity in my school and very little religious diversity. Having attended a small, private, Catholic school y entire life definitely made one of the biggest impacts on my development.

Linguistic Diversity in Early Childhood Education Essay

One issue of linguistic diversity, is you has the teacher needs to identify the needs of the children in your classroom. A teacher needs to address their own attitude toward the children and families that are linguistic and cultural diversity. If a teacher knows that most of the students are going to Spanish speaking, for example than she needs to prepare herself for this before schools starts. A teacher may want to get with other teachers at the school or school district and talk about ways to deal with non-English speaking children and families. I think another issues with linguistic diversity is that the teacher needs to expect has much out of the non-English speaking students as the English speaking students. If a teacher starts off expecting less than she will get just that. A teacher needs to monitor herself and meet with other teachers and discuss observations, progress and the way that students are tested and evaluated so that the teachers are not setting them up to fail. All students need to think that they can progress and not fail at everything. I think and issue of not being able to communicate with the families is a big issue for everyone. The families feel uncomfortable coming to the schools, especially if they do not have a translator with them or their child has to do the translating. The teachers feel uncomfortable because they do not know if they are getting the right information to the parents. So I think the community needs to come together and try to think of ways to solve this problem so our children will feel more comfortable at school and more valued. Teachers need to support cultural diversity by recognizing the importance of a child’s home language (Linguistic Diversity and Early Literacy). The best way to do this is to involve families and invite them to the classroom so they feel comfortable. Have the families reading to Linguistic Diversity in Early Childhood Education The children in the classroom in the home language than have another parent read the same book in their home language. I think the more that we as educators get these families together the better so that they do not feel so isolated. We as educators need to teach all our parents to be the first teacher for their child. We need to give all families the tools so that parents can become their child’s primary teacher and that way we all can become full partners in their child’s education. The Early Head Start article that I read is a very good example of what we need to do as an early intervention. I like Head Start because they give you specific guidelines and ways to do things that everyone can follow. I think the earlier that we get children and families focused on their children and their role in the child’s life as their teacher the better off we all are. Hiring bilingual staff may be one option on preserving the child’s native language and to ensure that information is shared in a timely manner. Ensure that staff is aware of cultural issues and differences provide an opportunity for staff to learn another language to communicate with the families. Language isn’t just about the child it is also about the family has a whole. References Otto, Beverly, 3rd ed. Language Development in Early Childhood, Pearson Precious Children, Diversity in the Classroom, National Association for the Education of Young Children (retrieved May 31, 2010). www. pbs. org/kcts Linguistic Diversity and Early Literacy, Serving Culturally Diverse Families in Early Head Start (retrieved May 31, 2010). www. ehsnrc. org.