Master Thesis in Managing People, Knowledge and Change (BUSM18)..

The aim of this essay is to examine why and how three teachers who work in elementary classes choose to use ability grouping during math lessons and what they think of ability grouping as a method to individualize the activities according to the pupil?s needs.I chose one main question for this study that is the following:What is the teacher?s point of view and experience of ability grouping in teaching mathematics?And three sub-questions:What are the motives behind the choice of ability grouping?What are the advantages of ability grouping?What are the disadvantages of ability grouping?In order to be able to answer my questions, I used the qualitative method. I interviewed three teachers who work in the elementary classes (First to fifth grade) to find out what they think about ability grouping and how it is experienced in mathematic teaching.The result shows that the common thing between these three teachers is that they don?t use ability grouping as the only teaching method. They all agree that the whole class teaching has many benefits for the pupils.

After the last election Sweden has got a government that claims to be feminist. This thesis discusses whether the change of labels has also brought along policy formulated in a feminist way, arguing that the way policy is expressed affects how people see a certain problem. Three policy proposals are analysed, and in only one case the government seems to have been influenced by feminist ideas. The other proposals partly support claims made by new institutionalism that norms and routines in an organisation work to resist policy change, but also shows that feminist ideas are resisted more actively. The fact that so called policy entrepreneurs was present in the policy process at a certain period in time, probably counts for one explanation to the exceptional policy.

The Swedish preschool combines both education and care from a holistic point of view. This makes it even harder for both parents and the educators to make an objective evaluation on their own preschool. In Sweden we are proud to have one of the world?s best preschools. It is regulated by the government and is obligated to undertake critical evaluation from the state and the parents that are the consumers of these services.

The purpose with this essay is to study police students perception of men?s and women?s role taking and behavior in a group. The question that is presented is if a group?s efficiency can depend on which gender the members of the group have. There are many theories about the concept male and female and the meaning of these words.

The aim of this study was to examine the existing discourse of youth robberies from year 2003 to year 2013 in DN and Aftonbladet. By using discourseanalysis as theory and method I have studied newsartikles from these two newspapers.The study shows that the portrayal of youth robberies is focused on the young muggers as a group and not as individuals. The groups that are mentioned are young men and women, children and muggers with another ethnical background than swedish. Girls, children and ethnical background are given more attention in the articles, and are portrayed as more problematic. The youth robberies are described as brutal and are focused on the young muggers as unrestrained, evil individuals with no future.The analysis also shows that a change in the discourse is taking place during the studied period.

This paper aims to describe and elaborate on a recent discursive change within the new-age movement. Since the seventies and the publishing of speculative popular science books like The Tao of Physics by Fritjof Capra and The self-aware Universe by Amit Goswami, the idea that quantum physics resonates with spirituality has become the topic of hundreds of books and movies.The quantum-spiritual discourse has three distinct ways to approach quantum physics in its discussion on spirituality: The parallelistic approach which emphasizes the similarities between eastern philosophies and modern physics, the monistic-idealistic approach which tells us that mind is the foundation of matter and the scientific spiritual approach which tries to explain spiritual claims scientifically. In the quantum-spiritual discourse, quantum physical phenomena (e.g. non-locality and entanglement) are being called upon to validate metaphysical statements. The primary assumption of the discourse is that the shift of paradigm due to the establishment of modern physics also is a shift of paradigm of spirituality.With the object to examine the common claims made in the discourse, cross-references between spiritual arguments and facts of quantum physics are being made.

Government regulations and customs duties restrict the import of trucks to some of the markets to which Scania tries to sell their trucks. The distribution problem due to these regulations is solved by the foreign assembly department, KD, at Scania. This means that competence is needed and costs are added not related to Scania's core operations.The aim of this master thesis has been to analyse and to evaluate alternative ways of managing the packing operations considering cost, quality and work organisation. To study and examine the work methods and operations of today and also to present methods measuring the operations effectiveness and productivity.We have used the system approach to maintain totality and to understand the component's relation to this totality. Field studies combined with studies of relevant literature and studies of other companies operations have given us the knowledge and the understanding of the packing operations needed.

The 1900s saw two incidents of states using their military in civil disorder situations, which resulted in the killing of unarmed citizens. May 14, 1931 in Ådalen, marks a significant part of Swedish history and its view of the use of military force.  On that day, a peaceful protest march escalated, which resulted in live firing by the military stationed there to uphold law and order. This resulted in the deaths of five civilians and the prohibition of the use of military force in incidents of civil disorder. In 1972 in Northern Ireland a similar event took place on January 30, which is commonly known as Bloody Sunday. The Troubles were raging and resulted in protests for civil rights by nationalists.

In this study is being examined how cities can be planned in the face of rising water levels and extreme weather, due to the changing climate. The starting point has been to investigate how the problems can be tackled and how the positive sides of water in the city can be strengthened, and synergy effects and greater sustainability be achieved thereby. The method has been literature studies and case studies containing interviews and visits. Göteborg, Kristianstad and Arvika have been studied for discussions and ideas about adaptation. Today, building near water is very popular which brings both advantages and disadvantages.

Botanist Kjell-Arne Olsson inventoried the plant fen ragwort Senecio paludosus 1983 in Scania andfound a big number of locations within Biosphere Reserve Kristianstad Vattenrike. In 2012, a reinventoryof the 1983 survey was carried out to study whether there has been any change in the fenragwort population in Kristianstad Vattenrike since the last inventory. The results show that therehas been no overall change in the number of fen ragwort in Kristianstad Vattenrike, on certainpremises they have increased in number while in others they have fallen. However, the inventoryshows that almost half of the locations with fen ragwort have disappeared during the same period.The main reason for this is that fen ragwort did not manage to competitive with other vegetation,taking in consideration this has been smaller premises with young plants. In addition to competitionother factors such as prolonged high water, grazing and caterpillars from Tyria jacobaeaecontributed to the decrease.

The aim of this essay is to investigate the situation for democracy in China. The study raises two main questions. They are as follows: Are there obstacles to a democratization process in China? and Are there openings when it comes to a gradual change for democratization in China? The theoretical framework consists of Robert A.Dahl´s Polyarchy theory, and in addition , five factors promoting democracy. Also the notion of an MDP-society (a modern, dynamic and pluralistic society) is looked upon.

This survey examines how a regional archive, Värmland Archives, interprets and works from the departure point of national cultural accessibility goal ?Everyone should have the opportunity to participate in cultural life?. And it is also a comporative study of discourse regarding accessibility between Värmland Archives and some other actors in the archival cultural system. Critical discourse analysis, according to Norman Fairclough, is used as a theory method. A discourse analysis is made on empirical data based on document study and qualitative research interviews. My conclusion is that if the term Accessibility is seen as a focal point the accessibility discourse in the documents of Värmland Archives and of the other actors studied can not be clearly discerned. Värmland Archives´s interpretation of terms regarding accessibility analyzed in the survey, varies among the staff regarding how the archives and its services should be accessible, and what accessibility means in the context of the archives.

The agriculture throughout the world is becoming increasingly deregulated and this has affected the prices of raw materials to fluctuate at a higher degree than earlier. This in turn has made it interesting and in some cases even necessary for the trader as well as the producer to gain knowledge about the trade instruments available to ensure a good enough price for their produced goods. This study encompasses a number of ways to trade grain and oil plants in order to clarify what differences there are in the several contracts that exist in the present situation, economical as well as practical. The various trade instruments available to the producers on the Swedish market are described in the theoretical part of this study. The study also contains a simple arithmetic example, based on historical prices collected from grain traders and trading floors, in order to point out the differences in the economical outcomes depending on the business strategy used to sell the produced goods. The study shows the importance, as a producer, of being able to use and take advantage of the different trading instruments at hand to monitor and exploit the shifts in the market. From an economical point of view it is not enough to just excel at farming but knowledge about the market functions and the trade instruments at hand is also required to be able to secure a good enough price for your goods.

Leber´s hereditary optic neuropathy (LHON), a disease affecting vision, is caused by several point mutations in mitochondrial DNA. Mutations leading to a defect NADH ubiquinone oxidoreductase protein will affect the respiratory chain and cause a disturbed ATP production. It is still unknown why this defect leads to the degeneration of retinal ganglion cells and cells in the opticus nerve as well as demyelination of axons in these areas. Analysis of mitochondrial DNA is an important tool in the diagnosis of the disease. At the present time analysis is based on cleavage by restriction enzymes, which only detects two of the most frequent mutations: m.3460G>A and m.11778G>A.