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There is mounting evidence that the programs and services essential to provide adequately for the educational needs of the nation will necessitate a broader and more demanding education structure than ever before. Specialists in many educational areas were asked to identify the characteristics of educational structure in relation to the achievement of established goals that would be essential to provide necessary and desirable programs. After having assessed the available research, reviewed the literature, and secured the empirical judgment of knowledgeable leaders and administrators in their respective fields of specialization, these specialists submitted 54 position papers to the Great Plains School District Organization Project. Fifteen of these papers have been reproduced in this publication. It is hoped that these contributions will be used as starting points for further study, analysis, and utilization by those who seek to develop a system of school organization that will make possible comprehensive and equitable educational opportunities for all children, particularly those in the State of Nebraska. A related document is EA 022 608. (Author)

This paper examines the topic of policy analysis and draws upon the recently developed Association of Research Libraries (ARL) Management Review and Analysis Program which is a guide to conducting a self-study of an academic library's management and organization. The program was designed by the Management Studies Office and is presently being tested and refined prior to making it generally available. The purpose of the Management Review and Analysis Program is to analyze the success of the library's present approaches to several management topics, such as the formulation and use of library policies. This occasional paper goes beyond this assessment process and proposes a system for improving the use of management policies in large academic liabraries. Its intent is to propose an approach to the formulation and use of academic library policies, and to demonstrate their importance for academic library management. (Author/SJ)

Although library planners, managers, and administrators are beginning to investigate how to assess library organizations, most of these studies are based on an efficiency aspect of only one part of a library operation and even these are obfuscated by those promulgating the efficiency of computers in supplying library services and carrying out library operations. A study of how the Wayne State University (WSU) library staff expend their energies in keeping their organization going is reported in this working paper. The paper is presented in four parts: (1) a review of the general concepts of the methodologies for studying organizational effectiveness; (2) an outline plan for study that might be used at WSU; (3) a description of the first step in data gathering; and (4) a data gathering instrument that all library staff must complete. (Related papers are available as LI 003178, 003179, and 003180). (Author/NH)

Points stressed in this paper are: (1) Librarians can only function as professionals within an institution; (2) Every institutional organization's operation can only be understood within a social context; (3) Academic resource libraries are under stress, both financially and functionally, which is expressed by many as a need for innovation; (4) Wayne State University has an administrative and managerial structure that has operated well in the past three decades; (5) Change in organizational structure requires a transfer of information among specialists; (6) There are barriers to communication which arise from organizational structure and from specialized functions; (7) To effect changes in an organization certain kinds of information transfer are necessary and social scientists have been able to generalize these processes to the point where individuals outside an organization, using these generalized concepts, can cause change to take place within an organization; (8) Within every organization, specialists arrange themselves within certain roles to protect the functioning of the organization; and (9) Although changes can be brought about through the use of knowledge of the specialists within an organization, management techniques for gathering information and effecting change have been developed which are directly applicable to libraries. (Related papers are available as LI 003179, 003180 and 003181) (Author)

Some of the situations which exist in the university libraries and are in need of change are discussed in this paper, including: (1) university libraries are tied to the universities' administrative structure; (2) university libraries have a responsibility over which they have little control to alter because of the traditional library administrative structures; (3) the myth that university libraries are to have comprehensive collections which are to everything to everybody has collapsed; (4) dispersion and proliferation of university library collections is not economical; (5) university libraries must examine their processes and organizations to insure that they can respond to changes within their parent organizations and that they can justify their share of expenditure of funds; and (6) university libraries must be prepared to accept and support different objectives and to develop the expertise and specialization which can relate to different communication patterns among librarians, faculties, universities and other institutions. (Related papers are available as LI 003178, 003180 and 003181). (Author/NH)

This paper classifies teacher centers according to the following categories: a) their organizational structure, b) their function, and c) the relationship between "a" and "b." It is indicated that the typologies were distilled from the results of a research project that surveyed 200 teacher center sites in the United States. The paper describes and outlines the characteristics of seven organizational types of teacher centers: independent, quasi-independent, professional organization, single unit, free local partnership, free local consortium, and legislative/political consortium. It does the same for four functional types of centers: informal "English," advocacy, responsive, and undifferentiated or unique. The author observes that some combinations of structures and functions are more logical than others and that as educational planners better understand the combinations, they will design appropriate types of centers to accomplish their objectives. (LP/JA)

Position papers on planning for school district organization were prepared for the project staff of the Great Plains School District Organization Project, a four-state study. A total of 104 studies and reports were prepared by personnel from secondary schools, institutions of higher learning, State Departments of Education, and related educational institutions in Iowa, Missouri, Nebraska, and South Dakota. Of the 104 studies and reports, 54 were position papers developed in the areas of educational needs, demographic factors, curriculum and educational programs, educational services, and organization and finance. A total of 68 position papers and reports are presented in this publication, followed by a synthesis of findings and recommendations reported in the papers, and a discussion of the implications of the information included in the papers. (VM)

THIS BOOK COMPRISES THE MAJOR PAPERS DELIVERED AT A CONFERENCE ON MARCH 20-22, 1967, SPONSORED BY THE POLICY AND DEVELOPMENT COUNCIL, AN ADVISORY UNIT OF THE DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION IN ONTARIO. THE CONFERENCE WAS ATTENDED BY REPRESENTATIVE PERSONS FROM DEPARTMENTS OF GOVERNMENT, UNIVERSITIES, AND MAJOR SCHOOL SYSTEMS ACROSS CANADA. THE CONFERENCE HAD TWO OBJECTIVES--(1) TO GATHER PLANNERS AND STUDENTS OF PLANNING TO DISCUSS THE STATE OF THE ART, ITS TECHNICAL PROBLEMS, AND ITS FUTURE, AND (2) TO EXPLAIN TO CANADIAN EDUCATORS WHAT IS MEANT BY "PLANNING." FOUR OF THE PAPERS DEALT WITH NATIONAL OR INTERNATIONAL EXPERIENCE AND EMPHASIZED ONE PARTICULAR ASPECT OF PLANNING EXPERIENCE--THE ORGANIZATIONAL PROBLEMS, THE COMPLICATIONS OF A FEDERAL SYSTEM, OR THE DATA PROBLEMS. FOUR PAPERS WERE TECHNICAL, DEALING WITH ECONOMIC ASPECTS OF PLANNING AND WITH SOCIAL GOALS. SCHEMES FOR TRAINING PLANNERS WERE THE SUBJECT OF TWO PAPERS. (HW)

The purpose of this paper is to describe and reflect on an attempt to create a regional educational plan that uses parts of the existing governmental structure. The idea is to create a shortcut in linking educational producers with consumers. The design stage is analyzed to establish the credibility of the program's organizational structure. The program is intended to use informal and formal education to bring literacy to the largely poor and illiterate rural population of the highlands of Guatemala. (Author/IRT)

The purpose of this theoretical paper is to describe a set of models for the instructional organization of the multiunit secondary school. The school's instructional organization is viewed as a mechanism for structuring resources to influence learning outcomes. The multiunit elementary school (MUS-E) models served as the point of departure for extending individually guided education (IGE) to the secondary levels. The major variables that influenced the design of the IGE/multiunit secondary school (MUS-S) were characteristics of the individual learner, insights into human abilities and learning, and the structure of the learning environment. A "multiunit component crosswalk" was created to identify MUS-E components (such as nongrading, staff hierarchies, and continuous progress) that could be applied to middle and senior high school levels. A modular instructional organization was generated for the IGE/MUS-S. The basic components were the "Individually Guided Inter-Disciplinary" Module, which includes all required experiences, and the "Enrichment" Module, which includes all elective experiences. Each module was comprised of a learner unit, instructional unit, curriculum unit, and decision unit. Variations of IGE/MUS-S models were developed for junior high, middle, and senior high schools of various sizes. (Author/DN)

This paper attempts to provide a broad theoretical framework for understanding planning in organizations and other social systems; and it identifies the key conditions, processes, and structures of social systems in the planning concept. While other frameworks exist that detail singular aspects of planning as it actually occurs and describe planning as a normatively conceived process, it is assumed that those more detailed theories can be fitted into this general framework, potentially useful in analyzing particular cases. The content is organized according to (1) definitional issues, (2) framework for analyzing the planning potential of a social system, (3) implications of proposed framework for system analysis, (4) planning and organizations in relationship to the analytic framework, (5) organizational structures and processes involved in planning, and (6) conclusion. These sections move from definition to a general theoretical statement, and, finally, to the application of the theory to organizations. A bibliography is included. (Author)

The school is viewed as a social system, composed of human beings interlocked in a network of social relationships and possessing a system of shared orientations which serve as standards for human behavior. Two related concepts are discussed: (1) pupil control ideology, conceptualized along a continuum ranging from "custodialism" to "humanism;" and (2) organizational climate, also arrayed along a continuum from open to closed. It is hypothesized that schools with open climates, and teachers and principals serving in relatively open schools, will be significantly more humanistic in pupil control ideology than schools with closed climates, or teachers and principals serving in closed climates. Two measurement instruments, the Pupil Control Ideology form (PCI) and the Organizational Climate Description Questionnaire (OCDQ) are briefly described. These were used to collect data on 45 elementary schools in 30 school districts. Results indicate that public elementary schools with open climates are significantly more humanistic in pupil control ideology than those with closed climates. Also, teachers, but not principals, serving in open schools, were found to be more humanistic in pupil control ideology than those in closed schools. (TL)

This paper examines (1) attempts at educational reform in Venezuela and Colombia by means of decentralization, and (2) the impact of decentralization on two contrasting educational systems. In Venezuela, the national school system was highly centralized with even routine decisions being made in Caracas, which resulted in a rigid, unresponsive relationship between local men and government officials. In Colombia, State and local units were relatively autonomous, and government funds were divided among these units so that control over allocations of educational money and enforcement of standard teacher qualification requirements were in the hands of the local units. In both countries, decentralization programs were designed that set up a series of regional offices to strike a better balance between local and national authorities. (RA)

The introduction establishes a perspective from which to develop an opinion about library service which may result in a need to redefine what is collected, how it is stored and what expertise should be developed. The available alternatives depend upon whom the services are provided for, how much service is provided and when, that is, who are the library's users. University libraries' users may include: faculty, graduate students, undergraduate students, academic and other university personnel, adjunct faculty, non-registered borrowers, visiting faculty, the general public, and other institutions. Once the users are identified decisions must be made concerning (1) what services to supply from the university library system, (2) what level to supply for each category of user, (3) what services to give in special units of the library system and not in others, (4) what needed services are not provided and (5) what services should be expanded or reduced. Tables 1 and 2 give "lists" of library service policies and "How to use the Inventory Checklist for Evaluating WSU User Services," is appended. (Related papers are available as LI 003178, 003179 and 003181.) (Author/NH)

Since the establishment of the pioneer USIS library in Mexico City in 1942, the nature of The United States Information Service (USIS) libraries has been subject to political disputes. The question of whether or not they should function as propaganda arms or information centers still remains a polemical issue. The USIA became an independent agency of the executive branch of government in 1953. Since then, the number of U.S. Information centers has grown to its present level of 133. Each Center tailors its programs to meet the special needs of its own community. Generally, the Information Center Service maintains four types of programs: 1) libraries or cultural centers for the study of the U.S.; 2) a commercial book program to place more American-written books in bookstores and classrooms; 3) teaching English; and 4) exhibits of American achievement. Moreover, the Centers assist the Informational Media Guaranty Program and Binational Centers around the world. Since 1961, a policy has been made to withdraw funds from Western Europe and to use them in the developing nations. Funds are appropriated each year by Congress. The future of USIS libraries is as uncertain as ever-changing world politics, the availability of funds, and the predispositions of the current administration. (CH)

The following papers were presented at the Adult Education Research Conference in Saskatchewan: (1) Three Channel Theory of Communication in Small Groups; (2) Communicating with Low Income People: CSCS Research; (3) Focus on the Future: Futurology for Correctional Education; (4) Using Experimental Design in Educational Research in a Volunteer, Informal Adult Education Program; (5) A Study of Central Personality and Skill Characteristics of the Expanded Food and Nutrition Educational Program Aides and Homemakers; (6) Testing Knowledge about Adult Education; (7) Implications of Learning Models for Adult Instruction: A Comparative Analysis; (8) A New Dimension in Program Development Theory; (9) Motivational Factors of Adult Learners in a Directed Self-Study Bachelor's Degree Program; (10) A Methodology for the Development of an Ideal Hierarchical Position-Centric Role Model; (11) An Analysis of the Need and Form for Comprehensive Adult Education Associations; (12) Cognitive Structure and Concept Formation; (13) An Evaluation of the Expanded Food and Nutrition Education Program in Missouri; (14) The Relationship between Group Process Training and Group Problem Solving; (15) Measuring Role Acquisition by Teacher Aides in Head Start Centers; (16) Institutional Change and The Ghost of the Past; (17) Analysis of University Service in Adult Education; (18) Role Theory used in West Pakistan; (19) Supervisory Effectiveness; (20) Theory and Research; (21) Heuristic Models of Organization Development. (CK)

This discussion identifies some of the social and organizational issues which will affect the design and implementation of a university management information system (MIS). Implications are discussed which affect both the data collection, and analysis and reporting segments of the MIS process. The analysis points out the extent to which an MIS design needs to consider the nature of the university in which it is placed, and some of the critical problems for implementing and gaining acceptance and utilization of MIS. Some of the difficult issues and organizational questions with which a university's executive officers and the MIS director must struggle to implement an effective total management information system are discussed. A 26-item bibliography is included. (MJM)

In developing countries, public administration is hampered by a number of obstacles foreign to large industrialized nations. Some of these obstacles are shortages of tools and skilled personnel, outmoded organizational structures, political competition, and cultural and attitudinal barriers. The administrative obstacles and their interrelationships are more effectively illuminated by a functional model than by a Weberian bureaucracy model of administration. However, the functional model implies that public administration can develop only as much as the country it serves. A related document is EA 003 930. (RA)

UNDER THE PROVISIONS OF THE VOCATIONAL EDUCATION ACT OF 1963, THE ADVISORY COUNCIL ON VOCATIONAL EDUCATION WAS DIRECTED TO REVIEW THE ADMINISTRATION AND STATUS OF VOCATIONAL EDUCATION PROGRAMS AND TO MAKE RECOMMENDATION FOR IMPROVING SUCH PROGRAMS. HIGHLIGHTS, RECOMMENDATIONS, ISSUES, AND PROBLEMS OF VOCATIONAL EDUCATION WITHIN THE NATIONAL CONTEXT OF CHANGING SOCIAL, EDUCATIONAL, AND ECONOMIC CONDITIONS ARE REPORTED. PUBLICATION 1 IS "HIGHLIGHTS AND RECOMMENDATIONS FROM THE GENERAL REPORT OF THE ADVISORY COUNCIL ON VOCATIONAL EDUCATION, 1968." PUBLICATION 2 IS THE "GENERAL REPORT OF THE ADVISORY COUNCIL ON VOCATIONAL EDUCATION, 1968." PUBLICATION 3 IS THE "SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS ADOPTED FROM THE GENERAL REPORT OF THE ADVISORY COUNCIL ON VOCATIONAL EDUCATION, 1968." SOME HIGHLIGHTS ARE--(1) ENROLLMENT IN VOCATIONAL EDUCATION INCREASED FROM APPROXIMATELY 4 MILLION IN 1962 TO ABOUT 7 MILLION IN 1967 WITH MAJOR ENROLLMENT IN SECONDARY SCHOOLS AND ADULT PROGRAMS, (2) HEAVIEST ENROLLMENTS WERE IN HOMEMAKING, TRADE AND INDUSTRIAL, AND OFFICE OCCUPATIONAL AREAS, AND (3) OF 347,370 GRADUATES AVAILABLE FOR PLACEMENT IN OCTOBER 1966, 80 PERCENT WERE PLACED IN FIELDS OR RELATED FIELDS FOR WHICH THEY TRAINED. TWO MAJOR RECOMMENDATIONS WERE THAT ALL FEDERAL VOCATIONAL EDUCATION ACTS ADMINISTERED BY THE OFFICE OF EDUCATION BE COMBINED INTO ONE ACT AND THAT TWO TO FOUR CENTERS FOR VOCATIONAL EDUCATION CURRICULUM DEVELOPMENT BE ESTABLISHED. (EM)

The COVID-19 pandemic represents an unprecedented event that has brought deep changes in hospital facilities with reshaping of the health system organization, revealing inadequacies of current hospital and local health systems. When the COVID-19 emergency will end, further evaluation of the national health system, new organization of acute wards, and a further evolution of the entire health system will be needed to improve care during the chronic phase of disease. Therefore, new standards for healthcare personnel, more efficient organization of hospital facilities for patients with acute illnesses, improvement of technological approaches, and better integration between hospital and territorial services should be pursued. With experience derived from the COVID-19 pandemic,new models, paradigms, interventional approaches, values and priorities should be suggested and implemented.

In recent decades, the paper industry has undergone many changes, making this industry more lucrative, “greener”, and thus more attractive. Today, recycled paper is a key raw material for paper production. However, this intense growth has also increased the number of market players, making competition more intense and dynamic and causing frequent turmoil. In such an environment, planning procurement and forecasting the price of recycled paper is a big challenge, even for highly experienced procurement managers. In addition, paper production itself is a dynamic process that requires all key grades of recycled paper to be available at all times. Accordingly, managing the optimal level of recycled paper stocks is also a difficult task faced by the procurement unit. The goal of this paper is to address these challenges by developing a new model for the sustainable procurement of recycled paper in the paper industry with the help of the principles of strategic management. Specifically, we aim to enhance our understanding of the factors driving the complexity of recycled paper procurement management. To this end, we conducted a comparative case study in four European companies. To build cases, we collected secondary data on the sampled companies as well as primary data from interviews with top executives at these companies. On the basis of the results from the comparative case study, we propose a new model for the procurement of recycled paper that helps increase the accuracy of forecasting price trends and by extension overall procurement performance. In a nutshell, this paper seeks to improve procurement processes by reducing the complexity of the enterprise procurement unit as well as by offering guidelines for the maintenance of optimal stock levels of recycled paper.