The Determination Of The Rio Grande - 1377 Words

Blair, Akhil, Kyle, Divya (1C 9A) The Determination of the Rio Grande being the Texas official border was influenced by many policies and beliefs. Although one large piece was influenced by the Manifest Destiny. Manifest Destiny was a belief that God wanted America to expand all the way to the west coast of the American Continent. The Americans wanted the Rio Grande to be the Texas border because of this belief. However, Mexico objected and claimed that the Nueces River was the Texas border. The United States did not want the Nueces River to be the border because it did not fulfill the Manifest Destiny. So then the only way to make the Rio Grande the border was to push Mexican out of the area. American had to make Mexico recognize that the Texas border was the Rio Grande. The Rio Grande is the fifth longest river to run through the United States and the 20th longest in the world. It flows 1,900 miles from the San Juan Mountains of Southwestern Colorado to the Gulf of Mexico. Along its way, it travels 175 miles through Colorado, 470 miles through New Mexico, and the remaining 1,240 miles through Texas. Currently, the river is used as a border from Texas (United States), to Chihuahua, Coahuila, Nuevo Leà ³n, and Tamaulipas (Mexico). During this conflict, Mexico had a different point of view. They Claimed and wanted the Texas Border to be the Nueces river. This was because Mexico wanted most of the rich land in Texas. They also thought that the Mexicans had the right toShow MoreRelatedMexican American War And The Mexican War1380 Words   |  6 PagesMexican government to purchase the disputed lands between the Nueces River and the Rio Grande. When that offer was rejected, troops from the United States commanded by Major General Zachary Taylor were move d into the disputed territory of Coahuila. These troops were then attacked by Mexican troops, killing 12 American troops and taking 52 prisoners. These same Mexican troops later laid siege to a US fort along the Rio Grande. This would lead to the conflict that resulted in the loss of much of Mexico sRead MoreThe Treaty Of The Guadalupe Hidalgo Treaty1009 Words   |  5 Pagesultimately resolved through the passing of the Guadalupe Hidalgo Treaty of 1848. Remuneration was requested from the republic of Mexico which was granted by the U.S. This movement allowed and officially surrendered the land bounded by California and the Rio Grande river. Although Texas had been annexed in 1845 to be part of the Union as the 28th state, this led to necessity for government control that was not easily supplied since Texas was a long distance away. However, the annexation of Texas increasedRead MoreEssay United States Border Patrol1416 Words   |  6 Pagesjoin the Border Patrol. I am from Del Rio Texas, a border town neighbors with Mexico. The U.S. Border Patrol has had a major impact and a long history in Del Rio. In the Customs Border Patrol website, it informs that, â€Å"The Border Patrol Agents of the Del Rio Sector provide law enforcement that not only affects the quality of life of the people along the border but the entire U.S. The Border Patrol is a multi-task law enforcement body that has served Del Rio since July, 1 1924† (Border Security alongRead MoreWestward Expansion Of The United States1017 Words   |  5 PagesU.S. and ended in the defeat of Mexico and the loss of half its northern territory. On February 2, 1848 an agreement was finally made with the Mexican government on the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, which stated that Mexico agreed to acknowledge Rio Grande as the boundary between Mexico of Texas and to cede California and New Mexico to the United States. In return, the U.S. would pay off any financial claims its new citizens had against Mexi co and to pay the Mexicans $15 million. As Americans pushedRead MoreAn Analysis Of Barack Obamas Speech1167 Words   |  5 Pagessame rights as them also. In addition to posing these series of questions, Obama provides examples of illegal immigrants who work hard and point out the ignorance of the American citizens. Obama describes the true grit of immigrants and the determination they have. He uses a simile to compare his two daughters to the immigrants stating that â€Å"I’ve seen the courage of students who are as American as Malia or Sasha.† The simile used by Barack Obama shows that illegal immigrants who work hard are loyalRead MoreBrazil And Its Impact On America1872 Words   |  8 Pagesrelation between themselves and others in the Black Diaspora. Brazil ties into the African Diaspora because millions of enslaved Africans were dispersed in Brazil. Brazil was the center of the European slave trade before it gained independence in 1822. Rio de Janeiro and Bahia had more slaving voyages than any other port in all of Europe. Brazil was consistently the largest home for slaves between North America and South America. Instead of encouraging natural reproduction to increase the slave populationRead MoreManifest Destiny Essay1269 Words   |  6 Pagesintended a quick victory, but the war went on much longer than expected. The war reached its conclusion with the signing of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo on February 1, 1848. The treaty conditions granted the United States the land Texas with the Rio Grande river set as its southern border and all of the land that extended between Texas and the Pacific. The land became the states of New Mexico, California, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, Wyoming, and Colorado. The United States then gained over one millionRead MoreSouthwest Airlines : A Low Cost Airline Operating1204 Words   |  5 PagesHouston, later completing the â€Å"triangle route† to San Antonio (Southwest, 2014). Southwest Airlines did not produce its first profitable year until 1976 when it servic ed cargo between the cities it served. The airline later expanded services to the Rio Grande Valley, Corpus Christi, Lubbock, Midland-Odessa, El Paso and Austin. It wasn’t until 1979 that Southwest flew outside the state of Texas serving New Orleans. In 1980, Southwest started service to Oklahoma City, Tulsa, and Albuquerque. Over theRead MoreThe Massacre of Captain John Gunnison and his Explorers in 18531494 Words   |  6 PagesUnfortunately, Fremont’s team became stranded at the 12,000 foot level in the San Juan Mountains. Eleven men were lost as well as all the mules and most of the equipment. Fremont himself barely survived. While this was a setback, it did not dampen the determination to find a suitable route, particularly to the California gold mines. Progress accelerated when Franklin Pierce won the presidency in 1852. He appointed Mississippi Democratic U.S. Representative Jefferson Davis as Secretary of War and assignedRead Moresyllabus1379 Words   |  6 PagesPaso Community College Syllabus Instructor’s Course Requirements I. Course Number and Instructor Information HECO 1322 NUTRITION AND DIET THERAPY INSTRUCTOR’S NAME Evelin Eichler, MS, RD, LD CAMPUS AND OFFICE NUMBER Rio Grande – No office TELEPHONE NUMBER (Cellphone) (575) 642-1850 OFFICE HOURS To be announced E-MAIL Communication with instructor should be done through the class message system, not through the college e-mail address

Beautiful Landscapes and Scenery of New Zealad Is Dying...

New Zealand, which is known for its beautiful landscapes that are often captured on film in movies and television shows such as The Lord of the Rings Trilogy or Xena: the Warrior Princess, is now facing problems with deforestation, soil erosion, and invasive species that are killing native plants and animals (Central Intelligence Agency). With all countries whose population is growing, there are major effects caused by it. According to The World Factbook, a website created and ran by the Central Intelligence Agency, New Zealand is a country made of multiple islands that lie off the southeast coast of the continent Australia in the South Pacific Ocean. With about 268,000 square kilometers of land, New Zealand is an island that has both†¦show more content†¦Many New Zealanders help harvest and build much of their exports. New Zealand main exports are dairy products, meat, and fish (Central Intelligence Agency). They also export different woods or wood products as well as machi nery. The World Factbook states that the total amount of exports are $38 billion. New Zealand’s partners for exports are Australia, China, Japan, and the United States. They get imports from the countries listed prior in addition to Singapore and Germany. The imported goods total about $37,000 and include electronics, vehicles, machinery, and textiles (Central Intelligence Agency). Some major environment problems New Zealand are facing are deforestation, soil erosion, and harm to native plants and animals because or invasive species (Central Intelligence Agency). Greenpeace, an independent global campaigning organization, states that deforestation is a major problem in New Zealand because the burning of the forests have resulted in too much carbon in the air. This extra carbon in the air adds to the â€Å"greenhouse effect† which in turn causes climate change. This change in climate can result in the destruction of more forests because it causes more forest fires and drought (Greenpeace). Another outcome caused by deforestation is soil erosion. There are many types of soil erosion that happen in New Zealand. Two types that New Zealand deals with the most are steambank erosion and surface erosion

Costing Case Analysis Activity Based Costing

Question: Discuss about theCosting Case Analysis for Activity Based Costing. Answer: Introduction: This project covers various aspects of costing analysis. The costing analysis will help to eliminate ambiguity in calculation of the product cost based on the formulas. The assessment of the product cost can be either based on conventional costing method or based on ABC or Activity Based Costing. The activity based costing or ABC costing is more precise in ascertaining the cost of the product. Here in below would look into different aspects of costing and analysis of costs of products (Study 2016). Purpose of a Cost Formula and the Components: Does anyone actually know the cost to operate their own car? If they actually know the figures they can easily calculate whether they can afford that car or not. People do often underestimate the cost of operating a vehicle or buying any product. The assessment of cost of products is of huge relevance to the business. This not only helps to maintain the product cost and to bring it down further to stay competitive. The cost formulas are important for the assessment of the cost to an organization. The cost assessment is based on some formulas. The formulas are primarily used to ascertain the costs of various components. The cost component includes fixed cost and variable cost (Smith 2016). The cost formulas are used to determine the cost of a product after considering all the costs incurred or to be incurred in producing something or introducing a new activity. In case of a manufacturing company which manufactures n number of items, a cost formula helps to calculate the total cost after considering all the fixed costs and variable cost of each product. The components of the cost formula are as follows: Fixed costs These costs are fixed cost and does not increase or decrease with the number of products. The fixed cost are like rent of a factory, salary of staff, insurance cost etc. These costs can be incurred monthly/quarterly/yearly. At certain level of production the fixed costs remains the same. In case of increase of production beyond certain capacity might influence the fixed cost otherwise it remains fixed irrespective of number of units produced or manufactured. Variable costs The costs are incurred in proportion to the number of products. The decrease in number of unit manufacture or the increase would have proportionate impact on the total variable cost of the product. So if the number of products increases or decrease, the variable cost may automatically increase or decrease. These costs are not constant like materials, labour wages, and cost of another product required producing the main product. There are some others costs which are also integral part of the production are duel in nature. Those costs are either partially fixed or partially variable. These costs are termed as Semi-Fixed cost or Semi-Variable cost (Economics 2016). Determination of Cost Formula: The cost formula is mainly based on the allocation of cost and of the overhead. The material cost is based on the actual quantity of material used for production of one unit of goods. The allocation of material cost would be based on the number of units produced multiplied by the actual quantity of material used for production of each unit. This is a significant part of the production. The goods are to be produced according to the allocation of materials. The cost of materials is to be multiplied by the total material used. This would reflect in assessment of total material costs used for the production of the unit. John gathered data for last two years and created the estimation of the cost of goods produced by his company. According to him prediction model of overheads allocation would help ramp up production. The assessment of the prediction model is important aspect for the business. They have decided that if the labour hours and the machine hours are increased substantially, wou ld it help to achieve better production and reduce the cost per unit. In this connection the assessment of the overhead based on the increased labour hour and machine hours become important. The labour hour cost is $80 per hour and they are planning to increase our labour hours to 8,500 and machine time to 2,300 hours. This would significantly increase the production and also increase the cost of the products produced. The cost formula is determined on the basis of the allocation of cost and the cost functions. This approach of cost allocation would give proper indication of the actual cost of each bicycle produced. Once the apportionment and the calculation of the cost on the basis of labour hour and machine hour is complete, it would reveal the actual cost of the product. This kind of allocation and the calculation of cost are considered as ABC costing where activity based apportionment of the goods takes place (Johnson 2016). The actual factors that are considered during ascertaining of the costs are as following: The identification of the activities of production and apportionment of the cost accordingly. The classification of each activity based on the method of apportionment like number of unit machine hour, labour hour. The identification and the calculation of accumulated cost of each unit and the total cost. The choice of most appropriate cost drivers The calculation of total units of the cost driver and the activity rate of each unit produced Application of the cost of each activity on the basis of the apportionment method. Cost item Possible cost driver (units) Salaries/benefits of staff members total hours worked by the staff member Salaries (not identifiable by program) Total hours worked by the staff member (if identifiable) number of beneficiaries/ total beneficiaries; total costs of program/ total costs of organization; total staff Office space rent and facilities maintenance total staff Sq. ft. occupied per program / total sq. ft. Utilities total office staff Supplies total supplies IT hardware and maintenance total laptops IT software licenses Number of software licenses utilized Depreciation (equipment) total equipment total hours used Legal fees total hours billed by organization Shared marketing materials and advertising costs Materials ordered by program total ads (if available) Subscriptions overall staff Training, overall staff Determination of the Costs as Requested by Jon Cruise: Island Wheels Ltd Method of Apportionment Road Trek BMX Total Units Produced 1500 1000 500 Direct Material Materials Used gm 750 1400 850 3000 Total Materials 1125000 1400000 425000 2950000 Labour Overhead Direct Labour hours 2.5 3 1.5 7 Total labour Hour 3750 3000 750 7500 Machine related overhead Machine hours 1 0.5 0.25 1.75 Total Machine Hour 750 700 212.5 1662.5 Estimated Cost Total Cost Direct Material 472,000 180,000 224,000 68,000 Labour Overhead 37000 18500 14800 3700 Machine related overhead 43000 19398 18105 5496 If the number of labour hours and the machine hours are increased significantly, then the cost of each unit produced will be different. Total labour hours consumed is 7500 hours and if it is increased to 8500 hours. The labour cost will increase by $80,000. If the machine time is increased to 2300 hours, the extra machine hours would be $51000. This would ultimately increase the overhead cost but also increase the production at the same time. Calculate the Product Cost: Island Wheels Ltd Method of Apportionment Road Trek BMX Total Units Produced 1500 1000 500 Direct Material Materials Used gm 750 1400 850 3000 Total Materials 1125000 1400000 425000 2950000 Labour Overhead Direct Labour hours 2.5 3 1.5 7 Total labour Hour 3750 3000 750 7500 Machine related overhead Machine hours 1 0.5 0.25 1.75 Total Machine Hour 750 700 212.5 1662.5 Estimated Cost Total Cost Direct Material 472,000 180,000 224,000 68,000 Labour Overhead 37000 18500 14800 3700 Machine related overhead 43000 19398 18105 5496 Actual Cost Total Cost Direct Material 472,000 180,000 224,000 68,000 Labour Overhead 600,000 300,000 240,000 60,000 Machine related overhead 133,000 60,000 56,000 17,000 Cost of Product 1,205,000 540,000 520,000 145,000 The estimated cost of the cycles will not match with the actual cost. The cost drivers will determine the cost of overhead significantly higher. Therefore the apportionment of the cost in the basis of machine hours and labour hours would be inappropriate. It should be linked to number of bicycles produced (Accountingcoach 2016). Explain the Concept of ABC: ABC termed as Activity-based costing is a system followed in calculating a cost of product by taking into consideration the different resources, activities relating to processing the final product, all direct and indirect cost to be incurred for processing the product. ABC is a modern approach to determine the exact cost of a product. With the help of this method, the company can be able to calculate the cost of each product, services and activities. ABC is a activity based management for apportionment of overhead cost and other direct costs for identifying strength and weaknesses of production and other departments in a manufacturing industry. The allocation of the cost is entirely dependent on the use of the effective cost drivers where management has responsibility to allocate the cost based on the basis of activities of the production department (Way 2016). The production department and the managers has the primary role to locate the loopholes in is the management and the production department which is causing drainage of resources. The ABC can allocate costs and provide much needed inputs to find out the activities responsible for loss or declined profit. The manufacturing industries have to follow various procurement process and the allocation of the raw material and other resources to production. The major process of manufacturing involves allocation of raw materials labours and other things of manufacturing are to run machine for production. The cost in production of each unit of product will be apportioned on the basis of cost drivers and that will allow better opportunity for the business to grow and cut cost (Lister 2016). This is an enormous task to be managed by ABC. The right direction and the process of allocation would yield better results for the organisation. The organisation has the chances of increasing the cost of production. ABC costing for production and apportionment of the cost effusively analyses procurement and other policies and for the production at different level manages. The professional has to do the duty according to the proposed code of conduct for apportionment of raw materials of best grade with rest of job is on the application department. Advantages of Activity-Based Costing (ABC) Helps to find out the product and service which is not generating enough profits for the company. Helps to find out production or service activities which are out dated and more cost burden for the company thereby increasing the cost of the product. The cost calculated under this method is more accurate and realistic. Two or more products undergoing same activity can be allocated a cost which is reliable as all overheads are considered. The required information from each processing department can be obtained to make allocate profits of different products and services. It is a measurement tool to understand a product and its cost to a customer and profits to a company. Useful in large manufacturing firms. Better tool for management to allocate resources properly. Limitations of Activity-Based Costing (ABC) It is a costly method as compared to traditional method. Difficult to select the most appropriate cost drive. Difficult to calculate cost on the basis of activities. Mid-sized firms, small manufacturing firms cannot afford the cost of ABC method. Time consuming as staff from each department may be not co-operative to share information. ABC Should be Introduced in Island Wheels Ltd: The main factor of ABC costing is nothing but apportionment of the cost on the basis of cost drivers. The conception would be better applied in an manufacturing organization which has multiple cost heads included in the production or manufacturing process. There are several other reasons for using ABM and the ABC techniques in cost of unit calculation, the cost calculated is separately analysed which equip every organization related to understanding of cost cutting. The ABC techniques are applied in major industries like General Electric. The Chief Executive Jeffery Immelt once told President Obama regarding application of ABC techniques in these organizations which helped him to evaluate the cost structure of GE in America and other parts of the world in terms of labour cost. A wall street journal also reported that Wal-Mart is opening store all over the world and hiring most of the employees who are not US citizens (Matthews 2012). This is to be acknowledged that main objective of the ABC costing can only when successful costing with aide of ABC can squeeze the cost out of the system. The better allocation of labour and the material can save cost and time and make manufacturing more efficient. The application of ABC would be successful in larger organisation. Island Wheels Ltd is comparatively small organisation to be able to control the factors of costing with aide of ABC costing. The important factor of ABC costing is review of the previous year performance to achieve next years goal (Efinancemanagement 2016). The forecasting of profit in an organisation is dependent on many factors and ABC is one of such factors. Profit estimation and cost allocation would be more effective in large organisation where the efficiency is measured on the basis of performance. ABC is used as a tool for effective management system for sustained growth and profitability(Business 2016). Conclusion: The understanding of ABC costing is bright from the point of view of the management. It can be best utilised for understanding of cost allocation. The growth factor of the business is to ensure smooth operation and cost control. If the costs are not controlled in the proper manner it would not help in building the organisation goals. The assessment of ABC is entirely dependent on te management and the efficiency of the management to create value for its goods. The important factor of ABC is understood in this report but the application carries a lot of risks including risk of cost escalation unless the cost factors and the cost drivers are allocated properly. The efficiency of the worker will not be judged by ABC if it is applied in a small industry. The ABC costing would be effective better in larger organisation with different departments where efficiency is only being judged with cost drivers. References: Accountingcoach. "What is a cost driver? accessed 09 13, 2016" www.accountingcoach.com. www.accountingcoach.com. 2016. https://www.accountingcoach.com/blog/what-is-a-cost-driver. Business. "Activity Based Costing ABC, and ABC Management Explained." accessed 09 13, 2016 www.business-case-analysis.com. www.business-case-analysis.com. 2016. https://www.business-case-analysis.com/activity-based-costing.html. Economics. "Variable Costs and Fixed Costs." economics.fundamentalfinance.com. economics.fundamentalfinance.com. 2016. accessed 09 13, 2016 https://economics.fundamentalfinance.com/micro_costs.php. Efinancemanagement. "Cost Drivers." accessed 09 13, 2016 www.efinancemanagement.com. www.efinancemanagement.com. 2016. https://www.efinancemanagement.com/costing-terms/cost-drivers. Johnson, Rose. Traditional Costing Vs. Activity-Based Costing. 2016. accessed 04 10, 2016 https://smallbusiness.chron.com/traditional-costing-vs-activitybased-costing-33724.html. Lister, onathan. "Product Costing vs. Cost Accounting." smallbusiness.chron.com. smallbusiness.chron.com. 2016. accessed 09 16, 2016 https://smallbusiness.chron.com/product-costing-vs-cost-accounting-37642.html. Matthews, Merrill. "Companies 'Outsource' Because That's Where The Sales Are." www.forbes.com. www.forbes.com. 2012. accessed 09 16, 2016 https://www.forbes.com/sites/merrillmatthews/2012/07/20/companies-outsource-because-thats-where-the-sales-are/2/. Smith, Charmayne. "How to Calculate Predetermined Overhead Rate Machine Hours." smallbusiness.chron.com. smallbusiness.chron.com. 2016. https://smallbusiness.chron.com/calculate-predetermined-overhead-rate-machine-hours-38399.html. Study. "Total Cost in Economics: Definition Formula." study.com. study.com. 2016. https://study.com/academy/lesson/total-cost-in-economics-definition-formula.html. Way, Jay. "How to Determine Cost Drivers." smallbusiness.chron.com. smallbusiness.chron.com. 2016. accessed 09 13, 2016 https://smallbusiness.chron.com/determine-cost-drivers-40992.html. www.accountingcoach.com. What is process costing? 2016. https://www.accountingcoach.com/blog/what-is-process-costing.

Public Policy Essay Example

Public Policy Essay Final Paper Brittany Baity PPA603: Government Budgeting (MBQ 1118A) Instructor:   Chiji Ohayia June 06, 2011 Public policy is the study of policy making by governments. A governments public policy is the set of policies (laws, plans, actions, behaviors) that it chooses. (Lee, Johnson, Joyce, 2008) Since governments claim authority and responsibility (to varying degrees) over a large group of individuals, they see fit to establish plans and methods of action that will govern that society. I will discuss the possible funding options for reducing Georgia’s sex offender rate, evaluate how public policy decisions affect the receipt of revenues, and develop a revenue policy that aligns with community values. It is a parent’s nightmare: a son or daughter is abducted, sexually assaulted and murdered by a predator that had been lurking, undetected, in their community. In 2006, President George W. Bush signed the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act, which mandated the maintenance of a national registry of sex offenders, greatly expanded the legal definition of sex offenses and sex offenders, and established Project Safe Childhood program within the U. S. Department of Justice, Project Safe Childhood includes grants to states to help combat Internet predators as well as to help fund civil commitments, and aims to coordinate federal, state and local efforts to vigorously investigate and prosecute crimes against children, including sexual assault, child pornography, and kidnapping. Brown, 2009) Since the mid 1990’s, sex offenders policy in Georgia has become increasingly more punitive and restrictive. (Williams, 2011) Anyone convicted of a sex crime is required to register as a sex offender. This person will have his or her personal details and crimes committed listed on Web-based notification sites for the remainder of his or her life, and will have restrictions on where he or she can live and will be recommended to a treatment center following release from prison. The core assumption that most children are sexually assaulted by strangers who are repeat offenders has not been supported by research. We will write a custom essay sample on Public Policy specifically for you for only $16.38 $13.9/page Order now We will write a custom essay sample on Public Policy specifically for you FOR ONLY $16.38 $13.9/page Hire Writer We will write a custom essay sample on Public Policy specifically for you FOR ONLY $16.38 $13.9/page Hire Writer A statistical report published by the Georgia Department of Justice in 2000 revealed that only seven percent of offenders who sexually assaulted juveniles aged 0 to 17 were strangers to their victims; the vast majority of juveniles were assaulted by an acquaintance e. g. family friend, babysitter, neighbor, teacher, coach, or religious leader. This report also included that sexual assault of children ages twelve and under has been characterized by subjective assessments or typical high profile crimes for too long. Brown, 2009) Those who argue that current policies are based on inaccurate assumptions about the perpetrators or sexual assaults against children are often quickly silenced by those who point to the horrific crimes committed by a few sadistic repeat offenders. Many experts agree that current sex offender policies—including registration, community notification, mandatory sentencing, civil commitment, and GPS tracking aimed at convicted sex offenders—do nothing to protect children from the individuals who are most likely to sexually assault them. Studies show that there are more than 500,000 registered sex offenders in the United States, and there are an estimated 100,000 sex offenders who are missing from the system. (Brown, 2009) Loopholes in this current system have allowed some sexual predators to evade law enforcement and place our children at risk. Some may wonder why there is such a focus on sex offenders. Why is there such a focus on pedophiles and sex offenders and rapists? The reason is, if Georgian’s look at the statistics it has the highest recidivist offender rate of any crime, even higher than murderers and armed robbery. As a society, people must share revulsion for what these criminals do to our children. The crimes are so terrible, that people are uncomfortable talking about them, but if people are to make real progress such as organizing community meetings, law enforcement become more aggressive and also create more victim groups. The Government created a Project Safe Childhood which is a program to protect children from rapist and sex offenders. The Project Safe Childhood will make a ground for a national zero-tolerance culture. The Project Safe Childhood program is a strong three-legged stool: one leg is the federal contributions led by the United States Attorneys around the country, another is state and local law enforcement, including the Internet Crimes Against Children task forces funded by the Department’s Office of Justice Programs and the third is non-governmental organizations, like the Financial Coalition Against Child Pornography and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. [NCMEC] (Geffner, 2008) Under the Project Safe Childhood structure, state, local and federal partners are seeking the toughest sentences possible. The Government has made half a million dollars available for the Project Safe Childhood program. This program intends to bring state and local law enforcem ent together with federal prosecutors from their regions. Cooperative law-enforcement work on the registry has already led to some great stories of success. The first case brought under the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act involved a fugitive who was arrested by the Social Security Administration for allegedly using a false name and another man’s Social Security number as he tried to set up a new identity for himself. It turns out that this individual was convicted for assaulting a police officer and possession of sexually exploitive material in Idaho in 2003 and he was wanted on a probation violation in another state for failing to register as a sex offender. He had done so at his first address, but did not re-register when he moved and then fled the state. Deputy U. S. Marshals working with the Social Security Administration and the local U. S. Attorney’s office built a case against the man and he was charged via criminal complaint for failing to register as a sex offender. The charges were brought in October 2006, making this the first case charged under the new act. (Geffner, 2008) The importance of the civil rights movement, Martin Luther King said that â€Å"History will have to record that the greatest tragedy of this period of social transition was not the strident clamor of the bad people, but the appalling silence of the good people. † (Schuster, 2010)As a community we must seed our communities with our knowledge and our passion. Remember that this communication starts with each other, the Project Safe Childhood partners. U. S. Attorney’s offices need to be calling their state and local partners constantly. When working together several of these problems will begin to cease. Politicians, child advocates, and journalists denounce current sex offender laws as ineffective and flawed, yet are rarely able to articulate exactly why new laws are needed. Instead, they cite each news story about a kidnapped child or web predator as proof that more laws are needed, as if sex crimes would cease if only the penalties were harsher, or enough people were monitored. The fact that rare crimes continue to be committed does not necessarily imply that current laws against those crimes are inadequate. By that standard, any law is ineffective if someone violates that law. (Geffner, 2008) Nearly all of the sex offender policy issues currently debated including registration, community notification, residency restrictions, civil commitment, classification of juveniles as sex offenders, mandatory sentencing, the death penalty, and castration all involve achieving an effective balance of public safety, maintaining individual civil liberties, and a just and efficient allocation of resources. Those who participate in the public discourse on sex offender policy share a desire to protect children and reduce sexual assault but differ greatly in their opinions about the rights of offenders and their assessment of just and effective punishment and management of sex offenders. Many lawmakers and political pundits argue that sex offenders’ rights are forfeited when they commit crimes against children. They support their arguments by citing cases in which repeat offenders have assaulted and murdered children after they have been released from prison; for such offenders, these commentators argue, no punishment is too harsh and no price is too high. On the other side of the debate, civil libertarians and victims’ rights advocates, mental health professionals, defense attorneys, and members of the law enforcement community assert that there are too many restrictions place on too many offenders. Furthermore, opponents of stricter policies argue that such measures result in unfairly harsh penalties for individuals including juveniles, teens who engaged in consensual sex, and those arrested for public urination and indecent exposure. These individuals are labeled as sex offenders but pose no threat of violence to their communities. Public safety and federal, state, and local budgets would be better served, by targeting only those sex offenders who commit forcible sex crimes or demonstrate a tendency toward violence. A case which illustrates the complexities of the debate over whether current sex offender policies are just and effective is that of Genarlow Wilson, who was sentenced to 10 years in prison without possibility of parole in 2005 after he was videotaped having consensual oral sex with a 15-year-old girl at a 2003 New Years Eve party in Georgia. Oral sex between teens constituted aggravated child molestation and carried a mandatory sentence under a Georgia state law in effect in 2003. The Georgia law was changed in 2006, and now consensual oral sex between teens is a misdemeanor punishable by a maximum of one year behind bars with no requirement to register as a sex offender. (Williams, 2011) Mandy of the most thoughtful commentators on the prevention of sexual violence urge a public health approach to the problem of sexual violence. Sexual violence, like the classic infectious diseases, smallpox, measles, has widespread negative effects on our society. The public health approach, a systematic application of scientific learning aimed at understanding and addressing root causes, could help effectively reduce sexual violence in the same way that it has controlled many infectious diseases. The public health approach entails a systematic method of analysis, a way of seeing the problem in a larger, more contextualized framework. It divides interventions into three categories: primary, secondary, and tertiary. Primary prevention efforts focus on stopping sexually abusive behaviors before it starts. The public health approach is aimed at changing the conditions that produce the problem. Secondary programs focus on those at high risk for offending as well as stopping recent sexual offenders from re-offending. Tertiary prevention involves trying to stop future violence by those who have a history of offending behaviors. (Brown, 2009) The public health approach uses systematic and empirically based information for deciding how best to attack a public health problem like sexual violence. It consciously looks beyond individual characteristics or offenders to identify causes that exist at a societal of community level. These classic steps that enabled public health to conquer infectious disease aim to address violence comprehensively. The first step is ongoing systematic collection, analysis, and interpretation of data on the incidence, prevalence, and risk factors. The second step is identifying causes through research, and the third step is the development and evaluation of programs. Finally, the public health model engages in dissemination and implementation communicating which preventive programs work based on evaluation of data and putting these programs into practice. The public health approach helps us understand the difference between thinking about a problem like sexual violence at the scale of individuals and thinking about it from the perspective of the population as a whole. The public health approach allows us to see that there is collective risk as well as individual risk, and that the worst of the worst account for only a fraction of the collective risk posed by sexual violence. The public health approach, by insisting on empirically based policies for reducing exual violence. Unlike the conventional narrow and politicized approach that values only punishment, public health advocates understand the need for a comprehensive approach addressing all levels of prevention: primary, secondary, and tertiary. (Schuster, 2010) The predator laws exemplify an approach that is 180 degrees from these public health principles. The predator laws were not based on research. They make no pretense of attacking the root causes of sexual violence or changing the conditions that produce it. Rather, they take a simple containment approach to those who are already identified as dangerous offenders. Far from being comprehensive, they focus only on a small part of the problem, a part that is far removed from the root causes or the experiences of most victims of sexual violence. There has been little research about the effectiveness of the predator law approaches and little reason to believe that they have reduced the scope of sexual violence in any meaningful way. The public health approach allows people to see what a focus on identified individual offender’s hides: the value and necessity of primary prevention, because most sexual violence does not show up in the criminal justice system, most will remain unaddressed by secondary and tertiary interventions. Primary prevention is proactive, while the secondary and tertiary methods are reactive. Primary prevention aims at addressing sexual violence before it happens. Secondary and tertiary approaches become applicable only after an offender has begun abusing victims. Although primary prevention programs are in their infancy, and their effectiveness is as yet unproven, they have a number of attractions. They are relatively cheap and can reach large numbers of people. They aim to change root causes of sexual violence by addressing attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors and thus stop sexual violence before it begins. Secondary and tertiary approaches, in contrast, do not address new entrants into sexual offending, but confine their attention to those who have already offended. Another key advocate of public health approaches is Kathleen Basile, an official with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Basile states that â€Å"more attention should be given to primary prevention of sexual violence if real gains are to be made in decreasing this problem. † Basile argues that â€Å"national campaigns against sexual violence in the media could affect rates of sexual offending by gradually influencing societal norms that condone sexual aggression. † She cites campaigns regarding the use of utomobile seat belts, â€Å"largely because the norms about wearing seat belts have changed through public awareness combined with changes in laws. † Smoking cessation campaigns provide another example of the larger society getting involved in preventing a widespread problem. She also stated that â€Å"the same societal urgency needs to be established around decreasing sexual violence perpetration by involving the public in large-scale sexual viol ence preventive efforts. † (Brown, 2009) Primary prevention programs are largely in the developmental stage. Restorative justice approaches seek to facilitate offender reintegration while emphasizing the importance of accountability and community safety. The restorative justice movement argues that restorative approaches produce greater prospects of safety, because they place offenders within a web of relationships that helps ensure accountability is on redressing harm to the victim. These programs operate at both the internal and external levels, providing â€Å"opportunities for hop and recovery† and a feeling of acceptance, along with the kinds of family and community connections that enable the community to exert its normal forms or control. The key is the ability for these programs to accommodate and promotes both â€Å"accountability and understanding. † The laws have failed so miserably, reform of statutes of limitations is needed for all victims, past and present. The solution needs no task force or further study. It is clear: statutes of limitations for sexual abuse of children need to be abolished. Murder has no statute of limitations because the victim can never speak for himself or herself. Child abuse is a little different. It involves a heinous crime, a powerless and vulnerable victim incapable of speaking for himself or herself and the murder of the victim’s very childhood and soul. On July 20, 2005 the U. S. Department of Justice launched the National Sex Offender Public Registry (NSOPR), a searchable Web site that links state and territory sex-offender public registries and allows users access to public information on sex offenders throughout the country. NSOPR, which currently links to 22 state registries, offers information on almost 200,000 registered sex offenders nationwide. America’s communities have long awaited a national site to search for sex offenders. NSOPR was built in partnership with federal, state, and private sector partners. (Brown, 2009) NSOPR allows states to maintain control over their own data. States are actively participating in this unprecedented public safety opportunity in large part because they retain control over their public sex-offender data, rather than submitting it to a costly or difficult-to-maintain national repository. By design, once a query has been entered, NSOPR simply delivers users to the state site hosting the information. NSOPR is cost-effective for both citizens and states. Unlike some Web sites that claim to offer national sex-offender information, NSOPR does not require users to submit extensive personal information or to pay a fee to access the information they seek. Equally important, states bear no cost to link to the site, which has cost the Department of Justice and its partners just under $1 million to design and deliver. From a technology standpoint, NSOPR bandwidth, as well load capacity, will be added to enlarge the tunnel through which queries travel, allowing searches to reach state public sex-offender registries more quickly. NSOPR currently gives concerned citizens easy-to-use and free access to information on two out every live registered sex offenders in the United States. In the absence of an informed public debate on the re-entry of those who have been convicted of sex crimes, fear-based laws are being enacted across the country. Recent trends have made community re-entry across the country. Recent trends have made community re-entry the trigger point for society’s most venomous and simplistic responses toward people with a history of sexually offending. Ironically, the re-entry process also has the potential to become one of the best forums for creating the conditions for a safer community and preventing the sexual abuse of children. In many instances, the general public and policy-makers continue to hold beliefs that are not based on the current research. As a result, laws have several assumptions embedded in them that impact re-entry negatively and are not supported by the scientific evidence. As a culture, we have historically opted for silence and denial rather than to educate ourselves with accurate information about child sexual abuse or even about sexuality in general. The current vituperative and punitive tone evidenced in the media and policy discussions begs the question of whether or not those with sexual behavior problems feel they can come forward and seek help. Creating the conditions for openness about sexually disordered and sexually exploitive behavior includes addressing the need for factual information. The state-by-state sex offender registries were meant to assist law enforcement and probation and parole officers in the supervision of those who have been convicted of sex crimes, not to create conditions of greater danger to community members. The Georgia Legislature’s passage of harsh new restrictions on registered sex offenders prompted Stop It Now! Georgia’s public education is a critical first step in protecting children from child sexual abuse. In accordance with O. C. G. A.  §Ã‚  42-1-12, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI) is the central repository for Georgias Violent Sexual Offender Registry. Williams, 2011) The Georgia Bureau of Investigation makes every effort to ensure that the information contained in the Georgia Sex Offender Registry is accurate. As the information is provided by other agencies and entities and is continuously changing, the GBI makes no promise or any express or implied guarantee concerning the accuracy of this information. The G eorgia Public Policy Foundation (GPPF) is a free-market think tank based in Atlanta, Georgia, USA. The President and Chief Executive Officer is Rogers Wade. Its board of directors currently includes twenty seven men and women from around the state. The foundation were established in the fall of 1991. The mission of the foundation is to be the most respected and influential source of public policy research, analysis and education in Georgia. The foundation states its belief that good public policy is based upon fact, an understanding of sound economic principles and the core principles of our free enterprise system economic freedom, limited government, personal responsibility, individual initiative, respect for private property and the rule of law. In 2004, the foundation was ranked in the November-December issue of James Magazine for being No. 1 for highest integrity and No. 3 for most knowledgeable among business organizations or state associations. (Williams, 2011) At its best, community re-entry becomes a cooperative process with a role for all of use to play in preventing future sexual assaults, whether as a private citizen, a publi c official, or agency professional. True primary prevention demands that each of us be accountable for educating ourselves with a clear understanding of the facts, so we as American citizens can take the necessary actions in our personal and professional lives to prevent the sexual abuse and sexual exploitation of children. To conclude, Public policy is policies making by governments. A governments public policy is the set of policies (laws, plans, actions, behaviors) that it chooses. Since governments claim authority and responsibility (to varying degrees) over a arge group of individuals, they see fit to establish plans and methods of action that will govern that society. Georgia has several different programs that benefit victims and their families after being victimized. The federal government funds these programs and makes them available to everyone in the community. People have to become more aware of sexual offenders in our community. This is a crime that continues to rise if the Public does not take action to i t immediately. Reference Page: Brown, Mark 2009. Dangerous Offenders: Punishment and Social Order. New York: NY Geffner, Robert 2008 Identifying and Treating Sex Offenders: Current Approaches, Research, and Techniques. Binghamton, NY; The Haworth Maltreatment ; Trauma Press Lee, R. D. , Johnson, R. W. , ; Joyce, P. G. (2008) Public budgeting systems (8th ed. ). Sudbury, MA: Jones and Bartlett Schuster II, W. Michael 2010 For the Greater Good: The Use of Public Policy Considerations in Confirming Plans of Reorganization New York: LFB Scholarly Publishing, LLC Williams, Cathy The Georgia Public Policy foundation retrieved from http://www. gppf. org/ on June 5, 2011

Sustaining IT Value for the Organization Essays

Sustaining IT Value for the Organization Essays Sustaining IT Value for the Organization Essay Sustaining IT Value for the Organization Essay Leadership Principles Principle No. 1 Set the azimuth for the organization. Continuously communicate the company’s mission, vision and values. The leader is expected to remind the employees the company’s core objective so that they can be motivated to counter the competition in the environment. IT is constantly improving and innovation is widely being experienced in the competitive environment so to stay ahead of the game, the leader is supposed to relate the company’s goals and ensure that the IT technology developed is bent towards the goals and company values (Tapscott Caston,1993). Principle No. 2 Listen to your teammates. Never pass up an opportunity to keep your mouth shut. Leaders in the organization should encourage dialogue through horizontal and vertical information so that they can evaluate IT suggestions effectively. Feedback concerning the realized impact of the technology to the organization is necessary to develop strategies to either improve it or maintain its current form. The leader should not impose strategies, measure on the workforce, and disregard their opinions. Teamwork increases the output because of less tension and conflicts. IT Leadership philosophy IT leadership needs objective assessment of the entire IT portfolios of the company. This is important because it allows for effective project planning with reduced costs and risks. The leader is able to pre-determine the best way forward in the company to improve it and counter losses. According to Van (2001), a leader must also evaluate the amount of money spent on IT to control the type of IT investments and ensure that they are aligned to the company’s long-term goals. Making the most appropriate choice concerning the options of IT investments provides a condition of reliability and compatibility of the technology and the business activities of the company. Finally, the leader should accurate in planning and taking action on the proposed IT projects.

Macon Bolling Allen, the First African-American Licensed Attorney

Macon Bolling Allen, the First African-American Licensed Attorney Macon Bolling Allen was not only the first African-American licensed to practice law in the United States, he was also the first to hold a judicial post. Allen was born A. Macon Bolling in 1816 in Indiana. As a free African-American, Allen learned to read and write. As a young adult, he gained employment as a schoolteacher. Allen Becomes an Attorney During the 1840s, Allen moved to Portland, Maine. Although it is unclear why Allen moved to Maine, historians believe it may have been because it was a free state. While in Portland, he changed his name to Macon Bolling Allen. Employed by General Samuel Fessenden- an abolitionist and lawyer- Allen worked as a clerk and studied law. Fessenden encouraged Allen to pursue a license to practice law because anyone could be admitted to the Maine Bar association if they were considered to have good character. However, Allen was initially rejected because he was not considered a citizen because he was African-American. However, Allen then decided to take the bar examination to bypass his lack of citizenship. On July 3, 1844, Allen passed the exam and became licensed to practice law. Yet, despite earning the right to practice law, Allen was unable to find much work as an attorney for two reasons: many whites were not willing to hire a black attorney and there were very few African-Americans living in Maine. By 1845, Allen moved to Boston. Allen opened an office with Robert Morris Sr. Their office became the first African-American law office in the United States. Although Allen was able to make a modest income in Boston, racism and discrimination were still presentpreventing him from being successful. As a result, Allen took an exam to become a Justice of the Peace for Middlesex County in Massachusetts. As a result, Allen became the first African-American to hold a judicial position in the United States. Allen decided to relocate to Charleston following the Civil War. Once settled, Allen opened a law office with two other African-American attorneysWilliam J. Whipper and Robert Brown. The passing of the fifteenth amendment inspired Allen to become involved in politics and he became active in the Republican Party. By 1873, Allen was appointed a judge on the Inferior Court of Charleston. The following year, he was elected as a probate judge for Charleston County in South Carolina. Following the Reconstruction period in the south, Allen relocated to Washington D.C. and worked as a lawyer for the Land and Improvement Association. Abolition Movement After becoming licensed to practice law in Boston, Allen caught the attention of abolitionists such as William Lloyd Garrison. Allen attended an anti-slavery meeting in Boston. Most notably, he attended the anti-slavery convention in May 1846. At the convention, a petition was passed around in opposition to involvement in the Mexican War. However, Allen did not sign the petition, arguing that he was supposed to defend the United States Constitution. This argument was made public in a letter written by Allen that was published in the Liberator. However, Allen ended his letter arguing that he still adamantly opposed enslavement. Marriage and Family Life Very little is known about Allens family in Indiana. However, once moving to Boston, Allen met and married his wife, Hannah. The couple had five sonsJohn, born in 1852; Edward, born in 1856; Charles, born in 1861; Arthur, born in 1868 and Macon B. Jr., born in 1872. According to United States Census records, all of Allens sons worked as schoolteachers. Allens Death Allen died on October 10, 1894, in Washington D.C. He was survived by his wife and one son.

There is no place in a modern constitution for prerogative powers Essay

There is no place in a modern constitution for prerogative powers. They have received no democratic seal of approval, Their amenability to judicial review is - Essay Example In other words, the Constitution does not operate usually in abnormal times, and both the existence of a "wartime" constitution and the potential for "constitutional dictatorship" follow from that relevant fact. In spite of sporadic rhetoric, in contrast to statutes and decisions, very little has really changed in two centuries from the way presidents have invariably acted during a dire emergency. In answering Lincoln's question, raised in 1861, constitutional democracy can be very strong to keep up its own existence without undermining the liberties of the people it has been formed to protect. But the nation's political leadership must be so liable and at the same time be willing to stick to constitutional constraints. Saying that, let me now spell out the content and issues that follow for discussion: 1) the president must possess emergency powers capable of operating in abnormal times; 2) prerogative powers innately belong to the president in his capacity as political head of the nation and definitive guardian of the Constitution; 3) the Bush administration is making many of the same mistakes in its war on terror as the Johnson and Nixon administrations made with regard to the earlier Vietnam misadventure; 4) Congress, while salvaging its capacity to work out real legislative supervision over the presidential use of war powers in 1973-76, finds itself reluctant or unable to say no to the President since September 11, 2001; 5) legislation enacted since the terrorist attack in New York and anywhere else has engorged not only the President's ability to take the nation into war but has revolutionized the whole concept of separation of powers/checks and balances; and 6) emergency/prerogative power mu st be used in a terrible emergency only, and when the initial emergency situation comes to an end so should the unregulated use of outstanding presidential power. In Federalist No. 23, Alexander Hamilton, writing about the idea of crisis government and the need for indeterminate power in the national government, announced that the war powers "should exist without restraint, because it is impossible to anticipate or define the degree and variety of national emergencies, and the correspondent extent and variety of the means which may be indispensable to please them." (4) The period of civil war permanently transformed our understanding of the war powers. Lincoln's imaginative combining of the commander-in-chief, take care, and executive power clauses into a notion of presidential war power independent of legislative authority--where ends justified means--laid to rest the earlier, limited meaning of commander-in-chief. Lincoln's assertion of this independent, virtually unlimited war power, held together by Locke's "prerogative" theory, (5) was legitimized and sanctioned by the Supreme Court within two years. (6) This transformation set the stage for the modern presidential office, applied the notion of constitutional dictatorship in the United States, and began the development of the "wartime" constitution. Earlier in the development of the Republic, generally that period from Abraham Lincoln to Franklin Roosevelt, presidents would act illegally and then depend upon Congress to ratify their actions after the

Cinematography in Bollywood and Hollywood Research Paper

Cinematography in Bollywood and Hollywood - Research Paper Example The research is aimed at comparing the cinematography techniques in Bollywood and Hollywood. The research will compare the various shooting methods used in the two film industries, especially in regards to the similarities and differences. This research is aimed at discovering the effect of the cinematography techniques on the final product of the film industry, which in turn provides the justification for the stiff competition in the industries. It is evident that the cinematography techniques used in film production goes a long way in affecting the culture of the final consumer. Quantitative research has indicated that culture in many countries is usually affected by the depictions in the movies, and this qualitative research will emphasize the effect of the cinematography techniques on the movie itself. Research Design As already stated, this research is a quantitative study that aims to compare the cinematography techniques of Bollywood and Hollywood. This comparative study will compare the techniques used by film directors to depict their movies, and thus affect the audience. The qualitative research design methodology that will be used is historical research design. In this process, two historical movies, one each from the Bollywood and Hollywood film production industry will be analyzed. As already stated, the research problem is the difference between the movies produced in Hollywood and those produced in Bollywood. The research will rely on inductive and logical reasoning to determine the differences between the two movie productions. After the identification of the research problem, the next step is the collection and evaluation of primary source data. The source data in this case will be the two movies being analyzed for the differences in cinematography styles. Scope and Sample The scope of research usually identified the areas that the researcher is trying to study and the expected conclusions, analyses and results. In this case, the broad research scope for this study is to find the differences and similarities between the two movie industries mentioned above. This research will focus on the cinematography styles used in the two industries, which will be a representative of the whole industry. As already stated in the research proposal, the research will focus on the following questions that will set out the scope of the paper. 1) What are the preferred shooting methods and techniques in Hollywood? 2) What are the preferred shooting and techniques in the Bollywood film Industry? 3) What are the effects of the shooting techniques and methods on the final products of the Bollywood films and Hollywood films? As already mentioned, the sample that will be used in this research is a cross-section of movies and films from the two movie industries. The movies will each be analyzed in terms of their cinematographic techniques and the effects of the techniques on the final product. Research Instruments Qualitative research based on hi storical or past events or procedures is usually evaluated differently from other kinds of research. As already stated, the two movies that will be analyzed will be analyzed in terms of their cinematography techniques. This means that the movies will be analyzed using inductive and logical reasoning. Since the research is historical, the two main techniques that will be used are external and internal criticism. This means that

Body language Essay Example for Free

Body language Essay Gestures- an example of an gesture would be a thumbs up to refer to well done. I tried to use hand gesture to help the women to understand what I was saying.  Body language body language is a broad term for forms of communication using body movements or gestures instead of, or in addition to, sounds, verbal language, or other forms of communication. It forms part of the category of paralanguage, which describes all forms of human communication that are not verbal language. This includes the most subtle of movements that many people are not aware of, including winking and slight movement of the eyebrows. I tried to adapt to Egan theory of SOLER by leaning forward to show that I was interested. Listening- if we are not talking we are listening to what others are saying and trying to understand there views our body language can tell if we are listening to a persons whenever any body was talking I would lean forward to shows that I am interested. Because it was an group interactions I had to give other people the chance to talk and t get their opinion across  * Expression- facial expression can send very complex message that can be read easily. I tried to use a good facial expression to make her feel comfortable and welcomed. Eye contact Eye contact is the event when two people look at each others eyes at the same time. I kept good eye contact with her to show that I was actually listening and with the other members of the group  One 2 one seven year old boy  Verbal-  Tone /Pitch its not just what we say, but the way we say it. If we were to talk very fast in a loud voice with a fixed voice tone,  people may think that we are angry and shouting. I did not shout at the seven year old boy and I talk out a tone and pitch in which he could hear clearly. Slangs and jargons- I did not use slang in my dialect. This is because slang is mostly associated with teenagers and also he may not understand what I was saying  Pace the pace is the speed in which I talk. I can talk fast and I can talk slow. Because he is a kid I had to talk slow so that she can understand  Non verbal  Gestures- an example of an gesture would be a thumbs up to refer to well done. I tried to use hand gesture to help the boy to understand what I was saying and also used hand gesture when I had to take the boy to the toilet I had to hold his hands. Body language -. This includes the most subtle of movements that many people are not aware of, including winking and slight movement of the eyebrows. I tried to adapt to Egan theory of SOLER by leaning forward to show that I was interested. I did not stand over him Listening- if we are not talking we are listening to what others are saying and trying to understand there views our body language can tell if we are listening to a persons whenever any body was talking I would lean forward to shows that I am interested. Because it was an group interactions I had to give other people the chance to talk and t get their opinion across. Expression- facial expression can send very complex message that can be read easily. I tried to use a good facial expression to make him feel comfortable and welcomed by smiling a lot.  Eye contact Eye contact is the event when two people look at each others eyes at the same time. I kept good eye contact with him to show that I was actually listening to him.  The care value base is very important. The care value base is used widely in the field of health , social care and early years. The care value base is used to describe a set of principles that were thought to be relevant to the health and social care practitioners. The care value base can be used as an ethnical guide to decision making and practice in health, social care and early years setting. The care value base is used to be certain that care works or practitioners are not discriminating, being unkind, or providing poor care for their patients or service users The care value base covers five main areas:  1. Promoting anti-discriminatory practice  2. Maintaining confidentiality  3. Promoting and supporting individuals rights and respect  4. Acknowledging individuals personal beliefs and identities  5. Promoting effective communication  The care value base can form part of a code of conduct, or a professional code of ethics for anyone working in a caring profession. The car value base has become more important due to the fact the country has become more and more multicultural and ethnically diverse. Also there more people with disability. Laws have been passed which prohibit discrimination on the grounds of race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, age, disability etc. is therefore vital that people do not feel discriminated against when they are using care services.

Fahrenheit 451 - A Structured and Censored World :: Fahrenheit 451 Essays

Fahrenheit 451 - A Structured and Censored World Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 forces us to envision a world that is so structured and censored fireman exist not to fight fires, for all buildings are fireproof, but instead to burn books. Fahrenheit 451 is a horrific account of what could happen in an all too close future when society carries "political correctness" to its extreme. One of the primary characters that one meets in Fahrenheit 451 is a young girl named Clarrise has been raised to live the way things once were, in a time where people had true freedom Because of Clarrise's view of life she is branded as anti-social by her teachers and an outcast by her fellow classmates. Clarrise becomes acquainted with another main character named Guy Montag. Montag is a fireman who deep inside does not want to live a life without having to think. Montag's inner thoughts become more and more a part of him as the book progresses. Montag eventually becomes a freedom fighter of sorts when he joins a group of people who illegally hide and re ad books. Montag's wife Mildred on the other hand prefers not to have to think, but rather to allow others to think for her to simply say "yes I agree." Mildred is the epitome of laziness. The most complex of all the characters is the fire chief Beatty. Beatty is a man who once was educated but has now turned his back on education and works to destroy it. Beatty knows what is in books but chooses not to care, not to do anything but help the destruction of books. The loss of the characters freedom to read and to think was not an act that was forced on the people but, embraced by the people. The people loved the idea of not having to think anymore. The desire to confront issues was gradually lost by the people. Since the desire the desire to confront issues was lost people stopped doing anything that was so called "politically incorrect" so as to affend no one. After a while not confronting issues became so natural that anyone who did was considered odd and a threat.

Environmental Laws of Bangladesh

The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at www. emeraldinsight. com/0959-6119. htm IJCHM 18,4 Hotels’ environmental management systems (ISO 14001): creative ? nancing strategy Wilco W. Chan and Kenny Ho School of Hotel and Tourism Management, Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Hong Kong Abstract Purpose – Environmental concerns have been increasing in the travel industry. However, most hotels are unwilling to develop an international environmental management system (EMS) probably due to a lack of resources and knowledge.In order to encourage more organizations to take part in the EMS, three cases adopting international EMS are investigated to ascertain the ways to support the formation of EMS. Based on their experience, hoteliers are encouraged to team up with green members to apply for research funding for the investigation and implementation of EMS. Also, â€Å"energy performance contracting† methods to ? nance environmenta l improvement projects in hotels were also discussed.Design/methodology/approach – A single case study approach was adopted to illustrate the differences in the resources mobilization for setting EMS in these three hotels. A search of documentary evidence and interviews with hotel staff was the main instrument for data collection. Findings – The Shangri-la Hotel used its own resources to set up its EMS and strategically used its developed template for other hotels in the group to follow. The other two hotels, Nikko and Grandstanford, adopted a creative and â€Å"non-balance sheet† approach to mobilize resources for the formation of EMS.Both hotels have recourse to external resources including a university’s engineering department, hotel management school, green bodies, government funds and trade associations to develop and implement the EMS. The study further identi? ed energy performance contracting as another promising ? nancing tool for the implementat ion of the energy-related part of the EMS. Research limitations/implications – The representative and general nature of the ? ndings are limited to large hotels in metropolitan areas, as the three case hotels are located in the metropolis of Hong Kong.Practical implications – The ? ndings provide informative details on how to secure external resources to set up internationally recognized environmental management systems and the safe way for hotel operators to trial use energy-saving facilities. Originality/value – This study provides indications and details on some creative ? nancing techniques for setting up EMS in hotels. These ? nancial strategies are the ? rst of their kind in print and can serve as a useful reference for hotels to develop international EMS. Keywords Environmental management, Hotels, Financing Paper type Case study 302International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management Vol. 18 No. 4, 2006 pp. 302-316 q Emerald Group Publishing Limit ed 0959-6119 DOI 10. 1108/09596110610665311 Introduction Many efforts on environmental protection work in hotels in the 1990s were a continuation of some long-standing environmental concerns such as energy Support for the author from Mr Tamiyasu Okawa and Mr Jean-Marie Leclercq, the present general manager and ex-general manager of The Hotel Nikko Hongkong is gratefully acknowledged. The author would also like to thank The Hong Kong Hotel Association for the help in providing valuable information. onservation, sewage discharge, air and noise pollution that occurred over the past few decades (Stipanuk, 1996). Coupled with this development have been the growing concerns for a â€Å"green† hotel in the eyes of customers. A study indicated that 75 percent of interviewed customers claimed that they were environmentally-minded consumers and would choose hotels which showed concern for the environment (Feiertag, 1994). Also, Cook et al. (1992) pointed out that business in the travel industry was required to adapt to new environmental realities and to implement environmental policies and strategies.In 1995, a comprehensive environmental action checklist and action development guide for small and medium-sized hotels was jointly published by international hotel and environmental associations (International Hotel and Restaurant Association, 1995). This publication provided hotels with more detailed information to launch environmental management systems (EMS). Under these circumstances, EMS, as across the world, has recently become more recognized in the hotel industry. Almost all hotels have implemented their in-house EMS with varying degrees of intensity.Kirk’s survey found that the most signi? cant bene? t of environmental management was the improvement in public image and better relationships with the local community (Kirk, 1995). However, many hoteliers with written environmental policies saw the greatest bene? t in ? nancial management performance. Thu s, to implement the EMS, the ? rst step is to have a clear environmental policy, objectives, targets and good planning. To further enhance effectiveness, hoteliers should always monitor and review the system after the implementation.However, due to resource limitations, many hotels’ environmental efforts pause after they have taken some environmental actions such as implementation of water saving campaign, installation of energy-ef? cient lighting, reuse of waste paper and other initiatives. Recent ISO 14000 series provides an effective guideline on the content of EMS, auditing, environmental performance evaluation and so on, as shown in the appendix. Among them, ISO 14001 documents all essential elements in the EMS as shown in Table I. Most importantly, a successful EMS requires a lot of resources, including manpower, cost and time for planning (Sayre, 1996).The costs arising from the implementation of ISO 14001 include those associated with initial set-up, maintenance and i mprovement (Chin et al. , 1998). The cost of initial set-up refers to all costs associated with the provision of hardware and software facilities, plus tools for establishing the system in compliance with the ISO 14000 EMS standards. Speci? cally this category of cost involves the purchase of monitoring and measuring equipment, documentation processing and storage equipment/accessories, hiring specialist environmental assistance, initial staff training, computer software as well as staff recruitment.Added to the cost pool is the ? nancing of maintenance and improvements. This category of expenditure refers to the costs of maintaining and continually improving the EMS in the company so that optimum environmental performance can be achieved with the changing environmental conditions and requirements. It also includes the costs associated with ongoing staff training, environment equipment replacement and upgrading, periodic environmental auditing and third-party certi? cation and so fo rth. Environmental management systems 303 IJCHM 18,4 1. 2. 2. 1 2. 2 2. 3 2. 4 3. 3. 1 3. 2 3. 3. 4 3. 5 3. 6 3. 7 4. 4. 1 4. 2 4. 3 4. 4 5. Environmental policy Planning Environmental aspects Legal and other requirements Objectives and targets Environmental management program(s) Implementation and operation Structure and responsibility Training, awareness and competence Communication Environmental management system documentation Document control Operational control Emergency preparedness and response Checking and corrective action Monitoring and measurement Non-conformance and corrective and preventive action Records Environmental management system audit Management review 04 Table I. ISO 14001 environmental management system elementsSource: Fredericks and McCallum (1998) In addition, EMS certi? cation costs at least HK$100,000 (about US$13,000) should also be budgeted (Anon, 1996). The cost is paid to the certifying body, which would examine whether the hotel has ful? lled all the necessary conditions of international EMS standard ISO 14001. However, most organizations lack the knowledge, experience and expertise required to develop an EMS and many are unable or unwilling to commit the required staff and ? ancial resources to undertake this development (Chapman, 1997). Earlier studies also found that lodging customers in the US are not willing to pay extra to support environmental policies (Watkins, 1994; Jaffe, 1993). However, some hotels launched pilot schemes to encourage guests to contribute to local environmental schemes (Green, 1995). Though new international EMS standard ISO 14001 certi? cates in Hong Kong have recently been obtained by several hotels, the progress on industry-wide adoption is still slow. The phenomenon is not just con? ned to Hong Kong.Pryce (2001) highlighted, according to a Pricewaterhouse Coopers’ report, that only 40 percent of large hotel groups surveyed in Europe had a formal EMS and only one was externally veri? ed. Pryc e (2001) further quoted the results of a survey of small and medium-sized hotels in three UK countries and pointed out that none of these hotels had implemented a formal EMS. Thus, it is valuable to understand how environmental pioneers in the hotel sector, Shangri-la, Nikko and Grandstanford set up their EMS under resource constraints. Especially after the Asian ? ancial crisis, 9/11 event and SARS, the resources available to the hotel sector appear to be less than before. Therefore, the principal objective of the study is to identify and analyze the ways that these hotels mobilize resources to establish EMS up to ISO 14001, especially any creative and non-conventional ? nancing (that is neither debt or equity issues, nor borrowing or requesting funds from the hotel owners). Methodology The approach adopted in the study is close to action research, using case studies that aim to explore the rich background of the cases.As the purpose of this study is to explore the variations in en vironmental management systems and its associated ? nancing measures, the study adopted a non-traditional case selection criterion. Decisions are based on which case studies provide the most fruitful data for the research question (Doyle, 2003) or provide the most â€Å"opportunity to learn† (Stake, 2000). In addition, the investigating topic is new and falls into the â€Å"timing in the early stages of the ? eld†, studies of individual cases are particularly suitable (Eisenstadt, 1991).These single cases have been used to offer vivid, powerful and penetrative descriptions of events, relationships, and ways of working that are not captured by existing theories (Cunningham, 1997; Crane, 1998; Dyer and Wilkins, 1991). To analyze these cases strategically, a descriptive framework consisting of search of documentary evidence and interviews with hotel staff of the hotels studied was developed to organize case studies. The documentation encompasses hotel EMS manual, universi ty’s published reports, fund application documents, periodicals, and hotel reports.The total number of interviewees is 14 including one owner representative, two general managers, one resident manager, three chief engineers, four green managers or quality assurance managers and three departmental head’s assistants. Shangri-la case The island Shangri-la hotel is a ? ve-star hotel located at the top of a large shopping complex near Central Hong Kong, and with 565 rooms and seven catering outlets. In September 1996, it started the process of developing an EMS and soon became the ? rst hotel in Asia to obtain ISO 14001 certi? ation. Its prompt development of EMS up to international standards is based on its existing â€Å"best practice† in each department. The EMS brings signi? cant bene? ts – reputation and competitive edge – to the hotel and these bene? ts have always outweighed the cost (Tsai et al. , 2003). In general, the funding sources of most l arge business are mainly derived from equity and debt issues. For Shangri-la’s environment management system, it most likely came from internal resources of the group (Tan, 2004).A further investigation of the group’s annual reports indicate that, apart from funds originating from regular income, the group issued convertible bonds with the total principal amount of US$258 million with interest at the rate of 2. 875 percent per annum. This implies that ? nancing for environmental works should not just be limited to equity ? nancing, reserve and income fund. Funds available from debt ? nancing can also be considered as an alternative. The successful ISO 14001 certi? cation in Hong Kong’s Island Shangri-la hotel provides a model for the groups’ other hotels to set up environmental management systems and its certi? ation. An environmental management manual was also developed to address the immediate and long-term environmental impact of hotel Environmental ma nagement systems 305 IJCHM 18,4 306 operations. In addition, an environmental consultant was hired to inspect hotels to ensure not merely that the EMS is being maintained but that continual environmental improvement is achieved by setting new environmental goals (Shangri-la Hotels Group, 2005). Therefore, Shangri-la’s certi? cation in Hong Kong can be regard as a pilot practice and reusable resource for further development of EMS in the group’s other hotels that do not have a proper EMS.Nikko’s case Hotel Nikko Hongkong (Nikko) is a member of Nikko Hotels International, with headquarter in Tokyo, Japan. The hotel continues the tradition of Japanese hospitality, which is renowned throughout the world. Opened in April 1988, Hotel Nikko Hongkong is a ? ve-star deluxe hotel in Hong Kong, with 462 rooms. The hotel is located at Tsim Sha Tsui East overlooking Victoria Harbour in Hong Kong. Environmental protection has always been at the heart of the philosophy of Nikk o. Even as early as 1992, the hotel was pushing for environmental improvements by implementing energy and water conservation practices throughout the hotel.As soon as the green practices on water and energy were on track, the hotel started looking for ways to minimize waste production (Hotel Nikko Hongkong, 1999). Over the past years, the management and staff of Nikko have continued through different stages of improvement on the environment. Nikko is the leader in implementing EMS in the Hong Kong hotel industry. The environmental management system (based on the ISO 14001 standard) of Nikko was set up in April 1999 (Hotel Nikko Hongkong, 1999). However, before Nikko’s completion of EMS implementation, Nikko did face many dif? culties and had spent tremendous efforts on environmental protection.Among these, resources and ? nancial support are the main concerns in launching an EMS campaign. Operating budgets may not allow hoteliers the extravagance of calling in expert consulta nts to set up the environmental system. While operating budgets were tight, Nikko from 1992 sought help from community bodies such as academic institutions and government departments (Department of Building Services Engineering and Hotel Nikko Hongkong, 1996). Partnership with community bodies Over the past years, Nikko developed a cohesive partnership with outside bodies in implementing its EMS.The collaborating partners of Nikko are categorized as four types. These include educational establishments, green bodies, government’s departments as well as the industry council. Collaboration with community bodies is one way to reduce costs of research and enables hotels to acquire funds for ongoing environmental work. Figure 1 shows the relationship between Nikko and its partners, plus the contribution of these partners in supporting Nikko’s environmental endeavors. Nikko has gained support and recognition from partners such as the Hong Kong Hotel Association (HKHA), govern ment’sIndustry Department (ID), Friends of the Earth and other environmentally-friendly enterprises. With the help of those partners, Nikko has successfully solved resource-oriented problems in launching the hotel’s environmental activities and eventually obtained the ISO 14001 certi? cate. Environmental management systems 307 Figure 1. Relationship in partnership of Hotel Nikko Hongkong Educational establishments The major educational partner of Nikko is the Department of Building Services Engineering of The Hong Kong Polytechnic University.Table II shows various projects or publications conducted by the educational department in improving many aspects of Nikko’s EMS. As can be seen from Table II, most of the student-assisted research focused on evaluating the performance of environmental improvement that required a signi? cant resource. The ex-GM said that collaboration with universities was a program of mutual bene? ts. On the side of universities, students m ight have on-site working opportunity provided by Nikko whilst professors might use Nikko as a test case. For Nikko, the hotelier might save a huge amount of research costs, as most of the research work is unpaid.Besides, the University’s School of Hotel and Tourism Management and Hong Kong University of Science and Technology’s (HKUST) Institute for Environmental Studies also lend their effort in supporting the hotel’s environmental pursuits. The former assisted in the compilation of the energy and water conservation guide and the IJCHM 18,4 Student research project 1998-2000 308 Publications 1996 and 1998 Table II. Joint projects collaborated by Nikko and the Department of Building Services Engineering of the Hong Kong Polytechnic University 1. Indoor air quality study 2.Review of building labeling scheme – checking compliance with energy ef? ciency codes 3. Parameter setting for boiler and chiller data log – calibration of equipment 4. Air ? ow balance and distribution in hotel food and beverage outlets 5. Indoor air quality survey 6. Opportunities for energy ef? cient lighting retro? t 7. Study of power factor and distribution losses 1. Keeping Hong Kong’s Hotel Industry Competitive into the Twenty-? rst Century – Environmental Management Systems for Hotels. With overall objective helping the Hong Kong hotel industry to be more competitive and pro? able and, at the same time, reduce adverse environmental impacts 2. A Guide to Energy and Water Conservation in Hotels. Aimed to contribute to reduce energy and water consumption in all hotels, contributing to their pro? tability whilst helping to protect the environment for future generations. Based on a number of energy and water conservation projects carried out in hotel buildings in Hong Kong, but particularly the extensive range of projects at Hotel Nikko Hongkong Source: Hotel Nikko Hongkong (1999) latter was involved in bidding for a HK$1 million fund (arou nd US$130,000) for developing an EMS template for hotels.As such, the hotel’s environmental performance and operating ef? ciency would increase. This partnership creates a win-win situation. Environmental-supporting parties Nikko has set up a cohesive partnership with parties endorsing environment conservation. Friends of the Earth Association supports Nikko’s efforts in saving energy and improving environmental performance. The parties provided Nikko with the latest environmental information related to the hotel industry and shared their professional ideas or recommendations with Nikko. In this way, Nikko saved costs in information collection and expert consultancy.Furthermore, the environmental-supporting groups usually give recognition to environmental-friendly businesses, including Nikko, with outstanding performance. The award is not merely a simple recognition of effort in environment conservation, but also adds to their reputation and can become a strong stimulu s to push environmental conscious visitors choosing Nikko. Government departments In 1997, Nikko received the Energy Ef? cient Building Award 1997 from the Planning, Environment and Lands Bureau. In 1998, Nikko further joined with other partners and successfully obtained HK$1 million from the Industry Support Fund of the IndustryDepartment for a project entitled â€Å"Keeping Hong Kong’s hotel industry competitive into the twenty-? rst century – environmental management systems for hotels†. The project aimed to develop an EMS template for the local hotel sector. Apart from awards and funds, cohesive linkage with governments and bureaus also enable Nikko to have up-to-date environment-related legislation data more easily, and express its ideas more directly to government of? cials. Industry councils Hotel Nikko plays an active role in sharing experiences and participating in projects proposed by the local hotel association, the Hong Kong Hotel Association (HKHA). In return, Nikko receives relevant environmental information from other member hotels of the association. The association also assisted Nikko by assigning its Environmental Committee to take up an advisory role in the above-mentioned EMS template development. In addition, the association also helped in translating the Guide to Energy and Water Conservation in Hotels developed by Nikko into Chinese by introducing Zhengzhou Holiday Inn and Zhengzhou Crowne Plaza to aid the translation. Nikko’s endeavor and effort was further recognized by international industry councils.In 1995, the International Hotels and Restaurants Association granted Nikko the award â€Å"Corporate Green Hotelier of the Year 1995†. The award further identi? es Nikko as a successful leader in the global green hotel movement. Inter-continental Grand Stanford Grand Stanford is a waterfront ? ve-star hotel located in Tsim Sha Tsui East. It has 579 rooms and four food and beverage outlets. The hotel was managed by Holiday Inn in the 1980s and by the owner’s management company in the 1990s.The resources available to the development of ISO 14001 EMS in Inter-continental Grand Stanford mainly include Nikko’s experience, the government funded scheme of hotel environmental system, and university’s assistance (Chan, 2005). Thanks to Nikko generous sharing of ISO 14001 certi? cation experience and the data required for setting up an EMS, Grand Stanford’s senior management embarked on the development of EMS under ISO 14001 version in the early 2000s. Besides Nikko’s experience, Grand Stanford also bene? ts substantially from the government funded scheme bout the environmental assessment of the hotel buildings. The scheme includes the development of a number of environmental assessment manuals for different phases of hotels – project, new building and existing building. In addition, Grand Stanford also acted like Nikko in the past by co-operating wi th nearby university to conduct a number of measurements for environmental performance indicators. Apart from these external resources, Grand Stanford also progressively employed internal funds to install energy-saving facilities including heat pumps for the hot water system and solar-control ? m for windows.Implications Based on the investigation of these three cases, the study summarized the similarities and differences in their approaches. As shown in Table III, all these hotels have strong partnerships with green bodies and have been involved in sharing experience with trade association, other hotels and government. Two hotels were also found to have strong collaboration with a university’s engineering department and hotel school. The Environmental management systems 309 IJCHM 18,4 Collaborate with university’s: 1.Engineering department 2. Hotel school Nikko ? ? ? ? ? Shangri-la Grand Stanford ? ? 310 Partnership with environmental supporting parties Written suppor t to apply: 1. Government fund 2. Private fund Free EMS template Sharing experience from: 1. Trade association 2. Other hotels 3. Of? cial department Internal reserve or debt issue ? ? ? ? Table III. Similarities and differences in approaches ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? former provides technical expertise and the latter provide operational knowledge in the environmental projects in hotels.In terms of monetary investment, one hotel placed a large amount on formation of EMS while the other purchased a number of energy saving facilities. In fact, the project funds secured by Nikko represent a small part of the funds available in the community. Further research indicated that there are other sources of funds available for quality environmental projects, as shown in Table IV. However if one wants to successfully secure the funds, a good and meaningful proposal for application of funds is required.This implies an experienced proposal writer and a team of related experts is a pre-requisite. Agai n, this type of caliber is not easily available in hotels. Thus, collaboration with educational institutes in writing up the proposal may enhance the likelihood of success. Energy performance contracting Besides applications for public or private funding for hotel’s environmental work, energy performance contracting can be considered as another alternative to ? nance environmental improvement.Performance contracting is a unique arrangement where contractors usually assume responsibility for purchasing and installing the equipment, as well as maintenance throughout the contract. Only when the installed equipment actually reduces expenses does the contractor get paid. This allows the hotel owners to make necessary improvements while investing very little money up front. Meanwhile, it is also a risk-sharing relationship between the host and the contractor that is sometimes called as the Energy Service Company (ESCO) (Woodruff and Turner, 1998).ESCO is a company that provides bot h the technical expertise to reduce energy costs and the ? nance for energy ef? ciency investments. In the UK, performance contracting is called contract energy management (The Chartered Institution of Building Services Engineers, 1991). In fact, the name is relatively new, but some of the companies in the industry have been in business for over 20 years. Name of environmental fund USa Richard King Mellon Foundation John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation The Pew Charitable Trusts The Ford Foundation W. K. Kellogg Foundation The Andrew W.Mellon Foundation Environment Wales The Environmental Action Fund The Environmental Know How Fund The Environmental Protection Research Program Environmental Conservation Fund and Woo Wheelock Green Fund Innovation and Technology Fund: Innovation and Technology Support Program Innovation and Technology Fund: University-Industry Collaboration Program Innovation and Technology Fund: General Support Fund Sustainable Development Fund Competitive E armarked Research Grant (CERG) University Internal Fund Departmental Research Fund in University National Natural Science Foundation (NSFC)Environmental management systems 311 Europeb Hong Kongc Source: a Stein (1993); b Forrester and Casson (1998); c www. itf. gov. hk/Default. asp Table IV. Fund available for quality environmental project According to Hansen and Weisman (1998), performance contracting is now poised on the threshold of even greater opportunities to work with government, utilities, institutions and commercial establishments. In the mid-late 1990s, performance contracting received more attention in the US.For example, the US federal government has used performance contracting to upgrade facilities, even when budgets were being dramatically cut. In essence, they â€Å"sold† some of their future energy savings to an ESCO (Woodruff and Turner, 1998). In the case of Canada, trade associations urged government to fund the set up of ESCO, as there was little prospect for setting up private sector ? rms in the short-term (Association of Energy Engineers, 1998). In Hong Kong, a research report also found that most interviewees considered that performance contracting for energy conservation may be suitable in the future (Chan, 1999).The key elements of applying performance contracting suggested by the interviewees were â€Å"management commitment, government support, technical and human factors†. Conclusions Environmental management systems are well-recognized in the hotel industry across the world. Unfortunately, many hoteliers are unable or unwilling to implement the system due to resources constraints. However, two cases studied reveal that resources for the formation of internationally recognized EMS 14001 can be drawn outside the balance sheet (that is equity and liabilities).In the mid-1990s, two professors’ suggestions that sound environmental management can reduce costs also occurred to IJCHM 18,4 312 Kirk (1995) who subseque ntly advised the hotel business to start with easy-to-achieve and low cost environmental projects. Moderate and high investment projects can be scheduled later when hoteliers had con? dence in and established bene? ts from earlier environmental actions (Iwanowski and Rushmore, 1994; Kirk, 1995). This approach is particularly suitable to hotels with tight resources or when the hotel sector experiences a business downturn.Nevertheless, hoteliers may learn from successful cases, particularly Nikko, and collaborate with various â€Å"green† partners – universities, government, trade associations and green bodies – to work on more complex environmental matters. Speci? cally, hotels can team up with these green members to apply for research funding for the investigation and implementation of EMS. This practice, in turn, accelerates the speed of environmental actions. Apart from EMS with ISO certi? cation, Green Globe 21 also offers a certi? cation to travel-related or ganizations that wished to demonstrate their commitment to environmental improvement.The Green Globe program provides travel and tourism companies with a framework for achieving year on year improvement in environmental performance (Rodgers, 2002). The framework contains ? ve sections, including environmental policy, regulatory framework, environmental performance; EMS as well as requirements for stakeholder consultation and communication. Other-related certi? ed programs may include Australia’s International Ecotourism Standard, Americas’ Sustainable Tourism Certi? cation Network and Europe’s Voluntary Initiatives for Sustainability in Tourism (Hammond, 2004).Similarly, obtaining these certi? cations also requires a signi? cant amount of resources and effort. The ? nancial tools – mainly collaboration between hotel and external parties including universities, governments, trade associations and green bodies – ascertained in these case studies can thus be applied when any organization plans to pursue these programs. Other than green certi? cation granted by ISO and Green Globe, the voluntary environment assessment scheme for hotels (Hong Kong Hotels Association, 2000) also receives a considerable amount of technical resources and research expertise.The scheme sets a scoring scheme in two areas. One is to consider actions by the hotels in endeavoring to reduce environmental impacts through more effective management and maintenance practice. The other is to assess the building facilities performance by referring to indoor environmental performance criteria, local codes of good practice and benchmarked energy and water consumption. As such, hotel’s collaboration with university staff in conducting research and applying for research funds as manifested in the studied cases may provide valuable and enormous assistance to attain a good scoring result.The lesson learnt from these cases reveal that trade association’s p articipation in environmental work cannot be neglected. The association in these cases not merely promoted the green activities by presenting environmental awards and organizing seminars but for instance also coordinated with enthusiastic hotels by arranging transport to ship all discarded bottles for recycling. Most importantly, the association also assisted in writing endorsement letters to apply for funds for creating a template for hotels to develop EMS according to ISO requirements.Thus, the association indeed provides a catalyst function to advance the function of EMS in the industry. Embedded in these supportive activities are enormous time and resources. On the other hand, the government also played an important role in the industry’s green environment, not just by creating environmental funds to assist the business. In fact, the government of? cials have always shared their experience on environmental work with the practitioners. In order to keep updating their envir onmental technology knowledge, the of? ials regularly liaise with manufacturers, professors and their colleagues in the environmental protection department as well as the engineering department. Without their endeavor in environmental improvement, the pace of environmental movement would de? nitely slow down. In the late 1990s, a survey conducted by the United Nations and the International Hotel Association identi? ed a lack of training resource as the major concern when introducing environmental matters in hotel management curricula.The French Ministry of Spatial Planning and Environment together with some hotels have sponsored the production of teaching tools for environmental issues in hospitality curricula (United Nations Environmental Program, 2001). The Hong Kong and French government’s funding in these two cases further indicate the importance of government support in pursuit of sustainable tourism by the industry. In fact, besides funding, the government of? cials hav e always shared their experience on environmental work with practitioners and listen to environmental problems encountered by practitioners. This two-way communication also implies a signi? ant amount of time devoted by both parties. Thus, government’s active participation may hasten the pace of environmental change. Other than the above-mentioned stakeholders in the hotel industry’s pursuit of sustainable tourism development, green groups are also another major contributor. They often complement the university’s environmental research, and green groups have also conducted some environmental research which may, to a certain extent, be applicable to the hotel environment. For instance, Friends of the Earth has investigated disappearing timber in tropical rain forests in relation to buildings.