Books on the topic 'National Quality Framework (NQF)'

These Guidelines are one of the results of the four-year research project “Open Online Learning for Digital and Networked Society” (2017-2021). The project objective was to enable university teachers to design open and online learning through open and online learning curriculum and environment applying learning analytics as a metacognitive tool and creating open and online learning assessment and recognition practices, responding to the needs of digital and networked society. The research of the project resulted in 10 scientific publications and 2 studies prepared by Vytautas Magnus university Institute of Innovative Studies research team in collaboration with their international research partners from Germany, Spain and Portugal. The final stage of the research attempted creating open and online learning assessment and recognition practices, responding to the learner needs in contemporary digital and networked society. The need for open learning recognition has been increasing during the recent decade while the developments of open learning related to the Covid 19 pandemics have dramatically increased the need for systematic and high-quality assessment and recognition of learning acquired online. The given time also relates to the increased need to offer micro-credentials to learners, as well as a rising need for universities to prepare for micro-credentialization and issue new digital credentials to learners who are regular students, as well as adult learners joining for single courses. The increased need of all labour - market participants for frequent and fast renewal of competences requires a well working and easy to use system of open learning assessment and recognition. For learners, it is critical that the micro-credentials are well linked to national and European qualification frameworks, as well as European digital credential infrastructures (e.g., Europass and similar). For employers, it is important to receive requested quality information that is encrypted in the metadata of the credential. While for universities, there is the need to properly prepare institutional digital infrastructure, organizational procedures, descriptions of open learning opportunities and virtual learning environments to share, import and export the meta-data easily and seamlessly through European Digital Hub service infrastructures, as well as ensure that academic and administrative staff has digital competencies to design, issue and recognise open learning through digital and micro-credentials. The first chapter of the Guidelines provides a background view of the European Qualification Framework and National Qualification frameworks for the further system of gaining, stacking and modelling further qualifications through open online learning. The second chapter suggests the review of current European policy papers and consultations on the establishment of micro-credentials in European higher education. The findings of the report of micro-credentials higher education consultation group “European Approach to Micro-credentials” is shortly introduced, as well as important policy discussions taking place. Responding to the Rome Bologna Comunique 2020, where the ministers responsible for higher education agreed to support lifelong learning through issuing micro-credentials, a joint endeavour of DG Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion and DG Research and Innovation resulted in one of the most important political documents highlighting the potential of micro-credentials towards economic, social and education innovations. The consultation group of experts from the Member States defined the approach to micro-credentials to facilitate their validation, recognition and portability, as well as to foster a larger uptake to support individual learning in any subject area and at any stage of life or career. The Consultation Group also suggested further urgent topics to be discussed, including the storage, data exchange, portability, and data standards of micro-credentials and proposed EU Standard of constitutive elements of micro-credentials. The third chapter is devoted to the institutional readiness to issue and to recognize digital and micro-credentials. Universities need strategic decisions and procedures ready to be enacted for assessment of open learning and issuing micro-credentials. The administrative and academic staff needs to be aware and confident to follow these procedures while keeping the quality assurance procedures in place, as well. The process needs to include increasing teacher awareness in the processes of open learning assessment and the role of micro-credentials for the competitiveness of lifelong learners in general. When the strategic documents and procedures to assess open learning are in place and the staff is ready and well aware of the processes, the description of the courses and the virtual learning environment needs to be prepared to provide the necessary metadata for the assessment of open learning and issuing of micro-credentials. Different innovation-driven projects offer solutions: OEPass developed a pilot Learning Passport, based on European Diploma Supplement, MicroHE developed a portal Credentify for displaying, verifying and sharing micro-credential data. Credentify platform is using Blockchain technology and is developed to comply with European Qualifications Framework. Institutions, willing to join Credentify platform, should make strategic discussions to apply micro-credential metadata standards. The ECCOE project building on outcomes of OEPass and MicroHE offers an all-encompassing set of quality descriptors for credentials and the descriptions of learning opportunities in higher education. The third chapter also describes the requirements for university structures to interact with the Europass digital credentials infrastructure. In 2020, European Commission launched a new Europass platform with Digital Credential Infrastructure in place. Higher education institutions issuing micro-credentials linked to Europass digital credentials infrastructure may offer added value for the learners and can increase reliability and fraud-resistant information for the employers. However, before using Europass Digital Credentials, universities should fulfil the necessary preconditions that include obtaining a qualified electronic seal, installing additional software and preparing the necessary data templates. Moreover, the virtual learning environment needs to be prepared to export learning outcomes to a digital credential, maintaining and securing learner authentication. Open learning opportunity descriptions also need to be adjusted to transfer and match information for the credential meta-data. The Fourth chapter illustrates how digital badges as a type of micro-credentials in open online learning assessment may be used in higher education to create added value for the learners and employers. An adequately provided metadata allows using digital badges as a valuable tool for recognition in all learning settings, including formal, non-formal and informal.

The IMS-Arbovirus is a model that provides a methodological framework for arboviral disease prevention and control. It divides the compendium of actions to be taken into the following components, which are not listed in their order of importance: management, epidemiology (with emphasis on health surveillance), laboratory, patient care (clinical), integrated vector management (IVM), and environment (with emphasis on water, sanitation, and hygiene). It also proposes common crosscutting themes for each component: operations research and health communication and promotion for behavioral change. Each component and crosscutting theme is overseen and executed by personnel trained for this purpose. The Integrated Management Strategy for Arbovirus Disease Prevention and Control in the Americas contains a group of indicators selected by the countries, and a trained professional regularly conducts an informal evaluation of the strategy. This evaluation may be based on what the coordinator for each component or the participants in the process report, often based only on their own experiences. Generically, this methodology attempts to organize ideas and the methodologies that should be followed for best performance in an evaluation. The IMS-Arbovirus currently includes monitoring and evaluation from the outset, thus systematically coordinating its planning, monitoring, and evaluation. The main objective is for monitoring and evaluation to serve as a good mechanism for management, course correction, and accountability to advance and improve the quality and impact of management with the preparation of the IMS Arbovirus. The specific objectives are as follows: determine the progress made and barriers implementing the IMS-Arbovirus, formulate recommendations to improve the IMS-Arbovirus Implementation process, and create a monitoring plan based on the evaluation's results.

The EU natural gas system has been developed since the 1960s, following discovery of the Groningen gas field. Climate change and security of supply challenges are affecting the natural gas market, provoking greener innovation including the introduction of renewable gases, such as biogas, which needs to be converted to biomethane (natural gas quality) before injection into the natural gas system and transported cross-border. This chapter examines the legal framework on EU and national level. Special attention is paid to: the extent to which biogas/biomethane is considered a renewable energy source; safety and quality standards; access and connection rules. National gas quality standards may, however, prove to be an obstacle for transportation cross-border. In addition, there is a trend towards cross-border contractual trade in biomethane and slowly emerging organizational developments facilitating cross-border trade in biomethane.

Antimicrobial stewardship (AS) is a coordinated strategy for quality improvement designed to improve the appropriate use of antimicrobial agents to optimize clinical outcomes whilst minimizing collateral antimicrobial effects including antimicrobial resistance andClostridium difficileinfection. AS is a function of the multidisciplinary antimicrobial management team and is dependent on key relationships with infection protection and control, clinical governance, therapeutic, and medical management structures within a healthcare organization. AS should operate within a national framework and is driven by quality improvement and patient safety. Engagement with prescribers through education, surveillance, and audit and feedback are key to the success of an AS programme.

In accordance with the EU's traditional focus on small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) financing and its more recent attempt to support SME access to capital markets, Directive 2014/65/EU (MiFID II) has introduced the new category of SME Growth Markets (GMs). Aimed at preserving the status quo, in which SMEs prefer second-tier exchange-regulated markets, typically in the form of multilateral trading facilities (MTFs), the MiFID II rules employ a ‘light touch’ approach. Under the new regime SME GMs: (1) constitute an optional feature of the MTF regime intended to result in a ‘specific quality label’, and (2) are subject to the rules established by each Member State as applied by the local national competent authority, within the very broad framework provided by MiFID II. This chapter argues that the MiFID II regulation pertaining to SME GMs represents a missed opportunity, if not a source of potential harm to the capital-raising efforts of SMEs.

Attention to the human rights of the elderly has gained increased international attention. This chapter provides an overview of some international agencies’ efforts to address human rights of elders, as well as related efforts in different regions of the world. The UN does not have a specific treaty or convention regarding human rights of the elderly; only in 1995 was comprehensive legal analysis of the rights of the elderly addressed. The 2002 Madrid International Action Plan on Aging was a non-legally binding declaration by participating governments. Article 14 addresses equal access to healthcare and services, including physical and mental health services. The Commission on Human Rights 2011 Special Rapporteur emphasized human rights issues in primary healthcare and chronic illness; long-term care; palliative care; and informed consent as related to older persons. The Alzheimer’s Disease International Kyoto Declaration provides countries with a framework of action to address the needs and quality of life of those with dementia and their caregivers. Similarly, the United States has developed a national plan to address Alzheimer’s disease.

This publication reviews the work of the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) with the countries of the Caribbean subregion and assesses the lessons learned to extend successful strategies and avoid obstacles. It also illustrates the shared achievements of the Caribbean subregion in advancing information systems for health (IS4H) and lights the way ahead on this shared journey. To identify key lessons for the future, this after-action review discusses four questions about the collective work done: What was expected to happen? What really happened? What went well and why? What can be improved and how? In the past four years, PAHO has provided support for IS4H strengthening through actions and strategies in collaboration with countries under the IS4H strategic framework. The IS4H initiative was created with the vision of implementing universal access to health and universal health coverage in the Region through the strengthening of interconnected and interoperable information systems that assure effective and efficient access to quality data, strategic information, and ICT tools for decision-making and well-being. The vision and leadership of the Member States in the Caribbean have contributed to the strengthening of IS4H for the entire Region of the Americas. PAHO remains keenly aware of the importance of strong national and regional information systems for health in reaching the targets of the Sustainable Health Agenda for the Americas 2018–2030.

The majority of patients admitted to intensive care units survive to hospital discharge, but then face a long and challenging functional recovery, due to the physical and psychological sequelae of their critical illness. There is associated physical, emotional, and financial strain on families and care-givers, in addition to the ongoing impact on patients themselves. The optimization of post-ICU morbidity and ‘health-related quality of life’ have thus become key components of the critical care treatment pathway. Structured exercise rehabilitation programmes, tailored to the specific needs of individual patients can enhance the long-term recovery from critical illness, but the practical implementation of such programmes remains inconsistent and non-standardized. Validated screening and assessment tools are being developed to identify those patients who would benefit from post-ICU rehabilitation programmes, target the specific needs of individuals and monitor the response to treatment. Ongoing research aims to determine the features of a successful post-ICU rehabilitation programme, with respect to the location and supervision of the regime, and the actual content of the intervention. Rehabilitation commenced as soon as possible after hospital discharge is likely to be most effective, but further evidence is required to identify the timing of treatment that would achieve the optimal therapeutic impact. The National Institute of Clinical Excellence have issued a post-ICU rehabilitation guideline. As well as providing a framework for implementation of such a programme, this further endorses the understanding that exercise rehabilitation can no longer be considered an afterthought and should be fully incorporated into the critical care treatment pathway.

The modernisation of contemporary Russian higher pedagogical education places special demands on training of a competent specialist having outspoken professional position, well-formed readiness to adapt to the labour market, capable of self-development and educating learners in the conditions of rapidly changing reality. The formation of such personality is possible in the educational space of a university, being characterised by the unity of learners’ classroom and extracurricular activities, coordinated interaction of all participants of pedagogical process aimed at solving the common goal and specific tasks focused on high-quality training of future specialists. The formation of student’s personality as a future teacher has a number of stages coordinated with the process of learning at the university, in particular, with formation of certain knowledge base within the framework of academic discipline studies, acquisition of professional experience in the process of pedagogical training, study of perspective practices and experience of pedagogical activity. The proper attitude to accumulation, generalisation and popularisation of advanced pedagogical experience contributes to formation and development of professional mastery of both students of pedagogical profile and young teachers. The advanced pedagogical experience of winners and laureates of the national pedagogical mastership contests in the Russian Federation and CIS countries requires special research. An attempt of large-scale research of this unique practical experience and its implantation into the training process at pedagogical universities was undertaken by the Russian State Pedagogical University. The research results were tested at the All-Russian applied research conference with international participation “International Best Practices in Pedagogical Activity: Experience, Risks, Prospects”. The conference was presented with 102 papers by representatives of educational organisations from Russia and foreign countries, including Latvia, Kazakhstan, Belarus and Uzbekistan. The aim of the conference was to discuss efficient practices of transformation of modern education aimed at updating its content by strengthening practical orientation and integration of higher and general education, exchange of experience among educators actively using modern educational technologies. The conference was held along the following directions: – Practical application of results of efficient pedagogical solutions and advantages of promising practices of pedagogical excellence aimed to improve the quality of education. – The system of young educators support: ideas and practices. – Digital learning environment: pedagogue’s new tools. – The teacher’s personality in innovative educational space. – Trends in pedagogical education development. – Learner’s individual trajectory as a resource for future teacher formation. – Best teaching practices: international and national experience. The conference participants discussed the pressing issues of organising the teaching process in general-education organisations and vocational guidance in higher education. The participants noted that such pedagogical transfer in modern conditions is one of the important and productive directions of searching for the ways to improve pedagogical mastery.

The monograph reflects the problems of Russian psycholinguistics from the moment of its inception in Russia to the present day and presents its main directions that are currently developing. In addition, theoretical developments and practical results obtained in the framework of different directions and research centers are described in a concise form. The task of the book is to reflect, as far as it is possible in one edition, firstly, the history of the formation of Russian psycholinguistics; secondly, its methodology and developed methods; thirdly, the results obtained in different research centers and directions in different regions of Russia; fourthly, to outline the main directions of the further development of Russian psycholinguistics. There is no doubt that in the theoretical, methodological and applied aspects, the main problems and the results of their development by Russian psycholinguistics have no analogues in world linguistics and psycholinguistics, or are represented by completely original concepts and methods. We have tried to show this uniqueness of the problematics and the methodological equipment of Russian psycholinguistics in this book. The main role in the formation of Russian psycholinguistics was played by the Moscow psycholinguistic school of A.A. Leontyev. It still defines the main directions of Russian psycholinguistics. Russian psycholinguistics (the theory of speech activity - TSA) is based on the achievements of Russian psychology: a cultural-historical approach to the analysis of mental phenomena L.S. Vygotsky and the system-activity approach of A.N. Leontyev. Moscow is the most "psycholinguistic region" of Russia - INL RAS, Moscow State University, Moscow State Linguistic University, RUDN, Moscow State Pedagogical University, Moscow State Pedagogical University, Sechenov University, Moscow State University and other Moscow universities. Saint Petersburg psycholinguists have significant achievements, especially in the study of neurolinguistic problems, ontolinguistics. The most important feature of Russian psycholinguistics is the widespread development of psycholinguistics in the regions, the emergence of recognized psycholinguistic research centers - St. Petersburg, Tver, Saratov, Perm, Ufa, Omsk, Novosibirsk, Voronezh, Yekaterinburg, Kursk, Chelyabinsk; psycholinguistics is represented in Cherepovets, Ivanovo, Volgograd, Vyatka, Kaluga, Krasnoyarsk, Irkutsk, Vladivostok, Abakan, Maikop, Barnaul, Ulan-Ude, Yakutsk, Syktyvkar, Armavir and other cities; in Belarus - Minsk, in Ukraine - Lvov, Chernivtsi, Kharkov, in the DPR - Donetsk, in Kazakhstan - Alma-Ata, Chimkent. Our researchers work in Bulgaria, Hungary, Vietnam, China, France, Switzerland. There are Russian psycholinguists in Canada, USA, Israel, Austria and a number of other countries. All scientists from these regions and countries have contributed to the development of Russian psycholinguistics, to the development of psycholinguistic theory and methods of psycholinguistic research. Their participation has not been forgotten. We tried to present the main Russian psycholinguists in the Appendix - in the sections "Scientometrics", "Monographs and Manuals" and "Dissertations", even if there is no information about them in the Electronic Library and RSCI. The principles of including scientists in the scientometric list are presented in the Appendix. Our analysis of the content of the resulting monograph on psycholinguistic research in Russia allows us to draw preliminary conclusions about some of the distinctive features of Russian psycholinguistics: 1. cultural-historical approach to the analysis of mental phenomena of L.S.Vygotsky and the system-activity approach of A.N. Leontiev as methodological basis of Russian psycholinguistics; 2. theoretical nature of psycholinguistic research as a characteristic feature of Russian psycholinguistics. Our psycholinguistics has always built a general theory of the generation and perception of speech, mental vocabulary, linked specific research with the problems of ontogenesis, the relationship between language and thinking; 3. psycholinguistic studies of speech communication as an important subject of psycholinguistics; 4. attention to the psycholinguistic analysis of the text and the development of methods for such analysis; 5. active research into the ontogenesis of linguistic ability; 6. investigation of linguistic consciousness as one of the important subjects of psycholinguistics; 7. understanding the need to create associative dictionaries of different types as the most important practical task of psycholinguistics; 8. widespread use of psycholinguistic methods for applied purposes, active development of applied psycholinguistics. The review of the main directions of development of Russian psycholinguistics, carried out in this monograph, clearly shows that the direction associated with the study of linguistic consciousness is currently being most intensively developed in modern Russian psycholinguistics. As the practice of many years of psycholinguistic research in our country shows, the subject of study of psycholinguists is precisely linguistic consciousness - this is a part of human consciousness that is responsible for generating, understanding speech and keeping language in consciousness. Associative experiments are the core of most psycholinguistic techniques and are important both theoretically and practically. The following main areas of practical application of the results of associative experiments can be outlined. 1. Education. Associative experiments are the basis for constructing Mind Maps, one of the most promising tools for systematizing knowledge, assessing the quality, volume and nature of declarative knowledge (and using special techniques and skills). Methods based on smart maps are already widely used in teaching foreign languages, fast and deep immersion in various subject areas. 2. Information search, search optimization. The results of associative experiments can significantly improve the quality of information retrieval, its efficiency, as well as adaptability for a specific person (social group). When promoting sites (promoting them in search results), an associative experiment allows you to increase and improve the quality of the audience reached. 3. Translation studies, translation automation. An associative experiment can significantly improve the quality of translation, take into account intercultural and other social characteristics of native speakers. 4. Computational linguistics and automatic word processing. The results of associative experiments make it possible to reveal the features of a person's linguistic consciousness and contribute to the development of automatic text processing systems in a wide range of applications of natural language interfaces of computer programs and robotic solutions. 5. Advertising. The use of data on associations for specific words, slogans and texts allows you to predict and improve advertising texts. 6. Social relationships. The analysis of texts using the data of associative experiments makes it possible to assess the tonality of messages (negative / positive moods, aggression and other characteristics) based on user comments on the Internet and social networks, in the press in various projections (by individuals, events, organizations, etc.) from various social angles, to diagnose the formation of extremist ideas. 7. Content control and protection of personal data. Associative experiments improve the quality of content detection and filtering by identifying associative fields in areas subject to age restrictions, personal information, tobacco and alcohol advertising, incitement to ethnic hatred, etc. 8. Gender and individual differences. The data of associative experiments can be used to compare the reactions (and, in general, other features of thinking) between men and women, different social and age groups, representatives of different regions. The directions for the further development of Russian psycholinguistics from the standpoint of the current state of psycholinguistic science in the country are seen by us, first of all:  in the development of research in various areas of linguistic consciousness, which will contribute to the development of an important concept of speech as a verbal model of non-linguistic consciousness, in which knowledge revealed by social practice and assigned by each member of society during its inculturation is consolidated for society and on its behalf;  in the expansion of the problematics, which is formed under the influence of the growing intercultural communication in the world community, which inevitably involves the speech behavior of natural and artificial bilinguals in the new object area of psycholinguistics;  in using the capabilities of national linguistic corpora in the interests of researchers studying the functioning of non-linguistic and linguistic consciousness in speech processes;  in expanding research on the semantic perception of multimodal texts, the scope of which has greatly expanded in connection with the spread of the Internet as a means of communication in the life of modern society;  in the inclusion of the problems of professional communication and professional activity in the object area of psycholinguistics in connection with the introduction of information technologies into public practice, entailing the emergence of new professions and new features of the professional ethos;  in the further development of the theory of the mental lexicon (identifying the role of different types of knowledge in its formation and functioning, the role of the word as a unit of the mental lexicon in the formation of the image of the world, as well as the role of the natural / internal metalanguage and its specificity in speech activity);  in the broad development of associative lexicography, which will meet the most diverse needs of society and cognitive sciences. The development of associative lexicography may lead to the emergence of such disciplines as associative typology, associative variantology, associative axiology;  in expanding the spheres of applied use of psycholinguistics in social sciences, sociology, semasiology, lexicography, in the study of the brain, linguodidactics, medicine, etc. This book is a kind of summarizing result of the development of Russian psycholinguistics today. Each section provides a bibliography of studies on the relevant issue. The Appendix contains the scientometrics of leading Russian psycholinguists, basic monographs, psycholinguistic textbooks and dissertations defended in psycholinguistics. The content of the publications presented here is convincing evidence of the relevance of psycholinguistic topics and the effectiveness of the development of psycholinguistic problems in Russia.