ORGANIZATIONAL DEVELOPMENT DUE TO A TECHNOLOGICAL EDUCATIONAL INNOVATION

ABSTRACT: This study presents a research work about the impact of a technological educational innovation implementation, titled Remote Laboratories, on the Organizational Development, from the perspective of Organizational Behavior. This innovative analysis approach raises the research problem as a system where the input is an educational innovation and the output is Organizational Development. An intermediate element is the Organizational Learning and correlations are constructed from the perspective of Organizational Behavior. The proposed system has a feedback to detect the opportunity areas based on the desired performance indices. The findings generated from the case study are supported by a research methodology that includes: problem´s description, hypothesis, participants, instruments, analysis of results, findings and conclusions. The obtained results are relevant for the industry because they can serve as a reference to managers responsible for the technological innovation. Findings and conclusions constitute a collection of experiences that could contribute to increase organizational development of educational institutions and companies. Keywords: organizational behavior, organizational learning, organizational development, remote lab, educational innovation

Bacteria coated cathodes as an in-situ hydrogen evolving platform for microbial electrosynthesis

Hydrogen is a key intermediate element in microbial electrosynthesis as a mediator of the reduction of carbon dioxide (CO2) into added value compounds. In the present work we aimed at studying the biological production of hydrogen in biocathodes operated at − 1.0 V vs. Ag/AgCl, using a highly comparable technology and CO2 as carbon feedstock. Ten bacterial strains were chosen from genera Rhodobacter, Rhodopseudomonas, Rhodocyclus, Desulfovibrio and Sporomusa, all described as hydrogen producing candidates. Monospecific biofilms were formed on carbon cloth cathodes and hydrogen evolution was constantly monitored using a microsensor. Eight over ten bacteria strains showed electroactivity and H2 production rates increased significantly (two to eightfold) compared to abiotic conditions for two of them (Desulfovibrio paquesii and Desulfovibrio desulfuricans). D. paquesii DSM 16681 exhibited the highest production rate (45.6 ± 18.8 µM min−1) compared to abiotic conditions (5.5 ± 0.6 µM min−1), although specific production rates (per 16S rRNA copy) were similar to those obtained for other strains. This study demonstrated that many microorganisms are suspected to participate in net hydrogen production but inherent differences among strains do occur, which are relevant for future developments of resilient biofilm coated cathodes as a stable hydrogen production platform in microbial electrosynthesis.

Representações Sociais de professores do ensino técnico integrado ao médio do Instituto Federal da Paraíba sobre formação docente

<p>Vocational and Technological Education - EPT, in Brazil, is mainly allocated to the Federal Institutes of Education, Science and Technology. However, some teachers who work in this type of teaching do not have pedagogical training to teach classes in technical education integrated to high school, despite having consistent training in their areas of knowledge. Given this reality, the need for initial and continuing teacher education of teachers working in EFA has been increasing in the host of these institutions and raising academic debates on the subject. As a way to contribute to this theme, this research aimed to investigate the pedagogical formation of teachers from the Federal Institute of Education, Science and Technology of Paraíba - IFPB and to understand their social representations about teacher education. The theoretical-methodological path that underpinned this research was the precepts about the Theory of Social Representations of Moscovici (1978; 2015) and other authors, and the use of the theoretical-methodological support of the Central Core Theory (ABRIC, 2001; 2003). The research participants consisted of 100 teachers, ten from each of the ten IFPB campuses selected. Data were collected through the application of the Free Word Association Technique - with the inductive term “teacher training is ...”, as well as a questionnaire and on-site observation, recorded in a field diary. Data treatment was performed through Excel, with systematization of the words evoked in a Spiral of Directions. The combination of theoretical and technical concepts related to the research theme and proposition as well as the results presented shows, in their quantitative and qualitative aspects, that the most shared elements which belonged to the central nucleus of social representations, were fundamental as well as knowledge of intermediate element I. This work not only sought to understand the level of the pedagogical formation of the investigated ones, but also apprehended the process of construction of their social representations. It also pointed alternatives to (re) think a teacher formation concatenated with the yearnings and interests of IFPB teachers.</p>

Cartographic training for bachelors of tourism in the context of professional competence

The article theoretically and practically substantiates the necessity of teaching Mapping for Bachelors of Tourism. The cartographic competence of future professionals is closely connected with their professional skills. The specific feature of the cartographic method is that it allows one to visualize the geographic space or any simulated space for studying. Consequently it develops the student’s spatial thinking, and makes both cerebral hemispheres be active. It is known that the right cerebral hemisphere is responsible for the creative feature of the human nature, and the left cerebral hemisphere is responsible for the logic. The essence of the cartographic method is that in the process of researching the reality an intermediate element appears. And the intermediate element is a map the role of which is of two kinds: it is a research tool and the subject of research presented as a model, a prototype of the reality at the same time. The symbolic figurative language of a map develops the abstract thinking about the real prototype. It should be emphasized that maps help specialists to establish new patterns in location and interconnection of phenomena. Understanding of the graphic image of the structure of the geographical space, highlighting the peculiarities of the tourist and recreational component, administrating the tourist and recreational space, designing a regional project for the development of tourism, creating package tours – all these professional skills are immediately related to students’ intellectual-graphic activities, to their abilities to visualize the geospace, to be good at Mapping. In the final part of the article the cartographic competence is defined as an element of the culture of a competent specialist in tourism’s personality.

Relating crustacean zooplankton community structure to residential development and land-cover disturbance near Canadian Shield lakes

We applied the land-cover cascade (LCC) concept to evaluate whether human disturbance affects crustacean zooplankton community in 13 nutrient-poor lakes of the Laurentian region along a gradient of residential development and land-cover disturbance. Zooplankton biomass responded indirectly to residential disturbances within the watershed based on path analysis. In most LCC models, total phosphorus enrichment was a strong intermediate element linking residential disturbances to increased biomass of small crustaceans ( Bosmina , Ceriodaphnia , and Diaphanosoma ) and Daphnia species ( D. g. mendotae , D. dubia , and D. ambigua ). Zooplanktivory index was also an intermediate element in LCC models of crustacean functional groups and an independent element in daphnid-based LCC models. Low zooplanktivory was associated with higher biomass of large Daphnia ( D. pulicaria and D. catawba ). However, residential disturbance and select environmental factors (phosphate enrichment, zooplanktivory index, lake depth, littoral macrophytes) explained only 42% and 57%, respectively, of among-lake variation in crustacean community and Daphnia assemblages. Variation partitioning analysis suggested that planktivory had a similar or greater influence than human disturbance and phosphate enrichment. Our study improves the knowledge of crustacean zooplankton responses to increasing residential development and land-use disturbances near Canadian Shield lakes.