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Universities are now compelled to attend to metrics that (re)shape our conceptualisation of the student experience. New technologies such as learning analytics (LA) promise the ability to target personalised support to profiled 'at risk' students through mapping large-scale historic student engagement data such as attendance, library use, and virtual learning environment activity as well as demographic information and typical student outcomes. Yet serious ethical and implementation issues remain. Data-driven labelling of students as 'high risk', 'hard to reach' or 'vulnerable' creates conflict between promoting personal growth and human flourishing and treating people merely as data points. This article argues that universities must resist the assumption that numbers and algorithms alone can solve the 'problem' of student retention and performance; rather, LA work must be underpinned by a reconnection with the agreed values relating to the purpose of higher education, including democratic engagement, recognition of diverse and individual experience, and processes of becoming. Such a reconnection, this article contends, is possible when LA work is designed and implemented in genuine collaboration and partnership with students. ArticleWe live in uncertain, unpredictable and super complex times, which, as Ron Barnett writes, produce a 'fragility in the way that we understand the world ' (2000, p. 257). Indeed, if the world and the society contained within it are part of an open, indeterminate, 'messy' (Law, 2004), and thus unpredictable but self-organising system (Prigigone & Sten-gers, 1984), how might our universities resist the lure of developments in technology, such as learning analytics (LA), that seek to 'tidy up' this messiness but, at the same time, risk diminishing the underpinning values of higher education? This article argues that the popularity of LA as a solution to the 'problem' of student retention, experience and performance (Olmos & Corrin, 2012) fails to attend to the complexities of collective and individual existence. Shaped by historical drivers for the massification and marketisa-tion of HE as well as the current, fundamental tenants of neo-liberalism that position English universities as 'schizophrenic transnational business corporations' (Shore, 2010, p. 15), universities routinely fail to account for students' 'continual change[s] of form' (Bergson, 1911, p. 301) and the 'processes of becoming that are fostered in a culture of affirmation that acts through either empowering or confining powers' (Braidotti, 2012, p. 173). Students who transition through university thus emerge in and through educational processes in unique and unpredictable ways (Biesta, 2010;Postma, 2016).What is needed in Higher Education (HE) is an 'alternative work model' (Freire, 2007, p. 4) that recognises our complicity in the neo-liberal world. Here, we reject both the concept of student as consumer or product of HE, as well as the liberal tradition of students as apprentice academics in search of knowledge for its ...

Despite the breadth of health benefits associated with regular physical activity (PA), many children in the UK are not sufficiently active enough to meet health guidelines, and tend to become less active as they mature into and throughout adolescence. Research has indicated that children’s school, home and neighbourhood environments can all significantly influence their opportunities to engage in moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA). However, less is known about how children’s MVPA patterns within these key environments may change across the school year. The current mixed-methods case study aims to explore this issue by tracking key stage 2 (KS2) and key stage 3 (KS3) children’s MVPA patterns across the school year. Fifty-eight children (29 boys, 29 girls, KS2 = 34, KS3 = 24) wore an integrated global positioning systems (GPS) and heart rate (HR) monitor over four consecutive days in the first term of school (autumn), before these measurements were repeated in the two remaining school terms (winter–summer). A subsample of children (n = 6–8 per group) were invited to take part in one of six focus groups each term to further explore their PA behaviours and identify the barriers and facilitators to PA. The children’s MVPA was significantly lower (p = 0.046) in term 2 (winter/spring term) than during the warmer terms (autumn and summer). All the locations showed reductions in MVPA in term 2, except indoor MVPA, which increased, and MVPA on foot in the neighbourhood, which remained consistent. Focus groups revealed location, friends, and the variety of options to be associated with MVPA, and poor weather, parental permission, and time limitations to be barriers to MVPA. This mixed-methodological, repeated-measures design study highlights differences in the activity patterns and perceptions of children over the school year. Future studies should implement longitudinal, multi-method approaches to gain deeper insight into how children’s PA behaviours differ over time. Consequently, this can inform future health policies promoting children’s PA throughout the year.

Miller, Paul K. and Benkwitz, Adam (2016) Where the action is: towards a discursive psychology of "authentic" identity in soccer fandom. Psychology of Sport and Exercise, Downloaded from: http://insight.cumbria.ac.uk/id/eprint/1825/ Usage of any items from the University of Cumbria's institutional repository 'Insight' must conform to the following fair usage guidelines.Any item and its associated metadata held in the University of Cumbria's institutional repository Insight (unless stated otherwise on the metadata record) may be copied, displayed or performed, and stored in line with the JISC fair dealing guidelines (available here) for educational and not-for-profit activities provided that• the authors, title and full bibliographic details of the item are cited clearly when any part of the work is referred to verbally or in the written form "fans" and mere "spectators." This work is premised on the classical -but problematicsocial-cognitive assumption that identity itself both precedes and (largely) determines the manner in which it is communicated. As such, the core objective of this paper is to take provisional empirical steps towards a formal psychology of "authentic" sporting fandom that does not replicate this troublesome assumption.Design: A Discursive Psychological framework is used to explore how self-identified soccer fans make "robust" cases for the authenticity of their own fan-identities.Method: N=26 unstructured interviews are analysed to highlight the constructive and attributional techniques drawn upon by speakers when making cases, and the culturallyavailable knowledges and contextual reasoning procedures that these make apparent.Results: Three models for legitimating fan-identity are described: (a) longitudinal endurance, (b) logical choice-making and (c) emotional imperative. It is noted how key issues that inform social-cognitive analysis are actually assembled as members' concerns in the service of persuasively accounting for particular claims in situ, and that this can facilitate a stronger understanding of the interrelation between sporting culture and social identity itself.

A key part of developing an understanding of 'what works' within the evolving mental health recovery evidence base is finding ways of serviceusers (and their friends and family) and practitioners working collaboratively. This interaction is slowly shifting practice, whereby care is potentially coconstructed in a setting between those involved to facilitate recovery-oriented processes. Increasingly, mental health services are appreciating the potential role of sport. This study adds to this body of literature by providing analysis of a football project in a medium-secure service context. This study also expands the methodological and theoretical scope of the literature by adopting an ethnographic approach and by utilising the CHIME conceptual framework as an evaluative tool. 47 participants were involved in the study, which included service-users, staff and volunteers. The data demonstrated that these sessions have considerable links to the CHIME processes, and can therefore be considered to enhance personal recovery for those involved.

The school environment is ideally placed to facilitate physical activity (PA) with numerous windows of opportunity from break and lunch times, to lesson times and extracurricular clubs. However, little is known about how children interact with the school environment to engage in PA and the other locations they visit daily, including time spent outside of the school environment i.e., evening and weekend locations. Moreover, there has been little research incorporating a mixed-methods approach that captures children’s voices alongside objectively tracking children’s PA patterns. The aim of this study was to explore children’s PA behaviours according to different locations. Sixty children (29 boys, 31 girls)—35 key stage 2 (aged 9–11) and 25 key stage 3 (aged 11–13)—wore an integrated global positioning systems (GPS) and heart rate (HR) monitor over four consecutive days. A subsample of children (n = 32) were invited to take part in one of six focus groups to further explore PA behaviours and identify barriers and facilitators to PA. Children also completed a PA diary. The KS2 children spent significantly more time outdoors than KS3 children (p = 0.009). Boys engaged in more light PA (LPA) when on foot and in school, compared with girls (p = 0.003). KS3 children engaged in significantly more moderate PA (MPA) at school than KS2 children (p = 0.006). Focus groups revealed fun, enjoyment, friends, and family to be associated with PA, and technology, costs, and weather to be barriers to PA. This mixed methodological study highlights differences in the PA patterns and perceptions of children according to age and gender. Future studies should utilize a multi-method approach to gain a greater insight into children’s PA patterns and inform future health policies that differentiate among a range of demographic groups of children.

UK Universities are increasingly being 'encouraged' to focus on student engagement, retention and performance, with learning analytics becoming commonplace. Based on inter-related student-staff partnerships, this study adopted a human and compassionate approach to the use of student data and subsequent interventions. Analysis of focus group and interview data from 86 student participants explored key themes: peer-mentoring increasing engagement with the communal-habitus; increased confidence and engagement; and the demystification and humanisation of the university environment.Findings highlight the importance of emphasising human and compassionate support for students within rapidly developing learning analytics approaches, with subject-specific peer-mentoring found here to be beneficial.