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In response to recent concerns on earnings quality and a firm's fundamental performance, the purpose of this paper is to re‐examine salient questions under accrual accounting: how earnings quality affects the role of earnings and operating cash flows in a firm's valuation.

Using a large sample ranging from 1989 to 2008, the authors contrast the effects of three representative accrual‐based earnings quality measures on the association between earnings, operating cash flows and a firm's abnormal stock returns.

In the univariate analysis it was found that earnings explain returns similarly to operating cash flows. With control of earnings quality, the results indicate that earnings' role in explaining contemporaneous abnormal returns remains unchanged when earnings quality is better. Conversely, operating cash flows explain more contemporaneous abnormal returns when earnings quality is better. The findings could suggest that the market reacts to operating cash flows conditionally on earnings quality. Intriguingly, the results also indicate that the market perceives better earnings quality captures superior performance of operating cash flows rather than that of earnings. These findings are further fortified by additional analyses revealing that the earnings quality measure with control of operating cash flows affects the supplemental role of operating cash flows most.

The paper's findings provide insights on how the market processes firm value signals embedded in earnings quality, which have direct implications for regulators, standard setters, academics and practitioners.

In this paper, the complex flow evaporation process of droplet impact on the liquid film in a horizontal falling film evaporator is numerically studied based on smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH) method. The purpose of this paper is to present the mechanism of the water treatment problem of the falling film evaporation for the high salinity mine water in Xinjiang region of China.

To effectively characterize the phase transition problem, the particle splitting and merging techniques are introduced. And the particle absorbing layer is proposed to improve the nonphysical aggregation phenomenon caused by the continuous splitting of gas phase particles. The multiresolution model and the artificial viscosity are adopted.

The SPH model is validated qualitatively with experiment results and then applied to the evaporation of the droplet impact on the liquid film. It is shown that the larger single droplet initial velocity and the smaller single droplet initial temperature difference between the droplet and liquid film improve the liquid film evaporation. The heat transfer effect of a single droplet is preferable to that of multiple droplets.

A multiphase SPH model for evaporation after the droplet impact on the liquid film is developed and validated. The effects of different factors on liquid film evaporation, including single droplet initial velocity, single droplet initial temperature and multiple droplets are investigated.

This paper reports the first part of a recent interview with Dr Bor-Shiuan Cheng on his values, beliefs or thoughts on how to lead a fulfilling life as a person and a researcher.

This paper is based on a recent interview with Dr Bor-Shiuan Cheng.

Life is a journey of discovering our purpose and fulfilling our own destiny. Once Dr Cheng decided his career direction after trying out different alternatives, he sticks to it and makes the best out of it. His choice of majoring in psychology became a basis for the contributions to Chinese management research.

Dr Cheng’s life and career paths showcased a successful scholar who keeps doing one thing in his life, being himself, being focused and persistent. His experience may inspire and encourage junior scholars for career development.

The interview presents the life and career paths of Dr Cheng, who has chosen to take a road less traveled and enjoyed different views along the road.

This paper aims to report empirical research investigating how school‐based management (SBM) and paradigm shift (PS) in education are closely related to teachers' student‐centered teaching and students' active learning in a sample of Hong Kong secondary schools.

It is a cross‐sectional survey research involving 31 secondary schools, 1,119 teachers and 7,063 students with seven sets of questionnaires: three for students, three for teachers and one for principals.

The results of analysis indicate the following findings. The greater tendency towards SBM of a school associates with the greater extent of PS from the site‐bounded paradigm towards the triplization paradigm in education. Both the measures of SBM and PS in education are closed related to teachers' student‐centered teaching (in terms of facilitating student learning, facilitating student thinking and facilitating student self‐reflection and assessment) and students' active learning (in terms of positive learning attitudes, application of various learning methods, learning effectiveness, multiple thinking in learning and satisfaction in learning). The profiles of “high SBM and high‐PS” schools are much more preferable than “low SBM and low‐PS” schools in terms of various measures of teachers' teaching and students' learning.

Even though SBM and PS in education are strongly emphasized in ongoing educational reforms in different parts of the world, there is lack of empirical study to show how they are related to teachers' teaching and students' learning in practice. The findings of the research contribute to filling this research gap and advancing theoretical and practical understanding in such a frontier area.

The motel industry in Taiwan is a highly competitive industry, which requires considerable investment and demands innovative services. This paper aims to identify the competitive qualities that urgently require improvement to enhance the service quality of motels using the two-phase method of importance-performance and gap analysis (IPGA) and the Kano model, and develops specific improvement strategies.

By questionnaire survey, this study collects 562 valid questionnaires from motels in Taipei City. The IPGA and Kano model are used to identify the service attributes of market competitiveness that urgently require improvement.

The results show there are 14 attributes that should be urgently improved, of which four are the attractive qualities of market competitiveness (competitive qualities). This study develops ten improvement strategies, as based on the four competitive qualities, for the reference of the motel industry.

The results can identify the competitive qualities that require urgent improvement to address the development of improvement strategies for motels. The managers of motels can refer to the ten improvement strategies to create excellent and competitive motel services.

The results combine “customers’ needs” with “the competitive meanings of quality attributes in the market” under limited resources, to upgrade motel service quality, customers’ willingness to purchase and motel competitiveness.

This paper aims to analyse the reform syndrome, bottle‐neck effects and their impacts on teachers and school education in the last ten years and highlight the direction of new developments.

The paper examines educational reforms in Hong Kong in the last decade.

Echoing the international trends of educational reforms, Hong Kong, as an international city, has initiated a series of educational reforms in the past decades. The experiences of educational reforms in Hong Kong may provide a good case for understanding the dynamics of educational reforms and drawing theoretical and practical implications for research, policy formulation and implementation not only in Hong Kong but also in other international communities.

From the analysis of the reform syndrome, particularly the bottle‐neck effect, there should be seven key aspects for policy‐makers, educators and stakeholders in Hong Kong to address the emergent key issues in educational reforms and work for the further development of their education system in the coming few years.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a framework for reconceptualising research on school autonomy to redress the limitations of traditional research, strengthen the conceptual links between school autonomy and learning outcomes and offer a range of new strategies for studying the interplay of school autonomy, leadership and learning.

Based on a review of international studies and the findings of the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) and the Teaching and Learning International Study (TALIS), the conceptual limitations of and gaps in traditional research on school autonomy in relation to leadership and learning are discussed, and their implications for the development of a new framework are outlined.

The conceptual limitations of traditional research on school autonomy are as follows: internal school autonomy is insufficiently differentiated; too little attention is paid to cultural autonomy and internal structural autonomy at individual and group levels; autonomy is measured only as perceived by principals, with no attention to the perspectives of other key stakeholders; and conceptual links between school autonomy and learning outcomes are missing, leading to inconsistent findings on the effects of school autonomy on student learning. To redress these limitations, a new framework for research is developed. School autonomy is reconceptualised as a combination of functional autonomy, structural autonomy and cultural autonomy. Leadership is also reconceptualised by categorising three types of leadership activity: leadership for functional initiatives, leadership for structural initiatives and leadership for cultural initiatives. This categorisation may help to strengthen conceptions of the relevance of leadership to autonomy and performance in future research.

A typology of research strategies is developed to broaden the possibilities for implementing the reconceptualisation framework. A single-component strategy, a two-component strategy, an interaction strategy and a holistic case-study strategy are presented. Depending on the research purposes and the available resources, one or a combination of these strategies can be used to conceptualise the study of school autonomy, leadership and performance.

The new ideas and perspectives associated with the reconceptualisation framework will contribute to future research in this area on an international scale. Future PISA, TALIS and similar studies will also benefit from this reconceptualisation.

An appropriate fixture layout can decrease the assembly variation of Aeronautical Thin‐Walled Structure (ATWS) substantially. The purpose of this paper is to develop a fixture layout method to minimize variation.

The paper uses genetic algorithm and ants algorithm (GAAA) to optimize the fixture layout by first, analyzing the “N‐2‐1” positioning principle of ATWS riveting, and then developing a hierarchical fixture layout model to represent the base points and locating points of ATWS. Second, information of base points and locating points is coded as gene and chromosome, according to a special coding rule and the fixture layout model. The fitness is also defined by the assembly variation of key characteristic points (KCPs). Third, the genetic and ants manipulations are discussed individually, and the two parts are connected by threshold value of the probability for chromosome in the genetic manipulation.

The method can solve the fixture layout problem of ATWS with automated riveting efficiently, which is shown as an example in this paper.

The assembly variation is decreased by using the method presented in this paper according to the variation comparison.

The hierarchical fixture layout model is proposed for the first time in this paper and base points and locating points are optimized successfully by the GAAA.

To develop a framework for conceptualizing and managing integration in STEM learning, that can help address key issues in its research and implementation worldwide.

Integration in learning is a complicated but not a well-defined concept and therefore it is difficult to illustrate in theory and practice how to conceptualize, manage and implement integrated STEM learning with aims to enhance students' learning effectiveness and multiple-thinking ability. Based on a typology in integrated learning, this article re-conceptualizes integrated STEM learning into a comprehensive framework of three categories, six subcategories and four basic models. With this framework, how to manage integrated STEM learning and related issues in schools for effectiveness are discussed.

As a typology, integration in STEM learning can be classified as content integration, pedagogical integration and learner integration. They can be further differentiated as six subcategories: subject integration, domain integration, method integration, cognitive integration, SEN integration and diverse ability integration in STEM learning. Depending on the extents of content integration and pedagogical integration, four basic models of integrated learning can be identified in theory and practice. The categories, subcategories and basic models have their own characteristics, strengths and limitations. Strategies are developed to address the characteristics and related key issues of each category of STEM learning.

The framework may help to analyze the key issues of integrated STEM learning in research and development, such as “Why and what integration in STEM learning is important and necessary in curriculum reforms for the future?”, “How the integrated STEM approach is different from the traditional subject approach?”, “How the STEM learning activities can be integrated and managed effectively for enhancing students' learning effectiveness and multiple thinking capacity?”, and “What key implications can be drawn for managing and implementing STEM learning?”

Based on the proposed typology and models of STEM learning, various strategies of managing STEM are discussed and developed, which will contribute to policy formulation and professional practice of integrated STEM learning locally and internationally.

The proposed typology and models of STEM learning and related new ideas and perspectives will contribute to future research and development in this area locally and internationally.

Rural regions in Canada are aging faster than urban centers, but access to health and social care is limited. Integrated health and social care (IHSC) through collaboration across different health and social care organizations can support enhanced care for older adults living in rural regions. However, IHSC is not well understood within a rural Canadian context.

A case study of a Canadian IHSC initiative, Geriatric Assessment Program Collaboratory (GAPC), in northern Alberta was undertaken to understand how successful IHSC can occur in an urban/rural region. The study used key informant interviews and a focus group of representatives from the GAPC organizations.

Nine factors were identified that support GAPC: communications, information sharing, shared vision and goals, inter-organizational culture, diffused leadership, team-based approaches, dedicated resources, role clarity, champions and pre-existing relationships. Eight external influence factors were identified as influencing partnership including geography, strong sense of community, inter-sectoral work, public policy, governance authorities and structures, funding models, aging communities and operating within a not-for-profit (NFP) setting.

The study reveals insights into how IHSC can occur within a rural Canadian context. This study demonstrates that IHSC occurs at the local level and that primary care providers can drive IHSC successfully.