Detailed Review of Ethical Identity Of IBs Essay Example

Detailed Review of Ethical Identity Of IBs Essay Example Detailed Review of Ethical Identity Of IBs Essay Detailed Review of Ethical Identity Of IBs Essay Identity, according to the Oxford Dictionary, is (1) absolute sameness; oneness; equality of two expressions for all values of the literal quantities, equation expressing this; (2) condition or fact that person or thing is itself and not something else; individuality, personality (The Oxford Dictionary 1984). In terms of corporate identity, the consistent visual symbols of the corporation fit the first linguistic definition, while the distinct attributes of the corporation (Balmer 1998, Bernstein 1984) or the reality and uniqueness of the organization (Gray and Balmer 2001 p. 1) fit the second definition. Hence, corporate identity can be the same and yet different (Bernstein 2003). Reviews of the literature on corporate identity indicate a plethora of definitions for the term, ranging from the tangible to intangible, and from the tactical to strategic (see Allessandri 2001, Melewar and Jenkins 2002 for a compilation of the various definitions). However, there is some agreement among researchers that the term is related to answering the questions what are we? And who are we? (Balmer and Greyser 2003) or what the firm is (Hawn, 1998, Portugal and Halloran 1986), hence referring to the distinct attributes of the organisation. Birkigt and Stadler (1986, as cited in Balmer 2001) suggest four elements of corporate identity: personality, behaviour, communication and symbolism, while van Rekom (1997) identifies three elements: essence features of the firm, features that set it apart from others and continuity of the features over time. According to Balmer and Soenen (1999) corporate identity encompasses three elements: the mind (the expressed organisational ethos, vision, strategy and product performance), the soul (distinctive corporate values of the firm) and the voice (the various ways of communicating to key stakeholder groups). In short, corporate identity is the bonding of strategy, structure, communication and culture, embracing both tangible (e. g. name, logo and colour) and intangible (e. g. firms behaviour and reputation) elements that make it distinctive (Balmer 2001, p. 280). Balmer and Soenen (1999) further operationalised four distinctive features of corporate identity using the mnemonic ACID, each letter representing a distinct identity type: actual, communicated, ideal and desired. Actual identity encompasses the business strategy, values and philosophy, corporate culture and structure (Gray and Balmer 1998) while communicated identity is closely linked to image and reputation, which in turn leads to the realisation of desired (what corporate management wants it to be) and ideal identities (what stakeholders see as optimal). Since their exists an explicit covenant or a promise (Johansson and Hirano 1999, Mitchell 1999) between an organisation and its key stakeholders, corporate identity must be managed so as to ensure alignment between the various identities suggested by Balmer and Soenen (1999). This entails communicating and behaving in a manner that leaves a pleasant impression with key stakeholders (Cornellisson and Elving 2003). One of the avenues through which information about corporate identity (e. g. its ideology, management philosophy, products, commitments to society, etc. ) is communicated is the corporate annual report. Hence, managing information disclosure in corporate annual reports in a consistent and pleasing manner will produce a positive corporate image an over time will produce a positive corporate reputation (Allesandri 2001). In other words, through proper communication management, companies can build their reputation, which may lead to competitive advantage (see the operational model for managing corporate identity by Gray and Balmer 1998) and will pay off in both operational and financial ways (Dowling 2001), as well as ensure business survival (Balmer and Stotvig 1997, van Riel and Balmer 1997). Islamic banks are representative of a new wave of corporations whose social goals are at least (if not more) as important as making profit. Based on the definition by Gray and Balmer (2001), such corporations fit what they described as having ethical identity. They studied two such corporations. Migros and Patagonia to find commonalities that exist between them. Berrone et al. (2005) assessed the impact of corporate ethical identity on the firms financial performance and their results indicate that revealed ethics (aspects of communication of the ethical identity) have informational worth and enhance shareholder value, while applied ethics (all actions and policies considered as ethical and beyond communication of ethical values) have a positive impact through the improvement of stakeholder satisfaction. Since commonalities already exist between Islamic banks, as they are based on the Islamic ethical business framework drawn from the Shariah (Islamic law, often referred to as ethics in action), it would be interesting to assess whether an ethical identity gap exists and its implications on corporate branding and corporate image and reputation. Hence, in this article, we attempt to assess the degree of variation of communicated ethical identity (as disclosed in the corporate annual report) against a benchmark of ideal ethical identity (checklist constructed based on Islamic precepts) for the Islamic banking sector where trust is vital. Specifically, we measure the degree of ethical identity of seven Islamic banks in the Arabian Gulf region based on their corporate annual reports for the years 2002-2004 inclusive, using what we term an Ethical Identity Index (EII). The reason for confining our scope to Islamic banks in the Arabian Gulf region is because these countries share a similar socio-economic structure, which as such enables us to control for macro and cultural effects and make comparison and interpretations more meaningful. We chose corporate annual reports rather than other media of communication in assessing communicated ethical identity because they offer a snapshot of managements mindset in a particular period (Neimark 1992), have greater potential to influence due to widespread distribution (Adams and Harte 1998), are more accessible for research purposes and are used by a number of stakeholders as the sole source of certain corporate information (Deegan and Rankin 1997). The results of our survey, analysis and discussion constitute a further contribution to corporate identity, corporate communication, corporate social responsibility and Islamic banking literature. The article proceeds as follows. The next section presents a literature review on various aspects of Islamic banking and discusses what constitutes the ideal ethical identity based on the Islamic precepts. The third section describes the research method. The fourth section presents our results and discussion, followed by the conclusions, implications and avenues for further research in the final section.

Review of Reading Eggs for Children Ages 4 to 8

Review of Reading Eggs for Children Ages 4 to 8 Reading Eggs is an interactive online program intended for children ages 4-8 and designed to teach children how to read or to build on existing reading skills. The program was originally developed in Australia by Blake Publishing but brought to schools in the United States by the same company that developed Study Island, Archipelago Learning. The premise behind Reading Eggs is to engage students in a fun, interactive program that initially builds a foundation for learning to read and eventually guides them towards reading to learn. The lessons found in Reading Eggs are designed to tie into the five pillars of reading instruction. The five pillars of reading instruction include phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension. Each of these components is necessary for children to master if they are going to be expert readers. Reading Eggs provides an alternative avenue for students to master these concepts. This program is not intended to replace traditional classroom instruction, instead, it is a supplemental tool in which students can hone and build the skills which they are being taught at school. There are 120 total lessons found in the Reading Eggs program. Each lesson builds on a concept taught in the previous lesson. Each lesson has between six and ten activities that students will complete to master the overall lesson. Lessons 1 through 40 are designed for students who have very little reading skills. Children will learn their first reading skills at this level including sounds and names of the alphabet letters, reading sight words, and learning essential phonics skills. Lessons 41 through 80 will build on those skills previously learned. Children will learn more high-frequency sight words, build word families, and read both fiction and nonfiction books designed to build their vocabulary. Lessons 81 through 120 continue to build on previous skills and will provide activities for children to read for meaning, comprehension, and to continue to increase vocabulary. Here are some key components of Reading Eggs. Its Teacher/Parent-Friendly Reading Eggs is easy to add a single student or a whole class.Reading Eggs has terrific reporting that makes it easy to monitor individual student or whole class progress.Reading Eggs provides teachers with a downloadable letter to send home to parents. The letter explains what Reading Eggs is and provides login information for students to work on the program at home at no additional cost. It also provides parents with the opportunity to have an account to track their child’s progress at no additional cost.Reading Eggs provides teachers with a comprehensive user guide as well as toolkit loaded with books, lesson plans, resources, and activities. The teacher toolkit has several books and activities that they can use in conjunction with their Smart Board to interactively teach lessons to the whole class. Its Instructional With Diagnostic Components Reading Eggs provides teachers and parents with the opportunity to assign specific lessons to students. For example, if a kindergarten teacher is teaching the letter â€Å"K†, the teacher can go in and assign the lesson over the letter â€Å"K† to all of the students to reinforce that concept.Reading Eggs also provides teachers and parents with the option of giving each child a diagnostic placement test. This test consists of forty questions. When the child misses three questions, then the program assigns them to the appropriate lesson that corresponds to how they did on the placement test. This allows students to skip past concepts which they have already mastered and places them at the level in the program where they should be.Reading Eggs allows teachers and parents to reset a student’s progress at any time in the program. Its Fun and Interactive Reading Eggs has kid friendly themes, animations, and songs.Reading Eggs allows users to create and personalize their own unique avatar.Reading Eggs provides users with motivation by providing incentives and rewards. Each time they complete an activity, they are rewarded with golden eggs. Their eggs are kept in their â€Å"eggy bank† which they can use to buy reward games, clothes for their avatar, or accessories for their house. In addition, when a user completes a lesson they earn an animated â€Å"critter†, which they collect as they go through the program.Reading Egg lessons are set up similar to a board game where you move from stepping stone to another by completing an activity. Once you have completed each activity, then you have completed that lesson and get to move on to the next lesson. Reading Eggs Is Comprehensive Reading Eggs has hundreds of extra learning activities and games aside from those in the standard 120 reading lessons.The Playroom is loaded with over 120 learning activities covering a wide range of topics ranging from letter reinforcement to art.My World allows students to visit eight destinations loaded with fun, interactive activities.Story Factory allows students to write and build their own stories and then enter them into a weekly story writing competition.Puzzle Park gives students a chance to earn some more Golden Eggs by completing word puzzles and practicing sight word recognition.The Arcade is a place where students can use their earned Golden Eggs to play much fun, interactive reading games.Driving Tests contains assessments covering sights words, phonics skills, and content area vocabulary. If a student satisfactorily completes a test, they are rewarded a racing car game which they can play to earn more golden eggs.Skills Bank is designed to build a student’s ski lls in spelling, vocabulary, grammar, and punctuation. Music Cafà © allows students to access and play their favorite songs that hear within a lesson. Its Structured Reading Eggs provides students with a comprehensive dashboard located on the left of their screen. This dashboard keeps track of which lesson they are on, how many golden eggs they have earned, and allows them access to their stuff and all the other places they can go to the program.Reading Eggs forces students into order by padlocking activities. You must complete activity one to open activity two.Reading Eggs also locks components such as My World, Puzzle Park, the Arcade, Driving Tests, Skills Bank until a user has mastered the appropriate number of lessons to have developed the skills necessary to use those components. Research on Reading Eggs Reading Eggs has been proven to be an effective tool for children to learn how to read. A study was conducted in 2010 that paralleled the features and components of the Reading Eggs program to essential elements that students must comprehend and possess to be able to read. Reading Eggs uses a variety of effective, research-based learning activities that motivate students to successfully complete the program. The web-based design features those components that have been proven to be highly effective in getting children to be high functioning readers. Overall Impression Reading Eggs is an exceptional early literacy program for parents of young children as well as schools and classroom teachers. Children love using technology and they love to get rewards and this program combines both of them effectively. In addition, the research-based program successfully incorporates the five pillars of reading. You may feel concerned if you think young children may be overwhelmed by the program, but the tutorial in the help section was terrific. Overall, Reading Eggs deserves five out of five stars, because it is a wonderful teaching tool that children will want to spend hours using.