Student Acceptance of E-Learning during the COVID-19 Outbreak at Engineering Universities in Spain

This article analyses students' intention to use a particular e-learning technology (MS Teams) at university during the COVID-19 outbreak in Spain using the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT). The model was refined through a qualitative analysis based on six focus group discussions with students from different engineering faculties in Madrid, Spain. A survey involving 346 undergraduate students was subsequently fed into the model. Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) and SMART PLS software were applied for data analysis. The results shed light on theoretical and practical implications. The model was validated by the data and displayed a high predictive ability. Social influence was found to have the greatest influence over students' acceptance, followed by the professor's role in shaping the perception of improvement. Facilitating conditions were found to be the least relevant factor, probably due to the particular context in which this study was conducted. A significant difference was found between the public and private institutions in terms of the importance of the perceived usefulness for the professor (this factor was more important for students' acceptance at the public university). In order to improve its acceptance and use under the current scenario, it is thus important for universities wishing to introduce e-learning to focus on creating a positive social environment around the e-learning platform, for example, by using social networks or relying on testimonies by professionals who could confirm the interest of such a platform in a future work environment. Understanding professors' perspective on the implementation of the platform is also of paramount importance. More research is also needed regarding context-related differences when analysing students' acceptance of e-learning.

Universal Basic Income in the Spanish construction sector: Engaging businesses in a public-policy debate

At this scale, labour market dynamics and the behaviour of different economic agents, such as businesses, take on particular relevance.Our main research objective is to investigate shared beliefs and opinions among business managers about UBI, about its impact at the system level, and, more specifically on labour market supply and demand. The reason for the increasing attention it receives can be explained by different contextual factors, mainly related to concerns over growing inequality, the stigmatization and insufficient coverage of conditional aid for development programmes (Banerjee, 2016), rising unemployment rates due to increasing work automation (Robins, 1985), and paid labour no longer being a guarantee of poverty alleviation (Robins, 1985). Notwithstanding, academics and policy-makers have repeatedly expressed important concerns about UBI feasibility, mainly due to high implementation costs (Calnitsky, 2017), but also about its desirability and uncertain effects at the individual and the system level, particularly upon the labour market equilibrium (Murray, 2016). With the emergence of modern capitalism, many authors, such as Paine (1974), had reflected about the right to distribute equally among all people the revenue of the land. Since humans could originally find in nature - their common property - what they needed to survive, a society that assigned those resources to private hands should compensate other individuals.

Catalyzing Transformational Partnerships for the SDGs: Effectiveness and Impact of the Multi-Stakeholder InitiativeEl dia despues

Partnerships are essential to delivering the transformational change demanded by the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) and essential to achieving Agenda 2030. It is therefore necessary to strengthen the partnering capacity of different types of organizations so they can collaborate in multi-stakeholder partnerships. However, partnership working can be costly in terms of time and other resources and is complex. Given the urgency and importance of sustainable development, illustrated by the recent pandemic and social unrest around inequity, we focused on the creation of a partnership that became effective quickly and was able to deliver societal impact at scale. Using a case study approach, the transformational potential and the early stages of "El dia despues" (in English, "The day after") were analyzed as it represents a multi-stakeholder partnership forged to frame an SDG-oriented collaborative response to the COVID-19 crisis in Spain.El dia despuesis defined as a partnership incubator, a space where public administrations interact under conditions of equivalence with all the other stakeholders, where private companies can link their innovation processes to other SDG-committed actors and social needs and where the academic sector can participate in a sustained dialogue oriented to the action. Our findings reveal that in order to catalyze the co-creation process and achieve systemic change through a set of connected multi-stakeholder initiatives, a very flexible collaborative arrangement is required, with all partners acting as facilitators. In this way, a solid interdisciplinary team is created, united around a shared vision, with trust-based relationships and a common identity fueling impact-oriented projects targeted to advance the SDGs.