Over half of England’s secondary schools are now academies. While their impact on achievement has been debated, the social and cultural outcomes prompted by this neoliberal educational model has received less scrutiny. This book draws on original research based at Dreamfields Academy, a celebrated flagship secondary school in a large English city, to show how the accelerated marketization and centralization of education is reproducing raced, classed and gendered inequalities. The book also examines the complex stories underlying Dreamfields’ glossy veneer of success and shows how students, teachers and parents navigate the everyday demands of Dreamfields’ results-driven conveyor belt. Hopes and dreams are effectively harnessed and mobilized to enact insidious forms of social control, as education develops new sites and discourses of surveillance.

This book presents peer-reviewed papers from 14th International Conference on Learning Factories (CLF 2024) that took place from April 17-19, 2024, at the University of Twente, the Netherlands. CLF 2024 continued the successful CLF conference series targeting the latest research and development in the field of learning factories. The book is organized into two volumes and covers state-of-the-art research insights towards Learning Factories of the Future including learning factory design, Industry 5.0, digital twinning and VR/AR, 5G/6G in learning factories, AI for manufacturing systems, human-centred work design, human-robot collaboration, sustainability in learning factories, as well as cross-learning factory product/production systems. The book seamlessly integrates theory with real-world practice, empowering learners such as students, qualified engineers, and workers to keep pace with rapidly evolving technologies and methodologies, through enhancing learning factories. It also helps society and industry effectively manage future transitions with addressing current topics around digitalization, sustainability, and lifelong learning in industry.

This book presents the state of the art of learning factories. It outlines the motivations, historic background, and the didactic foundations of learning factories. Definitions of the term learning factory and a corresponding morphological model are provided as well as a detailed overview of existing learning factory approaches in industry and academia, showing the broad range of different applications and varying contents. Learning factory best-practice examples are presented in detailed and structured manner. The state of the art of learning factories curricula design and their use to enhance learning and research as well as potentials and limitations are presented. Further research priorities and innovative learning factory concepts to overcome current barriers are offered. While today numerous learning factories have been built in industry (big automotive companies, pharma companies, etc.) and academia in the last decades, a comprehensive handbook for the scientific community and practitioners alike is still missing. The book addresses therefore both researchers in production-related areas, that want to conduct industry-relevant research and education, as well as managers and engineers in industry, who are searching for an effective way to train their employees. In addition to this, the learning factory concept is also regarded as an innovative learning concept in the field of didactics.

This book features state-of-the-art contributions from two well-established conferences: Changeable, Agile, Reconfigurable and Virtual Production Conference (CARV2020) and Mass Customization and Personalization Conference (MCPC2020). Together, they focus on the joint design, development, and management of products, production systems, and business for sustainable customization and personalization. The book covers a large range of topics within this domain, ranging from industrial success factors to original contributions within the field.

The Digital Twin book is about harnessing the power of technology, business practices, and the digital infrastructure to make revolutionary improvements for the benefit of society. Ninety experts from around the world contributed to summarize four decades of digital advances and successes, and to define the Digital Twin’s potential for the decades ahead. The book describes how Digital Twins will play a key role in specific applications and across important sectors of the global economy, making it a must-read for executives, policymakers, technical leaders, researchers, and students alike. The book consists of thirty-eight chapters that cover Digital Twin concepts, supporting technologies, practices, and specific implementation strategies for various production and service sectors. Digital Twins are about creating faster, less expensive, and error-free manufacturing, products, processes, and services. This includes engineering of systems for energy, communications, construction, transportation, and food processing. It also covers solutions for making human existence better and more enjoyable through the life sciences, smart cities, and artistic creations. The Digital Twin’s functionality addresses the entire lifecycle of products and services. Importantly, the book describes the journey required for businesses and public organizations to embrace Digital Twins as part of their tool kit. The Digital Twin is the ideal starting point for teaching and research in all application domains.

This book explains and exemplifies how SMEs can embrace the Smart Production approach and technologies in order to gain a beneficiary outcome. The book describes the Smart Production vision for SMEs, as well as the method to get there. The concept behind the book is based on the long-term experience of the authors in researching and tackling problems of SMEs in the manufacturing sector. The book provides applied methods and obtained solutions in different branches and different sizes of SMEs, encompassing a broad survey of our markets and societies. The perspective is systemic/holistic and integrated including human, organizational, technological, and digital perspectives.

The changing manufacturing environment requires more responsive and adaptable manufacturing systems. The theme of the 5th International Conference on Changeable, Agile, Reconfigurable and Virtual production (CARV2013) is "Enabling Manufacturing Competitiveness and Economic Sustainability. Leading edge research and best implementation practices and experiences, which address these important issues and challenges, are presented. The proceedings include advances in manufacturing systems design, planning, evaluation, control and evolving paradigms such as mass customization, personalization, changeability, re-configurability and flexibility. New and important concepts such as the dynamic product families and platforms, co-evolution of products and systems, and methods for enhancing manufacturing systems' economic sustainability and prolonging their life to produce more than one product generation are treated. Enablers of change in manufacturing systems, production volume and capability, scalability and managing the volatility of markets, competition among global enterprises and the increasing complexity of products, manufacturing systems and management strategies are discussed. Industry challenges and future directions for research and development needed to help both practitioners and academicians are presented. About the Editor Prof. Dr.-Ing. Michael F. Zaeh, born in 1963, has been and is Professor for and Manufacturing Technology since 2002 and, together with Prof. Dr.-Ing. Gunther Reinhart, Head of the Institute for Machine Tools and Industrial Management (iwb) at the Technische Universitaet Muenchen (TUM). After studying general mechanical engineering, he was doctoral candidate under Prof. Dr.-Ing. Joachim Milberg at TUM from 1990 until 1993 and received his doctorate in 1993. From 1994 to 1995, he was department leader under Prof. Dr.-Ing. Gunther Reinhart. From 1996 to 2002, he worked for a machine tool manufacturer in several positions, most recently as a member of the extended management. Prof. Dr.-Ing. Michael F. Zaeh is an associated member of the CIRP and member of acatech, WGP and WLP. His current researches include among others Joining and Cutting Technologies like Laser Cutting and Welding as well as Friction Stir Welding, Structural Behaviour and Energy Efficiency of Machine Tools and Manufacturing Processes like Additive Manufacturing.