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The paper examines the significance of enforceability and adaptability in governing vertical alliances and their performance ramifications for suppliers. Literature on supplier relations suggests that suppliers are skeptical of close ties with their buyers (Helper 1991, Helper and Sako 1995). Such skepticism persists in spite of the fact that buyers are writing longer (enforceable) contracts with fewer suppliers. In this context, the paper develops a transaction cost economics (TCE)-based model that distinguishes between the verifiable and nonverifiable aspects of governance attributes (of safeguards, incentive intensity, and adaptability) in explaining supplier performance variations. The paper argues that the following factors prove valuable for suppliers: (1) the adaptive and collaborative orientation fostered by the original equipment manufacturer's (OEM's) credible commitment to the exchange and by information sharing on the part of the supplier, (2) the presence of certain nonverifiable safeguards, and (3) the incentives inherent in target pricing. These assertions have been tested using data from the home appliance industry. Results indicate that information sharing together with (1) OEM dependence and (2) target pricing does indeed enhance supplier performance. Also, results suggest that while nonverifiable safeguards can help, verifiable safeguards do not have a positive association with supplier interests. Under certain conditions then, suppliers can venture into closer relationships with buyers and benefit.

This paper advances a continuing line of research investigating the potential of web-based educative curriculum materials (ECMs) to facilitate teachers' development of professional teaching knowledge (PTK). Our ECMs consisted of online lesson plans scaffolded with embedded digital resources to promote teacher understanding of a particular wise-practice pedagogy: problem-based historical inquiry (PBHI). Our research question was: Can a 2nd generation of web-based ECMs encourage social studies teachers' development of PTK for PBHI? Participants reacted positively to several educative scaffolds, especially videocases of experts modeling historical thinking. Evidence suggested that multiple experiences with planning and implementing instruction with our ECMs helped teachers recognize value in some of the materials' underpinning concepts (e.g., scaffolding and inquiry-based instruction). However, planning instruction individually, the novelty of planning resources enhanced with digital resources, and certain contextual features of schooling such as inadequate focused time for planning seemed to frustrate the ECMs potential to promote teacher-learning. Here we suggest that ECMs function less effectively as stand-alone supports; however, employed in more formal contexts that feature collaboration, they may be able to provide valuable support for teachers' professional development.

Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effects of scaffolded lesson study on the content knowledge, conceptions of curriculum, and classroom practice of 22 elementary and secondary history teachers in four school districts.


Design/methodology/approach
Teachers, teacher educators, and historians collaborated to design and test research lessons grounded in a theory-based framework for problem-based historical inquiry (PBHI) practice. The authors sought to support consonance between the reform ideas of the formal, professional development, curriculum, and the curriculum as enacted in participants' classrooms.


Findings
Project participation was associated with significant gains in content knowledge and the conceptualization and implementation of more challenging instruction consistent with the PBHI model and the standards of authentic intellectual work (AIW). Mean AIW instruction scores for research lessons were more than double the scores for participants' non-lesson study lessons and indicated noteworthy progress in integrating the formal and enacted curricula. Evidence suggested that many teachers developed more nuanced understandings of historical phenomena, gained greater appreciation for the importance of authentic purpose in motivating student engagement in challenging learning, and began to reconsider what is required to facilitate complex learning and to refine their repertoire of learning strategies.


Originality/value
Evidence from the first year of this project offers hope for the potential of collaborative communities of practice to facilitate a shared professional knowledge base of wise practice that brings the formal, intended, and enacted curriculum into greater alignment. These results also emphasize the evolutionary process of conceptual change.