Molière and his players

Thesis (M.A.)--Boston Universit

Assessing student perceptions of the Pharm.D. degree at a private tertiary medical university in India

Background: Pharmacy education in India has expanded to include the Doctorate of Pharmacy degree (Pharm.D.). With clinical practice in early development, job opportunities in India are limited. Graduates often consider pharmacy opportunities abroad. Aims: This study compares Indian students’ career aspirations related to the Pharm.D. degree before and after beginning their programmes. Methods: A 5-point Likert scale paper survey with open ended questions was distributed to all Pharm.D. students (Year 1- 6) at a medical university in India. Results: With a response rate of 83% (144/173), over half of the students’ primary goal was to pursue careers abroad post-graduation (54.2% before, 51.4% after). Data from the last three graduating classes indicated that 28.3% travelled abroad for future studies while 62.3% secured positions in India. Conclusions: Opportunities abroad remain challenging for Indian trained Pharm.D.s’; graduates may consider the expanding clinical opportunities in India

Continuity and Change in the History of Scottish Juvenile Justice

This paper explores the theme of continuity and change in the history of Scottish juvenile justice, drawing attention to the longer historical view which enables us to focus on the underlying continuities between nineteenth and twentieth century developments. In this context the paper presents a number of key research findings based on extensive primary research on Victorian and Edwardian Scotland. These focus on three areas: the role of reformatory and industrial schools, the operation of the early juvenile courts and the impact of new scientific discourses. The paper argues that these insights are of value in supporting an interpretation of reform which in many ways complements explanations in the existing literature but is also distinctive in placing particular weight on mid nineteenth century philanthropic dynamism as a primary catalyst of reform

A failure recovery planning prototype for Space Station Freedom

NASA is investigating the use of advanced automation to enhance crew productivity for Space Station Freedom in numerous areas, including failure management. A prototype is described that uses various advanced automation techniques to generate courses of action whose intents are to recover from a diagnosed failure, and to do so within the constraints levied by the failure and by Freedom's configuration and operating conditions

The Relationship Between Prior Experiences in Mathematics and Pharmacy School Success

Objective. To assess students’ pre-pharmacy math experiences, confidence in math ability, and relationship between experiences, confidence, and grades in math-based pharmacy courses. Methods. A cross-sectional survey of first year to third year pharmacy students was conducted. Students reported type of pre-pharmacy math courses taken, when they were taken [high school (HS) vs. college] and year of HS and college graduation. Students rated their confidence in math ability using the previously validated 11-item Fogerty Math Confidence Scale (Cronbach alpha=0.92). Math grade point average (GPA), Pharmacy College Admission Test quantitative (PCAT quant) scores, and grades (calculations and kinetics) were obtained from transcripts and school records. Spearman correlation and multivariate linear regression were used to compare math experiences, confidence, and grades. Results. There were 198 students who reported taking math courses 7.1 years since HS graduation and 2.9 years since their last schooling prior to pharmacy school. Students who took math courses with more time since HS/last schooling had lower calculations and kinetics grades. Students reporting having taken more HS math courses had better calculations grades. Students with higher math GPA, and PCAT quant scores also had higher calculations and kinetics grades. Greater confidence in math ability was associated with higher calculations grades. In multivariate regressions, PCAT quant scores and years since HS independently predicted calculations grades, and PCAT quant scores independently predicted kinetics grades. Conclusion. The number of pre-pharmacy math courses and time elapsed since they were taken are important factors to consider when predicting a pharmacy student’s success in math-based pharmacy school courses

A Link in a Chain:’ An Audiotopic Analysis of Pete Seeger, 1955 – 1962

The folk artist Pete Seeger has earned widespread acclaim for his music which has touched the lives of millions of fans in America and around the world. His songs, which at first glance are bits of seemingly simple Americana crooned by a banjo picker with a scratchy voice, are in fact packed with social commentaries. Whether they address racial or class inequalities, the tragedy of war, or the problems of American culture from materialism to suburban homogeneity, a protest spirit fills Seeger’s songs. The literature on Seeger to date has been preoccupied with this spirit, presenting Seeger as a politician to readers of his biographies and related materials. They have explored his radical upbringing, his relationship with the Communist Party-USA and his musical campaigns for leftist causes. While the literature satisfies scholars of American social and political history, music scholars are lately frustrated by the lack of attention Seeger’s music has received from the perspective of ethnomusicology. I venture to bridge the gap between Seeger the politician and Seeger the musician by analyzing Seeger the performer. Inspired by Ethnic Studies scholar Josh Kun’s 2005 book Audiotopia: Music, Race, and America (Berkeley: University of California), I argue that Seeger’s key contribution as an artist is found in his ability to unleash musical audiotopias on his audiences. An “audiotopia” is a term that Kun invented to explain the relationship that music has with a listener. Music, Kun believes, is a “point of contact” (Kun 2). When it enters “the bones and tissues” of a listener’s body, an act of hybridization takes place, in which music, which comes from elsewhere, enters that person’s being and powerfully stimulates the imagination until the listener finds him or herself transported (metaphorically) to a place beyond the here and now (Kun 13; 22 - 23). What follows is a confrontation between the listener’s understanding of his or her own self-identity and the context in which the song is situated. An audiotopia is rather like a “utopia,” a safe, ideal place, but more closely mirrors what Michel Foucault calls a “heterotopia,” or a combined multiplicity of idealized places and spaces where the social, cultural, and geographical boundaries known in reality are morphed into a world in which they can all exist together harmoniously (Kun 23). Because of its audiotopic power, music is particularly well-suited to foster social change. It places its listeners in within a song’s setting and the individual(s) the song may be about, allowing them to share in the lives and experiences of others. Although Kun mentions Pete Seeger in Audiotopia’s introduction, he goes on to analyze musical audiotopias through exploring racial issues in the twentieth century. I believe that Seeger’s music is particularly well-suited to an audiotopic analysis. As a man committed to cultural heterogeneity, class equality, and social change, in the mid-twentieth century he sang to (often lily white) audiences about the struggles of African Americans in the Deep South, poor mining communities, immigrant lives, and added to these a number of international songs to further widen his audiences’ musical experiences. During the early days of Seeger’s blacklist when the House Un-American Activities Committee prosecuted him for his left-wing associations, unable to secure larger venues, he sang most often to college students and young children, an impressionable population who grew up in the later sixties questioning their realities and believing they could change them. I find that Seeger’s music fostered his concert-goers’ audiotopic experiences through audience participation, Seeger’s often close proximity to his listeners, the content of his lyrics, his frequent choice to sing in languages other than English, and the ways in which his banjo replicated sounds from around the world. Through musical audiotopias, Seeger the performer introduced his listeners to people and places they may not otherwise have encountered, and this empathy paved the way for greater social change

Chandra and XMM-Newton Observations of the Abell 3391/Abell 3395 Intercluster Filament

We present Chandra and XMM-Newton X-ray observations of the Abell 3391/Abell 3395 intercluster filament. It has been suggested that the galaxy clusters Abell 3395, Abell 3391, and the galaxy group ESO-161 located between the two clusters, are in alignment along a large-scale intercluster filament. We find that the filament is aligned close to the plane of the sky, in contrast to previous results. We find a global projected filament temperature kT = $4.45_{-0.55}^{+0.89}$~keV, electron density $n_e=1.08^{+0.06}_{-0.05} \times 10^{-4}$~cm$^{-3}$, and $M_{\rm gas} = 2.7^{+0.2}_{-0.1} \times 10^{13}$~M$_\odot$. The thermodynamic properties of the filament are consistent with that of intracluster medium (ICM) of Abell 3395 and Abell 3391, suggesting that the filament emission is dominated by ICM gas that has been tidally disrupted during an early stage merger between these two clusters. We present temperature, density, entropy, and abundance profiles across the filament. We find that the galaxy group ESO-161 may be undergoing ram pressure stripping in the low density environment at or near the virial radius of both clusters due to its rapid motion through the filament.Comment: 13 Pages, 12 Figures, 5 Tables. Submitted to ApJ, comments are welcom

Native American Weight Loss Movement: Pilot Test of a Culturally Tailored Weight Loss Program for American Indians

American Indians (AIs) have higher rates of obesity than other racial/ethnic groups, placing them at heightened risk for cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, and certain cancers. Culturally appropriate weight loss interventions may be the key to reducing risk. The most successful program used in AI communities has been the Diabetes Prevention Program (DPP), which limits enrollment to individuals with a clinical diagnosis of pre-diabetes. The purpose of this pilot project was to modify and culturally tailor a weight loss intervention to AI communities in Kansas to improve weight loss related behaviors among those who do not qualify for the DPP. The Native American Weight Loss Movement (NAWLM) was developed from 2012-2014 using an iterative process with 4 sequential modifications to the program. Group 1 received a slightly modified version of the DPP that was originally tailored to African Americans. Each group received an improved program based on modifications from the previous group. Our analysis shows 36.1% (95% CI: 25.7, 47.5) of all participants (n=72) lost weight; a majority (63.9%, 95% CI: 52.8-75.0) maintained weight, gained weight, or dropped out. Among individuals who completed the program (n=34), 76.5% lost weight (95% CI: 61.4, 91.5). These individuals lost an average of 2.98% body weight (95% CI: 1.58, 4.37), with 6 participants losing \u3e7% body weight. While most participants who completed the program lost weight, more research is needed to determine factors that discourage drop-out and promote behavioral changes. NAWLM shows promise as a weight loss program for AIs who do not qualify for the DPP

Preparation for meaningful work and life: urban high school youth's reflections on work-based learning 1 year post-graduation

The challenges confronted by low-income high school students throughout school and across the transition to higher education and employment are well-documented in the US and many other nations. Adopting a positive youth development perspective (Lerner et al., 2005), this study reports findings from interviews with 18 low-income, racially and ethnically diverse graduates of an urban Catholic high school in the US. The interviews were designed to shed light on the post-high school experiences of urban high school graduates and to understand how students construct meaning about the value of school and work-based learning (WBL) in their preparation for meaningful work and life. The interviews highlight the perceived value of the academic and non-cognitive preparation students experienced through high school and WBL in relation to the challenges they encountered along the pathway to post-high school success and decent work. Overall, the findings suggest the potential of WBL for low-income youth in facilitating access to resources that build academic and psychological/non-cognitive assets, while also illustrating the role of structural and contextual factors in shaping post-high school transitions and access to meaningful work and life opportunities.Published versio

A failure management prototype: DR/Rx

This failure management prototype performs failure diagnosis and recovery management of hierarchical, distributed systems. The prototype, which evolved from a series of previous prototypes following a spiral model for development, focuses on two functions: (1) the diagnostic reasoner (DR) performs integrated failure diagnosis in distributed systems; and (2) the recovery expert (Rx) develops plans to recover from the failure. Issues related to expert system prototype design and the previous history of this prototype are discussed. The architecture of the current prototype is described in terms of the knowledge representation and functionality of its components