Headstart Nursery: Rooted in Quality

Growers can more efficiently use their land if they grow from transplants than from seed. Headstart Nursery started in 1979 to supply Christopher Ranch, well-known for their garlic products, with bell pepper transplants. Since then, Headstart expanded their transplant line to other Salinas Valley crops and even flowers. Transplants are labor intensive; Headstart has been innovative with their human resource management policies and practices

Reinvigorating the discipline:pervasive computing and tomorrow's computer scientists

Declining enrollments in computer science and related fields are a global concern. This issue's column, by Mike Hazas and Rebecca Marsden of Lancaster University in the UK describes the novel Lancaster Headstart program that uses the excitement of pervasive computing to attract students into the computer science

An Exact Formula for the Average Run Length to False Alarm of the Generalized Shiryaev-Roberts Procedure for Change-Point Detection under Exponential Observations

We derive analytically an exact closed-form formula for the standard minimax Average Run Length (ARL) to false alarm delivered by the Generalized Shiryaev-Roberts (GSR) change-point detection procedure devised to detect a shift in the baseline mean of a sequence of independent exponentially distributed observations. Specifically, the formula is found through direct solution of the respective integral (renewal) equation, and is a general result in that the GSR procedure's headstart is not restricted to a bounded range, nor is there a "ceiling" value for the detection threshold. Apart from the theoretical significance (in change-point detection, exact closed-form performance formulae are typically either difficult or impossible to get, especially for the GSR procedure), the obtained formula is also useful to a practitioner: in cases of practical interest, the formula is a function linear in both the detection threshold and the headstart, and, therefore, the ARL to false alarm of the GSR procedure can be easily computed.Comment: 9 pages; Accepted for publication in Proceedings of the 12-th German-Polish Workshop on Stochastic Models, Statistics and Their Application

Domains pilot: Kent County Council HeadStart Project. Case studies in promoting resilience in vulnerable children

This pilot exercise was undertaken as part of the Big Lottery funded HeadStart programme. HeadStart aims to improve the mental well-being of at-risk* 10 to 16 year-olds by investing up to £75m in up to 12 local partnerships to facilitate and support: 1. the implementation of a locally developed, cross-disciplinary, multi-layered and integrated prevention strategy, with the young person and their needs at its core 2. the development of the necessary local conditions to enable that strategy to become sustainable in time 3. the development of a more robust evidence-base around ‘what works’ in the area of mental well-being to be pro-actively shared beyond HeadStart with the aim of contributing to the national and local policy debate. Previous stages of HeadStart Kent involved knowledge transfer exercises in the form of seminars. KCC staff and the HeadStart programme partners were introduced to the theory of resilience and its application with vulnerable children. A key aim of the seminars was to ensure projects focused on promoting the protective factors associated with resilience when designing and delivering their services. The HeadStart seminars provided the knowledge transfer to partners delivering commissioned services specific to the programme. This pilot exercise will further contribute to the evidence gathering by working with KCC practitioners at the earlier stage of assessment using a resilience approach. Increasing the chance of children and young people demonstrating resilience when faced with adversity requires the enhancement of protective factors (those factors which shield the young person from potential blows to their resilience) and the reduction of risk (the removal or re-framing of potentially threatening events or issues). Therefore, it is useful to focus on resilience in terms of the areas or ‘domains’ of a person’s life that can be manipulated or changed. The introduction of a domains approach to resilience at the assessment stage, will better inform intervention and support strategies based on a child or young person’s individual need

Losing the lead: Patents and the disclosure requirement

This paper analyzes the patenting decision of a successful inventor in a model of dynamic technology adoption with asymmetric firms. We show that the extent of the inventor's technological headstart is decisive for his patenting behavior. The overall patenting effect consists of two parts, a protective and a disclosure effect. If the technological headstart is high the negative disclosure effect may overcompensate the positive protective effect of a patent. In this case the inventor prefers secrecy. Welfare considerations show that a patent may be socially desirable even though it delays the first adoption of a new technology

U.S. Software Protection: Problems of Trade Secret Estoppel under International and Brazilian Technology Transfer Regimes Note

This note describes the fundamental aspects of software protection and applies the requisites of U.S. trade secret protection to software. After explaining how the UNCTAD and Brazilian transfer of technology regimes apply to software licensing arrangements, this note argues that software distribution under these regimes estops U.S. trade secret protection by defeating the requisites of secrecy and competitive advantage. Specifically, the effects of the UNCTAD Draft International Code of Conduct on the Transfer of Technology (UNCTAD Code) and the Brazilian technology transfer regulations are analyzed to demonstrate the difficulties posed by legal regimes being considered and already in force in a number of developing countries. This note concludes with an analysis of some of the possibilities for protection of trade secrets with international softward distribution