And Then There Were Four ...: How Many (and Which) Measures of Active Labor Market Policy Do We Still Need? ; Finding a Balance after the Evaluation of the Hartz Reforms in Germany

Through the Hartz reforms, German active labor market policy was fundamentally restructured and has since been systematically evaluated. This paper reviews the recent evaluation findings and draws some conclusions for the future setup of active labor market policies in Germany. It argues in favor of a reduced range of active labor market policy schemes focusing on programs with proven positive effects (that are wage subsidies, training, start-up grants and placement vouchers) and calls for a systematic evaluation of all instruments not scrutinized so far.Active labor market policy, Germany, evaluation

Supporting Universities and Employers to Measure the Value of Postgraduate Placements

A 'Return on Investment' toolkit for HEI's to identify and quantify the benefits to employers of investing in postgraduate education. This was one of two toolkits funded by HEFCE under the Postgraduate Support Scheme.HEFC

Understanding PP placement in written Dutch : a corpus-based multifactorial investigation of the principal syntactic, semantic and discursive determinants

The present paper aims at refining current knowledge about the driving forces in Dutch constituent ordering of non-predicate prepositional phrases (PPs) as well as re-evaluating the common assumption in traditional Dutch reference grammars that the middle field position is the standard slot. Building on journalistic data in the Dutch Parallel Corpus, it is first shown that non-predicate PPs are significantly more often placed in postfield position (the structural position after the final verb cluster) than in middle field position (the position before the final verb cluster), which indicates that the postfield position rather than the middle field position should be considered the standard slot for PPs in written Dutch. Second, a binary logistic regression model was fitted with PP placement as a function of several syntactic, semantic and discursive predictor variables. This model is able to describe, explain and predict more than 80% of the variation in the data set, leading to a much better understanding of the mechanisms underlying PP placement in written journalistic Dutch. On the basis of our findings, we furthermore propose a refined and more fine-grained version of the theoretical framework in which PP placement in Dutch is traditionally described and understood

Learning to read in regular and special schools: a follow up study of students with Down Syndrome

In 2006, a questionnaire was sent to 160 parents of children with Down syndrome in Dutch primary education (special and regular) with a response rate of 76%. Questions were related to the child's gender, age and school history, academic and non-academic skills, IQ, parental educational level, and the extent to which parents worked on academics with their child. In a 2010-follow-up, out of these 121 parents, 115 (95%) filled in a questionnaire on reading and school placement of 16 of these children, IQ was unknown. These children were excluded from the analysis. Controlling for reading scores at time 1 (2006) and the other 2006-variables, ANCOVA's showed that reading scores at time 2 (2010) were higher for children the more years they had been in a regular school between time 1 (t1) and time 2 (t2). This was true for the total group and particularly for the younger children(< 9 years), whether all children or only children still in regular education in 2006 were included. Predicting change scores confirmed this advantage of regular placement, but only in the younger children. Particularly during the first years of primary school, reading development of children with Down syndrome appears to be stimulated by regular school placement

TIPS and HCC: friends or foes ?

Portal hypertension and hepatocellular carcinoma [HCC] are major complications of liver cirrhosis and may coexist in the same patient. Transjugular intrahepatic portosystemic shunt [TIPS] is an effective treatment for recurrent variceal bleeding and refractory ascites although accumulating evidence has shown that its indication is gradually expanding. TIPS placement reduces portal flow by connecting splanchnic vessels to systemic circulation. As a consequence parenchymal portal venous flow is decreased so inducing an ischemic injury. In this condition, a possible activation of hepatic stellate cells, an induction of neoangiogenesis and an increase in secretion of HGF and VEGF may represent possible triggers for hepatocarcinogenesis. On these bases, several studies have explored a possible influence of TIPS on the onset of hepatocellular carcinoma [HCC] in cirrhotic patients. To date the results are controversial and the role of TIPS as risk factor for HCC is still unclear. Moreover, the diversion of portal flow and the onset of arterioportal shunts following TIPS insertion, may reduce the efficacy and the safety profile of transarterial treatments. Until now, very little evidence has been collected regarding this topic and the results are conflicting. Therefore, whether TIPS and hepatocellular carcinoma are either "Friends or Foes" is still an ongoing dilemma