School Counselors\u27 Perceptions about lnterventions for At-Risk Students Including Grade Retention: Implications for School Leaders

The term at-risk is used by educators and policymakers to describe a wide variety of students who struggle in schools (Kronholz, 2011). Factors associated with labeling students at-risk include minority status, poverty, language difficulties, low school attendance, and poor family support (Re~ Akpo-Sanni, Losike-Sedimo, 2012; Stockard, 2010). For many at-risk students, reading at a proficient level is a primary concern for school leaders and teachers (Allington, 2011; McAlenney & Coyne, 2011), especially with increased accountability including school sanctions for not closing reading achievement gaps (Chappell, Nunnery, Pribesh, & Hager, 2011). Although a plethora of interventions have been proposed to assist at-risk students, requiring students to repeat a grade continues to be used as a threat for students who are not proficient, despite evidence that suggests grade retention is detrimental to students on various outcomes (Battistin & Schizzerotto, 2012; Webley, 2012)

Construction of and efficient sampling from the simplicial configuration model

Simplicial complexes are now a popular alternative to networks when it comes to describing the structure of complex systems, primarily because they encode multi-node interactions explicitly. With this new description comes the need for principled null models that allow for easy comparison with empirical data. We propose a natural candidate, the simplicial configuration model. The core of our contribution is an efficient and uniform Markov chain Monte Carlo sampler for this model. We demonstrate its usefulness in a short case study by investigating the topology of three real systems and their randomized counterparts (using their Betti numbers). For two out of three systems, the model allows us to reject the hypothesis that there is no organization beyond the local scale.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figure

Transnational organised crime monthly briefing, June 2015: Australian Crime Commission highlights links between terrorism and organized crime

Open Briefing: Postings on Transnational Organised Crime

‘Equal Participation of All’: A study of environmental justice and vulnerability in the Resilient Melbourne and Resilient Sydney Strategies

‘Resilient Melbourne’ (RM) and ‘Resilient Sydney’ (RS) are City Resilience Strategies (100RC, 2017) developed to prepare cities for climate change impacts and other ‘shocks’ and ‘stresses’. Through an environmental justice (EJ) lens, this research examines the 100RC’s City Resilience Framework (CRF) and the RM and RS strategy-development processes and resulting actions and priorities. A qualitative comparative methodology using document analysis and in-depth interviewing of 18 individuals found that limited consideration of embedded power structures in the CRF prevents underlying drivers of risk and vulnerability from being addressed; as such, the resulting actions of a procedurally-unjust strategy-development process will be distributively unjust. In one city, the need to gain legitimacy in a complex metropolitan governance system was a driver of the strategy-development process that was procedurally just. This research contributes the first EJ analysis of the CRF, the first comparative analysis of 100RC member cities, the first EJ analysis of a developed nation’s CRS and the first academic attention of any sort to RS

Financial transparency in Britain’s secrecy jurisdictions has just got a whole lot murkier following the UK’s decision to leave the EU

In light of recent political events, this commentary aims to provoke and promote a discussion concerning the effect of the UK’s decision to leave the EU, on its ability to regulate financial crime in the Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies which operate as financial secrecy havens

Transnational organised crime monthly briefing, July 2015: Attack on tourists in Port El Kantaoui highlights threat of terrorism and organised crime in Tunisia

Open Briefing: Postings on Transnational Organised Crime