INTELLIGENT TUTORING SYSTEMS, PEDAGOGICAL AGENT DESIGN, AND HISPANIC ENGLISH LANGUAGE LEARNERS

According to the most recent data from the National Center of Education Statistics (NCES) there were approximately 5 million English Language Learners (ELLs) in the U.S. public schools in the Fall of 2016, representing about 10% of the student population (2019). Spanish is the primary language for most ELL students, by a large margin. As a group, ELLs have faced a deeply rooted and persistent math achievement gap (U.S. Department of Education, 2015). Despite research indicating that intelligent tutors and animated pedagogical agents enhance learning, many tutors are not designed with ELLs in mind. As a result, Hispanic ELL students may experience difficulty accessing the relevant content when using a tutor. This mixed-method research investigates how a tutor can reach Hispanic ELL students, based on the social and cultural Identity framework of the Figured Worlds Theory by Holland et al., (1998). Students will socially and culturally engage with their animated pedagogical agents constructing figured worlds of learning and connection that have the power to shape the students’ senses of themselves as learners of math. This study investigates how Hispanic ELL students perceive the utility of and relate to a learning companion (LC) design. Data was examined from 76 middle school students interacting with a math tutor, MathSpring. The findings indicate that ELL students find the MathSpring LC more useful and helpful than do non-ELL students and the ELL students designed LCs that looked more like themselves than did the non-ELL students. The findings also indicate that students formed ‘She/Me Connection’ and ‘She is Like Me’ figured worlds

Where Does a Woman Fit in a Mad Man's World? A Textual Analysis of Feminist Motifs Determined by the Production Values in Mad Men

Thesis advisor: William StanwoodThe textual analysis of season four, episode one of Mad Men entitled “Public Relations” study the productions values in terms of feminist motifs. By using social codes developed by Leed-Hurwitz and Barthes’ five systems of meaning in semiotics, observations are made about the elements of the mise-en-scène in relation to the gender roles present in the narrative. If certain codes persist, it is assumed that these repetitive observations reflect the deliberate composition of the mise-en-scènce in order to reinforce feminist motifs. The results reveal that the production values in the mise-en-scène indeed reinforce feminist motifs in Mad Men, the most comprehensive motif being the male gender as the norm. The messages communicated by this motif include the idea that masculinity is defined by sex and that a women’s worth is defined by masculinity.Thesis (BA) — Boston College, 2011.Submitted to: Boston College. College of Arts and Sciences.Discipline: Communication Honors Program.Discipline: Communication

Tidal freshwater wetland zonation: seed and seedling dynamics

Zonation patterns of seed rain (input), persistent seed bank (seeds persisting for 1 year or longer), field seedlings, and seed production were studied in a New Jersey tidal freshwater wetland along transects extending from a tidal stream bank 30 m into the high marsh. Species diversity was highest along the stream channel and lowest at the farthest high marsh sites. Seed rain and persistent seed bank densities were similar across the transect. Although species composition varied considerably among life history categories, generally field seedlings mirrored the species composition of the seed rain. Seed rain, seed bank, seedlings observed in the field, and seed production patterns varied between species, across sites for a species, and between years. Sites varied in the proportion of estimated seed production represented as seedlings either in greenhouse (5-99%) or field (2-24%) samples. Tidal transport influenced dispersal of seeds and the persistent seed bank.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/31870/1/0000820.pd

Effect of oil on recruitment from the seed bank of two tidal freshwater wetlands

The effect of oil spills on the recruitment of freshwater tidal wetland species was determined using soil seed bank samples collected in early March from two New Jersey Delaware River marshes. Samples were exposed to simulated tidal cycles 0 (2 days), 2 and 4 wk after soil was collected; 0 wk samples were treated before germination began. Oil treatment significantly reduced survival to I May (end of study) of Acnida cannabina and Bidens laevis , the dominant species, as well as number of species per sample and height of B. laevis . Total perennial seedlings, present in low numbers, also showed significant reduction with treatment. However, during the course of the study, Peltandra virginica recruitment and survival were not reduced by oil treatment and recruitment of Sagittaria latifolia appeared enhanced. There was no consistent pattern regarding which treatment time produced the greatest effect. Interactions (site, treatment, time) were generally not significant. Because these tidal freshwater wetlands and seed banks are dominated by annuals, reduction in seedling numbers and growth could substantially alter vegetation patterns. Timing of oil spills would be important, but impact would depend on species composition of the seed bank and colonizing vegetation, dispersal of seeds into the site, and germination requirements.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/43918/1/11273_2004_Article_BF00244927.pd

OSH MANAGEMENT SYSTEM IMPLEMENTATION IN PT NOJORONO TOBACCO INTERNATIONAL

PT Nojorono Tobacco International is one of the biggest cigarette factories in Indonesia. This company  has a commitment to implement Occupational Health and Safety Management System (SMK3) based on PP No 50 Tahun 2012 with a purpose to reduce the number of workplace accidents. The purpose of this reserach is to know about the goal and steps that has been taken to implement SMK3 plans in PT Nojorono Tobacco Internationa, also an adaption that doing by company with the impementation of SMK3 and the fuctions from HRD department to support the implementation of SMK3.This research uses descriptive method and the data was collect by interview. As result, the goal from the implementation of SMK3 in PT Nojorono Tobacco International to achieve zero accident workplace with steps that has been taken is Safety plans with the adaption, determine commitment and policy of Occupational Health and Safety, training about SMK3, and form organization structure, and Occupational Health that doing by company is doing Hazard Identification and Risk Assestment that followed by Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) usage rule  Hazard Identification Risk Assessment that followed by PPE usage rule.The functions from HRD Department to support the implementation of SMK3 in PT Nojorono Tobacco International is form Health, Safety, and Environment (HSE) division and give training about K3.   Key words: SMK3, PT NTI, Workplace Acciden

Xeroform gauze is superior to silver sulfadiazine cream in promoting zone of stasis healing for mixed-depth scald burns in children

TITLE: Xeroform gauze is superior to silver sulfadiazine cream in promoting zone of stasis healing for mixed-depth scald burns in children INTRODUCTION: Silver sulfadiazine 1% cream changed daily was historically the mainstay initial treatment at our pediatric burn center. Over recent years, we transitioned to using closed Xeroform dressings (3% bismuth tribromophenate in petrolatum-soaked gauze) in the initial care of partial thickness burns. The purpose of this study is to compare patient outcomes between Xeroform only and silver sulfadiazine. METHODS: A retrospective chart review was conducted of patients age 5 years with mixed-depth scald injuries between: 1) years 2004-2008, when silver sulfadiazine was standard care, and 2) 2015-2018, when Xeroform only had become standard. Data collected included demographics, burn total body surface area (TBSA), length of hospital stay, and necessity, size, and timing of skin grafting. RESULTS: Three hundred forty-seven patients were included, of whom 200 were treated with silver sulfadiazine and 147 with Xeroform only. Burn TBSA and rates of skin grafting were similar between the groups; however, the mean area of the skin graft was significantly smaller for the Xeroform group (147cm2 vs. 336cm2, p=0.027). Of note, time from injury to grafting was significantly longer in the Xeroform group (24d vs. 9.9d, p=0.002), with a larger proportion of these patients returning for outpatient grafting. CONCLUSION: These results suggest that initial treatment with a closed dressing of Xeroform gauze may promote zone of stasis healing resulting in smaller graft sizes compared to silver sulfadiazine cream. Fewer dressing changes combined with later skin grafting could allow burn wounds to demarcate and heal more effectively, benefiting both graft and donor sites

FACE READERS: The Frontier of Computer Vision and Math Learning

The future of AI-assisted individualized learning includes computer vision to inform intelligent tutors and teachers about student affect, motivation and performance. Facial expression recognition is essential in recognizing subtle differences when students ask for hints or fail to solve problems. Facial features and classification labels enable intelligent tutors to predict students’ performance and recommend activities. Videos can capture students’ faces and model their effort and progress; machine learning classifiers can support intelligent tutors to provide interventions. One goal of this research is to support deep dives by teachers to identify students’ individual needs through facial expression and to provide immediate feedback. Another goal is to develop data-directed education to gauge students’ pre-existing knowledge and analyze real-time data that will engage both teachers and students in more individualized and precision teaching and learning. This paper identifies three phases in the process of recognizing and predicting student progress based on analyzing facial features: Phase I: Collecting datasets and identifying salient labels for facial features and student attention/engagement; Phase II: Building and training deep learning models of facial features; and Phase III: Predicting student problem-solving outcome. © 2023 Copyright for this paper by its authors

Leveraging Affect Transfer Learning for Behavior Prediction in an Intelligent Tutoring System

In the context of building an intelligent tutoring system (ITS), which improves student learning outcomes by intervention, we set out to improve prediction of student problem outcome. In essence, we want to predict the outcome of a student answering a problem in an ITS from a video feed by analyzing their face and gestures. For this, we present a novel transfer learning facial affect representation and a user-personalized training scheme that unlocks the potential of this representation. We model the temporal structure of video sequences of students solving math problems using a recurrent neural network architecture. Additionally, we extend the largest dataset of student interactions with an intelligent online math tutor by a factor of two. Our final model, coined ATL-BP (Affect Transfer Learning for Behavior Prediction) achieves an increase in mean F-score over state-of-the-art of 45% on this new dataset in the general case and 50% in a more challenging leave-users-out experimental setting when we use a user-personalized training scheme

ATL-BP: a student engagement dataset and model for affect transfer learning for behavior prediction

IIS-1551572 - National Science Foundationhttp://10.0.4.85/TBIOM.2022.3210479Published versio

Changing trade patterns, unchanging European and global governance. Bruegel Working Paper 2014/02, February 2014

The world economy is going through its biggest transformation in a relatively short space time. There have been many explanations for this phenomenon but the unprecedented scale and pace of this change and, most crucially, its implications, still seems little understood. In turn, there has been little preparation for, or adjustment to, this changing world, though if the change continues at this pace, the effectiveness of many global institutions in their current form will be threatened. We highlight the dramatic degree of the shifts taking place in world GDP and trade and include fresh projections of what world trade patterns might look like in 2020, should the trends observed over the past decade to continue. We also show the resulting shift in trade relationships for many key countries. European member states tend to have quite different trading partners’ profiles, and this heterogeneity is quite likely to become more pronounced with time. This, in turn, suggests a significant challenge for the effective functioning of the euro area and weakens the original rationale of its creation. If our projections to 2020 are broadly right, then many established frameworks for the running of the world economy and its governance are not going to be fit for purpose, and will need to change. The global monetary system itself, and global organisations such as the IMF, G7, and G20 are going to have to adapt considerably if they want to remain legitimate representatives of the world order. The alternative is their relegation to irrelevance