Impact of College Counseling within Private high schools on First-generation College-bound Students\u27 Enrollment in Four-year Colleges: A Case Study

First-generation college-bound students (FGCBS), students whose parents do not have a college degree, are at a disadvantage during the preparation for and enrollment in 4-year colleges, according to the literature. A majority of these students either never enter 4-year colleges, or enroll in 2-year colleges and never complete a bachelor\u27s degree. With the demand in the work force for college degrees, much research has been conducted on understanding the experiences of these students. Previous research has focused on college counseling for FGCBS within public schools, traditionally low-resourced public schools, as this is where most FGCBS are enrolled. This study addresses a void in the literature by focusing on the college-counseling experiences of FGCBS enrolled in private schools, which are schools that traditionally send close to 100% of their graduates to 4-year colleges. The key question is whether FGCBS in private schools experience a gap in resources and outcomes despite college counseling opportunities comparable to those of their non-FGCB peers. This case study focused on FGCBS in two private high schools in San Francisco. A survey adapted from the CHOICES Project at UCLA was used to survey 156 seniors at both schools (74% response rate) about their college-counseling experience. Additionally, five FGCBS at each school were interviewed and all three college counseling staff at each school were interviewed. Both qualitative and quantitative data were collected and analyzed. The major findings from the study complement previous research about FGCBS, extending knowledge of students\u27 experiences from the public school to the private school sphere. Four main constructs were addressed throughout the study: students\u27 educational aspirations, students\u27 perceived access to resources, barriers to 4-year college, and students performance indicators. First, FGCBS\u27 educational aspirations were found to be no different than non-FGCBS: FGCBS had high aspirations to attend college and, in fact, they had similar aspirations as non-FGCBS to attend selective colleges. Second, perceived access to resources of FGCBS statistically were no different than non-FGCBS, but through interviews, it was evident that FGCBS did not feel as comfortable taking advantage of the resources they knew were available within the school, resulting in them not having the same level of information and support during the college application process. Third, many perceived barriers to a 4-year degree were identified. Through both quantitative statistical and qualitative methods, there was a difference in perceived barriers to a 4-year degree, where FGCBS identified more barriers to this goal than non-FGCBS. They identified many barriers consistent with the literature, such as lack of parental educational capital and lack of financial capital. Additionally, there was a statistical difference between perceived barriers between FGCBS enrolled at each high school, where FGCBS at Woodcrest identified more barriers than FGCBS at Stoneholt. It is interesting because at Woodcrest the students were taught and encouraged to realistically face their situation as FGCBS and at Stoneholt their first-generation status was not really addressed through college counseling. All the FGCBS faced the same barriers but only their perception differed. Fourth, performance was assessed. Overall, despite lower test scores and lower GPAs than non-FGCBS, and a difference of GPAs between the FGCBS at the two high schools (Stoneholt FGCBS had lower GPAs), 100% of FGCBS at both high schools graduated and enrolled in 4-year colleges for the fall. Several recommendations arose that need further research concerning the role of college counselors in order to improve success rates for FGCBS. College counselors should be trained in financial aid information, FGCBS should start the college counseling process sooner than their non-FGCBS counterparts and college counselors should give extra attention to FGCBS to compensate for the lack of parental educational and financial capital. The bigger question still to be explored is how the private school structure itself contributed to the findings and therefore how it can be changed in order to better support the counseling staff to ultimately support FGCBS better

A Novel Web Service Based Home Energy Management System

In the last years energy consumption in the home environments has increased considerably. There is an interest to provide users with means to reduce their energy consumption. Introducing a Home Energy Management System (HEMS) into user residences might provide the necessary tools to reduce and optimize the energy consumption in home environments. The main element of HEMS is the home gateway. In this paper, a home gateway suitable for HEMS is presented. The home gateway proposed uses rules to implement the home energy management system. The rules can be downloaded though web services from a rule server. Furthermore, web services are used to provide modularity to the home gateway by enabling the deployment of the different logical components into different devices, if necessary

Innovación docente en el grado de maestro de la Universitat de València. La percepción auditiva y visual del paisaje a través de las tic

El presente artículo tiene como objetivo principal trabajar el medio natural y el paisaje sonoro desde el punto de vista auditivo y visual. Para ello, se han integrado en el aula de grado de magisterio de la Universitat de València dos proyectos de innovación educativa: L'HORT 2.0 (UV-SFPIE_DOCE14-223306) y IEDUCARTS (UV-SFPIE_DOCE14-222755). El primero utiliza el huerto escolar y de investigación como recurso para aproximar al alumnado a su entorno natural. El segundo, trabaja las artes visuales y la música a través de la percepción para crear un espacio de reflexión y debate sobre las distintas posibilidades de trabajo que ofrece la educación artística en consonancia con otros lenguajes

Juventud, políticas públicas y crisis en España: ¿Triángulo mágico o triángulo de las Bermudas?

En tiempos de crisis, las políticas de juventud están experimentando enormes recortes y transformaciones hasta el punto que hemos llegado a preguntarnos si realmente existen como políticas públicas con entidad propia. La situación en la que se encuentran muchos sujetos jóvenes en España les lleva a preguntarse dónde están las redes de protección tradicionales: la familia, las ONG's o el Estado de Bienestar, cuando realmente se los necesita. Nuestro objetivo en este artículo es presentar y discutir la situación de las políticas de juventud en España en el contexto actual de austeridad y drásticos recortes sociales. Este análisis lo llevamos a cabo a partir de los parámetros del triángulo mágico que unen las políticas, la investigación y el trabajo social con jóve

Coxsackie B3 Virus-induced Acute Hemorrhagic Edema of Infancy

Acute hemorrhagic edema of infancy (AHEI) is a cutaneous leukocytoclastic small vessel vasculitis of unknown incidence. It affects mostly infants aged 4 to 24 months. The distinctive features of AHEI include a generally healthy-appearing child with low-grade or absent fever and rarely painful targetoid purpuric edematous lesions. The disease usually resolves spontaneously within 3 weeks without late sequelae. The main differential diagnosis of AHEI is Henoch-Schönlein purpura (HSP). Initially, purpura fulminans should also be ruled out. We report the case of a 5-year-old girl with low fever and rapidly progressive skin lesions who had been admitted to the pediatric clinic. The child presented with palpable annular targetoid and purpuric plaques of different size predominantly affecting the face and extremities. In addition, there was a painful, hemorrhagic edema on the dorsum of her hands and feet. Based on the course of the disease and the typical clinical presentation, i.e., extensive characteristic skin lesions in a young child in a good general health condition, a diagnosis of AHEI was established. A virus serology test showed increased titers of enterovirus and coxsackievirus. Isolation of virus from feces confirmed an infection with coxsackie B3 virus. To our knowledge, this is the first report linking coxsackie B3 virus infection to AHE