Supercharging Chaperones: A Meeting Toolkit for Maximizing Learning for Youth and Chaperones

Trip and conference chaperones are a wonderful resource in youth development programs. These well-intended volunteers, many parents of youth participating in the event, want the best experience for the youth but are not necessarily trained in positive youth development. A consequence of this circumstance is that not all chaperones provide the best opportunities for youth learning. Providing a card-based resource kit that allows for flexibility supports chaperones in running event meetings that are fun and engaging and that improve learning of content and development of life skills

A Framework for Success: The Importance of Board Member Orientation

Volunteer groups such as master gardeners, watershed stewards, beach watchers, and 4-H councils are a tremendous asset to the university extension system, making it possible to greatly expand the reach and depth of Extension programming. Often these groups are overseen and advised by a volunteer board of directors. Conducting a simple board orientation is an effort that can increase the groups\u27 effectiveness. An Extension professional, using basic facilitation skills, can lead a board through six topics of discussion, with the intended outcome being a more effective board. Extension professionals facilitate meetings regularly, so by simply adding this important educational endeavor to routine work, they can increase Extension\u27s impact

Applying 4-H Judging Strategies to Board, Dice, and Card Games: Developing Skills in Urban and Suburban Youths

Most 4-H judging events involve livestock or other traditional 4-H projects. Consequently, many urban and suburban youths miss out on building life skills developed through judging. In a nontraditional approach to 4-H judging, such youths play board, dice, and card games and then judge the games using the practice of giving oral reasons. The youths also reflect on the life skills learned while playing and judging the games. This approach has been used in a Washington State 4-H program. Youths have responded positively, demonstrated skills, and returned to the program year after year. Because Extension offices across the country have resources related to judging, the approach is easily replicated

Defining Effective Programs: How to Navigate Through the Diverse Definitions

There are many organizations that use shared terms to describe effective programs but don’t agree on the definition of these terms. Terms such as evidence based, research-based, proven practices, and promising practices have multiple definitions amongst practitioners. Exploring the different definitions, of these shared terms, by yourself or with your peers is one way to discover how programs are defined by others. This article and links will lead you through a process to understand the variety of youth development definitions used by practitioners and challenge you to create common definitions that will lead to better discussions with others regarding the effectiveness of programs

Formation of the Black Hole in Nova Scorpii

Israelian et al. (1999) showed that the stellar companion of the black-hole binary Nova Sco is polluted with material ejected in the supernova that accompanied the formation of the black-hole primary. Here we systematically investigate the implications of these observations for the black-hole formation process. Using a variety of supernova models, including both standard as well as hypernova models (for different helium-star masses, explosion energies, and explosion geometries) and a simple model for the evolution of the binary and the pollution of the secondary, we show that most of the observed abundance anomalies can be explained for a large range of model parameters (apart from the abundance of Ti). The best models are obtained for He star masses of 10 to 16 Msun, where spherical hypernova models are generally favoured over standard supernova ones. Aspherical hypernova models also produce acceptable fits, provided there is extensive lateral mixing. All models require substantial fallback and that the fallback material either reached the orbit of the secondary or was mixed efficiently with material that escaped. The black hole therefore formed in a two-step process, where the initial mass of the collapsed remnant was increased substantially by matter that fell back after the initial collapse. This may help to explain the high observed space velocity of Nova Sco either because of a neutrino-induced kick (if a neutron star was formed first) or by asymmetric mass ejection in an asymmetric supernova explosion.Comment: 16 pages, 3 Figures, 4 Tables. submitted to Ap

Take an Adventure Bite

The Adventure Bites - Cooking with Kids program enhanced nutrition curriculum by including a Life Skill development focus and a family night - to improve youth nutrition behaviors. The data was collected using the WSU 4-H Life Skills pre-post youth evaluations, staff surveys, a parent retrospective pre-post survey, and comparison data from non-program sites. The results support adding Life Skills and family night events into youth nutrition curricula. There are opportunities to improve evaluation and do further testing, to determine what the individual impact of Life Skill development and/or individual impact of having family nights had on changes in youth behaviors regarding nutrition

Adding Focused Life Skills Training to a Civic Engagement Program to Boost Life Skills Competencies in Youth

This paper highlights the impacts of a revised curriculum which incorporated a strong life skills focus into an existing civic education curriculum (for 4-H youth). The revised curriculum resulted in actual youth gains in life skills competencies. The study also explored the effect of volunteer facilitators in the implementation of an added life skills training component. Despite some significant limitations to the internal and external validity of the study, preliminary indications were that adding explicit life skills training content does in fact lead to an increase in life skills competencies. This was clearer in cases where volunteer facilitators fully implemented the additional content versus implementing none or only part of the life skills training. The limitations of the study and suggestions for future research are outlined in the conclusion

Synthesis of Cruentaren A

Cruentaren A, an antifungal benzolactone produced by the myxobacterium Byssovorax cruenta, is highly cytotoxic against various human cancer cell lines and a highly selective inhibitor of mitochondrial F-ATPase. A convergent and efficient synthesis of cruentaren A is reported, based upon a diastereoselective alkylation, a series of stereoselective aldol reactions utilizing Myers’ pseudoephedrine propionamide, an acyl bromide–mediated esterification and a ring-closing metathesis (RCM) as the key steps. The RCM reaction was applied for the first time towards the total synthesis of cruentaren A, which led to a convergent and efficient synthesis of the natural product

Dynamics of an Acute Coral Disease Outbreak Associated with the Macroalgae \u3cem\u3eDictyota\u3c/em\u3e SPP. in Dry Tortugas National Park, Florida, USA

Reports of coral disease outbreaks have increased in recent decades, but often few details are known about these outbreaks, such as environmental triggers, associated biological variables, or even the precise temporal span of the outbreak. Here we document an acute outbreak of a rapid tissue loss disease on the highest live coral cover (15%–30%) reefs within Dry Tortugas National Park, Florida, USA. This disease exhibited similar signs to white plague disease with the notable exception that a white film often was observed on the recently denuded skeleton. The temporal span of the disease was short (\u3c2 mo). Partial mortality was recorded but there was no detectable impact to overall coral cover. A significant increase and then decrease in the cover of macroalgae, primarily of the genus Dictyota, occurred simultaneously with the increase and drop in disease lesion density (number of lesions per living tissue area), respectively. No other anomalous biological or physical factors (e.g., unusual temperature, turbidity, passage of storms) corresponded with the outbreak, although it is likely that some environmental anomaly that was undetectable with the methods employed favored both disease and Dictyota expansion. This is the first study to associate a rapid increase in a macroalgal population with a coral disease outbreak. We highlight the need for increased study of the initiation of such outbreaks in the caribbean