Implementing a 4-H Aquatic Resources Education Program in New York City Through Collaborations

The New York State 4-H Sportfishing and Aquatic Resources Education Program (SAREP) has enjoyed relatively high participation rates in upstate New York, but until 1998, had experienced little success in New York City. This was due to the Cornell staff\u27s inexperience in working with the Extension program in NYC, which does not use the traditional rural volunteer-led 4-H club model. Rather than create a traditional club system in NYC, it was decided to build collaborations with existing youth-serving organizations. The approach resulted in 17 different youth-serving organizations conducting SAREP programming reaching approximately 40,000 youth annually

Early affective changes and increased connectivity in preclinical Alzheimer's disease.

IntroductionAffective changes precede cognitive decline in mild Alzheimer's disease and may relate to increased connectivity in a "salience network" attuned to emotionally significant stimuli. The trajectory of affective changes in preclinical Alzheimer's disease, and its relationship to this network, is unknown.MethodsOne hundred one cognitively normal older adults received longitudinal assessments of affective symptoms, then amyloid-PET. We hypothesized amyloid-positive individuals would show enhanced emotional reactivity associated with salience network connectivity. We tested whether increased global connectivity in key regions significantly related to affective changes.ResultsIn participants later found to be amyloid positive, emotional reactivity increased with age, and interpersonal warmth declined in women. These individuals showed higher global connectivity within the right insula and superior temporal sulcus; higher superior temporal sulcus connectivity predicted increasing emotional reactivity and decreasing interpersonal warmth.ConclusionsAffective changes should be considered an early preclinical feature of Alzheimer's disease. These changes may relate to higher functional connectivity in regions critical for social-emotional processing

Promoting VCU Community Solutions

This promotional project focuses on VCU Community Solutions — the new interdisciplinary initiative for education, research, and service. Since this initiative demonstrates the synergy that students, faculty, and community members can create by working together, the promotional video captures their perspectives. Through interviews and footage of community programs, the video shows how VCU Community Solutions engages university and community partners in addressing critical social issues — creating more imovative approaches by working together

Effectiveness of a Peer-Delivered Dissonance-Based Program in Reducing Eating Disorder Risk Factors in High School Girls

Objective This pilot study investigated the feasibility, acceptability, and effectiveness of a peer-led dissonance-based eating disorders (ED) prevention/risk factor reduction program with high school girls. Method Ninth grade girls (n  = 50) received the peer-led program within the school curriculum. A quasi-experimental design was used to assess changes in ED risk factors preintervention and postintervention compared with waitlist control. Participants were followed through 3-month follow-up. Results Peer-leader adherence to an intervention manual tailored for this age group was high. The intervention was rated as highly acceptable, with a large proportion of participants reporting that they enjoyed the program and learned and applied new information. Intervention participants exhibited significantly greater pre-post reductions in a majority of risk-factor outcomes compared to waitlist controls. When groups were combined to assess program effects over time there were significant pre-post reductions in a majority of outcomes that were sustained through 3-month follow-up. Discussion This pilot study provides tentative support for the effectiveness of using peer leaders to implement an empirically supported ED risk factor reduction program in a high school setting. Additional research is needed to replicate results in larger, better-controlled trials with longer follow-up

Can Human Assistance Improve a Computational Poet?

Abstract Good computational poetry requires sufficiently interesting poetic phrases to be generated or chosen. Different metrics for determining what makes a sufficiently interesting phrase have rarely been directly compared. We directly compare of a number of metrics-topicality, sentiment, and concrete imagery-by collecting human judgments on each metric for the same data set of human-generated phrases, then having humans judge computationally generated poems chosen to include high-scoring phrases against each other. We find through a quantitative analysis that the output of at least some of these metrics is perceived as better than output using none of these metrics

Parenting and Beyond: Common Neurocircuits Underlying Parental and Altruistic Caregiving

Interpersonal relationships constitute the foundation on which human society is based. The infant–caregiver bond is the earliest and most influential of these relationships. Driven by evolutionary pressure for survival, parents feel compelled to provide care to their biological offspring. However, compassion for non-kin is also ubiquitous in human societies, motivating individuals to suppress their own self-interests to promote the well-being of non-kin members of the society. We argue that the process of early kinship-selective parental care provides the foundation for non-exclusive altruism via the activation of a general Caregiving System that regulates compassion in any of its forms. We propose a tripartite structure of this system that includes (1) the perception of need in another, (2) a caring motivational or feeling state, and (3) the delivery of a helping response to the individual in need. Findings from human and animal research point to specific neurobiological mechanisms including activation of the insula and the secretion of oxytocin that support the adaptive functioning of this Caregiving System

The 1% Campaign

The purpose of The1% Campaign is to raise scholarship funds for first year VCU students who are dependents of VCU/VCUHS employees. Honoring Dr. Grace E. Harris, this fund will eventually provide tuition and fees for new students for need-based and/or merit-based scholarships. The ultimate goal of The 1% Campaign is to entirely fund one percent of the entering first year class which is approximately thirty to thirty-five students. The recipients will be named Grace E. Harris Scholars