Information literacy in the programmatic university accreditation standards of select professions in Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia

University accreditation schemes, in some form or other, are ubiquitous among English-language speaking countries around the world. Some countries employ national or regional accreditation processes, and a few authors have explored the role of information literacy (IL) in these institution-wide accreditation practices. Little, however, has been written about IL in the context of accreditation standards developed by various professions to regulate the quality of university programmes educating future professionals in the field. This paper investigates the potential of these professional accreditation standards to advance the IL cause and give it a higher profile on campus. It undertakes a qualitative content analysis of the professional accreditation standards for three professions-- nursing, social work, and engineering –in Canada, the United States (US), the United Kingdom (UK), and Australia to determine: a.) If (and in what context) the term IL is used in the accreditation criteria; b.) Other terms/language used in the accreditation criteria to describe IL and associated skills and competencies; and c.) Correlations between outcomes outlined in the accreditation documents and IL competencies outlined by the library profession. The study identifies trends, both within specific professions, and within the documents produced by each of the four countries under consideration. It reports significant variation in the language used in the professions to describe the concept of IL, highlighting the alternative language used in the various professions to describe this ability. The study also maps outcomes outlined in the accreditation documents to the Association of College and Research Libraries’ (ACRL’s) Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education ((ACRL 2000) in order to identify areas of overlapping concern. In doing so, this study helps familiarise librarians with the accreditation standards in several subjects, and provides a model for librarians to use in analysing accreditation standards in other subject areas in order to advance IL on their campuses

Title IX and Intercollegiate Athletics: An Analysis of The Extent to Which Title IX Has Fulfilled its Original Promise of Establishing Gender Equity Between Men and Women in Intercollegiate Athletics

This thesis examines the extent to which Title IX has fulfilled its original promise of establishing gender equity between men and women in intercollegiate athletics. To evaluate the OCR’s commitment to establishing gender equity in intercollegiate athletics, the evolution of Title IX from 1972-2020 is provided, demonstrating a disconnect between Title IX’s intent in 1972 and how it is interpreted and enforced today by the OCR. The OCR’s Three-Part Test is analyzed by each prong’s ability to establish and measure gender equity, revealing the test’s inconsistency with the core intent of Title IX, as well as the OCR’s nonexistent enforcement of discriminatory practices despite the lack of institutional compliance. The substantial lack of equitable opportunities for female athletes, a consequence of both the OCR’s unreliable interpretations and enforcement of Title IX, is demonstrated through analysis of institutional fulfillment of Title IX scholarship and Three-Prong Test requirements. To further investigate the deviation of Title IX interpretations from the legislation’s original purpose, the effect of political ideology on Title IX policy is analyzed, demonstrating the politicization of Title IX over the course of six presidential administrations. Overall, this thesis reveals Title IX’s immense progress in establishing greater athletic opportunities for women, as well as the lack of institutional compliance, due to the OCR’s inconsistent commitment to providing nondiscriminatory athletic opportunities for all athletes. Ultimately, a five-point policy is proposed to update Title IX guidance and incentivize robust enforcement, consistent with the core value of the legislation

Lessons for the Philanthropic Sector on the Use of Matching Contingencies

Many philanthropic institutions require prospective or current grantees to match all or part of the value of a grant in order to secure funding. Foundations use matching contingencies to recruit funding partners, build grantee capacity to raise funds, replicate program models, and exit from the field, among other purposes. In January 2014, Atlantic commissioned Mathematica Policy Research to evaluate its matching practices. The purpose of the evaluation is to document the utility and outcomes of Atlantic's use of matching requirements. The findings in this report provide information on the outcomes and effects of the use of matching contingencies to inform other philanthropic organizations about possible consequences of this funding practice

The Membership Business Model: Great for Business but What about Consumers?

Membership business models are increasingly prevalent, as they appear to be beneficial to companies. However, questions exist about the benefits of the membership business model to consumers. This paper examines consumer perspectives on the membership business model in the context of customer complaints related to Savage X Fenty’s business practices. Data were collected via 692 complaints posted to the Better Business Bureau website and analyzed according to protocols for phenomenology. Eight themes emerged from the data, beginning with membership sign-up and ending with being charged after-the-fact. The themes captured the different frustrations that consumers experienced with Savage X Fenty’s membership business model. The results are discussed in light of marketing relationships, ethics, and service recovery

Impacts of a multi-trap line on benthic habitat containing emergent epifauna within the Mid-Atlantic Bight

Alteration and degradation of benthic structure by fishing gear can impede efforts to manage fish stock sustainably. Although the impacts of mobile gear are well known, effects of passive gear (e.g. fish traps) upon structure have been little studied. We modified commercial traps for American lobster Homarus americanus and black sea bass Centropristis striata by attaching GoPro (R) cameras to ascertain the degree and nature of impacts to seafloor habitats. Customized traps were included within a line of 20 traps, deployed and retrieved according to standard commercial fishing practice. Less than 5% of traps landed directly on bedforms when deployed. However, during retrieval traps dragged along the ocean floor, increasing trap-habitat contact rate to 50%, and causing traps to collide with corals, bryozoans, and other epifauna. Drag time of traps depended on the position in the trap line. Experimentally extending the trap line reduced drag time during retrieval for traps near the distal end of the line. Our results show that impacts of commercial trap fishing can be substantial during trap retrieval, and that the impact depends on their location on a trap line. Fishing practices should be developed that minimize effects of trap retrieval on structural benthic habitat

High-dimensional immunotyping of tumors grown in obese and non-obese mice

Obesity is a disease characterized by chronic low-grade systemic inflammation and has been causally linked to the development of 13 cancer types. Several studies have been undertaken to determine whether tumors evolving in obese environments adapt differential interactions with immune cells and whether this can be connected to disease outcome. Most of these studies have been limited to single-cell lines and tumor models and analysis of limited immune cell populations. Given the multicellular complexity of the immune system and its dysregulation in obesity, we applied high-dimensional suspension mass cytometry to investigate how obesity affects tumor immunity. We used a 36-marker immune-focused mass cytometry panel to interrogate the immune landscape of orthotopic syngeneic mouse models of pancreatic and breast cancer. Unanchored batch correction was implemented to enable simultaneous analysis of tumor cohorts to uncover the immunotypes of each cancer model and reveal remarkably model-specific immune regulation. In the E0771 breast cancer model, we demonstrate an important link to obesity with an increase in two T-cell-suppressive cell types and a decrease in CD8 T cells.publishedVersio

The Bolocam Galactic Plane Survey: Survey Description and Data Reduction

We present the Bolocam Galactic Plane Survey (BGPS), a 1.1 mm continuum survey at 33" effective resolution of 170 square degrees of the Galactic Plane visible from the northern hemisphere. The survey is contiguous over the range -10.5 < l < 90.5, |b| < 0.5 and encompasses 133 square degrees, including some extended regions |b| < 1.5. In addition to the contiguous region, four targeted regions in the outer Galaxy were observed: IC1396, a region towards the Perseus Arm, W3/4/5, and Gem OB1. The BGPS has detected approximately 8400 clumps over the entire area to a limiting non-uniform 1-sigma noise level in the range 11 to 53 mJy/beam in the inner Galaxy. The BGPS source catalog is presented in a companion paper (Rosolowsky et al. 2010). This paper details the survey observations and data reduction methods for the images. We discuss in detail the determination of astrometric and flux density calibration uncertainties and compare our results to the literature. Data processing algorithms that separate astronomical signals from time-variable atmospheric fluctuations in the data time-stream are presented. These algorithms reproduce the structure of the astronomical sky over a limited range of angular scales and produce artifacts in the vicinity of bright sources. Based on simulations, we find that extended emission on scales larger than about 5.9' is nearly completely attenuated (> 90%) and the linear scale at which the attenuation reaches 50% is 3.8'. Comparison with other millimeter-wave data sets implies a possible systematic offset in flux calibration, for which no cause has been discovered. This presentation serves as a companion and guide to the public data release through NASA's Infrared Processing and Analysis Center (IPAC) Infrared Science Archive (IRSA). New data releases will be provided through IPAC IRSA with any future improvements in the reduction.Comment: Accepted for publication in Astrophysical Journal Supplemen

The Bolocam Galactic Plane Survey: II. Catalog of The Image Data

We present a catalog of 8358 sources extracted from images produced by the Bolocam Galactic Plane Survey (BGPS). The BGPS is a survey of the millimeter dust continuum emission from the northern Galactic plane. The catalog sources are extracted using a custom algorithm, Bolocat, which was designed specifically to identify and characterize objects in the large-area maps generated from the Bolocam instrument. The catalog products are designed to facilitate follow-up observations of these relatively unstudied objects. The catalog is 98% complete from 0.4 Jy to 60 Jy over all object sizes for which the survey is sensitive ( \u3c 3\u27.5). We find that the sources extracted can best be described as molecular clumps-large dense regions in molecular clouds linked to cluster formation. We find that the flux density distribution of sources follows a power law with dN/dS alpha S(-2.4+/-0.1) and that the mean Galactic latitude for sources is significantly below the midplane: \u3c b \u3e = (-0 degrees.095 +/- 0 degrees.001)

C/EBPB-dependent adaptation to palmitic acid promotes tumor formation in hormone receptor negative breast cancer

Epidemiological studies have established a positive association between obesity and the incidence of postmenopausal breast cancer. Moreover, it is known that obesity promotes stem cell-like properties of breast cancer cells. However, the cancer cell-autonomous mechanisms underlying this correlation are not well defined. Here we demonstrate that obesity-associated tumor formation is driven by cellular adaptation rather than expansion of pre-existing clones within the cancer cell population. While there is no correlation with specific mutations, cellular adaptation to obesity is governed by palmitic acid (PA) and leads to enhanced tumor formation capacity of breast cancer cells. This process is governed epigenetically through increased chromatin occupancy of the transcription factor CCAAT/enhancer-binding protein beta (C/EBPB). Obesity-induced epigenetic activation of C/EBPB regulates cancer stem-like properties by modulating the expression of key downstream regulators including CLDN1 and LCN2. Collectively, our findings demonstrate that obesity drives cellular adaptation to PA drives tumor initiation in the obese setting through activation of a C/EBPB dependent transcriptional network.publishedVersio

Assessing the effectiveness of two theoretically motivated computerassisted reading interventions in the United Kingdom: GG Rime and GG Phoneme

We report an empirical comparison of the effectiveness of two theoretically motivated computer-assisted reading interventions (CARI) based on the Finnish GraphoGame CARI: English GraphoGame Rime (GG Rime) and English GraphoGame Phoneme (GG Phoneme). Participants were 6–7-year-old students who had been identified by their teachers as being relatively poor at reading. The students were divided into three groups. Two of the groups played one of the games as a supplement to normal classroom literacy instruction for five sessions per week for a period of 12 weeks. The third group formed an untreated control. Both games led to gains in reading, spelling, and phonological skills in comparison with the untreated control group. The two interventions also had some differential effects. The intervention gains were maintained at a four-month follow-up