The relationship of professional support and commitment to the teaching profession

Although the study of professional support and professional commitment are prevalent in the education literature, not many studies examined both these issues issue among technical school educators. Acknowledging this limitation, this study was undertaken to examine the extent to which professional commitment can be influenced by professional support among this group of teachers. Data for this exploratory study were collected using self administered questionnaires, from 120 randomly selected technical school teachers. Correlational analysis revealed that there was a significant relationship between professional support and professional commitment among the teachers understudied. Multiple regression analysis showed that the variance in explaining professional commitment was contributed by professional support, comprising, both principal support and collegial support. Based on the statistical results, implications of the findings were discussed in the context of understanding the relationship between professional support and professional commitment. Suggestions on how to increase professional commitment and professional support as well avenues for future research were also provided

The Influence Of Selected Factors On ProfessionalnCommitment of Technical School Teachers In Sarawak

Although studies on commitment are prevalent in the education literature, most of these studies generally focused on commitment as a unidimensional concept. Recent studies provided evidence that commitment is multi-dimensional (Meyer and Allen, 1990, 1991, 1997), but received little attention from researchers. Acknowledging that commitment is multi-dimensional in nature, this study was undertaken to use a three-component commitment model, proposed by Meyer and Allen's (1990) to examine professional commitment. The study also examined the extent to which professional commitment can be predicted by perceived principal support, collegial support, role states and job characteristics. Data were collected from 120 randomly selected technical school teachers in Sarawak, using self-administered questionnaires. Overall, the study concluded that technical school teachers were highly committed to the teaching profession. They reported relatively high levels of affective, continuance and normative commitment. Results obtained from the correlation analysis revealed that teachers who perceived high levels of principal support, collegial support and job characteristics were more committed to the teaching profession. However, teachers who perceived high levels of role states were relatively less committed. Principal support, collegial support and job characteristics were also strongly related to affective, continuance and normative commitment. Role states were negatively related to affective commitment but positively related to continuance commitment. Results from a series of regression models revealed that overall professional commitment was predicted by principal support (emotional support), collegial support and job characteristics (feedback) but not role states. These three predictors explained 46.1% of the variance in professional commitment. Separately assessing each of the three components of professional commitment, it was found that affective, continuance and normative commitment were predicted by different clusters of factors. Specific results showed that affective commitment was highly dependent on emotional support, role conflict, skill variety, task significance and feedback. These predictors explained 38.3% of the variance in affective commitment. Only skill variety was significant in explaining continuance commitment, which contributed 1 1.7% of the variance in continuance commitment.Normative commitment closely resembled the pattern of results found in professional commitment, with emotional support, collegial support and feedback as significant predictors. These predictors explained 39.9% of the variance in normative commitment. The results of this study highlighted the importance of recognising that professional commitment be viewed as a multi-dimensional concept. Therefore, more studies should look into the multi-dimensional aspect of commitment to gain a more comprehensive understanding of the true nature of professional commitment. Based on the statistical results, implications of the findings were discussed in the context of understanding professional commitment of teachers. Suggestions on how to increase professional commitment and avenues for hture research were also provided in this dissertation

Maritime threat response

This report was prepared by Systems Engineering and Analysis Cohort Nine (SEA-9) Maritime Threat Response, (MTR) team members.Background: The 2006 Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) Cross-Campus Integrated Study, titled “Maritime Threat Response” involved the combined effort of 7 NPS Systems Engineering students, 7 Singaporean Temasek Defense Systems Institute (TDSI) students, 12 students from the Total Ship Systems Engineering (TSSE) curriculum, and numerous NPS faculty members from different NPS departments. After receiving tasking provided by the Wayne E. Meyer Institute of Systems Engineering at NPS in support of the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense, the study examined ways to validate intelligence and respond to maritime terrorist attacks against United States coastal harbors and ports. Through assessment of likely harbors and waterways to base the study upon, the San Francisco Bay was selected as a representative test-bed for the integrated study. The NPS Systems Engineering and Analysis Cohort 9 (SEA-9) Maritime Threat Response (MTR) team, in conjunction with the TDSI students, used the Systems Engineering Lifecycle Process (SELP) [shown in Figure ES-1, p. xxiii ] as a systems engineering framework to conduct the multi-disciplinary study. While not actually fabricating any hardware, such a process was well-suited for tailoring to the team’s research efforts and project focus. The SELP was an iterative process used to bound and scope the MTR problem, determine needs, requirements, functions, and to design architecture alternatives to satisfy stakeholder needs and desires. The SoS approach taken [shown in Figure ES-2, p. xxiv ]enabled the team to apply a systematic approach to problem definition, needs analysis, requirements, analysis, functional analysis, and then architecture development and assessment.In the twenty-first century, the threat of asymmetric warfare in the form of terrorism is one of the most likely direct threats to the United States homeland. It has been recognized that perhaps the key element in protecting the continental United States from terrorist threats is obtaining intelligence of impending attacks in advance. Enormous amounts of resources are currently allocated to obtaining and parsing such intelligence. However, it remains a difficult problem to deal with such attacks once intelligence is obtained. In this context, the Maritime Threat Response Project has applied Systems Engineering processes to propose different cost-effective System of Systems (SoS) architecture solutions to surface-based terrorist threats emanating from the maritime domain. The project applied a five-year time horizon to provide near-term solutions to the prospective decision makers and take maximum advantage of commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) solutions and emphasize new Concepts of Operations (CONOPS) for existing systems. Results provided insight into requirements for interagency interactions in support of Maritime Security and demonstrated the criticality of timely and accurate intelligence in support of counterterror operations.This report was prepared for the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland DefenseApproved for public release; distribution is unlimited

An outbreak of Streptococcus pyogenes in a mental health facility : advantage of well-timed whole-genome sequencing over emm typing

Financial support: The outbreak investigation was supported by Institute of Mental Health.OBJECTIVE:  We report the utility of whole-genome sequencing (WGS) conducted in a clinically relevant time frame (ie, sufficient for guiding management decision), in managing a Streptococcus pyogenes outbreak, and present a comparison of its performance with emm typing. SETTING:  A 2,000-bed tertiary-care psychiatric hospital. METHODS:  Active surveillance was conducted to identify new cases of S. pyogenes. WGS guided targeted epidemiological investigations, and infection control measures were implemented. Single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP)-based genome phylogeny, emm typing, and multilocus sequence typing (MLST) were performed. We compared the ability of WGS and emm typing to correctly identify person-to-person transmission and to guide the management of the outbreak. RESULTS:  The study included 204 patients and 152 staff. We identified 35 patients and 2 staff members with S. pyogenes. WGS revealed polyclonal S. pyogenes infections with 3 genetically distinct phylogenetic clusters (C1-C3). Cluster C1 isolates were all emm type 4, sequence type 915 and had pairwise SNP differences of 0-5, which suggested recent person-to-person transmissions. Epidemiological investigation revealed that cluster C1 was mediated by dermal colonization and transmission of S. pyogenes in a male residential ward. Clusters C2 and C3 were genomically diverse, with pairwise SNP differences of 21-45 and 26-58, and emm 11 and mostly emm120, respectively. Clusters C2 and C3, which may have been considered person-to-person transmissions by emm typing, were shown by WGS to be unlikely by integrating pairwise SNP differences with epidemiology. CONCLUSIONS:  WGS had higher resolution than emm typing in identifying clusters with recent and ongoing person-to-person transmissions, which allowed implementation of targeted intervention to control the outbreak.PostprintPeer reviewe

Search for eccentric black hole coalescences during the third observing run of LIGO and Virgo

Despite the growing number of confident binary black hole coalescences observed through gravitational waves so far, the astrophysical origin of these binaries remains uncertain. Orbital eccentricity is one of the clearest tracers of binary formation channels. Identifying binary eccentricity, however, remains challenging due to the limited availability of gravitational waveforms that include effects of eccentricity. Here, we present observational results for a waveform-independent search sensitive to eccentric black hole coalescences, covering the third observing run (O3) of the LIGO and Virgo detectors. We identified no new high-significance candidates beyond those that were already identified with searches focusing on quasi-circular binaries. We determine the sensitivity of our search to high-mass (total mass M>70 M⊙) binaries covering eccentricities up to 0.3 at 15 Hz orbital frequency, and use this to compare model predictions to search results. Assuming all detections are indeed quasi-circular, for our fiducial population model, we place an upper limit for the merger rate density of high-mass binaries with eccentricities 0<e≤0.3 at 0.33 Gpc−3 yr−1 at 90\% confidence level

Ultralight vector dark matter search using data from the KAGRA O3GK run

Among the various candidates for dark matter (DM), ultralight vector DM can be probed by laser interferometric gravitational wave detectors through the measurement of oscillating length changes in the arm cavities. In this context, KAGRA has a unique feature due to differing compositions of its mirrors, enhancing the signal of vector DM in the length change in the auxiliary channels. Here we present the result of a search for U(1)B−L gauge boson DM using the KAGRA data from auxiliary length channels during the first joint observation run together with GEO600. By applying our search pipeline, which takes into account the stochastic nature of ultralight DM, upper bounds on the coupling strength between the U(1)B−L gauge boson and ordinary matter are obtained for a range of DM masses. While our constraints are less stringent than those derived from previous experiments, this study demonstrates the applicability of our method to the lower-mass vector DM search, which is made difficult in this measurement by the short observation time compared to the auto-correlation time scale of DM

Search for gravitational-lensing signatures in the full third observing run of the LIGO-Virgo network

Gravitational lensing by massive objects along the line of sight to the source causes distortions of gravitational wave-signals; such distortions may reveal information about fundamental physics, cosmology and astrophysics. In this work, we have extended the search for lensing signatures to all binary black hole events from the third observing run of the LIGO--Virgo network. We search for repeated signals from strong lensing by 1) performing targeted searches for subthreshold signals, 2) calculating the degree of overlap amongst the intrinsic parameters and sky location of pairs of signals, 3) comparing the similarities of the spectrograms amongst pairs of signals, and 4) performing dual-signal Bayesian analysis that takes into account selection effects and astrophysical knowledge. We also search for distortions to the gravitational waveform caused by 1) frequency-independent phase shifts in strongly lensed images, and 2) frequency-dependent modulation of the amplitude and phase due to point masses. None of these searches yields significant evidence for lensing. Finally, we use the non-detection of gravitational-wave lensing to constrain the lensing rate based on the latest merger-rate estimates and the fraction of dark matter composed of compact objects

Development of multicultural education in Singapore.

The paper provides an insight into Singapore multicultural education system and explains the concept of multicultural education which includes the five dimensions of multicultural education: content integration, knowledge construction, prejudice reduction, equity pedagogy and school culture. It proceeds to look at how the five dimensions integrated into Singapore’s Education system

Intelligent control of a nitrogen laser

The aim of this project was to build and refine a nitrogen laser, and subsequently apply computational intelligence to control and stabilize the output characteristics of the nitrogen laser beam.RG 70/9