Stragegies for Attracting and Retaining Teachers

Attracting and retaining high quality teachers is a challenge for many school districts. This is especially true in a time of increased accountability and limited resources. This report details best practice in the training, hiring, improvement, and retention of high quality teaching staff. The authors explain how school leaders can attract quality teaching staff, provide effective new teacher induction programs, and establish procedures that will assist in retaining the best of the best teaching staff

HELPING TEACHERS BE SUCCESSFUL: LESSONS FOR ADMINISTRATORS

The goal of this study was to identify areas of teacher performance that were lacking to the point that the teacher was nonrenewed. Individual school districts can gain insight into why teachers are failing and make adjustments to their training and teacher induction programs that will improve professional practice. The study found that teachers failed primarily in the area of classroom management. Of the 22 possible teaching skills in which teachers could be deficient, four of the top five causes for nonrenewal came within the category of classroom management (Creating an Environment of Respect and Rapport, Managing Student Behavior, Managing Classroom Procedures, and Establishing a Culture for Learning). School districts should examine their staff development strategies and teacher induction programs to assure that these areas of concern are addressed

The Risk of Exposure to Diagnostic Ultrasound in Postnatal Subjects

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/135382/1/jum2008274565.pd

Proximity extension assay testing reveals novel diagnostic biomarkers of atypical parkinsonian syndromes.

OBJECTIVE: The high degree of clinical overlap between atypical parkinsonian syndromes (APS) and Parkinson's disease (PD) makes diagnosis challenging. We aimed to identify novel diagnostic protein biomarkers of APS using multiplex proximity extension assay (PEA) testing. METHODS: Cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) samples from two independent cohorts, each consisting of APS and PD cases, and controls, were analysed for neurofilament light chain (NF-L) and Olink Neurology and Inflammation PEA biomarker panels. Whole-cohort comparisons of biomarker concentrations were made between APS (n=114), PD (n=37) and control (n=34) groups using logistic regression analyses that included gender, age and disease duration as covariates. RESULTS: APS versus controls analyses revealed 11 CSF markers with significantly different levels in cases and controls (p<0.002). Four of these markers also reached significance (p<0.05) in APS versus PD analyses. Disease-specific analyses revealed lower group levels of FGF-5, FGF-19 and SPOCK1 in multiple system atrophy compared with progressive supranuclear palsy and corticobasal syndrome. Receiver operating characteristic curve analyses suggested that the diagnostic accuracy of NF-L was superior to the significant PEA biomarkers in distinguishing APS, PD and controls. The biological processes regulated by the significant proteins include cell differentiation and immune cell migration. Delta and notch-like epidermal growth factor-related receptor (DNER) had the strongest effect size in APS versus controls and APS versus PD analyses. DNER is highly expressed in substantia nigra and is an activator of the NOTCH1 pathway which has been implicated in the aetiology of other neurodegenerative disorders including Alzheimer's disease. CONCLUSIONS: PEA testing has identified potential novel diagnostic biomarkers of APS

Database resources of the National Center for Biotechnology Information

In addition to maintaining the GenBank(R) nucleic acid sequence database, the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) provides data retrieval systems and computational resources for the analysis of data in GenBank and other biological data made available through NCBI's website. NCBI resources include Entrez, Entrez Programming Utilities, PubMed, PubMed Central, Entrez Gene, the NCBI Taxonomy Browser, BLAST, BLAST Link (BLink), Electronic PCR, OrfFinder, Spidey, RefSeq, UniGene, HomoloGene, ProtEST, dbMHC, dbSNP, Cancer Chromosomes, Entrez Genomes and related tools, the Map Viewer, Model Maker, Evidence Viewer, Clusters of Orthologous Groups (COGs), Retroviral Genotyping Tools, HIV-1/Human Protein Interaction Database, SAGEmap, Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO), Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man (OMIM), the Molecular Modeling Database (MMDB), the Conserved Domain Database (CDD) and the Conserved Domain Architecture Retrieval Tool (CDART). Augmenting many of the Web applications are custom implementations of the BLAST program optimized to search specialized datasets. All of the resources can be accessed through the NCBI home page at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

Progression of atypical parkinsonian syndromes: PROSPECT-M-UK study implications for clinical trials

The advent of clinical trials of disease-modifying agents for neurodegenerative disease highlights the need for evidence-based endpoint selection. Here we report the longitudinal PROSPECT-M-UK study of progressive supranuclear palsy, corticobasal syndrome, multiple system atrophy and related disorders, to compare candidate clinical trial endpoints. In this multicentre United Kingdom study, participants were assessed with serial questionnaires, motor examination, neuropsychiatric and magnetic resonance imaging assessments at baseline, six and twelve-months. Participants were classified by diagnosis at baseline and study end, into Richardson syndrome, progressive supranuclear palsy-subcortical (progressive supranuclear palsy-parkinsonism and progressive gait freezing subtypes), progressive supranuclear palsy-cortical (progressive supranuclear palsy-frontal, progressive supranuclear palsy-speech-and-language, and progressive supranuclear palsy-corticobasal syndrome subtypes), multiple system atrophy-parkinsonism, multiple system atrophy-cerebellar, corticobasal syndrome with and without evidence of Alzheimer’s disease pathology and indeterminate syndromes. We calculated annual rate of change, with linear mixed modelling, and sample sizes for clinical trials of disease modifying agents, according to group and assessment type. Two hundred forty-three people were recruited (117 progressive supranuclear palsy, 68 corticobasal syndrome, 42 multiple system atrophy and 16 indeterminate; 138 [56.8%] male; age at recruitment 68.7 ± 8.61 years). One hundred fifty-nine completed six-month assessment (82 progressive supranuclear palsy, 27 corticobasal syndrome, 40 multiple system atrophy and 10 indeterminate) and 153 completed twelve-month assessment (80 progressive supranuclear palsy, 29 corticobasal syndrome, 35 multiple system atrophy and 9 indeterminate). Questionnaire, motor examination, neuropsychiatric and neuroimaging measures declined in all groups, with differences in longitudinal change between groups. Neuroimaging metrics would enable lower sample sizes to achieve equivalent power for clinical trials than cognitive and functional measures, often achieving N &amp;lt; 100 required for one-year two-arm trials (with 80% power to detect 50% slowing). However, optimal outcome measures were disease specific. In conclusion, phenotypic variance within progressive supranuclear palsy, corticobasal syndrome and multiple system atrophy is a major challenge to clinical trial design. Our findings provide an evidence base for selection of clinical trial endpoints, from potential functional, cognitive, clinical or neuroimaging measures of disease progression