Parent Involvement in Public Education: A Review of The Literature

At the direction of the Policy and Planning Council, A MERC Study Group began meeting in September, 1994 for the purpose of planning and directing a study of parental involvement in public schools. This literature review represents the first product of that process. Research over the past several decades has shown that involving parents in the process of educating their children provides substantial advantages for their education (e.g., Stevenson and Baker, 1987; Henderson, 1987; Moles, 1982; et.al.). In a representative statement, Rebecca Crawford Burns summarizes the literature on the benefits of parent involvement to the education process as follows: Meaningful parent involvement results in improved student achievement, attendance, motivation, self-esteem, and behavior. Parent involvement also is a major contributor to children\u27s positive attitude toward school and teachers. Indeed, the more parents are involved, the more children benefit (Burns, 1993, p.9). Thus, an understanding of how parent involvement may be increased is important to the improvement of education. It is hardly surprising, therefore, that there is increasing interest among educational researchers and policy makers in the dynamics of parental involvement in the educational process - an interest that is beginning to rival the historically strong intuitive interest of practitioners (Carrasquillo and London, 1993; Kelley, 1990; Moles, 1982). This review of literature on parent involvement begins at this point, conceptually. Its concern is not with the extensive literature on the benefits of parent involvement, nor on the literature of how much involvement is present or lacking. Instead it concentrates upon research that has focused upon the dynamic relationship between parent, child, and school. Its purpose is to help establish a baseline summary to guide researchers and practitioners in developing a richer understanding of how parents intact (or fail to interact) with the complex of individual that make up the school community. it focuses upon the most recent literature on the subject, as well as those older resources that are most frequently cited in the more contemporary literature

Open-source software for generating electrocardiogram signals

ECGSYN, a dynamical model that faithfully reproduces the main features of the human electrocardiogram (ECG), including heart rate variability, RR intervals and QT intervals is presented. Details of the underlying algorithm and an open-source software implementation in Matlab, C and Java are described. An example of how this model will facilitate comparisons of signal processing techniques is provided.Comment: 10 pages, 5 figure

Development of in vitro assays for the detection of botulinum toxins in foods

Currently the only accepted method for the detection of botulinum neurotoxin in contaminated samples is the mouse bioassay. Although highly sensitive this test has a number of drawbacks: it is expensive to perform, lacks specificity and involves the use of animals. With increasing resistance to such animal tests there is a need to replace the bioassay with a reliable in vitro test. Over the past six years it has been demonstrated that all the botulinum neurotoxins act intracellularly as highly specific zinc endoproteases, cleaving proteins involved in the control of secretion of neurotransmitters. In the work described, this enzymatic activity has been utilised in assay formats for the detection in foods of neurotoxin of the serotypes involved in food-borne outbreaks in man. These assays have been shown to have a greater sensitivity, speed and specificity than the mouse bioassay. It is envisaged that such assays will prove realistic alternatives to animal-based tests

Functional modulation of nuclear steroid receptors by tauroursodeoxycholic acid reduces amyloid beta-peptide-induced apoptosis

Tauroursodeoxycholic acid ( TUDCA) prevents amyloid beta-peptide (A beta)-induced neuronal apoptosis, by modulating both classical mitochondrial pathways and specific upstream targets. In addition, activation of nuclear steroid receptors (NSRs), such as

ATP-Binding Cassette Transporter Expression in Human Placenta as a Function of Pregnancy ConditionS⃞

Fetal drug exposure is determined by the type and concentration of placental transporters, and their regulation is central to the development of new treatments and delivery strategies for pregnant women and their fetuses. We tested the expression of several clinically important transporters in the human placenta associated with various pregnancy conditions (i.e., labor, preeclampsia, and preterm labor-inflammation). Placentas were obtained from five groups of women at the time of primary cesarean section: 1) term no labor; 2) term labor; 3) preterm no labor (delivered for severe preeclampsia); 4) preterm labor without inflammation (PTLNI); and 5) preterm labor with inflammation (PTLI). Samples were analyzed by Western blot and immunohistochemistry to identify changes in protein expression. Relative mRNA expression was determined by quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction. A functional genomic approach was used to identify placental gene expression and elucidate molecular events that underlie the given condition. Placental expression of ATP-binding cassette transporters from women in labor and women with preeclampsia was unaltered. Multidrug resistance protein 1 (MDR1) and breast cancer resistance protein (BCRP) and mRNA expression increased in placentas of women with preterm labor with inflammation. Molecular pathways of genes up-regulated in PTLI samples included cytokine-cytokine receptor interactions and inflammatory response compared with those in the PTLNI group. The mRNA expression of MDR1 and BCRP was correlated with that of interleukin-8, which also increased significantly in PTLI samples. These data suggest that the transfer of drugs across the placenta may be altered in preterm pregnancy conditions associated with inflammation through changes in MDR1 and BCRP