Virginia College Access Resource Study: Region One Report

This research brief shares the results of a MERC study commissioned by the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia (SCHEV) and supported by Virginia 529 about college access in central Virginia. The purpose of college access providers is discussed as well the current areas of need. A list of access providers in Virginia are listed at the end of the brief

Understanding the Implications of Work Based Learning for Students PK-12 School Systems Institutions of Higher Education and Hosting Organizations

This literature review by the Metropolitan Educational Research Consortium (MERC) and Institute for Collaborative Research and Evaluation (ICRE), in partnership with the Virginia Talent + Opportunity Partnership (V-TOP) and State Council of Higher Education for Virginia (SCHEV) explores work-based learning and its implications for PK-12 institutions, institutions of higher education, and hosting organizations (e.g. employers). The report also provides background information about the foundations of work-based learning and concludes with a series of recommendations for practice, policy, and future research related to work-based learning. There is also an accompanying podcast episode where report authors discuss the key takeaways with partners from V-TOP and SCHEV

When the past is another country: The impact of emigration on memories.

Prior research on memories provides evidence for a curvilinear relationship of memories to age, where events occurring during the critical years of adolescence and early adulthood are more likely to be remembered than events occurring either earlier or later in the lifecourse. The primacy of experiences from the critical years, and their role in development of identity, may be responsible for this relationship. Are such patterns of memories affected by significant life transitions that initiate a new set of novel experiences, even when the adolescent/early adult years are long past? This research examines emigration from one country to another as an example of such a transition, focusing on the memories of Jewish emigrants from the (former) Soviet Union to the United States. A mail survey was administered to a sample drawn from the records of refugee assistance agencies; 1,013 respondents provided data on their memories of national/world and personal events and their social background characteristics. The usual curvilinear association of memories with the critical years was identified, indicating that the destabilizing experience of emigration does not disrupt established patterns of memories. Indeed, the percentages of emigrants mentioning specific events corresponded closely to percentages of respondents in Russia and Ukraine mentioning the same events in a survey ten years earlier. Implications of the lasting nature of memories are considered. I hypothesized that the emigration period itself would serve as a source of significant memories, increasing mentions of events from the time of emigration. This hypothesis was not supported for mentions of national or world events, but memories of personal events showed associations with both the time of adolescence/early adulthood and the time of emigration. Moreover, the nature of the emigration experience itself affected memories: respondents who experienced emigration against the background of social and political turmoil (1989-91) or as an irrevocable breach in their lives (before 1989) were more likely to have memories of emigration than later emigrants, an association opposite in direction to any possible effect of recency. These results are consistent with explanations identifying novel experiences and the (re)shaping of identity as factors responsible for observed patterns of memories.Ph.D.Developmental psychologyEthnic studiesJudaic studiesPsychologySocial SciencesSocial psychologyUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/126396/2/3253249.pd

Collective Knowledge of Public Events: The Soviet Era from the Great Purge to Glasnost

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/91772/1/Schuman-RussiaAJS.pd

Comparing Iraq to Vietnam: Recognition, Recall, and the Nature of Cohort Effects

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/91768/1/Schuman-Iraq_to_Vietnam.pd