Assessing social, emotional, and intercultural competences of students and school staff. A systematic literature review

The inclusion of social, emotional, and intercultural competences (SEI) in academic contexts has been supported by international organizations, such as the European Union, the United Nations, and the OECD, since the early 2000s. However, little information is yet available regarding the assessment of these competences. This paper shares the findings of a systematic literature review that produced an inventory of existing tools for the assessment of SEI competences of students and school staff. This is the first time assessment tools for these three competences have been concurrently reviewed. An interdisciplinary and international research team conducted this systematic literature review in the databases of ERIC, PsycInfo, PSYNDEX, Scopus, and Web of Science. Out of 13,963 articles, 149 assessment tools were examined and processed. In addition to the instrument analysis and a detailed description of the procedure, this article shows the basic theoretical concepts, as well as the limitations, of such a review. It was found that 1) the majority of the discovered instruments rely on self-reported survey and inventory data, 2) of the three competences, intercultural competence had the fewest relevant instruments, and 3) very few tools have been created to assess all three competences together. From this review, it is apparent that a wider variety of assessment tools (other than self-reports), as well as more comprehensive tools (e.g. qualitative analysis of vignettes) for the assessment of all three SEI competences, should be developed to meet international demand. The results of the literature review are available and freely accessible in the form of an assessment catalogue. (DIPF/Orig.

TrakEM2 Software for Neural Circuit Reconstruction

A key challenge in neuroscience is the expeditious reconstruction of neuronal circuits. For model systems such as Drosophila and C. elegans, the limiting step is no longer the acquisition of imagery but the extraction of the circuit from images. For this purpose, we designed a software application, TrakEM2, that addresses the systematic reconstruction of neuronal circuits from large electron microscopical and optical image volumes. We address the challenges of image volume composition from individual, deformed images; of the reconstruction of neuronal arbors and annotation of synapses with fast manual and semi-automatic methods; and the management of large collections of both images and annotations. The output is a neural circuit of 3d arbors and synapses, encoded in NeuroML and other formats, ready for analysis

A Tutorial in Connectome Analysis: Topological and Spatial Features of Brain Networks

High-throughput methods for yielding the set of connections in a neural system, the connectome, are now being developed. This tutorial describes ways to analyze the topological and spatial organization of the connectome at the macroscopic level of connectivity between brain regions as well as the microscopic level of connectivity between neurons. We will describe topological features at three different levels: the local scale of individual nodes, the regional scale of sets of nodes, and the global scale of the complete set of nodes in a network. Such features can be used to characterize components of a network and to compare different networks, e.g. the connectome of patients and control subjects for clinical studies. At the global scale, different types of networks can be distinguished and we will describe Erd\"os-R\'enyi random, scale-free, small-world, modular, and hierarchical archetypes of networks. Finally, the connectome also has a spatial organization and we describe methods for analyzing wiring lengths of neural systems. As an introduction for new researchers in the field of connectome analysis, we discuss the benefits and limitations of each analysis approach.Comment: Neuroimage, in pres

An Integrated Micro- and Macroarchitectural Analysis of the Drosophila Brain by Computer-Assisted Serial Section Electron Microscopy

A new software package allows for dense electron microscopy reconstructions of neuronal networks in the fruit fly brain, and reveals specific differences in microcircuits between insects and vertebrates

Overview of physics studies on ASDEX Upgrade

The ASDEX Upgrade (AUG) programme, jointly run with the EUROfusion MST1 task force, continues to significantly enhance the physics base of ITER and DEMO. Here, the full tungsten wall is a key asset for extrapolating to future devices. The high overall heating power, flexible heating mix and comprehensive diagnostic set allows studies ranging from mimicking the scrape-off-layer and divertor conditions of ITER and DEMO at high density to fully non-inductive operation (q 95 = 5.5, ) at low density. Higher installed electron cyclotron resonance heating power 6 MW, new diagnostics and improved analysis techniques have further enhanced the capabilities of AUG. Stable high-density H-modes with MW m-1 with fully detached strike-points have been demonstrated. The ballooning instability close to the separatrix has been identified as a potential cause leading to the H-mode density limit and is also found to play an important role for the access to small edge-localized modes (ELMs). Density limit disruptions have been successfully avoided using a path-oriented approach to disruption handling and progress has been made in understanding the dissipation and avoidance of runaway electron beams. ELM suppression with resonant magnetic perturbations is now routinely achieved reaching transiently . This gives new insight into the field penetration physics, in particular with respect to plasma flows. Modelling agrees well with plasma response measurements and a helically localised ballooning structure observed prior to the ELM is evidence for the changed edge stability due to the magnetic perturbations. The impact of 3D perturbations on heat load patterns and fast-ion losses have been further elaborated. Progress has also been made in understanding the ELM cycle itself. Here, new fast measurements of and E r allow for inter ELM transport analysis confirming that E r is dominated by the diamagnetic term even for fast timescales. New analysis techniques allow detailed comparison of the ELM crash and are in good agreement with nonlinear MHD modelling. The observation of accelerated ions during the ELM crash can be seen as evidence for the reconnection during the ELM. As type-I ELMs (even mitigated) are likely not a viable operational regime in DEMO studies of 'natural' no ELM regimes have been extended. Stable I-modes up to have been characterised using -feedback. Core physics has been advanced by more detailed characterisation of the turbulence with new measurements such as the eddy tilt angle - measured for the first time - or the cross-phase angle of and fluctuations. These new data put strong constraints on gyro-kinetic turbulence modelling. In addition, carefully executed studies in different main species (H, D and He) and with different heating mixes highlight the importance of the collisional energy exchange for interpreting energy confinement. A new regime with a hollow profile now gives access to regimes mimicking aspects of burning plasma conditions and lead to nonlinear interactions of energetic particle modes despite the sub-Alfvénic beam energy. This will help to validate the fast-ion codes for predicting ITER and DEMO

Absent, obscured, and hidden: An interdisciplinary analysis of visual race, ethnicity, and gender in UNDP representations of inequality

This study covers visual analyses of digital media to explore issues of inequality in development discourse. Using web-based articles presented by the United Nations Development Programme as our central object of research, we show the extent to which discourses on sustainable development represent ethnicity, gender, and race. This paper argues that representations can be interpreted as an integral part of systemic inequality. We demonstrate that the discursive formation reflects and encourages a specific approach to sustainable development, especially regarding inequality reduction. This approach is based on the four analytical categories: absence, arrangement, essentialization, and obscuration. This work encourages further interdisciplinary research and argues for a methodologically combined inequality analysis

Absent, obscured, and hidden: An interdisciplinary analysis of visual race, ethnicity, and gender in UNDP representations of inequality

This study covers visual analyses of digital media to explore issues of inequality in development discourse. Using web-based articles presented by the United Nations Development Programme as our central object of research, we show the extent to which discourses on sustainable development represent ethnicity, gender, and race. This paper argues that representations can be interpreted as an integral part of systemic inequality. We demonstrate that the discursive formation reflects and encourages a specific approach to sustainable development, especially regarding inequality reduction. This approach is based on the four analytical categories: absence, arrangement, essentialization, and obscuration. This work encourages further interdisciplinary research and argues for a methodologically combined inequality analysis