Dressed for Success: Do School Uniforms Improve Student Behavior, Attendance, and Achievement?

Concerns about safety in urban schools has led many school districts to require uniforms for their students. However, we know very little about what impact school uniforms have had on the educational environment. In this paper we use a unique dataset to assess how uniform adoption affects student achievement and behavior in a large urban school district in the southwest. Since each school in the district could decide independently about whether or not to adopt uniforms, we are able to use variation across schools and over time to identify the effects of uniforms. Using student and school fixed-effects along with school-specific linear time trends to address selection of students and schools into uniform adoption, we find that uniforms had little impact on student outcomes in elementary grades but provided modest improvements in language scores and attendance rates in middle and high school grades. These effects appear to be concentrated in female students.

Dressed for Success? The Effect of School Uniforms on Student Achievement and Behavior

Uniform use in public schools is rising, but we know little about how they affect students. Using a unique dataset from a large urban school district in the southwest United States, we assess how uniforms affect behavior, achievement and other outcomes. Each school in the district determines adoption independently, providing variation over schools and time. By including student and school fixed-effects we find evidence that uniform adoption improves attendance in secondary grades, while in elementary schools they generate large increases in teacher retention.

The Rise of Robots and the Fall of Routine Jobs

This paper examines the impact of industrial robots on jobs. We combine data on robot adoption and occupations by industry in thirty-seven countries for the period from 2005 to 2015. We exploit differences across industries in technical feasibility – defined as the industry's share of tasks replaceable by robots – to identify the impact of robot usage on employment. The data allow us to differentiate effects by the routine-intensity of employment. We find that a rise in robot adoption relates significantly to a fall in the employment share of routine manual task-intensive jobs. This relation is observed in high-income countries, but not in emerging market and transition economies

Supporting Team Reflexivity During the COVID-19 Lockdown: A Qualitative Study of Multi-Vision Groups In-Person and Online

Introduction: The professional self is often hindered by a lack of self-care and poor work-life balance, and cannot be considered an unlimited resource. Given this, the reflexive team is an important organizational tool for protecting workers’ well-being. The non-profit organization Maestri di Strada (MdS) (“Street Teachers”) conducts action research (AR) in the area of socio-education. The main tool used by the group to protect the well-being of its members is a guided reflexivity group, inspired by the Balint Group and termed the Multi-Vision Group (MG). In March 2020, because of the COVID-19 lockdown, the MdS team had to quickly revamp its working model, and MGs were held online for the first time. Aim: Through qualitative research that takes a longitudinal approach, the aim of this study is to evaluate the efficacy of the MG in supporting the team’s reflexivity in this new online format. Methods: This article considers MGs during two different time periods: pre-pandemic (T1) and early pandemic (T2). During T1, the MdS team met 18 times in person, while during T2 the team met 12 times through an online platform (always under the guidance of a psychotherapist). During all sessions in both time periods, a silent observer was present in the meetings, and they subsequently compiled narrative reports. The textual corpora of the reports were submitted for a Thematic Analysis of Elementary Contexts through T-Lab Plus, in order to examine the main content of the groups’ discourse. Results: The results (five clusters in T1; and five in T2) show that, during T2, the group devoted considerable time to experiences tied to the pandemic (T21: schools facing the pandemic crisis; T2.2: the pandemic: death, inner worlds, and thought resistance; T2.3: kids’ stories involving physical distancing and emotional proximity). The group also came up with innovative educational initiatives that defied the lockdown (T2.4: fieldwork: the delivery of “packages of food for thought”; T2.5: the MdS group: identity and separation). Based on these findings, the MG most likely contributed to the emergence of MdS as a “resilient community,” capable of absorbing the shock of the pandemic and realizing a fast recovery response

Unilateral NMR: a Noninvasive Tool for Monitoring In Situ the Effectiveness of Intervention to Reduce the Capillary Raise of Water in an Ancient Deteriorated Wall Painting

Portable unilateral NMR was used to quantitatively map in a fully noninvasive way the moisture distribution in an ancient deteriorated wall painting before and after an intervention to reduce the capillary raise of water through the wall. Maps obtained at a depth of 0.5 cm clearly showed the path of the capillary raise and indicated that, after the intervention, the moisture level was reduced. Maps obtained by measuring the first layers of the wall painting were affected by the critical environmental conditions of the second hypogeous level of St. Clement Basilica, Rome, and by the presence of salts efflorescence and encrustations on the surface of the wall painting. The morphology and the elemental composition of salts investigated by SEM-EDS indicated that efflorescences and encrustations were mostly constituted of gypsum and calcite. The presence of these salts is explained with the presence of high concentration of carbon dioxide and sulphur-rich particles due to pollution which, along with the high-moisture level and the extremely feeble air circulation, cause recarbonation and sulphation processes on the plaster surface

Scion–rootstock interactions influence the growth and behaviour of the grapevine root system in a heavy clay soil

Background and Aims Generally, grapevine roots have been less studied than the above‐ground parts of the plant. Here we analyse scion–rootstock interactions in mature vines growing in a heavy clay soil in a climate characterised by severe summer drought to investigate the effect of the scion–rootstock interaction in a suboptimal soil. Methods and Results The rootstocks, 34 Ecole de Montpellier, 140 Ruggeri and 1103 Paulsen, were grafted onto Nerello Mascalese and Nero d'Avola scions and assessed along with self‐rooted vines. Root distribution and root architecture were analysed using the profile wall method at 0, 60 and 120 cm from the row midline. Root density was greatest at a depth between 21 and 60 cm. The cumulative root fraction for root density registered a β value, a numerical quantity that summarises depth distribution, ranging between 0.932 and 0.962. Root number and density were significantly lower for the self‐rooted vines compared to that of the grafted vines. Conclusions The scion genotypes affected most developmental parameters, including the diameter of the root system, the root density at 21–80 cm depth and the ratio of fine roots to coarse roots. Significance of the Study The scion plays an important role in grapevine root growth, development and distribution in a heavy clay soil, although the mechanism remains unclear

HLA in migraine and coeliac children

The linkage between HLA antigens and disease susceptibility has been investigated in several diseases. Two different mechanisms are known to act in the relation between the HLA system and headache: linkage and association of alleles. Among neurological disorders associated with coeliac disease (CD) we focused on headache in 1997. From a group of 70 coeliac children, we studied 10 children with headache (3 boys and 7 girls). For each subject we evaluated clinical history and HLA antigens. The incidence of headache was not different with respect to the prevalence of headache in the general population. The HLA setting is not different between the 2 groups examined. However, we highlight 2 cases for the particular HLA setting

Recherche sur l'étiologie d'une nouvelle maladie de la grappe: la pourriture acide

Les espèces et la fréquence d'isolement des levures associées à la pourriture acide ont été determinées.Les genres les plus fréquemment isolés ont été Candida, Pichia et Hanseniaspora, qui sont à même de reproduire in vivo les symptômes de la maladie. Néanmoins d'autres espèces, bien que moins fréquentes, se sont révélées être capables de provoquer la pourriture acide in vitro et de reproduire des profils GLC des composants volatils de l'espace de tête très semblables à ceux des grappes infectées naturellement. Les activités enzymatiques extracellulaires lytiques et leur fréquence dans la population des levures isolées sur les raisins pourris ont été étudiées.Research on the etiology of a new disease of grapes: sour rotThe species of the yeasts associated with sour rot and the frequency of their isolation were determined. The most frequent genera were Candida, Pichia and Hanseniaspora. Species belonging to these genera were able to induce the symptoms of the disease in vivo when inoculated into table grapes. However, other species less frequent have also been found able to induce the rot in vitro and to reproduce GLC profiles of volatile compounds of head space very similar to those of naturally infected grapes. The extracellular lytic enzyme activity of isolated strains and their frequency in the population of infected grapes were studied