Blurring Boundaries: Transforming Place, Policies, and Partnerships for Postsecondary Education Attainment in Metropolitan Areas

By 2020, more than six out of 10 U.S. jobs will require postsecondary training. Despite a slight increase in college attainment nationally in recent years, the fastest-growing minority groups are being left behind. Only 25 and 18 percent of Blacks and Hispanics, respectively, hold at least an associate's degree, compared with 39 percent of Whites. Without substantial increases in educational attainment, particularly for our nation's already underserved groups, the United States will have a difficult time developing a robust economy.Home to 65 percent of Americans, and a majority of all African Americans and Hispanics (74 and 79 percent, respectively), the 100 largest metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs) can play a strong role in developing this nation's workforce. In fact, to reach a national attainment target that meets our workforce needs, more than half of college degrees could be generated from the these cities. The majority of degrees needed among African-American and Hispanic adults could also be produced in MSAs.Clearly, investing in and organizing around the potential of metropolitan areas is critical, and the stakes have never been higher. Yet the current funding climate requires strategic public and private partnerships to invest in education innovation and human capital development in order to have the most robust impact on sustainable national growth. For this study, the Institute for Higher Education (IHEP) sought to follow up on its previous work examining MSA educational attainment rates by further exploring policies that either inhibit or facilitate degree production, and identifying metropolitan-level, cross-section collaborations that help local leaders contribute to national completion goals

Completing College: A National View of Student Attainment Rates

College completion, earning a degree or certificate, is considered to be a key college success outcome, supported by every educational policymaker. Yet, institutions and policymakers in the U.S. know surprisingly little about the rates of completion for students who follow all but the most traditional of postsecondary pathways. This is because traditional graduation rate calculations are institution based and only count students who finish at the same institution where they started. Building on findings from previous reports in the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center's Signature Report series, this new report measures this key college success outcome -- rates of first completion -- encompassing postsecondary credentials of all levels and types at any institution in any state, whether it is the first, second, third, or more, attended.Students in the U.S. pursuing a postsecondary education move along pathways that are increasingly complex. In its second Signature Report, Transfer and Mobility: A National View of Pre-Degree Student Movement in Postsecondary Institutions (Hossler et al., 2012), the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center found that one-third of first-time college students attended multiple institutions before earning a degree or certificate. Nontraditional students, like those who postpone college enrollment after high school, attend college part time, and/or have full-time jobs, have become the new majority among U.S. college students. This emphasizes the limitations of continuing to rely on traditional measures of student and institutional success that describe only first-time full-time students who never enroll at any institution other than their starting institution. Such measures fail to capture the full range of outcomes among today's college students. They also fail to recognize institutional and policy efforts to support students pursuing diverse pathways.This report draws on the Clearinghouse database's near-census national coverage of enrollments and awarded degrees to explore the six-year outcomes of a cohort of first-time-in-college degree-seeking students who started in fall 2006 (N=1,878,484)

Challenges and Research Directions in Medical Cyber-Physical Systems

Medical cyber-physical systems (MCPS) are lifecritical, context-aware, networked systems of medical devices. These systems are increasingly used in hospitals to provide highquality continuous care for patients. The need to design complex MCPS that are both safe and effective has presented numerous challenges, including achieving high assurance in system software, intoperability, context-aware intelligence, autonomy, security and privacy, and device certifiability. In this paper, we discuss these challenges in developing MCPS, some of our work in addressing them, and several open research issue

Detecting Bladder Biomarkers for Closed-Loop Neuromodulation: A Technological Review

Neuromodulation was introduced for patients with poor outcomes from the existing traditional treatment approaches. It is well-established as an alternative, novel treatment option for voiding dysfunction. The current system of neuromodulation uses an open-loop system that only delivers continuous stimulation without considering the patient’s state changes. Though the conventional open-loop system has shown positive clinical results, it can cause problems such as decreased efficacy over time due to neural habituation, higher risk of tissue damage, and lower battery life. Therefore, there is a need for a closed-loop system to overcome the disadvantages of existing systems. The closed-loop neuromodulation includes a system to monitor and stimulate micturition reflex pathways from the lower urinary tract, as well as the central nervous system. In this paper, we reviewed the current technological status to measure biomarker for closed-loop neuromodulation systems for voiding dysfunction

Comparison of Serum Beta 2-Microglobulin and 24 hour Urinary Creatinine Clearance as a Prognostic Factor in Multiple Myeloma

A new staging system for multiple myeloma (MM) has utilized serum concentrations of beta 2-microglobulin (Sβ2M) and albumin as important prognostic factors for survival. Since Sβ2M is an indicator of glomerular filtration rate, we compared the prognostic values of Sβ2M and 24-hr urinary creatinine clearance (Ccr) in patients with MM. We retrospectively reviewed the records of 170 MM patients from January 1996 to November 2003 whose 24-hr urinary Ccr was available at the time of diagnosis. We found that pretreatment Sβ2M was inversely related to Ccr (Spearman's correlation coefficient=-0.787). In univariate analysis, the hazard ratio (HR) of death was 1.043 (p<0.001) for Sβ2M and 0.985 (p<0.001) for Ccr. Multivariate analysis showed that Sβ2M (HR 1.030, p=0.010) and Ccr (HR 0.993, p=0.059) were significant prognostic factors in patients' survival. In conclusion, 24-hr urinary Ccr may be utilized for staging of patients with MM

Agritourism operators’ decision-making process toward environmental sustainability: The moderating effect of barriers

As a viable alternative to agriculture businesses, agritourism has been tied to the concept of sustainable agriculture, which maintains economic viability and enhances the agricultural attractiveness for visitors engaging with the natural environment. Environmental management directed toward sustainability has become an increasingly important topic in the agritourism industry, and agritourism operators in particular play a key role in promoting tourism for sustainability. However, even though agritourism operators are motivated to preserve the natural environment through sustainable agriculture, questions still remain with respect to determining how agritourism operators can enact environmentally responsible practices. Therefore, there is a need to examine the agritourism operators’ environmental behaviors to improve environmental operation by applying Value-Belief-Norm (VBN) theory and the concept of perceived barriers. This study included a sample of agritourism operators who were members of agricultural marketing service-related associations in the U.S., and 366 responses were analyzed using structural equation modeling (SEM) and latent moderated structural equations (LMS). Using SEM, the study found VBN theory to be successful in explaining the environmental decision-making processes through which agritourism operators’ environmental values impact their environmental beliefs, and in turn create a moral obligation that eventually leads to environmentally responsible behavioral intention. The study further revealed that the new environmental paradigm (NEP) served as a significant indicator for evaluating the degree of individual environmental concerns and ascribed responsibility for environmental problems. The LMS analysis also considered two perspectives, internal and external barriers, and revealed interesting and different results. Internal barriers had a negative interactive effect on the impact of value on the NEP, while external barriers had a positive interaction effect on the impact of personal norms on environmentally responsible behavioral intention. That is, when agritourism operators encounter significant internal barriers (e.g., lack of technical knowledge, resources, and ability) to implementing environmentally responsible practices, their personal values have less influence on their environmental attitudes. On the other hand, agritourism operators with a strong sense of obligation to protect the environment are more likely to engage in environmental behaviors that bypass external barriers such as a lack of external assistance and unclear environmental legislation/policies. During the environmental decision-making process, it is critical to understand agritourism operators’ behaviors and environmental challenges and/ or conditions that contribute to negative environmental impact on natural resources. By looking through the lens of agritourism operators who actually perform environmental sustainability in an agricultural setting, this study extends agritourism development literature by incorporating environmental sustainability and enhancing understanding of agritourism operators’ environmental behaviors. This study is meaningful in suggesting how to help operate agritourism businesses and how to protect management from dangerous situations by predicting their environmental behaviors with respect to environmentally sustainable agritourism

Agritourism operators’ decision-making process toward environmental sustainability: The moderating effect of barriers

As a viable alternative to agriculture businesses, agritourism has been tied to the concept of sustainable agriculture, which maintains economic viability and enhances the agricultural attractiveness for visitors engaging with the natural environment. Environmental management directed toward sustainability has become an increasingly important topic in the agritourism industry, and agritourism operators in particular play a key role in promoting tourism for sustainability. However, even though agritourism operators are motivated to preserve the natural environment through sustainable agriculture, questions still remain with respect to determining how agritourism operators can enact environmentally responsible practices. Therefore, there is a need to examine the agritourism operators’ environmental behaviors to improve environmental operation by applying Value-Belief-Norm (VBN) theory and the concept of perceived barriers. This study included a sample of agritourism operators who were members of agricultural marketing service-related associations in the U.S., and 366 responses were analyzed using structural equation modeling (SEM) and latent moderated structural equations (LMS). Using SEM, the study found VBN theory to be successful in explaining the environmental decision-making processes through which agritourism operators’ environmental values impact their environmental beliefs, and in turn create a moral obligation that eventually leads to environmentally responsible behavioral intention. The study further revealed that the new environmental paradigm (NEP) served as a significant indicator for evaluating the degree of individual environmental concerns and ascribed responsibility for environmental problems. The LMS analysis also considered two perspectives, internal and external barriers, and revealed interesting and different results. Internal barriers had a negative interactive effect on the impact of value on the NEP, while external barriers had a positive interaction effect on the impact of personal norms on environmentally responsible behavioral intention. That is, when agritourism operators encounter significant internal barriers (e.g., lack of technical knowledge, resources, and ability) to implementing environmentally responsible practices, their personal values have less influence on their environmental attitudes. On the other hand, agritourism operators with a strong sense of obligation to protect the environment are more likely to engage in environmental behaviors that bypass external barriers such as a lack of external assistance and unclear environmental legislation/policies. During the environmental decision-making process, it is critical to understand agritourism operators’ behaviors and environmental challenges and/ or conditions that contribute to negative environmental impact on natural resources. By looking through the lens of agritourism operators who actually perform environmental sustainability in an agricultural setting, this study extends agritourism development literature by incorporating environmental sustainability and enhancing understanding of agritourism operators’ environmental behaviors. This study is meaningful in suggesting how to help operate agritourism businesses and how to protect management from dangerous situations by predicting their environmental behaviors with respect to environmentally sustainable agritourism.</p

How to enhance tourist perceptions of environmental issues through nature images: An importance-performance analysis

Environmental problems have been discussed as a serious issue across the world. To conserve nature, many environmental organizations have tried to facilitate tourists’ environmental perceptions by using nature images on their websites. However, few guidelines have been introduced regarding how to select appropriate nature images. Given this gap, this study conducted an importance-performance analysis (IPA) which provides the specific guideline for the use of appropriate nature images through nature-related websites. A total of 526 participants were recruited through an online survey. The results revealed that 14 nature images were categorized as Useful, Healthy, and Spontaneous nature images and identified different environmental perspectives between website visitor and non-visitor groups. These findings can be a valuable reference for website designers and stockholders to select effective nature images in encouraging people’s positive environmental perceptions. Moreover, the current study demonstrates the usefulness of IPA as a measurable tool in investigating what factors of nature images should be presented to enhance environmental perceptions through nature-related websites