Provision for students with learning difficulties in general colleges of further education - have we been going round in circles?

This is a PDF version of an article published in British journal of special education© 2006. The definitive version is available at www.blackwell-synergy.com.This article discusses the current situation for students with severe learning difficulties in general colleges of further education. Findings are presented from a critical review of the literature and a small-scale preliminary investigation which set out to explore the idea that, despite radical changes to the special school sector and to the structure and organisation of further education, provision in colleges of further education for these students is poorly focused. Students with severe learning difficulties experience provision that is, at best, circuitous and repetitive and that, at worst, leads individuals back into dependence, unemployment and social segregation. Using the outcomes of interviews and the scrutiny of inspection reports, a searching critique of current practice and an interesting set of recommendations for ways in which the situation could be radically reviewed and improved is provided

Chern-Simons anomaly as polarization effect

The parity violating Chern-Simons term in the epoch before the electroweak phase transition can be interpreted as a polarization effect associated to massless right-handed electrons (positrons) in the presence of a large-scale seed hypermagnetic field. We reconfirm the viability of a unified seed field scenario relating the cosmological baryon asymmetry and the origin of the protogalactic large-scale magnetic fields observed in astronomy.Comment: 4 pages, latex, matches published versio

Critical Perspectives on Modern Languages in Scottish Further Education 2000-2002

The research in this thesis focuses on issues surrounding modern language provision within Scottish further education during the period 2000-2002. The study analyses the arguments regarding the place of modern language study within Scottish further education (FE) as expressed in formal and informal discourses, and assesses the influence of socio-cultural and socio-historical assumptions on these discourses. To this end, a multi-strand and multi-level research model was adopted, examining official and other public documents, together with views expressed by stakeholders from five Scottish FE colleges and from industry. These were analysed both on their own terms and by taking into account changes in the external context. The initial focus of the study centred on the motivational characteristics of student participants. However, changes in the external context prompted the inclusion of further data into the research design and a shift of methodological emphasis, exploring the ways in which assumptions underlying data collection procedures related to labour market information and uptake of individual FE subjects may be contributing to a continuous re-affirmation that 'English is enough'. The validity of this assertion and the authority accorded to it are called into question. It is argued that the belief will increasingly limit Scottish FE students' potential to participate as self-confident and self-determining individuals in a global and multilingual economy for which their vocational education and training is ostensibly trying to prepare them. Some suggestions, arising from the research, for a more inclusive language education policy are considered

A note on accelerating cosmologies from compactifications and S-branes

We give a simple interpretation of the recent solutions for cosmologies with a transient accelerating phase obtained from compactification in hyperbolic manifolds, or from S-brane solutions of string/M-theory. In the four-dimensional picture, these solutions correspond to bouncing the radion field off its exponential potential. Acceleration occurs at the turning point, when the radion stops and the potential energy momentarily dominates. The virtues and limitations of these approaches become quite transparent in this interpretation.Comment: 9 pages, 1 figure. References adde

No good surprises: intending lecturers' preconceptions and initial experiences of further education

Current initiatives to promote lifelong learning and a broader inclusiveness in post-16 education have focused attention on further education (FE). The article examines the experiences and reactions of 41 intending lecturers studying full-time for a Postgraduate Certificate in Further Education and Training (PGCET), as they enter FE colleges on teaching practice and encounter FE students for the first time. It argues that the sector may have something to learn from the contrast between these intending lecturers' expectations and their subsequent experiences, and that attempts to address problems which are endemic within the current FE sector by initiatives to improve teacher competence, such as the Further Education National Training Organisation (FENTO)'s recently introduced FE teacher training standards, are inadequate and misdirected

Mildred Dresselhaus and Solid State Pedagogy at MIT

Mildred Dresselhaus is known for her influential research on the physics of carbon. Her wide‐ranging influence as a physics teacher, although well‐known to her students, has been less thoroughly examined. Exploring how Dresselhaus grew into her role teaching solid state physics at MIT reveals much about how that subfield evolved

Tumu korero = Foundation of learning.

In Rarotongan and English

Solitons in one-dimensional interacting Bose-Einstein system

A modified Gross-Pitaevskii approximation was introduced recently for bosons in dimension $d\le2$ by Kolomeisky {\it et al.} (Phys. Rev. Lett. {\bf 85} 1146 (2000)). We use the density functional approach with sixth-degree interaction energy term in the Bose field to reproduce the stationary-frame results of Kolomeisky {\it et al.} for a one-dimensional Bose-Einstein system with a repulsive interaction. We also find a soliton solution for an attractive interaction, which may be boosted to a finite velocity by a Galilean transformation. The stability of such a soliton is discussed analytically. We provide a general treatment of stationary solutions in one dimension which includes the above solutions as special cases. This treatment leads to a variety of stationary wave solutions for both attractive and repulsive interactions.Comment: Latex, 14 pages, No figur

Systemic Therapy for Elderly Patients with Gastrointestinal Cancer

The majority of patients with gastrointestinal cancers are over the age of 65. This age group comprises the minority of the patients enrolled in clinical trials, and it is unknown whether older patients achieve similar results as younger patients in terms of survival benefit and tolerability. In addition, there are few studies specifically designed for patients over 65 years. Subset analyses of individual trials and studies using pooled patient data from multiple trials provide some understanding on outcomes in older patients with gastrointestinal cancers. This article reviews the evidence on chemotherapeutic regimens in the elderly with colorectal, pancreatic, and gastroesophageal cancers, and discusses a practical approach to provide the best outcomes for older patients