Data linkage for early intervention in the UK: Parental social license and social divisions

Electronic linking of public records and predictive analytics to identify families for preventive early intervention increasingly is promoted by governments. We use the concept of social license to address questions of social legitimacy, agreement, and trust in data linkage and analytics for parents of dependent children, who are the focus of early intervention initiatives in the UK. We review data-steered family policy and early intervention operational service practices. We draw on a consensus baseline analysis of data from a probability-based panel survey of parents, to show that informed consent to data linkage and use is important to all parents, but there are social divisions of knowledge, agreement, and trust. There is more social license for data linkage by services among parents in higher occupation, qualification, and income groups, than among Black parents, lone parents, younger parents, and parents in larger households. These marginalized groups of parents, collectively, are more likely to be the focus of identification for early intervention. We argue that government awareness-raising exercises about the merits of data linkage are likely to bolster existing social license among advantaged parents while running the risk of further disengagement among disadvantaged groups. This is especially where inequalities and forecasting inaccuracies are encoded into early intervention data gathering, linking, and predictive practices, with consequences for a cohesive and equal society

All the ACEs: A Chaotic Concept for Family Policy and Decision-Making?

This paper will consider ACEs as a chaotic concept that prioritises risk and obscures the material and social conditions of the lives of its objects. It will show how the various definitions of ACEs offer no cohesive body of definitive evidence and measurement, and lead to a great deal of over-claiming. It discusses how ACEs have found their time and place, locating a variety of social ills within the child’s home, family and parenting behaviours. It argues that because ACEs are confined to intra-familial circumstances, and largely to narrow parent-child relations, issues outside of parental control are not addressed. It concludes that ACEs form a poor body of evidence for family policy and decision-making about child protection and that different and less stigmatising solutions are hiding in plain sight

Climatology of the U.S. Inter-Mountain West

The Inter-Mountain West (IMW) of North America is a region that lies between the Rocky Mountains to the east and the Cascades and Sierra Nevada to the west (Fig. 1). The climate of the IMW is generally semi-arid but this varies by location and elevation. An estimated 50- 80% of the IMW’s streams and rivers are fed by mountain snowpack (Marks and Winstral 2001), while the majority of the streams and rivers flow into desert sinks or closed-basin lakes such as the Great Salt Lake (Fig. 1). These streams and rivers create some agriculturally productive areas in the otherwise dry basins and mountain valleys. In particular, the Colorado River supplies water to the population-booming southwestern states and cities. Climate in the Colorado River Basin has been a subject of intense research due to its projected drying trend (Barnett and Pierce 2008). Change in winter precipitation regime (i.e. ratio between rainfall and snowfall) is also a subject of interest not only because its role in water resource but also its impact on recreational (ski) industry in the IMW.https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/modern_climatology/1005/thumbnail.jp

Single particle multipole expansions from Micromagnetic Tomography

Micromagnetic tomography aims at reconstructing large numbers of individual magnetizations of magnetic particles from combining high-resolution magnetic scanning techniques with micro X-ray computed tomography (microCT). Previous work demonstrated that dipole moments can be robustly inferred, and mathematical analysis showed that the potential field of each particle is uniquely determined. Here, we describe a mathematical procedure to recover higher orders of the magnetic potential of the individual magnetic particles in terms of their spherical harmonic expansions (SHE). We test this approach on data from scanning superconducting quantum interference device microscopy and microCT of a reference sample. For particles with high signal-to-noise ratio of the magnetic scan we demonstrate that SHE up to order $n=3$ can be robustly recovered. This additional level of detail restricts the possible internal magnetization structures of the particles and provides valuable rock magnetic information with respect to their stability and reliability as paleomagnetic remanence carriers. Micromagnetic tomography therefore enables a new approach for detailed rock magnetic studies on large ensembles of individual particles.Comment: 21 pages, 4 Figures, 3 Tables. For Supplemental Material see "Ancillary files" in this arxiv websit

CFS prediction of winter persistent inversions in the Intermountain Region

A recent study by Gillies and others of persistent inversion events in the Intermountain West of the United States found a substantive linkage between the intraseasonal oscillation (ISO) and the development of persistent inversion events. Given that NCEP’s Climate Forecast System (CFS) has demonstrated skill in the prediction of the ISO as far out as 1 month, it was decided to examine the CFS forecast’s capability in the prediction of such winter persistent inversions. After initial analysis, a simple regression scheme is proposed that is coupled to the CFS output of geopotential height as a way to predict the occurrence of persistent inversion events for Salt Lake City, Utah. Analysis of the CFS hindcasts through the period 1981–2008 indicates that the regression coupled with the CFS can predict persistent inversion events with lead times of up to 4 weeks. The adoption of this coupled regression–CFS prediction may improve the forecasting of persistent inversion events in the Intermountain West, which is currently restricted to the more limited time span (;10 days) of medium-range weather forecast models

Initial development of a high-pressure crystal growth facility: Center director's discretionary fund

A low-cost, flexible, high-pressure (600 psi) system for crystal growth and related thermophysical properties measurements was designed, assembled, and tested. The furnace system includes a magnetically coupled translation mechanism that eliminates the need for a high-pressure mechanical feedthru. The system is currently being used for continuing crystal growth experiments and thermophysical properties measurements on several material systems including Hg(1-x)Cd(x)Te, Hg(1-x)Zn(x)Te, and Hg(1-x)Zn(x)Se

Quantitative Attribution of Climate Effects on Hurricane Harvey’s Extreme Rainfall in Texas

Hurricane Harvey made landfall in August 2017 as the first land-falling category 4 hurricane to hit the state of Texas since Hurricane Carla in September 1961. While its intensity at landfall was notable, most of the vast devastation in the Houston metropolitan area was due to Harvey stalling near the southeast Texas coast over the next several days. Harvey\u27s long-duration rainfall event was reminiscent of extreme flooding that occurred in the neighboring state of Louisiana: both of which were caused by a stalled tropical low-pressure system producing four days of intense precipitation. A quantitative attribution analysis of Harvey\u27s rainfall was conducted using a mesoscale atmospheric model forced by constrained boundary and initial conditions that had their long-term climate trends removed. The removal of the various trends of the boundary and initial conditions minimizes the effects of warming in the air and the ocean surface on Harvey. The 60 member ensemble simulations suggest that post-1980 climate warming could have contributed to the extreme precipitation that fell on southeast Texas during 26–29 August 2017 by approximately 20%, with an interquartile range of 13%–37%. While the attribution outcome could be model dependent, this downscaling approach affords the closest means possible of a case-to-case comparison for event attribution, complementing other statistics-based attribution studies on Harvey. Further analysis of a global climate model tracking Harvey-like stalling systems indicates an increase in storm frequency and intensity over southeast Texas through the mid-21st century

Strategic toolkits: seniority, usage and performance in the German SME machinery and equipment sector

This paper examines the strategic tool kit, from a human resource management (HRM) perspective, in terms of usage and impact. Research to date has tended to consider usage, assuming to a certain extent that knowledge and understanding of particular tools suggest that practitioners value them. The research on which this paper is based builds upon the idea that usage indicates satisfaction, but develops the usage theme to investigate which decision-makers are actually engaged in both tool appliance and the strategic process. Of particular interest to the researchers are the educational background, age and seniority of the decision-makers. In addition, potential links with HRM and organizational performance are also explored. The context of the research, the German machinery and equipment sector, provides an insight into the industry's ability to sustain growth in face of increasing international competition. The paper calls for a greater awareness, from a human resource perspective, and utilization of strategic management practice and associated decision-making aids