Impact of American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009 on Child Care and Development Block Grant (CCDBG) Funding

State Allocations for $2 Billion in CCDBG Funding. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 includes$2 billion for the Child Care and Development Block Grant (CCDBG). CLASP has estimated the state allocations for the child care funding as well as the share of funds states will receive for quality initiatives

Ensuring Quality Care for Low-Income Babies: Contracting Directly With Providers to Expand and Improve Infant and Toddler Care

Outlines current state childcare subsidy policies and the need to provide high-quality early childhood care to all families. Recommends contracting directly with providers to secure spaces for low-income babies and to ensure higher standards of care

Reaching All Children? Understanding Early Care and Education Participation Among Immigrant Families: A Brief

Children born to immigrant parents often face multiple risk factors that make their participation in quality early education programs particularly beneficial--yet these children appear less likely to participate in such programs. This two-page brief summarizes the 26-page paper, Reaching All Children? Understanding Early Care and Education Participation Among Immigrant Families, part of CLASP's Breaking Down Barriers project intended to better understand and remedy the barriers immigrant families face to accessing high-quality early education programs

Coping with the Fallout for Preference-receiving Countries from EU Sugar Reform

Developing countries can produce sugar at much lower cost than it can be produced in the EU, yet reform of the EU sugar policy will result in both winners and losers among them. Reform will benefit competitive sugar exporters currently excluded from the EU market. It will adversely affect those developing countries that currently benefit from preferential import access to the EU's high-priced sugar market, while diminishing the benefits received by those least-developed countries to which duty-free and quota-free access has been promised after July 2009. This article identifies the countries likely to lose and the extent of their potential losses. It examines alternative proposals that have been put forward to assist these countries to adjust to the adverse effects of EU sugar policy reform and contributes to the debate by putting forward a further proposal.ACP countries, development, EBA initiative, EU sugar reform, trade preferences, International Relations/Trade,

Reform of the EU Sugar Regime: Impacts on Sugar Production in Ireland

The EU Common Market Organisation has remained largely unchanged since its inception nearly 40 years ago. Reform has become inevitable due to changes to other sectors in the Common Agriculture Policy and pressure arising from international commitments. The current system provides sufficient support for all Member States to produce sugar, regardless of their efficiency. The proposed reform will therefore affect the least efficient producing regions most strongly. This paper examines the case of Ireland in light of the competitive position of its sugar sector in the EU context. Calculation of the likely impact on sugar beet gross margins and farm income suggest that many producers will want to exit sugar beet production. In light of this, the implications and possible strategies for growers and Irish Sugar are discussed.EU sugar policy, Irish agriculture, farm income

Coping with the fallout for preference-receiving countries from EU sugar reform.

Developing countries can produce sugar at much lower cost than in the EU, yet reform of the EU sugar policy will result in both winners and losers among them. This is because the EU is both an exporter and importer of sugar. Sugar policy reform will mean a reduction in EU sugar production, benefiting competitive sugar exporters such as Brazil. But sugar policy reform will adversely affect those developing countries which currently benefit from preferential import access to the EU’s high-priced sugar market, while diminishing the benefits of those least developed countries to which duty-free and quota-free access has been promised after July 2009. This paper concentrates on the latter group of preference-receiving countries. It identifies the countries concerned and the extent of their potential losses. It critiques alternative proposals which have been put forward to assist these countries to adjust to the adverse effects of EU sugar policy reform. The paper concludes by proposing a modified package of measures to offset the negative effects of EU sugar policy reform on preference-receiving countries.EU sugar policy, preference erosion, compensation

Charting Progress for Babies in Child Care: Expand Monitoring and Technical Assistance

Highlights findings about the need for regular monitoring, unannounced inspections, and technical assistance for childcare providers of infants and toddlers to ensure that licensing regulations and health and safety measures are implemented correctly

An Examination of Olympic Sport Climbing Competition Format and Scoring System

Sport climbing, which made its Olympic debut at the 2020 Summer Games, generally consists of three separate disciplines: speed climbing, bouldering, and lead climbing. However, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) only allowed one set of medals each for men and women in sport climbing. As a result, the governing body of sport climbing, rather than choosing only one of the three disciplines to include in the Olympics, decided to create a competition combining all three disciplines. In order to determine a winner, a combined scoring system was created using the product of the ranks across the three disciplines to determine an overall score for each climber. In this work, the rank-product scoring system of sport climbing is evaluated through simulation to investigate its general features, specifically, the advancement probabilities and scores for climbers given certain placements. Additionally, analyses of historical climbing contest results are presented and real examples of violations of the independence of irrelevant alternatives are illustrated. Finally, this work finds evidence that the current competition format is putting speed climbers at a disadvantage.Comment: 17 pages, 7 figure

Systems Biology Approach to PFAS Exposures and Pregnancy-Induced Hypertensive Outcomes

Exposure to per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) has been associated with pregnancy-induced hypertensive disorders. Despite the regulatory effects in the United States to phase out legacy PFAS, they continue to persist in the environment. This is in part due to the unique chemical and physical properties of these compounds and also the generation of replacement PFAS. The exact cellular mechanisms by which PFAS are associated with hypertensive disorders is not largely understood. Here, we utilized a systems-biology approach to identify and mediate PFAS associated pregnancy-induced hypertensive disorders. Five PFAS: PFOS, PFOA, GenX, PFNA, and PFHxS, were analyzed in silico to predict genes and pathways associated with pregnancy-induced hypertensive disorders. Key molecular players were then assessed in vitro using placental cell lines to evaluate potential molecular pathways mediating the response to PFAS exposure. Further analysis using gene expression microarray technology was completed to assess significant findings in GenX and PFOS. The FAK and retinoate biosynthesis signaling pathways were determined to be the most significant canonical pathways involved in GenX and PFOS exposures respectively. These findings provide novel insights into the key molecular players of PFAS-induced hypertensive disorders and highlight the need for continued efforts to minimize PFAS exposure and prevent associated adverse health outcomes.Bachelor of Science in Public Healt