Föderales Handeln in einer nicht-föderalen Gesellschaft? Föderalismusreform und Bildungspolitik

In den Ausführungen wird zunächst eine kurze Skizze der generellen verfassungsrechtlichen Problematik gezeichnet, die sich mit der Diskussion um die Föderalismusreform verbindet. Anschließend werden die Konsequenzen der getroffenen Regelungen für den Bereich von Bildung und Wissenschaft näher beleuchtet. (DIPF/Orig.

Action following measurement. Leadership as important task of educational policy

Ausgehend von literarischen und philosophischen Parallelen (Heinrich Heine) formuliert der Autor sein Thema des Vortrags. ... "Leadership" sei die wichtigste Aufgabe der Bildungspolitik und der Schulaufsicht, um die Grundlagen ihres Handelns rational zu klären; sie müssten die Bedingungen schaffen und die Folgen abschätzen, unter denen Bildungsreformen wirken könnten. Dabei bleibe trotz großer Wissensbestände die Unsicherheit im Handeln bestehen. Bildungsforschung und Bildungspolitik blieben aufeinander angewiesen, könnten aber ihre jeweilige eigenständige Verantwortung nicht abwälzen. (DIPF/Orig.)The author phrases the topic of his lecture by drawing analogies to literature and philosophy (Heinrich Heine). ... His name is closely linked to the "empirical turn" and major projects such as PISA, PIRLS, LAU etc. In order to rationally explain the basis of their actions, [the author defines] "Leadership" as the most important task of education policy and school supervisory boards. They must create conditions under which educational reforms can be effective, and estimate the outcome of these reforms. Still, despite the broad knowledge already gained, their actions will remain afflicted with uncertainty, as well as educational research and education policy will remain dependent on each other, although this does not mean that they can shift their very own responsibilities on to the other. (DIPF/Orig.

School belongs to the teachers! - Really only to them? A reply to Annemarie von der Groeben

In Heft 3/2000 hatte A. von der Groeben Einwände gegen die aktuellen Verfahren der "Qualitätssicherung" und den Umgang mit den Ergebnissen formuliert. Ihr antwortet hier der maßgebliche "Amtschef" der Kultusministerkonferenz: Die Gefahren seien nicht zu leugnen, aber die Chancen für die Weiterentwicklung des Bildungswesens seien größer und sollten auch von den Lehrerinnen und Lehrern konstruktiv genutzt werden. (DIPF/Orig.)In No. 3/2000 A. von der Groeben has raised objections against current procedures of \u27safeguarding quality\u27 and the ways the results are dealt with. The head of the conference of education ministers counters her claims: The dangers are not to be denied, but the chances for further development of the education systems exceed these dangers and should also be used constructively by the teachers. (DIPF/Orig.

Efficiency of spatio-temporal vaccination regimes in wildlife populations under different viral constraints

Classical Swine Fever (CSF) is considered an endemic disease in European wild boar populations. In view of the high economic impact of the introduction of the virus into domestic pig units, huge efforts are invested in the preventive control of CSF in wild boar populations. Recent European Community guidelines favour oral mass vaccination against CSF in wild boar populations. The guidelines are explicit on the temporal structure of the vaccination protocol, but little is known about the efficacy of different spatial application schemes, or how they relate to outbreak dynamics

Functional Health Literacy in an Urban Primary Care Clinic

The purpose of this study was to determine the level of functional health literacy in a sample of patients treated in 1of our 5 primary care clinics. A total of 92 randomly selected adults (mean age = 59 years) completed the TOFHLA while waiting for a scheduled appointment. Twenty eight percent of the sample had less than adequate levels of functional health literacy. Income, car ownership and education were significant and independent predictors of literacy level in this sample. Low levels of functional health literacy limit a patient\u27s ability to read, understand and act on health information. It is essential that nurse practitioners and clinical nurse specialists use relevant cues to assess for illiteracy and modify their methods of providing health information when appropriate

Characterization of a CdZnTe detector for a low-power CubeSat application

We report spectral and imaging performance of a pixelated CdZnTe detector custom designed for the MeVCube project: a small Compton telescope on a CubeSat platform. MeVCube is expected to cover the energy range between 200 keV and 4 MeV, with a sensitivity comparable to the one of the last generation of larger satellites. In order to achieve this goal, an energy resolution of few percent in full width at half maximum (FWHM) and a 3-D spatial resolution of few millimeters for the individual detectors are needed. The severe power constraints present in small satellites require very low power read-out electronics for the detector. Our read-out is based on the VATA450.3 ASIC developed by Ideas, with a power consumption of only 0.25 mW/channel, which exhibits good performance in terms of dynamic range, noise and linearity. A 2.0 cm× 2.0 cm× 1.5 cm CdZnTe detector, with a custom 8 × 8 pixel anode structure read-out by a VATA450.3 ASIC, has been tested. A preliminary read-out system for the cathode, based on a discrete Amptek A250F charge sensitive pre-amplifier and a DRS4 ASIC, has been implemented. An energy resolution around 3% FWHM has been measured at a gamma energy of 662 keV; at 200 keV the average energy resolution is 6.5%, decreasing to ≲ 2% at energies above 1 MeV. A 3-D spatial resolution of ≈ 2 mm is achieved in each dimension.Peer Reviewe