Perceived School Style and Academic Outcomes among Ethnically Diverse College Students

Students’ perceptions of their schools play an important role in achievement. One framework for measuring students’ perceptions is an adaptation of Baumrind’s parenting typology, which measures perceived “school style” (Pellerin, 2005) along two dimensions of responsiveness (warmth) and demandingness (high academic expectations). Although research suggests that perceptions of authoritative styles (both responsive and demanding) correlate with better student outcomes (Dornbusch et al., 1987), no existing research has considered whether these findings apply to ethnically diverse samples. We surveyed 301 students from five Midwestern colleges who completed measures of perceived school style, perceived discrimination, and several academic outcomes. Academically stigmatized students (African Americans and Latinos) perceived similar levels of demandingness but significantly lower levels of responsiveness from their instructors than did their non-stigmatized peers. Importantly, perceived discrimination in college fully mediated this relationship. With regard to the academic outcome variables, we found a significant interaction between responsiveness and demandingness such that only students who perceived high levels of both showed higher levels of attendance and out-of-class engagement. Finally, we found a significant three-way interaction between responsiveness, demandingness, and academic minority status in predicting academic efficacy. High levels of responsiveness and demandingness were related to increased academic efficacy only for non-academically stigmatized students. These results imply not only that the benefits of perceived school responsiveness and demandingness often depend on one another, but also that these benefits do not always apply equally to all students

«Agotamiento» en la era digital

La Sentencia del Tribunal de Justicia de la Unión Europea de 3 de julio de 2012 ha abierto intensos debates acerca de la aplicabilidad de la regla conocida como del «agotamiento del derecho de distribución» a todas aquellas obras de propiedad intelectual recogidas en formato digital en un soporte no físico. Hasta 2012 se entendía que la regla del agotamiento sólo era aplicable a aquellas obras de propiedad intelectual comercializadas en un soporte (o corpus mysticum) físico; sin embargo, el Tribunal hace una interpretación por la cual actualiza está regla a la economía digital, entendiendo que cuando (como en el caso juzgado) se celebra un contrato de licencia de uso de programa de ordenador sin limitación temporal y éste es descargado directamente online desde la web del titular de los derechos el contrato es análogo a una compraventa a los efectos de entender aplicable la regla del agotamiento. En este artículo se analizan las fases por las que ha pasado la economía digital en cuanto a la transmisión de contenidos digitales (divididas en tres periodos) así como otras figuras próximas a la regla del agotamiento como son la doctrina de la primera venta y la licencia implícita; así como las consecuencias desde un punto de vista económico que puede tener una interpretación más o menos expansiva de las posibilidades del titular de los derechos de introducir medidas tecnológicas de protección en las obras de propiedad intelectual que comercializa, conocidas como Digital Right Management.The judgment of the Court of Justice of the European Union of 3 July 2012 (UsedSoft v. Oracle) opened intense debates about the applicability of the rule known as «exhaustion of the right of distribution» to all those works of intellectual property collected in digital format on a non-physical medium. Until 2012 it was understood that the rule of exhaustion was only applicable to those works of intellectual property marketed in a physical support (or corpus mysticum). Nevertheless, the Court makes an interpretation in which it updates the rule to the digital economy understanding that when (as in the case in court) a license agreement without temporal limitation for the use of a computer program is concluded and the program is downloaded directly online from the rights holder's websíte, the contract is analogous to a sale with regards to the rule of exhaustion. This article analyses the phases through which the digital economy has gone through in terms of the transmission of digital content (divided into three periods) as well as other figures close to the rule of exhaustion as the doctrine of the first sale and the implied license; as well as the consequences that could have a more or less expansive interpretation of the possibilities of the right holder to introduce technological protection measures in the works of intellectual property that he commercializes known Digital Right Management, from an economic point of view

Opportunities and Risks of Digitalization for Climate Protection in Switzerland

Information and Communication Technology (ICT) is an important enabler for a low-carbon economy in Switzerland. ICT has the potential to avoid up to 3.37 times more greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions than the amount of emissions caused by the production, operation and disposal of ICT devices and infrastructures used in Switzerland in 2025. In absolute terms, ICT will enable the Swiss economy to save up to 6.99 Mt CO2-equivalents (CO2e) per year, with an own carbon footprint of 2.08 Mt CO2e per year. This opportunity for the ICT sector to contribute to climate protection, however, can only be realized under optimistic assumptions. In particular, it is necessary that the existing technological and economic potentials are systematically exploited by taking ambitious and targeted actions. Such actions can be especially effective in the transportation, building and energy sectors, which have the highest potential for ICT-enabled (“smart”) solutions to reduce GHG emissions. At the same time, the carbon footprint of the ICT sector itself must be reduced by 17%, which is technologically and economically feasible due to efficiency gains

Utilizing ERTS imagery to detect plant diseases and nutrient deficiencies, soil types and soil moisture levels

There are no author-identified significant results in this report

The Precautionary Principle as a Framework for a Sustainable Information Society

The precautionary principle (PP) aims to anticipate and minimize potentially serious or irreversible risks under conditions of scientific uncertainty. Thus it preserves the potential for future developments. It has been incorporated into many international treaties and pieces of national legislation for environmental protection and sustainable development. In this article, we outline an interpretation of the PP as a framework of orientation for a sustainable information society. Since the risks induced by future information and communication technologies (ICT) are social risks for the most part, we propose to extend the PP from mainly environmental to social subjects of protection. From an ethical point of view, the PP and sustainability share the principle of intergenerational justice, which can be used as an argument to preserve free space for the decisions of future generations. Applied to technical innovation and to ICT issues in particular, the extended PP can serve as a framework of orientation to avoid socio-economically irreversible developments. We conclude that the PP is a useful approach for: (i) policy makers to reconcile information society and sustainability policies and (ii) ICT companies to formulate sustainability strategie

Schoolchildren in the Principality of Liechtenstein are mildly iodine deficient

Abstract Objective To investigate the iodine status of schoolchildren in the Principality of Liechtenstein. Design A representative, cross-sectional principality-wide screening of iodine level in household salt and urinary iodine concentrations (UIC) in primary-school children. Data were compared with the WHO criteria and with 2009 iodine survey data from Switzerland, a neighbouring country that supplies most of the salt used in Liechtenstein. Settings Principality of Liechtenstein. Subjects Schoolchildren (n 228) aged 6-12 years from five different primary schools representing 11·4 % of the children at this age. Results The median UIC was 96 (range: 10-446) μg/l; 11 %, 56 % and 1 % of children had a UIC 300 μg/l, respectively. In all, 79 % of households were using adequately iodised salt (≥15 ppm). The median UIC was 20 % lower than that in children at comparable age in Switzerland (120 μg/l; P < 0·05). Conclusions According to the WHO criteria, schoolchildren in Liechtenstein are mildly iodine deficient and household iodised salt coverage is inadequate. Public health measures to increase iodine intakes in the Principality should be considere

Stereospecific assignments of the isopropyl methyl groups of the membrane protein OmpX in DHPC micelles

In NMR studies of large molecular structures, the number of conformational constraints based on NOE measurements is typically limited due to the need for partial deuteration. As a consequence, when using selective protonation of peripheral methyl groups on a perdeuterated background, stereospecific assignments of the diastereotopic methyl groups of Val and Leu can have a particularly large impact on the quality of the NMR structure determination. For example, 3D 15N- and 13C-resolved [1H,1H]-NOESY spectra of the E.Coli membrane protein OmpX in mixed micelles with DHPC, which have an overall molecular weight of about 60 kDa, showed that about 50% of all obtainable NOEs involve the diastereotopic methyl groups of Val and Leu. In this paper, we used biosynthetically-directed fractional 13C labeling of OmpX and [13C,1H]-HSQC spectroscopy to obtain stereospecific methyl assignments of Val and Leu in OmpX/DHPC. For practical purposes it is of interest that this data could be obtained without use of a deuterated background, and that combinations of NMR experiments have been found for obtaining the desired information either at a 1H frequency of 500MHz, or with significantly reduced measuring time on a high-frequency instrumen