On matriculation certificate in further education : notes on how to binge and question syllabi topics : an excursus on Systems of Knowledge

In education, the common practice is for students to demonstrate what they know in examinations. The grading system makes more noticeable this basic fact. This paper, in its first section, considers the two-year course students complete in a sixth form to qualify for a Matriculation Certificate that holds two passes at Advanced level and four at Intermediate level. To this extent it questions whether students qualify for their Matriculation Certificate by digesting a vast amount of information from six subjects at the cost of depriving themselves of other abilities, like the capacity to bring to fruition their relationships with others or the ability to understand matters of public interest. For this purpose, this paper measures and explores whether such condensed coursework dulls creative and inventive skills. The second section of the paper investigates whether Systems of Knowledge offers an alternative path about how students engage with people and the world in a critical, creative, and innovative fashion.peer-reviewe

On the contribution of adaptation to originality in Thomas Mann's Doctor Faustus and the history of art

This article assesses the manner in which the gesture of adaptation affects notions of originality. Through its fluctuations, the adaptive process can generate divergent thinking about the question of originality. Adaptation appears resourceful for the purposes of originality when it produces innovative works of art by modifying adopted sources. At the same time, any claim towards originality can be compromised whenever the exercise of adaptation turns out to be overtly dependent on the adoptive sources. To this extent, in the first part of the essay, Thomas Mann's Doctor Faustus is deployed as a means of exploring whether the novel's bid towards originality is undermined by the adaptation ofthe Faust theme. What further limits the novel's effectiveness as an "original" is the possibility that the protagonist ofthe novel, Adrian Leverkiihn, may be perceived as an adaptation of Friedrich Nietzsche's own biography. The second part of this study investigates whether the work, through the adaptation of recurring motifs in the history of art, can bring about original arrangements in works of art.peer-reviewe

Validation of a Polymerase Chain Reaction technique for Kidd blood group genotyping

The Kidd blood group antigens, Jkª and Jkᵇ , are two of the main surface markers which are found on the membrane of red blood cells. The determination of whether a donor or a recipient has the Jkª and/or the Jkᵇ antigens is crucially important to have a successful transfusion without the development of adverse incompatibility-related reactions. In Malta, routine serological-based tests are applied with the purpose of differentiating between homozygous and heterozygous states for the Jk antigens respectively. Although these tests are highly specific and sensitive, there are particular clinical scenarios where haemagglutination assays are not suitable for determining the individual’s Kidd blood group status. Additionally, the alternative genotyping procedure has never been applied in Malta within the context of blood grouping. The current study was therefore carried out to determine whether a molecular-based technique such as Polymerase Chain Reaction – Restriction Fragment Length Polymorphism analysis (PCR-RFLP) is a suitable alternative procedure for distinguishing amongst the three different Kidd phenotypes. After extracting deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) from 50 blood samples obtained from serologically-tested healthy blood donors who expressed at least one of the Kidd antigens, PCR-RFLP analyses were carried out. The results of the latter were then compared with those previously obtained with haemagglutination and a complete match was observed between the two. Therefore, this PCR-RFLP method was confirmed as a suitable alternative laboratory technique that can be used to determine efficiently the Kidd blood group of both donors and recipients, in an accurate manner without subjectivity as encountered in the case of haemagglutination. This research further facilitates the introduction of molecular-based techniques in molecular blood transfusion.peer-reviewe

Key concepts in consumer and community engagement: A scoping meta-review

Background: Although consumer and community engagement (CCE) in health care is receiving increasing attention, research and practice in this area are hampered by the variability of concepts and terminology commonly employed. This scoping meta-review aims to identify key CCE concepts and examine terminology used to describe them. Methods. In a scoping meta-review, an extensive list of 47 phrases and 11 Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) was used to undertake a comprehensive and systematic search in PubMed Central, Embase, EBM reviews, CINAHL, APAPsycNET, and Scopus. Results: 59 systematic reviews met the selection criteria and were included in the final analysis. The analysis identified nine different concepts related to CCE: shared decision making, self-management, CCE in health care systems, community-based health promotion, providing access to health care, rehabilitation, participation in research, collaboration in research design and conduct, and peer support. The identified concepts differ from each other in many aspects including the aim of the activity, the role of consumers and the type of professionals' involvement. Each concept was described by a range of terms, with some terms shared by different concepts. In addition, two overlapping concepts of patient-centeredness and patient empowerment were recognised. Conclusions: This study describes CCE-related key concepts and provides new insight into their relationship with different CCE-related terms. Identification of key CCE-related concepts and terms will be useful to focus future studies and initiatives and enhance production of CCE-related evidence. © 2014 Sarrami-Foroushani et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd

Implementing strategies in consumer and community engagement in health care: Results of a large-scale, scoping meta-review

© 2014 Sarrami-Foroushani et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. Background: There is growing recognition of the importance of the active involvement of consumers and community members in health care. Despite the long history of consumer and community engagement (CCE) research and practice, there is no consensus on the best strategies for CCE. In this paper, we identify various dimensions of CCE-related strategies and offer a practical model to assist policy-makers, practitioners and researchers. Methods: We undertook a large-scale, scoping meta-review and searched six databases using a list of nine medical subject headings (MeSH) and a comprehensive list of 47 phrases. We identified and examined a total of 90 relevant systematic reviews. Results: Identified reviews show that although there is a significant body of research on CCE, the development of the field is hindered by a lack of evidence relating to specific elements of CCE. They also indicate a diverse and growing enterprise, drawing on a wide range of disciplinary, political and philosophical perspectives and a mix of definitions, targets, approaches, strategies and mechanisms. CCE interventions and strategies aim to involve consumers, community members and the public in general, as well as specific sub-groups, including children and people from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds. Strategies for CCE vary in terms of their aim and type of proposed activity, as do the methods and tools which have been developed to support them. Methods and tools include shared decision making, use of decision aids, consumer representation, application of electronic and internet-based facilities, and peer support. The success of CCE is dependent on both the approach taken and contextual factors, including structural facilitators such as governmental support, as well as barriers such as costs, organisational culture and population-specific limitations. Conclusions: The diversity of the field indicates the need to measure each component of CCE. This meta-review provides the basis for development of a new eight stage model of consumer and community engagement. This model emphasises the importance of clarity and focus, as well as an extensive evaluation of contextual factors within specific settings, before the implementation of CCE strategies, enabling those involved in CCE to determine potential facilitators and barriers to the process

Toward an Understanding of “The Sex Game”: The Effects of Gender and Self-Monitoring on Perceptions of Sexuality and Likability in Initial Interactions 1

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/71418/1/j.1559-1816.1990.tb01475.x.pd

LDPCA code construction for Slepian-Wolf coding

Error correcting codes used for Distributed Source Coding (DSC) generally assume a random distribution of errors. However, in certain DSC applications, prediction of the error distribution is possible and thus this assumption fails, resulting in a sub-optimal performance. This letter considers the construction of rate-adaptive Low-Density Parity-Check (LDPC) codes where the edges of the variable nodes receiving unreliable information are distributed evenly among all the check nodes. Simulation results show that the proposed codes can reduce the gap to the theoretical bounds by up to 56% compared to traditional codes.peer-reviewe

Scoping Meta-Review: Introducing a New Methodology

© 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. For researchers, policymakers, and practitioners facing a new field, undertaking a systematic review can typically present a challenge due to the enormous number of relevant papers. A scoping review is a method suggested for addressing this dilemma; however, scoping reviews present their own challenges. This paper introduces the "scoping meta-review" (SMR) for expanding current methodologies and is based on our experiences in mapping the field of consumer engagement in healthcare. During this process, we developed the novel SMR method. An SMR combines aspects of a scoping review and a meta-review to establish an evidence-based map of a field. Similar to a scoping review, an SMR offers a practical and flexible methodology. However, unlike in a traditional scoping review, only systematic reviews are included. Stages of the SMR include: undertaking a preliminary nonsystematic review; building a search strategy; interrogating academic literature databases; classifying and excluding studies based on titles and abstracts; saving the refined database of references; revising the search strategy; selecting and reviewing the full text papers; and thematically analyzing the selected texts and writing the report. The main benefit of an SMR is to map a new field based on high-level evidence provided by systematic reviews

Selective reconstruction of low motion regions in distributed video coding

The research work disclosed in this publication is partially funded by the Strategic Educational Pathways Scholarship Scheme (Malta). The scholarship is part-financed by the European Union - European Social Fund. (ESF 1.25).The Distributed Video Coding (DVC) paradigm offers lightweight encoding capabilities which are suitable for devices with limited computational resources. Moreover, DVC techniques can theoretically achieve the same coding efficiency as the traditional video coding schemes which employ more complex encoders. However, the performance of practical DVC architectures is still far from such theoretical bounds, mainly due to the inaccurate Side Information (SI) predicted at the decoder. The work presented in this paper shows that the soft-input values predicted at the decoder may not correctly predict the Wyner-Ziv coefficients, even for regions containing low motion. This generally degrades compression efficiency. To mitigate this, the proposed system predicts the quality of the SI for regions with low motion and then employs a technique which avoids correcting mismatch at locations where the SI and WZ falls within different quantization intervals but the prediction error is within an acceptable range. The experimental results demonstrate that the average Peak Signal-to-Noise Ratio (PSNR) is improved by up to 0.39dB compared to the state-of-the-art DVC architectures, like the DISCOVER codec.peer-reviewe