Transfer students in STEM majors: Gender differences in the socialization factors that influence academic and social adjustment

The purposes of this study were (a) to examine the socialization factors of community college transfer students in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM); (b) to examine the socialization factors that impact the academic and social adjustment of community college transfer students in STEM majors; and (c) to understand how female community college transfer students describe their overall socialization experiences in STEM majors. A survey was used to collect data concerning the background characteristics as well as the community college and university experiences of transfer students. A purposive sample of female community college transfer students were interviewed to gather information about their overall socialization experiences. The researcher employed a hypothetical conceptual framework of undergraduate socialization for community college transfer students based on Weidman\u27s (1987) conceptual framework of undergraduate socialization. The hypothesized model was used to examine how selected variables-- background characteristics, community college experiences, and university experiences--impacted the academic and social adjustment among community college transfer students. Quantitative analysis, including descriptive statistics, independent samples t test, and hierarchical multiple regression, as well as qualitative analysis, including narrative inquiry, were used to analyze the data. Two hierarchical multiple regression models were used to examine the background characteristics and the community college and university variables that predict academic and social adjustment. The results of this study suggest that the background characteristics, including gender; community college experiences, including transfer semester hours, experience with faculty and transfer process; as well as university experiences that include negative general perception of transfer students, impacted the academic adjustment of community college transfer students. Similarly, a second hierarchical multiple regression model was used to examine the background characteristics and community and university variables that predict social adjustment. The results of this study suggest that the background characteristics parental household income level; community college experiences: academic advising, course learning; and university experiences: financial influential reasons for attending ISU and negative general perception of transfer students impacted the social adjustment of community college transfer students in STEM. Additionally, qualitative data, which focused on five female community college transfer students, highlight the role of parents, faculty, community colleges, and universities in the academic and social adjustment of community college transfer students in STEM majors. The study should be replicated in other research universities with a large transfer student population. In addition, it is imperative that policymakers and community college and university faculty and staff understand the socialization of transfer students to ensure the institutional environments are conducive to successful transfer and adjustment

Adapting a capacity-development-in-higher-education project:Doing, being and becoming virtual collaboration

In November 2019, scholars and practitioners from ten higher education institutions celebrated the launch of the iKudu project. This project, co-funded by Erasmus+[1], focuses on capacity development for curriculum transformation through internationalisation and development of Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) virtual exchange. Detailed plans for 2020 were discussed including a series of site visits and face-to-face training. However, the realities of the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted the plans in ways that could not have been foreseen and new ways of thinking and doing came to the fore. Writing from an insider perspective as project partners, in this paper we draw from appreciative inquiry, using a metaphor of a mosaic as our identity, to first provide the background on the iKudu project before sharing the impact of the pandemic on the project’s adapted approach. We then discuss how alongside the focus of iKudu in the delivery of an internationalised and transformed curriculum using COIL, we have, by our very approach as project partners, adopted the principles of COIL exchange. A positive impact of the pandemic was that COIL offered a consciousness raising activity, which we suggest could be used more broadly in order to help academics think about international research practice partnerships, and, as in our situation, how internationalised and decolonised curriculum practices might be approached. [1] KA2 Erasmus+ Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices (capacity building in the field of Higher Education

Inflammatory and haematological markers in the maternal, umbilical cord and infant circulation in histological chorioamnionitis

BACKGROUND: The relationship between histological chorioamnionitis and haematological and biochemical markers in mothers and infants at delivery, and in infants postnatally, is incompletely characterised. These markers are widely used in the diagnosis of maternal and neonatal infection. Our objective was to investigate the effects of histological chorioamnionitis (HCA) on haematological and biochemical inflammatory markers in mothers and infants at delivery, and in infants post-delivery. METHODS: Two hundred and forty seven mothers, delivering 325 infants, were recruited at the only tertiary perinatal centre in Western Australia. Placentae were assessed for evidence of HCA using a semi-quantitative scoring system. Maternal high sensitivity C-reactive protein (hsCRP), procalcitonin, and umbilical cord hsCRP, procalcitonin, white cell count and absolute neutrophil count were measured at delivery. In infants where sepsis was clinically suspected, postnatal CRP, white cell count and absolute neutrophil count were measured up to 48 hours of age. The effect of HCA on maternal, cord and neonatal markers was evaluated by multivariable regression analysis. RESULTS: The median gestational age was 34 weeks and HCA was present in 26 of 247 (10.5%) placentae. Mothers whose pregnancies were complicated by HCA had higher hsCRP (median 26 (range 2-107) versus 5.6 (0-108) mg/L; P<0.001). Histological chorioamnionitis was associated with higher umbilical cord hsCRP (75(th) percentile 2.91 mg/L (range 0-63.9) versus 75(th) percentile 0 mg/L (0-45.6); P<0.001) and procalcitonin (median 0.293 (range 0.05-27.37) versus median 0.064 (range 0.01-5.24) ug/L; P<0.001), with a sustained increase in neonatal absolute neutrophil count (median 4.5 (0.1-26.4)x10(9)/L versus 3.0 (0.1-17.8)x10(9)/L), and CRP up to 48 hours post-partum (median 10 versus 6.5 mg/L) (P<0.05 for each). CONCLUSION: Histological chorioamnionitis is associated with modest systemic inflammation in maternal and cord blood. These systemic changes may increase postnatally, potentially undermining their utility in the diagnosis of early-onset neonatal infection

Perceptions of Chinese and Tanzanian employees regarding intercultural collaboration

China’s impact and role in the development of countries in Africa, primarily through foreign direct investments and grants to governments, has increased in the past decade. For instance, the total value of trade between China and Africa was USD198.5 billion in 2012, increasing to USD385bn in 2015 (African Economic Outlook, 2014, p. 76). A growing number of Chinese private and governmental organisations are investing in southern Africa. In Tanzanian contexts, this leads to a close collaboration of Chinese and Tanzanian employees (African Economic Outlook, 2014). These collaborations in Chinese organisations in Tanzania lead to intercultural communication situations and to new intercultural experiences and perceptions

The Neurotrophic Receptor Ntrk2 Directs Lymphoid Tissue Neovascularization during Leishmania donovani Infection

The neurotrophic tyrosine kinase receptor type 2 (Ntrk2, also known as TrkB) and its ligands brain derived neurotrophic factor (Bdnf), neurotrophin-4 (NT-4/5), and neurotrophin-3 (NT-3) are known primarily for their multiple effects on neuronal differentiation and survival. Here, we provide evidence that Ntrk2 plays a role in the pathologic remodeling of the spleen that accompanies chronic infection. We show that in Leishmania donovani-infected mice, Ntrk2 is aberrantly expressed on splenic endothelial cells and that new maturing blood vessels within the white pulp are intimately associated with F4/80hiCD11bloCD11c+ macrophages that express Bdnf and NT-4/5 and have pro-angiogenic potential in vitro. Furthermore, administration of the small molecule Ntrk2 antagonist ANA-12 to infected mice significantly inhibited white pulp neovascularization but had no effect on red pulp vascular remodeling. We believe this to be the first evidence of the Ntrk2/neurotrophin pathway driving pathogen-induced vascular remodeling in lymphoid tissue. These studies highlight the therapeutic potential of modulating this pathway to inhibit pathological angiogenesis

"A country with land but no habitat": women, violent accumulation and negative-value in Yvonne Vera’s The Stone Virgins

In the work of Zimbabwean novelist Yvonne Vera, land is shown to be a complex and contested resource to which the typically abject fates of her female protagonists are inextricably bound. As she put it in a 2001 interview shortly before the publication of her final novel, “the connection between women and land in Zimbabwe is negative”. This article situates Vera’s work in the context of debates over Zimbabwean land reform, and considers examples of how the “negative” connection between women and land is articulated in her fiction through contrasting leitmotifs of abjection and habitat, culminating in the cautiously redemptive conclusion of her last published novel, The Stone Virgins (2002). The discussion draws on Silvia Federici’s work on women, the body and primitive accumulation and on Jason Moore’s theory of negative-value in the capitalist world-ecology, to account for why, in Vera’s work, the female body is invariably positioned, abjectly, at the nexus of colonial governance and what David Moore has described as Zimbabwe’s postcolonial regime of “violent accumulation”

Peasant settlers and the ‘civilizing mission’ in Russian Turkestan, 1865-1917

This article provides an introduction to one of the lesser-known examples of European settler colonialism, the settlement of European (mainly Russian and Ukrainian) peasants in Southern Central Asia (Turkestan) in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It establishes the legal background and demographic impact of peasant settlement, and the role played by the state in organising and encouraging it. It explores official attitudes towards the settlers (which were often very negative), and their relations with the local Kazakh and Kyrgyz population. The article adopts a comparative framework, looking at Turkestan alongside Algeria and Southern Africa, and seeking to establish whether paradigms developed in the study of other settler societies (such as the ‘poor white’) are of any relevance in understanding Slavic peasant settlement in Turkestan. It concludes that there are many close parallels with European settlement in other regions with large indigenous populations, but that racial ideology played a much less important role in the Russian case compared to religious divisions and fears of cultural backsliding. This did not prevent relations between settlers and the ‘native’ population deteriorating markedly in the years before the First World War, resulting in large-scale rebellion in 1916

DETORQUEO, QUIRKY, and ZERZAUST Represent Novel Components Involved in Organ Development Mediated by the Receptor-Like Kinase STRUBBELIG in Arabidopsis thaliana

Intercellular signaling plays an important role in controlling cellular behavior in apical meristems and developing organs in plants. One prominent example in Arabidopsis is the regulation of floral organ shape, ovule integument morphogenesis, the cell division plane, and root hair patterning by the leucine-rich repeat receptor-like kinase STRUBBELIG (SUB). Interestingly, kinase activity of SUB is not essential for its in vivo function, indicating that SUB may be an atypical or inactive receptor-like kinase. Since little is known about signaling by atypical receptor-like kinases, we used forward genetics to identify genes that potentially function in SUB-dependent processes and found recessive mutations in three genes that result in a sub-like phenotype. Plants with a defect in DETORQEO (DOQ), QUIRKY (QKY), and ZERZAUST (ZET) show corresponding defects in outer integument development, floral organ shape, and stem twisting. The mutants also show sub-like cellular defects in the floral meristem and in root hair patterning. Thus, SUB, DOQ, QKY, and ZET define the STRUBBELIG-LIKE MUTANT (SLM) class of genes. Molecular cloning of QKY identified a putative transmembrane protein carrying four C2 domains, suggesting that QKY may function in membrane trafficking in a Ca2+-dependent fashion. Morphological analysis of single and all pair-wise double-mutant combinations indicated that SLM genes have overlapping, but also distinct, functions in plant organogenesis. This notion was supported by a systematic comparison of whole-genome transcript profiles during floral development, which molecularly defined common and distinct sets of affected processes in slm mutants. Further analysis indicated that many SLM-responsive genes have functions in cell wall biology, hormone signaling, and various stress responses. Taken together, our data suggest that DOQ, QKY, and ZET contribute to SUB-dependent organogenesis and shed light on the mechanisms, which are dependent on signaling through the atypical receptor-like kinase SUB

Effects of ocean sprawl on ecological connectivity: impacts and solutions

The growing number of artificial structures in estuarine, coastal and marine environments is causing “ocean sprawl”. Artificial structures do not only modify marine and coastal ecosystems at the sites of their placement, but may also produce larger-scale impacts through their alteration of ecological connectivity - the movement of organisms, materials and energy between habitat units within seascapes. Despite the growing awareness of the capacity of ocean sprawl to influence ecological connectivity, we lack a comprehensive understanding of how artificial structures modify ecological connectivity in near- and off-shore environments, and when and where their effects on connectivity are greatest. We review the mechanisms by which ocean sprawl may modify ecological connectivity, including trophic connectivity associated with the flow of nutrients and resources. We also review demonstrated, inferred and likely ecological impacts of such changes to connectivity, at scales from genes to ecosystems, and potential strategies of management for mitigating these effects. Ocean sprawl may alter connectivity by: (1) creating barriers to the movement of some organisms and resources - by adding physical barriers or by modifying and fragmenting habitats; (2) introducing new structural material that acts as a conduit for the movement of other organisms or resources across the landscape; and (3) altering trophic connectivity. Changes to connectivity may, in turn, influence the genetic structure and size of populations, the distribution of species, and community structure and ecological functioning. Two main approaches to the assessment of ecological connectivity have been taken: (1) measurement of structural connectivity - the configuration of the landscape and habitat patches and their dynamics; and (2) measurement of functional connectivity - the response of organisms or particles to the landscape. Our review reveals the paucity of studies directly addressing the effects of artificial structures on ecological connectivity in the marine environment, particularly at large spatial and temporal scales. With the ongoing development of estuarine and marine environments, there is a pressing need for additional studies that quantify the effects of ocean sprawl on ecological connectivity. Understanding the mechanisms by which structures modify connectivity is essential if marine spatial planning and eco-engineering are to be effectively utilised to minimise impacts

Urban coral reefs: Degradation and resilience of hard coral assemblages in coastal cities of East and Southeast Asia

© 2018 The Author(s) Given predicted increases in urbanization in tropical and subtropical regions, understanding the processes shaping urban coral reefs may be essential for anticipating future conservation challenges. We used a case study approach to identify unifying patterns of urban coral reefs and clarify the effects of urbanization on hard coral assemblages. Data were compiled from 11 cities throughout East and Southeast Asia, with particular focus on Singapore, Jakarta, Hong Kong, and Naha (Okinawa). Our review highlights several key characteristics of urban coral reefs, including “reef compression” (a decline in bathymetric range with increasing turbidity and decreasing water clarity over time and relative to shore), dominance by domed coral growth forms and low reef complexity, variable city-specific inshore-offshore gradients, early declines in coral cover with recent fluctuating periods of acute impacts and rapid recovery, and colonization of urban infrastructure by hard corals. We present hypotheses for urban reef community dynamics and discuss potential of ecological engineering for corals in urban areas