Faculty Perceptions of Teacher Professionalism in Christian Schools

Able school administrators understand that teachers are their most valuable asset. If Christian schools are to effectively serve the families who entrust their children to their care, teachers must demonstrate both professional competency and godly character. This study was an investigation of faculty perceptions of teacher professionalism at ten Christian schools in the mid-Atlantic region of the United States. An online survey of 24 items was completed by 230 teachers (males=30; females=200). The survey instrument was a modified version of Tichenor and Tichenor’s (2009) four dimensions of teacher professionalism. Data were analyzed using a multivariate analysis-of-variance (MANOVA) with gender as the independent variable. Results demonstrated statistically significant variance in totals on 18 of 24 individual items, three of the four dimensions, and on the total score

The Allocation of Merit Pay in Academia: A Case Study

This paper investigates whether the widespread awarding of faculty merit pay at a large public university accurately reflects productivity. We show that pairwise voting on a quality standard by a committee can in theory be consistent with observed allocation patterns. However, the data indicate only nominal adherence to a quality standard. Departments with more severe compression issues are more likely to award merit pay as a countermeasure and some departments appear to be motivated by nonpecuniary incentives. Much of the variance in merit pay allocation remains unexplained. These results suggest reform is needed to improve transparency in the merit system.merit, faculty compensation

Macaques preferentially attend to visual patterns with higher fractal dimension contours.

Animals' sensory systems evolved to efficiently process information from their environmental niches. Niches often include irregular shapes and rough textures (e.g., jagged terrain, canopy outlines) that must be navigated to find food, escape predators, and master other fitness-related challenges. For most primates, vision is the dominant sensory modality and thus, primates have evolved systems for processing complicated visual stimuli. One way to quantify information present in visual stimuli in natural scenes is evaluating their fractal dimension. We hypothesized that sensitivity to complicated geometric forms, indexed by fractal dimension, is an evolutionarily conserved capacity, and tested this capacity in rhesus macaques (Macaca mulatta). Monkeys viewed paired black and white images of simulated self-similar contours that systematically varied in fractal dimension while their attention to the stimuli was measured using noninvasive infrared eye tracking. They fixated more frequently on, dwelled for longer durations on, and had attentional biases towards images that contain boundary contours with higher fractal dimensions. This indicates that, like humans, they discriminate between visual stimuli on the basis of fractal dimension and may prefer viewing informationally rich visual stimuli. Our findings suggest that sensitivity to fractal dimension may be a wider ability of the vertebrate vision system

A New Brain (February 27-28, March 5-7, 2015)

Program for A New Brain (February 27-28, March 5-7, 2015). To view the photos from this production of A New Brain, please click here

Biofuels, poverty, and growth: A computable general equilibrium analysis of Mozambique

"Large private investments in biofuels are presently underway in Mozambique. This paper uses an economywide model to assess the implications of these investments for growth and income distribution. Our results indicate that biofuels provide an opportunity to enhance growth and poverty reduction. Overall, the proposed biofuel investments increase Mozambique's annual economic growth by 0.6 percentage points and reduce the incidence of poverty by about six percentage points over the 12-year phase-in period. However, the benefits depend on production technology. Our results indicate that an outgrower approach to producing biofuels is more pro-poor, due to the greater use of unskilled labor and accrual of land rents to smallholders in this system, compared with the more capital-intensive plantation approach. Moreover, the expected benefits of outgrower schemes will be further enhanced if they result in technology spillovers to other crops." from authors' abstractBiofuels, economic growth, Poverty, Developing countries,

Purchasing superior-value offerings effectively and successfully

In business markets price still plays a significant part in selling and buying decisions. Suppliers strive to get an equitable or fair return on the value of their offerings and buyers look for bargains and usually find them, thanks to over-eager suppliers. However, recent experiments show that there are other more effective and successful ways of selling witho