Using multimedia to enhance the accessibility of the learning environment for disabled students: reflections from the Skills for Access project

As educators' awareness of their responsibilities towards ensuring the accessibility of the learning environment to disabled students increases, significant debate surrounds the implications of accessibility requirements on educational multimedia. There would appear to be widespread concern that the fundamental principles of creating accessible web‐based materials seem at odds with the creative and innovative use of multimedia to support learning and teaching, as well as concerns over the time and cost of providing accessibility features that can hold back resource development and application. Yet, effective use of multimedia offers a way of enhancing the accessibility of the learning environment for many groups of disabled students. Using the development of ‘Skills for Access’, a web resource supporting the dual aims of creating optimally accessible multimedia for learning, as an example, the attitudinal, practical and technical challenges facing the effective use of multimedia as an accessibility aid in a learning environment will be explored. Reasons why a holistic approach to accessibility may be the most effective in ensuring that multimedia reaches its full potential in enabling and supporting students in learning, regardless of any disability they may have, will be outlined and discussed

Moving NRQCD

I discuss the derivation and applications of Moving NRQCD (MNRQCD), a generalization of NRQCD which allows the treatment of heavy quarks moving with a finite velocity. This formalism is vital in reducing discretization errors in calculations of large recoil decays, such as B --> K^* + gamma or the Isgur-Wise function at large w.Comment: 3 pages, LaTex, uses espcrc2.sty. Talk presented at Lattice 9

The Relevance of Evolutionary Science For Economic Theory and Policy

NSF’s “Dear Colleague Letter” reflects the widely perceived need to go beyond current economic theory in the formulation of public policy. At the same time, there is a profound lack of unity among the disciplines that comprise the behavioral, social, and economic sciences. This white paper emphasizes the relevance of evolutionary science as a way to integrate the SBE sciences, similar to the integration that is more advanced in the biological sciences. Modern evolutionary science is broadly construed to include cultural in addition to biological evolution and the study of neural and psychological mechanisms (proximate causation) in addition to the environmental factors that brought the mechanisms into existence and result in the expression of specific behaviors (ultimate causation). It provides an exceptionally useful set of theoretical and empirical tools for integrating the many disciplines in the biological and SBE sciences required to formulate economic theory and public policy for the 21st century. The task of integration is already in progress and can be applied to the formulation of public policy without a long academic time lag. We therefore call for integration across disciplines and evolutionary science as an integrative framework to be recognized as a funding priority by NSF.

Emerging Issues for the FAA Office of Commercial Space Transportation

The Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) Office of Commercial Space Transportation (AST), part of the U.S. Department of Transportation, has licensed over 230 launches since 1989. The FAA licenses, regulates, and promotes U.S. commercial space transportation including expendable launch vehicles, new reusable launch vehicles that can carry people such as Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo and XCOR’s Lynx, and the operation of non-federal launch sites or what are more commonly known as commercial spaceports. There are 9 licensed spaceports in the U.S. Although the FAA licenses launch and reentry for public safety, it does not have authority for in-orbit space transportation. In addition, unlike for passenger aircraft, FAA/AST does not have authority to protect people onboard commercial space vehicles nor does it certify vehicles. In 2014, the FAA issued “Recommended Practices for Human Space Flight Occupant Safety,” a document which could serve as a foundation for future regulations, if needed. There are about 30 “pre-application consultations” that are on-going with AST including proposals for new vehicles, new spaceports, safety approvals and requests for payload reviews. AST staff has grown to 81 people with a budget request to add more in FY 2016. With NASA increasingly shifting to commercial launch services for supply of the International Space Station (and return) and soon for astronaut crew transfer, the visibility of the commercial space transportation industry has increased. Both NASA and FAA have worked closely together to define their respective oversight responsibilities in the successful Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program and are currently working together in the Commercial Crew Program. Separately, the FAA is promoting its regulations for international adoption as suborbital companies market their services outside the United States. All of these indicators are a sign of U.S. industry growth and generate new issues for the FAA. This presentation will cover an introduction to FAA Office of Commercial Space Transportation and policy issues faced by the office and commercial industry including gaps in regulatory authority. The presentation will also include the competitive position of the U.S. in the global commercial launch services market and FAA’s international goals.https://commons.und.edu/ss-colloquium/1053/thumbnail.jp

Draftee Division: The 88th Infantry Division in World War II

The involuntary soldiers of an unmilitary people such were the forces that American military planners had to pit against hardened Axis veterans, yet prewar unpreparedness dictated that whole divisions of such men would go to war under the supervision of tiny professional cadres. Much to his surprise and delight, Army Chief of Staff General George C. Marshall found that the 88th Infantry Division, his first draftee division, fought like wildcats and readily outclassed its German adversaries while measuring up to the best Regular Army divisions. Draftee Division is at once a history of the 88th Division, an analysis of American unit mobilization during World War II, and an insight into the savage Italian Campaign. After an introduction placing the division in historical context, separate chapters address personnel, training, logistics, and overseas deployment. Another chapter focuses upon preliminary adjustments to the realities of combat, after which two chapters trace the 88th\u27s climactic drive through the Gustav Line into Rome itself. A final chapter takes the veteran 88th to final victory. Of particular interest are observations concerning differences connected with mobilization between the 88th and less successful divisions and discussions of the contemporary relevance of the 88th\u27s experiences. Draftee Division is especially rich in its sources. John Sloan Brown, with close ties to the division, has secured extensive and candid contributions from veterans. To these he has added a full array of archival and secondary sources. The result is a definitive study of American cadremen creating a division out of raw draftees and leading them on to creditable victories. Its findings will be important for military and social historians and for students of defense policy John Sloan Brown is a major on active duty with the U.S. Army. He has taught at the United States Military Academy and recently was an Honor Graduate at the Command and General Staff College.https://uknowledge.uky.edu/upk_military_history/1010/thumbnail.jp