Integrating Information Literacy into the Virtual University: A Course Model

published or submitted for publicatio

Using Technology to Support the Grading and Distribution of Written Exam Questions for Large Classes

Because marking and returning written work on tests in high-enrollment classes is an unwieldy task, the trend is towards the exclusive use of multiple-choice questions or online quizzes with no individual feedback. Most large-enrollment classes are associated with first-year courses, where students need timely feedback to adjust to the expectations of university-level courses. However, many students do not bother to pick up their midterms once they are made available. If existing technology could be leveraged to scan hand-graded work and distribute digital copies, students could receive timely and confidential feedback in a streamlined, secure and convenient manner. This presentation will describe a solution developed for a first-year chemistry course to address the issue of timely and individual student feedback for written midterm questions in a large-enrollment class. Scantron® sheets were customized to provide space where open-ended questions could be printed onto both sides of the sheets, along with areas for graders to bubble-in individual grades for questions. After questions were hand-graded and scores bubbled-in , the sheets were scanned to read student identification and their scores on individual questions. At the same time, jpeg images were capture from both sides of the sheets. An application was developed to upload the student data and images to the course management system, where it was electronically returned to students. This solution provides instructors with a mechanism to provide more convenient feedback to students with less administrative headaches

Relationship Between General Education Teachers\u27 Sense of Efficacy and Use of Accommodations for Students with Learning Disabilities in General Education Classrooms

One hundred and five middle school general education teachers of English, math, social studies, and science in Virginia were surveyed to determine if their reported levels of teaching efficacy and personal teaching efficacy were related to their use of accommodations for mainstreamed students with learning disabilities. A 32-item self-efficacy scale was used to assess subjects\u27 levels of teaching efficacy and personal teaching efficacy. A 41-item survey was constructed to assess the extent to which subjects used accommodations for students with learning disabilities. Results showed a significant positive correlation between subjects\u27 sense of personalteaching efficacy and their use of accommodations for students with learning disabilities. No significant relationship existed between subjects\u27 levels of teaching efficacy and their use of accommodations

Lesnick v. Hollingsworth & Vose Co. - The Pure Stream of Commerce No Longer Flows Through the Fourth Circuit

Personal jurisdiction over nonresidents in a forum state has been problematic in our federal system for quite some time. Today, in order to establish personal jurisdiction over a nonresident defendant, the nonresident must have minimum contacts with the forum state. While the test may be stated succinctly, determining whether a person or corporation has minimum contacts with the forum state is an extremely complex process, as seen in the line of personal jurisdiction cases following International Shoe Co. v. Washington

Welfare receipt and family structure: evaluating the effects on children's reading achievement

Journal ArticleThis paper examines the impact of public and private support system on cognitive outcomes for children born to adolescent mothers. The data for this analysis were drawn from the 1979 to 1988 rounds of the National Longitudinal Surrey of Youth between the ages of six and ten in 1988. The key inputs for this analysis are four indicators of private support: average family income, extensiveness of mother's employment, presence of grandparents and presence of a significant other. Additionally, I use one indicator of public support: average number of survey years that the family received welfare benefits. All five indicators are averaged over the life span of the child. I also control for maternal resources - intellectual skills and self-esteem

Magdalene Laundries: The First Prisons for Women in the United States

The Indiana Women’s Prison, originally known as the Indiana Reformatory Institution for Women and Girls, is considered the first separate prison for women in the United States. We believe that distinction belongs instead to Catholic institutions commonly referred to as “Magdalene Laundries” that were established throughout the nation beginning in the 1840s and that served as private prisons for women whose sexuality offended mainstream society. We first discovered the existence of a Magdalene Laundry in Indianapolis as part of research on the early history of our prison. In digitizing records for the original inmates, we found that none were in for sex-related offenses. We discovered a Catholic prison that had opened in Indianapolis five months before the Indiana Reformatory Institution for Women and Girls. We have since found 15 Catholic women’s prisons that existed before the one in Indianapolis opened, beginning with Louisville, Kentucky, in 1843, and another 23 before 1900. We discuss attributes that clearly establish these institutions as private prisons to which state and city courts sentenced women and girls for sex- related crimes. As in the now-infamous Magdalene Laundries in Ireland, women in U.S. institutions were forced to perform hard labor without compensation and were subjected to cruel and sustained punishment, often for years. In incarcerating, abusing, and stigmatizing thousands of women, these prisons played an important role in shaping attitudes toward female sexuality and identity for 150 years, yet we seem to have lost all memory of them. We contend that this historical amnesia hinders our understanding of prisons and marginalized women, past and present

Plagued by Doubt and Viral Misinformation: The Need for Evidence-based Use of Historical Disease Images

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Elsevier via the DOI in this record.The digitisation of historical disease images and their widespread availability on the internet have been a boon to education and research, but with unintended consequences, including the misrepresentation of infectious diseases in the past and the viral spread of misinformation. Many medieval images containing scenes of infectious disease come from non-medical sources and are not meant to convey any medical meaning. Erroneous modern captions have led to the publication of several historical images labelled as depictions of the plague, although artistic and textual evidence shows that they are not. Mislabelled images lose their intended historical narrative, and their use creates a distorted view of the past and of the disease in question. Scholars should give the same careful consideration to an image's evidentiary context that they would insist on giving to all other forms of evidence

Effect of cultivar and soil characteristics on nutritional value in organic and conventional wheat

Evidence of greater nutritional value in organic crops is currently a subject of intense debate. Our objectives in this study were to test for grain mineral concentration in 35 winter wheat cultivars in paired organic and conventional systems, and to determine the influence of cultivar, soil characteristics and farming system on mineral concentration. Here we report preliminary results that show that the grain mineral concentration in organic wheat was higher for copper (Cu), magnesium (Mg), manganese (Mn), phosphorus (P) and zinc (Zn) and lower in calcium (Ca), than the grain mineral concentration in conventional wheat. No difference was found between systems for iron (Fe) concentration. Cultivar was significant in determining mineral concentration for Ca, Cu, Mg, Mn and P. Soil mineral concentration was not responsible for grain mineral concentration, with the exception of P. The organic wheat farming systems had higher grain mineral concentrations of Cu, Mg, Mn, P and Zn than the conventional systems, possibly due in part to increased soil organic matter and pH in the organic systems. Growing specific cultivars capable of exploiting particular soil conditions may be necessary in order to optimize the nutritional value in organic farming systems