Relationship between the Responses of Biology and English Teachers on Extrinsic motivational factors Provision for Teachers and Students’ Academic Achievement in Adamawa State

This study investigated the relationship between the responses of Biology and English teachers on extrinsic motivational factors provision to teachers and students’ academic achievement in Adamawa State. The design of the study was survey research design. Two research questions and two null hypotheses tested at 0.05 level of significance guided the study. The sample of the study comprised 64 Biology and English teachers and 182 Biology and English students’ selected by stratified random sampling technique from the five educational zones of the State. Data were collected with Relationship Between Teachers’ Extrinsic motivation Questionnaire (RBTEMQ) and Biology and English Achievement Tests (BAT and EAT). The RBTEMQ was constructed by the researchers on five point scale while BAT and EAT were multiple choice objective tests. The RBTEMQ was face validated while BAT and EAT were both face and content validated. The reliability coefficient of RBTEMQ was estimated with Cronbach alpha method which gave an internal consistency reliability coefficient of 0.74; that of BAT and EAT were estimated with Kuder – Richardson formula 20 which gave internal consistency reliability coefficients of 0.75 and 0.76 respectively. Data were analyzed with mean and standard deviation to answer the research questions while Pearson Product Moment Correlation method was used to test the hypotheses. Results revealed that the provision of extrinsic motivational factors to Adamawa State teachers was low but there is significant relationship between the responses of Biology and English teachers on the provision of extrinsic motivational factors for teachers and students’ academic achievement. It was recommended among others that Adamawa State government should provide adequate extrinsic motivational factors for teachers. Key words: Relationship, extrinsic motivation factors for teachers, students’ academic achievement

Test-to-Stay After Exposure to SARS-CoV-2 in K-12 Schools

OBJECTIVES: We evaluated the safety and efficacy of a test-to-stay program for unvaccinated students and staff who experienced an unmasked, in-school exposure to someone with confirmed severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection. Serial testing instead of quarantine was offered to asymptomatic contacts. We measured secondary and tertiary transmission rates within participating schools and in-school days preserved for participants. METHODS: Participating staff or students from universally masked districts in North Carolina underwent rapid antigen testing at set intervals up to 7 days after known exposure. Collected data included location or setting of exposure, participant symptoms, and school absences up to 14 days after enrollment. Outcomes included tertiary transmission, secondary transmission, and school days saved among test-to-stay participants. A prespecified interim safety analysis occurred after 1 month of enrollment. RESULTS: We enrolled 367 participants and completed 14-day follow-up on all participants for this analysis. Nearly all (215 of 238, 90%) exposure encounters involved an unmasked index case and an unmasked close contact, with most (353 of 366, 96%) occurring indoors, during lunch (137 of 357, 39%) or athletics (45 of 357, 13%). Secondary attack rate was 1.7% (95% confidence interval: 0.6%-4.7%) based on 883 SARS-CoV-2 serial rapid antigen tests with results from 357 participants; no tertiary cases were identified, and 1628 (92%) school days were saved through test-to-stay program implementation out of 1764 days potentially missed. CONCLUSION: After unmasked in-school exposure to SARS-CoV-2, even in a mostly unvaccinated population, a test-to-stay strategy is a safe alternative to quarantine

Safety Considerations in the Management Of Hospital-Generated Wastes in University of Calabar Teaching Hospital, Calabar

One hundred and twenty one hospital workers were studied to assess their compliance with standard methods of handling and disposing hospital generated wastes. One group comprised of 20 doctors, 22 nurses and 16 laboratory scientists who made up 58 waste generators. Another group included 30 ward orderlies and 33 cleaners making up 63 workers who serve as waste managers. Questionnaires, random personal observation and brief intercept studies were used to assess compliance. The study revealed that 30.6% of the workers studied did not wear any form of protective clothing during work. Neither waste generators nor managers segregated wastes into infectious and non-infectious components while sterilization of waste material was not done before disposal. More enlightenment and greater supervision of hospital waste managers is hereby advocated. This will reduce nosocomial infections for health personnel and save the general public from environmental health hazard emanating from improperly managed infectious wastes. Key Words: Hospital-generated wastes, Management, Safety considerations [Mary Slessor Jnl of Medicine Vol.3(1) 2003: 69-71

Carbonate drifts as marine archives of aeolian dust (Santaren Channel, Bahamas)

Sediment data from the Bahamian Santaren carbonate drift reveal the variability of trans-Atlantic Saharan dust transport back to about 100 ka BP (Marine Isotope Stage 5-3) and demonstrate that carbonate drifts are a valuable pelagic archive of aeolian dust flux. Carbonate drift bodies are common around tropical carbonate platforms; they represent large-scale accumulations of ocean-current transported material, which originates from the adjacent shallow-water carbonate factory as well as from pelagic production, i.e. periplatform ooze. Subordinately, there is a clay-size to silt-size non-carbonate fraction, which typically amounts to less than 10% of the sediment volume and originates from aeolian and fluvial input. Sedimentation rates in the 5.42 m long core GeoHH-M95-524 recovered 25 km west of Great Bahama Bank in the Santaren Channel ranges from 1-5 to 24.5 cm ka-1 with lowest values during the last glacial lowstand and highest values following platform re-flooding around 8 ka BP. These sedimentation rates imply that carbonate drifts have not only the potential to resolve long-term environmental changes on orbital timescales, but also millennial to centennial fluctuations during interglacials. The sediment core has been investigated with the aim of characterizing the lithogenic dust fraction. Laboratory analyses included X-ray fluorescence core scanning, determination of carbonate content and grain-size analyses (of bulk and terrigenous fraction), as well as visual inspections of the lithogenic residue; the age model is based on oxygen isotopes and radiocarbon ages. Data show that the input of aeolian dust in the periplatform ooze as indicated by Ti/Al and Fe/Al element ratios abruptly increases at 57 ka BP, stays elevated during glacial times, and reaches a Holocene minimum around 6.5 ka BP, contemporary to the African Humid Period. Subsequently, there is a gradual increase in dust flux which almost reaches glacial levels during the last centuries. Grain-size data show that the majority of dust particles fall into the fine silt range (below 10 µm); however, there is a pronounced coarse dust fraction in the size range up to 63 µm and individual ‘giant’ dust particles are up to 515 µm in size. Total dust flux and the relative amounts of fine and coarse dust are decoupled. The time-variable composition of the grain-size spectrum is interpreted to reflect different dust transport mechanisms: fine dust particles are delivered by the trade winds and the geostrophic winds of the Saharan Air Layer, whereas coarse dust particles travel with convective storm systems. This mode of transport ensures continuous re-suspension of large particles and results in a prolonged transport. In this context, grain-size data from the terrigenous fraction of carbonate drifts provide a measure for past coarse dust transport, and consequently for the frequency of convective storm systems over the dust source areas and the tropical Atlantic