Developing project management skills: A service learning approach

This paper describes a unique approach to project management education. MBA students enrolled in a project management course have been renovating homes for low income senior citizens. Concurrent with instruction and project planning and control methods, students must communicate with the customer, plan tasks, coordinate schedules, procure materials, learn construction skills, perform physical labor and track project progress. Reflection activities ensure that students see the broadly applicable metaphors that emerge from the experience. Results indicate that a community service project can provide a powerful learning vehicle. Evidence from similar programs run through corporations suggests that this approach is suited to industry applications as well

Pathogenic, Molecular, and Immunological Properties of a Virus Associated with Sea Turtle Fibropapillomatosis. Phase II : Viral Pathogenesis and Development of Diagnostic Assays

Research conducted under this RWO from July 1, 1997 through June 30, 2000 has provided important new information about the pathogenesis, virology, and immunology of marine turtle fibropapillomatosis. In particular, we have provided strong evidence for the association of a herpesvirus with fibropapillomatosis of the green turtle,Chelonia mydas, and the loggerhead turtle, Caretta caretta, in Florida. In addition we have provided new evidence for the absence of papillomaviruses from sea turtle fibropapillomas. Although unsuccessful, important new attempts were made to cultivate the FP-associated herpesvirus in vitro in collaboration with the National Wildlife Health Center. During this period of time, we completed publication of the first comprehensive description of the comparative pathology and pathogenesis of experimentally induced and spontaneous fibropapillomas of green turtles (Chelonia mydas). We initiated innovative studies on the persistence of a Chelonian herpesviruses in the marine environment demonstrating for the first time that the environmental survivability of Chelonian herpesviruses makes them real threats to marine turtle health. Finally, we explored development of a serological assay for FP using synthetic herpesvirus peptides and developed methodologies for detection of antibodies to LETV [Iung-eye-trachea virus] a disease-associated herpesvirus of the green turtle, Chelonia mydas.. This last initiative is ongoing and will further our efforts to develop specific immunological assays for the FP-associated herpesvirus and FP. (17 page document

Social experience during adolescence in female rats increases 50 kHz ultrasonic vocalizations in adulthood, without affecting anxiety-like behavior

Funding was provided by a University of St Andrews postgraduate studentship to MGE.Adolescents are highly motivated to engage in social interactions, and researchers have hypothesized that positive social relationships during adolescence can have long term, beneficial effects on stress reactivity and mental well‐being. Studies of laboratory rodents provide the opportunity to investigate the relationship between early social experiences and later behavioral and physiological responses to stressors. In this study, female Lister‐hooded rats (N = 12 per group) were either (a) provided with short, daily encounters (10 min/day) with a novel partner during mid‐adolescence (postnatal day 34–45; “social experience,” SE, subjects) or (b) underwent the same protocol with a familiar cagemate during mid‐adolescence (“control experience,” CE, subjects), or (c) were left undisturbed in the home cage (non‐handled “control,” C, subjects). When tested in adulthood, the groups did not differ in behavioral responses to novel environments (elevated plus maze, open field, and light‐dark box) or in behavioral and physiological (urinary corticosterone) responses to novel social partners. However, SE females emitted significantly more 50 kHz ultrasonic vocalizations than control subjects both before and after social separation from a familiar social partner, which is consistent with previous findings in male rats. Thus, enhanced adolescent social experience appears to have long‐term effects on vocal communication and could potentially modulate adult social relationships.PostprintPeer reviewe

Social Security Reform: Risks, Returns, and Race

The debate over social security reform has far-reaching implications for the economic well-being of blacks and other minority groups. In this article, we examine how blacks have fared under the existing system, and then consider the likely consequences of moving toward a privatized system. Specifically, we consider the claim, recently advanced by some privatizers, that blacks receive an especially bad deal under the existing system and would be better off under a privatized system. We find that, for blacks as a group, this claim tends to overstate both the shortcomings of the existing system and the advantages of privatization. Furthermore, we urge that the racial impact of social security reform deserves serious and sustained consideration. While the path of reform will inevitably require difficult tradeoffs between competing policy goals and political constituencies, no serious reform proposal can ignore the issue of racial equality in the debate over social security

Peri-pubertal exposure to testicular hormones organizes response to novel environments and social behaviour in adult male rats

Funding was received from the Wellcome Trust ISSF (grant ID 097831/Z/11/Z) scheme, awarded to the University of St Andrews.Previous research has shown that exposure to testicular hormones during the peri-pubertal period of life has long-term, organizational effects on adult sexual behaviour and underlying neural mechanisms in laboratory rodents. However, the organizational effects of peri-pubertal testicular hormones on other aspects of behaviour and brain function are less well understood. Here, we investigated the effects of manipulating peri-pubertal testicular hormone exposure on later behavioural responses to novel environments and on hormone receptors in various brain regions that are involved in response to novelty. Male rodents generally spend less time in the exposed areas of novel environments than females, and this sex difference emerges during the peri-pubertal period. Male Lister-hooded rats (Rattus norvegicus) were castrated either before puberty or after puberty, then tested in three novel environments (elevated plus-maze, light–dark box, open field) and in an object/social novelty task in adulthood. Androgen receptor (AR), oestrogen receptor (ER1) and corticotropin-releasing factor receptor (CRF-R2) mRNA expression were quantified in the hypothalamus, hippocampus and medial amygdala. The results showed that pre-pubertally castrated males spent more time in the exposed areas of the elevated-plus maze and light–dark box than post-pubertally castrated males, and also confirmed that peri-pubertal hormone exposure influences later response to an opposite-sex conspecific. Hormone receptor gene expression levels did not differ between pre-pubertally and post-pubertally castrated males in any of the brain regions examined. This study therefore demonstrates that testicular hormone exposure during the peri-pubertal period masculinizes later response to novel environments, although the neural mechanisms remain to be fully elucidated.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe

Receptive Field Block Net for Accurate and Fast Object Detection

Current top-performing object detectors depend on deep CNN backbones, such as ResNet-101 and Inception, benefiting from their powerful feature representations but suffering from high computational costs. Conversely, some lightweight model based detectors fulfil real time processing, while their accuracies are often criticized. In this paper, we explore an alternative to build a fast and accurate detector by strengthening lightweight features using a hand-crafted mechanism. Inspired by the structure of Receptive Fields (RFs) in human visual systems, we propose a novel RF Block (RFB) module, which takes the relationship between the size and eccentricity of RFs into account, to enhance the feature discriminability and robustness. We further assemble RFB to the top of SSD, constructing the RFB Net detector. To evaluate its effectiveness, experiments are conducted on two major benchmarks and the results show that RFB Net is able to reach the performance of advanced very deep detectors while keeping the real-time speed. Code is available at https://github.com/ruinmessi/RFBNet.Comment: Accepted by ECCV 201

Application and Evaluation of a Snowmelt Runoff Model in the Tamor River Basin, Eastern Himalaya Using a Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) Data Assimilation Approach

Previous studies have drawn attention to substantial hydrological changes taking place in mountainous watersheds where hydrology is dominated by cryospheric processes. Modelling is an important tool for understanding these changes but is particularly challenging in mountainous terrain owing to scarcity of ground observations and uncertainty of model parameters across space and time. This study utilizes a Markov Chain Monte Carlo data assimilation approach to examine and evaluate the performance of a conceptual, degree-day snowmelt runoff model applied in the Tamor River basin in the eastern Nepalese Himalaya. The snowmelt runoff model is calibrated using daily streamflow from 2002 to 2006 with fairly high accuracy (average Nash-Sutcliffe metric approx. 0.84, annual volume bias <3%). The Markov Chain Monte Carlo approach constrains the parameters to which the model is most sensitive (e.g. lapse rate and recession coefficient) and maximizes model fit and performance. Model simulated streamflow using an interpolated precipitation data set decreases the fractional contribution from rainfall compared with simulations using observed station precipitation. The average snowmelt contribution to total runoff in the Tamor River basin for the 2002-2006 period is estimated to be 29.7+/-2.9% (which includes 4.2+/-0.9% from snowfall that promptly melts), whereas 70.3+/-2.6% is attributed to contributions from rainfall. On average, the elevation zone in the 4000-5500m range contributes the most to basin runoff, averaging 56.9+/-3.6% of all snowmelt input and 28.9+/-1.1% of all rainfall input to runoff. Model simulated streamflow using an interpolated precipitation data set decreases the fractional contribution from rainfall versus snowmelt compared with simulations using observed station precipitation. Model experiments indicate that the hydrograph itself does not constrain estimates of snowmelt versus rainfall contributions to total outflow but that this derives from the degree-day melting model. Lastly, we demonstrate that the data assimilation approach is useful for quantifying and reducing uncertainty related to model parameters and thus provides uncertainty bounds on snowmelt and rainfall contributions in such mountainous watersheds

Job Club: A program to assist occupational therapy students\u27 transition to practice

Transition to practice can be identified as the change from the role of student to the role of practitioner. This period of transition is a time of intense professional and personal development. Typically, it can take anywhere between six months to two years before an entry-level therapist feels competent in the workplace. A number of factors affect the transition process, including role uncertainty, inadequate supervision, and an overall lack of confidence in clinical skills. This paper discusses a case example of a Job Club, provided by a Western Australian Occupational Therapy university program. The concept was initially set up to support students through the process of seeking and gaining employment. Over time, the club developed a broader scope based on the needs of attendees. This example illustrates the needs of students for greater support in this important transition, and lays the groundwork for formal research in future