Study of Pupil Personnel Ratios, Services, and Programs in California

Gray, Elsner, and Poynton present a brief overview and analysis of Assembly Bill 722. The authors provide a summary of the key components of the study including the need for pupil support services, effective pupil support services and programs, and ratios of pupil-to-pupil support personnel. They offer an additional analysis of implications for future practice, including a critique of the reported effectiveness of the pupil programs, but lack of access for most students given the high pupil to personnel ratio

Retaking Summative Assessments at the High School Level

In 2010, under President Obama, A Blueprint for Reform: The Reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act was written to reform the No Child Left Behind Act that was signed into law in 2002 by President George W. Bush. The new goal under the reform was that by 2020 all students will graduate from high school and be college and career ready. With a growing emphasis on all students being successful in the classroom, educators had to explore different methods to implement in the classroom to help all students learn the state standards. Allowing summative assessment retakes was one of the methods that many teachers chose to implement in order to help students succeed in the classroom. The purpose of this study was to determine whether an association exists between whether a student completes summative assessment retakes and retention of content material in high school mathematics classes

MA

thesisThis study examines politeness as a face-threat mitigating strategy in increasingly imposing questions. Brown and Levinson (B&L) established politeness as socially determined by rank of imposition, social distance, and relative power. The hypothesis that politeness forms used by respondents will reflect the B&L social factors of rank of imposition, social distance, and relative power, is tested. B&L's model predicts that increasing rank of imposition will lead to increased politeness; decreased social distance will lead to decreased politeness; greater power of interviewee will lead to decreased politeness. I designed a series of political questions concerning the speaker's reaction to Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson's protest of President Bush; both the question and the answers would be viewed as face-threatening acts (FTAs) that increased in imposition as they progressed. Generally, as degree of imposition increased politeness increased. The other social factors examined resulted in a variety of surprising results, which can be attributed to the interactions in the complex factors that contribute to evaluation of relative investment of the speaker. The study suggests that politeness may be better understood as being directly related to the investment of the speaker, where investment is determined by a combination of social and situational factors

Addressing sexual orientation and gender identity harassment in schools through community building

On a daily basis, in schools across the country, numerous students are subjected to verbal and physical harassment based on their actual or perceived sexual orientation and/or gender identity. Compounding this issue is the fact that much of this harassment is ignored or minimized by fellow students, teachers, and administrators. The author chose to address this issue at the local level, working with members of the Gay-Straight Alliance (GSA) at Sobrato High School in Morgan Hill to help them increase their visibility and accessibility, thereby developing a safer and more supportive campus environment for all students, particularly those who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or questioning. The project involved working weekly with GSA members and the faculty advisor to develop a website for the club. Through the website, the GSA will be able to post upcoming events, links to local LGBTQ resources, and meeting information, strengthening their presence on campus. The web site created also includes other features that will allow the GSA club to evaluate their outreach, such as a blog where members and site visitors may post comments, a stats feature where website traffic can be monitored and a polls feature where opinion polls may be created to assess the safety and supportiveness of their campus environment

A Church Adrift: Virginia\u27s Church Of England, 1607-1677

The Church of England in the Virginia colony is an institution which has been much overlooked in historiography. Traditionally, historians have focused upon the weakness of the church, with its lack of a complete hierarchy and dearth of ministers. These weaknesses, combined with some of the more unsavory attitudes and actions of early colonists, have led many scholars to postulate that religion did not play much of a role in the Virginia colony. While the early colonists did struggle, and the church was weak, historians have overlooked the fact that most Virginians were seventeenth-century Englishmen, and inhabited a world that knew no sacred-secular divide. This lack of clear division is reflected in the manner in which Virginians shored up the weaknesses of their church: county courts took the place of ecclesiastical courts, and the governor and congregations filled the role of archbishop. In the end, Virginians created a peculiar hybrid of a church, one in which the Book of ComPrayer was taught and reverenced, but also one in which the vestries chose the ministers for individual congregations. This congregational Anglicanism proved strength to Virginia\u27s Church of England when civil war struck England and the church was outlawed. Virginia\u27s church was able to continue to function because, as long as individual congregations were pleased with their ministers, that minister\u27s job was secure, whatever theological differences he may have had with those in power. The restoration in Virginia took only three years, too, because its church had never ceased to function. The colony\u27s religious weakness became its strength

Qualitative evaluation of adherence therapy in Parkinson’s disease: a multidirectional model

Background: Medication can control the symptoms of Parkinson’s disease (PD). Despite this, non-adherence with medication is prevalent in PD. Treatments for improving adherence with medication have been investigated in many chronic conditions, including PD. However, few researchers have evaluated their interventions qualitatively. We investigated the acceptability and potential mechanism of action of adherence therapy (AT) in PD patients and their spouse/carers who received the intervention as part of a randomized controlled trial. Methods: Sixteen participants (ten patients and six spouses/carers) who had recently completed the trial were purposely selected in order to cover a range of ages and disease severity. Semi-structured interviews were conducted in the participants’ homes. Data were transcribed and analyzed using a thematic approach. A second researcher, naïve to PD and AT, analyzed the data independently to limit bias. Results: The trial showed that AT significantly improved both medication adherence and quality of life in people with PD. Specifically, patients who received AT reported improvements in mobility, activities of daily living, emotional wellbeing, cognition, communication, and body discomfort. General beliefs about medication also significantly improved in those who received AT compared with controls. In the current qualitative evaluation, a total of 175 codes were generated, which formed eleven subthemes. These could be grouped under three overarching themes, ie, perceptions prior to AT, positive effects of AT, and attributes of AT. Conclusion: This randomized controlled trial is the first to investigate AT in PD. The acceptability and underlying mechanism of the intervention suggest a new multidirectional model of AT in PD which future research should seek to confirm. The findings provide a deeper understanding of AT and will allow clinicians to modify the delivery of the intervention by acknowledging various pathways to improved outcomes

Diagnostic accuracy of TB-LAMP for pulmonary tuberculosis: a systematic review and meta-analysis.

BACKGROUND:The need for a rapid, molecular test to diagnose tuberculosis (TB) has prompted exploration of TB-LAMP (Eiken; Tokyo, Japan) for use in resource-limited settings. We conducted a systematic review to assess the accuracy of TB-LAMP as a diagnostic test for pulmonary TB. METHODS:We analyzed individual-level data for eligible patients from all studies of TB-LAMP conducted between Jan 2012 and October 2015 to compare the diagnostic accuracy of TB-LAMP with that of smear microscopy and Xpert MTB/RIF® using 3 reference standards of varying stringency. Pooled sensitivity and specificity and pooled differences in sensitivity and specificity were estimated using random effects meta-analysis. Study quality was evaluated using QUADAS-2. RESULTS:Four thousand seven hundred sixty individuals across 13 studies met eligibility criteria. Methodological quality was judged to be low for all studies. TB-LAMP had higher sensitivity than sputum smear microscopy (pooled sensitivity difference + 13·2, 95% CI 4·5-21·9%) and similar sensitivity to Xpert MTB/RIF (pooled sensitivity difference - 2·5, 95% CI -8·0 to + 2·9) using the most stringent reference standard available. Specificity of TB-LAMP was similar to that of sputum smear microscopy (pooled specificity difference - 1·8, 95% CI -3·8 to + 0·2) and Xpert MTB/RIF (pooled specificity difference 0·5, 95% CI -0·9 to + 1·8). CONCLUSIONS:From the perspective of diagnostic accuracy, TB-LAMP may be considered as an alternative test for sputum smear microscopy. Additional factors such as cost, feasibility, and acceptability in settings that continue to rely on sputum smear microscopy should be considered when deciding to adopt this technology. Xpert MTB/RIF should continue to be preferred in settings where resource and infrastructure requirements are adequate and where HIV co-infection or drug-resistance is of concern

Wills, Trusts, and Estates

The 2019 Virginia General Assembly did not enact any major new legislation, but it did pass several significant amendments. Among the most useful was an amendment to the Virginia Uniform Transfers to Minors Act which extended the maximum age for custodianships from twenty-one to twenty-five. The legislature also decided to cease imposing income taxes on estates and trusts whose sole connection to the Commonwealth is that they are being administered here. It responded to two recent court cases involving the required execution formalities for leases and the right to award attorneys’ fees in actions involving an agent’s breach of fiduciary duty under a power of attorney. Among other legislative actions, the General Assembly modernized the recordation tax exemption for certain deeds of distribution; dealt with issues affecting Virginia’s small estate, wrongful death, and property tax exemption statutes; made it easier for financial institutions to combat financial exploitation of the elderly; strengthened the enforcement of reporting requirements for guardians; and protected circuit court clerks who disclose probate tax return information to the commissioner of accounts or who destroy wills they have been holding for 100 years or more

Wills, Trusts, and Estates

The 2018 Virginia General Assembly enacted legislation to conform the interpretation of wills with trusts, revised the recent trust decanting and augmented estate statutes, and provided a procedure for resolving doctor/patient disputes over appropriate medical care. It also confirmed the creditor protection available for life insurance and annuities, and addressed certain entities’ eligibility for real and personal property tax exemptions, annual disclosures of charitable organizations’ administrative and charitable service expenses, virtual nonstock corporation member meetings, bank directors’ stock holdings, the disposition of unused tax credits at the taxpayer’s death, and fiduciary qualification without surety. The Supreme Court of Virginia handed down eight recent decisions addressing the presumption of undue influence, requirements for estoppel and preclusion, the signature requirement for a proper codicil, trust governing law and interpretation, the fiduciary duties of agents, the jurisdiction of Commissioners of Accounts, and appraisal requirements for state tax credits

Wills, Trusts, and Estates

The Supreme Court of Virginia has handed down seven recent decisions addressing the authority of an agent to change the principal\u27s estate plan, legal malpractice claims in estate planning, rights of incapacitated adults, limits of the constructive trust doctrine, effects of a reversionary clause in a deed, ownership of an engagement ring, and proof of undue influence. The 2017 Virginia General Assembly clarified rules on legal malpractice and tenancies by the entireties, adopted the Uniform Trust Decanting Act and the Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act, and expanded provisions governing estate administration, life insurance, and advance medical directives. Other legislation affecting wills, trusts, and estates included clarifications and technical corrections relating to augmented estate claims, non-exoneration of encumbered property, administration procedures, life insurance, adult financial exploitation, death certificate amendments, and spousal exemptions from real estate tax