Habeas Corpus and State Sentencing Reform: A Story of Unintended Consequences

This Article tells the story of how fundamental shifts in state sentencing policy collided with fundamental shifts in federal habeas policy to produce a tangled and costly doctrinal wreck. The conventional assumption is that state prisoners seeking habeas relief allege constitutional errors in their state court convictions and sentences. But almost 20 percent of federal habeas petitions filed by noncapital state prisoners do not challenge state court judgments. They instead attack administrative actions by state prison officials or parole boards, actions taken long after the petitioner's conviction and sentencing. Challenges to these administrative decisions create serious problems for federal habeas law, which is designed to structure federal review of state court judgments and is ill suited to review administrators' actions. Courts find themselves trying to squeeze square pegs into round holes, and the confusion is particularly intolerable given the stakes for prisoners, state prison systems, and federal courts. This Article is the first to identify this significant problem, to analyze its disparate and complicated causes, and to propose a simple and rational way for Congress to respond

Elementary Educators’ Perceptions of Practices that Contribute to Literacy Achievement

The purpose of this qualitative study was to investigate and examine specific kindergarten through third grade practices perceived as contributing to literacy achievement at 3 high-achieving elementary schools within the Washington County Virginia Public School System. The study was completed through a process of open-ended interviews with participants comprising classroom teachers, reading specialists, and administrators. The findings from this study may assist practitioners by providing information relative to programs, resources and instructional strategies that are perceived as contributing to literacy achievement. The findings of this study suggested that the perceptions among classroom teachers, reading specialists, and administrators regarding literacy practices were parallel. In summation, the participants’ perceptions included a balanced approach to literacy instruction with an emphasis on the following: phonics acquisition in kindergarten through second grade; a focus on explicit comprehension instruction beginning in third grade; development of vocabulary to increase background knowledge and comprehension; frequent opportunities for independent reading practice; targeted instruction in small-group and one-on-one settings; and the use of supplemental literacy and assessment resources. Recommendations from this study included the consideration of providing balanced literacy instruction in kindergarten through third grade; an emphasis on phonics skills in kindergarten through second grade, and an emphasis on comprehension skills beginning in third grade; frequent and consistent guided and independent reading time within the classroom setting; an increased emphasis on vocabulary development; the provision of targeted small-group and one-on-one instruction; and the use of supplemental literacy and assessment resources

Service Learning in Preschool: An Intergenerational Project Involving Five-Y ear-Olds, Fifth Graders, and Senior Citizens

Service Learning is a powerful form of experiential pedagogy that is gaining popularity in classrooms from preprimary settings through graduate school. It involves students in activities that explicitly and intentionally integrate community involvement with appropriate academic objectives. This article describes an intergenerational service learning project that brought together preschoolers, golden-agers, and at-risk elementary-aged students. Lunch Time Book Buddies-Pass It On included both direct service and indirect service and made valuable contributions to young children\u27s developing literacy, social-emotional, physical, and cognitive abilities

Influential Article Review - What Factors Contribute to a Complex Economic System

This paper examines economics. We present insights from a highly influential paper. Here are the highlights from this paper: For Adam Smith, wealth was related to the division of labor. As people and firms specialize in different activities, economic efficiency increases, suggesting that development is associated with an increase in the number of individual activities and with the complexity that emerges from the interactions between them. Here we develop a view of economic growth and development that gives a central role to the complexity of a country's economy by interpreting trade data as a bipartite network in which countries are connected to the products they export, and show that it is possible to quantify the complexity of a country's economy by characterizing the structure of this network. Furthermore, we show that the measures of complexity we derive are correlated with a country's level of income, and that deviations from this relationship are predictive of future growth. This suggests that countries tend to converge to the level of income dictated by the complexity of their productive structures, indicating that development efforts should focus on generating the conditions that would allow complexity to emerge to generate sustained growth and prosperity For our overseas readers, we then present the insights from this paper in Spanish, French, Portuguese, and German

Spatial distribution of stars and brown dwarfs in sigma Orionis

I have re-visited the spatial distribution of stars and high-mass brown dwarfs in the sigma Orionis cluster (~3 Ma, ~360 pc). The input was a catalogue of 340 cluster members and candidates at separations less than 30 arcmin to sigma Ori AB. Of them, 70 % have features of extreme youth. I fitted the normalised cumulative number of objects counting from the cluster centre to several power-law, exponential and King radial distributions. The cluster seems to have two components: a dense core that extends from the centre to r ~ 20 arcmin and a rarified halo at larger separations. The radial distribution in the core follows a power-law proportional to r^1, which corresponds to a volume density proportional to r^(-2). This is consistent with the collapse of an isothermal spherical molecular cloud. The stars more massive than 3.7 Msol concentrate, however, towards the cluster centre, where there is also an apparent deficit of very low-mass objects (M < 0.16 Msol). Last, I demonstrated through Monte Carlo simulations that the cluster is azimuthally asymmetric, with a filamentary overdensity of objects that runs from the cluster centre to the Horsehead Nebula.Comment: MNRAS, accepte

Evidence for complementary effects of code- and knowledge-focused reading instruction

There is growing recognition of the need to end the debate regarding reading instruction in favor of an approach that provides a solid foundation in phonics and other underlying language skills to become expert readers. We advance this agenda by providing evidence of specific effects of instruction focused primarily on the written code or on developing knowledge. In a grade 1 program evaluation study, an inclusive and comprehensive program with a greater code-based focus called Reading for All (RfA) was compared to a knowledge-focused program involving Dialogic Reading. Phonological awareness, letter word recognition, nonsense word decoding, listening comprehension, reading comprehension, written expression and vocabulary were measured at the beginning and end of the school year, and one year after in one school only. Results revealed improvements in all measures except listening comprehension and vocabulary for the RfA program at the end of the first school year. These gains were maintained for all measures one year later with the exception of an improvement in written expression. The Dialogic Reading group was associated with a specific improvement in vocabulary in schools from lower socioeconomic contexts. Higher scores were observed for RfA than Dialogic Reading groups at the end of the first year on nonsense word decoding, phonological awareness and written expression, with the differences in the latter two remaining significant one year later. The results provide evidence of the need for interventions to support both word recognition and linguistic comprehension to better reading comprehension

Prospectus, March 5, 1980

ISSUES BREWING IN MAYOR\u27S OFFICE; Courts swinging to harshness; McJilton has high outlook for Rantoul; Dressage Seminar at PC Saturday; Week in Review: World, Nation, State, Local; Defensive driving workshop; Growth and development of children to be discussed at first meeting of PACT; PC classes for older adults; Women\u27s History; CPA to discuss tax returns; Women\u27s program offers workshops; Climbing high: an obsession; New organization gets parents and kids together; Dance Marathon at U. of I.; EMTs get refresher course; Dates to live by; Student tells of her adventures in Mexico; Spring Game Tourneys for all Parkland students; Karate; Classifieds; Parkland Basketball; Cobras capture Region crown; Bench Warmer: Bench is a learning lesson : Kaminke; Parkland ends on a down note; Illini, Loyola in NIT tonight; Swags win, We lose, Tourney beginshttps://spark.parkland.edu/prospectus_1980/1035/thumbnail.jp

A refined, rapid and reproducible high resolution melt (HRM)-based method suitable for quantification of global LINE-1 repetitive element methylation

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The methylation of DNA is recognized as a key mechanism in the regulation of genomic stability and evidence for its role in the development of cancer is accumulating. LINE-1 methylation status represents a surrogate measure of genome-wide methylation.</p> <p>Findings</p> <p>Using high resolution melt (HRM) curve analysis technology, we have established an in-tube assay that is linear (r > 0.9986) with a high amplification efficiency (90-105%), capable of discriminating between partcipant samples with small differences in methylation, and suitable for quantifying a wide range of LINE-1 methylation levels (0-100%)--including the biologically relevant range of 50-90% expected in human DNA. We have optimized this procedure to perform using 2 μg of starting DNA and 2 ng of bisulfite-converted DNA for each PCR reaction. Intra- and inter-assay coefficients of variation were 1.44% and 0.49%, respectively, supporting the high reproducibility and precision of this approach.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>In summary, this is a completely linear, quantitative HRM PCR method developed for the measurement of LINE-1 methylation. This cost-efficient, refined and reproducible assay can be performed using minimal amounts of starting DNA. These features make our assay suitable for high throughput analysis of multiple samples from large population-based studies.</p

Small Schools: Great Strides, A Study of New Schools in Chicago

This book documents a two-year study and analysis of small schools in Chicago. Using a mixed-method study, gathering both quantitative and qualitative data, the research serves to compare results to previous studies of small urban schools.The study examines the effects of small schools on students, parents, teachers, and community members. Both previous and current research suggest that small school size is correlated with an increase in student attendance, performance, and better sense of community overall.https://educate.bankstreet.edu/books/1022/thumbnail.jp

Increased Incidence of Loco-Regional Recurrences Among African American Women with Terminal Stage Breast Cancer

A prospective analysis of women with terminal breast cancer admitted to CHNE from November 2006–August 2007 evaluated anecdotal observations that African American (AA) women are likelier than Caucasian women to evidence loco-regional recurrences (LRR). Women with terminal breast cancer who were admitted to CHNE, a not-for-profit hospice serving over 90% of Northeast Florida hospice patients, were eligible for participation. 134 terminal breast cancer patients were assessed by hospice nurses for LRR presence via chest wall examination. 80% of them (107) were Caucasian, 17% (23) were AA and 3% (4) were of other ethnicities. Evidence of LRR were noted in 13% of the women (17/134). The proportion of patients with LRR was higher in AA women than Caucasian women (26% vs. 10%, 6/23 vs. 11/107, respectively), although this difference was not statistically significant (p = 0.08). The majority of Caucasian women with LRR consented to a medical record review, but a minority of AA women consented (8/11 vs. 2/6, respectively, p = 0.16)