A Study of the Effects of County Characteristics on College Enrollment

For the past 100 years, policy analysts studied college enrollment at the individual level. Yet little research has been performed on whether the surrounding community characteristics contribute to enrollment rates. This is in part due to seeing college attendance as an individual choice whereas K-12 enrollment is typically predetermined by place of residence. However, this ignores the potential impact economic and social characteristics a community has on students while growing up. This paper attempts to add to the literature by testing county level variables with a panel regression with high school fixed effects. The results show higher averages of KEES (Kentucky Educational Excellence Scholarship) money and eligibility for free or reduced lunch among graduates are the most significant determinants of college enrollment in this study. County variables were mostly insignificant. An exception to this was crime rates for counties with urban clusters, though the coefficient was small. Another was the percentage of college educated adults which was very large, but only when the percentage of graduates enrolled in community colleges was the dependent variable. My recommendation is twofold. First, policy makers should consider ways to compensate for the effects of student poverty among graduates by exploring the possibility of creating after school tutoring programs. Second, analysts ought to conduct similar studies which compensate for some of the weaknesses of my model by using individual student data, an instrument variable for endogeneity caused by parents, and use variables which measure factors in a smaller community setting

The Impact of Media Influence About Hair Texture on Internalized Racial Oppression, Ethnic Identity, and Self-Efficacy

Problem African American women and matters of importance pertaining to African American women are understudied and lacking within research. Understanding the ways in which majority culture media influences aspects related to women of color, especially those pertaining to hair texture, and their impact is essential to bring about awareness and mobilize changes that will positively affect the lives of Black women. Representation matters. When minority women of any culture value the majority culture they tend to devalue themselves. Representation matters and is important because if self-esteem, worth, goodness, and virtue is only portrayed in majority culture aesthetics, internalization of those influential concepts of good and bad takes place, and that begins to transform and seep into every orifice of the Black women’s life. The impact of beauty on power and economic and social mobility leaves many African American women disenfranchised and disempowered because the definition of beauty, especially as it pertains to hair texture, is narrow and the standard of beauty by cultural and societal standards denies benefits, economic, social, education, vocation, and otherwise, to those who are not defined as such. Method Participants completed surveys that measured a) media influence about hair texture, b) internalized racial oppression, c) ethnic identity, and d) self-efficacy. This work employed structural equation modeling to test the hypothesized model for the impact of media influence about hair texture on internalized racial oppression, ethnic identity, and self-efficacy; as well as three within group models for ethnic identification, hair texture, and skin tone. Results Structural equation modeling indicated that the original hypothesized theoretical model was a poor fit to the data. Therefore, the model was revised on the basis of theory and modification indices. The revised model revealed that media influence about hair texture had a positive direct effect on internalized racial oppression. Media influence about hair texture had a positive direct effect on ethnic identity but also a negative direct effect on ethnic identity as it pertains to affirmation, commitment, and belonging. Media influence about hair texture had a negative direct effect on self-efficacy. The revised model was also well fitted to the between groups ethnic identification, hair texture, and skin tone with the impact of media influence about hair texture on internalized racial oppression being two times greater in African American women than black women. Conclusions This study added to the limited body of literature concerning African American women and the role that media influence plays on internalized racial oppression, aspects of ethnic identity, and self-efficacy. It suggests that high media influence about hair texture contribute to high levels of internalized racial oppression; low levels of ethnic affirmation, commitment, and belonging; and low levels of self-efficacy. It also confirmed that media influence about hair texture on internalized racial oppression, ethnic identity, and self-efficacy impacts African American and Black ethnically identified women, hair textures, and skin tones differently. In particular, this study suggests that higher levels of media influence increases minorities’ adoption of racist messages; higher levels of media influence lower one’s confidence of success and achievement; and higher levels of media influence lower minorities’ desire to affirm, belong, and commit to their ethnic group

Neotropical Nectar-feeding Bats (Family Phyllostomidae) Revisited: Lingual Data Support a Recently-Proposed Molecular Phylogeny

From the early 1900s to the 1970s, all New World nectar-feeding bats were classified under the subfamily Glossophaginae. During the last few decades of the 20th century, however, several analyses supported the hypothesis that this taxon was an unnatural grouping. T. A. Griffiths (1982) proposed creating a new subfamily, the Lonchophyllinae, which would include Lonchophylla, Lionycteris, and Platalina, three genera formerly included in the Glossophaginae. This proposal raised significant controversy. A recent molecular study by R. J. Baker and colleagues (2000) examined the RAG2 gene DNA sequence in a large number of bats in the family Phyllostomidae, including Lonchophylla, Lionycteris, and Lonchorhina. The evidence suggested that Lonchophylla and Lionycteris are more closely related to Lonchorhina (a nonnectarivorous genus) than to the Glossophaginae sensu Griffiths (Platalina was not available for examination). In this study, I present observations on the lingual morphology of Lonchorhina that support Baker et al.\u27s placement of Lonchorhina with Lonchophylla and Lionycteris. While Lonchorhina does not exhibit the extreme adaptations for nectar-feeding found in the lonchophylline genera, it does share several derived lingual character states with the lonchophyllines. These character states are not found in Macrotus, Micronycteris, or Phyllostomus, other members of the subfamily Phyllostominae (in which Lonchorhina has traditionally been placed). While this is clearly a work-in-progress, data collected to date provide some support for Baker et al. \u27s hypothesis, and thus for Griffiths\u27 (1982) original creation of the subfamily Lonchophyllinae

La educación para la muerte como ámbito formativo: más allá del duelo

¿Qué justifica hurtar al niño el derecho a saber qué es y no es la muerte? Se puede educar con y para la muerte, porque morir es tan frecuente como vivir, y mutuamente se generan y contienen. Se pretende reflexionar sobre esta verdad que escamoteamos, y dar pistas para replantear el sentido de lo que hacemos desde la Educación, sobre todo en momentos en que debemos ayudar a asumir una muerte en un aula o centro escolar. Se intenta normalizar la referencia objetiva a la muerte y se ofrecen contenidos inéditos para abordar esta realidad, con un enfoque complejo-evolucionista, comprendido como paradigma emergente, promotor de una Educación de la Conciencia.What justifies to steal to the boy the right that is to say what is and it is not the death? It is possible to be educated with and for the death, because to die it is as frequent as to live, and mutually they are generated and they contained. It is tried to reflect on this truth that we retracted, and to give tracks to reframe the sense of which we do from the Education, mainly at moments at which we must help to assume a death in a classroom or school center. It is tried to standardize the objective reference to the death and unpublished contents are offered to approach this reality, with an approach complex-evolucionist, understood like emergent, promotional paradigm of an Education of the Conscience

La práctica del 'acompañamiento educativo' desde la tutoría en situaciones de duelo

This article is continuation of an work initiated in 1998 and directed to the enrichment of the formation of the teaching staff from the Didactics and the Educative Direction, that altogether has come to denominate "Education for the Death" and "Didactics of Death" (A. de la Herrán el al., 1999; A. de la Herrán, y M. Cortina, 2006). The authors, make specific one methodology of paliative didactic intervention, contrasted actually with positive evaluation, that is tried to objetive and to put under debate to be developed by the tutor. For a greater didactic potentiality, it has been decided on its presentation from several examples, stopping to us in each one of them in its description, its interpretation and the performance recommended according to the proposed model, that has denominated `educative support'. For its integral understanding it is recommended, therefore, to review the totality of the cases. The most outstanding aspect of this model of tutorial intervention is indeed that it sets out to the didactic tutor- and not to the orientation one- like `accompanying'. In principle, is the tutor the tutor the person with affective bond, that better knows the student and who interacts more with the family. Therefore, except for exceptions (indicating of W.C. Kroen, 2002), tutor has to be the person who, with suitable formation, better can carry out from her orientation function 'educative support'.Este artículo es continuación de un trabajo iniciado en 1998 y dirigido al enriquecimiento de la formación del profesorado desde la Didáctica y la Orientación Educativa, que en conjunto se ha venido a denominar "Educación para la Muerte" y "Didáctica de la Muerte" (A. de la Herrán et al., 1999; A. de la Herrán, y M. Cortina, 2006). Los autores, concretan una 'metodología de intervención didáctica paliativa', contrastada en la práctica con evaluación positiva, que se pretende objetivar y someter a debate para ser desarrollada por el tutor. Para una mayor potencialidad didáctica, se ha optado por su presentación desde varios ejemplos, deteniéndonos en cada uno de ellos en su descripción, su interpretación y la actuación recomendada conforme al modelo propuesto, que se ha denominado 'acompañamiento educativo'. Para su comprensión integral se recomienda, por tanto, revisar la totalidad de los casos. El aspecto más destacado de este modelo de intervención tutorial es precisamente que se propone al tutor -y no al orientador- como 'acompañante didáctico'. En principio, es el tutor la persona con vínculo afectivo, quien mejor conoce al alumno y quien más interactúa con la familia. Por tanto, salvo excepciones (indicadores de W.C. Kroen, 2002), el tutor/a ha de ser la persona que, con formación adecuada, mejor pueda desempeñar desde su función orientadora el 'acompañamiento educativo'

Determination of interproton distances from NOESY spectra in the active site of paramagnetic metalloenzymes: cyanide-inhibited horseradish peroxidase

Two dimensional (2D) nuclear Overhauser effect (NOE) or NOESY experiments are performed on cyanide inhibited horseradish peroxidase in order to assess the prospects for obtaining quantitative interproton distances for the hyperfine shifted and paramagnetically relaxed active site signals in an intermediate sized (-44 kDa) paramagnetic metalloenzyme. This protein represents an ideal test case for such experiments because a series of structurally defined proton pairs on the heme and axial His 170 have been previously assigned. The relaxation properties of hyperfine shifted signals relevant to the experimental setup of 2D experiments and interpretation of both 1D and 2D NOE data are also investigated. NOESY spectra as a function of mixing time show that quantitative rise curves can be obtained that clearly differentiate between primary and secondary NOES even among the most strongly relaxed protons, but this requires very short mixing times in the range 0.5-3.0 ms. The sensitivity of the weak cross peaks at these short mixing times is improved by the relatively rapid pulse repetition rate and concommitant increase in the number of scans allowed by the rapid relaxation of active site protons. The paramagnetic relaxation influence, as well as the size of the protein, results in rise curves that are linear to only 1.5 ms for geminal protons and to only 3-5 ms for more weakly dipolar coupled proton pairs. However, the cross peak intensities in the linear region are shown to yield cross relaxation rates and internuclear distances for a series of assigned and orientationally invariant proton pairs that are in good agreement with their known distances. The patterns of NOESY rise curves are used both to determine the orientations of one propionate and both vinyl groups relative to the heme and to show that the axial His exhibits an orientation relative to its helix that is similar but not identical to that in crystallographically characterized cytochrome c peroxidase. Selective and nonselective 1D as well as 2D selective relaxation rate measurements for hyperfine shifted signals show that only selective or intrinsic relaxation rates can be used to optimize the setup of NOESY experiments and interpret 1D NOE data. The results of the study indicate that NOESY spectra can be expected to yield valuable quantitative structural information on the hyperfine shifted active site residues in a variety of cyanide-inhibited heme peroxidases

Contexte de L´pçedagpgoe de la mort en Espagne

La Pedagogía de la Muerte define un ámbito de investigación, formación e innovación educativa emergente. Se fundamenta en su posible habilitación educativa y didáctica en todos los niveles educativos y en su carácter fundamental para la formación. En poco más de diez años, el trabajo de un reducido grupo de autores ha puesto a España como uno de los escasos países en los que su desarrollo ha sido intenso, coherente y crecientemente demandado. Los trabajos invitan a vislumbrar una Pedagogía más abierta, más profunda y orientada por una teleología que tenga en cuenta las características esenciales del ser humano y su propia evolución. En el presente trabajo se realiza una revisión teórica de aportaciones realizadas por los más destacados autores españoles, analizando algunas de sus contribuciones e implicaciones. El artículo se divide en tres partes: Introducción, estudios y propuestas de Pedagogía de la Muerte en España, y conclusiones. Las propuestas se abordan en función de si están centradas en el valor formativo de la muerte para la evolución como ámbito perenne del ser humano, en la normalización de la muerte en la educación, en la intervención educativa paliativa o en el análisis de experiencias didácticas y de formación de profesorado. En las conclusiones se reflexiona sobre algunos retos que en un futuro pueden contribuir a la evolución de la Pedagogía de la Muerte. Entre ellas, el intercambio internacional de experiencias y el desarrollo de investigaciones científicas conjuntas que favorezcan la inclusión curricular de la muerte como elemento formativo.Pedagogy of Death is defined as a field of research, training and educational innovation emerging. It is based on their possible educational inclusion and its importance to formation. In just over ten years, the work of a small group of authors has pointed Spain as one of the few countries where development of the field has been intense, consistent and with a growing demand. The works invite to envision a more open Pedagogy, deeper and guided by a teleology that takes into account the essential characteristics of human beings and their own evolution. In this article, a theoretical review of work made by leading Spanish authors is done, discussing some of their contributions and implications. The article is divided into three parts: Introduction, studies and proposals for Pedagogy of Death in Spain, and conclusions. The proposals are discussed in terms of whether they are focused on the educational value of death for evolution as a perennial field in human beings, normalization of death in education, palliative intervention or analysis of learning experiences and teacher training. The conclusions reflect on some challenges that can contribute to future developments in Pedagogy of Death. Among them, the international exchange of experiences and development of joint scientific research that support the curricular inclusion of death as a formative element.La pédagogie de la mort définit un champ de recherche, de formation et de l'innovation éducative émergente. Elle est basée sur son potentiel éducatif et pédagogique à tous les niveaux de l'éducation et son rôle central dans l'enseignement. En un peu plus de dix ans, le travail d'un petit groupe d'auteurs a fait de l'Espagne l'un des rares pays dans lequel son développement a été intense, cohérent et de plus en plus demandé. Ces oeuvres nous invitent à entrevoir une pédagogie plus ouverte, plus profonde et guidée par une téléologie qui prend en compte les caractéristiques essentielles des êtres humains et de leur propre évolution. Cette étude présente un examen théorique des contributions apportées par les principaux auteurs espagnoles, l'analyse de certains de leurs contributions et leurs implications pédagogiques. L'article est divisé en trois parties: introduction, des études et des propositions de la pédagogie de la mort en Espagne, et les conclusions. Différentes propositions sont présentées en se concentrant sur la valeur éducative de la mort, pour l'évolution, comprise comme un point permanent de l'être humain ; d'autres propositions sont relatives à la normalisation de la mort dans l'éducation, l´intervention éducative palliatif ou l'analyse d'expériences d'apprentissage et de formation des enseignants. Dans les conclusions il y a des réflexions sur certains défis que dans l'avenir peuvent contribuer au développement de la pédagogie de la mort. Parmi eux, l'échange international d'expériences, et le développement de la recherche scientifique conjointe qui encourage l'inclusion curriculaire de la mort comme un élément formatif

Role of New Functional MRI Techniques in the Diagnosis, Staging, and Followup of Gynecological Cancer: Comparison with PET-CT

Recent developments in diagnostic imaging techniques have magnified the role and potential of both MRI and PET-CT in female pelvic imaging. This article reviews the techniques and clinical applications of new functional MRI (fMRI) including diffusion-weighted MRI (DWI), dynamic contrast-enhanced (DCE)-MRI, comparing with PET-CT. These new emerging provide not only anatomic but also functional imaging, allowing detection of small volumes of active tumor at diagnosis and early disease relapse, which may not result in detectable morphological changes at conventional imaging. This information is useful in distinguishing between recurrent/residual tumor and post-treatment changes and assessing treatment response, with a clear impact on patient management. Both PET-CT and now fMRI have proved to be very valuable tools for evaluation of gynecologic tumors. Most papers try to compare these techniques, but in our experience both are complementary in management of these patients. Meanwhile PET-CT is superior in diagnosis of ganglionar disease; fMRI presents higher accuracy in local preoperative staging. Both techniques can be used as biomarkers of tumor response and present high accuracy in diagnosis of local recurrence and peritoneal dissemination, with complementary roles depending on histological type, anatomic location and tumoral volume

Absorption capacity, kinetics and mechanical behaviour in dry and wet states of hydrophobic DEDMS/TEOS-based silica aerogels

This work is a new approach to the study of the structural, mechanical and absorption properties of hybrid organic/inorganic silica-based aerogels. Diethoxydimethylsilane and tetraethoxysilane have been used as precursors. Changes in properties such as specific surface area, porous volume, pore radius, and surface texture and chemistry were researched as a function of the relative organic content. In addition, the absorption properties were tested for different organic liquids. The discrepancy in the absorption mechanisms and the kinetics of pure inorganic and hybrid samples were discussed. It was confirmed that swelling occurs in samples with high organic content, which, in turn, governs the absorption process. Finally, the mechanical behaviour was studied by uniaxial compression. A significant rise of the rupture strain up to 0.45 and a 10-fold decrease in the Young’s modulus to 7.8 MPa were measured in the dry samples by increasing the organic content. The mechanical response of the samples after saturation by the absorption of two reference oily liquids, namely, common motor oil and liquid polydimethylsiloxane, was also compared with the behaviour of dry samples. The presence of liquid within the sample reduced the value of the mechanical parameters in almost all cases. Moreover, the inclusion of organic chains also made the wet aerogels highly deformable. In summary, these first results suggest that tuning the organic ratio of the hybrid aerogels allows the control of not only the structural and mechanical properties but also the absorption properties.Junta de Andalucía P09-TEP-546