Multiculturalism: A Challenge to Two Myths of Liberalism

This paper sketches a brief account of multiculturalism in order to distinguish it from other positions that have been under attack recently. Following this, we address two prevalent and diametrically opposed criticisms of multiculturalism, namely, that multiculturalism is relativistic, on the one hand, and that it is absolutist, on the other. Both of these criticisms, we argue, simply mask liberal democratic theory's myth- begotten attempt to resolve the tension between the one and the many. Multiculturalism challenges the myths of meritocracy and abstract individualism which underlie liberalism; properly understood, it evades the criticisms often hurled at it

Exploring Hybrid Learning: Enhancing Access to Health and Safety Education at WorkSafeHealth

WorkSafeHealth, a not-for-profit health and safety association in the province of Ontario, is mandated by the Ministry of Labour, Immigration, Training and Skills Development to provide training and consultation services to client firm trainees across the province. Despite the efforts of WorkSafeHealth personnel to provide timely access to health and safety education, the vast regional expanse in which WorkSafeHealth provides these services hinders consultant-trainers’ abilities to furnish training to Ontario workers who must be equipped with this critical information to work safely in their respective industries. Therefore, current operational service delivery methods must change to support WorkSafeHealth personnel’s fulfillment of the organization’s mandate. Currently, learners residing in remote areas are often required to travel hundreds of kilometres to reach a training venue when a required course is offered: these commutes are often undertaken on rough terrain and other roads with hazards that could result in motor vehicle incidents. WorkSafeHealth can capitalize on the organization’s existing learning technologies to facilitate courses simultaneously to face-to-face and virtual learners: a training model known as hybrid learning. After illuminating WorkSafeHealth’s organizational context, mandate, and organizational influences, throughout this organizational improvement plan, effective approaches to leadership through which this solution can be implemented, communicated, and monitored and evaluated is presented

Simulation par le modèle AgriFlux du devenir de l'atrazine et du dééthylatrazine dans un sol du Québec sous mais sucré

Les outils mathématiques sont de plus en plus utilisés pour simuler la contamination d'origine agricole des eaux souterraines. Le modèle AgriFlux permet, à l'aide du module PestiFlux, de simuler les processus responsables du devenir des pesticides dans le sol: ruissellement, volatilisation, adsorption/désorption rapide, adsorption/désorption lente, complexation par la matière organique dissoute, biodégradation en sous-produits, hydrolyse, drainage et lessivage. AgriFlux est utilisé pour simuler le devenir de l'atrazine et du dééthylatrazine sur une parcelle expérimentale de la région de Québec (Québec, Canada) cultivée en maïs sucré (Zea mays, L.) traité à l'atrazine. Des prélèvements d'eau interstitielle ont été réalisés (1986-1990) à l'aide de lysimètres avec succion (0,5 et 1,0 m de profondeur) et analysés pour leur contenu en atrazine et dééthylatrazine. De manière générale, AgriFlux reproduit bien l'évolution des concentrations mesurées, dans le temps et dans le profil de sol (r=0,76). Certains pics de concentrations observés sur le terrain ne sont toutefois pas représentés ou sont décalés dans le temps, ce qui pourrait être attribué à une sous-estimation de la variabilité spatiale des paramètres. Le rapport dééthylatrazine/atrazine est relativement bien simulé en 1988 à 0,5 m, mais est moins représentatif pour les autres données, ce qui pourrait être dû à une certaine imprécision dans la simulation de la biodégradation. Une analyse de sensibilité du modèle aux variations de différents paramètres a montré que le paramètre le plus influent dans les conditions testées est la constante de biodégradation. Les résultats obtenus montrent la pertinence d'AgriFlux (PestiFlux) dans la simulation du devenir des pesticides dans le sol et donc des risques de contamination des eaux souterraines en région agricole.Groundwater and surface water contamination by agricultural practices has become an increasingly preoccupying problem. Mathematical models are valuable tools to help prevent this type of pollution from non-point sources. AgriFlux is a mechanistic, stochastic model simulating the fate of agricultural contaminants in the unsaturated zone at the scale of the agricultural field. AgriFlux, through the PestiFlux module, now simulates pesticide transformations in the soil from their application to the field until their leaching with percolating water. The processes represented include volatilization, complexation by the soluble organic matter, instantaneous adsorption and desorption, slow adsorption and desorption to less available sites, biodegradation to by-products and hydrolysis to non-toxic compounds. The pesticide freely dissolved in solution or complexed with soluble organic matter can be mobilized with runoff, drainage and leaching waterAn application of PestiFlux to an experimental field near Quebec City (Quebec, Canada) is presented. The soil is a well-drained loamy sand cropped from 1986 to 1990 with sweet corn (Zea Mays, L.) receiving atrazine treatments (1.6 to 1.8 kg.ha-1 of active ingredient). Interstitial water was sampled using 12 suction lysimeters located at both the 0.5 and 1.0 m depths in the soil. All stations were sampled monthly in 1986 and 1987 and the collected water was analyzed for atrazine alone. In 1988, the sampling (every two weeks) was limited to the lysimeters which had previously shown the highest pesticide concentrations (two lysimeters at 0.5 m and one lysimeter at 1.0 m). The interstitial water was analyzed for atrazine and deethylatrazine. There was no sampling in 1989. In 1990, all stations were sampled on a weekly basis and a composite water sample obtained for each depth was analyzed for both compounds. Most of the pesticide-related parameters required to run PestiFlux were deduced from the literature, with the exception of the biodegradation rate coefficient which was estimated from field monitoring of atrazine. The parameters required to simulate water fluxes and plant uptake were the same as those used in a previous application of AgriFlux to the same experimental field for the simulation of nitrate fluxes (LAROCQUE and BANTON, 1995).Results show that PestiFlux generally represents well the measured atrazine and deethylatrazine concentrations in the interstitial water at 0.5 and 1.0 m. A linear regression using all measured and simulated concentrations indiscriminately gives a correlation coefficient of 0.76 when using the logarithm of concentrations. The temporal evolution of the pesticide concentrations is relatively well simulated, especially on the long term with an adequate representation of the increase in pesticide concentrations in the soil profile at 1.0 m. This increase is probably due to the fallow existing in 1985 which would have favored leaching of adsorbed pesticide below the soil profile, leaving only low residual pesticide concentrations. Over one growing season, the transport of atrazine and deethylatrazine is well represented by the model, although some peak concentrations are delayed or attenuated. This result could be due to an underestimation of the spatial variability of the different parameters. It is possible that the coefficient of variation of 10% adopted may not represent adequately the spatial variation of some parameters. Nevertheless, most measured concentrations of both compounds are within the mean simulated concentrations and included between two standard deviations. For 1988, most of the measured concentrations are located near the upper limit of the envelope curve which is consistent with the fact that the sampled lysimeters were those yielding the highest concentrations. The simulated concentrations show a generally good representation of the relative atrazine and deethylatrazine concentrations. The ratio of the mean deethylatrazine to atrazine concentrations provides a closer look at the adequacy between the simulated concentrations of both compounds. A comparison between the measured and the simulated ratios shows a good adequacy at 0.5 m in 1988 and both over- and under-estimation of the ratio for the other available data. This is probably due to an imprecision in the simulation of biodegradation rates during some periods. All the parameters used in the simulation have an important uncertainty, due to the significant spatial variation of the parameters in the field and to the imprecise knowledge of some pesticide characteristics. In order to identify the parameters which have the most important influence on the results, an analysis of the sensitivity of the cumulated leaching mass of both compounds at 1.0 m to variations of the different input parameters was performed. The results show that the biodegradation rate has the greatest influence on the results. This is probably due to the importance of this process in the simulated situation. This result confirms the importance of an adequate quantification of this parameter and of its spatial variation. PestiFlux offers a comprehensive representation of pesticide transformations in the soil and is easy to use. As a module of AgriFlux, it has the advantage of being integrated into a well-tested and reliable modeling environment. The presented simulation results show that, apart from some limits due to the quantification of some of the parameters, PestiFlux is a useful and comprehensive tool for estimating potential groundwater pollution by pesticides

Mise en place d’un laboratoire naturel sur le mont Covey Hill (Québec, Canada)

Le mont Covey Hill héberge des populations de salamandres rares et menacées dont les habitats sont maintenus en partie par\ud l’eau souterraine. Des travaux de recherche multidisciplinaires (UQAM, U. McGill, U. Montréal, IRBV, Centre Brace, SCABRIC et\ud ministères) ont permis de comprendre l’hydrologie ainsi que la répartition et les caractéristiques des habitats de salamandres. Ces projets ont contribué à la mise en place de stations de suivi écologique à long terme et de stations hydrométriques permanentes. En tant que propriétaire de terrains dédiés à la conservation, Conservation de la Nature assure la coordination de ces initiatives. Le mont Covey Hill est aujourd’hui un Laboratoire naturel unique au Québec, dédié à la compréhension intégrée et à long terme d’un écosystème fragile. Cet article a pour objectif de présenter le Laboratoire naturel par une description des recherches en cours et à venir

Simplification rationnelle des outils hydrologiques de gestion : recommandations méthodologiques pour la construction de modèles semi-empiriques à origine mécaniste

Les modèles de simulation hydrologiques sont reconnus comme des outils mathématiques très performants mais généralement d'application difficile, principalement à cause du nombre élevé des paramètres requis. À l'inverse, les outils actuels de gestion sont généralement développés à l'aide d'approches empiriques limitant leur application. De plus, leurs paramètres ne sont pas des grandeurs mesurables et doivent être ajustés pour chaque situation. Une approche est proposée pour le développement d'outils semi empiriques de gestion. Elle consiste à simuler un grand nombre de scénarios en utilisant un modèle complexe de simulation puis à rationaliser l'information obtenue pour développer un nouveau modèle semi empirique. L'exemple illustrant cette approche concerne l'évaluation des flux d'eau ruisselée à la surface des champs, lessivée vers la nappe souterraine et drainée par les drains agricoles spécifiquement pour le contexte du Québec. À partir des résultats de simulation de 4500 scénarios, une simplification.rationalisation a permis de réduire à 120 le nombre de scénarios de référence à l'aide desquels peuvent être évalués tous les scénarios possibles par de simples interpolations linéaires. Une application de l'algorithme résultant sur un site du Québec a montré la bonne concordance entre les résultats calculés et mesurés. À la fois l'ordre de grandeur du ruissellement et du drainage et leur grandeur relative sont bien évalués.Considering the complexity of the water cycle in soil systems, models are used more than ever in parallel with field investigations to assist in the decision making process (KHAKURAL et ROBERT, 1993). Most available models are either too complicated (many non-measurable parameters) or too simple (empirical or site-specific) to be used as management tools. Such tools should conform to known theory and should be structured to enable efficient analysis of field situations with minimal requirements for parameters (CARSEL et al 1984). However, if the mechanistic models are very performing tools with regards to their representation of the processes and for the accuracy and reliability of their results, they are criticized for their complexity and for the large number of parameters they require. For this reason, their potential application as management tools cannot be recommended especially in preliminary investigations when the methodology has to be straight forward and rapidly implemented. On the other hand, existing management tools are often developed using an empirical approach for a specific context which considerably limits their transferability to different situations. Moreover, their empirical parameters often cannot be measured for the new situations, and must be adjusted for each new application. A new approach conciliating the qualities of both kinds of tools was elaborated for the development of management tools. This approach consists in using mechanistic models for simulating a set of possible situations and in rationalizing the information obtained by simulation through regression analyses or other methods. An example of this methodology is presented in this paper with the development of the hydrological part (runoff, leaching and drainage) of a management tool dedicated to the evaluation of nutrient losses related to manure applications. Developed for the Quebec conditions, 4500 theoretical situations were considered corresponding to ten climates, nine soil textures, 25 crops and two slope values. Independently, agricultural management practices and drainage were taken into account.For the mechanistic simulation of the water budget in the 4500 theoretical situations, the hydrologic module of the mechanistic-stochastic model AgriFlux was used (BANTON et al. 1993b). Because of the important field variability of most parameters, the stochastic AgriFlux model incorporates the variability resulting from field heterogeneity, measurement errors and intrinsic uncertainty related to parameter definition. The soil profile is divided in plot scale homogeneous horizons (or compartments) and a daily time step is used in the calculations. The water budget module in AgriFlux is named HydriFlux and simulates all the water-related processes (precipitations, snowmelt, infiltration, runoff, water uptake by plants, evaporation, percolation and drainage) using characteristic water contents and unsaturated hydraulic conductivity.In the example presented, the simulation results obtained by running HydriFlux have shown that the soil water fluxes (runoff and percolation) vary as linear functions of both the annual rain volume (the most important characteristic of the climate) and the logarithm of the saturated hydraulic conductivity (the most important characteristic of the soil type). A reduction of the number of crops could also be achieved by taking into account the water needs and the water uptake curves of the crops. This rationalization-simplification reduced the number of theoretical simulations to be stored in the management tool to 120 (2 climates x 3 textures x 10 crops x 2 slopes). These represent only 2.7% of the initial situations simulated by the mechanistic HydriFlux model. The different water fluxes are stored in the management tool as tables in which direct interpolations are performed to calculate the fluxes corresponding to all the potential intermediary situations. Such developed management tool presents good qualities at the same time for its calculation speed, for its easy parameterization, for the reliability of its evaluation (through the evaluation of the mechanistic model) and for its high transferability and applicability to various situations. The calculations are rapidly done and their programming can be very easily made by using a spreadsheet software.An application of this evaluation method has been done on an experimental site located in Quebec (ENRIGHT et MADRAMOOTOO, 1994), the only one for which both the runoff and the drainage have been measured during many years (1989 to 1991, April to December). The application on two fields (1.84 et 4.63 ha) has shown a good concordance between the calculated and measured results, as well for the magnitude of the fluxes than for the relative importance of these fluxes. Moreover, this application has shown that the variability of the measured values is higher than the calculated ones, attesting of the great influence of the variations in climatic, soil, crop and management conditions on the water budget. However, the good evaluation of the fluxes (for relative and absolute values) confirms the reliability of the proposed approach and of the simplification

Modeling low-flow bedrock springs providing ecological habitats with climate change scenarios

Groundwater discharge areas, including low-flow bedrock aquifer springs, are ecologically important and can be impacted by climate change. The development of and results from a groundwater modeling study simulating fractured bedrock spring flow are presented. This was conducted to produce hydrological data for an ecohydrological study of an endangered species, Allegheny Mountain Dusky Salamanders (Desmognathus ochrophaeus), in southern Quebec, Canada. The groundwater modeling approach in terms of scale and complexity was strongly driven by the need to produce hydrological data for the related ecohydrological modeling. Flows at four springs at different elevations were simulated for recent past conditions (2006–2010) and for reference (1971–2000) and future (2041–2070) periods using precipitation and temperature data from ten climate scenarios. Statistical analyses of spring flow parameters including activity periods and duration of flow were conducted. Flow rates for the four simulated springs, located at different elevations, are predicted to increase between 2% and 46% and will be active (flowing) 1–2% longer in the future. A significant change (predominantly an increase) looking at the seasonality of the number of active days occurs in the winter (2–4.9%) and spring seasons (−0.6–6.5%). Greatest flow rates were produced from springs at elevations where sub-horizontal fractures intersect the ground surface. These results suggest an intensification of the spring activity at the study site in context of climate change by 2050, which provides a positive habitat outlook for the endangered salamanders residing in the springs for the future

Year-Round Schooling: A Catalyst for Pedagogical Change

In this article we argue that the implementation of a year-round school calendar served as a catalyst for innovations in teaching and learning and for school-level capacity-building by facilitating teachers' planning, formal and informal talk about teaching and learning, teamteaching, philosophically based programmatic changes, and a culture that supports innovation. We conclude that receptivity to change and ability to make conceptual links are keys to improving the learning environment for students and that whether the impetus is first- or second-order, structural or conceptual, is less important than is sometimes believed.Dans cet article, nous soutenons que la mise en oeuvre d'un calendrier scolaire qui s'étend sur douze mois a servi de catalyseur pour des innovations dans l'enseignement et l'apprentissage, ainsi que pour la création d'habiletés à l'échelle scolaire. En effet, une telle démarche a facilité: la planification de la part des enseignants, les conversations (formelles et informelles) au sujet de l'enseignement et de l'apprentissage, l'enseignement en équipes, l'application au programme de changements basés sur des idées philosophiques, et le développement d'une culture qui appuie l'innovation. Nous concluons d'abord que la réceptivité aux changements et l'habileté à imaginer des liens conceptuels constituent des facteurs clés pour l'amélioration de l'environnement d'apprentissage des élèves et ensuite, que la nature de l'impulsion (qu'elle soit de premier ou de second ordre, structurelle ou conceptuelle) importe moins que l'on a parfois tendance à croire

Polarization shaping for control of nonlinear propagation

We study the nonlinear optical propagation of two different classes of space-varying polarized light beams -- radially symmetric vector beams and Poincar\'e beams with lemon and star topologies -- in a rubidium vapour cell. Unlike Laguerre-Gauss and other types of beams that experience modulational instabilities, we observe that their propagation is not marked by beam breakup while still exhibiting traits such as nonlinear confinement and self-focusing. Our results suggest that by tailoring the spatial structure of the polarization, the effects of nonlinear propagation can be effectively controlled. These findings provide a novel approach to transport high-power light beams in nonlinear media with controllable distortions to their spatial structure and polarization properties.Comment: 5 pages, and 4 figure

An imaging neutron/gamma-ray spectrometer

We present the test results of a neutron/gamma-ray imaging spectrometer for the identification and location of radioactive and special nuclear materials. Radioactive materials that could be fashioned into a radiation dispersal device typically emit gamma rays, while fissile materials such as uranium and plutonium emit both neutrons and gamma rays via spontaneous or induced fission. The simultaneous detection of neutrons and gamma rays is a clear indication of the presence of fissile material. The instrument works as a double-scatter telescope, requiring a neutron or gamma ray to undergo an interaction in two detectors to be considered a valid event. While this requirement reduces the detector efficiency, it yields information about the direction and energy of the incident particle, which is then used to reconstruct an image of the emitting source. Because of this imaging capability background events can be rejected, decreasing the number of events required for high confidence detection and thereby greatly improving its sensitivity. The instrument is optimized for the detection of neutrons with energies from 1-20 MeV and gamma rays from 0.4 to 10 MeV. Images and energy spectra for neutron and gamma rays are reported for several sources including depleted uranium and plutonium. In addition, the effect of neutron source shielding is investigated

A modeling study of heterogeneity and surface water-groundwater interactions in the Thomas Brook catchment, Annapolis Valley (Nova Scotia, Canada)

A modelling study of the impacts of subsurface\ud heterogeneity on the hydrologic response of a small catchment\ud is reported. The study is focused in particular on the\ud hydraulic connection and interactions between surface water\ud and groundwater. A coupled (1-D surface/3-D subsurface)\ud numerical model is used to investigate, for a range of scenarios,\ud the spatio-temporal patterns of response variables such\ud as return flow, recharge, groundwater levels, surface saturation,\ud and streamflow. Eight scenarios of increasing geological\ud complexity are simulated for an 8 km2 catchment in\ud the Annapolis Valley (eastern Canada), introducing at each\ud step more realistic representations of the geological strata\ud and corresponding hydraulic properties. In a ninth scenario\ud the effects of snow accumulation and snowmelt are also considered.\ud The results show that response variables and significant\ud features of the catchment (e.g. springs) can be adequately\ud reproduced using a representation of the geology and\ud model parameter values that are based on targeted fieldwork\ud and existing databases, and that reflect to a sufficient degree\ud the geological and hydrological complexity of the study area.\ud The hydraulic conductivity values of the thin surficial sediment\ud cover (especially till) and of the basalts in the upstream\ud reaches emerge as key elements of the basin’s heterogeneity\ud for properly capturing the overall catchment response