Factors Affecting Retention of Transfer Students at Linfield College

Building on the work of Tyler (2011), this paper analyzes the factors that affect the decision by transfer students at Linfield College to return for a second year. Data was obtained for transfer students from the Department of Institutional Research at Linfield College from 2009 to 2013. We estimate the logit probabilities of retention likelihood as a function of academic ability, net price, curricular engagement, extra-curricular engagement, choice of major and demographic characteristics. We find that academic ability, curricular engagement, institutional commitment, and choice of major variables may be significant factors in the retention of transfer students at Linfield College. The estimated effects and the resulting conclusions must be interpreted cautiously due to our small sample size. However, a discussion of the results shows that Linfield may be able to improve retention of transfer students through increased curricular engagement and greater departmental awareness

Rapid Computation of Thermodynamic Properties Over Multidimensional Nonbonded Parameter Spaces using Adaptive Multistate Reweighting

We show how thermodynamic properties of molecular models can be computed over a large, multidimensional parameter space by combining multistate reweighting analysis with a linear basis function approach. This approach reduces the computational cost to estimate thermodynamic properties from molecular simulations for over 130,000 tested parameter combinations from over a thousand CPU years to tens of CPU days. This speed increase is achieved primarily by computing the potential energy as a linear combination of basis functions, computed from either modified simulation code or as the difference of energy between two reference states, which can be done without any simulation code modification. The thermodynamic properties are then estimated with the Multistate Bennett Acceptance Ratio (MBAR) as a function of multiple model parameters without the need to define a priori how the states are connected by a pathway. Instead, we adaptively sample a set of points in parameter space to create mutual configuration space overlap. The existence of regions of poor configuration space overlap are detected by analyzing the eigenvalues of the sampled states' overlap matrix. The configuration space overlap to sampled states is monitored alongside the mean and maximum uncertainty to determine convergence, as neither the uncertainty or the configuration space overlap alone is a sufficient metric of convergence. This adaptive sampling scheme is demonstrated by estimating with high precision the solvation free energies of charged particles of Lennard-Jones plus Coulomb functional form. We also compute entropy, enthalpy, and radial distribution functions of unsampled parameter combinations using only the data from these sampled states and use the free energies estimates to examine the deviation of simulations from the Born approximation to the solvation free energy

The impacts of organised crime in the EU: some preliminary thoughts on measurement difficulties

This article analyses the social construction of the problem of organised crime and associated problems of measurement. It reports on a study conducted for the European Parliament which had three principal aims: 1. To produce a critical assessment of the state-of-the-art in terms of what is and is not known about the prevalence and distribution of different forms of organised crime. 2. To set out a robust conceptual framework which would enable us to think more clearly and coherently about the costs of organised crime going forward. 3. To use this assessment and framework to interrogate empirical data on the costs of organised crime in the EU, where it is available and is judged to be reasonably valid and reliable, to produce informed estimates of what these social and economic costs might be. It comments on the conceptual and empirical problems involved in this exercise and the policy issues that arise in the context of it

En embuscade sur le sentier de l’argent. Une perspective internationale

This article examines the growth of financial measures against 'organised crime' in the form of money-laundering and asset confiscation. After discussing the implications of conflicts over what crimes should be included in money-laundering statutes —e.g. drugs-only or all 'serious' crime —it summarises the findings of a research study conducted by the author into the impact of money-laundering reporting in the UK upon criminal investigation by the police and customs, and into the forfeiture of the proceeds of crime. It concludes that these measures have had a very limited effect and will continue to do so, unless more technological and human resources are put into the investigation process. Furthermore, the tendency of offenders at all but the highest levels to spend their money as they go along places limits on the likely impact of these measures, based as they are on a model of criminal organisation that is more than the reality

Money for crime and money from crime: financing crime and laundering crime proceeds

This article summarises briefly what is known internationally about how ‘organised crimes’ are financed and how this differs from the financing of licit businesses. It shows how illicit financing might and does operate, noting that a key issue is the social capital of offenders and their access to illicit finance which ironically, may be easier if controls make it harder to launder money. It then reviews international evidence on how proceeds of crime are laundered, concluding with an examination of the implications of these observations for the study of organised crime and the effects of anti-money laundering efforts. In money laundering cases internationally, the most commonly prosecuted cases are not complicated. This is not evidence that there are no complicated cases, since the proportion of crime proceeds and crime financing that have been subjected to serious investigation is modest. There is a core contradiction between general economic policy pushed hard multilaterally for liberalisation of financial flows and a crime control policy intent on hampering them. No-one could rationally think that AML controls in general or financial investigation in particular will ‘solve’ organised crime completely or eliminate high-level offending: for there even to be a chance to achieve that, there would need to be a step change in transparency and effective action against high-level corruption along all possible supply chains. However more action (not just legislation) on these could facilitate interventions against the more harmful individuals, networks and crime enablers. The less complex financial activities of local drug-dealing gangs can be intervened against, without needing international cooperation or familiarity with sophisticated money laundering typologies

Thinking about organised crime

The term ‘organised crime’ suggests a greater level of coherence than exists in reality, while the major threat imagery it evokes is useful for some purposes but counterproductive for others. While some organised criminal groups and activities pose a threat to national security, most affect human security at a sub-national level. Michael Levi critically examines some economic, physical and perception features of the harms and threats encompassed by organised crime, and discusses their implications for strategic and tactical interventions

Assessing the trends, scale and nature of economic cybercrimes: overview and issues

Trends in police-recorded and (where they exist) household survey-measured cybercrimes for economic gain are reviewed in a range of developed countries – Australia, Canada, Germany, Hong Kong, the Netherlands, Sweden, the UK and the US - and their implications for criminal policy are considered. The datasets indicate a substantial rise in online fraud – though one that is lower than the rise in online shopping and other ‘routine activity’ indicators - but it is not obvious whether this is just displacement for the fall in household and automobile property crime, nor how much overlap there is between the offenders and past ‘offline’ offenders. Nor do the data indicate whether the frauds result from insiders or outsiders, or are collusive. The direct and indirect costs of cyberfrauds are examined, and it is concluded that there is no satisfactory basis for the larger estimates of cost, but it is undeniable that those costs are large enough to merit concern. There remains a problem of what metrics are appropriate for judging the threat and harm from cybercrimes, and their impact on national and human security. There is not a sharp division between these larger national security issues and cyber attacks on banks, businesses, and the spear phishing of individuals with important knowledge of system vulnerabilities in the public or the private sector. Rather there is a punctuated continuum in the interplay between private, corporate governmental and wider social risks