The Farm Act's Regional Equity Provision: Impacts on Conservation Program Outcomes

The 2002 and 2008 Farm Acts increased funding for conservation programs that provide financial assistance to farmers to implement conservation practices on working farmland. Along with seeking cost-effective environmental benefits, these programs have a goal of spreading conservation funding equitably across States. The 2002 and 2008 Farm Acts strengthened this allocative goal by setting a minimum threshold for conservation funding for each State—one that exceeds historical funding for some States—for enrolling agricultural producers in specified conservation programs. This study uses conservation program data to examine evidence of the impacts of the Regional Equity provision of the 2002 Farm Act, and explores the tradeoffs that can occur among conservation program goals when legislation gives primacy to fund allocation. The study found that cross-State shifts in funding reduced the acres receiving conservation treatment for many resource problems, but increased the net economic benefits from treatments on some of them. Overall impacts on the types of producers enrolled were small.Conservation program outcomes, working-land, land protection programs, state funding levels, regional equity provision, cost & benefits, Agricultural and Food Policy, Environmental Economics and Policy, Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

Unsettling Responsibility in Science Education

This open access book engages with the response-ability of science education to Indigenous ways-of-living-with-Nature. Higgins deconstructs the ways in which the structures of science education—its concepts, categories, policies, and practices—contribute to the exclusion (or problematic inclusion) of Indigenous science while also shaping its ability respond. Herein, he undertakes an unsettling homework to address the ways in which settler colonial logics linger and lurk within sedimented and stratified knowledge-practices, turning the gaze back onto science education. This homework critically inhabits culture, theory, ontology, and history as they relate to the multicultural science education debate, a central curricular location that acts as both a potential entry point and problematic gatekeeping device, in order to (re)open the space of responsiveness towards Indigenous ways-of-knowing-in-being

Des jeux de société comme pivots pédagogiques pleins de-jeux en l’enseignement et l’apprentissage de STIM

Drawing inspiration from Ellsworth’s (2005) work on thinking with pedagogically nonprescriptive objects and the pedagogies they permit and prohibit, we turn our attention to similar educational “texts” increasingly used in STEM (i.e., science, technology, engineering, mathematics) education—board games. We tinker with board games as they refuse and resist the ways that STEM education often privileges cognitive destinations rather than relational learning journeys that enfold the whole learning self, the content, as well as the materiality of learning. We ask, how might games simultaneous act as locations of, and as, pedagogy that inflect experiences of student learning? To answer this question, we explore the pedagogical intents expressed by game designers themselves by their design diaries, blogs and interviews while thinking with Ellsworth’s concept of pedagogical pivot . In exploring game designers’ statements, we map out some of the potentialities that this pedagogical medium might offer STEM teaching and learning.S’inspirant des travaux d’Ellsworth (2005) sur la réflexion relative à des objets pédagogiques non normatifs et aux pédagogies qu’ils permettent et interdisent, notre attention est portée sur des “textes” éducatifs similaires de plus en plus utilisés dans l'enseignement des STIM: les jeux de société. Nous expérimentons le fait que les jeux de société ne se prêtent pas aux manières selon lesquelles l’enseignement-apprentissage des STIM privilégie les cheminements cognitifs plutôt que des parcours d'apprentissage relationnels qui englobent toute acquisition, le contenu ainsi que la matérialité de l’apprentissage. Nous nous demandons comment les jeux pourraient simultanément fonctionner comme endroits d’apprentissage, et même comme une pédagogie, qui modifient les expériences d’apprentissage des étudiants? Afin de répondre à cette question, nous explorons les intentions pédagogiques des concepteurs de jeux en lisant leurs journaux de conception, blogs et entretiens, tout en établissant un rapport avec le concept des pivots pédagogiques de Ellsworth. En explorant les déclarations des concepteurs de jeux, nous avons élaboré certaines des potentialités que cet outil pédagogique pourrait offrir à l’enseignement et à l’apprentissage de STIM

Geometric Alignments of the Subgrid-Scale Force in the Atmospheric Boundary Layer

In recent years field experiments have been undertaken in the lower atmosphere to perform a priori tests of subgrid-scale (SGS) models for large-eddy simulations (LES). The experimental arrangements and data collected have facilitated studies of variables such as the filtered strain rate, SGS stress and dissipation, and the eddy viscosity coefficient. However, the experimental set-ups did not permit analysis of the divergence of the SGS stress (the SGS force vector), which is the term that enters directly in the LES momentum balance equations. Data from a field experiment (SGS2002) in the west desert of Utah, allows the calculation of the SGS force due to the unique 4×4 sonic anemometer array. The vector alignment of the SGS force is investigated under a range of atmospheric stabilities. The eddy viscosity model is likely aligned with the measured SGS force under near-neutral and unstable conditions, while its performance is unsatisfactory under stable condition

Flow over Hills: A Large-Eddy Simulation of the Bolund Case

Simulation of local atmospheric flows around complex topography is important for several applications in wind energy (short-term wind forecasting and turbine siting and control), local weather prediction in mountainous regions and avalanche risk assessment. However, atmospheric simulation around steep mountain topography remains challenging, and a number of different approaches are used to represent such topography in numerical models. The immersed boundary method (IBM) is particularly well-suited for efficient and numerically stable simulation of flow around steep terrain. It uses a homogenous grid and permits a fast meshing of the topography. Here, we use the IBM in conjunction with a large-eddy simulation (LES) and test it against two unique datasets. In the first comparison, the LES is used to reproduce experimental results from a wind-tunnel study of a smooth three-dimensional hill. In the second comparison, we simulate the wind field around the Bolund Hill, Denmark, and make direct comparisons with field measurements. Both cases show good agreement between the simulation results and the experimental data, with the largest disagreement observed near the surface. The source of error is investigated by performing additional simulations with a variety of spatial resolutions and surface roughness propertie

Farm Level Impacts of a Revenue Based Policy in the 2007 Farm Bill

Revenue-based policy alternatives are thought to be a potential component of the 2007 Farm Bill. This research provides an economic analysis of switching to a revenue assurance farm program for representative farms. Specifically, this research provides a monte-carlo stochastic simulation model that compares the effect of a revenue based safety net policy relative to continuing the 2002 Farm Bill policies for different types of U.S. crop farmers. The results show that both revenue assurance proposals by the National Corn Growers Association leave the majority of farmers, especially feed grain producers, with higher total receipts and higher government payments.Agricultural and Food Policy,

Are STEM Games Intended To Be Educative?

Our research aimed to expand perceptions of learning in school science and mathematics as relational and dynamic selves and experiences in the making. We grounded our work in Ellsworth’s (2005) notion of pedagogical pivots, thus recognizing STEM board games as texts that propel learning and learners forward through affective and aesthetic experiences, interaction as relationality, and boundaries as porous and fluid. To animate our theoretical framework, we held participatory review groups and reported on a group of eight pre-service teachers who played Santorini (mathematics) and Evolution: The Beginning (science). The results indicate that participants engaged in substantial moments of becoming across all three pedagogical pivots, which were made apparent in numerous ways through game play and interaction with the game, specifically exemplified through four emergent themes: 1) engrossment and presence both inside and outside of the game; 2) a becoming-play (about the process of play) and a becoming-game (bound by rules, security); 3) a becoming-community (collective learning, reciprocity, relationality); and 4) a becoming-self (as identifies are (re)forming). The data that emerged is a confluence of connections that produce a “becoming-with-ness” of the game itself and are described through participant statements, displayed through bodily reactions and interactions with space (relational or architectural), with the game itself, with other players, and which are shown through field notes, video and audio recordings of game-play observations. Data from the observed “in between” spaces—moments where learning or thinking might occur—allows for an identification of games as rich “texts” for mathematics and science education

“Role models can’t just be on posters”: Re/membering Barriers to Indigenous Community Engagement

Current Canadian scholarly literature, education policy, and curricular documents encourage the participation of Indigenous community members as a key component of Indigenous Education reform. Guided by sharing circles conducted with Indigenous Elders, families, teachers, and support workers, we present community voices and experiences of Indigenous Education in an urban school board through poetic transcription. Our research suggests that four key barriers will have to be overcome in efforts to improve urban Indigenous Education: unwelcoming schools, professionalization of classroom teaching, colonized classrooms, and unilateral decolonization. Poetic transcription is used in this article to centre the voices of Indigenous participants as well as attempt to decolonize our approach to data dissemination of Indigenous voices as white, Euro-Canadian university-based researchers. La littérature savante, les politiques d’éducation et les documents curriculaires canadiens actuels encouragent la participation des membres des communautés autochtones comme élément-clé de la réforme en matière d’éducation autochtone.  À partir des cercles de partage auxquels participaient les aînés, les familles, les enseignants et les agents de soutien, nous présentons, par l’intermédiaire de la transcription poétique, les voix et les expériences d’une communauté autochtone en milieu scolaire urbain. Notre recherche suggère quatre barrières à surmonter dans le but d’améliorer l’expérience scolaire en milieu urbain : écoles non accueillantes, professionnalisation de l’enseignement en salle de classe, salle de classe colonisée et décolonisation unilatérale. L’utilisation de la transcription poétique dans cet article a comme objectif de mettre en valeur les voix des participants de la communauté autochtone et de tenter de décoloniser, à titre de chercheurs universitaires blancs euro-canadiens, notre approche de dissémination des données reliées aux voix autochtones

Similarity Scaling Over a Steep Alpine Slope

In this study, we investigate the validity of similarity scaling over a steep mountain slope (30-41 $$^\circ$$ ). The results are based on eddy-covariance data collected during the Slope Experiment near La Fouly (SELF-2010); a field campaign conducted in a narrow valley of the Swiss Alps during summer 2010. The turbulent fluxes of heat and momentum are found to vary significantly with height in the first few metres above the inclined surface. These variations exceed by an order of magnitude the well-accepted maximum 10% required for the applicability of Monin-Obukhov similarity theory in the surface layer. This could be due to a surface layer that is too thin to be detected or to the presence of advective fluxes. It is shown that local scaling can be a useful tool in these cases when surface-layer theory breaks down. Under convective conditions and after removing the effects of self-correlation, the normalized standard deviations of slope-normal wind velocity, temperature and humidity scale relatively well with $$z/\varLambda$$ , where $$z$$ is the measurement height and $$\varLambda (z)$$ the local Obukhov length. However, the horizontal velocity fluctuations are not correlated with $$z/\varLambda$$ under all stability regimes. The non-dimensional gradients of wind velocity and temperature are also investigated. For those, the local scaling appears inappropriate, particularly at night when shallow drainage flows prevail and lead to negative wind-speed gradients close to the surfac

Decolonizing actions that speak louder than words : science education through multiple lenses in Nunavut / by Marc Higgins.

"Education in Nunavut, still largely based on Euro-Canadian knowledge and Western teachings, is a negative experience for many Nunavut youth - the result of cultural inappropriateness and worldview mismatch. The mismatch is one between an appropriate learning experience and the character, values, and traditions of Nunavut - and it remains especially pronounced in science education. In addressing this mismatch, I strive to decolonize both practice and practitioner by using movie camera lenses: in the first instance, to lend voice to Inuit youth's perspectives on science and, in the second instance, to turn the lens inward to address my own Eurocentric worldview and how it impacts the science education I deliver. Through this decolonizing synergy, I search to understand and deliver science education that strives to reach tenets of respectful research - to enact decolonizing actions that speak louder than words."--from abstract