The Researchers\u27 Perspective: For and By the Community: Processes and Practices from the Development of National School Library Standards

In this study, we describe the innovative and rigorous phased process used to compose the American Association of School Librarians (AASL) National School Library Standards (AASL, 2018). We begin by recounting previous standards iterations and compared their development processes to the most recent process used during the development of the AASL Standards. After we detail the development timeline and process phases, we conclude with implications for best practices in standards development for school librarians, professional leaders, and practitioners

Building of Causality: A Future for School Librarianship Research and Practice

The article discusses the future trends in school librarianship and its impact on professional practice. Topics discussed include the research study conducted by Colorado Study and funded by the American Association of School Librarians, along with how to respond to the changes technology has brought in engaging learners

Evidence, Standards, and School Librarianship: Prevailing Policies, Promising Methods, and Progress on a Research Agenda

Guided by the question, What are the implications of national educational evidence standards for school librarianship research?, prevailing U.S. evidence-driven educational policies are examined to identify implications for school librarianship research; promising methods to contribute to building this evidence base are explored; and finally, progress on a long-term research agenda designed to enable school librarianship researchers to contribute evidence to educational policy is reviewed. As promising methods are explored, an actionable agenda is proposed that school library researchers can undertake to participate in a causal research environment

Creating a Foundation for the Causal Relationship Between Libraries and Learning: A Proposed Application of Nursing and Public Health Research Methods

Thomas Cook, a renowned causal research expert and professor of sociology, psychology, education, and social policy at Northwestern University (USA), called for school library researchers to parallel causality determination efforts in health-related fields. In this paper, we respond to Dr. Cook’s challenge with a proposed research design centered on Mixed Research Synthesis (MRS) as part of process validated by the U.S. Department of Education and National Science Foundation’s Common Guidelines for Education Research and Development. MRS studies, often used in nursing and public health research to develop causal theories, enable researchers to develop evidence summaries; identify and adjudicate rival and companion theories, and determine the active ingredients and weak links in the implementation chain of interventions, programs, and policies. MRS is the essential first step in a possible ongoing multi-phased research agenda designed to progress from theory building to theory testing to causal determination. In addition to building on and extending school librarianship’s heritage in replicated correlational research and strong affective value, the researchers’ proposed MRS implementation will test the usefulness of a technique that has never been used in school settings and will provide a useful entry point for researchers concerned with other types of libraries

Librarians as Natural Disaster Stress Response Facilitators: Building Evidence for Trauma-Informed Library Education and Practice

Public librarians are on the front line of catastrophic events that, each year, leave millions of people with significant mental health consequences; in the midst of these tragedies, librarians are often called upon to address community needs, often while neglecting their personal hardships. In this paper, we propose research, education, and practice opportunities centered on SOLAR, a community-based therapeutic approach that will allow librarians to recognize and assist patrons with symptoms just short of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) related to natural disasters. This proposed therapy offers public librarians an opportunity to engage with a treatment framework to meaningfully support their patrons while benefiting from the self-care often overlooked in times of crisis. This work may be a template for contextually sensitive, community-facilitated mental health services critical for communities that lack financial and geographical access to larger health infrastructures. We include opportunities for research in librarians’ trauma response to inform public librarians’ education and practice to improve disaster preparedness and community well-being

The Preparation and Certification of School Librarians: Using Causal Educational Research About Teacher Characteristics to Probe Facets of Effectiveness

How do we define a high-quality school librarian? Decades of educational researchers have attempted to link teacher characteristics—such as how teachers are prepared, which credentials they carry, and years of experience—to student outcomes. These researchers have contended that individual educator attributes may have a direct effect on what and how much their students learn. School librarians are also teachers who have direct student contact, and although numerous studies have indicated that school librarian preparation, licensure, and other background characteristics are promising areas for further direct exploration, researchers have yet to examine if, how, and why school librarians’ certification or preparation positively impacts students’ learning outcomes. The purpose of this paper is to compare findings from causal educational research to findings from descriptive school librarianship research to discern possible areas of causal alignment that warrant further investigation. In this study, we present a subset of a larger mixed research synthesis of causal educational research related to student achievement, contextualized with existing school librarianship research, to draw relationships between classroom teacher and school librarian preparation and characteristics and to shape researchable conjectures about school librarians’ effects on learner outcomes

Meeting the Needs of IT Stakeholders in a Northwest Florida State College

Many studies support the important role that two and four-year college programs can play in certification training and as a gateway to the four-year IT degree. In an effort to determine if one Florida Panhandle community college was delivering its intended IT education goals and meeting the needs of local employers, the researchers performed five comparative analyses that stemmed from the overarching research question, “How do IT program learning outcomes compare to the requirements of IT job postings as well as to IT student and faculty perceptions of what is learned and what is taught?” The results of this study, when contextualized with extant literature, suggest that schools are challenged in aligning curricula with IT employers needs especially in clarifying the value of certifications and obtaining meaningful experiential learning opportunities for students as they manage their education and career pathways.ye

A high-resolution map of human evolutionary constraint using 29 mammals.

The comparison of related genomes has emerged as a powerful lens for genome interpretation. Here we report the sequencing and comparative analysis of 29 eutherian genomes. We confirm that at least 5.5% of the human genome has undergone purifying selection, and locate constrained elements covering ∼4.2% of the genome. We use evolutionary signatures and comparisons with experimental data sets to suggest candidate functions for ∼60% of constrained bases. These elements reveal a small number of new coding exons, candidate stop codon readthrough events and over 10,000 regions of overlapping synonymous constraint within protein-coding exons. We find 220 candidate RNA structural families, and nearly a million elements overlapping potential promoter, enhancer and insulator regions. We report specific amino acid residues that have undergone positive selection, 280,000 non-coding elements exapted from mobile elements and more than 1,000 primate- and human-accelerated elements. Overlap with disease-associated variants indicates that our findings will be relevant for studies of human biology, health and disease

A High-Resolution Map of Human Evolutionary Constraint Using 29 Mammals

The comparison of related genomes has emerged as a powerful lens for genome interpretation. Here we report the sequencing and comparative analysis of 29 eutherian genomes. We confirm that at least 5.5% of the human genome has undergone purifying selection, and locate constrained elements covering ~4.2% of the genome. We use evolutionary signatures and comparisons with experimental data sets to suggest candidate functions for ~60% of constrained bases. These elements reveal a small number of new coding exons, candidate stop codon readthrough events and over 10,000 regions of overlapping synonymous constraint within protein-coding exons. We find 220 candidate RNA structural families, and nearly a million elements overlapping potential promoter, enhancer and insulator regions. We report specific amino acid residues that have undergone positive selection, 280,000 non-coding elements exapted from mobile elements and more than 1,000 primate- and human-accelerated elements. Overlap with disease-associated variants indicates that our findings will be relevant for studies of human biology, health and disease.National Human Genome Research Institute (U.S.)National Institute of General Medical Sciences (U.S.) (Grant number GM82901)National Science Foundation (U.S.). Postdoctural Fellowship (Award 0905968)National Science Foundation (U.S.). Career (0644282)National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (R01-HG004037)Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.Austrian Science Fund. Erwin Schrodinger Fellowshi

Erratum: Corrigendum: Sequence and comparative analysis of the chicken genome provide unique perspectives on vertebrate evolution

International Chicken Genome Sequencing Consortium. The Original Article was published on 09 December 2004. Nature432, 695–716 (2004). In Table 5 of this Article, the last four values listed in the ‘Copy number’ column were incorrect. These should be: LTR elements, 30,000; DNA transposons, 20,000; simple repeats, 140,000; and satellites, 4,000. These errors do not affect any of the conclusions in our paper. Additional information. The online version of the original article can be found at 10.1038/nature0315