Did the CDC guidelines for suicide reports affect the New York Times?

The CDC informed the American media of the best way to avoid contributing to imitative suicides by releasing guidelines for suicide reports in 2001. In this study, suicide reports in the New York Times were examined to establish if these guidelines affected the reporting. To determine if there was any change, all suicide reports from five years before, the year of guideline release, and five years after were extracted from the Times database. To determine compliance, articles were coded using a coding sheet that operationalized the guidelines into 12 yes–or–no questions. The New York Times observed nearly one and a half guidelines more in 2006 than 10 years before, from about 5 to nearly 6.5 observed. Some guidelines were observed differently in 2001, suggesting greater focus on the topic. However, only some of the changes were in line with the guidelines, and none of them lasted five years

Heat pipe investigations

Techniques associated with thermal-vacuum and bench testing, along with flight testing of the OAO-C spacecraft heat pipes are outlined, to show that the processes used in heat transfer design and testing are adequate for good performance evaluations

SCRUM RETROSPECTIVES: MEASURING AND IMPROVING EFFECTIVENESS

Within Scrum, the retrospective is the principal means through which a team focuses on continuous process improvement. As such, retrospectives provide Scrum teams a method which will allow them to identify and resolve issues that impact team performance. However, it is hard to measure increased performance based on process improvements resulting from retrospectives. Through a series of semi-structured interviews with team members, Scrum Masters, Product Owners, and organizational leadership, the research will identify quantitative measures which can be used to evaluate the effectiveness of retrospectives. Subsequently, a new game-based retrospective will be developed incorporating game elements to help improve the effectiveness of retrospectives. Finally, an empirical experiment will be conducted to evaluate the quantitative measures as well as the effectiveness of the game-based retrospective

Understanding IS Education Quality in Developing Countries: Role of Acculturation

Many developing countries (DCs) have limited IS human resources. Hence, their university-level IS classes are often taught by foreign faculty. Despite this arrangement, poor quality of IS education in DCs is a continuing problem. Research indicates cultural differences as an important reason for this problem. Foreign faculty imposing western-curriculum and teaching practices without adapting to the requirements of native students and native students inability/unwillingness to make the necessary adjustments leads to poor course quality. Therefore, we argue that cultural adaptation of foreign faculty and native students will improve IS course quality. Drawing from the acculturation literature that deals with cultural adaptations we develop a model of acculturation specific to teaching of IS courses by foreign faculty in DCs. In doing so, relevant factors from the IS education literature that influence faculty and students’ adaptation are synthesized. This paper extends acculturation theory and discusses relevant implications for IS education in DCs

REPATRIATION OF INFORMATION SYSTEMS STUDENT SOJOURNERS FROM DEVELOPING COUNTRIES: ROLE OF ACCULTURATION

When students return from studying abroad they often find that it is more difficult than they anticipated weaving themselves back into their native culture. With the emphasis on implementing Information Systems in developing countries it is imperative that the knowledge learned abroad is used within the home country. For this research-in-progress, we propose that the psychological theory of acculturation can be used to explain IS-specific difficulties experienced by IS student sojourners as they repatriate to the home countries after studying abroad

Dont Break the Build: Developing a Scrum Retrospective Game

This study discusses the design and observed play of a game-based Scrum retrospective. The game builds on the existing wealth of retrospective activities but adds in actual game play. The game is created in such a way as to satisfy the definition of a game and includes a win/loss state uncommon within typical retrospective activities. Leveraging existing design paradigms, the game looks to capitalize on the reported benefits of using games in team building and learning environments. The game fulfills the goals of a Scrum retrospective for the team to inspect and adapt processes by guiding the team in focused discussion regarding their performance and observations during the proceeding Sprint. The study provides an overview of the game design and mechanics and provides observations and results from post-game questionnaires. Finally, the study proposes changes to the game based on results of the observations and discusses future research possibilities