Eight Questions about Implementing Standards-Based Education

Accessed 95,443 times on https://pareonline.net from November 13, 1999 to December 31, 2019. For downloads from January 1, 2020 forward, please click on the PlumX Metrics link to the right

Non-suicidal self-harm amongst incarcerated men: a qualitative study

Purpose: To further understanding of the needs and motivations of incarcerated men who self-harm with no apparent suicidal intent. These have received little attention in research and policy, despite men accounting for a high and increasing proportion of self-harm in prisons. Methods: Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 20 adult male prisoners with a recent history or thoughts of non-suicidal self-harm. The interviews were analysed drawing on principles of thematic analysis and discourse analysis. Findings: Against a backdrop of early traumatic experiences and more recent adverse events (including prison-related ones), self-harm was described by many as a desperate - but meaningful – coping strategy; both a means of releasing tension, sadness and frustration, and of being heard in an unresponsive system. Value: These findings echo those of research conducted with women (including women prisoners) who self-harm, but challenge some of the more negative ways in which non-suicidal male prisoner self-harm has been portrayed in the (scant) previous literature. As well as pointing to the need for greater awareness of the complex needs of men in prisons, they underscore the importance of (also) exploring - and perhaps addressing - the issue of self-harm separately from suicide, and of striving to make prisons, as well as prisoners, ‘healthier’ and better able to cope with pressure

School District Leadership that Works: The Effect of Superintendent Leadership on Student Achievement

As the latest in its continuing series of research on school, leadership, and classroom practices related to student achievement, McREL conducted a meta-analysis of research on the effect of superintendent leadership on student achievement. For this study, McREL researchers identified 27 research reports conducted since 1970 that examined, using quantitative, rigorous methods, the influence of school district leaders on student performance. Using a sophisticated research technique called a meta-analysis, McREL combined data from separate studies into a single sample, creating what McREL believes to be the largest-ever quantitative examination of research on superintendents. Altogether, these studies involved 2,714 districts and the achievement scores of 3.4 million students. The study produced the following major findings. Finding 1: District-level leadership matters. The McREL research team, led by McREL President and CEO Tim Waters and McREL Senior Fellow Robert J. Marzano, found a statistically significant relationship (a positive correlation of .24) between district leadership and student achievement.Finding 2: Effective superintendents focus their efforts on creating goal-oriented districts. McREL researchers also identified five district-level leadership responsibilities that have a statistically significant correlation with average student academic achievement. All five of these responsibilities relate to setting and keeping districts focused on teaching and learning goals.Finding 3: Superintendent tenure is positively correlated with student achievement. McREL found two studies that looked specifically at the correlations between superintendent tenure and student achievement. The weighted average correlation in these two studies was a statistically significant .19, which suggests that length of superintendent tenure in a district positively correlates to student achievement. These positive effects appear to manifest themselves as early as two years into a superintendent's tenure

How profitable are FX technical trading rules?

This paper provides a comprehensive empirical investigation of the profitability of foreign exchange technical trading rules over the 1996:10?2015:06 period for 22 currencies quoted in US dollars. It reports evidence of profitability across a universe of 113,148 rules that include traditional moving average rules and those constructed on the basis of technical indicators such as Bollinger bands and the relative strength index. The best trading rules achieve annualised returns of up to 30%. The Step-SPA test (Hsu, Hsu, & Kuan, 2010) results show a sharp fall in the total number of rules that are robust to data snooping bias. Virtually no traditional rule is significant in the 2006?2015 sub-sample, in line with the adaptive markets hypothesis. By contrast, rules based on new technical indicator such as Bollinger Band and relative strength index rules remain robustly profitable across all currencies over the more recent sub-sample

Quality traceability for user-centric context-aware systems in intelligent environments

Context-awareness is an important component of modern software systems. For example, in Ambient Assisted Living (AAL), the concept of context-awareness empowers users by reducing their dependence on others. Due to this role in healthcare, such systems need to be reliable and usable by their intended users. Our research addresses the development, testing and validation of context-aware systems in an emerging field which currently lacks sufficient systems engineering processes and disciplines. One specific issue being that developers often focus on delivering a system that works at some level, rather than engineering a system that meets a specified set of system requirements and their corresponding qualities. Our research aims to contribute towards improving the delivery of system quality by tracing, developing and linking systems development data for requirements, contexts including sensors, test cases and their results, and user validation tests and their results. We refer to this approach as the “quality traceability of context-aware systems”. In order to support the developer, the quality traceability of context-aware systems introduces a systems development approach tailored to context-aware systems in intelligent environments, an automated system testing tool and system validation process. We have implemented a case study to inform the research. The case study is in healthcare and based on an AAL system used to remotely monitor and manage, in real time, an individual prone to depressive symptoms

Intervening to prevent suicide at railway locations: findings from a qualitative study with front-line staff and rail commuters.

For every suicide on the British railway network, at least six potential attempts are interrupted by front-line staff or rail commuters. However, the factors that maximise or hinder the likelihood and effectiveness of such interventions are poorly understood. The aim of the current study was to shed light on the experience of intervening to prevent a suicide at a railway location, including how and why people intervene, and their feelings and reflections in the aftermath. In-depth interviews were carried out with rail commuters (n = 11) and front-line railway staff (n = 10) who had intervened to stop a suicide by train. Data were analysed thematically. Participants had intervened to prevent suicide in several ways, both from afar (e.g. by calling a member of staff) and more directly (verbally or non-verbally), in some cases with no prior training or experience in suicide prevention, and often as a 'quick, gut reaction' given the limited time to intervene. In more 'reasoned' interventions, poor confidence and concerns around safety were the greatest barriers to action. Although often privy to their final outcome, most participants reflected positively on their intervention/s, stressing the importance of training and teamwork, as well as small talk and non-judgemental listening. Suicides in railway environments can present bystanders with little time to intervene. Potential interveners should therefore be resourced as best as possible through clear infrastructure help/emergency points, visibility of station staff and training for gatekeepers

Factors deterring and prompting the decision to attempt suicide on the railway networks: findings from 353 online surveys and 34 semi-structured interviews

Background There is a suicide on the British railways every 36 hours. However, the reasons why people choose to die by train are not well understood. Aims To explore factors influencing and discouraging the decision to attempt suicide on the railway networks. Method We conducted an online survey and qualitative interviews with individuals who had contemplated or attempted suicide by train. Results A total of 353 survey responders had considered and 23 had attempted suicide at rail locations (including railways and metro/underground); a third of these cases were impulsive. The most frequently reported motivations for contemplating or attempting suicide were perceptions of quick and certain lethality (54 and 37%, respectively) and easy access to rail settings (33 and 38%, respectively). The main factor discouraging people from rail suicide was its wider impact, especially on train drivers (19%). In qualitative interviews (N = 34) the desire to avoid intervention from others was also a common motivating factor for attempting suicide on the railway networks. Conclusions People attempt suicide by train because railway settings are easy to access and because of an inaccurate perception of certain and quick lethality. Tackling exaggerated perceptions of lethality may help reduce suicides by train

Bayesian retrieval of complete posterior PDFs of oceanic rain rate from microwave observations

A new Bayesian algorithm for retrieving surface rain rate from Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) Microwave Imager (TMI) over the ocean is presented, along with validations against estimates from the TRMM Precipitation Radar (PR). The Bayesian approach offers a rigorous basis for optimally combining multichannel observations with prior knowledge. While other rain-rate algorithms have been published that are based at least partly on Bayesian reasoning, this is believed to be the first self-contained algorithm that fully exploits Bayes’s theorem to yield not just a single rain rate, but rather a continuous posterior probability distribution of rain rate. To advance the understanding of theoretical benefits of the Bayesian approach, sensitivity analyses have been conducted based on two synthetic datasets for which the “true” conditional and prior distribution are known. Results demonstrate that even when the prior and conditional likelihoods are specified perfectly, biased retrievals may occur at high rain rates. This bias is not the result of a defect of the Bayesian formalism, but rather represents the expected outcome when the physical constraint imposed by the radiometric observations is weak owing to saturation effects. It is also suggested that both the choice of the estimators and the prior information are crucial to the retrieval. In addition, the performance of the Bayesian algorithm herein is found to be comparable to that of other benchmark algorithms in real-world applications, while having the additional advantage of providing a complete continuous posterior probability distribution of surface rain rate

Applicability of molding procedures in laboratory mix tests for quality control and assurance of the deep mixing method

The deep mixing method (DMM) has been applied in many construction projects. The laboratory mix test is essential to the quality control and quality assurance (QC/QA) of deep mixing methods. The procedures used for the preparation of specimens in the laboratory mix test greatly affect the physical and mechanical properties of the stabilized soils. Different procedures are applied in different countries/regions. With the increasingly globalized DMM market, it is desirable that a common understanding of the nature of the laboratory mix test and internationally accepted guidelines to conduct it be established in order to guarantee the QC/QA of DMMs. As part of an international collaborative study, the influence of different molding techniques for the laboratory preparation of specimens was studied. Five different molding techniques were tested in four organizations. The results showed that the molding techniques considerably influenced the magnitude and variation of the unconfined compressive strength and the wet unit weight of the stabilized specimens. The applicability of the molding techniques was discussed in terms of their undrained shear strength and the liquidity index of the soil and binder mixture, and the usefulness of the techniques was demonstrated. (C) 2015 The Japanese Geotechnical Societ

Situational-Context for Virtually Modeling the Elderly

The generalized aging of the population is incrementing the pressure over, frequently overextended, healthcare systems. This situations is even worse in underdeveloped, sparsely populated regions like Extremadura in Spain or Alentejo in Portugal. In this paper we propose an initial approach to use the Situational-Context, a technique to seamlessly adapt Internet of Things systems to the needs and preferences of their users, for virtually modeling the elderly. These models could be used to enhance the elderly experience when using those kind of systems without raising the need for technical skills. The proposed virtual models will also be the basis for further eldercare innovations in sparsely populated regions