More than a game: evaluation report

&lsquo;More than a Game&rsquo; is a sport-based youth mentoring program developed and implemented by Western Bulldogs in partnership with Newport Islamic Society (NIS), the Australian Federal Police, Victoria Police and Hobsons Bay City Council, with funding from the Attorney General&rsquo;s Department Building Community Resilience (BCR) grant scheme. The program aimed to develop a community-based resilience model that would use team-based sports to address issues of identity, sense of belonging and cultural isolation amongst young men of Islamic faith, all of which are identified as factors that may promote forms of violent extremism. The program involved 60 young men, aged 15-25, from the Newport Islamic Society in Melbourne&rsquo;s Western suburbs. The boys were engaged in numerous activities where they were mentored by staff from Western Bulldogs, Victoria Police and Australian Federal Police, who worked in conjunction with community leaders from the Newport Islamic Society.Through sports-based training, mentoring programs, and community dialogue, &lsquo;More Than a Game&rsquo; aimed to develop participants&rsquo; leadership, communication, and cross-cultural engagement skills; to identify and facilitate the development of young role models in the community; to enhance greater understanding of the Muslim community in Melbourne&rsquo;s West, and to foster greater intercultural contact and understanding between participants and other cultural groups. A number of activities were developed and implemented as a part of the program</span

"More than a game": the impact of sport-based youth mentoring schemes on developing resilience toward violent extremism

This paper draws upon the findings of an evaluation of “More than a Game”, a sport-focused youth mentoring program in Melbourne, Australia that aimed to develop a community-based resilience model using team-based sports to address issues of identity, belonging, and cultural isolation amongst young Muslim men in order to counter forms of violent extremism. In this essay we focus specifically on whether the intense embodied encounters and emotions experienced in team sports can help break down barriers of cultural and religious difference between young people and facilitate experiences of resilience, mutual respect, trust, social inclusion and belonging. Whilst the project findings are directly relevant to the domain of countering violent extremism, they also contribute to a growing body of literature which considers the relationship between team-based sport, cross-cultural engagement and the development of social resilience, inclusion and belonging in other domains of youth engagement and community-building

Enduring Medial Perforant Path Short-Term Synaptic Depression at High Pressure

The high pressure neurological syndrome develops during deep-diving (>1.1 MPa) involving impairment of cognitive functions, alteration of synaptic transmission and increased excitability in cortico-hippocampal areas. The medial perforant path (MPP), connecting entorhinal cortex with the hippocampal formation, displays synaptic frequency-dependent-depression (FDD) under normal conditions. Synaptic FDD is essential for specific functions of various neuronal networks. We used rat cortico-hippocampal slices and computer simulations for studying the effects of pressure and its interaction with extracellular Ca2+ ([Ca2+]o) on FDD at the MPP synapses. At atmospheric pressure, high [Ca2+]o (4–6 mM) saturated single MPP field EPSP (fEPSP) and increased FDD in response to short trains at 50 Hz. High pressure (HP; 10.1 MPa) depressed single fEPSPs by 50%. Increasing [Ca2+]o to 4 mM at HP saturated synaptic response at a subnormal level (only 20% recovery of single fEPSPs), but generated a FDD similar to atmospheric pressure. Mathematical model analysis of the fractions of synaptic resources used by each fEPSP during trains (normalized to their maximum) and the total fraction utilized within a train indicate that HP depresses synaptic activity also by reducing synaptic resources. This data suggest that MPP synapses may be modulated, in addition to depression of single events, by reduction of synaptic resources and then may have the ability to conserve their dynamic properties under different conditions

Community reporting thresholds : Sharing information with authorities concerning violent extremist activity and involvement in foreign conflict: A UK replication study

The first people to suspect or know about someone becoming involved in planning acts of violent extremism will often be those closest to them: their friends, family and community insiders. However, whilst these 'intimates' have a vital role to play against potential terrorist threats and offer a first line of defence, very little is known about what reporting of the potential violent extremist involvement of an ‘intimate’ means for community members. 'Intimates' reporting is a critical blind spot in current Countering Violent Extremism (CVE)/Prevent thinking and strategy internationally. These new findings from CREST-funded research by the University of Huddersfield and Deakin University, Australia address this evidential gap in the UK. Replicating and developing a previous Australian study, the ‘Community Reporting Thresholds’ project has used qualitative, in-depth interviews with community members (particularly young adults) and front-line professional practitioners (CT police personnel, Prevent practitioners and community organisation staff) to investigate thresholds, barriers and enablers for community members sharing concerns about the involvement on an ‘intimate’ in violent extremism. Key findings are that community members are primarily motivated by care and concern for their intimate in considering reporting. The gravity of reporting to the police means that most community respondents would only report after a staged process, whereby they first attempt to dissuade the intimate, and also take counsel and guidance from family members, friends and trusted ‘community leaders’. Community respondents want to report to local police, not CT specialists, and to do so by face to face means. They also want support and updates after reporting through a feedback loop. Some respondents are unsure how to report, a perspective echoed by professional practitioners who see national reporting mechanisms as confusing and made more difficult by the public image of Prevent. These findings have enabled identification in the Final Report and the Executive Summary of clear strategic directions for future policy and practice consideration

Refugee access and participation in tertiary education and training

This report includes recommendations about refugee access to tertiary education and training and is based on research conducted by ICEPA to identify best practice relating to issues faced by refugees in, or seeking access to, the tertiary education and training sector. The research project also evaluated the education and training programs, alternative entry schemes and any other support services which assist refugees to realise their educational goals in Victorian universities and TAFE institutes

Transition between immune and disease states in a cellular automaton model of clonal immune response

In this paper we extend the Celada-Seiden (CS) model of the humoral immune response to include infectious virus and cytotoxic T lymphocytes (cellular response). The response of the system to virus involves a competition between the ability of the virus to kill the host cells and the host's ability to eliminate the virus. We find two basins of attraction in the dynamics of this system, one is identified with disease and the other with the immune state. There is also an oscillating state that exists on the border of these two stable states. Fluctuations in the population of virus or antibody can end the oscillation and drive the system into one of the stable states. The introduction of mechanisms of cross-regulation between the two responses can bias the system towards one of them. We also study a mean field model, based on coupled maps, to investigate virus-like infections. This simple model reproduces the attractors for average populations observed in the cellular automaton. All the dynamical behavior connected to spatial extension is lost, as is the oscillating feature. Thus the mean field approximation introduced with coupled maps destroys oscillations.Comment: 27 pages LaTeX + 7 Figures Postscrip

Composite MFV and Beyond

We revisit and extend realizations of Minimal Flavor Violation (MFV) in theories with strongly coupled electro-weak symmetry breaking. MFV requires that some chiralities of light SM quarks are strongly composite leading, depending on the scenario, to bounds from compositeness searches, precision electro-weak tests or even flavor physics. Within the framework of partial compositeness we show how to extend the MFV paradigm allowing the treat the top quark differently. This can be realized if for example the strong sector has an U(2) symmetry. In this case the light generations can be mostly elementary and all the bounds are easily satisfied.Comment: 16 pages. v2) estimates improved, conclusions unchange

Right-Handed Sector Leptogenesis

Instead of creating the observed baryon asymmetry of the universe by the decay of right-handed (RH) neutrinos to left-handed leptons, we propose to generate it dominantly by the decay of the RH neutrinos to RH leptons. This mechanism turns out to be successful in large regions of parameter space. It may work, in particular, at a scale as low as $\sim$~TeV, with no need to invoke quasi-degenerate RH neutrino masses to resonantly enhance the asymmetry. Such a possibility can be probed experimentally by the observation at colliders of a singlet charged Higgs particle and of RH neutrinos. Other mechanisms which may lead to successful leptogenesis from the RH lepton sector interactions are also briefly presented. The incorporation of these scenarios in left-right symmetric and unified models is discussed.Comment: 14 pages, latex, axodraw; minor clarifications and references added, extended discussion of the signatures at collider