Teaching Teachers to Teach Physics to High School Learners

AbstractTo address the past inadequacies of high school teacher education in South Africa a course was taught to equip teachers with a basic understanding of Physics. This work discusses measures implemented in this module to increase cohort pass rates from around 40% to over 80%. The measures implemented include Problems Based Learning (PBL), technological learning (TL) and group learning (GL). This increased pass rate has a significant impact on throughput and also a far-wider reaching impact - that of improving the quality of education at high school level. In this work, we also highlight the difficulties faced by the students who are all in full-time employment with language barriers consequent of English being a second language. The methods employed while lecturing this cohort have been adopted by the cohort in their own classrooms with significant results noted. The study employs a mixed modal approach to quantify all data with qualitative responses

Within-School Heterogeneity in Quality: Do Schools Provide Equal Value Added to All Students?

Low-socioeconomic status (SES), minority, and male students perform worse than their high-SES, non-minority, and female peers on standardized tests. This paper investigates how within-school differences in school quality contribute to these educational achievement gaps by SES, ethnicity, and sex. Using individual-level data on the universe of public-school students in California, I estimate school quality using a value added methodology that accounts for the fact that students sort to schools on observable characteristics. I run three separate analyses, in which I allow each school to provide a distinct value added to their low-/high-SES, minority/non-minority, and male/female students. I find that there is within-school heterogeneity in value added by SES, ethnicity, and sex, as on average schools provide less value added to their low-SES, minority, and male students. Thus within-school heterogeneity in quality is one factor that contributes to differential outcomes for disadvantaged students

Within-School Heterogeneity in Quality: Do Schools Provide Equal Value Added to All Students?

Low-socioeconomic status (SES), minority, and male students perform worse than their high-SES, non-minority, and female peers on standardized tests. This paper investigates how within-school differences in school quality contribute to these educational achievement gaps by SES, ethnicity, and sex. Using individual-level data on the universe of public-school students in California, I estimate school quality using a value added methodology that accounts for the fact that students sort to schools on observable characteristics. I run three separate analyses, in which I allow each school to provide a distinct value added to their low-/high-SES, minority/non-minority, and male/female students. I find that there is within-school heterogeneity in value added by SES, ethnicity, and sex, as on average schools provide less value added to their low-SES, minority, and male students. Thus within-school heterogeneity in quality is one factor that contributes to differential outcomes for disadvantaged students

Human-Capital Formation During Childhood and Adolescence: Evidence from School Quality and Postsecondary Success in California

This paper investigates the role of school quality in human-capital formation. Specifically, I investigate how the timing of school quality differentially affects long-run outcomes. Using individual-level data on the universe of public-school students in California, I estimate elementary-, middle-, and high-school quality using a value-added methodology that accounts for the fact that students sort to schools on observable characteristics. I then determine the impact of school quality on future K-12 and postsecondary outcomes. I find that high-school quality has the largest impact on postsecondary enrollment, while elementary- and middle-school quality play a larger role in college readiness. In other words, early human-capital investments are important for future postsecondary success, but the unique timing of the college decision process allows for later human-capital investments to also play a significant role

Human-Capital Formation During Childhood and Adolescence: Evidence from School Quality and Postsecondary Success in California

This paper investigates the role of school quality in human-capital formation. Specifically, I investigate how the timing of school quality differentially affects long-run outcomes. Using individual-level data on the universe of public-school students in California, I estimate elementary-, middle-, and high-school quality using a value-added methodology that accounts for the fact that students sort to schools on observable characteristics. I then determine the impact of school quality on future K-12 and postsecondary outcomes. I find that high-school quality has the largest impact on postsecondary enrollment, while elementary- and middle-school quality play a larger role in college readiness. In other words, early human-capital investments are important for future postsecondary success, but the unique timing of the college decision process allows for later human-capital investments to also play a significant role

A 'pockets' approach to addressing financial vulnerability

This briefing paper outlines recent evidence on financial vulnerability among families in Scotland, and draws on the Healthier, Wealthier Children case study as an example of action that could help families both at risk of, and experiencing, poverty

Development of a pipeline and protocols for next generation sequencing of blood and formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded tumour DNA samples

Using existing software and six novel scripts, we developed a pipeline for variant calling using exome re-sequencing data of germline blood deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) samples. We observed >99% (6,723/6,739) concordance between calls from our pipeline and previous genotyping. We identified >93% of single nucleotide variants (SNVs) and >94% of insertion/deletions called by a commercial partner using the same sequencing reads. Using a subset of genes, we showed that around half of predicted pathogenic variants could be validated in vitro. Together, these data showed that our pipeline was reliable for variant calling. Next generation sequencing (NGS) of DNA from formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded (FFPE) tumours is technically challenging. We sought to determine the sensitivity of NGS to detect known somatic hotspot mutations (n=25) in 19 FFPE advanced colorectal cancers and to optimise it for the identification of novel somatic variants. Analysis using Illumina’s MiSeq software identified 100% of somatic mutations with 93% specificity, whereas the Genome Analysis Tool Kit’s (GATK) HaplotypeCaller identified 80-92% of somatic mutations with 100% specificity. We investigated the background mutator profile and found that normal FFPE DNA had 3-fold more SNVs than matched blood DNA, with an excess of FFPE-associated C:G>T:A substitutions (27.1 vs. 5.3%). Uracil DNA glycosylase treatment reduced this excess. Only ~5% of variants were consistently called in replicate runs and were likely to be genuine somatic variants. We detected potential candidates for genetic biomarkers of cetuximab-resistance in colorectal cancers that were previously shown to be wild type for KRAS, NRAS, BRAF and PIK3CA. We found that 7/21 (33%) of the CRCs analysed harboured mutations at either codon 12 or 61, whileother CRCs carried truncating KRAS mutations. NRAS also carried a codon 12 mutation in 1 CRC, and PIK3CA possessed mutations at codons 542 and 545. PTEN was found to harbour 5 truncating mutations at codons 71, 140, 155, 178 and 189, potentially leading to loss of function

Measurement of the temperature dependence of the Buckingham effect (electric-field-gradient-induced birefringence) in gases

Thesis (PhD) - University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2009.The aim of this research project was to assemble an apparatus to measure the electric quadrupole moments of gas molecules using the technique of electricfield- gradient-induced birefringence, or the Buckingham effect. Comprehensive research by various workers in the field has shown that this technique provides the only direct means of obtaining the quadrupole moment of a molecule. Theory has shown that the most accurate determination of the electric quadrupole moment is through a study of the temperature dependence of the effect. This not only allows for the quadrupole moment to be obtained but also enables the temperature-independent quadrupole hyperpolarisability term to be extracted. Both the quadrupole moment and the hyperpolarisabilty provide valuable information in a variety of applications, including intermolecular forces, electrostatic potentials and non-linear optical phenomena. This thesis fully describes the apparatus used in these measurements, including a description of the custom built oven that allowed for measurements to be performed over a temperature range spanning from 25"C up to 200"C. Results for the quadrupole moments and quadrupole hyperpolarisabilities of carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, nitrous oxide and hydrogen are presented, together with a quadrupole moment for carbonyl sulphide from room-temperature measurements. Wherever possible, the results of this work are compared to previously published experimental and theoretical data