The Rise of School-Supporting Nonprofits

This paper examines voluntary contributions to public education via charitable school foundations, booster clubs and PTAs/PTOs as an alternative to local revenues generated via the property tax. We employ panel data on school-supporting charities with national coverage from 1995 to 2010, which we geocode and match to school districts. We first document the meteoric rise of school-supporting nonprofits during this panel, and then estimate a series of regression models including both reduced-form and fixed effects specifications to examine the distributional consequences of voluntary distributions. We find that districts with higher perpupil expenditures and higher enrollments are more likely to have one or more operating schoolsupporting charities, but that the level of per-pupil voluntary contributions declines with student enrollment. Higher-poverty school districts are less likely to be served by a school-supporting nonprofit and receive significantly lower voluntary contributions on a per-pupil basis. Finally, impressive recent growth in the number and financial size of these school supporting charities since 1995 has not offset reductions in state aid. Moreover, we do not find sufficient evidence to conclude that voluntary contributions change the distribution of funding across school districts and undo school finance equalization.LBJ School of Public Affair

National Alfalfa & Forage Alliance

The National Alfalfa & Forage Alliance (NAFA) was formed on April 6, 2006. Its membership consists of state/regional seed associations, state/regional hay associations, genetic suppliers, seed marketers, allied industry, and research/extension affiliates. Each of these industry segments has representation on the NAFA board of directors

Getting personal

Start with yourself. The author first got this advice when planning a World War II program for British primary students and continues to bring this philosophy into her teaching. During the past year, the author has used personal stories to connect with current and prospective students and to paint a picture of the real life of a librarian. She also makes a space for students to talk about themselves, creating a feeling of “we’re all in this together” and providing them a greater sense of agency in these uncertain times. Getting personal will continue to serve us as educators in the coming years as we train students who are whole human beings and will bring themselves to their libraries and classrooms

Coming Out of Our Shells: Safety and Vulnerability in Reality Storytelling

Reality storytelling shows are a growing phenomenon across the United States. These shows often take place monthly in bars. Ordinary people volunteer to tell brief, possibly edgy, personal stories. This type of communication presents a unique opportunity for studying embodied information practices. The field of LIS tends to conceptualize information as an object, and discusses information separately from the bodies that interact with it. Seeking to better understand the reality storytelling phenomenon and embodied information practices, I undertook an ethnographic study of a particular reality storytelling show. Carapace occurs once a month in Atlanta, Georgia. I began with the question: How does the Carapace community negotiate the making of meaning? This question was crafted to guide my understanding of the community and their information practices. I attended six Carapace shows over seven months and conducted 18 interviews. I performed as a storyteller at some of the shows I attended. I found that many of the practices at Carapace focus on creating a safe space for personal storytelling. Tellers are meant to feel safe to share any story they may wish to tell. Audience members are made to feel safe enough to take the risk of hearing any story. These safeties largely fall into two categories: “the water is fine,” and “it’s okay to stay in your shell.” Organizers and community members try to make the environment generally pleasant. However, because not everything feels comfortable for everyone there, and because some things are out of their control, they also provide safety by allowing attendees to retreat into the “shells.” This usually takes the form of partially, or completely, disengaging (e.g., avoiding eye contact, leaving the room). When attendees choose to “come out of their shells” they experience moments of connection. The message at the heart of the Carapace experience is “you are not alone.”Doctor of Philosoph

Economics of Community Services -- Budgeting Methods

This publication illustrates how budgeting can be used to clarify choices about delivery of community services. An example demonstrating the estimation of future fires and annual costs, cost per fire calculation, and determining funding alternatives is provided. A discussion of budgeting for other community services such as transportation, ambulance, law enforcement, and rural rental housing is also included

Shear-induced damped oscillations in an epithelium depend on actomyosin contraction and E-cadherin cell adhesion.

Shear forces between cells occur during global changes in multicellular organization during morphogenesis and tissue growth, yet how cells sense shear forces and propagate a response across a tissue is unknown. We found that applying exogenous shear at the midline of an epithelium induced a local, short-term deformation near the shear plane, and a long-term collective oscillatory movement across the epithelium that spread from the shear-plane and gradually dampened. Inhibiting actomyosin contraction or E-cadherin trans-cell adhesion blocked oscillations, whereas stabilizing actin filaments prolonged oscillations. Combining these data with a model of epithelium mechanics supports a mechanism involving the generation of a shear-induced mechanical event at the shear plane which is then relayed across the epithelium by actomyosin contraction linked through E-cadherin. This causes an imbalance of forces in the epithelium, which is gradually dissipated through oscillatory cell movements and actin filament turnover to restore the force balance across the epithelium

Mechano-transduction: from molecules to tissues.

External forces play complex roles in cell organization, fate, and homeostasis. Changes in these forces, or how cells respond to them, can result in abnormal embryonic development and diseases in adults. How cells sense and respond to these mechanical stimuli requires an understanding of the biophysical principles that underlie changes in protein conformation and result in alterations in the organization and function of cells and tissues. Here, we discuss mechano-transduction as it applies to protein conformation, cellular organization, and multi-cell (tissue) function

The Most Distant Stars in the Milky Way

We report on the discovery of the most distant Milky Way (MW) stars known to date: ULAS J001535.72$+$015549.6 and ULAS J074417.48$+$253233.0. These stars were selected as M giant candidates based on their infrared and optical colors and lack of proper motions. We spectroscopically confirmed them as outer halo giants using the MMT/Red Channel spectrograph. Both stars have large estimated distances, with ULAS J001535.72$+$015549.6 at $274 \pm 74$ kpc and ULAS J074417.48$+$253233.0 at 238 $\pm$ 64 kpc, making them the first MW stars discovered beyond 200 kpc. ULAS J001535.72$+$015549.6 and ULAS J074417.48$+$253233.0 are both moving away from the Galactic center at $52 \pm 10$ km s$^{-1}$ and $24 \pm 10$ km s$^{-1}$, respectively. Using their distances and kinematics, we considered possible origins such as: tidal stripping from a dwarf galaxy, ejection from the MW's disk, or membership in an undetected dwarf galaxy. These M giants, along with two inner halo giants that were also confirmed during this campaign, are the first to map largely unexplored regions of our Galaxy's outer halo.Comment: Accepted and in print by ApJL. Seven pages, 2 figure

Increasing β-catenin/Wnt3A activity levels drive mechanical strain-induced cell cycle progression through mitosis.

Mechanical force and Wnt signaling activate β-catenin-mediated transcription to promote proliferation and tissue expansion. However, it is unknown whether mechanical force and Wnt signaling act independently or synergize to activate β-catenin signaling and cell division. We show that mechanical strain induced Src-dependent phosphorylation of Y654 β-catenin and increased β-catenin-mediated transcription in mammalian MDCK epithelial cells. Under these conditions, cells accumulated in S/G2 (independent of DNA damage) but did not divide. Activating β-catenin through Casein Kinase I inhibition or Wnt3A addition increased β-catenin-mediated transcription and strain-induced accumulation of cells in S/G2. Significantly, only the combination of mechanical strain and Wnt/β-catenin activation triggered cells in S/G2 to divide. These results indicate that strain-induced Src phosphorylation of β-catenin and Wnt-dependent β-catenin stabilization synergize to increase β-catenin-mediated transcription to levels required for mitosis. Thus, local Wnt signaling may fine-tune the effects of global mechanical strain to restrict cell divisions during tissue development and homeostasis

Power and Negotiation in a University/Community Partnership Serving Jewish Teen Girls

University/community partnerships involve collaborative work with great potential and risk. This work can allow for productive exchanges that improve the quality of programs and enable broader dissemination of innovative ideas and practices grounded in feminist and social justice ideals. However, institutional demands and individual commitments introduce complications. This paper examines the complex power dynamics that emerge from cross-institutional partnering and program delivery in the context of a feminist education and youth-led participatory action research program for Jewish teen girls. Specifically, we examine the previously under-studied topic of university/community collaboration in which the participating institutions are similarly situated in structures of power. We explore how power dynamics and the partners’ shared and differential strategic goals were negotiated within a context of distinct institutional mandates, with a focus on the pressures of time, funding, and developing youth participatory action research with relatively privileged youth. We discuss implications and strategies for navigating complex university/community engagements that enable balanced, long-term, and sustained partnerships in which mutual interests are served