Marketing Practices of International Schools in a Competitive Asian Context

This exploratory, descriptive study identifies marketing activities, marketing tools, and the perceived effectiveness of both towards achieving institutional marketing goals of international schools in the East Asia Region Council of Overseas Schools (EARCOS). There is scant research about marketing practices of international schools. An increase in the number of international schools in the EARCOS region coupled with the declining number of students in the past three years signal the need for schools to be more proactive in their marketing practices to recruit and retain students by implementing successful marketing activities, tools, and strategic plans. Though this study focuses on the population of 150 EARCOS schools, it is believed that the results will help inform similarly dynamic theoretical populations like South East Asia, the Middle East, and Eastern Europe where school administrators are looking to improve institutional marketing activities.The return rate of 67 schools, 45% of the population, fell beneath the target sample size, however the demographic distribution of the respondents mirrored the population of EARCOS member schools. The results of the study indicate that schools across the EARCOS region participate in similar marketing activities and use similar tools. The size, age, and location of the school made no significant difference in the results. The most effective marketing activities and tools identified by marketing research, center on the customer and experience-centric concepts of relationship marketing (RM) and internal marketing (IM), yet EARCOS schools indicate that they use more rudimentary activities and tools associated with buying and selling of a product. EARCOS schools also indicated that they find a greater degree of success reaching institutional marketing goals by using RM and IM but employ the rudimentary activities and tools associated with buying and selling more. Simply, EARCOS schools are using marketing activities and tools poorly and they are all doing it poorly together

Modeling Fragment Simulating Projectile Penetration into Steel Plates Using Finite Elements and Meshfree Particles

Simulating fragment penetration into steel involves complicated modeling of severe behavior of the materials through multiple phases of response. Penetration of a fragment-like projectile was simulated using finite element (FE) and meshfree particle formulations. Extreme deformation and failure of the material during the penetration event were modeled with several approaches to evaluate each as to how well it represents the actual physics of the material and structural response. A steel Fragment Simulating Projectile (FSP) – designed to simulate a fragment of metal from a weapon casing – was simulated for normal impact into a flat square plate. A range of impact velocities was used to examine levels of exit velocity ranging from relatively small to one on the same level as the impact velocity. The numerical code EPIC, used for all the simulations presented herein, contains the element and particle formulations, as well as the explicit methodology and constitutive models needed to perform these simulations. These simulations were compared against experimental data, evaluating the damage caused to the projectile and the target plates, as well as comparing the residual velocity when the projectile perforated the target

Human Movement Variability and Aging

An optimal level of variability enables us to interact adaptively and safely to a continuously changing environment, where often our movements must be adjusted in a matter of milliseconds. A large body of research exists that demonstrates natural variability in healthy gait (along with variability in other, healthy biological signals such as heart rate) and a loss of this variability in aging and injury, as well as in a variety of neurodegenerative and physiological disorders. We submit that this field of research is now in pressing need of an innovative “next step” that goes beyond the many descriptive studies that characterize levels of variability in various patient populations. We need to devise novel therapies that will harness the existing knowledge on biological variability and create new possibilities for those in the grip of disease. We also propose that the nature of the specific physiological limitation present in the neuromuscular apparatus may be less important in the physiological complexity framework than the control mechanisms adopted by the older individual in the coordination of the available degrees of freedom. The theoretical underpinnings of this framework suggest that interventions designed to restore healthy system dynamics may optimize functional improvements in older adults. We submit that interventions based on the restoration of optimal variability and movement complexity could potentially be applied across a range of diseases or dysfunctions as it addresses the adaptability and coordination of available degrees of freedom, regardless of the internal constraints of the individual

Dynamic Video Streaming for Nano Quadcopters

The objective of this project was to develop a system that streams real-time video from a Crazyflie 2.0 nano quadcopter. We discuss the motivation behind the project including applications to swarm robotics and computer vision research. We highlight the initial research and design goals that guided the development of the system such as hardware selection and system specifications. We detail the software and hardware subsystems that we implemented including the video-streaming board, firmware, and video-streaming user application. We examine the performance of the final system and discuss the limitations imposed by the hardware. We conclude by describing future work that will enhance the capabilities and robustness of the system

Step activity and stride-to-stride fluctuations are negatively correlated in individuals with transtibial amputation

Background Variability occurs naturally from stride to stride in healthy gait. It has been shown that individuals with lower limb loss have significantly increased stride-to-stride fluctuations during walking. This is considered indicative of movement disorganization and is associated with less healthy movement. Given that lower limb prosthesis users perform on average less physical activity than able bodied individuals, the purpose of this study was to determine whether increased fluctuations also correspond to a reduced level of activity in daily life. Methods Twenty-two transtibial amputees wore an activity monitor (Actigraph, Pensacola, FL, USA) for 3 weeks. Lower limb kinematics during treadmill walking were measured using a 12-camera motion capture system. The largest Lyapunov exponent (λ) was calculated bilaterally at the ankle, knee and hip to quantify the stride-to-stride fluctuations of the lower limb joints. Pearson correlations were used to identify the relationships between the average daily step count over the 3 week collection period and λ. Findings Significant, moderate negative correlations between daily step count and λ were found at the intact ankle (r = 0.57, P = 0.005), and the knee on the affected side (r = 0.44, P = 0.038). No such correlation was found at any other lower limb joint. Interpretation The negative correlation evident at these two joints demonstrates that increased stride-to-stride fluctuations are related to decreased activity levels, however it remains unclear whether these changes in the stride-to-stride fluctuations promote decreased activity or whether less active individuals do not gain sufficient motor learning experience to achieve a skilled movement

Dynamic balance changes within three weeks of fitting a new prosthetic foot component

Balance during walking is of high importance to prosthesis users and may affect walking during baseline observation and evaluation. The aim of this study was to determine whether changes in walking balance occurred during an adaptation period following the fitting of a new prosthetic component. Margin of stability in the medial-lateral direction (MOSML) and an anterior instability margin (AIM) were used to quantify the dynamic balance of 21 unilateral transtibial amputees during overground walking. Participants trialled two prosthetic feet presenting contrasting movement/balance constraints; a Higher Activity foot similar to that of their own prosthesis, and a Lower Activity foot. Participants were assessed before (Visit 1) and after (Visit 2) a 3-week adaptation period on each foot. With the Higher Activity component, MOSML decreased on the prosthetic side, and increased on the sound side from Visit 1 to Visit 2, eliminating a significant inter-limb difference apparent at Visit 1 (Visit 1–sound = 0.062 m, prosthetic = 0.075 m, p = 0.018; Visit 2–sound = 0.066 m, prosthetic = 0.074 m, p = 0.084). No such change was seen with the Lower Activity foot (Visit 1–sound = 0.064 m, prosthetic = 0.077 m, p = 0.007; Visit 2–sound = 0.063 m, prosthetic = 0.080 m, p \u3c 0.001). Significant changes in AIM were observed at Visit 2 (Visit 1: −0.16 (0.08) m, Visit 2: −0.17 (0.08) m; F = 23.396, p \u3c 0.01). These findings suggest that changes in balance during walking can occur following the initial receipt of a device regardless of whether the component is of the same functional category as the one an individual is accustomed to using

Changes in human walking dynamics induced by uneven terrain are reduced with ongoing exposure, but a higher variability persists

During walking, uneven terrain alters the action of the ground reaction force from stride to stride. The extent to which such environmental inconsistencies are withstood may be revealed by the regulation of whole-body angular momentum (L) during walking. L quantifies the balance of momenta of the body segments (thigh, trunk, etc.) about their combined center of mass, and remains close to zero during level walking. A failure to constrain L has been linked to falls. The aim of this study was to explore the ability of young adults to orchestrate their movement on uneven terrain, illustrated by the range of L (LR) and its variability (vLR). In eleven male adults, we observed significant increases in sagittal plane LR, and vLR in all three planes of motion during walking on an uneven in comparison to a flat surface. No reductions in these measures were observed within a 12-minute familiarisation period, suggesting that unimpaired adults either are unable to, or do not need to eliminate the effects of uneven terrain. Transverse plane LR, in contrast, was lower on immediate exposure, and then increased, pointing to the development of a less restrictive movement pattern, and would support the latter hypothesis