Culturally Responsive Beliefs and Practices of General and Special Education Teachers Implementing Response to Intervention (RTI) in Diverse Elementary Schools

The purpose of this study was to examine the extent to which diverse RTI schools in North Carolina engage in culturally responsive beliefs and practices. A total of eight diverse elementary schools participated in this study. Within these schools, 200 general and special education teachers in grades k-5 completed surveys. Areas surveyed included culturally responsive teacher practices, culturally responsive school practices, level of training, and demographics. Three open-ended questions addressed successes, barriers, and needs to implementing culturally responsive practices as part of RTI. The majority of participants had more than 10 years experience in education and had received training in culturally responsive practices. A key finding of this investigation was that a high proportion of the teachers agreed to employing all of the culturally responsive practices except for one. In addition, an equally high proportion of teachers perceived their school as employing all of the culturally responsive practices except one. Answers to open-ended questions both supported and refuted these findings. These findings of this study are discussed, including the implications for future research

Interrelationships of light and space within the still-life painting and the figure drawing

My Master of Fine Arts thesis is built around two genre, still-life and the human figure, in a representational style that is catagorically classical with an impressionistic skew. It implies, however, neither a singularly literal rendering nor a deliberately analytical diffusion of forms or colors. It is, rather, a very general composite of both resolutions employed with care not to pin-point either in such a way as to risk "freezing" the work in a kind of stylistic rigidity that does a direct disservice to both classicism and impressionism. The still-life presentation of oil paintings emanates from the investigation of two types of objects and surroundings propounding one theme. Themetically the paintings depict the nuances of natural daylight upon objects - most of them near white in color and in an environment of similar color. The two divisions of still-life subject matter circumscribed within this theme are as follows: 1. Objects and their settings carefully selected and arranged to form a unified grouping in a specific space and light situation in order to capture a particular spatial and luminary effect. 2. Objects (basically immovable or fixed) found within their preexistent environment and chosen because of the way in which they work with their already established space and light as a unit controlled only by the ways I have transferred their united image to the canvas. The arranged objects are, for the most part, organic, natural forms against a setting of manufactured forms put together in such a way as to allow the light not only to fuse these disparate elements, but also to give these immobile objects a sense of suspended animation

Addressing Barriers to Effective RTI through School Counselor Consultation: A Social Justice Approach

Response to Intervention (RTI) is a culturally responsive framework developed to provide targeted, evidence-based instruction to all students in regular education settings. A goal of RTI is to reduce the disproportionate number of students of color referred for special education services. However, numerous barriers often prevent teachers from effectively engaging in the RTI process and serve to impede the delivery of instruction. School counselors can provide rational emotive-social behavior (RE-SB) consultation for teachers to address psychosocial barriers and promote social justice. This article outlines RTI, barriers to implementation, and how school counselors can advocate for all students through RE-SB consultation

Disentangling Changes in the Spectral Shape of Chlorophyll Fluorescence : Implications for Remote Sensing of Photosynthesis

Novel satellite measurements of solar-induced chlorophyll fluorescence (SIF) can improve our understanding of global photosynthesis; however, little is known about how to interpret the controls on its spectral variability. To address this, we disentangle simultaneous drivers of fluorescence spectra by coupling active and passive fluorescence measurements with photosynthesis. We show empirical and mechanistic evidence for where, why, and to what extent leaf fluorescence spectra change. Three distinct components explain more than 95% of the variance in leaf fluorescence spectra under both steady-state and changing illumination conditions. A single spectral shape of fluorescence explains 84% of the variance across a wide range of species. The magnitude of this shape responds to absorbed light and photosynthetic up/down regulation; meanwhile, chlorophyll concentration and nonphotochemical quenching control 9% and 3% of the remaining spectral variance, respectively. The spectral shape of fluorescence is remarkably stable where most current satellite retrievals occur (far-red, >740nm), and dynamic downregulation of photosynthesis reduces fluorescence magnitude similarly across the 670- to 850-nm range. We conduct an exploratory analysis of hourly red and far-red canopy SIF in soybean, which shows a subtle change in red:far-red fluorescence coincident with photosynthetic downregulation but is overshadowed by longer-term changes in canopy chlorophyll and structure. Based on our leaf and canopy analysis, caution should be taken when attributing large changes in the spectral shape of remotely sensed SIF to plant stress, particularly if data acquisition is temporally sparse. Ultimately, changes in SIF magnitude at wavelengths greater than 740 nm alone may prove sufficient for tracking photosynthetic dynamics. Plain Language Summary Satellite remote sensing provides a global picture of photosynthetic activity-allowing us to see when, where, and how much CO2 plants are assimilating. To do this, satellites measure a small emission of energy from the plants called chlorophyll fluorescence. However, this measurement is typically made across a narrow wavelength range, while the emission spectrum (650-850 nm) is quite dynamic. We show where, why, and to what extent leaf fluorescence spectra change across a diverse range of species and conditions, ultimately informing canopy remote sensing measurements. Results suggest that wavelengths currently used by satellites are stable enough to track the downregulation of photosynthesis resulting from stress, while spectral shape changes respond more strongly to dynamics in canopy structure and chlorophyll concentration.Peer reviewe

River Report. State of the Lower St. Johns River Basin, Florida: Water Quality, Fisheries, Aquatic Life, Contaminants, 2022.

https://digitalcommons.unf.edu/sotr/1012/thumbnail.jp

Connecting active to passive fluorescence with photosynthesis: a method for evaluating remote sensing measurements of Chl fluorescence

Recent advances in the retrieval of Chl fluorescence from space using passive methods (solar-induced Chl fluorescence, SIF) promise improved mapping of plant photosynthesis globally. However, unresolved issues related to the spatial, spectral, and temporal dynamics of vegetation fluorescence complicate our ability to interpret SIF measurements. We developed an instrument to measure leaf-level gas exchange simultaneously with pulse-amplitude modulation (PAM) and spectrally resolved fluorescence over the same field of view – allowing us to investigate the relationships between active and passive fluorescence with photosynthesis. Strongly correlated, slope-dependent relationships were observed between measured spectra across all wavelengths (Fλ, 670–850 nm) and PAM fluorescence parameters under a range of actinic light intensities (steady-state fluorescence yields, Ft) and saturation pulses (maximal fluorescence yields, Fm). Our results suggest that this method can accurately reproduce the full Chl emission spectra – capturing the spectral dynamics associated with changes in the yields of fluorescence, photochemical (ΦPSII), and nonphotochemical quenching (NPQ). We discuss how this method may establish a link between photosynthetic capacity and the mechanistic drivers of wavelength-specific fluorescence emission during changes in environmental conditions (light, temperature, humidity). Our emphasis is on future research directions linking spectral fluorescence to photosynthesis, ΦPSII, and NPQ

River Report. State of Lower St. JOhns River Basin, Florida: Water Quality, Fisheries, Aquatic Life, Contaminants, 2023

https://digitalcommons.unf.edu/sotr/1013/thumbnail.jp

Genetic diversity fuels gene discovery for tobacco and alcohol use

Tobacco and alcohol use are heritable behaviours associated with 15% and 5.3% of worldwide deaths, respectively, due largely to broad increased risk for disease and injury(1-4). These substances are used across the globe, yet genome-wide association studies have focused largely on individuals of European ancestries(5). Here we leveraged global genetic diversity across 3.4 million individuals from four major clines of global ancestry (approximately 21% non-European) to power the discovery and fine-mapping of genomic loci associated with tobacco and alcohol use, to inform function of these loci via ancestry-aware transcriptome-wide association studies, and to evaluate the genetic architecture and predictive power of polygenic risk within and across populations. We found that increases in sample size and genetic diversity improved locus identification and fine-mapping resolution, and that a large majority of the 3,823 associated variants (from 2,143 loci) showed consistent effect sizes across ancestry dimensions. However, polygenic risk scores developed in one ancestry performed poorly in others, highlighting the continued need to increase sample sizes of diverse ancestries to realize any potential benefit of polygenic prediction.Peer reviewe