What are the Perspectives of School District Staff on the Barriers & Benefits of Implementing the Second Step Curriculum within a School District?

This qualitative research set out to explore district staff members’ ideals of implementing a social-emotional learning curriculum in their district. Interviews of individual staff members was the source of data for this study. Participants noted that the addition of the SEL program has had positive impacts on current students. Participants also indicated that, although, the addition of this program is necessary, it is also necessary that all staff have some type of training to better support the student population. Also mentioned by the participants was the need for teaching the program with fidelity and including the teaching throughout the day, not just a one lesson a week and done. Recommendations for further research include expanding the study to other school districts to validate and add to the findings of this study, while also assist in understanding the results. Additionally, further research should include a wider group of diverse populations within other school settings; including this diverse population may produce different results not seen in this study

Important factors in the success of small businesses in the creative services industry

This project was undertaken to determine which managerial skills prove the most important to entrepreneurs in the creative services industry (e.g. commercial art, design, or photography) and how these needs coincide with those of small business owners in general. Through the use of a researcher-developed questionnaire, owner/ managers of creative service firms in the Milwaukee, Racine, and Chicago areas were asked for information on their backgrounds, motivations, attitudes, and experiences as entrepreneurs. The information given by the 68 respondents was then compared to generally-held theories on managerial strengths and weaknesses and their effect on the success or failure of small businesses in general. The results showed that cash flow (or the lack thereof) was the first concern of small creative businesses, followed very closely by the amount of time and work involved in the administration of the business itself. The latter was more than likely due to the lack of general business management knowledge, with one-third of the respondents mentioning this as something they wish they had had much more of before opening their businesses. Also of significant concern was the difficulty in attracting customers. This was, once again, a function of planning or marketing, and certainly contributed to any financial difficulties. So far, these concerns paralleled those of small business in general. Where the difference occurred, however, was that up among the top problems mentioned in the questionnaire, was that of dealing with temperamental creative personnel. The findings indicated a need for understanding of and adaption for the special needs of creative personnel. These individuals are not motivated by many of the things which move others to action. The need for challenge and desire for freedom to create stimulates not only the person himself, but also his creative juices. The acceptance of and accommodation for the fact that the creative person tends not to be one of the good, solid 9-5 people, will generally reap rewards for the manager and his company; the unacceptance and attempt to mold them into a good, solid 9-5\u27er , will not. In addition to the problem of motivating the creative personality, the creative service entrepreneur must face a unique asset/personnel relationship. His people\u27s talents are not only the products he sells, but are actually his company\u27s major assets as well. Therefore, the loss of a key creative person can significantly alter a firm\u27s business prospects. The questionnaire revealed that over 40% of those who had lost a key creative employee had also lost business because of it, and over 70% cited problems in replacing the person. This, then, seemed to be the only significant different. Dealing with and/or the loss of creative personnel was an added concern for owner/managers of creative service microbusinesses. For those managers possessing an understanding of the creative person\u27s motivations and frustrations, however, this appeared to be more of a consideration, rather than a problem

Storage of Architectural Materials at the Syracuse University Library

When the Department of Special Collections at the Syracuse University Library acquired the papers of Werner Seligmann, an architect and former Dean of the Syracuse University School of Architecture, the opportunity presented itself to develop a model storage system that could be applied to the other architectural drawings in the Department. While not large in comparison to these other collections, the Seligmann Papers were sizable enough to give us a better understanding of the storage issues involved if we decided to undertake the task of re-housing our other drawings. If such a task were to be undertaken, a new storage system would need to be compact, scalable, economical, and archivally sound. This paper describes the challenges, preservation, cost and space issues we addressed as well as the method of work we followed to house the Seligmann drawings

Rehabilitation Settings After Joint Replacement: An Application of Multiattribute Preference Elicitation

While advances in medical treatment and technologies have the potential to improve the delivery of health care, their use typically involves making multiple, complex decisions. Patients and their medical providers may share in the decision-making processes and balance a variety of criteria and/or attributes in the pursuit of improved health. This necessitates a stronger understanding of the role of human behavior in health care processes and presents a timely opportunity to use decision analysis tools to contribute to this important aspect of health care operations. This article reports on the application of multiattribute preference elicitation to identify postsurgical rehabilitation setting options for elective hip and knee replacement patients and their discharge planning team prior to placement in these settings. These preferences are analyzed to identify trends in emphases across patients and the discharge planning team, including a comparison with actual outcomes to determine the extent of congruence with each other, an important component of patient-centered care. Variances are identified in what patients and the discharge planning team expected and what actually happened. Reasons for these variances are discussed

Mapping Review of Fieldwork Education Literature

Fieldwork is an integral phase of occupational therapy education, bolstered by a small but growing evidence base. A broad understanding of the state of that evidence base is necessary to inform the directions for future growth. The purpose of this work was to establish the current state of occupational therapy fieldwork literature, map that literature to recognized criteria for educational research, and identify gaps in the existing literature. Authors followed the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses guidelines to conduct a mapping review of articles with a primary focus on fieldwork education of occupational therapy (OT) or occupational therapy assistant (OTA) students in United States (Accreditation for Occupational Therapy Education)-based programs. Mapping criteria included level of education [OT, OTA], level of fieldwork [Level I, Level II], and categories of the AOTA Education Research Agenda - Revised (2018). Sources included four databases (Academic Search Premier, CINAHL, ERIC, PubMed) and one additional journal (Journal of Occupational Therapy Education). A total of 1,619 articles were identified, with 67 articles meeting inclusion criteria. The 67 included articles disproportionately focused on Level II OT fieldwork (53%, n=36), with sparse representation of Level I OTA fieldwork (1.5%, n=1), and addressed only two categories of the Education Research Agenda (2018; 80%, n=54). Level I fieldwork, occupational therapy assistant programs, and large swaths of the association’s Education Research Agenda (2018) were dramatically (or completely) underrepresented in fieldwork education research, suggesting important priorities for the immediate future of occupational therapy fieldwork education

Perceived usefulness of a distributed community-based syndromic surveillance system: a pilot qualitative evaluation study

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>We conducted a pilot utility evaluation and information needs assessment of the Distribute Project at the 2010 Washington State Public Health Association (WSPHA) Joint Conference. Distribute is a distributed community-based syndromic surveillance system and network for detection of influenza-like illness (ILI). Using qualitative methods, we assessed the perceived usefulness of the Distribute system and explored areas for improvement. Nine state and local public health professionals participated in a focus group (<it>n = 6</it>) and in semi-structured interviews (<it>n = 3</it>). Field notes were taken, summarized and analyzed.</p> <p>Findings</p> <p>Several emergent themes that contribute to the perceived usefulness of system data and the Distribute system were identified: 1) <it>Standardization: </it>a common ILI syndrome definition; 2) <it>Regional Comparability: </it>views that support county-by-county comparisons of syndromic surveillance data; 3) <it>Completeness: </it>complete data for all expected data at a given time; <it>4) Coverage: </it>data coverage of all jurisdictions in WA state; 5) <it>Context: </it>metadata incorporated into the views to provide context for graphed data; 6) <it>Trusted Data</it>: verification that information is valid and timely; and 7) <it>Customization: </it>the ability to customize views as necessary. As a result of the focus group, a new county level health jurisdiction expressed interest in contributing data to the Distribute system.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>The resulting themes from this study can be used to guide future information design efforts for the Distribute system and other syndromic surveillance systems. In addition, this study demonstrates the benefits of conducting a low cost, qualitative evaluation at a professional conference.</p

Effects of Health Insurance on Perceived Quality of Care Among Latinos in the United States

There is suggestive evidence that lower rates of health insurance coverage increases the gaps in quality and access to care among Latinos as compared with non-Latino whites. In order to examine these potential disparities, we assessed the effects of insurance coverage and multiple covariates on perceived quality of care. To assess the distribution of perceived quality of care received in a national Latino population sample, and the role of insurance in different patient subgroups. Telephone interviews conducted between 2007 and 2008 using the Pew Hispanic Center/Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Latino Health Surveys (Waves 1 and 2). Randomly selected Latino adults aged ≥18 years living in the United States. Pearson χ2 tests identified associations among various demographic variables by quality of care ratings (poor, fair, good, excellent) for the insured and uninsured (Wave 1: N = 3545). Subgroup analyses were conducted among Wave 2 participants reporting chronic conditions (N = 1067). Bivariate and multivariate analyses were conducted to estimate the effects of insurance, demographic variables and consumer characteristics on quality of care. Insurance availability had an odds ratio of 1.47 (95% CI, 1.22–1.76) net of confounders in predicting perceived quality of care among Latinos. The largest gap in rates of excellent/good ratings occurred among the insured with eight or more doctor visits compared to the uninsured (76.2% vs. 54.6%, P &lt; .05). Future research can gain additional insights by examining the impact of health insurance on processes of care with a refined focus on specific transactions between consumers and providers’ support staff and physicians guided by the principles of patient-centered care

BRCA2 polymorphic stop codon K3326X and the risk of breast, prostate, and ovarian cancers

Background: The K3326X variant in BRCA2 (BRCA2*c.9976A&gt;T; p.Lys3326*; rs11571833) has been found to be associated with small increased risks of breast cancer. However, it is not clear to what extent linkage disequilibrium with fully pathogenic mutations might account for this association. There is scant information about the effect of K3326X in other hormone-related cancers. Methods: Using weighted logistic regression, we analyzed data from the large iCOGS study including 76 637 cancer case patients and 83 796 control patients to estimate odds ratios (ORw) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for K3326X variant carriers in relation to breast, ovarian, and prostate cancer risks, with weights defined as probability of not having a pathogenic BRCA2 variant. Using Cox proportional hazards modeling, we also examined the associations of K3326X with breast and ovarian cancer risks among 7183 BRCA1 variant carriers. All statistical tests were two-sided. Results: The K3326X variant was associated with breast (ORw = 1.28, 95% CI = 1.17 to 1.40, P = 5.9x10- 6) and invasive ovarian cancer (ORw = 1.26, 95% CI = 1.10 to 1.43, P = 3.8x10-3). These associations were stronger for serous ovarian cancer and for estrogen receptor–negative breast cancer (ORw = 1.46, 95% CI = 1.2 to 1.70, P = 3.4x10-5 and ORw = 1.50, 95% CI = 1.28 to 1.76, P = 4.1x10-5, respectively). For BRCA1 mutation carriers, there was a statistically significant inverse association of the K3326X variant with risk of ovarian cancer (HR = 0.43, 95% CI = 0.22 to 0.84, P = .013) but no association with breast cancer. No association with prostate cancer was observed. Conclusions: Our study provides evidence that the K3326X variant is associated with risk of developing breast and ovarian cancers independent of other pathogenic variants in BRCA2. Further studies are needed to determine the biological mechanism of action responsible for these associations

Detector Description and Performance for the First Coincidence Observations between LIGO and GEO

For 17 days in August and September 2002, the LIGO and GEO interferometer gravitational wave detectors were operated in coincidence to produce their first data for scientific analysis. Although the detectors were still far from their design sensitivity levels, the data can be used to place better upper limits on the flux of gravitational waves incident on the earth than previous direct measurements. This paper describes the instruments and the data in some detail, as a companion to analysis papers based on the first data.Comment: 41 pages, 9 figures 17 Sept 03: author list amended, minor editorial change

Upper limits on the strength of periodic gravitational waves from PSR J1939+2134

The first science run of the LIGO and GEO gravitational wave detectors presented the opportunity to test methods of searching for gravitational waves from known pulsars. Here we present new direct upper limits on the strength of waves from the pulsar PSR J1939+2134 using two independent analysis methods, one in the frequency domain using frequentist statistics and one in the time domain using Bayesian inference. Both methods show that the strain amplitude at Earth from this pulsar is less than a few times $10^{-22}$.Comment: 7 pages, 1 figure, to appear in the Proceedings of the 5th Edoardo Amaldi Conference on Gravitational Waves, Tirrenia, Pisa, Italy, 6-11 July 200