Belonging, wellbeing and stress with online learning during COVID-19

Sense of belonging, perceived stress and wellbeing are reported factors that influence students’ university experience and learning. The COVID-19 pandemic and shift to online emergency remote teaching were likely to exacerbate these affective dimensions of student experience. This article employed a quantitative survey research design to determine how students’ sense of belonging, perceived stress and wellbeing were influenced during the pandemic. An online questionnaire was administered to 537 South African students at one residential university. Data analysis was performed using multiple regression analysis. The results indicated that platform pedagogy was a significant predictor of belonging, perceived stress, and wellbeing, while lecturers’ pedagogical competence was not. Lived learning experience of online learning was a significant predictor of perceived stress, and communication was a significant predictor of belonging. The importance of the learning environment in student belonging and wellbeing is key to student success and this study provides insights for developing targeted interventions

Optical Propagation and Communication

Contains an introduction and reports on four research project.Maryland Procurement Office Contract MDA 904-90-C-5070Charles S. Draper Laboratories Contract DL-H-441698National Institute of Standards and Technology Grant 60-NANBOD-1052U.S. Army Research Office Grant DAAL03-90-G-0128U.S. Navy - Office of Naval Research Grant N00014-89-J-1163U.S. Air Force - Office of Scientific Research Contract F49620-90-C-003

Optical Propagation and Communication

Contains an introduction and reports on five research projects.Maryland Procurement Office Contract MDA 904-90-C-5070National Science Foundation Grant ECS 87-18970National Institute of Standards and Technology Grant 60-NANBOD-1052U.S. Army Research Office Grant DAAL03-90-G-0128U.S. Army Research Office Contract DAAL03-87-K-0117U.S. Navy - Office of Naval Research Grant N00014-89-J-1163U.S. Air Force - Office of Scientific Research Contract F49620-90-C-003

Overt Visual Attention as a Causal Factor of Perceptual Awareness

Our everyday conscious experience of the visual world is fundamentally shaped by the interaction of overt visual attention and object awareness. Although the principal impact of both components is undisputed, it is still unclear how they interact. Here we recorded eye-movements preceding and following conscious object recognition, collected during the free inspection of ambiguous and corresponding unambiguous stimuli. Using this paradigm, we demonstrate that fixations recorded prior to object awareness predict the later recognized object identity, and that subjects accumulate more evidence that is consistent with their later percept than for the alternative. The timing of reached awareness was verified by a reaction-time based correction method and also based on changes in pupil dilation. Control experiments, in which we manipulated the initial locus of visual attention, confirm a causal influence of overt attention on the subsequent result of object perception. The current study thus demonstrates that distinct patterns of overt attentional selection precede object awareness and thereby directly builds on recent electrophysiological findings suggesting two distinct neuronal mechanisms underlying the two phenomena. Our results emphasize the crucial importance of overt visual attention in the formation of our conscious experience of the visual world

Improving learning in South African schools: the QLP baseline evaluation

The Quality Learning Project (QLP) is a five-year school improvement project intended to facilitate educational change in South Africa by working with district officials, school management teams and educators. The aim of the project is to improve learner performance in mathematics and the languages of instruction in Grades 8-12 in 500 schools across 17 districts

Detection and prevention of money laundering in professional football

The central theme of this contribution is money laundering in professional football. First, it is clarified why the professional football sector is so appealing to persons and organizations for laundering their criminally acquired assets. Then it is examined how these risks have materialized in practice, based on a case study on money laundering activities in the top of english football. This case is centred on the financial adventures of birmingham fc. We will not only highlight the malpractices that took place, but we will also look for starting points to raise barriers against financial misconduct and criminal practices.keywordsmoney launderingprofessional footballsoccercrime-facilitative systemcrime riskscrime preventionnetherlandsunited kingdom

Direct comparison of Xpert MTB/RIF assay with liquid and solid mycobacterial culture for quantification of early bactericidal activity

Item does not contain fulltextThe early bactericidal activity of antituberculosis agents is usually determined by measuring the reduction of the sputum mycobacterial load over time on solid agar medium or in liquid culture. This study investigated the value of a quantitative PCR assay for early bactericidal activity determination. Groups of 15 patients were treated with 6 different antituberculosis agents or regimens. Patients collected sputum for 16 h overnight at baseline and at days 7 and 14 after treatment initiation. We determined the sputum bacterial load by CFU counting (log CFU/ml sputum, reported as mean +/- standard deviation [SD]), time to culture positivity (TTP, in hours [mean +/- SD]) in liquid culture, and Xpert MTB/RIF cycle thresholds (C(T), n [mean +/- SD]). The ability to discriminate treatment effects between groups was analyzed with one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA). All measurements showed a decrease in bacterial load from mean baseline (log CFU, 5.72 +/- 1.00; TTP, 116.0 +/- 47.6; C(T), 19.3 +/- 3.88) to day 7 (log CFU, -0.26 +/- 1.23, P = 0.2112; TTP, 35.5 +/- 59.3, P = 0.0002; C(T), 0.55 +/- 3.07, P = 0.6030) and day 14 (log CFU, -0.55 +/- 1.24, P = 0.0006; TTP, 54.8 +/- 86.8, P < 0.0001; C(T), 2.06 +/- 4.37, P = 0.0020). The best discrimination between group effects was found with TTP at day 7 and day 14 (F = 9.012, P < 0.0001, and F = 11.580, P < 0.0001), followed by log CFU (F = 4.135, P = 0.0024, and F = 7.277, P < 0.0001). C(T) was not significantly discriminative (F = 1.995, P = 0.091, and F = 1.203, P = 0.316, respectively). Culture-based methods are superior to PCR for the quantification of early antituberculosis treatment effects in sputum