Place-Based Education: People, Places, and Spaces for Interdisciplinary Literacy Learning

Abstract Place-based education (PBE) encourages teachers to create authentic learning communities of real-world experts outside of the regular classroom setting. Literacy strategies were used to support understanding of content. This article will explore the results of teacher action research in creating interdisciplinary literacy opportunities in the real world using a PBE model. What impact does PBE have on motivation and interest of learning in this interdisciplinary setting? The advantages and challenges are examined through the use of interviews, exit slips, and antidotal records during a summer camp experience with students in grades 4-6. The findings from a research project involving interdisciplinary literacy in various place-based settings will be explored, along with the places and lesson ideas used with children. Keywords: place-based education (PBE), interdisciplinary literacy, inquiry learning, action researc

A Guide to Evaluating the Experience of Media and Arts Technology

Evaluation is essential to understanding the value that digital creativity brings to people's experience, for example in terms of their enjoyment, creativity, and engagement. There is a substantial body of research on how to design and evaluate interactive arts and digital creativity applications. There is also extensive Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) literature on how to evaluate user interfaces and user experiences. However, it can be difficult for artists, practitioners, and researchers to navigate such a broad and disparate collection of materials when considering how to evaluate technology they create that is at the intersection of art and interaction. This chapter provides a guide to designing robust user studies of creative applications at the intersection of art, technology and interaction, which we refer to as Media and Arts Technology (MAT). We break MAT studies down into two main kinds: proof-of-concept and comparative studies. As MAT studies are exploratory in nature, their evaluation requires the collection and analysis of both qualitative data such as free text questionnaire responses, interviews, and observations, and also quantitative data such as questionnaires, number of interactions, and length of time spent interacting. This chapter draws on over 15 years of experience of designing and evaluating novel interactive systems to provide a concrete template on how to structure a study to evaluate MATs that is both rigorous and repeatable, and how to report study results that are publishable and accessible to a wide readership in art and science communities alike.Comment: Preprint. Chapter to appear in "Creating Digitally. Shifting Boundaries: Arts and Technologies - Contemporary Applications and Concepts", Anthony L. Brooks (Editor), Springer. https://link.springer.com/book/978303131359

Racial and athletic identity of African American football players at Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) and Predominantly White Institutions (PWI)

This study examined racial and athletic identity among African American football players at Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) and Predominantly White Institutions (PWI). Negotiating the dualism of racial and athletic identities can be problematic because both roles are subject to prejudice and discrimination, particularly for student-athletes in revenue producing sports like football. Results indicated that seniors at both institution types reported significantly lower levels of Public Regard, and that lower levels of Public Regard predicted higher levels of college adjustment. Senior football players reported a greater acknowledgement that society does not value African Americans, and this acknowledgment predicted greater college adjustment. No differences between institution types in racial Centrality emerged, but football players at PWI reported higher levels of Athletic Identity. By garnering a better understanding of the psychosocial needs of African American football players, these results can inform college student personnel who can prioritize facilitating student-athlete academic and life skills with the same attention given to ensuring their athletic success

Establishment of Charter Schools in the Commonwealth of Virginia

Virginia is facing significant challenges related to public education such as decreased funding for public education, decreased teacher salaries, and overcrowded classrooms. Senate Joint Resolution 6 was a bill proposed in 2016 that sought to grant the Board of Education authority, subject to criteria and conditions prescribed by the General Assembly, to establish charter schools within the school divisions of the Commonwealth. There are racial implications related to the creation and authorization of charter schools and this report details those impacts and creates a set of recommendations to eliminate racial implementations when determining who authorizes charter schools in the Commonwealth of Virginia

Recreation Effects on Wildlife: A Review of Potential Quantitative Thresholds

Outdoor recreation is increasingly recognised for its deleterious effects on wildlife individuals and populations. However, planners and natural resource managers lack robust scientific recommendations for the design of recreation infrastructure and management of recreation activities. We reviewed 38 years of research on the effect of non-consumptive recreation on wildlife to attempt to identify effect thresholds or the point at which recreation begins to exhibit behavioural or physiological change to wildlife. We found that 53 of 330 articles identified a quantitative threshold. The majority of threshold articles focused on bird or mammal species and measured the distance to people or to a trail. Threshold distances varied substantially within and amongst taxonomic groups. Threshold distances for wading and passerine birds were generally less than 100 m, whereas they were greater than 400 m for hawks and eagles. Mammal threshold distances varied widely from 50 m for small rodents to 1,000 m for large ungulates. We did not find a significant difference between threshold distances of different recreation activity groups, likely based in part on low sample size. There were large gaps in scientific literature regarding several recreation variables and taxonomic groups including amphibians, invertebrates and reptiles. Our findings exhibit the need for studies to measure continuous variables of recreation extent and magnitude, not only to detect effects of recreation on wildlife, but also to identify effect thresholds when and where recreation begins or ceases to affect wildlife. Such considerations in studies of recreation ecology could provide robust scientific recommendations for planners and natural resource managers for the design of recreation infrastructure and management of recreation activities

The impact of organic farming on the rural economy in England

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A Pilot Search for Gravitational Self-Lensing Binaries with the Zwicky Transient Facility

Binary systems containing a compact object may exhibit periodic brightening episodes due to gravitational lensing as the compact object transits the companion star. Such "self-lensing" signatures have been detected before for white dwarf binaries. We attempt to use these signatures to identify detached stellar-mass neutron star and black hole binaries using data from the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF). We present a systematic search for self-lensing signals in Galactic binaries from a subset of high-cadence ZTF data taken in 2018. We identify 19 plausible candidates from the search, although because each candidate is observed to only brighten once, other origins such as stellar flares are more likely. We discuss prospects for more comprehensive future searches of the ZTF data.Comment: 12 pages. Submitted to the Open Journal of Astrophysic

Buoyancy regulation and aggregate formation in Amoebobacter purpureus from Mahoney lake

Abstract The meromictic Mahoney Lake (British Columbia, Canada) contains an extremely dense layer of purple sulfur bacteria (Amoebobacter purpureus). The buoyant density of Amoebobacter cells grown in pure culture at saturating light intensity was significantly higher (1027–1034 kg m−3) than the density of lake water (1015 kg m−3). When stationary cultures were shifted to the dark, the gas-vesicle content increased by a factor of 9 and buoyant density decreased to 1002 kg m−3 within three days. A novel mechanism of cell aggregation was detected for the Mahoney Lake strain. Dense cell aggregates were formed after depletion of sulfide. Formation of aggregates was correlated with an increase in cell surface hydrophobicity. Cell aggregates could be disintegrated within less than 1 s by addition of sulfide or various thiol compounds. Mercaptanes with a branched structure in the vicinity of the terminal thiol group, compounds with esterified thiol groups (methylmercaptanes), reducing compounds lacking thiol groups and detergents did not influence aggregate stability. Cell aggregates disintegrated upon addition of urea or of proteinase K. Addition of various sugars had no effect on aggregation; this points to the absence of lectins. The results indicate that cell-to-cell adhesion in A, purpureus ML1 is mainly caused by a hydrophobic effect and includes a specific mechanism possibly mediated by a surface protein. Extrapolation of laboratory results to field conditions demonstrated that both regulation of buoyant density and formation of cell aggregates result in passive accumulation of cells at the chemocline and contribute to the narrow stratification of A. purpureus in Mahoney Lake