The Economic Benefits of Closing Educational Achievement Gaps: Promoting Growth and Strengthening the Nation by Improving the Educational Outcomes of Children of Color

This report quantifies the economic benefits of closing one of the most harmful racial and ethnic gaps: the educational achievement gap that exists between black and Hispanic children and native-born white children. Gaps in academic achievement are a function of a host of factors, such as income and wealth inequality, access to child care and preschool programs, nutrition, physical and emotional health, environmental factors, community and family structures,differences in the quality of instruction and school, and educational attainment. This suggests there are a wide range of public policies that could help narrow educational achievement gaps; this report demonstrates that there are enormous payoffs to closing the gaps through public policies. It also outlines effective public policy strategies to achieve this goal, though their details are left to future research. After briefly summarizing the analysis's findings, this report places the educational achievement gaps in context to help explain their significance and the reasons they exist. In particular, the report reviews data on growing inequality, demographic changes, and intensifying global economic competition. This clarifies the need to address educational achievement gaps and helps explain why the benefits of closing gaps are great. The report then describes factors that cause educational achievement gaps and offers public policies that could help close them. The subsequent sections of the report discuss the literature on the importance of academic achievement to economic growth, the methodology used in the analysis, and its detailed findings

The Relative Efficacy of Comparatively Weak and Strong Reinforcement Contingencies During Self-Evaluation

34 leaves. Advisor: W. Scott Wood.The problem. To assess the effectiveness of comparat1vely weak and strong reinforcement contingencies during self-evaluation training in producing maintenance of room cleaning behavior of youth in a shelter environment was the problem. Procedure. Youth were trained to evaluate their own rooms and to determine the number of room points they would earn in a token economy based on that evaluation. Training procedures included, modeling, feedback following practice evaluation, and either token reinforcement for accurate evaluation or monetary reinforcement for accuracy. After training to criterion youth were allowed to assess their own room and reinforcement was based on this evaluation. The effect of varying the conditions under which training occurred was measured by monitoring performance when all of the obtrusive contingencies were withdrawn. Findings. In three successive maintenance conditions dramatic reductions in the percentages of items cleaned according to the defined criteria occurred across seven of the eight subjects. Percentages of items cleaned appropriately were generally high for the group during all of the conditions in which token reinforcement was present. This included the two baseline/tokens conditions as well as the two self-evaluation conditions. Conclusions. Token reinforcement in the form of points that could be exchanged for reinforcers consistently produced high cleaning percentages whether the condition existed alone or was combined with additional reinforcers for accurate self-evaluation. Self-evaluation did not significantly increase the youths cleaning behavior above the rates obtained during the baseline/tokens phase. Self-evaluation added desirable features to the token economy but did not contribute to any long term maintenance of the behavior when removed. Recommendations. Researchers should continue to examine self-control strategies as potential techniques that may lead to generalization of treatment effects. Research studies may be most profitable if they experimentally verify the variables that operate when generalization is achieved

The Space Shuttle Booster

An analysis and status report of Space Shuttle booster configuration design features is presented. In comparing stowed, fixed straight, and delta wing basic configurations; the delta wing approach with a canard has been selected. Wing planform shape and cross-section is strongly influenced by air breathing engine installation requirements rather than purely aerodynamic performance optimization

The Northern IRA and the early years of partition 1920 1922

The years i 920-22 constituted a period of unprecedented conflct and political change in Ireland. It began with the onset of the most brutal phase of the War ofIndependence and culminated in the effective miltary defeat of the Republican IRA in the Civil War. Occurring alongside these dramatic changes in the south and west of Ireland was a far more fundamental conflict in the north-east; a period of brutal sectarian violence which marked the early years of partition and the establishment of Northern Ireland. Almost uniquely the IRA in the six counties were involved in every one of these conflcts and yet it can be argued was on the fringes of all of them. The period i 920-22 saw the evolution of the organisation from a peripheral curiosity during the War of independence to an idealistic symbol for those wishing to resolve the fundamental divisions within the Sinn Fein movement which developed in the first six months of i 922. The story of the Northern IRA's collapse in the autumn of that year demonstrated dramatically the true nature of the organisation and how it was their relationship to the various protagonists in these conflcts, rather than their unceasing but fruitless war against partition, that defined its contribution to the Irish revolution

Space Shuttle Booster Configuration Features

Some of the major Space Shuttle configuration design features are considered. The scope of the discussion is limited to the booster stage of a two-stage, parallel mounted concept. The body shape is considered including cross sectional shape, fineness, and nose shape. The factors affecting wing and tail concept and sizing are discussed. The interrelationship between the critical vehicle balance requirements and the forward location of the airbreathing engines is considered. Finally, the booster and orbiter launch arrangement and its influence on performance and ground operations is reviewed. A summary of the trends in booster configuration design is presented

Analysis of Traffic Loads on Bridges: Report II Characteristics of Traffic on Ohio River Bridges - 1968

The recent bridge disaster at Point Pleasant, West Virginia, has renewed concern about the mechanism of material fatigue as a possible cause of catastrophic failure of bridge structures. A reasonable methodology for evaluating the fatigue condition of the highway bridge requires a knowledge of the distribution of traffic loads utilizing the facility during the analysis period. The accuracy of such an analysis is dependent on the accuracies of the input data -- material fatigue properties and traffic characteristics. The more critical of the above parameters, with respect to accuracy, appears to be traffic characteristics. This is especially true of vehicle weight characteristics since no loadometer surveys had been made at any Ohio River bridge location prior to this study