The Impact of the Lead Teacher Professional Learning Community within the Rice University Mathematics Leadership Institute

Now in its fourth year, Rice University’s Mathematics Leadership Institute (MLI) has developed over sixty high school mathematics Lead Teachers. We focus on how membership in MLI has impacted participant teachers’ professional lives. The Lead Teacher community that emerged during MLl’s first Summer Leadership Institute embodies the characteristics of a sustaining and coherent knowledge community where teachers are able to share their secret “stories of practice in safe places . . . in order to make their personal practical knowledge explicit to themselves and to others” [1]. This article includes stories of individual teachers who refused to sacrifice hours of instructional time for mandated curriculum testing, who encouraged and supported a large group of MLI teachers to participate in a grueling advanced certification program, and who challenged the local administration’s expectation to compromise personal professional standards. These stories may not have emerged in their particular ways had these teachers and their supporting co-manager not been members of this coherent and sustained knowledge community. This knowledge community has enabled the achievement of MLI goals with respect to teachers’ increased mathematics content knowledge, leadership development, and student achievement. We also include focus group comments and quantitative data

Proton irradiation of simple gas mixtures: Influence of irradiation parameters

In order to get information about the influence of irradiation parameters on radiolysis processes of astrophysical interest, methane gas targets were irradiated with 6.5 MeV protons at a pressure of 1 bar and room temperature. Yields of higher hydrocarbons like ethane or propane were found by analysis of irradiated gas samples using gas chromatography. The handling of the proton beam was of great experimental importance for determining the irradiation parameters. In a series of experiments current density of the proton beam and total absorbed energy were shown to have a large influence on the yields of produced hydrocarbons. Mechanistic interpretations of the results are given and conclusions are drawn with regard to the chemistry and the simulation of various astrophysical systems

The Domestic Relations Exception, Domestic Violence, and Equal Access to Federal Courts

This Article examines the classic issue of the allocation of jurisdiction between the state and federal courts, with an untraditional focus on family law, domestic violence, and women\u27s access to federal courts. The piece first explores the domestic relations exception to federal jurisdiction, a longstanding judge-created doctrine under which the federal courts lack jurisdiction to hear divorce, custody, and other family matters traditionally reserved to the states. In the recent case of Marshall v. Marshall, 126 S. Ct. 1735 (2006), the Supreme Court had the opportunity to abandon the domestic relations exception (as well as its relative, the probate exception) but refused to do so, despite acknowledging the weak rationale for maintaining it. This Article critiques the traditional explanations for the exception\u27s existence, and argues that its roots may be traced to the principles of coverture. The “exception” may in fact not be an exception to jurisdiction at all, but rather a recognition that divorce and related cases could not meet federal diversity requirements because married women could not establish citizenship separate from that of their husbands. This explanation reveals both one of the primary causes for the exception\u27s creation and the consequences of maintaining it—the belief that family law is a “women\u27s issue” that is not deserving of the attention of the federal courts. The Article goes on to suggest that the legacy of the exception can be seen in the Court\u27s treatment of domestic violence cases. It focuses primarily on Castle Rock v. Gonzales, 545 U.S. 748 (2005), which held that a domestic violence victim had no constitutionally protected property interest in the enforcement of a protection order, and therefore no claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. In so doing, the Court has again restricted federal court review of issues that centrally concern women. The Article concludes that the domestic relations exception should be abolished as a significant first step. However, the Supreme Court must also recognize that in its denial of federal rights to victims of domestic violence, it is continuing to deny all women full participation and citizenship

The U.S. Treasury Yield Curve: 1961 to the Present

Cataloged from PDF version of article.The discount function, which determines the value of all future nominal payments, is the most basic building block of finance and is usually inferred from the Treasury yield curve. It is therefore surprising that researchers and practitioners do not have available to them a long history of high-frequency yield curve estimates. This paper fills that void by making public the Treasury yield curve estimates of the Federal Reserve Board at a daily frequency from 1961 to the present. We use a well-known and simple smoothing method that is shown to fit the data very well. The resulting estimates can be used to compute yields or forward rates for any horizon. We hope that the data, which are posted on the website http://www.federalreserve.gov/pubs/feds/2006 and which will be updated quarterly, will provide a benchmark yield curve that will be useful to applied economists. © 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved