Learning Democracy and ‘Difference’ in Civil Society

Civil society has captured the imagination of many adult educators and has become a central focus of both local and international development work. Volunteerism has come to be seen as a source of democratic learning and this emphasis calls adult educators to deeply interrogate its contours. This paper reports on an American volunteerism program organized to recruit young people into participation in civil society and examines the relationship between learning about citizenship or democracy and understanding social inequality, or ‘social problems’

How School Counselors Cope with Student Suicide: A Qualitative Study

Recognizing that school counselors will likely encounter the tragedy of youth suicide, many counselor educator programs focus on identification of suicidal ideation and prevention, but the field of school counseling remains largely under-equipped regarding how to cope with the aftermath of student suicide. In an effort to expand the qualitative research within the profession on how best to educate, support, and implement suicide postvention strategies, there remained a need to explore the experience of the school counselor in the aftermath of such tragedy. This study addressed how school counselors who were trained in CACREP-accredited programs experience the response to student suicide. Eight practicing school counselors who experienced the loss of a student to suicide were interviewed using a revised version of Seidman’s three-part model. Each participant took part in two individual 45-90 minutes long interviews at least a week apart. The qualitative study was guided by three questions: What is the school counselor’s experience of student suicide? What ways did the school counselor cope with the experience of student suicide? And lastly, what effect did suicide have the life of the school counselor, both professionally and personally? Data analysis was conducted utilizing Giorgi’s (2009) Descriptive Phenomenological Method. Six essential themes were described by participants forming the structural description of their experience of student suicide: (1) Historical Context: Early Experiences with Trauma and/or Loss, (2) Personal History with Counseling, (3) Training in Graduate Program, (4) Response of School/District, (5) Coping Reactions and Related Predictors, and (6) Shift in Perspective on Trauma and/or Loss. A potentially predictive model detailing factors that contributed to higher levels of adaptive coping in school counselors post tragedy is presented and discussed

Experience, Learning, & Consciousness: Advancing a Feminist-Materialist Theory of Adult Learning

This paper theorizes from the literature of feminism, sociology, historical materialism, and adult education to advance a feminist-materialist approach to the long-standing debates regarding individual and social dimensions of learning and the relationships between experience, learning, and consciousness

The Dialectics of Praxis

This paper takes up the theorization of the dialectical relationships between consciousness, praxis, and contradiction by drawing primarily on the work of critical feminist and anti-racist scholars Roxana Ng and Paula Allman. Beginning with the important Marxist theorizations of the lives of immigrant women, the state, and community services made by Roxana Ng, we move forward with asserting that Roxana’s commitment to making social relations of power and exploitation ‘knowable’ and ‘transformable’ is based on a complex and revolutionary articulation of the relationship between thinking and being. This dialectical conceptualization of praxis is necessary for any potentially coherent revolutionary feminist anti-racist project. The challenge posed by Roxana is two-fold: not only how best to ‘know’ the world, but how to teach this analysis and generate revolutionary practice

Introduction From the Special Issue Editors: Preparing Graduate Students for a Changing World of Work

Introduction article for a special issue of the Canadian Journal of Higher Education. The issue represents the growing recognition of changes in the career paths and trajectories of graduate students, as well as the deepening interest in the support and development of professional knowledge and skills in advanced degree holders. The call for proposals for this issue sought contributions that theorized the problem of graduate student development, reports on empirical research, and/or illuminated comparative models for work in the Canadian context to inform the growing field of graduate student support in Canada. The goal of this special issue is to contribute to the global conversation about graduate student education reform by deepening the conversation on this issue across Canada

Through gender : an investigation into the role of gender in planning context

Vikten av arbete med jämställdhet har fastställts av FN, Sveriges regering och den nya politiken för gestaltad livsmiljö. För att uppnå jämställdhet är det viktigt att analysera strukturer och maktordningar kring manligt och kvinnligt. De flesta ser ofta på planering som något könsneutralt, men i själva verket representerar och reproducerar planeringen manliga normer och ideal. Genom ett genusperspektiv går det att identifiera och ifrågasätta dessa, samt synliggöra underliggande maktordningar och låta fler erfarenheter ta plats. I detta arbete har vi undersökt och medvetandegjort genus roll i planeringssammanhang. Detta har vi dels gjort genom en litteraturstudie som fokuserat på frågor om genus, rätt till staden och jämställdhet. Vi har även utfört fallstudier där vi granskat ett urval av Malmö stads styrdokument, för att få en överblick huruvida genus används, och fört samtal med tjänstepersoner från Malmö stad och konsulter från arkitektkontoret Tengbom, för att ta del av yrkesverksammas erfarenheter om genus i planeringssammanhang. Utifrån litteraturstudien gick det att identifiera en rad fenomen om genus och planering. Dessa fenomen delades in i grupper som visar på olika nivåer i arbete med genus i planeringssammanhang. Dessa grupper av fenomen är: grundläggande utgångspunkter, praktiska perspektiv, inställningar och attityder, samt samhällsfenomen. Fallstudierna visade att de utvalda styrdokumenten från Malmö stad nämner genus men mest i förbifarten eller mellan raderna och sällan utförligt. Det finns sätt att arbeta med genus, exempelvis genom vardagsperspektiv och väl förankrat deltagande, men det finns också mycket osäkerhet i hur. Planering med genusperspektiv gör skillnad i processen, även om det inte alltid syns på den fysiska platsen. Om planerare är medvetna om genus, blir staden annorlunda genom att processen påverkas och förändras. Utifrån litteraturen och fallstudierna gick det att konstatera att det finns mycket att vinna på att använda genusperspektiv i planering, men att det underprioriteras på grund av rådande normer och forskningens tendens att prioritera mätbara kunskap. Genusperspektiv behövs för att skapa en jämställd planering, men också för att lyfta den kunskap som är omätbar.The importance of working on gender equality has been established by the UN, the Swedish Government and the new policy for ‘well-designed habitat’. In order to achieve gender equality, it is important to analyse power structures around male and female. Planning is mostly seen as something gender neutral, but in reality the planning represents and reproduces male norms and ideals. Through a gender perspective, it is possible to identify and question these, and make underlying power systems visible and allow more experiences to take place. In this thesis, we have investigated and made aware the role of gender in the context of planning. We did this partly through a literature study that focused on questions about gender, the right to the city and gender equality. We have also conducted case studies where we examined a selection of Malmö City’s governing documents, to get an overview of whether gender is used, and have had conversations with officials from the city of Malmö and consultants from the architectural firm Tengbom, in order to take part of professionals’ experiences about gender in planning context. Based on the literature study, it was possible to identify a number of phenomena on gender and planning. These phenomena were divided into groups that points to different levels in work with gender in planning context. These groups of phenomena are: basic starting points, practical perspectives, outlooks and attitudes, as well as social phenomena. The case studies showed that the selected governing documents from the City of Malmö mention gender but mostly in passing or between the lines, and rarely extensively. There are ways to work with gender, for example through everyday perspective and well-grounded participation, but there is also much uncertainty about how. Planning with a gender perspective makes a difference in the process, although it is not always visible in the physical location. If planners are aware of gender, the city becomes different in that the process is influenced and changed. Based on the literature and case studies it was possible to state that there is much to be gained from using gender perspective in planning, but that it is under-prioritized due to prevailing norms and the tendency of research to prioritize measurable knowledge. Gender perspective is needed to create an equal planning, but also to raise the knowledge that is immeasurable

A ubiquitin carboxyl extension protein secreted from a plant-parasitic nematode Globodera rostochiensis is cleaved in planta to promote plant parasitism

Nematode effector proteins originating from esophageal gland cells play central roles in suppressing plant defenses and in formation of the plant feeding cells that are required for growth and development of cyst nematodes. A gene (GrUBCEP12) encoding a unique ubiquitin carboxyl extension protein (UBCEP) that consists of a signal peptide for secretion, a mono-ubiquitin domain, and a 12 amino acid carboxyl extension protein (CEP12) domain was cloned from the potato cyst nematode Globodera rostochiensis. This GrUBCEP12 gene was expressed exclusively within the nematode\u27s dorsal esophageal gland cell, and was up-regulated in the parasitic second-stage juvenile, correlating with the time when feeding cell formation is initiated. We showed that specific GrUBCEP12 knockdown via RNA interference reduced nematode parasitic success, and that over-expression of the secreted GrΔSPUBCEP12 protein in potato resulted in increased nematode susceptibility, providing direct evidence that this secreted effector is involved in plant parasitism. Using transient expression assays in Nicotiana benthamiana, we found that GrΔSPUBCEP12 is processed into free ubiquitin and a CEP12 peptide (GrCEP12) in planta, and that GrCEP12 suppresses resistance gene-mediated cell death. A target search showed that expression of RPN2a, a gene encoding a subunit of the 26S proteasome, was dramatically suppressed in GrΔSPUBCEP12 but not GrCEP12 over-expression plants when compared with control plants. Together, these results suggest that, when delivered into host plant cells, GrΔSPUBCEP12 becomes two functional units, one acting to suppress plant immunity and the other potentially affecting the host 26S proteasome, to promote feeding cell formation

Biomass distribution among tropical tree species grown under\ud differing regional climates

In the Neotropics, there is a growing interest in establishing plantations of native tree species for commerce, local consumption, and to replant on abandoned agricultural lands. Although numerous trial plantations have been established, comparative information on the performance of native trees under different regional environments is generally lacking. In this study, we evaluated the accumulation and partitioning of above-ground biomass in 16 native and two exotic tree species growing in replicated species selection trials in Panama under humid and dry regional environments. Seven of the 18 species accumulated greater total biomass at the humid site than at the dry site over a two-year period. Species specific biomass partitioning among leaves, branches and trunks was observed. However, awide range of total biomass found among species (from 1.06 kg for Dipteryx panamensis to 29.84 kg for Acacia mangium at Soberania) justified the used of an Aitchison log ratio transformation to adjust for size. When biomass partitioning was adjusted for size, a majority of these differences proved to be a result of the ability of the tree to support biomass components rather than the result of differences in the regional environments at the two sites. These findings were confirmed by comparative ANCOVAs on Aitchison-transformed and non-Aitchison-transformed variables. In these comparisons, basal diameter, height and diameter at breast height were robust predictors of biomass for the pooled data from both sites, but Aitchison-transformed\ud variables had little predictive power

Student Abstract Competition

Articlehttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/97000/1/UMURJ-Issue07_2010-StudentAbstractCompetition.pd