IMPACT: The Journal of the Center for Interdisciplinary Teaching and Learning. Volume 12, Issue 1, Summer 2023

The essays in this issue explore how to enhance teaching and student learning in the classroom. Our first contributor argues that providing students the opportunity to write questions about course material is a fruitful way to address students’ reticence about asking questions during class and also may result in students performing better on testable material. Moreover, instructors benefit from having students’ questions because the written questions can also be used by the instructor to know better what students are and are not understanding about course material and alerts instructors to where they can further explain or clarify course material. Finally, our first contributor also suggests that students in interdisciplinary classrooms might especially benefit from writing their questions, while instructors of interdisciplinary courses may find the flexibility with using technology to address the written questions in “real time” via the use of technology especially beneficial. In our second contribution, the author argues that pre-service teachers’ educational curriculum should address the academic literature that links poor musical-rhythmic tendencies with reading struggles for reading learners. The author also argues that the rhythm-reading connection is applicable to interdisciplinary educators because it asks those educators to reflect on possible connections between the body and the acquisition of skills that are usually considered purely intellectual. Our Impact book reviewers cover a varied set of interesting and important topics in this issue. One reviewer informs readers about a handbook on community psychology that prioritizes applied and interdisciplinary work; another reviewer details an author’s synthesis of what contemporary archaeology has now come to understand about Maya civilization’s resilient and complex society through time and within their varied mosaic of managed environments; a different reviewer delves into an author’s exploration of how digital media platforms generate novel opportunities for sufferers of trauma to make sense of their experience, and our final reviewer details an author’s accounting of the history, origins, and evolution of the Camp Fire Girls, one of America’s longest-serving girls’ youth movements, its impact on girls’ lives, and how the organization adapted to and resisted dominant ideologies about girls, culture, and race across time

Binding of aminoglycoside antibiotics to helix 69 of 23S rRNA

Aminoglycosides antibiotics negate dissociation and recycling of the bacterial ribosome’s subunits by binding to Helix 69 (H69) of 23S rRNA. The differential binding of various aminoglycosides to the chemically synthesized terminal domains of the Escherichia coli and human H69 has been characterized using spectroscopy, calorimetry and NMR. The unmodified E. coli H69 hairpin exhibited a significantly higher affinity for neomycin B and tobramycin than for paromomycin (Kds = 0.3 ± 0.1, 0.2 ± 0.2 and 5.4 ± 1.1 µM, respectively). The binding of streptomycin was too weak to assess. In contrast to the E. coli H69, the human 28S rRNA H69 had a considerable decrease in affinity for the antibiotics, an important validation of the bacterial target. The three conserved pseudouridine modifications (Ψ1911, Ψ1915, Ψ1917) occurring in the loop of the E. coli H69 affected the dissociation constant, but not the stoichiometry for the binding of paromomycin (Kd = 2.6 ± 0.1 µM). G1906 and G1921, observed by NMR spectrometry, figured predominantly in the aminoglycoside binding to H69. The higher affinity of the E. coli H69 for neomycin B and tobramycin, as compared to paromomycin and streptomycin, indicates differences in the efficacy of the aminoglycosides

Coping strategies employed by public psychiatric healthcare workers during the COVID-19 pandemic in southern Gauteng, South Africa.

Within the context of the novel coronavirus pandemic and new challenges to a resource-constrained public healthcare system, many healthcare workers in South Africa have faced numerous stressors that have compromised their mental health. While the current literature on COVID-19 in South Africa highlights the widespread psychosocial stress experienced by healthcare workers during the pandemic, little is known about the coping strategies utilized to continue service delivery and maintain ones mental health and well-being during this ongoing public health emergency. In this study, we sought to explore the coping strategies used by healthcare workers employed in the public psychiatric care system in southern Gauteng, South Africa during the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic. Psychiatric healthcare workers (n = 55) employed in three tertiary public hospitals and two specialized psychiatric facilities participated in in-depth interviews between July 2020 and March 2021. We found that coping strategies spanned multi-level and multi-systemic efforts. Intrapersonal, interpersonal, material, and structural coping were mapped across individual, family, and hospital systems. The most commonly utilized coping strategies included positive mindsets and reappraisal, social support systems, and COVID-19 specific protections. Findings also highlighted the contextual and interconnected nature of coping. Healthcare workers applied multiple coping strategies to combat the negative mental health effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. Better understanding these strategies, contexts in which they are employed, and how they interact can be used to develop evidence-based interventions to support healthcare workers experiencing healthcare-related stressors during the COVID-19 pandemic

The lived experiences of tuberculosis survivors during the COVID-19 pandemic and government lockdown in South Africa: a qualitative analysis

Abstract Background Tuberculosis (TB) is a major health concern in South Africa, where prior to COVID-19 it was associated with more deaths than any other infectious disease. The COVID-19 pandemic disrupted gains made in the global response to TB, having a serious impact on the most vulnerable. COVID-19 and TB are both severe respiratory infections, where infection with one places individuals at increased risk for negative health outcomes for the other. Even after completing TB treatment, TB survivors remain economically vulnerable and continue to be negatively affected by TB. Methods This cross-sectional qualitative study, which was part of a larger longitudinal study in South Africa, explored how TB survivors’ experienced the COVID-19 pandemic and government restrictions. Participants were identified through purposive sampling and were recruited and interviewed at a large public hospital in Gauteng. Data were analyzed thematically, using a constructivist research paradigm and both inductive and deductive codebook development. Results Participants (n = 11) were adults (24–74 years of age; more than half male or foreign nationals) who had successfully completed treatment for pulmonary TB in the past two years. Participants were generally found to be physically, socioeconomically, and emotionally vulnerable, with the COVID-19 pandemic exacerbating or causing a recurrence of many of the same stressors they had faced with TB. Coping strategies during COVID similarly mirrored those used during TB diagnosis and treatment, including social support, financial resources, distraction, spirituality, and inner strength. Conclusions Implications and suggestions for future directions include fostering and maintaining a strong network of social support for TB survivors