Exchange Rate Determination Under Monetary Policy Rules in a Financially Underdeveloped Economy: A Simple Model and Application to Mozambique

Microstructure aspects of nominal exchange rate determination are less relevant in countries with embryonic financial markets. In less-developed economies, trade in goods and services is a more significant driver of currency demand than financial market speculation or hedging; and central banks actively set monetary variables. We develop a simple variation of the standard monetary model of exchange rate determination, incorporating interest rate rules but not relying on interest rate parity; and study the effect of monetary fundamentals on the Mozambican exchange rate. We find a long-run relationship between fundamentals and exchange rates, with coefficient signs in regression equations consistent with theoretic predictions. Moreover, the monetary model outperforms a random walk in predicting metical exchange rates out-of-sample at the four-quarter horizon.

CRITERI DI CORRELAZIONE TRA PROVE MOTORE AL BANCO E IMPIEGO SU STRADA: MODELLI TEORICI E VERIFICA SPERIMENTALE

Lo stage, svolto presso IVECO, ha riguardato l’ottimizzazione del piano di sperimentazione del motore, essendo la “sperimentazione” l’aspetto fondamentale nella validazione di un nuovo prodotto. L’obiettivo è quello di diminuire la numerosità e la durata delle prove motore, ricorrendo in misura sempre maggiore alle prove al banco in parziale sostituzione di quelle veicolari in quanto queste, oltre ad essere di più difficile monitoraggio, risultano essere più onerose in termini di tempi e costi. Il lavoro si è svolto in due fasi principali: 1) Analisi delle anomalie evidenziate nelle prove di sperimentazione volta all’individuazione di relazioni tra i tipi di guasto e le modalità di accadimento al banco e su veicolo 2) Studio delle usure riscontate, su alcuni componenti, dalle prove motore al banco e su veicolo al fine dell’individuazione di eventuali correlazioni tra ore prova motore al banco e km di prova veicolare

Existence of Ground States of Nonlocal-Interaction Energies

We investigate which nonlocal-interaction energies have a ground state (global minimizer). We consider this question over the space of probability measures and establish a sharp condition for the existence of ground states. We show that this condition is closely related to the notion of stability (i.e. $H$-stability) of pairwise interaction potentials. Our approach uses the direct method of the calculus of variations.Comment: This version is to appear in the J Stat Phy

A comprehensive description and critical analysis of portfolio assessment

The purpose of this study is to provide a comprehensive description of portfolio assessment and analyze critically the use of portfolios for student assessment at the high school level with specific application to the mathematics content area. A portfolio is a purposeful collection of student work that demonstrates their learning experiences, knowledge, applications and development over time. There are many variations of portfolio assessment depending upon the specific purpose of compiling the portfolio. Portfolio assessment is a new trend in the area of student assessment that will address the need for an alternative to traditional pencil and paper testing procedures. The use of portfolios allows for the creativity of each individual student, maintains their diversity, allows them to take control of their learning and encourages students to become self-directed learners. Student narratives should also be included in each portfolio describing how they produced the contents and what they learned about themselves in the process. New mathematics curriculum standards as established by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) cannot be assessed through traditional testing procedures. Experts conclude portfolios are a favorable method to assess these standards

Identifying Learning Outcomes And The Use Of The Discussion Board In An Online Course

With the popularity and resulting demand for online courses growing, many educators have developed at least a component of their courses, if not the entire course, online.  These online courses, or components thereof, present many challenges to educators. Of the challenges faced, none is more important than learning.  If we are not returning to the static model of learning but instead we are increasing the number of online courses then as educators, we must deliver online courses in which students learn through active participation.  In developing online courses, one of the first challenges facing the instructor is to identify and communicate the learning outcomes of the course.  Without identification of learning outcomes, instructors will not be able to assess learning.  Once learning objectives are identified and assessments match these outcomes, faculty should find ways to create an active learning environment. This paper describes the progression of an online introductory accounting course and how it evolved to improve the learning experience and create an active learning environment for students. Our experiences may provide useful examples that could be followed by others.  The paper specifically describes the identification and communication of learning outcomes with related assessments and the use of the discussion board to foster an active learning environment.&nbsp

Standard Of Measurement For Student Evaluation Instruments

For colleges and universities, the expectation for excellence in teaching and learning has made development of a system for measuring teaching effectiveness critical. Teaching effectiveness is generally assessed with a comprehensive review of skills including instructional design, instructional delivery and course management. This requires student feedback usually in the form of Student Evaluation Instruments (SEIs). Since SEIs are an important part of measuring teaching effectiveness to assess excellence, and excellence in the classroom is expected when considering promotion and tenure, it follows that they play an integral role in the promotion and tenure process.  In fact, faculty promotions and the issuance of tenure may hinge on the results of these vital evaluations. Our study investigates the use of SEIs at our university’s School of Business.  Unlike many other prior studies, limited to a single course or department and a single semester, we examined data collected from the use during six semesters (three years) of our Student Evaluation Instrument for the entire School of Business.  The results yielded nearly 30,000 useable responses across all business majors. If SEIs are to be used effectively and fairly then one must have a clear understanding as to what should be the appropriate standard used to evaluate faculty teaching effectiveness. Should a global value – the mean for the entire school or university – be used or should it be based on the mean for each department?  We believe this to be a critical consideration given the potential for differences in mean ratings amongst departments.  &nbsp

Attentional processes during P3-based Brain Computer Interface task in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis patients

To be available for a wide range of end-users a brain-computer interface (BCI) should be flexible and adaptable to end-users’ cognitive strengths and weaknesses. People’s cognitive abilities change according to the disease they are affected by, and people suffering from the same disease could have different cognitive capacities. We aimed at investigating how the amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) disease, and two different cognitive attentional aspects [1] influenced the usage of a P3-based BC

Evaluating autobiographical skills and their relationship with suggestibility in children: development and validation of the Children Recalling Autobiographical Memory

IntroductionAutobiographical narrative skills and resistance to suggestibility factors are central aspects in children’s testimony. While the assessment of suggestibility relies on standardized questionnaire, no such an instrument exists to reliably assess autobiographical skills in children. This aspect is further important when considering that the development of such skills seems to be related to the suggestibility, that is, suggestibility would be reduced in presence of higher autobiographical skills. However, no direct test of this relationship is available in literature, also due to the lack of quantitative instruments for assessing autobiographical skills.MethodsTo fulfill both these methodological and theoretical issues, in this study a new tool was validated to measure the main autobiographical narrative skills (Where, What, When, Who, and How) in relation to both Retrospective Memory and Prospective Memory: the Children Recalling Autobiographical Memory (CRAM). We recruited a sample of 321 children aged 7–16 years.Results and discussionThe result of the EFA analysis showed one-factor model, and revealed also good fit indexes and internal reliability. After validating this new tool, we further used it to test our main hypothesis, that is, children with higher autobiographical memory skills were less vulnerable to interrogative suggestibility as assessed by Gudjonsson Suggestibility Scale 2 (GSS2). A hierarchical linear regression model showed a reduction in suggestibility with age and level of autobiographical skills. Moreover, the level of such skills moderate the effect of age, such as only in presence of high or moderate level of autobiographical skills the age significantly reduces the level of suggestibility

Clínica de plantas na provínica de manica

Projeto piloto aumenta eficiência do trabalho dos extensionistas no controle fitossanitário: 0s doutores de plantas têm a função de ponte entre informação técnica e conhecimentos científicos e os saberes tradicionais das comunidades