Lifting the Voices of High-Achieving, Middle-Class, African American Students

The state of African American education is complex. Beginning in the 17th century, African Americans fought for an education that allowed them to read and write. During the 21st century, African Americans value on education extends beyond only reading and writing to using these skills and other skills to maintain strong academic and leadership backgrounds for a higher education. The purpose of this study was to understand the college preparation process of high-achieving, middle-class, African American students at a large research institution in the mid-Atlantic United States. This study was important because despite high-achieving, middle-class, African American students' success, there still exists an achievement gap between African American students and their White and Asian peers. Three theoretical frameworks and models were used as a guide for this study, critical race theory (Delgado & Stefancic, 2001), Perna and Titus' (2005) integrated conceptual model on college enrollment, and the predisposition stage of the college choice research (Hossler & Gallagher, 1987; Hossler, Braxton, & Coppersmith, 1989). Utilizing a constructivist case study methodology, data was collected using personal interviews, a focus group, and personal documents (college admissions statement and/or resumes). Through a within-case and cross-case analysis, school, family, and community contexts that influence the college preparation process were explored

SELF-EFFICACY AND BURNOUT AMONG MISSISSIPPI MILD/MODERATE SPECIAL EDUCATION TEACHERS

This study sought to determine if there was a relationship between Mississippi mild/moderate (certification endorsement number 221) special education teachers’ levels of self-efficacy and burnout, as well as to determine which factors influenced self-efficacy and burnout. Teachers from across the state of Mississippi responded to an online questionnaire that collected demographic data, the Teachers’ Sense of Self-Efficacy Scale, and the Teacher Burnout Scale. The results of the correlation research showed that subscales of Student Engagement and Instructional Strategies are positively correlated. Subscales of Student Engagement and Classroom Management are positively correlated. The Teacher Burnout survey subscale of Coping had a negative correlation with two variables, including Student Engagement and Classroom Management. Student Engagement had a negative correlation with Coping Skills. Coping and Administrative Support are positively correlated. A multiple regression analysis showed no statistically significant relationship between the independent factors of years of experience, caseload size, and type of degree earned and the independent factors of the Teacher’s Sense of Self-Efficacy subscales. A multiple linear regression analysis showed no statistically significant relationship between the same independent factors and the dependent variable of each of the Teacher Burnout Scale subscales

Analysis of auditory functions in grades one, two, and three.

Thesis (Ed.M.)--Boston Universit

Differences in risk factors and chronic conditions between informal (family) carers and non-carers using a population-based cross-sectional survey in South Australia

Background: There is growing discussion on the impact of informal caregiving on the health status and morbidity of family carers. Evidence suggests a proportion of carers may be at risk of poor health outcomes. However, there are limited population-based studies that provide representative data on specific risk factors among carers (eg, blood pressure, cholesterol, smoking status, activity and body mass index) and major chronic conditions (eg, asthma, diabetes and arthritis). This study aimed to redress that imbalance. Method: Self-reported data were from the South Australian Monitoring and Surveillance System (SAMSS), a representative cross-sectional state-wide population-based survey of 600 randomly selected persons per month. SAMSS uses computer-assisted telephone interviewing (CATI) to monitor chronic health-related problems and risk factors and to assess health outcomes. In total, 2247 family carers were identified from 35 195 participants aged 16 years and older for the 5-year period from 2010 to 2015. Logistic regression analyses examined associations of being a carer with self-reported chronic diseases and health risk factors. In addition, the population attributable risk (PAR) of being a carer was examined for selected chronic conditions. Results: The prevalence of carers was 6.4%, and peak age group for carers was 50-59 years. Adjusted ORs for chronic conditions in carers were significant for all chronic conditions examined. Although there is a high prevalence of self-reported risk factors and chronic conditions among carers compared with non-carers at the population level, PAR findings suggest that caregiving is associated with a small to moderate increased risk of having these chronic conditions. Conclusions: Monitoring of carer health and morbidity particularly 'at risk' individuals such as female carers with asthma or diabetes remains important and provides an ongoing baseline for future surveys. To achieve this, caregiver-based studies need to become part of mainstream biomedical research at both epidemiological and clinical levels.Anne F Stacey, Tiffany K Gill, Kay Price, Anne W Taylo

Cold Atmospheric Pressure Air Plasma Jet for Medical Applications

By flowing atmospheric pressure air through a direct current powered microhollow cathode discharge, we were able to generate a 2 cm long plasma jet. With increasing flow rate, the flow becomes turbulent and temperatures of the jet are reduced to values close to room temperature. Utilizing the jet, yeast grown on agar can be eradicated with a treatment of only a few seconds. Conversely, animal studies show no skin damage even with exposures ten times longer than needed for pathogen extermination. This cold plasma jet provides an effective mode of treatment for yeast infections of the skin

Estuarine boundary layer mixing processes : insights from dye experiments

Author Posting. © American Meteorological Society, 2007. This article is posted here by permission of American Meteorological Society for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Journal of Physical Oceanography 37 (2007): 1859-1877, doi:10.1175/jpo3088.1.A series of dye releases in the Hudson River estuary elucidated diapycnal mixing rates and temporal variability over tidal and fortnightly time scales. Dye was injected in the bottom boundary layer for each of four releases during different phases of the tide and of the spring–neap cycle. Diapycnal mixing occurs primarily through entrainment that is driven by shear production in the bottom boundary layer. On flood the dye extended vertically through the bottom mixed layer, and its concentration decreased abruptly near the base of the pycnocline, usually at a height corresponding to a velocity maximum. Boundary layer growth is consistent with a one-dimensional, stress-driven entrainment model. A model was developed for the vertical structure of the vertical eddy viscosity in the flood tide boundary layer that is proportional to u2*/N∞, where u* and N∞ are the bottom friction velocity and buoyancy frequency above the boundary layer. The model also predicts that the buoyancy flux averaged over the bottom boundary layer is equal to 0.06N∞u2* or, based on the structure of the boundary layer equal to 0.1NBLu2*, where NBL is the buoyancy frequency across the flood-tide boundary layer. Estimates of shear production and buoyancy flux indicate that the flux Richardson number in the flood-tide boundary layer is 0.1–0.18, consistent with the model indicating that the flux Richardson number is between 0.1 and 0.14. During ebb, the boundary layer was more stratified, and its vertical extent was not as sharply delineated as in the flood. During neap tide the rate of mixing during ebb was significantly weaker than on flood, owing to reduced bottom stress and stabilization by stratification. As tidal amplitude increased ebb mixing increased and more closely resembled the boundary layer entrainment process observed during the flood. Tidal straining modestly increased the entrainment rate during the flood, and it restratified the boundary layer and inhibited mixing during the ebb.The work was supported by the National Science Foundation Grant OCE00-95972 (W. Geyer, J. Lerczak), OCE00-99310 (R. Houghton), and OCE00-95913 (R. Chant, E. Hunter)

Using unoccupied aerial vehicles (UAVs) to map seagrass cover from Sentinel-2 imagery

Seagrass habitats are ecologically valuable and play an important role in sequestering and storing carbon. There is, thus, a need to estimate seagrass percentage cover in diverse environments in support of climate change mitigation, marine spatial planning and coastal zone management. In situ approaches are accurate but time-consuming, expensive and may not represent the larger spatial units collected by satellite imaging. Hence, there is a need for a consistent methodology that uses accurate point-based field surveys to deliver high-quality mapping of percentage seagrass cover at large spatial scales. Here, we develop a three-step approach that combines in situ (quadrats), aerial (unoccupied aerial vehicle—UAV) and satellite data to map percentage seagrass cover at Turneffe Atoll, Belize, the largest atoll in the northern hemisphere. First, the optical bands of four UAV images were used to calculate seagrass cover, in combination with in situ data. The seagrass cover calculated from the UAV was then used to develop training and validation datasets to estimate seagrass cover in Sentinel-2 pixels. Next, non-seagrass areas were identified in the Sentinel-2 data and removed by object-based classification, followed by a pixel-based regression to calculate seagrass percentage cover. Using this approach, percentage seagrass cover was mapped using UAVs (R2 = 0.91 between observed and mapped distributions) and using Sentinel-2 data (R2 = 0.73). This work provides the first openly available and explorable map of seagrass percentage cover across Turneffe Atoll, where we estimate approximately 242 km2 of seagrass above 10% cover is located. We estimate that this approach offers 30 times more data for training satellite data than traditional methods, therefore presenting a substantial reduction in cost-per-point for data. Furthermore, the increase in data helps deliver a high-quality seagrass cover map, suitable for resolving trends of deteriorating, stable or recovering seagrass environments at 10 m2 resolution to underpin evidence-based management and conservation of seagrass.publishedVersio

Behavior of QQ-Plots and Genomic Control in Studies of Gene-Environment Interaction

Genome-wide association studies of gene-environment interaction (GxE GWAS) are becoming popular. As with main effects GWAS, quantile-quantile plots (QQ-plots) and Genomic Control are being used to assess and correct for population substructure. However, in GE work these approaches can be seriously misleading, as we illustrate; QQ-plots may give strong indications of substructure when absolutely none is present. Using simulation and theory, we show how and why spurious QQ-plot inflation occurs in GE GWAS, and how this differs from main-effects analyses. We also explain how simple adjustments to standard regression-based methods used in GE GWAS can alleviate this problem

Central Adjudication Identified Additional and Prognostically Important Myocardial Infarctions in Patients Undergoing Percutaneous Coronary Intervention

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