Alternative Pathways to High School Graduation: An International Comparison

Evaluates alternative pathways to high school graduation -- such as school- or employment-based technical or vocational training programs -- in different countries, in terms of content, graduation requirements, inclusiveness, and outcomes

How young people are faring 2012

This report provides an independent, up-to-date and in-depth analysis of the education, training and work activities of young Australians. The series provides important information on how successfully our education and training system is working to meet the needs of young Australians as they make the transition from school to further study and work.  This contemporary, point-in-time picture of the learning and earning circumstances of young Australians is also placed in the context of the long-term trends that emerge from looking at changes in educational and labour force participation over the last two to three decades. How Young People are Faring 2012 has been prepared by Lyn Robinson and Stephen Lamb from the Centre for Research on Education Systems at the University of Melbourne. The significant story that emerges from HYPAF 2012 is one of a changing landscape of work and learning. The report shows solid gains in educational attainment , however, the data suggests that we should not become complacent about broader and alternative pathways from school to work, further study and training. Traditional education pathways are not enough in themselves to help young people enter the world of work. The combination of a changing youth labour market, long-term unemployment and the persistent marginalisation experienced by certain groups reinforces the need to ask: how well are young people prepared for increasingly fluid worlds of work? Image: merfam / flick

Two-dimensional Stokes flow driven by elliptical paddles

A fast and accurate numerical technique is developed for solving the biharmonic equation in a multiply connected domain, in two dimensions. We apply the technique to the computation of slow viscous flow (Stokes flow) driven by multiple stirring rods. Previously, the technique has been restricted to stirring rods of circular cross section; we show here how the prior method fails for noncircular rods and how it may be adapted to accommodate general rod cross sections, provided only that for each there exists a conformal mapping to a circle. Corresponding simulations of the flow are described, and their stirring properties and energy requirements are discussed briefly. In particular the method allows an accurate calculation of the flow when flat paddles are used to stir a fluid chaotically

Participation and achievement in VET of non-completers of school

This report examines the vocational and training (VET) activities and experiences of non-completers of Year 12 in the initial post- school years. It investigates differences between those who participate in VET after leaving school and those who do not. It also reviews VET achievement examining results in the VET courses undertaken by non-completers. The report provides information on the characteristics and success rates of non-completers who participated in VET, concentrating on the characteristics and achievement levels of those non-completers who participated in VET according to their specific study programs. The analyses were based on data from the Y95 cohort of the Longitudinal Surveys of Australian Youth (LSAY). The findings suggest that non-completers study a range of courses within the VET sector, and that it is important that VET remains flexible and continues to provide diversity in the range of courses available to this group of teenagers. [Executive summary, ed

Prairie Mixture Establishment

I n the fall of 2004, two diverse species prairie mixtures, composed of 9-prairie species and 20-species, were broadcast on a recently harvested soybean field. The soil was mostly bare, with minimal crop residue or weeds. The site was mowed several times during the summer of 2005 for weed management. There was some broadleaf and grass weed competition during the 2005 growing season, but some prairie grass and legume seedlings were seen. No systematic stand evaluations were conducted in 2005. In mid-May of 2006 there was such a uniform and significant growth of the native grasses Canada and Virginia wildrye, that the co-PIs decided to revise the management plans for the Lewis site. The overall intent was to establish a coolseason/warm-season dual forage system, using alfalfa and red clover as the ‘cool-season’ component. With the presence of the native, cool-season wildrye component, it was decided to use an all ‘native species’ system at the Armstrong Farm, to contrast with the alfalfa/warm-season prairie mixtures study being managed at a site near Ames, IA

'There was never man handled as I am' : the legacy and significance of Archbishop Thomas Cranmer, 1558-1660

For centuries, historians and theologians have acknowledged the pre-eminent role of Thomas Cranmer in the English Reformation. However, his significance as an enduring religious influence in the century following his martyrdom has not received close investigation. This thesis traces the legacy and significance of Cranmer from the Elizabethan Settlement to the Restoration, focussing especially upon important mid-seventeenth-century religious debates. Interpretations of Cranmer during 1558-1660 provide strong indications of where English Protestantism stood theologically, and how highly many Protestants valued the reforms enacted under Cranmer and his colleagues during the reign of Edward I (1547-1553). This legacy has a significant bearing upon how one interprets English Protestantism, as it demonstrates a commitment to the Reformed theology of Cranmer's later years and a lack of continuity with Roman Catholic antecedents. Furthermore, mid-seventeenth century interpretations of Cranmer demonstrate the importance of religious factors in the English Civil Wars. Changing interpretations of Cranmer by radical puritans and Laudians highlight the innovative nature of religious reforms leading to and during the hostilities of the 1640s, whilst the use of Cranmer by moderates within the English Church reveals a longstanding reverence for and adherence to the doctrine of the Edwardian reformers. Thus, this examination reveals the construction of Cranmer as a universally approved Protestant hero during the Elizabethan era, lasting into the 1630s. This came undone in the mid-seventeenth century, however, as debates over the eucharist, episcopacy, and liturgy forced Laudians, Presbyterians, and especially radical puritans, to re-evaluate Cranmer and the role he played in the Edwardian Reformation

The Need For Speed: Rapid Refitting Techniques for Bayesian Spectral Characterization of the Gravitational Wave Background Using PTAs

Current pulsar timing array (PTA) techniques for characterizing the spectrum of a nanohertz-frequency stochastic gravitational-wave background (SGWB) begin at the stage of timing data. This can be slow and memory intensive with computational scaling that will worsen PTA analysis times as more pulsars and observations are added. Given recent evidence for a common-spectrum process in PTA data sets and the need to understand present and future PTA capabilities to characterize the SGWB through large-scale simulations, we have developed efficient and rapid approaches that operate on intermediate SGWB analysis products. These methods refit SGWB spectral models to previously-computed Bayesian posterior estimations of the timing power spectra. We test our new methods on simulated PTA data sets and the NANOGrav $12.5$-year data set, where in the latter our refit posterior achieves a Hellinger distance from the current full production-level pipeline that is $\lesssim 0.1$. Our methods are $\sim10^2$--$10^4$ times faster than the production-level likelihood and scale sub-linearly as a PTA is expanded with new pulsars or observations. Our methods also demonstrate that SGWB spectral characterization in PTA data sets is driven by the longest-timed pulsars with the best-measured power spectral densities which is not necessarily the case for SGWB detection that is predicated on correlating many pulsars. Indeed, the common-process spectral properties found in the NANOGrav $12.5$-year data set are given by analyzing only the $\sim10$ longest-timed pulsars out of the full $45$ pulsar array, and we find that the ``shallowing'' of the common-process power-law model occurs when gravitational-wave frequencies higher than $\sim 50$~nanohertz are included. The implementation of our methods is openly available as a software suite to allow fast and flexible PTA SGWB spectral characterization and model selection.Comment: 19 pages, 12 figures. Submitting to Physical Review

Key inflammatory pathway activations in the MCI stage of Alzheimer's disease

OBJECTIVE: To determine the key inflammatory pathways that are activated in the peripheral and CNS compartments at the mild cognitive impairment (MCI) stage of Alzheimer's disease (AD). METHODS: A cross-sectional study of patients with clinical and biomarker characteristics consistent with MCI-AD in a discovery cohort, with replication in the Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI) cohort. Inflammatory analytes were measured in the CSF and plasma with the same validated multiplex analyte platform in both cohorts and correlated with AD biomarkers (CSF Aβ42, total tau (t-tau), phosphorylated tau (p-tau) to identify key inflammatory pathway activations. The pathways were additionally validated by evaluating genes related to all analytes in coexpression networks of brain tissue transcriptome from an autopsy confirmed AD cohort to interrogate if the same pathway activations were conserved in the brain tissue gene modules. RESULTS: Analytes of the tumor necrosis factor (TNF) signaling pathway (KEGG ID:4668) in the CSF and plasma best correlated with CSF t-tau and p-tau levels, and analytes of the complement and coagulation pathway (KEGG ID:4610) best correlated with CSF Aβ42 levels. The top inflammatory signaling pathways of significance were conserved in the peripheral and the CNS compartments. They were also confirmed to be enriched in AD brain transcriptome gene clusters. INTERPRETATION: A cell-protective rather than a proinflammatory analyte profile predominates in the CSF in relation to neurodegeneration markers among MCI-AD patients. Analytes from the TNF signaling and the complement and coagulation pathways are relevant in evaluating disease severity at the MCI stage of AD