Covering Kids & Families Evaluation: Expectations of Sustainability: What Do CKF Grantees and State Officials Predict Will Happen Once RWJF Funding Ends?

Based on a survey of CKF state grantees and Medicaid and Children's Health Insurance Program officials, examines prospects for continuing efforts to increase enrollment, factors contributing to survival, alternative funding sources, and priorities

Covering Kids & Families Evaluation: Improving Medicaid and SCHIP Through Simplification and Coordination

Based on a survey of CKF state grantees and Medicaid and Children's Health Insurance Program officials, outlines procedural simplifications and better coordination achieved to improve programs and increase enrollment, CKF's role, and contributing factors

Outliving Grant Funding: A Review of State CKF Projects and Coalitions and the Roles of Funding and In-Kind Support in Their Survival

Examines how the requirements built into RWJF's grants for projects to increase enrollment in Medicaid and State Children's Health Insurance Programs affected the sustainability, evolution, and activities of grantees and coalitions after the grants ended

The Effect of a Summer Oral Language and Literacy Intervention on the Literacy Acquisition of At-Risk First Grade Emergent Readers

The persistent achievement gap between children from low-socioeconomic and mid- to upper-socioeconomic homes is evident in both national and statewide literacy assessments. Although the summer months away from school are part of the problem, they also hold the potential for an effective solution. Interventions that accelerate literacy development during summer vacation, particularly for children of low-socioeconomic status, have the potential to shift the educational trajectory of our most at-risk students. We investigated the effect of a four-week summer oral language and literacy intervention on the literacy development of rising first grade students from at-risk elementary schools in Jefferson County Public School system located in Louisville, Kentucky. The participants included 95 rising first grade students attending the summer intervention; and 92 students eligible for attendance, but whose families did not register them for voluntary participation. Trained interventionists administered the six tasks of the Observation Survey (Clay, 2002, 2005) to both groups of students in May of their kindergarten year and again in August of their first grade year. The tasks included letter identification, a word test, concepts about print, hearing and recording sounds in words, writing vocabulary, and text level reading. A multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was conducted with the posttest data to determine the effect of the summer intervention. The analysis indicated there were significant differences between the treatment and comparison groups in each of the six tasks, demonstrating a positive effect of the summer oral language and literacy intervention

Skin cancer: Be kind to the skin you are in

https://aquila.usm.edu/student_brochures/1003/thumbnail.jp

Lessons for the Philanthropic Sector on the Use of Matching Contingencies

Many philanthropic institutions require prospective or current grantees to match all or part of the value of a grant in order to secure funding. Foundations use matching contingencies to recruit funding partners, build grantee capacity to raise funds, replicate program models, and exit from the field, among other purposes. In January 2014, Atlantic commissioned Mathematica Policy Research to evaluate its matching practices. The purpose of the evaluation is to document the utility and outcomes of Atlantic's use of matching requirements. The findings in this report provide information on the outcomes and effects of the use of matching contingencies to inform other philanthropic organizations about possible consequences of this funding practice

Covering Kids & Families Evaluation: Strategies for Sustaining CKF: Interim Synthesis of Evaluation Findings

Explores state grantees' and coalitions' views on the sustainability of their efforts to help eligible families enroll in public health insurance after RWJF funding ends, the permanence of the changes effected, and their implications for CKF activities

TGF-β Signaling Regulates Neuronal C1q Expression and Developmental Synaptic Refinement

Immune molecules, including complement proteins C1q and C3, have emerged as critical mediators of synaptic refinement and plasticity. Complement localizes to synapses and refines the developing visual system via C3-dependent microglial phagocytosis of synapses. Retinal ganglion cells (RGCs) express C1q, the initiating protein of the classical complement cascade, during retinogeniculate refinement; however, the signals controlling C1q expression and function remain elusive. Previous work implicated an astrocyte-derived factor in regulating neuronal C1q expression. Here we identify retinal TGF-β as a key regulator of neuronal C1q expression and synaptic pruning in the developing visual system. Mice lacking TGF-β receptor II (TGFβRII) in retinal neurons have reduced C1q expression in RGCs, reduced synaptic localization of complement, and phenocopy refinement defects observed in complement-deficient mice, including reduced eye specific segregation and microglial engulfment of RGC inputs. These data implicate TGF-β in regulating neuronal C1q expression to initiate complement- and microglia-mediated synaptic pruning

Activity-dependent regulation of Schwann cell development by extracellular ATP

During development, the importance of activity-dependent plasticity in neurons is widely appreciated, but comparatively less is known of the role of electrical activity in controlling glial development. Schwann cells (SCs)--the myelinating cells in the peripheral nervous system--are critically dependent on axons during the perinatal period, but axonal signals controlling SC development and myelination have remained elusive. The onset of high frequency action potential activity along developing peripheral nerves corresponds to the period when SCs are exiting the cell cycle and initiating myelination. We postulated that neural impulse activity could play an instructive role in regulating SC gene expression and function during development. To address these questions, a neuron/SC co-culture system equipped with stimulating electrodes was used to evoke action potentials in dorsal root ganglion neurons (DRGs), and study the ensuing effects in pre-myelinating SCs. We found that SCs can detect neural impulse activity in pre-myelinated axons, and the activity-dependent axon-Schwann cell signaling molecule was identified as extracellular ATP. Activity-dependent release of ATP activated multiple intracellular signaling pathways in SCs, and increased levels of several transcription factors, including CREB, c-fos, and krox-24. Importantly, we found that ATP has profound effects on SC development. Activity-dependent ATP release significantly inhibited SC proliferation, arrested SC differentiation, and completely prevented the formation of myelin. Extracellular ATP can activate multiple types of purinergic receptors; therefore we explored the specific purinergic receptors and signaling pathways that could mediate this form of activity-dependent neuron-SC communication. Using a combination of pharmacological and molecular approaches, we found that pre-myelinating SCs express a far more complex array of ATP receptors (P2X and P2Y) that previously thought. Surprisingly, we discovered that pre-myelinating SCs also express a class of functional adenosine receptors (A2), which are positively coupled to cAMP. Extracellular adenosine, a breakdown product of ATP, regulated MAP Kinase signaling and proliferation in SCs independently of ATP. Collectively, our findings suggest that ATP and adenosine released from electrically active axons activate a complex intracellular signaling network in SCs, whereby ATP and adenosine act together to regulate SC function during development and nervous system plasticity