The Relationship between School Shootings and Gun Acquisition Rates

In this paper, I seek to understand how communities respond to tragic events involving violence, exploring the relationship between school shootings and gun acquisition rates. Using National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) as a proxy for firearm acquisition rates, I estimate an event study framework, finding that gun acquisition rates increase by up to 32% one month after a school shooting compared to firearm acquisition rates one month before a school shooting. Furthermore, I supplement my analysis by using Google Search data on firearms. Additionally, I stratify my analysis by the four census regions and whether a school shooting occurred in a majority-minority county. My results contribute to existing literature, investigating the linkages between Google search data and social phenomena and the impact of mass shootings on the social sphere

Eagle Scouts: Merit beyond the Badge

Previous studies have shown that participation in Scouting produces better citizens.6 And, there is no shortage of examples or anecdotal accounts that would affirm these findings. Surprisingly, however, there is very little scientific evidence to confirm the prosocial benefits associated with Scouting or earning the rank of Eagle Scout. Thus, the central question of this study is to determine if participation in Scouting and ultimately becoming an Eagle Scout is associated with prosocial behavior and positive youth development that carries over into young adulthood and beyond

Developing The Educating For Discipleship Model To Be Used in Sabbath School in South Korea

Problem Sabbath School is designed to be a system in which people are engaged in the process of becoming disciples, however, the church tends to operate in a formal and mechanical manner. As a result, the Sabbath School cannot be an agency to produce Christ’s disciples and the church cannot be a community of discipleship. Both of these conditions can be addressed by attending to the health of the faith community which allows the process of discipleship to accomplish transformation of the members of the community. The Seventh-day Adventist Church has Sabbath School, which is a great system for the purpose of encouraging discipleship. This study will develop an Educating for Discipleship model to ignite the spirit of discipleship. Sabbath School will be an active time of inspiring discipleship and working to achieve Sabbath School’s original goal, that of education for soul-winning and mission. Method This study applies research, Bible analysis, a review of literature, an analysis of Counsels on Sabbath School (White, 2002a) and the combined aims of Sabbath School to the process of discipleship. Results This study develops the Educating for Discipleship model, a Bible study centered model which leads children, youth and new believers to become Christ’s disciples and His missionaries. The Educating for Discipleship model is operated in Sabbath School because Sabbath School is a place of Bible study for believers and its expressed goals are matched with the discipleship process. Conclusion The Educating for Discipleship model will establish discipleship through purposeful studying of the Bible. Bible study in Sabbath School creates cooperation between teachers and members, with influence extending to families and the entire churches. It utilizes inductive and deductive reasoning simultaneously. The Educating for Discipleship model restores the function of Sabbath School, which is to help believers to apply and practice the word of God in their lives. The restored Sabbath School plays a pivotal role in the church, fostering the growth of a discipleship community. Sabbath School operated via the Educating for Discipleship model will provide a practical educational environment for participants to live as Jesus’ disciples especially as missionaries and servants in many different fields

Color-Shift Compensation for Foldable OLED Display

This publication describes techniques for off-angle color-shift compensation that accommodates a user’s viewing direction and use cases for devices including foldable OLED displays, particularly, foldable displays configured in an intermediate mode with a first display portion positioned in a first plane (e.g., as a display) and a second display portion positioned in a second plane at an angle to the first plane (e.g., as an input screen). The techniques include generating a Color Compensation lookup table (LUT) relating display input values with corresponding display output values (target color space), based on angle measurements between the first display portion and the second display portion. The Color Compensation LUT is stored on a computer-readable medium (CRM) of the device as device data. A Display Manager implemented on the CRM utilizes sensor data from sensors (e.g., radar sensors, gyroscope sensors, hinge sensors) to enable off-angle color-shift compensation that compensates for a color difference between the first display portion and the second display portion

Image Data Compensation to Prevent Display Artifacts on an OLED Display

This publication describes techniques for image data compensation that prevent display artifacts on an organic light-emitting diode (OLED) display when the refresh rate and the clock speed of the display are changed. The OLED display may be implemented in a mobile device that supports multiple refresh rates. To conserve power, the mobile device may alter the refresh rate and clock speed of the OLED display from a first refresh rate and clock speed to a second refresh rate and clock speed. Image data intended to be displayed on a particular pixel row of the OLED display may be compensated based on the first refresh rate, the second refresh rate, and the location of the particular pixel row within the OLED display to generate compensated image data. Using the techniques described herein, the compensated image data may be output for use in preventing display artifacts while the image data is displayed in a first frame after the refresh rate and clock speed are changed

Colored reflectors to improve coincidence timing resolution of BGO-based time-of-flight PET detectors

Time-of-flight (TOF) positron emission tomography (PET) detectors improve the signal-to-noise ratio of PET images by limiting the position of the generation of two 511 keV gamma-rays in space using the arrival time difference between the two photons. Unfortunately, bismuth germanate (BGO), widely used in conventional PET detectors, was limited as a TOF PET scintillator due to the relatively slow decay time of the scintillation photons. However, prompt Cerenkov light in BGO has been identified in addition to scintillation photons. Using Cerenkov photons for timing has significantly improved the coincidence timing resolution (CTR) of BGO. Based on this, further research on improving the CTR for a BGO-based TOF PET system is being actively conducted. Wrapping materials for BGO pixels have primarily employed white reflectors to most efficiently collect scintillation light. White reflectors have customarily been used as reflectors for BGO pixels even after Cerenkov light began to be utilized for timing calculations in pixel-level experiments. However, when the arrival-time differences of the two 511 keV annihilations photons were measured with pure Cerenkov radiators, painting the lateral sides of the radiators black can improve CTR by suppressing the reflection of Cerenkov photons. The use of BGO for TOF PET detectors requires simultaneously minimizing scintillation loss for good energy information and suppressing reflected Cerenkov photons for better timing performance. Thus, reflectors for BGO pixels should be optimized for better timing and energy performance. In this study, colored polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) tapes with discontinuous reflectance values at specific wavelengths were applied as a BGO reflector. We hypothesized that CTR could be enhanced by selectively suppressing reflected Cerenkov photons with an optimum colored reflector on the BGO pixel while minimizing scintillation photon loss. CTRs were investigated utilizing white and three colors (yellow, red, and green) PTFE tapes as a reflector. In addition, black-painted PTFE tape and enhanced specular reflector film were investigated as reference reflector materials. When 3 × 3 × 20 mm3BGO pixels were wrapped with the yellow PTFE reflector, the CTR was significantly improved to 365 ± 5 ps from 403 ± 14 ps measured with the conventional white PTFE reflector. Adequate energy information was still obtained with only 4.1% degradation in light collection compared to the white reflector. Colored reflectors show the possibility to further improve CTR for BGO pixels with optimum reflectance design

A Survey on the Impact of Operation Volume on Rectal Cancer Management

The rectal cancer management can be influenced by the surgeon's practice and the hospital. This study was to evaluate the differences according to the surgeon's operative volume and the level of the hospital. Questionnaires were sent out to the members of the 'Korean Society of Coloproctology', and the responses were evaluated according to the surgeon's operation volume, the surgeon's age, and the level of the hospital. Sixty responses were received during the three months' period (from August to October 2004). Thirty three respondents (55%) operated more than 50 cases of rectal cancer per year (high-volume surgeons), and 37 respondents (61%) worked at university hospitals or tertiary care facilities (high-level hospitals). The preoperative evaluation with endorectal ultrasonography (ERUS) was significantly different according to the surgeon's operation volume and the level of the hospital, whereas magnetic resonance imaging and positron emission tomography (PET) was significantly different only for the surgeon's operation volume. The preoperative radiation therapy was significantly different according to the surgeon's operation volume, the surgeon's age, and the level of the hospital. However, there was no significant difference found on the operative procedures or postoperative surveillance. The preoperative loco-regional evaluation and the preoperative radiation therapy could be considered as the factors that influence the volume-outcome relationship in rectal cancer treatment

Numerical analysis of dielectric micro-particle motion in a fluid and electric field

We present numerical analysis of a coupled problem composed of fluidics, electromagnetic and particle dynamics. The forces acting on the dielectric micro-particle consist of a dielectrophoretic(DEP) force, drag force and gravitational force in the proposed analysis model. DEP force and drag force are calculated using the distribution of the electric field and fluid velocity field to analyze the characteristic of the micro-particle motion. The forces exerted by each field are driving terms in the Newton’s equation for particle motion. The designed particle separating device, which has the one inlet and the two outlets, is simulated to validate proposed numerical scheme. The analysis results show the trace of the micro-particles can be analyzed using the proposed numerical approach