901 research outputs found
Evaluating the implementation of the AVID program at Pemberton Township High School
Pemberton Township High School started AVID for the 2003-2004 school year. The AVID program is designed to prepare students for a college bound curriculum. The purpose of this study was to describe and evaluate the implementation of the AVID program at Pemberton Township High School. The population of the study consisted of the entire ninth grade class of 21 AVID students from Pemberton Township High School. The data was collected through the use of a six question, Likert-type survey and algebra first and second marking period grades. The survey was used to rate the AVID students\u27 satisfaction of the five components of the AVID program. The students\u27 algebra grades provided data on how successful the students were at completing their course work. The findings of the study show that the students are not satisfied with the AVID mentoring program and family workshops. The students\u27 Algebra I grades are not acceptable. Based on the data collected, it is recommended that the AVID site team concentrate most of their efforts on the family workshops and the mentoring component of AVID. The AVID site team should seek more training on developing a successful AVID program
Risk, Uncertainty, and the Perceived Threat of Terrorist Attacks: Evidence of Flight-to-Quality
Information provided by the US Department of Homeland Security regarding potential terrorist attacks significantly affects US Treasury securities markets. When the government announces heightened terror alert levels, investors\u27 perceptions of risk increase and investors purchase 1-month and 1-year Treasury bills and 3-year, 5-year, 7-year, and 10-year US Treasuries in a flight-to-quality episode. Partial anticipation of increased threat level announcements is stronger than the anticipation of announcements regarding the federal funds rate during the 10 days prior to an announcement
Abstract appeals to free speech wonât solve the debate surrounding Confederate monumentsâitâs a political question
This month has seen the most recent push to remove Confederate statues in cities across the Southern US. Nathan T. Carrington and Logan Strother unpack the argument made by some who support the statues that their removal flies in the face of freedom of speech. They argue that questions over the fate of Confederate monuments are by their nature, political
Megapolitan Political Ecology and Urban Metabolism in Southern Appalachia
Drawing on megapolitan geographies, urban political ecology, and urban metabolism as theoretical frameworks, this article theoretically and empirically explores megapolitan political ecology. First, we elucidate a theoretical framework in the context of southern Appalachia and, in particular, the Piedmont megapolitan region, suggesting that the megapolitan region is a useful scale through which to understand urban metabolic connections that constitute this rapidly urbanizing area. We also push the environmental history and geography literature of the U.S. South and southern Appalachia to consider the central role urban metabolic connections play in the region's pressing social and environmental crises. Second, we empirically illuminate these human and nonhuman urban metabolisms across the Piedmont megapolitan region using data from the Coweeta Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) program, especially highlighting a growing âring of asphaltâ that epitomizes several developing changes to patterns of metabolism. The conclusion suggests that changing urban metabolisms indicated by Coweeta LTER data, ranging from flows of people to flows of water, pose a complicated problem for regional governance and vitality in the future
By Shepherd, et all, posted on November 29th, 2013 in Articles, Climate
Earth is increasingly an âurbanized â planet. The âWorld Population Clock â registered a Population of 7,175,309,538 at 8:30 pm (LST) on Oct. 6, 2013. Current and future trends suggest that this population will increasingly reside in cities. Currently, 52 percent of the world population is urban, which means we are a majority âurbanized â society. Figure 1 indicates this trend will continue, wit
Parallelization of Kinetic Theory Simulations
Numerical studies of shock waves in large scale systems via kinetic
simulations with millions of particles are too computationally demanding to be
processed in serial. In this work we focus on optimizing the parallel
performance of a kinetic Monte Carlo code for astrophysical simulations such as
core-collapse supernovae. Our goal is to attain a flexible program that scales
well with the architecture of modern supercomputers. This approach requires a
hybrid model of programming that combines a message passing interface (MPI)
with a multithreading model (OpenMP) in C++. We report on our approach to
implement the hybrid design into the kinetic code and show first results which
demonstrate a significant gain in performance when many processors are applied.Comment: 10 pages, 3 figures, conference proceeding
New observations of Ambient Inclusion Trails (AITs) and pyrite framboids in the Ediacaran Doushantuo Formation, South China
Ambient Inclusion Trails (AITs) are intriguing microtubular structures that commonly occur in association with pyrite in Precambrian organic-rich cherts and phosphorites. They are thought to be created by the migration of pyrite or other crystal grains through a lithified substrate driven by pressure solution from the in situ thermal decomposition of organic matter. New phosphorite samples of the Ediacaran Doushantuo Formation (South China) contain abundant AITs exhibiting diverse morphotypes, which may be distinguished from filamentous microfossils and endolithic microborings with a suite of morphological criteria based on optical microscopy and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). Black shales of the Baizhu section contains abundant pyrite framboids whose size distributions reveal significant temporal variations of redox conditions in shallow marine waters that probably promoted the formation of the Doushantuo phosphorites.
AITs in the phosphorites are categorized into three types and further into five subtypes (I-a, I-b, II-a, II-b, and III) based on their morphologies and observed or interpreted associations with various kinds of terminal pyrite crystals. Among these, subtype II-a, single striated microtubes 2â10 ÎŒm wide, are interpreted to have resulted from migration of intact pyrite framboids. Those of subtype II-b, dense clusters of outward radiating microtubes with consistent widths and inward-facing cuspate ridges, likely have formed by explosive disintegration and propulsion of pyrite framboids due to highly concentrated carbon dioxide gas during the oxidation of organic matter. During early diagenesis, formation of euhedral and framboidal pyrites involve a suite of biogeochemical and physical processes including non-biological oxidation of organic matter and reduction of sulfate in the presence of ferrous iron. Following the burial of pyrites, further oxidative degradation of organic matter produced abundant CO2 gas, which drives the pyrites to move through the solid, but not yet fully lithified phosphatic gel composing granules. This model explains the formation of previously reported but unexplained star-burst type AITs and it may be tested by experimental studies.
Our new observations provide evidence for the widespread occurrence of AITs in the Doushantuo phosphorites and urge careful petrographic examinations and differentiation between AITs and morphologically similar biogenic microstructures
High potential for weathering and climate effects of non-vascular vegetation in the Late Ordovician
It has been hypothesized that predecessors of todayâs bryophytes significantly increased global chemical weathering in the Late Ordovician, thus reducing atmospheric CO2 concentration and contributing to climate cooling and an interval of glaciations. Studies that try to quantify the enhancement of weathering by non-vascular vegetation, however, are usually limited to small areas and low numbers of species, which hampers extrapolating to the global scale and to past climatic conditions. Here we present a spatially explicit modelling approach to simulate global weathering by non-vascular vegetation in the Late Ordovician. We estimate a potential global weathering flux of 2.8 (km3 rock) yrâ1, defined here as volume of primary minerals affected by chemical transformation. This is around three times larger than todayâs global chemical weathering flux. Moreover, we find that simulated weathering is highly sensitive to atmospheric CO2 concentration. This implies a strong negative feedback between weathering by non-vascular vegetation and Ordovician climate
LiFtEr: Language to Encode Induction Heuristics for Isabelle/HOL
Proof assistants, such as Isabelle/HOL, offer tools to facilitate inductive
theorem proving. Isabelle experts know how to use these tools effectively;
however, there is a little tool support for transferring this expert knowledge
to a wider user audience. To address this problem, we present our
domain-specific language, LiFtEr. LiFtEr allows experienced Isabelle users to
encode their induction heuristics in a style independent of any problem domain.
LiFtEr's interpreter mechanically checks if a given application of induction
tool matches the heuristics, thus automating the knowledge transfer loop.Comment: This is the pre-print of our paper of the same title accepted at
APLAS2019 (https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-34175-6_14). We updated the
draft after fixing the errata found by Kenji Miyamot
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