How does newly qualified teachers' collegial network foster their feedback-seeking behaviour and job satisfaction?

This study goes beyond the classic paradigm that newly qualified teachers (NQTs) are in need of formal support in order to cope with the challenges they face during the early stages of their teaching career. The focus of this survey study with 443 NQTs in Flanders, Belgium is whether NSTs' proactive seeking of feedback from the principal and from their colleagues acts as a mediator between the characteristics of their collegial network and NQTs' job satisfaction. The results reveal that seeking feedback from the principal and colleagues mediates the relation between knowing other colleagues' areas of expertise and valuing that expertise in the collegial network, on the one hand, and job satisfaction, on the other. More specifically, seeking feedback from the principal was more strongly related to NQTs' job satisfaction than seeking feedback from colleagues. Remarkably, psychological safety was only related to seeking feedback from colleagues. No relationship was found between psychological safety and seeking feedback from the principal. The study concludes with suggestions on how to support the professional development of NQTs

Liver X receptor beta deficiency attenuates autoimmune-associated neuroinflammation in a T cell-dependent manner

The initiation and progression of autoimmune disorders such as multiple sclerosis (MS) is linked to aberrant cholesterol metabolism and overt inflammation. Liver X receptors (LXR) are nuclear receptors that function at the crossroads of cholesterol metabolism and immunity, and their activation is considered a promising therapeutic strategy to attenuate autoimmunity. However, despite clear functional heterogeneity and cell-specific expression profiles, the impact of the individual LXR isoforms on autoimmunity remains poorly understood. Here, we show that LXRα and LXRβ have an opposite impact on immune cell function and disease severity in the experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis model, an experimental MS model. While Lxrα deficiency aggravated disease pathology and severity, absence of Lxrβ was protective. Guided by flow cytometry and by using cell-specific knockout models, reduced disease severity in Lxrβ-deficient mice was primarily attributed to changes in peripheral T cell physiology and occurred independent from alterations in microglia function. Collectively, our findings indicate that LXR isoforms play functionally non-redundant roles in autoimmunity, potentially having broad implications for the development of LXR-based therapeutic strategies aimed at dampening autoimmunity and neuroinflammation