Professionals: Any Room in God’s Ministry?

As Christian professionals, the activity of architects is steeped in technicalities. They are expected to work a lot of hours; leaving them no extra time for actual “ministry.” In such an environment, with hardly enough time for family or personal Bible study, can they possibly be missionaries? “Yes, we can,” says a professional in this field

Metadata-Based Integration of Qualitative and Quantitative Information Resources Approaching Knowledge Management

This paper presents a concept for the integration of quantitative and qualitative information sources with their accompanying management support functionalities from navigation and retrieval up to analysis and business intelligence. The integration is realized by a common keyword-based metadata base, retrievable and extendible by the end user on a web-based platform. This enables a dynamic acquisition of supplementary information on the usage, usability and benefit of basic and derived information objects, e.g. data warehouses, data marts, OLAP cubes, reports or (textual) documents. Being extended by functions to automatically catch contextual links during system usage, the concept is discussed as a contribution to the implementation of knowledge management. The concept is being developed and successfully tested in the practical environment of a reference project for the implementation of an IT-infrastructure to support decentralized decision-making at a German university

Gefühle einfordern? Zur Normativität gesellschaftlicher Affektlagen

In diesem philosophischen Working Paper versuchen wir eine Klärung der normativen Maßstäbe affektiver Wirklichkeitsbestimmung auf gesellschaftlicher Ebene. Wir verbinden dazu Überlegungen der Phi-losophie der Emotionen mit sozialphilosophischen Ansätzen und beziehen beides auf den kollektiven Umgang mit der Klima- und Umweltkrise. Der Text beginnt mit einer Charakterisierung menschlicher Affektivität, die sowohl das individuelle Fühlen als auch gesellschaftliche Affektdynamiken umfasst. Auf dieser Grundlage unterscheiden wir anschließend drei Dimensionen emotiver Normativität: epistemische Normativität, praktische Normativität sowie die Normativität ethisch-existenzieller Horizonte. Der Text schließt mit einer Skizze des „Entwurfscharakters“ gesellschaftlicher Affektlagen: dem Potenzial von Emotionen, Wirklichkeit nicht nur zu erfassen, sondern sie auch aktiv und kreativ zu gestalten. Dabei nehmen wir Bezug auf Eva von Redeckers Konzept der Bleibefreiheit

M-139 Corridor Improvement Plan: Enabling a Strong, Place-based Vision for Berrien Springs & Oronoko Charter Township, MI

This corridor plan was jointly commissioned by the Village of Berrien Springs and Oronoko Charter Township in response to the 2013 findings of the M-139 Corridor Improvement Taskforce. The twelve appointed members of this taskforce included Village and Township officials as well as a range of private property owners and citizens. In anticipation of expanded water and sewer service, a major indoor equestrian arena, and various private and university development prospects, the taskforce identified the following challenges and opportunities that deserve attention and planning: • Existing zoning along the corridor creates unnecessary burdens due to non-conforming uses and structures. • The Village and Township zoning is “mismatched” and does not present a unified vision. • Existing zoning is unlikely to support the vision set out in the 2007 Master Land Use Plan for Berrien Springs or the vision set out by the 2010 Master Plan for Oronoko Charter Township. • Existing zoning predetermines land use and is not very flexible for changing markets. • Existing zoning does not enable a very efficient use of land and infrastructure. In response, the Village and Township collaborated in securing the services of the Andrews University School of Architecture, Art & Design to conduct a public participatory process, to develop a proposed sub-area plan, and to propose recommended changes to the existing zoning ordinances. Beginning in August 2013, the team conducted a series of seven public meetings with property owners and stakeholders, and one internal meeting with community officials. The results of this process are presented within this report and are intended to be carried forward as outlined at the end of this document.https://digitalcommons.andrews.edu/arch-books/1006/thumbnail.jp

A Vision for Growth and Conservation in the Village of Berrien Springs & Oronoko Charter Township, Michigan

This document was prepared for the citizens of Berrien Springs and Oronoko Charter Township to inform public debate and policy decisions about opportunities for growth and conservation. The proposals within this document were self-initiated and unsolicited, but are intended to illustrate useful advice and long-term possibilities for actual implementation. They were collaboratively prepared in 2011 by twenty-six Andrews University graduate students and their three professors, who proudly live and practice within the local community.https://digitalcommons.andrews.edu/arch-books/1004/thumbnail.jp

INTSABA: A Mountain Home

The quality of the work in this book is all that was expected and more. This is the beginning of a journey that will impact all eSwatini. The Architecture School at Andrews University will remain a significant companion on this wonderful journey. We consider these children as Hope Seekers and our coffee table book about them shows the courage and ingenuity they display as they strive to survive. We are indeed all ‘hope seekers,’ except that we have options and they don’t. We praise God that there is now an open window to bring real hope to a population of children who need it most.https://digitalcommons.andrews.edu/books/1138/thumbnail.jp

Comprehensive analysis of the base composition around the transcription start site in Metazoa

BACKGROUND: The transcription start site of a metazoan gene remains poorly understood, mostly because there is no clear signal present in all genes. Now that several sequenced metazoan genomes have been annotated, we have been able to compare the base composition around the transcription start site for all annotated genes across multiple genomes. RESULTS: The most prominent feature in the base compositions is a significant local variation in G+C content over a large region around the transcription start site. The change is present in all animal phyla but the extent of variation is different between distinct classes of vertebrates, and the shape of the variation is completely different between vertebrates and arthropods. Furthermore, the height of the variation correlates with CpG frequencies in vertebrates but not in invertebrates and it also correlates with gene expression, especially in mammals. We also detect GC and AT skews in all clades (where %G is not equal to %C or %A is not equal to %T respectively) but these occur in a more confined region around the transcription start site and in the coding region. CONCLUSIONS: The dramatic changes in nucleotide composition in humans are a consequence of CpG nucleotide frequencies and of gene expression, the changes in Fugu could point to primordial CpG islands, and the changes in the fly are of a totally different kind and unrelated to dinucleotide frequencies