Is The Black Male College Graduate becoming an Endangered Species? A Multi-Case Analysis of the Attrition of Black Males in Higher Education

The purpose of this study was to examine how some black college students survived the phenomenon of low graduation rates, also known as attrition, occurring among black male students attending colleges in the state of California. Current research indicated that this phenomenon is a nationwide issue. The gap between black male college students and none-minority college students is significant and an indication of either discriminatory practices or inefficiencies within the system. This multiple case study involved a series of semi-structured interviews and field observation over a three month time-frame. The data was coded and triangulated. The findings pointed to several psycho-social factors that supported our framework of Social Network Theory and Resiliency Theory

Examining Culturally Relevant Leadership Best Practices in Different Educational Environments

Though culturally relevant educational leadership has been practiced for more than 20 years, marginalized students from culturally diverse communities continue to be underserved. Additionally, other educational programs outside of traditional K-12 school environments are far less likely to have educational administrators who have any experience or training in culturally relevant leadership, begging the question, “Do we really understand what effective culturally relevant leadership best practices are, and if so, how can we improve them in all educational settings, and not just K-12 education?” This research project focuses on answering the following questions: 1.) What best practices are utilized by culturally relevant educational administrators?; 2.) What best practices are utilized by culturally relevant educational administrators who come from different cultural or racial backgrounds?; and 3.) What best practices are utilized by culturally relevant administrators from different types of educational institutions or environments? A qualitative multiple-case study design was utilized to explore the best practices of four randomly selected educational administrators in California, from different cultural backgrounds and from different school environments, with considerable experience and success in teaching and educational administration. Results from the study indicate that despite some differences in their approaches and their respective educational programs, there were common factors that were instrumental in the record of success experienced by these research participants. Key among these factors were (I.) Positive Relationships with the local community; (II.) Principal or Administrative Mentoring Programs; and (III.) Shared Decision Making. These, and other factors were vital for professional development, improved student academic performance, retention, and engagement, especially for marginalized populations in culturally diverse schools

Pressure groups and government policy on education, 1800 - 1839.

This study examines the roles of the principal groups and individuals, who, during the years 1800-1839, promoted the education of the poor and pressurised governments with the notion that the state ought to ac ept responsibility for the formation of a nationa1 system. Their m tives were primarily religious, philanthropic or political with a degree of self-interest in the desire to preserve order in society. The religious interests are examined mainly through the work of the British and Foreign Sch ol Society, which served the Dissenter traditi ns, and the Nati nal S ciety which defended the prerogative of the Establi h d Church t superintend the education of the people. The tilitarians and Radicals were imp rtant for the practica1 expression f their philos phical and political ideas led them to make a considerable c ntributi n to the provision schools. They also had the inspiration and organising ability of Jam s Mill and Francis Place. The ideas of Robert Owen are considered because he was a pressure figure for a few years, but his work also sowed the seeds of Co-operation and w rking-cla s movements, which made an impact during the 1830's. As the populati n slowly improved in standard of learning, the development of Mechanics' Institutes, the Society for the Difflision of Useful Knowledge and the foundation of University College are viewed as part of a strategy for the general promotion of adult education1 The dominant personality of Henry Brougham is evident in much of this study. He instituted the Charity Commissions in 1819, was spokesman (iv) for education in Parliament for many years, anj was a link between the different groups because of his involvement in so many. During the 1830's the new science of statistics emerged and the Statistical Societies were important for their presentation of data on education1 The existence of a National Board of Education in Ireland after 1831 placed the province ahead of England and the influences from this experiment, mediated to Parliament by Thomas Wyse and others, all helped to pressurise the governments of the day, whose policy had been to encourage voluntary effort and to avoid the imposition of central administrative control

PSM Lite?

PresentationWe all agree on the common stance that no one in any industry desires the occurrence of an accident. This belief is a common premise no matter what respective industry one may work in or for. A serious fire, a permanent injury, toxic release or the fatality of an employee or owner can cause the loss of profit, reputation or even an entire business. Even if you are not a facility or small company that manages Highly Hazardous Chemicals and happen to fall under the OSHA Process Safety Management or EPA Risk Management Program, you still want to prevent such losses. One may not have a major budget to implement extravagantly structured safety, health and compliance management systems that may bring success but are very expensive to maintain for smaller or midsize facilities. [3] You do, however, need to understand your risks and apply recognized EHS measures to mitigate and manage those risks. The OSHA PSM regulatory standard prescribes fourteen explicit elements that are required to be in place for manufacturing facilities that fall under the standard. To many smaller or mid-sized, moderately regulated (or non-regulated) manufacturing sites, OSHAs PSM standard might not be a logical or realistic fit unless you are in a facility that works with or around highly hazardous chemicals (HHCs) [5]. However, it would be a very tremendous mistake to think that there are no parts of the OSHA PSM standard or guideline that do not apply to these in some way, shape or form. In addition, many if not most, of the activities performed by maintenance, construction and engineering groups at small non-regulated or non-chemical facilities are governed and regulated by the same industry codes and standards required for larger OSHA PSM facilities. The only real difference may be in the level and degree of risk, documentation and resources required to maintain the programs. However, in the eyes of this presenter, it wouldn’t be a bad practice to document your activities as if you were under the watchful eyes of OSHA through a PSM program [6]

The communication of strategic plans for diversity and inclusion in academic medicine: a mixed-methods study

OBJECTIVE: To characterize the use of strategic planning for diversity and inclusion in AAMC-member U.S. medical schools and its relation to underrepresented minority (URM) faculty. METHODS: We examined websites of 118 institutions for strategic plans to improve faculty diversity. Race/ethnicity data from the AAMC Faculty Roster were used to stratify schools into higher or lower/no increase in URM faculty (1998 to 2015). We searched for an association between these plans and change in URM faculty. We conducted qualitative sub-analyses of the most recent plans of institutions that expressed goals for faculty diversity. Analyses involved a modified-grounded theory approach, using a priori codes informed by an AAMC guide and a data-driven, constant comparison method. Plans were stratified into two groups by higher or lower URM faculty in 2015. Larger themes based on both a priori and emergent codes were identified. Sub-analyses for associations between AAMC Guide Adherence and URM faculty were conducted. RESULTS: Most institutions (72%) had plans for faculty diversity. There was no association between URM faculty change and a goal for faculty diversity (p=0.43) or plan duration (p=0.64). Qualitatively, four themes were accordant with effective strategic planning principles. Four emergent themes in both high and low URM groups reflected novel issues, two occurred in the low URM group, and one in the high URM group. Quantitative sub-analyses found no association between Guide Adherence and URM status (p= 0.86). CONCLUSION: Despite general adherence to best practices, strategic plans for diversity and inclusion are not associated with URM faculty presence or change.2019-06-09T00:00:00

Strengthening policy capability: New Zealand's Policy Project

Policy practitioners apply tools and frameworks to policy chal- lenges in order to improve social, economic, and environmental outcomes. Could such tools and frameworks be applied to improve the quality of policy design itself? In 2014, prompted by evidence of widespread inconsistency in the quality of policy advice being produced across agencies, the New Zealand Government launched the Policy Project. It deployed policy ana- lytic tools and frameworks to investigate current practice in policy design to improve the quality of policy advice across the whole of government. Through collaborative methods, the Policy Project identified and codified what quality policy advice looks like and the skills and processes needed to produce it. We review the con- text and creation of the Policy Project, its contributions, evidence of its impacts, and prospects for its replication across other public sectors

Colourings of planar quasicrystals

The investigation of colour symmetries for periodic and aperiodic systems consists of two steps. The first concerns the computation of the possible numbers of colours and is mainly combinatorial in nature. The second is algebraic and determines the actual colour symmetry groups. Continuing previous work, we present the results of the combinatorial part for planar patterns with n-fold symmetry, where n=7,9,15,16,20,24. This completes the cases with values of n such that Euler's totient function of n is less than or equal to eight.Comment: Talk presented by Max Scheffer at Quasicrystals 2001, Sendai (September 2001). 6 pages, including two colour figure

A survey of emerging architectural techniques for improving cache energy consumption

The search goes on for another ground breaking phenomenon to reduce the ever-increasing disparity between the CPU performance and storage. There are encouraging breakthroughs in enhancing CPU performance through fabrication technologies and changes in chip designs but not as much luck has been struck with regards to the computer storage resulting in material negative system performance. A lot of research effort has been put on finding techniques that can improve the energy efficiency of cache architectures. This work is a survey of energy saving techniques which are grouped on whether they save the dynamic energy, leakage energy or both. Needless to mention, the aim of this work is to compile a quick reference guide of energy saving techniques from 2013 to 2016 for engineers, researchers and students