Curriculum guide:mental health and distress

Good mental health has been defined as ‘a state of wellbeing in which the individual realises his or her own abilities, can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and fruitfully, and is able to make a contribution to his or her community’ (WHO (2010)). Social work aims to promote ‘social change, problem solving in human relationships and the empowerment and liberation of people to enhance wellbeing’ (www.ifsw.org). This guide is intended for social work educators tasked with delivering teaching on mental health, for those teaching other areas to think how issues of mental health and distress intersect, and for course directors

Predictive climate signals

Presented at Irrigated agriculture responds to water use challenges - strategies for success: USCID water management conference held on April 3-6, 2012 in Austin, Texas.Includes bibliographical references.The Highland Lakes are operated by the Lower Colorado River Authority (LCRA) in Texas to provide water supply to municipal, industrial, agricultural users and environmental flows for the river and Matagorda Bay. The Highland Lakes also provide for hydroelectric generation and recreation. The catchment area is in the Texas Hill Country, a region classified as the Edwards Plateau. Subject to extended droughts interrupted by intense rainfall, the region has the nickname of Flash Flood Alley. Precipitation in the region is understood to be influenced by oceanic conditions in the Pacific, Atlantic, and Gulf of Mexico. While the behavior of these global climate patterns is climatologically understood, finding strong skill in prediction of streamflows has been challenging. Identifying concurrent teleconnections, and to a lesser extend lagging indicators, is a critical first step for finding potential for predictors. Research efforts have often focused on predicting rainfall or climatic indexes. However, surface water managers need to relate predictions to streamflows. Climate indices can also be useful if they are hindcasted, enabling for relationships to the streamflow record to be established. Persistence is one of the strongest predictive indicators in the region, primarily through the winter season. Persistence is useful in short term predictions because it directly relates to streamflows and indirectly is influenced by teleconnection patterns. Therefore explicitly considering teleconnection patterns adds less incremental short term skill but potential benefit for longer term prediction. Use of persistence and ENSO forecasts are currently being used in water supply forecasts at the LCRA

Palmer amaranth: It’s here, now what?

Palmer amaranth and waterhemp are two dioecious pigweed species native to North America. Waterhemp’s original range was the western Corn Belt, including Iowa, whereas Palmer amaranth originally inhabited the southwestern United States. Palmer amaranth began to spread to the southeastern United States early in the 20th century but was not listed among the most troublesome weeds of the Southeast until the late 1980s. Interestingly, this is the same time frame that waterhemp emerged as a serious management issue in Iowa and surrounding states. This paper will review the history of Palmer amaranth in Iowa, factors that contribute to its weediness, and management considerations

How should we measure indigenous entrepreneurship? A search for explanatory variables

In Canada and elsewhere around the world Indigenous Peoples are struggling to rebuild their &lsquo;nations&rsquo; and improve the socioeconomic circumstances of their people. We are embarking on a program of research in an effort to understand this phenomenon and to inform the process. In this paper we (i) explore the approach to development being adopted by Indigenous people in Canada; (ii) conduct a preliminary literature review; (iii) identify input indicators of entrepreneurship and business development capacity, process measures of development activity and an output indicator of development effectiveness and (v) identify the information available from secondary sources relating to these indicators and the gaps in information that will have to be filled by primary research.<br /

The Maine Annex, vol. 1, Extra

The Maine Annex, published by the students of the University of Maine at the Brunswick Campus, was launched January 10, 1947. Editors introduced the publication as the product of a group of progressive students attending the Brunswick Campus. The goal of the publication, according to editors, was to tell the story of our life on this campus. The four-page, tabloid-sized paper included display advertising from area businesses. Following World War II, the federal G.I. Bill enabled approximately 2.3 million, predominantly white male Veterans to receive a post-secondary education. To accommodate increased enrollment, in 1946 the University of Maine established the Brunswick Campus at the former Brunswick Naval Air Station. The remote campus operated until spring 1949, when Veteran registrations waned. This two-page Extra edition of The Maine Annex features several stories related to the launch of the fund drive to build the Memorial Union on the University of Maine, Orono campus with fundraising goal of $21,000 for the Brunswick campus. Student donations from the Orono launch event netted an estimated$94,000. Where the Memorial Gymnasium was constructed as a tribute to World War I war dead among the Alumni, the Memorial Union was to serve as a tribute to 175 UMaine Alumni who died in World War II