A Challenge for the Next Decade: Preserving Affordable Rental Housing

Many of Maine’s low-income families and elderly residents have been able to secure affordable housing with help from a Section 8 certificate, which allows residents to pay no more than 30 percent of their income toward rent and ensures the federal government will make up the difference. Over the years, much of the development of Section 8 housing projects has been assisted by financial incentives and agreements between private and non-profit owners and the federal government. Yet recent changes in federal legislation remove many of these incentives and the agreements that go with them. As a result, some of Maine’s affordable housing supply may disappear as private owners convert their properties to market-rate rental housing. Laura Burns outlines the recent changes in federal legislation and discusses their potential impact on Maine’s communities. Currently in Maine, there are 3,500 assisted rental apartments with Section 8 contracts scheduled to expire in the next five years. Without any incentives to renew, the owners of these projects face the economic decision of whether to continue to provide affordable housing without any of the incentives or guarantees that previously existed, or to convert their properties to market rate. Burns argues that local and state officials must do what they can now to keep the state’s already scarce supply of affordable housing in place

Searching for Balance: The Reading Choices, Experiences, and Habits of Women in Higher Education Leadership Roles

Women in higher education leadership roles face complicated challenges in their professional roles, and struggle to maintain work-life balance, yet they make time to read for professional development and for pleasure. Utilizing grounded theory methodology, focus group methods, and grounded theory coding, this study examines the reading choices and habits of women in higher education leadership roles, delving into how they balance their reading between material tied to their professional interests and leisure reading material, and to what extent reading for pleasure contributes to their work-life balance. The study explores what reading materials women academic leaders consume, and where they acquire reading recommendations. The study also examines whether women had an early love of reading and when that began, and follows their reading choices and habits through K-12, college, graduate school, and their present lives. In addition, the study explores how reading has impacted women throughout their personal and professional lives, and how it has contributed to their current higher education leadership roles. Suggestions will be made regarding changes that can be implemented in curricula to better support and prepare young women to attain leadership positions and lead balanced lives once in these roles

An exploratory investigation of third graders\u27 perceptions of bullying

The purpose of this study is to investigate students\u27 views regarding a variety of topics related to bullying. Different methods were used to gather information regarding the students\u27 opinions. The students shared their ideas through the use of surveys, writing samples, and interviews. This study\u27s results determined students\u27 beliefs about bullying as well as their awareness of its occurrence. Students were able to provide accurate definitions of bullying. Students were also able to discuss several appropriate ways to react to bullying. Results of this study contribute more to the understanding of students\u27 perspectives about the topic of bullying in the school setting

A Legacy of Leadership and Support for Grassroots Grantmaking: A Retrospective Assessment of the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation's Community Foundations and Neighborhoods Small Grants Program

Provides a retrospective evaluation of the Mott Foundation's Community Foundations and Neighborhood Small Grants Program, and looks at common factors that contribute to the sustainability of small grant programs

Advancing Supervision in Clinically-Based Teacher Education

For this special issue, Advancing Supervision in Clinically-Based Teacher Education, we invited conceptual papers, empirical research studies, descriptive narratives, and evaluations of supervision from faculty, emerging scholars, professionals, and practitioners situated in teacher preparation contexts. The papers included illuminate how supervision in clinical teacher education is being improved, studied, or developed

Culture and motivation in English for hospitality students: Why integrative motivation may be essential

Hospitality students are the future negotiators of cultural interaction in our field, and how they imagine culture through their language studies is important. In particular, cultural concepts form an essential part of their motivation to learn a foreign language, in so far as it indicates their willingness to integrate into another culture, as Gardner (1960; 2007) and Dörnyei (2001;1994) have demonstrated. In fact, this integrative motivation has been recognized as one of the key elements for a successful learning outcome in languages. Our research explores whether integrative motivation is ubiquitous in the English for hospitality classroom. In a study with 51 adult English for Hospitality students, it found that students saw culture as malleable and showed a mixed motivational orientation. Based on these findings, some relevant curriculum implications are discussed. Apart from having the necessary practical skills required in the industry, hospitality students and workers also need to be effective communicators by understanding the roots of cultural awareness and the possibility of having more than one cultural identity

Comparative Language Learning Beliefs: Why Aptitude Matters

Language Learning Beliefs (LLB) are an important area for foreign and second language learning research that has grown considerably over the last decade, and which spans multi-disciplinary fields across education, linguistics and psychology (Martínez Agudo, 2014). These beliefs have become more important as they affect motivation and perhaps even language learning strategies (Zare-ee, 2010), though more research must be done in the latter area (Martínez Agudo, 2014). One understudied branch of LLB is that of language aptitude. Beliefs concerning language aptitude are not new, given that they appeared as a staple area of Horwitz’s seminal research for the BALLI questionnaire (Beliefs About Language Learning Inventory) (1987). However, beliefs on language aptitude need to be revisited given the multiple studies in social psychology on how beliefs affect learning when considering a given quality as innate or learned (Dweck, 2014). These studies show how believing intelligence to be fixed or incremental has a variety of consequences for learners that are fundamental for their long-term success in the classroom. Our aim in this paper is to merge these pertinent concepts to the foreign language classroom, in particular because the belief that intelligence is fixed or incremental mirrors the long-standing debate over language aptitude as innate or learned

Making them talk: examining students`willingness to communicate in an EMI class environtment through instrumental motivation

Objective: Communicative language teaching (CLT) is an approach that emphasizes an active interaction in the classroom, including the practice of productive skills like interactive speaking, a skill that is particularly important in EMI classes. In this paper, we evaluated the effect of a continuous evaluation system based on receiving points for speaking in the second language in class, which offered a more instrumental motivation, and its relationship to students’ perceived willingness to communicate (WTC) in affective, cognitive and behavioral components. Methodology. Once the points system was in place, it was used to encourage students to improve their fluency by participating in class in English, avoiding Spanish. When the course finished, a questionnaire examined their perceptions of the system and how it affected their English use in class. Results. Our results indicated a high percentage of students, 81%,who evaluated the system positively overall and who would want to continue it in the future, though lower levels of agreement were seen when looking at comfort and enjoyment. Finally, the qualitative results echo this data while offering more nuance on how the system affects students WTC. Conclusions: We conclude that the system was positive for students’ perceptions of their WTC, despite it being an instrumental motivation that looks toward a more extrinsic orientation. Originality. Our work explores the value of a positive reinforcement system that can push students to be more active about their foreign language use in class and explores an understudied area in foreign language teaching, instrumental motivation to improve students’ willingness to communicate.Objetivo: La enseñanza comunicativa del lenguaje (CLT) es un enfoque que enfatiza una interacción activa en el aula, incluida la práctica de habilidades productivas como el habla interactiva, una habilidad que es particularmente importante en las clases de EMI. En este trabajo evaluamos el efecto de un sistema de evaluación continua basado en la obtención de puntos por hablar en la segunda lengua en clase, que ofrecía una motivación más instrumental, y su relación con la disposición percibida para comunicarse (WTC) de los estudiantes en los aspectos afectivo, cognitivo y componentes conductuales. Metodología. Una vez que se implementó el sistema de puntos, se utilizó para alentar a los estudiantes a mejorar su fluidez participando en clase en inglés, evitando el español. Cuando terminó el curso, un cuestionario examinó sus percepciones del sistema y cómo afectó su uso del inglés en clase. Resultados. Nuestros resultados indicaron un alto porcentaje de estudiantes, 81%, que evaluaron positivamente el sistema en general y que querrían continuarlo en el futuro, aunque se observaron niveles más bajos de acuerdo en cuanto a la comodidad y el disfrute. Finalmente, los resultados cualitativos hacen eco de estos datos al tiempo que ofrecen más matices sobre cómo el sistema afecta a los estudiantes de WTC. Conclusiones: Concluimos que el sistema fue positivo para las percepciones de los estudiantes sobre su WTC, a pesar de ser una motivación instrumental que mira hacia una orientación más extrínseca. Originalidad. Nuestro trabajo explora el valor de un sistema de refuerzo positivo que puede empujar a los estudiantes a ser más activos en el uso de la lengua extranjera en clase y explora un área poco estudiada en la enseñanza de lenguas extranjeras, la motivación instrumental para mejorar la disposición de los estudiantes a comunicarse