Changing the Kindergarten Cutoff Date: Effects on California Students and Schools

Summarizes a review of research on how raising the kindergarten entry age affects elementary- and middle-school test scores; achievement gaps between subgroups; grade retention, high school graduation, and college enrollment rates; and wages as adults

Early Grade Retention and Student Success: Evidence From Los Angeles

Analyzes risk factors of retention through third grade in the L.A. Unified School District, including age, gender, race/ethnicity, family income, and English learner status; retention's effectiveness in improving grade-level skills; and educators' views

Transgressions and expressions: Affective facial muscle activity predicts moral judgments

Recent investigations into morality suggest that affective responses may precede moral judgments. The present study investigated, first, whether individuals show specific facial affect in response to moral behaviors and, second, whether the intensity of facial affect predicts subsequent moral judgments. Muscle activity relating to disgust (levator labii), anger (corrugator supercilii), and positive affect (zygomaticus major) was recorded while participants considered third-person statements describing good and bad behaviors across five foundations of morality (purity, fairness, harm, authority, and ingroup). Facial disgust was highest in response to purity violations, followed by fairness violations. In contrast, harm violations evoked anger expressions. Importantly, the extremity of subsequent moral judgments was predicted by facial affect, such that judgments about purity and fairness correlated with facial disgust, harm correlated with facial anger, and ingroup correlated with positive facial affect. These results demonstrate that individuals spontaneously exhibit domain-specific moral affect that allows inferences about their moral judgments. </jats:p

Preschool and School Readiness: Experiences of Children With Non-English-Speaking Parents

Examines gaps in school readiness among low-income children, especially those in immigrant and linguistically isolated families; the type of early care and education they receive; and the need for targeted center-based preschool programs to close gaps

Full-Day Kindergarten in California: Lessons From Los Angeles

Analyzes the impact of full-day kindergarten on academic, grade retention, and English fluency outcomes through second grade by school and student characteristics, with a focus on the economically disadvantaged and English learners. Outlines implications

The mass and dynamical state of Abell 2218

Abell 2218 is one of a handful of clusters in which X-ray and lensing analyses of the cluster mass are in strong disagreement. It is also a system for which X-ray data and radio measurements of the Sunyaev-Zel'dovich decrement have been combined in an attempt to constrain the Hubble constant. However, in the absence of reliable information on the temperature structure of the intracluster gas, most analyses have been carried out under the assumption of isothermality. We combine X-ray data from the ROSAT PSPC and the ASCA GIS instruments, enabling us to fit non-isothermal models, and investigate the impact that this has on the X-ray derived mass and the predicted Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect. We find that a strongly non-isothermal model for the intracluster gas, which implies a central cusp in the cluster mass distribution, is consistent with the available X-ray data and compatible with the lensing results. At r<1 arcmin, there is strong evidence to suggest that the cluster departs from a simple relaxed model. We analyse the dynamics of the galaxies and find that the central galaxy velocity dispersion is too high to allow a physical solution for the galaxy orbits. The quality of the radio and X-ray data do not at present allow very restrictive constraints to be placed on H_0. It is apparent that earlier analyses have under-estimated the uncertainties involved. However, values greater than 50 km/s/Mpc are preferred when lensing constraints are taken into account.Comment: 16 pages, 9 postscript figures, accepted for publication in MNRA

Definition, technology readiness, and development cost of the orbit transfer vehicle engine integrated control and health monitoring system elements

An Integrated Control and Health Monitoring (ICHM) system was conceived for use on a 20 Klb thrust baseline Orbit Transfer Vehicle (OTV) engine. Considered for space used, the ICHM was defined for reusability requirements for an OTV engine service free life of 20 missions, with 100 starts and a total engine operational time of 4 hours. Functions were derived by flowing down requirements from NASA guidelines, previous OTV engine or ICHM documents, and related contracts. The elements of an ICHM were identified and listed, and these elements were described in sufficient detail to allow estimation of their technology readiness levels. These elements were assessed in terms of technology readiness level, and supporting rationale for these assessments presented. The remaining cost for development of a minimal ICHM system to technology readiness level 6 was estimated. The estimates are within an accuracy range of minus/plus 20 percent. The cost estimates cover what is needed to prepare an ICHM system for use on a focussed testbed for an expander cycle engine, excluding support to the actual test firings