Ministerial Education Councils’ Capacity for Policy Decision-Making in Canada, Germany, and Switzerland: Finding a Balanced Perspective

Scholars have become increasingly vigilant about leaders, the role of government and wider governance bodies, and their influence on education policy. Councils in Europe and North America, generally, and education councils, specifically, are good examples of influential bodies whose decision-making processes have rightfully come under scrutiny; however, many scholarly assessments have been characterized by rhetorical claims that focus on these bodies’ limited ability to make decisions and address social challenges. This article details a qualitative, comparative case study conducted in 2018 that investigated how Councils of Ministers of Education in Canada, Germany, and Switzerland address national educational issues of collective interest. The resulting dataset is comprehensive, and this research invites colleagues to refine or rethink some of their limiting rhetorical tools and underlying assumptions

The Expense Tied to Secondary Course Failure: The case of Ontario

This article describes a study that examined the volume of secondary course failure and its direct budget impact on Ontario’s K–12 public education system. The study employed a straightforward, descriptive accounting method to estimate the annual expenditure tied to secondary course failure, taking into account some factors known to be systemically related (e.g., grade level, subject area, additional services received). Other studies have used secondary dropouts as the measure of failure and estimated the private or public costs; this study focused on the direct budget impact of secondary course failures on districts and the school system. In the 2008–2009 year, there were approximately 5,082,543 secondary course attempts across 70 school boards in Ontario: 4,682,535 were completed successfully (passed) and 400,008 were unsuccessfully completed (failed). I estimated the total level of expenditure tied to failure for Ontario’s public education system to be $472,729,698, or 7.7% of total instructional and operational spending. My findings point to practical applications that could help district and system leaders in their work to drive positive educational outcomes. I also provide a methodological framework for thinking about levels of expenditure tied to secondary course failure at the system and school board levels. Currently no such framework exists in the public realm

The effect of long-term water level drawdown on the vegetation composition and CO2 fluxes of a boreal peatland in central Finland

Cette étude a permis d’acquérir une meilleure compréhension des implications potentielles du réchauffement climatique sur les tourbières dominées par les sphaignes. Le drainage d’une partie de la tourbière a débuté il y a 55 ans. La composition végétale des parties naturelle et drainée a été comparée à l’aide de six transects et analysée par des techniques d’ordination. Les flux de CO2 ont été mesurés durant la saison de croissance sur un transect de la partie drainée et modélisés. En réponse au drainage, la composition végétale a changé et ce n’était pas relié au gradient naturel centre-bordure. Dans la partie humide du transect (éloigné du canal de drainage), la photosynthèse et la respiration totale ont diminué. La captation du CO2 y était légèrement moins élevée que dans la partie sèche. Cette étude suggère que les effets des changements climatiques seraient atténués par un changement des communautés végétales.This study is providing a better understanding of the potential implications of the global climatic warming on Sphagnum dominated peatlands. The drainage of a part of the peatland began 55 years ago. Vegetation composition of the drained and natural areas was compared along six transects and analysed by ordination techniques. CO2 fluxes were measured during the growing season on one transect of the drained area and inferred by modelling. In response to drainage, vegetation composition changed and it was not related to a natural mire margin-mire expanse gradient. In the wetter part of the transect (far from the drainage ditch), gross photosynthesis and total respiration decreased. There was also slightly less CO2 sequestration than in the drier part. This study suggests for Sphagnum dominated peatlands that the effect of climate change might be reduced by a change of vegetation communities

A Practical Resource for the Social Sciences: A Book Review of Bruce Friedman’s The Research Toolkit - Problem Solving Processes for the Social Sciences

Bruce D. Friedman provides an invaluable resource for social science researchers and practitioners to add to their “toolkit.” This book provides practical and straightforward guidance for understanding and conducting qualitative and quantitative research. As a social science researcher, sessional instructor, and doctoral student, reading this book answered important questions I had regarding the research process and implications of social science research. This review will discuss the primary tenets of the book as well as the relevance of this toolkit for student-researchers

Is the Contralateral Delay Activity (CDA) a robust neural correlate for Visual Working Memory (VWM) tasks? A reproducibility study

Visual working memory (VWM) allows us to actively store, update and manipulate visual information surrounding us. While the underlying neural mechanisms of VWM remain unclear, contralateral delay activity (CDA), a sustained negativity over the hemisphere contralateral to the positions of visual items to be remembered, is often used to study VWM. To investigate if the CDA is a robust neural correlate for VWM tasks, we reproduced eight CDA-related studies with a publicly accessible EEG dataset. We used the raw EEG data from these eight studies and analyzed all of them with the same basic pipeline to extract CDA. We were able to reproduce the results from all the studies and show that with a basic automated EEG pipeline we can extract a clear CDA signal. We share insights from the trends observed across the studies and raise some questions about the CDA decay and the CDA during the recall phase, which surprisingly, none of the eight studies did address. Finally, we also provide reproducibility recommendations based on our experience and challenges in reproducing these studies

Superintendents’ Work (Intensification) in a Shifting Policy Climate: Enacting a Student Discipline Strategy

In this case narrative, senior superintendents reckon with the challenges of implementing a revised strategic policy for student discipline in an intensified work environment. Challenges include: (a) providing professional learning to familiarize leaders and educators with regulatory requirements; (b) a problematic trend of school and district leaders avoiding long-term suspensions; (c) the disproportionate number of minoritized students who are suspended/expelled; and (d) securing the resources needed to realize the punitive and preventative elements of the strategy. The case description is followed by three exercises— case framing, reflective practice, and action plan—that instructors can use in graduate-level courses and professional development workshops

Photoviscous technique development. Volume I - Theory and experiments

Photoviscuous technique for fluid flow studies - theory and experiment