NOU Spring Field Days and Annual Meeting, Kimball, May 20–22, 2016

The annual meeting of the Nebraska Ornithologists\u27 Union was held at the Kimball Event Center on May 20–22, 2016, and was organized by Robin Harding and Betty Grenon. Although it was a long drive for most, 75 birders attended, including guests from Iowa, South Dakota, Wyoming, Colorado, and Arkansas. On Friday evening, President Dan Leger presented a Michael Forsberg photograph of Burrowing Owls to Betty Grenon in appreciation for her many years of service as Treasurer. The evening program continued with a presentation by Angela Dwyer and Larry Snyder of the Bird Conservancy of the Rockies, formerly known as the Rocky Mountain Bird Observatory. The Bird Conservancy and Nebraska Prairie Partners are responsible for implementing the Mountain Plover nest protection program. They began counting Mountain Plovers in 2001 and later created a nest incentive program with modest payments to landowners who are willing to have plover nests in their agricultural fields marked with stakes to prevent tillage of that area of the field. Approximately 5% of the total population of 12,500 Mountain Plovers nests in Nebraska and the species is listed as Near Threatened by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. The birds often construct two nest scrapes. The female lays a clutch of eggs in one, leaves the male to incubate that one, and then goes on to lay another clutch in the second scrape, which she then incubates. Field trips on Saturday and Sunday morning were led by Kathy DeLara, Bill Flack, Dave Heidt, Wayne Mollhoff, and Don and Janis Paseka. Destinations included Gotte Park in Kimball, Oliver Reservoir, Bushnell, I-80 Exit 1, the Pine Bluffs area in Wyoming, Mountain Plover nests south of Kimball, Golden Eagle nest south of Potter, Hackberry Canyon, Pumpkin Creek, Wildcat Hills State Recreation Area, Scottsbluff sewage lagoons, and Wright\u27s Gap Road. Total species count for the weekend meeting was 156

Complete Wiener-Hopf Solution of the X-Ray Edge Problem

We present a complete solution of the soft x-ray edge problem within a field-theoretic approach based on the Wiener-Hopf infinite-time technique. We derive for the first time within this approach critical asymptotics of all the relevant quantities for the x-ray problem as well as their nonuniversal prefactors. Thereby we obtain the most complete field-theoretic solution of the problem with a number of new experimentally relevant results. We make thorough comparison of the proposed Wiener-Hopf technique with other approaches based on finite-time methods. It is proven that the Fredholm, finite-time solution converges smoothly to the Wiener-Hopf one and that the latter is stable with respect to perturbations in the long-time limit. Further on we disclose a wide interval of intermediate times showing quasicritical behavior deviating from the Wiener-Hopf one. The quasicritical behavior of the core-hole Green function is derived exactly from the Wiener-Hopf solution and the quasicritical exponent is shown to match the result of Nozi\`eres and De Dominicis. The reasons for the quasicritical behavior and the way of a crossover to the infinite-time solution are expounded and the physical relevance of the Nozi\`eres and De Dominicis as well as of the Winer-Hopf results are discussed.Comment: 19 pages, RevTex, no figure

How do school counselling and therapy services undertake participation activities in a way that meets the ethical requirements of therapeutic practice?

This study explores how organisations providing counselling and therapy services within schools undertake participation activities, and the ways in which ethical considerations might have affected the choice of methods. It primarily focuses on the participation of children and young people in improving the quality of services. The research aimed to gather potential models of involving children and young people in the development of services. Two semi-structured interviews and one focus group took place, gathering data from five services providing therapeutic services in schools in London or the South East. The research found that while participative practice is inherent in the day-to-day delivery of therapy and counselling, it is still in development at an organisational level. The need for standardisation of approach at an organisational level clashed with the therapist and counsellors’ need to consider an ethical approach and the individual needs of clients. Specific challenges related to collecting the views of young children were noted in the interviews.The study concludes that devising a prescriptive approach that is delivered identically in every case is not appropriate. Every method used must be differentiated for different ages and developmental stages, and a level of flexibility in its implementation must be allowed. This flexibility will allow the therapist or counsellor to adapt the approach in situations where its delivery may conflict with ethical principles