Drinks, Hijinks, and Policy Change: Fraternities at Gettysburg College in the Haaland Years (1990-2004)

This paper establishes what the fraternity structure was like at Gettysburg College during Gordon Haaland\u27s presidency. Between 1990 and 2004, we explore the roaring party dynamic that was continually threatened by the administration and examine how the switch to sophomore rush tried to tame it. With testimonies from fraternity brothers during this era we try to capture the good, bad, and ugly of fraternity life. While Haaland\u27s administration did not get ride of the fraternity system, it certainly made it safer and reigned it in significantly

A Tropic Understanding of Street Art as Political and Social Advocacy

Graffiti and street art has been prevalent in the past few decades taking stances toward social and political adversity, but there lacks discussion about how dialogue is provoked within street artwork. Through the detailed analysis of the visual display created by JR on the West Bank Wall, these paper places focus on the rhetorical function of how street artist utilize images as means for political and social advocacy. The display shifts the focus from trauma, dislocation, and victimhood to that of comedic relief in our “humanness”. The identification of tropes within a street art display indicates that they are in use, sometimes without thought, within the creation and exhibition of visual imagery and not just in verbal and written text. It’s unlikely that art can change the world, but if it evokes reflection then there’s hope for new dialogue and a change in perspectives of others and of the world around us

The Separate or Concurrent Effects of Methylphenidate and Alcohol on Acquisition and Retention of the Morris Water Maze in Adolescent Rats

Alcohol’s (A) capacity to impair learning and memory has been well documented in the Morris Water Maze (MWM) but few studies have examined methylphenidate’s (MPH) impact on MWM performance (Haidun et al., 2010; Zeise et al., 2007). Even fewer studies have evaluated concurrent administration of these two drugs in adolescent rats (see Markwiese, et al., 1998). This project used a rat model of adolescent drug use to examine individual effects of MPH and A, as well as polypharmacy interactions between MPH and A, on MWM spatial acquisition and retention. Thirty-two adolescent (P30) male Long-Evans hooded rats were used. Subjects were assigned to one of 4 conditions based on drug administered prior to 6 consecutive acquisition sessions. Animals received 2 i.p. injections prior to each session. The methylphenidate group (MPH+S) received 2 mg/kg MPH and 1 ml/kg saline solution (S), the alcohol group (A+S) received 2 g/kg ethanol and S, the methylphenidate and alcohol group (MPH+A) received both MPH and A, and the saline control group (S+S) received S injections. MPH was administered 50 mins prior to each session and A administered 20 mins prior to each session. Each session consisted of 4 trials and rats swam from one of four start locations (N,E,S,W) to a submerged platform in the NE quadrant. Trial duration was 60 seconds and rats remained on the platform for 10 secs. Performances were video recorded, and latency and swim accuracy scored. Whishaw Corridors established a direct swim path from start location to platform and an error was recorded when swim paths exited the corridor. On day 7, the submerged platform was removed and a single, 60 sec retention test was conducted with no drug administered prior to test. Amount of time spent swimming in the NE quadrant was analyzed to assess retention. Acquisition: Both dependent measures, latency and swim accuracy, yielded similar outcomes. Factorial ANOVAs and post hoc tests showed improvement across training sessions for all groups. Importantly, the MPH+A group was impaired relative to all other conditions, and the S+S group performed better than the A group. No significant differences were observed between S+S and MPH+S groups. Retention: A one-way ANOVA of swim time in the NE quadrant revealed longer swim times for the S+S group compared to the A+S group, and longer swim times for the MPH+S group compared to the A+S group. No other significant differences were observed. While all groups improved performance during acquisition, methylphenidate + alcohol compromised spatial learning, and alcohol alone impaired learning relative to controls. Interestingly, measures of retention indicated only alcohol diminished spatial memory in adolescent rats

Quality of life in people with Type 2 diabetes in relation to deprivation, gender, and age in a new community-based model of care

Objectives. To evaluate changes in health related quality of life (HRQL) for individuals with Type 2 diabetes following the introduction of a new community-based model of care. Methods. A survey method was used in which HRQL, Problems Areas In Diabetes (PAID) and demographics were assessed before and 18 months after introducing the new service. Results. Overall HRQL and PAID scores were lower than published levels in individuals with diabetes but remained stable during the transition to the new model of care except for the bodily pain domain and deteriorating PAID scores for older patients. Four domains of SF36 health showed deterioration in the highest socio-economic groups. Deterioration was also observed in males, most notably mental health, in patients aged 54 years or less, 75 years or more and patients from socio-economic groups 1 and 2. HRQL was lowest at baseline and follow-up in socio-economic groups 6 and 7. Low levels of distress in patients across all deprivation categories was observed but remained stable over the transition. Conclusions. HRQL and distress associated with diabetes remained stable following the introduction of the new community-based model of care except for deterioration in the bodily pain domain and deteriorating PAID scores for older patients. Relevance for Practice. (i) Health related quality of life assessment is practical and acceptable to patients. (ii) In clinical governance terms it is good practice to monitor the impact of change in service delivery on the health of the patients in your care. (iii) Screening with health related quality of life tools such as generic and disease specific tools could help identify health problems otherwise undetected within current clinical care. Systematic identification of the most vulnerable groups with Type 2 diabetes should allow care to be better targeted

The devil is in the detail: hints for practical optimisation

Finding the minimum of an objective function, such as a least squares or negative log-likelihood function, with respect to the unknown model parameters is a problem often encountered in econometrics. Consequently, students of econometrics and applied econometricians are usually well-grounded in the broad differences between the numerical procedures employed to solve these problems. Often, however, relatively little time is given to understanding the practical subtleties of implementing these schemes when faced with illbehaved problems. This paper addresses some of the details involved in practical optimisation, such as dealing with constraints on the parameters, specifying starting values, termination criteria and analytical gradients, and illustrates some of the general ideas with several instructive examples

Teaching an Old Dog New Tricks: Improved Estimation of the Parameters of Stochastic Differential Equations by Numerical Solution of the Fokker-Planck Equation

Many stochastic differential equations (SDEs) do not have readily available closed-form expressions for their transitional probability density functions (PDFs). As a result, a large number of competing estimation approaches have been proposed in order to obtain maximum-likelihood estimates of their parameters. Arguably the most straightforward of these is one in which the required estimates of the transitional PDF are obtained by numerical solution of the Fokker-Planck(or forward-Kolmogorov) partial differential equation. Despite the fact that this method produces accurate estimates and is completely generic, it has not proved popular in the applied literature. Perhaps this is attributable to the fact that this approach requires repeated solution of a parabolic partial differential equation to obtain the transitional PDF and is therefore computationally quite expensive. In this paper, three avenues for improving the reliability and speed of this estimation method are introduced and explored in the context of estimating the parameters of the popular Cox-Ingersoll-Ross and Ornstein-Uhlenbeck models. The recommended algorithm that emerges from this investigation is seen to offer substantial gains in reliability and computational time.stochastic di®erential equations, maximum likelihood, ¯nite di®erence, ¯nite element, cumulative

Markers of automaticity in sleep-associated consolidation of novel words

Two experiments investigated effects of sleep on consolidation and integration of novel form-meaning mappings using size congruity and semantic distance paradigms. Both paradigms have been used in previous studies to measure automatic access to word meanings. When participants compare semantic or physical font size of written word-pairs (e.g. BEE–COW), judgments are typically faster if relative sizes are congruent across both dimensions. Semantic distance effects are also found for wellestablished words, with semantic size judgements faster for pairs that differ substantially on this dimension. English-speaking participants learned novel form-meaning mappings with Mandarin (Experiment 1) or Malay (Experiment 2) words and were tested following overnight sleep or a similar duration awake. Judgements on English words controlled for circadian effects. The sleep group demonstrated selective stronger size congruity and semantic distance effects for novel word-pairs. This benefit occurred in Experiment 1 for semantic size comparisons of novel words, and in Experiment 2 on comparisons where novel pairs had large distances and font differences (for congruity effects) or in congruent trials (for semantic distance effects). Conversely, these effects were equivalent across sleep and wake for English words. Experiment 2 included polysomnography data and revealed that changes in the strength of semantic distance and congruity effects were positively correlated with slow-wave sleep and sleep spindles respectively. These findings support systems consolidation accounts of declarative learning and suggest that sleep plays an active role in integrating new words with existing knowledge, resulting in increased automatic access of the acquired knowledge

Perceptions of a service redesign by adults living with type 2 diabetes

<b>Aim:</b> This article is a report of a study conducted to explore the perceptions of adults with type 2 diabetes towards the service redesign. <b>Background:</b> Diabetes is reaching epidemic proportions and the management of this chronic illness is changing in response to this challenge. In the United Kingdom, there is ongoing restructuring of healthcare services for people with chronic illnesses to ensure that their general health and clinical needs are met predominantly in primary care. <b>Method:</b> An explorative qualitative approach was used. Eight focus groups were conducted with 35 people with type 2 diabetes in one urban location between 2003 and 2004. Five focus groups were conducted with people who had recently experienced the restructured service and three groups with people who had up to 2 years' experience of the new service. Concurrent data collection and thematic analysis were conducted by three researchers and credibility and verification sought by feedback to participants. <b>Findings:</b> Five main themes were identified: impact of living with diabetes; understanding diabetes; drivers for organizational change; care in context and individual concerns. Participants identified issues for ongoing development of the service. <b>Conclusion:</b> People with type 2 diabetes appreciate their care management within the primary care setting where there has been investment in staff to deliver this care. Healthcare resources are required to support the development of staff and the necessary infrastructure to undertake management in primary care. Policy makers need to address the balance of resources between primary and secondary care