Developments in GRworkbench

The software tool GRworkbench is an ongoing project in visual, numerical General Relativity at The Australian National University. Recently, GRworkbench has been significantly extended to facilitate numerical experimentation in analytically-defined space-times. The numerical differential geometric engine has been rewritten using functional programming techniques, enabling objects which are normally defined as functions in the formalism of differential geometry and General Relativity to be directly represented as function variables in the C++ code of GRworkbench. The new functional differential geometric engine allows for more accurate and efficient visualisation of objects in space-times and makes new, efficient computational techniques available. Motivated by the desire to investigate a recent scientific claim using GRworkbench, new tools for numerical experimentation have been implemented, allowing for the simulation of complex physical situations.Comment: 14 pages. To appear A. Moylan, S.M. Scott and A.C. Searle, Developments in GRworkbench. Proceedings of the Tenth Marcel Grossmann Meeting on General Relativity, editors M. Novello, S. Perez-Bergliaffa and R. Ruffini. Singapore: World Scientific 200

A critical examination of Australian police peacekeepers navigating ethics, human rights, structure, and agency in Timor-Leste and the Solomon Islands

Since 1964 Australia has sent police officers on peacekeeping and capacity building missions to almost every continent. In particular, Australia’s geopolitical interests in the Asia-Pacific have contributed to involvement in major long-term missions in Timor-Leste and the Solomon Islands and the creation of the International Deployment Group as a permanent arm for deploying Australian police internationally. However, as is the case with domestic policing, the complex moral dilemmas experienced by police, and the subsequent implications for human rights, are evident. Current research into police peacekeeping has shown that donor police in post-conflict societies have been implicated in a range of moral and human rights breaches suggesting that peacekeepers have on occasion failed to uphold their obligations to ethical practice and human rights maintenance. What is missing from current research is an examination of the understanding and contribution to ethics and human rights from the police peacekeepers’ perspective. This thesis focuses on examining the experiences of Australian police officers deployed to these nations with a view to conceptualising their understanding and lived experience of contributing to ethical practice and human rights maintenance, adopting a hermeneutic-phenomenological framework to give participants the opportunity to engage in reflexivity. This thesis also considers the lived experiences of people who worked or interacted with Australian police throughout their missions inclusive of a diverse array of backgrounds. Using theories of structure and agency, participants reflected on the contextual, cultural, socioeconomic, geographic, and historical structures that presented as both barriers and facilitators to police peacekeepers engaging in ethical practice and human rights. Participants also reflected on their use of agency in their practice to contribute to improvements in ethical practice and human rights in the host context through transformation of those structures. By going ‘to the source’ in the examination of human rights and ethical practice in police peacekeeping, consideration of their experiences elucidates their post-action reflections and provides an opportunity for considering ways towards making sense of ethical practice and human rights in post-conflict police work

Issues in Evaluating Special Education Teachers: Challenges and Current Perspectives

Educatio

Ethics in Project Management Research on Values-Based Leadership in Project Driven Arenas

The paper addresses the values-based leadership skills, values and concepts of ethical project management professionals, and, considers the applicability of this leadership construct to the processes of managing major projects in different industries and applications. The purpose of the research study is to determine the suitability of a values-based leadership approach for leading project teams, with a focus on improving the partnerships within industrial programs. The main research question addressed is:"Can the application of values-based leadership skills, values and concepts improve the processes of project management, especially within project-driven industries?" A follow on to this research question is the hypothesis of: "Values-based leadership skills, values, and concepts are highly applicable to the processes of project management, in particular, in the leading of programs from concept through completion." The study assesses the eleven leadership values postulated in the criteria for the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award (2013) as means to establish an ethical rubric within project-driven industries. Additionally, the paper reviews the six core principles of values-based leadership postulated by G.W. Fairholm (1998). The research study uses a quantitative approach (survey) to assess the critical elements of this topic. On previous research performed on this topic, a mixed methods approach was found appropriate to identify the values shared between the leader and followers (qualitative), review the values-base for the particular application (quantitative), and compare the leader\u27s ethical values with the organization (mixed methods)

Developing an Explicit Instruction Special Education Teacher Observation Rubric

In this study, we developed an Explicit Instruction special education teacher observation rubric that details the elements of explicit instruction, and tested its psychometric properties using many-faceted Rasch measurement (MFRM). Video observations of classroom instruction from 30 special education teachers across three states were collected. External raters (n = 15) were trained to observe and evaluate instruction using the rubric, and assigned scores of ‘implemented’, ‘partially implemented’ or ‘not implemented’ for each of the items. Analyses showed that the item, teacher, lesson and rater facets achieved high psychometric quality for the instrument. Implications for research and practice are discussed

The impact of smoking in adolescence on early adult anxiety symptoms and the relationship between infant vulnerability factors for anxiety and early adult anxiety symptoms : The TOPP Study

Cigarette smoking is increased in people with trait anxiety and anxiety disorders, however no longitudinal data exist illuminating whether smoking in adolescence can influence the developmental trajectory of anxiety symptoms from early vulnerability in infancy to adult anxiety expression. Using The Tracing Opportunities and Problems in Childhood and Adolescence (TOPP) Study, a community-based cohort of children and adolescents from Norway who were observed from the age of 18months to age 18–19years, we explored the relationship between adolescent smoking, early vulnerability for anxiety in infancy (e.g. shyness, internalizing behaviors, emotional temperaments) and reported early adult anxiety.Structural equation modeling demonstrated that adolescent active smoking was positively associated with increased early adulthood anxiety (β = 0.17, p<0.05), after controlling for maternal education (proxy for socioeconomic status). Adolescent anxiety did not predict early adult smoking. Adolescent active smoking was a significant effect modifier in the relationship between some infant vulnerability factors and later anxiety; smoking during adolescence moderated the relationship between infant internalizing behaviors (total sample: active smokers: β = 0.85,p<0.01, non-active smokers: ns) and highly emotional temperament (total sample: active smokers: β = 0.55,p<0.01,non-active smokers: ns), but not shyness, and anxiety in early adulthood. The results support a model where smoking acts as an exogenous risk factor in the development of anxiety, and smoking may alter the developmental trajectory of anxiety from infant vulnerability to early adult anxiety symptom expression. Although alternative non-mutually exclusive models may explain these findings, the results suggest that adolescent smoking may be a risk factor for adult anxiety, potentially by influencing anxiety developmental trajectories. Given the known adverse health effects of cigarette smoking and significant health burden imposed by anxiety disorders, this study supports the importance of smoking prevention and cessation programs targeting children and adolescence

Evidence of a deep viral host switch event with beak and feather disease virus infection in rainbow bee-eaters (Merops ornatus)

Since the characterization of psittacine beak and feather disease (PBFD) in 1984, a wide range of avian circoviruses have been discovered with varying pathogenic effects amongst a diverse range of avian hosts. Until recently these circovirus species were thought to be restricted to within avian Orders such as the Psittaciformes for beak and feather disease virus (BFDV) and Columbiformes for pigeon circovirus with little evidence of cross-family transmission or replication. We report evidence of a naturally occurring novel host switch event with self-limiting BFDV infection in a group of rainbow bee-eaters (Merops ornatus) a species of Coraciiformes unrelated to parrots and not previously known to be susceptible to any avian circovirus. The outbreak highlights important and unexpected aspects of disease emergence and host-switching pertinent to other situations when viruses might cross species boundaries as well as the potential of avian circoviruses to infect disparate host species

The globular cluster system of NGC 1316. II - The extraordinary object SH2

SH2 has been described as an isolated HII-region, located about 6.5 arcmin south of the nucleus of NGC 1316 (Fornax A), a merger remnant in the the outskirts of the Fornax cluster of galaxies. We give a first, preliminary description of the stellar content and environment of this remarkable object. We used photometric data in the Washington system and HST photometry from the Hubble Legacy Archive for a morphological description and preliminary aperture photometry. Low-resolution spectroscopy provides radial velocities of the brightest star cluster in SH2 and a nearby intermediate-age cluster. SH2 is not a normal HII-region, ionized by very young stars. It contains a multitude of star clusters with ages of approximately 0.1 Gyr. A ring-like morphology is striking. SH2 seems to be connected to an intermediate-age massive globular cluster with a similar radial velocity, which itself is the main object of a group of fainter clusters. Metallicity estimates from emission lines remain ambiguous. The present data do not yet allow firm conclusions about the nature or origin of SH2. It might be a dwarf galaxy that has experienced a burst of extremely clustered star formation. We may witness how globular clusters are donated to a parent galaxy.Comment: 5 pages, to appear in A&A, format slightly different from the printed versio