Title VII & LGBTQ Employment Discrimination: An Argument for a Modern Updated Approach to Title VII Claims

This note addresses the now-existing circuit split in the federal courts regarding antidiscrimination protections for LGBTQ individuals under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The note begins by examining the history of Title VII and its interpretation in early cases following its enactment. After examining less-successful attempts at securing increased protections for LGBTQ employees, the note argues that the approach that would best serve their interests would be for courts to take a more pragmatic approach to interpreting this legislation

Physical Education, teachers and training: understanding the voice of teachers and their training needs for engaging in truly nonlinear teaching practice

Background The potential gap between the academically considered notion of Physical Education and Physical Education in practice has implications across the entire education spectrum but it is arguably compounded at primary age where teachers are prepared more generally across the whole curriculum for teaching rather than specialising. Non-traditional methods can provide students with a holistic education, encompassing social, physical and cognitive learning outcomes (Dyson et al., 2004) but limitations have been placed on Physical Education through the inability to break away from physical training separated from cognition (Pill, 2014). Pedagogic knowledge and skills are vital for a primary teacher (Smith, 2007) but despite their understood requirement, teachers are often not prepared by the education they receive prior to teaching, leading to the teacher resorting back to traditional approaches. Methodology The thesis took an interpretivist, qualitative approach to the research using semi-structured interviews to collect the data. There were 15 participants who had completed their primary education training in the last 10 years, including those currently studying. The transcripts were analysed using inductive content analysis, coded through an unconstrained matrix and categorised into Low and High-order themes from the derived data. Results The six High-order themes were Teachers’ Philosophy, Apprenticeship, Confidence, Student Experience, Physical Education Context and Bridging the Gap. Conclusion There is a requirement for a newly qualified teacher to establish and understand a chosen philosophy to make choices towards developing their teaching style and maintaining their beliefs throughout their teaching journey throughout the challenges faced. Although there is a recognised move toward non-traditional methods and a greater acceptance of Whitehead’s (2013a; p26) definition of physical literacy academically, the gap between academic literature and Physical Education in practice is evident. The lack of applicable practical knowledge for teachers demonstrated in academic literature, in addition to the range of terminology and complex approaches has led towards a lack of clarity in both discourse and the application of non-traditional approaches in Physical Education

Management of concurrency in a reliable object-oriented computing system

PhD ThesisModern computing systems support concurrency as a means of increasing the performance of the system. However, the potential for increased performance is not without its problems. For example, lost updates and inconsistent retrieval are but two of the possible consequences of unconstrained concurrency. Many concurrency control techniques have been designed to combat these problems; this thesis considers the applicability of some of these techniques in the context of a reliable object-oriented system supporting atomic actions. The object-oriented programming paradigm is one approach to handling the inherent complexity of modern computer programs. By modeling entities from the real world as objects which have well-defined interfaces, the interactions in the system can be carefully controlled. By structuring sequences of such interactions as atomic actions, then the consistency of the system is assured. Objects are encapsulated entities such that their internal representation is not externally visible. This thesis postulates that this encapsulation should also include the capability for an object to be responsible for its own concurrency control. Given this latter assumption, this thesis explores the means by which the property of type-inheritance possessed by object-oriented languages can be exploited to allow programmers to explicitly control the level of concurrency an object supports. In particular, a object-oriented concurrency controller based upon the technique of two-phase locking is described and implemented using type-inheritance. The thesis also shows how this inheritance-based approach is highly flexible such that the basic concurrency control capabilities can be adopted unchanged or overridden with more type-specific concurrency control if requiredUK Science and Engineering Research Council, Serc/Alve

The Measurement of Eye Movements in Mild Traumatic Brain Injury: A Structured Review of an Emerging Area

Mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI), or concussion, occurs following a direct or indirect force to the head that causes a change in brain function. Many neurological signs and symptoms of mTBI can be subtle and transient, and some can persist beyond the usual recovery timeframe, such as balance, cognitive or sensory disturbance that may pre-dispose to further injury in the future. There is currently no accepted definition or diagnostic criteria for mTBI and therefore no single assessment has been developed or accepted as being able to identify those with an mTBI. Eye-movement assessment may be useful, as specific eye-movements and their metrics can be attributed to specific brain regions or functions, and eye-movement involves a multitude of brain regions. Recently, research has focused on quantitative eye-movement assessments using eye-tracking technology for diagnosis and monitoring symptoms of an mTBI. However, the approaches taken to objectively measure eye-movements varies with respect to instrumentation, protocols and recognition of factors that may influence results, such as cognitive function or basic visual function. This review aimed to examine previous work that has measured eye-movements within those with mTBI to inform the development of robust or standardized testing protocols. Medline/PubMed, CINAHL, PsychInfo and Scopus databases were searched. Twenty-two articles met inclusion/exclusion criteria and were reviewed, which examined saccades, smooth pursuits, fixations and nystagmus in mTBI compared to controls. Current methodologies for data collection, analysis and interpretation from eye-tracking technology in individuals following an mTBI are discussed. In brief, a wide range of eye-movement instruments and outcome measures were reported, but validity and reliability of devices and metrics were insufficiently reported across studies. Interpretation of outcomes was complicated by poor study reporting of demographics, mTBI-related features (e.g., time since injury), and few studies considered the influence that cognitive or visual functions may have on eye-movements. The reviewed evidence suggests that eye-movements are impaired in mTBI, but future research is required to accurately and robustly establish findings. Standardization and reporting of eye-movement instruments, data collection procedures, processing algorithms and analysis methods are required. Recommendations also include comprehensive reporting of demographics, mTBI-related features, and confounding variables

Miniature rotating transmissive optical drum scanner

A miniature rotating transmissive optical scanner system employs a drum of small size having an interior defined by a circumferential wall rotatable on a drum axis, an optical element positioned within the interior of the drum, and a light-transmissive lens aperture provided at an angular position in the circumferential wall of the drum for scanning a light beam to or from the optical element in the drum along a beam azimuth angle as the drum is rotated. The miniature optical drum scanner configuration obtains a wide scanning field-of-view (FOV) and large effective aperture is achieved within a physically small size

IT’S ABOUT HOW WELL YOU USE IT: SKATING STRIDE IN NOVICE, INTERMEDIATE AND ADVANCED INLINE SKATERS

Adequate skating technique is imperative to roller sports. Characteristics that differ between inline skating competencies have not been addressed. This study assessed skating parameters associated with coaching cues across three levels of experience. Inline-skaters (n=24) were divided into novice, intermediate and advanced groups based on experience. Skate trajectories were captured through 3D analysis as participants skated maximally down a 10 m runway. One-way ANOVA was used to compare differences for the skating parameters between skill levels. Significant differences (P < 0.016) were found for stride-width, recovery, stride-width-recovery and stride-length-recovery and stride rate. Results have implications for delivery of coaching and skating skill development

IT’S ABOUT HOW WELL YOU USE IT: SKATING STRIDE IN NOVICE, INTERMEDIATE AND ADVANCED INLINE SKATERS

Adequate skating technique is imperative to roller sports. Characteristics that differ between inline skating competencies have not been addressed. This study assessed skating parameters associated with coaching cues across three levels of experience. Inline-skaters (n=24) were divided into novice, intermediate and advanced groups based on experience. Skate trajectories were captured through 3D analysis as participants skated maximally down a 10 m runway. One-way ANOVA was used to compare differences for the skating parameters between skill levels. Significant differences (P < 0.016) were found for stride-width, recovery, stride-width-recovery and stride-length-recovery and stride rate. Results have implications for delivery of coaching and skating skill development

READ AND REACT: EFFECTS OF TASK COMPLEXITY ON MOTOR SKILL EXECUTION

Performance in team sports requires players to both observe their game environment and proceed with technical skill. This case study evaluated if changing the complexity of a perceptual-motor task caused technical performance changes. Kinematic data were collected and analysed for 34 handballs across four levels of complexity using visual and auditory stimuli (simple-response, choice response, choice response with distractor, choice response with cross modality distractor). Kinematic differences were found between the simple response and choice response task for six out of 10 parameters. Although differences occurred, the effect of distractor stimuli on handball kinematics was unclear. The cognitive complexity of a task may affect technical performance and therefore has implications for biomechanical testing environments

BIOMECHANICAL ANALYSIS OF THE HANDBALL IN AUSTRALIAN FOOTBALL

The handball pass in Australian Football has become increasingly important in recent years. However, important technical elements of handballing have not been identified in the scientific literature. The purposes of this study were to provide a descriptive analysis of the handball through the evaluation of a player considered to have good technique, to compare handballs for maximal speed and accuracy, and to compare preferred and non-preferred hands. Three-dimensional data were collected from one elite level Australian Football player using Optotrak Certus. The player performed three handballs for maximal speed and three handballs for accuracy with both the preferred and non-preferred hand. Linear hand speed, linear shoulder speed, shoulder angular velocity and elbow angular velocity were larger in the maximal speed condition. Differences in the development of hand speed were found for preferred and non-preferred hands