Shall we be one strong united people...

This selection of diary entries, letters, and sermons by Unitarian minister William Greenleaf offers insights into the thinking of pro-Union leaders in St. Louis who were also antislavery

Documenting Ferguson: Capturing History as It Happens

This poster chronicles a novel archive project—the Documenting Ferguson Project at Washington University in St. Louis (WUSTL). Our poster highlighted our steps in the documentation and preservation of materials created in the course of and surrounding events in Ferguson, Missouri following the shooting death of Michael Brown on August 9, 2014. WUSTL created a committee, consisting of University Archives and other library staff, faculty, and additional university staff, to coordinate the efforts to capture the history as it happened. The Documenting Ferguson Project Team was called together in August 2014, soon after the death of Michael Brown and the first protests in Ferguson, Missouri. It was immediately clear that the events unfolding in the St. Louis suburb were producing important records and required a specialized response to target the wealth of born-digital materials. Our poster will address the issues that arose and how the Documenting Ferguson Project confronted them. The approach includes web archiving, crowd sourced content, documentation of the project, preservation, and working with researchers. The events in Ferguson have grown to encompass and touch on many issues facing, not only residents of that community, but people from all walks of life in St. Louis and the rest of the country. As archivists, we are tasked with documenting these events and preserving the memory surrounding them for future generations.https://openscholarship.wustl.edu/lib_present/1013/thumbnail.jp

Rural Public Transportation Strategies for Responding to the Livable and Sustainable Communities Initiative

This digest summarizes key findings of research performed under NCHRP Project 20-65, Task 42, Rural Public Transportation Strategies for Responding to the Livable and Sustainable Communities Initiative, by ICF International. For the study, ICF conducted a nationwide survey of state departments of transportation (DOTs) and their rural livability activities; conducted follow-up interviews about grants from the Partnership for Sustainable Communities (PSC); and created a primer highlighting strategies that state DOTs, transit operators, and their partners can use to help rural organizations applying for discretionary grant programs. The strategies discussed in the primer are: (1) Building awareness of PSC resources and livability in rural communities; (2) Providing programmatic and financial support; (3) Creating statewide or regional partnerships; and (4) Encouraging transit coordination at the regional level

Pre-test and post-test means and standard deviation on measures of well-being and communication (N = 10).

<p>Pre-test and post-test means and standard deviation on measures of well-being and communication (N = 10).</p

Major themes derived from interviews with mentees related to the features of the Curtin Specialist Mentoring Program (CSMP), how the program helped, and positive outcomes resulting from program.

<p>Major themes derived from interviews with mentees related to the features of the Curtin Specialist Mentoring Program (CSMP), how the program helped, and positive outcomes resulting from program.</p

Documenting Ferguson: Building a community digital repository

An update on the activities of the Documenting Ferguson collecting initiative one year after the death of Michael Brown. The presentation highlights community contributed items in the collection, how to contribute to the collection, how this project is different from traditional archival and digital projects, and plans for the future.https://openscholarship.wustl.edu/lib_present/1018/thumbnail.jp

A specialist peer mentoring program for university students on the autism spectrum: A pilot study

The provision of peer mentoring may improve tertiary education outcomes of students with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). This study evaluated the pilot year of the Curtin Specialist Mentoring Program (CSMP), a specialised peer mentoring program for university students with ASD aimed at improving self-reported well-being, academic success and retention in university studies.A single group pre-test, post-test design was employed. Quantitative and qualitative evaluations were undertaken with 10 young adults with ASD to explore the effectiveness and acceptability of the CSMP program. Students completed a battery of questionnaires focused on general anxiety, state communication apprehension, perceived communication competence, and communication apprehension both prior to, and five months after commencing enrolment in the CSMP. Information regarding academic success and retention was also obtained. Interviews with participants provided further insight into their experience of the program.Students enrolled in the CSMP showed significant improvement in social support and general communication apprehension assessment scores. Interviews revealed key features of the CSMP that may have contributed to these positive outcomes.The current study provides preliminary evidence that a specialised peer mentoring program can improve the well-being of students with ASD, and highlights the importance of interventions which are individualised, flexible, based on a social model, and target environmental factors such as social support

Designing a Serious Game for Youth with ASD: Perspectives from End-Users and Professionals

© 2018, Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature. Recent years have seen an emergence of social emotional computer games for individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). These games are heterogeneous in design with few underpinned by theoretically informed approaches to computer-based interventions. Guided by the serious game framework outlined by Whyte et al. (Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders 45(12):1–12, 2014), this study aimed to identify the key motivating and learning features for serious games targeting emotion recognition skills from the perspectives of 11 youth with ASD and 11 experienced professionals. Results demonstrated that youth emphasised the motivating aspects of game design, while the professionals stressed embedding elements facilitating the generalisation of acquired skills. Both complementary and differing views provide suggestions for the application of serious game principles in a potential serious game