Despite the likely declassification of the Senate report on CIA’s practices, the U.S. government still maintains vast capabilities to spy on its own citizens

Last week the Senate Intelligence Committee voted to declassify parts of its controversial report into the CIA’s practices in the aftermath of 9/11. Allison Stanger warns against interpreting this and the likely termination of the collection of telephone meta-data as the beginning of the end of the U.S. surveillance state. She argues that most of the emergency measures that quickly became business as usual during the Bush Administration are still on the books, and that these will still allow the government to track the communications of Americans abroad, as well as their Internet traffic that is not based in the U.S

The Millennial Who Planted Trees

In this work of creative non-fiction essays and stories, the author explores ecological restoration through a variety of contexts, settings, and conditions

Implementing Information Literacy in Higher Education: A Perspective on the Roles of Librarians and Disciplinary Faculty

The article discusses information literacy from a higher education perspective. According to a report of the American Library Association\u27s Presidential Committee on Information Literacy, information literacy pertains to a group of abilities requiring individuals to determine when information is needed and have the skill to locate, evaluate and effectively utilize the needed information. Included is a list of Association of College & Research Libraries (ACRL) standards that universities and colleges can use to modify and assess their information literacy programs. Academic librarians have an important role in helping college students to effectively and efficiently discover and access significant information

The hydrogeology of the Oman Mountains

Northern Oman is an arid area almost entirely dependent upon groundwater recharged by highly sporadic rainfall. Precipitation estimates are hampered by a lack of any reliable altitude-rainfall relationship. Below 700 m there is no statistically significant relationship. The isotopic composition of groundwater is strongly influenced by the rainfall amount (related to storm frequency), and not just by altitude/temperature. Storm events with long return periods are of disproportionate importance to recharge. Despite the huge volume of carbonate formations, holokarstic development is generally immature, and groundwater storage is greatest in alluvial piedmont surrounding main limestone massifs. Isotopes, chemistry and hydrologic measurements show that post-storm evaporative losses are very large. The origin of limestone springs and their chemical and physical anomalies are described. Structure rather than petrology controls groundwater flow in the limestones, hence regional differences in structural style produce contrasting hydrologic regimes between the various massifs. The Semail nappe mantle sequence is the only other hard-rock formation of groundwater significance. Though much less productive than the carbonates, these ultramafics display extraordinary chemical activity, yielding bicarbonate waters from the weathered zone, whilst more deeply circulating groundwaters produce hyperalkaline springs by low-temperature serpentinisation. Associated processes include solute reduction, hydrogen evolution, hydroxide and carbonate precipitation, hydroxide-basic rock reaction, salt enrichment and water-rock isotopic exchange. Throughout the interior catchments, groundwater mostly flows into narrow buried alluvial channels which are often constricted at hard-rock nodal points, thus facilitating very efficient interception and recovery by the "falaj" system. Traditional agriculture has evolved to cope with fluctuating groundwater supply but is sensitive to increased abstraction. On the Batinah plain, greatly increased coastal abstraction has locally induced moderate to severe salinisation. Existing process studies are insufficiently quantified to provide the resolution necessary to manage groundwater resources, especially in high-risk coastal areas

Voluntary Incident and Near-Miss Reporting

Baptist Health South Florida (BHSF) is the largest not-for-profit healthcare organization in South Florida that is comprised of six hospitals. Mariners Hospital is part of BHSF and is located 65 miles south of Miami in the Florida Keys. It is a 25 Bed Critical Access Hospital that in fiscal year 2013 treated 597 inpatients, 11,514 emergency visits, 20,740 outpatients and 5,000 encounters in the employed physician\u27s offices. With our desire to provide the highest quality of care, it is crucial to have any unanticipated or near-miss events reported. Incident reports provide valuable information for quality improvement. Not all hospital employees know what events should be reported. Under reporting of incidents remains a serious issue in healthcare. Nationally, there are 5-20% of incidents never reported

A Comparative Analysis of the Coalescing of Non-Biblical and Biblical Principles to Maximize Workplace Productivity

The relationship between leadership, management and communication theories and practices that result in productive work environments are explored. The analysis includes various business cultures, leadership strategies, management tactics, training methods, and philosophies that reflect the workplace culture most employees prefer. Research suggests that Christian business leaders can thrive in a secular marketplace and they can have just as much success leading teams as non-Christian leaders. Research validates the premise that a workplace environment built on Christian principles will not only succeed in the basic sense, but it can thrive. This paper is a comparative analysis of Biblical and non-Biblical perspectives for leading teams. These perspectives will be analyzed. The coalescing of three leadership/management principles and three Christian principles can be applied to work environments lead by Christian employers. In addition, despite the political rationale for the separation of church and state, an argument will be made that together, they represent strength for customer relations and employer/employee satisfaction. Finally, this paper will emphasize that employees who work in a supportive environment are more productive, happier, and lead to a better overall working environment for everyone. Research shows that the days of ruling with an “Iron Fist” and management tactics that use the “fear” as the core motivator is not just outdated, but ineffective

Review: Re-rooting the Learning Space: Minding Where Children\u27s Mathematics Grow, by Jennifer S. Thom

Jennifer Thom’s first single-authored book is an engaging and organic approach to complex learning theory and mathematics. At first glance, the reader is met with an intertextual exploration of mathematics education through ecological sensibility, thought, and diverse ways of knowing. Yet what is most striking about this book is its playfulness, and the ease with which Thom explains concepts. As the reader opens the first page, she/he is invited to consider the living systems of a tree as an analogy of learning systems, and is invited to interact with this book as one might with various parts of a tree: “that any one leaf is neither directly connected to the other leaves nor does one need to view them in any particular sequence” (p. xi). Through this acknowledgement of parts, Thom also accepts the interconnected nature of mathematics and an ecological sensibility. What follows this initial statement is a key, of sorts, to help interpret the intentional complexity of the text, visuals, font choice, shading, and type-setting