Measuring and Fostering Non-Cognitive Skills in Adolescence: Evidence from Chicago Public Schools and the OneGoal Program

Recent evidence has established that non-cognitive skills (e.g., persistence and selfcontrol) are valuable in the labor market and are malleable throughout adolescence. Some recent high school interventions have been developed to foster these skills, but there is little evidence on whether they are effective. Using administrative data, we apply two methods to evaluate an intervention called OneGoal, which attempts to help disadvantaged students attend and complete college in part by teaching non-cognitive skills. First, we compare the outcomes of participants and non-participants with similar pre-program cognitive and non-cognitive skills. In doing so, we develop and validate a measure of non-cognitive skill that is based on readily available data and rivals standard measures of cognitive skill in predicting educational attainment. Second, we use an instrumental variable difference-in-difference approach that exploits the fact that OneGoal was introduced into different schools at different times. We estimate that OneGoal improves academic indicators, increases college enrollment by 10–20 percentage points, and reduces arrest rates by 5 percentage points for males. We demonstrate that improvements in non-cognitive skill account for 15–30 percent of the treatment effects

Constructing the other: managerial rhetorics of diversity.

In this article, we examine how HR managers rhetorically construct diversity as discourses of Otherness. Our analysis relies on argument schemes developed by the classical rhetoric tradition. HR managers talk about diverse employees as visible, hearable and enjoyable Others, measure Otherness in terms of time, pace and rhythm, and evaluate the Other in terms of his/her compliance. While these discourses are varied and sometimes contradict the dominant (negative) Discourses of Otherness, they remain at the same time monolithic. The construction and valorisation of Otherness is predominantly deployed in function of reinforcing dominant managerial Discourses of discipline, compliance and control.Employment; Expected; Managers; Studies;

Engaging with (diversity) management: An analysis of minority employees' agency.

This study analyses how minority employees engage with (diversity) management to construct their organizational identities and, by so doing, comply with, accommodate and/or resist managerial control. Differently from most studies of diversity as a discourse, which consider diversity discourses as direct forms of control, we approach diversity as an identity-regulating discourse, controlling minority employees indirectly by offering them specific organizational identities. Further, these identity-regulating discourses combine with the specific material structure of the organization, creating a particular mix of direct and indirect control. We analyze four minority employees' identities in two organizations, a technical drawing company and a hospital. We show that minority employees actively engage, as agents, with both types of control, which constrain them but also open up possibilities for resistance, and even forms of (micro-)emancipation. The paper contributes to the reconceptualization of diversity as an identity-regulating discourse and to the further theorization of identity regulation and emancipation.Agency; Companies; Control; Diversity; Emancipation; Employees; Management; Materiality; Open; Regulation; Resistance; Structure; Studies;

Many diversities for many customers: contextualizing diversity (management) in four service companies.

Diversity studies generally define diversity by referring to one or more employees' demographic traits such as gender, race, ethnicity, and age, and examine subsequently the effects of these differences onto a variety of organizational practices and outcomes (see Milliken & Martins, 1996 for a review). In recent years, however, a few diversity scholars have increasingly expressed dissatisfaction with this kind of approach. The major point of critique is that, while focusing on the effects of diversity, research has left the notion of diversity itself undertheorized (Nkomo & Cox, 1996). The unproblematized use of demographic traits as independent variables to operationalize diversity has de facto led to an understanding of diversity as a given, fixed individual or group essence (Litvin, 1997). The anchoring of diversity within the individual or the group bears two major related consequences, further limiting the current understanding of diversity. First, it defines diversity independently of the specific context under study, obscuring the active role organizations play in the production of specific understandings of diversity (Ely, 1995; Foldy, 2002). Second, by so doing, it conceals how specific understandings of diversity reflect organizational power relations (Zanoni & Janssens, 2004).Effects; Studies; Variables;

Electrochromic properties of spiropyran-terthiophene adaptive polymers

Adaptive materials have the ability to modify their behaviour or characteristics in response to external stimuli, for example through electrochemical changes, macroscopically in the molecular structure. These materials may have only one form with binding skills whilst others are passive. In principle this material can be switched ‘on’ and ‘off’ using external stimuli [3]. In this field hybrid Polythiophenes substituted with Spiropyrans are an important representative class of conjugated polymers that form environmentally and thermally stable materials and stimulate deep interest for their optoelectronic and reversible properties. An enhancement in the electronic and photonic properties of the materials and the creation of new functions, such as new sensory materials or new biocompatible structures, critically depends on the synthesis of polythiophene [1,4]. This problem can be bypassed with some synthetically procedures that have been developed by our group and published on previous outputs. In this work the new family of hybrid spiropyran-terthiophenes moieties has been fully characterized and analyzed. An important aspect emerged in the study consists is the charge transfer during the processes of activation and deactivation of the material [2]. It has been observed spectroelectrochemically that a consistent charge transfer occurs while the activated surface is stimulated with an external potential. The kinetics of activation and deactivation has been detected at different potentials. This plays a remarkable role in the complete description of the properties of the structure under different conditions, especially during the electrochemical activation of the material in an electrolytical cell. This offers the possibility of inducing dramatic changes to the bulk properties of the active system by electrochemical stimulus. Herein we present the electrochemical and spectrelectrochemical behaviour of our materials. BIBLIOGRAPHY 1. S. Gambhir, K. Wagner, D. L. Officer, Towards functionalised terthiophene-based polymers. Synthetic Metals 154, 2005: 117-120. 2. S. Hammes-Schiffer, A. V.Soudakov. Proton-coupled electron transfer in solution, Proteins and electrochemistry. Journal of Physical Chemistry B, 2008, 14108-14123. 3. A. Radu, S. Scarmagnani, R. Byrne, C. Slater, K. T. Lau, D. Diamond, Photonic modulation of surface properties: a novel concept in chemical sensing. Journal of Physics D: Applied Physics, 40, 2007, 7238-7244. 4. H. Mehenni, L. H. Dao, Synthesis and characterization of novel conducting homopolymers based on β-styryl terthiophene. Canadian Journal of Chemistry, 86, 2008, 1010-1018

Electro- and photo- chromism of hybrid conducting polymers

Polythiophenes are an important representative class of conjugated polymers that form some of the most environmentally and thermally stable materials that can be used as electrical conductors, nonlinear optical devices, polymer LEDs, electrochromic windows, sensors, solar cells, polymer electronic interconnects, nanoelectronic and optical devices.1 Gaining control over the structure, properties, and function in polythiophenes continues to make the synthesis of polythiophenes a critical subject in the development of new advanced materials. An enhancement in the electronic and photonic properties of the materials and the creation of new functions, such as new sensory materials, critically depends on the synthesis of the polythiophene.4 This leads to the exciting prospect that the properties of polythiophenes can be selectively engineered through synthesis and assembly. Herein, we show the incorporation of molecular photochromic switches, such as benzospiropyran, into the polythiophene backbone. These are an intriguing class of organic molecules, which allow the control of molecular structure and function with light.2, 3 This offers the possibility of inducing dramatic changes to the bulk properties of a system by photonic irradiation. More importantly, benzospiropyran forms photo- reversible transition metal ion complexes. Herein, we present our work on the electro-chemical and optical properties of these hybrid materials

Diversity management as identity regulation in the Post-Fordist productive space.

Management; Regulation; Research; Space;

Evolution of Scholarly Communication: How Small and Medium-Sized Libraries are Adapting

For the transformation of scholarly publishing to succeed, it is imperative that small and medium-sized institutions are actively engaged in scholarly communication initiatives. This paper presents the results of a survey of scholarly communication initiatives at selected U.S institutions and discusses the influence of institutional variables on the approaches that are employed. The survey was designed to gather information comparable to a 2007 ARL (Association of Research Libraries) survey

Personal Agents for Implicit Culture Support

We present an implementation of a multi-agent system that aims at solving the problem of tacit knowledge transfer by means of experiences sharing. In particular, we consider experiences of use of pieces of information. Each agent incorporates a system for implicit culture support (SICS) whose goal is to realize the acceptance of the suggested information. The SICS permits a transparent (implicit) sharing of the information about the use, e.g., requesting and accepting pieces of information