TAR (THEATRE AS REPRESENTATION) AS A PROVOCATIVE TEACHING TOOL IN SCHOOL ADMINISTRATION: A DRAMATIZED INCLUSIVE CLASSROOM SCENARIO

The following dramatized classroom scenario depicts a teacher struggling with the nature of an inclusive learning environment, with instructional leadership and supervision of instruction as the theoretical and practical backdrop. The purpose of this article is to demonstrate how the use of a TAR (theatre as representation) case study can be used as a provocative teaching tool by those engaged in the professional development of in-service administrators, aspiring administrators, and students enrolled in a graduate level educational administration program. In addition to the secnario’s text, teaching notes in the form of discussion questions, complete with accompanying rationales, are provided

Tax Salience, Escrow, and Support for Property Tax: Findings from a Survey of South Carolina Voters

Tax salience has been found to impact tax opposition attitudes in a previous study, and scholars find that tax presentation is a key factor influencing the salience of a tax to those who pay it. We test Cabral and Hoxby’s 2012 hypothesis that homeowners who escrow their property tax payments will express more support for property tax increases than non-escrow taxpayers. Using original data collected from a mailed survey of South Carolina voters our multi-variate regression analysis shows that homeowners who escrow property taxes express more support for increasing school tax than do non-escrow payers. We also find significant knowledge limits among respondents in understanding the actual school tax costs on taxpayers in South Carolina. Most S.C. homeowners are exempt from paying property taxes for school operations, but this is not widely understood according to our findings

Comparison of Mid- to Long-term follow-up of Patient-Reported Outcomes Measures after Single-level Lumbar Total Disc Arthroplasty, Multi-level Lumbar Total Disc Arthroplasty, and the Lumbar Hybrid Procedure for the Treatment of Degenerative Disc Disease

Prospective cohort study. OBJECTIVE. The aim of this article is to compare the mid- to long-term patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs) between single-level total disc arthroplasty (TDA), multi-level TDA, and hybrid constructs (combination of TDA and anterior lumbar interbody fusion [ALIF] across multiple levels) for symptomatic degenerative disc disease (DDD). SUMMARY OF BACKGROUND DATA. The treatment of single-level DDD is well documented using TDA. However, there is still a paucity of published evidence regarding long-term outcomes on multi-level TDA and hybrid constructs for the treatment of multi-level DDD, as well as lack of long-term comparisons regarding treatment of single-level DDD and multi-level DDD. METHODS. A total of 950 patients underwent surgery for single-level or multi-level DDD between July 1998 and February 2012 with single-level TDA (n = 211), multi-level TDA (n = 122), or hybrid construct (n = 617). Visual Analog Score for the back (VAS-B) and leg (VAS-L) were recorded, along with the Oswestry Disability Index (ODI) and Roland Morris Disability Questionnaire (RMDQ). RESULTS. All PROMs in all groups showed statistically and clinically significant improvements (P < 0.005) in pain and function that is well above the corresponding minimum clinically important difference (MCID) and exceeds literature thresholds for substantial clinical benefit (SCB). Unadjusted analyses show that there were no statistically significant differences in the change scores between the surgery groups for VAS back and leg pain, and RMDQ up to 8 years’ follow-up. Adjusted analyses showed the ODI improvement score for the single group was 2.2 points better (95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.6–3.9, P = 0.009) than in the hybrid group. The RMDQ change score was better in the hybrid group than in the multi-level group by 1.1 points (95% CI: 0.4–1.9, P = 0.003) at 6 months and a further 0.4 point at 2 years (95% CI: 0.1–0.8, P = 0.011). CONCLUSION. In the setting of meticulous preoperative evaluation in establishing a precision diagnosis, clinically and statistically equivalent results can be achieved when treating symptomatic DDD through single-level TDA, multi-level TDA, and hybrid constructs. These results are sustained at mid- to long-term follow-up. Level of Evidence:

Mean values with cubic characters

We investigate various mean value problems involving order three primitive Dirichlet characters. In particular, we obtain an asymptotic formula for the first moment of central values of the Dirichlet L-functions associated to this family, with a power saving in the error term. We also obtain a large-sieve type result for order three (and six) Dirichlet characters.Comment: 22 pages; greatly shortened, simplified and corrected versio

Enantioselective Synthesis of the Lomaiviticin Aglycon Full Carbon Skeleton Reveals Remarkable Remote Substituent Effects During the Dimerization Event

Chemistry and Chemical Biolog

Sub-nanosecond signal propagation in anisotropy engineered nanomagnetic logic chains

Energy efficient nanomagnetic logic (NML) computing architectures propagate and process binary information by relying on dipolar field coupling to reorient closely-spaced nanoscale magnets. Signal propagation in nanomagnet chains of various sizes, shapes, and magnetic orientations has been previously characterized by static magnetic imaging experiments with low-speed adiabatic operation; however the mechanisms which determine the final state and their reproducibility over millions of cycles in high-speed operation (sub-ns time scale) have yet to be experimentally investigated. Monitoring NML operation at its ultimate intrinsic speed reveals features undetectable by conventional static imaging including individual nanomagnetic switching events and systematic error nucleation during signal propagation. Here, we present a new study of NML operation in a high speed regime at fast repetition rates. We perform direct imaging of digital signal propagation in permalloy nanomagnet chains with varying degrees of shape-engineered biaxial anisotropy using full-field magnetic soft x-ray transmission microscopy after applying single nanosecond magnetic field pulses. Further, we use time-resolved magnetic photo-emission electron microscopy to evaluate the sub-nanosecond dipolar coupling signal propagation dynamics in optimized chains with 100 ps time resolution as they are cycled with nanosecond field pulses at a rate of 3 MHz. An intrinsic switching time of 100 ps per magnet is observed. These experiments, and accompanying macro-spin and micromagnetic simulations, reveal the underlying physics of NML architectures repetitively operated on nanosecond timescales and identify relevant engineering parameters to optimize performance and reliability.Comment: Main article (22 pages, 4 figures), Supplementary info (11 pages, 5 sections