Rwanda Country Snapshot

This document presents an overview of CARE's programming in Rwanda, including WEE programs

Norway's Sami Parliament

There are many parallels between the role and function of the Samediggi, or Sami Parliament, and the former Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC). However, the positive approach of the Norwegian government to a popularly elected indigenous representative body is in contrast to the experience in Australia, where ATSIC was frequently at loggerheads with government, especially in the last few years of its existence

Aboriginal legal aid funding: discriminatory policy or a failure of federalism?

Australia’s federal system of government poses some difficulty in relation to compliance with obligations under international instruments, notwithstanding the Commonwealth’s unequivocal powers on external affairs in the Australian Constitution. It is the Commonwealth Government that is a signatory to international agreements and treaties, but this does not necessarily mean that it administers the relevant policy field domestically. In practice, the complex and multi-faceted relationships between Commonwealth, State and Territory Governments make the political dimensions of the federal relationship as important as the legal arrangements. The Commonwealth Government does not always have unambiguous control over a given policy issue

More Social Needs Endorsed by Caregivers of Young Children Experiencing Everyday Discrimination

Background: Both discrimination and social needs are underlying risk factors for poor health outcomes; however, there are no studies looking at how feelings of discrimination impact reporting of social needs in the pediatric health care setting. Objective: To compare caregiver report of social needs and desire for help addressing social needs in the pediatric primary care setting based on respondents’ experiences with discrimination. Methods: We conducted a cross-sectional study of caregivers of children aged 2-5 in an urban primary care setting. Caregivers completed a tool to screen for 15 social needs and desire for help to address these needs, with in-person assistance available. The tool was adapted based on qualitative data with this same population and included items from the PHQ-2, 2-item food insecurity screener, and WE CARE survey. The short version of the “Everyday Discrimination Scale” was also completed, and caregivers were categorized as experiencing everyday discrimination if they responded “rarely”, “sometimes”, or “often” on any of 5 types of discrimination. If caregivers experienced everyday discrimination, they were also asked about perceived basis for discrimination. T-tests were conducted to compare the number of reported social needs and number of needs for which a caregiver desired help between groups based on experience of everyday discrimination and type of discrimination. Results: One hundred seventy-eight caregivers (94% mothers, mean age 32) of diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds (29% white, 61% black; 10% Hispanic) completed the screening tool. Sixty-seven percent had public insurance, and 35% were from households with an annual income below $20,000. Fifty-three percent of caregivers reported everyday discrimination, especially in regards to being treated with less respect and receiving poorer service in stores and restaurants (Figure 1) and most commonly on the basis of race (48%), gender (38%), and age (31%). Both caregivers who endorsed everyday discrimination in general, and those endorsing discrimination specifically by gender and age, reported a significantly higher number of social needs and number of social needs for which they wanted help (Table 1). Conclusions: In an urban population of mostly young Black mothers, the majority endorsed feeling some degree of everyday discrimination. Despite this, caregivers who endorsed feelings of discrimination, especially because of their gender and age, reported more social needs and a greater desire for help addressing these needs. This suggests that caregivers feel comfortable reporting sensitive social needs in the context of a child’s healthcare setting even though they may experience everyday discrimination. These findings may also suggest an association between experienced discrimination and social needs, with both potentially influenced by similar sociodemographic factors

Benchmarking database systems for Genomic Selection implementation

Motivation: With high-throughput genotyping systems now available, it has become feasible to fully integrate genotyping information into breeding programs. To make use of this information effectively requires DNA extraction facilities and marker production facilities that can efficiently deploy the desired set of markers across samples with a rapid turnaround time that allows for selection before crosses needed to be made. In reality, breeders often have a short window of time to make decisions by the time they are able to collect all their phenotyping data and receive corresponding genotyping data. This presents a challenge to organize information and utilize it in downstream analyses to support decisions made by breeders. In order to implement genomic selection routinely as part of breeding programs, one would need an efficient genotyping data storage system. We selected and benchmarked six popular open-source data storage systems, including relational database management and columnar storage systems. Results: We found that data extract times are greatly influenced by the orientation in which genotype data is stored in a system. HDF5 consistently performed best, in part because it can more efficiently work with both orientations of the allele matrix

The evolution of the angiosperm plastid genome

Plastids originated from the endosymbiosis of a cyanobacterium by a eukaryotic cell approximately 1.5 billion years ago. Since then, their genome has undergone substantial reduction, with present day plastids retaining less than 5% of genes found in their cyanobacterial ancestor. Many of these remaining genes are essential for photosynthesis, including components of the photosystems, NAD(P)H dehydrogenase-like complex, cytochrome b6f complex and rubisco. While previous comparative analyses have shown that the plastid genome has evolved exceptionally slowly, it is unknown why this slow evolution occurs and whether adaptation has occurred given this constraint. This thesis seeks to address both of these questions through an investigation of the constraints on plastid gene evolution and a search for hallmarks of adaptive evolution that may have been previously overlooked. I reveal that there is significant variation in the rate of molecular evolution between the plastid-encoded genes, with those involved in energy production evolving notably slower than those involved in information processing (i.e., transcription and translation). Additionally, I discover that three key factors – gene position, level of gene expression and the encoded protein’s composition – collectively account for >50% of the variation in the rate of sequence evolution. Thus, contrary to expectations, factors unrelated to the molecular function of a gene are the major determinants its evolvability. A novel computational approach, herein named RECUR, was subsequently developed to identify hallmarks of adaptive evolution in the plastid genome. In combination with conventional methods for detecting selection, I identified evidence of adaptive evolution at 7% of the residues in genes encoding components of the photosystems. Through the use of various in silico approaches, I predicted the impact of these evolutionary changes on the photosystems and revealed that evolution has repeatedly influenced the interaction between photosystem II and its D1 subunit, potentially reducing the energetic barrier for D1 turnover and enhancing photosystem II repair. In conclusion, this thesis has leveraged millions of years of natural selection experiments to identify plausible engineering targets for enhancing photosynthesis. Moreover, the development of RECUR enables the broader scientific community to explore recurrent evolution, facilitating new discoveries and aiding evolutionary guided protein engineering

Teaching to the World: The Internationalization of a College of Education in the United States

This study illustrates the presence and importance of an international perspective for educators in higher education. Taking into consideration the growth of internationalization in higher education, it is necessary to observe how Schools of Education incorporate that focus into their curriculum. In this study, the panelist investigates the extent to which a university School of Education in the United States has internationalized the curriculum for educators, both in theoretical discussions and in practice. The questions at hand are to discover how a school of education incorporates an international focus to the curriculum. What challenges do they encounter? What is the evolution and development of integrating that international focus? What are the faculty and student perceptions of the international focus, and the importance of such, within the curriculum at both the undergraduate and graduate level? Additionally, how does a school of education-sponsored study abroad opportunity contribute to the international focus of the curriculum? This case study of one university’s School of Education seeks to offer insight into the internationalization process for educators through faculty and student interviews, analysis of websites, policies, and syllabi, and participant observation in a School of Education sponsored study abroad. Findings reveal a productive tension between a focus within teacher education at the local level, and internationalizing the experience which informs their teaching

The evolutionary constraints on angiosperm chloroplast adaptation

The chloroplast (plastid) arose via the endosymbiosis of a photosynthetic cyanobacterium by a nonphotosynthetic eukaryotic cell ∼1.5 billion years ago. Although the plastid underwent rapid evolution by genome reduction, its rate of molecular evolution is low and its genome organization is highly conserved. Here, we investigate the factors that have constrained the rate of molecular evolution of protein-coding genes in the plastid genome. Through phylogenomic analysis of 773 angiosperm plastid genomes, we show that there is substantial variation in the rate of molecular evolution between genes. We demonstrate that the distance of a plastid gene from the likely origin of replication influences the rate at which it has evolved, consistent with time and distance-dependent nucleotide mutation gradients. In addition, we show that the amino acid composition of a gene product constraints its substitution tolerance, limiting its mutation landscape and its corresponding rate of molecular evolution. Finally, we demonstrate that the mRNA abundance of a gene is a key factor in determining its rate of molecular evolution, suggesting an interaction between transcription and DNA repair in the plastid. Collectively, we show that the location, the composition, and the expression of a plastid gene can account for >50% of the variation in its rate of molecular evolution. Thus, these three factors have exerted a substantial limitation on the capacity for adaptive evolution in plastid-encoded genes and ultimately constrained the evolvability of the chloroplast