Indigenous Tribes in the Brazilian Amazon: Finding a Balance between Sustainability and Economic Development

The number of isolated indigenous tribes in Brazil is dropping due to a multitude of factors, including resource extraction. If these factors continue, there will be further reduction of the population of indigenous tribes which causes the loss of culture of the world’s oldest societies. This research establishes the roles that the Brazilian government, NGOs, and the international community should play to preserve indigenous tribes. The research question is: How can Brazil sustain isolated indigenous tribes in the Amazon without compromising its own economic development? The research method is the modified Delphi method which results in a consensus of experts on the best practices to sustain these tribes. This study’s findings show that combining a new Brazilian economic model, decreasing climate change, creating and enforcing land demarcations, increasing indigenous involvement, and advocacy, and adding pressure from the international community can reverse the decline of the isolated indigenous population in the Brazilian Amazon, preserving any remaining culture and identity for these communities

Maria Montessori

Dr. Maria Montessori was born in Italy in 1870. At the age of 24 she became the first woman to receive a medical degree from the University of Rome. As assistant physician in the psychiatric clinic of the University of Rome, she became interested in the learning ability of mentally and physically atypical children. Her interest in this field was furthered by her reading of the success of Dr. Edward Sequin, a French physician, who was doing extensive work with the education of [people with learning disabilities]. Dr. Montessori founded the Orthophrenic School in Rome in 1898 and carried on much of her early work in this school. She also lectured at the University of Rome on pedagogical anthropology. In 1922 she was named inspector general of all schools in Italy. Her work was interrupted in 1933 because she was not able to accept the type of training the Mussolini regime was imposing on children. She left Italy in 1933 and did not return until 1947. Madame Montessori spent the last of her life speaking and writing about the Montessori method in Spain, India, England, and the Netherlands. Her work was by now accepted for the normal child as well as the mentally handicapped. Dr. Maria Montessori died in 1952 while visiting the Netherlands. The author of this article, Dr. John R. O\u27Donnell, is in his second year on the University of Dayton faculty. He has lectured widely and is looked upon as a resource person in the field of elementary school mathematics, an area in which he has written several books

Water quality in the Illawarra-South Coast region of New South Wales, Australia

Water quality is a serious environmental concern in the South Coast region of New South Wales as many aspects of human ecology and the economy are dependant on good water quality. Apart from drinking water for residents and visitors, tourism and agricultural productivity rely on good quality water. This paper presents an overview of general issues with regard to the development of water quality assessment procedures and programs, and discusses a number of issues considered important for the region. These include the impacts of increasing urbanisation, industrial activity (including mining), the potential wider use of groundwater and the improved management of water quality information. Issues that need further attention include the potential impacts of climate change on water resources and quality, the development of local water quality guidelines, and the provision of more information on organic contaminants

A Comparison of Quadriceps -to-Hamstrings Ratios During Isokinetic Testing, Cutting, and Drop Landings in Male Soccer Players

Collegiate soccer is not an unusual place to suffer a knee injury. The sport has many dynamic movements, such as cutting, jumping and shooting. Many professionals use quadriceps-to-hamstring (Q/H) ratios as a tool to determine when an injured player can to return to game play or use the ratio to investigate how predisposed a certain player is to sustaining a knee injury. However, many of these ratios are taken in isokinetic testing in a controlled environment and to our knowledge it is unknown if these ratios are similar to those measured during dynamic activity. Therefore, this study investigated if there was a relationship between Q/H ratios measured during isokinetic testing and drop landings and cutting. Fifteen Division 2 collegiate male soccer players (age: 19.79 ± 1.25 years; height: 176.74 ± 6.22 cm; weight: 77.24 ± 11.01 kg). Wearing Athlos© compression shorts participants performed isokinetic testing, drop landings and cutting drills while muscle activity was measured. A significant difference was found between the bilateral Q/H ratios during the drop landings (p = 0.04; h = 0.49). There were no significant bilateral differences measured during the cutting drills in either direction and isokinetic testing (p \u3e 0.05). Additionally, there was so significant relationship in Q/H ratios between isokinetic testing and the dynamic movements (p\u3e 0.05). This suggests that clinicians should use Q/H ratios during dynamic movements rather than isokinetic testing in a controlled environment to better assess player risk disposition and return-to-play criteria

Mary\u27s Coming Home

https://digitalcommons.library.umaine.edu/mmb-vp/5413/thumbnail.jp

Best Friends Forever? The Influence of Technology on High-Quality and Low-Quality Childhood Friendships

This literature review provides a holistic assessment of childhood interaction by investigating the many ways in which new technologies have influenced both high-quality and low-quality childhood friendships. As technology becomes increasingly more prevalent in society and inevitably continues to evolve peer-to-peer communication, traditional approaches to social interaction have adopted entirely new mediums. Children are now being exposed to communication-altering devices younger than ever before, which has profoundly influenced their social relationships. This thesis explores past competing research on the topic of children and technology by explaining the many ways in which technology has both helped children develop high-quality peer relationships, and also accentuated many characteristics of low-quality peer relationships

Water quality in the Wingecarribee Shire, NSW

This paper reports on a water quality monitoring program carried out for Wingecarribee Shire Council between March 2002 and July 2004 by University of Wollongong staff and students. Initially 40 sites were sampled on four occasions over three months in a pilot program leading to the selection of sites and parameters for a two year program of monthly monitoring. A range of chemical, physical and biological parameters was measured including nutrients and faecal coliform bacteria on samples collected over the 26 approximately monthly sampling trips. Chlorophyll a, phaeophyton and blue-green algae were also determined over a shorter period. The sampling period included the particularly hot and dry spell September 2002 - January 2003 and a return to less extreme conditions after February 2003. The range of nutrient and coliform data is reported with discussion of the effects of rainfall patterns on nutrients and on faecal coliform counts at the various sites. Small creek sites showed significant changes to nutrient regimes in the long dry spell, whereas the same effect was not apparent in larger river sites. Very wide ranges of faecal coliform counts were found, especially at small creek sites in farmland. Excepting extreme results, generally elevated coliform counts were found when rainfall occurred 0-3 days immediately prior to sampling. Generally lower counts were found in drier weather. The Shire has already implemented some measures to improve water quality in response to this program

Optimal Inapproximability Results for MAX-CUT and Other 2-Variable CSPs?

In this paper we show a reduction from the Unique Games problem to the problem of approximating MAX-CUT to within a factor of αGW + ∈, for all ∈ \u3e 0; here αGW ≈ .878567 denotes the approximation ratio achieved by the Goemans-Williamson algorithm [26]. This implies that if the Unique Games Conjecture of Khot [37] holds then the Goemans-Williamson approximation algorithm is optimal. Our result indicates that the geometric nature of the Goemans-Williamson algorithm might be intrinsic to the MAX-CUT problem. Our reduction relies on a theorem we call Majority Is Stablest. This was introduced as a conjecture in the original version of this paper, and was subsequently confirmed in [45]. A stronger version of this conjecture called Plurality Is Stablest is still open, although [45] contains a proof of an asymptotic version of it. Our techniques extend to several other two-variable constraint satisfaction problems. In particular, subject to the Unique Games Conjecture, we show tight or nearly tight hardness results for MAX-2SAT, MAX-q-CUT, and MAX-2LIN(q). For MAX-2SAT we show approximation hardness up to a factor of roughly .943. This nearly matches the .940 approximation algorithm of Lewin, Livnat, and Zwick [41]. Furthermore, we show that our .943... factor is actually tight for a slightly restricted version of MAX-2SAT. For MAX-q-CUT we show a hardness factor which asymptotically (for large q) matches the approximation factor achieved by Frieze and Jerrum [25], namely 1 − 1/q + 2(ln q)/q2 . For MAX-2LIN(q) we show hardness of distinguishing between instances which are (1−∈)-satisfiable and those which are not even, roughly, (q−∈/2)-satisfiable. These parameters almost match those achieved by the recent algorithm of Charikar, Makarychev, and Makarychev [10]. The hardness result holds even for instances in which all equations are of the form xi − xj = c. At a more qualitative level, this result also implies that 1 − ∈ vs. ∈ hardness for MAX-2LIN(q) is equivalent to the Unique Games Conjecture