A Qualitative Multi-site Case Study: Components, Strengths, & Benefits of Studio Production in Traditional Public High Schools

My own experiences in the visual arts lead me to a personal understanding of their importance and an interest in arts education advocacy. In order to advocate for the visual arts one must know what the arts teach and how to talk about those benefits. The lack of research on what is taught in the visual arts makes discussing the benefits difficult. Hetland, Winner, Veenema, & Sheridan (2007) began to close this gap with their findings of eight Studio Habits of Mind (develop craft, engage and persist, envision, express, observe, reflect, stretch and explore, understanding the art world) being taught in visual arts classrooms. However, their data was only collected from art magnet schools of the Boston area. My qualitative multisite case study builds on Hetland‘s et al. (2007) findings by focusing on the extent to which the Studio Habits of Mind are present within traditional public high schools. Analysis of the data collected in this study began with reflective notes during data collection, and continued with reading and re-reading of field notes, transcriptions of teacher interviews, and course documents. What was done and said in the classrooms were put into categories based on what they were teaching or encouraging students to learn. In addition to the eight Studio Habits of Mind I also found responsibility and confidence being taught. As the data was collected and analyzed differences in the extent to which each Studio Habit of Mind was taught began to surface between the schools, the teachers, and the class levels. Demonstrations, language, time, and emersion were found to support the teaching of the Studio Habits of Mind when used in a balanced teaching approach

Neurodevelopmental effects of genetic frontotemporal dementia in young adult mutation carriers.

While frontotemporal dementia has been considered a neurodegenerative disease that starts in mid-life or later, it is now clearly established that cortical and subcortical volume loss is observed more than a decade prior to symptom onset and progresses with ageing. To test the hypothesis that genetic mutations causing frontotemporal dementia have neurodevelopmental consequences, we examined the youngest adults in the GENFI cohort of pre-symptomatic frontotemporal dementia mutation carriers who are between 19 and 30 years of age. Structural brain differences and improved performance on some cognitive tests were found for MAPT and GRN mutation carriers relative to familial non-carriers, while smaller volumes were observed in C9orf72 repeat expansion carriers at a mean age of 26 years. The detection of such early differences supports potential advantageous neurodevelopmental consequences of some frontotemporal dementia-causing genetic mutations. These results have implications for the design of therapeutic interventions for frontotemporal dementia. Future studies at younger ages are needed to identify specific early pathophysiologic or compensatory processes that occur during the neurodevelopmental period

The genomic landscape of hypodiploid acute lymphoblastic leukemia

The genetic basis of hypodiploid acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), a subtype of ALL characterized by aneuploidy and poor outcome, is unknown. Genomic profiling of 124 hypodiploid ALL cases, including whole-genome and exome sequencing of 40 cases, identified two subtypes that differ in the severity of aneuploidy, transcriptional profiles and submicroscopic genetic alterations. Near-haploid ALL with 24-31 chromosomes harbor alterations targeting receptor tyrosine kinase signaling and Ras signaling (71%) and the lymphoid transcription factor gene IKZF3 (encoding AIOLOS; 13%). In contrast, low-hypodiploid ALL with 32-39 chromosomes are characterized by alterations in TP53 (91.2%) that are commonly present in nontumor cells, IKZF2 (encoding HELIOS; 53%) and RB1 (41%). Both near-haploid and low-hypodiploid leukemic cells show activation of Ras-signaling and phosphoinositide 3-kinase (PI3K)-signaling pathways and are sensitive to PI3K inhibitors, indicating that these drugs should be explored as a new therapeutic strategy for this aggressive form of leukemia

Neurodevelopmental effects of genetic frontotemporal dementia in young adult mutation carriers

© The Author(s) 2023. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Guarantors of Brain. All rights reserved.While frontotemporal dementia has been considered a neurodegenerative disease that starts in mid-life or later, it is now clearly established that cortical and subcortical volume loss is observed more than a decade prior to symptom onset and progresses with ageing. To test the hypothesis that genetic mutations causing frontotemporal dementia have neurodevelopmental consequences, we examined the youngest adults in the GENFI cohort of pre-symptomatic frontotemporal dementia mutation carriers who are between 19 and 30 years of age. Structural brain differences and improved performance on some cognitive tests were found for MAPT and GRN mutation carriers relative to familial non-carriers, while smaller volumes were observed in C9orf72 repeat expansion carriers at a mean age of 26 years. The detection of such early differences supports potential advantageous neurodevelopmental consequences of some frontotemporal dementia-causing genetic mutations. These results have implications for the design of therapeutic interventions for frontotemporal dementia. Future studies at younger ages are needed to identify specific early pathophysiologic or compensatory processes that occur during the neurodevelopmental period.This project was supported by Canadian Institutes of Health Research as part of a Centres of Excellence in Neurodegeneration grant, and by Canadian Institutes of Health Research operating grants (327387; 452843; 70797). The Dementia Research Centre is supported by Alzheimer’s Research UK, Alzheimer’s Society, Brain Research UK, and The Wolfson Foundation. This work was supported by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Queen Square Dementia Biomedical Research Unit and the University College London Hospitals Biomedical Research Centre, the Leonard Wolfson Experimental Neurology Centre (LWENC), and the UK Dementia Research Institute, which receives its funding from UK DRI Ltd, funded by the UK Medical Research Council, Alzheimer’s Society and Alzheimer’s Research UK. This work was also supported by the MRC UK GENFI grant (MR/M023664/1), the Italian Ministry of Health (CoEN015 and Ricerca Corrente), the Alzheimer’s Society grant (AS-PG-16-007), the Bluefield Project and the EU Joint Programme – Neurodegenerative Disease Research (GENFI-PROX grant 2019-02248). M.B. is supported by a Fellowship award from the Alzheimer’s Society, UK (AS-JF-19a- 004-517). M.B.’s work was also supported by the UK Dementia Research Institute which receives its funding from DRI Ltd., funded by the UK Medical Research Council, Alzheimer’s Society and Alzheimer’s Research UK. J.D.R. is supported by the Miriam Marks Brain Research UK Senior Fellowship and has received funding from an MRC Clinician Scientist Fellowship (MR/M008525/1) and the NIHR Rare Disease Translational Research Collaboration (BRC149/NS/MH). J.B.R. is funded by the Wellcome Trust (103838) and the National Institute for Health Research Cambridge Biomedical Research Centre. This work was funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) under Germany’s Excellence Strategy within the framework of the Munich Cluster for Systems Neurology (EXC 2145 SyNergy – ID 390857198). It is also funded by the Ministry of Health, Italy (S.S.). R.V.’s work is supported by the Mady Browaeys Fonds voor Onderzoek naar Frontotemporale Degeneratie. R.S.-V.’s work is supported by Instituto de Salud Carlos III (grant number 20/00448), cofunded by the EU. ANR-PRTS PrevdemALS study funding (I.L.B.). Several authors of this publication (J.C.vS., M.S., A.D., M.O., R.V., I.L.B., J.D.R.) are members of the European Reference Network for Rare Neurological Diseases (ERN-RND) - Project ID No 739510.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio