Deaths in custody in Australia: National Deaths in Custody Program 2011–12 and 2012–13

Abstract: The data presented in this report include frequencies of deaths in prison and police custody and information regarding the deceased, including demographic information and cause of death. Long term trends are also presented. In 2011–12 and 2012–13, there were 144 deaths in custody, 73 in 2011–12 (42 prison custody; 31 police custody and custody-related operations) and 71 in 2012–13 (53 prison custody; 18 police custody and custody-related operations). At June 30 2013 the total prison population in Australia was 30,775 (including 8,430 Indigenous prisoners; 27%). More than two-thirds of deaths in prison were due to natural causes (n=64), most commonly cancer. Hanging deaths accounted for 19 percent (n=17) of prison custody deaths. The number of police custody deaths in 2012–13 dropped significantly from 2011–12 and is the lowest recorded since the definition of police custody deaths was expanded in 1990

The Impact of New Media on Policy Affecting Agriculture

New media have changed the way people communicate and transfer information, but their effects on agenda-setting and the transfer of salience of objects and attributes have not been explored empirically. This study utilized a quantitative content analysis to determine how the blogosphere affects the agricultural policy agenda by analyzing a specific piece of policy that has the potential to effect agriculture. Results indicate a significant predictive relationship of the blogosphere agenda, media agenda, interest group agenda, and public agenda to the policy agenda. This adds new information on agenda-setting in an online environment by concluding agenda-setting occurs in new media environments similarly to traditional media environments. Future studies should consider the influence of the blogosphere on the political agenda

Influential Article Review - A New Approach to Rural Economic Growth in Pakistan's Rain-Fed Areas

This paper examines sustainable economic development. We present insights from a highly influential paper. Here are the highlights from this paper: The purpose of this article is to present a framework that could be used to achieve the objective of sustainable rural development in a community which is characterized by high numbers of smallholders, landless peasants, and unskilled or semi-skilled labor ultimately leading to low productivity and high rates of poverty. The study presents a design inspired by “Saemaul Undong” (New Village Movement) of South Korea. The proposed model is based on proposing a four-tier approach for the working of the village-level cooperatives which will be self-reliant through a network connection to the national and international markets. Existing studies and surveys in Punjab province of Pakistan have established that rural areas are often lacking essential facilities that affect the abilities of these areas to retain skilled manpower thus leading to resource drain and negatively impacting agricultural productivity. The proposed Village-City Model, “VCM,” was designed to strengthen the local infrastructure and built interest-based cooperatives to develop an environment which can sustain the benefits of higher productivity and translate these into better livelihoods. It is proposed that farmer-centered cooperatives with appropriate institutional arrangements could result in developing village-based cities where skilled manpower can exert better resource use efficiency, access to market coupled with rural finance schemes to enhance resource base and access to technology. The cooperatives experience is considered as a bitter experience in Pakistan. However, the analysis of failures of cooperatives in Pakistan revealed many bottlenecks which have been addressed through indigenization of Saemaul Undong

Employee Perceptions of the Brand Salience and Differentiation for a State Forestry Organization

A survey was conducted of employees of the Florida Forest Service (FFS) to determine their perceptions related to the brand ’s differentiation and salience as well as what they believed public perceptions were. Employees’ perceptions are important to the FFS brand. As a service-oriented organization, FFS employees will largely affect public perceptions of the organization and its activities. Employees believed all FFS activities were important but that wildfire-related activities and functions were more salient and more important for differentiating the FFS brand from similar organizations. The employees believed the public was not well informed of FFS’s functions, with the exception of wildfire functions. Employees also believed the public perceived wildfire activities were more important for brand differentiation that FFS’s other activities. Because FFS is a public organization with a variety of functions and activities, it risks its credibility if it is not able to represent the full scope of its activities and functions to the public. It was recommended to make salience and differentiation a priority for the FFS brand. The FFS brand needs to increase the public’s exposure to the FFS brand and represent the full scope of its activities and functions to ensure credible representation of the brand. For research, it was recommended to study tactics for affecting employee perceptions of the organization’s activities and employees’ perceptions of public opinion

Leading Students to Empower their Peers in Undergraduate Research

UCF and FAU’s offices of undergraduate research have three separate opportunities for current undergraduate researchers to assume a leadership role and assist their peers in getting started in research. This presentation will lay out the three models, at each institution, for student leadership in undergraduate research: peer mentors/ student teaching assistants, student assistants who host peer mentor advising hours throughout the academic year, and student councils who focus on outreach across campus and serve in an advisory capacity. This session will provide an overview of these programs on the two campuses

Managing Media Relations: Determining the Reputation of Land Grant Institutions from the Perspective of Media Professionals

In recent years, the land grant university has struggled with public awareness outside of its traditional audiences, indicating a potential disconnect between the general public and the media. The purpose of this study was to assess the perceptions and awareness of media with regard to the image and reputation of the University of Florida’s Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (UF/IFAS). A sample of 150 state and local media professionals was surveyed to assess perceptions and awareness of UF/IFAS. The results indicated that the media’s perceptions of UF/IFAS image and reputation were positive, but their awareness of the institution’s range of program areas was low. Media professionals consider the information provided by UF/IFAS to be credible, useable, and newsworthy. Respondents said the environment, followed by disaster preparation and recovery were the most important topics to their target audience, while the least important topics to their target audience were 4-H youth development and agriculture. Media professionals were more likely to use UF/IFAS as a source for agriculture and natural resource topics than other topics. Other universities should consider conducting similar research to develop a body of knowledge on media relations at land grant institutions

FINISHING OR WINNING? THE VARIABLES THAT IMPACTED THE NASCAR CHAMPIONSHIP IN THE CHASE I FORMAT (2004-2013)

Since 2004 NASCAR has evolved its championship format in an effort to put more emphasis on wins, thus encouraging drivers to take more risk to get the race win. Past research has shown that drivers taking a conservative approach, by completing laps rather than going for wins, results in championships. This research attempts to determine if previous models are robust in predicting factors that influence individual points accumulation towards winning the championship and if driver consistency, rather than winning, remains the dominant factor in predicting NASCAR\u27s championship standings

Duality of Orthogonal and Symplectic Matrix Integrals and Quaternionic Feynman Graphs

We present an asymptotic expansion for quaternionic self-adjoint matrix integrals. The Feynman diagrams appearing in the expansion are ordinary ribbon graphs and their non-orientable counterparts. The result exhibits a striking duality between quaternionic self-adjoint and real symmetric matrix integrals. The asymptotic expansions of these integrals are given in terms of summations over topologies of compact surfaces, both orientable and non-orientable, for all genera and an arbitrary positive number of marked points on them. We show that the Gaussian Orthogonal Ensemble (GOE) and Gaussian Symplectic Ensemble (GSE) have exactly the same graphical expansion term by term (when appropriately normalized),except that the contributions from non-orientable surfaces with odd Euler characteristic carry the opposite sign. As an application, we give a new topological proof of the known duality for correlations of characteristic polynomials. Indeed, we show that this duality is equivalent to Poincare duality of graphs drawn on a compact surface. Another application of our graphical expansion formula is a simple and simultaneous (re)derivation of the Central Limit Theorem for GOE, GUE (Gaussian Unitary Ensemble) and GSE: The three cases have exactly the same graphical limiting formula except for an overall constant that represents the type of the ensemble.Comment: 39 pages, AMS LaTeX, 49 .eps figures, references update

Myth or Reality? Exploring Intergenerational Social Assistance Participation in Ontario, Canada

Is there an intergenerational causal link in social assistance (SA) participation? There is a dearth of research addressing this question, yet the discourse of ‘welfare dependency’ is hegemonic. The limited research that does attempt to tease out a causal link in intergenerational SA participation remains equivocal. Qualitative research is largely absent in welfare scholarship; research that might provide a more nuanced understanding of the dynamics underlying SA receipt. We employ an inductive qualitative analysis, using procedures from grounded theory, to understand SA participants’ experiences and perspectives on intergenerational SA usage. We find that the two causal mechanisms underlying intergenerational SA usage, the learning effect and conformity effect, require further investigation. The theoretical foundations fundamental in explaining a causal intergenerational link are shaken by our grounded theory approach