Discovery and Strategic Partnership Group Concept Mapping: 2014-2015 Progress Report

In 2014, New York State received funding from the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services to begin the NYS PROMISE (Promote the Readiness of Minors in Supplemental Security Income) research initiative. The goal of this initiative is to coordinate the system of support surrounding these youths to better catalyze their potential to transition from Supplemental Security Income (SSI) to a sustainable future of living and earning as independent adults. To guide strategy and support PROMISE priorities over the course of the initiative, NYS PROMISE convened the NYS PROMISE Steering Committee, comprised of appointed liaisons from agencies who are connected to the NYS PROMISE initiative. To support sustainable partnership development for greater progress and impact on the goals of NYS PROMISE, the Steering Committee engaged in a structured, time sensitive strategic planning and partnership framework development effort. To develop the elements of a prioritized strategy, the group used Group Concept Mapping (GCM), and constructed a visual framework, or concept map, that served as the basis for prioritization and strategy development throughout the process. The GCM approach employs a group process to capture individual contributions for consensus around a given topic, using a structured approach with a specific sequence of steps that support timely and consistent engagement in the process. GCM incorporates opinions and values, and presents the results in ways that are understandable and usable. 25 individuals from 8 member agencies took part in the concept map development, contributing elements in response to the following prompt: “To yield enduring individual outcomes, a viable system to support youth with disabilities in their transition from high school to successful adult lives needs to include…

Design of Dispersive Delay Structures (DDSs) Formed by Coupled C-Sections Using Predistortion with Space Mapping

The concept of space mapping is applied, for the first time, to the design of microwave dispersive delay structures (DDSs). DDSs are components providing specified group delay versus frequency responses for real-time radio systems. The DDSs considered in this paper are formed by cascaded coupled C-sections. It is first shown that aggressive space mapping does not provide sufficient accuracy in the synthesis of DDSs. To address this issue, we propose a predistortion space mapping technique. Compared to aggressive space mapping, this technique provides enhanced accuracy, while compared to output space mapping, it provides greater implementation simplicity. Two full-wave and one experimental examples are provided to illustrate the proposed predistortion space mapping technique

Kinematic Mappings for Cayley-Klein Geometries via Clifford Algebras

This paper unifies the concept of kinematic mappings by using geometric algebras. We present a method for constructing kinematic mappings for certain Cayley-Klein geometries. These geometries are described in an algebraic setting by the homogeneous Clifford algebra model. Displacements correspond to Spin group elements. After that Spin group elements are mapped to a kinematic image space. Especially for the group of planar Euclidean displacements SE(2) the result is the kinematic mapping of Blaschke and Gr\"unwald. For the group of spatial Euclidean displacements SE(3) the result is Study's mapping. Furthermore, we classify kinematic mappings for Cayley-Klein spaces of dimension 2 and 3

Patient experience and challenges in group concept mapping for clinical research.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: Group concept mapping (GCM) is a research method that engages stakeholders in generating, structuring and representing ideas around a specific topic or question. GCM has been used with patients to answer questions related to health and disease but little is known about the patient experience as a participant in the process. This paper explores the patient experience participating in GCM as assessed with direct observation and surveys of participants. METHODS: This is a secondary analysis performed within a larger study in which 3 GCM iterations were performed to engage patients in identifying patient-important outcomes for diabetes care. Researchers tracked the frequency and type of assistance required by each participant to complete the sorting and rating steps of GCM. In addition, a 17-question patient experience survey was administered over the telephone to the participants after they had completed the GCM process. Survey questions asked about the personal impact of participating in GCM and the ease of various steps of the GCM process. RESULTS: Researchers helped patients 92 times during the 3 GCM iterations, most commonly to address software and computer literacy issues, but also with the sorting phase itself. Of the 52 GCM participants, 40 completed the post-GCM survey. Respondents averaged 56 years of age, were 50% female and had an average hemoglobin A1c of 9.1%. Ninety-two percent (n = 37) of respondents felt that they had contributed something important to this research project and 90% (n = 36) agreed or strongly agreed that their efforts would help others with diabetes. Respondents reported that the brainstorming session was less difficult when compared with sorting and rating of statements. DISCUSSION: Our results suggest that patients find value in participating in GCM. Patients reported less comfort with the sorting step of GCM when compared with brainstorming, an observation that correlates with our observations from the GCM sessions. Researchers should consider using paper sorting methods and objective measures of sorting quality when using GCM in patient-engaged research to improve the patient experience and concept map quality

Comparing the Effect of Concept Mapping and Conventional Methods on Nursing Students' Practical Skill Score

Background: Development of practical skills in the field of nursing education has remained a serious and considerable challenge in nursing education. Moreover, newly graduated nurses may have weak practical skills, which can be a threat to patients’ safety. Objectives: The present study was conducted to compare the effect of concept mapping and conventional methods on nursing students’ practical skills. Patients and Methods: This quasi-experimental study was conducted on 70 nursing students randomly assigned into two groups of 35 people. The intervention group was taught through concept mapping method, while the control group was taught using conventional method. A two-part instrument was used including a demographic information form and a checklist for direct observation of procedural skills. Descriptive statistics, chi-square, independent samples t-tests and paired t-test were used to analyze data. Results: Before education, no significant differences were observed between the two groups in the three skills of cleaning (P = 0.251), injection (P = 0.185) and sterilizing (P = 0.568). The students mean scores were significantly increased after the education and the difference between pre and post intervention of students mean scores were significant in the both groups (P < 0.001). However, after education, in all three skills the mean scores of the intervention group were significantly higher than the control group (P < 0.001). Conclusions: Concept mapping was superior to conventional skill teaching methods. It is suggested to use concept mapping in teaching practical courses such as fundamentals of nursing

Coarse median structures and homomorphisms from Kazhdan groups

We study Bowditch's notion of a coarse median on a metric space and formally introduce the concept of a coarse median structure as an equivalence class of coarse medians up to closeness. We show that a group which possesses a uniformly left-invariant coarse median structure admits only finitely many conjugacy classes of homomorphisms from a given group with Kazhdan's property (T). This is a common generalization of a theorem due to Paulin about the outer automorphism group of a hyperbolic group with property (T) as well as of a result of Behrstock-Drutu-Sapir on the mapping class groups of orientable surfaces. We discuss a metric approximation property of finite subsets in coarse median spaces extending the classical result on approximation of Gromov hyperbolic spaces by trees.Comment: 23 pages, v2: Minor revision following the referee's suggestions. The final publication is available at link.springer.com via https://doi.org/10.1007/s10711-015-0090-

EFEKTIVITAS MODEL PEMBELAJARAN KOOPERATIF TIPE CONCEPT MAPPING GROUP RESUME(CMGR) DAN CONCEPT MAPPING (CM) DITINJAU DARI MOTIVASI PESERTA DIDIK

This study aimed to investigate: (1) which type more effective, a CMGR type, a CM type, or a Direct Instruction, (2) which one had a better mathematics achievement, students who had high, middle or low motivation students, (3) in each CMGR type, a CM type or Direct Instruction model, which one had a better mathematics achievement, students who had high, middle, or low motivation (4) in each motivation students (high, middle and low), which one more effective, students taught by a CMGR type, a CM type, or a Direct Instruction. We used the fifth grade students of elementary school in Nusawungu Subdistrict as the population. This study was a quasi experimental research by 3 x 3 factorial design. The instruments used to collect data are prior ability test in mathematics, a motivation questionnaire and achievement test in mathematics. The data were analyzed using unbalanced two ways analysis of variance. Based on the data analyzed, it was concluded that: (1) a CMGR type had better mathematics achievement than a CM type and a Direct Intruction, and a CM type had better mathematics achievement than a Direct Instruction, (2) the high motivation students had better mathematics achievement than the middle and low motivation students, and the middle motivation students had better mathematics achievement than the low motivation students, (3) for all types of learning model, high motivation students had better mathematics achievement than middle and low motivation students, (4) for high and middle motivation students, a CMGR type more effective than a CM type and Direct Instruction, and for low motivation students, a CM type more effective than a CMGR type and Direct Instruction

NYS PROMISE Learning Community Group Concept Mapping: Fall 2016 Case Manager Experience - Final Report

Beginning in 2014, the Federal Government provided funding to New York State as part of an initiative to improve services that lead to sustainable outcomes for youth receiving Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits. As part of the NYS PROMISE initiative, Concept Systems, Inc. worked with the Learning Community to develop learning needs frameworks using the Group Concept Mapping methodology (GCM). The GCM projects gather, aggregates, and integrate the specific knowledge and opinions of the Learning Community members. This allows for their guidance and involvement in supporting NYS PROMISE as a viable community of practice. This work also increases the responsiveness of NYS PROMISE to the Learning Community members’ needs by inspiring discussion during the semi-annual in-person meetings. As of the end of year three, three GCM projects have been completed with the PROMISE Learning Community. These projects focused on Outreach and Recruitment Project 1), Case Management and Service Delivery (Project 2), and Case Manager Experience (Project 3). This report discusses the data collection method and participation in the Case Manager Experience GCM project, as well as providing graphics, statistical reports, and a summary of the analysis