Idea Generation and Exploration: Benefits and Limitations of the Policy Delphi Research Method

Researchers use the policy Delphi method to explore a complex topic with little historical context that requires expert opinion to fully understand underlying issues. The benefit of this research technique is the use of experts who have more timely information than can be gleamed from extant literature. Additionally, those experts place researchers in a specific moment, thus increasing the possibility of capturing change over time. One limitation of the policy Delphi is the difficulty in developing an accurate initial questionnaire to start the process. The purpose of this article is to identify benefits and limitations of this research method. Kathy K. Franklin is Associate Professor of Postsecondary and Private Sector Leadership at East Tennessee State University (ETSU), Franklin received her B.S. from the University of Alabama, M.B.A. from Middle Tennessee State University, and her Ed.D. from ETSU. Jan K. Hart is Assistant Director of the Medical Sciences Library at the University of Arkansas Medical School. Hart received her B.A. from the University of Kansas, M.L.S. from the University of Denver, and her Ed.D. from the University of Arkansas, Little Rock.Franklin and Hart study diverse research methodologies in the exploration and confirmation of theory.     

Children's cognition of stressful events

Current research on children and stress supports the belief that children today experience stressful events in a complex developmental-ecological context. Many interdependent elements, including child variables (sex, age, temperament, and developmental stage), family variables (marital status, interactions, child-rearing practices, and socioeconomic status), and variables related to the child's extended social and physical environments (neighborhood, child care, and peers), affect the ways in which children perceive, respond, and cope with stressors (Benswanger, 1982; Honig, 1986). The accuracy of children's perceptions and the development of coping skills, however, vary according to children's cognitive abilities and limitations.Jan Allen is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Child and Family Studies, College of Human Ecology, at The University of Tennessee in Knoxville. The author is appreciative of helpful comments about this article from Dr. Deborah W. Tegano and Becki A. Bowditch.     

Developing Student Collaborations across Disciplines,Distances, and Institutions

Because quantitative biology requires skills and concepts from a disparate collection of different disciplines, the scientists of the near future will increasingly need to rely on collaborations to produce results. Correspondingly, students in disciplines impacted by quantitative biology will need to be taught how to create and engage in such collaborations. In response to this important curricular need, East Tennessee State University and Georgia Technological University/Emory University cooperated in an unprecedented curricular experiment in which theoretically oriented students at East Tennessee State designed biophysical models that were implemented and tested experimentally by biomedical engineers at the Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering at Georgia Technological University and Emory University. Implementing the collaborations between two institutions allowed an assessment of the student collaborations from before the groups of students had met for the first time until after they had finished their projects, thus providing insight about the formation and conduct of such collaborations that could not have been obtained otherwise.     

A Longitudinal Study of the Talent Search Program

This longitudinal study examined the impact of participation in the federally funded Talent Search program at The University of Tennessee, Knoxville. The Talent Search program provides career exploration and counseling services to low-income students with the potential to be first-generation college graduates. Postsecondary education enrollment rates of 758 Talent Search participants were compared with enrollment rates of a control group of 450 individuals who were eligible for Talent Search services but did not participate. Chi-square analysis revealed that Talent Search participants were significantly more likely to enroll in postsecondary education than were members of the control group (p < .001). These results have implications for career development services provided to low-income, potential first-generation college graduates.     

Crisis in the transition from school to work: The Cross-River-State (Nigeria) lesson

Summary The Cross River State of Nigeria is rich, open, and to some extent its virgin fields of industrialization, its agricultural lands, the petroleum industry and allied business have not only provided employment opportunities for its citizens, but have also helped to boost its economy.At the same time, varied educational institutions have been opened for the education of young people. In 1976, many school age children were enrolled in the primary school because the universal primary education scheme was formally launched throughout the country. Although education in the secondary school level depends on one's ability to pay rather than on one's ability to learn, more parents are today able to pay for their son's and daughters' education than it was the case twenty years ago.While the cost of educating young people in recent times has been increasing substantially, the bad fit of schooling at almost every level has become one of the explosive issues in both the state and the national levels (Abdulatif, 1977). Today there has been an increasing concern about the future implications of: (i) the universal primary education scheme on local communities, state, and national governments, (ii) young adults leaving secondary schools for the world of work with the type of orientation that they have in the secondary schools. This concern is aggravated as school intake is outpacing the growth and the opportunities in the small, capital intensive modern sector of the state's economy to absorb the bulk of the increased in the labour force. This concern is felt more because more students are completing secondary education each year and about 70 percent of those attending some kind of formal secondary institution terminate their education at that level and start looking for some jobs.This report is strictly based on an unpublished doctoral dissertation written by the author at Teachers College, Columbia University, New York, 1977, the title, Secondary School Education and Employment in Nigeria-Implications for Career Guidance: A Study in the Cross River State. This study was conducted in the Cross River State of Nigeria which until February 4, 1976 bore the name South Eastern State.Ahmadu Bello University     

色彩对影视作品氛围营造的重要性

色彩是影视作品构成中重要的元素,是一种不可或缺的艺术表现手法.色彩本身是没有喜怒哀乐的,是因为人的人身阅历的烙印,才使得人们对色彩有了喜与悲的比较,色彩的表现含义也变得丰富起来.     

Undergraduates' Evaluations of Developmental Claims and Their Identification of Information Sources

Students in a large human development course rated the accuracy of 50 developmental claims. Half of the claims were specifically embedded in the course content, but the remaining claims were not addressed in the course. Students also identified the major information source for each developmental claim rated. From the beginning to the end of the course, students (especially high performers) improved in evaluating the accuracy of course-related developmental claims and increasingly attributed their ratings of these claims to professional information sources. Our study underscores the importance of sensitizing students to the role of research evidence in judging the credibility of claims in general education courses.Sherry K. Bain is an Associate Professor in Educational Psychology and Counseling at the University of Tennessee and a member of the school psychology graduate faculty, Her research has included investigations of common beliefs in areas such as giftedness and educational psychology and their relationship to data-based evidence. Robert L. Williams is a Professor in Educational Psychology and Counseling at the University of Tennessee. His current research focuses on the role of critical thinking in a large human development course. Rachael Isaacs and Ashley Williams are doctoral students in the School Psychology Program at the University of Tennessee. Susan Stockdale is an Assistant Professor of Educational Psychology and Middle Grades Education at Kennesaw State University. Her recent research has related to critical thinking and cooperative learning in higher education     

史朝义之死考

史朝义之死是唐代历史中的一个重要问题,因为他的死亡标志着八年安史之乱的结束。但关于史朝义的死亡时间、死亡地点及英死亡方式,《旧唐书》、《新唐书》、《资治通鉴》等基本史书的相关记载却不尽相同,今人对这一问题也未展开专门讨论,一些论著涉及到这一问题时认识并不一致,本文试对这一问题进行分析,试求出历史真相。     

Fear of death and physical illness: a personal construct approach

The Threat Index, Templer's Death Anxiety Scale, and the Collett-Lester Fear of Death Scale were administered to 100 respondents in an attempt to assess their personal orientation toward death. Each respondent was a member of one of the following groups: people with no known illness; people attending their family physician for a checkup; rheumatoid arthritics; diabetics; or people recently treated for cancer. Hierarchical multiple regression analyses indicated that older respondents were significantly less death anxious, less fearful of their own death, and more integrated (that is, showed less self-death discrepancy) than younger respondents. Further analyses revealed no differences between any of the groups on fear of death or death anxiety, indicating that the current state of an individual's health was not related to his or her death orientation. Instead, correlational and regression analyses suggested that anxiety and fear were much more likely to be influenced by a respondent's level of actualization and, to a lesser extent, level of integration. The expected additive effects of actualization and integration did not emerge, a finding that was at variance with previous research.     

Personnel interviewing for quality child care

Child care directors' interest in hiring well-qualified staff has increased as issues related to insurance and liability, media-hyped occurrences of child abuse in day care, and quality of child care in general have become of greater concern. Thus, many directors are seeking and developing thorough and innovative methods for interviewing prospective employees (Leak, 1982; Neugebauer, 1982; Sciarra and Dorsey, 1990).Jan Allen is Associate Professor, and Carol Catron Director, Campus Child Care Programs, Department of Child and Family Studies, College of Human Ecology, The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN.     

Success Without ‘A’ Pass: an Educational Experiment Revisited

In 1963, the University of Sussex inaugurated an innovative Early Leavers Scheme in response to two government reports which confirmed that it was still the norm for talented working‐class children to leave school aged 15 or 16 and indicated that the hopes of the 1944 Education Act were as yet unfulfilled. This article explores what the scheme has meant to some of the people who got to university because of it. Research on relevant documentation of the scheme and its outcomes held in the University of Sussex archives and information gathered from four people admitted to the scheme and its impact on them inform this article. The scheme is contextualised with relevant policy documents, government reports and academic publications to provide a framework for the accounts of those who took part in it and it is tentatively suggested that these have implications for higher education policy today.     

On Death

Death is not a terrible word,but a provoking one.Different people have different opinions,but no one can convince others of what death really means.This article made a tentative and superficial analysis on death according to the true feeing and experiences of the author.In her opinion,we needn’t consider more about death;the important for the death is how to live meaningfully.     

Understanding food processing and systems: Pilot testing a standards‐aligned middle school curriculum

Consumer confidence and trust, as it relates to the food system, is one of the most sensitive areas within consumers’ understanding of food. Surveys have shown that a large majority of people would like to learn more about agriculture and food manufacturing, with young people being among those most eager for more information about where their food comes from. Food‐focused educational resources often go unused due to teachers’ lack of familiarity with the subject area, the pressures of standardized testing, and lack of alignment to state content standards. Building on the success of the Hands On Classrooms platform that developed and validated curricula with high adoption rates by teachers and a demonstrated impact on student knowledge and self‐efficacy, a new curriculum on food system and food processing was developed and pilot tested. Two teachers from rural Virginia and Tennessee participated in the study. Both teachers received online professional development prior to implementation. Students were given pretests and posttests to measure (a) what impact does the curriculum have on students’ knowledge of food systems and processing and (b) to what extent does the curriculum have an impact on student's self‐reported skills related to these topics? A total of 87 students completed the assessments and showed significant improvements from pretest to posttest on both knowledge (p < .001) and skills (p < .001) related specifically to where food comes from and how it is processed, content that is typically not covered in middle school curriculum. Further research can be undertaken to measure the impact on others in different geographic and socioeconomic areas to provide additional data to validate the program.     

Toward Integration: From Quantitative Biology to Mathbio-Biomath?

In response to the call of BIO2010 for integrating quantitative skills into undergraduate biology education, 30 Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) Program Directors at the 2006 HHMI Program Directors Meeting established a consortium to investigate, implement, develop, and disseminate best practices resulting from the integration of math and biology. With the assistance of an HHMI-funded mini-grant, led by Karl Joplin of East Tennessee State University, and support in institutional HHMI grants at Emory and University of Delaware, these institutions held a series of summer institutes and workshops to document progress toward and address the challenges of implementing a more quantitative approach to undergraduate biology education. This report summarizes the results of the four summer institutes (2007–2010). The group developed four draft white papers, a wiki site, and a listserv. One major outcome of these meetings is this issue of CBE—Life Sciences Education, which resulted from proposals at our 2008 meeting and a January 2009 planning session. Many of the papers in this issue emerged from or were influenced by these meetings.     

论孔子德政学说的现实价值

内容丰富的德政学说是孔子儒学理论体系中最可宝贵的一朵奇葩。从“爱民”到“富民”、从“教民”到“安民”、从“举贤”到“正政” ,这些内涵深刻的德政思想 ,无不如中天红日 ,光彩四射。它不仅在历史上曾发挥过积极作用、产生过深远影响 ,而且就是到了今天 ,对于我们推行“以德治国”的伟大方略 ,尤其是对于加强干部队伍的道德建设 ,也是仍然有着不朽的借鉴价值和积极的启迪意义的。     

Values in Competitive Games

Margaret H'Doubler attained a degree of achievement in dance and left a legacy which still influences the art form today. Teaching and writing at the University of Wisconsin for 44 years, H'Doubler established a program of dance and pioneered new forms of movement which affected the field of dance far beyond the campus at Wisconsin. This paper traces the evolution of those ideas and the people and processes which influenced and were influenced by H'Doubler. Perhaps more importantly, it speaks to the intangible qualities of character and grace which symbolize this remarkable woman.     

Human Rights and Equal Opportunities for People with Mental Handicap‐‐With Particular Reference to Down Syndrome

THE FOCUS of this paper is on attitudes to people with mental retardation, the origin of some of these attitudes and the way handicapped people have been treated at different times in history, including our own. It considers the way in which handicapped people are treated today as perhaps being a legacy of former attitudes and beliefs. It addresses the problem of defining human rights in social and individual contexts and how sometimes conditions are required even for an acknowledgement of humanness. The ‘quality of life’ issue is reviewed in terms of life and death decisions, both before and after birth and up to old age. Respect for human rights are discussed‐‐including the right to work, the right to protection, the right to live in the community‐‐from a practical as well as a philosophical point of view.     

苏霍姆林斯基教育思想在中国的传播及其现实意义

苏霍姆林斯基的教育思想最早由我校外国教育研究所和华东师大外国教育研究所介绍到我国.他的教育思想具有丰富性、全面性、深刻性等特点,尤其是他关于和谐教育、培养学生精神生活的思想,说到了教育的本质.近年来我国引进许多西方的教育理论,但大多是技术层面的,缺少对人的价值的完整论述.因此,苏霍姆林斯基的教育思想今天仍然有现实意义,应该在我国教育界继续大力学习和推广.     

The National Technological University

Abstract

Widely shared concerns in the US engineering profession have fostered the evolution of technologies and organizations that today are centred in the National Technological University (NTU). Most engineering graduates enter the workforce with a baccalaureate degree today, as they did in 1900, despite the enormous complexity of modern technology. Furthermore, accelerating technological change makes career‐long learning a necessity. This article looks at the work of the NTU.     

云南省红河学院非体育专业学生体质状况调查

健康是人类永恒的话题,千百年来人们一直在关注着自身的健康,随着时代的发展人们更加注重自身的体质健康。大学生作为祖国的未来和希望,他们的健康越来越受到人们的关注。未来社会的竞争将是人才素质的全面竞争,没有健康的体魄就无法更好的适应现代社会高强度的竞争,也无法圆满的完成时代赋予我们的责任和使命。本次调查以红河学院非体育专业学生为示例,因为红河学院地处边疆少数民族地区,是滇南唯一的一所大学,而学生的结构除由少数民族学生外,还有来自全国26个省市的学生,由于其特殊的地理位置和构成群体,对其研究就显得非常重要。