Body Fatness and Performance Differences between Men and Women

The purpose of this study was to determine the extent to which the mean difference in performance between men and women on selected physical performance tests was related to the sex difference in body fatness. Percent total body fat (% fat) estimated from skinfold thickness measures and performances on the modified pull-up, vertical jump, 50-yard dash, and 12-minute-run tests were measured on 55 male and 55 female college students. Males had significantly less fat and performed significantly better than females on each of the performance tests. Mean differences were 8.2% fat, 20.0 modified pull-ups, 20.8 cm on the vertical jump, 1.3 seconds on the 50-yard dash, and 590 m on the 12-minute run. Linear regression equations predicting performance scores from % fat within the groups of men and women indicated that if body fatness in men and women were similar, performance differences would be reduced, on the average, by 7 modified pull-ups, 4 cm on the vertical jump, .5 seconds on the 50–yard dash, and 146 m on the 12-minute run. These expected changes in performance were 36%, 19%, 38%, and 25% of the mean sex difference in performance on the four physical performance tests, respectively. It was concluded that greater body fatness is one characteristic that partly explains why women, on the average, do not perform as well as men on strenuous tasks requiring movement of the body weight. The sex-specific difference in body fatness should be one factor considered in establishing separate occupational and athletic performance expectations for men and women.     

The Role of Universities in the ‘Cultural Health’ of their Regions: universities' and regions' understandings of cultural engagement

As Arbo and Benneworth (2007) have alerted us, higher education institutions are now expected not only to conduct education and research, but also to play an active role in the development of their economic, social and cultural surroundings. They call this the ‘regional mission’ of HEIs. This paper is concerned with cultural engagement. Research on universities’ cultural engagement in their regions and the impact of that engagement is still in its infancy, partly because there are different understandings of ‘culture’ and of what ‘engagement’ entails. In this paper, qualitative data from the reports of mixed teams of academics and regional administrators involved in a large international project designed to improve universities’ regional engagement are analysed and discussed. The on-going study — PASCAL Universities' Regional Engagement (PURE) — investigates the role of HEIs in their regions across in a variety of fields such as the economy, community development, the environment and others. This article analyses the data from the study to identify the different perspectives universities and regions have of cultural engagement. The aim here is to demonstrate the value of PURE in facilitating the development of mutual understanding both between universities through a common language and between universities and their regions in respect of mutual expectations. For example, particularly difficult to de-construct is universities’ engagement with disadvantaged communities (Doyle, 2007) but Powell's (2009) work suggests that universities might engage more broadly and effectively ‘through better knowledge sharing and co-creation with business and community partners’ to become ‘real drivers of creative change in developing socially inclusive projects’. Others have written about the educational role of universities in developing a ‘lifelong learning culture’ in their region (European Universities’ Charter on Lifelong Learning, 2008).     

Promising effects of an intervention: Young children’s literacy gains and changes in their home literacy activities from a bilingual family literacy program in Canada

The goal of this paper was to examine promising effects of a bilingual family literacy program: to track the changes of families’ literacy activities through a bilingual family literacy intervention, and to examine the children literacy gains in both Chinese and English across socioeconomic sub-groups. The intervention was an eight-week, two hours per week, literacy program in three Chinese communities in Toronto. Parents, with their children, participated in the program. The extremely high attendance rate provided evidence that families enjoyed the family literacy intervention and felt that the sessions were worthwhile. For their families’ literacy activities, the three sites followed the same trend: reaching the peak of activity at week four, slightly dropping down at weeks five and six, and then increasing to a second peak at week seven or week eight. Results also showed that across the three groups, children of mothers with lower education levels made fewer gains in their English expressive vocabularies and their Chinese expressive vocabularies, than children whose mothers had a higher level of education.     

Family Literacy Programs: Where Have They Come from and Where Are They Going?

Family literacy programs in North America and the United Kingdom have enjoyed widespread public and political support. Thousands of initiatives following a variety of models currently operate under the spectrum of family literacy programs. In edthis paper, the influence of learning theories, the research on children’s early literacy development, and the sociopolitical context with gave rise to the intervention movement, will be reviewed with respect to their impact on current models of family literacy programs. The research on program evaluation is also considered, and is related to current practice and future directions in family literacy programming.