Quality and efficiency of basic research in molecular biology: a bibliometric analysis of thirteen excellent research institutes

We try to assess, in a systematic and objective manner, the research performance of 13 research institutes active in the field of molecular biology. For this purpose we have counted the number of scientific publications and the number of citations received during a five-year period (1980–1984). We use citations per publication as an indicator of quality and costs per citation as an indicator of efficiency of research. Peer review seems to discourage uninteresting, i.e. not cited, research. Grant systems seem to work more efficiently than funding on a permanent institutional basis.     

School decentralization as a process of differentiation,hierarchization and selection

The Austrian ‘school autonomy policy’, which allowed schools to develop specific ‘curricular profiles’, is taken as an example for discussing processes and effects of school decentralization policies. Data from school case studies (based on qualitative interviews and document analysis) are used to analyse and interpret the processes by which schools and teachers take up policy innovations and translate it into action and structures on school and classroom level. These policy changes and the resulting governance regimes are examined from a perspective on changing modes of ‘action coordination’ between actors on different levels of a school system and from an attention to processes of ‘re-contextualization’ in multi-level governance systems. The main result is that the Austrian decentralization policy – although not explicitly based on a market approach – boosted principles of competitive coordination between schools. In consequence, it resulted in processes of differentiation and hierarchization of schools and classes and offered new legitimatory and practical opportunities for student selection.     

How I Got My Head in the Cloud … But Forgot to Bring an Umbrella

The Association of College and Research Libraries developed information literacy standards and associated performance indicators for undergraduate psychology students. A survey of tenure-track faculty members and full-time lecturers in the Psychology Department at Eastern Michigan University was conducted to discover how those professors viewed the importance of these indicators, and how those professors perceived their role, as well as the role of librarians, in supporting instruction that develops those skills. The psychology faculty acknowledged the curricular value of the information literacy performance indicators and perceived librarians as having a supportive role relative to their own more primary role in developing the skills.     

Learning Analytics: Insights Into the Natural Learning Behavior of Our Students

The literature of gerontology may be found in the journals of many disciplines and in the popular press. Only journals published in the U.S. and devoted exclusively or in large part to the literature of social gerontology are described here. Journals intended primarily for the layman rather than for the professional worker are not included, even though they may contain some material of interest to the professional. All available bibliographic information is given, and special features of each journal are described. Newsletters of more than local significance are listed but not individually described.