London Revisited: South Korea at the Olympics of 1948 and 2012

1948 was South Korea's first ever appearance in the Olympics – a poor country, forced to adjust to division on the peninsula, with a limited athletic presence. But South Korea won its first medals and contributed to the tortuous process of securing its international standing. Sixty-four years later, by the time of its second appearance in a London Olympics South Korea had become a powerful economy with a high international profile and a strong athletic representation – coming 5th in the final medal table. This study compares and contrasts not just the two London Olympics in terms of athletic performances but also the changed roles for South Korea within both the global sporting community and broader international society. Despite the continuing division on the peninsula, the two London Olympics provide symbols and markers of the aspirations, achievements and failures of South Korean policy-makers and their people.     

Differential electronic detector to monitor apoptosis using dielectrophoresis-induced translation of flowing cells (dielectrophoresis cytometry)

The instrument described here is an all-electronic dielectrophoresis (DEP) cytometer sensitive to changes in polarizability of single cells. The important novel feature of this work is the differential electrode array that allows independent detection and actuation of single cells within a short section ( ～ 300?μm) of the microfluidic channel. DEP actuation modifies the altitude of the cells flowing between two altitude detection sites in proportion to cell polarizability; changes in altitude smaller than 0.25 μm can be detected electronically. Analysis of individual experimental signatures allows us to make a simple connection between the Clausius-Mossotti factor (CMF) and the amount of vertical cell deflection during actuation. This results in an all-electronic, label-free differential detector that monitors changes in physiological properties of the living cells and can be fully automated and miniaturized in order to be used in various online and offline probes and point-of-care medical applications. High sensitivity of the DEP cytometer facilitates observations of delicate changes in cell polarization that occur at the onset of apoptosis. We illustrate the application of this concept on a population of Chinese hamster ovary (CHO) cells that were followed in their rapid transition from a healthy viable to an early apoptotic state. DEP cytometer viability estimates closely match an Annexin V assay (an early apoptosis marker) on the same population of cells.     

Does Grading Method Influence Honours Degree Classification?

Variation in mark-spread is very evident in degree classification data provided by the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA). Previous empirical investigations suggested that, at the level of the module, the spread of results might, in some subjects, be influenced by the method of grading (percentage marking or shorter grade-point scale). The availability of degree classification data from HESA made it possible to test whether the effect perceived at module level carried through to the honours degree classification. The empirically-generated hypothesis was that subjects characterised by a relatively narrow spread under percentage marking would show a wider spread when a grade-point scale of around 20 divisions was used, with the effect being detectable in honours degree classification data. The hypothesis was tested, using HESA data for academic years 1994-95 to 1998-99, on those new universities in England and Wales for which the existence of an institution-wide grading approach could be established. Tests were undertaken at the level of the HESA subject area, and at the more fine-grained level of the individual subject where numbers permitted. Results from the analyses are mixed. The analyses have probably been influenced by weaknesses in the way that HESA has collected award data, but nevertheless suggest lines for further inquiry into a matter that is of importance for equity within institutions (especially where modular schemes are being operated) and more broadly across the higher education sector.     

From Mao to the Marketplace: storying an educational community

This paper is an edited version of a lecture in celebration of the twenty‐fifth anniversary of the Cambridge Journal of Education given at the Cambridge Institute of Education on 12 February 1996. The author, who was editor of the Journal for it's first eleven years, recalls the features of the East Anglian educational community for which the Journal initially provided a platform and the overlapping sets of professional values which, he claims, underpinned much of its educational practice. The Journal provides a source for the history of this community and of the issues and concerns which dominated it particularly in those early years. The paper focuses in particular on the issues to do with teacher education which concerned contributers twenty‐five years ago and reflects on the ways in which these have developed. The author suggests that there has been a loss of intellectual vitality over this period and places the blame for this squarely on government policies including, centrally, the extension of market principles to education. Finally he suggests an agenda for the educational community and perhaps for the Journal which is aimed at re‐establishing ‘the intellectual capital’ of the teaching profession     

THE PRACTICE OF HIGHER EDUCATION: IN PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE AND OF EQUITY

A bstract .  In this essay, David Bridges explores the notion of practice with particular application to the practice of higher education. He considers whether some of the changes in practices linked to the massification of higher education have in fact resulted in the breakdown of higher education as a practice , at least on Alasdair MacIntyre's definition of the term. Specifically, Bridges examines whether higher education has lost its sense of the forms of human excellence around which its life is constructed. Finally, he points to issues of equity raised by the huge variety of forms that higher education now takes and asks whether this variety might mean that students are winning entry to some very different qualities of experience when judged against the requirement that they should contribute to the development of human excellence.     

Correlates of mastery-related behavior: a short-term longitudinal study of infants in their second year

The present study examined correlates of mastery-related behavior across the infant's second year of life. Maternal control style was quantified on a control to support-of-autonomy continuum, infant-mother attachment was assessed in the Strange Situation, and mastery-related behavior was observed in a toy play session at 12 and 20 months. Infants whose mothers were supportive of their autonomy displayed greater task-oriented persistence and competence during play than did infants of more controlling mothers; securely attached and avoidant infants tended to exhibit greater persistence at tasks than anxious-ambivalent babies, and ambivalent babies were the most negative in affect.