Development of an Online Orientation for an Instructional Technology Masters Program

Four graduate students were tasked with creating a real-world solution to a problem faced by the instructional technology masters program in which they were participating. While taking an online course in multimedia instructional product development, part of East Carolina University??s Masters of Science in Instructional Technology degree program, a team of students faced the challenges of being physically separated, lacking some software and hardware tools, and the relatively brief development period of a semester??s time, to produce supplemental instructional content for students new to the masters program. Working from locations scattered throughout North Carolina, the production team found the time and resources, and relied on the strengths of individual team members, to produce an online orientation for students new to the instructional technology masters program.     

Parenting and Beyond: Common Neurocircuits Underlying Parental and Altruistic Caregiving

Interpersonal relationships constitute the foundation on which human society is based. The infant-caregiver bond is the earliest and most influential of these relationships. Driven by evolutionary pressure for survival, parents feel compelled to provide care to their biological offspring. However, compassion for non-kin is also ubiquitous in human societies, motivating individuals to suppress their own self-interests to promote the well-being of non-kin members of the society. We argue that the process of early kinship-selective parental care provides the foundation for non-exclusive altruism via the activation of a general Caregiving System that regulates compassion in any of its forms. We propose a tripartite structure of this system that includes (1) the perception of need in another, (2) a caring motivational or feeling state, and (3) the delivery of a helping response to the individual in need. Findings from human and animal research point to specific neurobiological mechanisms including activation of the insula and the secretion of oxytocin that support the adaptive functioning of this Caregiving System.     

Literacy and life skills education for vulnerable youth: What policy makers can do

In countries with a high concentration of youth with low literacy levels, the policy and programming task related to education and training is particularly daunting. This note briefly presents policies and practices which have been put in place to provide vulnerable youth with literacy and life skills education. It is based on a multi-country research study undertaken by the UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning (UIL) in cooperation with the Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development Canada (DFATD Canada; previously Canadian International Development Agency, CIDA), and on subsequent policy dialogue forums with policy makers, practitioners, researchers and youth representatives held in Africa, the Arab region and Asia. Built on this review of existing policies and their implementation, this note provides lessons for innovative practices and suggests six concrete ways to address the needs of vulnerable youth through literacy and life skills education.     

Bioinformatics Education in High School: Implications for Promoting Science,Technology, Engineering,and Mathematics Careers

We investigated the effects of our Bio-ITEST teacher professional development model and bioinformatics curricula on cognitive traits (awareness, engagement, self-efficacy, and relevance) in high school teachers and students that are known to accompany a developing interest in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) careers. The program included best practices in adult education and diverse resources to empower teachers to integrate STEM career information into their classrooms. The introductory unit, Using Bioinformatics: Genetic Testing, uses bioinformatics to teach basic concepts in genetics and molecular biology, and the advanced unit, Using Bioinformatics: Genetic Research, utilizes bioinformatics to study evolution and support student research with DNA barcoding. Pre–post surveys demonstrated significant growth (n = 24) among teachers in their preparation to teach the curricula and infuse career awareness into their classes, and these gains were sustained through the end of the academic year. Introductory unit students (n = 289) showed significant gains in awareness, relevance, and self-efficacy. While these students did not show significant gains in engagement, advanced unit students (n = 41) showed gains in all four cognitive areas. Lessons learned during Bio-ITEST are explored in the context of recommendations for other programs that wish to increase student interest in STEM careers.     

The Importance of Library Liaison Programs

The purpose of the library liason program is to build relationships with faculty members and provide personal communication about library services, information literacy and instruction, and collections. Suggestions for transforming or revitalizing your library liason program are provided.     

What We Learned along the Way: Librarian Experiences from K–12 and How They Aid in University Library Instruction

This article shares the perspectives of two former high school and middle school librarians who moved into academic libraries. The move from the K–12 sector to higher education offered them unique insights into working with first-year students as they started their college careers. Existing literature discusses the importance of collaboration between high school and academic librarians. The authors of this article have firsthand experience of how students work in the middle and high school realm, and they demonstrate how to apply that knowledge and experience with college students.     

Annual Review of Work in Newspaper and Periodical History

Dynamics of the Pictured Page: representing the nation in the ‘Illustrated London News’, 1842–1852 Peter W. Sinnema, 1998 Aldershot, UK, Ashgate pp.231

American Photojournalism Comes of Age Michael L. Carlebach, 1998 Washington, DC, Smithsonian Institution Press pp.224

Media Technology and Society. A history: from the telegraph to the Internet Brian Winston, 1998 London, Routledge pp. xiv, 374

On Television and Journalism Pierre Bourdieu, 1998 Priscilla Parkhurst Ferguson, trans. London, Pluto Press pp.97

A Journalism Reader Michael Bromley and Tom O'Malley, eds, 1997 London and New York, Routledge pp. xix, 394

Ulster Loyalism and the British Media Alan F. Parkinson, 1998 Dublin, Four Courts Press pp. 184

William Randolph Hearst: the early years 1863–1910 Ben Proctor, 1998 New York and Oxford, Oxford University Press pp. xiv + 345

Health and British Magazines in the Nineteenth Century E.M. Palmegiano, 1998 Maryland, Scarecrow Press pp. 296

The War Correspondents: the Crimean War Andrew Lambert and Stephen Badsey, 1994 Stroud, UK, Sutton Publishing pp. 335 including index

News from the Front: war correspondents on the Western Front, 1914–18 Martin J. Farrar, 1998 Stroud, UK, Sutton Publishing pp. 238 including index     

Navigating the Maze: Sources for press historians

Television history channels and programming have seen considerable growth in recent years, yet empirical research on television history audiences remains limited. This essay argues that media history scholars need better to understand what happens when audiences consume television history, examining the critical debates concerning the genre's specific modalities of rendering the past on screen before exploring what opportunities and problems it affords viewers. The essay draws on original qualitative, empirical research on audiences of historical reality television through a specific, small-scale case study of BBC Wales' Coal House at War (Indus 2008). It argues for the need to retain a dual focus upon such programming's historical content and its televisuality if we are to appreciate the intricacies of viewers' cultural consumption. The essay concludes by demonstrating that audiences' own oral and written responses to television history reveal something of how people, situated in their specific times and places, understand both their past and their present.