Mass Incarceration and Eviction Applications in Calculus: A First-Timer Approach

Abstract

In the calculus classroom, integrating applications with the theoretical and procedural conveys the relevance of the material. Since Newton and Leibniz developed calculus in the context of physics and astronomy, applications in these fields tend to predominate. To engage and excite our students, pedagogical considerations must include broader examples from across the curriculum. Our students have been particularly responsive to examples that address social justice issues. Here we describe two projects used in calculus courses at two different (liberal arts) institutions concerning mass incarceration and eviction. In addition, we offer advice on the implementation for your classroom and include some of our materials.     

Career guidance,career assessment,and consultancy

Summary Although career guidance activities can positively influence students' career development, the effectiveness of such activities is often impaired because they attempt to provide the same services to all students at the same time. Programs typically do not consider either students' differential developmental patterns or the fact that many students have particular needs due to learning, physical, or emotional handicaps. Therefore, a primary focus of refining programs must be the individualization of services to meet a wide variety of student needs.Referral to career assessment or to professionals trained in career assessment and consultation is a valuable option open to school counselors who have neither the time nor the specialized training to conduct such assessments themselves. Career assessment centers offer comprehensive assessment services, including both more traditional assessments as well as innovative activities. Using a consultation paradigm, the school counselor and career assessment officer can better provide comprehensive, individualized assessment and counseling tailored to the specific needs of students, regardless of their handicaps and their different levels of developmental readiness     

Linking Extreme Marital Discord, Child Rearing, and Child Behavior Problems: Evidence from Battered Women

Relations between marital discord, parental behavior, and child behavior were investigated in a sample of 37 battered women and 37 comparison mothers and their children, aged 2-8 years. It was hypothesized that violent fathers would be more irritable but less involved, battered women more stressed and inconsistent in discipline, and both parents would reportedly use fewer positive and more negative child-rearing responses than comparison families. Based on maternal self-reports and mother-child observations, the only robust self-report difference between the groups of mothers were the level of stress and reports of inconsistency in parenting; in contrast, all of the expected differences were found between the mothers' reports of the 2 groups of fathers. Group effects on child behavior problems were also found. Children from violent families were reported to have more internalizing behavior problems, more difficult temperaments, and to be more aggressive than the comparison children. In the violent families, maternal stress and paternal irritability were the 2 significant predictors of child behavior problems, whereas in the comparison families only maternal stress was a reliable predictor.     

An international collaborative investigation of beginning seventh grade students' understandings of scientific inquiry: Establishing a baseline

Although understandings of scientific inquiry (as opposed to conducting inquiry) are included in science education reform documents around the world, little is known about what students have learned about inquiry during their elementary school years. This is partially due to the lack of any assessment instrument to measure understandings about scientific inquiry. However, a valid and reliable assessment has recently been developed and published, Views About Scientific Inquiry (VASI; Lederman et al. [2014], Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 51, 65–83). The purpose of this large-scale international project was to collect the first baseline data on what beginning middle school students have learned about scientific inquiry during their elementary school years. Eighteen countries/regions spanning six continents including 2,634 students participated in the study. The participating countries/regions were: Australia, Brazil, Chile, Egypt, England, Finland, France, Germany, Israel, Mainland China, New Zealand, Nigeria, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Taiwan, Turkey, and the United States. In many countries, science is not formally taught until middle school, which is the rationale for choosing seventh grade students for this investigation. This baseline data will simultaneously provide information on what, if anything, students learn about inquiry in elementary school, as well as their beginning knowledge as they enter secondary school. It is important to note that collecting data from all of the approximately 200 countries globally was not humanly possible, and it was also not possible to collect data from every region of each country. The results overwhelmingly show that students around the world at the beginning of grade seven have very little understandings about scientific inquiry. Some countries do show reasonable understandings in certain aspects but the overall picture of understandings of scientific inquiry is not what is hoped for after completing 6 years of elementary education in any country.     

Spanish Language Children and Teen Books Focusing on Human Sexuality and Reproductive Health

Talking to children and teens about sexuality is difficult for most parents, especially for those whose primary language is Spanish. Teens who come to the United States from Spanish speaking countries are also at a disadvantage because of a language barrier. Many times there is a lack of high quality Spanish materials that have been reviewed on the topic of sex and reproductive health. There are serious consequences of unplanned teen pregnancies to communities such as poverty, low educational attainment and other health disparities. This bibliography reviews human sexuality titles in Spanish for both children and teens. Professionals in the healthcare or medical libraries, school librarians, public librarians and academic librarians will find this bibliography valuable for the purposes of educating the public and developing their institution’s collection.     

The Meyerhoff Way: How the Meyerhoff Scholarship Program Helps Black Students Succeed in the Sciences

The Meyerhoff Scholarship Program (MSP) is widely recognized for its comprehensive approach of integrating students into the science community. The supports provided by the program aim to develop students, primarily Blacks, into scientists by offering them academic, social, and professional opportunities to achieve their academic and career goals. The current study allowed for a rich understanding of the perceptions of current Meyerhoff students and Meyerhoff alumni about how the program works. Three groups of MSP students were included in the study: (1) new Meyerhoff students participating in Summer Bridge (n = 45), (2) currently enrolled Meyerhoff students (n = 92), and (3) graduates of the MSP who were currently enrolled in STEM graduate studies or had completed an advanced STEM degree (n = 19). Students described the importance of several key aspects of the MSP: financial support, the Summer Bridge Program, formation of Meyerhoff identity, belonging to the Meyerhoff family, and developing networks—all of which serve to integrate students both academically and socially.     

Understanding the experience of non contributory online participants (readers) in National College for School Leadership online communities

This study explored the range of participation taking place in the National College for School Leadership (NCSL) online communities and focussed on participants who defined themselves as not actively contributing to the online discussion. We called these non-contributory participants “readers” Whilst we recognised that an individual community member’s degree of participation might simply reflect their choice, we wanted to ensure that where fuller active participation was sought, there were no system or personal barriers to prevent it. A literature review with a dual focus was therefore made, the first element being factors in the online environment that might affect participation, and the second being personal motivation where we drew especially on dynamic motivation theory. A questionnaire was constructed based on this dual review. This had questions that generated both numerical and text based responses. After a pilot study, alterations in the questionnaire were made and the revised version was sent to 2,600 recently active community members. Over 750 replies were received yielding qualitative and quantitative data. Of these, 587 identified themselves as “readers” and only their responses were analysed for this paper. Analysis produced a very rich picture of motivational factors affecting participation in online communities. Benefits of various types of online interaction were put forward and suggestions about barriers to online interaction were made. This paper suggests that online participation may be seen as a continuum and that non contributory online participants (readers) are a far from homogeneous group ranging from those who experience technical and personal barriers to those who value and gain much from readership. Suggestions are made to assist readers who would like to take further scaffolded steps towards the role of contributor     

Corporate social responsibility and environmental sustainability: Why professional sport is greening the playing field

In this study, we explore institutional forces affecting environmental sustainability in professional sport teams and leagues in North America. Interviews with sport executives and executives from partner groups, 122 websites and organizational documents, and 56 media reports were examined. Data revealed how environmental management practices are being diffused in professional sport organizations. Evidence indicated associative behavior among sport organizations with respect to environmental management. Data also illustrated that media played a role in driving and defining the type and extent of involvement in professional sport teams’ environmental sustainability efforts. We discuss environmental sustainability as it affects a team's or league's CSR related initiatives (i.e., averting legal recourse, saving money, as well as building stronger relationships with stakeholders (e.g., customers, fans, local communities, federal governments and corporate partners)), and speculate how these efforts might evolve and inform the development of environmental sustainability in organizations in the sport, service and entertainment sectors.     

The Impact of an Inquiry-Based Geoscience Field Course on Pre-service Teachers

The purpose of this quasi-experimental study was to determine the effects of a field-based, inquiry-focused course on pre-service teachers?? geoscience content knowledge, attitude toward science, confidence in teaching science, and inquiry understanding and skills. The field-based course was designed to provide students with opportunities to observe, compare, and investigate geological structures in their natural environment and to gain an understanding of inquiry via hands-on learning activities designed to immerse students in authentic scientific investigation. ANCOVA and MANCOVA analyses examining differences in outcome measures between students in the field experience (n?=?25) and education students enrolled in the traditional, classroom-based course (n?=?37) showed that students in the field course generally had significantly higher scores. Results provide evidence of the value of the field and inquiry-based approach in helping pre-service teachers develop the needed skills and knowledge to create effective inquiry-based science lessons.