Upper extremity augmentation of lower extremity kinetics during countermovement vertical jumps

Twenty-five volleyball players (14 males, 11 females) were videotaped (60Hz) performing countermovement vertical jumps with and without an arm swing. Ground reaction force and video-based coordinate data were collected simultaneously. The resultant joint force and torque at the hip, knee, ankle and shoulder for two trials per subject per condition were computed and normalized. Average kinematic, resultant joint force and torque data were compared using repeated-measures analysis of variance. Larger values were recorded for the vertical velocity of the centre of mass at take-off in the jumps with (mean 2.75, s=0.3m.s-1) versus without (mean 2.44, s= 0.23m.s-1) an arm swing. The jumps with no arm swing produced larger torques at the hip during the first third of the propulsive phase (from zero to maximum vertical velocity of the centre of mass). During the final two-thirds of the propulsive phase, the arm swing augmented hip extensor torques by slowing the rate of trunk extension and placing the hip extensor muscles in slower concentric conditions that favoured the generation of larger forces and resultant joint torques. During the first two-thirds ofthe propulsive phase, knee extensor torque increased by 28% in the jumps with an arm swing, but maintained a relatively constant magnitude in the jumps with no arm swing.     

Non-vocational Adult Education and its Professionals in the United Kingdom

In this overview of non-vocational adult education and the training of its professionals we seek to provide a map of existing provision through secondary analysis of existing data. The territory is a complex one with a range of providers and considerable blurring of the vocational and non-vocational divide. Further, because of devolution within the four countries of the UK, there are certain relatively minor differences in the four administrations. Where these are of some significance, they are noted, but in general the specific focus is on England. Our analysis is based on data gathered as part of the Europe-wide ALPINE survey. Our secondary data are augmented by personal interviews with key informants representing different parts of the adult education sector.     

Speech and Reading

Asked to contribute an article on reading and the disadvantaged pupil Michael Duane, ex-Headmaster of Risinghill, now lecturer at Garnett College of Education, writes: 'If the article appears to spend little time on the actual process of reading, it is because I believe our preoccupation with the techniques of teaching reading— i.t.a., Look and Say, etc .— to be totally misconceived and a diversion from what should be our real preoccupation, viz. the provision of lively and interesting experience for children and of talk arising out of that experience.'     

The Use of Human Relations Techniques in the Training of Counselors: A Course Evaluation

This article describes incorporation of the goals of personal growth, knowledge of group process, and application of process groups in professional settings into a course designed and taught by doctoral students under faculty supervision. Evaluation of the course was accomplished through measures of authoritarianism, self-perception and nature of interaction with others, and comparison with other graduate courses. It was concluded that the goals were appropriate and achievable. Evidence that students participating in the course tended to respond more freely and openly to each other, in addition to self-reports of personal and professional growth, justified the continuation of similar courses in the curriculum.     

European Cooperation in Continuing Engineering Education

The European Economic Community has failed to bring about any appreciable level of co-operation in the University* world of Europe. Whilst there is a small number of Universities cooperating in student exchange programmes, in general the situation has not changed in any detectable way in regard to University cooperation, since the establishment of the EEC. Indeed Ireland, as with other European countries, has much stronger University links with the USA than with any of its European partners. It is sometimes said that “European cooperation is like the weather in Ireland, everyone talks about it but does nothing about it” This paper whilst perhaps adding to the ‘talk’, makes a definite proposal for the establishment of a central office which will be the focus for the generation of University cooperation in Europe, specifically in the important field of Continuing Engineering Education (CEE). It is suggested that this office could become the nucleus for more general cooperation between European Universities, particularly in the contribution which the Universities make to the research and development needs of European ‘high-tech’ industry