Legal Notes When May a College Regulate an Instructor's In-Class Speech? Recent Guidance from the Sixth Circuit

In a recent opinion, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that a community college instructor has a constitutional right to utilize the words nigger and bitch in the context of a classroom discussion in a course on interpersonal relations. This article discusses this case in the context of other court decisions concerning a college's right to regulate an instructor's classroom speech. Implications for personnel evaluation in the higher education setting are discussed.     

The Comparability of Scores from Different Digital Devices: A Literature Review and Synthesis with Recommendations for Practice

Evidence of comparability is generally needed whenever there are variations in the conditions of an assessment administration, including variations introduced by the administration of an assessment on multiple digital devices (e.g., tablet, laptop, desktop). This article is meant to provide a comprehensive examination of issues relevant to the comparability of scores across devices, and as such provide a starting point in designing and implementing a research agenda to support the comparability of any assessment program. This work starts with a conceptual framework rooted in the idea of a comparability claim—a conceptual statement about how each student is expected to perform on each of the devices in question. Then a review of the available literature is provided, focusing on how aspects of the devices (touch screens, keyboards, screen size, and displayed content) and aspects of the assessments (content area and item type) relate to student performance and preference. Building on this literature, recommendations to minimize threats to comparability are then provided. The article concludes with ways to gather evidence to support claims of comparability.     

All Validities are Not Created Equal: Determinants of Variation in SAT Validity Across Schools

Previous research has demonstrated that cognitive test validities are generalizable and predictive of academic performance across situations. However, even after accounting for statistical artifacts (e.g., sampling error, range restriction, criterion reliability), substantial variability often remains around estimates of cognitive test–performance relationships suggesting the presence of additional moderators. In the present study, we examine the sources of institutional variation in Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) validity across a sample of 110 institutions. Institutional characteristics moderated the size of SAT validities, such that more selective schools and schools that emphasize traditional assessment techniques (i.e., school records, standardized tests) showed higher SAT validities while schools that were larger and where students demonstrated more financial need, schools that emphasized the usage of alternative assessment techniques (i.e., essays, letters of recommendations, extracurricular activities), and schools that enrolled higher percentages of historically disadvantaged minority students generally exhibited lower SAT validities. Future directions in the understanding of situational influences on SAT–grade point average validities are discussed.     

Benzodiazepine administration prevents the use of error-correction mechanisms during fear extinction

Three experiments examined the effect of systemic administration of the benzodiazepine midazolam on extinction and re-extinction of conditioned fear. Experiment 1 demonstrated that midazolam administration prior to extinction of a conditioned stimulus (CS) impaired that extinction when rats were subsequently tested drug free; however, extinction was spared if rats were extinguished, reconditioned, and re-extinguished under midazolam. Experiment 2 provided a replication of this effect within-subjects; rats were conditioned to two CSs (A and B), extinguished to one (A-), reconditioned to both, and then extinguished/re-extinguished to both stimuli in compound (AB-), under either vehicle or midazolam. On the drug-free test, rats given midazolam froze more to the CS that had been extinguished (B) than the one that been re-extinguished (A). The final experiment examined whether extinction under midazolam was regulated by prediction error. Rats were trained with three CSs (A, B, C) and extinguished to two (A-, C-). These stimuli then underwent additional extinction under midazolam or vehicle, with one CS now presented in compound with the non-extinguished CS (AB-, C-). Rats were then tested for fear of A relative to C. Rats given vehicle showed a deepening of extinction to A relative to C, as is predicted from error-correction models; however, rats given midazolam failed to show any such discrepancy in responding. The results are interpreted to indicate that the drug reduced prediction error during extinction by reducing fear, and rats were able to re-extinguish fear via a retrieval mechanism that is independent of prediction error.     

Critical Conversations on Social Justice in Undergraduate Mathematics

Abstract

This article explores how critical conversations engage undergraduate mathematics faculty in a community of practice that enhances their knowledge about teaching and learning mathematics for social justice. More broadly, critical conversations are defined as a cooperative learning strategy that can be used to identify, explore, and respond to various interests and issues situated across differing values and beliefs. We present a case study of a critical conversation that took place at a 2016 Mathematics for Social Justice workshop organized by a group of junior faculty. Participant reflections situate perspectives that can help novice and experienced instructors design conversations about teaching mathematics for social justice. Specifically, individual and group reflections highlight the importance of: (i) framing and reflecting on the conversation; (ii) exploring implications and content connections; and (iii) identifying barriers. Implications for faculty members and mathematics departments are provided.     

Concurrent and Longitudinal Contributions of a Brief Assessment of Reading‐Specific Executive Function to Reading Comprehension in First and Second Grade Students

Executive function (EF) contributes significantly to reading comprehension across the lifespan. Emerging research indicates domain‐specific assessments of EF are better suited for assessment and intervention in academic contexts. For example, graphophonological‐semantic cognitive flexibility (GSF), the ability to flexibly switch between the graphophonological and semantic components of printed words, contributes uniquely to reading comprehension across the lifespan, and GSF training improves children's reading comprehension. This study compared the original GSF measure, which is problematic for use in schools due to its subjectively interpreted explicit explanation component, to an abbreviated implicit task that is better suited for assessment of GSF in practical contexts in 68 first and second grade students. Implicit and explicit GSF contributed uniquely to reading comprehension concurrently and longitudinally when children (n = 31) were in third and fourth grades, beyond verbal ability, decoding ability, and matrix reasoning.     

Muscle force characteristics of male and female collegiate cross-country runners during overground running

ABSTRACT

Males and females demonstrate unique running mechanics that may contribute to sex-related differences in common running related injuries. Understanding differences in muscle forces during running may inform intervention approaches, such as gait retraining addressing muscle force distribution. The purpose of this study was to compare muscle force characteristics and inter-trial variability between males and females during running. Twenty female and 14 male collegiate cross-country runners were examined. Three-dimensional kinetic and kinematic data were collected during overground running and used to estimate muscle forces via musculoskeletal modelling. Principle components analysis was used to capture the primary sources of variance from the muscle force waveforms. The magnitude of the forces for the hamstrings, gastrocnemius, and soleus muscles were higher across the majority of stance in male runners regardless of footstrike pattern. Males also demonstrated greater inter-trial variability in the timing of the peak gluteus maximus force and the magnitude of local peaks in the gastrocnemius force waveform. Male and female collegiate cross-country runners appear to employ unique lower extremity muscle force characteristics during overground running.     

The Relations between Frontal Brain Electrical Activity and Cognitive Development during Infancy

The relations between changes in the scalp-recorded electroencephalogram (EEG) and the development of the ability to perform successfully 2 cognitive tasks attributed to frontal lobe functioning were examined in 13 infants from 7 to 12 months of age. Infants successful in performing the A-not-B task with increasingly longer delays across the second half of the first year of life showed changes in power in scalp-recorded brain electrical activity in the frontal region and an increase in anterior/posterior EEG coherence. Infants with rapid mastery of object retrieval did not differ in frontal EEG development from infants who exhibited the normal developmental progression in object retrieval performance. In a task examining inhibition of reaching to a novel toy, there were no differences in frontal EEG as a function of performance. Results from a cross-sectional sample revealed similar findings. These data confirm work with nonhuman primates on the importance of maturation of frontal cortex in the successful performance on certain tasks (A-not-B), but do not confirm nonhuman primate data on the importance of frontal cortex for other tasks (object retrieval). The data also suggest that the electroencephalogram may be useful as a noninvasive measure of central nervous system development during the first year of life.     

Weaving a New 'Net: A Mesh-Based Solution for Democratizing Networked Communications

Although the Internet is largely decentralized in its communication and social patterns, its technical and regulatory apparatuses are highly centralized and hierarchical. Consequently, digital communications are vulnerable to a degree of surveillance and censorship that would be unthinkable in traditional social arenas, threatening “Internet freedom” and cyberliberties in both democratic and politically repressed societies. We believe a new architecture is required in order to protect the continuance of civil liberties in networked society. In this article, we propose 10 “social specifications” describing the requirements of such a network, and outline an architecture called MondoNet that meets these specifications using ad hoc, wireless mesh networking technologies. We also address the legal and technical challenges facing the MondoNet project, and anticipate future developments in this field.     

The use of physiological, anthropometric, and skill data to predict selection in a talent-identified junior volleyball squad

The aim of this study was to determine whether physiological, anthropometric, and skill test results could discriminate between junior volleyball players of varying ability. Twenty-eight junior volleyball players competed for selection in a talent-identification volleyball programme. Participants underwent measurements of stature, standing reach stature, body mass, skinfold thickness, overhead medicine ball throw, vertical jump, spike jump, 5-m and 10-m speed, "T" test agility, maximal aerobic power, and passing, setting, serving, and spiking technique and accuracy. A discriminant analysis was conducted on the selected and non-selected groups to obtain a regression equation that could be used to predict selection in junior volleyball squads based on the dependent variables. Passing and serving technique were the only significant variables included in the discriminant analysis. Cross-validation results showed that 17 of 19 selected players (89.5%) and 5 of 9 non-selected players (55.6%) were correctly classified into selected and non-selected groups, respectively, providing an overall predictive accuracy of 78.6%. The results of this study demonstrate that selected skill test results (i.e. subjective coach evaluations of passing technique and serving technique), but not physiological and anthropometric data, discriminate between successful and unsuccessful talent-identified junior volleyball players. These results demonstrate the importance of developing passing and serving technique in talent-identified junior volleyball players.