Can nightmares become sweet dreams? Peer review in the wake of a systemwide administrative mandate

In 1993, the Board of Governors of the University of North Carolina at Charlotte enacted a mandate requiring peer evaluation of teaching, including class-room observation, for non-tenured faculty. Participants involved in the AAHE Peer Review Project feared the mandate would taint efforts to introduce faculty to collegial approaches to the peer review of teaching. As reported here, negative fallout from the mandate has been balanced to some degree by the positive effects of having a required evaluation system. Departmental culture shaped peer review activities undertaken in the first year and may have ultimately overshadowed effects of the mandate on the project.Deborah M. Langsam is an Associate Professor of Biology at the University of North Carolina in Charlotte. A mycologist specializing in aquatic fungi, Langsam earned her baccalaureate degree from Brooklyn College, M.A. from the City University of New York, and her Ph.D. in botany from Duke University. She is also a winner of the NCNB Award for Teaching Excellence, serves as the UNCC campus project coordinator for the AAHE Peer Review of Teaching project, and has led numerous workshops on teaching portfolios. Philip L. Dubois is Provost and Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. A political scientist, Dubois earned his baccalaureate degree at the University of California at Davis and his M.A. and Ph.D. degrees at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. He assumed his current position at UNCC in 1991, after having served fifteen years in faculty and administrative posts at University of California-Davis.     

Disentangling the relationship between working memory and language: The roles of short-term storage and cognitive control

This study investigates the relationship between working memory and language in young children growing up in a multilingual environment. The aim is to explore whether mechanisms of short-term storage and cognitive control hold similar relations to emerging language skills and to investigate if potential links are mediated by related cognitive abilities. A sample of 119 Luxembourgish 6-year-olds completed several assessments of working memory (complex and simple span), native and foreign vocabulary, syntax, reading, rhyme awareness, and fluid intelligence. Results showed that short-term storage and cognitive control manifested differential links with developing language abilities: Whereas verbal short-term storage was specifically linked to vocabulary; cognitive control manifested unique and robust links with syntax and early reading development. The study suggests that in young children the working memory system is composed of separate but interacting components corresponding to short-term storage and cognitive control that can be distinguished by the roles they play in supporting language acquisition.     

Measurement error in short-term power testing in young people

The aim of this study was to examine the consistency or reproducibility of measuring cycling peak power in children and adults. Twenty-seven pre-pubertal girls and boys and 27 female and male physical education students (age 9.8 +/- 0.5 and 24.4 +/- 4.3 years, respectively; mean +/- s) participated in the study. All participants performed five tests over 15 days and underwent a habituation session before the study. Each test included four sprints against four different braking forces. We found that braking forces of 7.5% of body weight in children and 10% of body weight in adults were too high for most of the participants to elicit maximal cycling power. Unlike the children, the physical education students improved their performance between session 1 and session 2 (1025 +/- 219 vs 1069 +/- 243 W; P < 0.001). Therefore, to obtain reproducible measures of cycling peak power, a habituation session including a complete test protocol (i.e. warm-up plus three sprints) is highly recommended. When the protocol included three sprints in children and at least two sprints in adults, measurement of cycling peak power was found to be highly reliable (test-retest coefficient of variation approximately 3%). Finally, to avoid performance fluctuations, especially over several consecutive evaluations (e.g. longitudinal studies), it is necessary to maintain high motivation in children.