Forty Years Later: C.P. Snow's Two Cultures Revisited

About 40 years ago, in May 1959, the British novelist Charles Percy Snow was invited to give that year's Rede Lecture at Cambridge. The event became the cause of a major dispute that has not died down since. His concept of ‘The two cultures’ as the lecture was entitled echoes to our day, especially in the technical curriculum discussion. In fact, Snow's Rede Lecture is the only work of his still in print.     

EMPIRICAL COMPARISON OF SELECTED ITEM BIAS DETECTION PROCEDURES WITH BIAS MANIPULATION

Biased test items were intentionally imbedded within a set of test items, and the resulting instrument was administered to large samples of blacks and whites. Three popular item bias detection procedures were then applied to the data: (1) the three-parameter item characteristic curve procedure, (2) the chi-square method, and (3) the transformed item difficulty approach. The three-parameter item characteristic curve procedure proved most effective at detecting the intentionally biased test items; and the chi-square method was viewed as the best alternative. The transformed item difficulty approach has certain limitations yet represents a practical alternative if sample size, lack of computer facilities, or the like preclude the use of the other two procedures.     

Mentoring in a Graduate Counseling Program: Students Helping Students

This article presents a student-to-student mentoring program, which matches current and incoming students to ease the new student's transition to and involvement in graduate school.