World Bank okays public interest in higher education

This essay review discusses the report of TheTask Force on Higher Education and Society(TFHES), convened in 1998 by the World Bank butindependently financed and staffed incollaboration with UNESCO and severalfoundations. Peril and Promise marks anhistoric turning point in the framework forpostsecondary educational planning. Rate-of-return analysis has been de-emphasized,while promotion of the public interest hasmoved front and center. The report of theTFHES, published in 2000 by the World Bank, hasreceived deserved attention in some parts ofthe world and has even developed an associatedwebsite (http://www.tfhe.net). As we explainbelow, the framework advocated by the TFHES isalready being used in official policy documentsof the World Bank, whose position will surelymultiply the influence of the Task Forcethrough its effect on other development banksas well as on programs of bilateral nationalassistance. And yet, despite its seminalimportance, the TFHES report has yet to befully appreciated by many researchers of highereducation. With this essay review, we hope tobroaden the discussion of the Task Force, and to offer a preliminary assessment of its impactin the 2002 World Bank policy document, and toconnect its arguments to questions that arecentral in the scholarly literature of ourfield.     

Evidence for a shift in the choice criterion of rats in a 12-arm radial maze

Rats were trained in a standard 12-arm radial maze task. Following training, each trial consisted of a sequence of 2, 4, 6, 8, or 10 choices, followed by a 15-min delay, which then was followed by a choice between a single arm and a response manipulandum mounted in the center of the maze. An arm visit was reinforced if the arm had not been visited prior to the delay, whereas a manipulandum response was reinforced if the arm had been visited. It was found that rats are relatively more likely to reject arms by responding to the manipulandum following a delay occurring late in the choice sequence. This indicates that the choice criterion used by rats in the radial maze becomes more strict as the choice sequence progresses. Such a process provides an alternative explanation for some of the data recently reported by Cook, Brown, and Riley (1985).     

Trace conditioning as an inhibitory procedure

Virtually no evidence of excitatory CR acquisition is observed in rabbit eyelid conditioning with a trace-conditioning procedure if the CS-UCS trace interval is greater than a few seconds. The lack of overt CRs following training with a trace-conditioning procedure has traditionally been interpreted as due to the passive decay of the CS stimulus trace over time. However, it is conceivable that a trace interval sufficiently long to preclude CR acquisition may be sufficiently long to teach the subject that the CS signals a UCS-free period, thereby producing an inhibitory CS. To test this proposal, eyelid conditioning in rabbits was conducted in two experiments with a 10-sec trace interval (there being no evidence of excitatory conditioning with this procedure). The trace-CS was then tested for evidence of inhibition with retardation-of-acquisition and summation tests. The trace-CS was shown to have conditional inhibitory properties. These results indicate that the interstimulus interval function in trace conditioning may be determined, in part, by inhibitory associations.     

School‐based health promotion: An introduction to the practitioner's edition

In this age of increasing professional accountability, it is important that school practitioners engage in evidence‐based practices. In support of this goal, the intent of this special issue is to disseminate practical, user‐friendly, evidenced‐based information related to school‐based health issues. This article introduces the Psychology in the Schools “Practitioner's Edition” on school‐based health promotion. A conceptual framework for the issue, encompassing universal prevention strategies and tertiary intervention strategies, is described. First, school practitioners have unique opportunities to promote healthy behavior for all children and to engage in universal prevention of common health conditions. Second, practitioners should recognize the special needs of children with specific diagnosed medical conditions and employ individualized intervention strategies for these children. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Blurring Boundaries between Technical Communication and Engineering: Challenges of a Multidisciplinary, Client-Based Pedagogy

Educational settings tend to provide highly specialized contexts for learning. In contrast, workplaces are increasingly multidisciplinary, presenting challenges often not considered in the technical communication curriculum. Our technical communication program is addressing this issue by building partnerships with programs in mechanical engineering and industrial engineering. In this article, we discuss a study of our initial semester matching technical communication students with teams of engineers in a capstone, client-based design course. We focus on challenges the students faced in the multidisciplinary, client-based experience. Based on our initial results, we suggest that academic and professional settings could do more to address the types of challenges identified. We call for a more inclusive pedagogy, one that expands the boundaries of technical communication and welcomes multidisciplinary experience in shared contexts.     

Predictors of Undergraduate Student Binge Drinking

The relative importance of a number of predictors of binge drinking and of high‐versus low‐frequency binge drinking among undergraduate students was studied. Findings demonstrated that race, class, fraternity or sorority membership, use of other drugs in the past 30 days, positive alcohol expectancies, perception of minimal risk, perception that friends do not disapprove of binge drinking, and perception of high normative drinking were factors in predicting episodes of binge drinking. Being male, having fraternity or sorority membership, perceiving that friends do not disapprove, and using other drugs distinguished high‐frequency from low‐frequency binge drinkers.     

Simple delayed discrimination of tastes in the rat

Although taste memory has been extensively studied within the context of long-delay taste aversion learning, little attention has been devoted to taste memory within more traditional memory designs, for example, simple delayed discriminations. This was examined in the present experiment. Specifically, following taste discrimination training during which responding was reinforced following exposure to only one of two tastes, delays were imposed between sampling of the initial taste and the opportunity to respond. On the average, subjects were able to perform the simple delayed taste discrimination with an accuracy of 80% or better at a delay of 45 sec. Discrimination performance returned to chance at an average delay of 58 sec. Taste memory within the simple delayed discrimination paradigm is discussed and compared with other assessments of short-term memory in the rat and other species.     

Using Information to Promote Equal Opportunities and Improve Decision‐making

This article explores how information can be used to assist policy‐makers and practitioners: an issue central to the work of Desmond Nuttall. The narrative draws on Desmond Nuttall's work as Director of the Research and Statistics Branch of the Inner London Education Authority (ILEA) and on seminars and workshops which the author ran jointly with him after the abolition of the ILEA. The paper focuses particularly on equality of opportunity.