Early childhood practicum students' professional growth in the USA: areas of confidence and concern

This research examines specific areas of confidence and concern as expressed by 40 American undergraduate early childhood students on a practicum (supervised field-based internships); if their beliefs changed over the course of their practicum, and if prior teaching experience had an impact on their confidence levels. Areas of confidence and concern were determined through questionnaires, reflections and interviews at three points in time during the semester. Findings indicate that students were more confident when arranging the physical environment and least confident in managing children's behaviour. Significant changes in understanding and interaction with children, planning and implementing activities and overall confidence were observed over time periods. Experienced students initially showed and maintained higher confidence levels than inexperienced students who were much less confident at the start of the practicum, but improved significantly. Interestingly, by the end of the semester, this latter group was as confident as more experienced students. Here the factors that affected confidence, the factors that boosted student confidence at different time periods and differences in confidence among students based on prior experience are discussed.     

Globalization’s culture consequences of MBA education across Australia and Singapore: sophistry or truth?

A generally held view among international managers is that the cultural changes occurring in most modernizing societies may lead to similar outcomes and the erosion of cultural differences. Cultural convergence is posited to result from the homogenizing effect of technological transfers between societies. One major force which emerges from this technology transfer is the convergence of education (Webber 1969). The purpose of this study is to investigate the convergence of Masters of Business Administration (MBA) education along Hofstede’s (1997, 2001) five work-related cultural dimensions across Australia and Singapore. The pre-test and post-test quasi experimental design with control groups was employed. The findings revealed that there are convergences along Hofstede’s Individualism, Uncertainly Avoidance and Power Distance. However, the Singapore Chinese scored significantly higher on Long versus Short-term Orientation (or Confucian Work Dynamism) at both time points.     

Do electric vehicle incentives matter? Evidence from the 50 U.S. states

We estimate the effectiveness of policy incentives for adoption of electric vehicles (EVs) in the 50 U.S. states. We employ a rich dataset of semi-annual state-level new EV vehicle registrations by make and model from 2010 to 2015 and state-level policy instruments that could affect new EV model registrations. We construct two measures of policy, one which aggregates policy instruments that can be assigned a value and a second that aggregates those without explicit values. Using a within model difference-in-difference estimator with high-dimensional fixed effects, we find that a $1000 increase in the value of a state’s model-specific EV policies increases registrations of that model within the state by 5–11%.     

Teacher Education Objectives: A Survey of Student Views

This article is a summary of the Survey of Teacher Education Objectives: The Views of Diploma in Education Students published as a monograph in 1982. A report of the previous study was published in 1981 and a summary of the report appeared in Vol. 4 No. 1 of this Journal.     

Library 2.0: The New E‐World Order

This article explains why Library 2.0 is nothing less than a new world order. The author, who is the manager of the Strategic Planning Office of the National Library of Singapore, argues that libraries must stop trying to change the behavior of their users. Instead they must give up control and make use of collaborative tools and technology to engage and share information rather than just provide it. He highlights three areas where change is imperative if libraries are to have a bright future.     

Genetic Polymorphisms Associated With Breast Cancer in Malaysian Cohort

Genome-wide association studies have discovered multiple single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) associated with the risk of common diseases. The objective of this study was to demonstrate the replication of previously published SNPs that showed statistical significance for breast cancer in the Malaysian population. In this case–control study, 80 subjects for each group were recruited from various hospitals in Malaysia. A total of 768 SNPs were genotyped and analyzed to distinguish risk and protective alleles. A total of three SNPs were found to be associated with increased risk of breast cancer while six SNPs showed protective effect. All nine were statistically significant SNPs (p ≤ 0.01), five SNPs from previous studies were successfully replicated in our study. Significant modifiable (diet) and non-modifiable (family history of breast cancer in first degree relative) risk factors were also observed. We identified nine SNPs from this study to be either conferring susceptibility or protection to breast cancer which may serve as potential markers in risk prediction.

Electronic supplementary material

The online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s12291-013-0414-0) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.     

Walking the Roads as Immigrant Mothers and Teacher Educators: A Collaborative Self-Study of Three Korean Immigrant Early Childhood Educators

Offering an analysis of our multifaceted experiences as three Korean immigrant early childhood teacher educators in the United States, this critical collaborative self-study examines how positions as immigrant mothers and teacher educators interplay with each other. This study also explores ways in which the intersectional experiences influence our teaching pedagogy and practices. We found that we as immigrant mothers have challenges pertaining to parental involvement and maintaining our heritage language, meet tensions when advocating for diversity, and experience role-model pressure as teacher educators. Keeping these challenges in mind, the interactions between our two roles benefitted our students as our teaching became more critical and deeper. This collaborative self-study unpacks the intersecting positions of immigrant mother and teacher educator insightfully and reveals the development of pedagogical practices. It also suggests directions for classroom teachers and future researchers in relation to immigrant children and families.