Leadership training: A lesson in living

Programs for gifted girls should not be reinforcing existing stereotypes. The academic, social and counseling approaches used for gifted girls must broaden values, needs and interests with programs that encourage and motivate.     

The effect of progressively increased physical efforts on visual evoked potentials in volleyball players and non-athletes

We assessed the effect of physical effort with increasing intensity on neural activity in the visual pathway in volleyball players (n = 10) and non-athletes (n = 10). Participants performed three 10-min tests of increasing intensity on a cycle ergometer. Each participant was assigned individual workloads below the lactate threshold (40% [Vdot]O(2max)), at the lactate threshold (65-75% [Vdot]O(2max)), and above the lactate threshold (80% [Vdot]O(2max)). Four recordings of visual evoked potentials were made: pre-exercise and immediately after each of the three subsequent tests. We assessed neural activity of the visual pathway by examining the amplitude and latency of the N75, P100, and N135 components of the visual evoked potentials waveform. Pre-exercise P100 wave latency was shorter (P < 0.05) in volleyball players than in non-athletes. In non-athletes, the latency of P100 following the first and second effort (40% and 65-75% [Vdot]O(2max)) was reduced compared with pre-exercise (P < 0.01). However, P100 latency increased and P100 amplitude decreased after the third test (80% [Vdot]O(2max)) in non-athletes. In contrast, no significant changes in the latency or amplitude of visual evoked potentials were observed in the athletes in the three tests. Neural conductivity in the visual pathway after exercise might be at least partially dependent on the individual's personal training adaptation status.     

Mentoring in literacy education: a commentary from graduate students,untenured professors,and tenured professors

This commentary continues a dialogue which began among literacy teacher educators attending an alternative format session about mentoring in the academy at a national conference. Literacy teacher educators participated in an informal discussion centered on the nature of mentoring in the academy for doctoral students, untenured professors, and tenured professors. Doctoral students focused on their changing identities and roles in the academy, their concerns about navigating the political infrastructure of academia, and the importance of assuming a proactive stance towards obtaining mentoring, especially for part‐time doctoral students. Untenured professors focused on the ways they were inventing and reinventing themselves within the power and politics of academia and their need for more holistic mentoring during these turbulent times. Tenured professors were able to embed mentoring experiences into their scholarly work and find ways to benefit or learn from mentoring experiences. These mentors also found comfort in more informal mentoring that included self‐initiated endeavors centered on mutual interests. Our commentary draws on these discussions as well as the professional literature on mentoring to describe the importance of mutual trust and reciprocity in mentoring throughout all stages of academia with attention to cultural and linguistic diversity.     

Identity Gaps of Contemporary U.S. Immigrants: Acknowledging Divergent Communicative Experiences

Through the lens of the communication theory of identity (e.g., Hecht, Collier, &; Ribeau, 1993 Hecht , M. L. , Collier , M. J. , &; Ribeau , S. A. ( 1993 ). African American communication: Ethnic identity and cultural interpretation . Newbury Park , CA : Sage . [Google Scholar]), this study examines how immigrants living in the United States negotiate multiple dimensions of their identities. A thematic analysis of in-depth interviews with 17 immigrants from 16 countries explores what identity gaps exist for immigrants in the contemporary United States. Findings suggest that several identity gaps permeate immigrants' lived experience, including personal-enacted, personal-relational, enacted-relational, communal-relational, personal-communal, and enacted-communal gaps. Specific attention is paid to how these gaps are expressed differently by different immigrants.     

The Role of the NUKAT Union Catalog in Shaping the Society of Knowledge in Poland: January 2008 Conference Report

The paper summarizes the proceedings of the January 2008 conference entitled The Role of the NUKAT Union Catalog in Shaping the Society of Knowledge in Poland.     

Study Success

The meaning of study success is crucial when investigating the validity of the admission system to higher education. A common measure of study success is grades. However, grades might be a measure of different kinds of success in different education programmes due to disciplinary differences. This article presents the results of a study carried out in the Departments of Business Administration and Social Welfare at a Swedish university. University teachers were interviewed about their views on study success in their freshmen and senior students of today and in the future. The results indicate that the teachers in the Department of Business Administration tend to choose cognitive criteria whereas the teachers in the Department of Social Welfare tend to choose non-cognitive criteria and criteria classified as both cognitive and non-cognitive, when asked about their present students. Regarding the success of future students, the tendency is similar but the differences between the two groups of teachers are smaller.     

The construct of talent

The role of the teaching hospital in medical education may be a useful model to describe the potential role of the Professional Development School (PDS) for teacher education. For most of the past century, teaching hospitals have been the key clinical training site for medical students. These hospitals offer students exposure to a broad mix of medical conditions, patient care services, and practicing physicians as teachers. The relationships between medical schools and teaching hospitals have been well defined and recognized by accrediting bodies. This model contributes substantially to the status of the U.S. medical education system as one of the best in the world, emulated by many other countries. In this article we describe the evolution of this model, including recent calls for modifications to better match current concepts on physician training and societal health care needs. Lessons from the medical education experience that are relevant to the PDS model and the education of teachers are discussed.