Next Steps for Mind,Brain, and Education: Strengthening Early‐Career Development

An increasing number of scholars are being trained in the field of mind, brain, and education (MBE), yet discussions of trainees' needs and how to meet them are rare. We, the inaugural International Mind, Brain, and Education Society (IMBES) Trainee Board, identify three broad needs of MBE trainees: guidance and support, greater access to and connections among the MBE community, and professional development. We report a first step to address these needs: a daylong trainee conference, which included sessions to foster connections among trainees, provide mentorship from MBE leaders, and provide knowledge and skill building for careers. Attendees' survey results suggest the conference successfully supported trainees' development. As substantial trainee needs remain, we offer specific ways that principal investigators, institutions, funding agencies, future IMBES trainee boards, and the MBE community can further address trainees' needs to support early‐career development and strengthen the MBE field generally.     

Repeating the first grade: How the decision is made

Although there has been a great deal of debate about whether or not children should repeat a grade in school, a more interesting question is which children are retained. This study addresses the question of what kind of children were retained in the first grade as compared to the norm, and as compared to a group of promoted children who were classroom peers yet who educators in the middle of the year considered to be possible nonpromotion candidates. Teachers from 6 school districts identified in March 146 children as candidates to repeat the first grade. By September, 84 had been retained, 62 promoted. In the Spring before the decision was made, we tested all children with a variety of measures of immaturity: intellectual, social, emotional, and physical. Promoted candidates differed from nonpromoted first graders with respect to academic achievement, cognitive development, and adaptation to school. All candidates, both promoted and retained, scored below average in reading achievement, visual-motor integration, and adaptation, but scored in the average range with respect to IQ, height and weight, and social adjustment. A cluster analysis on cases for the retained children further revealed three subgroups of retained children: One group had low scores on all measures of immaturity, especially self-concept; a second group had high or medium scores on all measures; and a third group had low math skills, but good social skills. These results may be interpreted as indicating that some children are appropriately retained and some are not.     

The chaotic late Qing and early Republican periods

This article excavates some of the core intellectual elements underlying the Xinhai Revolution of 1911 and their historical genealogies. Rather than focusing on the modern nature of the revolution, Mizoguchi locates the revolution within the context of traditional Chinese culture and thought. A central focus of the article is the notion of “self-governance” (zizhi), which played a central role in determining the shape the revolution was to ultimately take. It analyzes the social thought of key figures of the Qing period, showing how in modified guise, core Confucian ethical concepts such as the dichotomy between the private (si) and public (gong) as well as utopian concepts such as datong (great harmony) determined the deep structure of revolutionary thought at the end of the Qing and into the Republican and Communist periods.     

Light's retention scale does not predict success in first-grade retainees

Light's Retention Scale totals, along with measures of reading achievement, mathematics achievement, and self-concept taken at the time first grade nonpromotion was being considered, were used to predict nine separate outcome measures of academic, emotional, and social status at the end of the repeated first grade. In none of the stepwise regressions did the Light total add to the prediction of outcome in the children repeating the first grade. This result, added to earlier studies, suggests that Light's Retention Scale is neither reliable nor valid as a psychometric device.     

Detecting potential hucksterism in meta-analysis using a follow-up fail-safe test

Meta-analysis is an analysis of analyses. It is a technique widely used by researchers and practitioners to aggregate and summarize statistically reported empirical educational research. In 10 years, meta-analysis appeared more than 600 times in research journals and dissertation abstracts. Although most meta-analyses were reported as significant, few of the findings determined how many unpublished “no-effect” studies, if sampled, would have invalidated significance. If significant meta-analysis results are over represented through selective sampling, hucksterism in the form of sampling bias exists. An explanation for using a follow-up test called the fail-safe N is provided with tables constructed to assist researchers and practitioners to estimate, without calculation, the relative stability of meta-analysis results. The implication is that failsafe N should routinely be used and reported in meta-analysis research.     

The retrograde motion of planets and children: Interpreting percentile rank

A common method used to interpret raw scores is to convert them into percentile rank. The broad application of percentile rank in almost all norm-referenced tests, and the exclusive use in some tests, requires the conversion of raw scores. Because percentile rank is not a linear transformation of raw scores, percentile-rank transformation in the lower and upper part of the raw-score distribution relates percentile rank and raw scores differently than in the center of the raw-score distribution. This paper describes the popularity of using percentile rank and offers an interpretation of the use of percentile rank with normal and skewed score distributions.     

Educating children to cope with death: A preventive model

Today's children increasingly are exposed to death in their environments. The professional literature indicates potentially adverse effects of unresolved childhood grief. These factors point to the need for death education to be included in the school curriculum, with a focus on promotion of health and prevention of disorders. School psychologists should be in the forefront of advocating, developing, and implementing such a program, in collaboration with the teachers. This article reviews what is known about children's conceptions of death, how children grieve, and relevant research. The guidelines of clinicians in the field are presented on such issues as explaining death to children, their attending funerals, and treating bereaved youths and their families. In addition the broad outline for a death education program is presented, incorporating developmental and theoretical principles about children's grieving process. The curriculum's goals are to provide students with appropriate information about the life cycle, to identify affective issues associated with grief, and to facilitate the development of effective coping strategies for managing bereavement reactions. A death education program may help students to more fully appreciate life while realizing that death is a natural part of the life process.     

Comprehensive school-linked services: Implications for school psychologists

This article reviews the primary concepts underlying the current movement toward the provision of comprehensive school-linked services for children and families in low-income communities and the implications of this movement for school psychologists. The development of collaborative partnerships involving schools, public, and community-based agencies is an attempt to increase the availability and accessibility of needed services to children and families. The adoption of collaborative governance and a case management system is intended to offer an alternative to the proliferation of separate categorical programs and the associated lack of coordination among programs. The hope is to emphasize prevention and efficient early intervention. Collaborative efforts can provide an opportunity for role expansion among school psychologists. This possibility is discussed within a consultation model of service delivery that is consistent with the collaborative nature of school-linked services and with the preventive stance that orginated them. School psychologists are in a position to contribute to team consultation, case management, and needs assessment. Implications for training are drawn.