Interrogating Positive Youth Development Through Sport Using Critical Race Theory

ABSTRACT

Sport has the potential to serve as a context in which youth can develop as players and people. Positive youth development (PYD) through sport is a prevalent strength-based approach that aims to promote life skills acquisition in youth participants. The purpose of this article is to demonstrate the utility of critically interrogating PYD through sport using critical race theory (CRT). Select key tenets of CRT serve as analytical tools that can highlight potentially problematic assumptions that underline current approaches to PYD through sport. Interrogation of PYD through sport using CRT exposes its limitations in theory, research, and practice. This race-centered perspective can help to reimagine sport coaching for positive development from a more socially responsible, critical praxis.     

The Cost-Effectiveness of Increasing Hours Per Week of Early Intervention Services for Young Children with Disabilities

Although there is a widespread belief that increasing the hours of early intervention services for children with disabilities will result in increased benefits for the participating children and their families, there is little research evidence to support this point of view. In this study, young children with disabilities were randomly assigned to receive either one hour per week of early intervention services, or three hours per week. Measures of child and family outcomes over the subsequent five-year period demonstrated no consistent benefits associated with increasing the hours of intervention. Possible reasons for the lack of benefits are discussed in the context of previous research.     

Fragmentation and Interrogation as an Approach to Integration

This article tracks the generative role of research and fragmentation as a means for integrating technology and form within an architecture technology lecture class and a co‐requisite design studio. The complexity of teaching building systems integration within a design studio context is achieved by removing any expectation of building design completion on a comprehensive scale. Typically, in a comprehensive studio, students will design an entire building at a general scale, but at the expense of detailed technical design. However, with use of building fragments, students will design a building corner or a structural bay in great detail while leaving the rest of the building less developed. With our approach, integration occurs through interrogation of case‐study buildings and student projects in the technical course which is complemented by a series of fragmental design studies in the studio. We propose that designing fragments encourages constructive thinking at multiple scales rather than design as a singular problem solving process. As a result, design is not seen as the creation of objects, but as the guidance of multiple, simultaneously acting forces into an integrated assembly. The co‐requisite technical course also embraces fragmentation for research purposes: three professors provide three different technical (structures, environment and construction) and conceptual viewpoints for three distinct building pairs. Various forces within those building pairs are compared to illuminate strategic thinking for comprehensive building design. The intense focus on selective technical systems within these building pairs is intended to support the same development of integrative strategic thinking in the studio.     

Training on the project: a quantifying approach to competence development

In the project ‘Competence-Driven Project Portfolio Analysis’ (CDPPA), an integrated system for supporting R&D project selection, staff assignment and activity scheduling with special consideration of the strategic development of competencies has been designed and implemented prototypically. The system has been field-tested at the Electronic Commerce Competence Center (EC3), a public–private partnership R&D enterprise. Experiences from this trial application are summarised and discussed, particularly concerning data collection and competence measurement, the benefits and limits of the chosen multi-criteria decision analysis approach, the evaluation of introduced changes to the decision-making processes, and the transparency of the formal planning model and its components.     

Longitudinal Studies of Alternative Types of Early Intervention: Rationale and Design

In 1985, the US. Department of Education awarded a competitively bid contract to Utah State University to conduct a series of longitudinal studies on the effects and costs of alternative types of early intervention programs for children having disabilities. Issues addressed by this set of studies included the effects and costs of varying (a) the intensity of intervention, (b) the age at which intervention is begun, and (c) the ways in which parents are involved in intervention programs. This article summarizes the historical context in which these studies were implemented, the rationale for conducting this type of study, and the procedures incorporated into the design of each study to ensure that the results would be useful to practitioners and other researchers.     

How persistent and general is the contextual interference effect?

The persistence and generality of the contextual interference (CI) effect was tested using a rapid sequential aiming task. Participants (N=48) practiced three movement patterns for three blocks of 18 trials under a blocked (BL) or random (RA) schedule. Movement patterns were displayed and KR provided throughout practice and testing. A 24-hr delayed knowledge of results (KR) retention test included three blocks of 18 trials, followed by a transfer test of a single new movement pattern. In contradiction of the CI effect, RA practice provided an advantage for RA retention only, not BL retention. Furthermore, group differences at transfer were not persistent. Hence, RA practice does not necessarily provide enhanced, context-free learning, but it is essential training for task switching. Overall the findings reveal limited persistence and generality of the CI effect.     

Leadership Reflections: It is Not About the Perks

Abstract

Our guest columnist is Karl Bridges who has served in a variety of leadership roles in academic libraries. I have gotten to know Karl over the past few years as he was asked to serve in an interim dean role and then hired into the permanent dean positions. At the time, I was at the University of Wyoming and serving as a leader in sparsely populated state where everyone knows your name. Western leaders have to form a tight bond – there are fewer of us and the distances are great. But regardless of geographical situations, leaders need and depend on peer networks that provide a safe space for frank conversations and sharing ideas that help all libraries achieve their goals. Karl has dealt with changing university leadership, library transformations, and dire budget situations. Well, pretty much what every library leader must face. Despite these challenges, library leaders have an opportunity to make a real difference. Karl draws upon his years of experience to provide a thought piece about library leadership noting the complexity, the importance of leadership, and the real joy of making a difference in someone’s life. I hope you enjoy this raw look at leadership and that it reminds you of the purpose of leadership.     

The physiological cost of velocity coupling during tennis groundstrokes

Velocity coupling denotes a perceptual motor behaviour known to occur during coincidence timing tasks. Individuals have been shown to increase their effector limb speed with increases in stimulus speed during interceptive tasks. However, little is known about the physiological effects of velocity coupling. The aim of this study was to determine the physiological cost of velocity coupling during tennis groundstrokes. Eight male and eight female competitive tennis players volunteered to perform three 4-min bouts of continuous groundstrokes against balls projected from a tennis ball machine at speeds of 18, 22, and 27 m x s(-1) (65, 79, and 97 km x h(-1)) and a frequency of 14 balls per minute, the order of which was counterbalanced. Breath-by-breath pulmonary gas exchange, heart rate, locomotion time, and limb acceleration were measured throughout each of the 4-min bouts. Capillary blood samples (for blood lactate analysis), rating of perceived exertion, and difficulty rating were taken at the end of each bout. Increasing ball speed did not influence the locomotion time between groundstrokes but did result in a bilateral increase in both the mean upper- and lower-limb acceleration (all P < 0.05). Velocity coupling behaviour increased oxygen uptake, blood lactate concentration, heart rate, rating of perceived exertion, and perceived task difficulty (all P < 0.05). It would appear, therefore, that velocity coupling influenced tennis groundstroke behaviour and indirectly modified the concurrent cardiopulmonary and metabolic responses.