School Leaders as Political Strategists: William Boyd's Contributions to our Understanding of the Politics of Leadership

William Boyd's contributions to the education field's understanding of the political nature of school leadership are formidable. In this article, I describe the growth and development, over a roughly 30-year time span, of his key insight that successful school leaders should have the capabilities of a political strategist and that the actualization of this capacity is related to school leaders’ political and policy context. The perennial question of “who governs education” was central to Boyd's work and his various answers are important touchstones for today's educational leaders.     

THE IMPACT OF A ‘CITIZEN AFFAIRS’ WORKSHOP ON ANOMIA,LIFE SATISFACTION AND INTERNAL‐EXTERNAL CONTROL IN A SELECTED GROUP OF OLDER ADULTS

An educational experience designed to increase knowledge of the political process, provide peer interaction, and promote civic involvement did appear to enhance internal locus of control in a selected sample of older adults. No significant changes in anomia or life satisfaction occurred. Implications of the findings for educational programming for older adults are discussed. It is suggested that the SRS model used in the study should be tested further for exploring the impact of educational programs upon internal‐external control.     

More evidence that cognitive complexity is not loquacity: A reply to Beatty and Payne

Beatty and Payne (1984) recently presented data allegedly demonstrating that assessments of cognitive complexity based on Crockett's popular Role Category Questionnaire (RCQ) are severly confounded by “loquacity,” the simple amount of verbal response to stimuli. The present paper responds critically to the claims of Beatty and Payne, arguing that these researchers employed a flawed measure of loquacity and inappropriate data analytic procedures. In order to better clarify the influence of loquacity on sophisticated social‐cognitive and communicative functioning, two empirical studies are reported in which alternative measures of loquacity were employed. In neither of these studies was loquacity found significantly associated with social‐cognitive or communicative abilities.     

New approach to visual servo control using terminal constraints

A large class of visual servo controllers relies on an a priori obtained reference image, captured at the desired position and orientation (i.e., pose) of a camera, to yield control signals to regulate the camera from its current pose to a desired pose. In many applications, accessibility and economics of the operation may prohibit acquisition of such a reference image. This paper introduces a new visual servo control paradigm that enables control of the camera in the absence of reference image using a set of terminal constraints. Specifically, the desired pose is encoded using the angle of obliquity of the optical axis with respect to the object plane and its direction of arrival at the plane. A constrained convex optimization problem is formulated over a conic section defined by the terminal constraints to yield an error system for the control problem. Subsequently, this work introduces continuous terminal sliding mode visual servo controllers to regulate the camera to the desired pose. Lyapunov-based stability analysis guarantees that the origin is a finite-time-stable equilibrium of the system. Numerical simulation results are provided to verify the performance of the proposed visual servo controller.     

The relationship of ethnic identity and ego identity status among adolescents and young adults

A multi-ethnic sample of 248, ages 13–26, was used to examine the effects of age, gender, and ethnic group membership on ethnic identity and ego identity scores. Subjects were recruited from college and public schools in a large northeastern metropolitan area. The multigroup ethnic identity measure (MEIM) was used to assess ethnic identity and ego identity status was measured by the extended objective measure of ego identity status (EOMEIS). An age by ethnic group design was employed. Consistent findings of significant ethnic group differences in levels of ethnic identity were observed. Age and ethnic group were found to contribute differently to ethnic identity and ego identity status. The relationship between ethnic identity and ego identity status was found to be pronounced among subjects of color but not as dramatic as hypothesized.