Does becoming a Member of the Football Bowl Subdivision Increase Institutional Attractiveness to Potential Students

In recent years, a number of colleges and universities have made the decision to pursue membership in the NCAA’s Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) with the idea that participating in higher profile intercollegiate football can help attract students to their institution. This belief, however, has not been empirically examined. Using difference-in-differences estimation, this study examined freshmen application trends at three colleges and universities (Florida Atlantic University, Florida International University, and Western Kentucky University) which moved from the Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) to the FBS in the mid-2000s relative to similar FCS institutions which did not move to the FBS. Findings showed that moving to the FBS had a positive, statistically significant correlation with freshmen applications at the two institutions located in Florida but not at Western Kentucky University.     

Networking the Counterculture: The 1970 Alternative Media Conference at Goddard College

In June of 1970, a group of radio station programmers, record company executives, cartoonists, musicians, poets, political activists, and assorted hippie hangers-on gathered at Goddard College in Plainfield, Vermont for the Alternative Media Conference (AMC). In this article, the authors trace the history of the AMC, from its initial inception in 1970 to the second Alternative Media Conference in 2013, and its role in shaping not only alternative media across the United States but also, more specifically, Free-Form radio. In shedding light on this history, we seek to open previously neglected scholarly discourse on the history of Free-Form FM radio.     

School choice and the social market in New Zealand: Education reform in an era of increasing inequality

This article argues that the growing social and economic inequalities of New Zealand society have their echoes in growing educational gaps. This does not mean that one directly determines the other, but that social and economic changes impinge both directly, through such things as housing patterns and community resources, and indirectly, through perceptions of aspiration and opportunity, on schooling systems and on students. For the period under review here, income inequalities have continued to rise in New Zealand, and for most of that time real incomes for the majority have fallen. Wealth and poverty, at least within the larger cities, have become more concentrated. Patterns of wealth and deprivation have reinforced processes of school segregation that have occurred under policies of school choice. Over the last few years, a range of social and educational policies have been developed to mitigate the worst effects of market policies. However, it is argued that until the earnings gap is closed, and in particular until child poverty is addressed through increases in social security, there is little chance that educational outcomes for deprived young people will improve significantly.     

Motivation in group assessment: a phenomenological approach to post-graduate group assessment

Whilst group work has many benefits for enhancing collaborative learning, it can cause anxiety in summative assessments when group members do not contribute equal effort. Increasing understanding of student perceptions of group assessment, and in particular their motivation to persevere to overcome the challenges, has the potential to lead to better assessment design and reduce dysfunctional behaviour. This exploratory study borrows from phenomenology to investigate the lived experience of a cohort of post-graduate journalism students at a UK university, who were required to work in small groups to produce a web-based, multimedia journal for a final summative assessment. Using the expectancy-value theory of motivation, this study examines whether students were motivated by the task, and how this might influence their perception of the group assessment experience. The study found that not only was the group motivated by this assessment design, but also, in contrast to much of the literature on group assessment, their experience of group work was defined by harmony, loyalty and an ‘all for one, one for all’ attitude. It is therefore proposed that student groups are less likely to be dysfunctional or dissatisfied with group assessment if the group expects to do well and values the task.     

‘You Never Know,Things Might Have Once Existed’: Young Readers Engaging with Postmodern Texts that Blur the Boundaries between Fact and Fiction

This article considers children’s engagement with the Ologies, a series of postmodern texts that blur the boundaries between fact and fiction. It follows on from a text-based analysis of the series published in this journal (22(3) 2015). Data collected from 9–12 year olds demonstrate how actual readers took up the invitation offered by the text and were able to identify the tension between realism and fantasy, oscillate between different genres, stop to play games and use the tactile to make meaning. In addition, they willingly brought their own knowledge of the world to the text and were able to tease out meanings through dialogic interaction. We argue that the meaningful discussion that ensued is due to the multi-layered nature of the books which offers agency to the pupils with little adult interference.     

Lamotrigine poisoning presenting as seizures: a case of deliberate poisoning

Features of Lamotrigine poisoning are not clearly described in children. We report a child who presented with seizures and bizarre neurological symptoms, later attributed to lamotrigine poisoning.