National qualifications in Scotland: A lightning rod for public concern about equity during the pandemic

Scotland, traditionally, has high levels of confidence in teachers. Fairness and justice are key concepts in policy and practice in Scottish education. For more than 100 years, the high-stakes assessment system in Scotland, with the Scottish Higher qualification at its heart, has been crucial to that sense of opportunity and justice. However, in 2019–2020, public confidence in high-stakes assessment in Scotland, as in other United Kingdom countries, was dented. In Scotland, the Covid-19 pandemic meant that schools were closed, teachers provided online learning opportunities for pupils working at home and, for the first time in 130 years, it was not possible to run national examinations. To ensure that learners were not further disadvantaged, alternative approaches to gathering evidence for qualifications were instigated. However, these results were challenged as socially unjust and the results that had been nationally moderated were replaced by results based on locally moderated teachers' professional judgement. As Scotland looks to qualifications beyond Covid-19, trust must be re-built. This article reports on a participative research project that sought to understand public perceptions of standards and fairness across a range of key communities following this experience. Drawing on both qualitative and quantitative data, we analyse factors which affected trust in National Qualifications under the pandemic. The evidence suggests that when considering what matters for qualifications to be trusted, technocratic solutions are likely to be rejected by stakeholders. Understanding and responding to what led to the mistrust of qualifications in Scotland will be crucial to inform its future qualifications system.     

Dean flow-coupled inertial focusing in curved channels

Passive particle focusing based on inertial microfluidics was recently introduced as a high-throughput alternative to active focusing methods that require an external force field to manipulate particles. In inertial microfluidics, dominant inertial forces cause particles to move across streamlines and occupy equilibrium positions along the faces of walls in flows through straight micro channels. In this study, we systematically analyzed the addition of secondary Dean forces by introducing curvature and show how randomly distributed particles entering a simple u-shaped curved channel are focused to a fixed lateral position exiting the curvature. We found the lateral particle focusing position to be fixed and largely independent of radius of curvature and whether particles entering the curvature are pre-focused (at equilibrium) or randomly distributed. Unlike focusing in straight channels, where focusing typically is limited to channel cross-sections in the range of particle size to create single focusing point, we report here particle focusing in a large cross-section area (channel aspect ratio 1:10). Furthermore, we describe a simple u-shaped curved channel, with single inlet and four outlets, for filtration applications. We demonstrate continuous focusing and filtration of 10 μm particles (with >90% filtration efficiency) from a suspension mixture at throughputs several orders of magnitude higher than flow through straight channels (volume flow rate of 4.25 ml/min). Finally, as an example of high throughput cell processing application, white blood cells were continuously processed with a filtration efficiency of 78% with maintained high viability. We expect the study will aid in the fundamental understanding of flow through curved channels and open the door for the development of a whole set of bio-analytical applications.     

The Impact of NIH Postdoctoral Training Grants on Scientific Productivity

In this paper, we estimate the impact of receiving an NIH postdoctoral training grant on subsequent publications and citations. Our sample consists of all applications for NIH postdoctoral training grants (unsuccessful as well as successful) from 1980 to 2000. Both ordinary least squares and regression discontinuity estimates show that receipt of an NIH postdoctoral fellowship leads to about one additional publication over the next five years, which reflects a 20% increase in research productivity.     

Reporting NAEP Results Using Standards

What is the difference between NAEP anchor levels and achievement levels? How are the processes different for creating these levels? What points of controversy surround use of these levels for reporting achievement? Will having standards for NAEP promote improvement of public education?     

The “overdue kid”: A face-to-face library service encounter as ritual interaction

Using the theoretical frameworks of Erving Goffman and Michael Lipsky, an example of school library staff and student interactions is examined, using functional discourse analysis to reveal how practice is produced as a clerical control routine which upholds institutional authority over users, rather than legitimate service work. The study, which consists of a single interaction between a middle school library clerk and a young adolescent with overdue books, is an example of what Goffman calls a “remedial interchange” in which the clerk, with the use of the library's computer, identifies the student's “offense” of keeping books overdue, despite repeated notices. Upon admission of the student's virtual transgression, the clerk provides an “offering” to hold his desired books until he returns the others, thus redressing the balance of the interaction while still retaining asymmetrical institutional control over the student.