TRANSFORMING OLDER ADULT EDUCATION: AN EMERGING PARADIGM FROM A NATIONWIDE STUDY

Educational opportunities for older adults have changed dramatically in the past 20 years due, in part, to the rise of new institutions (e.g., learning in retirement institutes, Shepherd's Centers, OASIS institutes) and modification to earlier programs based in senior centers and community colleges. Little systematic research has examined the shared characteristics of these program types—how the are organized, funded, governed and so on. In response, with funding from the AARP Andrus Foundation, a national study of older adult education organizations was conducted during 1992‐1993. A “Critical Pathways Taxonomy” was devised in surveying 260 organizations that provide educational programs for seniors. Five program models were studied and compared. New roles for older learners were identified in areas of planning, teaching, governance, and community service. The study suggests that a new paradigm of older adult education is emerging.     

The Preparation of Physical Educators: A Public Health Perspective

Sedentary living is a serious global public health problem that is associated with numerous preventable diseases. Schools are in a position to be the most costeffective public resource to combat inactivity. In schools physical educators are positioned to be the strongest advocates of a healthy, active lifestyle. To effectively promote physical activity on school campuses and to encourage it in communities beyond the school day, physical educators will need to develop skills that are not typically stressed in undergraduate physical education teacher education (PETE) programs. As a result, both undergraduate PETE and in-service staff-development programs will need to be revised if schools are to play a major role in physical activity promotion.     

Informing choice: The organization of institutional interaction in clinical midwifery care

Researchers in LIS have called for the study of the social practices out of which informing is achieved. This article analyzes the informed choice discussion (ICD) between midwives and childbearing women as a form of institutional interaction that accomplishes informing. The ICD institutionally presumes a woman to have information needs that must be met before she can make a decision. Conversation analysis, a method commonly used to study practitioner–client interaction but little used in LIS, is employed to identify the unique “fingerprint” of the ICD. Analysis shows how participants develop a joint sense of the interactional tasks of informing and deciding. As an ideal, informed choice divides the cognitive labor: informing is midwife-led and deciding is client-led. In practice, however, informing and deciding are intertwined to such an extent that their resolution is neither automatic nor straightforward but must be negotiated. To be accepted as adequate, a decision must also be deemed adequately informed. Difficulties in negotiating transitions can result in one speaker treating a decision as resolved while another treats it as still open. Analyzing the fingerprints of institutional informing interactions can provide a starting point for analyzing the interactional accomplishment of informing in other settings.     

Technological change and managerial challenges in the movie theater industry

The recent rise of digital technology in the delivery of entertainment casts doubt among industry stakeholders on whether movie theaters will continue to be the primary channel of the release of motion pictures. Despite the growth of competing outlets due to the spread of digitalization, we argue that the movie theater industry may benefit from digital technologies as well. Enhancing the cinemagoing experience, better matching of the cinemagoing experience to consumer preferences, and improving capacity utilization are crucial if movie theaters are to continue having a pivotal role in the distribution of filmed entertainment. In particular, our data analysis demonstrates that the use of new digital technologies and “big data” may be one way to turn the current threats into future opportunities for movie exhibitors. Therefore, managerial strategies that aim to raise the value proposition of theaters by enhancing the cinemagoing experience, and that boost adaptability to rapidly changing consumer preferences about how and when they view filmed entertainment, ought to be studied and implemented.

     

Land education: Indigenous,post-colonial,and decolonizing perspectives on place and environmental education research

This editorial introduces a special issue of Environmental Education Research titled ‘Land education: Indigenous, post-colonial, and decolonizing perspectives on place and environmental education research.’ The editorial begins with an overview of each of the nine articles in the issue and their contributions to land and environmental education, before outlining features of land education in more detail. ‘Key considerations’ of land education are discussed, including: Land and settler colonialism, Land and Indigenous cosmologies, Land and Indigenous agency and resistance, and The significance of naming. The editorial engages the question ‘Why land education?’ by drawing distinctions between land education and current forms of place-based education. It closes with a discussion of modes and methods of land education research.     

Blockbusters and market expansion: evidence from the motion picture industry

Like other cultural industries, the theatrical film industry is subject to the ‘blockbuster effect’, where popular products often dominate their competition by orders of magnitude over relatively short-run time horizons. This paper investigates this particular feature of the industry and the implication for overall market size. Using simple regression analysis, a positive relationship between (product-level) market concentration and market size is established using weekly box office revenue data from the US motion picture industry. This empirical evidence supports a simple theoretical model of heterogeneous consumers who selectively participate in the market.     

The Development of a Multi-media Portfolio for Enhancing Learning and Assessment in a K-8 Science Methods Class

Journal of Science Teacher Education -     

How do theatrical box office revenues affect DVD retail sales? Australian empirical evidence

This study considers the Australian DVD industry using a data set of retail sales for over 44,800 titles 1997–2007. A sub-sample of 760 titles which also received an initial theatrical release reveals that the DVD revenue distribution has thicker tails than the theatrical revenue distribution implying the top-ranked DVDs earning a greater share of revenues than their theatrical contemporaries. A comparison of revenues finds not only a high degree of correlation between the two markets, but a relationship that is nonlinear and increasing at higher theatrical revenue levels. This finding is consistent with a word-of-mouth momentum effect and more institutional flexibility in the DVD market. The high levels of correlation are present across all genres/ratings and are observed to be stronger for large release titles. Finally, a seemingly unrelated regression structure is proposed to jointly consider the two markets, which is shown to be empirically valid.     

Physical education's role in public health: steps forward and backward over 20 years and HOPE for the future

The 1991 paper, "Physical education's role in public health" described the importance of physical education in addressing public health problems. On its 20th anniversary, this article reviews accomplishments in improving the health impact of physical education and identifies areas lacking progress. Major accomplishments include development of evidence-based programs, documentation of health and academic benefits of physical education, and acceptance of physical education as a public health resource. Additional work is needed to evaluate the uptake of evidence-based programs, improve national surveillance of physical education quantity and quality, establish stronger policies supporting active physical education, and achieve wide acceptance of public health goals within the physical education field. These opportunities constitute an agenda for actualizing the promise of health-optimizing physical education before the next 20 year anniversary.