From the cheap seats: one consideration of school-based PE's position in contemporary American schools

Background: As the USA enters the second decade of the twenty-first century, it does so in a polarized political, social, and educational climate heretofore unseen in its relatively short history. Such a climate has implications for what role schools play in American society and especially how school-based physical education (SBPE) may need to reinvent how and what it contributes to the schooling of American children and, ultimately, the common good. Currently, SBPE receives verbal endorsement from the public and politicians yet little in the way of policy and financial support from legislators at national, state, and local levels.

Aims: The purpose of this essay is to present a US-centered perspective on the current ‘position’ of SBPE and offer some modest (and hardly earth-shattering) suggestions for the immediate future from the perspective of a mid-career physical education teacher educator. Recommendations are made that may enable SBPE to make valuable contributions (perhaps even more that it currently does) and, hopefully, remove SBPE from the divided debate on what public schooling should include and how it should be provided.

Conclusions: SBPE is in a precarious position where it can be severely wounded or even wiped out by those issues plaguing it or it can emerge from this time as a subject matter of great import. More importantly, it can emerge as this important piece of education on its own terms.     

A two-stage proxy variable approach to estimating movie box office receipts

This paper advances the ongoing discussion of methods for predicting movie box office revenues with two contributions to the methodology and an out-of-sample test of the model. The first innovation is the development of a two-stage model using publicly available pre-release indicators to predict (1) initial week and (2) subsequent run box office revenues. To incorporate the experience-good nature of movies, the second stage is estimated by incorporating a proxy variable for box office success during the first week relative to predicted first week success. The second contribution is an empirical test of De Vany and Walls’ (J Econ Dyn Control 28:1035–1057, 2004) finding that the distribution of movie revenues has “heavy tails” and follows a non-Gaussian stable distribution with infinite variance. We estimate the two-stage model of a movie’s box office success on all general release movies in 1 year with both the Gaussian and stable distribution with heavy tails and infinite variance and find no evidence for the stable distribution in either stage of the estimation. This two-stage model is validated by comparing all general release movies in 3 future years (out-of-sample data) to the model’s predictions.     

What Kind of a Girl Does Science? The Construction of School Science Identities

A view of science as a culturally‐mediated way of thinking and knowing suggests that learning can be defined as engagement with scientific practices. How students engage in school science is influenced by whether and how students view themselves and whether or not they are the kind of person who engages in science. It is therefore crucial to understand students' identities and how they do or do not overlap with school science identities. In this paper, we describe four middle school African American girls' engagement with science. They were selected in the 7th grade because they expressed a fondness for science in school or because they had science‐related hobbies outside of school. The data were collected from the following sources: interviews of students, their parents and their teachers; observations in science classes; journal writing; and focus groups. These girls' stories provide us with a better understanding of the variety of ways girls choose to engage in science and how this engagement is shaped by their views of what kind of girl they are. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 37: 441–458, 2000.     

1265: An examination of some of the management implications of directed time

This enquiry seeks to establish how some secondary school headteachers have directed their DEs‐prescribed allocation of 1265 hours. Investigations focus particularly on those management processes used to determine the budget, the measures employed to ensure a flexibility in a budget once it has been defined, and some effects of budgeting on meetings. The allocation of hours to specific school tasks is scrutinized and the authors conclude with recommendations and suggestions for improving budgeting decisions in the future.     

Risk factors in early child development: Is prenatal cocaine/poly-drug exposure a key variable?

In order to explore the possible confounding effects of age, race, sex, and socioeconomic status on developmental outcomes of prenatal cocaine exposure, two matched samples of preschoolers (20 children with cocaine/polydrug in utero exposure and 20 children with no prenatal drug exposure) were compared on the Stanford-Binet: 4th ed. (S-B: 4th ed.), Social Skills Rating System, Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scale—Survey Form, Preschool Language Scale: 3rd ed. (PLS: 3rd ed.), and the Child Behavior Checklist. None of the 40 children had attended or were currently enrolled in preschool programs. Both groups had scores approximately one standard deviation below the expected mean in social skills, auditory comprehension, and expressive language. Likewise, externalizing behavior difficulties were approximately one standard deviation above the mean for both groups. Results suggest in utero drug exposure had no independent impact on cognitive, social, language, and behavioral developmental outcomes when the confounding variables of age, ethnicity, gender, and SES were controlled. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Recruiting older adults as participants in applied social research: Applying and evaluating approaches from clinical studies

While issues of recruiting older persons in clinical trials are well known, efficacious strategies in the recruitment process in applied social research are less explored. As more research becomes community-based, it is useful to see, if effective clinical-trial recruitment strategies can be applied to social and applied research studies. The goal of this article is to examine clinical recruitment strategies used with older adults (e.g. print and electronic advertising, referrals, and community-partnered approaches) in applied social research studies and to illustrate issues arising from the use of each recruitment approach with older adults in real-life settings. Experiences from four community-based, social research studies are included to show how some of the most successful clinical recruitment strategies fare in social gerontological studies. Specific guidelines are provided about how recruitment strategies can aid in future study planning and improved recruitment of older participants in social research.     

Teaching Artistry Full Circle: Formally Incarcerated Students as Co-Teachers

Through reflection on a longitudinal teaching, devising, and directing experience in a regional prison, as well as subsequent opportunities for collaboration with formerly incarcerated students, this article posits improvisation as a powerful vehicle for inclusivity, pluralism, and humanistic exchange in applied arts settings.     

Implications of a Cognitive Science Model Integrating Literacy in Science on Achievement in Science and Reading: Direct Effects in Grades 3–5 with Transfer to Grades 6–7

Reported are the results of a multiyear study in which reading comprehension and writing were integrated within an in-depth science instructional model (Science IDEAS) in daily 1.5 to 2 h daily lessons on a schoolwide basis in grades 3–4–5. Multilevel (HLM7) achievement findings showed the experimental intervention resulted in significant and consistent direct effects in grades 3–4–5 and complementary transfer effects in grades 6–7 on both ITBS Science (+1.08 Grade Equivalent Units [GE]) and ITBS Reading (+.57 GE). Discussed are implications of the findings and related research for changing grade K-5 curriculum policy to allocate increased instructional time for integrated science instruction.