The Educational Relevance of Research in Cognitive Neuroscience

The benefits of incorporating findings from cognitive neuroscience into the field of educational psychology are considered. The first section begins with arguments against the idea that one can ignore the brain when positing a model of student learning or motivation. The second section describes limitations in the methods used to reveal brain-cognition relations. In the third section, properties of the brain and brain development are described. The fourth section summarizes the cognitive neuroscientific research on attention, memory, reading, and math. Finally, areas of future research in cognitive neuroscience are suggested that would help answer important questions about individual and developmental differences in student learning.     

Working engineers’ satisfaction with helping people and society through their jobs

ABSTRACT

This research explored the extent that working engineers were satisfied with their ability to help or serve people and/or society through their jobs. Over 450 engineering graduates responded to an online survey, including alumni recently transitioning to the workforce from 16 U.S. institutions and professional volunteers with Engineers Without Borders-U.S.A. Only 18% of the respondents currently working in engineering jobs had some level of dissatisfaction with helping others through their job; this differed by job sector and discipline but not gender or between recent alumni and service-active engineers. Forty per cent cited dissatisfaction with service aspects of their work as a contributing factor for leaving an engineering job. A few seemed to have left engineering careers due to dissatisfaction with their ability to help others. The results point to the importance of aligning personal goals for helping people/society with engineering careers; employers facilitating these connections may reap benefits in employee retention.     

高水平教练员获取科研成果的途径

为保持优秀运动员的运动优势,高水平教练员必须不断提高自身的知识水平和结构.但体育科研在运动成绩中所占的比重及科研成果向教练员传递的有效机制,我们还了解甚少.     

AN INVESTIGATION OF PART-TIME FACULTY COMMITMENT TO DEVELOPMENTAL ADVISING

Part-time faculty can make substantial contributions to institutions because they represent a flexible resource that allows the institution to respond more effectively to the environment. An area of concern is whether the part-time status imparts a level of commitment to teaching that undermines educational quality. This study examines one component of part-time faculty's teaching commitment by considering their efforts toward the practice of developmental advising.     

A determination of the dynamic response of softballs

An apparatus is described for measuring the stiffness and coefficient of restitution (COR) of balls with application to softballs. While standardized test methods currently exist to measure these properties, they do not represent the displacement rate and magnitude that occur in play. The apparatus described herein involves impacting a fixed, solid cylindrical surface (matched to the diameter of the bat) with a ball and measuring the impact force during impact and speed of the ball before and after impact. The ratio of the ball speeds determines the COR, while the impact force is used to derive a ball stiffness. For an example of the contribution of the new ball test, the performance of hollow bats, which is sensitive to ball stiffness, was compared. Bat performance showed a much stronger dependence on the proposed ball stiffness than the traditional measure. Finally, it was shown that to achieve similar conditions between impacts with fixed and recoiling objects, the impact speed should be chosen so that the centre of mass energy was the same in the two cases. The method has application to associations wishing an improved method to regulate ball and bat performance.     

The Reliability of College Grades

Little is known about the reliability of college grades relative to how prominently they are used in educational research, and the results to date tend to be based on small sample studies or are decades old. This study uses two large databases (N > 800,000) from over 200 educational institutions spanning 13 years and finds that both first‐year and overall college GPA can be expected to be highly reliable measures of academic performance, with reliability estimated at .86 for first‐year GPA and .93 for overall GPA. Additionally, reliabilities vary moderately by academic discipline, and within‐school grade intercorrelations are highly stable over time. These findings are consistent with a hierarchical structure of academic ability. Practical implications for decision making and measurement using GPA are discussed.