The HPT Model Applied to a Boutique‐Style Online Retail Store

Suzy Q's is a retail business located in the southeastern United States. It offers hand‐knitted scarves; handmade hair accessories; handcrafted beaded jewelry such as necklaces, bracelets, and earrings; small handmade children's toys; and stock and custom‐printed T‐shirts. It began operations in early 2014. The owners established an online store and developed plans to sell items at local craft fairs and farmers’ markets in the southeastern United States. During its initial launch, the business generated limited orders for its products. In the beginning there was a limited amount of advertising using social media, which consisted of establishing a Facebook page, posting notifications on the business's Facebook page, and posting notifications about the business to the owners’ personal contacts on Facebook. Despite establishing a web presence and utilizing social media in its first year of operations, Suzy Q's did not generate a significant number of orders and received very little revenue. The owners of Suzy Q's, our client, established a goal to generate at least $700 per month in revenue for the calendar year 2015. Our analysis of the business revealed that the managers and employees had the skills needed to perform the work, but the lack of orders presented an obstacle to achieving their business goals. After completing a performance analysis, we recommended that Suzy Q's establish a single online presence, implement a marketing effort, establish a local presence, create a dedicated studio space, and create a formal business plan. It was our belief that Suzy Q's had the potential to reach its goals set for 2015 and beyond if these solutions were implemented.     

K-ABC content bias: Comparisons between Mexican American and White children

Content (item) bias on the Mental Processing Scales and the Achievement Scale of the Kaufman Assessment Battery for Children (K-ABC) was investigated with 100 Mexican American and 100 White fifth- and sixth-grade boys and girls. All children were English-speaking and from similar socioeconomic status (SES) backgrounds. An item-group (partial correlation) method that controlled for age, sex, and ability was used to examine bias. On the Mental Processing Scales, 17 (14%) of 120 items were found to be biased—the strong majority against the Mexican American children. On the Achievement Scale, it was observed that 58 (63%) of 92 K-ABC items were biased—all against the Mexican American sample. This latter finding is discussed in the context of possible differences in learning opportunities (language based, SES based, and school segregation) experienced by the two ethnic groups.     

Context-Sensitive Instructional Design Models: A Response to Design Research,Studies, and Criticism

Instructional design, as it is traditionally conceptualized, is being challenged on several fronts, through surveys of design practice, cross-disciplinary studies of design practice, and practical criticism focusing on issues of design models' flexibility and efficiency. Collectively these challenges raise questions about the viability of the instructional design enterprise. This paper reviews these challenges and attempts to respond by offering alternative approaches to instructional design.     

Using teacher judgment and IQ to estimate reading and mathematics achievement in a remedial-reading program

This study investigated the relative merits of using teacher judgment and the Slosson Full-Range Intelligence Test to estimate the math and reading achievement of students in a summer remedial-reading program. The subjects included children in grades kindergarten through six who were enrolled in the Auburn University Summer Clinic. Components analyses showed that the Slosson Full-Range Intelligence Test recovered substantially more variance from the distributions of the KeyMath-Revised and the Woodcock Reading Mastery Tests-Revised than did teacher judgments. Analysis of variance showed that significant differences between the means of the three tests resulted from the inclusion of students with learning disabilities. Implications of the results are discussed.     

CERN: Past performance and future prospects: II. The scientific performance of the CERN accelerators

In a series of three papers, we attempt to evaluate the past scientific performance of the three main particle accelerators at the Geneva-based European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) over the period since 1960, and to assess the future prospects for CERN and its users during the next ten to fifteen years.We concerned ourselves in a previous paper (Paper 1 - Martin and Irvine [51] with the position of the CERN accelerators in world high-energy physics relative to those at other large laboratories working in the field. We dealt primarily with the period from 1969 to 1978, and attempted to establish how the experimental output from the three principal CERN accelerators, taken as a whole, compared with that from other major facilities. In undertaking this comparative evaluation, we drew on the method of “converging partial indicators” used in previous studies of three Big Science specialties.In contrast, this paper (Paper II) focuses in detail on the scientific performance of each of the CERN accelerators taken individually. In particular, it asks, first, how the outputs from the CERN 28 GeV (giga or billion electron-volts) Proton Synchrotron compare with those from a very similar 33 GeV American accelerator at Brookhaven National Laboratory over the past two decades? Second, how great have been the experimental achievements of the Intersecting Storage Rings in world terms? And, third, how do the outputs from the CERN 400 GeV Super Proton Synchrotron and from a rival American machine at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory compare? Attempts are then made to identify the main factors responsible for determining the relative scientific performance of each CERN machine.These factors are of relevance to the subject of a third paper (Paper III - Martin and Irvine [52]) which sets out to assess the future prospects for CERN and in particular for LEP, the large electron-positron collider scheduled for completion in the latter part of the 1980s. What are the construction requirements (financial and technical) associated with LEP, and how easily will they be met? How does the scientific potential of LEP compare with that of other major accelerators under construction around the world? And, in the light of the previous record of the CERN accelerators, to what extent is this potential likely to be realized? The paper concludes with a discussion of the extent to which predictive techniques can be utilized in the formulation of scientific priorities, and of the problems in current science policy-making that such techniques might help address.