The Politics of Playing Along: Radio and Regulation in Democratic Europe

The loss of localism has been a common trend in most radio markets in Europe and the United States. Deregulation of ownership led to a concentration phenomenon that has affected local radios in several western democracies. New forms of regulation have been considered as possible ways to stop the erosion of localism by applying rules to markets in the defense of diversity, pluralism, and the local dimension. This article analyses the local radio market in Portugal, by assessing the changes in the legislation and by examining the regulatory action that can, according to its remit, act preventively to avoid market forces to harm these principles.     

Environmental education in action: a discursive approach to curriculum design

Why do the designers of environmental education do what they do towards the environment through education? More importantly, how do they account for their design decisions (plans and actions)? Using the theoretical and methodological framework of discourse analysis, we analyse environmental education designers' discourse in terms of the discursive resources—or interpretive repertoires—that they use to (a) make their position, (b) make their talk do work and (c) tell a story about events, situations and who they are (identity). Drawing on observations and interviews from a larger programme concerned with understanding environmentalism and environmental education, we identified five main repertoires: relevance, knowledge transferability and translatability, emotionality, expertise and empiricism. The approach provides us with a more refined characterization of the culture of environmental education curriculum design through the ways designers in the field explain their doings, and we explore the important implications for curriculum design in this field.     

Effects of roller massager on muscle recovery after exercise-induced muscle damage

Two experiments (n = 10) were conducted to determine the effects of roller massager (RM) on ankle plantar flexor muscle recovery after exercise-induced muscle damage (EIMD). Experiment 1 examined both functional [i.e., ankle plantar flexion maximal isometric contraction and submaximal (30%) sustained force; ankle dorsiflexion maximal range of motion and resistance to stretch; and medial gastrocnemius pain pressure threshold] and morphological [cross-sectional area, thickness, fascicle length, and fascicle angle] variables, before and immediately, 1, 24, 48, and 72 h after an EIMD stimulus. Experiment 2 examined medial gastrocnemius deoxyhaemoglobin concentration kinetics before and 48 h after EIMD. Participants performed both experiments twice: with (RM) and without (no-roller massager; NRM) the application of a RM (6 × 45 s; 20-s rest between sets). RM intervention did not alter the functional impairment after EIMD, as well as the medial gastrocnemius morphology and oxygenation kinetics (P > 0.05). Although, an acute increase of ipsilateral (RM = + 19%, NRM = ?5%, P = 0.032) and a strong tendency for contralateral (P = 0.095) medial gastrocnemius pain pressure threshold were observed. The present results suggest that a RM has no effect on plantar flexors performance, morphology, and oxygenation recovery after EIMD, except for muscle pain pressure threshold (i.e., a soreness).     

Economically Disadvantaged Urban Female Students Who Achieve in Schools

Recently, researchers at the National Research Center on the Gifted and Talented completed a three-year study of thirty-five economically disadvantaged, ethnically diverse, talented high school students who either achieved or underachieved in their urban high school. In this article, the results are discussed of the case study analysis of nine high-achieving female students who participated in the larger three-year study. Qualitative methods were used to examine the perceptions of students, teachers, and administrators about the reasons that some academically talented students achieve at high levels. Female students who achieved in school acknowledged the importance of being grouped together in honors and advanced classes for academically talented students, and of receiving support and encouragement from each other and from supportive adults, including teachers, guidance counselors, coaches, and mentors. Females who achieved in school participated in multiple extracurricular activities both after school and during the summer. Most high-achieving females in this study chose not to date in order to be able to concentrate their energies on their studies. They also had a strong belief in self and were resilient about negative aspects of their families and their environment. Although parents of students in this study cared deeply about their children, their involvement in their children's high school education was minimal.     

History, Philosophy, and Science in a Social Perspective: A Pedagogical Project

Various studies have promoted instruction in the history and philosophy of science (HPS) in science classes, but the best way of putting this perspective into practice remains undetermined. To contribute to this issue, we developed a pedagogical project in some high schools in Brazil that aimed to present science content using an historical–philosophical approach focusing on the HPS from a social perspective. The content was developed broadly, highlighting the dialogues between science and the cultures in which scientific knowledge was accumulated. The results of the first stage of project implementation show that some strategies efficiently encouraged student discussion about science using an historical–philosophical approach. One successful strategy was the use of artistic material, such as movies and plays. The creative language and images in these elements allowed teachers to broaden historical–philosophical discussions without compromising science content. This project shows that a social approach to the HPS stimulates interdisciplinary discussions in science classes, enabling students to reflect on the nature of science.     

Das Institute of Science and Technology – Austria

Mit BGBl I 2006/69 wurde das Bundesgesetz über das Institute of Science and Technology – Austria erlassen. Der folgende Beitrag besch?ftigt sich mit der Rechtsform, den gesetzliche Aufgaben, der innere Organisation, der studienrechtliche Ausgestaltung sowie der Finanzierung des I.S.T. Austria.     

TEK talk: so what? Language and the decolonization of narrative gatekeepers of science education curriculum

We provide a response to Michiel van Eijck and Wolff-Michael Roth’s article and Michael Mueller and Deborah Tippins’ rejoinder. As we adhere to the conversation, we hope to bring new insights on the matter of Traditional Ecological Knowledge and/in science education. As the title suggests, we divided the present commentary in two distinct but interconnected sections. The first section (Giuliano) deals with the limitations imposed by language in dealing with a possible amalgamation of TEK into the traditional school science curriculum and the threat that such a move would represent to the value of keeping them distinct from one another. The second section (Nicholas) touches on the unseen (or ignored?) perils of neglecting indigenous voices in the debate—which, in itself, corresponds to yet another limiting factor inherent to this forum. Also, the second section reports on a professional experience with B.Ed. students that speaks to the practical implications of the current discussion. Combined, the two sections seek to uncover the potential significance of the TEK-WMS discussion to different education actors beyond the non-aboriginal scholarly world.     

Bangladeshi Science Teachers’ Perceived Importance and Perceived Current Practices in Promoting Science Education Through a Context-Based,Socio-scientific Framework

Science & Education - The paper reports a study that seeks to develop an instrument so as to explore Bangladeshi science teachers’ perceived importance and perceived current practices,...     

Public Perception of Invasive Plant Species: Assessing the impact of workshop activities to promote young students' awareness

Invasive species are one of the main threats to biodiversity worldwide. Even though they are identified and recognized as such by the Portuguese law, the majority of the population is not yet aware of this problem. Aiming to increase awareness about biological invasions among young students, a workshop on Invasive Plant Species was organized at the Botanical Museum of the University of Coimbra. A total of 170 teenager students from five schools participated in the workshop. Three activities were prepared, focusing on: (1) identification of invasive plants, (2) competition between native and invasive plants and (3) control of invasive plants. One year later, questionnaires were sent to the participants, aiming to appraise workshop effectiveness, and this questionnaire revealed that these students know more about invasive plant species than a comparable group of students that did not participate in the workshop. The results clearly showed that practical informal education activities may be effective in raising public awareness. Questionnaires were essential to evaluate the knowledge acquired and retained by the students during the workshop.     

semPlot: Unified Visualizations of Structural Equation Models

Structural equation modeling (SEM) has a long history of representing models graphically as path diagrams. This article presents the freely available semPlot package for R, which fills the gap between advanced, but time-consuming, graphical software and the limited graphics produced automatically by SEM software. In addition, semPlot offers more functionality than drawing path diagrams: It can act as a common ground for importing SEM results into R. Any result usable as input to semPlot can also be represented in any of the 3 popular SEM frameworks, as well as translated to input syntax for the R packages sem (Fox, Nie, & Byrnes, 2013) and lavaan (Rosseel, 2012). Special considerations are made in the package for the automatic placement of variables, using 3 novel algorithms that extend the earlier work of Boker, McArdle, and Neale (2002). The article concludes with detailed instructions on these node-placement algorithms.