Design observations for interagency collaboration

We present 14 design observations for public safety networks (PSNs) and describe how they may apply more broadly to a wider range of inter-organizational systems within the public sector. A PSN is an interagency collaboration focused on developing and using information systems in support of information sharing and functional interoperability among public safety organizations engaged in law enforcement, criminal justice, and emergency response. We base our design observations upon an analysis of an extensive survey of 80 PSNs plus 6 in-depth case studies. The design observations identify commonalities that can guide agencies participating in interagency collaborations in addressing the interlocking issues they face. Our goal in presenting this set of design observations is to: (1) encourage improved PSN systems design and (2) draw attention to the importance of jointly addressing governance and technological considerations when designing PSNs.     

促进学生流动:美国高等教育国际化的发展趋势

这篇论文讨论了美国高等教育国际化的一个方面——美国的跨国学生流动.文章不但分析了学者们之前发表的研究性文章和公开的相关数据,而且还探讨了美国高校在跨国学生流动方面的特点、鼓励学生流动的原因、美国政府的角色和举措.文章还讨论了美国高校跨国学生流动的现状与问题.     

Psychosocial and behavioral factors related to the post-partum placements of infants born to cocaine-using women

OBJECTIVE: One objective was to determine if cocaine-using women who did not maintain infant custody (NMC) would report more psychological distress, domestic violence, negative coping skills, lower social support and more childhood trauma than cocaine-using women who maintained custody (MC) of their infant. A second objective was to evaluate the relative contribution of psychosocial factors to infant placement. METHODS: Psychosocial profiles of MC women (n=144) were compared with NMC (n=66) cocaine-using women. Subjects were low income, urban, African-American women who delivered an infant at a county teaching hospital. The Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI), an assessment of coping strategies (COPE), Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support (MSPSS), Conflict Tactics Scale (CTS) and Childhood Trauma Questionnaire (CTQ) were administered. The associations of infant placement status to demographic factors, drug use and psychosocial measures were evaluated. RESULTS: The NMC group reported greater overall psychological distress, psychoticism, somatization, anxiety and hostility than the MC group. The NMC group had more childhood neglect and physical abuse and used more negative coping strategies than the MC group. Lack of prenatal care [OR=.83, CI (.75-.91), p<.0001], heavier prenatal cocaine use [OR=2.55, CI (1.13-4.34), p<.007], greater psychological distress [OR=2.21, CI (1.13-4.34), p<.02] and a childhood history of emotional neglect [OR=1.10, CI (1.02-1.19), p<.02] were associated with increased likelihood of loss of infant custody after control for other substance use and demographic variables. CONCLUSIONS: NMC women have more negative psychological and behavioral functioning post-partum than MC women. Less prenatal care and greater cocaine use, psychological distress and maternal childhood emotional neglect are associated with the post-partum placement of infants born to cocaine-using women. PRACTICE IMPLICATIONS: Results of this study indicate that poor, urban women who use cocaine prenatally display several measurable differences on psychosocial and behavioral risk factors based on child placement status. Among these risk factors heavier cocaine use, lack of prenatal care, more severe psychological symptoms and early childhood experiences of emotional neglect increase the likelihood of loss of infant custody. Routine, objective assessments of psychosocial and behavioral characteristics of women who use cocaine during pregnancy can aid Child Protective Service workers and clinicians by providing baseline data from which to tailor interventions and set improvement criteria for mother-child reunification.     

Executive function effects and numerical development in children: Behavioural and ERP evidence from a numerical Stroop paradigm

Most research on numerical development in children is behavioural, focusing on accuracy and response time in different problem formats. However, Temple and Posner (1998) used ERPs and the numerical distance task with 5-year-olds to show that the development of numerical representations is difficult to disentangle from the development of the executive components of response organization and execution. Here we use the numerical Stroop paradigm (NSP) and ERPs to study possible executive interference in numerical processing tasks in 6–8-year-old children. In the NSP, the numerical magnitude of the digits is task-relevant and the physical size of the digits is task-irrelevant. We show that younger children are highly susceptible to interference from irrelevant physical information such as digit size, but that access to the numerical representation is almost as fast in young children as in adults. We argue that the developmental trajectories for executive function and numerical processing may act together to determine numerical development in young children.     

Promoting Gypsy children's behavioural engagement and school success: Evidence from a four‐wave longitudinal study

Low schooling, high non‐attendance and school dropout rates are critical phenomena within disadvantaged groups, especially among the Gypsy community. For example, in the UK, 10%–25% of Gypsy children do not attend school regularly and have significantly higher levels of overall absence from school (percentage of half‐day sessions missed) than pupils from other ethnic groups. In Portugal, available data on Gypsy children is sparse, yet data from one geographic region of the country reports high school failure (45%) and dropout rates (15%) among this population. The present study assessed the efficacy of a four‐year intervention to promote Gypsy children's behavioural engagement and school success. Gypsy communities were contacted and 30 children participating in the four waves were randomly distributed into control and experimental groups. Every school day throughout four years, 16 children in the experimental group were called at home and invited to go to school. The effectiveness of the intervention was evaluated in four waves (at the end of each of the four school years), assessing behavioural engagement (i.e. school non‐attendance, classroom behaviour) and school achievement (i.e. mathematics achievement, student progression). Findings show the efficacy of the intervention on promoting behaviour engagement and academic success without devaluing Gypsy people's culture.     

Responding to Hong Kong’s political crisis: moralist activism amongst youth

ABSTRACT

Discourses of morality are prevalent in contemporary Hong Kong youth activism. This paper suggests that this moralist disposition is the product of youth frustrations towards Hong Kong’s political crisis, whereby the power gap between civil society and the government renders the former incapable of exerting substantial influence over the governance of the city. Rather than ascribe the cause of this power imbalance solely to government policies, this paper reveals that civil society also contributed towards the making of this political crisis. By reviewing the citizen-led pro-democracy movement throughout the decades, it is shown that civil society has been ineffective in implementing political reforms because its actors and organisations harbour a political subjectivity that prioritises economic considerations over democratic aspirations, and are thus inclined to compromise with the government to preserve economic stability than to demand for political reforms. As a result, contemporary youth activists describe Hong Kong civil society as “uncaring” and lacking in moral commitment towards realising democratic reforms that will facilitate the development of a just society. Seeking to reconfigure such political attitudes that currently prevail in civil society, youth activists refashion themselves into political actors embodying a form of moral personhood that embraces notions of responsibility and of wanting to do good for the city, to show that another way of being politically engaged in Hong Kong is possible.     

DEPICTING TEACHERS' ROLES IN SOCIAL RECONSTRUCTION IN THE SOCIAL FRONTIER, 1934–1943

According to the dominant historiographical narrative, the social reconstructionists were a homogeneous group with a shared social, political, economic, and educational agenda. However, the pages of the journal The Social Frontier are replete with evidence that they were not in agreement on significant issues, especially when it came to the proper role of teachers in reform efforts. In fact, a close look reveals that the social reconstructionists presented multiple, overlapping, and often conflicting theories and strategies to advance the reconstruction of society, while explicating different roles for teachers therein. When teachers are placed at the center of the investigation, their factionalism, which has been discussed previously by C.A. Bowers and James Giarelli in their studies of the journal, is conspicuously apparent. Analysis of the different conceptions of teachers presented in The Social Frontier (subsequently titled Frontiers of Democracy) reveals that collectively, the social reconstructionists engaged in “more than one struggle”; and individually, they held views that were influenced by personal priorities and responses to the Depression, the spread of Communism and Fascism, the start of war in Europe and Asia, and, eventually, the involvement of the United States in World War II.