The Role of Language in a Journalistic Interpretive Community

Drawing on anniversary-edition articles and interviews with journalists at Jakarta Post, Indonesia’s largest English-language news outlet, we argue that language of publication directly informs the narratives a journalistic interpretive community [Zelizer, Barbie. 1993. “Journalists as Interpretive Communities.” Critical Studies in Mass Communication 10: 219–237] develops to position itself as a news authority. Analysis showed that associations with English as a foreign language in Indonesia influenced stories of the newspaper’s professional values and practice, and the ways it conceptualized readership. The study contributes to the growing body of literature that examines intersections of journalism and language—in this case, English as a language of publication in a global context.     

Using digital images of the zebra finch song system as a tool to teach organizational effects of steroid hormones: a free downloadable module

Zebra finch song behavior is sexually dimorphic: males sing and females do not. The neural system underlying this behavior is sexually dimorphic, and this sex difference is easy to quantify. During development, the zebra finch song system can be altered by steroid hormones, specifically estradiol, which actually masculinizes it. Because of the ease of quantification and experimental manipulation, the zebra finch song system has great potential for use in undergraduate labs. Unfortunately, the underlying costs prohibit use of this system in undergraduate labs. Further, the time required to perform a developmental study renders such undertakings unrealistic within a single academic term. We have overcome these barriers by creating digital tools, including an image library of song nuclei from zebra finch brains. Students using this library replicate and extend a published experiment examining the dose of estradiol required to masculinize the female zebra finch brain. We have used this library for several terms, and students not only obtain significant experimental results but also make gains in understanding content, experimental controls, and inferential statistics (analysis of variance and post hoc tests). We have provided free access to these digital tools at the following website: http://mdcune.psych.ucla.edu/modules/birdsong.     

Improving graduate education to support a branching career pipeline: recommendations based on a survey of doctoral students in the basic biomedical sciences

Today's doctoral programs continue to prepare students for a traditional academic career path despite the inadequate supply of research-focused faculty positions. We advocate for a broader doctoral curriculum that prepares trainees for a wide range of science-related career paths. In support of this argument, we describe data from our survey of doctoral students in the basic biomedical sciences at University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). Midway through graduate training, UCSF students are already considering a broad range of career options, with one-third intending to pursue a non-research career path. To better support this branching career pipeline, we recommend that national standards for training and mentoring include emphasis on career planning and professional skills development to ensure the success of PhD-level scientists as they contribute to a broadly defined global scientific enterprise.     

Attitudes to cadaveric organ donation in Irish preclinical medical students

There is a worldwide shortage of organs for transplantation. It has been shown that the attitude of healthcare professionals can improve the rates of organ donation, and that educational programs aimed at improving both attitudes and knowledge base of professionals can have positive outcomes. Although there has been research carried out on this topic, there has been none in Ireland. Anatomy dissection can be a stressor to medical students-we investigate the attitudes of Irish students to organ donation and how they change with exposure to anatomy dissection. A questionnaire was administered to first year students in the School of Medicine in University College Dublin, Ireland, three times over a nine-week period at the commencement of classes in an academic year. The attitudes of the students were positive throughout regarding organ donation by a stranger, a family member, or themselves. There was, however, a significant decrease in support for the donation of a family member's organs in a minority of students. Irish students' attitudes to postmortem organ donation are positive and are not changed by exposure to the dissecting room. There is support for the donation of organs, and willingness among students to donate their own organs and support donation by family members.     

Harnessing technology to improve formative assessment of student conceptions in STEM: forging a national network

Concept inventories, consisting of multiple-choice questions designed around common student misconceptions, are designed to reveal student thinking. However, students often have complex, heterogeneous ideas about scientific concepts. Constructed-response assessments, in which students must create their own answer, may better reveal students' thinking, but are time- and resource-intensive to evaluate. This report describes the initial meeting of a National Science Foundation-funded cross-institutional collaboration of interdisciplinary science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education researchers interested in exploring the use of automated text analysis to evaluate constructed-response assessments. Participants at the meeting shared existing work on lexical analysis and concept inventories, participated in technology demonstrations and workshops, and discussed research goals. We are seeking interested collaborators to join our research community.     

Perspective Paper: Assessing Air Quality as Part of a Physical Therapy Plan of Care

Purpose: The purposes of this clinical perspective paper are (1) to expand physical therapists’ awareness to the topic of air quality as a health priority when providing professional services; and (2) to provide templates for screening the indoor clinical environments and patient profiles to avert respiratory exacerbations, especially in persons with asthma. Summary of Key Points: The location where a physical therapist practices determines the air quality indices to which a person is exposed. Poor indoor air quality can expose a person to even greater compromise of respiration (ie, Sick Building Syndrome) than outdoor air quality secondary to an array of factors like building materials, the ventilation exchange rate of an enclosed space, chemicals used in cleaning, and humidity. Statement of Conclusions: Extrinsic (ie, environmental) and intrinsic (eg, pre-disposition to airway hypersensitivity) factors must be accounted for by physical therapists to safeguard their patients and themselves from experiencing respiratory compromise and/or distress as a result of a treatment session or their place of employment. Recommendations: Efforts to screen indoor environments for potential triggers and patient risk profiles for abnormal airway reactivity should routinely be undertaken. Individualized Action Plans should be prospectively prepared and readied for implementation when warranted.Key Words: asthma, Sick Building Syndrome, indoor air quality, respiratory impairment     

The Jatropha biofuels sector in Tanzania 2005-2009: Evolution towards sustainability?

Biofuel production has recently attracted much attention. Some anticipate substantial social and environmental benefits, while at the same time expecting sound profitability for investors. Others are doubtful, envisaging large trade-offs between the pursuit of social, environmental and economic objectives, particularly in poor countries in the tropics. The paper explores these issues in Tanzania, which has been an African forerunner in the cultivation of a bio-oil shrub called Jatropha curcas L. We trace how isolated Jatropha biofuel experiments developed since early 2005 towards a sectoral production and innovation system, and we investigate to what extent that system has been capable of developing and maintaining sustainable practices and producing sustainable outcomes. The application of evolutionary innovation theory allows us to view the developments in the sector as a result of evolutionary variation and selection on the one hand, and revolutionary contestation between different coalitions of stakeholders on the other. Both these processes constitute significant engines of change. While variation and selection are driven predominantly by localised technical and agronomic learning, the conflict-driven dynamics are highly globalised and occur primarily as a result of reflexive learning about problematic sustainability impacts. The sector is found to have moved some way towards a full sectoral innovation and production system, but it is impossible to predict whether a viable sector with a strong “triple bottom line” orientation will ultimate emerge, since many issues surrounding the social, environmental and financial sustainability still remain unresolved, especially relating to local and global governance.     

“Follow the Water”: Steve Squyres and the Mars Exploration Rovers

Steve Squyres was responsible for assembling the team of scientists, engineers and instruments that formed the Mars Exploration Rovers (MER). Squyres developed a vision that small-scale observations made by a robotic geologist on Mars would be the key for resolving the mystery of water on Mars. Prior to the MER missions, planetary scientists were divided between groups holding that ancient fluvial-like surface features on Mars were formed by water and those holding that the erosive and depositional forces were tied to liquid and gaseous CO₂. At issue was a fundamental understanding not only of early Martian geological processes and early solar luminosity, but also the possibility of life on Mars. To resolve these questions, Squyres and his team developed a new breed of rovers that were capable of identifying minerals and collecting textural observations. The resulting twin rovers, Opportunity and Spirit, have successfully resolved the single most important question about Mars that scientists have been debating for the past 30 years, providing compelling evidence for the action of water on the Martian surface. Squyres and the MER team have also initiated a new era in planetary exploration and inspired a new generation of students to become scientists and explorers. Steve Squyres and the MER team produced fundamental insights into the geology and climatology of Mars. These have resulted in major advances in our understanding of the potential for life on other planets and of life’s evolution on Earth. For the discovery and elucidation of water on Mars through the “robotic geologists” of the Mars Exploration Rovers, Steve Squyres was awarded the 2007 Benjamin Franklin Medal in Earth and Environmental Science.     

Murdered bread, living bread: Doris Grant and the homemade, wholemeal loaf

Doris Grant (1905-2003), a middle-class, British housewife, published numerous books from the 1940s into the 1970s urging her fellow housewives to bake organic, wholemeal bread for their families. This article argues that Grant's arguments defy easy categorization as either 'conservative' or 'progressive'. On the one hand, her targeted appeal to women reflected a traditional, conservative understanding of gender roles: women were, first and foremost, wives and mothers and therefore naturally responsible for family diet and health. On the other hand, Grant also pushed her readers to look beyond their homes and recognize a dangerous food supply system that was impinging on their daily lives. She demanded that her readers reject comfortable complicity in this system and preached the value of individual action in effecting substantive change.