No issue in American higher education is more contentious than that of race-based affirmative action. In light of the ongoing debate around the topic and recent Supreme Court rulings, affirmative ...action policy may be embarking on a new path. As an alternative to race-based affirmative action, some analysts suggest affirmative action policies based on class. In Race, Class, and Affirmative Action, sociologist Sigal Alon studies the race-based affirmative action policies in the U.S. and the class-based affirmative action policies in Israel. Alon evaluates how these different policies foster campus diversity and socioeconomic mobility by comparing the Israeli policy with a simulated model of race-based affirmative action and the U.S. policy with a simulated model of class-based affirmative action. Alon finds that affirmative action at elite institutions in both countries is a key vehicle of mobility for disenfranchised students, whether they are racial and ethnic minorities or socioeconomically disadvantaged. It improves their academic success and graduation rates and leads to better labor market outcomes. The beneficiaries of affirmative action in both countries thrive at elite colleges and in selective fields of study. They would not be better off attending less selective colleges instead. Alon finds that Israel’s class-based affirmative action programs have provided much-needed entry slots at the elite universities to students from the geographic periphery, from high-poverty high schools and from poor families. However, this approach has not generated as much ethnic diversity as a race-based policy would. By contrast, affirmative action policies in the U.S. have fostered racial and ethnic diversity; a level that cannot be matched with class-based policies. Yet, class-based policies would do a better job at boosting the socioeconomic diversity at these bastions of privilege. The findings from both countries suggest that neither race-based nor class-based models by themselves can generate broad diversity. According to Alon, the best route for promoting both racial and socioeconomic diversity is to embed the consideration of race within class-based affirmative action. Such a hybrid model would maximize the mobility benefits for both socioeconomically disadvantaged and minority students. Race, Class and Affirmative Action moves past political talking points to offer an innovative, evidence-based perspective on the merits and feasibility of different designs of affirmative action.
Recent analyses differ on how effective the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC) is at improving infant health. We use data from nine states that participate ...in the Pregnancy Nutrition Surveillance System to address limitations in previous work. With information on the mother's timing of WIC enrollment, we test whether greater exposure to WIC is associated with less smoking, improved weight gain during pregnancy, better birth outcomes, and greater likelihood of breastfeeding. Our results suggest that much of the often reported association between WIC and lower rates of preterm birth is likely spurious, the result of gestational age bias. We find modest effects of WIC on fetal growth, inconsistent associations between WIC and smoking, limited associations with gestational weight gain, and some relationship with breastfeeding. A WIC effect exists, but on fewer margins and with less impact than has been claimed by policy analysts and advocates.
Influenza vaccination is recommended especially for persons at risk of complications. In 2003, the World Health Assembly urged Member States (MS) to increase vaccination coverage to 75% among older ...persons by 2010.
To assess progress towards the 2010 vaccination goal and describe seasonal influenza vaccination recommendations in the World Health Organization (WHO) European Region.
Data on seasonal influenza vaccine recommendations, dose distribution, and target group coverage were obtained from two sources: European Union and European Economic Area MS data were extracted from influenza vaccination surveys covering seven seasons (2008/2009–2014/2015) published by the Vaccine European New Integrated Collaboration Effort and European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control. For the remaining WHO European MS, a separate survey on policies and uptake for all seasons (2008/2009–2014/2015) was distributed to national immunization programmes in 2015.
Data was available from 49 of 53 MS. All but two had a national influenza vaccination policy. High-income countries distributed considerably higher number of vaccines per capita (median; 139.2 per 1000 population) compared to lower-middle-income countries (median; 6.1 per 1000 population). Most countries recommended vaccination for older persons, individuals with chronic disease, healthcare workers, and pregnant women. Children were included in < 50% of national policies. Only one country reached 75% coverage in older persons (2014/2015), while a number of countries reported declining vaccination uptake. Coverage of target groups was overall low, but with large variations between countries. Vaccination coverage was not monitored for several groups.
Despite policy recommendations, influenza vaccination uptake remains suboptimal. Low levels of vaccination is not only a missed opportunity for preventing influenza in vulnerable groups, but could negatively affect pandemic preparedness. Improved understanding of barriers to influenza vaccination is needed to increase uptake and reverse negative trends. Furthermore, implementation of vaccination coverage monitoring is critical for assessing performance and impact of the programmes.
This book compares two challenges made to American public school curricula in the 1980s and 1990s. It identifies striking similarities between proponents of Afrocentrism and creationism, accounts for ...their differential outcomes, and draws important conclusions for the study of culture, organizations, and social movements. Amy Binder gives a brief history of both movements and then describes how their challenges played out in seven school districts. Despite their very different constituencies--inner-city African American cultural essentialists and predominately white suburban Christian conservatives--Afrocentrists and creationists had much in common. Both made similar arguments about oppression and their children’s well-being, both faced skepticism from educators about their factual claims, and both mounted their challenges through bureaucratic channels. In each case, challenged school systems were ultimately able to minimize or reject challengers’ demands, but the process varied by case and type of challenge. Binder finds that Afrocentrists were more successful in advancing their cause than were creationists because they appeared to offer a solution to the real problem of urban school failure, met with more administrative sympathy toward their complaints of historic exclusion, sought to alter lower-prestige curricula (history, not science), and faced opponents who lacked a legal remedy comparable to the rule of church-state separation invoked by creationism’s opponents.
Communicating science is a core component of the Sea Grant model. Telling compelling stories that convey accurate and balanced information in an interesting manner is key to these communications ...efforts and to achieving the organization's overall goal of an engaged public and decision-makers. This article outlines and highlights best practices for some of the most commonly used storytelling mediums: narrative writing, photography and video, and podcasts. The importance of conducting first-hand reporting, placing a narrative focus on people, and taking time to formulate a thoughtful and strategic communications approach are key takeaways.
From the Foreword "These authors have clearly shown the value in looking for the signature pedagogies of their disciplines. Nothing uncovers hidden assumptions about desired knowledge, skills, and ...dispositions better than a careful examination of our most cherished practices. The authors inspire specialists in other disciplines to do the same. Furthermore, they invite other colleagues to explore whether relatively new, interdisciplinary fields such as Women's Studies and Global Studies have, or should have, a signature pedagogy consistent with their understanding of what it means to 'apprentice' in these areas." - Anthony A. Ciccone, Senior Scholar and Director, Carnegie Academy for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning. How do individual disciplines foster deep learning, and get students to think like disciplinary experts? With contributions from the sciences, humanities, and the arts, this book critically explores how to best foster student learning within and across the disciplines. This book represents a major advance in the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) by moving beyond individual case studies, best practices, and the work of individual scholars, to focus on the unique content and characteristic pedagogies of major disciplines. Each chapter begins by summarizing the SoTL literature on the pedagogies of a specific discipline, and by examining and analyzing its traditional practices, paying particular attention to how faculty evaluate success. Each concludes by the articulating for its discipline the elements of a "signature pedagogy" that will improve teaching and learning, and by offering an agenda for future research. Each chapter explores what the pedagogical literature of the discipline suggests are the optimal ways to teach material in that field, and to verify the resulting learning. Each author is concerned about how to engage students in the ways of knowing, the habits of mind, and the values used by experts in his or her field. Readers
Active labour market programmes (ALMPs) are a central aspect of labour market policies and are intended to combat the negative effects of long-term unemployment and increase the ability of ...individuals to obtain gainful employment and financial self-sufficiency. The purpose of this Swedish study is to explore the designs of six ALMPs and their sequential chains, through which participants are intended to transition from long-term unemployment to employment. Three of the ALMPs were delivered by the municipality and three by different NGOs. Programme stakeholders were interviewed using a semi-structured interview guide followed by clarifying questions. The results reveal that the basic components of the ALMPs vary in terms of activities, programme durations and education of the employees. Moreover, the goals of the sequential chains differ, and it was found that the municipal ALMPs define paid work on the open labour market, or financial independence, as the most important goal for participants. The goals for participants in NGO-based ALMPs, however, focused on enhancing wellbeing, skills, and self-confidence. The study adds to our understanding of differences and similarities of the basic components and sequential chains of municipality and NGO based ALMPs.
David Stockman, Ronald Reagan's budget director, proclaimed the Small Business Administration a "billion-dollar waste -- a rathole," and set out to abolish the agency. His scathing critique was but ...the latest attack on an agency better known as the "Small Scandal Administration." Loans to criminals, government contracts for minority "fronts," the classification of American Motors as a small business, Whitewater, and other scandals -- the Small Business Administration has lurched from one embarrassment to another.
Despite the scandals and the policy failures, the SBA thrives and small business remains a sacred cow in American politics. Part of this sacredness comes from the agency's longstanding record of pioneering affirmative action. Jonathan Bean reveals that even before the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the SBA promoted African American businesses, encouraged the hiring of minorities, and monitored the employment practices of loan recipients. Under Nixon, the agency expanded racial preferences. During the Reagan administration, politicians wrapped themselves in the mantle of minority enterprise even as they denounced quotas elsewhere.
Created by Congress in 1953, the SBA does not conform to traditional interpretations of interest-group democracy. Even though the public -- and Congress -- favors small enterprise, there has never been a unified group of small business owners requesting the government's help. Indeed, the SBA often has failed to address the real problems of "Mom and Pop" shop owners, fueling the ongoing debate about the agency's viability.
The first book to tell the story of the Advanced Placement program, the gold standard for academic rigor in American high schools The Advanced Placement program stands as the foremost source of ...college-level academics for millions of high school students in the United States and beyond. More than 22, 000 schools now participate in it, across nearly forty subjects, from Latin and art to calculus and computer science. Yet remarkably little has been known about how this nongovernmental program became one of the greatest success stories in K–12 education—until now. In Learning in the Fast Lane, Chester Finn and Andrew Scanlan, two of the country's most respected education analysts, offer a groundbreaking account of one of the most important educational initiatives of our time. Learning in the Fast Lane traces the story of AP from its mid-twentieth-century origins as a niche benefit for privileged students to its emergence as a springboard to college for high schoolers nationwide, including hundreds of thousands of disadvantaged youth. Today, AP not only opens new intellectual horizons for smart teenagers, but also strengthens school ratings, attracts topflight teachers, and draws support from philanthropists, reformers, and policymakers. At the same time, it faces numerous challenges, including rival programs, curriculum wars, charges of elitism, the misgivings of influential universities, and the difficulty of infusing rigor into schools that lack it. In today's polarized climate, can AP maintain its lofty standards and surmount the problems that have sunk so many other bold education ventures?Richly documented and thoroughly accessible, Learning in the Fast Lane is a must-read for anyone with a stake in the American school system.
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