A Leadership Training Group for at Risk Fifth & Seventh Graders: Results from A Brief Strength-Based Group Program

ABSTRACT

An increasing number of youth are exhibiting social, emotional, and behavioral problems that hinder their ability to function at grade level. Subsequently, school mental health services have not been able to address the need for services particularly among students who are minority and poor. A mixed methodology study was conducted to determine the treatment outcomes from a brief strength-based leadership training group for primarily students who are African American and poor. Pre–post scores on three scales and focus group data revealed significant positive changes in regard to internal areas of functioning and social skills, anger management skills, and school attitude. Gender and age significantly impacted outcomes.     

Social centrality and aggressive behavior in the elementary school: Gender segregation,social structure,and psychological factors

In this paper, we build on key findings in the sociological literature regarding different patterns of association between social centrality and overt aggressive behavior in the context of same‐and‐cross gender social interactions. We explore these associations in a population of urban elementary school students ( = 8.62, SD = 0.69, N = 848), while addressing claims that the role of psychological factors is overstated in this literature. Our results indicate that, on average, social centrality is positively associated with aggressive behavior for boys, but negatively for girls. We also find a moderating effect indicating that the proportion of male peers with whom participants are reported to hang around, as well as their own gender play a role in the association between social centrality and aggression. These findings are discussed in the context of an ecological perspective on human development in which interactions among individuals, their social groups, and key environments are viewed as central to shaping developmental pathways.     

增进学生身心健康是我国学校体育发展的根本和方向——学习贯彻习近平总书记在全国教育大会上的重要讲话精神

2018年9月10日，习近平总书记在全国教育大会上强调：“要树立健康第一的教育理念，开齐开足体育课，帮助学生在体育锻炼中享受乐趣、增强体质、健全人格、锤炼意志。”这为我国未来学校体育的发展指明了方向。学校体育要认真贯彻落实习近平总书记的重要讲话精神，把增进学生的身心健康作为学校体育工作的出发点和落脚点，切实提高学生的身心健康水平，促进学生全面发展。本文首先阐述了习近平总书记重要讲话精神的核心要义，以及所体现的以人为本的思想、高度重视把学生的健康放在首位、非常关注学生的身心协调发展等。其次，就如何落实习近平总书记的重要讲话精神提出了建设性意见：必须开齐开足体育课，保证校内外锻炼时间；提高体育课和课外体育活动的教育教学质量，加强学生的运动效果；“五育”并重，将学校体育纳入学校教育质量评价的重要组成部分；体育教师应树立强烈的社会责任感和使命感等措施和建议。     

Testing the feasibility of a value‐added model of school quality in a low‐income country

Value‐added models (VAMS) are commonly used in high‐income countries for measuring the quality of teachers and schools, on the grounds that they are a fairer reflection of true quality than simple average test scores, as they account for differences in student intake. Not accounting for student's prior test scores can give a misleading impression of school quality. In this article, we adapt the current VAM of secondary school quality to the Ugandan context, and test its robustness. Using official test score data from Uganda, we test the robustness of the model to a range of different empirical specifications, including sensitivity to the inclusion of controls for student socioeconomic status. We find that the model is robust to a variety of different specifications and control variables. The VAM is low cost and has the potential to provide a clearer signal to parents, teachers, schools, and policy‐makers about how much learning is actually happening in different schools. This approach could be carried out at low cost in a wide range of low‐income countries that have similar testing regimes.     

师范院校通识教育的实施策略

基于通识教育的内涵和师范教育的特性,师范院校通识教育的使命体现在两个层面:终极层面,即"完整的人"的培养;专业层面,即教育信念的培养。师范院校通识教育在理念、课程、教师、教学方式、教学管理等方面还存在问题。改进和完善师范院校通识教育,必须首先确立科学的通识教育理念,明确通识教育的使命,加强对通识教育理念的宣传;从通识教育的理念和使命出发,顶层设计通识教育课程体系;强化通识教育师资建设,建设一支专、兼结合的优质通识教育课程师资队伍;创新通识教育教学方式,积极推进小班讨论教学、研究型教学,强化经典导课程教学,在专业方向课程教学中融渗通识教育,将专业教育和通识教育有机结合;加强通识教育管理工作,探索建立全校层面的通识教育机构,建立通识教育质量评估反馈机制,建立通识教育课程教学助教制,实施双导师制,推进优质通识教学资源共享。     

未成年人运动伤害归责原则的法经济学分析

通过分析未成年人运动伤害事故时，教育机构和未成年学生及其监护人在严格责任和过错责任两种归责原则下的博弈行为选择，可以判断出过错责任原则对教育机构、未成年学生及其监护人的行为进行调整则更有利于社会福利。过错推定原则降低了案件的归责成本，减少了因果关系认定的成本，减少了弱者的举证成本。依据未成年人的年龄、民事行为能力的不同，幼儿园、中小学校或者其他教育机构在运动伤害事故中的侵权责任分别采取过错责任原则和过错责任推定原则是合理的。     

新建地方本科院校办学特色建设的理性思考——以泉州师范学院为例

办学特色是我国高等教育大众化背景下新建地方本科院校求生存、谋发展的必然选择。本文首先分析了高校 办学特色的科学内涵，并以泉州师范学院为例，对新建地方本科院校的办学特色进行了优劣势分析，并从办学定位、学科专业 建设、人才培养、服务社会、师资队伍、校园文化等六个方面，提出了培育高校办学特色的具体建议。     

The socioeconomic consequences of dropping out of high school: Evidence from an analysis of siblings

There is widespread belief that dropping out of high school leads to economic hardship. This belief rests on tenuous evidence. High school dropouts likely face an increased risk of economic hardship because of differences beyond a high school diploma. In particular, dropouts are more likely to come from disadvantaged backgrounds and thus face an elevated risk of economic hardship. Using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Youth 1979 Cohort, I estimate the consequences of dropping out by comparing dropouts to their siblings who completed high school. I also present OLS regression estimates using the same data. OLS regression estimates are consistently higher than sibling fixed effects estimates with the largest discrepancy occurring between estimates of the effect of dropping out on income-to-poverty ratio. However, the sibling fixed effect estimates reveal that dropping out has an effect on economic hardship net of unobserved background characteristics that are shared by siblings. I conclude with a discussion of how recent policy shifts affect the economic standing of low-ability students and suggest avenues for future research.     

Bargaining for Success: Examining the Relationship Between Teacher Unions and Student Achievement

While many previous studies have identified a positive relationship between teachers unions and student achievement on standardized tests, little research to date has explored the channels through which unions might actually affect achievement. Utilizing multilevel random intercept models, we examine the effects of two categories of items commonly negotiated in teacher contracts—“industrial union” items and “professional union” items—on individual student math scores. Further, we assess the ability of these two clusters of variables to explain the positive union effect found in previous research. The results confirm that teachers unions are positively associated with student achievement and suggest that the industrial model explains moderately more of the union effect than the professional model; however, only the combination of both models is capable of reducing the union effect to nonsignificance. These findings are also confirmed in a supplemental analysis utilizing instrumental variables to account for the possibility of endogeneity. Finally, a decomposition of the union effect suggests that teachers unions are most beneficial to middle‐ and high‐achieving students. We conclude that through industrial and professional bargaining, teachers are able to secure higher salaries, credentialing, and greater autonomy which lead to improved student achievement.