Establishing the R&D agenda for twenty-first century learning

An infusion of twenty-first century skills into American public education necessitates a plan for research and development to further such reform. While the nation agrees that students must obtain critical thinking, problem-solving, and communication skills to succeed in the current global marketplace, this chapter puts forth a long-term, proactive agenda to invest in targeted research to propel and sustain this shift in education. The authors examine the impact such an R&D agenda would have on pedagogy and assessment and the implications for institutions of higher education. As the United States struggles to maintain dominance in the international economy, it faces a great challenge in keeping up with European and Asian competitors' strategies for preparing youth for the global marketplace. The authors hope the global reality will help contextualize the debate around American education--the current trend toward basics and accountability needs to be broadened. Building on frameworks created by the Partnership for 21st Century Skills, this chapter proposes questions to guide research around teaching, professional development, and assessment significant to twenty-first century skills. Knowing that educational change depends on providing teachers with the tools, support, and training to make fundamental changes in their practice, the authors argue for extensive research around best practices. In addition, if assessments are created to measure the desired outcomes, such measuring tools can drive reform. Furthermore, large-scale changes in teacher preparation programs must take place to allow teachers to adequately employ twenty-first century teaching and assessment strategies.     

THE CARING DILEMMA IN MIDWIFERY

The caring dilemma, first described by Reverby in 1987, denotes the tension caused by being obliged to provide care without the right to determine how that care is to be provided. Such a dilemma is salient in the practice of midwifery based on a continuity of care model that has recently emerged or been implemented in various jurisdictions. Briefly, this model involves the provision of care by a single midwife or pair of midwives to a woman throughout her pregnancy, birth and post-natal period. Continuity of care necessitates that midwives be on call for significant lengths of time to ensure attendance at the woman's birth. It is the on-call nature of this form of midwifery work that most significantly poses a caring dilemma for midwives. In this paper, we trace both the structural and experiential aspects of the caring dilemma through an examination of midwifery in the Canadian province of Ontario. Our analysis reveals that despite being a salient feature of midwifery practice, some work structures can be created to mediate the caring dilemma experienced by midwives.

Le dilemme de la prise en charge, que Reverby a évoqué la première fois en 1987, dénote la tension que cause le fait d’être tenu d'offrir une prise en charge sans avoir le droit d’établir de quelle manière l'offrir. L'exemple des sages-femmes, dont la pratique repose sur un type de soin continu qui est récemment apparu ou qu'on vient de mettre sur pied dans diverses administrations, illustre très clairement ce dilemme. Pour résumer, ce modèle veut qu'une femme enceinte soit prise en charge pendant sa grossesse, à son accouchement et durant sa période postnatale par une ou deux sages-femmes. La continuité de la prise en charge oblige les sages-femmes à être sur appel durant des périodes prolongées pour que la femme qui accouche bénéficie de leur présence. Pour les sages-femmes, c'est la nature même de leur travail effectué sur appel qui engendre, de façon cruciale, le dilemme de la prise en charge. Dans cet article, nous abordons les aspects structurels et expérimentaux que représente le dilemme de la prise en charge par le biais d'une étude sur la pratique du métier de sage-femme dans la province canadienne de l'Ontario. Notre analyse révèle que, si le dilemme de la prise en charge est inhérent à la profession de sage-femme, il n'empêche que des structures professionnelles peuvent être mises en place pour en atténuer les aspects négatifs.     

The dual process model of coping with bereavement: a decade on

The Dual Process Model of Coping with Bereavement (DPM; Stroebe & Schut, 1999) is described in this article. The rationale is given as to why this model was deemed necessary and how it was designed to overcome limitations of earlier models of adaptive coping with loss. Although building on earlier theoretical formulations, it contrasts with other models along a number of dimensions which are outlined. In addition to describing the basic parameters of the DPM, theoretical and empirical developments that have taken place since the original publication of the model are summarized. Guidelines for future research are given focusing on principles that should be followed to put the model to stringent empirical test.     

Graphical Display of Means

A graphical procedure for the display of treatment means that enables one to determine the statistical significance of the observed differences is presented. It is shown that the widely used least significant difference and honestly significant difference statistics can be used to construct plots in which any two means whose uncertainty intervals do not overlap are significantly different at the assigned probability level. It is argued that these plots, because of their straightforward decision rules, are more effective than those that show the observed means with standard errors or confidence limits. Several examples of the proposed displays are included to illustrate the procedure.     

IFLA Library Reference Model,RDA, and Serials in a Nutshell

Abstract

IFLA Library Reference Model (IFLA LRM) represents the consolidation of Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records (FRBR) and the two other conceptual models of the Functional Requirements (FR) family, the Functional Requirements for Authority Data (FRAD) and the Functional Requirements for Subject Authority Data (FRSAD). IFLA LRM includes a specific section (5.8) devoted to serials. The RDA Steering Committee adopted IFLA LRM as the conceptual model for the development of RDA in November 2016. The 3R (RDA Toolkit Restructure and Redesign) Project’s purpose is partly to make RDA compatible with the IFLA LRM. A beta version of the English-language content of the RDA Toolkit, which incorporates the IFLA LRM, was released in June 2018. This column explores, in lay terms, serials in relation to the IFLA LRM and the RDA Toolkit Restructure and Redesign (3R) Project. The beta version of the restructured and redesigned RDA Toolkit introduces several new concepts relating to serials.     

Sustainable consumption and third-party certification labels: Consumers’ perceptions and reactions

Compared with conventional products, sustainable products continue to attract relatively lower market shares. To increase customer acceptance, many sustainable products feature third-party certification labels (TPCL), yet it is unclear whether TPCL are effective and what processes and boundary conditions define their role in consumer decision making. Across three experimental studies, this research determines that sustainable products are characterized by credence qualities, associated with increased perceptions of risk, which negatively influence consumers' purchase intentions. Drawing on signaling theory, this study also shows that TPCL on sustainable products provide brand-like information cues that reduce the perceived risk of sustainable products. Finally, a third experimental study demonstrates that consumers must perceive TPCL as credible for them to reduce consumers’ risk perceptions.     

Flood Risk Perceptions and Insurance Choice: Do Decisions in the Floodplain Reflect Overoptimism?

In the presence of rare disasters, risk perceptions may not always align with actual risks. These perceptions can nevertheless influence an individual's willingness to mitigate risks through activities such as purchasing flood insurance. In a survey of Maryland floodplain residents, we find that stated risk perceptions predict voluntary flood insurance take‐up, while perceptions themselves varied widely among surveyed residents, owing in large part to differences in past flood experience. We use a formal test for overoptimism in risk perceptions and find that, on aggregate, floodplain residents are overly optimistic about flood risks.     

Estimating nonlinear additive models with nonstationarities and correlated errors

In this paper, we study a nonparametric additive regression model suitable for a wide range of time series applications. Our model includes a periodic component, a deterministic time trend, various component functions of stochastic explanatory variables, and an AR(p) error process that accounts for serial correlation in the regression error. We propose an estimation procedure for the nonparametric component functions and the parameters of the error process based on smooth backfitting and quasimaximum likelihood methods. Our theory establishes convergence rates and the asymptotic normality of our estimators. Moreover, we are able to derive an oracle‐type result for the estimators of the AR parameters: Under fairly mild conditions, the limiting distribution of our parameter estimators is the same as when the nonparametric component functions are known. Finally, we illustrate our estimation procedure by applying it to a sample of climate and ozone data collected on the Antarctic Peninsula.     

Framing Atmospheres: Goffman,Space, and Music in Everyday Life

In this article, we synthesize Goffman's microsociology with recent developments in fields such as aesthetics, geography, and urban studies labeled “atmosphere theory.” Our central rationale is if microsociology is to deepen its account of embodiment and the noncognitive it needs a theory of spatialized moods. In the second half, we develop our synthesis with respect to musical atmospheres and conclude by drawing on our own research regarding how social actors use music to shape “involvements” and “disinvolvements” in the spatial ambiances of public transportation, the street, the workplace, and the home.