Linking organizational effectiveness and environmental change

Advisors on strategic planning often give two separate pieces of advice to managers: first, managers must interact with rather than react to the external environment. That is, they should be proactive, not reactive. Second, the organizational effectiveness must be improved. However, seldom is any linkage established between these two pieces of advice. The first premise is primarily an external view, and the second is an internal view. If these two views are not linked, the results may range from slightly below optimum to bankruptcy. The purpose of this article is to show how these two views can be linked.     

Some computational problems related to multinomial trials

Efficient numerical algorithms are developed to evaluate several probabilities related to multinomial trials.In the first part of the paper, the probability distribution of the number of trials until the alternatives j, j = 1,… m, have occurred at least i_j times is computed. The multinomial trials involve the m alternatives l,…, m, with positive probabilities P_l-P_m of occurrence. In the second part, several aspects of a multinomial subset selection problem, discussed by S. S. Gupta and K. Nagel, are investigated.     

Marginality and the Academic*

The question of social and psychological separation of the academic and intellectual in American society is raised. The empirical literature, although in short supply, suggests that the academic is socially isolated from the larger society and experiences attitudinal alienation. Interviews with sixty-one college and university professors tended to confirm this view, but particularly so among those respondents who identified themselves as intellectuals.     

Trends in Socioeconomic Achievement among Immigrant and Native-Born Asian-Americans, 1960–1976*

The first waves of Asian immigration to the United States were halted by exclusionary and racist legislation in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. With the reforms of the 1965 Immigration Act, there has been a resurgence of immigration from Asia. This study analyzes changes in the socioeconomic composition of immigrant and native-born Asian-Americans (Japanese, Chinese, and Filipinos) from 1960 to 1976. The educational levels of all Asian groups, immigrant and native-born, have equaled or exceeded those of whites in recent years. Asians are more likely to be found in professional occupations than are whites, although there is also a concentration of immigrant Chinese and Filipinos in service occupations and the retailtrade sector. Native-born Asian-Americans have reached parity with whites in terms of average earnings, though immigrant Asians remain far behind. The findings are discussed in light of the changing structural conditions and opportunities of Asians in American society.     

The impact of family structure transitions on youth achievement: Evidence from the children of the NlSY79

We investigated the sensitivity of measures of cognitive ability and socioemotional development to changes in parents' marital status using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, 1979. We used several scores for each assessment, taken at different times relative to parents' marital transitions, which allowed us to trace the effects starting up to five years before a parent's change in marital status and continuing for up to six years afterward. It also allowed us to correct for the unobserved heterogeneity of the transition and nontransition samples by controlling for the child's fixed effect in estimating the time path of his or her response to the transition. We found that children from families with both biological parents scored significantly better on the BPI and the PIAT-math and PIAT-reading assessments than did children from nonintact families. However, much of the difference disappeared when we controlled for background variables. Furthermore, when we controlled for child fixed effects, we did not find significant longitudinal variation in these scores over long periods that encompass the marital transition. This finding suggests that most of the variation is due to cross-sectional differences and is not a result of marital transitions per se.     

The Effect of Veteran Status on Mortality among Older Americans and its Pathways

This research examines excess mortality among American veterans age 70 years or older during a two-to-three year interval from 1993/94 to the end of 1995. Using a structural hazard rate model, we analyzed data on a sample of respondents age 70 or over from the Survey of Asset and Health Dynamics among the Oldest Old (AHEAD). We found that at age 70, older veterans have a slightly higher death rate than their nonveteran counterparts, implying a mortality crossover right before this age. Such excess mortality among veterans increases considerably with age, when other factors are held equal. The direct and indirect effects of veteran status on mortality by means of physical and mental health mostly perform in opposite directions, and such effects vary greatly in magnitude and direction as a function of age. The intervening effects of physical and mental health status decrease substantially with increasing age. Many of the mechanisms inherent in the excess mortality among older veterans are not captured by variations in their health status, especially among the oldest-old. A more extensive study on this topic is urgently needed.     

Eskimo Education in the Canadian Arctic

En premier lieu cet article inventorie la litterature traitant des caracteristiques des enseignants, du programme d'etude et des techniques pedagogiques en au-tant que ces elements sont efficaces dans l'education des jeunes indiens et esqui-maux. Par apres, en s'appuyant sur l'ensemble des publications sur le sujet et sur les propres etudes nordiques de l'auteur a printemps 1969 on cherche a savoir jusqu'a quel point ces caracteristiques ideales du professeur, du programme et des techniques pedagogiques se retrouvent dans les salles de cours du nord. II semble que les enseignants autochtones esquimaux, meme avec peu d'entrainement, obtiendraient de meilleurs resultats scolaires que les edu-cateurs blancs durant les premieres annees. Un programme de cette nature de type experimental est maintenant en cours au Nouveau Quebec. Les professeurs esquimaux enseignent en esquimau et utilisent un materiel didactique special. This paper first reviews the literature on teacher characteristics, curriculum, and classroom teaching techniques as these relate to effectiveness in teaching Indian and Eskimo children. There follows a consideration of the extent to which ideal teacher and curriculum characteristics and teaching techniques are found in northern classrooms, based on published literature and the author's research in the north in the spring of 1969. It appears that ill-trained Eskimo teachers might teach the early grades more effectively than white teachers. Such an experimental program is found in Nouveau Quebec where Eskimo teachers using special material use Eskimo as the language of instruction.