The Social Geography of Education: Neighborhood, Class Composition, and the Educational Achievement of Elementary School Students in Zurich, Switzerland

Despite an impressive amount of research and policy intervention no robust pattern of neighborhood effects on educational attainment has previously been identified. Adequate theoretical modeling and the sensitivity of the results to the method of the study are the major challenges in this area of research. This paper elaborates the social mechanisms of neighborhood effects and applies various methodological approaches to test them. Using data from Switzerland, the research reported here has detected heterogeneous effects of neighborhood on elementary school students’ educational achievement in Zurich. Although modest in comparison with the effects of classroom composition, these effects appear to be mediated primarily through social integration into a local peer network and are differentiated according to students’ gender and their social origin.

Primary lowland dipterocarp forest at Danum Valley, Sabah, Malaysia. Species composition and patterns in the understorey

The spatial distributions of species of tree ≥10 cm gbh were examined in two 4 ha plots and related to the local variation in topography and soil chemistry. The plots were similar in their species composition, particularly in terms of the densities of small trees, and they showed very similar edaphic characteristics. Size class distributions varied little within and between plots. Ordination of 0.25 ha subplots highlighted parallel gradients in the vegetation of both plots when the densities of trees ≥10 cm gbh were considered. Focusing on understorey trees in the 10-<50 cm gbh class at the 0.04 ha subplot scale showed a similar vegetation gradient in both plots closely associated with change from lower slope to ridge. No relationship with soil chemistry was found. On the ridges a special group of understorey species formed clumps and these species contributed importantly to the ordinations. Borneo has a regional history of occasionally severe droughts. It is suggested here that the observed patterns in the understorey are due to differential responses to low soil water supply, the ridges probably tending to dryness more than the lower slopes. Within the large and diverse family Euphorbiaceae, which dominates the understorey at Danum, there may be ecophysiological groupings of species. The long-term effects of disturbance interacting with local edaphic factors on forest structure and composition are discussed.

The Relationship between AP English Language Performance and College Outcomes

This study focused on the relationship between students’ Advanced Placement (AP) English language performance and their subsequent college success. Targeted students were divided into three groups according to their AP English Language performance. Subsequent college success was measured by students’ first-year college GPA, retention to the second year, and institutional selectivity. The demographic characteristics of the three AP performance groups with regard to gender, ethnicity, and best language spoken are provided. Results indicated that, after controlling for students’ SAT scores as a measure of prior academic performance, AP English Language performance was positively related to all three measures of college success.

Impact of oral contraceptives on weight, body composition, and cardiovascular disease risk factors in women age 18--30 years participating in a 15-week exercise program

Objective. To assess differences in body weight, body composition, total cholesterol, blood pressure, and blood glucose between OC users and non-users age 18-30 y before and after a 15-week cardiovascular exercise program in Houston, TX from 2003 to 2007.^ Study Design. Secondary analysis of prospective data. ^ Study Subjects. 453 Non-Hispanic white (NHW), Hispanic, and African American (AA) women age 18-30 y with no previous live birth, a history of menstruating, no use of other hormonal contraceptives or medications, no menopause or hysterectomy, and no current pregnancies.^ Measurements. Demographic data, medication use, and menstrual history were assessed via self-administered questionnaires at baseline. Anthropometric and laboratory measures were taken at baseline and 15-weeks. ^ Data Analysis. Linear regression assessed the association between OC use and study variables at baseline, and the change in study variables from baseline to 15-weeks. Logistic regression assessed the association between OC use and CVD risk. Each analysis was also stratified by race/ethnicity. ^ Results. At baseline, OC users had higher total cholesterol (p<.0005) and were above cholesterol risk cut points for CVD (OR=4.3, 95% CI=2.4-7.7) compared to non-users. At baseline, OC use was also associated with higher diastolic blood pressure (p=.018) compared to non-users, primarily in non-Hispanic whites (p=.007). OC use was associated with lower blood glucose compared to non-users in Hispanics only (p=.008). OC use was associated with absolute change in diastolic blood pressure (p=.044) and total cholesterol (p=.003). There was evidence that OC use may affect individuals differently based on race/ethnicity for certain obesity and CVD risk factors.^ Conclusions. OC users and non-users responded similarly to a 15-week cardiovascular exercise program. Exceptions included a greater change in diastolic blood pressure and total cholesterol among NHW and Hispanic OC users compared to non-users after exercise intervention. At baseline, OC use was associated with diastolic blood pressure and was most strongly associated with increased levels of total cholesterol. OC users were at greater risk of having total cholesterol above CVD risk cut points than non-users.^

BIOMEDICAL LANGUAGE UNDERSTANDING AND EXTRACTION (BLUE-TEXT): A MINIMAL SYNTACTIC, SEMANTIC METHOD

Clinical text understanding (CTU) is of interest to health informatics because critical clinical information frequently represented as unconstrained text in electronic health records are extensively used by human experts to guide clinical practice, decision making, and to document delivery of care, but are largely unusable by information systems for queries and computations. Recent initiatives advocating for translational research call for generation of technologies that can integrate structured clinical data with unstructured data, provide a unified interface to all data, and contextualize clinical information for reuse in multidisciplinary and collaborative environment envisioned by CTSA program. This implies that technologies for the processing and interpretation of clinical text should be evaluated not only in terms of their validity and reliability in their intended environment, but also in light of their interoperability, and ability to support information integration and contextualization in a distributed and dynamic environment. This vision adds a new layer of information representation requirements that needs to be accounted for when conceptualizing implementation or acquisition of clinical text processing tools and technologies for multidisciplinary research. On the other hand, electronic health records frequently contain unconstrained clinical text with high variability in use of terms and documentation practices, and without commitmentto grammatical or syntactic structure of the language (e.g. Triage notes, physician and nurse notes, chief complaints, etc). This hinders performance of natural language processing technologies which typically rely heavily on the syntax of language and grammatical structure of the text. This document introduces our method to transform unconstrained clinical text found in electronic health information systems to a formal (computationally understandable) representation that is suitable for querying, integration, contextualization and reuse, and is resilient to the grammatical and syntactic irregularities of the clinical text. We present our design rationale, method, and results of evaluation in processing chief complaints and triage notes from 8 different emergency departments in Houston Texas. At the end, we will discuss significance of our contribution in enabling use of clinical text in a practical bio-surveillance setting.

Assessing the relationship between board composition and nonprofit hospital financial performance from a multi-theoretic perspective

This dissertation assesses the relationship between board composition and financial performance for the top 71 major nonprofit hospitals in the United States during the period 2004-2009. The underlying data were collected from copies of IRS Form 990 available at http://www.guidestar.org . The dissertation investigates five factors: board size, board independence (percentage of outsiders), number of MDs, CEO succession and CEO compensation. And it evaluates the results within a multi-theoretic framework drawing on agency theory, resource dependence theory, institutional theory and social network theory. Corporate governance literature suggests that board composition has an important impact on firm financial performance. This dissertation examines whether the same may be true for nonprofit hospitals. The results should help hospital executives make better governance decisions during trying economic times.^

(Table 1) Maceral composition and organic carbon chemistry of ODP Leg 104 samples

The Cenozoic sediments sampled in ODP Leg 104 on the Vøring Plateau show a distinct variability of the total organic carbon content (TOC) and the accumulation rates of TOC. Based on the geochemical and organic-petrographic characterization of the sedimentary organic matter (OM), the allochthonous and autochthonous proportion of the OM could be quantified. The results clearly demonstrate that high TOC percentages and TOC accumulation rates in Cenozoic sediment sections display a generally high input of allochthonous organic matter. Oxidized and partly well-rounded organic particles built up the main portion of OM within the Miocene, TOC-rich sediments. The most probable source of this oxidized OM are reworked sediments from the Scandinavian shelf. Changes in the input of these organic particles are to some degree correlative with sea-level changes. The Cenozoic accumulation of autochthonous OM is low and does not reveal a clear variation during the Miocene and early Pliocene. In spite of a high accumulation rate of biogenic opal during the Early Miocene, the accumulation rate of autochthonous TOC is low. The autochthonous particle assemblage is dominated by relatively inert OM, like dinoflagellate cysts. This points to an intensive biological and/or early diagenetic degradation of the marine OM under well oxidized bottom water conditions during the last 23 Myr. Nevertheless, a continuation of marine OM degradation during later stages of diagenesis cannot be excluded. A prominent dominance of allochthonous OM over autochthonous is documented with the beginning of the Pliocene. At 2.45 Ma the episodic occurrence of ice-rafted, thermally mature OM reflects the onset of the glacial erosion of Mesozoic, coal and black shale bearing sediments on the Scandinavian and Barents Sea shelves. The first occurrence of these, in view of the actual burial depth, thermally overmature OM particles is, therefore, a marker for the beginning of the strong Scandinavian glaciation and the advance of the glacial front toward the shelves.