Does speed matter? : the impact of the EU membership incentive on rule adoption in minority language rights protection

Denna avhandling tar sin utgångspunkt i ett ifrågasättande av effektiviteten i EU:s konditionalitetspolitik avseende minoritetsrättigheter. Baserat på den rationalistiska teoretiska modellen, External Incentives Model of Governance, syftar denna hypotesprövande avhandling till att förklara om tidsavståndet på det potentiella EU medlemskapet påverkar lagstiftningsnivån avseende minoritetsspråksrättigheter. Mätningen av nivån på lagstiftningen avseende minoritetsspråksrättigheter begränsas till att omfatta icke-diskriminering, användning av minoritetsspråk i officiella sammanhang samt minoriteters språkliga rättigheter i utbildningen. Metodologiskt används ett jämförande angreppssätt både avseende tidsramen för studien, som sträcker sig mellan 2003 och 2010, men även avseende urvalet av stater. På basis av det \"mest lika systemet\" kategoriseras staterna i tre grupper efter deras olika tidsavstånd från det potentiella EU medlemskapet. Hypotesen som prövas är följande: ju kortare tidsavstånd till det potentiella EU medlemskapet desto större sannolikhet att staternas lagstiftningsnivå inom de tre områden som studeras har utvecklats till en hög nivå. Studien visar att hypotesen endast bekräftas delvis. Resultaten avseende icke-diskriminering visar att sambandet mellan tidsavståndet och nivån på lagstiftningen har ökat markant under den undersökta tidsperioden. Detta samband har endast stärkts mellan kategorin av stater som ligger tidsmässigt längst bort ett potentiellt EU medlemskap och de två kategorier som ligger närmare respektive närmast ett potentiellt EU medlemskap. Resultaten avseende användning av minoritetsspråk i officiella sammanhang och minoriteters språkliga rättigheter i utbildningen visar inget respektive nästan inget samband mellan tidsavståndet och utvecklingen på lagstiftningen mellan 2003 och 2010.

Genome-wide association mapping in a wild avian population identifies a link between genetic and phenotypic variation in a life-history trait

Understanding the genetic basis of traits involved in adaptation is a major challenge in evolutionary biology but remains poorly understood. Here, we use genome-wide association mapping using a custom 50 k single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) array in a natural population of collared flycatchers to examine the genetic basis of clutch size, an important life-history trait in many animal species. We found evidence for an association on chromosome 18 where one SNP significant at the genome-wide level explained 3.9% of the phenotypic variance. We also detected two suggestive quantitative trait loci (QTLs) on chromosomes 9 and 26. Fitness differences among genotypes were generally weak and not significant, although there was some indication of a sex-by-genotype interaction for lifetime reproductive success at the suggestive QTL on chromosome 26. This implies that sexual antagonism may play a role in maintaining genetic variation at this QTL. Our findings provide candidate regions for a classic avian life-history trait that will be useful for future studies examining the molecular and cellular function of, as well as evolutionary mechanisms operating at, these loci.

Otto Klitgord and Andrew Clauson

Otto Klitogord (left) is depicted awarding the Hon. Andrew Clauson (right) with membership in TPS - June 26, 1952. Otto Klitgord was the first president of the New York City College of Technology. He was named director of the New York State Institute of Applied Arts and Sciences when it was formed in the 1946 and became president in the 1950s when the administration was reorganized. Klitgord served until 1960, making his tenure as president the longest in City Tech's history.

1984 Yearbook Innervisions

Vol. 4; 129 p. b&w, color photographs; Sept. 1984 TOC: Leadership in Profile…10/Yearbook Reception…14/Mr. and Mrs. Fiorello LaGuardia…17/Faculty and Staff…20/College Wide Activities and Events…39/Continuing Education…42/Recreation…46/Student Government…51/Honors Night…56/Activities Events and Trips…65/Graduate Special Section…77/Graduates…83/In Memoriam…124/Yearbook Committee…127/Ads…129 YEARBOOK CREDITS: Project Director, VINCENT BANREY; Copy/Caption Writers and Editors: UMOJA KWANGUVU and CATHERINE WHAN-ABBATE; Photographers: YVONNE CANNON, YOUNG CHOI, WALTER JACKSON, UMOJA KWANGUVU, RANDY FADER-SMITH, CLASSIC STUDIOS; Production Committee: ARLENE BANREY, ELIZABETH BAUMANN, GEORGE BERMUDEZ, BRIDGET DAVIS, MARGARET FERNANDEZ, FRAN GIBSON, RAMONA H. KENOL, EDDIE LEBRON, REGINA McDONALD, HORACIO OWENS, JOSE PENA, KEVIN RILEY, SHIRLEY SAULSBURY, CORDELIA WHICHARD; Typing: BLANCA ARBITO, ENID RIVERA, CAROLYN TAYLOR, CATHERINE WHAN-ABBATE, ADRIENNE WILLIAMS, AUDREY WILLIAMS.

1983 Yearbook Innervisions

128 p. b&w, color photographs TOC: LaGuardia the Man…4/Cooperative Education…12/Faculty and Staff…20/College Wide Events and Activities…37/Recreation…45/Nursery Program…51/Student Government…55/Student Activities…59/Dedication to Graduates…71/Graduates…81 YEARBOOK CREDITS: Project Director, VINCENT BANREY; Committee Chairperson, WALTER JACKSON; Copy /Caption Writer and Editor, UMOJA KWANGUVU; Photographers: ROBERT BROWN, WALTER JACKSON, RANDY FADER-SMITH, MARK SEALY, CLASSIC STUDIOS; Designed by VINCENT BANREY; Layout: VINCENT BANREY, SANDRA BRADLEY, BRIDGET DAVIS, REINALDO DENNY, UMOJA KWANGUVU, KEVIN RILEY; Typesetting, AUDREY WILLIAMS; Typing: SANDRA BRADLEY, TANYA BUSH-CORONA, BRIDGET DAVIS, ROSALIE NIEVES; Graphics: VINCENT BANREY, GEORGE BERMUDEZ, REINALDO DENNY, WALTER JACKSON.

1985-1986 Yearbook

TOC: Life at LaGuardia…3/ LaGuardia At Work…11/College-Wide Activities…20/Mayor LaGuardia…26/Martin Luther King…28/Statue of Liberty…30/Activities and Trips…33/Recreation…52/Student Government and Clubs…56/Faculty and Staff…64/Letters to Graduates…83/Class ’85…87/Class ’86…115/Dedication to the Challenger…156/Boosters and Ads…158 Yearbook Committee: Project Director, VINCENT BANREY; Asst. Project Director, CATHY WHAN; Editor-in-Chief, MARGARET NEISS; Layout Editor, HORACIO OWENS; Asst. Layout Editor, MARICRUZ SAUNDERS; Copy Editor/Captain Editor, UMOJA KWANGUVU; Typesetter, EDWARD HOLLINS; Cover Artist, DAVID VAZQUEZ; End Sheets Photo, YOUNG BAEK CHOI; Finance Manager, GEORGE BERMUDEZ; Photographers: HORACIO OWENS, MARINA DIAZ, MARGARET NEISS, LORI GEORGE, RANDY FADER SMITH, UMOJA KWANGUVU, JUAN SEGARRA, PETER ABBATE, CLASSIC STUDIO; Production Staff: HORACIO OWENS, MARGARET NEISS, MARINA DIAZ, UMOJA KWANGUVU, MARICRUZ SAUNDERS, IRENE LEBRON, ARLENE BANREY, QUAALAN SAMUELS, MAYRA ALDONADO, CATHY WHAN, RAVI RAMDASS, GEORGE BERMUDEZ, BLANCA ARBITO, EDWARD HOLLINS, BRIDGET DAVIS; Feature Writers: YVONNE CANNON AND HARRIET ASCHOFF ("LaGuardia at Work"); GEORGE BERMUDEZ ("Mayor LaGuardia, A Civil Rights Political Leader"); SCOTT ENGEL ("Statue Of Liberty"); JEFFREY DAVIS ("Tribute to Ron Miller"); MARICRUZ SAUNDERS ("Challengers"); CASSANDRA WILLIAMS ("King: The Vision and the Fulfillment").

Effective Data Management Enables Intelligent Utility Management

Instrumentation and automation plays a vital role to managing the water industry. These systems generate vast amounts of data that must be effectively managed in order to enable intelligent decision making. Time series data management software, commonly known as data historians are used for collecting and managing real-time (time series) information. More advanced software solutions provide a data infrastructure or utility wide Operations Data Management System (ODMS) that stores, manages, calculates, displays, shares, and integrates data from multiple disparate automation and business systems that are used daily in water utilities. These ODMS solutions are proven and have the ability to manage data from smart water meters to the collaboration of data across third party corporations. This paper focuses on practical, utility successes in the water industry where utility managers are leveraging instantaneous access to data from proven, commercial off-the-shelf ODMS solutions to enable better real-time decision making. Successes include saving $650,000 / year in water loss control, safeguarding water quality, saving millions of dollars in energy management and asset management. Immediate opportunities exist to integrate the research being done in academia with these ODMS solutions in the field and to leverage these successes to utilities around the world.

City Of Toronto’S Approach On Implementing The New Federal Wastewater Effluent Regulations Using A GIS-Based Hydrologic And Hydraulic Model

Canada releases over 150 billion litres of untreated and undertreated wastewater into the water environment every year1. To clean up urban wastewater, new Federal Wastewater Systems Effluent Regulations (WSER) on establishing national baseline effluent quality standards that are achievable through secondary wastewater treatment were enacted on July 18, 2012. With respect to the wastewater from the combined sewer overflows (CSO), the Regulations require the municipalities to report the annual quantity and frequency of effluent discharges. The City of Toronto currently has about 300 CSO locations within an area of approximately 16,550 hectares. The total sewer length of the CSO area is about 3,450 km and the number of sewer manholes is about 51,100. A system-wide monitoring of all CSO locations has never been undertaken due to the cost and practicality. Instead, the City has relied on estimation methods and modelling approaches in the past to allow funds that would otherwise be used for monitoring to be applied to the reduction of the impacts of the CSOs. To fulfill the WSER requirements, the City is now undertaking a study in which GIS-based hydrologic and hydraulic modelling is the approach. Results show the usefulness of this for 1) determining the flows contributing to the combined sewer system in the local and trunk sewers for dry weather flow, wet weather flow, and snowmelt conditions; 2) assessing hydraulic grade line and surface water depth in all the local and trunk sewers under heavy rain events; 3) analysis of local and trunk sewer capacities for future growth; and 4) reporting of the annual quantity and frequency of CSOs as per the requirements in the new Regulations. This modelling approach has also allowed funds to be applied toward reducing and ultimately eliminating the adverse impacts of CSOs rather than expending resources on unnecessary and costly monitoring.

Developing a Credit for Prior Learning Program: System-Wide Strategies for Program Creation, Operations, and Recruitment

Credit for prior learning programs help students complete degrees more quickly and for less money. This report addresses the challenges of scaling up a credit for prior learning program at the university system level, and explores the delineation of responsibilities between system staff and institutional staff.

Animação bidimensional para World Wide Web baseada em autômatos finitos

Este trabalho aplica a Teoria de Autômatos na proposição de uma nova alternativa para prover animações 2D na World Wide Web, verificando as contribuições alcançadas para as questões relacionadas ao espaço de armazenamento, reutilização e manutenção do conteúdo e suporte à recuperação de informação. Para este objetivo, é proposto o modelo AGA (Animação Gráfica baseada em Autômatos Finitos), o qual especifica a animação a partir de uma estrutura baseada em autômatos finitos com saída. Esse modelo é definido de tal forma que os mesmos autômatos utilizados na especificação, ao serem simulados, realizam o controle da animação durante a apresentação. O modelo AGA apresenta características que favorecem a redução do espaço de armazenamento da animação, provêem suporte à recuperação de informação, colaboram com a reutilização e manutenção do conteúdo das animações. Uma implementação multiplataforma foi desenvolvida para apresentar animações especificadas nesse modelo na Web. Essa implementação proporciona a elaboração de consultas ao conteúdo da animação, além dos recursos tradicionais de reprodução. A partir dessa implementação, o AGA foi submetido a um estudo de caso prático, onde os resultados obtidos são comparados com o produzidos pelo GIF (Graphic Interchange Format). Esse comparativo demonstra que o AGA possui várias vantagens em relação à estrutura adotada pelo GIF. O modelo AGA é estendido utilizando autômatos temporizados para prover restrições temporais às especificações e também ampliar as funcionalidades de interação com o observador da animação. Essa extensão, chamada de modelo AGA-S (Animação Gráfica baseada em Autômatos Temporizados Sincronizados), é definida a partir do autômato temporizado proposto por Alur e Dill. Para esse modelo, é definida uma operação formal para sincronização dos componentes da animação e adicionada uma estrutura baseada em autômatos finitos para controlar a interação do observador com a animação.

Enterprise-wide risk management : um modelo de gestão integrada de riscos

Existem diversos tipos de riscos que uma organização pode correr. Normalmente eles são gerenciados isoladamente em casa unidade ou divisão. Diante do cenário mais volátil da nova economia, é proposto um modelo de gerenciamento de risco que busca integrar todos os diferentes tipos de risco, chamado de Enterprise-Wide Risk Management (EWRM). O modelo organiza a gestão de riscos, sob a ótica de portfolio, interferindo na estratégia da empresa e criando valor ao acionista. O trabalho mostra a evolução dos modelos de gerenciamento de risco até o EWRM, propondo uma metodologia para sua implementação assim como os fatores chave para seu sucesso

The value of local partners in Brazil: the effects of ownership clusters and business group membership on firm value in emerging markets

Este estudo analisa como a classe de acionistas afeta o valor das empresas brasileiras listadas na bolsa de valores no ponto de vista da governança corporativa. O trabalho examina a interação entre o valor das empresas e cinco tipos de concentrações acionárias comumente presente em mercados emergentes: famílias, agentes públicos, investidores estrangeiros, executivos e investidores financeiros nacionais. A análise empírica demonstra que o mix e a concentração de participação acionária afeta significativamente o valor das empresas. Utilizando uma compilação única de dados em painel de 2004 a 2008, a presente pesquisa também desenvolve hipóteses sobre o efeito da participação em grupos econômicos para o valor das empresas. A investigação encontra evidências de que, apesar de sua importância para o desenvolvimento de empresas brasileiras, o capital familiar, instituições públicas, e investidores estrangeiros estão cedendo lugar a monitores mais especializados e menos concentrados, como executivos e instituições financeiras nacionais. Estes resultados indicam que a governança corporativa no Brasil pode estar alcançando níveis de maturidade mais elevados. Adicionalmente, apesar de não haver indicação da existência de correlação entre a participação em grupos econômicos e o valor das empresas, os resultados indicam que a presença de um tipo específico de acionista em uma empresa do grupo facilita investimentos futuros desta classe de acionista em outras empresas do mesmo grupo, sinalizando que os interesses acionários são provavelmente perpetuados dentro de uma mesma rede de empresas. Finalmente, a pesquisa demonstra que enquanto o capital familiar prefere investir em empresas com ativa mobilidade do capital, investidores internacionais e instituições públicas procuram investimentos em equity com menor mobilidade de capital, o que lhes garante mais transparência com relação ao uso dos recursos e fundos das empresas.

A low cost one-camera optical tracking system for indoor wide-area augmented and virtual reality environments

In the last years the number of industrial applications for Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR) environments has significantly increased. Optical tracking systems are an important component of AR/VR environments. In this work, a low cost optical tracking system with adequate attributes for professional use is proposed. The system works in infrared spectral region to reduce optical noise. A highspeed camera, equipped with daylight blocking filter and infrared flash strobes, transfers uncompressed grayscale images to a regular PC, where image pre-processing software and the PTrack tracking algorithm recognize a set of retro-reflective markers and extract its 3D position and orientation. Included in this work is a comprehensive research on image pre-processing and tracking algorithms. A testbed was built to perform accuracy and precision tests. Results show that the system reaches accuracy and precision levels slightly worse than but still comparable to professional systems. Due to its modularity, the system can be expanded by using several one-camera tracking modules linked by a sensor fusion algorithm, in order to obtain a larger working range. A setup with two modules was built and tested, resulting in performance similar to the stand-alone configuration.