Outdated journal rankings and the ERA exercise

As the results of the latest Excellence in Research Australia (ERA) exercise come closer to being announced, universities around Australia are holding their collective breaths. The ERA claims to be an assessment of research strengths and quality at Australian universities. While it is not supposed to produce a set of league tables, ultimately that is what tends to happen...

A preliminary analysis of teacher perceptions of the effects of NAPLAN on pedagogy and curriculum

This paper reports preliminary survey findings of Western Australian and South Australian teacher perceptions of the impact of NAPLAN on curriculum and pedagogy in their classroom and school. The paper examines how teachers perceive the effects of NAPLAN on curriculum and pedagogy and whether these perceptions mediated by the teacher’s gender, the socioeconomics of the school, the State and the school system in which the teacher works. Teachers report that they are either choosing or being instructed to teach to the test, that this results in less time being spent on other curriculum areas and that these effects contribute in a negative way to the class environment and the engagement of students. This largely agrees with a body of international research that suggests that high-stakes literacy and numeracy tests often results in unintended consequences such as a narrow curriculum focus, a return to teacher-centred instruction and a decrease in motivation. Analysis suggests there is a relationship between participant responses to the effect of NAPLAN on curriculum based on the characteristics of which State the teacher taught in, the socioeconomic status of the school and the school system in which they were employed (State, Catholic, and Independent).

The effects of NAPLAN: Teacher perceptions of the impact of NAPLAN on pedagogy and curriculum

This paper reports preliminary findings of a survey of in-service teachers in WA and SA conducted in 2012. Participants completed an online survey open to all teachers in WA and SA. The survey ran for three months from April to June 2012. One section of the survey asked teachers to report their perceptions of the impact that NAPLAN has had on the curriculum and pedagogy of their classroom and school. Two principal research questions were addressed in this preliminary analysis. First what are teacher perceptions of the effects on NAPLAN on curriculum and pedagogy? Second, are there any interaction effects between gender, socioeconomics status, location and school system on teachers perceptions? Statistical analyses examined one- and two-way MANOVA to assess main effects and interaction effects on teachers' global perceptions. These were followed by a series of exploratory one- and two-way ANOVA of specific survey items to suggest potential sources for differences among teachers from different socioeconomic regions, states and systems. Teachers report that they are either choosing or being instructed to teach to the test, that this results in less time being spent on other curriculum areas and that these effects contribute in a negative way on the engagement of students. This largely agrees with a body of international research that suggests that high-stakes literacy and numeracy tests often results in unintended consequences such as a narrow curriculum focus (Au, 2007), a return to teacher-centred instruction (Barret, 2009) and a decrease in motivation (Ryan & Wesinstein, 2009). Preliminary results from early survey respondents suggests there is a relationship between participant responses to the effect of NAPLAN on curriculum and pedagogy based on the characteristics of which State the teacher taught in, their perceptions of the socioeconomic status of the school and the school system in which they were employed (State, Catholic, and Independent).

Origins of Australian Football: Victoria's Early History. Volume 3: Covert 'Professionalism': The Power of the Wealthy Clubs 1886 to 1890

This volume continues the story of football in Marvellous Melbourne during the 1880s. At this time the VFA continued to expand as Melbourne’s boom continued apace. In 1886 Port Melbourne, Prahran, St Kilda, Footscray and South Williamstown joined the competition, and the Ballarat clubs Ballarat, Ballarat Imperial and South Ballarat were also contending for the VFA premiership. In 1886 matches were divided into four quarters, goal umpires waved two flags to announce a goal, and time clocks and bells were employed to mark the end of quarters. Victoria also played inter-colonial matches against New South Wales, Tasmania and South Australia. VFA secretary T.S. Marshall was at the forefront of fighting the game’s turn towards professionalism, but although it was illegal to pay players, the practice continued. The period 1886 to 1890 also set the stage for the eventual formation of the Victorian Football League, for by the end of the 1880s the Victorian Football Association had become in effect a two-tier competition. The most popular clubs in the VFA, South Melbourne, Geelong, Carlton and Essendon collected the lion’s share of the gate money, which they used to build their wealth and entrench their position as the dominant Victorian teams. The lower tier clubs had to make do with paltry gate money and season fixtures that advantaged the strong clubs. In these fixtures the strong clubs elected to play each other first to increase their gate money, and only deemed to play the poorer clubs at the start of the season. This led to an increasing divide between the VFA’s rich and poor, and by 1890 South Williamstown and Prahran merged with Williamstown and St Kilda respectively, University dropped out of senior ranks, and the Ballarat clubs were excluded from competing for the VFA premiership, which left 12 senior clubs until Collingwood’s emergence in 1892. At this time, no team was as powerful as South Melbourne, which experienced the greatest success in the club’s VFA and VFL history when it collected triple premiership crowns in 1888, 1889, and 1890. South Melbourne was a most ambitious club and spearheaded the move towards professionalism, although this could not be made public. The fine teams it produced at this time contained some of the greatest players of the era, such as Peter Burns, “Sonny” Elms and “Dinny” McKay, and it looked after players with health insurance, jobs, inter-colonial trips, and other incentives. Geelong’s premiership in 1886 was perhaps its greatest triumph, but this success was followed by a premiership drought that would last for 39 years. Carlton remained one of Victorian football’s power clubs, and after securing the premiership in 1887 continued to compete for top honours. As always, the game became ever more popular and world record crowds of over 30,000 attended matches between South Melbourne, Carlton, Geelong and Essendon.

Creating choices in advertising's newest frontier

Not much has happened in Myanmar for most of the past 50 years; not much that is, for Western media, investors or even tourists to notice. Myanmar remained isolated for most of that time; an isolation that was partly self-imposed and, especially after the violent military crackdown against large-scale protests in 1988, externally reinforced via Western sanctions set up at the request of democracy leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi after her National League for Democracy was denied power following its landside triumph in the 1990 election for a constituent assembly.

Polymorphisms in a desaturase 2 ortholog associate with cuticular hydrocarbon and male mating success variation in a natural population of Drosophila serrata

Elucidating the nature of genetic variation underlying both sexually selected traits and the fitness components of sexual selection is essential to understanding the broader consequences of sexual selection as an evolutionary process. To date, there have been relatively few attempts to connect the genetic variance in sexually selected traits with segregating DNA sequence polymorphisms. We set out to address this in a well-characterized sexual selection system - the cuticular hydrocarbons (CHCs) of Drosophila serrata - using an indirect association study design that allowed simultaneous estimation of the genetic variance in CHCs, sexual fitness and single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) effects in an outbred population. We cloned and sequenced an ortholog of the D. melanogaster desaturase 2 gene, previously shown to affect CHC biosynthesis in D. melanogaster, and associated 36 SNPs with minor allele frequencies > 0.02 with variance in CHCs and sexual fitness. Three SNPs had significant multivariate associations with CHC phenotype (q-value < 0.05). At these loci, minor alleles had multivariate effects on CHCs that were weakly associated with the multivariate direction of sexual selection operating on these traits. Two of these SNPs had pleiotropic associations with male mating success, suggesting these variants may underlie responses to sexual selection due to this locus. There were 15 significant male mating success associations (q-value < 0.1), and interestingly, we detected a nonrandom pattern in the relationship between allele frequency and direction of effect on male mating success. The minor-frequency allele usually reduced male mating success, suggesting a positive association between male mating success and total fitness at this locus.

A case study of teaching English and multimodality with ICTs: Constraints and possibilities

Current Australian policies and curricular frameworks demand that teachers and students use technology creatively and meaningfully in classrooms to develop students into 21C technological citizens. English teachers and students also have to learn new metalanguage around visual grammar since multimodal tasks often combine creative with critical General Capabilities (GC) with that of the of ICTs and literacy in the Australian Curriculum: English (AC:E). Both teachers and learners come to these tasks with varying degrees of techno-literacy, skills and access to technologies. This paper reports on case-study research following a technology based collaborative professional development (PD) program between a university Lecturer facilitator and English Teachers in a secondary Catholic school. The study found that the possibilities for creative and critical engagement are rich, but there are real grounded constraints such as lack of time, impeding teachers’ ability to master and teach new technologies in classrooms. Furthermore, pedagogical approaches are affected by technical skill levels and school infrastructure concerns which can militate against effective use of ICTs in school settings. The research project was funded by the Brisbane Catholic Education Office and focused on how teachers can be supported in these endeavours in educational contexts as they prepare students of English to be creative global citizens who use technology creatively.

Toll-like receptor 4 and CD14 polymorphisms in ankylosing spondylitis: Evidence of a weak association in finns

Objective To investigate the association of CD14 and Toll-like receptor (TLR4) with ankylosing spondylitis (AS). Methods A promoter variant in CD14 and 2 coding polymorphisms in TLR4 were investigated in UK and Finnish families with AS and in a UK case-control study. A metaanalysis of published TLR4 and CD14 studies was performed. Results In the Finnish study the CD74-260bp T variant showed an association (p = 0.006), and the common 2-marker TLR4 haplotype showed a weak association (global p = 0.03), with AS. No associations were seen in the UK based studies or in the metaanalyses. Conclusion CD14 and TLR4 showed an association with AS in the Finns only.

Evidence-based recommendations for the monitoring and treatment of ankylosing spondylitis: Results from the Australian 3E initiative in rheumatology

Aim: To develop a set of Australian recommendations for the monitoring and treatment of ankylosing spondylitis (AS) through systematic literature review combined with the opinion of practicing rheumatologists. Methods: A set of eight questions, four in each domain of monitoring and treatment, were formulated by voting and the Delphi method. The results of a systematic literature review addressing each question were presented to the 23 participants of the Australian 3E meeting. All participants were clinical rheumatologists experienced in the daily management of AS. Results: After three rounds of breakout sessions to discuss the findings of the literature review, a set of recommendations was finalized after discussion and voting. The category of evidence and strength of recommendation were determined for each proposal. The level of agreement among participants was excellent (mean 84%, range 64-100%). Conclusions: The 12 recommendations developed from evidence and expert opinion provide guidance for the daily management of AS patients. For most recommendations, we found a paucity of supportive evidence in the literature highlighting the need for additional clinical studies.

Twelve not so angry men: Masculinities and the perceptions of the 'off-field' violence involved in Australian body contact sports

Recently, media 'scandals' have pervaded a number of Australian body contact sports, in particular rugby league, rugby union and Australian rules football. Utilising the theoretical framework of masculinities, this research interviews footballers to gauge their perceptions of this media attention and how it compares to their own perspectives regarding off-field violence. Drawing inspiration from James Messerschmidt's (2000) 'Nine Lives' study and R.W. Connell's (1995) theoretical masculinities framework, in-depth, semi-structured interviews—known as life histories—were conducted with 12 footballers. Twelve life histories were completed with four men from each of the three major Australian football codes, namely Australian rules football, rugby union and rugby league. The research explores linkages between masculinity, body contact sport and engagement (or lack thereof) in violence 'off field'.

Approaching Sacred Pregnancy : The Cult of the Visitation and Narrative Altarpieces in Late Fifteenth-Century Florence

The study focuses on the Visitation as a narrative subject of altarpieces in late fifteenth-century Florence. Although the Visitation was a well-known story in both verbal and visual representations since the early medieval period, it became a popular subject of altarpieces only towards the end of the fifteenth century. In this study, the first part provides an overview of the complex religious and historical background to an emerging cult of the Visitation. Devotional practices focusing on the Visitation belong in a context of late medieval Marian devotion and in 1389 a new feast of the Visitation was introduced into the liturgical calendar of the Catholic Church. Because of the ongoing schism within the Catholic Church, the feast was not unanimously accepted across Western Europe until the later part of the fifteenth century. Contrary to a widely disseminated view, the feast of the Visitation cannot be associated with Franciscan spirituality, but was rather a clearly defined Dominican project that primarily emphasised the importance of peace and unity within the Christian Church. Simultaneously with the gradual acceptance of the new feast, visual representations of the Visitation began to appear at the centre of altarpieces. The Visitation exemplifies an increasing preference for narrative subjects within the genre of the altarpiece. The second part of the study presents an analysis of the concept of the narrative altarpiece and highlights the complexities involved in combining a narrative content with the traditional devotional function of the altarpiece. In detailed case studies some prominent art works produced in Florence between 1490 and 1503 are discussed within a framework of contextual analysis, narrative theory and iconography. Altarpieces by Domenico Ghirlandaio, Piero di Cosimo and Mariotto Albertinelli represent visual manifestations of a cult of the Visitation with roots in late medieval devotional practices. At the same time, the altarpieces highlight the multiple functions of altarpieces in a culture where art works responded to a variety of social and religious needs. Building on earlier studies, each case study presents new insights and evidence not considered in previous art historical research.

Muscle morphometry of the individual hamstring muscles in semi-elite AFL Players: Preliminary findings from a longitudinal study

Hamstring strains in the Australian Football League (AFL) have a high incidence (15%) and recurrence rate (34%) with lateral hamstring injuries most common (83%). Retrospective studies have found significant muscle volume asymmetries ≤23 months post hamstring injury; however examination of the association between hamstring strains and muscle asymmetry has not been investigated prospectively. This study presents baseline data from a longitudinal study focusing on individual hamstring morphometry in uninjured and injured semi-elite AFL players.

Identification of two distinct bovine parainfluenza virus type 3 genotypes

The partial gene sequencing of the matrix (M) protein from seven clinical isolates of bovine parainfluenza virus type 3 (BPIV-3), and the complete sequencing of a representative isolate (Q5592) was completed in this study. Nucleotide sequence analysis was initiated because of the failure of in-house BPIV-3 RT-PCR methods to yield expected products for four of the isolates. Phylogenetic reconstructions based on the nucleotide sequences for the M-protein and the entire genome, using all of the available BPIV-3 nucleotide sequences, demonstrated that there were two distinct BPIV-3 genotypes (BPIV-3a and BPIV-3b). These newly identified genotypes have implications for the development of BPIV-3 molecular detection methods and may also impact on BPIV-3 vaccine formulations.

Functional dynamics of the nitrogen balance of sorghum: I. N demand of vegetative plant parts.

Stay-green, an important trait for grain yield of sorghum grown under water limitation, has been associated with a high leaf nitrogen content at the start of grain filling. This study quantifies the N demand of leaves and stems and explores effects of N stress on the N balance of vegetative plant parts of three sorghum hybrids differing in potential crop height. The hybrids were grown under well-watered conditions at three levels of N supply. Vertical profiles of biomass and N% of leaves and stems, together with leaf size and number, and specific leaf nitrogen (SLN), were measured at regular intervals. The hybrids had similar minimum but different critical and maximum SLN, associated with differences in leaf size and N partitioning, the latter associated with differences in plant height. N demand of expanding new leaves was represented by critical SLN, and structural stem N demand by minimum stem N%. The fraction of N partitioned to leaf blades increased under N stress. A framework for N dynamics of leaves and stems is developed that captures effects of N stress and genotype on N partitioning and on critical and maximum SLN.

Lessons to be learnt from two professional development programs

The involvement of teachers in any process which seeks to enhance classroom pedagogy is vital. In this area, professional development (PD) for teachers can be effective in developing and broadening classroom practices, but the process takes time. Teachers need time to reflect on their practice and be confident in implementing new programs and strategies by taking risks and employing different approaches in their pedagogy. There are various ways of initiating professional development which also take into account time for reflection. One is by the use of professional development to improve knowledge and skills. Another way is by teachers observing the practice of their colleagues before reflecting and modifying their own practice. This study discusses the findings of a case study where two different PD programs in a single secondary school were implemented with the assistance of two University Lecturers. The study revealed that although there were positive reflections on the development of knowledge and skills from the PD, factors such as collegiality and time and infrastructure constraints impacted the teachers involved in both the Reflective Practice and the technology PD programs. The school was part of the Brisbane Catholic Education Office (BCE) in Queensland, Australia and the researchers were both Senior Lecturers at the Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane.