Search results

Complexity theorists propose that organizations are made up of complex responsive processes in which people create and recreate organizational forms through dynamic micro-level interactions. Social constructionists add that conversations are the means by which these interactions occur. Our analysis illustrates how the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) engaged a wide range of stakeholders in a successful dialogue process to recreate a new system for monitoring nuclear reactors. The success was due, in large part, to the conversational qualities tacitly and explicitly agreed to by those involved in the process which included a spirit of freedom, inclusion, inquiry, spontaneity, and possibility. Using a grounded theory building process, we show how these qualities produced transformative change by increasing levels of interconnectivity, shared identity, and collective capacity among participants. These findings provide the beginnings of a model for understanding continuous and transformative change and demonstrate the value of engaging the “whole system” in sustained dialogue, even in complex, highly regulated environments.

Arnold Arons, along with Robert Karplus, can fairly be called one of the founding fathers of U.S. Physics Education Research and a pioneer of inquiry methods of education. The instructional methods advocated by Arons were influenced by the work of Socrates, Plato, Montaigne, Rousseau, Dewey, Whitehead, and Piaget, but are primarily derived from Arons’ epic half century effort to improve introductory science teaching by shutting up and listening carefully to students’ responses to probing Socratic questions on physics, science, and ways of thinking. Arons emphasized: (1) conceptual understanding, (2) operative knowledge, (3) interactive engagement, (4) Socratic dialogue, (5) attention to cognitive development, (6) attention to preconceptions of beginning students, (7) operational definitions, (8) reduction of volume and pace of standard introductory courses, (9) idea first, name afterward, (10) importance of a course “story line,” and (11) science as a liberal art. Most of these are attributes of enlightened inquiry-based learning as described in Inquiry and the National Science Education Standards: A Guide for Teaching and Learning (NRC, 2000).

A recent National Research Council study estimates that there are now 217,000 contaminated sites in the United States (NRC, 2003a). The proliferation of hazardous contamination across the landscape is an unwelcome if unsurprising byproduct of industrialization during the past century and the ledger continues to grow despite billions spent on remediation. Both government and the private sector are culpable in the production and disposal practices that created these sites. Although most sites are small and privately owned, the largest, and the majority of the most hazardous sites, were created by government itself. This is particularly the case with respect to nuclear weapons production, development and testing, but is also the result of other defense-related activities. These sites collectively contain billions of cubic yards of soil and groundwater in need of remediation (NRC, 2003a). Many would threaten both the environment and human health in their current condition, if present-day management control were to be neglected or lost.

This study explores the social, biological, and genetic determinants of depression in later life. It adds complexity to the idea that later life depression is a natural outgrowth of vascular impairment, antagonistic pleiotropy, or compromised neuroanatomical structures, arguing instead for the importance of education as a fundamental cause.

The study uses the NAS-NRC Twin Registry of World War II Veterans. The use of twins permits the exploration of gene-environment interplay. A recent survey instrument associated with the registry contains numerous indicators of health, including a measure of depression.

The results show that education has a strong negative relationship with depression among those in their 70s and early 80s. Although this relationship is partly explained by lower rates of cardiovascular disease and diabetes among the well-educated, the relationship between education and many common physical illnesses is quite small. Most people of this age experience at least one chronic illness. The relationship between education and depression is explained, instead, by how education reduces impairments in activities of daily living. These impairments are not an inevitable outgrowth of declining health. The well-educated are better able to moderate the impact of poor health on daily functioning. Moreover, the well-educated are able to avoid the otherwise strong genetic risks for depression in later life. Gene × environment models show a high heritability for later life depression on average, but also reveal that this heritability declines with increasing education. Among those with a four-year college degree, the heritability of depression is very small.

These patterns are interpreted in light of compensatory gene × environment interactions, which emphasize the importance of especially enriched environments for overcoming genetic risk.

Indian Companies Act (2013) and revised clause 49 of Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) provides for a major overhaul of corporate governance norms to be adopted by firms in India. Some of the key provisions of the act pertain to board subcommittees. Given this background, the chapter seeks to analyze the role of overall board composition and board subcommittees (audit, nomination and remuneration and risk management committee) on firm performance. In addition, the relationship between ownership and firm performance is analyzed. The study documents that large listed companies in India that have constituted a nomination and remuneration committee have had positive influence on firm performance as measured by Tobin’s Q (TQ). Board subcommittees’ (i.e., audit, nomination and remuneration and risk management committee) independence is positively associated with firm performance as measured by TQ. Overall, the board size is positively associated with firm performance. However, in the presence of a nomination and remuneration committee, board size is negatively associated with firm performance. This study offers insights for policymakers interested in analyzing corporate governance practices in terms of board subcommittees as evidenced from a developing economy such as India.

The importance of early and developmentally appropriate science education is increasingly recognized. Consequently, creation of common guidelines and standards in early childhood science education has begun (National Research Council (NRC), 2012), and researchers, practitioners, and policy makers have shown great interest in aligning professional development with the new guidelines and standards. There are some important issues that need to be addressed in order to successfully implement guidelines and make progress toward accomplishing standards. Early childhood teachers have expressed a lack of confidence in teaching science and nature (Torquati, Cutler, Gilkerson, & Sarver, in press) and have limited science and pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) (Appleton, 2008). These are critical issues because teachers’ subject-matter knowledge is a robust predictor of student learning outcomes (Enfield & Rogers, 2009; Kennedy, 1998; Wilson, Floden, & Ferrini-Mundy, 2002) and is seen as a critical step toward improving K-12 student achievement (National Commission on Mathematics and Science Teaching for the 21st Century (NCMST), 2000; NRC, 2000). We argue that the same is true of preschool teachers.

This chapter discusses: (a) theories and practices in early childhood science education (i.e., preschool through 3rd grade) in relation to teaching for conceptual change, (b) research on methods of professional development in early childhood science education, and (c) innovative approaches to integrating scientific practices, crosscutting concepts, and disciplinary core ideas with early childhood professional development.

The burgeoning interest over the last decade in technology transfer at universities in the United States has driven contentious debates over patent policy. In this context, biotech patenting has become the poster-child for claims that the proliferation of patenting by universities, and in the private sector, is undermining scientific norms and threatening innovation. Commentators have expressed particular fears about the negative effects of biotech patenting on the public information commons and concerns about emerging “patent anticommons.” This chapter argues that the standard (finite) commons model is being misapplied in the biotech arena because, owing to the complexity of biological processes and the power of existing biotech methods to produce genetic data, biomedical science is, in crucial respects, an unbounded, uncongested common resource. These findings imply that strategic biotech patenting of problem-specific research tools (i.e., single-nucleotide polymorphisms, drug targets) is not economically justified and therefore is irrational.

A current vision of education in America today is that all students be science literate. To accomplish this, educators and teachers need to be aware of the challenges involved in promoting science literacy: science literacy encompasses a wide range of knowledge, including construction of knowledge, use of that knowledge, and recall of critical facts necessary to apply scientific information in the world today. In addition, teachers and educators need a knowledge of the issues of “inclusion” since students of diverse abilities, including those with disabilities and others at risk for school failure, are being educated, as much as possible, in general education classrooms taught by content experts.

A bridge to span the gap between the challenges of science literacy for all students and the complexities of student diversity is Content Enhancement – instruction that responds to the needs of students of diverse abilities while maintaining content integrity by focusing on the critical information that all students need to know. In Content Enhancement, the teacher helps students learn by organizing information, providing explicit instruction when necessary, and assuring that students are active partners with the teacher and other students in the construction of knowledge. Graphic organizers and instructional sequences have been developed to help teachers organize information at the course, unit and lesson levels; learn to answer large, difficult questions with ideas that can be generalized to other settings; explore and manipulate knowledge by developing analogies and comparisons; and respond to assessments.

Openness is critical to long-term cleanup and stewardship of former nuclear weapons manufacturing facilities. Openness is especially challenging in such facilities because a culture of secrecy has dominated them since the earliest days of nuclear weapons development. This paper describes a multi-year effort at the Hanford Site called the Hanford Openness Workshops. The Workshops were convened to address and resolve issues impeding the availability and understanding of information important to public health, the environment, and decision–making. Lessons from the workshops can improve dialogue about nuclear waste cleanup and long-term stewardship among regulators, decision makers, stakeholders, and Tribes.