Nos últimos anos diversos países, desenvolvidos ou subdesenvolvidos, adotaram algum tipo de programa de incentivos professores, seja este financeiro (aumentos de salários permanentes ou temporários) ou no sentido de melhorar o ambiente de trabalho do professor. Seguindo esse exemplo, estados brasileiros adotaram o incentivo financeiro como tentativa de melhorar o desempenho dos alunos. Neste trabalho será analisado o programa de bonificação a professores do Estado de São Paulo implementado em dezembro de 2008, direcionado a professores e funcionários de escolas que atingem as metas pré-estabelecidas para cada ano. O objetivo do estudo é analisar o padrão de recebimento do bônus entre as escolas durante os cinco primeiros anos de vigência do programa (2009 a 2013) e verificar se o incentivo financeiro consegue produzir mudanças na rotina escolar a fim de melhorar o desempenho da escola como um todo. Em função do desenho do programa, para algumas escolas, a probabilidade de alcance da meta, em um determinado momento, é bastante alta, não requerendo dessas escolas um esforço de fato substantivo. Para outras, no entanto, o alcance da meta é de fato algo mais distante que requer mudança de comportamento. Assim, a ideia é comparar o desempenho das escolas paulistas no ambiente em que a política de bonificação exista e em um ambiente no qual esta não exista (ambiente contrafactual construído nesse trabalho) a fim de identificar o acréscimo ou decréscimo de esforço e desempenho que pode ser creditado ao incentivo gerado pela política. Através dessa análise pode-se mensurar quanto do desempenho efetivo das escolas advém de suas características socioeconômicas (e particularidades) e quanto é resultado da exposição à nova política. Com a análise realizada neste trabalho é possível concluir que a política gera pouco incentivo para que escolas com desempenho baixo ou intermediário atinjam as metas pré-definidas pela Secretaria de Estado de São Paulo. O que ocorre nos cinco anos analisados) é que escolas com alto desempenho e que realizam pouco ou nenhum esforço dada a política recebem o bônus na maioria dos anos. / Teachers incentive programs is a recurring theme in the literature, whether these incentives are financial (permanent salary increases or temporary) or to improve the teacher\'s work environment. Several Brazilian states have adopted the financial incentive as an attempt to improve performance and students\' knowledge. This article will review the São Paulo program implemented in December 2008, for teachers and school staff that reach pre-set targets for each year. The objective of the study is to analyze the bonus receiving pattern between schools during the first five years of the program (2009-2013) and verify if the financial incentive can produce changes in the school routine (such as changes in teaching practices and increased participation of parents in the education of their children) in order to improve the school\'s performance as a whole. Depending on the program design, for some schools, the probability of achieving the goal, at any given time, is quite high, not requiring a great effort from these schools. For others, however, the achievement of the goal is almost impossible, what requires a change of behavior. Thus, the idea is to compare school performances in two different environments: one where the bonus policy exists and another that it does not (created in this work). This comparison will allow the identification of how much effort each school put through the exams and which part of these effort is related to the socioeconomics characteristics that these schools are inserted on and which is from the actual exposure to the policy. With this analisis is possible to conclude that the program generates lower incentives to schools with medium and lower performances. Schools with higher performance always get the bonification without doing any or small effort.

No description available.

In recent years, the entertainment industry has begun to announce the release dates of many of their movies years in advance. This leads one to believe that movie studios are not taking into account the quality of a movie when a studio decides its release date. This paper will be an analysis in whether there is a difference in seasonality between different qualities of movies. If a studio announces the release date before filming even begins, it is clear that they do not know, and therefore cannot properly consider, the quality of the movie when they make its release date public. I will use films that make over a million dollars at the box office from 2000-2016 to examine the seasonality of good, average, and bad movies. My models will control for variables that were found to be significant in previous research. These include budget, MPAA rating, genre, and Oscar nominations. I will prove that there is a difference in seasonality between all three of these qualities groups. This will show that the Hollywood is now dismissing a key component in the difficult decision process that is movie release dates.

We investigate the existences and qualitative properties of periodic solutions of the following two classes of nonlinear differential equations: I) (Special) Relativistic Pendulum Equations (RPEs); II) (2-coupled) Gross-Pitaevskii Equations (GPEs). The pendulum equation describes the motion of a pendulum. According to Special Relativity, which was published by A. Einstein in 1905, causality is more fundamental than constant time-space, thus time will ow slower and space will distort to keep causality if the speed of motion is near the speed of light. In such high speed situations, the pendulum equation needs to be revised due to Special Relativity. The revised equation is called RPE. Our result answers some open questions about the existence of multiple periodic solutions for RPEs. GPEs are sometimes called coupled nonlinear schrodinger equations. the Schrodinger equation is the fundamental equation of Quantum Mechanics which is the \exotic" probabilistic fundamental physics law of the \micro" world { the world of atoms and molecules. A well-known physicist and Nobel laureate, R. Feynman, said \I think I can safely say that nobody understands quantum mechanics." which indicates the physical/ philosophical difficulty of interpretations. It raises paradoxical problems such the well-known Schrodinger's Cat. Setting aside these difficult, if we combine Special Relativity and Quantum Mechanics as a many-body system, then we have Quantum Field Theory (QFT) which is more deterministic, and governs even elementary particle physics. GPEs are also related to QFT. For example, superconductivity and Bose Einstein Condensates (BEC). These phenomena in condensed matter physics can be thought of as the emergence of the mysterious micro world physics at \macro" level. We study these equations from the viewpoint of mathematical interest. It is generally difficult to solve nonlinear differential equations. It is also generally difficult even to prove the existence of solutions. Although we show there exist solutions, we still do not know how to solve the differential equations analytically. Variational Methods (or Calculus of Variations) are useful tools to show there exist solutions of differential equations. The idea is to convert the problem of solving equations into the problem of finding critical points (i.e. minimum/maximum points or saddle points) of a functional, and each critical point can generally correspond to a weak solution. However, it is also generally difficult to find out such critical points because we look for critical points in an infinite-dimensional functions space. Thus many advanced mathematical theories or tools have been developed and used for decades in nonlinear analysis. We use some topological theories. From information of the functional's shape, these theories deduce if there exists a critical point, or how many critical points exist. The key of these theories is to use the symmetry of the equations. We also investigate bifurcation structures for II), i.e. the connection structures between the solutions. By linearizations which look at the equations \locally," we reduce the problem in the infinite dimension to one in a finite dimension. Furthermore, it allows us to apply Morse Theory, which connects between local and global aspects of the functional's information. In several cases, we show that there are infinitely many bifurcation points that give rise to global bifurcation branches.

Introduction: The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of spinal manipulation therapy (SMT) duration and amplitude on spinal stiffness. Methods: Simulated SMTs were performed at the L6 spinous process in twenty-two felines. SMTs ranging from 25 to 250 ms duration were performed. Groups 1 and 2 received maximal displacements of 1.0mm to 3.0mm. Groups 3 and 4 received maximal loads of 25% to 85% body weight. Local stiffness was quantified by applying an indentation to the vertebra. Results: Repeated SMTs caused minimal changes in stiffness. The interaction effect of duration X displacement in Groups 1 and 2, and the effect of duration in Group 3 were significant. Conclusion: Repeated SMTs cause minimal changes in stiffness thought to be due to a viscoelastic response. Some of the changes following select SMT conditions may be the result of an interaction effect between SMT duration and amplitude. No specific threshold condition was identified as causing a greater stiffness change. / Physical Therapy

The aim of this thesis is to investigate the relationship between individuals and society in the context of healthcare and medical research, more specifically concerning the rights and duties of individuals in regard to biobank-based research. My starting point is that we all have a strong vested interest in improved healthcare, and therefore the possibilities to conduct important research should be optimized. In the first article, I investigate whether individual results from research using samples in large-scale biobanks should be returned. I conclude that there is good reason not to implement such policies, and instead to allocate available resources to pursuing medical advances. In the second article, I compare consent for using stored samples in research with consent for organ donation, whereby many countries have adopted opt-out strategies in order to increase the number of organs available. I claim that the default position should be changed in biobank research as well, i.e. it should be presumed that individuals want to contribute rather than that they do not. In the third article, I argue that safeguarding autonomy by requiring informed consent for using samples in research not only defeats the interests of society but also runs counter to the interests of the individuals the policy purports to protect. Finally, in the fourth article I suggest that it is reasonable to view participation in medical research from the perspective of a social contract, built on our mutual need for medical advances, and that this implies that there is a moral duty to adhere to the contract by allowing one’s samples to be used in research. A central conclusion in this thesis is that biobank research should be viewed as a natural part of healthcare, like quality control, method development and teaching, and that as such, it ought to be endorsed and facilitated.

Currently, several state Departments of Transportation (DOTs) are using contractor test results, in conjunction with verification test results, for construction and materials acceptance purposes. While the reasons for using contractor test results for construction and materials acceptance purposes are real (essentially shortage of state DOT staff and intensive construction schedules), the practice itself has fundamental pitfalls. This research reveals the conceptual and technical pitfalls of using contractor test results for acceptance and payment purposes; identifies and ranks potential alternatives and improvements to the use of contractor test results for acceptance and payment purposes; and investigates the potential application of skip-lot sampling as a means for reducing acceptance sampling and testing for highway agencies.

This research, based on the perspective of dynamic resources-based view, probes into strategies taken by the six local newspapers (the China Times, the United Daily News, the Liberty Times, the Apple Daily, the Commercial Times and the Economic Times) to response to the challenges in an ever-changing environment. They continuously review the established resources and deficiencies of the organizations and try to seek strategic alliances for complementarity and cooperation to create competitive advantages. This study adopts the methodology of case study. The researcher conducts in-depth interviews to gather firsthand information from the six newspapers and add up some related literature to process secondhand analysis. The result shows strategic alliance is not a stiff relationship but a dynamic process that continuously adjusts to factors such as the environment, the organizational life circle and the competitive strategies. Corporate view points about resources, that is advantageous competitiveness, is by the same token never static. On the contrary, companies will keep modifying and deploying resources to maintain the competitive advantages or to create new advantages. Strategic alliance is one of the critical means through which an enterprise can acquire resources and create satisfactory results at the same time.

Platelets are small fragments, but they are of crucial importance for the coagulation. The risk of spontaneous bleeding increases when the level of platelets falls below a thrombocyte particle concentration threshold value of 50 x 109/L. In those cases a platelet transfusion might be compulsory. Ongoing research tries to improve the quality of the platelets and to increase the safety of the method used. However, we still need to better understand which factors that affect how patients react upon platelet transfusion. In this study, 100 transfusions performed at Uppsala University Hospital during 2009 were examined. The platelets used had been produced with apheresis followed by pathogen inactivation by Intercept Blood SystemTM. Platelets were counted before and after transfusions and the increase was calculated in purpose to examine how well the patients responded to the platelet transfusions. These values were plotted against platelet storage time in order to examine the possible impact on the result of treatment.

No description available.