Attrition in Higher Education continues to present academics, researchers and professionals with an ongoing dilemma. Achieving a fair balance between the academic rigour of meritocracy and the wider access agenda of social inclusion, demands that entrance criteria incorporates measures beyond the traditional prior academic attainment. Emotional Intelligence has been presented in the literature as a valid and reliable predictor of retention and performance in industry and researchers have suggested that similar benefits may be found in education. In this dissertation, the construct of Emotional Intelligence was explored, reviewing contemporary models and their respective measurement tools. A self report tool for measuring ‘trait’ Emotional Intelligence was selected from the review and used to examine the predictive relationship between emotional intelligence and the outcomes at the end of the first year of undergraduate nurse education namely: clinical practice performance; academic performance and course attrition by nursing and midwifery students. The sample group consisted of a cohort of student nurses and midwives (N = 178) who commenced their training in 2007. A significant predictive relationship was found between emotional intelligence and clinical practice performance (r = 0.75, N = 116, p < 0.05); emotional intelligence and academic performance (r = 0.16, N = 168, p < 0.05) and emotional intelligence and attrition (r = 0.31, N = 178, p < 0.05). Age was also found to predict attrition (r = 0.25, N = 178, p < 0.05) while prior academic attainment was found to predict academic performance (r = 0.20, N = 168, p < 0.05). The dissertation proposes the inclusion of measures of emotional intelligence as an aid to recruitment and selection processes in nurse and midwifery education. It also recommends that other practice based vocational programmes, within the higher education sector, consider exploring emotional intelligence in their recruitment and selection processes.

The present thesis describes the relation of the gross domestic product and the unemployment rate by educational attainment. The analysis of relation between time series refers to data for the Czech Republic. The thesis is divided into four main chapters. The first chapter deals with the definition of the gross domestic product, the calculation method, the detection and the measurement. The following chapter is focused on the issue of unemployment. Both the chapters are supplemented by historical development of indicators in the Czech Republic. The last theoretical part presents the statistical methods used in the time series analysis. The fourth chapter provides the actual analysis of relations between the gross domestic product and the unemployment rate by educational attainment. The analysis is based on data for the period 1996--2014, which are quarterly seasonally unadjusted data.

A growing body of research supports the suggestion that the relationships which children form with their teachers and classmates have an impact on learning (Roorda, Koomen, Spilt, & Oort, 2011). Largely built on studies with typically developing children, the current understanding of the relationship-learning association is that these relationships can impact upon learning either by directly improving the quality of pedagogy or through mediating factors such as increased pupil motivation (Martin & Dowson, 2009).The aim of this study was to expand the discussion and evidence base surrounding relationship-learning association to include pupils with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) and Behavioural, Emotional and Social Difficulties (BESD). Previously these groups were not directly addressed by this literature, yet there is evidence from both government-compiled (Department for Education, 2011d) national statistics and independent research (e.g. Symes & Humphrey, 2010) that these groups are at risk of poor academic and social outcomes. While classroom relationships might be an ingredient of superior teaching of children with special educational needs (Dyson, Farrell, Polat, Hutcheson, & Gallanaugh, 2004), it was hypothesised that difficulties commonly associated with either or both of these groups, such as communication problems (Cashin, 2005; Lindsay, Dockrell, & Strand, 2007) may serve to influence the nature and salience of the relationship-learning association.The study used a mixed methods design, incorporating a multiple regression analysis to determine whether changes in teacher or peer relationship quality over 18 months predicted attainment relative to other plausible predictors at the end of that period (N= ASD:143 BESD: 648) and an embedded, multiple case study (Yin, 2011) analysis around two children from each group to determine how the facets of their individual educational needs and other contextual factors influenced the importance and nature of the relationship-learning association in their education. Multiple regression models indicated that relationship change was not a statistically significant predictor of attainment other than peer relationship change for pupils with BESD, where the effect size implies that some academic benefits may accrue at group level from successful relationship interventions. Case study analysis suggested that many of the factors reducing the likelihood of relationships directly improving attainment also make them more important to the effectiveness of teaching and the classroom functioning of pupils. Implications and directions for future research are also discussed.

This dissertation is a study of the effect of Texas's charter high schools on diploma graduation and General Educational Development (GED) attainment. Utilizing data from the Texas Schools Project at the University of Texas at Dallas, the study follows a cohort of Texas students enrolled as 10th graders in the fall of 1999 and tracks their graduation outcomes through the summer of 2002 when they were expected to have completed high school. The analysis uses case study research and probit regression techniques to estimate the effect of charter school attendance on graduation and GED outcomes as well as the effect of individual charter school characteristics on charter students' graduation outcomes. The study's results indicate that charter school attendance has a strong negative effect on diploma graduation and a strong positive effect on GED attainment. In addition, the study finds that charter schools that offer vocational training, open entry/exit enrollment options, and charters that are operated in multiple sites or "chain" charters have positive effects on charter students' diploma graduation outcomes. Charters that offer accelerated instruction demonstrate a negative effect on diploma graduation. The study finds that charter school graduation outcomes improve as charters gain experience and that racially isolated minority charter schools experience reduced graduation outcomes. The study's results also indicate that Texas's charter high schools may be providing district schools with a means through which to offload students who may be difficult to educate. The analysis finds that districts may be pushing low-performing high school students with attendance and discipline problems into charter schools in order to avoid the effort of educating them and to improve district performance on accountability measures related to standardized test scores and graduation rates. This finding suggests that that competition from charter high schools will not provide much incentive for districts to improve their programs, undermining a central premise of school choice initiatives.

An exploratory analysis in low-dimensional objective space of the vector evaluated particle swarm optimization (VEPSO) algorithm is presented. A novel visualization technique is presented and applied to perform the exploratory analysis. The exploratory analysis together with a quantitative analysis revealed that the VEPSO algorithm continues to explore without exploiting the well-performing areas of the search space. A detailed investigation into the influence that the choice of archive implementation has on the performance of the VEPSO algorithm is presented. Both the Pareto-optimal front (POF) solution diversity and convergence towards the true POF is considered during the investigation. Attainment surfaces are investigated for their suitability in efficiently comparing two multi-objective optimization (MOO) algorithms. A new measure to objectively compare algorithms in multi-dimensional objective space, based on attainment surfaces, is presented. This measure, referred to as the porcupine measure, adapts the attainment surface measure by using a statistical test along with weighted intersection lines. Loosely based on the VEPSO algorithm, the multi-guided particle swarm optimization (MGPSO) algorithm is presented and evaluated. The results indicate that the MGPSO algorithm overcomes the weaknesses of the VEPSO algorithm and also outperforms a number of state of the art MOO algorithms on at least two benchmark test sets. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2017. / Computer Science / PhD / Unrestricted

The objective of this study was to examine the association between risky sexual behavior and contextual factors related to economic resources, woman’s empowerment, and health facility characteristics among young women in Zomba district, Malawi. Secondary analyses of the Schooling, Income, and Health Risk (SIHR) study were undertaken. Four outcomes related to risky sexual behavior were examined: if participants had ever had sex, consistent condom use, and two scores measuring risk related to partner history and age during sexual activity. Regression models with cluster-robust standard errors and multilevel regression models were used to estimate associations; analyses were stratified by school enrolment status at baseline of the SIHR study and utilized weights to account for SIHR sampling design. For participants in school at baseline, the percent of girls enrolled in school at the community level was associated with ever having sex and consistent condom use. Belief in the right to refuse sex was protective against ever having sex, lower household education was associated with higher odds of ever having sex, and near rural and far rural residence was associated with decreased odds of condom. For participants not in school at baseline, lower individual education was associated with riskier scores related to age and partner history and lower household education was associated with lower age during sexual activity. Private or non-governmental health facilities were associated with decreased odds of condom use and higher age during sexual activity. In both strata, increasing age and near rural residence (within 16 kilometers of urban center) increased odds of ever having sex; lower educational achievement was associated with lower age during sexual activity. A history of pregnancy was associated with lower odds of condom use and riskier partner history. Risky sexual behavior is multifaceted and complex. While various factors related to women’s empowerment played a role, the most consistent variables associated with risky sexual behavior were those related to education. Interventions and programs seeking to reduce risky sexual behavior among young women, thereby reducing their risk of HIV infection, should continue to focus on improving access to education at multiple levels.

Objective: Cognitive reserve influences age of onset, speed of progression, and clinical manifestations of Alzheimer’s disease. We investigated whether cognitive reserve interacts with clinical and neuropsychological parameters in mild cognitive impairment (MCI). Methods: In this cross-sectional study, we recruited 273 people (70.6 ± 10.1 years, 54.6% women) suffering from subjective memory complaints (n = 65), MCI (n = 121), or dementia (n = 87). Patients underwent neuropsychological evaluation, laboratory testing, and brain imaging. Additionally, we obtained information on years of education and help-seeking motivation. Results: MCI patients with a university degree were significantly older than those without (71.6 ± 9.6 vs. 66.9 ± 10.3, p = 0.02). University-educated MCI patients demonstrated superior performance in verbal fluency. Intrinsic help-seeking motivation (self-referral) was associated with higher cognitive reserve. Female MCI patients presented with greater intrinsic motivation. Conclusion: Cognitive reserve modulates clinical and neuropsychological measures in patients with MCI.

No description available.

Affirmative action in higher education is a necessary component for ethnic minorities to be afforded postsecondary educational access and opportunities to improve their socioeconomic status. The ban of affirmative action in undergraduate admissions, wherever instituted, has decreased the undergraduate enrollment of ethnic minorities. The broad objective of this research is to demonstrate how the elimination of affirmative action has lessened postsecondary educational access for minorities, who presently account for the majority or near-majority population in several states and will soon account for a much larger segment of the national population. This study will use two series of multiple regression models with scale-level variables to note the effect of the removal of affirmative action and the effectiveness of the Talented Twenty Program in maintaining student diversity at the University of Florida and the Florida State University. The major finding of this research is that the minority enrollment at UF and FSU was significantly related to the change in policy from affirmative action to the Talented Twenty Program. This study and the prior literature strongly suggest that the current diversity levels at these public universities are most likely a result of the university recruitment and outreach programs and population change.

No description available.