This study investigated the blood alcohol concentration (BAC) predictions of above or below the .08 per se level by Texas peace officers in the field based on the scoring of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) Horizontal Gaze Nystagmus (HGN) test. This study involved the submission of 35 standardized field sobriety testing (SFST) evaluations, including the HGN test from Texas peace officers throughout the State of Texas in a six-month period after completion of the SFST practitioner course. A total data set of 2,000 individual samples was used for this study. A statistical analysis of the data indicated that Texas peace officer BAC predictions of above or below the .08 per se level, based upon the observation and scoring of the observed clues during the administration of the HGN test, were 92.8% accurate during the first six month period upon completion of the SFST practitioner course. An analysis of the data also indicated that Texas peace officer BAC predictions of above or below the .08 per se level, based upon the observation and scoring of the observed clues during the administration of the HGN test, were more accurate during the second three-month period (94.0%) as opposed to the first three-month period (91.6%) upon the completion of the SFST practitioner course. There was no statistical significance found between the two three month periods for BAC predictions by the Texas peace officers. The mean BAC for this study was .114. Three recommendations were made as a result of this study. First, the Texas peace officer should submit the 35 SFST evaluations on a bi-yearly basis to ensure consistency in the administration of the tests. Second, the Texas peace officer should attend SFST update training on a bi-yearly basis to maintain proficiency in the SFST battery and curriculum. Third, the current SFST practitioner curriculum should focus more on the administration and scoring of the SFSTs including the HGN test to maximize the learning of the competencies of the correct administration and scoring of the SFST battery.

Food insecurity is characterized by the consumption of low quantity or quality foods, worrying about food supply and/or acquiring foods through socially unacceptable means (Alaimo et al., 2001). Food insecurity is associated with poor physical and mental health putting food insecure students at an increased risk of low performance on standardized assessments (Howard, 2011). This mixed methods study aimed at establishing the relationship between food insecurity and EQAO examination performance in Ottawa, and describes the strategies used to mitigate the effects of food insecurity in schools. The results unveiled that while schools use community-based interventions and provide healthful eating education to parents, food insecurity remains associated to lower test scores on the EQAO grade 3 and grade 6 standardized examinations. As such, current interventions being used within schools in Ottawa are not adequately meeting the needs of food insecure students.

Habilitation - Universität, Regensburg, 2009. / Includes bibliographical references and register.

12 pp. / This publication describes the procedure that is now recommended as a US standard for computing reference evapotranspiration. Included in the publication are: the rationale for developing the new procedure, the equations utilized in the new procedure, a discussion of how the new procedure differs from the established AZMET procedure, and tables to facilitate conversion between procedures (new and AZMET).

Standardized Patients (SPs) are lay persons who are employed extensively within health professional education to help teach and assess a range of clinical skills. Individuals trained to take on the physical, historical and emotional aspects of patient stories are integral to the dissemination of collective attitudes, values, and beliefs about what it means to be a competent health professional. As an embodied affective presence literally in front of and often in physical contact with health professionals SPs are a fertile site of knowledge production as well as transformative learning. Their unique contribution is a corollary of both their location as non-clinicians and their pedagogical facility with embodied emotions and affect. SPs in medical education teach about emotion and affect, engage affectively in the presentation of clinical material and as a professionalizing group have developed an educational methodology for facilitating understanding and experience of emotion and affect. In this thesis I examine the field of human simulation and the work of standardized patients (SPs) through critical theoretical perspectives seeking to broaden our understanding of their contributions as a present and future force in health professional education, specifically medical education. Central to my examination is the constitutive role of emotion and affect as they are conceived both within medical education and engaged by standardized patients as media through which different knowledges are produced. My analysis is shaped by poststructuralist feminist writers on emotion, Michel Foucault’s genealogical historical approach, and principally Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari’s alternative nomadology as theorized in a thousand plateaus (1987). I intend an alternative reading of the advent of SPs in medical education through a process of mapping rhizomatic networks that include acting, emotion, affect, medicine, and the place of women patients and standardized patients in medical arenas. I have located the current study within an ongoing project of embodied ethical practice and nomadic subjectivity within education specific to human simulation and standardized patients.

Standardized Patients (SPs) are lay persons who are employed extensively within health professional education to help teach and assess a range of clinical skills. Individuals trained to take on the physical, historical and emotional aspects of patient stories are integral to the dissemination of collective attitudes, values, and beliefs about what it means to be a competent health professional. As an embodied affective presence literally in front of and often in physical contact with health professionals SPs are a fertile site of knowledge production as well as transformative learning. Their unique contribution is a corollary of both their location as non-clinicians and their pedagogical facility with embodied emotions and affect. SPs in medical education teach about emotion and affect, engage affectively in the presentation of clinical material and as a professionalizing group have developed an educational methodology for facilitating understanding and experience of emotion and affect. In this thesis I examine the field of human simulation and the work of standardized patients (SPs) through critical theoretical perspectives seeking to broaden our understanding of their contributions as a present and future force in health professional education, specifically medical education. Central to my examination is the constitutive role of emotion and affect as they are conceived both within medical education and engaged by standardized patients as media through which different knowledges are produced. My analysis is shaped by poststructuralist feminist writers on emotion, Michel Foucault’s genealogical historical approach, and principally Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari’s alternative nomadology as theorized in a thousand plateaus (1987). I intend an alternative reading of the advent of SPs in medical education through a process of mapping rhizomatic networks that include acting, emotion, affect, medicine, and the place of women patients and standardized patients in medical arenas. I have located the current study within an ongoing project of embodied ethical practice and nomadic subjectivity within education specific to human simulation and standardized patients.

Thesis (doctoral)--Universität Hamburg.

Thesis (doctoral)--Universität Erlangen, 1912. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 70-71).

Over the past twenty years, there has been significant research conducted on the effects of large-scale standardized tests on academic achievement. Policy makers around the world have developed policies and allocated substantial sums of money in order to increase the frequency of large-scale standardized tests, although existing research offers inconclusive findings as to whether the use of large-scale standardized tests leads to higher achievement. This study was intended to empirically examine the use of standardized testing and its relationship with student achievement. The study focused on two questions: first, why do some nations require their students to take large-scale standardized tests more frequently than others? And second, is there a correlation between the frequency of large-scale standardized tests frequency and academic achievement? This study examined data from the 2003 and 2009 administrations of the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) in order to address these questions. Results from this study indicated the frequency of large-scale standardized tests is most likely to be associated with testing consequence or stake (e.g., data are made public, etc.). Additionally, results suggest that the frequency of large-scale standardized tests is not significantly related to academic achievement.

Since the passing of No Child Left Behind Act in 2001, the United States' secondary education system has undergone significant changes. In this study, I discuss the ways in which the law has encouraged the normalization of standardized testing and aim to answer two primary research questions. RQ1: What do college students and their instructors identify as the key challenges that arise as students educated under NCLB begin college coursework, and how does each group address these challenges? RQ2: What strategies do the actors and spect-actors in a Forum Theatre production arrive at for addressing the challenges faced by college instructors and their students who have completed their secondary education under No Child Left Behind? To answer the initial research question, I conducted focus group interviews with instructors and students at the University of North Texas to understand the challenges each faces in the classroom. To answer the second research question, I compiled narratives from the focus group interviews along with other materials into a performance script that concluded with scenarios based in Augusto Boal's Forum Theatre techniques. In live performance events audience members rehearsed strategies for addressing the challenges that instructors and students face in classrooms through performance. Following descriptions of the performances, I analyze the scenarios through theories of Michel Foucault and Paulo Freire, to understand the productive power of the banking model reflected in the suggestions from the audience.