This research project takes a critical look at the data that drives educational policies. This research project looks at the data at the national level as well as the regional levels in order to see if the data is functioning differently at the different levels. All data has been collected from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) through reports published by the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), an independent committee assigned to collect and analyze educational data. The data was collected and then correlations were run between the expenditures per pupil, number of pupils per teacher, standardized test scores, such as average ACT, average SAT, average 8th grade Math and Reading tests, and average 4th grade Math and Reading tests. This research project also included the percentage of minority students in the classroom, a variable whose data has been collected over the years, but it has never been included in any prior analyses. What this research project found is that some of the data, such as the standardized test scores, have a different strength of relationship between variables at the different levels. For example, expenditures per pupil have strength in the relationship between the different standardized test scores at the national level, but once those numbers are broken down by region, the strength in the variables relationship is weakened. This research project also discovered that the make up of the classroom, specifically the percentage of minority students, is a vital factor in the performance of all students.

Denna rapport behandlar tekniska beskrivningar. Främst med fokus på problematiken för att skapa dessa på national men även global nivå samt utvecklingspotentialen med att standardisera dessa. Rapporten inriktar sig på stora industriella aktörer med en repetitiv hantering av byggprojekt för att på minsta möjliga sätt hindra sin kärnverksamhet men även underlätta utveckling och utökning av sin produktion. Rapporten tar upp fördelar men även potentiella nackdelar med ett standardiserat förfarande, därigenom vad företag måste tänka på och säkerställa för att få en fungerande och utvecklande process. I syfte att motivera företagens arbete med standardiserade beskrivningar visar rapporten vilka riktvärden som kan påverkas. Riktvärden som baseras på kompetenta personers erfarenhet inom branschen. Med detta förklaras även vikten i att sätta upp mål för utvecklingen och samtidigt processer för att följa upp så att uppsatta mål uppnås men även återkopplas genom erfarenhetsåterföring och revidering. Tre större industriella aktörer har medverkat i arbetet med rapporten, alla tre med ett stort fokus på vad en standardisering kan innebära för deras verksamhet. Där av har rapportens kärndelar anpassats efter att stämma överens med företagens frågeställningar. Då tekniska beskrivningar inom branschen inte är något nytt fenomen men att standardisera dessa ännu ej är i bruk, konstateras att ämnet måste undersökas mer samt testas i praktiken för att helt kunna följa upp att företagen mål uppnås. Dock kan av rapportens slutsatser dras att det finns stora besparingar och effektiviseringar som potentiellt kan påverkas. Detta med utgångspunkt av digniteten för de projekt företagen kommer i kontakt med.

The purposes of this study were to: (a) analyze subjects' responses from Form F of the Standardized Bible Content Tests of the American Association of Bible Colleges by factor analysis and the Rasch measurement model and (b) determine dimensionality of Form F, determine the correlation to the Literal, Anti-literal, Mythological Scales, and determine the best criterion-referenced test design of Form F using Rasch measurement procedures. Volunteers from a purposefully selected sample of nine colleges from the American Association of Bible Colleges participated in the study. One research instrument with five demographic questions, the Standardized Bible Content Test Form F, and the Literal, Anti-literal, and Mythological Scales was administered to 179 volunteer graduating seniors. Frequencies and percentages of responses were computed for the demographic questions. Mean scores on the Literal, Anti-literal, and Mythological Scales were computed for gender and religious affiliation. Principal components analysis of Form F with varimax rotation and list-wise deletion of missing data was used to assess the dimensionality of Form F. Correlations between scores on the Literal, Anti-literal and Mythological Scales and scores from the principal components analysis of Form F were computed. Dunn's multiple comparison procedures were used to test for statistical significance. Rasch-Model measurement analysis of the scales extracted by principal components analysis was accomplished to obtain suggested target description, test design, variable definition, and item calibration.

This research seeks to understand the relationship between arts-based assessments and perception of self through exploration of participants’ interpretations of their own animal drawings. Subjects’ experiences with projective tests, personality assessments and tools, and art assessments were also examined for contextual understanding and comparison. To conduct this mixed methods pilot study, a survey was administered to alumni of the Loyola Marymount University Marital and Family Therapy Department. The findings suggest evidence of self- projection within arts-based assessment interpretation by way of metaphor, and highlight the potential for interpretation bias in therapeutic assessment, both in administration and perception. This pilot study has provided foundational information for future research, and suggests the following to be considered for continued exploration: styles of interpretation, framework of questions, usefulness of assessments, consistency of assessment interpretation, and how demographics plays a role in each of these elements.

At the onset of the "Big Data" age, we are faced with ubiquitous data in various forms and with various characteristics, such as noise, high dimensionality, autocorrelation, and so on. The question of how to obtain accurate and computationally efficient estimates from such data is one that has stoked the interest of many researchers. This dissertation mainly concentrates on two general problem areas: inference for high-dimensional and noisy data, and estimation of the steady-state mean for univariate data generated by computer simulation experiments. We develop and evaluate three separate sequential algorithms for the two topics. One major advantage of sequential algorithms is that they allow for careful experimental adjustments as sampling proceeds. Unlike one-step sampling plans, sequential algorithms adapt to different situations arising from the ongoing sampling; this makes these procedures efficacious as problems become more complicated and more-delicate requirements need to be satisfied. We will elaborate on each research topic in the following discussion. Concerning the first topic, our goal is to develop a robust graphical model for noisy data in a high-dimensional setting. Under a Gaussian distributional assumption, the estimation of undirected Gaussian graphs is equivalent to the estimation of inverse covariance matrices. Particular interest has focused upon estimating a sparse inverse covariance matrix to reveal insight on the data as suggested by the principle of parsimony. For estimation with high-dimensional data, the influence of anomalous observations becomes severe as the dimensionality increases. To address this problem, we propose a robust estimation procedure for the Gaussian graphical model based on the Integrated Squared Error (ISE) criterion. The robustness result is obtained by using ISE as a nonparametric criterion for seeking the largest portion of the data that "matches" the model. Moreover, an l₁-type regularization is applied to encourage sparse estimation. To address the non-convexity of the objective function, we develop a sequential algorithm in the spirit of a majorization-minimization scheme. We summarize the results of Monte Carlo experiments supporting the conclusion that our estimator of the inverse covariance matrix converges weakly (i.e., in probability) to the latter matrix as the sample size grows large. The performance of the proposed method is compared with that of several existing approaches through numerical simulations. We further demonstrate the strength of our method with applications in genetic network inference and financial portfolio optimization. The second topic consists of two parts, and both concern the computation of point and confidence interval (CI) estimators for the mean µ of a stationary discrete-time univariate stochastic process X \equiv \{X_i: i=1,2,...} generated by a simulation experiment. The point estimation is relatively easy when the underlying system starts in steady state; but the traditional way of calculating CIs usually fails since the data encountered in simulation output are typically serially correlated. We propose two distinct sequential procedures that each yield a CI for µ with user-specified reliability and absolute or relative precision. The first sequential procedure is based on variance estimators computed from standardized time series applied to nonoverlapping batches of observations, and it is characterized by its simplicity relative to methods based on batch means and its ability to deliver CIs for the variance parameter of the output process (i.e., the sum of covariances at all lags). The second procedure is the first sequential algorithm that uses overlapping variance estimators to construct asymptotically valid CI estimators for the steady-state mean based on standardized time series. The advantage of this procedure is that compared with other popular procedures for steady-state simulation analysis, the second procedure yields significant reduction both in the variability of its CI estimator and in the sample size needed to satisfy the precision requirement. The effectiveness of both procedures is evaluated via comparisons with state-of-the-art methods based on batch means under a series of experimental settings: the M/M/1 waiting-time process with 90% traffic intensity; the M/H_2/1 waiting-time process with 80% traffic intensity; the M/M/1/LIFO waiting-time process with 80% traffic intensity; and an AR(1)-to-Pareto (ARTOP) process. We find that the new procedures perform comparatively well in terms of their average required sample sizes as well as the coverage and average half-length of their delivered CIs.

This article is about social workers that assess disabled people’s needs and their abilities to implement a new way of working. The National Board of Health and Welfare (Socialstyrelsen) in Sweden are developing a new way of working in these cases and it’s supposed to make the social work more evidence based. The National Board of Health and Welfare has already developed this kind of instrument for the social workers who assess needs of children and elderly people and now it’s time for those who work with disabled people. Therefore, I have chosen to study which possibilities these social workers have to implement this new method called IBIC (Individens Behov I Centrum - The individual’s needs in focus, my translation). I have based my study on three factors that are important that the persons involved in an implementation have in order for the implementation to succeed. They are: comprehension, capability and willingness. The aim was to get an understanding based on the three factors comprehend, capability and willingness of which abilities the assessment workers have to implement IBIC and how this would affect the profession. To reach that aim I have interviewed six social workers who assess the needs of disabled persons. The social workers were chosen because of their work title and after approval by their managers. I was able to get one who has worked 22 years, two who has worked around 10 years and three who has just started working. This meant that I got a good distribution in length of experience. In my sample there is also one who has worked with the standardized work method for children that I mentioned earlier. The results show that most of the social workers comprehend IBIC but it is doubtful whether or not they have the capability and the willingness to implement it. The result also shows that an implementation of IBIC most likely would mean that the profession which now is based on occupational values would move towards organizational professionalism.

Thesis (LLM)--University of Stellenbosch, 2000. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: International trade has increased tremendously in the last few decades. When parties to a contract find themselves in different countries and each has its own legal background, specific problems originate in connection with formation of the contract, its execution, the breach thereof and so forth. The predominant theme of this work is the question of how a diversity of legal rules should be approached in an international context. The focus is on contract formation, and the rules of offer and acceptance are therefore examined. As a result of diverse legal cultures, different legal systems often have contradicting rules pertaining to contract formation, which can lead to a variety of problems if the contracting parties are not aware of the inconsistencies. According to international private law's choice of law-rules, such a contract should be governed by the rules of the legal system with which it has the closest connection. Connecting factors can be for instance the domicile of particular persons at various times, the situs of property, or the place where a juristic act was performed. One specific legal system will therefore rule the contract. There is however another possibility: that of a uniform substantive law. This involves the unification of different legal rules into one set of rules to be applied to contracts which are concluded in an international context. Taking into account that many of the rules and doctrines applicable to contract law have a common philosophical origin, the necessity of a convergence of these rules may be questioned. However, most of the rules ended up being different in different legal systems, and parties to an international transaction will probably not have the same idea about questions such as the possibility to revoke an offer before acceptance, or the precise moment of formation of the contract. A comparative study of the rules of offer and acceptance illustrates this point. International efforts to unify the law in this regard are explored, in order to assess the possibility of a uniform substantive law of contracts. Some of the international instruments seem to be able to find a middle way between conflicting rules, although it may not always be the best way to solve the problem. It is argued that harmony is not necessarily advanced by a codification of existing rules, and that a common legal culture which can lead to the incremental development of harmonious legal principles may be an alternative solution for the problem of incompatible national legal systems in an international context. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Internasionale handel het die afgelope paar dekades geweldig toegeneem. Wanneer kontraktante hulle in verskillende lande bevind, elke party met sy eie regsagtergrond, ontstaan eiesoortige probleme in verband met kontraksluiting, die uitvoering daarvan, kontrakbreuk, en dies meer. Die oorheersende tema van hierdie werk is die vraag na die hantering van 'n verskeidenheid regsreëls betrokke in 'n internasionale konteks. Die fokus is op kontraksluiting, en die reëls aangaande aanbod en aanname word derhalwe ondersoek. As gevolg van die bestaan van uiteenlopende regskulture het verskillende regstelsels dikwels teenstrydige reëls met betrekking tot kontraksluiting. Dit kan natuurlik problematies wees, veral indien die partye tot die kontrak nie bewus is van die teenstrydighede nie. Ooreenkomstig die choice of law-reëls van internasionale privaatreg, word so 'n kontrak beheers deur die regstelsel waarmee dit die nouste verbintenis het. Faktore wat dui op so 'n band kan byvoorbeeld die domisilie van bepaalde persone op verskillende tye, die situs van eiendom, of die plek waar 'n regshandeling verrig is wees. Een spesifieke regstelsel sal dus van toepassing wees op die kontrak. Daar is egter ook 'n ander moontlikheid: dié van 'n eenvormige substantiewe reg. Dit behels die vereniging van verskillende regsreëls ten einde een stel reëls daar te stel wat toegepas word op internasionale kontrakte. lndien in ag geneem word dat heelparty reëls en leerstukke in die kontraktereg 'n gemeenskaplike filosofiese oorsprong het, is die noodsaaklikheid van 'n vereniging van die reëls nie 'n gegewe nie. Die meeste van dié reëls het egter verskillend uitgekristalliseer in verskillende regstelsels, en partye tot 'n internasionale transaksie sal heel waarskynlik nie dieselfde opinie hê oor kwessies soos die moontlikheid om 'n aanbod voor aanname daarvan te herroep, of die presiese oomblik van totstandkoming van 'n kontrak nie. 'n Vergelykende studie van die reëls van aanbod en aanname illustreer die punt. Internasionale pogings om die reg in die verband te verenig word ondersoek, ten einde die moontlikheid van 'n eenvormige substantiewe reg van toepassing op kontrakte te beoordeel. Sekere van die internasionale instrumente blyk 'n middeweg tussen uiteenlopende reëls te vind, alhoewel dit nie noodwendig die beste manier is om die probleem voorhande op te los nie. Daar word geargumenteer dat harmonie nie noodwendig bevorder word deur 'n kodifikasie van bestaande reëls nie, en dat 'n gemeenskaplike regskultuur wat tot die geleidelike ontwikkeling van eenvormige regsbeginsels kan lei, 'n alternatiewe oplossing vir die probleem van onversoenbare nasionale regstelsels in 'n internasionale konteks kan wees.

<p>In 1995 and 2000 a total of 29 886 non surgical ED visits at Uppsala University Hospital were registered. Presenting complaint, admittance to a ward, length of stay, in-hospital mortality, discharge diagnoses, 30-day and long-term mortality were registered. The presenting complaints were sorted into 33 presenting complaint groups (PCGs). </p><p>For different PCGs there was different in-hospital fatality rate. Compared to the largest PCG, chest pain, the gender and age adjusted OR was 2.12 (95% CI 1.01 – 4.44) for the miscellaneous complaint group and 2.04 (95 % CI 1.35 – 3.08) for the stroke–like symptom group. Within a given PCG the in-hospital mortality could vary depending on discharge diagnoses. By relating PCG and long term mortality to the expected mortality in the population, the Standardized Mortality Ratio (SMR) could be calculated. The SMR was found to be highest in seizure 2.62 (95 % CI 2.13 – 3.22), intoxication 2.51 (95% CI 2.11-2.98) and symptoms of asthma 1.8 (1.65 – 2.06). For the same discharge diagnoses the long term mortality could differ considerably depending on PCG at ED arrival (p<0.001). </p><p>Between 1995 and 2000 there was a 30 % increase in ED visits at the non surgical ED. PCGs representing lesser severe conditions had increased. Demographic changes could account for 45 % of the increment and the remaining increase could be ascribed to change in visiting pattern. </p><p>In the 2000 cohort 41.0 % of all visits were performed by re-visitors. The number of revisits and five-year mortality had an inversed u-shaped relationship were patients with three re-visits within the same year had an increased mortality compared to patients with more or less visits. </p><p>Conclusion: It is possible to define presenting complaint groups (PCGs) that are robust and consistent over time and useful as a tool for epidemiological studies in the ED.</p>

Over the past 10-15 years, the epidemiological research literature on juvenile delinquency has suggested that there is an over-representation of males and Hispanics within the juvenile justice system, and a disproportionate number of youths having an IDEA disability, including emotional disability, learning disability, and mental retardation. In addition, juvenile delinquents tend to perform lower academically than their peers, come from low socioeconomic status backgrounds, drop out of school more often, and frequently come into contact with law enforcement agencies. Moreover, low academic achievement, male gender, and drop out contribute to the increased chances that adolescents will become involved in delinquent activities. Characteristics of juvenile delinquents also tend to be stable over time and resistant to most types of intervention.The purpose of the present study was to examine whether there were significantly greater percentages of school drop out in adjudicated versus non-adjudicated delinquent high school youths with and without an IDEA disability diagnosis. Significant differences between standardized test scores of those adjudicated and non-adjudicated youths who dropped out versus remained in school were also examined. Other variables studied in conjunction with these included gender, minority, and free/reduced lunch status.Chi-Square Tests of Independence revealed a significant association between adjudication and drop out, regardless of disability, gender, minority, or free/reduced lunch status. Chi-Square results also showed a significant association between adjudication and disability, but for non-drop out delinquent youths only. Drop out and disability was found to be significantly associated for males only.Univariate Analyses of Variance revealed significant differences in AIMS Reading standard scores between delinquents who had, versus had not, been identified as having a disability. Significant differences in reading scores were also found between those identified, versus not identified as SLD. Furthermore, an interaction effect between disability and minority status was present. Similar differences were found with respect to AIMS Math scores. Limitations and implications of findings as well as future research directions were discussed.

Objective: The researcher replicated 12 questions from a previous user satisfaction study for the C-HOBIC assessment tool at St. Boniface Hospital in Winnipeg Manitoba. The research questions were: (a) what is user satisfaction regarding the C-HOBIC assessment tool 20 months after implementation, (b) has user satisfaction changed since the first evaluation, and (c) do user demographics correlate with user satisfaction and the C-HOBIC assessment tool? Method: 20 months after the previous study (Canadian Nurses Association, 2015), a convenience sample of 71 participants from a pool of approximately 700 clinicians completed an online survey comprised of 12 questions taken from the previous study. Results: The data were analyzed using Shapiro-Wilk, descriptive statistics, chi-square test for independence, and Spearman’s correlation. The Likert-style survey produced discrete, ranked data that did not follow a normal distribution. Overall user satisfaction with the C-HOBIC assessment tool was rated higher in the previous group (n=59) as compared to user satisfaction in the current group (n=71). There was a significant but weak correlation with gender and C-HOBIC patient outcomes positively influencing patient care directions, and improving patient care planning. A significant but weak correlation existed between the years of a participant's clinical experience and the ease of integrating C-HOBIC into practice. Conclusions: There were more participants not satisfied with the use of the C-HOBIC assessment tool than were satisfied. Participants in this study had less user satisfaction with the C-HOBIC assessment tool and associated outcomes than participants from a similar study 20 months before. Gender and years of clinical experience are correlated with user satisfaction. The small sample size, the non-normally distributed data, and convenient sampling method do not support generalization of the results beyond the data set. / Graduate / 0569 / alshunt@gmail.com