Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The Education Gap: Vouchers and Urban Schools

While the merits of vouchers have been the subject of intense public debate in recent years, there has been very little available evidence upon which to gauge their efficacy. The first publicly funded voucher plan involving private schools wasn't established until 1990 in Milwaukee; before then, the only data on school choice came from a small, poorly designed program in California. Voucher programs grew dramatically in the latter half of the 1990s. In 2000, about 60,000 students participated in seventy-one programs, most privately funded. This growth is now providing researchers with the ability to measure the impact of vouchers for the first time in multiple cities. The Education Gap is the first book to gather a significant body of data on vouchers in multiple locations, and it reveals startling new evidence that voucher programs benefit African-American students more than participants from other ethnic groups. To explain this phenomenon, the authors point out that residential selection is the most common form of school choice available in American public education today. Since this process is likely to leave African Americans in the worst public schools, new forms of choice directed toward low-income families are most likely to benefit black students. The authors examine the effects of school vouchers on test scores, parental satisfaction, parent-school communications, and political tolerance among students and parents participating in four pilot programs in New York City; Dayton, Ohio; Washington, D.C.; the Edgewood school district in San Antonio; and a program that offered vouchers to 40,000 low-income families nationwide. Though the programs operated in a wide variety of settings, the findings were surprisingly consistent. After two years, African-American students who used vouchers to switch from public to private schools scored substantially better on math and reading tests. By contrast, no significant positive effects on the test scores of other ethnic groups were detected. While parents in all ethnic groups were generally more supportive of private education, African-American parents expressed particularly high enthusiasm for the private schools their children attended. The authors also report information on the kinds of students and families who take advantage of a voucher opportunity, allowing them to seewhether only the i? degreebest and brightesti? i? public school students were able to take advantage of school voucher programs. The results documented in The Education Gap shed new light on the effects of school vouchers on students in poor, urban environments. This information will be important to policymakers, scholars, and citizens are they continue to search for ways to improve education in urban areas.
Platelet P2 receptors: old and new targets for antithrombotic drugs

Platelets possess three P2 receptors for adenine nucleotides: P2Y1 and P2Y12, which interact with ADP, and P2X1, which interacts with ATP. The interaction of adenine nucleotides with their platelet receptors plays an important role in thrombogenesis. The thienopyridine ticlopidine, an antagonist of the platelet P2Y12 ADP receptor, reduces the incidence of vascular events in patients at risk, but it also has some important drawbacks: a relatively high incidence of toxic effects; delayed onset of action; high inter-individual variability in response. Another thienopyridine, clopidogrel, has superseded ticlopidine, because it is an efficacious antithrombotic drug and is less toxic than ticlopidine. However, the high inter-patient variability in response still remains an important issue. These drawbacks justify the continuing search for agents that can further improve the clinical outcome of patients with atherosclerosis through greater efficacy and/or safety. A new thienopyridyl compound prasugrel, which is characterized by higher potency and faster onset of action compared with clopidogrel, is currently under clinical evaluation. Two direct and reversible P2Y12 antagonists, cangrelor and AZD6140, have very rapid onset and reversal of platelet inhibition, which make them attractive alternatives to thienopyridines, especially when rapid inhibition of platelet aggregation or its quick reversal are required. Along with new P2Y12antagonists, inhibitors of the other platelet receptor for ADP, P2Y1, and of the receptor for ATP, P2X1, are under development and may prove to be effective antithrombotic agents.
Tomorrow's: World, consumer and tourist

In a world of 9/11 and Tsunami, trying to predict the future of tourism is an uncertain science. VisitScotland, the national tourism agency of the Scotland uses a process of scenario planning and futures thinking in order to make sense of that uncertain future. This paper, examines how world mega trends and consumer behaviour will shape the future tourists. Four scenarios are constructed using the principles of cognitive mapping. Firstly, a right royal treatment scenario describes the business traveller as sophisticated, demanding and time sensitive. He/she wants exceptional service but is only willing to pay a premium price for added value rather than functionality. The tourist living local scenario describes the authentic tourist as someone that is discerning but wants to ‘live local’. They are from a networked society where information is freely available. They are ethical and inconspicuous consumers who have grown up in an affluent world. Their values and beliefs are based upon an untrusting and anxious society fuelled by safety. The authentic tourist feels safe in the past rather than the artificial world of Disneyland. The living the low-brow and high-brow life scenario reflects cultural capital being driven by an educated well-travelled consumer who is more concerned with experience than material possessions. The Asia gets going scenario is a realization that the middle classes of China are driving the growth of tourism across the world by 2015; here, Chinese tourists want to live their dreams.
Governance among Confounding Logics: The Case of DePaul Industries

Abstract This paper explores board decision-making in social enterprises. It argues that while dominant theoretical frameworks (agency and stakeholder theories) help to understand the challenges faced by the boards of social enterprises, they need to be complemented to account, more adequately, for challenges deriving from the confounding logics framing valuations of organizational effectiveness in social enterprises. The paper identifies pace of decision-making as a crucial variable that requires further research attention and, building on the literature on group decision and dynamics, it advances several factors that can frame the expediency (or sluggishness) with which the boards of social enterprises take decisions.
Trends and Models in International Quality Assurance in Higher Education in Relation to Trade in Education.

Trade in higher education in its many diverse forms transcends and challenges the national regulatory frameworks in higher education, including national quality assurance and accreditation systems. New kinds of international quality assurance and accreditation are seen as the crucial elements of regulation in a more and more trade oriented international higher education market. In this paper four models of development of international quality assurance are analysed: 1) Strengthening the capacities of national quality assurance and accreditation systems; 2) Promoting cross-border quality assurance and the mutual recognition of quality assurance and accreditation; 3) Developing meta-accreditation of quality assurance and accreditation agencies on an international and global level; and 4) Establishing international quality assurance and accreditation schemes. Current developments and strategies in international quality assurance are situated within these four models and discussed with reference to the trade in education issue.
Trading Volume with Private Valuation: Evidence from the Ex-Dividend Day

We test a theory of the interaction between investors' heterogeneity, risk, transaction costs, and trading volume. We take advantage of the specific nature of trading motives around the distribution of cash dividends, namely the costly trading of tax shields. Consistent with the theory, we show that when trades occur because of differential valuation of cash flows, an increase in risk or transaction costs reduces volume. We also show that the nonsystematic risk plays a significant role in determining the volume of trade. Finally, we demonstrate that trading volume is positively related to the degree of heterogeneity and the incentives of the various groups to engage in trading. Article published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Society for Financial Studies in its journal, The Review of Financial Studies.
Devolution and Intergovernmental Relations: The Emergence of Intergovernmental Affairs Agencies

Systems of intergovernmental relations are an intrinsic feature of multi-tiered systems of government. In executive-dominated, Westminster-style parliamentary federations, these relations tend to be co-ordinated by specialist agencies located near the centre of government. Such agencies, though small, have been established in the UK government as well as in the Scottish and Welsh devolved administrations. To date, pre-devolution norms of friendly and informal relations among civil servants, and the continued primacy of decentralised, inter-departmental relations, have facilitated mostly cordial intergovernmental interaction. To the degree that future devolved administrations seek more persistently to pursue a coherent set of policy priorities in their relations with central government, they may choose to further centralise co-ordination of IGR. While such a move may well be warranted from a policy perspective, it may well also engender an institutional dynamic inimical to continued amicable relations between governments.
Synchronization of dynamical networks by network control

In this paper, we study the locally controlled synchronization of dynamical networks by introducing a distributed controller which has a different network structure from the original network. We refer to this configuration as a feedback network. To reflect practical reality, a cost function is considered to constrain the controller. Then based on the master stability function method, the constrained controller design problem is transformed into a mixed-integer nonlinear optimization problem. In addition, when a single controller can not be found under the constraint, a switching controller is designed by a Lyapunov function method. The convex combination technique is used to design the synchronizing switching signal between the candidate controllers, and its coefficients are given by the solution of a convex optimization problem. We also provide a feasible way to construct the candidate controllers, and give a numerical example to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed results.
Does part-time employment help or hinder single mothers’ movements into full-time employment?

A significant demographic trend in recent decades in Australia has been the growth in lone parent families as a proportion of all families, associated with which has been growth in welfare dependency. This has led to considerable policy focus on increasing lone parent participation in employment. A key issue that has arisen for the Government in pursuing this policy goal is whether, in the context of a welfare system that accommodates the combining of part-time employment with welfare receipt, part-time employment helps or hinders a progression to full-time employment, and whether and how this depends on characteristics such as the number and ages of dependent children. In this study, we investigate this issue using Australian panel data on female lone parents over the period 2001 to 2007. We estimate dynamic random effects multinomial logit models of three labour force states – not employed, employed part-time, and employed full-time – allowing investigation of whether part-time work represents a stepping stone to full-time employment. Evidence in support of the stepping stone hypothesis is found. Part-time employment increases the probability of full-time employment in the next year by approximately six percentage points. No (statistically significant) evidence is found that this stepping stone function varies by number of children or age of the youngest child.
Monitoring and reducing patient dissatisfaction: a case study of an Iranian public hospital

Patients' dissatisfaction with hospital services is a major indicator for the assessment of healthcare quality. This paper proposes an innovative framework to measure and decrease patient dissatisfaction with hospital services. First, a validated and verified SERVQUAL-based questionnaire is proposed to be distributed among patients. Then, according to the collected data, the level of dissatisfaction is monitored by deploying a p-chart and a Demerit chart. Finally, in order to identify long-term improvement opportunities, an improvement index and Pareto chart have been exploited. The usefulness of the proposed framework is illustrated by the application on a case study in a public hospital of Iran. The results revealed that both the Demerit chart and p-chart are quite competent in monitoring patients’ dissatisfaction and alarming out-of-control situations. In the studied hospital, food service was found to be the critical challenge that required both immediate and long-term improvements. Nurses’ criteria should receive immediate improvement while long-term efforts should be devoted to hospital environment and facilities.
Thalidomide downregulates angiogenic genes in bone marrow endothelial cells of patients with active multiple myeloma.

PURPOSE To study the antiangiogenic effect of thalidomide. PATIENTS AND METHODS The expression of key angiogenic genes was studied in bone marrow endothelial cells (ECs) of patients with active and nonactive multiple myeloma (MM), monoclonal gammopathies unattributed/unassociated (MG[u]), diffuse large B-cell non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, in a Kaposi's sarcoma (KS) cell line, and in healthy human umbilical vein ECs (HUVECs) following exposure to therapeutic doses of thalidomide. RESULTS Thalidomide markedly downregulates the genes in a dose-dependent fashion in active MMECs and KS cell line, but upregulates them or is ineffective in nonactive MMECs, MG(u)ECs, NHL-ECs, and in HUVECs. Secretion of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), basic fibroblast growth factor (bFGF) and hepatocyte growth factor also diminishes according to the dose in culture conditioned media (CM) of active MMECs and KS, whereas it does not change in the other CM. CONCLUSION Inhibition by thalidomide is probably confined to the genes of active MMECs and KS. This would account for its higher efficacy in these diseases.
Interaction Between Value Line's Timeliness and Safety Ranks

The Value Line Investment Survey, with its well-known timeliness and safety rankings, has managed to generate a superior performance record over time. The authors' findings show that Value Line's timeliness ranks were significant predictors of success during our study period, even when several other key financial and market characteristics are considered. The timeliness ranks, however, appear to be biased toward the selection of securities with above-average market risk, even when controlling for safety level. The authors conclude that individual investors should not use Value Line's safety ranks to assess risk, but should instead focus on security betas. Following Value Line's recommended strategy would lead investors to large market-capitalization stocks with significant price and earnings growth momentum. Despite the “value” in its title, Value Line certainly does not recommend value stocks.
In a randomized case–control trial with 10-years olds suffering from attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) sleep and psychological functioning improved during a 12-week sleep-training program

Abstract Objectives. We tested the hypothesis that sleep training would improve emotional, social and behavioural functioning in children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) compared to children with ADHD without such intervention and to healthy controls. Methods. Forty children with ADHD were randomly assigned to intervention and control conditions. Parents of 20 children with ADHD were instructed and thoroughly supervised in improving their children's sleep schedules and sleep behaviour. Parents of the other 20 children with ADHD and parents of 20 healthy children received general information about sleep hygiene. At baseline and 12 weeks later, parents and children completed questionnaires related to children's sleep and psychological functioning. Results. Relative to the control groups, children in the intervention group improved sleep quantitatively and qualitatively (F values < 3.33, P values < 0.05). The intervention group children reported improvements in mood, emotions, and relationships (F values < 2.99, P values < 0.05). Parents reported that their children improved in physical and psychological wellbeing, mood, emotions, relationships, and social acceptance (F values < 3.02, P values < 0.05). Conclusions. Training and monitoring parents of children with ADHD in regulating and supervising children's sleep schedules leads to positive changes in the emotions, behaviour and social lives of these children.
Cloning and analysis of the rat glutamate-cysteine ligase modifier subunit promoter.

Glutamate-cysteine ligase (GCL), the rate-limiting enzyme in glutathione (GSH) synthesis, is made up of two subunits, a catalytic (GCLC) and a modifier (GCLM) subunit, which are differentially regulated. Increased GCLM expression occurs under certain oxidative stress conditions. To facilitate studies of GCLM transcriptional regulation, we have cloned and characterized a 1.86-kb 5'-flanking region of the rat GCLM (GenBank Accession No. AF311745). A TATA-like element and one transcriptional start sites are located at 364 and 93 nucleotides upstream of the translational start site, respectively. The promoter contains consensus binding sites for many transcription factors including activator protein 1 (AP-1), transcription factor 11 (TCF11), heat shock transcription factor (HSF), and nuclear factor kappa B (NFkappaB). The rat GCLM promoter was able to drive efficiently luciferase expression in H4IIE cells. Sequential deletion analysis revealed DNA regions, -649 to -154 and -1251 to -649, are involved in positive and negative gene regulation, respectively. Candidate transcription factors were identified by DNase I footprinting.
Combined monitor for direct and indirect measurement of biofouling

Biofouling is one of the most important problems associated with heat exchangers, leading to a loss of thermal performance in their cycle. To maintain them in optimum working condition, biofouling must be kept under control and, to do so, instrumentation is required for its monitoring. The development of the biofouling layer can be qualitatively followed, but only during maintenance shutdown periods is it possible to attain a quantitative assessment. The CMDIMB [Combined Monitor for Direct and Indirect Measurement of Biofouling] was conceived as a means of discovering the evolution of the frictional resistance (f) and the heat transfer resistance (R f) of a fluid because these are variables that indirectly define the biofouling deposited in the tubes of a seawater-cooled heat exchanger. They likewise serve to directly indicate its mass and thickness according to the total solid matter adhered over time. The results obtained allowed the values of the variables taken by the CMDIMB to be extrapolated to the heat exchanger that was set up in parallel. The CMDIMB is proposed as a highly useful tool for directly and indirectly monitoring biofouling growth in heat exchangers that do not possess the necessary instrumentation to monitor this phenomenon.
Optimal Execution and Alpha Capture

A third wave of technological change known as “alpha profiling” is taking root at the institutional trading desk. Traders submit orders to prediction models that estimate the relative probability of various price scenarios. Traders can use this information to select an execution strategy or allow the model to propose an optimal execution schedule. A consistent implementation of the optimal schedule for each alpha profile increases alpha capture in the same way that statistical arbitrage generates trading profits. In this article, the authors present a model to estimate how the expected implementation shortfall depends on the alpha profile and implementation schedule. They use this model to compute an optimal execution strategy given the alpha profile of an order. They show examples of optimal execution schedules for typical alpha profiles. The authors also discuss the accuracy of alpha profiling and estimate the potential to reduce the imple men tation shortfall by applying this methodology for a typical port folio manager.
New paradigm for the Asian boardroom – brand equity

Purpose – The main purpose of this paper is to bring to the fore the strategic importance of branding as managed by the boardrooms, so that Asian companies can realize their full potential by inculcating right branding practices.Design/methodology/approach – The paper methodically dissects the reasons for the lack of branding in the Asian region. It analyzes the societal factors that have shaped the Asian management mindset. Then, the paper takes up some of the Asian pioneers in the field to demonstrate the practical viability of what the author argues.Findings – It has been found that Asian companies do not realize the importance of branding. Asian business leaders treat branding as an expense and not an investment. Further, many Asian companies still prefer building up tangible assets rather than strategic intangibles such as brand equity.Practical implications – The important implication of this paper is that branding should no longer be delegated to the lower echelons of the company but rather managed.
Redistributing Smarter: Self-Selection, Targeting and Non-Conventional Policy Instruments

Modern public economic theory emphasizes imperfect information as the ultimate constraint on redistribution policy: the needy are hard to identify. To target transfers efficiently, the standard tax-transfer system with its reliance on self-reporting needs to be supplemented by other devices designed to separate the needy from the non-needy. These include the use of in-kind transfers, quantity and price controls, and monitoring by welfare administrators. The role of such devices as part of the mix of redistribution policies and their potential implications for rationalizing the Canadian transfer system are summarized.