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May 30, 2008Thunderbird Kicks Off Innovation Summit and $20,000 ChallengeFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: Thunderbird School of Global Management is preparing for its third annual Global Sustainable Innovation Summit that draws the brightest graduate-level students from top universities around the world. The event includes a global competition to develop sustainable and innovative business solutions to real-world challenges presented by sponsoring companies. Last year, the challenge attracted 118 teams from 59 universities and 15 countries. "The companies value their fresh perspective about how innovation and sustainability can be integrated in ways that simultaneously create social, environmental and business value." The competition begins Oct. 6 with an online round of questions from sponsoring companies with a global focus seeking innovative solutions to their every-day business challenges. This year's sponsors and summit partners include Johnson & Johnson, APS, BillMatrix, Xerox, and Net Impact. Opportunities to participate as a sponsor and/or judge are still available in all three categories of silver, gold and platinum. Silver sponsorships of $8,500 provide keynote speakers, panel discussions and networking events. Each will receive more than 30 innovative concept plans pertaining directly to their business challenges and receive access to about 1,000 student-participant resumes. Platinum sponsorships of $50,000 allow companies to pose questions during both the online and final rounds of the challenge. AScribe provides direct, immediate access to mainstream national media for 600 colleges, universities, medical centers, public-policy groups and other leading nonprofit organizations. Posted by Michael at 11:09 PM | TrackBack FOUR AFFORDABLE HOUSING DEVELOPMENTS EARN HUD SECRETARY'S HOUSING AND COMMUNITY DESIGN AWARDFrom HUD Press Releases: Four affordable housing developments are the recipient of the HUD Secretary's Housing and Community Design Award for excellence in residential housing design. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the American Institute of Architects selected Greenbridge of White Center, Washington; K Lofts of San Diego, California; Valencia Gardens, of San Francisco, California; and Patrolia Loft of Boston, Massachusetts for redefining affordable housing and its place within the community. The awards were presented during the 2008 AIA National Convention and Design Exposition in Boston. "Each of these innovative designs produced homes that are breaking the affordable housing mold," said HUD Deputy Secretary Roy A. Bernardi. Greenbridge of White Center, Washington is a hundred-acre, mixed-income, "green community" of a thousand low-income...workforce...rental...and for-sale homes. This new HOPE SIX development replaces a 568-unit World War II-era low-income public housing project and promises to become an engine for change in the surrounding community. Greenbridge transforms the social failure of mid-20th Century planning into a new mixed-come neighborhood that provides affordable housing at multiple income levels, and replaces a project known for its high-crime rate with a neighborhood built around parks and open spaces. K Lofts of San Diego is a development that was created through a design process that included residents, community stakeholders, local government, and civic groups. Valencia Gardens of San Francisco, California is a HUD-funded HOPE SIX development produced a mixed-use, affordable, public housing community located on a five-acre site in San Francisco's Mission District. Patrolia Loft of Boston, Massachusetts is an interior fit-out of an existing concrete-shell apartment for a resident who requires a wheelchair. Posted by Michael at 10:52 PM | TrackBack Sad Children Outperform Happy Children in Attention-to-Detail TasksFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: Psychologists at the University of Virginia and the University of Plymouth (United Kingdom) have conducted experimental research that contrasts with the belief that happy children are the best learners. The findings, which currently appear online in the journal Developmental Science, and will be printed in the June issue, show that where attention to detail is required, happy children may be at a disadvantage. The researchers conducted a series of experiments with different child age groups who had happy or sad moods induced with the aid of music (Mozart and Mahler) and selected video clips ("Jungle Book" and "The Lion King"). The findings in each experiment with both music and video clips were conclusive, with the children induced to feel a sad or neutral mood performing the task better than those induced to feel a happy state of mind. Lead researcher Simone Schnall of the University of Plymouth describes the psychology behind the findings: "Happiness indicates that things are going well, which leads to a global, top-down style of information processing. We provide direct, immediate access to mainstream national media for 600 colleges, universities, medical centers, public-policy groups and other leading nonprofit organizations. AScribe transmits news releases directly to newsroom computer systems and desktops of major media organizations via a supremely trusted channel - The Associated Press. We also feed news to major news retrieval database services, online publications and to developers of web sites and Intranets. And AScribe does it at a cost all organizations, large and small, can afford, a fraction of what corporate newswires charge. Posted by Michael at 10:43 PM | TrackBack Why Middle School Creates the Pathway to College and the WorkforceUnited Way of Greater Los Angeles: This report examines the state of middle schools in L.A. County and the importance of middle grades on higher education, youth development, and eventual workforce readiness. This report contains a discussion on the importance middle grades play in young adulthood, the state of our middle schools (demographics, school capacities and academic achievement), the relationship between middle grades and higher education (high school graduation and college attendance), and more. Policy recommendations to improve schools and advance a nurturing learning environment for middle school students are also provided. There are approximately 400,000 middle school students in L.A. County, with a majority of students from minority and under-represented communities (73% are Latino or African-American, and at least 66% are in the free and reduced meal programs). For every 100 entering 9th grade students in L.A. County in 2002, only 57 actually graduated after four years. About 7 in 10 middle schools serving low income populations are failing federal education standards. Schools with 90% minority enrollment (Latino or African American) face extreme shortages of qualified teachers, employing only 45% of the qualified instructors that they need in math and science. Almost half of all students do not feel safe at school; 48% of 7th graders report being harassed, pushed or shoved at least one time. Posted by Michael at 5:44 PM | TrackBack May 29, 2008The Condition of Education 2008From Ascribe Newsfeed: A team of experts for the American Institutes for Research (AIR) played a key role in producing "The Condition of Education 2008," an annual report on the state of education in the United States that has been released by the federal government's National Center on Education Statistics (NCES). The congressionally mandated report, which was released Thursday, May 29, 2008, offers a detailed account of all aspects of U.S. education, from early childhood education and student achievement to post secondary education and school environment. A large number of AIR staff participated in various aspects of the project. AIR authors include Grace Kena, Rachel Dinkes, Angelina KewalRamani, Mary Ann Fox, Jana Kemp, Kristen Darling, Kevin Bianco and Lauren Drake. The full text of "The Condition of Education 2008," along with related data tables and indicators from previous years, can be viewed at http://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe. Established in 1946, with headquarters in Washington, D.C., the American Institutes for Research (AIR) is an independent, nonpartisan not-for-profit organization that conducts behavioral and social science research on important social issues and delivers technical assistance both domestically and internationally in the areas of health, education, and workforce productivity. We provide direct, immediate access to mainstream national media for 600 colleges, universities, medical centers, public-policy groups and other leading nonprofit organizations. AScribe transmits news releases directly to newsroom computer systems and desktops of major media organizations via a supremely trusted channel - The Associated Press. Posted by Michael at 11:57 PM | TrackBack Rite of Passage? Why Young Adults Become Uninsured and How New Policies Can Help, 2008 UpdateFrom The Commonwealth Fund: Young adults, ages 19 to 29, are one of the largest segments of the U.S. population without health insurance: 13.7 million lacked coverage in 2006. This issue brief outlines several policy changes to help uninsured young adults gain coverage and prevent others from losing it. Posted by Michael at 11:50 PM | TrackBack Young Adults at Risk: 13.7 Million Lack Health Insurance CoverageFrom The Commonwealth Fund: According to a newly updated report from The Commonwealth Fund, 38 percent of high school graduates who do not attend college and 34 percent of college graduates will spend some time uninsured in the year after graduation. Posted by Michael at 11:50 PM | TrackBack Bridging the math gender gapFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: New research published in the journal Science demonstrates that girls perform better in mathematics in more gender equal societies, in some cases besting male peers. The research, led in part by Kellogg School of Management Professor Paola Sapienza, sought to address the issue of whether social and cultural factors influence womens success in math and science. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 11:43 PM | TrackBack HUD ANNOUNCES DISASTER ASSISTANCE FOR GEORGIA STORM VICTIMSFrom HUD Press Releases: U.S. Housing and Urban Development Deputy Secretary Roy A. Bernardi today announced HUD will speed federal disaster assistance to the State of Georgia and provide support to homeowners and low-income renters forced from their homes following severe storms and tornadoes. This assistance includes foreclosure relief for families whose homes are insured through HUD's Federal Housing Administration (FHA) in Bibb, Carroll, Crawford, Douglas, Emanuel, Glynn, Jefferson, Jenkins, Johnson, Laurens, McIntosh, Treutlen, Twiggs, and Wilkinson Counties. President Bush's disaster declaration triggers a variety of federal assistance including grants for temporary housing and home repairs, low-cost loans to cover uninsured property losses, and other programs to help individuals and business owners recover from the effects of the disaster. "Whether it's foreclosure relief for FHA-insured families or helping these communities to rebuild, HUD stands ready to help in any way we can." "The last thing some of these families need to worry about is how to pay a mortgage on a home that's been severely damaged or destroyed. The President's disaster declaration also gives the State of Georgia the tools it needs to begin the rebuilding process." Offering the State of Georgia the ability to re-allocate existing federal resources toward disaster relief - HUD's Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) and HOME programs give the State the flexibility to redirect millions of dollars to address critical needs, including housing and services for tornado victims. HUD is the nation's housing agency committed to increasing homeownership, particularly among minorities; creating affordable housing opportunities for low-income Americans; and supporting the homeless, elderly, people with disabilities and people living with AIDS. Posted by Michael at 11:42 PM | TrackBack HUD ANNOUNCES DISASTER ASSISTANCE FOR IOWA STORM VICTIMSFrom HUD Press Releases: U.S. Housing and Urban Development Deputy Secretary Roy A. Bernardi today announced HUD will speed federal disaster assistance to the State of Iowa and provide support to homeowners and low-income renters forced from their homes following severe storms, tornadoes, and flooding. This assistance includes foreclosure relief for families whose homes are insured through HUD's Federal Housing Administration (FHA). President Bush's disaster declaration triggers a variety of federal assistance including grants for temporary housing and home repairs, low-cost loans to cover uninsured property losses, and other programs to help individuals and business owners recover from the effects of the disaster. "Whether it's foreclosure relief for FHA-insured families or helping these communities to rebuild, HUD stands ready to help in any way we can." "The last thing some of these families need to worry about is how to pay a mortgage on a home that's been severely damaged or destroyed. The President's disaster declaration also gives the State of Iowa the tools it needs to begin the rebuilding process." Offering the State of Iowa the ability to re-allocate existing federal resources toward disaster relief - HUD's Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) and HOME programs give the State the flexibility to redirect millions of dollars to address critical needs, including housing and services for tornado victims. HUD is the nation's housing agency committed to increasing homeownership, particularly among minorities; creating affordable housing opportunities for low-income Americans; and supporting the homeless, elderly, people with disabilities and people living with AIDS. Posted by Michael at 11:41 PM | TrackBack Another source of growing economic insecurityFrom Economic Policy Institute: There are many dimensions to the economic insecurity facing American families today. Mid-level incomes have stagnated in real terms over the past few years, and most recently, higher gas and food prices are taking a larger bite out of paychecks. But one dimension of economic insecurity gets less attention: the increase in family income volatility, or how much families' incomes fluctuate up and down over time. Recent analysis shows that families are facing much greater income swings than they did a generation ago. An included chart plots the increase in average family income volatility, showing various peaks and valleys around an upward trend since the mid-1970s. Over the last three decades, volatility by this measure has doubled. Posted by Michael at 11:39 PM | TrackBack The rising instability of family incomesFrom Economic Policy Institute: The Great Risk Shift (Hacker 2006; revised and expanded in 2008) documented a major post-1970s rise in family income instability and argued that it was one indicator of an increasing shift of economic risk from government and employers onto workers and their families. There is an important distinction between family income (total earnings, asset income, and transfer income for all members of a family) and individual earnings. More important, all of these measures---transitory variance, the standard deviation of income changes, and the probability of large income drops---show a substantial increase in family income instability. A final note before moving to the results themselves: While the PSID is a well-regarded data source used by many of the nation's top social scientists, questions have been raised about the quality of the data in the 1990s, when the survey procedures changed. The CBO study brings together individual earnings data from the Continuous Work History Sample (CWHS), based on Social Security wage records, with longitudinal family income data from the Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP). According to those in attendance when the CBO's preliminary results were presented at the American Economic Association's annual meeting in early January, the CBO actually found an increase in family income volatility when it used the SIPP data alone. A wealth of research in psychology and economics suggest that major income fluctuations create not just financial hardship, but also anxiety and discontent. Posted by Michael at 11:38 PM | TrackBack Children's diet not the main cause of ADHDFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Food may not be the major cause of hyperactivity in children; genetics, brain function and parental actions such as smoking may be just as important. A review of scientific evidence found only a minority of children were actually affected by what they eat. A combination of food, genetics and environmental toxins are more likely to be involved, with no single factor to blame. Foods which might affect behaviour, in particular table sugar were studied. No adverse effects were seen in children who had a sugary drink versus a drink with artificial sweetener. Parents often believe their children's diet is making them hyperactive and think changes in the food provided is the answer to the problem. ADHD (attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder) has a strong genetic link, with half the children born of parents with diagnosed ADHD likely to develop the disorder themselves. Chemical imbalances in the brain are also involved and studies have found that children with the condition have on average 4% smaller brains. Genes may interact with environmental toxins such as alcohol in the womb, lead, and parental smoking to cause later problems with attention span. Professor David Benton, who specialises in eating behaviour and who carried out the study said 'Parents say after an hour of eating sugary foods that their child is distracted and fidgety, but studies show that this is more what the mother expects to see and not what's really going on'. He added 'the origin of the idea that sugar is responsible for hyperactivity seems to be purely based on the fact that sugar is a source of energy, as are other carbohydrates. This review which was carried out at the University of Wales, Swansea is published in the May issue of the journal Critical Reviews in Food Science and Nutrition. Posted by Michael at 11:37 PM | TrackBack Most caregivers of young children lack basic knowledge of potentially toxic household productsFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: According to a new study, knowledge of potentially toxic household substances among primary caregivers for young children is alarmingly poor. The results show that less than one-third of primary caregivers for children under the age of six could correctly estimate the toxicity of household poisons. The study is being presented at the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine's 2008 Annual Meeting. These include: more education, responsibility for fewer children and an age greater than twenty-three years. This paper will be presented at the 2008 SAEM Annual Meeting, May 29-June 1, 2008, Washington, D.C. on Friday, May 30, 2008, in the poster presentations that will be held from 3:30 -- 5:30 in Exhibit Hall A of the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel. Abstracts of the papers presented are published in Vol. 15, No. 5, Supplement 1, May 2008 of the official journal of the SAEM, Academic Emergency Medicine. The Society for Academic Emergency Medicine (SAEM) is a national non-profit organization of over 6,000 academic emergency physicians, emergency medicine residents and medical students. SAEM's vision is to promote ready access to quality emergency care for all patients, to advance emergency medicine as an academic and clinical discipline, and to maintain the highest professional standards as clinicians, teachers, and researchers. Together, the companies have created a global publishing business with deep strength in every major academic and professional field. Posted by Michael at 11:34 PM | TrackBack American Dental Education Association Members Meet With Legislators and Staff at Advocacy DayFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: American Dental Education Association members from 25 states visited more than 90 Congressional offices to educate members of Congress and their staff about issues affecting access to oral health care and funding for dental and craniofacial research last month. These activities were part of the annual AADR-ADEA Advocacy Day, hosted jointly by the American Association for Dental Research (AADR) and the American Dental Education Association (ADEA). The event was attended by over 50 representatives from academic dental institutions, dental research, and patient advocate groups. "No dental school can do on its own what ADEA can do for us collectively through events such as Advocacy Day." Specific issues that members discussed with their representatives were the Deamonte Driver Dental Care Access Improvement Act of 2008, funding for the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research (NIDCR), and legislation to prevent the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services from implementing several directives that would reduce funding and impede access to Medicaid and SCHIP. Prior to their visits with Members of Congress, participants spent a day in a legislative workshop listening to noted speakers that included Bill Press, host of The Bill Press Show, a nationally syndicated radio talk show, and Lawrence A. Tabak, D.D.S., Ph.D., Director of the National Institute for Dental and Craniofacial Research (NIDCR) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The mission of ADEA is to lead individuals and institutions of the dental education community to address contemporary issues influencing education, research, and the delivery of oral health care for the health of the public. We provide direct, immediate access to mainstream national media for 600 colleges, universities, medical centers, public-policy groups and other leading nonprofit organizations. AScribe transmits news releases directly to newsroom computer systems and desktops of major media organizations via a supremely trusted channel - The Associated Press. Posted by Michael at 12:42 AM | TrackBack 300 Teens in 21 California Libraries to Examine Hidden Meanings in Everyday Places in Innovative Writing, Photography Program; 10-Week Statewide Program Aims to Connect Teens to Their CommunitiesFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: The California Council for the Humanities has awarded grants to 21 California libraries to conduct an innovative Council-developed photography and writing project for teens this summer and fall. The program was inspired by the work of John Stilgoe, professor of landscape history at Harvard University, and his book "Outside Lies Magic: Regaining History and Awareness in Everyday Places." "Stilgoe sees everyday landscape as a historical record and wants to awaken people to the excitement of going outside and exploring their surroundings," said Council Executive Director Ralph Lewin. "Senior Programs Manager Felicia Kelley developed the My Place program by expanding on Stilgoe's ideas and making them accessible to kids," Lewin added. In addition to connecting young people to their communities, the My Place program aims to increase intergenerational understanding, promote civic engagement and highlight the role of libraries as centers of community cultural life. The Council's new California Stories campaign, How I See It, is helping young people to share - in their own words and through a variety of media - what their lives are like, what they care about, and what it's like to grow up in today's California. For more information, visit the Council's website at http://www.californiastories.org or contact the Council's administrative office at 415-391-1474. AScribe transmits news releases directly to newsroom computer systems and desktops of major media organizations via a supremely trusted channel - The Associated Press. Posted by Michael at 12:36 AM | TrackBack First State-by-State Health System Scorecard to Focus on Children Finds Wide Differences in Health CareFrom The Commonwealth Fund: States vary widely in the quality of health care children receive, as well as children's access to care, family insurance premiums, equity, and the potential to lead long healthy, productive lives, according to a new scorecard issued by The Commonwealth Fund. The report, U.S. Variations In Child Health System Performance: A State Scorecard, by Commonwealth Fund researchers Katherine Shea, M.P.H., Karen Davis, Ph.D., and Edward Schor, M.D., ranked states on 13 indicators for children grouped in categories that include access, quality, costs, equity, and healthy outcomes. States in the Northeast and Upper Midwest often rank high in multiple areas. In contrast, states with the lowest rankings tend to be concentrated in the South and Southwest. However, there was room for improvement in even the highest ranked states, which fell short of established standards on some indicators. Typically, states that fell in the bottom of the overall ranking lagged well behind their peers on the access to care measure and struggled with other measures. In general, scorecard authors found that children in the bottom ranked states are less likely to get the recommended health care, including vaccines, dental care, and regular check-ups. And, children in those states are at greater risk for developmental delays and infant mortality. Quality scores indicate that across the country children aren't receiving the vaccines they need, don't have access to mental health care for emotional problems and are at high risk for developmental delays, aren't getting their regular medical and dental check-ups, don't have a medical home, and are more likely to end up in the hospital if they have asthma. Posted by Michael at 12:34 AM | TrackBack U.S. Variations in Child Health System Performance: A State ScorecardFrom The Commonwealth Fund: This report examines variations among states' child health care systems, building on the State Scorecard published by The Commonwealth Fund Commission on a High Performance Health System. Focusing on 13 performance indicators of access, quality, costs, equity, and the potential to lead healthy lives, the authors find wide variation among states, including distinct regional patterns. Top-performing states, such as Iowa and Vermont, have adopted policies to expand children's access to care and improve the quality of care. While leading states outperform lagging states on multiple indicators, all states have opportunities to improve. Twenty-eight million children are covered by Medicaid, and 6 million are covered by the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), which was enacted in 1997 to expand coverage of children in low-income families. Yet, some states do better than others in promoting the health and development of their youngest residents, and in ensuring that all children are on course to lead healthy and productive lives. The analysis focuses on 13 indicators of child health system performance along the dimensions of access, quality, costs, and the "potential to lead healthy lives." Iowa and Vermont have created children's health care systems that are accessible, equitable, and deliver high-quality care, all while controlling levels of spending and family health insurance premiums. Over the last decade, both states adopted policies to expand children's access to care and improve their quality of care. Sixty-one percent of children in New Hampshire, and over half of all children in all the New England states, have a medical home, compared with only one-third in Mississippi. There are strong regional patterns in child health system performance. Posted by Michael at 12:32 AM | TrackBack New study shows sedentary high school girls are at significant risk for future osteoporosisFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Significant numbers of female high school athletes and non-athletes suffer from one or more components of the female athlete triad, a combination of three conditions that can lead to cardiovascular disease, according to a new study by Medical College of Wisconsin researchers in Milwaukee. The study results were presented today at the American College of Sports Medicine at Indianapolis, by Anne Z. Hoch, D.O., associate professor of orthopedic surgery and physical medicine and rehabilitation at the Medical College, and director of the Froedtert & Medical College Sports Medicine Program. Dr. Hoch found that 78 percent of female high school athletes and 65 percent of female high school non-athletes display one or more components of the female athlete triad. The triad is a combination of three conditions -- low energy availability, menstrual abnormalities and low bone mineral density -- that often leads to the same steroid and hormonal profiles as postmenopausal women. "We are concerned that non athletic girls have some of the same components of the female athlete triad as athletes and are in fact at greater risk for low bone density," says Dr. Hoch. In an effort to lose weight, they are restricting their caloric intake and adapting unhealthy nutrition habits." Both groups showed little difference in low energy availability, with 39 percent of non-athletes and 36 percent of athletes reporting this condition. The study was funded in part by a grant from the General Clinical Research Center, which has evolved into the Clinical and Translational Science Institute; the Medical College's Cardiovascular Center; and the Steve Cullen Run and Walk. Posted by Michael at 12:32 AM | TrackBack Child maltreatment victims lose 2 years of quality of lifeFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Child maltreatment is associated with reductions in quality of life even decades later, according to a new University of Georgia study that finds that---on average---victims lose at least two years of quality of life. UGA College of Public Health associate professor Phaedra Corso and her colleagues at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention analyzed surveys of more than 6,000 people to assess the deficits in quality of life that victims suffer. Childhood maltreatment---which includes physical, sexual and emotional abuse and neglect---has been linked to an increased risk for ailments ranging from heart disease, obesity and diabetes to depression and anxiety. Corso said few studies have examined the long-term impact of childhood maltreatment on quality of life, and, until now, none had been designed so that the measures can be used in comparative economic impact analyses. These analyses are important, Corso said, because they allow public health officials to compare the costs and benefits of two unrelated public health interventions. To assess reductions in quality of life, the team matched responses to a survey that assessed physical functioning, pain, cognitive functioning and social support with data from surveys that explicitly asked people how many years of life they would trade to be free of a given health condition. "For children and adults to live to their full potential, we must support programs that stop child maltreatment before it ever begins and work to help those who have already experienced it." The researchers also found significant differences among age groups, with the gap between the non-maltreated and maltreated group growing smaller---but never disappearing---in older age groups. Posted by Michael at 12:31 AM | TrackBack May 27, 2008More Than 1 Million People Benefit from Goodwill Programs; Historic Record Demonstrates Continued Need for Employment ServicesFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: Through its network of independent agencies in North America, the organization realized an estimated $3.2 (b) billion in revenues, also a record high. "For the first time in our 100+ years of helping people, we have passed the 1 million mark," says Jim Gibbons, President and CEO of Goodwill Industries International. "At Goodwill, we see that in this time of economic uncertainty, people need the job training and other support we offer more than ever." Goodwill helps people who are having a hard time finding a job - either because of a disability, poverty, lack of education and work experience or another obstacle -by selling donations of clothing and household items in Goodwill stores and using the revenue to fund job training programs that benefit hundreds of thousands of people each year. "We aim to help people climb the career ladder so that they can move out of poverty and enjoy the dignity and independence that work brings." "Every 53 seconds of every business day last year, Goodwill placed someone in a good job," says Gibbons. "By donating and shopping Goodwill, you are investing in the economic strength of your community." To learn more about Goodwill programs in your community, visit http://www.goodwill.org or call 800-664-6577. AScribe Newswire distributes news from nonprofit and public sector organizations. We provide direct, immediate access to mainstream national media for 600 colleges, universities, medical centers, public-policy groups and other leading nonprofit organizations. AScribe transmits news releases directly to newsroom computer systems and desktops of major media organizations via a supremely trusted channel - The Associated Press. Posted by Michael at 9:00 PM | TrackBack Race, Ethnicity, and the Subprime Mortgage CrisisFrom Economic Policy Institute: The subprime mortgage crisis, with its links to the broader housing sector and to financial markets, is at the top of the national policy agenda. As Congress and the Federal Reserve consider proposals for reform, it is important to consider how and why this crisis came to have a disproportionate impact on communities of color. On Thursday, June 12, 2008, EPI's Program on Race, Ethnicity, and the Economy presents a panel discussion to examine the reasons for this disparate impact and how policy reforms can be best tailored to serve the communities hardest hit by the crisis. Posted by Michael at 8:59 PM | TrackBack Prevalence of obesity among US children and teens does not increaseFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: There was no significant increase in the prevalence of obese children and teens in the U.S. between 1999 and 2006, in contrast to the increase that had been reported in prior years, according to a study in the May 28 issue of JAMA. Height and weight measurements were obtained from 8,165 children and adolescents as part of the 2003-2004 and 2005-2006 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), which are nationally representative surveys of the U.S. population. High BMI was defined based on 2000 sex-specific BMI-for-age growth charts, and was reported based on three levels: at or above the 97th percentile, at or above the 95th percentile, and at or above the 85th percentile, according to these growth charts for U.S. children by age, sex and racial/ethnic group. No statistically significant change in high BMI for age was found between 2003-2004 and 2005-2006. No statistically significant trend in high BMI was found over the time periods 1999-2000, 2001-2002, 2003-2004, and 2005-2006. Because no significant differences were found between 2003-2004 and 2005-2006, these 2 two-year survey periods were combined to make detailed population estimates for the prevalence of high BMI. For 2003-2006, 11.3 percent of children and adolescents were at or above the 97th percentile of BMI for age. For the same period, 16.3 percent of children and adolescents had a BMI for age at or above the 95th percentile of BMI for age, and 31.9 percent were at or above the 85th percentile. Prevalence estimates varied by age and by racial/ethnic group. Non-Hispanic black and Mexican American girls were more likely to have a high BMI for age than non-Hispanic white girls. Posted by Michael at 8:59 PM | TrackBack Secondhand smoke increases hospital admissions for all types of infectious diseasesFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Children exposed to second hand tobacco smoke are more likely to get severe infectious diseases and have to be admitted to hospital, finds research published online ahead of print in Tobacco Control. These children are at greater risk of a whole range of infectious illnesses, such as meningococcal disease, and not just respiratory illness, the results showed. The researchers assessed the relationship between second hand smoke exposure and first admission to hospital for any infectious illness for 7,402 children born in Hong Kong in April and May 1997. Children who lived in the household of someone who smoked within three metres of them during their first few months of life were the most at risk of being admitted to hospital with one in three admitted by the age of 12 months. The earlier the exposure to smoke the more profound the effect with exposure to second hand smoke during the first six months of life increasing the likelihood of being admitted to hospital for an infectious disease during the eight years by almost 45 per cent. More vulnerable infants were also at increased risk of hospitalisation with those born with a low birth weight being 75 per cent more likely to be admitted to hospital with an infectious disease during the eight years and those who were premature being twice as likely. "An excess risk of severe morbidity from both respiratory and other infections for all infants exposed to second hand smoke suggests that such exposure, as well as acting via direct contact with the respiratory tract, may also affect the immune system," they say. They add that premature infants and those with a low birth rate might be more at risk because their respiratory and immune systems were less well developed. Posted by Michael at 8:59 PM | TrackBack Early Intervention for Infants and Toddlers With Developmental Delays UnderutilizedFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: Results of a new University of Colorado Denver School of Medicine study are raising concerns regarding the nation's children suffering from developmental delays. An early intervention program run by all 50 states is available for children under age three but it is not being utilized, especially for African-American children. Part C early intervention is specified in the Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act (IDEA) as an early intervention program for children age 3 and younger with developmental delays. "This study documents high rates of Part C eligibility nationally but found only a small proportion of children who are likely to be Part C eligible actually receive early intervention," said Steven Rosenberg, PhD, associate professor of psychiatry at UC Denver School of Medicine and the study's principal investigator. The School of Medicine (http://www.uchsc.edu/som/) faculty work to advance science and improve care as the physicians, educators and scientists at University of Colorado Hospital, The Children's Hospital, Denver Health, National Jewish Medical and Research Center, and the Denver Veterans Affairs Medical Center. For additional news and information, please visit the UC Denver newsroom (http://www.uchsc.edu/news/) online. We provide direct, immediate access to mainstream national media for 600 colleges, universities, medical centers, public-policy groups and other leading nonprofit organizations. AScribe transmits news releases directly to newsroom computer systems and desktops of major media organizations via a supremely trusted channel - The Associated Press. We also feed news to major news retrieval database services, online publications and to developers of web sites and Intranets. Posted by Michael at 8:57 PM | TrackBack Arizona's First Things First Early Childhood InitiativeFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: Governor Janet Napolitano, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and the Education Commission of the States (ECS) will hold a groundbreaking Forum here Friday, May 30, to discuss ways of strengthening the pathways between Arizona's First Things First early childhood initiative and its existing K-12 system. The meeting will also discuss ways to integrate early childhood programs into the work of Arizona's P-20 Council, established to improve and align the state's early childhood through postsecondary education systems and align them to the expectations of 21st century employers. The Forum is the first of five throughout the country co-sponsored by Kellogg and ECS (the others are in Colorado, Connecticut, Ohio and Pennsylvania). To participate, call 1-800-227-9428 and use pass code "Arizona." Governor Napolitano will speak at approximately 10:30 a.m., followed by remarks from Rufus Glasper, P-20 Council chair; Sterling Speirn, president of the W.K. Kellogg Foundation; and Roger Sampson, president of ECS. Posted by Michael at 8:56 PM | TrackBack May 25, 2008Fixing the education digital disconnect one video game at a timeFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: On Thursday, 22 May 2008, the Federation of American Scientists (FAS) will launch Immune Attack TM, an exciting, fun and fast-moving video game that teaches the critical scientific facts of immunology. "My students were very engaged while playing Immune Attack," said Netia Elam, AP Biology Teacher at Forest Park High School in Woodbridge, VA. The game allows students to use sights, sounds, and touch to get better acquainted with the immune system. It also encourages them to interact with each other and have problem-solving discussions to enhance their game-play and ultimately learn the subject. The challenges in Immune Attack give those who might not otherwise be interested in biology the chance to learn in a fun, hands-on manner they won't find in a text book," said Michelle Lucey-Roper, director of the Learning Technologies Program at FAS. FAS is researching and developing ways to produce complex games and 3-D interactive simulations that will one day revolutionize education and how people learn. Immune Attack builds on insights from FAS's Learning Science and Technology Research and Development Roadmap, the FAS report "Harnessing the Power of Video Games for Learning", and the Digital Opportunity Investment Trust (DO IT) -- a proposal to transform learning and training for the 21st century. To schedule an interview or photo opportunity with Henry Kelly or Michelle Lucey-Roper, please contact Monica Amarelo at mamarelo@fas.org or (202) 454-4680. Also Netia Elam of Forest Park High School in Woodbridge, VA, and students from McKinley Technology High School in DC are available for interviews in advance or on-site. Posted by Michael at 10:59 PM | TrackBack Public schools as good as private schools in raising math scoresFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Students in public schools learn as much or more math between kindergarten and fifth grade as similar students in private schools, according to a new University of Illinois study of multi-year, longitudinal data on nearly 10,000 students. "These data provide strong, longitudinal evidence that public schools are at least as effective as private schools in boosting student achievement," according to the authors, education professor Christopher Lubienski, doctoral student Corinna Crane and education professor Sarah Theule Lubienski. Combined with other, yet-unpublished studies of the same data, which produced similar findings, "we think this effectively ends the debate about whether private schools are more effective than publics," said Christopher Lubienski, whose research has dealt with all aspects of alternative education. This is important, he said, because many current reforms, such as No Child Left Behind, charter schools and vouchers for private schools, are based on that assumption. Both studies were based on fourth- and eighth-grade test data from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). The conclusions of the husband-and-wife team seemed "crazy radical" at the time, Sarah Lubienski said, and generated significant controversy. (Unlike literacy, math is viewed as being less dependent on a student's home environment and more an indication of a school's effectiveness, Sarah Lubienski said.) After adjusting for demographics and initial kindergarten scores, they found that achievement gains between kindergarten and fifth grade were roughly equal. "It is worth noting," the researchers write in analyzing their results, "how little variation school type really accounts for in students' growth in achievement ... Posted by Michael at 10:54 PM | TrackBack National Initiative Aims to Set Record Voter Turnout at Colleges and UniversitiesFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: To help ensure that students stay engaged through the general election, the National Campus Voter Registration Project (http://www.yourvoteyourvoice.org/) has launched a nonpartisan, nationwide campaign to register college students, educate students about the issues and candidates, and motivate students to go to the polls on Election Day. The National Campus Voter Registration Project, is a joint effort of 50 national higher education associations (http://www.yourvoteyourvoice.org/sponsors.html) that provides resources to the nation's 3,700 colleges and universities to aid campus efforts for the 2008 election. Throughout the primaries, polls have shown record levels of engagement among the nation's youth, especially with college students, who have taken on active roles in the 2008 primary season. The project is co-chaired by the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities (http://www.naicu.edu/) (NAICU), American Association of State Colleges and Universities (http://www.aascu.org/) (AASCU), and Council of Independent Colleges (http://www.cic.org/) (CIC). "In the last two presidential elections, students saw the difference that each individual vote can make," said NAICU President David L. Warren (http://www.naicu.edu/about/id.284/default.asp). If the momentum continues through the party conventions and into the fall, the student vote will not only hit a record high but it could determine our next president." A complete list of the participating 50 national higher education associations can be found at http://www.yourvoteyourvoice.org/. With nearly 1,000 member institutions and associations, NAICU reflects the diversity of private, nonprofit higher education in the United States. We provide direct, immediate access to mainstream national media for 600 colleges, universities, medical centers, public-policy groups and other leading nonprofit organizations. Posted by Michael at 10:50 PM | TrackBack Americans believe wounded Iraq war veterans are not receiving high quality medical care in USFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: As part of the ongoing poll series, Debating Health: Election 2008, a recent survey by the Harvard Opinion Research Program at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) and Harris Interactive® finds that a majority of Americans (62%) believe that wounded Iraq war veterans do not receive high quality care in military and Veteran's Administration (VA) hospitals once they return to the U.S. Similar majorities feel that veterans requiring rehabilitation care and mental health care do not receive high quality care (62% and 65% respectively). This survey follows a number of recent news stories on the quality of health care provided to Iraq war veterans. Americans who have a close family member who is serving or has served in the military are just as likely as Americans with no military connection to say that wounded Iraq veterans do not receive high quality care in military and VA hospitals (64% versus 59%). The quality of medical care that wounded soldiers receive on the front lines in Iraq has gotten more favorable news coverage than the care that war veterans receive in the U.S. Many reports have noted that wounded soldiers who would not have survived their injuries in previous wars are surviving today due to the high quality medical care they receive in Iraq. Compared to both remaining Democratic presidential candidates, more Americans feel that John McCain will make sure that wounded veterans returning from Iraq receive high quality health services. "Providing quality health care for our soldiers in harm's way here and abroad is an emotional issue for many Americans," said Humphrey Taylor, Chairman of The Harris Poll®. Posted by Michael at 10:38 PM | TrackBack Unemployment Insurance Extension Passes Senate, 75 to 22From Economic Policy Institute: On Thursday, the Senate passed, by a veto-proof margin, an amendment to the war supplemental appropriations bill that included emergency extensions to unemployment insurance. The provision extends unemployment benefits by 13 weeks for all workers nationwide (and an additional 13 weeks for workers in high-unemployment states), and would help ease an enormous strain for more than 4 million jobless workers and their families who are most hurt by the economic downturn. The measure now returns to the House of Representatives, where it must also pass by a two-thirds margin to override a threatened presidential veto. Read about it in EPI's latest Policy Memo. Posted by Michael at 10:34 PM | TrackBack May 22, 2008HUD Charges Pennsylvania Owners with Violating Fair Housing ActFrom HUD Press Releases: The Fair Housing Act makes it unlawful for a housing provider to refuse to rent to families because they have children and to make, print or publish, in print or on-line, any statement or advertisement that states a preference for single people or couples without children. A converted warehouse, Lofts at the Mill consists of 74 residential apartment units. During 2005 and 2006, the property manager ran several ads in newspapers and on the Internet, which advertised the property as "21 and over." After viewing these advertisements, a local fair housing group contacted Danny Joyce, the property manager, to inform him that the language violated the Fair Housing Act because it prohibits families with children from living or renting at the Mill. Upon learning of the discriminatory content of the advertisements, the Department of Housing and Urban Development exercised its authority to initiate complaints when no individual came forward to file a complaint. As part of its investigation, HUD utilized undercover testers to determine whether the mangers refused to rent to families with children. Another tester was given a brochure that contained the statement, "The Mill is an apartment community catering to young professionals and all occupants must be twenty-one years or older." "Our message to all landlords is clear discriminating against families with children is against the law," said Kim Kendrick, HUD Assistant Secretary for Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity (FHEO). The HUD charge now goes before an administrative law judge who may award damages to each complainant for actual loss as a result of the alleged discrimination, as well as damages for emotional distress, humiliation, and loss of civil rights. Posted by Michael at 7:51 PM | TrackBack Fine San Francisco Restaurants Collaborate in SummerTini, a Fun Cocktail Event Benefiting Homeless Culinary StudentsFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: For the fourth year in a row, members of San Francisco's food community have joined forces to organize SummerTini, a benefit on Friday, June 13 for the CHEFS program of Episcopal Community Services (ECS). The fourth annual SummerTini event will benefit Conquering Homelessness through Employment in Food Service (CHEFS), ECS's culinary training program that places homeless adults in gainful employment within the food industry. Today more than 85 percent of CHEFS graduates acquire jobs, which is a tremendous rate given the complex challenges associated with chronic homelessness that many face. Starting 24 years ago with the opening of the Episcopal Sanctuary Shelter, ECS has grown to 10 permanent supportive housing sites for over 1,000 formerly homeless individuals and families, two large shelters helping 500 people a night, senior services, and a skills center providing education and training. ECS's ongoing case management, access to healthcare, and employment services have all made a strategic difference in the lives of chronically homeless people. It's an event where you can do good, feel great and have lots of fun," said Pablo Wong, President of ECS's Board of Directors. Take your Friday night happy hour and support a valued program in our city. We provide direct, immediate access to mainstream national media for 600 colleges, universities, medical centers, public-policy groups and other leading nonprofit organizations. AScribe transmits news releases directly to newsroom computer systems and desktops of major media organizations via a supremely trusted channel - The Associated Press. Posted by Michael at 7:43 PM | TrackBack A trial of removing food additives should be considered for hyperactive childrenFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: A properly supervised trial eliminating colours and preservatives from the diet of hyperactive children should considered a part of the standard treatment, says an editorial in this week's BMJ. Although a substantial body of evidence shows a link between attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and artificial food colourings and preservatives, removing them is still considered as an alternative rather than a standard treatment for ADHD, writes Professor Andrew Kemp from the University of Sydney. In contrast, despite a lack of evidence for its effectiveness, the use of alternative medicine is widespread---up to 50% of children attending tertiary children's hospitals in the UK and Australia have used it in the past year. Of the three main treatments for ADHD in children---drugs, behavioural therapy, and dietary modification---only drugs and dietary modification are supported by data from several trials. Yet, behavioural therapy, which has no scientific evidence base, is still thought of as necessary for "adequate treatment", he says. In light of these findings, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) reviewed the evidence linking preservatives and colourings with hyperactive behaviours from 22 studies between 1975 and 1994 and two additional meta-analyses. 16 of the studies reported positive effects in at least some of the children. However, the EFSA pointed out that hyperactivity has a wide range of social and biological causes, and exclusively focusing on food additives may "detract from the provision of adequate treatment" for children with the disorder. Removing colours and preservatives is a relatively harmless intervention, so a properly supervised and evaluated trial period of eliminating them should be considered as part of the standard treatment, he concludes. Posted by Michael at 7:41 PM | TrackBack High-school girls who consider themselves attractive are more likely to be targets for bullyingFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: University of Alberta Educational Psychology PhD student Lindsey Leenaars has completed a study that assessed what types of high school students are being indirectly victimized. This includes being involved in emotionally damaging scenarios such as receiving hurtful anonymous notes, being socially excluded, or having rumours spread about them, including threats of physical harm. Leenaars analyzed data that was collected in Ontario in 2003. More than 2,300 students aged 12--18 filled out an anonymous questionnaire asking them questions, including how they rate their attractiveness, their sexual activity, their friendships and school social problems. Leenaars found the females who viewed themselves as attractive had a 35 per cent increased chance of being indirectly victimized. Conversely, for males who perceived themselves as good looking, their risk of being bullied decreased by 25 per cent. Leenaars also found older teens (aged 16--18) were at a 35 per cent increased risk of being victimized if they were sexually active. Leenaars says this information could be used to raise awareness amongst parents, teachers and counselors. She adds it would also be helpful when schools are working on a variety of anti-bullying programs to include all students, not just those who may be traditionally perceived as victims. "The findings have important implications for the development of interventions designed to reduce peer victimization, in that victims of indirect aggression may represent a broad group." This study was recently published in the journal Aggressive Behavior. Posted by Michael at 7:39 PM | TrackBack Fruit juice consumption not related to overweight in childrenFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Despite studies that assert otherwise, 100% fruit juice consumption is not related to overweight in children, according to the authors of "A Review of the Relationship Between 100% Fruit Juice Consumption and Weight in Children and Adolescents" in the May/June issue of the American Journal of Lifestyle Medicine (AJLM), published by SAGE. The statistics about overweight children are alarming. Over the past 20 years, there has been an increased prevalence of overweight and at-risk-for overweight in all ages and ethnic groups. "Health professionals and policy makers should be encouraged to objectively review the literature on all beverages and encourage consumption of healthful beverages including water, milk, and 100% fruit juice," according to the authors. The article by O'Neil and Nicklas clears up misconceptions that many healthcare professionals and parents may have about this issue." This article can be viewed for free for a limited time online at http://ajl.sagepub.com/cgi/rapidpdf/1559827608317277v1. The journal provides commentaries and research reviews on nutrition and diet, cardiovascular disease, obesity, anxiety and depression, sleep problems, metabolic disease, and more in a readable, immediately accessible, and usable format. SAGE is a leading international publisher of journals, books, and electronic media for academic, educational, and professional markets. Since 1965, SAGE has helped inform and educate a global community of scholars, practitioners, researchers, and students spanning a wide range of subject areas including business, humanities, social sciences, and science, technology and medicine. A privately owned corporation, SAGE has principal offices in Los Angeles, London, New Delhi, and Singapore. Posted by Michael at 7:39 PM | TrackBack May 21, 2008American Lung Association Launches Online Photo Campaign to Expose Big Tobacco in Communities NationwideFrom PR Newswire: Association has launched an online photo campaign in order to solicit the public's help in exposing the most egregious examples of tobacco advertising to children and teens in communities nationwide. The American Lung Association encourages all concerned individuals to expose Big Tobacco in their communities by using digital cameras or cell phones to snap and upload photos of inappropriate tobacco advertising to young people and other targeted populations by visiting the "Healthy Lungs" application on Facebook. Each photo submission must be accompanied by the city and state where it was taken, along with the name of the retail establishment. "Tobacco companies continue to target young people with advertising," said Bernadette Toomey, President and CEO, American Lung Association. "This pending legislation will finally give the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) the authority to curb tobacco marketing to youth, to set standards for tobacco products and to require claims made about tobacco products to be truthful." Convenience stores near schools, for example, often feature tobacco advertising near candy displays -- and promote candy flavored cigarettes. Not surprisingly, 1,300 children become regular smokers each day, while smoking remains the number one preventable cause of death in the U.S. Join the American Lung Association in exposing big tobacco in communities nationwide and encouraging Members of Congress to pass the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act this spring. Beginning our second century, the American Lung Association is the leading organization working to prevent lung disease and promote lung health. With the generous support of the public, the American Lung Association is "Improving life, one breath at a time." Posted by Michael at 11:36 PM | TrackBack Statement from U.S. Secretary of Education and U.S. Secretary of the Treasury on Student LoansFrom Education Newsfeed: As part of its continued commitment to make sure students have access to federal student loans in the coming academic year, the Administration today announced a four-part plan designed to improve the functioning of the student loan marketplace and provide liquidity and stability in the near term to ensure that all qualified students have access to federally insured loans for the coming school year. The plan includes a loan purchase commitment under which the Department agrees to purchase new federal loans originated for the 2008-2009 academic year, as well as a facility for providing short-term liquidity to lenders lacking access to affordable capital due to disruptions in credit markets. In addition, the plan includes a commitment to continue working with the lending community to explore ways to reengage capital markets; a strengthened lender-of-last-resort program to help insure students against shifting market forces; and increased Direct Loan capacity should it be needed to serve as an extra cushion for students. These efforts further the Administration's commitment to develop solutions that provide liquidity for student loans while supporting the current Federal Family Education Loan (FFEL) Program as a successful public/private partnership at no increased cost to taxpayers. "Over the past several months, I have worked closely with Secretary Paulson and others in the Administration to closely monitor events in the federal student loan market and actively engage the student loan community on our mutual goal of ensuring continued access to federal student loans for students and families," said Secretary Spellings. "I am confident that the Department of Education has designed a program that will facilitate the origination of new FFEL loans for the upcoming school year," said Secretary Paulson. Posted by Michael at 11:34 PM | TrackBack Budget myopia threatens 21st Century G.I. BillFrom Economic Policy Institute: This is a classic example of Beltway budget myopia. Furthermore, the proposed benefit expansion would have an imperceptible effect on the federal budget deficit. The included chart shows the share of the federal budget devoted to veterans' benefits and services, including projections from the Office of Management and Budget, through 2013. It also shows the effects of the enhanced educational benefits, using a cost estimate from the Congressional Budget Office. Essentially, the proposed increase would push up veterans' benefits as a share of total federal outlays by 0.15%. The federal government spent roughly $8,560 on each member of the U.S. population in 2007. If the enhanced veterans' benefits currently under debate had been in effect, this would have added only about $12 to this total. Blocking these hugely valuable benefits on the grounds of deficit hawkishness makes no economic sense. Posted by Michael at 11:33 PM | TrackBack ICU physicians less likely to discuss prognoses with African-American patientsFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: An important study raises concern about the way intensive care physicians approach patients and families facing serious end-of-life medical decisions. Based on interviews with more than 1,200 ICU physicians at five major medical centers across the country, researchers conclude that physicians are less comfortable discussing end-of-life issues and do it less frequently with African-American patients and their families than with Caucasian patients and families. J. Daryl Thornton, M.D., M.P.H., of the Center for Reducing Health Disparities at MetroHealth Medical Center in Cleveland and Case Western Reserve University (CWRU), an assistant professor at CWRU, will present the findings at the American Thoracic Society's 2008 International Conference in Toronto on Wednesday, May 21. "That is why it is so important that physicians are comfortable delivering difficult and sometimes complex diagnoses, potential outcomes and prognoses to patients and families in the ICU," said Dr. Thornton. "Our study suggests there may be some underlying biases and/or discomfort among physicians, which impacts their ability to have these difficult conversations with families." These two studies, taken together, suggest we need to collect more information about what impacts the prognostic decisions by physicians, and whether any underlying biases are influencing the way they communicate with patients and families." On the third day of the study, physicians were asked if they had had prognostic conversations with their patients or their patients' surrogates (the person appointed by the patient to make their medical decisions). The findings should be replicated and would be an important area for health disparities research---understanding the effects of physician biases on decision-making, communication and patient outcomes in the ICU," said Dr. Thornton. Posted by Michael at 11:23 PM | TrackBack Quitting smoking helps social lifeFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Putting down cigarettes for good can have unexpected social benefits, according to new research from Harvard and the University of California, San Diego. Smoking is bad, it turns out, not only for your physical wellbeing but for your social health, too -- with smokers increasingly edged out to the margins of social circles. Another significant finding of the study, published in the May 22 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, is that the decision to quit appears to be taken up almost communally, with whole clusters of spouses, friends, siblings and co-workers giving up the habit at about the same time. The researchers -- Nicholas Christakis of Harvard Medical School and James Fowler of UC San Diego -- analyzed changes in smoking behavior from 1971 to 2003 in a large social network of 12,067 densely interconnected people. Using data from the same Framingham Heart Study (which, among other things, was the first to identify the link between smoking and cardiovascular disease), the researchers observed that smoking behaviors are subject to similar social-network effects, at two and three degrees of separation. Except that quitting smoking, they found, spread through the network not only like one domino knocking down the next, which in turn knocks down another, but also like a house of cards collapsing. Christakis and Fowler note that their findings speak both to the power of relationships and to the efficacy of public-health campaigns to reduce smoking. Generally, the researchers found, the closer the relationship between contacts, the greater the influence when one person quit smoking. Posted by Michael at 11:22 PM | TrackBack Smokers flock together, quit togetherFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: When smokers kick the habit, odds are they are not alone in making the move. Instead, the decision to quit smoking often cascades through social networks, with entire clusters of spouses, friends, siblings and co-workers giving up the habit roughly in tandem, according to a new study supported in part by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The report, appearing in the May 22, 2008, New England Journal of Medicine and funded primarily by the National Institute on Aging (NIA), part of the NIH, could play a role in developing clinical and public health interventions to reduce and prevent smoking. Christakis and Fowler analyzed data collected on the network's smoking behaviors between 1971 and 2003. The researchers found the closer the relationship between contacts, the greater the influence when one person quit smoking. When a sibling quit, it reduced the chance of smoking by 25 percent among their brothers and sisters. In small firms, a co-worker quitting could decrease smoking among peers by 34 percent. "Interestingly, geography did not appear to play a role because smoking behaviors spread between contacts living miles apart and in separate households," said Christakis. To learn more about this research and related national health education campaigns, including a Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) awareness campaign, go to www.nhlbi.nih.gov. It is the primary federal agency for conducting and supporting basic, clinical and translational medical research, and it investigates the causes, treatments and cures for both common and rare diseases. For more information about NIH and its programs, visit www.nih.gov. Posted by Michael at 11:22 PM | TrackBack Rising Teen Birth Rate Takes $1.7 Billion Toll on California TaxpayersFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: OAKLAND, Calif., May 21 (AScribe Newswire) -- The end of California's 15-year decline in teen birth rates couldn't come at a worse time for a state already in fiscal crisis. According to the "No Time for Complacency: Teen Births in California" report released today by the Public Health Institute (PHI), rising teen birth rates are costing California taxpayers $1.7 billion a year, levying an average taxpayer cost per county of more than $29 million. "This discrepancy reinforces that California cannot be complacent with the status quo," explains lead-author Dr. Norman Constantine, PHI senior scientist and clinical professor of public health at UC Berkeley. Biennially the report examines birth rates for the state and by state Senate Districts. "The costs to local communities continue to increase as the number of teen births rise with the increasing teen population and now the increasing teen birth rate on top of that," explains co-author Dr. Carmen Nevarez, PHI's medical director and vice president of external relations. The Public Health Institute is an independent, nonprofit organization dedicated to promoting health, well-being and quality of life. Media Contact: NOTE TO EDITORS: The study report and full press kit materials are immediately available during the embargo period on a password protected web site at http://teenbirths.phi.org/press/. We provide direct, immediate access to mainstream national media for 600 colleges, universities, medical centers, public-policy groups and other leading nonprofit organizations. AScribe transmits news releases directly to newsroom computer systems and desktops of major media organizations via a supremely trusted channel - The Associated Press. Posted by Michael at 11:18 PM | TrackBack Statement From The National Network on Election Reform Commending Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius for Veto of Voter Photo Identification BillFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: The National Network on Election Reform, which represents organizations that advocate for civil rights, voting rights, the disability community, students, elderly citizens, workers, non-profits and others, applauds Governor Sebelius for vetoing House Bill 2019 (H.B. 2019) today. Statement From The National Network on Election Reform Commending Kansas Gov. "We commend Governor Sebelius for standing up to protect Kansans' right to vote. H.B. 2019 would have disenfranchised thousands of eligible Kansas voters by requiring them to show a government photo ID in order to vote and present a birth certificate, passport or naturalization papers in order to vote. It is estimated that approximately 107,000 Kansans lack a birth certificate or passport. In a time when our country is experiencing an overwhelming voter turnout, we should be discussing ways to ensure access to the ballot, not limit it." For more information, including research on voter ID, election fraud and other issues, or to schedule an interview with an expert on voter ID, contact Demos at 212-633-1405 or email press@demos.org. AScribe Newswire distributes news from nonprofit and public sector organizations. We provide direct, immediate access to mainstream national media for 600 colleges, universities, medical centers, public-policy groups and other leading nonprofit organizations. AScribe transmits news releases directly to newsroom computer systems and desktops of major media organizations via a supremely trusted channel - The Associated Press. We also feed news to major news retrieval database services, online publications and to developers of web sites and Intranets. And AScribe does it at a cost all organizations, large and small, can afford, a fraction of what corporate newswires charge. Posted by Michael at 11:10 PM | TrackBack Piper Trust Makes $2.5 Million in Grants to Benefit Children Focusing on Programs in Health, Arts and EducationFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: Grants totaling $2.5 million will go to seven programs for children, as well as a fall prevention coalition to benefit older adults funded through the Governor's Advisory Council on Aging. "Children's well-being is the best barometer of a community's well-being," said Judy Jolley Mohraz, Ph.D., president and CEO of Piper Trust. "The Trust is pleased to partner with nonprofits committed to improving the lives of our youngest children as well as school-age children and adolescents. Piper Trust made a $1 million commitment to Arizona Science Center as part of the organization's $25.2-million capital campaign for revitalizing hands-on exhibits, programs and facilities at the downtown Phoenix center that also will expand the organization's endowment and working capital. "We are very excited about the grant because it will enable the Scouts to reach out to many more young people in predominantly low-income, high-minority areas of Maricopa County with programs geared to develop values used as a compass to live a productive and rewarding life," said Larry Abbott, scout executive and CEO. Gabriel's Angels, which provides pet therapy programs for abused, abandoned and at-risk children, a $50,000 grant to train community volunteers and their pets to lead children through animal-assisted activities to build trust and create attachments. Girls For A Change, which offers middle and high school girls from low-income families the opportunity to develop leadership and entrepreneurial skills, a $90,000 Piper Trust grant to increase volunteer recruitment to expand the program to reach 300 girls. AScribe Newswire distributes news from nonprofit and public sector organizations. Posted by Michael at 11:08 PM | TrackBack TV Show to Explore Teacher ExcellenceFrom Education Newsfeed: The U.S. Department of Education's monthly TV show, "Education News Parents Can Use," will devote an entire hour to focusing on the single most important factor in raising student achievement---the teacher. Techniques for recruiting, rewarding and developing a world-class teacher corps will be explored. An interview with Deputy Assistant Secretary Farris on effective teaching and the impact that high performing teachers have on student achievement. A conversation with national award winners: Kiara Hargrove, chemistry teacher at Baltimore Polytechnic Institute; Don Comeaux, forensic and environmental science teacher at Belle Chasse High School; and, Deirdra Grode, 7th/8th grade social studies and language arts teacher at Hoboken Charter School, about teacher excellence, success in the classroom and ways to improve the teaching profession. A dialogue with Michael Marder, co-director of UTeach at the University of Texas at Austin, and Janice Trinidad, a 2007 UTeach graduate and first-year teacher, about effective practices for preparing math, science and computer science teachers for the 21st century. A roundtable with Patrick Schuermann, director of technical assistance at the Center for Educator Compensation Reform, Brad Jupp, senior academic policy advisor to the superintendent of Denver Public Schools, and, Gary Stark, senior vice president of program development at the National Institute for Excellence in Teaching. They'll talk about the national "pay for performance" movement and strategies for rewarding teachers based on their performance and overall student achievement. A video profile of a unique math and science teacher preparation program at the University of Texas at Austin, along with a video news story on ProComp: Denver's teacher compensation reform model. Posted by Michael at 12:05 AM | TrackBack May 20, 2008Responsible Fatherhood and Healthy Families Act of 2007From Center for Law and Social Policy: This brief on legislation outlines the provisions of the proposed Responsible Fatherhood and Health Families Act of 2007. If enacted, the legislation would provide demonstration grants to promote economic opportunity for low-income parents, reverse a 20 percent federal funding cut to the child support program, repeal a $25 child support fee charged to parents, require all collected child support to be paid to families, address unpaid child support debt, expand the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), and make a number of other changes in the law. Repeal section 7310 of the DRA, which requires parents who have never received Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) to pay a $25 annual fee if they receive $500 in child support collections. Require that states pay all collected child support to families, rather than use it to recover welfare costs, prohibit state assignment of child support rights, and require state TANF programs to disregard a portion of child support income that is at least equivalent to the earned income disregard. Ensure that child support collected in federally-funded foster care cases is used in the best interests of the child, rather than cost recovery, and includes authority to establish child support trust accounts. Expand the childless worker EITC and provide an additional credit for non-custodial parents who are current on child support payments. Provide for $150 million in state grants for fiscal years 2008 through 2101 to conduct demonstration projects to promote economic opportunity for low-income parents, including projects (1) supervised by courts or child support agencies to increase employment and child support payments by non-custodial parents and improve parent-child relationships; (2) to expand transitional jobs programs; and (3) to create public-private partnerships to improve career pathways for disadvantaged workers and at risk youth. Posted by Michael at 11:42 PM | TrackBack Second Chance Act of 2007: Community Safety Through Recidivism PreventionFrom Center for Law and Social Policy: The Second Chance Act of 2007 was signed into law by the president on April 9, 2008 after receiving broad bipartisan support from Congress. The legislation reauthorizes the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 (OCCSSA), authorizing grant funds that promote comprehensive planning and collaborative delivery of services to individuals recently released from prison. The Second Chance Act, H.R. 1593, was introduced by Representative Danny Davis on March 20, 2007. The Second Chance Act reauthorizes (but does not appropriate funds for) $300 million in grant programs to facilitate successful reentry. © 2008 Center for Law and Social Policy www.clasp.org reauthorize $110 million in federal grant funds for adult and juvenile offender reentry demonstration projects to provide pre-and-post release services for incarcerated and reentering persons, to engage families, and to address victim needs. Grant applicants must develop a long-term reentry strategic plan that includes a goal of reducing recidivism by 50 percent over a 5-year period, measures progress and performance outcomes, and include extensive public and private coordination. Required outcome measures address recidivism, supervised release violations, substance abuse, mental health, employment, education, housing, and child support. The legislation authorizes $55 million for each of fiscal years 2009 and 2010. The proposed project must be located in an urban area, have a large number of returning prisoners, and have a high recidivism rate. Authorizes $20 million in grants administered by the Attorney General to state, tribal, and local governments to expand comprehensive family-based substance abuse treatment programs as alternatives to incarceration for nonviolent parent drug offenders and provide prison-based family treatment programs for incarcerated parents of minor children. Posted by Michael at 11:33 PM | TrackBack Poverty Facts, 2004From Urban Institute: In 2004, 36.6 million people--or 12.6 percent of the U.S. population--were poor. The "poverty gap"--the amount of additional income required to remove all Americans from poverty--was $105.6 billion. Poverty rates were highest for African Americans, Hispanics, women, and persons under 25. Without government benefits, 61 million people would be poor. Social Security and other social insurance programs remove 21 million people from poverty. Means tested programs remove 3 million people from poverty. If food and housing assistance were counted as income for poverty purposes, an additional 7.6 million people would be counted as not poor. Posted by Michael at 11:28 PM | TrackBack An Economic Framework and Selected Proposals for Demonstrations Aimed At Strengthening Marriage, Employment, and Family Functioning OutcomesFrom Urban Institute: The increasing recognition of the importance of marriage for the social and economic well-being of children has led to demonstrations aimed at strengthening and stimulating healthy marriages. The next step is to ensure that factors closely linked with healthy marriages are addressed as well. This paper brings together research findings and policy ideas about the interactions between marriage, employment, and family functioning. It presents a framework and proposes several demonstrations aimed at improving employment and family outcomes for disadvantaged populations. The appendix reviews an extensive body of research on specific linkages between marriage, employment, and family functioning. Posted by Michael at 11:27 PM | TrackBack Third in Series of Reports on First-Year Teachers Identifies Two Insufficient Areas of Training - Teaching in Diverse Classrooms and Working With Special-Needs StudenFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: Public Agenda and the National Comprehensive Center for Teacher Quality today released research that points to two specific areas where teacher training may be lacking, according to rookie teachers in the trenches and fresh from training: preparedness for the diversity of the contemporary American classroom and teaching students with special needs. The survey covered 12 areas of teacher training ranging from direct instruction to their study of history, philosophy and policy debates in public education. This final report of the "Lessons Learned" series, "Teaching in Changing Times" focuses on the strengths and possible deficits of the training new teachers say they receive. The first report in the "Lessons Learned" series (http://www.publicagenda.org/LessonsLearned1) described the differences between the views and experiences of new secondary and elementary teachers. The second looked at the views of teachers coming into the field from three prominent alternate route programs (http://www.publicagenda.org/LessonsLearned2). A highly effective teacher workforce starts with quality preparation and needs to be bolstered with good induction and mentoring programs for new teachers. Most new teachers working in both high-needs and in wealthier schools say they were taught how to teach in an ethnically diverse student body, but new teachers who work in high-needs schools are significantly more likely to say that their training does, in fact, help them, with nearly half (47 percent) saying that their training helps them a lot. We provide direct, immediate access to mainstream national media for 600 colleges, universities, medical centers, public-policy groups and other leading nonprofit organizations. Posted by Michael at 11:15 PM | TrackBack Overweight in adolescence gives increased mortality rateFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: People who were already overweight in adolescence (14-19 years old) have an increased mortality rate from a range of chronic diseases as adults; endocrine, nutritional and metabolic diseases, cardiovascular diseases, colon cancer and respiratory diseases. There were also many cases of sudden death in this group. This comes from a new study from the Norwegian Institute of Public Health (NIPH). The incidence of obesity among children and adolescents has increased worldwide, but the long-term effects, both with regards to ill-health and mortality rate, are insufficiently documented. -- We found that increasing degrees of obesity among adolescents lead to an unfavourable development in the mortality rate from a range of significant causes of deaths, concludes Professor Tone Bjørge at the Department of Public Health and Primary Health Care, University of Bergen and researcher with the Medical Birth Registry at the NIPH. Bjørge is the primary author of the article "Body mass index in adolescence in relation to cause-specific mortality: A follow-up of 230,000 Norwegian adolescents" that was recently published in the American Journal of Epidemiology. During 1963-75 the NIPH studied 227 000 Norwegian adolescents (both boys and girls) in the age group 14-19 years, using height and weight measurements. During the follow-up period, on average 35 years, nearly 10 000 deaths were registered in this group. Cause-specific mortality rate among people who had low and high BMI (body mass index) were compared with the mortality rate among people who had normal BMI at the start of the follow-up. Posted by Michael at 11:14 PM | TrackBack New 'My Voice, My Life' Curriculum Promotes Self-Determination, Good Decision-MakingFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: Several factors contribute to this high cost, including higher rates of premature births and low birth weights among teen mothers, a likelihood of poverty experienced by teen parents as well as other health and societal risks associated with teen pregnancy. Although the teen pregnancy and birth rates among teens have declined in recent years, some groups continue to see high rates, which alarms Alameda County public health officials. For example, among Latinas, the teen birth rate is almost twice the national average - declining about half as fast as the national rate. According to the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unintended Pregnancy, 51 percent of Latinas get pregnant at least once by age 20 - compared to 3 in 10 nationally. According to PHI Medical Director and Vice President of External Relations, and project coordinator, Dr. Carmen Nevarez, this campaign began with a school-based curriculum originally developed by the Mexican Institute on Family and Population (IMIFAP) in Mexico City. The curriculum was designed to help youth learn skills such as assertive communication and informed decision-making around their sexuality. "We were so impressed with what we saw in Mexico City - young people educating and training other youth about these very important issues and making healthy decisions in their own lives in order to divert teen pregnancy. The goal of ASPIRE is to instill in youth the belief that anything is possible if you aspire to dream - a dream that can be a positive alternative to teen pregnancy, sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and unhealthy relationships. Posted by Michael at 11:13 PM | TrackBack Community Foundation Giving Jumps 14 Percent, New Foundation Center Report Finds; Support Hits Record High of $4.1 Billion in 2007From Ascribe Newsfeed: Estimated giving by the nation's 717 grantmaking community foundations rose 14 percent in 2007 to a record $4.1 billion, according to "Key Facts on Community Foundations," a new report from the Foundation Center. Giving projections for 2007 are based on responses to the Foundation Center's 2008 "Foundation Giving Forecast Survey" from 214 of the nation's largest community foundations, combined with year-end economic indicators. The outlook for 2008 giving is based on the responses of 197 larger community foundations. The report can be downloaded at no charge from the Gain Knowledge area of the Foundation Center's web site at http://www.foundationcenter.org/gainknowledge/research/nationaltrends.html. Established in 1956, and today supported by more than 600 foundations, the Foundation Center is the nation's leading authority on philanthropy, connecting nonprofits and the grantmakers supporting them to tools they can use and information they can trust. The Center maintains the most comprehensive database on U.S. grantmakers and their grants--a robust, accessible knowledge bank for the sector. It also operates research, education, and training programs designed to advance philanthropy at every level. The Center's web site receives more than 57,000 visits each day, and thousands of people gain access to free resources in its five regional library/learning centers and its national network of 375 Cooperating Collections. We provide direct, immediate access to mainstream national media for 600 colleges, universities, medical centers, public-policy groups and other leading nonprofit organizations. Posted by Michael at 11:11 PM | TrackBack Grocery BoostFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Low-income neighborhoods that lack easy access to grocery stores could lead to a breakdown of food security for hundreds of thousands of people - not in the developing world, but in major urban areas of the U.S. That's the conclusion from a report to be published in the inaugural issue of the International Journal Behavioural and Healthcare Research produced by Inderscience Publishers. Economists Nathan Berg and James Murdoch of the School of Economic, Political and Policy Sciences, at the University of Texas-Dallas, have looked closely at the locations of grocery stores across Dallas County, and have classified neighborhoods according to the number of grocery stores within a one-mile radius. They have correlated this spatial distribution with data from the Texas Health and Human Services Commission and the US Census to map distinct demographic characteristics in areas with many as opposed to few grocery stores. Many people in more prosperous neighborhoods take for granted that there are local grocery stores that can provide them with a wide variety of nutritious food at relatively low cost. Berg and Murdoch suggest that such disparities in access to nutritious food mean that as many as 400,000 low-income residents of Dallas County face significant challenges in providing healthy diets to their families, with all the repercussions for health, behavior, and society that entails. "Given the importance of healthy diets, perhaps a rethinking of the institutional framework that determines food supply in the U.S. should be more prominent among issues analyzed in economics and policy-related sciences," the researchers conclude. Posted by Michael at 11:11 PM | TrackBack Nonprofit Almanac 2008America's nonprofit sector continues to grow faster than its business sector or its government. The Nonprofit Almanac 2008 presents data on nonprofits' place in the national economy and trends in wages, employment, private giving, volunteering, and finances. The tables and graphics will give scholars, practitioners, and policymakers the data they need at a glance, while the textual analysis will help them plan for the future. Posted by Michael at 11:57 AM | TrackBack May 19, 2008Ad Campaign to Fight Lending DiscriminationFrom HUD Press Releases: WASHINGTON - The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development announced today that it has launched a national public service announcement (PSA) campaign that will educate the public, especially minorities, about their rights under the lending provisions of the federal Fair Housing Act. The centerpiece of the bilingual campaign is a television PSA featuring Dennis Haysbert, who is best known for his role as President Palmer in the Emmy award-winning television series "24." The PSA shows Haysbert, sitting in a café, drawing his dream home on a napkin and explaining that it is illegal to discriminate in lending because of someone'srace, color, national origin, religion, sex, familial status, or disability.The PSA ends with the tagline "HUD - One Call. The campaign, which is being administered by West Coast-based Pacific News Service, also includes radio PSAs and newspaper ads that illustrate the kinds of challenges many minority homebuyers face when they attempt to purchase a home. "HUD studies confirm that African Americans and Hispanics trying to become homeowners are often given less information about loan terms, are quoted higher rates and fees, and are sometimes discouraged from applying for loans," said Kim Kendrick, HUD's Assistant Secretary for Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity. FHEO and its partners in the Fair Housing Assistance Program investigate approximately 10,000 housing discrimination complaints annually. People who believe they are the victims of housing discrimination should contact HUD at 1 (800) 669-9777 (voice), 800-927-9275 (TTY). Posted by Michael at 8:17 PM | TrackBack Broadband access opens doors to networking, economic development for rural areasFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Proactive policies are needed to facilitate broadband Internet access and adoption in rural areas so that rural hospitals, schools and businesses can drive social and economic development and better position themselves to compete, say Penn State researchers in a recently released report from the Center for Rural Pennsylvania. The report, "Broadband Internet Use in Rural Pennsylvania," examines broadband availability and adoption in four sectors -- health care, local government, education and business -- through case studies, interviews with key information-technology personnel and analysis of organizations' Web sites. "Broadband services offer a huge opportunity for rural areas with significant payback in terms of economic development and community revitalization," said Amy Glasmeier, professor of geography and co-author of the report. According to the researchers, while the number of rural users of broadband Internet services has been steadily increasing, access to broadband is not universal in rural areas, and in some places, dial-up remains the only affordable option. While dial-up allows for electronic access to information, its slower speed and lower bandwidth capacity limit organizations from developing Internet-enabled processes and collaborations -- what the researchers distinguish as "transformative" uses. For instance, with broadband Internet, rural hospitals could improve patient care by forging networks with urban hospitals to access their expertise and resources. Rural hospitals also could develop interactive processes such as online appointment scheduling, remote patient monitoring through biosignals and image data and videoconferencing between patients and doctors. "Policy must consider ways to facilitate broadband deployment to do more than the status quo only slightly faster or with less face-to-face contact," Glasmeier said. Posted by Michael at 8:02 PM | TrackBack Men experience domestic violence, with health impactFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: "Domestic violence in men is under-studied and often hidden---much as it was in women 10 years ago," said study leader Robert J. Reid, MD, PhD, an associate investigator at the Group Health Center for Health Studies. Myth 1: Few men experience domestic violence. In-depth phone interviews with over 400 randomly sampled adult male Group Health patients surprised Dr. Reid and his colleagues: 5% had experienced domestic violence in the past year, 10% in the past five years, and 29% over their lifetimes. Women are more likely than men to experience more severe physical abuse, said Dr. Reid. Depressive symptoms were nearly three times as common in older men who had experienced abuse than in those who hadn't, with much more severe depression in the men who had been abused physically. "We know that many women may have trouble leaving abusive relationships, especially if they're caring for young children and not working outside the home," said Dr. Reid. Dr. Reid said more research is needed to determine the best ways for doctors to ask men if they have experienced domestic violence---and how best to help them into couples counseling, leaving their partners, or getting protection orders. The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality and the Group Health Center for Health Studies funded this work, co-authored by Melissa Anderson, MS, Paul Fishman, PhD, David Carrell, PhD, and Robert Thompson, MD of the Group Health Center for Health Studies; Amy Bonomi, PhD, MPH, now an Ohio State University associate professor of human development & family science in Columbus; and Group Health Center for Health Studies affiliate scientific investigator Frederick Rivara, MD, MPH, of Harborview Injury Prevention and Research Center and the University of Washington. Posted by Michael at 7:54 PM | TrackBack Engagement in culture events key to mental wellbeingFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Experts held a number of workshops for Liverpool residents aimed at identifying the positive and negative effects of the projects. Projects such as 'G-litter', which encouraged local people and businesses to pick up litter across the city, and 'Four Corners of the City', in which memories of community life were shared through creative arts, were some of the projects found to have a positive impact on mental well-being. Helen West, from the Mental Well-Being Impact Assessment group at the University of Liverpool, said: "Issues such as low esteem and lack of motivation can result from inequalities within a community, which we found to have a negative impact on mental well-being. By using culture as a tool to connect different parts of the community, however, people felt valued and encouraged to share their goals. "On the whole, Capital of Culture programmes have had a very positive effect on mental health; negativity towards events and initiatives only arises when communities feel they have not been considered in the development of a scheme. 1. The research, compiled from results of the pilot Mental Well-Being Impact Assessment Toolkit, developed by a public sector research partnership at the University of Liverpool makes a series of wide-ranging recommendations related to the content and management of the Capital of Culture programme. 2. The University of Liverpool is a member of the Russell Group of leading research-intensive institutions in the UK. It attracts collaborative and contract research commissions from a wide range of national and international organisations valued at more than £108 million annually. Posted by Michael at 7:51 PM | TrackBack Study finds 21st birthday binge drinking extremely common; can pose serious health hazardsFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: WASHINGTON -- The "21 for 21" ritual, where 21st birthday revelers attempt to down 21 alcoholic drinks, is highly prevalent among college students, according to new research. In the largest study of its kind, researchers at the University of Missouri determined that many college students drink to excess on their 21st birthdays and potentially jeopardize their health. The study will appear in the June issue of the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, which is published by the American Psychological Association. The data were collected from a larger study where students at one university were followed for four years and asked questions about their drinking behaviors. For this portion of the online survey, 2,518 current and former college students from one university responded to several questions. The participants had already turned 21 and were asked whether they had drunk alcohol to celebrate turning 21, and, if so, how much they had drunk and for how long. The researchers found that excessive drinking on this particular birthday was common, with more than four out of five participants reporting they had consumed some alcohol on their birthday. "This study provides the first empirical evidence that 21st birthday drinking is a pervasive custom in which binge drinking is the norm," said Patricia C. Rutledge, PhD, the study's lead author. Article: "21st Birthday Drinking: Extremely Extreme," Patricia C. Rutledge, PhD, University of Missouri -- Columbia and Allegheny College; Aesoon Park, and Kenneth J. Sher, PhD, University of Missouri -- Columbia and the Midwest Alcoholism Research Center; Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, Vol. 76, No. 03. Posted by Michael at 7:48 PM | TrackBack Foundation Center Hosts First Funding for the Environment MonthFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: June 2008 is Funding for the Environment Month at the Foundation Center, the first time the Center has devoted an entire month to the information needs of nonprofits engaged in activities related to the environment. Throughout the month the Center will host free events and classes in all five of its regional centers to help environmental organizations become better grantseekers and increase their funding. Special programs include such topics as: a June 2 webinar with grantmakers from across the country on funding for the environment and animal welfare, a "reality grantmaking" event in San Francisco, and a three-part "Go Green" series in Atlanta. "With the increasing urgency of news related to climate change, the global food crisis, and the need to adopt sustainability practices, nonprofit organizations and philanthropic institutions are rising to the challenge," said Janet Camarena, director of the Center's San Francisco office. Established in 1956, and today supported by more than 600 foundations, the Foundation Center is the nation's leading authority on philanthropy, connecting nonprofits and the grantmakers supporting them to tools they can use and information they can trust. We provide direct, immediate access to mainstream national media for 600 colleges, universities, medical centers, public-policy groups and other leading nonprofit organizations. AScribe transmits news releases directly to newsroom computer systems and desktops of major media organizations via a supremely trusted channel - The Associated Press. We also feed news to major news retrieval database services, online publications and to developers of web sites and Intranets. Posted by Michael at 7:38 PM | TrackBack Mott Foundation Grant to Fund Goodwill Staffing ServicesFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: The Charles Stewart Mott Foundation has awarded Goodwill Industries International a grant of $173,320 to help fund a national Goodwill staffing services project. The project aims to provide job seekers who have physical or mental disabilities, a non-violent criminal record, or lack of a high school diploma or GED, with employment. "Through funding from the Mott Foundation, Goodwill agencies will be able to enhance existing Goodwill staffing programs and replicate those with a proven record of success," says Jim Gibbons, President and CEO of Goodwill Industries International. Goodwill staffing services recruit, screen and place qualified employees in a wide range of specialties and job classifications on a temporary, temp-to-hire or permanent basis. Goodwill's staffing programs also offer retention and supportive services so that workers can build their skills, improve their chance of success at work and move up the career ladder. The Mott Foundation previously awarded Goodwill Industries a national Planning Grant for $35,000 to develop a micro-enterprise model that can be replicated at local Goodwill agencies nationwide. Strengthens communities and families by training people to become independent, tax-paying members of society. We provide direct, immediate access to mainstream national media for 600 colleges, universities, medical centers, public-policy groups and other leading nonprofit organizations. AScribe transmits news releases directly to newsroom computer systems and desktops of major media organizations via a supremely trusted channel - The Associated Press. We also feed news to major news retrieval database services, online publications and to developers of web sites and Intranets. Posted by Michael at 7:35 PM | TrackBack Latest Addition to 'Doing What Works' Web Site Features Tips on Effective Early Childhood Language and Literacy PracticesFrom Education Newsfeed: The U.S. Department of Education's "Doing What Works" Web site recently added a feature that will empower educators and administrators with research-based strategies to help boost their early childhood language and literacy practices. This new feature brings online the recommendations outlined in five research reports previously released by the Department's Institute of Education Sciences (IES) on early childhood education. The "Doing What Works" site, http://dww.ed.gov, offers a user-friendly interface to quickly locate teaching practices that have been found effective by IES, the Department's research arm, and similar organizations. In addition, it cites examples of possible ways, although not necessarily the only ways, teachers and designers of teaching materials may use this research to help students reach their academic potential. "If we want every student reading on grade level by 2014, we must make sure that educators have access to information about best practices in early childhood literacy," said U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings. "By sharing effective teaching practices, the Doing What Works website helps improve classroom instruction and give all children the chance to achieve their potential." The content on Early Childhood Language and Literacy focuses on two recommended practice areas: develop phonological awareness skills; and utilize interactive and dialogic reading practices to improve language and literacy skills. See how it works - providing examples of schools and classrooms engaged in those practices, including engaging videos. Similar resources, in areas such as school restructuring and mathematics instruction, will added to the site in the near future. The Department's Office of Planning, Evaluation & Policy Development leads the "Doing What Works" site. Posted by Michael at 7:35 PM | TrackBack May 16, 2008Education Department Names 44 Jacob K. Javits FellowsFrom Education Newsfeed: U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings today named 44 Jacob K. Javits fellows to pursue graduate study in selected fields within the arts, humanities, and social sciences. Selected from 899 applicants, fellows are chosen on the basis of superior academic achievement, financial need, and exceptional promise. "The Jacob K. Javits fellows are among America's best and the brightest," Spellings said. "I look forward to their contributions in fields from English to economics, and from playwriting to public policy." Fellows were selected by panels of academic scholars appointed by the Jacob K. Javits Fellowship Board, which is comprised of distinguished scholars appointed by the Secretary of Education. Arts fields --- creative writing, music performance, music theory, music composition, music literature, studio arts, television, film, cinematography, theatre arts, playwriting, screenwriting, acting, and dance. Humanities fields --- art history, archeology, area studies, classics, comparative literature, English language and literature, folklore, folk life, foreign languages and literature, less commonly taught languages, history, linguistics, philosophy, religion, speech, rhetoric, and debate. Social Sciences fields --- anthropology, communications and media, criminology, economics, ethnic and cultural studies, geography, political science, psychology, public policy and administration, and sociology. The fellowship consists of a maximum stipend amount of $30,000, not to exceed the fellow's financial need, and an institutional payment of $12,981, accepted by the institution of higher education in lieu of all tuition and fees for the fellow. In total, the Department is awarding $1,891,164 for the 44 students. According to program rules, 20 percent of the 44 fellowships were awarded in the arts, 20 percent in the social sciences, and 60 percent in the humanities. Posted by Michael at 11:15 PM | TrackBack The North Dakota Experience: Achieving High-Performance Health Care Through Rural Innovation and CooperationFrom The Commonwealth Fund: North Dakota faces health care challenges common to many rural areas of the U.S., but the state's health care system appears to be performing better than that in many other states--rural or urban. Resource constraints and the desire to preserve the local economy have made necessity the mother of invention in North Dakota, driving health care providers and policymakers to try new approaches to care and to institute better practices relatively quickly. Collaboration to support primary care and the concept of a medical home, organization of care through cooperative networks of providers, and innovative use of technology to meet patient needs and hold down costs are examples of how North Dakota is able to provide its citizens with accessible, quality, and efficient health care despite the challenges of a rural setting. Rural communities have a unique context of community trust and interdependence, a social capital that allows them to innovate in meeting patients' needs. North Dakota faces challenges common to other rural areas of the country that are relatively disadvantaged in attracting health care professionals and in deploying resources to serve small, geographically dispersed communities. Despite these challenges, the state's health care system appears to be performing better than many others in providing its citizens with accessible, relatively high-quality, and efficient health care services, as evidenced by the findings of two recent reports. North Dakota ranks in the top quartile of states on The Commonwealth Fund's State Scorecard on Health System Performance, which ranks states according to their performance across 32 key indicators of access, quality, utilization, equity, and health outcomes (Exhibit 1 and Appendix A). The latest Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care finds that North Dakota is one of the most efficient states in treating chronically ill Medicare patients in the last two years of life, with costs more than 25 percent below the national average. Posted by Michael at 10:57 PM | TrackBack Quality Matters: Developmental Screening for ChildrenFrom The Commonwealth Fund: A review of efforts to encourage developmental screening for young children as a routine part of preventive care; a case study of how one pediatric practice implemented a standardized screening tool; and more. Among the challenges is getting pediatricians, family physicians, and other child health care professionals to recognize the need for formal developmental screening. The academy launched a nine-month pilot project, called D-PIP or the Developmental Surveillance and Screening Policy Implementation Pilot, to examine the feasibility of implementing the screening tests among 17 pediatric practices. Some state Medicaid agencies, for example those in Hawaii and Massachusetts, have implemented policies requiring the use of validated developmental and behavioral screens at well-child visits in response to lawsuits against the agencies. Organization and Leadership: Oxford Pediatrics has five physicians and two nurse practitioners in its main office, located in Oxford, Ohio. Providers also work out of two satellite facilities in Ross, Ohio, and Brookville, Ind. The demonstration project focused on six practice areas: use of a preventive services prompting system, implementation of structured developmental assessments, evaluation of parents' needs and use of strength-based approaches, use of reminder systems for appointments or follow-up care, development of links to community resources, and creation of a registry of patients with special heath care needs. They note that these conditions are closely related to smoking, high blood pressure, and obesity, all of which are amenable to changes in personal lifestyle and public health initiatives. The states have each identified particular areas of focus, including value-based purchasing, quality reporting, care coordination, disease prevention, and wellness promotion. An AHRQ editorial team chooses the innovations and tools to feature on the site, selecting those that they deem to be new, have significant potential to change patient care delivery, and are designed to address health disparities. Posted by Michael at 10:53 PM | TrackBack New E-health recommendations from ACP aim to improve health care quality, safety, and accessFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: In a new position paper released today, the American College of Physicians says that collaboration among physicians, patients, technology developers, and policymakers must occur if E-health activities like electronic communication between physicians and their patients, remote monitoring of patients, personal and electronic health records, and patients seeking health information online are to transform health care in the US. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 10:51 PM | TrackBack A Collective Responsibility, A Collective Work: Supporting the Path to Positive Life Outcomes for Youth in Economically Distressed CommunitiesFrom Center for Law and Social Policy: This paper presents a picture of risk and challenge for youth in distressed communities and outlines how these communities can band together to create a continuum of supportive activities to bolster youth's success in school and life. As youth grow and develop, individualized support and exposure to new experiences has a significant impact on their life trajectory. Youth in economically distressed communities deserve to have access to these types of opportunities, which are much more readily available to their peers in other communities. This investment in youth can have a positive effect on academic success, future life earnings, family stability, and the livelihood of the community. This paper may be helpful in guiding a community's thinking about how to get started in creating a sustainable support system for all of its youth. Posted by Michael at 10:49 PM | TrackBack A Blueprint for Tax Reform and Health Reform : Before the Senate Committee on FinanceFrom Urban Institute: In this testimony Burman outlines a plan for tax reform that would maintain progressivity, raise enough revenues to finance the government, and dovetail with plans to provide universal access to health insurance. With a new financing source for health care, income tax rates could be cut sharply-the top rates could be cut to 25 percent or less. The health care voucher would also offset the inherent regressivity of a VAT. And, under the simplified system, most Americans would not have to file income tax returns. Posted by Michael at 10:48 PM | TrackBack Health Savings Accounts and High Deductible Health Insurance Plans: Implications for those with High Medical Costs, the Low-Income, and the UninsuredFrom Urban Institute: HSAs are highly tax-advantaged savings vehicles that are most attractive to the high income and those with low health service use. They are unlikely to significantly decrease the number of uninsured, who often have low incomes, do not benefit significantly from the tax advantages, nor have assets to cover the large deductibles associated with the plans. Their ability to reduce system wide spending is also limited. HSAs have the potential to increase segmentation of health care risk in private insurance markets, unless employers set premiums to offset the healthier selection or government subsidizes the costs of the remaining comprehensive coverage market. Posted by Michael at 10:48 PM | TrackBack Measuring Personal Saving: A Tale of American ProfligacyFrom Urban Institute Latest Reports: Official measures suggest that personal saving has been declining for the past 20 years, and even became negative in 2005. Inadequate saving threatens retirement preparations and reduces investment, which helps boost worker productivity and ultimately wages and living standards. However, neither of the two prominent measures of the saving rate, one based on the National Income and Products Account and the other on the Flow of Funds, exactly conforms to what most people think of as saving. This brief explains the measures and describes how they differ. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 10:46 PM | TrackBack More Older Americans are Poor than the Official Measure SuggestsFrom Urban Institute: The Census Bureaus official poverty measure no longer reflects the true resources or needs of adults age 65 and older. Recent consumption data show that older adults generally require more to cover their basic needs and economic data show that older adults have more resources than are reflected in the official poverty measure. This paper shows the sensitivity of poverty rates for older adults to alternative measures of consumption needs and income resources. The alternative measures all show that number of older adults living in poverty is greater than the official measure indicates. Posted by Michael at 10:46 PM | TrackBack Trends in Income Volatility and Risk, 1970-2004From Urban Institute: Public concern about economic insecurity has increased markedly over the last several decades. This paper assesses the extent to which this increase in concern has in fact coincided with increased risk to family income. Using data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, we examine changes in two indicators of income risk-the short-term variability (volatility) of family income, and the association between large income drops and destabilizing life events-over the 1970-2004 period. Our findings support the hypothesis that income risk has increased: the volatility of family income nearly doubled over the period, and destabilizing events became increasingly associated with large income drops. Posted by Michael at 10:45 PM | TrackBack May 15, 2008Special Interest Groups 'Win' Case to Pull Kids with Special Needs, Foster Students Out of Better Schools; Outraged Parent Advocates Vow to Fight OnFrom PR Newswire: The Alliance for School Choice tonight strongly condemned today's decision by an Arizona appellate court to overturn Arizona's school choice programs for foster children and students with special needs. Unless the programs are upheld on appeal, hundreds of children will be physically removed from their schools. Alliance President Charles Hokanson tonight announced the organization's full support for an appeal of the decision to the Arizona Supreme Court, which will be handled by the national Institute for Justice (IJ), the legal arm of the school choice movement. The decision -- based on a lawsuit brought about by the Arizona Education Association (AEA) union, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), and the People for the American Way (PFAW) -- was poorly formulated, according to a release by IJ, which plans to fight to keep the programs operational until a state-level appeal is heard. The lawsuits targeted Arizona's Scholarship for Pupils with Disabilities, which provides vouchers for 158 students to attend 52 schools this year, with an average scholarship amount of $9,478. "These programs absolutely must continue operating during the appeals process," Hokanson said. "It is unfair, unjust, and unconscionable to pull hundreds of disadvantaged children out of the high-quality schools they love." "Tonight marks a new low for the AEA, PFAW, and the ACLU," Hokanson added. "If they're at all celebrating this decision tonight, then they should be truly ashamed. Politics should never be played when it comes to the education and well-being of children -- let alone children with special needs and students in foster homes." Posted by Michael at 10:38 PM | TrackBack Most ethnic minority teens don't hang out with ethnic school crowdsFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: As teens find their places in the peer system in most high schools, crowds define most students' status and reputation. A new study finds that ethnic minority teens tend not to hang out with crowds made up of their ethnic peers. The study also found that being part of an ethnically oriented crowd at school is, for most Asian students, associated with mostly positive characteristics (such as pride in one's ethnic background). For most Latino students, being part of an ethnically oriented crowd is associated with a mixed group of characteristics (some pride, but also some feelings of discrimination and stereotyping). The students were given a list of the crowds most commonly mentioned by other teens at their school and asked to indicate the one they identified with most closely. In addition, a group of students placed all their classmates (including those initially polled) into crowds; the researchers then looked for characteristics that distinguished adolescents who were part of ethnically oriented crowds from adolescents who were part of non-ethnic crowds. Teens in the ethnic categories studied were more likely to be placed by peers---and to place themselves---in crowds that were not defined ethnically. However, since ethnicity is an important factor in the self-image and peer reputation of many youths, the study also sought to determine why some ethnic minorities do associate themselves with ethnic crowds at school. For all three ethnic groups studied, teenagers were more likely to be part of an ethnically oriented crowd if most of their friends came from the same ethnic background and if the students were doing poorly in school. Posted by Michael at 10:35 PM | TrackBack Top grades not always needed to become a doctorFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Students with average grades, who come from economically and educationally deprived areas, can do well at medical school provided they have extra academic and pastoral support during their first two years. Yet it is now acknowledged that the UK needs more doctors who better represent the diverse social and ethnic population of the country. As such, widening participation initiatives have become an important component of most UK Higher Education Institutions. The paper, written by the academics behind such an initiative at King's College London, analyses their success. To be accepted students needed to get CCC at A level, rather than the traditional AAB. Students on the EMDP course are given an extra year of studying---the first two years of the traditional five year degree are spread over three---to allow for more academic and pastoral support. Nine out of ten students so far accepted on to the EMDP programme are from ethnic minorities and just under a third (31%) from middle-class families. This compares with 51% and 76% respectively for students from "conventional" backgrounds. First time pass rates have generally been slightly lower for EMDP students, however in the clinical years (years 4--6) first time pass rates are identical for both conventional and EMDP students (93%). In an accompanying editorial, Hugh Ip and Chris McManus discuss whether the more diverse population of doctors resulting from the widening participation initiative will better serve a diverse population of patients. They also question if the £190 000 spent each year on the EMDP programme is money well spent. Posted by Michael at 10:29 PM | TrackBack Obesity and unhealthy lifestyles linked to more complex urinary problemsFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: People who are obese and lead unhealthy lifestyles are more likely to suffer from a larger number of urinary problems, according to a population-based study of more than 5,000 men and women published in the May issue of the UK-based urology journal BJU International. According to the Boston Area Community Health Survey (BACH), other health issues that increase the risk of multiple lower urinary tract symptoms include diabetes, high blood pressure and heart disease. The study, which received funding from the National Institute of Diabetes, Digestive and Kidney Diseases -- part of the USA's National Institutes of Health - looked at the urological symptoms of 5,506 residents in Boston, Massachusetts. All were aged between 30 and 70 and 42 per cent were male. "The cluster analysis method is highly objective and make no assumptions about which men or women are more likely to suffer from these common conditions" explains Dr Raymond C Rosen, Senior Scientist at the New England Research Institutes in Massachusetts. On average, symptomatic women were older than women who didn't report any symptoms and average ages in the more symptomatic clusters were higher. Men were much more likely to find themselves in Cluster Five if they had a sedentary lifestyle, with 54 per cent recording the lowest levels of physical activity, compared with 20 per cent for men with no symptoms. Established in 1929, BJU International is published 23 times a year by Wiley-Blackwell and edited by Professor John Fitzpatrick from Mater Misericordiae University Hospital and University College Dublin, Ireland. Together, the companies have created a global publishing business with deep strength in every major academic and professional field. Posted by Michael at 10:25 PM | TrackBack Dr. Anthony Fauci reflects on 25 years of HIVFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Outlining the peaks and valleys of the scientific community's journey so far, Dr. Fauci writes, "...we must learn from our mis-steps, build on our successes in treatment and prevention, and renew our commitment to developing the truly transforming tools that will one day put this scourge behind us." From the outset, AIDS was clearly more menacing than any other novel disease Dr. Fauci and his colleagues had previously encountered, he writes. The period when clinicians lacked the ability to diagnose and treat AIDS was the bleakest of his career. The discovery that HIV causes AIDS stimulated a burst of progress in both the clinic and the laboratory. But the 1987 debut of the first effective drug against HIV, zidovudine (AZT), generated excessive optimism, Dr. Fauci reflects, as the virus quickly and predictably developed drug resistance. Combination therapies dramatically cut the rate of AIDS deaths in the United States---but the developing world has continued to suffer from lack of access to effective treatments for HIV. Dr. Fauci praises research aimed at finding a cure for HIV/AIDS and affirms that this work must continue, but he places considerable hope and energy in preventing HIV infection, most importantly through the development of a vaccine. Twenty-five years since the discovery of HIV, Dr. Fauci views the prospect of ending the HIV/AIDS pandemic with cautious optimism. NIAID Director Anthony S. Fauci, M.D., is available to comment. Contact: To schedule interviews, contact the NIAID Office of Communications at (301) 402-1663, niaidnews@niaid.nih.gov. NIAID is a component of the National Institutes of Health. Posted by Michael at 10:22 PM | TrackBack New Voices Invests in a New Regional News Model, Community and Niche Web SitesFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: Ten innovative citizen media projects have been selected as this year's New Voices grant winners and will each receive up to $17,000 in start-up funding. One grantee will create a new model for regional news coverage in Ohio and Indiana. With this year's projects, a total of 40 community news start-ups have been funded from 845 entries since 2005. "These winners want to build new avenues producing local news and new ways to invite citizens to share particular expertise," said Jan Schaffer, director of J-Lab, which administers the New Voices program. "The number of applicants signals the growing interest in the power of citizen media to create a sense of place for all kinds of communities," said Gary Kebbel, Knight's journalism program officer. Citizen journalists and students at Miami University and Earlham College will produce stories for an interactive Web site and content will be shared with local mainstream media. A Philadelphia Web entrepreneur will spearhead a new Web site and quarterly publication to cover "green" jobs, grants, and economic initiatives by local businesses, universities and nonprofits. Civic group will create a bi-weekly online newspaper community for the rural community around Frostburg, Maryland, modeled on the National League of Cities' Inclusive Community Program. One-to-three minute segments will be broadcast monthly on KNBA-FM and National Native News. They will also be available online as podcasts and offered to the Alaska Public Radio network. Follow other citizen media developments at the Knight Citizen News Network (http://www.kcnn.org). Posted by Michael at 10:17 PM | TrackBack Pre-K students benefit when teachers are supportiveFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: A new study finds that the quality of interactions between teachers and children plays a key role in accounting for gains in children's development when compared to typical quality indicators such as teachers' education, class size, and child-to-teacher ratio. The study suggests that efforts to promote interactions with teachers that are instructionally and emotionally supportive can help children gain the most benefit from their pre-K experience and be more ready for school. It appears in the May/June 2008 issue of the journal Child Development. "This helps parents, teachers, and program administrators understand the specific features of pre-K programs that directly support children's academic, language and social development," Mashburn said. Efforts that focus on the quality of instructional and emotional interactions within pre-K classrooms appear to have the potential to improve children's development, more so than the traditional approaches of class size, teacher qualifications and student-teacher ratios" "Given that other studies have found the quality of instructional and emotional interactions in pre-K classrooms to be average at best, these results point to the importance of working to improve teacher-child classroom interactions." They tested children's academic, language, and social skills at the beginning and end of the program. In addition, teachers and program administrators provided information about whether programs met nine minimum standards of quality recommended by professional organizations, including teacher-child ratio and teacher certification. Rather, children developed greater academic and language skills in classrooms when they had higher quality instructional interactions, and they developed greater social skills when they had higher quality emotional interactions. High-quality emotional interactions happened when teachers frequently displayed positive emotions and were sensitive to children's needs, interests, motivations, and points of view. Posted by Michael at 10:14 PM | TrackBack Teenage girls still experience harassmentFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Girls and women have made dramatic strides toward gender equality in the United States. The study, the first to examine social and individual influences on girls' personal experiences of sexism, was carried out by researchers at the University of California Santa Cruz and the University of Kentucky. It appears in the May/June 2008 issue of the journal Child Development. In surveys, the researchers asked the girls about their experiences with sexual harassment and about discouraging comments they'd received about their abilities in science, math, or computers, as well as sports. The vast majority (90%) of girls said they had experienced sexual harassment at least once, with few reporting that such experiences had taken place more than once or twice. Specific forms of sexual harassment included receiving inappropriate and unwanted romantic attention (67% of girls), hearing demeaning gender-related comments (62%), being teased because of appearance (58%), receiving unwanted physical contact (52%), and being teased, bullied, or threatened with harm by a male (25%). The researchers found that both individual and social factors influenced whether girls were aware of sexism, with girls who were older and those from lower socioeconomic backgrounds reporting more sexism than their peers. Moreover, Latina and Asian American girls reported less sexual harassment than girls from other ethnic groups. Girls who felt pressure from parents to conform to gender stereotypes perceived more sexism than other girls. Finally, girls' own attitudes about themselves and society affected how they perceived sexism. "This study documents the continued pervasiveness of sexism in the lives of adolescent girls," notes Campbell Leaper, professor of psychology at the University of California Santa Cruz and the study's lead author. Posted by Michael at 10:13 PM | TrackBack FHASecure Refinances 200,000th Mortgage for American FamiliesFrom HUD Press Releases: U.S. Housing and Urban Development Deputy Secretary Roy A. Bernardi today announced the Bush Administration's FHASecure product has helped 200,000 homeowners refinance their mortgages and avoid foreclosure. Since September 2007, FHASecure has enabled struggling families - who are current or past due on their mortgages - to refinance through HUD's Federal Housing Administration (FHA). "Over the past several months, FHA has been working to help families who want permanent relief from their high cost subprime mortgages," said Bernardi. "These homeowners have found affordable relief from their exotic loans, and FHA is on pace to help a total of half million families keep their homes by year's end." In the past three months, FHASecure has insured twice as many loans as the program did in the program's first six months. In August 2007, President Bush launched a new initiative at HUD's Federal Housing Administration (FHA) called FHASecure to help hundreds of thousands of struggling homeowners - especially low-income families and minorities - avoid foreclosure. This product expanded FHA's ability to offer refinancing to homeowners who have good credit histories but cannot afford their mortgage payments after their teaser rates reset. In February 2008, President Bush requested $65 million for housing counseling in his Fiscal Year 2009 budget request. The Administration has increased funding for HUD's 2,300 approved housing counseling agencies by 150 percent since 2001. In March 2008, as part of the bipartisan economic growth package, FHA temporarily increased its loan limits until the end of this year, enabling hundreds of thousands of more families to purchase or refinance their homes at an affordable price. Posted by Michael at 10:13 PM | TrackBack Adolescents' values can serve as a buffer against behaving violently at schoolFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Researchers in Israel have found that teenagers' values helped determine whether or not they engaged in violent behavior at school, especially in schools where violence was common. The study is published in the May/June 2008 issue of the journal Child Development. The researchers gave questionnaires to 907 Jewish and Arab teenagers in grades 10 to 12 who attended 33 schools in Israel, where Jewish and Arab children attend two separate public schools systems. Values were defined as goals and ideas the students saw as important and guiding principles in their lives. The prevalence of violence in the schools was estimated by averaging, in each school, adolescents' reports of their own violent behavior, violent behavior by their two best friends, and the violence they had encountered at school. In both Arab and Jewish schools, adolescents who valued power (trying to attain social status by controlling and dominating others) reported more violent behavior than their peers. Teenagers who valued universalism (promoting understanding, appreciation, tolerance, and protecting the welfare of all people and nature) and those who valued conformity (limiting actions and urges that might violate social expectations and norms) reported less violent behavior than their peers. "It has always been a major goal of developmental research to understand the causes of violence," says Ariel Knafo, assistant professor of psychology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the lead author of the study. "The current study, focusing on a life period considered crucial to the development of values, shows the importance of values considered in the educational context. Posted by Michael at 10:12 PM | TrackBack Spillover effects of family and school stress linger in adolescents' daily livesFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Teenagers today face increasing pressures and demands from school and home. New research has found that stress at home affects adolescents' school life, and vice versa. What's more, that stress lasts for two days and affects academic performance across the high school years. The research was carried out at the University of California, Los Angeles, and is reported in the May/June 2008 issue of the journal Child Development. The study, which examined the implications of stress in adolescents' daily lives, looked at the spillover between daily family stressors and school problems among an ethically diverse group of 589 9th-grade students in the Los Angeles area. The teenagers reported their daily family and school experiences in a diary every day for two weeks, completing a checklist that assessed conflict with parents, family demands, learning difficulties, school attendance, and other experiences. These spillover effects continued for two days after the initial stressor occurred: Teenagers who experienced family stress had school adjustment problems not only the next day, but two days later. Adolescents who had higher levels of family stress and school problems at the start of high school, in 9th grade, saw declining academic achievement four years later, at the end of 12th grade. "The findings from this study indicate that there are indeed short- and long-term consequences of daily stress that should not be overlooked," according to Lisa Flook, a postdoctoral fellow at the University of California, Los Angeles, and the study's lead author. Posted by Michael at 10:11 PM | TrackBack Culture affects how teen girls see harassmentFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Teenage girls of all ethnic and socioeconomic backgrounds still experience sexism and sexual harassment -- but cultural factors may control whether they perceive sexism as an environmental problem or as evidence of their own shortcomings. Participants were asked about experiences with sexual harassment and any discouraging comments they received in traditionally male-dominated areas such as math, science, computers and sports. Specifically, 67 percent of girls reported receiving unwanted romantic attention, 62 percent were exposed to demeaning gender-related comments, 58 percent were teased because of their appearance, 52 percent received unwanted physical contact and 25 percent were bullied or threatened with harm by a male. 52 percent of girls also reported receiving discouraging gender-based comments on the math, science and computer abilities, usually from male peers, and 76 percent of girls reported sexist comments on their athletic abilities, again predominantly from male peers. Girls who had been exposed to feminist ideas, either through the media or an adult such as a mother or teacher, were more likely to identify and report sexist behavior than were girls who had no information about feminism. Girls who reported feeling pressure from their parents to conform to gender stereotypes were also more likely to perceive sexism. Girls who felt atypical for their gender and/or were unhappy with stereotypical gender roles were most likely to report sexism and harassment. Brown and Leaper note that it is important for girls to be able to identify sexism and sexual harassment as environmental factors, lest they attribute negative experiences to their own faults and suffer erosion of self-esteem. Posted by Michael at 10:09 PM | TrackBack Young children with OCD benefit from family-based treatmentFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Although children as young as 5 can be diagnosed with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), few research studies have looked at treatments specifically geared toward young children with this disorder. Now, a new study from the Bradley Hasbro Children's Research Center provides some of the first evidence-based data on a successful intervention for early childhood OCD. According to the study's findings, published in the May issue of the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, children with OCD between the ages of 5 and 8 may benefit from a form of psychotherapy, known as family-based cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), that is uniquely tailored to the child's developmental needs and family context. The overall focus of family-based CBT is to provide both child and parents with a set of tools to help them understand, manage and reduce OCD symptoms. "If left untreated, early childhood OCD can severely disrupt and impair a child's development and functioning and can extend into adulthood. Despite this risk, clinicians do not have a proven treatment model for these young children," says lead author Jennifer B. Freeman, Ph.D., of the Bradley Hasbro Children's Research Center and an assistant professor of psychiatry/human behavior (research) at The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University. Clinicians should consider the child's unique developmental characteristics and tailor psychoeducation, exposures and homework accordingly. Bradley Hospital, located in Providence, R.I., is a teaching hospital for The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University and ranks in the top third of private hospitals receiving funding from the National Institutes of Health. Posted by Michael at 10:07 PM | TrackBack Separation from mom, dad linked with learning trouble in kidsFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: In the wake of divorce, illness, violence and other problems that can unsettle homes, countless young children are liable to experience temporary separations from one or both parents before packing their knapsack for kindergarten. Published in the May/June issue of Ambulatory Pediatrics, a new, community-wide study from Rochester, New York, warns that such kids are at increased risk for learning difficulties and that these separations are good predictors of which children may require special educational interventions to succeed. Previous research on parent-child separation has concentrated on children in foster or kinship care, who are known to often experience considerable emotional, behavioral and developmental problems. Parents are less apt to be reading to their kids or taking time to teach them new skills, such as tying shoes, practicing their letters or penning their names," said Sandy Jee, M.D., M.P.H., assistant professor of Pediatrics at the University of Rochester Medical Center's Golisano Children's Hospital, who led the study. Parents or caregivers were asked if their child had ever been away from a parent for more than a month, and if so, if the separation occurred once, twice, or more than three times. "We found that 18 percent of these urban children had been separated from their parents at any point in their childhood," Jee said. Children who have been separated at any point scored significantly worse both on the 4-point scales measuring their ability to learn new tasks and their pre-literacy skills. Jee and her colleagues do not know yet which types of separations might have the most deleterious effects on kids' early learning, since the survey did not ask specific reasons for the separation. Posted by Michael at 10:06 PM | TrackBack Who Is Helped by the Child Tax Credit Provision in the House Tax "Extenders" Bill?From Center on Budget and Policy Priorities: The tax "extenders" bill scheduled for mark-up today in the House Ways and Means Committee (H.R. 6049) would temporarily expand the Child Tax Credit by lowering the earnings threshold that families must meet to qualify for the refundable portion of the credit. According to the Tax Policy Center, this provision would benefit 13 million children --- including 2.9 million children who would become newly eligible for the benefit and 10.1 million children who would see their CTC increased due to this provision. An expanded CTC would provide assistance to these families in which parents struggle to maintain jobs and meet the health and other expenses they incur due to the disability. The parents who would be assisted work in a broad range of low paying jobs; many perform difficult jobs that provide critical services, such as caring for the elderly or teaching young children. 480,000 parents provide health care services to the elderly or the ill as nursing home workers, home health aides, personal care assistants, medical assistants, and other low-paid health care professionals. Estimates of the number of children who would benefit from the CTC provisions that are based on the March 2006 Current Population Survey are somewhat lower than those computed by the Tax Policy Center. Because TPC has more complete data on tax filing units and tax filers' taxable income than are available from the Census Bureau, the TPC figures on the total number of children who would benefit are generally considered more accurate than the estimates using the March CPS data. Posted by Michael at 10:06 PM | TrackBack May 14, 2008Achieving Universal Coverage and Health System SavingsFrom The Commonwealth Fund: The presidential election has focused public attention on the need for health system reform---to ensure health insurance for all, to make health care more accessible and responsive to patients, and to slow the growth in health care cost. This issue brief sets forth a framework for expanding health coverage that offers Americans a choice of a product modeled on Medicare to those under age 65, made available through a national insurance connector. Coupled with reforms to Medicare provider payment, expansion of preventive health care, and improved information, such a strategy has the potential to achieve near-universal coverage and improve quality and access, while generating health system savings of $1.6 trillion over 10 years. Posted by Michael at 8:01 PM | TrackBack Female sex offenders often have mental problemsFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Women who commit sexual offences are just as likely to have mental problems or drug addictions as other violent female criminals. Given that previous research has focused on male perpetrators, knowledge of the factors specific to female sex offenders has been scant. A group of researchers at the Swedish medical university Karolinska Institutet have now looked into incidences of mental illness and drug abuse in these 93 convicted women, and compared them with over 20,000 randomly selected women in the normal population and with the 13,000-plus women who were convicted of non-sexual crimes over the same period. Thirty-seven per cent of the women convicted of sex offences had undergone treatment at a psychiatric clinic during the period, and eight per cent had been diagnosed as having a psychosis. There was no difference in incidences of mental illness and drug abuse between these women and women who had committed other kinds of violent crime. "This is interesting as men who commit sexual offences usually have fewer psychiatric problems than men who commit other violent crimes," says Niklas Långström, Associate Professor at Karolinska Institutet's Centre for Violence Prevention and one of the authors of the study. Incidences of psychosis were 16 times higher amongst the sex offenders than the control group, drug abuse 23 times higher. According to the research team, the results indicate that women suspected or convicted of sexual offences should undergo routine psychiatric examination, something which, at present, is not done. Posted by Michael at 8:01 PM | TrackBack Achieving Universal Coverage with Private and Public Group Health InsuranceFrom The Commonwealth Fund: Despite a handful of statewide reform initiatives, the nation is losing ground on coverage and families are feeling the strain on their wallets and their health. The two core components of the "Building Blocks" framework---expanding Medicare and maintaining the current role of employer-sponsored insurance---are both in line with public opinion. As outlined by the authors, the plan would continue uninterrupted coverage for many insured people, while offering new options for small firms and individuals. Under Building Blocks, small businesses, the uninsured, and the self-employed could gain coverage through a new national insurance connector that would offer a choice of a Medicare-like option with enhanced benefits, called Medicare Extra, and private plans. The premiums for Medicare Extra would be community-rated for everyone under age 60, estimated at $259 per month for single premiums and $702 per month for families in 2008. To help finance the plan, employers would be required---under a "play or pay" mandate---to offer coverage or pay a payroll tax of 7 percent of earnings, up to $1.25 per hour. Low-income adults with incomes below 150 percent of the federal poverty level would be eligible for coverage through Medicaid and the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), with premiums fully covered. "The estimated net effect on total national health spending is minor," say the authors, with an increase of less than 1 percent, or $15 billion dollars, in 2008. To learn more about the estimated impact of the Building Blocks framework, combined with health system reform initiatives, on coverage, access, and costs, read The Commonwealth Fund issue brief, The Building Blocks of Health Reform: Achieving Universal Coverage and Health System Savings. Posted by Michael at 8:01 PM | TrackBack Most female child molesters were victims of sexual abuseFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: A University of Georgia study that is the first to systematically examine a large sample of female child molesters finds that many of them were themselves victims of sexual abuse as children. The finding, published in the April issue of the Journal of Interpersonal Violence, has the potential to help break the cycle of abuse by improving treatment for offenders and their young victims. "This study informs us about the pathway to becoming sexually deviant for females," said study author Susan Strickland, assistant professor in the UGA School of Social Work. Many people believe that women are not capable of committing such acts, she said, and the abuse of boys by women is often dismissed as the boys sowing their oats or even being lucky. The truth is that both boys and girls are molested by female perpetrators and these victims often suffer a myriad of consequences affecting their sexuality, relationships and beliefs about themselves and others. Studies on female sex offenders are rare, and most have been descriptive in nature, used small samples and have not used valid statistical measures or control groups. Strickland's study, the largest of its kind, surveyed 130 incarcerated females - 60 of which were sex offenders and 70 of which were nonsexual offenders - and examined factors such as childhood trauma, substance abuse, emotional neediness and personality disorders. While the majority of both groups reported being the victims of childhood maltreatment, the sex offenders were significantly more likely to experience pervasive, serious and more frequent emotional abuse, physical abuse and neglect. Posted by Michael at 7:50 PM | TrackBack Link between Mothers' Depression, Young Children's InjuriesFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Infants and toddlers whose mothers are severely depressed are almost three times more likely to suffer accidental injuries than other children in the same age group, according to a new study. The study's findings, published today in the Advanced Access edition of the Journal of Pediatric Psychology, suggest that proper treatment for depression would improve not only the mothers' health, but the health of young children as well. Prior studies have shown that mothers who reported symptoms consistent with clinical depression had children who experienced a significant number of accidental injuries between the ages 3 months to 2 years. A likely cause for the link between severe maternal depression and young children's injury risk is that chronically depressed mothers may not appropriately safeguard the physical environments that children engage in, Schwebel said. Another cause may be that symptoms of depression include inattention, poor concentration and irritability, which "might lead to poor or inconsistent supervision and enforcement of safety-related rules," he said. The researchers found that young children, from birth to 3 years, whose mothers suffered severe, chronic depression, were three times more likely to experience accidental injuries than infants and toddlers whose mothers were only moderately depressed. The link between severe, chronic depression in mothers and injuries in young children remained consistent even when taking into account the families' socio-economic status, parenting styles, and the children's sex, temperament and behavior. However, when children grew older, from age 3 to first grade, there was little difference in the injury rates of those whose mothers suffered from severe depression and those who reported being moderately depressed when the children were toddlers. Posted by Michael at 7:48 PM | TrackBack May 13, 2008Reading First Impact StudyFrom MDRC: The U.S. Department of Education's Institute of Education Sciences has released the interim report from the Reading First Impact Study, a Congressionally-mandated evaluation of the federal government's $1.0-billion-per-year initiative to help all children read at or above grade level by the end of third grade. The NRP identified five areas of instructional practice that were found to be essential to teaching children to read: phonemic awareness (manipulation of individual speech sounds), phonics (mappings between sounds and print), fluency (improved speed and accuracy in oral reading), vocabulary, and text comprehension. Reading First is the largest federal funding initiative ever undertaken with the explicit goal of increasing classroom teachers' use of research-based reading instructional practices. Rather than an evaluation of the NRP's conclusions, the Reading First Impact Study is an assessment of the extent to which this federal funding stream increases teachers' use of the essential elements of reading instruction and improves students' reading comprehension skills. Study sites that received their Reading First grants later in the federal funding process experienced positive and statistically significant impacts both on the time teachers spent on the five essential components of reading instruction and on first- and second-grade students' reading comprehension. Districts and schools with the greatest demonstrated need, in terms of student reading proficiency and poverty status, were intended to have the highest funding priority. The impacts of Reading First on teachers' instructional practice and students' reading achievement are consistently positive for late award sites and mixed for early award sites. For grades one and two in sites that received their Reading First grants in 2004, the program produced positive and statistically significant increases in both teachers' instruction in the five dimensions and in students' reading comprehension. Posted by Michael at 6:01 PM | TrackBack Think before you drink, says university researchFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: People are being urged to think before they drink as part of a research project aimed at changing people's binge drinking habits. A team of health psychologists at The University of Nottingham plan to discover whether using the workplace to supply information on the health effects of binge drinking and asking employees for a small commitment to reducing the amount they drink in a single session could change people's binge drinking behaviour in the long term. Dr Martin Hagger, of the Risk Analysis, Social Processes and Health Research Group in the University's School of Psychology, said: "The workplace offers an existing network that could allow us to get the message about binge drinking out to as many people as possible. "That could include people who are regularly going out for a few post-work pints, having one too many at the weekend or are simply unaware of the actual units of alcohol they are consuming at home." Dr Hagger said: "It's all to do with raising people's awareness of situations in which they might binge drink and asking them to think of a plan of action they could use to change this behaviour. For example, if they know they are likely to go for drinks after work, they might visualise themselves only having a couple of alcoholic drinks before switching to a soft drink." The researchers will then follow up with the employees by telephone one month and three months later to find out how successful they have been to sticking to their strategy. Posted by Michael at 6:01 PM | TrackBack Homeless youth need more than treatment for substance abuse, study saysFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: A new study of homeless youth suggests that treating substance abuse and mental health problems may not be enough to help get teens off the streets. A study of 180 homeless youth in New Mexico found that those with the most social stability, such as those who attended school more often or those who had a job, were most likely to reduce their homeless days over a six-month period. While youth who had a history of abuse or mental health problems were more likely to become homeless, those same characteristics did not predict teens and young adults getting off the street six months later. "It looks like the predictors of homelessness might be different than the predictors of exiting homelessness. So that means prevention targets should be different from intervention targets," said Natasha Slesnick, lead author of the study and associate professor of human development and family science at Ohio State University. It's hard to get homeless youth off of alcohol and drugs when they're still trying to get their basic needs met. And a lot of the kids use alcohol and drugs as a way to cope with being homeless," she said. Those youth who were homeless for at least three months participated in follow-up interviews three and six months after beginning the program. These teens and young adults reported participating in the most dangerous behaviors including unprotected sex, multiple sex partners, and intravenous drug use. Previous studies have suggested that homeless males are more susceptible to environmental stress and thus, more likely to leave the street to escape that stress. Slesnick is currently conducting a study in Columbus, Ohio focusing on the differences between intensive intervention, case management and brief intervention methods on homeless youth. Posted by Michael at 6:01 PM | TrackBack Asthma Awareness Month Reinforces Importance of Asthma Prevention and ManagementFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: Bringing much-needed attention to a chronic disease that strikes one out of six kids in the state, the American Lung Association of California today marked Asthma Awareness Month by endorsing the California Department of Public Health's new five-year Strategic Plan for Asthma in California 2008-2012. The plan provides strategies to improve the health and quality of life of the more than 5 million Californians affected by asthma, and outlines steps to reduce the disease's health care costs - California hospitalizations totaled more than $763 million in 2005 alone. "We will continue to help prevent and control asthma so that those with asthma no longer need to experience a high number of asthma-caused missed school and work days, disruption of sleep and family activities, and urgent medical visits." In addition to conducting asthma advocacy work and funding asthma-related research, the American Lung Association of California offers Open Airways for Schools, an education program for children with asthma in grades 3-6, camps for children with asthma, and Breathe Well, Live Well for adults. Residents also can call the American Lung Association's multilingual Lung HelpLine at 1-800-LUNG-USA (1-800-586-4872) to speak with a nurse or respiratory therapist at no charge. Prevention and control strategies include developing an asthma action plan with a medical professional, using daily control medications if prescribed, scheduling regular follow-up clinic visits, having access to quick-relief inhalers and avoiding personal asthma triggers. AScribe transmits news releases directly to newsroom computer systems and desktops of major media organizations via a supremely trusted channel - The Associated Press. Posted by Michael at 5:51 PM | TrackBack New Plan Would Provide Health Insurance for Almost All Americans; Could Reduce Health Spending $1.6 Trillion Over 10 YearsFrom The Commonwealth Fund: In an article in today's Health Affairs and an accompanying issue brief, Commonwealth Fund researchers lay out a plan that would insure 44 million of the estimated 48 million uninsured Americans in 2008. It would offer new health insurance choices to individuals and small businesses for 30 percent less than what employers currently pay, leading to improved coverage or reduced premiums for 49 million individuals. The proposed approach could save $1.6 trillion over 10 years if it is coupled with efforts to reform how the United States pays for health care, invest in better information systems, and adopt initiatives to improve public health. The "Building Blocks" plan would preserve employer-sponsored health insurance, Medicaid, and the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), and build on the existing success of the Medicare program by offering a Medicare-like option along with a choice of private health plans through a new national, health insurance "connector." "This approach builds on group insurance coverage and the national reach of Medicare and at the same time addresses the high administrative and premium costs for individuals and small groups," said Commonwealth Fund President and article co-author Karen Davis. The approach is laid out in the article "Building Blocks of Universal Coverage With Private and Public Group Insurance" and is further described in combination with other reforms in the accompanying issue brief, The Building Blocks of Health Reform: Achieving Universal Coverage and Health System Savings, both by Commonwealth Fund researchers Cathy Schoen, Karen Davis, and Sara Collins. The sooner we start, the greater the gains for families and the nation." Posted by Michael at 5:48 PM | TrackBack Universal Mandatory Health Insurance in The Netherlands: A Model for the United States?From The Commonwealth Fund: In 2006, the Netherlands launched a sweeping national health care initiative to provide universal health care coverage for its population. According to the authors of "Universal Mandatory Health Insurance in the Netherlands: A Model for the United States?" The Dutch health care system is a work in progress. In 1941, the government introduced a mandatory health insurance plan for low- and middle-income people that provided most of the Dutch population with basic health insurance. Those with higher incomes typically purchased private insurance. As access to health care increased, so did spending, arousing fears that rising medical costs would jeopardize access to health care, inflate labor costs, and increase unemployment. In 1982, the Health Care Prices Act authorized the Dutch government to control physicians' fees and total revenues. Growing dissatisfaction with "top-down" health care rationing policies---criticized for their inability to promote efficiency and innovation---led to broad support for incentive-based reform. For example, the new system required a system of risk equalization to prevent insurers from seeking only young, healthy customers. It requires all people who legally live or work in the Netherlands to buy health insurance from a private insurance company. Employers are required to compensate their employees for these contributions. In addition, all adults are required to pay premiums directly to the selected insurer, which sets its own community-rated premium. The Dutch government has set up a Web site where consumers can compare all insurers with respect to price, services, consumer satisfaction, and supplemental insurance, and compare hospitals on different sets of performance indicators. Posted by Michael at 5:46 PM | TrackBack Expanded food and nutrition program shows $10 benefit for each $1 spentFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: A program to teach low-income adults about healthy food choices is a good bargain in terms of the health and economic benefits achieved, reports a cost-effectiveness study in the May/June issue of Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior (http://www.jneb.org/). EFNEP aims to provide low-income adults with the knowledge, skills, attitudes, and behaviors they need to improve their family's diet and nutritional well-being. "The outcome data indicate that food and nutrition behavior changes resulting from EFNEP are likely to improve future health and reduce health care costs," Dr. Dollahite said. The study included data on 5,730 low-income adults who "graduated" from the New York State EFNEP program in 2000. The study was supported by a USDA Research Development Grant from the Joint Center for Poverty Research (2000), the College of Human Ecology at Cornell University, and Cornell Cooperative Extension. The purpose of JNEB is to document and disseminate original research, emerging issues and practices relevant to nutrition education and behavior worldwide. The Society for Nutrition Education (SNE) (http://www.sne.org/) represents the unique professional interests of nutrition educators worldwide. SNE is dedicated to promoting healthy, sustainable food choices and has a vision of healthy people in health communities. Working in partnership with the global science and health communities, Elsevier's 7,000 employees in over 70 offices worldwide publish more than 2,000 journals and 1,900 new books per year, in addition to offering a suite of innovative electronic products, such as ScienceDirect (http://www.sciencedirect.com/), MD Consult (http://www.mdconsult.com/), Scopus (http://www.info.scopus.com/), bibliographic databases, and online reference works. Posted by Michael at 5:45 PM | TrackBack Colorado Companies Encouraged to Comply With Nondiscrimination Law Before One-Year Anniversary of Employment Nondiscrimination Act (ENDA); New Resource Sheds Light on Gender Expression, Discrimination and the LawFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: One year ago this month, Colorado passed into law an amended version of the Employment Nondiscrimination Act (ENDA). As the one-year anniversary approaches, the Gay & Lesbian Fund for Colorado is encouraging corporations, nonprofit organizations, government agencies, educational institutions, and other business entities to ensure that they are in compliance with the law. Signed into law by Governor Bill Ritter on May 25, 2007 and effective August 3, 2007, ENDA expands Colorado's employment nondiscrimination protections to include sexual orientation - an important step toward ending discrimination in the workplace for all Coloradans. "Until this legislation was passed, it was lawful in Colorado to fire someone simply because of their being gay," said Mary Lou Makepeace, executive director of the Gay & Lesbian Fund. They need to have policies and procedures in place, as well as staff training, to avoid any allegations of discrimination," says Pat Steadman, vice president of Mendez, Steadman & Associates, a political consulting firm. Since it was founded in 1996, the Gay & Lesbian Fund for Colorado has provided financial support and critical resources to hundreds of nonprofit organizations that share the fund's commitment to advancing equality and improving quality of life for people across Colorado. AScribe transmits news releases directly to newsroom computer systems and desktops of major media organizations via a supremely trusted channel - The Associated Press. Posted by Michael at 5:44 PM | TrackBack Inhospitable Job Market to Greet College GraduatesFrom Economic Policy Institute: This month's crop of new college graduates will confront a more inhospitable job market than their predecessors faced in 2001, the beginning of the last recession. In particular, wage and benefit trends show that the labor market for recent college graduates (ages 23-29) was weaker in 2007 than before the last recession in 2001. While the hourly wages for both men and women have ended their steady decline, they have barely risen and are still lower by about $0.60 for women and $1.60 for men than they were six years ago. Over the last recession and recovery, college graduates in entry-level jobs became less likely to receive employer-provided health insurance and pension coverage.1 The incidence of health insurance coverage is over 5 percentage points lower than in 2001, and less than half of young college grads now receive any form of pension coverage on the job. The fact that new college grads are doing poorly is a troubling sign, since those with higher education and more skills required in the new economy (e.g., computer literacy) are expected to be faring well. Health coverage is defined as being included in an employer-provided plan where the employer paid for at least some of the premium. Posted by Michael at 5:43 PM | TrackBack New Study Reveals Short and Long-Term Outcomes of Smaller Learning CommunitiesFrom Education Newsfeed: The Smaller Learning Communities (SLC) program was established in response to growing national concerns about students too often lost and alienated in large, impersonal high schools, as well as concerns about school safety and low levels of achievement and graduation for many students. Authorized under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, the SLC program was designed to provide local educational agencies with funds to plan, implement, or expand SLCs in large high schools of 1,000 students or more. The study based its findings on data from 119 grantees from among those funded in 2000 in the first cohort of grantees and surveyed in the spring of 2002 and fall 2003. The report also used data from in-depth case studies of 18 grantees that intended to use freshman or career academies to structure a smaller learning community. Schools reported a number of factors limiting effective SLC implementation, including scheduling and logistical issues, physical space, lack of teacher SLC professional development, and school staffing needs, especially in terms of core academic teachers and guidance counselors. While the study was primarily focused on implementation issues, some limited data on outcomes from the first Annual Performance Reports (APRs) are included in the report along with a number of limitations and cautions in interpreting the data. The data were based on school overall statistics observed immediately before and after participation in the federal program, and in no way imply a causal connection. There was a statistically significant positive trend in the percentage of 9th-grade students being promoted to 10th grade during the post-grant period. Posted by Michael at 5:42 PM | TrackBack Girls, young women can cut risk of early breast cancer through regular exerciseFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: In the largest and most detailed analysis to date of the effects of exercise on premenopausal breast cancer, the study of nearly 65,000 women found that those who were physically active had a 23 percent lower risk of breast cancer before menopause. In particular, high levels of physical activity from ages 12 to 22 contributed most strongly to the lower breast cancer risk. The study, by researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and Harvard University in Boston, will be available online May 13 in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. "We don't have a lot of prevention strategies for premenopausal breast cancer, but our findings clearly show that physical activity during adolescence and young adulthood can pay off in the long run by reducing a woman's risk of early breast cancer," says lead investigator Graham Colditz, M.D., Dr.P.H., the Niess-Gain Professor and associate director of Prevention and Control at the Siteman Cancer Center at Washington University School of Medicine and Barnes-Jewish Hospital. Numerous studies have shown that physical activity reduces the risk of postmenopausal breast cancer, but the few studies that have looked at the influence of exercise on breast cancer risk before menopause have produced conflicting results. For the current analysis, researchers examined data on a subset of women enrolled in the Nurses' Health Study II, a prospective study of registered nurses ages 24 to 42. "You don't have to be a marathon runner to get the risk-reducing benefits of exercise," Colditz adds. Thus, women who begin menstruating later or enter menopause early have a lower risk of breast cancer. And young women who are physically active are more likely to start their periods later and less likely to have regular cycles when they begin their periods. Washington University School of Medicine's 2,100 employed and volunteer faculty physicians also are the medical staff of Barnes-Jewish and St. Louis Children's hospitals. Posted by Michael at 5:42 PM | TrackBack The Learning Communities DemonstrationFrom MDRC: With their open admissions, low cost, and convenient locations, community colleges have taken great strides in recent decades in providing access to college for millions of students with diverse ethnic and academic backgrounds. Now, however, community colleges must tackle an even more formidable challenge: how to help increasingly large numbers of academically underprepared students succeed in college. The developmental courses to which over half of entering students are directed often prove to be too great a hurdle, and the majority who hope to earn a certificate or a degree, or to transfer, drop out before reaching their goals. In a learning community, a cohort of students takes two or more courses linked by integrated themes and assignments that are developed through ongoing faculty collaboration. Learning communities are intended to foster active and collaborative learning and to create stronger relationships among students and between students and faculty. While the number of learning community programs continues to grow, rigorous studies measuring their effectiveness are limited. To address this need for evidence, the Learning Communities demonstration, launched in 2007, uses random assignment to test models of learning communities at six community colleges: Kingsborough Community College, Queensborough Community College, Hillsborough Community College, Merced College, Houston Community College System, and Community College of Baltimore County. What are the effects of learning communities on students' persistence in higher education? This working paper describes the study's design, including a summary of the theoretical and empirical research relevant to learning communities, descriptions of the sites and their learning community models, the random assignment procedures, and plans for data analysis. Posted by Michael at 5:41 PM | TrackBack Nation's payrolls decline again; hours, wages, and incomes squeezedFrom Economic Policy Institute: Today's Bureau of Labor Statistics report indicates that the nation's payrolls contracted for the fourth month in a row, down 20,000 in April, with large losses in construction, manufacturing, and retail sales partially offset by gains in other areas. Posted by Michael at 5:40 PM | TrackBack Report Provides Blueprint to Fight Environmental Triggers of Childhood AsthmaFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: Our homes, schools, playgrounds and neighborhoods are riddled with preventable asthma triggers that leave millions of children gasping for air. But a new report released today by PolicyLink and The California Endowment lays out a plan for what we all can do to make our children's air safer and healthier. The new report, "Breathing Easy from Home to School: Fighting the Environmental Triggers of Childhood Asthma," provides a blueprint for dramatically reducing the community factors that contribute to asthma development and spark asthma attacks. The asthma epidemic is clearly a crisis, affecting more than 10 million children nationwide - about one in every seven school-aged kids. In some communities - particularly low-income communities and communities of color - as many as one in four children suffer from asthma. Kids in these high-risk communities are exposed daily to countless environmental hazards: exhaust-spewing cars, trucks and buses on nearby highways; unregulated industrial plants; and dilapidated schools with poor ventilation and mold. "Too many kids in poor communities are forced to breathe unhealthy air from the moment they get up to the moment they go to sleep," said Judith Bell, president of PolicyLink. "All of California's kids should be able to grow and learn in healthy environments," said Robert K. Ross, M.D., president and CEO of The California Endowment. The California Endowment's mission is to expand access to affordable, quality health care for underserved individuals and communities, and to promote fundamental improvements in the health status of all Californians. AScribe transmits news releases directly to newsroom computer systems and desktops of major media organizations via a supremely trusted channel - The Associated Press. Posted by Michael at 5:39 PM | TrackBack Military Child Care: A Government Success StoryFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: When politicians make speeches celebrating Armed Forces Day, they seldom discuss the military child care system. But this is an area in which the military has a lot to teach the civilian world. Indeed, the transformation of child care in the military is one of the government success stories of the past 20 years. The annual employee turnover rate was 300 percent, exposing soldiers' children to the constant churn of new and untrained child care workers. Within 15 years, the military went from having centers that didn't even meet basic health codes to having the highest quality child care in the United States. In the civilian world, only 10 percent of all full-time employees have access to employer-provided child care centers, a figure that falls to just 3 percent for men and women earning less than $15.00 per hour. All child care workers in the military receive standardized training and support, and must undergo extensive background checks. In contrast, less than 10 percent of all day care centers and less than 1 percent of in-home day care facilities in the private sector are accredited. Families earning up to $23,000 per year pay between $40 and $53 per week per child. AScribe transmits news releases directly to newsroom computer systems and desktops of major media organizations via a supremely trusted channel - The Associated Press. Posted by Michael at 5:38 PM | TrackBack Testimony on Employment Eligibility Verification Systems and the Potential Impacts on SSA's Ability to Serve Retirees, People with Disabilities, and Workers.From Center for Law and Social Policy: CLASP is nationally recognized as an expert on child support policy, including policies related to child support data bases, and consults regularly with federal security, educational and workforce prospects, and family stability of low-income children, youth and families. The National Immigration Law Center (NILC) is a nonpartisan national legal advocacy organization that works to protect and promote the rights of low-income immigrants and their family members. CLASP and NILC are submitting testimony to express our opposition to using the National Directory of New Hires for purposes of establishing a mandatory electronic employment verification system (EEVS) as is proposed in the New Employee Verification Act of 2008 (HR 5515). Under the current EEVS, the E-Verify program, the system requires the employer to report if the worker is a U.S. citizen or immigrant authorized to work. If the worker is not a U.S. citizen, the employer must provide t r or I-94 number. The employer must also report what type of document the worker presented to prove his or her employment authorization and identity and the expiration date of that document, if applicable. If state child support programs have to divert resources to enforce immigration laws, there will be fewer resources available to establish and enforce child support orders leading to fewer children receiving support from their noncustodial parents. As it is, federal child support program funding was cut by 20 percent in the Deficit Reduction Act of 2005, and many states and county child support programs are laying off as many as a third of their enforcement workers. Posted by Michael at 5:37 PM | TrackBack Deputy Secretary of Education Raymond Simon Highlights No Child Left Behind in South CarolinaFrom Education Newsfeed: Deputy Secretary of Education Raymond Simon today in South Carolina praised the state for setting some of the highest standards in the nation when compared to the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), or the Nation's Report Card. He also discussed the U.S. Department of Education's new Differentiated Accountability Program pilot, which will help states meet specific eligibility requirements to target resources and interventions to those schools most in need of significant reform. In addition, he discussed recently proposed regulations that aim to help students and schools improve by strengthening the No Child Left Behind Act. "Instead of questioning whether or not all students can learn, thanks to No Child Left Behind, we're finally beginning to make sure that every child is learning. In the past two years, the percentage of low-income students performing at or above grade level in math increased in grades 4 and 5, as well as in high school. At the U.S. Department of Education, our goal is to work with the states to help raise achievement, and this new pilot, we feel, does just that". "While South Carolina has made steady academic progress over the past decade," Deputy Secretary Simon said, "there is still work to be done. For example, the Nation's Report Card shows that many of South Carolina's African American students lag far behind their peers. We must make sure that educators have the flexibility they need to help struggling students and schools improve. And we must make sure that students who need extra help can access free tutoring." To view Mapping South Carolina's Educational Progress 2008, please visit www.ed.gov/nclb/accountability/results/progress/sc.html. For Mapping America's Educational Progress 2008, visit http://www.ed.gov/nclb/accountability/resresults/progress/nation.html. Posted by Michael at 5:32 PM | TrackBack Foundation Support Grows to Build Workforce Skills and Prosperity for Low-Wage EarnersThe Council on Foundations’ 2008 Philanthropy Summit highlighted programs of the National Fund for Workforce Solutions (NFWS) as emblematic of successful approaches to workforce development. The recognition came as new support was announced to broaden the impact of NFWS programs in urban and rural communities nationwide. Posted by Michael at 10:43 AM | TrackBack May 12, 2008Building the Future of Family InvolvementHarvard Family Research Project: NEW ISSUE OF "THE EVALUATION EXCHANGE" Harvard Family Research Project is pleased to announce our newest issue of "The Evaluation Exchange" on Building the Future of Family Involvement. WHAT'S IN THIS ISSUE Examining family involvement in policy, practice, and research, this issue explores where the field is today and where it needs to go in the future. The issue draws on HFRP's 25-year history of family involvement expertise and features innovative initiatives, new evaluation approaches and findings, and interviews with experts. It includes perspectives from the field’s most respected leaders, including: * Rudy Crew, Superintendent of the Miami-Dade County Public Schools * Karen Mapp, Anne Henderson, Kathy Hoover-Dempsey, Arnold Fege, and other researchers and experts * The National Parental Information and Resource Centers (PIRCs) and the National PTA * Longtime and emerging leaders in practice, research, and evaluation who are developing and implementing promising approaches It is our hope that this issue will spark discussion about new directions for family involvement moving forward. We invite you to explore the issue, pass it on to your friends and colleagues, and share your thoughts with us and with others in the field. Posted by Michael at 4:05 PM | TrackBack May 11, 2008Alcohol Outlets as Attractors of Violence and Disorder : A Closer Look at the Neighborhood EnvironmentFrom Urban Institute: This report investigates the relationship between alcohol availability, type of alcohol establishment, distribution policies and violence and disorder at the block group level in the District of Columbia. We test whether density of alcohol outlets influences: Spatial econometric regression models are estimated using an information theoretic approach. The findings indicate that on-premise outlets, but not off-premise outlets are a significant predictor of aggravated assault. Posted by Michael at 10:06 PM | TrackBack Major shift in HIV prevention priorities neededFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: According to a new policy analysis led by researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) and the University of California, Berkeley, the most common HIV prevention strategies---condom promotion, HIV testing, treatment of other sexually transmitted infections (STIs), vaccine and microbicide research, and abstinence---are having a limited impact on the predominantly heterosexual epidemics found in Africa. Furthermore, some of the assumptions underlying such strategies---such as poverty or war being major causes of AIDS in Africa---are unsupported by rigorous scientific evidence. The researchers argue that two interventions currently getting less attention and resources---male circumcision and reducing multiple sexual partnerships---would have a greater impact on the AIDS pandemic and should become the cornerstone of HIV prevention efforts in the high-HIV-prevalence parts of Africa. "Despite relatively large investments in AIDS prevention efforts for some years now, including sizeable spending in some of the most heavily affected countries (such as South Africa and Botswana), it's clear that we need to do a better job of reducing the rate of new HIV infections. In most countries, HIV transmission remains concentrated among sex workers, men who have sex with men and/or injecting drug users and their sexual partners. In some parts of Africa, HIV has jumped outside these high-risk groups, creating "generalized" epidemics spread mainly among people who are having multiple and typically "concurrent" (overlapping, longer-term) sexual relationships. Studies have shown no consistent reduction in risk for those testing HIV-negative and testing programs have produced no evidence of HIV reduction in populations. Posted by Michael at 10:06 PM | TrackBack Binge drinkers have a disconnect between assessing their driving abilities and realityFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: While many people believe that alcohol-impaired (AI) drivers are usually alcoholics, in fact, 80 percent of AI incidents are caused by binge drinkers. A recent study conducted among college students has found that binge drinkers, even when legally intoxicated, nonetheless believe they having adequate driving abilities. "Binge drinkers are individuals who, when they drink, typically drink to get drunk," explained Cecile A. Marczinski, assistant professor in the department of psychology at Northern Kentucky University and first author of the study. "Binge drinking is widespread on college campuses, with almost half of students reporting binge drinking," she said. "They are also particularly prone to AI driving. Thus, we needed to understand why a population that knows better than to engage in impaired driving still does. Participants in this study were 20 male and 20 female social-drinking college students (24 binge drinkers, 16 non-binge drinkers) between 21 and 29 years of age. All participants attended two sessions: one during which they received a moderate dose of alcohol (0.65 g/kg), and one during which they received a placebo. Following each session/dose, researchers measured the students' performance during a simulated driving task, and also measured their subjective responses, including ratings of sedation, stimulation and driving abilities. The authors hypothesize that binge drinkers lack an "internal sedation cue" that allows an accurate assessment of their driving abilities after drinking. "Furthermore," said Marczinski, "the dose of alcohol we gave resulted in a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of .08g percent, which is the legal limit for driving. Posted by Michael at 10:04 PM | TrackBack Center for Public Leadership Hosts a 'Conversation on Leadership and the Next Presidency'; Focus on Competencies - Not Policies - the Times DemandFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: "A crisis is a defining moment of any presidency," noted CPL director David Gergen. The morning will include a conversation on the challenges ahead for the next president, and what is required to address them. The afternoon program will also feature messages to would-be presidents from Harvard graduate students representing the next generation of leaders. "In studying the effectiveness of organizations for more than 40 years," added Ken Blanchard, leadership consultant and best-selling author, "there is no doubt in my mind that the key ingredient that determines success and human satisfaction is leadership. For that reason, May 12 will also mark the launch of the CPL Leadership Forum through a weblog to augment this discussion and continue highlighting leadership issues, and Harvard Kennedy School-related topics. ABOUT THE FOR PUBLIC LEADERSHIP: Established in 2000 through a generous grant from the Wexner Foundation, the Center for Public Leadership at Harvard's Kennedy School seeks to advance the frontiers of knowledge about leadership and to expand the pool of men and women who will become leaders for the common good. CPL provides cutting-edge teaching and research as well as hands-on training in the practical skills of leadership for people in government, nonprofits, and business. AScribe Newswire distributes news from nonprofit and public sector organizations. Posted by Michael at 10:00 PM | TrackBack Deputy Secretary of Education Highlights No Child Left Behind in South CarolinaFrom Education Newsfeed: Deputy Secretary of Education Raymond Simon today in South Carolina praised the state for setting some of the highest standards in the nation when compared to the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), or the Nation's Report Card. He also discussed the U.S. Department of Education's new Differentiated Accountability Program pilot, which will help states meet specific eligibility requirements to target resources and interventions to those schools most in need of significant reform. In addition, he discussed recently proposed regulations that aim to help students and schools improve by strengthening the No Child Left Behind Act. "Instead of questioning whether or not all students can learn, thanks to No Child Left Behind, we're finally beginning to make sure that every child is learning. In the past two years, the percentage of low-income students performing at or above grade level in math increased in grades 4 and 5, as well as in high school. At the U.S. Department of Education, our goal is to work with the states to help raise achievement, and this new pilot, we feel, does just that". "While South Carolina has made steady academic progress over the past decade," Deputy Secretary Simon said, "there is still work to be done. For example, the Nation's Report Card shows that many of South Carolina's African American students lag far behind their peers. We must make sure that educators have the flexibility they need to help struggling students and schools improve. And we must make sure that students who need extra help can access free tutoring." To view Mapping South Carolina's Educational Progress 2008, please visit www.ed.gov/nclb/accountability/results/progress/sc.html. For Mapping America's Educational Progress 2008, visit http://www.ed.gov/nclb/accountability/resresults/progress/nation.html. Posted by Michael at 9:51 PM | TrackBack Study supports reason for concern in childhood and adolescent obesityFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Study findings presented at the May 2008 Pediatric Academic Societies and Asian Society for Pediatric Research Joint Meeting indicate that childhood and adolescent obesity negatively impacts vascular endothelial function, which relates to cardiac health. Obesity has been increasing rapidly in the U.S. during the past 20 years and obesity in adults has been linked to cardiovascular disease. It is known that healthy endothelium (a single cell layer that lines all blood vessels) is key to maintaining vascular health. Endothelial "dysfunction" is a primary contributor to atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (the buildup of fatty deposits on the inside walls of arteries) in adults and is associated with increased risk of heart attacks, stroke, and congestive heart failure. Endothelial function can be measured non-invasively in children using venous occlusion plethysmography (VOP), a technique that measures responses of arm blood vessel responses to an inflatable cuff that externally halts and restarts blood flow. The study was designed to investigate the relationship between body mass index (BMI) and endothelial function measured via VOP in 76 children and adolescents ages nine through 18. Judith Groner, MD, the presenting author of the study, a pediatrician in Ambulatory Pediatrics at Nationwide Children's Hospital and a faculty member of The Ohio State University College of Medicine, said, "My colleagues in the Research Institute at Nationwide Children's and I found that regardless of age, race or sex, obesity in children and adolescents negatively impacts their endothelial function. Considering the connection between endothelial function and heart disease, this information is alarming given the high prevalence of childhood and adolescent obesity in our country." Posted by Michael at 9:49 PM | TrackBack Is divorce bad for the parents?From EurekAlert! - Breaking News: In a unique study funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, researchers found British adult children help their elderly parents according to current need (i.e. health) rather than past behaviour. This contrasts with other countries such as the US, where parents with a history of divorce see less of their children and receive less help from them. Parents with more children receive more support; however, step children give step parents less support. They analysed data from an annual survey of over five thousand British households (British Household Panel Survey) from 1991 to 2003. They compared this information with a survey of over 3500 people at around retirement age (55-69 years) in 1988, and an Italian family survey. The researchers led by Dr Karen Glaser found that children now help their elderly parents more than in the past. Comparing the UK with Italy, the researchers found the family oriented Italians care more for elderly parents regardless of need, whereas the pragmatic British gave support depending on the health situation of the elderly. 1.The research project 'Disruptions in family and work life: Implications for support in later life' was funded by the Economic and Social Research Council. The project is based on secondary analysis of national datasets, in particular the British Household Panel Survey (1991-2003), the British Retirement and Retirement Plans Survey (1988/89), and the Italian 1998 Indagine Multiscopo sulle Famiglie "Famiglia, soggetti sociali e condizione dell'infanzia" (Multipurpose Survey on Family and Childhood Conditions). 3.The Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) is the UK's largest funding agency for research and postgraduate training relating to social and economic issues. Posted by Michael at 9:48 PM | TrackBack May 8, 2008CEO Dissatisfaction with Nonprofit BoardsBoards of Midsize Nonprofits - Their Needs and Challenges: Nonprofit boards are increasingly a focus of those interested in nonprofit accountability and transparency, including policymakers, the media, researchers, and the public. Likewise, policy proposals and best practice guidelines often seem designed with large organizations in mind, raising concern among representatives of smaller organizations who feel the proposals may be inappropriate for their institutions. The discussion uses data from our Urban Institute National Survey of Nonprofit Governance, the first national representative survey of governance in the United States. This brief focuses on the subset of 1,862 organizations in that survey that have annual expenses between $500,000 and $5 million, hereafter referred to as 'midsize' nonprofits. Nonprofits in this size range make up approximately one in five public charities that file the Internal Revenue Service Form 990 (Pollak and Blackwood 2007). In particular, the brief addresses the following broad questions: * How actively engaged are midsize nonprofits’ board members, and what factors promote greater engagement? * How well do midsize nonprofits perform various responsibilities, and what factors promote stronger performance? * Who serves on midsize nonprofits’ boards, and what populations might they target to expand their pool of potential members? Posted by Michael at 12:21 PM | TrackBack May 7, 2008Is Globalization to Blame for U.S. Workers' Troubles?From Economic Policy Institute: On one shore are voters increasingly anxious about globalization and its effect on their jobs and communities. On the other are economists, policy makers, and pundits who maintain that trade is good for the economy, that the wider public is simply misguided about its benefits, and that politicians who sympathize with those concerned about globalization are pandering to special interests at the expense of the wider economy. This latter group relies heavily on the suggestion that "all economists believe" globalization is good for the vast majority of American workers. This reliance is odd given that mainstream economics actually argues that there are plenty of reasons for concern about globalization's effect on the majority of American workers. This primer highlights two issues in particular that should worry American workers about globalization: job losses stemming from growing trade deficits; and downward wage pressure for tens of millions of American workers. First, trade creates new jobs in exporting industries and destroys jobs when imports replace the output of domestic firms. Because trade deficits have risen over the past decade, more jobs have been displaced by imports than created by exports. Rather, they are a conservative measure of the involuntary job displacement caused by these growing deficits and an indicator of imbalance in the U.S. labor market and wider economy. Trade and wages While job-loss caused by rising trade deficits is the most visible effect of globalization, its impact on wages is a concern to an even much larger number of workers. Posted by Michael at 7:54 PM | TrackBack Socrates in the classroom develops students' thinking and changes the distribution of powerFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: When students have the opportunity to participate in "Socratic seminars" on a regular basis, a different classroom culture evolves. This is shown in a new dissertation in Pedagogy by Ann S Pihlgren at the Stockholm University in Sweden. The Socratic dialogue is a particular way of developing children's, as well as adults', thinking skills through cooperative dialogue where significant human ideas and values are discussed. By participating in Socratic seminars regularly every other week, preschool children and older students develop their thinking skills. The groups were filmed during three years of philosophizing in the classroom and the films were analyzed. The teacher dominated less, more students spoke and the students gradually took over the responsibilities of the teacher to promote exploration in the dialogue. The ability to use the Socratic seminar is learned by students and teachers through practice and by testing the rules of the seminar. The students construct a supportive group culture through their silent interaction, where gestures, glances, and body language are used to show not only support or sympathy for each other, but also cooperation with each other when someone attempts to disturb or to provoke the dialogue. To work with methods connected to the ancient philosopher Socrates may seem out-of-date in a modern school, but that is absolutely not the case, Ann S Pihlgren states. The dissertation offers excellent tools for teachers who want to develop students' thinking and to foster cooperative group dialogue. Plato was Socrates disciple and a prominent figure within the idealistic tradition of Western philosophy. Posted by Michael at 7:43 PM | TrackBack Obesity linked to increased risk for dementiaFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Obesity may increase adults' risk for having dementia, according to researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. "Our analysis of the data shows a clear association between obesity and an increased risk for dementia and several clinical subtypes of the disease," said Youfa Wang, MD, PhD, senior author of the study and associate professor with the Bloomberg School's Center for Human Nutrition. Wang adds, "Preventing or treating obesity at a younger age could play a major role in reducing the number of dementia patients and those with other commonly associated illnesses such as Alzheimer's disease by up to 20 percent in the United States." Lead researcher May A. Beydoun, along with Wang and H.A. Beydoun attribute these findings to a systematic review of 10 previously published studies that examined the relationships between dementia or its subtypes and various measures of body fat. Based on a pooled analysis of their findings from 7 of the studies, baseline obesity compared to normal weight increased the risk of Alzheimer's disease by 80 percent on average. The studies cited in the meta-analysis were conducted in a number of countries, including the United States, Finland, Sweden and France, and contained middle-aged and older adults. The most common form is Alzheimer's disease, with an estimated 5 million adults living with the disease in the United States alone. While more studies are needed to determine optimal weight and biological mechanisms associated with obesity and dementia, these findings could potentially decrease the number of people diagnosed with dementia and lead to an overall better quality of life," said May A. Beydoun, a former postdoctoral research fellow at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Posted by Michael at 7:42 PM | TrackBack America's Second Harvest Showcases the Faces of Hunger Through A Weeklong Photo Essay to Raise Awareness of the Increasing Number of Families in Need of Food AssistanceFrom PR Newswire: America's Second Harvest --The Nation's Food Bank Network, is showcasing a week long photo essay in an effort to spotlight the many faces of hunger in America. Congress is currently debating a new version of the expired 2007 Farm Bill that is necessary to bring much needed relief to 35 million hungry Americans. He lives in Mission, South Dakota, which has a population of 900 and is located in one of the five poorest counties in the United States. "Some days, it's hard to earn a dollar in this town," Philomen says. But thanks to the work of a local soup kitchen that receives product and assistance from the Community Food Banks of South Dakota and America's Second Harvest, he gets a hot meal several times a week, and the support and encouragement of friends and neighbors. For Philomen, and thousands of other individuals across South Dakota, the food they receive through the America's Second Harvest network provides the nourishment to survive and hope for a better future. Now in its 16th year, the Stamp Out Hunger! effort is the nation's largest single-day food drive, having collected more than 836 million pounds of food since its inception in 1993. For more information about the annual Stamp Out Hunger! Each year, America's Second Harvest secures and distributes more than 2 billion pounds of donated food and grocery products to support feeding programs at approximately 63,000 local charitable agencies, including food pantries, soup kitchens, emergency shelters, after-school programs, and Kids Cafes. Posted by Michael at 7:40 PM | TrackBack Justice Department Files Fair Housing Lawsuit Against City of Satsuma, AlabamaFrom PR Newswire: The Justice Department today sued the City of Satsuma, Ala., for violating the Fair Housing Act when the city refused to allow three women with disabilities to live together in a group home. The suit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Alabama, charges that Satsuma refused to make reasonable accommodations in its rules, policies, practices or services, which were necessary to afford the residents an opportunity to use and enjoy their home. The three adult residents lived in a single-family home with supportive services provided by professional care-givers. The City's zoning ordinance permits five unrelated persons to reside together in single-family homes in residential zones of the City. We will continue to enforce the Act vigorously," said Grace Chung Becker, Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division. This lawsuit arose as a result of complaints filed with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) by the three women, each of whom has a diagnosis of mental retardation. The suit seeks a court order prohibiting future discrimination by the City and requiring the City to grant the requested accommodation, pay monetary damages to compensate victims, and pay a civil penalty. The federal Fair Housing Act prohibits discrimination in housing based on race, color, religion, national origin, sex, disability and familial status. Since Jan. 1, 2001, the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division has filed 246 cases to enforce the Fair Housing Act, 117 of which have alleged discrimination based on disability. Posted by Michael at 7:37 PM | TrackBack Prisoner HIV program leads to continuum of medical care after releaseFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: By linking HIV positive prisoners to community-based medical care prior to release through an innovative program called Project Bridge, 95 percent of ex-offenders were retained in health care for a year after being released from incarceration, according to researchers from The Miriam Hospital. The benefits of the program are far-reaching as ex-offenders engaged in medical care are more likely to achieve social stabilization and less likely to return to prison. "Ex-offenders are often released to impoverished communities from which they came -- the potential this environment offers for relapse into drug use and lack of access to health care poses a threat to the health benefits they may have gained during incarceration," says principal investigator Leah Holmes, M.S.W., project director of Project Bridge and an adjunct professor at the University of Connecticut School of Social Work. "Ultimately, this can impose a burden on tax payers who end up paying for re-incarceration and/or emergency room visits for those not taking their medications." This particular study focused on a total of 59 participants who were enrolled in Project Bridge during the reporting period, May 2003 to December 2005. In conjunction with the HIV specialty care within the prison that Miriam Hospital physicians were already providing, Holmes launched the program in 1997 with the primary goal of retaining HIV positive ex-offenders in medical care through social stabilization. Holmes credits the use of professional social workers with making a difference when it comes to the program's effectiveness, in addition to the length of enrollment, intensity of the program, and collaboration between staff. Posted by Michael at 7:32 PM | TrackBack Increased Collaboration Between Jails, Communities Can Improve Return of Inmates to SocietyFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: Nine million men and women are jailed each year, many more than once. Despite limited resources and a churning population of inmates beset by numerous problems, the nation's 3,365 jails can do more to prevent crime by partnering with community organizations to improve the odds of inmates' successful return to society, two new reports from the Urban Institute, the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, and the Montgomery County (Maryland) Department of Correction and Rehabilitation demonstrate. "Life after Lockup: Improving Reentry from Jail to the Community," by Amy L. Solomon, Jenny W. L. Osborne, Stefan LoBuglio, Jeff Mellow, and Debbie Mukamal, is the first national resource focusing on jail inmates' transition from incarceration to society. It presents an overview of U.S. jails and their population and how reentry from jail differs markedly from reentry from state and federal prisons. A companion report, "The Jail Administrators' Toolkit for Reentry," is a handbook on such issues as assessment of inmates' needs, identifying community resources, educating the public, and measuring success. The Reentry Challenge Sixty-eight percent of jail inmates have drug or alcohol problems, 60 percent do not have a high school diploma or GED, 16 percent have a serious mental health illness, and 14 percent were homeless at some point during the year before incarceration, according to the federal Bureau of Justice Statistics. AScribe transmits news releases directly to newsroom computer systems and desktops of major media organizations via a supremely trusted channel - The Associated Press. Posted by Michael at 7:29 PM | TrackBack Current State of Businesses Owned by Women of Color Highlighted at Research SymposiumFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: The dynamics of the intersection of race and gender were the focus of research findings released today at the national symposium Research to Roadmap: Accelerating the Growth of Businesses Owned by Women of Color convened by the Center for Women's Business Research. The research is the first release of the results of a multi-year study conducted by the Center for Women's Business Research in partnership with Babson College exploring the impact of race and gender on the growth of businesses owned by women who are African-American, Asian, Latina and other ethnicities. The research found that being a business owner who is a woman of color can evoke misperceptions about business capacity, result in lessened access to capital for business growth, create the challenge of balancing the expectations and demands of running a business and being part of a diverse culture, and increase the difficulty of attracting top talent. The research also pointed out that many women business owners of color have a double bottom line. As part of the research methodology, participants identified obstacles at the personal, community, and national levels. - Diversity must be systemic: all races and ethnicities must be represented at all levels of leadership and decision-making. - Create affinity groups specifically for women of diverse races and ethnicities. Babson College in Wellesley, Mass., is recognized internationally as a leader in entrepreneurial management education. We provide direct, immediate access to mainstream national media for 600 colleges, universities, medical centers, public-policy groups and other leading nonprofit organizations. Posted by Michael at 7:28 PM | TrackBack National scientific meeting on child mental health at KentuckyFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: As the nation observes National Children's Mental Health Awareness Day on Thursday, the University of Kentucky Center for the Study of Violence Against Children will host national experts at the scientific meeting "From Neuroscience to Social Practice: Translational Research on Violence Against Children." The two-day event, being held May 7-8, includes the unveiling of research findings on violence against children that will be published in an upcoming issue of the Journal of Loss and Trauma. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 7:24 PM | TrackBack Making new moms workFrom Economic Policy Institute: This Mother's Day, we reflect on the critical but often overlooked issue of maternity leave. In a selection of 19 countries with comparable per capita income, the United States provides the fewest maternity leave benefits in both length of leave and paid time off (see chart). The United States passed the Family and Medical Leave Act in 1993, giving eligible parents 12 weeks unpaid leave to care for a new child. On May 2, New Jersey became the third state in the country to pass legislation that would provide at least some degree of paid family leave (following California and Washington). Most recently at the federal level, the Family Leave Insurance Act of 2008 (H.R. 5873) was introduced in April to provide paid leave to care for a new child and to cover workplaces with fewer than 50 employees. Policies that guarantee adequate leave are increasingly valuable not only for working families, but also for employers, who benefit from the retention of skilled personnel in the workplace and improved employee morale. Look for more comparisons between the United States and its global peers in the upcoming biennial release of The State of Working America 2008/2009, which will be released by the Economic Policy Institute on Labor Day, September 1, 2008. Posted by Michael at 7:20 PM | TrackBack Too much or too little weight gain poses risks to pregnant mothers, babiesFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Women who gain more or less than recommended amounts of weight during pregnancy are likely to increase the risk of problems for both themselves and their child, according to a new report by the RTI International-University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Evidence-based Practice Center. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 7:20 PM | TrackBack After Divorce, Stable Families Help Minimize Long-Term Harm to ChildrenFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: For children of divorce, what happens after their parents split up may be just as important to their long-term well-being as the divorce itself. A new study found that children who lived in unstable family situations after their parents divorced fared much worse as adults on a variety of measures compared to children who had stable post-divorce family situations. "For many children with divorced parents, particularly young ones, the divorce does not mark the end of family structure changes -- it marks the beginning," said Yongmin Sun, co-author of the study and associate professor of sociology at Ohio State University's Mansfield campus. In the two divorced family groups, children may have lived in single-parent families or ones with a stepparent. The key for this research was whether that arrangement -- whichever it was -- changed between ages 14 and 18. The researchers compared how children in these groups fared on measures of education, income and poverty in 2000 when they were 26. Results showed that young adults who grew up in stable post-divorce families had similar chances of attending college and living in poverty compared to those from always married families. This study found that for those in stable post-divorce families, the difference in adult well-being was mostly due to a shortage of economic and social resources. We provide direct, immediate access to mainstream national media for 600 colleges, universities, medical centers, public-policy groups and other leading nonprofit organizations. Posted by Michael at 7:18 PM | TrackBack May 6, 2008Massachusetts Inmates Report High Use of Prison Program, But Face Postrelease Challenges With Substance Abuse and Limited EmploymentFrom Urban Institute: Former prisoners in Massachusetts are back behind bars at a significantly lower rate than the national average, new research from the Urban Institute and the Massachusetts Department of Correction finds. Thirty-nine percent of the 1,786 male inmates released in 2002 by the Department of Correction (DOC) were in prison again within three years, compared with the national average of 53 percent. Interviews with 178 men who returned to prison show that substance use and employment instability ranked among their greatest challenges while in the community. Posted by Michael at 11:23 PM | TrackBack Participation in National Student Clearinghouse's Student Self-Service Surpasses 500 Colleges; Service Is Available to One in Four U.S. College StudentsFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: The National Student Clearinghouse, the nation's trusted source for degree and enrollment information, announced today that the number of colleges using its Student Self-Service web site has surpassed 500, providing access to the site to nearly five million students representing more than 25 percent of US college enrollment. Student Self-Service, which is free to participating institutions, enables students to obtain enrollment and student loan information and perform a number of enrollment verification and other activities at no charge. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 11:17 PM | TrackBack Making History in Solano CountyFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: The History Project at UC Davis and the Solano County Office of Education have received $1 million from the U.S. Department of Education to improve history instruction in Solano County public schools, where only one in three students performed at or above the "proficient" level in U.S. history on the 2007 California Standards Test. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 11:16 PM | TrackBack Letter Carriers Fight Hunger on May 10From PR Newswire: Government and Policy: Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 11:15 PM | TrackBack Hospitals in Louisiana and Mississippi to Receive More Katrina Recovery GrantsFrom HHS News and Events: Hospitals in Louisiana and Mississippi still working to recover from the Hurricane Katrina disaster will receive $19.1 million in additional assistance from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 11:12 PM | TrackBack The Third Path: Systemic Change Will Focus on Returning ValueFrom The Commonwealth Fund: As the political debate over the nation's health care crisis becomes increasingly polarized, it is tempting to believe that there are only two mutually exclusive paths before us: greater government involvement in order to ensure "universal" coverage or dependence on market forces. But neither addresses the core challenge facing our health care system: providing quality and value. Posted by Michael at 11:06 PM | TrackBack Telemedicine could eradicate many expensive ED visitsFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: A community-wide study in upstate New York found that nearly 28 percent of all visits to the pediatric emergency department could have been replaced with a more cost-effective Internet doctor's "visit," or telemedicine, according to investigators from the University of Rochester Medical Center. The Rochester team will present these findings and more at this year's Pediatric Academic Society Meeting in Honolulu, Hawaii. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 11:03 PM | TrackBack Massachusetts Health Care Reform--On Second Anniversary of Passage, What Progress Has Been Made?From The Commonwealth Fund: Massachusetts' passage of health care reform legislation in April 2006 heralded an exciting new era in state health policy. The reform plan is the most comprehensive effort by a state to achieve near-universal coverage, and arguably the most controversial, given its inclusion of an individual mandate. Posted by Michael at 11:01 PM | TrackBack Medical research is essential to improving the economy and bettering livesFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Health care in the United States is expensive, but its funding is crucial because it also is a major contributor to the economy and can better lives, according to an essay appearing in the June 2008 issue of the Journal of the American Society Nephrology. Because of the cost of health care, this is not time to shrink the budget at the National Institutes of Health, which funds medical research that leads to potentially curative therapy. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 10:53 PM | TrackBack HHS Secretary Invites Communities to Apply for An Innovative Electronic Health Record Demonstration Project Use of EHRs Can Improve the Quality of Health Care and Reduce ErrorsFrom HHS News and Events: HHS Secretary Mike Leavitt today called on community leaders across the country to apply for a new demonstration project that provides Medicare incentive payments to physicians for the use of certified electronic health records (EHRs) to improve patient care. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 10:53 PM | TrackBack BERNARDI HIGHLIGHTS BUSH ADMINISTRATION'S SOLUTIONS TO SAVE HOMEOWNERS FROM FORECLOSUREFrom HUD Press Releases: WASHINGTON- The Bush Administration has put in place responsible solutions to help American families stay in their homes and avoid foreclosure, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development Deputy Secretary Roy A. Bernardi said today. Delivering the keynote address at the Federal Home Loan Banks Annual Directors Conference, Bernardi highlighted President Bush's responsible plan to strengthen the economy and help homeowners by allowing HUD's Federal Housing Administration (FHA) to be "a good safeguard against foreclosure. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 10:53 PM | TrackBack Florida Homeless Program Receives HUD Award for ExcellenceFrom HUD Press Releases: Funded in part by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Clara White Mission received this year's award for its aggressive plan to provide permanent housing solutions for chronically homeless individuals and families. For the past 11 years, HUD and the American Planning Association (APA) have recognized model programs which improve employment, education, housing opportunities, mobility and the standard of living for lower income persons. In presenting the award, HUD Assistant Secretary Darlene Williams added, "It is never easy to decide on one winner, given the high quality of so many nominations. HUD and APA's selection of The Clara White Mission is in recognition of the nonprofit organization's work to create a diverse network of public and private funding sources including the Jacksonville Economic Development Commission, the Jessie Ball DuPont Fund, the Duvall County Housing Finance Authority and the Florida Department of Children and Families. More specifically, the Mission was recognized for transforming an old soup kitchen into a 36-unit facility that provides affordable housing, job training, child care, and a variety of other personal and family services. Last January, HUD awarded the Mission a renewal grant of $132,000. The mission is a key local partner in a national effort to ending long-term homelessness for persons living with a chronic condition such as mental illness, addiction or a physical disability. HUD is the nation's housing agency committed to increasing homeownership, particularly among minorities; creating affordable housing opportunities for low-income Americans; and supporting the homeless, elderly, people with disabilities and people living with AIDS. The Department also promotes economic and community development and enforces the nation's fair housing laws. Posted by Michael at 10:52 PM | TrackBack FHA COMMISSIONER WINS PRESTIGIOUS AFFORDABLE HOUSING AWARD FROM HOMEBUILDERS ASSOCIATIONFrom HUD Press Releases: WASHINGTON - HUD's Assistant Secretary for Housing-Federal Housing Commissioner Brian D. Montgomery has been awarded the prestigious Robert J. Corletta Award for Achievement in Affordable Housing. Presented by the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB), Montgomerywas recognized for his commitment to creating more affordable housing opportunities and solutions. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 10:51 PM | TrackBack BUSH ADMINISTRATION IMPLEMENTS A TARGETED, FINANCIALLY RESPONSIBLE PLAN TO HELP HOMEOWNERSFrom HUD Press Releases: RESPONSIBLE: The Bush Administration's plan will give the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) greater flexibility to insure mortgages and reduce monthly payments for borrowers with adjustable rate mortgages - without forcing taxpayers to foot the bill. Expanding FHASecure, the government-backed mortgage refinancing product, creates a more viable option for American families who are in the right house but the wrong mortgage, and will help break the cycle of price depreciation and foreclosure. The FHA Housing Stabilization and Homeownership Retention Act, H.R. 5830, would permit FHA to provide up to $300 billion in new federal guarantees for risky mortgages. RESPONSIBLE: The Administration's FHASecure expansion continues the agency's responsible underwriting standards, including documentation of income and ability to repay the loan. Borrowers must have sufficient income to make payments on their new FHA-backed mortgages. They must also show a reasonable credit history; show employment history; and fully document and verify their income. To further protect taxpayers and control risk, FHASecure would not allow borrowers' total monthly debt to exceed 43 percent of their monthly net income and, in certain cases, would only insure 90 percent of the value of the mortgage. FHA will permit lenders to make arrangements to "fill-in-the-gap" between existing loan balances and the FHA-insured loan amount, such as issuing subordinate liens. RECKLESS: For two years, Congress has ignored President Bush's call to modernize FHA and allow it to offer safe, affordable mortgage products to more first-time homeowners and families trying to stay in their homes. Posted by Michael at 10:50 PM | TrackBack National Association for College Admission Counseling Survey: Space on College Campuses Still Available for StudentsFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: Despite headlines about the growing competitiveness among the nation's colleges and universities, at least 295 colleges and universities still have space available for qualified students in their Fall 2008 freshman and/or transfer classes, according to the results of the National Association for College Admission Counseling's annual Space Availability Survey: Openings for Qualified Students. The survey queries NACAC member four-year colleges and universities on the availability of space, institutional financial aid and housing as of May 1, 2008. Now in its 21st year, the survey is designed as a tool for counselors, parents and teachers as they assist students who have not yet completed the college admission process. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 10:50 PM | TrackBack Mental disorders cost society billions in unearned incomeFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Major mental disorders cost the nation at least $193 billion annually in lost earnings alone, according to a new study funded by the National Institutes of Health's National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH). "Lost earning potential, costs associated with treating coexisting conditions, Social Security payments, homelessness and incarceration are just some of the indirect costs associated with mental illnesses that have been difficult to quantify," said NIMH Director Thomas R. Insel, M.D. "This study shows us that just one source of these indirect costs is staggeringly high." Direct costs associated with mental disorders like medication, clinic visits, and hospitalization, are relatively easy to quantify, but they reveal only a small portion of the economic burden these illnesses place on society. Using data from 4,982 respondents, the researchers calculated the amount of earnings lost in the year prior to the survey among people with serious mental illness (SMI). SMI is a broad category of illnesses that includes mood and anxiety disorders that have seriously impaired a person's ability to function for at least 30 days in the year prior to the survey. It also includes cases of any mental disorder associated with life-threatening suicidal behaviors or repeated acts of violence. Eighty-six percent of respondents reported earning income in the previous year. But those with SMI reported earning significantly less---around $22,545---than respondents without SMI, who averaged $38,852. "Yet this estimate is probably conservative because the NCS-R did not assess people in hospitals or prisons, and included very few participants with autism, schizophrenia or other chronic illnesses that are known to greatly affect a person's ability to work. Posted by Michael at 10:49 PM | TrackBack Goodwill Helps Visually Impaired Man Land Job and Succeed at New York's Finest; Darryl Humphrey Named Goodwill's 2008 Graduate Of The YearFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: Darryl Humphrey was unemployed for a year and a half, with no job prospects and no source of income. After working for the same agency for 14 years while his vision slowly deteriorated, Humphrey was let go with no referrals. More than a year later, he had exhausted his savings and applied for public assistance when he learned about Goodwill Industries of Greater New York and Northern New Jersey's program for people with visual impairments. Humphrey had long dreamed of working for the New York Police Department (NYPD), and Goodwill helped make that dream a reality. Today, he is employed full-time as an administrative aide. Due to his determination and drive, Goodwill is recognizing Darryl Humphrey as Goodwill Industries International's 2008 Graduate of the Year. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 10:48 PM | TrackBack World Autism Awareness DayFrom HHS News and Events: Today, on the first World Autism Awareness Day, we pause to reaffirm our commitment to protecting the health of children in our country and throughout the world. Our determination remains strong as we continue our research efforts to increase understanding of how to treat and prevent autism and autism spectrum disorders. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 10:42 PM | TrackBack HUD DEPUTY SECRETARY SERVES LUNCH AT AREA SHELTER IN RECOGNITION OF NATIONAL VOLUNTEER WEEKFrom HUD Press Releases: WASHINGTON - U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development Deputy Secretary Roy A. Bernardi today joined HUD staff to serve lunch at So Others Might Eat (SOME), in recognition of National Volunteer Week. SOME is a community-based organization that provides daily needs such as clothing, healthcare, and serves nearly 1,000 meals to men, women, and children each day. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 10:41 PM | TrackBack U.S. Department of Education, First Book and Random House Children's Books Launch 2008 Summer Reading InitiativeFrom Education Newsfeed: U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings; Wendy Bhagat, senior vice president, First Book; and Heidi Kilgras, editorial director, Random House Children's Books today announced the availability of free books through the 2008 Summer Reading Initiative. Announced at Edward Brooke Charter School in Boston, Mass., the Initiative marks the first stage of a national distribution of over 850,000 free, new Random House children's books to schools, libraries and literacy organizations serving low-income youth across the country. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 10:40 PM | TrackBack Estimated 750,000 problem gamblers among America's youthFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Gambling activity is widespread among U.S. adolescents and young adults ages 14 through 21, according to a study conducted by researchers at the University at Buffalo's Research Institute on Addictions (RIA). Results of the first national survey of its kind show problem gambling -- described as gambling with three or more negative consequences (for example, gambling more than you intended or stealing money to gamble) in the past year -- occurring at a rate of 2.1 percent among youth 14 to 21. That ppercentage projects to approximately 750,000 young problem gamblers nationwide. The rates of problem gambling found in the study are not, in fact, as high as the rates of problem gambling found in eight previous studies conducted in smaller jurisdictions by other research teams, according to Welte. "As might be expected, all statistically significant results showed that greater gambling involvement is associated with aging into an adult status," Welte stated. "We compared problem gambling rates among youth with problem gambling rates among adults from our national study of U.S. adults in 2000," Welte said. Native Americans were found to have a higher rate of frequent gambling (28 percent) when compared to whites (9 percent) as well as to be higher on measures of problem gambling. Other religions (which include Moslem, Hindu, Buddhist, Jehovah's Witnesses and others) had a lower rate of having gambling in the past year (42 percent), but if they gambled, they had higher rates of frequent gambling than any other religious group. Posted by Michael at 10:39 PM | TrackBack Preserve the Child Support System: Don';t Let the New Hire Database be Hijacked for Immigrant Employment VerificationFrom Center for Law and Social Policy: Congress should not authorize the use of a child support data base, called the National Directory of New Hires, to establish mandatory electronic employment verification system as is proposed in the "New Employee Verification Act of 2008" (HR 5515). This use of the National Directory of New Hires will seriously undermine the goals and effectiveness of the child support system. Posted by Michael at 10:38 PM | TrackBack Study Shows Children's Web Sites May Be Entertaining, But May Also Make Kids Cry; Most Popular Sites Commercialized; Some 'Sell' Kids' Creations Back to ThemFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: Publishers of many major children's Web sites should do a better job disclosing sales and advertising information to parents, especially as more kids at younger ages go online to play and meet friends, says a study released today by Consumer Reports WebWatch and the Mediatech Foundation of Flemington, N.J. For the study, parents in 10 families used video cameras to keep journals, providing insights into the way children use sites such as Club Penguin, Webkinz, Nick Jr., Barbie.com and others. Footage from those journals, which can be viewed at Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 10:37 PM | TrackBack May 5, 2008Alcoholism is not just a 'man's disease' anymoreFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: A new examination of data on similarly aged groups, compared across decades, has found substantial increases in drinking and alcohol dependence among women. A new examination of data, collected on similarly aged groups one decade apart, has found substantial increases in drinking and alcohol dependence among women -- particularly white and Hispanic women -- beginning with those born in the United States after World War II. "By looking at two different cross-sectional surveys that asked the same questions in the same manner, but were conducted 10 years apart, we were able to compare, for example, 30 - 40 year olds in 2001 with 30 - 40 year olds in 1991," explained Richard A. Grucza, an epidemiologist at Washington University School of Medicine and the study's corresponding author. "Essentially, this allowed us to correct for the effects of age on reporting. When we did this, we found that the tendency for young people to have higher levels of lifetime alcohol dependence clearly remained for women, although it disappeared for men." Furthermore, added Shelly F. Greenfield, associate clinical director of the Alcohol and Drug Abuse Treatment Program at McLean Hospital, prevalence surveys are inclusive. "Epidemiologic surveys document the prevalence of an illness such as alcohol dependence in the entire population rather than just one segment of the population, such as those seeking treatment," she said. "We found that for women born after World War II, there are lower levels of abstaining from alcohol, and higher levels of alcohol dependence, even when looking only at women who drank," said Grucza. "We can think of U.S. culture as having been traditionally dominated by white men," added Grucza. Posted by Michael at 4:32 PM | TrackBack Alcohol-outlet density and violence are clearly linked over timeFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: All three types of outlets examined -- hotel pubs, bars and packaged-liquor outlets --had positive relationships with assault rates. Hotel pubs and bars were the biggest drivers of violence in inner-city areas, while packaged-liquor outlets were more important in suburban areas. While previous studies have confirmed a relationship between alcohol-outlet density and violence, few have looked at what happens within a suburb as outlet density changes. finding that increasing the density of all kinds of alcohol outlets in a suburb leads to increasing rates of violence in that suburb. Results will be published in the June issue of Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research and are currently available at OnlineEarly. "The literature shows that suburbs with more alcohol outlets experience more violence, but only a handful of papers have explored what happens within a suburb as outlet density changes," explained Michael Livingston, a research fellow at the Turning Point Alcohol and Drug Centre and the study's sole author. "The study found that, across Melbourne, the three types of outlets examined -- hotel pubs, bars, and packaged liquor outlets -- all had positive relationships to assault rates," said Livingston. Livingston explained that, for inner-city areas, each additional hotel pub or on-premise license was related to two extra night-time assaults per year -- the strongest link found in the study. "The strong longitudinal relationship between outlet density and violence greatly strengthens the evidence base that density of alcohol outlets in a suburb is a driver of violence, making liquor licensing and planning regulations legitimate areas for public-health interventions," said Livingston. Posted by Michael at 4:31 PM | TrackBack US News & World Report Ranks John Jay in Top 20 Percent of Nation's MPA Programs; John Jay Recognized as No. 1 CUNY MPA ProgramFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: John Jay College of Criminal Justice's MPA Program was again ranked in the top 20 percent of the nation's MPA Programs by US News & World Report in its 2008 "Best Graduate Schools" survey. Only three public policy programs in New York City - NYU, Columbia and John Jay - were among the top 20 percent nationwide. Furthermore, the ranking places John Jay's program ahead of Baruch, the New School and Pace University. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 4:21 PM | TrackBack America's Second Harvest Showcases the Faces of Hunger Through A Weeklong Initiative to Raise Awareness of the Increasing Number of Families In Need of Food AssistanceFrom PR Newswire: Government and Policy: Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 4:20 PM | TrackBack Secondhand smoke exposure can cause cell damage in 30 minutesFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Exposure to secondhand smoke even for a brief period is injurious to health, a new study by researchers at the University of California, San Francisco has found. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 4:14 PM | TrackBack Ibuprofen linked to reduced risk of Alzheimer's diseaseFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Long-term use of ibuprofen and other drugs commonly used for aches and pains was associated with a lower risk of Alzheimer's disease, according to a study published in the May 6, 2008, issue of Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology. Previous studies have shown conflicting results, but this is the longest study of its kind. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 4:04 PM | TrackBack U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings Marks 25th Anniversary of A Nation at Risk Report by Broadening the National Dialogue on the State of American EducationFrom Education Newsfeed: U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings today marked the 25th anniversary of the ground-breaking A Nation at Risk report by broadening the national dialogue on the state of the American education system. Over the next several months, Secretary Spellings will pose various questions on the Department's website related to the state of education in the U.S. in an effort to spur ideas, discussion, debate and, ultimately, action to better serve America's students. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 3:45 PM | TrackBack Moms have few interactions with their infants during TV timeFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Infants who are exposed to television and video in low socio-economic households tend to have limited verbal interactions with their mothers, according to a new study led by Alan L. Mendelsohn, MD, assistant professor of pediatrics and director of clinical research for the divisions of general and developmental-behavioral pediatrics in the department of pediatrics at NYU School of Medicine. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 3:45 PM | TrackBack Educators Encouraged to Register Now for U.S. Department of Education Summer WorkshopsFrom Education Newsfeed: Teachers and other educators are encouraged to register now to attend one of the U.S. Department of Education's summer workshops, where teachers share successful strategies to raise student achievement. Registration and information on the free workshops being held in 12 U.S. cities are available at www.ed.gov/teacherinitiative. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 3:43 PM | TrackBack U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings Announces 2008 Prudential Spirit of Community Awards in Washington, D.C.From Education Newsfeed: U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings today delivered remarks and announced recipients of the 2008 Prudential Spirit of Community Awards at the U. S. Chamber of Commerce in Washington, D.C. The awards, sponsored by Prudential Financial and the National Association of Secondary School Principals, were created in 1995 to honor middle and high school students at the local, state and national level for outstanding community service. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 3:42 PM | TrackBack Foundation Giving Posts 10 Percent Gain in 2007; Giving Expected to Grow Modestly in 2008, Despite Challenging Economic EnvironmentFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: , The country's more than 72,000 grantmaking foundations increased their giving to $42.9 billion in 2007, according to "Foundation Growth and Giving Estimates: Current Outlook" (2008 Edition), released today by the Foundation Center. This estimated 10 percent gain followed a 7.1 percent increase in 2006. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 3:41 PM | TrackBack Global Entrepreneurship Monitor Report on Women and Entrepreneurship ReleasedFrom Ascribe Newsfeed: Women's Entrepreneurship matters - women are creating and running businesses around the world, contributing to economies that represent more than 70 percent of the world's population and 93 percent of global GDP (2007). Women's entrepreneurship is a key contributor to economic growth in low/middle income countries, particularly in Latin America and the Caribbean according to The Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) 2007 Report on Women and Entrepreneurship released today by The Center for Women's Leadership at Babson College ( Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 3:37 PM | TrackBack Uninsured kids in middle class have same unmet needs as poorFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Nationwide, uninsured children in families earning between $38,000 and $77,000 annually are nearly as likely to forgo health care as uninsured children in poorer families. More than 40 percent of children in those income brackets who are uninsured all year see no physicians and have no prescriptions all year, says new research from the University of Rochester Medical Center, to be presented Saturday, May 3, at the Pediatric Academic Society's annual meeting in Honolulu, Hawaii. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 3:37 PM | TrackBack The Widening Health Care Gap Between High- and Low-Wage WorkersFrom The Commonwealth Fund: Rising health care costs affect everyone, but pose a particular problem for low-wage workers and their families. This study shows that few of these workers are eligible for public insurance programs or can afford to purchase private insurance, and they are less likely than high-wage workers to work for companies offering health coverage. Posted by Michael at 3:37 PM | TrackBack Who Pays for Health Care When Workers Are Uninsured?From The Commonwealth Fund: A new Commonwealth Fund study finds that the public, along with workers, foot the bill when employers fail to provide their full-time workers with health insurance. Posted by Michael at 3:36 PM | TrackBack Fixing up 'this old house' may increase youngFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Ripping out and tearing down to create a divinely designed home, a la HGTV, is all the rage today -- and the economic downturn may be leading more families to renovate rather than relocate. But a new study by Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center has found that parents need to be aware that all this interior renovation can put their children's health at risk due to exposure to lead. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 3:36 PM | TrackBack $45 Billion a Year Is Spent by the Public on Health Care and Health Insurance for Full-Time Workers and Family Members Not Covered by Employer Health PlansFrom The Commonwealth Fund: Health insurance coverage and unpaid health care for full-time workers and their family members without employer coverage costs the U.S. public $45 billion a year, according to a report from The Commonwealth Fund released today. Posted by Michael at 3:35 PM | TrackBack US unemployment having impact on kids' health-care coverage -- and that puts their health at riskFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Two new studies conducted by researchers at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center point to the negative impact of parental job loss on children's health care and the importance of having continuous health insurance coverage to meet children's health-care needs and reduce health-care disparities. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 3:35 PM | TrackBack Testimony - Rising Numbers of Uninsured Young Adults: Causes, Consequences, and New PoliciesFrom The Commonwealth Fund: Young adults are disproportionately represented among people who lack health insurance, accounting for 30 percent of the 46.4 million uninsured people under age 65, explains Sara R. Collins in this Congressional testimony. Posted by Michael at 3:35 PM | TrackBack Nearly one-third of US parents don't know what to expect of infantsFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Almost one-third of US parents have a surprisingly low-level knowledge of typical infant development and unrealistic expectations for their child's physical, social and emotional growth, according research from the University of Rochester. The new findings, which suggest that such false parenting assumptions can not only impair parent-child interactions, but also rob kids of much-needed cognitive stimulation, will be presented Sunday, May 4, at the Pediatric Academic Society meeting in Honolulu, Hawaii. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 3:33 PM | TrackBack Young children hospitalized for flu associated with higher costs and higher risk illnessFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: The high costs of hospitalizing young children for influenza creates a significant economic burden in the United States, underscoring the importance of preventive flu shots for children and the people with whom they have regular contact, according to research led by Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 3:33 PM | TrackBack Children more vulnerable to harmful effects of leadFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Contrary to prevailing assumptions, children are more vulnerable to the harmful effects of lead exposure at the age of 6 than they are in early childhood, according to a Cincinnati Childrens Hospital Medical Center study. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 3:32 PM | TrackBack Identifying and Evaluating Equity Provisions in State Health Care ReformFrom The Commonwealth Fund: This Fund report identifies state policies that promote equitable health care access and quality by expanding insurance coverage and access to care, raising the quality of care, empowering patients, upgrading health system infrastructure, and addressing social and community-level determinants of health. Posted by Michael at 3:31 PM | TrackBack Mothers less likely to pursue HPV vaccination for youngest daughtersFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Because the first national study of its kind has found that US mothers report they are less likely to vaccinate daughters under age 13 against human papillomavirus virus, even though the vaccine is recommended for girls at age 11 and 12, it's incumbent upon the healthcare community to work to improve moms acceptance of the vaccination for younger daughters, say researchers at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center who conducted the study. Read more from this post. Posted by Michael at 3:31 PM | TrackBack New SCHIP enrollees have unmet health care needsFrom EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Even with prior private health insurance, patients enrolling in the state child | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
