An Empirical Study of Types of Democratic Deliberation: The Limits and Potential of Citizen Participation

Abstract: "Following more than a decade of theorizing and widespread practical application, political scientists have begun empirical research on democratic deliberation. For the most part, this research has focused on individual or collective outcomes of deliberation, paying relatively little attention to the deliberative processes themselves. Here an attempt is made to study these processes themselves. First, a typology of the different ways people talk to one another is offered. Four types of discourse are defined: (1) proto-discourse, (2) conventional, (3) cooperative, and (4) collaborative. The last two types are of the kind presumed by deliberative democratic theory, with more liberal versions assuming that deliberations are cooperative and rational and more critical versions assuming that deliberation are collaborative and transformative. Research is then reported on two deliberative groups of parents who met seven times to consider improvements in the delivery of K-12 education in their area. An analysis of their deliberations indicates that their interaction was overwhelmingly conventional or proto-discursive. The participants rarely engaged one another in the way assumed by liberal democratic theory and never engaged one another in a more critical or emancipatory manner. The paper concludes with a discussion of the impact of different types of discursive interaction on the construction of democratic citizenship. At issue here is how different kinds of discourses enable participants to be different kinds of political actors in those situations." Source: Center for the Study of Democracy.U.C. Irvine Paper 06-12 [via California eScholarship Repository]

Download pdf publication | Link to California eScholarship Repository

Seeking Health Online

"Most of the millions of Americans who turn to the web for health information are pleased by what they find - though few check the quality check of what they find"

"On a typical day some 10 million Americans now turn to the web for health information - about as many as those who pay bills online, read blogs or look up a phone number or address. At one time or another, about 80% American internet users, or some 113 million adults, have searched for information on at least one of seventeen health topics. Most start by employing a search engine and are looking for information on behalf of someone other than themselves. Most are pleased by what they find - although the great majority, about three-quarters -- do not consistently check the source and date of the health information they find online." Source: Pew Internet & American Life Project Report


Download Full Report | Read online summary

The G-Rated Job Market: Occupational Aspirations for Girls and Boys in Children's Films

"Among characters in the most popular G-rated films, there is significant
divergence between occupations held by movie characters and those held by
real people. Both male and female characters also tend to closely follow
gender stereotypes in occupations, and virtually no male characters engage
in stereotypically female work.

These conclusions are drawn from the most in-depth content analysis of
popular G-rated movies ever conducted. Researchers from the Annenberg
School for Communication at the University of Southern California (USC)
studied the 101 top-grossing G-rated films released from 1990 through
2004, analyzing a total of 4,249 speaking characters in both animated and
live-action films. “The G-Rated Job Market” is the third report in a series
drawing on this research." Source: Annenberg at USC [via seeJane]

Download PDF Report | Link to SeeJane organization

Related reports:

Where the Girls Aren't: Gender Disparity Saturates
G-Rated Films (pdf)

G Movies Give Boys a D: Portraying Males as Dominant,
Disconnected and Dangerous. (pdf)

How Schools Can Help Students Recover from Traumatic Experiences

A Tool Kit for Supporting Long-Term Recovery

"Many changes in students’ performance and behavior stem from their experience of, for example, witnessing violence, undergoing assault or abuse, living through natural disasters, or experiencing acts of terrorism. This tool kit describes how such changes appear in the school setting and provides a compendium of programs available to schools that help support the long-term recovery of traumatized students. The tool kit describes how to select students for such programs and possible ways to fund those programs. It compares the programs with one another according to the types of trauma they address, the problems they target, the requirements for training and implementation, and evidence for a program’s effectiveness. Finally, it gives a one-page information sheet on each selected program, summarizing the objective, intended population, and format of the program and providing details on implementation, personnel training and materials, and contact information." Source: RAND

Download full PDF Report | Link to RAND

Caring for Depression and Comorbid Pain

Evidence from the Health and Retirement Survey and the Healthcare for Communities Survey

"Depression that occurs along with painful physical symptoms has not been fully understood. Serious investigation into the interaction of depression and pain and its impact on the labor market, disability, and on financial aspects of health insurance and medication costs among Americans ages 55 to 65 is long overdue. This study found that depression and comorbid pain is associated with worse labor markets and worse financial, insurance, and disability outcomes compared to depression alone; and found that these adverse effects were attributed disproportionally to individuals whose depression included comorbid pain. Those individuals were less likely to take antidepressants, and pain comorbidity was associated with a heavier burden on total medication costs and prescription drug costs. Moreover, depression along with comorbid pain predicted early retirement for female workers, whereas depression alone did not predict early retirement for male or female workers. This study furthers the understanding of depression and pain comorbidity in terms of its prevalence in the general population and its effect on treatment and access to care." Source: RAND

Download PDF Report | Link to RAND

Where Are They Now? A Description of 1992-93 Bachelor's Degree Recipients 10 Years Later

"Using data from the 2003 Baccalaureate and Beyond Longitudinal Study (B&B:93/03), this report provides an overview of the status of 1992–93 college graduates 10 years after graduation. The report presents highlights of these college graduates’ lives in 2003 in five areas—education after the bachelor’s degree, labor force participation, opinions about their undergraduate education, family status, and civic participation. In addition to presenting a basic profile of graduates’ lives in 2003, the report is also intended as a broad introduction to the kinds of data available in B&B:93/03. A table compendium with five sections corresponding to the five areas above provides additional detail about how graduate characteristics are associated with the highlighted outcomes as well as related experiences in each area. The estimates in this report represent about 1.2 million bachelor’s degree completers from 1992–93" Source: National Center for Education Statistics

Download full PDF report | Link to NCES download site

Professor Qualities and Student Achievement

“This paper uses a new administrative dataset of students at a large university matched to courses and instructors to analyze the importance of teacher quality at the postsecondary level. Instructors are matched to both objective and subjective characteristics of teacher quality to estimate the impact of rank, salary, and perceived effectiveness on grade, dropout and subject interest outcomes. Student fixed effects, time of day and week controls, and the fact that first year students have little information about instructors when choosing courses helps minimize selection biases. We also estimate each instructor’s value added and the variance of these effects to determine the extent to which any teacher difference matters to short-term academic outcomes. The findings suggest that subjective teacher evaluations perform well in reflecting an instructor’s influence on students while objective characteristics such as rank and salary do not. Whether an instructor teaches full-time or part-time, does research, has tenure, or is highly paid has no influence on a college student’s grade, likelihood of dropping a course or taking more subsequent courses in the same subject. However, replacing one instructor with another ranked one standard deviation higher in perceived effectiveness increases average grades by 0.5 percentage points, decreases the likelihood of dropping a class by 1.3 percentage points and increases in the number of same-subject courses taken in second and third year by about 4 percent. The overall importance of instructor differences at the university level is smaller than that implied in earlier research at the elementary and secondary school level, but important outliers exist.”
Source: National Bureau of Economic Research

Download PDF Publication

Scholarship Advice for New Law Professors in the Electronic Age

Abstract:
The article suggests that the legal academy is in a time of transition between promotion and tenure rules based on traditional methods of publication and contemporary electronic and interdisciplinary possibilities for publication. While a number of articles contain recommendations for newer law professors about the process of scholarship, most of those articles are between five and twenty years old and do not address publishing in the age of blogs, expedited reviews, electronic submissions, and open-access databases.

The substance and length of what law professors write, the formats in which they do so, and the fora in which they publish are evolving. This article breaks new ground in offering advice for those who have recently joined the academy on how to comply with promotion and tenure guidelines while taking advantage of publishing opportunities in the electronic age. Although it gives special emphasis to newer faculty and to issues raised by modern technology, the article is not limited to those sorts of issue. Professors who have been writing for years may find some useful nuggets about citation practices regarding blogs, the impact of recent law review limits on article length, electronic methods of browsing journals and articles in other disciplines, access to government documents, and posting on open-access archives.

Source: Social Science Research Network

Link to download site

Findings from the NAWL 2006 National Survey on Retention and Promotion of Women in Law Firms.

"The Survey, which was completed by a majority of the nation’s 200 largest law firms, was designed to collect accurate data concerning the leadership status of women lawyers in private practice." Source: National Association of Women Lawyers

Download PDF Report | Link to association website

Media Industry Facing Biggest Upheaval Since Gutenberg: Media Consumers Morphing into Media Makers

Abstract:
The advance of innovative information and communication technologies has triggered a fundamental upheaval in the media industry. The technology is reforming the conventional media model. The media mix will become more varied; interactive and personalised offers are taking root and finding their ideal milieu on the web. Newspapers, radio stations and TV broadcasters will have to reposition themselves if they want to remain attractive in the media industry with the arrival of the Web 2.0. This will include seeking new distribution channels and considering e.g. pay-per-view programming and innovative forms of advertising. Source: Social Science Research Network

Link to download site

Documents Shed New Light on Pentagon Surveillance of Peace Activists

"Documents released by the American Civil Liberties Union reveal new details of Pentagon surveillance of Americans opposed to the Iraq war, including Quakers and student groups. The documents show that the Pentagon was keeping tabs on non-violent protesters by collecting information and storing it in a military anti-terrorism database." Source: American Civil Liberties Union

DOD response to ACLU of Georgia (Georgia, California and Texas protests)-PDF
DOD response to ACLU of Florida-PDF
DOD response to ACLU of Washington(AFSC protests in Massachusetts and Ohio)-PDF

Link to Site

Hate Crime Statistics

"According to statistics released today by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, 7,163 criminal incidents involving 8,380 offenses were reported in 2005 as a result of bias toward a particular race, religion, sexual orientation, ethnicity/national origin, or physical or mental disability. Hate Crime Statistics, 2005, published by the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting Program, includes data from hate crime reports submitted by city, county, state, tribal, and federal law enforcement agencies throughout the Nation." Source: U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation


Link to online data

Democrats Hold Double-Digit Lead in Competitive Districts

With less than two weeks to go before the midterm elections, the Democrats not only continue to maintain a double-digit advantage nationally, but also lead by the same margin in the competitive districts that will determine which party controls the House of Representatives. Nationally, the Democrats hold a 49%-38% lead among registered voters, and a nearly identical 50%-39% lead among those voters most likely to cast ballots on Nov. 7. Source: Pew Research Center for the People and the Press

Download PDF Report | Link to online summary

Lack of Competition in Elections Fails to Stir Public

Most Have Heard Little or Nothing about Redistricting Debate

The concern among some politicians and political experts over the lack of competitiveness in U.S. elections is generally not shared by the public. Moreover, voters appear to lack a clear sense of whether the elections in their own House districts are competitive or not.

The public is only dimly aware of the debate over how boundaries are drawn for legislative districts. Just 10% of Americans say they have heard a lot about this issue ­ compared with 89% who have heard little (38%) or nothing (51%) about it.

Source: Pew Center for People and the Press

Download PDF Report | Link to online summary

2003–04 National Postsecondary Student Aid Study

Undergraduate Financial Aid Estimates for 12 States: 2003–04

This E.D. TAB presents selected findings about the price of attendance and the types and amounts of financial aid received by in-state undergraduates enrolled in public 2-year, public 4-year, and private not-for-profit 4-year institutions during the 2003–04 academic year in 12 selected states. It is based on the undergraduate data in the 2003–04 National Postsecondary Student Aid Study (NPSAS:04), a nationally representative survey of postsecondary students. In addition to providing national estimates, the NPSAS:04 survey was designed to provide representative samples of undergraduates in public 2-year, public 4-year, and private not-for-profit 4-year institutions in 12 states: California, Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Indiana, Illinois, Minnesota, Nebraska, New York, Oregon, Texas, and Tennessee. Prior NPSAS studies have not been representative at the state level. For the in-state undergraduates in each of these 12 selected states, the tables in this E.D. TAB show the average tuition and fees and total price of attendance, the percentages of undergraduates receiving various types of financial aid and the average amounts received, the average net price of attendance after financial aid, average financial need and remaining need after financial aid, cumulative student loan amounts, earnings from work while enrolled, and other aspects of financing an undergraduate education. Tables of comparable national totals limited to in-state undergraduates in public 2-year, public 4-year, and private not-for-profit 4-year institutions in the 50 states, DC, and Puerto Rico are also provided to allow for comparisons of undergraduate financing patterns in each of the 12 selected states and the entire nation. Source: National Center for Education Statisitcs

Download PDF Report | Link to site

Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2003 U.S. datafile is now available for downloading

The Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) is an assessment (begun in 2000) that focuses on 15-year-olds' capabilities in reading literacy, mathematics literacy, and science literacy. In the United States, this age corresponds largely to grade 9 and 10 students. PISA also includes measures of general or cross-curricular competencies such as learning strategies. PISA emphasizes skills that students have acquired as they near the end of mandatory schooling. PISA is currently being administered every three years. PISA 2000 focused on reading literacy, PISA 2003 focused on mathematics literacy, and in 2006, PISA will focus on science literacy. In addition, PISA 2003 reported on problem-solving skills.
Source: National Center for Education Statistics.

Link to datafile directory

Call for Papers Persuasive 07

Can a web site persuade you to be politically active? Can a mobile phone motivate you to exercise more? Does instant feedback on gasoline use change how people drive? Do online rating systems inspire people to behave better online?

PERSUASIVE 07 will focus on how digital technology can motivate and influence people. This event will bring together researchers, designers, and developers interested in computers designed to change human attitudes and behaviors in positive ways.

Key themes of PERSUASIVE 07 include health, education, sustainability, productivity, social relationships, trust, ethics and more. Technologies of interest include web sites, mobile phones, video games, and electronic devices, among others.

Academics and practitioners are invited to submit their work for presentation at PERSUASIVE 07 at Stanford University, Palo Alto, California on April 27-28, 2007.

Link to site

A Harvard Panel Tackles the News Blues

Twenty years ago, when Harvard University’s Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics, and Public Policy was founded, there were no bloggers, podcasts, or Fox News Channel. Reporters didn’t have email addresses, letters to the editors were hand written, and telephones were plugged into walls.

But even back in 1986, there was a growing sense of a seismically changing news business and of a widening chasm between the journalism profession and the public.

When journalists, academics, and dignitaries gathered at Harvard on Oct. 13-14 to celebrate the Shorenstein Center’s 20th anniversary and to evaluate the current media landscape, those core issues had been magnified exponentially by the sweeping technological change of the past two decades.

“What has fundamentally changed is the fragmentation of the audience,” noted panelist Bill Kovach, founding chairman of the Committee of Concerned Journalists. “That’s what everybody is struggling with.”

Kovach and his fellow panelists spoke before a packed house (as well PBS “Frontline” cameras) at an Oct. 14 Shorenstein seminar. Their topic, designed as a discussion of journalism’s role in American civic discourse, had a simple title: “Media and Democracy.” Source: Project for excellence in Journalism

Link to online article | Watch video of event

Who Votes, Who Doesn't, and Why

"They vote ­ but not always. Compared with Americans who regularly cast ballots, they are less engaged in politics. They are more likely to be bored with the political process and admit they often do not know enough about candidates to cast ballots. But they are crucial to Republican and Democratic fortunes in the Nov. 7 midterm elections.

They are the intermittent voters: Americans who are registered to vote but do not always make it to the polls. They differ significantly from those who vote regularly. For one thing, they're less likely to be married than are regular voters. Intermittent voters also are more mistrustful of people compared with those who vote regularly. They also are less angry with government, though no less dissatisfied with President Bush than are regular voters, according to a survey conducted Sept. 21-Oct. 4 among 1,804 adults by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press in collaboration with the Associated Press." Source: Pew Research Center for the People and the Press

Download full PDF Report | Link to online summary

Evangelicals and the GOP: An Update

Strongly Republican Group Not Immune to Party's Troubles

"White evangelical Protestants have become one of the most important parts of the Republican Party's electoral base, making up over one-third of those who identify with the GOP and vote for its candidates. The party's political fortunes depend, in large part, on retaining the solid support of the evangelical community. But evangelicals, like other voters, have been affected by the broader wave of voter disillusionment with President Bush and the Republican Party. Evangelicals remain the party's most supportive group, but at levels significantly diminished from where they were in the 2002 and 2004 elections." Source: Pew Research Center for the People & the Press

Link to Online Report

Trade Promotion Authority and Fast-Track Negotiating Authority for Trade Agreements: Major Votes

This report profiles significant legislation, from 1974 to the present, concerning presidential trade promotion authority (also referred to as TPA) for trade agreements. TPA was previously known as fast-track trade negotiating authority for the President. This report identifies significant bills and resolutions that had floor votes. Also included is a list of floor votes on implementing legislation for trade agreements, from 1979 to the present; these bills were passed under expedited procedures by Congress and signed by the President. For further discussions of TPA or fast-track legislative activity, the report lists CRS reports and Internet resources. This report will be updated as legislation warrants. Source: Congressional Research Service

Download PDF Report | Link to online summary

aiwan-U.S. Political Relations: New Strains and Changes

"The status of Taiwan is a key issue for U.S. foreign policy and a critical point of contention in U.S. relations with China, which claims sovereignty over Taiwan. The U.S. policy framework for Taiwan was laid down in 1979 when Washington severed official relations with the Republic of China (ROC) on Taiwan and instead recognized the People's Republic of China (PRC) as the legitimate Chinese government. The basics of that policy shift -- the Taiwan Relations Act, the 3 U.S.China communiques, and the so-called "six assurances" toward Taiwan -- remain in place today. But many other factors have changed dramatically. The PRC itself is a rising global economic power scarcely resembling the country it was at the Nixon opening in the 1970's. U.S. economic and political relations with the PRC have expanded and become more diverse, playing a more complex role now than they did then in U.S. calculations of its own interests. The PRC's military has grown as well, with much of its strategic planning focusing on a Taiwan contingency. Taiwan, once an authoritarian one-party government under martial law, has become a fully functioning democracy." Source: Congressional Research Service.

Download PDF Publication | Link to online Summary

We Want Our Town Back!: Housing Discrimination and Exclusion

"What had transpired demographically during the 1980s, therefore, was not an increase in the number of Mexicans in the community as the school records alone suggested, but rather a shift in the composition of the Mexican segment of the
population. It had gone from a population of adult migrants–including those who lived in the community year-round–to one of families. This demographic shift corresponded with the reduction in ethnic tensions that so many residents, both Anglo and Mexican, had perceived and described."
Source: Center for Chicano Studies. Center for Chicano Studies Working Paper Series. U.C. Santa Barbara

Download PDF Publication | Link to eScholarship Repository

Copynorms: Copyright and Social Norms

ABSTRACT:
"Social norms regarding the copying, distribution, and use of expressive works (copynorms) are essential to understanding how copyright law affects society. By mitigating how stringently copyright owners and users actually enforce and observe copyright law, copynorms - whether those of librarians or file sharers - moderate, extend, and undermine the effect of copyright law. Yet, scholarship and public policy debates all too often overlook this phenomenon. This paper addresses this gap in the literature." Source: Berkeley Center for Law and Technology. Law and Technology Scholarship

Download PDF Report | Link to eScholarship repository

Does Television Cause Autism?

Abstract: Autism is currently estimated to affect approximately one in every 166 children, yet the cause or causes of the condition are not well understood. One of the current theories concerning the condition is that among a set of children vulnerable to developing the condition because of their underlying genetics, the condition manifests itself when such a child is exposed to a (currently unknown) environmental trigger. In this paper we empirically investigate the hypothesis that early childhood television viewing serves as such a trigger. Using the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ American Time Use Survey, we first establish that the amount of television a young child watches is positively related to the amount of precipitation in the child’s community. This suggests that, if television is a trigger for autism, then autism should be more prevalent in communities that receive substantial precipitation. We then look at county-level autism data for three states – California, Oregon, and Washington – characterized by high precipitation variability. Employing a variety of tests, we show that in each of the three states (and across all three states when pooled) there is substantial evidence that county autism rates
are indeed positively related to county-wide levels of precipitation. In our final set of tests we use California and Pennsylvania data on children born between 1972 and 1989 to show, again consistent with the television as trigger hypothesis, that county autism rates are also positively related to the percentage of households that subscribe to cable television. Our precipitation tests indicate that just under forty percent of autism diagnoses in the three states studied is the result of television watching due to precipitation, while our cable tests indicate that approximately seventeen percent of the growth in autism in California and Pennsylvania during the 1970s and 1980s is due to the growth of cable television. These findings are consistent with early childhood television viewing being an important trigger for autism. We also discuss further tests that can be conducted to explore the hypothesis more directly. Source: Johnson Graduate School of Management
Cornell University

Download PDF Publication | Link to download site

Manager Race and the Race of New Hires

Abstract: "Using personnel data from a large U.S. retail firm, we examine whether the race of the hiring manager affects the racial composition of new hires. We exploit manager changes at hundreds of stores to estimate models with store fixed effects. We find significant effects of manager race and ethnicity. First, all non-black managersi.e., whites, Hispanics, and Asianshire more whites and fewer blacks than do black managers. The differences between non-black and black managers are especially large in the South. Second, in locations with large Hispanic populations, Hispanic managers hire more Hispanics and fewer whites than white managers." Source: Center for Responsible Business. Working Paper Series. Paper 35. U.C. Berkeley

Download PDF Report | Link to eScholarship Repository

Cool Tool: Book Burro

Official description:

Book Burro is a Web 2.0 extension for Firefox and Flock. When it senses your are looking at a page that contains a book, it will overlay a small panel which when opened lists prices at online bookstores such as Amazon, Buy, Half (and many more) and soon whether the book is available at your library.

Customized by entering your zipcode, Book Burro lists libraries nearby that own the book you’re looking for as well as prices for other online stores such as Powell’s and Alibris.



Link to download site.

Economic Impact of the Nation's Historically Black Colleges and Universities

"The purpose of this study was to document the economic role of the nation’s historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) by estimating the short-term economic impact that each of these institutions has on their local communities. In this study, short-term economic impact was defined as the change in overall economic activity in the institutions’s community that is associated with four important categories of college/university-related expenditures, salaries, other institutional expenditures, and the expenditures of undergraduate and separately, graduate and professional students attending the institution. The IMPLAN (Impact Analysis for Planning) Professional Version 2.0 modeling system was used to build regional models for each of the 101 HBCUs in the 50 states and the District of Columbia and to calculate multipliers for estimating the HBCUs’ impact in terms of output, value-added, labor income, and employment. These multipliers were applied to each institution’s salary, staff, enrollment and expenditure data from the 2001 Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) and data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics Consumer Expenditure Survey. In 2001, the combined initial spending associated with the nation’s 101 HBCUs totaled $6.6 billion. Public HBCUs accounted for 62 percent of the total amount. The total economic impact of the nation’s HBCUs was $10.2 billion with 35 percent due to the multiplier effect. This amount would rank the collective economic impact of the nation’s HBCUs 232nd on the Forbes Fortune 500 list of the United States’ largest companies (Fortune Magazine, 2006). Additionally, the total employment impact of the 101 HBCUs included 180,142 total (initial and induced) full- and part-time jobs in 2001. The report includes templates that can easily be used to update impact estimates for subsequent years as new IPEDS data become available." Source: National Center for Education Statistics

Download PDF Report | Link to site

My Brother’s Keeper: Growing expectations confront hospitals on community benefits and charity care

"Any hospital with an emergency department is in the business of community benefit. Unlike other corporations, hospitals don't have the luxury of picking and choosing their preferred charity. Charity chooses them. However, in an era of increased emphasis on corporate responsibility, hospitals must review their role in community benefit. This starts with its largest component, charity care, but extends to a whole range of activities and reporting mechanisms. This paper is an update to the PwC's 2005 Acts of Charity report that framed the difficulties that hospitals face delivering and reporting charity care. This report seeks to expand on the previous research in the three key areas of reporting, pricing, and business relationships. My Brother's Keeper provides strategies for hospitals to mitigate current challenges in order to more fairly and efficiently provide and report community benefit. Hospitals must look at these issues holistically if they are to be their brother's keeper." Source: Price Waterhouse Coopers

Download PDF Report | Link to site

Acts of Charity: Charity Care Strategies for Hospitals in a Changing Landscape

"Hospital charity care provides millions of the uninsured with free care but courts, government regulators, and community leaders are now questioning the value that society derives from this community benefit. This comprehensive report by PwC's Health Research Institute examines the developing charity care issue, discusses key findings and recommendations and provides strategies for succeeding in this evolving environment."
Source: PriceWaterhouseCoopers

Download PDF Report | Link to site

How Religious are America's College and University Professors?

"At a moment when sociologists of religion are busy reassessing secularization theory in general – the thesis, subscribed to by all the founders of the discipline, that modernity inevitably brings with it a decline in the power of religion to shape people’s public and private lives – it is worth reconsidering as well the secularization of American higher education. This short essay takes a step in this
direction by answering a straightforward question: How religious, if at all, are America’s college and university professors? To gain traction on the matter, we analyze data from a nationally-representative survey carried out earlier this year of professors in all fields and types of higher education institutions. Although the focus of the survey was professors’ political attitudes, we included a number of standard measures of religiosity as well. We find that, on the whole, professors are indeed less religious than other Americans. However, there is substantial variation in religiosity from discipline to discipline and across types of institutions, and it is hardly the case that the professorial landscape is characterized by an absence of religion. The essay begins with an overview of our methodology, moves on to summarize key findings, and concludes by considering implications for future research. In the short space we have here, we can offer only an exploratory analysis of our data, but we think that even the descriptive statistics are interesting." Source: SSRC Working Paper

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Does Public Funding for Higher Education Matter?

Abstract: "This study uses panel data to examine the direct link between state funding and graduation rates at four-year institutions. When other factors are held constant, a $1,000 increase in state appropriations per FTE student at four-year public institutions is associated with about one percentage point increase in graduation rates. This positive link appears to hold for all research/doctoral, master’s, and baccalaureate institutions. In addition, there is evidence that a slow increase (or a decrease) in state funding seems to be associated with a fast increase in the tuition rate charged at four-year public institutions, which likely result in a negative impact on graduation rates further. Simply put, there is no such a thing as free lunch when it comes to graduation rates at public higher education institutions." Source: Cornell Higher Education Research Institute

Download PDF Working Paper

Foundation Center Releases Latest “FC Stats”

"FC Stats is a free online resource developed by the Foundation Center's Research Department. It provides users with ready access to a wealth of statistical data on U.S. private and community foundations and their funding patterns. FC Stats currently offers thousands of data tables available only from the Foundation Center. These tables and ranked lists provide the most frequently requested types of summary financial data on foundations at the national, state, and major metropolitan-area levels, as well as detailed data on funders and funding patterns by subject area, type of support, population group, and geographic focus. FC Stats is produced from the Center's research database, the authoritative national statistical data source on grantmaking foundations." Source: Foundation Center

Link to online database

November Turnout May Be High

Democrats Hold Enthusiasm, Engagement Advantage
"Turnout in the 2006 midterm election may well be higher than normal, given the level of interest expressed by voters. Today, 51% of voters say they have given a lot of thought to this November's election, up from 45% at this point in 2002 and 42% in early October of 1998. Even in 1994 ­ a recent high in midterm election turnout ­ just 44% of voters had thought a lot about the election in early October." Source: Pew Research Center

Download PDF Report | Link to site

Research and Debate -- Walking the City: Manhattan Projects

Although walking projects have been undertaken all over the world, each selection here is distinct, representing a particular kind of undertaking. Together, the projects shed light on the territorial practices of laying claim to the postmodern city,and suggest ways of embracing and rethinking urban landscapes. Walking has captured the imagination of artists and writers in a variety of ways, places and eras. A contemporary way of thinking about walking, begun in the early twentieth century with dada and the Surrealists, and continued by the Situationists, is as a subversive activity. But the idea of subversive walking also obscures its ordinariness. Elsewhere I have described how ordinary walking practices might lead designers and citizens toward a greater aesthetic and social vision.2 Here I describe how these particular walking projects work as territorial practices. Source: Places: Vol. 18: No. 1 [via U.C. eScholarship Digital Repository]

Download PDF Publication | Link to site

Economic Outcomes of High School Completers and Noncompleters 8 Years Later

"This Issue Brief uses data from the National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988 (NELS:88) to compare the economic outcomes of high school completers at three different points in time with the outcomes of individuals who did not complete high school. Differences by sex and the type of credential earned are also examined. The findings suggest that individuals who completed high school within 6 years generally had more favorable economic outcomes than their counterparts who completed high school later or not at all. However, differences in economic outcomes were most prominent between males and females even after controlling for the timing and type of high school credential earned." Source: National Center for Education Statistics

Download PDF Report | Link to site

Rentometer: Compare rent prices and property

Similar to the demographic report using Google maps I posted about last month, Rentometer gives you data on the rental housing prices in a particular area. Rentometer will give you an idea of the range of comparable rents in the geographic area and displays sites on a Google Map.

Link to site

Pew Backgrounder: Riding the Waves of "Web 2.0"

More than a buzzword, but still not easily defined

"Whatever language we use to describe it, the beating heart of the internet has always been its ability to leverage our social connections. Social networking sites like MySpace, Facebook and Friendster struck a powerful social chord at the right time with the right technology, but the actions they enable are nothing new. A trip to the Geocities homepage on the "Wayback Machine" circa December 19, 1996 (courtesy of The Internet Archive) yields this decidedly quaint statement from the company: "We have more than 200,000 individuals sharing their thoughts and passions with the world, and creating the most diverse and unique content on the Web."7 Replace "200,000" with "100 million" and you could almost imagine this sentence appearing on the MySpace homepage."
Source: Pew Research Center

Link to online report

Iraq Looms Large in Nationalized Election

Congressional Race Unchanged After Foley's Resignation

Pew's latest nationwide survey finds 58% of the public saying that the U.S. military effort in Iraq is not going well, and a 47% plurality believes the war in Iraq is hurting, not helping, the war on terrorism. The poll finds extensive public awareness of a leaked intelligence estimate suggesting that the war is spawning more terrorism. More than third of Americans (35%) say they have heard a lot about the intelligence report, and these people are much more likely than others to say the war in Iraq is hurting the war on terror. Source: The Pew Research Center for People and the Press

Download PDF Report | Summary of Findings | Topline Questionnaire

The Changing Landscape of American Public Education: New Students, New Schools

"Examining data for the decade of most concentrated change--between the 1993-94 and 2002-03 school years-- this report finds that Hispanics accounted for 64% of the students added to public school enrollment. Meanwhile, blacks accounted for 23% of the increase and Asians 11%. White enrollment declined by 1%.
During that same period, 15,368 schools, with an enrollment of 6.1 million in 2002-03, were opened. Nearly half, 2.5 million, of the students attending the new schools were white and meanwhile white enrollment in older schools dropped by 2.6 million. In contrast, about two-thirds of the increase in Latino enrollment was accommodated in older schools." Source: Pew Hispanic Center

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Low-income consumers, though less aware of genetically modified foods, are concerned and want labels

Consumer attitudes about genetically modified foods have been reported in a number of studies in recent years, but little attention has been paid to the awareness and attitudes of low-income consumers. While land-grant universities and public health departments have targeted these consumers for nutrition education, it is not clear what their attitudes are, or how the subject should be addressed in education programs such as those offered by Cooperative Extension. We conducted focus groups with low-income consumers in California during spring and summer 2002. Their awareness of genetically modified foods was low, but ethical and safety concerns were fairly high; and they wanted genetically modified foods to be labeled. Consumer and nutrition education programs targeted at low-income consumers should address emerging food technologies.
Source: California Agriculture: Vol. 57: No. 3

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Differential Mortality, Uncertain Medical Expenses, and the Saving of Elderly Singles

Abstract: People have heterogenous life expectancies: women live longer than men, rich people live longer than poor people, and healthy people live longer than sick people. People are also subject to heterogenous out-of-pocket medical expense risk. We construct a rich structural model of saving behavior for retired single households that accounts for this heterogeneity, and we estimate the model using AHEAD data and the method of simulated moments. We find that the risk of living long and facing high medical expenses goes a long way toward explaining the elderly's savings decisions. Specifically, medical expenses that rise quickly with both age and permanent income can explain why the elderly singles, and especially the richest ones, run down their assets so slowly. We also find that social insurance has a big impact on the elderly's savings. Source: National Bureau of Economic Research

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Berkman Luncheon Series and archive

The Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard hosts a series of informal luncheons and other meetings so that fellows and visitors can share the results of their research. You can watch/listen live or download past events from the archive. Past talks have included:

Podcasting and New Media in Education

Africa's Internet and Communications Infrastructure

Doc Searls on The Giant Zero

Source: Berkman Center

Link to site | Link to archive

Dot-Com Bubble, Part II? Why It's So Hard to Value Social Networking Sites

"Less than three years after emerging from nowhere, the hot social networking website MySpace is on pace to be worth a whopping $15 billion in just three more years. Or is it?

Is the much smaller Facebook, run by a 22-year-old, really worth the $900 million or more Yahoo is reported to have offered for it? Maybe. Or maybe this is Dot-Com Bubble, Part II, with MySpace, Facebook, YouTube and the other new Internet phenoms destined for oblivion when the fad fades." Source: Knowledge@Wharton

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Smithsonian Photography Initiative

"The Smithsonian Photography Initiative is devoted to the presentation and study of [13 million] photographic images, viewing photography as an art form, a record keeper, and a cross-disciplinary medium that encompasses science, history, popular culture, and more. Beyond offering more information about where to find photography collections throughout the Smithsonian, our website aims to be an educational tool, serving anyone who wishes to study, explore, and enjoy photographs of many kinds."

You can search the collections, log in, tag, and share your favorites.

Source: Smithsonian

Link to site

Bloggers Hit the Campaign Trail at What Cost?

"The very title of the new book by liberal Daily Kos blogger Markos Moulitsas—Crashing the Gate—reflects the blogosphere’s jaundiced view of the insider political establishment: it’s a “Beltway Mafia” composed of interest groups, political consultants, and journalists.

According to many bloggers, the dreaded mainstream media, (or MSM) have failed to reflect the voices and needs of citizens and are really just another establishment interest group. Consequently, the blogosophere has assumed the mantle in many eyes as the more authentic independent watchdog providing checks and balances on corrupt and well-entrenched institutional power. There is little doubt it has injected more voices into the public debate.

But with the crucial 2006 political season now entering the homestretch, bloggers are taking an increasingly active role in several key races, and that raises a new troubling question. Are bloggers straying from their self-proclaimed roles as critics and scrutinizers of the establishment and becoming instead de facto appendages of political campaigns?" Source: Project for Excellence in Journalism

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Interrogation of Detainees: Overview of the McCain Amendment

"This report discusses the McCain Amendment, as modified and subsequently enacted into law. This report also discusses the application of the McCain Amendment by the DOD in the updated 2006 version of the Army Field Manual, particularly in light of the Supreme Court's ruling in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld. In addition, the report discusses recent legislation relating to Al Qaeda detainees that references the McCain Amendment. The proposals discussed by this report are S. 3929 and S. 3930, which are both entitled the Military Commissions Act of 2006, introduced by Senator Mitch McConnell on September 22, 2006; S. 3901, the Military Commissions Act of 2006, proposed by Senator John Warner and voted out of the Senate Armed Services Committee on September 14, 2006; S. 3861, the Bringing Terrorists to Justice Act of 2006, and S. 3886, the Terrorist Tracking, Identification, and Prosecution Act of 2006, both introduced by Senator Bill Frist; and H.R. 6054, the Military Commissions Act of 2006, introduced by Representative Duncan Hunter. For a discussion of the provisions in the DTA that limit judicial review of challenges to U.S. detention policy, see CRS Report RL33180, Guantanamo Detainees: Habeas Corpus Challenges in Federal Court, by Jennifer K. Elsea and Kenneth Thomas." Congressional Research Service

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The Supreme Court and Women’s Rights: Gathering Storm Clouds,

The report, The Supreme Court and Women’s Rights: Gathering Storm Clouds, highlights recent cases involving key legal protections for women, many of them decided by narrow margins. This time of transition on the Court may not bode well for women’s hard-won legal gains, especially in the areas of constitutional rights to privacy and equal protection, and the federal statutory protection of women’s rights in employment, education, health, safety and welfare.
Source: National Women's Law Center

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New study indicates faculty treatment matters more than compensation

"A new study by the Collaborative on Academic Careers in Higher Education (COACHE), a research project based at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, has revealed that climate, culture, and collegiality are more important to the satisfaction of early career faculty than compensation, tenure clarity, workload, and policy effectiveness.

The survey of 4,500 tenure-track faculty at 51 colleges and universities discovered that there are key climate variables for junior faculty, such as: interest senior faculty take in their work, fairness with which they are evaluated, opportunities to collaborate with senior faculty, how well they seem to fit in their departments, sufficient professional and personal interaction with colleagues, and a sense of community in the department. The survey revealed that collegiality matters much to the success and satisfaction of new scholars, in stark relief to studies of an earlier generation that showed autonomy was one of the most important attractions to academic life." Source: Collaborative on Academic Careers in Higher Ed./Harvard School of Education

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The Future of the Internet II

Technology thinkers and stakeholders assess the future social, political, and economic impact of the internet.


"Hundreds of internet leaders, activists, builders and commentators were asked about the effect of the internet on social, political and economic life in the year 2020. The views of the 742 respondents who completed this survey were varied; there is general agreement about how technology might evolve, but there is less agreement among these respondents about the impact of this evolution. Most believe the internet will continue to spread in a "flattening" and improving world. There are many, though, who think major problems -- such as out-of-control surveillance and tracking systems and the formation of renegade bands of technology "refuseniks" -- will accompany technology advances by the end of the next decade." Source: Pew Internet & American Life Project Report

Download PDF Report | View Lee Rainie's interview on the Lehrer Newshour

Medicaid Crowd-Out of Private Long-Term Care Insurance Demand: Evidence from the Health and Retirement Survey

Abstract: "This paper provides empirical evidence of Medicaid crowd out of demand for private long-term care insurance. Using data on the near- and young-elderly in the Health and Retirement Survey, our central estimate suggests that a $10,000 decrease in the level of assets an individual can keep while qualifying for Medicaid would increase private long-term care insurance coverage by 1.1 percentage points. These estimates imply that if every state in the country moved from their current Medicaid asset eligibility requirements to the most stringent Medicaid eligibility requirements allowed by federal law – a change that would decrease average household assets protected by Medicaid by about $25,000 – demand for private long-term care insurance would rise by 2.7 percentage points. While this represents a 30 percent increase in insurance coverage relative to the baseline ownership rate of 9.1 percent, it also indicates that the vast majority of households would still find it unattractive to purchase private insurance. We discuss reasons why, even with extremely stringent eligibility requirements, Medicaid may still exert a large crowd-out effect on demand for private insurance." Source: National Bureau of Economic Research

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Do Female Physicians Capture Their Scarcity Value? The Case of OB/GYNs

This paper analyzes how the imperfectly competitive market for Obstetricians and Gynecologists clears in the face of an excess demand for female OB/GYNs. This excess demand results from the convergence of three factors: i) all OB/GYN patients are women, ii) many women prefer to be treated by a female OB/GYN, iii) only a small portion of OB/GYNs are female. The paper finds that both money and non-money prices adjust: female OB/GYNs charge higher fees and also have longer waiting times. Furthermore, these effects are mediated by institutional structure: in contract settings in which money prices are rigid (i.e. managed care), waiting times are more likely to adjust, and in settings in which money prices are more flexible, the reverse occurs. In the end, female OB/GYNs are able to capture some of the value of the preferred service they provide but do not entirely close the gender income gap. Source: National Bureau of Economic Research

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A New Populism in Latin America?

Abstract: "Adolfo Gilly, Department of Political Science, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM), talked about neo-liberalism and the emergence of a “new populism” in many Latin American countries. Alfredo Saad Filho, Department of History, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), talked about the political and economic transition to liberalism in Brazil. He discussed the Worker’s Party (PT), the administration of Luiz Inacio da Silva (Lula), and neo-liberalism in Brazil." Source: Center for Social Theory and Comparative History. Center for Social Theory and Comparative History Seminar Series. Paper 2006-J.

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Latino Labor Report 2006

The Hispanic unemployment rate reached a historic low of 5.2% in the second quarter of 2006. The gap between the seasonally-adjusted unemployment rates for Latinos and non-Latinos was just 0.6 percentage points--the smallest since 1973, when employment data on Latinos first became available. Wages for Latino workers also rose between the second quarters of 2005 and 2006, and at a faster rate than for other workers. Those developments reflect significant improvement in the labor market for Latinos in 2005-06 and indicate that the jobs recovery from the recession in 2001 is nearing completion for Hispanic workers. Source: Pew Hispanic Center

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Israel’s Separation Fence

Gadi Algazi, Department of History, Tel Aviv University, talked about colonialism and civil resistance in the West Bank. He discussed the non-violent resistance movement which began in the Palestinian villages. He also talked about the new Jewish settlements which were predominantly driven by economics rather than Zionism. The accompanying audio file provides the complete recording and audience discussion of the talk given by the author. Those who download the audio file must have their own software for playing and listening. Source: Center for Social Theory and Comparative History Seminar Series. Paper 2006-I

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Reproductive Genetic Testing: What America Thinks

"Advances in reproductive genetic technologies offer prospective parents an increasing array of options to help them have healthy babies, but these same advances also can raise troubling questions about the extent to which parents can or should choose the characteristics of their children.

Parents today can be tested to see if they carry a mutation in a gene that puts them at risk to have a child with a serious genetic disorder. Parents who are at risk can test embryos created through in vitro fertilization (IVF) and select which embryos to transfer to the mother's womb, or test a fetus during pregnancy to see if it is affected. Today we test for serious genetic disorders. In the future, as we learn more about genes, it may be possible to test for less serious disorders, or even characteristics such as behavior and intelligence.

This report presents the first look at the largest ever series of social science research studies to learn what Americans know, think and feel about the use and regulation of reproductive genetic testing - carrier testing, prenatal genetic diagnosis and preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD). These studies, funded by The Pew Charitable Trusts and conducted by the Genetics and Public Policy Center between October 2002 and August 2004, include 21 focus groups, 62 in-depth interviews, two surveys with a combined sample size of over 6000 people, and both in-person and online Genetic Town Halls." Source: Genetics and Public Policy Center

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Immigration and African-American Employment Opportunities: The Response of Wages, Employment, and Incarceration to Labor Supply Shocks

"The employment rate of black men, and particularly of low-skill black men, fell precipitously from 1960 to 2000. At the same time, the incarceration rate of black men rose markedly. This paper examines the relation between immigration and these trends in black employment and incarceration. Using data drawn from the 1960-2000 U.S. Censuses, we find a strong correlation between immigration, black wages, black employment rates, and black incarceration rates. As immigrants disproportionately increased the supply of workers in a particular skill group, the wage of black workers in that group fell, the employment rate declined, and the incarceration rate rose. Our analysis suggests that a 10-percent immigrant-induced increase in the supply of a particular skill group reduced the black wage by 3.6 percent, lowered the employment rate of black men by 2.4 percentage points, and increased the incarceration rate of blacks by almost a full percentage point." Source: National Bureau of Economic Research

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Taking Science to School: Learning and Teaching Science in Grades K-8

"What is science for a child? How do children learn about science and how to do science? Drawing on a vast array of work from neuroscience to classroom observation, Taking Science to School provides a comprehensive picture of what we know about teaching and learning science from kindergarten through eighth grade. By looking at a broad range of questions, this book provides a basic foundation for guiding science teaching and supporting students in their learning." Source: National Academies

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As Mid-Term Elections Loom, a Record Number of Americans Look to the Net for Information and Guidance

On a typical day in August 2006, 26 million Americans turned to the internet for news or information about politics and the upcoming mid-term elections. That number translates into 19% of adult internet users, or 13% of all Americans over the age of 18.

This is a high-point in the number of internet users turning to cyberspace on the average day for political news or information, exceeding the 21-million figure registered in a Pew Internet Project survey during the November 2004 general election campaign.1

Comparing August 2006 figures with those from a similar point in the 2002 mid-term election cycle is particularly revealing. In July 2002, approximately 11 million Americans, or 13% of online users, said they got some news or information about politics and the campaign from the internet on the average day. The August 2006 number is nearly two-and-a-half times larger than the mid-summer 2002 figure. Source: Pew Internet and American Life Project.

Link to online report

Publics of Asian Powers Hold Negative Views of One Another

"There is a good deal of dislike, if not outright hostility, in how the publics of major Asian countries view their neighbors. The deepest divides exist between traditional rivals - roughly seven-in-ten Japanese express an unfavorable view of China and an equal number of Chinese dislike Japan. Similarly, most Indians have an unfavorable view of Pakistan and most Pakistanis hold negative views about India. But there are other divisions as well. Both the Chinese and Japanese express generally unfavorable views of Pakistan, while the Chinese tend to feel negatively toward India as well." Source: Pew Global Attitudes Project



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Undisclosed U.S. Detention Sites Overseas: Background and Legal Issues

"The existence of secret prisons on a state's territory or the use of its airfields to transport prisoners, with or without the involvement or knowledge of the government involved, may entail a breach of international obligations. This report provides background information regarding the controversy and discusses the possible legal frameworks that may apply. It is based on available open-source documentation, as cited, and not on any independent CRS investigation. It focuses on protections accorded to persons under international law, and is not intended to address intelligence operations or policy. It also focuses primarily on the allegations relating to Europe, although other countries may be involved, and includes in its appendix a status discussion concerning relevant investigations being conducted by the European Parliament and the Council on Europe." Source: Congressional Research Service

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The Pacifica Radio/UC Berkeley Social Activism Sound Recording Project:

"The UC Berkeley Social Activism Sound Recording Project is a partnership between the UC Berkeley Library, the Pacifica Foundation, and other private and institutional sources. The intent of the project is to gather, catalog, and make accessible primary source media resources related to social activism and activist movements in California in the 1960's and 1970's. Some recordings have been edited for purposes of sound quality and continuity." Source: Media Resources Center, Moffitt Library U.C. Berkeley

Link to site

Black Churches and the Faith-Based Initiative: Findings from a Survey

"Black churches have been major institutions in African American communities, providing focus for charitable giving, social support, and civic engagement, as well as spiritual strength. This may make them logical beneficiaries of the federal government’s Faith-based and Community Initiative. But little is actually known about their level of engagement in this program, their interest in being involved, or their capacity to perform. This report summarizes major findings from a Joint Center study on black churches’ views toward and interest in the federal program. It provides insights for government policymakers, churches who are interested in participating in the FBCI, and the general public." Source: Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies

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Is the Academy a Liberal Hegemony?

The Political Orientations and Educational Values of Professors

Abstract:
In the last several years, conservatives have argued that an overwhelmingly Left and liberal faculty has taken over American colleges and universities. In particular, two main claims have been advanced: (1) a disproportionate percentage of the faculty is liberal; and (2) these liberal faculty are pushing their values on students and colleagues, skewing the educational process. However, data to support these contentions come from unrepresentative institutions and/or disciplines and mistakenly equate party identification with political ideology. In contrast, we use two nationally representative surveys done by the Carnegie Foundation (in 1989 and 1997) to address these concerns. We have several key findings: (1) although left-of-center faculty increased slightly, the best overall description of these trends suggests increased movement to the center, toward a more moderate faculty, between 1989 and 1997; (2) there are sizable differences across disciplines and institutional types, with conservatives being the plurality in some fields and in two-year colleges; (3) changes in age and gender have offsetting effects on changes in liberalism; and (4) there are significant differences in educational values between liberal and conservative professors. Source: Public Opinion Quarterly

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Does More Money Buy You More Happiness?

Abstract: Why do we believe that more money will buy us more happiness (when in fact it does not)? In this paper, we propose a model to explain this puzzle. The model incorporates both adaptation and social comparison. A rational person who fully accounts for the dynamics of these factors would indeed buy more happiness with money. We argue that projection bias, the tendency to project into the future our current reference levels, precludes subjects from correctly calculating the utility obtained from consumption. Projection bias has two effects. First, it makes people overrate the happiness that they will obtain from money. Second, it makes people misallocate the consumption budget by consuming too much at the beginning of the planning horizon, or consuming too much of adaptive goods.Source: Decisions, Operations, and Technology Management. Paper RS16. Anderson School of Management, U.C.L.A.

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The Changing Non-Voter: What Differentiates Non-Voters and Voters in Asian American and Latino Communities?

Abstract: Asian Americans and Latinos are currently one of the fastest growing racial minority groups in the United States. However, much of this growth is due to immigration: over half of both communities are new immigrants. Thus, Asian American and Latino political incorporation is directly related to the challenges associated with immigration and in ensuring the transition from citizen adult to voter. This paper explores the effect of immigration on the Asian American and Latino political behavior. Applying DeSipio’s (1996) model of new electorates, we disaggregate immigrants from both communities into three non-voting categories: non-naturalized immigrant adults, citizen adults not registered to vote, and registered voter adults who did not vote in the 2000 or 2004 election. Using Current Population Survey (CPS) data we identify and compare the factors that differentiate these three non-voting categories from those who voted between both communities. We find that Asian American and Latino political incorporation cannot be predicted solely on the basis of individual socioeconomic factors. In addition, we must take into account influences related to immigration and political institutions such as labor unions. Source: Center for the Study of Democracy. U.C. Irvine

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8th Annual Report on International Religious Freedom

“The purpose of this report is to document the actions of governments—those that repress religious expression, persecute innocent believers, or tolerate violence against religious minorities, as well as those that respect, protect, and promote religious freedom. We strive to report equally on abuses against adherents of all religious traditions and beliefs. The governments we report on range from those that provided a high level of protection for religious freedom in the broadest sense (those that “generally respected” religious freedom) to totalitarian regimes that sought to control religious thought and expression and regarded some or all religious groups as threats.” Source: U.S. Department of State

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Eight Americas: Investigating Mortality Disparities across Races, Counties, and Race-Counties in the United States

"Disparities in mortality across the eight Americas, each consisting of millions or tens of millions of Americans, are enormous by all international standards. The observed disparities in life expectancy cannot be explained by race, income, or basic health-care access and utilization alone. Because policies aimed at reducing fundamental socioeconomic inequalities are currently practically absent in the US, health disparities will have to be at least partly addressed through public health strategies that reduce risk factors for chronic diseases and injuries." Source: Public Library of Science Journal of Medicine.

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Enriching Discourse on Public Domains

Abstract:
Is there one public domain, or are there many public domains? The scholarly literature predominantly assumes there is only one, for references abound to “the public domain” in the singular. Yet, even a cursory review of this literature reveals that scholars sometimes define this term differently. So if there is only one public domain, but many definitions, perhaps one objective of scholarly discourse about the public domain should be to seek consensus on the one “true” definition.

Professor James Boyle has provocatively suggested that there are many public domains, and has urged scholars to develop a rich vocabulary for distinguishing among them. He points out that the word “property” has multiple meanings, and discourse about property proceeds without confusion because legal professionals have learned to discern which meaning is intended from the textual context. Boyle urges intellectual property scholars to develop a similarly nuanced public domain vocabulary so that it will be possible to distinguish among its several meanings as well. Source: Berkeley Center for Law and Technology. Law and Technology Scholarship (Selected by the Berkeley Center for Law & Technology). Paper 23.

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Americans See Less Progress on Their Ladder of Life

"In the past four years, some of the edge has come off good old American optimism.

Just under half (49%) of the respondents in a new Pew Research Center survey rate the quality of the life they expect to be leading five years from now higher than their current quality of life. As recently as 2002, more than six-in-ten (61%) Americans said their future would be better than their present." Source: Pew Research Center

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Democrats Hold Solid Lead; Strong Anti-Incumbent, Anti-Bush Mood

"As the congressional midterm campaign begins in earnest, the mood of the electorate is sharply drawn. Voters are disappointed with Congress and disapproving of President Bush. Anti-incumbent sentiment, while a bit lower than a few months ago, is far more extensive than in the previous two midterms and remains close to 1994 levels. Moreover, there are indications that voters are viewing the election through the prism of national issues and concerns. Many more voters see their vote as being against the president than at a comparable point in 1994, and a solid majority says party control of Congress will be a factor in their voting decision.

Voters are expressing strong and consistent anti-Republican attitudes. The GOP lags well behind the Democratic Party on nearly all major issues, including the economy, Iraq, education, health care, the environment and the budget deficit. And the Republicans have lost ground in recent years even on such traditional strengths as terrorism and improving the nation's morality." Source: Pew Research

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American Piety in the 21st Century: New Insights to the Depths and Complexity of Religion in the U.S

BSR-Baylor Survey of Religion

"Most survey studies that include questions about religion only have space to ask about basic religious indicators such as church attendance and belief in God. This is understandable, as most surveys are focused on other topics such as crime or politics and space is at a premium. ISR has received a major three-year grant from the John M. Templeton Foundation, to conduct a nationally representative multi-year study of religious values, practices, and behaviors. After several years devoted to development and pretesting by Baylor faculty, the Baylor Religion Survey (BSR) was fielded during the winter of 2005 and the data were made available for analysis in the spring of 2006." Source: Baylor University


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Why Study Users? An Environmental Scan of Use and Users of Digital Resources in Humanities and Social Sciences Undergraduate Education

This paper presents an overview of a two-year study funded by the Andrew W. Mellon and the William and Flora Hewlett Foundations that (1) mapped the universe of digital resources available to undergraduate educators in the humanities and social sciences (H/SS) and (2) examined how a better understanding of the variation in use and users can benefit the integration of these resources into undergraduate teaching. In order to address questions around user demand and resource sustainability, we used a variety of methodologies that included an extensive literature review; discussions with and surveys of faculty from different disciplines and institutions; and discussions and interviews with site owners, use researchers, librarians, and educational technology professionals. Our results suggest that faculty use a vast array of online materials from both educational and "non-educational" sources, including their own personal collections and the ubiquitous Google-type search. Individual characteristics, including disciplinary and institutional affiliation, affected patterns of use. Many faculty, however, do not use digital resources for a host of reasons including the lack of direct relevance to their preferred pedagogical approaches and insufficient time and classroom resources. Our discussions with digital resource providers confirmed that resources created by higher education institutions will continue to proliferate despite a lack of formal knowledge about users and/or clear models for financial sustainability. A more precise understanding of the diversity of use and user behavior, and the ability to share findings from user studies, will demand that the digital resource development community make typologies, standards of data and data collection, and results more transparent.
Source: Center for Studies in Higher Education. Paper CSHE-15-06.

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Universities and the Entrepreneurial State: Politics and Policy and a New Wave of State-Based Economic Initiatives

The convergence of US federal science and economic policy that began in earnest in the Reagan administration formed the first stage in an emerging post-Cold War drive toward technological innovation. A frenzy of new state-based initiatives now forms the Second Stage, further promoting universities as decisive tools for economic competitiveness. State governments have largely become the political environment in which new policy ideas are emerging, influenced by a sense of increased competition among states and other international economies for economic growth. The paper outlines the characteristics of this Second Stage, and offers short case studies of two influential HT initiatives in California--a leading HT state. Among the author's conclusions: HT economic activity is already relatively widespread among the various states (more so than perhaps previously thought); leading HT states rely heavily on their university sectors and a highly educated workforce, yet are increasingly importing talent and neglecting investment in the education and skills of their native populations; the long-term commitment of states to financially support the frenzy of HT initiatives is unclear; and state initiatives are rationalized by lawmakers as filling a need not currently met by the private sector or universities and, in part, as a response to a sense of competition between states, and thus far with only a minor concern for global competition. As this paper explores, the politics of HT--including the focus on university-industry collaboration and neo-conservative religious/moral controversies over stem cell research--is a significant factor for understanding how and why most states are pursuing the Second Stage. John Aubrey Douglass Source: Center for Studies in Higher Education, UC Berkeley

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The Core Analytics of Randomized Experiments for Social Research

"This paper examines the core analytic elements of randomized experiments for social research. Its goal is to provide a compact discussion for faculty members, graduate students, and applied researchers of the design and analysis of randomized experiments for measuring the impacts of social or educational interventions. Design issues considered include choosing the size of a study sample and its allocation to experimental groups, using covariates or blocking to improve the precision of impact estimates, and randomizing intact groups instead of individuals. Analysis issues considered include estimating impacts when not all sample members comply with their assigned treatment and estimating impacts when groups are randomized." Source: MDRC

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NCES : Projections of Education Statistics to 2015

"Some highlights from the report: enrollment in public elementary and
secondary schools rose 18 percent between 1990 and 2003 and is projected
to increase an additional 6 percent between 2003 and 2015; between 2003
and 2015, private school enrollment is expected to increase by 7 percent;
college enrollment rose by 25 percent between 1990 and 2004 and is
projected to increase a further 15 percent by 2015; the number of high
school graduates increased by 21 percent between 1990-91 and 2002-03 and a
further increase of 6 percent is projected by 2015-16." Source: National Center for Education Statistics

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from PW : "The art of the blurb"

Have you been asked to write a cover blurb? The author provides effective strategies for a stylish blurb.

Source: Publisher's Weekly

link to online article

A Sociological Critique of Bottled Water Consumption

Abstract: "This working paper excerpts some passages from my forthcoming book, Imaginary Refuge/Political Anesthesia, (University of Minnesota Press, 2007). In that book I name, define and explore the important features of what I call “inverted quarantine,” a particular type of response to feeling threatened. I have, elsewhere, called inverted quarantine a fatalistic, perverse form of environmental consciousness and action: A person knows enough about environmental hazards to feel threatened, but instead of doing something substantive about it, that is, acting politically, with others, to address the problem, he or she merely tries to buy protection for themselves, individually. The concept of “inverted quarantine” is applicable to certain popular forms of reaction to social issues – suburbanization and retreat to gated communities in response to the problems of the city, crime, racial tensions; home schooling in response to the real or perceived problems of the public education system. In the book, the focus is on inverted quarantine in response to toxic environmental threats. In addition to bottled water and water filters, explored in this working paper, the book also discusses organic food consumption and the marketing of “natural” or “organic” household products. In this working paper, only the most prominent features of the inverted quarantine phenomenon are discussed. Those who wish to see more details in the analysis of the concept are encouraged to read the full work, when it appears in print. A. Sz." Source: Center for Global, International and Regional Studies. U.C. Santa Cruz

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Defending Against Strategic Terrorists Over the Long Run: A Basic Approach to Resource Allocation

Abstract: "The efficient allocation of resources to defend the United States’ critical infrastructure and key assets against terrorist attacks involves both short and long-run issues. The former focus on attempts to detect and disrupt the planning and execution of operations already underway. The latter focus on long-term efforts to harden sites, reduce vulnerabilities,and make attacks more difficult and less attractive. Because these are longer-term efforts, strategic terrorists will adjust and respond to these measures in order to strike where the defense is weak and the expected gains are high. Recognizing that terrorists are strategic and that resources are limited, the Department of Homeland Security emphasizes that resources must be allocated on the basis of risk. This paper shows that the current approach to risk management does not threat terrorists as fully strategic and that the failure to do so can lead to a significant misallocation of defensive resources. The paper also provides a framework for allocating resources against long-term threats." Source:Institute of Governmental Studies, U.C. Berkeley

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What Impact, If Any, Will Higher Minimum Wages Have on Retailers and Low-income Workers?

"The struggle to raise pay for low-income workers, once fought in agricultural fields and on factory floors, is moving to the aisles of big retailers in Chicago where large national chains like Wal-Mart and Target may be forced to offer higher wages along with every-day low prices.

While retailers complain the legislation may lead them to stall plans for new downtown stores, Wharton faculty say Chicago's proposed living wage law is largely symbolic and would have little real impact on large retail chains or their employees. "The bottom line is it's feel-good legislation that won't have an effect on firm location or firm costs -- or on low-income families in Chicago, either," says Wharton finance professor Robert Inman.

Under a proposal passed by Chicago's City Council in July, retail chains with sales of more than $1 billion or stores larger than 90,000 square feet will be required to pay workers $10 an hour in wages and $3 in benefits by 2010. Illinois' current minimum wage is $6.50 an hour, while the federal minimum wage -- last increased in September 1997 -- remains at $5.15 an hour." Source: Knowledge@Wharton

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Income Poverty and Health Insurance Coverage in the U.S.

"This report presents data on income, poverty and health insurance coverage in the United States based on information collected in the 2006 and earlier Annual Social and Economic Supplements (ASEC) to the Current Population Surcey (CPS) conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau." Source: U.S. Census Bureau

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Reducing the Racial Achievement Gap: A Social-Psychological Intervention

Two randomized field experiments tested a social-psychological intervention designed to improve minority student performance and increase our understanding of how psychological threat mediates performance in chronically evaluative real-world environments. We expected that the risk of confirming a negative stereotype aimed at one's group could undermine academic performance in minority students by elevating their level of psychological threat. We tested whether such psychological threat could be lessened by having students reaffirm their sense of personal adequacy or "self-integrity." The intervention, a brief in-class writing assignment, significantly improved the grades of African American students and reduced the racial achievement gap by 40%. These results suggest that the racial achievement gap, a major social concern in the United States, could be ameliorated by the use of timely and targeted social-psychological interventions. Source: Science Mag

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Measuring Up : the National Report Card for Higher Education

Measuring Up 2006 consists of the national report card for higher education and fifty state report cards. Its purpose is to provide the public and policymakers with information to assess and improve postsecondary education in each state. Measuring Up 2006 is the fourth in a series of biennial report cards.

This Web site provides state leaders, policymakers, researchers and others with access to the national report card as well as access to all fifty state report cards. In addition, the site can compare any state with the best-performing states in each performance category, compare indicator scores and state grades for any performance category, obtain source and technical information for indicators and weights, and allow visitors to download the reports. Further, the Measuring Up Web site has the capacity to view previous report cards from 2000, 2002, and 2004. Source: National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education

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Exploring Gender Differences in Employment and Wage Trends Among Less-Skilled Workers

"In contrast to less-skilled men, less-skilled women have experienced growing labor force involvement and moderate wage increases. Compared to more-skilled women, less-skilled women have fallen behind. We investigated the reasons behind these trends in labor force participation and wages for male and female workers of different skill levels over the past 25 years, from 1979-2004. We find that less-skilled women have found themselves in an 'intermediate' place in the labor market. Like less-skilled men, they experienced deteriorating returns to education but, unlike the men, they benefited from a growing positive impact of accumulated experience on labor market outcomes. More-skilled women experienced both growing returns to education and greater accumulation of experience, leading to faster wage growth. In addition, at the same time that experience levels have grown, the returns to experience on wages and labor force participation have also risen among less-skilled women, while the returns to experience have declined among less-skilled men. The negative effect of children and marital status on wages and labor force participation has also declined markedly among women of all skill levels." Source: National Bureau of Economic Research

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How Corruption Hits People When They Are Down

"Using cross-country and Peruvian data, I show that victims of misfortune, particularly crime victims, are much more likely than non-victims to bribe public officials. Misfortune increases victims' demand for public services, raising bribery indirectly, and also increases victims' propensity to bribe certain officials conditional on using them, possibly because victims are desperate, vulnerable, or demanding services particularly prone to corruption. The effect is strongest for bribery of the police, where the increase in bribery comes principally through increased use of the police. For the judiciary the effect is also strong, and for some misfortunes is composed equally of an increase in use and an increase in bribery conditional on use. The expense and disutility of bribing thus compound the misery brought by misfortune." Source: National Bureau of Economic Research

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Computer and Internet Use by Students nursery school and K-12

"This report examines the use of computers and the Internet by American children enrolled in nursery school and students in kindergarten through grade 12. The report examines the overall rate of use (that is, the percentage of individuals in the population who are users), the ways in which students use the technologies, where the use occurs (home, school, and other locations), and the relationships of these aspects of computer and Internet use to demographic and socioeconomic characteristics such as students' age and race/ethnicity and their parents' education and family income. This report confirms that patterns of computer and Internet use seen in previous research are observed in more recent data. One of the more important findings presented in the report is that schools appear to help narrow the disparities between different types of students in terms of computer use. Differences in the rates of computer use are smaller at school than they are at home when considering such characteristics as race/ethnicity, family income, and parental education." Source: National Center for Education Statistics

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The Health Literacy of America’s Adults: Results from the 2003 National Assessment of Adult Literacy

"The Health Literacy of America’s Adults is the first release of the National Assessment of Adult Literacy (NAAL) health literacy results. The results are based on assessment tasks designed specifically to measure the health literacy of adults living in the United States. Health literacy was reported using four performance levels: Below Basic, Basic, Intermediate, and Proficient. The majority of adults (53 percent) had Intermediate health literacy. About 22 percent had Basic and 14 percent had Below Basic health literacy. Relationships between health literacy and background variables (such as educational attainment, age, race/ethnicity, where adults get information about health issues, and health insurance coverage) were also examined and reported. For example, adults with Below Basic or Basic health literacy were less likely than adults with higher health literacy to get information about health issues from written sources (newspapers, magazines, books, brochures, or the Internet) and more likely than adults with higher health literacy to get a lot of information about health issues from radio and television." Source: National Center for Education Statistics

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FreeDemographics

"Input any address and then view the relevant demographic data from the Census 2000 Report as well as the Census 2000 Housing Report. A Google Map identifying the particular region appears alongside the displayed data."

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Is There a Correlation between Scholarly Productivity, Scholarly Influence and Teaching Effectiveness in American Law Schools?

"This empirical study attempts to answer an age-old debate in legal academia: whether scholarly productivity helps or hurts teaching. The study is of an unprecedented size and scope. It covers every tenured or tenure-track faculty member at 19 American law schools, a total of 623 professors. The study gathers four years of teaching evaluation data (calendar years 2000-03) and creates an index for teaching effectiveness." Source: Social Science Research Network.

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Presidential Signing Statements and Executive Power

"A recent debate about the Bush administration's use of presidential signing statements has raised questions about their function, legality, and value. We argue that presidential signing statements are legal and that they provide a useful way for the president to disclose his views about the meaning and constitutionality of legislation. Although President Bush has challenged more statutory provisions in signing statements than prior administrations have, his signing statements are similar in many respects to the signing statements issued by prior presidents, such as President Clinton. In addition, basic tenets of positive political theory suggest that signing statements do not undermine the separation of powers or the legislative process and that, under certain circumstances, they can provide relevant evidence of statutory meaning." Source: Social Science Research Network

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The Economics of Open-Access Journals

“A new business model for scholarly journals, open access, has gained wide attention recently. An open-access journal’s articles are available over the Internet free of charge to all readers; revenue to cover publication costs comes from authors’ fees. In this paper, we present a model of the journals market. Drawing upon the emerging literature on two-sided markets, we highlight the features distinguishing journals from examples economists have previously studied (telephony, credit cards, etc.). We analyze the efficiency of equilibrium author and reader fee schedules for various industry structures and for various assumptions about journals’ objective functions. We ask whether open-access journals are viable in these various economic environments.” Source: Social Science Resource Network

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Why PIRG Is Wrong: Myths and Facts About College Textbooks

“While other higher education costs continue to rise faster than the price of textbooks, Public Interest Research Group (PIRG) projects have waged a biased and misleading campaign against publishers of textbooks. For the past two years, PIRG has disseminated inaccurate, incomplete and misleading information about college textbooks and the publishing industry. PIRG’s student volunteers ‘cherry-pick’ only a few figures to help support PIRG’s premise, creating a false and misleading picture. The organization continues to ignore industry-wide data, valid research, and information from independent, third party sources.” Source: Association of American Publishers, Inc.


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