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Adequate blood supply, a prerequisite for flap survival after grafting, makes angiogenesis of the flap the biggest problem to be solved. Researches have been conducted around vascularisation in correlation with flap grafting. However, bibliometric analyses systematically examining this research field are lacking. As such, we herein sought to conduct comprehensive comparative analyses of the contributions of different researchers, institutions, and countries to this research space in an effort to identify trends and hotspots in angiogenesis and vascularisation in the context of flap grafting. Publications pertaining to angiogenesis and vascularisation in the context of flap grafting were retrieved from the Web of Science Core Collection. References were then analysed and plotted using Microsoft Excel 2019, VOSviewer, and CiteSpace V. In total, 2234 papers that were cited 40 048 times (17.63 citations/paper) were included in this analysis. The greatest number of studies were from the United States, with these studies exhibiting both the highest number of citations (13 577) and the greatest overall H‐index (60). For The institutions that published the greatest number of studies were WENZHOU MEDICAL UNIVERSITY (681), while UNIVERSITY OF ERLANGEN NUREMBERG has the highest number of citations (1458), and SHANGHAI JIAO TONG UNIVERSITY holds the greatest overall H‐index (20). The greatest number of studies in this research space were published by Gao WY, while Horch RE was the most commonly cited researcher in the field. The VOS viewer software clustered relevant keywords into three clusters, with clusters 1, 2, 3, and 4 corresponding to studies in which the keywords 'anatomy', 'survival', 'transplantation', 'therapy' most frequently appeared. The most promising research hotspot‐related terms in this field included 'autophagy', 'oxidative stress', 'ischemia/reperfusion injury', which exhibited a most recent average appearing year (AAY) of 2017 and after. Generally speaking, the results of this analysis indicate that the number of articles exploring angiogenesis and flap‐related research has risen steadily, with the United States and China being the two countries publishing the greatest proportion of studies in this field. The overall focus of these studies has shifted away from 'infratest and tissue engineering' towards 'mechanisms'. In the future, particular attention should be paid to emerging research hotspots, which include 'ischemia/reperfusion injury' and treatments for promoting vascularization, such as 'platelet‐rich plasma'. In light of these findings, funding agencies should continue increasing their investment in the exploration of the concrete mechanisms and interventional therapeutic relevance of angiogenesis during flap transplantation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Every year billions of dollars are spent on research grants to produce new knowledge in universities. However, as grants may also affect other research funding, the effects of financial resources on knowledge production remain unclear. To uncover how financial resources affect knowledge production, we study the effects of research spending itself. Utilizing the legal constraints on university spending from an endowment we develop an instrumental variables approach. Our approach instruments for university research spending with time-series variation in stock prices interacted with cross-sectional variation in initial endowment market values for research universities in the United States. Our analysis reveals that research spending has a substantial positive effect on the number of papers produced, but not their impact. We also demonstrate that research spending effects are quite similar at private and public universities. (JEL H5, I2, O3) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on a survey on the demand for higher education in the U.S. A survey of studies on the demand for higher education circa 1975, made at the University of South Carolina, shows that two approaches have been taken in attempts to assess its magnitudes, one sociological and the other economic. In the investigation, a synthesis of the two approaches is presented and the information from the studies is supplemented by additional evidence from cross-section and time-series data for the U.S. and for South Carolina. The survey of some 18 studies, spanning the period 1965-75, is presented in chronological order, with the main results of the various studies provided in tabular form. The survey occupies the first section of Working Paper No. 76-6 of the Center for Studies in Human Resource Economics, College of Business Administration, University of South Carolina. The working paper gives a detailed report of the investigation. The second section of the paper examines additional cross-sectional data for all South Carolina counties and for the 50 states.

Objective The objectives were to critically appraise the medical education research literature of 2015 and review the highest-quality quantitative and qualitative examples. Methods A total of 434 emergency medicine ( EM)-related articles were discovered upon a search of ERIC, Psych INFO, Pub MED, and SCOPUS. These were both quantitative and qualitative in nature. All were screened by two of the authors using previously published exclusion criteria, and the remaining were appraised by all authors using a previously published scoring system. The highest scoring articles were then reviewed. Results Sixty-one manuscripts were scored, and 10 quantitative and two qualitative papers were the highest scoring and are reviewed and summarized in this article. Conclusions This installment in this critical appraisal series reviews 12 of the highest-quality EM-related medical education research manuscripts published in 2015. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

From its birth, The Journal of Consumer Affairs has provided a forum for government officials, consumer activists, and academics to discuss the definition of the consumer interest and how best to pursue it. In the inaugural issue of JCA, published in the summer of 1967, three of the first four articles were titled “The View from Washington” (by Deputy Assistant Secretary of Labor David Swankin), “Is It Time to Re-Evaluate the Consumer Protection Activities of the Federal Government?” (by Consumers Union president Colston E. Warne), and “The Consumer Interest—the Real Issue” (by Professor of Marketing Robert D. Schooler). When JCA began publication in 1967, a few landmark pieces of consumer legislation had already been passed concerning pharmaceuticals, cigarettes, and motor vehicles, but the heyday of the consumer movement—and consumer research—was just beginning. In his article, Warne wrote: “The time has come, I think, for consumers and consumer movements to face some highly unpleasant problems” (p. 24). Schooler chastised the federal government for being “misdirected toward real but secondary issues” (p. 40). Swankin called for an organization and a professional journal capable of creating “an intellectual climate in which the phrases ‘consumer interest,’‘consumer economics,’ and, yes, ‘consumer information’ can be developed and can flourish” (pp. 9–10). Nearly forty years later, and long after the zenith of the U.S. consumer movement, we still face a host of consumer problems and a federal government disinclined to address them. We do, however, have a respected journal in whose pages the consumer interest and consumer policy can be examined. On April 25, 2005, the University of Utah hosted a symposium on consumer policy in honor of the retirement of Dr. John R. Burton. John, who established the consumer studies program at the University of Utah, has devoted his career to teaching, research, and service that advance the consumer interest. Seven nationally renowned speakers, including professors Monroe Friedman, Loren Geistfeld, Jeanne Hogarth, Jean Lown, and Ivan Preston, presented papers pertaining to the consumer interest. Two of the seven papers are reproduced here. The first is by Stephen Brobeck, long-time executive director of the Consumer Federation of America (CFA) and the editor of The Encyclopedia of the Consumer Movement. Dr. Brobeck's article examines how a major consumer advocacy organization like CFA decides what public policy positions are in the consumer interest. The article applies a general framework to the specific issue of automobile fuel economy standards. In the companion piece to this article, Michael Burton, an assistant professor of political science at Ohio University and the son of the symposium's honoree, draws on his experience as a congressional aide and vice presidential staff member to describe and defend the art of compromise as it applies to consumer politics. – Robert N. Mayer, University of Utah [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

International students have long comprised an important part of U.S. higher education. However, little is known regarding the factors that encourage students from across the world to enroll in U.S. colleges and universities each year. This paper examines the relationship between international enrollment and the openness of the United States' skilled labor market, currently regulated by the H- 1B program. Gravity regressions reveal that H- 1B visa issuances to a country are positively and significantly related to the number of international students from that country. Causal estimates of the impact of labor market openness are achieved by exploiting a dramatic fall in the H- 1B visa cap in October 2003. Triple difference estimates show that the fall in the cap lowered foreign enrollment by 10%. ( JEL F22, I21, J11) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the past 20 years, the number of patents assigned to universities has increased dramatically. This increase coincided with several policy initiatives, such as the Bayh-Dole Act of 1980, designed to foster technology transfer between universities and the private sector. This paper examines the effect of such policies using an institutional framework, designed to illustrate how factors both from inside and outside of academia influence the decision to patent university research. We find passage of the Bayh-Dole Act spurred university patenting, but did not induce additional applied research funding. Thus, Bayh-Dole fostered technology transfer, but did not result in more applied research at universities. © 2005 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reports on the nature of the health research in progress at Ohio State University. The concern of the paper is with mental health. It discusses the reasons for undertaking health research, the objectives of such research, and the methods used. Studies completed and in process are likewise reported.

This paper reports on the nature of the health research in progress at Michigan State University. The concern of the paper is with physical health. It discusses the reasons for undertaking health research, the objectives of such research, and the methods used. Studies completed and in process are likewise reported.

This paper reports on the nature of the health research in progress at the University of Missouri. The concern of the paper is with physical health. It discusses the reasons for undertaking health research, the objectives of such research, and the methods used. Studies completed and in process are likewise reported. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper captures the structure of MBA programs in 25 leading U.S. business schools at the beginning of the revolution these programs are undergoing. It is a study of strategic groups in the MBA industry, and a baseline for examining adaptation and strategic change in educational institutions. We use the Co-plot method to map the schools according to the 1993 structure of their core courses and existing areas of concentration. The maps indicate similarities among business schools and shed light on their 1994 ranking. Each of the five top schools has been found to be in a different cluster of MBA program structures. The findings suggest that program structure content-the particular mix of core and concentration areas—in itself is not a source of superior performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper estimates the impact of fraternity and sorority membership on a wide array of drinking outcomes among respondents to four Harvard College Alcohol Study surveys from 1993 to 2001. Identification is achieved by including proxies for specific types of unobserved heterogeneity expected to influence the relationship. These include high school and parental drinking behaviors to account for time-invariant omitted factors and assessed importance of drinking-related activities and reasons for drinking to control for changes in preferences since starting college. Because self-selection is quantitatively important, I further hold constant variables plausibly affected by fraternity membership, such as current alcohol use categorization, ranging from abstainer to heavy drinker, and time spent socializing. Even in the fully saturated model, fraternity membership significantly increases drinking intensity, frequency, and recency, as well as the prevalence of many deleterious drinking consequences that potentially carry negative externalities. ( JEL I12, I20) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses a ranking of U.S. and Canadian academic institutions based on their relative contribution to the field of conservation biology. The authors argue that the purpose of the ranking is to provide a relative evaluation of an institutions research performance over time, and to provide students a relative index for education and future employment. In addition, it can be used by those in need of conservation research such as conservation groups, federal agencies, nongovernmental organizations, land trusts, and employers of conservation biologists. The ranking indexes include total publications, citations, and Hirsch’s h index which attempts to measure of the amount of influence for institutions top ranked articles.

How are privilege and/or particular gender norms for women spatially (re)produced over time and how are they challenged and changed? In interviews and mental mapping exercises with 32 students and graduates of an elite US women's college from graduating classes spanning 1937 to 2006, women's class and gender norms and expectations are found to have been produced, reproduced and reworked in their everyday experiences during college. Participants portray these norms through the scales of the body, institution and extra-institution in regards to the particular social and physical space of the campus. Participants’ experiences, as depicted in these scales, indicate that class norms remained stable over generational cohorts, but gender norms shifted drastically because the privilege found within and granted by the elite women's college campus allowed for and prompted such changes. Transformations of women's gender norms also correspond with changes in the larger social sphere with a particular split in how participants could enact their privilege to alter their gender norms before and after the late 1960s. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

University administrators have made difficult choices in response to the changing policy context for the use of affirmative action in admissions. This paper synthesizes the empirical literature on affirmative action and evaluates the efficacy of alternative strategies, including top-percent programs, class-based affirmative action, and targeted recruiting. The analyses offer several findings of interest to officials who direct such programs: (1) Affirmative action preferences given by top-tier universities have been large; (2) affirmative action leads minorities to enroll in higher-quality institutions; and (3) affirmative action has mostly positive effects on minority students later in life. The evidence shows a decline in minorities’ relative share of enrollment at flagship public universities after affirmative action was eliminated in several states, and the alternative strategies used by these universities have not offset these declines. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the debates over the 2003 U.S. Supreme Court decisions regarding race-based university admissions, speculation has focused on how affirmative action affects minority undergraduate enrollments. This paper uses a rational choice framework to test the conventional wisdom about the effect of race-based admissions, focusing on the landmark Hopwood judicial decision and California’s Proposition 209. This study offers more generalizable findings by incorporating all public universities bound under Hopwood and Proposition 209 using data spanning 1990–2000. Findings indicate that the effect of race-based admissions standards is not what might have been predicted: Shifts in minority enrollments that are attributable to affirmative action hinge on university-specific characteristics—namely, the level of selectivity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses research papers presented at the 2005 annual meeting of the American Political Science Association, held in Washington, DC. The paper "An Old Trend for a New Majority: Explaining the Higher Retirement Rate of Republicans." by Michael Murakami, University of California, Berkeley, sheds light on why over the past few decades, the Republicans in the U.S. House have retired at a higher rate than Democrats. The researchers conclude that this as an effect of their being in the minority party, without access to committee chairmanships, staff resources, and legislative clout. The paper "Party Leaders Under Investigation; Three Ethics Committee Cases Over the Past 25 Years." by Beth A. Rosenson, University of Florida, examines the congressional ethics investigations of Democratic House Speaker James Wright, Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich, and Republican House Majority Leader Tom DeLay. The paper "The Powers and Limits of Parties in the US. Senate." by Chris Den Hartog University of California, San Diego, evaluate the rates at which individual members of the democrat and the Republican party "won" and "lost" on Senate final passage votes, before and after U.S. Senator James Jeffords's announcement that he was switching from Republican to independent and would vote with Democrats on organizational matters.

The 1997 North American Summer Meeting of the Econometric Society will be held at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, California from June 25-29, 1997. The Program Chair will be Tom Palfrey and the Local Arrangements Chair is Kim Border. The program will include both invited and contributed papers. All paper submissions should be mailed to the Program Chair. The specification of paper submissions is also presented. Also, the 1997 Far Eastern Meeting of the Econometric Society will be held at the Chinese University in Hong Kong, Shatin, New Territories, Hong Kong on July 24-26, 1997.

The article comments on the impact of colleges and universities on local rental housing markets in the U.S. The study consists of the development and testing of a model of rental housing service demand. In this model, demand is assumed to vary positively with income, the percentage of total population which is enrolled in a college or university, and population density. A negative relationship is assumed between demand and the percentage of total employment which is in manufacturing. The first relationship defines a positive income elasticity of demand for rental housing services. The manufacturing variable is assumed to measure the effects of such external diseconomies of spatially concentrated industry as air pollution, ugliness, and noise. The population density variable is included to reflect the influence of differing numbers of rental housing service buyers in a given market area. It is believed that the college and university variable expresses the impact of this unmeasured component of student income which tends to increase student demand relative to non-student demand. Unmeasured student income consists of transfers from outside the local housing market area and relatively high permanent income.

In this paper, we devise a cost-allocation matrix and employ it to estimate the average input (net of capital) cost to the University of South Carolina of producing various degrees. The end product of our technique permits a statement of the comparative input costs of producing degrees from each of the several product (degree-granting) divisions within the university. These cost estimates should be useful to administrators concerned with establishing tuition rates. Although our data are for a particular university, factor inputs used by this university for transmitting knowledge are taken from regional, national and international markets. Curricula for similar degrees in different universities are similar in composition. Hence, our study should have general applicability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents information related to academic achievements, academic appointments and several other research activities related to rural sociology in universities in the U.S. The journal "Rural sociology" has shared in the tripling of the number of majors in the graduate faculty of sociology as compared with he last semester. The enrollment in the major course in rural sociology in the first semester is 120. Dr. Alan Westerman has been added to the staff as instructor and Mr. Alan Hugg, B.A., University of Manitoba, Master of Education, Springfield, as graduate assistant. Columbia University has organized a university-wide seminar on rural life in this year considering the family farm. The staff includes an economist, an anthropologist, a historian, a psychologist, two rural sociologists, a rural educationist, and a librarian. Professor W.A. Anderson of Cornell University, has participated in the 1946 session of the American Institute of Cooperation at Purdue University, held between August 26 and 30 presenting a paper entitled "The Need for Cooperative Education."

This article presents updates on meetings and events related to family living and marriage at universities and associations in the U.S. as of May 1946. At the two sessions of the American Sociological Society, papers presented were devoted to the topic of family. The first, on the Family and the War, chairman, Ray E. Baber, discussed papers by Mildred Fairchild on Compilation of Data Regarding American Women at Work and at Home in World War II, by Leonard Bloom on Familial Adjustments of Japanese-Americans to Relocation, and by John F. Cuber on A Study of the Adjustmental Problems of Returning Service Men and Their Spouses. The Association for Childhood Education, on the other hand, held a restricted 1946 Annual Meeting in Cincinnati, Ohio, on April 1946, limited to approximately eight hundred people. In addition, the Child Study Association of America held its Annual Conference on March 4, 1946.

Active learning in STEM education is essential for engaging the diverse pool of scholars needed to address pressing environmental and social challenges. However, active learning formats are difficult to scale and their incorporation into STEM teaching at U.S. universities varies widely. Here, we argue that urban agriculture as a theme can significantly increase active learning in undergraduate biology education by facilitating outdoor fieldwork and community‐engaged education. We begin by reviewing benefits of field courses and community engagement activities for undergraduate biology and discuss constraints to their broader implementation. We then describe how urban agriculture can connect biology concepts to pressing global changes, provide field research opportunities, and connect students to communities. Next, we assess the extent to which urban agriculture and related themes have already been incorporated into biology‐related programs in the United States using a review of major programs, reports on how campus gardens are used, and case studies from five higher education institutions (HEIs) engaging with this issue. We found that while field experiences are fairly common in major biology programs, community engagement opportunities are rare, and urban agriculture is almost nonexistent in course descriptions. We also found that many U.S. HEIs have campus gardens, but evidence suggests that they are rarely used in biology courses. Finally, case studies of five HEIs highlight innovative programming but also significant opportunities for further implementation. Together, our results suggest that urban agriculture is rarely incorporated into undergraduate biology in the United States, but there are significant prospects for doing so. We end with recommendations for integrating urban agriculture into undergraduate biology, including the development of campus gardens, research programs, community engagement partnerships, and collaborative networks. If done with care, this integration could help students make community contributions within required coursework, and help instructors feel a greater sense of accomplishment in an era of uncertainty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One striking phenomenon in the U.S. labor market is the reversal of the gender gap in college attainment. Females have outnumbered males in college attainment since 1987. We develop a discrete choice model of college entry decisions to study the driving forces of changes in college attainment by gender. We find that the increase in relative earnings between college-educated and high-school-educated individuals and the increasing parental education have important effects on the increase in college attainment for both genders, but cannot explain the reversal of the gender gap. Rising divorce probabilities increase returns to college for females and decrease those for males, and thus are crucial in explaining the reversal of the gender gap in college attainment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT. The amount of cheating and plagiarism on college campuses has become an increasingly important topic. The usual policy prescription to this type of problem is to step up monitoring efforts. However, this is difficult and costly. An alternative strategy is to substitute tougher and consistent sanctions for cheating and plagiarism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite his provisos, Waller created the impression that the rating and dating complex was a widespread (if not the dominant) pattern on American college campuses during the 1930s. This paper, however, argues that by the 1930s this form of dating was very much on the decline and, moreover, that it never was the most prevalent form of cross-sex socializing, on or off the campus. Nonetheless, it is acknowledged that rating and dating did become prominent during the 1920s as an outgrowth of the increasing importance of fraternities and sororities on college campuses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper I have used journal publication performance during the period 1970-1974 to rank economics departments in American academic institutions. The results indicate that the traditional leaders in the profession, Harvard, Chicago, Yale, M. I. T., Stanford, Princeton, Pennsylvania, and Berkeley, have retained their high position; however, the figures also show that the performance of many of the top institutions has been surpassed by Wisconsin and closely followed by UCLA, Washington-Seattle, Michigan, Northwestern, Carnegie-Mellon, Rochester, and Minnesota. In addition, the recent publishing performance of Columbia, Cornell, Brown, and Johns Hopkins has been equalled or exceeded by Illinois, SUNY-Buffalo, Michigan State, North Carolina, Texas A & M, Virginia, N. Y. U., and Maryland. The results for the South show that the publication output of the traditional leaders, North Carolina and Virginia, has been approximated by two rapidly rising institutions, Texas A & M and V. P. I., In addition, Florida State, Florida, Tulane, Georgia, Houston, Southern Methodist, Tennessee, and Kentucky have made substantial improvements in recent years, and, presently, their publication performance ranks on a par or ahead of institutions such as Duke, Vanderbilt, Rice, Texas, and North Carolina State. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Public administration has made a major commitment to mid-curriculum internships. At least part of the rationale for that commitment is that the internship is considered an investment in the future, a way of reducing the front-end costs of learning the labyrinthine byways of complex organizations. That commitment is not inexpensive. A rough calculation of the direct cost of last summer's intern group at Indiana University cost the University, the interns, and the host agencies roughly $110,000 to support 55 interns. Applying estimated national enrollment figures, if the average direct cost of an internship is $2000 per intern, and if even half of the 20,000 students enrolled in M.P.A. degrees take an internship, then total direct cost could be somewhere around $20,000,000. Rather than focus on the monetary benefit of an internship, the question this paper attempts to explore is "what makes an internship satisfactory or unsatisfactory to the intern himself?" Certainly direct benefits may occur to an agency, to the student, and to the school itself. For example, the host organization may get a sophisticated project done at low cost.

A creative partnership of public administration professionals and academics was formed to strengthen local management education in the state of West Virginia. The city manager practitioner group, a professional association of practitioners and academics, and the public administration program at the comprehensive state university joined together to improve understanding of and preparation for local government management. The cooperative effort to improve local management education and to extend practitioner-academic relationships was developed in the course of a number of meetings. The general goals of the cooperative effort were to interest and educate graduate public administration students in local management and to enrich the local management professionals and academics participating in the program. This program for improving local management education is readily adaptable to other locations and to other practitioner and academic groups. The major program components of practitioner taught seminars, intensive internships, colloquia and workshops, and student field research are easily modified to different situations.

The article presents information related to college sociology teachers in the U.S. John V. D. Saunders, assistant professor of sociology at the Louisiana State University, will join T. Lynn Smith, graduate research professor at the University of Florida, in the preparation of the manuscript for future sociology sections of the Handbook of Latin American Studies. The Handbook, a publication prepared in the Hispanic Foundation of the Library of Congress with the assistance of approximately sixty specialists from universities and colleges principally in the United States, is the standard United States guide to the current publications and scholarly activities within the social sciences and humanities as they relate to Latin America. Edward Koenig recently returned from Nigeria, West Africa, where he was with the International Development Services Inc. He was a member of a team studying agricultural co-operatives and credit problems in Western Nigeria for the International Co-operation Administration. He left the Baron Dc Hirsch Fund after ten years as its agent in New York State.

Presents news notes involving the Rural Sociological Society in the U.S. Announcements by sociological institutions; Programs and projects involving universities and colleges; Meetings and workshops.

The article presents information and announcements related to the field of rural sociology. The Social Research Center of the American University in Cairo announces openings for sociologists, anthropologists, and economists on its research staff. Research will include problems of social and economic developments social aspects of physical planning of the city of Aswan, labor problems the High Dam, Nubian resettlement, demography and family planning, settlement of nomads, and marketing. The article presents announcement about the fiftieth anniversary of the beginning of rural sociology at Cornell University, which will be observed with a dinner program in April 1965. The Council of the Southern Mountains is seeking a research director for a project under a Ford Foundation grant. The article reports on new projects as like the Farm Population Branch of the U.S. Department of Agriculture is cooperating with the University of Kentucky in the preparation of a monograph on the rural aged in the United States. The article also reports that sociologist Ismail Ajami has returned to Iran after completing his Ph.D. work at Cornell and Fuad C. Baali has been appointed Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Florida.

This article discusses several developments related to academic activities and appointments in field of sociology, from various universities and colleges in the U.S. Howard W. Been, the University of Kentucky's head of the Departments of Sociology and Rural Sociology, is in New Delhi, India, serving as a community development adviser to the Indian government. He is employed by the Ford Foundation. He is expected to return in July, 1959. John H. Mabry has been appointed associate medical sociologist in the University Medical Center and associate professor of sociology. He was formerly on the staff of the Upstate Medical Center in Syracuse, New York. In Mississippi State University, at the invitation of the Department of Sociology and Rural Life, a review panel visited in October to discuss and make recommendations about the research program. In Ohio State University, Robert M. Dimit, associate professor, has been promoted to the position of extension leader in research. He replaces Harold R. Capener, who is in India for two years as part of the Ohio State-India team. Dimit has recently completed a study of membership relations in the Ohio Farm Bureau Federation.

The article presents several news and announcements related to rural sociology that appeared in the 1945 issue of the journal "Rural Sociology." At the University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona, courses in Rural Sociology and Agrarian Movements taught by E.D. Tetreau, Professor of Rural Sociology have continued to be given through the years of the war with well-sustained enrollments. Service to institutions and agencies in Arizona has been considerably increased during the years since 1942. This includes membership on the Arizona War Food Administration Wage Board. At the Cornell University a bulletin by William M. Smith, formerly an extension instructor in the Department of Rural Sociology and now operating a farm in Norwalk, Ohio, has recently been issued. It is entitled "The Social Participation of Rural Young Married Couples." At the request of the War Department, Dr. Charles P. Loomis has been granted a four months leave of absence from his position as Head of the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at the Michigan State College, in order to carry out a special assignment in Europe.

For a searchable version of these abstracts, please visit www.acrabstracts.org. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on student's evaluation of instruction in rural sociology. It is based on questionnaire data obtained from a sample of 200 undergraduated in rural sociology classes in public and private colleges and universities from each of the major regions of the U.S. Questions answered by the students relate to reasons for taking a rural sociology course, how the course was conducted, how it should be conducted, and how students rate the course. All students report the use of examinations, although two-thirds of the students report having a maximum of two examinations per term. Forty per cent report the use of guest instructors or lecturers up to once a month. Other techniques in the order of frequency with which reported are field work or field trips, visual aids, panels, forums or debates, radio or television broadcasts, recordings, and laboratory work. In the students' opinion, a considerably better distribution in use of class time could be achieved. Almost one-half of the students prefer less time for lectures, approximately one-half favor more discussion, more than one-half favor greater use of field trips, visual aids, and panel discussions.

The article describes methods and statistical techniques used in constructing an index of "religious group action," one phase of a study of rural churches conducted by the Department of Rural Sociology, University of Missouri. In addition to studying the rural church in relation to these specific functions, there was a desire to compare churches as total functioning units and to test a number of traditional hypotheses concerning the relationship of environmental variables and the functioning of churches. A review of the literature disclosed that, since 1900, numerous efforts had been made to evaluate statistically the functioning of rural churches. Since most of these studies had used single-variable measures, it was hoped that such a measure might be found to serve the present research need. However, there was little agreement among the various studies as to what a given single-factor index measures. Factor analysis was chosen as the technique to be used, because it had been successfully used in constructing the Hagood Level-of-Living Index and because of properties of the first common factor, which this technique identifies. The development of the index made it possible to test the relationship of church functioning to such environmental variables as level-of-living of the township, soil type, farm tenancy rates and population growth or decline.

The article presents information on a study related to the growth in the educational structure that created complex educational systems which require effective management in the United States. The authors state that there has been an expansion of education at all levels from pre-kindergarten through post-graduate and continuing education. They explain that this growth in the educational structure has created complex educational systems which need effective management. The article says that the essential results of this study are a simplified simulation model relating to university operational costs and some conclusions and reflections about the nature and behavior of university costs.

The article discusses the activities of student affiliates of the American Finance Association, from 1960-1961. Some of the universities featured in the article include Marquette University, University of Florida, Indiana University, University of Houston, Rutgers, the State University, Fordham University, University of Kansas, University of Notre Dame, the University of Chicago, University of Minnesota, University of Connecticut. The article also announces some of the affiliates to be added to the American Finance Association.

We use a regression discontinuity design to study how academic probation affects outcomes and course‐taking behaviors at a large public university in the United States. Consistent with past work, students placed on probation improve their grade point average (GPA) in the subsequent semester. We document that part of this GPA improvement is attributable to strategic course‐taking, and there is significant heterogeneity in these behaviors across race. Non‐minority students placed on probation attempt fewer credits, easier courses, and are more likely to withdraw from courses in the following term. In contrast, underrepresented minorities exhibit few of these behaviors, consistent with past work that suggests black and Hispanic students are less likely to possess helpful institutional knowledge and use available support systems such as academic counseling. (JEL I20, I23) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: First‐generation college students (FGCS) often have different cultural values, practices, and goals from those of students from college‐going families. As they navigate college, FGCS coordinate these values, practices, and goals with those of their families, noncollege‐going friends, and communities. We draw on longitudinal and cross‐sectional studies of FGCS attending a public university in California to address three research questions: (1) What challenges do FGCS face in their transition to and through college?; (2) What resources do they use to surmount these challenges?; and (3) What is the association between FGCS’ resources and challenges and their academic persistence and career goals? Results showed that FGCS who surmounted challenges and persisted toward graduation had emotional support from family and friends from home; developed supportive relationships with university peers, staff, and faculty; and believed that college would allow them to attain their future life and career goals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Key pointsU.S. university OA policies are far less mandatory than those in the U.K.The waiver clauses in U.S. university policies make it easy for authors to decline making their articles OA.The relative autonomy – and competitiveness – of U.S. universities may be the reason for weaker OA policies.OA in the U.S. is likely to be driven by government funding agency policies rather than by academia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Discusses matters related to collegiate science and mathematics learning and instruction in the U.S. as of October 2004. Reasons for the lack of national standards for mathematics and science instruction; Overview of the calculus curriculum development projects funded by the National Science Foundation; Importance of the interplay between science and mathematics education at the K-12 and college levels.

The article presents news briefs in the U.S. The American Society for Cybernetics together with the Wharton School and the College of Engineering and Applied Science of the University of Pennsylvania will be the sponsors of a 3-day conference on Communication and Control in Social Processes to be held at the University of Pennsylvania from October 30 through November 2, 1974. Instructions for the submission of papers for the conference are given.

This article focuses on public administration of universities in the U.S. It is difficult to trace the origins of the administrative process in American higher education. The early university was staffed by a few professors, many of whom could teach the entire curriculum. The modem university is a complex organization of great diversity and intense specialization. It is difficult to trace the origins of the administrative process in American higher education. Indeed, there does not appear to have been a systematic evolution. A broadening and deepening of the administrative process in the university seems rather to have been the result of a series of pragmatic responses to felt needs. Casual administrative style is still the norm on campus, but increasingly circumstances are requiring the institutionalization of process. From uncertain beginnings, administration of the American university has become one of the great challenges of our times. While that challenge may be matched by frustration and overshadowed by turbulence, few would argue its critical importance.

Many feel that faculty members of the same gender may serve as role models, helping students to perform better in classes and encouraging them to continue in a subject. However, while higher education research has found evidence of positive effects of matching on gender, there are also many findings of zero impact. The main hurdle in this literature is identifying the exogenous impact in the absence of student sorting by gender. This article addresses this difficulty by using institutional data from a private liberal arts institution to examine outcomes for students in courses taught by new faculty members for which the students would not know the gender before registering. Results provide evidence of a role model effect for both genders; students earn higher grades in courses taught by same-gender instructors in fields traditionally dominated by the opposite gender. Major choice and course-taking behavior are mostly unaffected by faculty gender. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article explores the forces and changes experienced by Americans in academia, government, the private sector, and non-government organizations (NGOs) to the concepts of quality and quality of agricultural and applied economics. It discusses the connections in identifying issues that professors and the Agricultural and Applied Economics Association face in certifying the quality of work. The key attributes of teaching quality and quantity for quality certification are also outlined.

The novel contribution of this research is the examination of the gift-giving patterns of alumni business executives of a large urban public university. Our results reinforce the earlier findings that male alumni in Greek social organizations gave more to their alma mater. New insights unique to this study are that alumni with the higher-order executive job titles are more charitable. Further, the number of known other gift-giving alumni and friends seems to positively impact giving. The national athletic championship wins are also significant positive drivers of alumni giving in the championship year, as well as in the succeeding nonchampionship year. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The knowledge production process of thirty universities that participated in nanobiotechnology research during 1990–2005 is estimated by a stochastic directional technology distance function. Knowledge outputs include journal articles, patents, and Ph.D students. The dual elasticity of transformation between knowledge outputs is estimated. An increase in patents reduces the revenue shares of publications and Ph.D students for a majority of the thirty universities. Aggregate university inefficiency has a U shape with a minimum in 1997. Evidence of technological regress is found which indicates that the increased production of patents, publications, and Ph.D students is due to bigger research budgets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the effects of intellectual property (IP) rights on technological and scientific solutions made by academic scholars. It discusses the main empirical findings of several research works on the subject and enumerates the advantages and disadvantages of academic patenting. It also examines the contribution of universities in the U.S. to the innovation activity of other countries.