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This article describes an action research at an alternative high school which explores drop-out prevention strategies with first-year students. Student retention is extremely challenging for alternative schools. Because their mission is to provide a second chance to students who could not succeed in a regular setting, those schools regularly must deal with academically low-performing students, pregnant or parenting youths, or students with disciplinary problems. As numerous studies point out, these particular categories are at higher risks of dropping out of school. Bryant Adult Alternative High School in Alexandria, Virginia, has an average drop-out rate of about 60%. For a number of years, the school community has been striving to understand this problem and to find ways to fight it. In September 2007, the school faculty formed a drop-out prevention research group to gain a better insight into its drop-out rate, as well as to explore ways to reduce it. The research group decided to focus on new students because they constitute more than half of the student body at any given time. The school has an open enrollment that allows students to start the program at any time throughout the school year. Those students contribute significantly to the overall drop-out rate because one-third of them typically leave the school before the end of the school year. The research focused on three areas: (1) Collecting and analyzing statistical data of newly enrolled students, including their demographic information and academic history; (2) Analyzing new students' education values and commitment to earning a high school diploma; and (3) Mentoring as a means to promote students' success and reduce the number of students who drop out.

Reports on a survey of 321 community college faculty comparing reported job satisfaction with their perceptions of the leadership styles of their college's president. Finds high job satisfaction correlated with a "high relationship/low task" leadership style. Finds low job satisfaction among male and vocational faculty. (DMM)

Although the vast majority of minority candidates run under the Democratic label and minority voters are more supportive of the Democratic Patty, in recent years a nontrivial number of minority candidates have won Republican Party nominations in high-profile elections (i.e., governor and US Senate). In this study, we assess the level of support that white conservative voters give to minority Republican candidates. We are interested in seeing whether these voters are less supportive of the Grand Old Party (GOP) standard-bearer when the candidate is not white, since the vast majority of Republican candidates and Republican identifiers are non-Hispanic whites. Our data come from the 2006,2010, and 2012 Cooperative Congressional Election Study (CCES) surveys-election years with minority Republican nominees for governor and US Senate. Controlling for various factors, we consistently find that white conservatives are either more supportive of minority Republicans or just as likely to vote for a minority as they are a white Republican (a null result). Although we hesitate to dismiss the presence of racial prejudice in voting behavior, in the case of white conservatives our analyses suggest that the base of the GOP does not discriminate against minority nominees in high-profile contemporary general elections. At a minimum, the level of ideological polarization in American politics masks racially prejudiced voting behavior, and at a maximum, it renders it inoperable, because white conservatives view recent minority Republican nominees as at least as conservative as white GOP nominees and their level of support reflects this. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We explored health care access experiences of 32 male-to-female (MtF) and 15 female-to-male (FtM) transgender people of different ethnicities in Virginia using data from focus groups conducted in 2004. Victimization associated with social stigmatization played a dominant role in participants’ lives, manifested by discrimination; violence; and health care provider insensitivity, hostility, and ignorance of transgender health. Access to transgender-related medical services that would allow participants to pass in their chosen genders was their highest medical priority. Faced with barriers to access, hormonal self-medication was common, and silicone injections were reported by both MtF and FtM participants. Due to economic vulnerability, sex work was reported as a source of income by both MtFs and FtMs. MtFs expressed concern over confidentiality of HIV testing and additional discrimination if testing positive. FtMs expressed difficulty accessing gynecological care due to their masculine gender identities and expressions. Cultural and technical competency training for providers and implementation of local programs in transgender hormonal therapy are recommended to improve transgender health care access. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Eurytrema procyonis is reported from the pancreatic ducts of domestic cats from North Carolina and Virginia. There were extensive histopathological alterations to the pancreas, especially the pancreatic ducts. However, there was no clinical evidence of infections. The incorporation of a synanthropic host in the life history of E. procyonis allows for rapid distribution of this fluke over its potential geographical range.