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Stated Goals (stated + goal)
Selected AbstractsAutomated Test Assembly for Cognitive Diagnosis Models Using a Genetic AlgorithmJOURNAL OF EDUCATIONAL MEASUREMENT, Issue 3 2009Matthew Finkelman Much recent psychometric literature has focused on cognitive diagnosis models (CDMs), a promising class of instruments used to measure the strengths and weaknesses of examinees. This article introduces a genetic algorithm to perform automated test assembly alongside CDMs. The algorithm is flexible in that it can be applied whether the goal is to minimize the average number of classification errors, minimize the maximum error rate across all attributes being measured, hit a target set of error rates, or optimize any other prescribed objective function. Under multiple simulation conditions, the algorithm compared favorably with a standard method of automated test assembly, successfully finding solutions that were appropriate for each stated goal. [source] Targeted health insurance in a low income country and its impact on access and equity in access: Egypt's school health insuranceHEALTH ECONOMICS, Issue 3 2001Winnie Yip Abstract Governments are constantly faced with competing demands for public funds, thereby necessitating careful use of scarce resources. In Egypt, the School Health Insurance Programme (SHIP) is a government subsidized health insurance system that targets school children. The primary goals of the SHIP include improving access and equity in access to health care for children while, at the same time, ensuring programme sustainability. Using the Egyptian Household Health Utilization and Expenditure Survey (1995), this paper empirically assesses the extent to which the SHIP achieves its stated goals. Our findings show that the SHIP significantly improved access by increasing visit rates and reducing financial burden of use (out-of-pocket expenditures). With regard to the success of targeting the poor, conditional upon being covered, the SHIP reduced the differentials in visit rates between the highest and lowest income children. However, only the middle-income children benefitted from reduced financial burden (within group equity). Moreover, by targeting the children through school enrollment, the SHIP increased the differentials in the average level of access between school-going children and those not attending school (overall equity). Children not attending school tend to be poor and living in rural areas. Our results also indicate that original calculations may underestimate the SHIP financial outlays, thereby threatening the long run financial sustainability of the programme. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] New Patterns of Youth Transition in EducationINTERNATIONAL SOCIAL SCIENCE JOURNAL, Issue 164 2000Johanna Wyn Current research provides evidence that new relationships are being forged between youth people and education. Increased participation in post-compulsory education, combinations of work and study and uncertain career outcomes havebecome common experiences. There is an emerging disparity between the stated goals of education and the changing priorities and choices of young people. In particular, the linear notion of transitions, expressed in the metaphorsof pathways used in policy documents, is increasingly at odds with the patterns of life experienced by young people in many nations. Three themes stand out in the research on young people in the 1990s. First, an awareness of foreclosed options in educational outcomes is a consistent thread across a range of studies. Secondly, there is a discernible shift by the end of the 1990s toward more complex life-patterns and a blending or balancing of a range of personal priorities and interests. Thirdly, the need to give ,active voice' to young people about the dramatic social and economic changes they have been subjected to, is unmistakable in the light of the increasing disparity between the rhetoric of youth and education policy and their own experience of its out-comes. [source] An attachment theory perspective on the proposed matrix modelJOURNAL OF CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGY, Issue 9 2005Hal S. ShoreyArticle first published online: 17 JUN 200 The matrix model (C.R. Snyder & T.R. Elliott, this issue) advocates an increased grounding of clinical psychology graduate students in theory. The matrix model is theory-based in the ways that it advances this goal. Accordingly, evaluating the matrix model from an extant theoretical perspective should shed light on its applicability and utility as an educational framework. The present attachment theory perspective on the matrix model demonstrates that it meets its stated goals in that it possesses adequate (a) breadth in incorporating theory from across subdisciplines in psychology, and (b) depth in how it facilitates conceptualizing clients and research participants at the intrapersonal, interpersonal, and societal levels. The benefits for incorporating the matrix model in clinical psychology graduate programs are discussed. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Clin Psychol. [source] Tacit Knowledge and Public AccountsJOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHY OF EDUCATION, Issue 3 2003Stella González Arnal The current quality assurance culture demands the explicit articulation, by means of publication, of what have been hitherto tacit norms and conventions underlying disciplinary genres. The justification is that publication aids student performance and guarantees transparency and accountability. This requirement makes a number of questionable assumptions predicated upon what we will argue is an erroneous epistemology. It is not always possible to articulate in a publishable form a detailed description of disciplinary practices such as assessment. As a result publication cannot achieve its stated goals. There are always elements of our knowledge that cannot be linguistically articulated. [source] MELD,Moving steadily towards equality, equity, and fairnessLIVER TRANSPLANTATION, Issue 5 2005James Neuberger Background and aims: A consensus has been reached that liver donor allocation should be based primarily on liver disease severity and that waiting time should not be a major determining factor. Our aim was to assess the capability of the Model for End-Stage Liver Disease (MELD) score to correctly rank potential liver recipients according to their severity of liver disease and mortality risk on the OPTN liver waiting list. Methods: The MELD model predicts liver disease severity based on serum creatinine, serum total bilirubin, and INR and has been shown to be useful in predicting mortality in patients with compensated and decompensated cirrhosis. In this study, we prospectively applied the MELD score to estimate 3-month mortality to 3437 adult liver transplant candidates with chronic liver disease who were added to the OPTN waiting list at 2A or 2B status between November, 1999, and December, 2001. Results: In this study cohort with chronic liver disease, 412 (12%) died during the 3-month follow-up period. Waiting list mortality increased directly in proportion to the listing MELD score. Patients having a MELD score <9 experienced a 1.9% mortality, whereas patients having a MELD score > or =40 had a mortality rate of 71.3%. Using the c-statistic with 3-month mortality as the end point, the area under the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve for the MELD score was 0.83 compared with 0.76 for the Child-Turcotte-Pugh (CTP) score (P < 0.001). Conclusions: These data suggest that the MELD score is able to accurately predict 3-month mortality among patients with chronic liver disease on the liver waiting list and can be applied for allocation of donor livers.(Gastroenterology 2003;124:91,96.) Context: The Model for Endstage Liver Disease (MELD) score serves as the basis for the distribution of deceased-donor (DD) livers and was developed in response to "the final rule" mandate, whose stated principle is to allocate livers according to a patient's medical need, with less emphasis on keeping organs in the local procurement area. However, in selected areas of the United States, organs are kept in organ procurement organizations (OPOs) with small waiting lists and transplanted into less-sick patients instead of being allocated to sicker patients in nearby transplant centers in OPOs with large waiting lists. Objective: To determine whether there is a difference in MELD scores for liver transplant recipients receiving transplants in small vs large OPOs. Design and setting: Retrospective review of the US Scientific Registry of Transplant Recipients between February 28, 2002, and March 31, 2003. Transplant recipients (N = 4798) had end-stage liver disease and received DD livers. Main outcome measures: MELD score distribution (range, 6,40), graft survival, and patient survival for liver transplant recipients in small (<100) and large (> or =100 on the waiting list) OPOs. RESULTS: The distribution of MELD scores was the same in large and small OPOs; 92% had a MELD score of 18 or less, 7% had a MELD score between 19 and 24, and only 2% of listed patients had a MELD score higher than 24 (P = .85). The proportion of patients receiving transplants in small OPOs and with a MELD score higher than 24 was significantly lower than that in large OPOs (19% vs 49%; P<.001). Patient survival rates at 1 year after transplantation for small OPOs (86.4%) and large OPOs (86.6%) were not statistically different (P = .59), and neither were graft survival rates in small OPOs (80.1%) and large OPOs (81.3%) (P = .80). Conclusions: There is a significant disparity in MELD scores in liver transplant recipients in small vs large OPOs; fewer transplant recipients in small OPOs have severe liver disease (MELD score >24). This disparity does not reflect the stated goals of the current allocation policy, which is to distribute livers according to a patient's medical need, with less emphasis on keeping organs in the local procurement area. (JAMA 2004;291:1871,1874.) [source] Articulatory Phonetics in the First-Year Spanish ClassroomMODERN LANGUAGE JOURNAL, Issue 3 2000Deborah L. Arteaga focus of this article is twofold: I reconsider the general question of the role of articulatory phonetics in the second language (L2) classroom and review the phonetics presentation in 10 recent first-year Spanish texts. Pronunciation has been accorded little importance within recent methodological approaches, although their stated goals of communication and intelligibility in fact require the incorporation of explicit phonetics instruction in the language classroom. Considering the first-year Spanish L2 classroom, I propose a phonetics program based on the notion of a learner's dialect (cf. Bergen, 1974). I then measure the phonetics presentation of 10 Spanish textbooks against a learner's dialect, and find that pronunciation sections are in most cases incomplete and inaccurate and provide for no self-monitoring or recycling. This article argues against the current trend reflected in these texts, which relegates pronunciation to the laboratory manual or eliminates it altogether. [source] Jump-Starting Collaboration: The ABCD Initiative and the Provision of Child Development Services through Medicaid and CollaboratorsPUBLIC ADMINISTRATION REVIEW, Issue 3 2008Carolyn Berry Many policy problems require governmental leaders to forge vast networks beyond their own hierarchical institutions. This essay explores the challenges of implementation in a networked institutional setting and incentives to induce coordination between agencies and promote quality implementation. It describes the national evaluation of the Assuring Better Child Health and Development program, a state-based program intended to increase and enhance the delivery of child development services for low-income children through the health care sector, using Medicaid as its primary vehicle. Using qualitative evaluation methods, the authors found that all states implemented programs that addressed their stated goals and made changes in Medicaid policies, regulations, or reimbursement mechanisms. The program catalyzed interagency cooperation and coordination. The authors conclude that even a modest level of external support and technical assistance can stimulate significant programmatic change and interorganizational linkages within public agencies to enhance provision of child development services. [source] | ||||||||||||||||