Penn State Mont Alto recognizes and honors winners during awards ceremony

We look at a coaching system which has produced a long line of talent.

We investigate what makes the Dutch club's youth system so special.

A new youth academy in Ta' Qali for the island's outstanding talents has sharpened the focus of the Malta Football Association as it envisions a bright future for the game.

Fed up with their district’s unmet pledges to stop steering African American students into low-level classes, parents take action.

Although many children are treated in general emergency departments, many such facilities have limited pediatric capabilities. Transfer to academic centers improves outcomes for critically ill patients, but transfers of noncritically ill children have not been well studied.

Although more than half of these patients are seriously ill, many transferred patients are discharged directly from the emergency department or are admitted for less than 24 hours. Orthopedic problems, gastrointestinal conditions, and traumatic head injury are the most common complaints. (Read the full article)

Late preterm infants are at risk for a variety of developmental impairments; however, little is known about developmental differences among children born within the term range of 37 to 41 weeks’ gestation.

This study links comprehensive birth record data from 128 050 term births to children’s school records 8 years later. Analyses establish that, even among the "normal term" range, gestational age is an important independent predictor of academic achievement. (Read the full article)

The impact of relative age at school entry on academic progress and the risk of being diagnosed with ADHD remains controversial. Stimulants are widely used as a therapeutic option for ADHD in the United States and increasingly in Europe.

Relative age among classmates affects academic performance among boys and girls into puberty, as well as children’s risk of being prescribed stimulants for ADHD. This should be taken into account when evaluating children’s performance and behavior in school to prevent unnecessary stimulant prescribing. (Read the full article)

In the only previous cross-sectional study, the quality of pediatric guidelines was rated low on the AGREE-II (Appraisal of Guidelines for Research and Evaluation II) scale. The levels of evidence used in pediatric clinical practice guidelines have never been described.

American Academy of Pediatrics guidelines score low on the AGREE-II scale. Approximately one-quarter of recommendations are based on expert opinion or no reference. These findings support the adoption of standards for guideline development and research targeted toward unsupported recommendations. (Read the full article)

Extreme prematurity is a well-established cause of cognitive and motor impairment. There is some evidence that late prematurity and modifiable maternal attributes may negatively influence scholastic achievement, including standardized test performance.

We found that preterm birth significantly increases risk of first-grade failure rate even when the birth is just a few weeks before term gestation. Low maternal education status compounds the effect of prematurity. (Read the full article)

At least half of the achievement gap for low-income, minority children is present at kindergarten entry; however, there are no population-level early childhood interventions that effectively engage and support families and teachers to ameliorate the impact of adversity on achievement.

This study evaluated ParentCorps, a family-centered, school-based intervention to promote self-regulation and learning for all children entering school in disadvantaged, urban neighborhoods. ParentCorps results in higher kindergarten achievement among low-income, minority children. (Read the full article)

Previous studies that reported learning deficits among children with oral clefts mostly used small, clinic-based samples prone to ascertainment bias. No previous studies in the United States have used a population-based sample and direct testing of academic achievement.

Using a large population-based sample from the United States and standardized school tests for achievement, we found that children with oral clefts scored significantly lower than their classmates on all evaluated domains of achievement and had higher rates of learning disability. (Read the full article)

There is extensive literature documenting that children experiencing foster care placement have myriad adverse developmental outcomes, including poor academic achievement. However, such children face a host of other risk factors that may jeopardize healthy development independent of foster care placement.

Using statewide administrative data from Wisconsin, we observed children before, during, and after foster care placement and compared their educational outcomes with those of the general population, as well as with children more similar in terms of unobserved characteristics. (Read the full article)

It is unclear whether developmental delays observed among infants with single-suture craniosynostosis (SSC) persist at school age. Few neurodevelopmental studies have examined children with SSC beyond age 3, with most having methodological limitations.

This study is the first to follow and test infants with SSC and a control group at school age. Infancy delays among children with SSC persisted at school age in some areas (IQ, math) but not others (reading, spelling). (Read the full article)

Concussion produces a range of symptoms that may impede academic functioning. The need for empirical validation exists, despite growing consensus on the importance of a guided return-to-school process for students recovering from concussion.

This study provides initial evidence of a concussion’s adverse effects on academic learning and performance across all grades, including heightened levels of school-related concern and amplified postinjury academic difficulties experienced by symptomatic students relative to their recovered peers. (Read the full article)

Academic gender gaps in reading and math follow different paths as American students move from their school years into adulthood, according to new federal data.

Valor Collegiate Academies has been in the top 5 percent of Tennessee schools on growth and achievement every year since it started in 2014. But Tom visited Valor because of the well-regarded Valor Compass, a holistic human-development program.

An unusual program in Cincinnati provides academic coaches to help high school players meet eligibility requirements to stay in the game.

The Student Engagement Network's Faculty Academy funds projects developed by Penn State faculty that result in transformative experiences that complement student engagement.

Forty-nine Penn State Berks students received recognition for the University Scholastic awards on April 2, through personalized emails. The awards presented included the Evan Pugh Scholars Award,

Penn State Brandywine has recognized students who have earned academic honors. Their accomplishments were celebrated through a virtual academic recognition website, which included a video message of congratulations from Chancellor Marilyn J. Wells. Due to the coronavirus pandemic, the annual ceremony that is usually held on campus was held in a virtual format.

Michael Mann, distinguished professor of atmospheric sciences and director of Penn State's Earth System Science Center at Penn State, has been elected to the National Academy of Sciences, recognizing distinguished and continuing achievements in original research. Membership in the NAS is one of the highest honors given to a scientist or engineer in the United States.

Penn State New Kensington student-athletes from seven varsity sports teams were recognized virtually for academic and athletic performance during the 2019-20 academic year.

Penn State Wilkes-Barre held its 31st annual Celebration of Academic Excellence event on April 30. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, this year’s ceremony was held in a virtual format.

A research-practice partnership examines how urban after-school programs can support positive youth development.

The Delaware State Housing Authority (DSHA) honored students in the DSHA housing community for achieving academic excellence by making the honor roll and having perfect attendance, with a luncheon and awards ceremony at Polytech High School in Woodside, Delaware.

WOODSIDE — The Delaware State Housing Authority honored more than 60 students from the DSHA housing community for academic excellence on Wednesday, recognizing elementary students through high school for making the honor roll at their schools. DSHA’s annual awards ceremony, held this year at Polytech High School, has been a tradition for more than 20 […]

Three students received scholarships in industrial and mechanical engineering from the Material Handling Education Foundation for the 2020-21 academic year.

A new study found that students who received teacher home visits did better on state tests and had better attendance records than students whose homes were not visited.

Partnering with parents can help students of any age who have trouble with social or mental health issues. But the devil is in the details, finds an analysis of more than 100 studies.

Improvements slated to begin in the spring of 2018.

All the state universities in West Bengal will implement the academic calendar in their respective institutions within a month after the lockdown is lifted, Education Minister Partha Chatterjee said...

AcSIR-Act-2011 - The Academy of Scientific and Innovative Research Act, 2011

NEW CASTLE (Oct. 15, 2018) – Department of Health and Social Services (DHSS) Secretary Dr. Kara Odom Walker, a board-certified family physician, has been elected as a member of the prestigious National Academy of Medicine (NAM), Academy President Victor Dzau announced today during the organization’s annual meeting in Washington. Secretary Walker is one of 75 […]

A statement from Governor Carney on Delaware Schools: “We made the difficult decision today – in consultation with superintendents across our state – to close schools through the rest of the academic year. I know this will be difficult for a lot of Delawareans, and Delaware students. Nothing replaces in-person instruction, and the services that […]

Secretary of Education Susan Bunting congratulates 91 public school students from the Class of 2020 for being named Secretary of Education Scholars.

Cyber security firm Cyble has revealed that the database of education technology firm Unacademy has been breached and details of various account holders, including those registered with corporate e-mail accounts, are on sale in the dark web.

Whether it is Bill Gates and Steve Jobs for the baby boomers, or Mark Zuckerberg and Jack Dorsey for the millennials, the narrative of people starting from a garage to controlling the world has been compelling.

Edtech players can supplement brick-and-mortar companies, but it’s difficult to replace them as students from classes 8th to 12th are young enough to be self-motivated to study themselves.

The COVID-19 lockdown, came with a different set of concerns for class 12 students, whose board exams were postponed midway following the outbreak of coronavirus, putting on hold their future plans as well.

Let’s face it – the EDA industry needs new people and new ideas. One of the best places to find both is academia, and a presentation at the Cadence Theater at the recent Design Automation Conference (DAC 2015) described collaboration models that are working today.

The presentation was titled “Industry/Academia Engagement Models – From PhD Contests to R&D Collaborations.” It included these speakers, shown from left to right in the photo below:

• Prof. Xin Li, Electrical and Computer Engineering, Carnegie-Mellon University (CMU)
• Chuck Alpert, Senior Software Architect, Cadence
• Prof. Laleh Behjat, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Calgary

Alpert, who was filling in for Zhuo Li, Software Architect at Cadence, was the vice chair of DAC 2015 and will be the general chair of DAC 2016 in Austin, Texas. “My team at Cadence really likes to collaborate with universities,” he said. “We’re a big proponent of education because we really need the best and brightest students in our industry.”

Contests Boost EDA Research

One way that Cadence collaborates with academia is participation in contests. “It’s a great way to formulate problems to academia,” Alpert said. “We can have the universities work on these problems and get some strategic direction.”

For example, Cadence has been involved with the annual CAD contest at the International Conference on Computer-Aided Design (ICCAD) since the contest was launched in 2012. This is the largest worldwide EDA R&D contest, and it is sponsored by the IEEE Council on EDA (CEDA) and the Taiwan Ministry of Education. Its goals are to boost EDA research in advanced real-world problems and to foster industry-academia collaboration.

Contestants can participate in one of more problems in the three areas of system design, logic synthesis and verification, and physical design. The 2015 contest has attracted 112 teams from 12 regions. Cadence contributes one problem per year in the logic synthesis area. Zhuo Li was the 2012 co-chair and the 2013 chair. The awards will be given at ICCAD in November 2015.

Another step that Cadence has taken, Alpert said, is to “hire lots of interns.” His own team has four interns at the moment. One advantage to interning at Cadence, he said, is that students get to see real-world designs and understand how the tools work. “It helps you drive your research in a more practical and useful direction,” he said.

The Cadence Academic Network co-sponsors the ACM SIGDA PhD Forum at DAC, and Xin Li and Zhuo Li are on the organizing committee. This event is a poster session for PhD students to present and discuss their dissertation research with people in the EDA community. This year’s forum was “packed,” Alpert said, and it’s clear that the event needs a bigger room.

Finally, Alpert noted, Cadence researchers write and publish technical papers at DAC and other conferences, and Cadence people serve on the DAC technical program committee. “We try to be involved with the academic community on a regular basis,” Alpert said. “We want the best and the brightest people to go into EDA because there is still so much innovation that’s needed. It’s a really cool place to be.”

Research Collaboration Exposes Failure Rates

Xin Li presented an example of a successful research collaboration between CMU and Cadence. The challenge was to find a better way to estimate potential failure rates in memory. As noted in a previous blog post, PhD student Shupeng Sun met this challenge with a new statistical methodology that won a Best Poster award at the ACM SIGDA PhD Forum at DAC 2014.

The new methodology is called Scaled-Sigma Sampling (SSS). It calculates the failure rate and accounts for variability in the manufacturing process while only requiring a few hundred, or a few thousand, sample circuit blocks. Previously, millions of samples were required for an accurate validation of a new design, and each sample could take minutes or hours to simulate. It could take a few weeks or months to run one validation.

The SSS methodology requires greatly reduced simulation times. It makes it possible, Li noted, to run simulations overnight and see the results in the morning.

Li shared his secret for success in collaborations. “I want to emphasize that before the collaboration, you have to understand the goal. If you don’t have a clear goal, don’t collaborate. Once you define the goal, stick to it and make it happen.”

Contest Provides Learning Experience

Last year Laleh Behjat handed two of her new PhD students a challenge. “I told them there is an ISPD [International Symposium for Physical Design] contest on placement, and I expect you to participate and I expect you to win. Not knowing anything about placement, I don’t think they realized what I was asking them.”

The 2015 contest was called the Blockage-Aware Detailed Routing-Driven Placement Contest. Results were announced at the end of March at ISPD. And the University of Calgary team, despite its lack of placement experience, took second place.

Such contests provide a good learning tool, according to Behjat. Graduate students in EDA, she said, “have to be good programmers. They have to work in teams and be collaborative, be able to innovate, and solve the hardest problems I have seen in engineering and science. And they have to think outside the box.” A contest can bring out all these attributes, she said.

Further, Behjat noted, contest participants had access to benchmarks and to a placement tool. They didn’t have to write tools to find out if their results were good. Industry sponsors, meanwhile, got access to good students and new approaches for solving problems.

“You can see Cadence putting a big amount of time, effort and money to get students here and get them excited about doing contests,” she said. She advised students in the theater audience to “talk to people in the Cadence booth and see if you can have more ideas for collaboration.”

Richard Goering

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Last week, Siemens and Case Western Reserve University (CWRU) announced a new new academic partnership that they say will provide students with the skills needed to operate and advance the nation’s energy grid.

A not-for-profit in the US is seeking expressions of interests from organisations, including academia, for their COVID-19 Health Coalition, to help preserve the healthcare delivery system and protect US populations.

An Indian university in Mysuru, Karnataka seeks research collaborations across pharmacy, medicine, dental and life sciences. Opportunities also exist for short term training programs and fellowships abroad.

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