Popularized by social media, new classroom arrangements are all the rage in K-12. But experts and educators caution there is more to it than just moving desks around.

Teacher Christina Torres wanted to create an in-class, curricular space for her students to build in-depth relationships with books. And she thought that if she let them choose what they read, they might value literature more.

The appeals court put the brakes on a predominantly white community's racially tinged efforts to secede from a larger school system.

With more than 40 million unique visitors a year, GreatSchools.org is a wildly popular source of information on K-12 schools. Though the site has added more factors and nuance to how it rates schools, researchers argue that it’s exacerbating already existing patterns of segregation.

The parents of a 16-year-old who died last fall from football-related brain trauma are suing the New York school districts he played for and the medical responders who tended to him the night he sustained his fatal injury.

Croatia's Zagreb head into the final group game knowing that victory will secure a place in the UEFA Regions' Cup final after they replaced Istanbul at the top of Group A.

Theatre

The Importance of Being Earnest

Theatre

Neil Cooper

Neil Cooper

The Metamorphosis

A private equity company plans to acquire Renaissance Learning for $1.1 billion in a deal that will be one of the largest acquisitions ever in educational technology.

Rep. Luke Messer, R-Ind., has introduced legislation to allow money in 529 savings plans to be used for home-schooling expenses, a proposal that was stripped out of a late version of the recent tax-code overhaul.

AMID the terrible personal losses and hardships provoked by the coronavirus crisis, and its huge impact on the global economy and the lives and welfare of even those not directly touched by the disease, there are some small consolations.

The more popular the stream, the worse it looks. There is a technology out there that would work, but its association with piracy has companies afraid of using it.

A group of testing experts says that opt-out could jeopardize the ability to target educational resources appropriately.

Teachers unleash a flood of creative responses to one of the Most Persistent Teaching Questions of All Time: How do you get ever-chatty middle schoolers to quiet down and pay attention?

By John-Paul Holden

The hiring pool improved for schools when the recession squeezed teachers, study finds.

The current standard of care includes informing women about prenatal testing and newborn screening for cystic fibrosis and providing genetic counseling to parents whose child is referred for sweat-testing. Despite counseling, early data identified some persistent confusion about residual risk.

Prenatal discussions about carrier testing and newborn screening for cystic fibrosis are not routine. Parental anxiety about abnormal results from a screen is decreased after speaking to a genetic counselor when scheduling the sweat test. Despite counseling, residual risk continues to be poorly understood. (Read the full article)

Although gastroenteritis guidelines describe the need to perform oral rehydration, it remains underused, resulting in excessive use of intravenous rehydration. Other interventions, such as antiemetic administration, vary according to location, often resulting in differences in cost and outcomes.

In this nationwide cohort, intravenous rehydration use varied dramatically. Use was associated with the institution providing care and an increase in the need for future health care provider visits. Use of ondansetron also varied significantly across Canada. (Read the full article)

For treatment of obesity in preadolescent children, approaches that focus on parents taking sole responsibility for implementing weight-management strategies may be most effective. However, the optimal content, intensity, and duration of programs for obese children remain unclear.

Targeting parents only, a 10% relative weight loss is achievable in moderately obese preadolescent children and can be maintained 2 years from baseline, which justifies an investment in treatment as a secondary obesity-prevention strategy. (Read the full article)

Two UK models predict the risk of mortality in very preterm Western infants (1) alive at onset of labor and (2) admitted for neonatal intensive care. Prognostic models need temporal and geographic validation to evaluate their performance.

The 2 models showed very good performance in a recent large cohort of very preterm infants born in another Western country. The accurate performance of both models suggests application in clinical practice (Read the full article)

Very low birth weight (VLBW) male neonates appear to have increased mortality. VLBW female neonates appear to have better long-term outcomes.

VLBW male neonates have increased mortality and poorer neurological outcome. This gender difference appears to disappear at weeks' gestation. (Read the full article)

Eating disorders are characterized by preoccupation with weight and shape, which is manifested by a refusal to maintain a normal weight. An exact determination of expected body weight (EBW) is critical for diagnosis and clinical management of these disorders.

The McLaren and Moore methods present with several limitations when calculating EBW for adolescents with eating disorders. A commonly agreed upon method for EBW calculation such as the BMI percentile method is recommended for clinical and research purposes. (Read the full article)

Preterm infants are exposed to inadequately managed painful procedures during their NICU stay, which can lead to altered pain responses. Nonpharmacologic approaches are established for the treatment of single painful procedures, but evidence for their effectiveness across time is lacking.

Oral sucrose with or without the added technique of facilitated tucking has a pain-relieving effect even in extremely premature infants undergoing repeated pain exposures; facilitated tucking alone seems to be less effective for repeated pain exposures over time. (Read the full article)

The effectiveness of intravenous immunoglobulin treatment of patients with Kawasaki disease within 9 days of illness has been established. However, the effectiveness of such treatment ≥10 days after illness onset has not yet been clarified.

Intravenous immunoglobulin treatment ≥10 days after illness onset was observed to be effective for achieving inflammation resolution. Patients who are strongly suspected to have Kawasaki disease and demonstrate ongoing inflammation should therefore be treated as soon as possible. (Read the full article)

Over the past decade, drug oversight committees and professional organizations have debated the evidence regarding cardiac screening to identify undiagnosed disorders associated with sudden cardiac death in youth with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder before beginning treatment with stimulants.

How practicing pediatricians have responded to this controversy is not known. We present results from a national sample of pediatricians regarding current attitudes, barriers, and practices for cardiac screening in youth with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder before prescribing stimulants. (Read the full article)

Studies of the association between process and outcome measures of the quality of acute asthma care for children have been mixed. These studies are limited by small, single-institution settings or by examining the association at the aggregate level.

This first multicenter analysis of the process-outcome association in acute asthma care for children revealed no association. Because the validity of process measures depends on association with outcomes, further study is needed before implementing existing process measures as performance metrics. (Read the full article)

Booster seat use improves seat belt fit and reduces risk of injury for children <57 in tall. Booster seat use decreases between ages 4 and 8 years. Children observed riding with other children frequently do not use booster seats.

In this national survey of parents, we found that a majority of parents of 4- to 8-year-old children carpool, and when they carpool booster seat use is inconsistent. Social norms and self-efficacy appear to influence booster seat use when carpooling. (Read the full article)

Although China has the largest birth population in the world and a number of multicenter studies of neonatal respiratory failure are reported, there is a paucity of data regarding outcome measurement of very premature neonates requiring respiratory care and surfactant therapy.

This study is the largest survey, to date, in a Chinese network of 55 NICUs that presents the incidence, morbidity, and mortality rates, with risk factors of neonatal respiratory failure, with special emphasis on surfactant-treated very immature infants. (Read the full article)

Atherosclerotic cardiovascular diseases have roots in childhood. Modification of dietary fat intake influences serum lipid and lipoprotein concentrations. Reduction of saturated fat intake is recommended to promote cardiovascular health.

Dietary counseling had a beneficial effect on saturated fat intake from ages 7 months to 19 years. The counseling reduced serum low-density lipoprotein cholesterol concentrations in both genders. It also decreased computationally estimated concentrations of intermediate-density lipoprotein cholesterol, very low-density lipoprotein–triglycerides and apolipoprotein B in boys. (Read the full article)

There is evidence of an impaired respiratory regulation in SIDS, in which serotonergic and noradrenergic neurons are involved. Monoamine oxidase A is the enzyme that degrades both neurotransmitters, and genetic variation of this gene might contribute to SIDS.

Alleles with weak effect on the monoamine oxidase A gene activity (*2/*3) appear to be associated with sudden infant death syndrome in boys. This association is strongest in infants who died at the age with the highest SIDS prevalence. (Read the full article)

Sleep-disordered breathing is associated with neurobehavioral morbidity in children. Prior related research has generally been cross-sectional or short (ie, 1–2 years) follow-up studies of a single symptom (ie, snoring, obstructive sleep apnea, mouth breathing), with limited control for confounders.

Sleep-disordered breathing was assessed as a trajectory of combined symptoms from 6 months to 69 months, in more than 11 000 children. Sleep-disordered breathing was associated with 40% and 60% more behavioral difficulties at 4 and 7 years, respectively. (Read the full article)

Previous studies have identified barriers to providing optimal pediatric palliative care, including general communication issues between clinicians and family members. However, there is a paucity of data regarding the barriers specifically relating to advance care discussions.

This study identifies significant barriers to advance care discussions for children with life-threatening conditions. Clinicians perceive parental issues as the most common impediments to these discussions. Furthermore, providers believe that advance care discussions happen too late in the course of illness. (Read the full article)

Stairs are a common source of injury to children. Most injuries are minor soft tissue injuries, with the head and neck region being injured most commonly.

This is the first nationally representative study of stair-related injuries to young children in the United States. A child aged <5 years is treated in a US emergency department, on average, every 6 minutes for a stair-related injury. (Read the full article)

The survival of extremely low birth weight infants in resource-limited situations is dismal due to limited neonatal intensive care facilities. Nasal continuous positive airway pressure resulted in an increased survival of these infants, but many still require back-up ventilation.

Nasal continuous positive airway pressure and intubation, surfactant, and extubation practiced in a neonatal high care ward with limited resources and limited back-up ventilatory facilities can improve the survival of extremely low birth weight infants. (Read the full article)

Prone sleep, bed-sharing, maternal smoking during pregnancy, and prematurity increase the risk of sudden infant death syndrome. The sudden infant death syndrome rate initially declined dramatically after the initiation of the US Back-to-Sleep campaign in 1994, but subsequently plateaued.

The risk profile has changed since the Back-to-Sleep campaign; the prevalence of simultaneous risks has remained consistent. Intrinsic and extrinsic risks provide unification into 1 underlying triple-risk model and insights into potential underlying mechanisms. (Read the full article)

Complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) use for pediatric asthma is increasing. It is well known that effective asthma management depends on patient adherence to treatment. The authors of previous cross-sectional studies have linked CAM use with decreased adherence to conventional asthma treatment regimens.

This longitudinal data set was unique, allowing us to focus on patients who initiated CAM and to follow subsequent asthma medication adherence. We found that CAM use was not associated with adherence, suggesting that patients may practice CAM alongside conventional therapies. (Read the full article)

Although several randomized trials have examined the efficacy of serotonin receptor inhibitors in the treatment of repetitive behaviors, there still remains clinical uncertainty as to whether these agents are effective in treating such behaviors in children and adults with autism spectrum disorders.

The goal of this meta-analysis was to examine randomized trials of serotonin receptor inhibitors for treating repetitive behaviors in autism spectrum disorders. Although a small but significant effect of these agents was observed, this effect is likely due to the selective publication of trial results. (Read the full article)

We lack prospective studies documenting "dosage effects" of chronic child maltreatment for both subsequent adolescent and adult outcomes. It is unknown whether effects are linear, shelving, or exponential, and we lack data across domains of outcomes.

Chronic child maltreatment reports are a robust indicator of future negative health and behavioral outcomes. There is a dose-response relationship between chronicity and outcomes in adolescence, but this is attenuated in adulthood once adverse child outcomes are controlled. (Read the full article)

Sudden cardiac death in young athletes is an uncommon but devastating event. Addition of routine electrocardiogram (ECG) screening to standard preparticipation care may reduce the number of sudden deaths. Lack of data regarding effectiveness and costs has prevented widespread implementation.

Adding ECG screening to current preparticipation evaluation is not cost-effective. Cost is driven primarily by the evaluation of the large number of false-positive findings. An ECG-only screening strategy is more cost-effective. (Read the full article)

Eating disorder not otherwise specified (EDNOS) is the most common eating disorder diagnosis. Binge eating disorder, 1 type of EDNOS, is associated with obesity among adults. Little is known about the health outcomes associated with other types of EDNOS.

This is the first study to evaluate the prospective association of full and subthreshold bulimia nervosa, binge eating disorder, purging disorder, and other EDNOSs with specific mental and physical health outcomes. (Read the full article)

3,4-Methylenedioxymetham-phetamine (MDMA, ecstasy) is a widely used recreational drug affecting the serotonergic system. Preclinical studies indicate learning/memory problems with fetal exposure. Human infant prenatal exposure was related to alterations in gender ratio and poorer motor development at 4 months.

This is the first study documenting that heavier prenatal 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine exposure predicts poorer infant mental and motor development at 12 months with significant, persistent neurotoxic effects. Language and emotional regulation were unaffected. (Read the full article)

The 2009 influenza A (H1N1) pandemic caused illness in all age groups, but children were disproportionately affected. Children with underlying neurologic disorders were at high risk of influenza-related complications, including death.

This study provides the first detailed description of underlying neurologic disorders among children who died of influenza A (H1N1)pdm09 virus infection. (Read the full article)

Pediatric obesity is a prevalent public health issue that is associated with medical and physical consequences. Clinic-based interventions for pediatric obesity are effective, but they have limited reach and are costly.

This is the first examination of an empirically informed, scalable treatment of pediatric overweight and obesity delivered in YMCAs. The results indicate that a scalable, community-based pediatric obesity intervention can produce clinically meaningful changes in weight and quality of life. (Read the full article)

Several meta-analyses evaluating probiotics in preterm infants suggest a beneficial effect for the prevention of necrotizing enterocolitis and death, but less for nosocomial infection. Lactobacillus reuteri may reduce these outcomes because of its immunomodulation and bactericidal properties.

Although L reuteri did not appear to decrease the rate of death or nosocomial infection, the trends suggest a protective role consistent with the literature. Feeding intolerance and duration of hospitalization were significantly decreased in premature infants ≤1500 g. (Read the full article)

Social and environmental risks related to substandard housing contribute to adverse health outcomes. Partnerships between the health care and legal systems can help families address such risks and help clinicians understand the legal context of health.

A medical-legal partnership colocated in a pediatric primary care setting identified and treated a large cluster of poor quality, substandard housing. Housing improvements were possible because of strong collaboration between clinicians, attorneys, community partners, and families. (Read the full article)