Center for Economics and Personal Finance opens
Hoping to bridge the gap between what students need to know about economics and what they are being taught in school, New Mexico State University’s College of Business created the Center for Economics and Personal Finance Education (CEPFE).
The only such program in the state, CEPFE conducts workshops where high school teachers receive new ideas on how to teach economics and personal finance. Participants are given a review of economic concepts and receive a stipend and materials. The college also will supply year-round support to participants.
The College of Business received funding from the state Legislature to develop these workshops through CEPFE, which was awarded a three-year affiliation with the National Council on Economic Education in May 2005.
Benjamin N. Matta, director of CEPFE, said the program serves as a resource for high school teachers already inundated not only with daily work but also with federal requirements such as the No Child Left Behind Act.
“One way to help teachers is to advise them on how to integrate economics in areas that are being tested like math and writing,” Matta said. “This way we serve both goals – helping students prepare for the test as well as achieve economic literacy.”
For the future, CEPFE plans to include workshops for primary and middle school grades, provide literacy programs for adult populations, and partner with local financial institutions and with the economic education program of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. The center also intends to have workshops for school districts in the northern part of the state.
http://business.nmsu.edu
Rio Grande Cutthroats Tested for Whirling Disease
Researchers from NMSU are trying to protect the state’s Rio Grande cutthroat trout from deadly whirling disease.
So far, whirling disease has yet to find its way into New Mexico’s cutthroat trout populations. Fisheries experts want to keep the state from losing this native fish species.
“We don’t want cutthroats to go the way of rainbow trout, which have seen a complete collapse of some populations in the Midwest because of this disease,” said Colleen Caldwell, an NMSU-based fisheries biologist with the U.S. Geological Survey’s New Mexico Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit. “One thing we do know: Whirling disease is working its way south. That’s why it’s very important that we identify just how susceptible this native fish is.”
The disease is caused by a tiny parasite. The parasite attacks cartilage in the head and spine of young fish, causing nerve damage that kills the fish directly or causes them to spin, making them vulnerable to predators.
To find out how susceptible trout are to whirling disease, researchers exposed randomly selected 4-month-old Rio Grande cutthroat trout and rainbow trout to a range of disease concentrations. Scientists check exposed fish for visual and genetic symptoms of the disease.
http://leopold.nmsu.edu
Purifying Water
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Shuguang Deng, left, meets with graduate student, Prajwal vikram, at his desalination experiment station. The station uses solar panels to heat the water as part of desalination. |
Shuguang Deng is combining solar energy and reverse osmosis into a process called membrane distillation to remove salt from water. This process transports water vapor through a membrane, separating two liquid solutions. The membrane is hydrophobic, so water in liquid form cannot pass through. The water is heated to create water vapor, which passes through the membrane, leaving salt behind. As condensation occurs at a cooler temperature, the water reverts to liquid on the other side of the membrane.
Reverse osmosis cannot be used to treat water with high salinity because of the extreme high pressure needed to overcome osmotic pressure.
Another technology, thermal distillation, leaves impurities behind when water is boiled, but this process requires a lot of energy.
http://chemeng.nmsu.edu
Steriod usage could be bigger than realized
Anabolic steroid usage is a larger problem than the public realizes, says an NMSU exercise physiologist.
“Steroid usage is an issue in all sports and even beyond athletes. Many people take steroids to enhance their appearance,” says Joseph Berning, an assistant professor in the College of Education’s Physical Education, Recreation and Dance Department.
Berning and colleagues Kent Adams and Bryant Stamford, both with the University of Louisville, have looked at anecdotal evidence of steroid usage, which according to Berning suggests there is a widespread usage of anabolic steroids. This is a contrast to the scientific studies available that indicate usage is rare and no higher than 6 percent.
Conclusions from scientific studies suggest that anabolic steroid usage declines progressively from high school to college and beyond, but anecdotal evidence claims the opposite trend. Berning says in this clash between “hard” scientific data and “soft” anecdotal information, it is natural that professionals would gravitate toward scientifically based conclusions. But in the case of anabolic steroids, Berning and his colleagues question whether the testimony of those closest to the issue should be put aside as irrelevant.
http://education.nmsu.edu/perd/
Rare onion varieties saved
It’s enough to bring a tear to the eye. An NMSU scientist has pulled more than four dozen ancient onion varieties back from the brink of extinction by planting survivors from a New York collection under southern New Mexico’s near perfect growing conditions for the the past three years.
“These old varieties truly were in danger of being lost from the National Plant Germplasm System,” said Chris Cramer, an onion breeder with NMSU’s Agricultural Experiment Station. The massive 450,000-variety plant collection is part of a longterm cooperative federal, state and private effort to preserve genetic diversity.
“Many of these old onion varieties are off the market and aren’t grown anymore, but that doesn’t mean they’re not important,” Cramer said. “Some could easily contain genetic traits that weren’t important in their day, but could be very important now, especially in areas of disease resistance.”
Researchers need a constant supply of fresh seed from the old onion varieties, some of which trace their genetic roots back half a century. Onion seed only lasts about five years, even under ideal conditions.
The rare varieties are known as short-day onions for the hours of daylight required to form bulbs. They develop when the days are 11 to 12 hours long.
http://www.cahe.nmsu.edu/aes/
Math scores improve
NMSU’s College of Education is creating the model for closing mathematics achievement gaps among Hispanic students, says Karin Wiburg, associate dean for research.
The Gadsden Math Initiative (GMI) – a partnership between the university and the Gadsden Independent School District – is implementing new methods for teaching math to elementary and middle school students that are successfully raising test scores.
Data recently released from the project shows fourth-grade students scoring at or above the average for all fourth-grade students in mathematics in the state.
“The outcomes study so far confirms that these initiatives have had powerful positive effects on learning when they are implemented districtwide,” Wiburg says. The GMI focuses on helping students understand and build math concepts rather than memorizing techniques. GMI and the outcomes study are being funded by a National Science Foundation grant that continues until June 2006.
http://education.nmsu.edu
Night Life
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NMSU researchers are banding owls living in Las Cruces to track them and learn more about their behavior. |
A lively rattling sound inside the trap would make most people think twice but Mapula reaches deep into the mailboxshaped trap, past the first swinging door, all the way to the back. He gently extracts a burrito-sized burrowing owl chick that blinks its big yellow eyes in the fading light.
Mapula is a sophomore in NMSU’s fishery and wildlife sciences department. He and other students help trap owls near a busy street as part of NMSU associate professor Martha Desmond’s multi-layered research about burrowing owls in Las Cruces. The project is partially supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation’s Advance Program at NMSU for Women in Science.
Owls are banded and released so they can later be identified with binoculars. Researchers will be able to determine survival statistics, return rates and whether the same owls nest in the same burrows. Desmond is especially interested in the potential to conserve owl populations in urban settings: While they are waning in native habitats, they seem to be adapting to city life.
Desmond would like to see the project generate more awareness and highlight the need to consider owl habitat as the city grows. Simple steps could allow for owl habitat without impeding construction, such as building artificial owl burrows and preserving known nesting locations. Owl burrow locations could be included as an overlay on city maps being used in planning new developments.
“This is a bird that the public really likes,” Desmond said. “People like to see them in their neighborhoods.”
http://leopold.nmsu.edu
Research aims to help children with ADHD
An NMSU professor has found a way to link the efficient use of both sides of the body, known as cross-lateral integration, to possible improvements for children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
Scott Pedersen, an assistant professor in NMSU’s department of physical education, recreation and dance, is studying the reaction and movement time of children with and without ADHD to measure the differences in their cross-lateral integration.
Normal children usually develop this ability at 8 to 9 years of age, but Pedersen has found that children with ADHD develop the ability to use both sides of their body with equal efficiency much later.
Pedersen plans to develop a program designed to help children with ADHD become more efficient in the areas of reaction and movement time.
http://education.nmsu.edu/nmsuape/
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