Saturday, October 27, 2012

Fukushima fish still contaminated

Levels of radioactive contamination in fish caught off the east coast of Japan remain raised, official data shows.

It is a sign that the Dai-ichi power plant continues to be a source of pollution more than a year after the nuclear accident.

About 40% of fish caught close to Fukushima itself are regarded as unfit for humans under Japanese regulations.

The respected US marine chemist Ken Buesseler has reviewed the data in this week's Science journal.

He says there are probably two sources of lingering contamination.

"There is the on-going leakage into the ocean of polluted ground water from under Fukushima, and there is the contamination that's already in the sediments just offshore," he told BBC News.

Continue reading the main story

?Start Quote

With these results it's hard to predict for how long some fisheries might have to be closed?

End Quote Prof Ken Buesseler WHOI

"It all points to this issue being long-term and one that will need monitoring for decades into the future."

Prof Buesseler is affiliated to the US Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI).

His evaluation covers a year's worth of data gathered by the Japanese Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (MAFF).

Its monthly records detail the levels of radioactive caesium found in fish and other seafood products from shortly after the March 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami - the double disaster that triggered the Fukushima crisis.

The caesium-134 and 137 isotopes can be traced directly to releases from the crippled power station.

MAFF uses the information to decide whether certain fisheries along five east-coast prefectures, including Fukushima, should be opened or closed (it is not a measure of contamination in actual market fish).

The caesium does not normally stay in the tissues of saltwater fish for very long; a few percent per day on average should flow back into the ocean water. So, the fact that these animals continue to display elevated contamination strongly suggests the pollution source has not yet been completely shut off.

He notes that although caesium levels in any fish type and on any day can be highly variable, it is the bottom-dwelling species off Fukushima that consistently show the highest caesium counts.

For the WHOI researcher, this points to the seafloor being a major reservoir for the caesium pollution.

"It looks to me like the bottom fish, the fish that are eating, you know, crabs and shellfish, the kinds of things that are particle feeders - they seem to be increasing their accumulation of the caesium isotopes because of their habitat on the seafloor," he explained.

Prof Buesseler stresses however that the vast majority of fish caught off the northeast coast of Japan are fit for human consumption.

And while the 40% figure for unsafe catch in the Fukushima prefecture may sound alarming, the bald number is slightly misleading.

Last April, the Japanese authorities tried to instil greater market confidence by lowering the maximum permitted concentration of radioactivity in fish and fish products from 500 becquerels per kilogram of wet weight to 100 Bq/kg wet.

This tightening of the threshold immediately re-classified fish previously deemed fit as unfit, even though their actual contamination count had not changed.

It is also worth comparing the Japanese limit with international standards. In the US, for example, the threshold is set at 1,200 Bq/kg wet - significantly more lenient than even the pre-April Japanese requirement.

And Prof Buesseler makes the point that some naturally occurring radionuclides, such as potassium-40, appear in fish at similar or even higher levels than the radioactive caesium.

Nonetheless, the contamination question is a pertinent one in the Asian nation simply because its people consume far more fish per head than in most other countries.

"At one level, there shouldn't be any surprises here but on another, people need to come to grips with the fact that for some species and for some areas this is going to be a long-term issue; and with these results it's hard to predict for how long some fisheries might have to be closed," said the WHOI scientist.

Prof Buesseler, with Japanese colleagues, is organising a scientific symposium in Tokyo on 12/13 November to present the latest thinking on Fukushima and its impacts on the ocean. The information will then be shared with the public in a free colloquium on 14 November.

Jonathan.Amos-INTERNET@bbc.co.uk and follow me on Twitter: @BBCAmos

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-19980614#sa-ns_mchannel=rss&ns_source=PublicRSS20-sa

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Friday, October 26, 2012

US Air Force Plans Final Hypersonic X-51A Test Launch

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Saturday, October 20, 2012

Metal Dog Month ? FengShui Heritage - Feng Shui to Help Improve ...


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?? Geng Xu (?? Metal Dog) Month (October 8 ? November 6, 2012)

Do you feel that the energy is stagnated, your project does not evolve, things seem to slow down or come to a standstill?? These are a few examples of the effects of the repeated energy of the Water Dragon year and the Metal Dog month (see image). ? The numbers in black are the Dragon year's flying stars while the numbers in red are Geng Xu month' flying stars.?

When the numbers are repeated as in the image, we call this a Fu Yin ? ? chart which suggests possible mishaps, illnesses, and disputes especially when the stars are untimely.?

Do pay special attention to the north, southeast, northwest, and southwest sectors of your home, do not activate these sectors with frequent movements, activities, sound and light.?

Stay safe and may you be blessed.


Source: http://www.fengshuiheritage.com/archives/2012/10/19/metal-dog-month/

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Thursday, October 18, 2012

Study: Multivitamins may lower cancer risk in men

This Oct. 11, 2012 photo provided by the Brigham and Women's Hospital shows a monthly calendar vitamin pack used in a long-term study on multivitamins. America's favorite dietary supplements, multivitamins, modestly lowered the risk of developing cancer in healthy male doctors who took them daily for more than a decade, the first large study to test these pills has found. The study was published online in the Journal of the American Medical Association on Wednesday, Oct. 17, 2012. (AP Photo/Brigham and Women's Hospital)

This Oct. 11, 2012 photo provided by the Brigham and Women's Hospital shows a monthly calendar vitamin pack used in a long-term study on multivitamins. America's favorite dietary supplements, multivitamins, modestly lowered the risk of developing cancer in healthy male doctors who took them daily for more than a decade, the first large study to test these pills has found. The study was published online in the Journal of the American Medical Association on Wednesday, Oct. 17, 2012. (AP Photo/Brigham and Women's Hospital)

America's favorite dietary supplements, multivitamins, modestly lowered the risk for cancer in healthy male doctors who took them for more than a decade, the first large study to test these pills has found.

The result is a surprise because many studies of individual vitamins have found they don't help prevent chronic diseases and some have even caused problems.

In the new study, multivitamins cut the chance of developing cancer by 8 percent. That is less effective than a good diet, exercise and not smoking, each of which can lower cancer risk by 20 percent to 30 percent, cancer experts say.

Multivitamins also may have different results in women, younger men or people less healthy than those in this study.

"It's a very mild effect and personally I'm not sure it's significant enough to recommend to anyone" although it is promising, said Dr. Ernest Hawk, vice president of cancer prevention at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center and formerly of the National Cancer Institute.

"At least this doesn't suggest a harm" as some previous studies on single vitamins have, he said.

Hawk reviewed the study for the American Association for Cancer Research, which is meeting in Anaheim, Calif., where the study was to be presented on Wednesday. It also was published online in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

About one-third of U.S. adults and as many as half of those over 50 take them. They are marketed as a kind of insurance policy against bad eating. Yet no government agency recommends their routine use "regardless of the quality of a person's diet," says a fact sheet from the federal Office of Dietary Supplements.

Some fads, such as the antioxidant craze over vitamins A and E and beta-carotene, backfired when studies found more health risk with those supplements, not less. Many of those were single vitamins in larger doses than the "100 percent of daily value" amounts that multivitamins typically contain.

Science on vitamins has been skimpy. Most studies have been observational ? they look at groups of people who do and do not use vitamins, a method that can't give firm conclusions.

Dr. J. Michael Gaziano, of Brigham and Women's Hospital and VA Boston, led a stronger test. Nearly 15,000 male doctors who were 50 or older and free of cancer when the study started were given monthly packets of Centrum Silver or fake multivitamins without knowing which type they received.

After about 11 years, there were 2,669 new cancers, and some people had cancer more than once. For every 1,000 men per year in the study, there were 17 cancers among multivitamin users and more than 18 among those taking the placebo pills. That worked out to an 8 percent lower risk of developing cancer in the vitamin group.

Multivitamins made no difference in the risk of developing prostate cancer, which accounted for half of all cases. They lowered the risk of other cancers collectively by about 12 percent. There also was a trend toward fewer cancer deaths among multivitamin users, but the difference was so small it could have occurred by chance alone.

Side effects were fairly similar except for more rashes among vitamin users. The National Institutes of Health paid for most of the study. Pfizer Inc. supplied the pills and other companies supplied the packaging.

The main reason to take a multivitamin is to correct or prevent a deficiency, "but there may be a modest benefit in reducing the risk of cancer in older men," Gaziano said.

Cancer experts said the results need to be confirmed by another study before recommending multivitamins to the public. These participants were healthier ? only 4 percent smoked, for example.

For people who do want to take multivitamins, doctors suggest:

?Be aware that they are dietary supplements, which do not get the strict testing required of prescription medicines.

?Ask your doctor before taking any. Vitamin K can interfere with common heart medicines and blood thinners, and vitamins C and E can lower the effectiveness of some types of chemotherapy. For people having surgery, some vitamins affect bleeding and response to anesthesia.

?Current and former smokers should avoid multivitamins with lots of beta-carotene or vitamin A; two studies have tied them to increased risk of lung cancer.

__

Online:

JAMA: http://www.jama.ama-assn.org

Vitamin facts: http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/factsheet/prevention/antioxidants

and http://ods.od.nih.gov/factsheets/MVMS-HealthProfessional

Dietary advice: www.dietaryguidelines.gov

Task force advice: http://www.uspreventiveservicestaskforce.org/uspstf/uspsvita.htm

Vitamin E and prostate study: http://jama.ama-assn.org/content/306/14/1549

___

Marilynn Marchione can be followed at http://twitter.com/MMarchioneAP

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/bbd825583c8542898e6fa7d440b9febc/Article_2012-10-17-Vitamins-Cancer/id-3f4473e5e306438bb44337ef8db0509c

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Wednesday, October 17, 2012

Marketing Career: 5 tips for building a personal brand ...

The ladder of success no longer has certain rungs that must be met. Now, companies are placing a greater emphasis on company culture, and are looking for people who will fit into that.

In the days when large corporations were the trendsetters of the business world, you could get ahead by following a certain set of rules. As the recession knocked down some of these traditional companies from their former glory, a new way of doing business was highlighted.

Facebook, Google, Twitter, Apple and a thousand others like them ditched the suits and turned casual Friday into a week-long institution. Ping pong tables (like the one here at MECLABS) replaced conference tables and office spaces began providing an environment that would encourage employees to ?think different.?

Companies are looking beyond info from your resume, and wanting to get to know you. Zappos, for instance, has said that in their personality-focused hiring process, they ask themselves if the person being interviewed is someone they would want to get a beer with.

As personality and corporate culture become a bigger proponent of the hiring process, it may be time to make yourself known and stop hiding behind a generic black and white, 12-point Times New Roman font resume.

An increasing amount of companies want to see that you have unique, unconventional skills to bring to their team, instead of checking off a list of qualifications on your resume.

Establishing your personal brand online can be the most effective way to get ? and keep ? a company?s attention.

?

Tip #1. Identify who you are, and where you want to be

?It sounds so basic, but I think what we forget about a lot is, what do you want to do, where do you want to be? Then it makes it simple to break [personal branding] down into tangible goals,? said Taylor Aldredge, Ambassador of Buzz, Grasshopper.

Even if already on a set career path, asking these questions can give personal brand building a direction that will open up doors and allow for new and creative results within established processes.

After building her business, Tara R. Alemany, Owner, Aleweb Social Marketing, decided to bolster it by pursuing speaking engagements. ?To do this, she came up with the idea for producing online tutorials that would be both useful references for clients and open up her schedule.

?That frees me up for doing what I really love doing, which is speaking,? said Alemany.

Aldredge came around to the idea of personal brand building through a design class he took while attending Boston University. A visiting business professional in the class gave him advice that helped him ask the necessary questions when reviewing their current project, r?sum? building.

?He was walking around, and comes over to me?he looks at the r?sum?, and looks at me, and he looks back at it, and said, ?when I look at this, I don?t see you. This doesn?t match up. You?ve got to fix that.? I just thought that was great advice.?

?

Tip #2. Understand how your industry networks

?I read a lot,? said Aldredge. This can help you to ?get a perspective on what your audience is thinking, what they are talking about. Whether you?re trying to grow your brand or make yourself appealing to a company, know what your audience needs are.?

From less structured creative environments to the more traditional, ?it?s all the same,? says Aldredge about reaching out to contacts and thought leaders. ?How do you tell people about you? It is about finding somewhere to direct your conversation.?

Know the tools that will appeal to your industry

There are established tools to use that will appeal to almost every industry, such as LinkedIn, Twitter and ensuring that you are a high Google search engine result.

However, there are also outlets growing in popularity every day that can show a more diverse and complete view of your personality than those tactics.

?There are so many cool avenues that can change how people perceive you,? said Aldredge. ?Whether or not you?re technologically savvy, you can do something that changes the game.?

Aldredge lists some tools, useful both for displaying work history and projects:

?There?s no reason not to know how to do it,? said Aldredge. ?The day and age where we take a paper resume, and send a PDF ? it?s going by the wayside. In some [more traditional] industries that is still going to be the case?but if you?re in something new and emerging, your r?sum? is that one chance to reflect who you are as a person.?

The conversation of how to hire employees has changed, according to Aldredge. The kind of authenticity and transparency these outlets and others can provide is appreciated by future employers who want to understand your personality before hiring you.

?I think hiring managers want people who are going to stand out and fit within that culture?If you are the person who just wants to ?check the box? that is so detrimental. Nobody wants to hear that anymore.?

From a technical standpoint, he advises that whatever tools you utilize, to make your brand cohesive.

?Use the same picture on every website, the same colors, and fonts are as similar as they can be. Everything should point to the same direction. Consistency is really key when it comes to personal branding.?

LinkedIn

The advice Aldredge gives is to look at your LinkedIn page from your audience?s perspective. Research pages of successful people in your industry to understand key words that people will be searching for.

He also advises taking your headline and summary as far as you can. A successful tactic is to use your headline to list your skills and expertise instead of simply your current job. This displays what you consider your greatest assets and will help you be found in searches.

Reference ?Marketing Career: 3 steps to optimize your LinkedIn profile? for more suggestions on how to optimize your LinkedIn page.

Twitter

Aldredge describes the two heavy hitters of social media as, ?Facebook is the mall, and everyone is at the mall?Twitter is like the fashion show. There are a small percentage of people who are really good at it.?

?It?s a great writing exercise if you want to hone in on your ability to write effective sentences,? said Aldredge, adding that it can act as a great lead generation exercise. Twitter ?keeps you in check on how to write effectively really quickly.?

His suggestion is to only connect to people you believe will engage with you back. Following thousands of people who will never interact with you will not be effective in growing your reach or audience.

Another opportunity Aldredge has seen is Twitter boards at live events, where attendees can tweet under an event-specific hashtag and have it projected up onto the screen. Writing something clever that will appeal to your audience can grow contacts in your sphere and start useful conversations.

Google

?A great exercise to do is to Google yourself and see what comes up. If you?re not taking up the first page you need to reassess if your branding is working,? said Aldredge. ?From an SEO standpoint it?s defining what you?re interested in and making that consistent across all your feed.?

?

Tip #4. Be authentic

Authenticity when brand building is ?imperative? said Alemany. ?I think that for a brand to be successful, whether it?s a personal brand or a commercial brand, it has to be authentic.?

Authenticity can be a difficult task when building your personal brand. Alemany believes it is a matter of knowing what to share about your life, what your audience will find interesting and compelling about you, and what to keep personal.

?I think it?s a matter initially of doing some soul searching, and figuring out for your personal brand, what elements of who you are are key to that brand,? she said.

A key to authenticity is an ?understanding of who it is that you want to resonate with,? Alemany added.

?There?s often times that I am working with a client who has a book or a talk that they want to promote, and I ask them, ?who is your target audience?? and they say, ?anybody that will come listen, anyone that will read my book.? The issue with that is that it is too broad to be able to have a complete understanding of what the needs of that audience are,? she said.

Leverage personal experiences

A tactic Aldredge takes advantage of is to use his unusual life stories and experiences in terms of controlling how he is perceived by other people.

Aldredge gives the example of having done gymnastics throughout middle school and high school. ?That?s not something I think a lot of people would talk about?but it gave me a really unique story.?

Aldredge wrote in a cover letter for a job description seeking a ?marketing ninja? that, ?you have my r?sum?, and I think that speaks to my experiences and my marketing work.? He then used his cover letter as an arena to display ?all the ways I think I would make a good ninja. So I proceeded to explain all of my skills that were ninja related, not even mentioning marketing.?

He took a cue from the tone of the job description and crafted a cover letter that was written with the reader?s needs and wants in mind. While it wasn?t obviously useful, it spoke to his worldview and personality in a way that was perhaps more important to the reader.

?It?s about taking those stories in your life where you?ve done something different, or gone against the norm, and let that define who you are?It?s a fine line of balancing confidence and egotistical,? he added.

?

Tip #5. Go out of your comfort zone

There is ?a certain level of risk with personal branding,? said Aldredge. The only way to know how to skillfully maneuver sharing your personality with your audience is to make mistakes.

This takes a mentality of daring, and an understanding that, ?you have to shed that fear of embarrassment and humiliation.?

Aldredge promotes a philosophy of learning by doing. ?That?s how you learn where your line is, and that is how you build your confidence.?

His advice to people who are less comfortable with putting themselves out in branding is to, ?treat every conversation like it?s a networking conversation.?

Aldredge explains any exchange, whether it?s with a grocery store cashier or a coworker, gets you comfortable with speaking to somebody you?ve never met before, or don?t know well.

?It?s little things like that that can improve your ability to talk about yourself in quick ways that are very easy to take advantage of?It?s always a good idea to have a couple of those queued up in your head that no one else has really done ? something to make you stand out.?

An important aspect of building your personal brand is figure out what you?re comfortable with. Then, figuring out what you have to do to get to get to the next step of your career or branding process.

?Maybe that is going to an event and speaking with people, even if that?s a big fear for you,? said Aldredge.

?The hesitation is the fear of vulnerability; I always ask people, what do you have to lose? If you can?t come up with a good answer then there is probably nothing wrong with it. It?s about identifying what that is,? he concluded.

?

Related Resources

YOU ARE A BRAND! 2nd Edition: In Person and Online, How Smart People Brand Themselves for Business Success (MarketingSherpa Weekly Book Giveaway, enter by October 21)

Marketing Career: Can you explain your job to a six-year-old? (via MarketingExperiments)

Personal Branding: 3 tips for personal SEO

Marketing Career: How to get your next job in marketing

Marketing Career: How to overcome dissatisfaction in marketing jobs

The Secret The Smartest People In The World Know That You Don?t (via Business Insider)

Marketing Career: 3 steps to optimize your LinkedIn profile (via MarketingExperiments)

Internal Marketing: The 3 people you must sell to in your own office

Brand yourself: 5 new (and free) sites for personal branding (via USA Today College)

MECLABS Careers ? 5 current job openings

Marketing

Source: http://sherpablog.marketingsherpa.com/marketing/personal-brand-building-tips/

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'Jersey Shore' Stars Relive Worst Jobs: Stripping And 'Bitter Old People'

Ahead of Tuesday night's series premiere of 'Underemployed,' the 'Jersey Shore' stars remember their most 'God-awful' jobs.
By Christina Garibaldi


JWoww, Sammi and Deena
Photo: MTV News

Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1695681/jersey-shore-cast-worst-jobs-underemployed.jhtml

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The badlands of Bangalore University

BANGALORE: Saturday night's gang rape of an NLSIU student on the Jnanabharathi campus was waiting to happen. Only on September 27, unidentified men robbed an autorickshaw driver and his wife of their valuables on the campus. The miscreants tried to molest the woman but she escaped by biting the hand of one of the men.

The auto driver had driven his vehicle into the forest area of the campus with his wife, who was living separately. No arrests have been made in the case till date, reflecting the casual attitude prevailing among policemen over the issue of crime on the campus.

If the police had heeded the warning and taken some stringent steps to step up the patrolling and having check-posts within the campus in the wake of the September 27 incident, perhaps the Saturday crime might not have happened at all.

Police, however, claim that they have taken several steps to ensure that the rule of law prevails on the sprawling Bangalore University campus. They cite the incident of including transferring of a police inspector who was "not performing".

Ironically, on Saturday when the incident took place, all the officers including the deputy commissioner of police were on night rounds. As claimed by a senior police officer, the very road where the couple's car was parked was blocked by the officers but yet the incident took place.

This crime incident was a repeat of a similar gang rape that took place seven years back on the campus. In 2005, a 30-year-old woman was raped by a gang of taxi drivers. She was repeatedly raped and found in an unconscious state. From that time, there were many plans made to restrict the movement of outsiders within the campus. New gates were erected and plans were made to restrict the movement of traffic within the campus at night, but under the pressure from BBMP and the residents living nearby, this plan had to be shelved.

Source: http://timesofindia.feedsportal.com/fy/8at2EuX0fS7oD3Kh/story01.htm

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Monday, October 15, 2012

European Union to impose new sanctions to prevent Irans production of nuke weapon

Britain News.Net Monday 15th October, 2012

The European Union is planning to impose a new round of sanctions on Iran to prevent the country's production of a nuclear weapon, says a report.

Sources close to the matter revealed that the EU members meeting in Luxembourg would rubber stamp a "tough package" of sanctions designed to hit Iran's gas, banking and shipping sectors.

The new measures will include a ban on all dealings between European and Iranian banks above a "relatively low" threshold, the Telegraph reports.

According to the paper, on the eve of the meeting, Guido Westerwelle, Germany's Foreign Minister, set a defiant tone, insisting that Europe must send a "clear signal to Tehran" that it will not tolerate its nuclear armament.

Westerwelle's statement disclosed a resolve among EU member states frustrated by Iran's uranium enrichment programme, which continues in the face of threatened military strikes and tightening economic sanctions. (ANI)

Source: http://www.britainnews.net/index.php/sid/210055191/scat/b8de8e630faf3631

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Greene powers Jets to 35-9 runaway over Colts

New York Jets running back Shonn Greene (23) celebrates after scoring a touchdown as he is tackled by Indianapolis Colts' Tom Zbikowski (28) during the first half of an NFL football game Sunday, Oct. 14, 2012 in East Rutherford, N.J. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

New York Jets running back Shonn Greene (23) celebrates after scoring a touchdown as he is tackled by Indianapolis Colts' Tom Zbikowski (28) during the first half of an NFL football game Sunday, Oct. 14, 2012 in East Rutherford, N.J. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

New York Jets running back Shonn Greene (23) celebrates a touchdown with teammtes Austin Howard (77) and Nick Mangold (74) as Indianapolis Colts strong safety Tom Zbikowski (28) walks away during the first half of an NFL football game Sunday, Oct. 14, 2012 in East Rutherford, N.J. (AP Photo/Bill Kostroun)

New York Jets wide receiver Jason Hill (89) catches a pass for a touchdown in front of Indianapolis Colts cornerback Jerraud Powers (25) during the first half of an NFL football game on Sunday, Oct. 14, 2012, in East Rutherford, N.J. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

Indianapolis Colts quarterback Andrew Luck is sacked by New York Jets defensive end Quinton Coples (98) while attempting to pass the ball as teammate Mewelde Moore (26) looks on during the second half of an NFL football game Sunday, Oct. 14, 2012 in East Rutherford, N.J. (AP Photo/Bill Kostroun)

New York Jets quarterback Tim Tebow (15) dives for extra yards as Indianapolis Colts inside linebacker Kavell Conner (53), Drake Nevis (94) and Jerrell Freeman (50) tackle him during the first half of an NFL football game Sunday, Oct. 14, 2012, in East Rutherford, N.J. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

(AP) ? Shonn Greene hit the ground running ? and just kept going.

Rex Ryan's "Ground-and-Pound" offense returned in a big way Sunday as Greene ran for a career-high 161 yards and three touchdowns on 32 carries to power the New York Jets to a 35-9 rout of Andrew Luck and the Indianapolis Colts on Sunday.

"When you're running the ball that well," quarterback Mark Sanchez said, "you never want to stop."

Just about everything worked for the Jets as they rolled up 252 yards on the ground after struggling in the running game for weeks, Sanchez was solid and Tim Tebow made a few big plays. Even the Jets' maligned defense was able to shut down Luck and the Colts as New York snapped a two-game slide at home that had many wondering if the season was about to spiral out of control.

"We want to be a team no one wants to play," Ryan said. "And, we're on our way."

For a week, at least, Sanchez was in total control and the Jets (3-3) had their best overall performance ? save for a handful of personal foul penalties ? since an opening rout of Buffalo. After four straight games with less than 50 percent completion percentage, Sanchez finished 11 of 18 for just 82 yards, but had touchdown throws to Stephen Hill and Jason Hill.

"Wins come in all shapes and forms," Sanchez said. "I was proud of the way we were able to run the ball."

With the way the Jets, particularly Greene, performed behind an offensive line blasting open holes to run through, Sanchez didn't need to air it out.

"I think we can do it every week against any team," Greene said. "It's just a matter of us executing, not stopping ourselves and working hard during the week."

The frustrating thing for Indianapolis (2-3) was that New York did exactly what it expected. And the Colts still couldn't do anything about the running game.

"We wanted Sanchez to have to beat us with his arm," cornerback Jerraud Powers said. "If we stopped the run, that was what they were going to have to do. Whoever we play next week, that's what they're going to do. They're going to run the ball until we stop it."

Indianapolis trailed 21-6 at halftime and couldn't erase a big deficit for the second straight week after coming back from 18 points and beating Green Bay last Sunday for Bruce Arians' first win while filling in for Chuck Pagano, hospitalized while being treated for leukemia.

Luck finished 22 of 44 for 280 yards, two interceptions and a lost fumble on a day he misfired a handful of times. Luck was driving the Colts a possible touchdown with less than 7 minutes left, but Ellis Lankster ended that when he intercepted the rookie's toss for Donnie Avery in the end zone.

"It's learning how to be consistent, and that's something I've struggled with," Luck said. "I think I played very poorly this week after a decent half of football last weekend. As a team, we have to learn to come out and consistently be good."

The Colts were missing sacks leader Robert Mathis, and lost defensive end Cory Redding to an injured right knee in the first quarter. Indianapolis was also without leading rusher Donald Brown; replacement Vick Ballard had just 25 yards in his first NFL start.

Tebow helped the Jets take a 21-6 lead just before halftime on a drive kept alive by some trickery. On fourth-and-11 from the Colts 40, the do-it-all backup quarterback ? lined up as the punt protector ? took the direct snap, stepped forward and tossed a jump pass to linebacker Nick Bellore, who rumbled 23 yards as the crowd at MetLife Stadium went wild.

Three plays later, Tebow was at quarterback and ran 3 yards for a first down, setting up Sanchez's 5-yard TD toss to Jason Hill with 27 seconds left. Tebow met Sanchez as he ran toward the sideline and the two leaped and bumped hips to celebrate the score.

"We were very efficient, effective," Tebow said. "We had some big runs, threw the ball really well in the red area and converted on third down. It was a pretty good day for us."

Greene made it 28-6 late in the third quarter on a 4-yard spin-and-run on a drive sparked by Joe McKnight's 61-yard run that gave the Jets the ball at Indianapolis 6. McKnight injured his left ankle on the play, three plays after Bilal Powell was lost with a shoulder injury.

Both McKnight and Powell were scheduled to have MRI exams Monday.

Greene got the touchdown hat trick with a 2-yard run with 1:05 left, a few minutes after Muhammad Wilkerson forced a fumble on a sack of Luck and David Harris recovered at the Colts 14.

"If you can't block and you can't tackle, you can't win," Arians said. "It's fundamentals, things we identified going into the game: fake punts, stopping the run, protecting the quarterback. Red zone offense and defense were keys to the game. We didn't win in any of those areas."

NOTES: Jets CB Antonio Cromartie had two interceptions for TDs called back ? one on a personal foul penalty on Aaron Maybin and another on a pass interference call on Cromartie. ... Jets first-rounder Quinton Coples had 1? sacks, his first. ... The Colts were 3 of 11 on third downs, while the Jets were 6 of 12.

___

Online: http://pro32.ap.org/poll and http://twitter.com/AP_NFL

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/347875155d53465d95cec892aeb06419/Article_2012-10-14-Colts-Jets/id-a454756c0eb6498890d5f780a477081f

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Thousands rally for Malala, girl shot by Taliban

As doctors debated whether to send Malala Yousafzai abroad for care, thousands rallied in her name, including hundreds of schoolgirls who gathered in Afghanistan. NBC's Amna Nawaz reports.

By NBC News and news services

KARACHI, Pakistan -- Tens of thousands rallied in Pakistan's largest city Sunday in support of a 14-year-old girl who was shot and critically wounded by the Taliban for promoting girls' education and criticizing the militant group.?

The demonstration in the southern city of Karachi was by far the largest since Malala Yousufzai and two of her classmates were shot on Oct. 9 while returning home from school in Pakistan's northwest.?


The attack horrified people inside and outside Pakistan and sparked hope among some that it would prompt the government to intensify its fight against the Taliban and their allies.?

But protests against the shooting have been relatively small until now, usually attracting no more than a few hundred people. That response pales in comparison to the tens of thousands of people who held violent protests in Pakistan last month against a film produced in the United States that denigrated Islam's Prophet Muhammad.?

Demonstrations in support of Yousufzai ? and against rampant militant violence in the country in general ? have also been fairly small compared with those focused on issues such as U.S. drone attacks and the NATO supply route to Afghanistan that runs through Pakistan.?

Rizwan Tabassum / AFP - Getty Images

A Pakistani woman shouts slogans during a protest march against the assassination attempt by the Taliban on 14-year-old activist Malala Yousafzai, in Karachi on Sunday. Malala is making "slow and steady progress" in her recovery, the military said.

Right-wing Islamic parties and organizations in Pakistan that regularly pull thousands of supporters into the streets to protest against the U.S. have less of an incentive to speak out against the Taliban, who share their desire to impose Islamic law in the country ? even if they may disagree with some of the militant group's violent tactics.?

Pakistan's mainstream political parties are often also more willing to harangue the U.S. than direct their people power against Islamist militants shedding blood across the country ? partly out of fear and partly because they rely on Islamist parties for electoral support.?

One of the exceptions is the political party that organized Sunday's rally in Karachi, the Muttahida Quami Movement. The party's chief, Altaf Hussain, criticized both Islamic and other mainstream political parties for failing to organize rallies to protest the attack against Yousufzai.?

Positive developments have been reported regarding the recovery of 14-year-old Malala Yousufzai, who was shot by the Taliban near her school on Tuesday. NBC'S Amna Nawaz reports.

He called the Taliban gunmen who shot the girl "beasts" and said the shooting was an attack on "the ideology of Pakistan."?

"Malala Yousufzai is a beacon of knowledge. She is the daughter of the nation," Hussain told the audience by telephone from London, where he is in self-imposed exile because of legal cases pending against him in Pakistan. His party is the strongest in Karachi.?

Watch World News videos on NBCNews.com

Many of the demonstrators carried the young girl's picture and banners praising her bravery and expressing solidarity.?

Yousufzai earned the enmity of the Taliban for publicizing their behavior when they took over the northwestern Swat Valley, where she lived, and for speaking about the importance of education for girls.?

The group first started to exert its influence in Swat in 2007 and quickly extended its reach to much of the valley by the next year. They set about imposing their will on residents by forcing men to grow beards, preventing women from going to the market and blowing up many schools ? the majority for girls.

Images of daily life, political pursuits, religious rites and deadly violence.

Yousufzai wrote about these practices in a journal for the BBC under a pseudonym when she was just 11. After the Taliban were pushed out of the valley in 2009 by the Pakistani military, she became even more outspoken in advocating for girls' education. She appeared frequently in the media and was given one of the country's highest honors for civilians for her bravery.

The Pakistani Taliban said they carried out the shooting because Yousufzai was promoting "Western thinking." Police have arrested at least three suspects in connection with the attack, but the two gunmen who carried out the shooting remain at large.

The young girl was shot in the neck, and the bullet headed toward her spine. Doctors at a military hospital operated on her to remove the bullet from her neck, and she was put on a ventilator. Her condition improved somewhat on Saturday when she was able to move her legs and hands after her sedatives were reduced.

On Sunday, she was successfully taken off the ventilator for a short period and later reconnected to avoid fatigue, the military said. Doctors said she is making slow and steady progress.

The possibility of transferring Malala overseas for continued treatment was still being considered, a military spokesman said. Pakistan has arranged a specially equipped air ambulance with the United Arab Emirates that will be used if doctors decide to move her abroad.

Visas are being finalized for the air ambulance crew and six doctors who will accompany the flight, the Pakistani ambassador to the country, Jamil Ahmed Khan, told Pakistan's Geo TV. Arrangements have been made to treat the girl at three hospitals in Dubai and Abu Dhabi, he said.?

The UAE Embassy in Islamabad could not immediately be reached for comment.?

No decision has yet been taken to send the girl abroad, but the air ambulance is part of the contingency plan, the Pakistani military said.?

Afghan President Hamid Karzai has written letters to top political and religious leaders in Pakistan denouncing the attack on Yousufzai and asking them to help battle extremism in both countries, the president's office said in a statement issued late Saturday. Karzai wrote that he views the shooting as an attack on Afghanistan's girls as well.

NBC News? Fakhar Rehman in Pakistan and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

?

Source: http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/10/14/14431038-thousands-rally-in-karachi-for-malala-14-year-old-pakistani-girl-shot-by-taliban?lite

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Web of criminal activity surrounds Telly Hankton and Walter Porter ...

Enlarge graphic

The "Lethal Connections" graphic attempts to unravel the tangled web of criminal activity surrounding Telly Hankton and alleged hit-man Walter Porter on the streets of New Orleans.

Can't see the Flash graphic above? Click the thumbnail (right) for a print version of the graphic.

Source: http://www.nola.com/crime/index.ssf/2012/10/web_of_criminal_activity_surro.html

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Sunday, October 14, 2012

Weight Watchers Friendly Healthy Menu Plan 10-14-12 ...

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Happy Sunday to you!! Hope you are having a great weekend so far and can enjoy this beautiful day with your family. We are off to church and later a Pumpkin Carving Contest, the kids are so excited!

This Tuesday is my hubby?s birthday so we will go out to eat wherever he wants. I was planning on making a healthy carrot cake for him, but unfortunately he just would rather not have cake if it is healthy and so for his birthday wish he will be getting his full fat cake wherever he desires. :) But when my birthday happens right around thanksgiving you can be on the lookout for the BEST chocolate sugar free cake EVER ?cause I WANT one for sure!

Then by Friday he will be leaving for the weekend for a training so thankfully my sister-in-law will be visiting from CT. I will have some company and of course awesome help with the kiddies when she comes too. She?s the best! I hope everyone has someone in their life they can count on and really is just always there when you need a hand. THAT is my sister-in-law and I?m so very appreciative. Lucky for me she?s coming as my mommy friends want to go out for dinner on Saturday night and I wouldn?t have had anyone to babysit the kids if she weren?t coming. WHAT a double blessing for sure!

I?ve got a few new recipes planned this week but still have some favorites on the plan!

Check back tomorrow because I will be posting my new Pumpkin Protein Pancake recipe that is just incredible!

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Breakfasts

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Dinners

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Have a wonderful Sunday!!

{{{{{{HUGS}}}}}

Brenda

This entry was posted in Weekly Menu and tagged clean eating menu, healthy meal plan, sugar free meals, weight watcher friendly meal plan by Brenda. Bookmark the permalink.

Source: http://www.sugarfreemom.com/recipes/weight-watchers-friendly-healthy-menu-plan-10-14-12/

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Fun&Random

Wonderland: The Deck

There is another tale to the story of wonderland. One that exists after Alice has left. The red queen has fallen, but a new evil arises as four kingdoms once lost come to live. Will the Creatures of Wonderland fight back? [ALOT more information inside.]

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Horror at Shell Creek Mansion

Horror at Shell Creek Mansion

WORK IN PROGRESS- NOT ACCEPTING CHARACTERS YET.

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Why Standardized Tests Don't Measure Educational Quality - ASCD

W. James Popham

A standardized test is any examination that's administered and scored in a predetermined, standard manner. There are two major kinds of standardized tests: aptitude tests and achievement tests.

Standardized aptitude tests predict how well students are likely to perform in some subsequent educational setting. The most common examples are the SAT-I and the ACT both of which attempt to forecast how well high school students will perform in college.

But standardized achievement-test scores are what citizens and school board members rely on when they evaluate a school's effectiveness. Nationally, five such tests are in use: California Achievement Tests, Comprehensive Tests of Basic Skills, Iowa Tests of Basic Skills, Metropolitan Achievement Tests, and Stanford Achievement Tests.

A Standardized Test's Assessment Mission

The folks who create standardized achievement tests are terrifically talented. What they are trying to do is to create assessment tools that permit someone to make a valid inference about the knowledge and/or skills that a given student possesses in a particular content area. More precisely, that inference is to be norm-referenced so that a student's relative knowledge and/or skills can be compared with those possessed by a national sample of students of the same age or grade level.

Such relative inferences about a student's status with respect to the mastery of knowledge and/or skills in a particular subject area can be quite informative to parents and educators. For example, think about the parents who discover that their 4th grade child is performing really well in language arts (94th percentile) and mathematics (89th percentile), but rather poorly in science (39th percentile) and social studies (26th percentile). Such information, because it illuminates a child's strengths and weaknesses, can be helpful not only in dealing with their child's teacher, but also in determining at-home assistance. Similarly, if teachers know how their students compare with other students nationwide, they can use this information to devise appropriate classroom instruction.

But there's an enormous amount of knowledge and/or skills that children at any grade level are likely to know. The substantial size of the content domain that a standardized achievement test is supposed to represent poses genuine difficulties for the developers of such tests. If a test actually covered all the knowledge and skills in the domain, it would be far too long.

So standardized achievement tests often need to accomplish their measurement mission with a much smaller collection of test items than might otherwise be employed if testing time were not an issue. The way out of this assessment bind is for standardized achievement tests to sample the knowledge and/or skills in the content domain. Frequently, such tests try to do their assessment job with only 40 to 50 items in a subject field?sometimes fewer.

Accurate Differentiation As a Deity

The task for those developing standardized achievement tests is to create an assessment instrument that, with a handful of items, yields valid norm-referenced interpretations of a student's status regarding a substantial chunk of content. Items that do the best job of discriminating among students are those answered correctly by roughly half the students. Devlopers avoid items that are answered correctly by too many or by too few students.

As a consequence of carefully sampling content and concentrating on items that discriminate optimally among students, these test creators have produced assessment tools that do a great job of providing relative comparisons of a student's content mastery with that of students nationwide. Assuming that the national norm group is genuinely representative of the nation at large, then educators and parents can make useful inferences about students.

One of the most useful of those inferences typically deals with students' relative strengths and weaknesses across subject areas, such as when parents find that their daughter sparkles in mathematics but sinks in science. It's also possible to identify students' relative strengths and weaknesses within a given subject area if there are enough test items to do so. For instance, if a 45-item standardized test in mathematics allocates 15 items to basic computation, 15 items to geometry, and 15 items to algebra, it might be possible to get a rough idea of a student's relative strengths and weaknesses in those three realms of mathematics. More often than not, however, these tests contain too few items to allow meaningful within-subject comparisons of students' strengths and weaknesses.

A second kind of useful inference that can be based on standardized achievement tests involves a student's growth over time in different subject areas. For example, let's say that a child is given a standardized achievement test every third year. We see that the child's percentile performances in most subjects are relatively similar at each testing, but that the child's percentiles in mathematics appear to drop dramatically at each subsequent testing. That's useful information.

Unfortunately, both parents and educators often ascribe far too much precision and accuracy to students' scores on standardized achievement tests. Several factors might cause scores to flop about. Merely because these test scores are reported in numbers (sometimes even with decimals!) should not incline anyone to attribute unwarranted precision to them. Standardized achievement test scores should be regarded as rough approximations of a student's status with respect to the content domain represented by the test.

To sum up, standardized achievement tests do a wonderful job of supplying the evidence needed to make norm-referenced interpretations of students' knowledge and/or skills in relationship to those of students nationally. The educational usefulness of those interpretations is considerable. Given the size of the content domains to be represented and the limited number of items that the test developers have at their disposal, standardized achievement tests are really quite remarkable. They do what they are supposed to do.

But standardized achievement tests should not be used to evaluate the quality of education. That's not what they are supposed to do.

Measuring Temperature with a Tablespoon

For several important reasons, standardized achievement tests should not be used to judge the quality of education. The overarching reason that students' scores on these tests do not provide an accurate index of educational effectiveness is that any inference about educational quality made on the basis of students' standardized achievement test performances is apt to be invalid.

Employing standardized achievement tests to ascertain educational quality is like measuring temperature with a tablespoon. Tablespoons have a different measurement mission than indicating how hot or cold something is. Standardized achievement tests have a different measurement mission than indicating how good or bad a school is. Standardized achievement tests should be used to make the comparative interpretations that they were intended to provide. They should not be used to judge educational quality. Let's look at three significant reasons that it is thoroughly invalid to base inferences about the caliber of education on standardized achievement test scores.

Testing-Teaching Mismatches

The companies that create and sell standardized achievement tests are all owned by large corporations. Like all for-profit businesses, these corporations attempt to produce revenue for their shareholders.

Recognizing the substantial pressure to sell standardized achievement tests, those who market such tests encounter a difficult dilemma that arises from the considerable curricular diversity in the United States. Because different states often choose somewhat different educational objectives (or, to be fashionable, different content standards), the need exists to build standardized achievement tests that are properly aligned with educators' meaningfully different curricular preferences. The problem becomes even more exacerbated in states where different counties or school districts can exercise more localized curricular decision making.

At a very general level, the goals that educators pursue in different settings are reasonably similar. For instance, you can be sure that all schools will give attention to language arts, mathematics, and so on. But that's at a general level. At the level where it really makes a difference to instruction?in the classroom?there are significant differences in the educational objectives being sought. And that presents a problem to those who must sell standardized achievement tests.

In view of the nation's substantial curricular diversity, test developers are obliged to create a series of one-size-fits-all assessments. But, as most of us know from attempting to wear one-size-fits-all garments, sometimes one size really can't fit all.

The designers of these tests do the best job they can in selecting test items that are likely to measure all of a content area's knowledge and skills that the nation's educators regard as important. But the test developers can't really pull it off. Thus, standardized achievement tests will always contain many items that are not aligned with what's emphasized instructionally in a particular setting.

To illustrate the seriousness of the mismatch that can occur between what's taught locally and what's tested through standardized achievement tests, educators ought to know about an important study at Michigan State University reported in 1983 by Freeman and his colleagues. These researchers selected five nationally standardized achievement tests in mathematics and studied their content for grades 4?6. Then, operating on the very reasonable assumption that what goes on instructionally in classrooms is often influenced by what's contained in the texbooks that children use, they also studied four widely used textbooks for grades 4-6.

Employing rigorous review procedures, the researchers identified the items in the standardized achievement test that had not received meaningful instructional attention in the textbooks. They concluded that between 50 and 80 percent of what was measured on the tests was not suitably addressed in the textbooks. As the Michigan State researchers put it, "The proportion of topics presented on a standardized test that received more than cursory treatment in each textbook was never higher than 50 percent" (p. 509).

Well, if the content of standardized tests is not satisfactorily addressed in widely used textbooks, isn't it likely that in a particular educational setting, topics will be covered on the test that aren't addressed instructionally in that setting? Unfortunately, because most educators are not genuinely familiar with the ingredients of standardized achievement tests, they often assume that if a standardized achievement test asserts that it is assessing "children's reading comprehension capabilities," then it's likely that the test meshes with the way reading is being taught locally. More often than not, the assumed match between what's tested and what's taught is not warranted.

If you spend much time with the descriptive materials presented in the manuals accompanying standardized achievement tests, you'll find that the descriptors for what's tested are often fairly general. Those descriptors need to be general to make the tests acceptable to a nation of educators whose curricular preferences vary. But such general descriptions of what's tested often permit assumptions of teaching-testing alignments that are way off the mark. And such mismatches, recognized or not, will often lead to spurious conclusions about the effectiveness of education in a given setting if students' scores on standardized achievement tests are used as the indicator of educational effectiveness. And that's the first reason that standardized achievement tests should not be used to determine the effectiveness of a state, a district, a school, or a teacher. There's almost certain to be a significant mismatch between what's taught and what's tested.

A Psychometric Tendency to Eliminate Important Test Items

A second reason that standardized achievement tests should not be used to evaluate educational quality arises directly from the requirement that these tests permit meaningful comparisons among students from only a small collection of items.

A test item that does the best job in spreading out students' total-test scores is a test item that's answered correctly by about half the students. Items that are answered correctly by 40 to 60 percent of the students do a solid job in spreading out the total scores of test-takers.

Items that are answered correctly by very large numbers of students, in contrast, do not make a suitable contribution to spreading out students' test scores. A test item answered correctly by 90 percent of the test-takers is, from the perspective of a test's efficiency in providing comparative interpretations, being answered correctly by too many students.

Test items answered correctly by 80 percent or more of the test takers, therefore, usually don't make it past the final cut when a standardized achievement test is first developed, and such items will most likely be jettisoned when the test is revised. As a result, the vast majority of the items on standardized achievement tests are "middle difficulty" items.

As a consequence of the quest for score variance in a standardized achievement test, items on which students perform well are often excluded. However, items on which students perform well often cover the content that, because of its importance, teachers stress. Thus, the better the job that teachers do in teaching important knowledge and/or skills, the less likely it is that there will be items on a standardized achievement test measuring such knowledge and/or skills. To evaluate teachers' instructional effectiveness by using assessment tools that deliberately avoid important content is fundamentally foolish.

Confounded Causation

The third reason that students' performances on these tests should not be used to evaluate educational quality is the most compelling. Because student performances on standardized achievement tests are heavily influenced by three causative factors, only one of which is linked to instructional quality, asserting that low or high test scores are caused by the quality of instruction is illogical.

To understand this confounded-causation problem clearly, let's look at the kinds of test items that appear on standardized achievement tests. Remember, students' test scores are based on how well students do on the test's items. To get a really solid idea of what's in standardized tests, you need to grub around with the items themselves.

The three illustrative items presented here are mildly massaged versions of actual test items in current standardized achievement tests. I've modified the items' content slightly, without altering the essence of what the items are trying to measure.

The problem of confounded causation involves three factors that contribute to students' scores on standardized achievement tests: (1) what's taught in school, (2) a student's native intellectual ability, and (3) a student's out-of-school learning.

What's taught in school. Some of the items in standardized achievement tests measure the knowledge or skills that students learn in school. In certain subject areas, such as mathematics, children learn in school most of what they know about a subject. Few parents spend much time teaching their children about the intricacies of algebra or how to prove a theorem.

So, if you look over the items in any standardized achievement test, you'll find a fair number similar to the mathematics item presented in Figure 1, which is a mildly modified version of an item appearing in a standardized achievement test intended for 3rd grade children.

Figure 1. A 3rd Grade Standardized Achievement Test Item in Mathematics


Sally had 14 pears. Then she gave away 6. Which of the number sentences below can you use to find out how many pears Sally has left?

  1. 14 + 6 = ___
  2. 6 + 14 = ___
  3. __ ? 6 = 14
  4. 14 ? 6 = ___

This mathematics item would help teachers arrive at a valid inference about 3rd graders' abilities to choose number sentences that coincide with verbal representations of subtraction problems. Or, along with other similar items dealing with addition, multiplication, and division, this item would contribute to a valid inference about a student's ability to choose appropriate number sentences for a variety of basic computation problems presented in verbal form.

If the items in standardized achievement tests measured only what actually had been taught in school, I wouldn't be so negative about using these tests to determine educational quality. As you'll soon see, however, other kinds of items are hiding in standardized achievement tests.

A student's native intellectual ability. I wish I believed that all children were born with identical intellectual abilities, but I don't. Some kids were luckier at gene-pool time. Some children, from birth, will find it easier to mess around with mathematics than will others. Some kids, from birth, will have an easier time with verbal matters than will others. If children came into the world having inherited identical intellectual abilities, teachers' pedagogical problems would be far more simple.

Recent thinking among many leading educators suggests that there are various forms of intelligence, not just one (Gardner, 1994). A child who is born with less aptitude for dealing with quantitative or verbal tasks, therefore, might possess greater "interpersonal" or "intrapersonal" intelligence, but these latter abilities are not tested by these tests. For the kinds of items that are most commonly found on standardized achievement tests, children differ in their innate abilities to respond correctly. And some items on standardized achievement tests are aimed directly at measuring such intellectual ability.

Consider, for example, the item in Figure 2. This item attempts to measure a child's ability "to figure out" what the right answer is. I don't think that the item measures what's taught in school. The item measures what students come to school with, not what they learn there.

Figure 2. A 6th Grade Standardized Achievement Test Item in Social Studies


If someone really wants to conserve resources, one good way to do so is to:

  1. leave lights on even if they are not needed.
  2. wash small loads instead of large loads in a clothes-washing machine.
  3. write on both sides of a piece of paper.
  4. place used newspapers in the garbage.

In Figure 2's social studies item for 6th graders, look carefully at the four answer options. Read each option and see if it might be correct. A "smart" student, I contend, can figure out that choices A, B, and D really would not "conserve resources" all that well; hence choice C is the winning option. Brighter kids will have a better time with this item than their less bright classmates.

But why, you might be thinking, do developers of standardized tests include such items on their tests? The answer is all too simple. These sorts of items, because they tap innate intellectual skills that are not readily modifiable in school, do a wonderful job in spreading out test-takers' scores. The quest for score variance, coupled with the limitation of having few items to use in assessing students, makes such items appealing to those who construct standardized achievement tests.

But items that primarily measure differences in students' in-born intellectual abilities obviously do not contribute to valid inferences about "how well children have been taught." Would we like all children to do well on such "native-smarts" items? Of course we would. But to use such items to arrive at a judgment about educational effectiveness is simply unsound.

Out-of-school learning. The most troubling items on standardized achievement tests assess what students have learned outside of school. Unfortunately, you'll find more of these items on standardized achievement tests than you'd suspect. If children come from advantaged families and stimulus-rich environments, then they are more apt to succeed on items in standardized achievement test items than will other children whose environments don't mesh as well with what the tests measure. The item in Figure 3 makes clear what's actually being assessed by a number of items on standardized achievement tests.

Figure 3. A 6th Grade Standardized Achievement Test Item in Science


A plant's fruit always contains seeds. Which of the items below is not a fruit?

  1. orange
  2. pumpkin
  3. apple
  4. celery

This 6th grade science item first tells students what an attribute of a fruit is (namely, that it contains seeds). Then the student must identify what "is not a fruit" by selecting the option without seeds. As any child who has encountered celery knows, celery is a seed-free plant. The right answer, then, for those who have coped with celery's strings but never its seeds, is clearly choice D.

But what if when you were a youngster, your folks didn't have the money to buy celery at the store? What if your circumstances simply did not give you the chance to have meaningful interactions with celery stalks by the time you hit the 6th grade? How well do you think you'd do in correctly answering the item in Figure 3? And how well would you do if you didn't know that pumpkins were seed-carrying spheres? Clearly, if children know about pumpkins and celery, they'll do better on this item than will those children who know only about apples and oranges. That's how children's socioeconomic status gets mixed up with children's performances on standardized achievement tests. The higher your family's socioeconomic status is, the more likely you are to do well on a number of the test items you'll encounter in a such a test.

Suppose you're a principal of a school in which most students come from genuinely low socioeconomic situations. How are your students likely to perform on standardized achievement tests if a substantial number of the test's items really measure the stimulus-richness of your students' backgrounds? That's right, your students are not likely to earn very high scores. Does that mean your school's teachers are doing a poor instructional job? Of course not.

Conversely, let's imagine you're a principal in an affluent school whose students tend to have upper-class, well-educated parents. Each spring, your students' scores on standardized achievement tests are dazzlingly high. Does this mean your school's teachers are doing a super instructional job? Of course not.

One of the chief reasons that children's socioeconomic status is so highly correlated with standardized test scores is that many items on standardized achievement tests really focus on assessing knowledge and/or skills learned outside of school?knowledge and/or skills more likely to be learned in some socioeconomic settings than in others.

Again, you might ask why on earth would standardized achievement test developers place such items on their tests? As usual, the answer is consistent with the dominant measurement mission of those tests, namely, to spread out students' test scores so that accurate and fine-grained norm-referenced interpretations can be made. Because there is substantial variation in children's socioeconomic situations, items that reflect such variations are efficient in producing among-student variations in test scores.

You've just considered three important factors that can influence students' scores on standardized achievement tests. One of these factors was directly linked to educational quality. But two factors weren't.

What's an Educator to Do?

I've described a situation that, from the perspective of an educator, looks pretty bleak. What, if anything, can be done? I suggest a three-pronged attack on the problem. First, I think that you need to learn more about the viscera of standardized achievement tests. Second, I think that you need to carry out an effective educational campaign so that your educational colleagues, parents of children in school, and educational policymakers understand what the evaluative shortcomings of standardized achievement tests really are. Finally, I think that you need to arrange a more appropriate form of assessment-based evidence.

Learning about standardized achievement tests. Far too many educators haven't really studied the items on standardized achievement tests since the time that they were, as students, obliged to respond to those items. But the inferences made on the basis of students' test performances rest on nothing more than an aggregated sum of students' item-by-item responses. What educators need to do is to spend some quality time with standardized achievement tests?scrutinizing the test's items one at a time to see what they are really measuring.

Spreading the word. Most educators, and almost all parents and school board members, think that schools should be rated on the basis of their students' scores on standardized achievement tests. Those people need to be educated. It is the responsibility of all educators to do that educating.

If you do try to explain to the public, to parents, or to policymakers why standardized test scores will probably provide a misleading picture of educational quality, be sure to indicate that you're not running away from the need to be held accountable. No, you must be willing to identify other, more credible evidence of student achievement.

Coming up with other evidence. If you're going to argue against standardized achievement tests as a source of educational evidence for determining school quality, and you still are willing to be held educationally accountable, then you'll need to ante up some other form of evidence to show the world that you really are doing a good educational job.

I recommend that you attempt to assess students' mastery of genuinely significant cognitive skills, such as their ability to write effective compositions, their ability to use lessons from history to make cogent analyses of current problems, and their ability to solve high-level mathematical problems.

If the skills selected measure really important cognitive outcomes, are seen by parents and policymakers to be genuinely significant, and can be addressed instructionally by competent teachers, then the assembly of a set of pre-test-to-post-test evidence showing substantial student growth in such skills can be truly persuasive.

What teachers need are assessment instruments that measure worthwhile skills or significant bodies of knowledge. Then teachers need to show the world that they can instruct children so that those children make striking pre-instruction to post-instruction progress.

The fundamental point is this: If educators accept the position that standardized achievement test scores should not be used to measure the quality of schooling, then they must provide other, credible evidence that can be used to ascertain the quality of schooling. Carefully collected, nonpartisan evidence regarding teachers' pre-test-to-post-test promotion of undeniably important skills or knowledge just might do the trick.

Right Task, Wrong Tools

Educators should definitely be held accountable. The teaching of a nation's children is too important to be left unmonitored. But to evaluate educational quality by using the wrong assessment instruments is a subversion of good sense. Although educators need to produce valid evidence regarding their effectiveness, standardized achievement tests are the wrong tools for the task.

References

Freeman, D. J., Kuhs, T. M., Porter, A. C., Floden, R. E., Schmidt, W. H., & Schwille, J. R. (1983). Do textbooks and tests define a natural curriculum in elementary school mathematics? Elementary School Journal, 83(5), 501?513.

Gardner, H. (1994). Multiple intelligences: The theory in practice. Teacher's College Record, 95(4), 576?583.

Author's note: A longer version of this article will appear in the final chapter of W. James Popham's book Modern Educational Measurement: Practical Guidelines for Educational Leaders, 3rd ed., (forthcoming); Needham Heights, MA: Allyn & Bacon.

W. James Popham is a UCLA Emeritus Professor. He may be reached at IOX Assessment Associates, 5301 Beethoven St., Ste. 190, Los Angeles, CA 90066 (e-mail: wpopham@ucla.edu).

Source: http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/mar99/vol56/num06/why-standardized-tests-don't-measure-educational-quality.aspx

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