Wednesday, October 30, 2019

Skills Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Skills - Essay Example The supporting staff in the workforce should come up with the skills and also behaviors required in working effectively with the young people, the parents and children as well as with each other in positive ways that lead to achieving better outcomes (McWilliam 35). Those in the workforce should be skilled with knowledge on how to support young people who particularly are vulnerable inclusive of those who are looked after, those that are disabled and also with mental problems (McWilliam 45). Through the various education stages, young people face increasing difficulties in securing gainful employment and also career opportunities. When we focus on the world today, most of the unemployed people globally are young people (McWilliam 25). The government should come up with solutions to solve this problem like generating links with the work foundation to employ young people (McWilliam 15). Environments for learning should be created in such a way that they are conducive for studying. Such learning environments should be both indoor as well as outdoor spaces (Selter & Bentley 34). They should include more than just a single room arrangement. They should also be equipped with various activities such as cooperative play, messy play, and also large muscle activities. Resnick, Mitchel. "All I really need to know (about creative thinking) I learned (by studying how children learn) in kindergarten." Proceedings of the 6th ACM SIGCHI conference on Creativity & cognition. ACM,

Monday, October 28, 2019

Male and Female Roles in Society Essay Example for Free

Male and Female Roles in Society Essay Mozart Beethoven Within the classical style of music stand two well-known, well-versed composers: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Ludwig van Beethoven. Both men were crucial, influential figures in the Classical era of music and composed works that are still held with great praise and dignity over 200 years later. To passive listeners, Mozart and Beethoven are very similar in their style and compositions. Although similarities do exist, their music and personal lives differed, most appropriately due to the periods in which they became famous. Mozart, considered the best and most successful composer of the Classical era, began his work at a time when classical music was prominent. Beethoven, meanwhile, was successful during the transition between the Classical and Romantic eras. Although hes considered an influential figure of the Classical era, he is also credited with developing a new style and pushing the boundaries of classical music. Because Beethoven was born when Mozart began composing his early successful works he was able to take advantage of learning and studying classical music when it was at its best. Both composers were born into highly-musical families. Their fathers were their first teachers who considered their sons musical prodigies. Sonically, their works were quite different. Its often said that Beethoven stands out more than Mozart in classical music, that his compositions are more complex are more in touch with personality and emotion. At the same time, it could be said that Mozart was ahead of his time. Beethoven borrowed many ideas from numerous composers before him, including Mozart; in adding his own touch he made his works loved then and now

Saturday, October 26, 2019

Gandhi Was One of the Greatest Men to Ever Live Essay -- Indian, Revol

I am going to try to answer an interesting question as to who is the greatest man in the world today. In seeking an answer to this inquiry, I predict that people would first instinctively go back to the days of the great wars in history, and go over the names of the men who held positions of vast responsibility and power in that astonishing conflicts, people who succeed in front of their task and, thus, were considered heroes. However, I turn away from the storm of wars, and from the men who rode that storm to power and place; and I look further for that man who impresses me as the greatest man who lived in the world. A man, who people can surely call the greatest, should be a universal man — a man who combines in perfect balance the supreme qualities of an idealist and a realist, a dreamer and a doer. The man who satisfies those qualities, I believe is Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, the Indian leader, of the great revolutionary movement against British rule in India. He is better known as Mahatma, called by his own countrymen first, meaning â€Å"the Saint†. Gandhi was born on second October, 1869 in India, of a rich, clever and cultivated family. He was reared as the sons of such families are always reared, possessed of everything that money could buy (Gandhi: A Biography). On September 29, 1888 he went to England to study law at University College London. He took his degree in regular course, returned to India, but failed to become a successful lawyer in Bombay and Rajkot. At the same time, he already found that religion was coming to have a dominant place within his life. Even before his journey to England, he had taken the vow to abstain from wine, flesh, and sexual intercourse, and on his return to India, his asceticism in... ...crowds of people were gathering in order to hear his words. He seems to be was a person whom the Indians saw in him, perfect and universal man. He had a simple, altruistically and uncorrupted personality. In his political duties he was a firm realist, consistently working towards a goal of liberation; while on the other hand, he was an idealist, living ever in the pure happiness of the spirit. Works Cited "Gandhi: A Biography." Kamat's Potpourri. 4 Jan. 2011. Navajivan Trust. 13 Feb. 2011. . Holmes, John Haynes. "Mahatma Gandhi: an American Portrait." Harvard Square Library. 2006. Harvard University. 12 Feb. 2011. . Moncur, Michael. "Mahatma Ghandi Quotations." The Quotations Page. 1994. 12 Feb. 2011. .

Thursday, October 24, 2019

Psychological assessment tools

Validation history, strength and weaknesses: One of the criticism of the gung scale Is that It used graded responses that may be confusing to elderly patients ,and so they may require assistance from the examiner to complete the form. Another problem with the test is that the mean score for elders Is significantly higher than that for younger subjects, with many normal elders assessed as false positive. It also misses depression in the elderly if it takes the form of multiple somatic complaints. Many authors have advised that it should NT be used for either research or clinical assessment of geriatric depression.Despite the concerns over the use of gung self depression scale in elderly , it still continues to be used for research especially in Europe,where it has been noted to revel sex and differences In in scales factor structure in the elderly population-the scale has also en translated to many languages including Arabic, German ,Portuguese and Spanish. 2. Millions clinical multir acial inventory. In 1969, Theodore millions undertook the test construction of the mimic. It contained 11 personality scales and clinical syndromes. Alt was revised both in 1989 and 1994.The millions clinical multiracial inventory is used to asses patient with a suspected or known psychological disorder to refine the diagnoses. The test is designed to be used specifically with adults. While it is developed mainly for use with mentally ill population. Scope: It is sometimes used for patients without a known psychological disorder. It can sometimes provide onsite into personality traits that can help people in psychotherapy NAS other settings. The MIMIC contains a total of 28 scales broken down into 24 clinical scales(personality and clinical syndrome scale).The 14 personally scales include; schizoid, avoiding, depressive ,dependent, histrionic, narcissistic,c antisocial, sadistic, compulsive, negativism,masochistic, psychotically, borderline and paranoid. The clinical scales include; anxiety, comparators, bipolar, hysteria, alcohol dependence, drug dependence, PATS, thought disorder, delusion disorder, and major depression. The mortifying indices include disclosure scale (x) , the desirability scale (y), and the debasement scale (z). Items: There are 175 true or false questions ,which ar designed to be completed in half an hour.The test closely coordinates with the ADSM . Patients' raw scores are converted to Base Rate (BRB) scores to allow comparison between the personality indices. The Base Rate scores are essentially where each score fits on a scale of 1-115, with 60 being he median score. Conversion to a Base Rate score is relatively complex, and there are certain corrections that are administered based on each patient's response style The Disclosure scale is the only scale in the MIMIC-III in which the raw scores are interpreted and in which a particularly low score is clinically relevant.A raw score above 178 or below 34 is considered to not be an accurat e representation of the patient's personality style as they either over-or under-disclosed and may indicate questionable results. A base rate score of 75 or greater on the Desirability or Debasement scales indicate that the examiner should proceed with cautioner the Personality and Clinical Syndrome scales, base rate scores of 75-84 are taken to indicate the presence of a personality trait, or (for the Clinical Syndromes scales) the presence of a clinical syndrome. Scores of 85 or above indicate the persistence of a personality trait or a clinical syndrome .Validation History and psychometric properties: Theoretical-substantive validity[edit] The first stage was a deductive approach and involved developing a large pool of items; the number of items was reduced based on a rational approach according to he degree to which they fit the theory as well as elimination of items based on simplicity, grammar, content, and scale relevance. Internal-structural validity[edit] Once the initial i tem pool was reduced, the second validation stage assessed how well items interrelated, and the psychometric properties of the test were determined.Internal consistency is the extent to which the items on a scale generally measure the same thing. Cockroach's alpha statistics range from . 66 (Compulsive) to . 90 (Major Depression). Test-retest reliability is a measure of the stability of the measure, or the change over time. The higher the correlation, the more stable the measure is. Based on 87 participants, the test-retest reliability of the MIMIC-III (5-14 days later) ranged from . 82 (Debasement) to . 96 (Comparators) with a median coefficient of . 91 . These however, no long-term data are available. External-criterion validity[edit] The final validation stage includes convergent and discriminative validity of the test, which is assessed by correlating the test with similar/dissimilar instruments. Positive predictive power is the likelihood of being right given a test positive, w hich ranged from . 30 (Masochistic) to . 1 (Dependent). Sensitivity, or the proportion of individuals that have a condition that are correctly identified ranged from . 44 (Negativism) to . 92 (Paranoid). Strength and weaknesses; the test is brief in comparison to other personality inventories and it has a strong theoretical basis.Some psychologists prefer to give it because the administration and scoring are simple, and it has a multi-axial format. The organization of the scales was confirmed by factor analysis and correlations done with third-party tests further confirm the validity of the scales. Internal consistency and alpha coefficients for the est., as well as test-retest reliability, are all good. 3. BECK'S ANXIETY INVENTORY The Beck Anxiety Inventory (ABA), created by DRP. Aaron T. Beck and other colleagues. It is a 21 -question multiple-choice self-report inventory that is used for measuring the severity of an individual's anxiety.The Beck Anxiety Inventory is a well accept ed self-report measure of anxiety in adults and adolescents for use in both clinical and research settings Scope: Though anxiety can be thought of as having several components, including cognitive, somatic, affective, and behavioral components, Beck et al. Included only two components in the Basis original proposal: cognitive and somatic. [2] The cognitive subspace provides a measure of fearful thoughts and impaired cognitive functioning, and the somatic subspace measures the symptoms of physiological arousal.Because the somatic subspace is emphasized on the ABA, with 15 out of 21 items measuring physiological symptoms, perhaps the cognitive, affective, and behavioral components of anxiety are being deemphasized. Therefore, the ABA functions more adequately in anxiety disorders with a high somatic component, such as panic disorder. On the there hand, the ABA won't function as adequately for disorders such as social phobia or obsessive-compulsive disorder, which have a stronger cogni tive or behavioral component.

Wednesday, October 23, 2019

Biological Perspective Essay

One client I worked with had very low levels of assertiveness and because of this was often treated very badly by friends, family and work colleagues. This led to her becoming really rather depressed, which meant that she tended to avoid interactions with other people whenever possible, lowering further still her confidence and her ability to deal with social situations. She was becoming increasingly withdrawn. Whilst the counselling helped her to understand how she was contributing towards her own distress by having so low an opinion of herself, the antidepressants helped her to feel well enough to start to re-engage with people and to put into practice some of the ideas and life skills she was learning in therapy. By the time the medication was slowly stopped after her depression had lifted, she had firmly established new patterns of behaviour and relationships. She was easily able to continue this new and more useful way of being, therefore removing the need for further medication . Back to Top The Disadvantages of Antidepressants Many people I know would say that when you are profoundly depressed, there are no disadvantages to taking something that makes you feel better. Certainly I know many clients whose lives have been transformed by taking the right antidepressant, prescribed by their doctor or psychiatrist. Having said that, no medication is without its problems. With antidepressants, the main problems are firstly, finding the right antidepressant and secondly, side-effects. Antidepressants seem to help about half of the people who take them and different antidepressants work better with some people than others. The process of matching the right medication to the person is far from a precise science and one psychiatrist I know will admit that it often comes down to luck and guesswork. Having said that, the choice of antidepressant is usually informed by the exact nature of the symptoms experienced.

Tuesday, October 22, 2019

American Home Products Essay Example

American Home Products Essay Example American Home Products Paper American Home Products Paper American Home Products (AHP) is a capital structure case. For the purpose of this analysis it is assumed that AHP currently has no debt. In other words it is an unlevered company. The focus of this case is that with the retirement of AHPs CEO there is an opportunity to change the capital structure of the firm by adding some debt. The issue is should debt be added and, if so, how much debt should be added. Four options will be analyzed: 0%, 30%, 50%, and 70%. Currently, due to the lack of debt, this firm only faces operating risk as opposed to financial risk. AHP has a solid five year compound annual growth rate in both earnings and dividends per share of 12.4% and 13.6% respectively. This compares favorably to a proxy company, Warner-Lambert, where the five year compound annual growth rate in both earnings and dividends per share was 3.0% and 8.0% respectively. Overall, the unlevered AHP has a history of solid returns, good growth and in general low business risk. Since we are dealing with accounting numbers in this case, certain assumptions were made for this analysis. First, since AHP has high quality earnings it is assumed that the cash and accounting numbers will be close over the long term. Second, the level of debt taken on in these scenarios is going to go into perpetuity, getting replaced as it matures. Also the risk level of future tax shields is the same as the risk level of the debt of the firm. Finally it is assumed that the firm can borrow in all three scenarios at 14%. The analysis compares AHP issuing debt and retiring equity in three scenarios: 30%, 50%, and 70%. As depicted in Figure 1, Appendix A, the unlevered value of the firm (VU) is $4665.0 million. The required return, ru, was calculated using the constant dividend growth model where the dividends/share of $1.90 divided by a current stock price of $30/share plus an average dividend increase since 1973 of 12.12% per year yielding an ru = 18.45%. When debt occurs in each scenario the market price of the firm also changes. Figure 1 in Appendix A depicts the new stock price/share for each proposed level of debt. The current price of $30/share would increase to $31.58/share for 30%, $32.21 for 50%, and $33.16/share for 50%. These new values were calculated using the current dividend ratio (unlevered stock price/share divided by the current dividend) of $30/$1.90 = 15.79. This ratio was then multiplied by the dividends per share for each of the scenarios resulting in the above stock prices. To calculate the weighted average cost of capital (WACC) for each of the debt scenario we need to know the cost of debt and the cost of equity. The before-tax cost of debt is given in the case as 14%. To calculate the cost of equity, we can again turn to the constant growth model where r = (D1/P0 + g) = $2.13/$30 + 12.12% = 19.22% for the unlevered firm where D1 is the expected dividend in 1982, P0 is the current stock price, and 12.12% is the average % increase in dividends year-over-year. The results for the cost of equity at each debt level are listed in Appendix A, figure 1: 18.86%, 18.73%, and 18.54% for the 30%, 50%, and 70% scenarios respectively. Using the above values for cost of equity and debt, along with debt and equity values given in this case the WACC can now be calculated resulting in 19.22%, 17.40%, 16.36%, and 15.36% for the 0%, 30%, 50%, and 70% scenarios respectively. If the firm is able to earn simply its WACC (NPV = 0), the value of the firm is going to increase by the investment amount. If the firm earns more than its WACC, then the value of the firm should increase by the investment amount plus the amount captured by the shareholders in the positive NPV resulting in a higher market price. Of course, if the NPV is negative the value of the firm goes up less than the value of the investment. The interest expenses given in this case are a return on the debt. As discussed in class, when calculating return on assets (ROA) we can not simply divide net income by assets if a firm is using debt financing because there is a downward bias due to the interest expense. ROA determines profitability of the assets. We need to add the interest expense times (1-tax rate) to the net income before dividing by assets resulting in an ROA of 18.81% for the unlevered scenario and 20.21% for each of our debt scenarios. Comparing firm ROA against WACC for each debt scenario shows we are earning more than WACC in each case, which is good. We are not destroying shareholder value in any of these cases. ROA is the same across the scenarios since the operating risk and performance are all the same. However, ROE is not the same. The levered firm is able to earn favorable financial leverage (a.k.a. trading on the equity). ROE is listed in Figure 1 and in the case of the levered firm ROE ROA because the firm is able to earn more of those funds than the after-tax cost of debt. There is favorable financial leverage in all proposed scenarios. To determine where there is favorable versus unfavorable leverage we can perform an earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) profitability analysis. Figure 2 in Appendix B lists the calculated EBIT indifference levels with each scenario compared against one another and Figure 3 plots the unlevered firm against each proposed debt case. For expected EBIT $130.4 million we have unfavorable leverage for all debt scenarios. Whereas for any value of EBIT ~$175 million we have favorable financial leverage with the 70% scenario. The optimal capital structure is the point where the value of the firm is maximized and WACC is minimized. Adding too much debt will decrease the value of the firm due to agency and expense costs. Finally, we can compare the proposed capital structures by calculating ROA and ROE for the EBIT indifference levels. The table in Appendix C, Figure 4 lists the previously calculated indifference levels along with the new calculations for ROA and ROE at these levels. Since this comparison is limited to comparing a capital structure with debt versus an all-equity structure, ROA=ROE=after-tax cost of debt at the EBIT indifference levels. Figure 5 shows that for EBIT levels ~$130 million, the best choice is 0% debt. For EBIT levels between ~$130 and ~$152 million, the best choice is 30% debt. Between ~$152 and ~$165 million, the best option is 50% debt. And for EBIT above $165 million, the best choice is 70% debt. In summary, AHP should implement a more aggressive capital structure by leveraging the company to 70% debt since EBIT will be substantially above $165 million. I believe the capital markets would favor AHP adopting my proposed capital structure since the resulting ROE increases would show more profitability and the stock price would increase. There would be a higher degree of operating risk but given the firms outstanding past performance, solid growth, and expected future earnings this should not pose a problem.

Monday, October 21, 2019

Why ACT Reading Paired Passages Are So Hard

Why ACT Reading Paired Passages Are So Hard SAT / ACT Prep Online Guides and Tips Paired passages on the ACT are a relatively new phenomenon, first announced by ACT, Inc in spring of 2013. Just as the changes to the new SAT have made it resemble the ACT, so have some of the changes to the ACT made it more like the SAT. What are paired passages, why are they suddenly on the ACT, and what’s the best way to prepfor them? Read on to find out. feature image credit: Pencil Biting by Walt Stoneburner, used under CC BY 2.0. ACT Reading Paired Passages: The Origin Story As far as I’ve been able to research it out, the first time any mention of two short passages (paired pasages) appeared in the â€Å"preparing for the ACT† manual was 2012-2013 (in 2011-2012, the Reading section was still made up of â€Å"four prose passages† with questions that asked about individual passages). For a long time, however, despite the fact that as early as June 2014 the ACT was including paired passages on official test administrations (as per PrepScholar co-founder Allen Cheng, who took the ACT then), the only place with official practice for ACT paired passage questions was the ACT website, which provided 9 paired passage questions (3 of which asked about multiple passages). Most prep books (including The Real ACT, 3rd (and current) edition, Kaplan's ACT Premier 2014 guide, the ACT Black Book, and Meltzer's The Complete Guide to ACT Reading) do not include paired passage practice questions, let along any strategies to deal with them. As of July 2015, the new 2015-2016 "Preparing for the ACT" guide finally includes a test with paired passages and 10 questions on these passages (incuding another 3 on both passages). Fun fact: as I was looking through the new guide, I noticed that the ACT Reading questions looked really familiar, and so I double checked with Allen's June 2014 booklet (acquired through TIR) and confirmed that yes, the test included in the "Preparing for the ACT: 2015-2016" guide is the (US administered) June 2014 ACT. Why Does This Make Paired Passages on ACT Reading Extra Difficult? I don’t mean to climb on my soapbox, but I see this as more than a â€Å"minor† change. We at PrepScholar have always stated that the best way to practice for the ACT is to use actual ACT Reading practice questions, because only the ACT words the questions (and answer choices) in that certain way. If there are no (or relatively few) questions to practice with, how are students supposed to prepare for the test? Moreover, how can the scores of students who took the ACT without paired passages on the Reading section (any student who took the ACT prior to June 2014) be compared to those of students who are taking the ACT with paired passages (any student who took the test June 2014 or later)? For the most part, answering a question about multiple passages is more difficult than answering a question about just one passage, because nswering questions on multiple passages requires you to synthesize more information and juggling multiple perspectives in your head, as you try to keep track of who said what where and when did she say it. This is definitely a valuable skill to develop, particularly for students heading to college. However, ACT Reading is already a big time crunch (35 minutes to answer 40 questions), and going from 4 to 5 passages, even if those passages are now 2/5 shorter, is not insignificant. chubby soapbox by daretoeatapeach, used under CC BY 2.0. This is clearly a photorealistic portrait of me done as I was writing this article. Clearly. Paired Passage Question: A Comparison Below is a comparison of a paired passage question with a single-passage question, modified to be on the same topic. For each question, I list the steps needed to successfully answer the question. Paired passage example (adapted from an ACTual ACT Reading question): Based on these two passages, which pair of phrases best compares Stark’s relationship to Science and Banner’s relationship to Science? F. Aimless researcher versus idle dreamer G. Fascinated onlooker versus pragmatic worker H. Casual alchemist versus thoughtful artist J. Indifferent outsider versus sarcastic farmer How do you answer this question? You must go through Passage A and find information about Stark’s relationship to Science, then go to Passage B and find information about Banner’s relationship to Science, then compare the two, and then see which answer matches reality. That's a four step process. When answering a comparable question on a single passage, you only have to go through two steps. Take the following (adapted) ACT question: Stark’s approach to the task of converting the junk in the cave to a functioning energy source can best be described as: F. reluctant until his companion’s plans inspire him.G. enthusiastic until his companion’s error puts them both in an awkward position.H. apprehensive until he discovers his error is not a devastating one.J. thrilled until he remembers that his companion is a poor planner. All you need to do in order to answer this question is go through the passage and find information about Stark’s approach to converting junk into functioning energy source and then see which answer matches reality. What Can I Do To Practice Paired Passages? Since there are so few official sample questions out there, this makes it difficult (but not impossible!) to create tailored advice. I recommend starting with my article on how to attack paired passages in ACT Reading, which goes into great detail on this very topic. In short, though, here are the takeaway strategies from that article: 1. Answer questions on individual passages first. As I discussed above, questions on single passages are generally less complex than those on multiple passages, which makes them better to tackle first. In addition, answering questions on a particular passage may lead to your finding information that is useful for answering multipassage questions. 2. Guess on all multi-passage questions. If you’re not aiming for above a 31 on Reading, you can safely skip/guess on the 3 questions per ACT Reading section that ask about multiple questions, and still have some room for other errors. Choose your favorite letter pair (A/F, B/G, and so on) and go for it! 3. Eliminate three wrong answers (yes, that good old standby). Answer choices to questions on multiple passages tend to be relatively complicated, but this means that they can also be easier to eliminate, since if any part of the answer choice is wrong, then the whole thing must be wrong. 4. Practice with official SAT paired passage questions. Currently, there are 8 free official SAT practice tests that contain ACT-length paired passages. Each set of these paired passages has around 12 questions, for a total of 95 paired passage questions (yes, I did actually go in and count it). That's exactly 5x as many questions as compared to the 19 total (not just free, but TOTAL) official paired passage questions provided by the ACT. What’s Next? Want to make sure you're practicing ACT Reading as effectively as possible? Find out more about paired passages and strategies to help answer questions on multiple passages here. How should you approach passages in the first place? Our blog has explanations of three different ways to approach the passage on ACT Reading. Want to improve your ACT Reading skills? Read our series of targeted articles on big picture, little picture, and vocab in context questions - articles about function and inference questions on ACT Reading are coming soon! Want to improve your ACT score by 4 points? Check out our best-in-class online ACT prep program. We guarantee your money back if you don't improve your ACT score by 4 points or more. Our program is entirely online, and it customizes what you study to your strengths and weaknesses. If you liked this Reading lesson, you'll love our program.Along with more detailed lessons, you'll get thousands ofpractice problems organized by individual skills so you learn most effectively. We'll also give you a step-by-step program to follow so you'll never be confused about what to study next. Check out our 5-day free trial: