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As schools attempt to address the needs of an ever more diverse student population, many have turned to intensive interventions to improve reading performance. Reading First grants from the United States Department of Education encouraged schools to implement evidence-based instructional practices in elementary schools. However, for many schools, implementation of Reading First and other intensive data-driven reading initiatives has not included students considered to have significant disabilities or has led to increased pull-out or separate remediation services. We consider how Reading First efforts can be integrated into a rich, inclusive education program for all students, including those considered to have the most significant disabilities. We discuss how schools can creatively utilize staff and scheduling to maximize push-in support and encourage interdisciplinary and data-driven problem solving to provide meaningful guidance for reading instruction for the benefit of all students.

To assess suitable areas for species, plant ecologists need accurate spatial information about available water for plants. Despite the recognized importance of topography in controlling soil moisture patterns, existing maps do not account for the redistribution of water through lateral fluxes. We included lateral fluxes in a GIS-based soil water balance model with the aim of evaluating the influence of lateral fluxes on soil moisture patterns and their importance to explain tree species distribution at regional scale. We used hydrological knowledge about lateral fluxes to map the distribution of monthly average soil moisture over the 1961–1990 period, for a 43,000-km 2 area in northeastern France. We then compared the ability of soil water estimated with or without lateral fluxes to explain the distribution of 19 common tree species. Spatial patterns significantly change when lateral fluxes are included in the model, with both large-scale effects due to variations in climate and soil properties, and local effects due to topography. The lateral redistribution given by the model revealed from 5% to 25% less water on the crests compared to in the valleys for metamorphic, sand and sedimentary bedrocks. Most of the tree species distributions studied were better explained when lateral fluxes were taken into account. Estimating soil moisture dynamics improves the ability to determine suitable areas for species at the landscape scale. It has major implications in the current climate change context owing to the potential to delineate topographic refugia or areas where species could colonize. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Canopy base height (CBH) is a key parameter used in forest-fire modeling, particularly crown fires. However, estimating CBH is a challenging task, because normally, it is difficult to measure it in the field. This has led to the use of simple estimators (e.g., the average of individual trees in a plot) for modeling CBH. In this paper, we propose a method for estimating CBH from airborne light detection and ranging (LiDAR) data. We also compare the performance of several estimators (Lorey's mean, the arithmetic mean and the 40th and 50th percentiles) used to estimate CBH at the plot level. The method we propose uses a moving voxel to estimate the height of the gaps (in the LiDAR point cloud) below tree crowns and uses this information for modeling CBH. The advantage of this approach is that it is more tolerant to variations in LiDAR data (e.g., due to season) and tree species, because it works directly with the height information in the data. Our approach gave better results when compared to standard percentile-based LiDAR metrics commonly used in modeling CBH. Using Lorey's mean, the arithmetic mean and the 40th and 50th percentiles as CBH estimators at the plot level, the highest and lowest values for root mean square error (RMSE) and root mean square error for cross-validation (RMSEcv) and R2 for our method were 1.74/2.40, 2.69/3.90 and 0.46/0.71, respectively, while with traditional LiDAR-based metrics, the results were 1.92/2.48, 3.34/5.51 and 0.44/0.65. Moreover, the use of Lorey's mean as a CBH estimator at the plot level resulted in models with better predictive value based on the leave-one-out cross-validation (LOOCV) results used to compute the RMSEcv values. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Discusses the relationship between nursing and primary health care. Support of nurses for village health worker programs; Role of nursing professionals in promoting welfare improvements; Cooperation between nurses and traditional health attendants. INSET: Primary health care checklist for nursing.

To limit introduction of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), the United States restricted travel from China on February 2, 2020, and from Europe on March 13. To determine whether local transmission of SARS-CoV-2 could be detected, the New York City (NYC) Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (DOHMH) conducted deidentified sentinel surveillance at six NYC hospital emergency departments (EDs) during March 1-20. On March 8, while testing availability for SARS-CoV-2 was still limited, DOHMH announced sustained community transmission of SARS-CoV-2 (1). At this time, twenty-six NYC residents had confirmed COVID-19, and ED visits for influenza-like illness* increased, despite decreased influenza virus circulation. † The following week, on March 15, when only seven of the 56 (13%) patients with known exposure histories had exposure outside of NYC, the level of community SARS-CoV-2 transmission status was elevated from sustained community transmission to widespread community transmission (2). Through sentinel surveillance during March 1-20, DOHMH collected 544 specimens from patients with influenza-like symptoms (ILS) § who had negative test results for influenza and, in some instances, other respiratory pathogens. ¶ All 544 specimens were tested for SARS-CoV-2 at CDC; 36 (6.6%) tested positive. Using genetic sequencing, CDC determined that the sequences of most SARS-CoV-2-positive specimens resembled those circulating in Europe, suggesting probable introductions of SARS-CoV-2 from Europe, from other U.S. locations, and local introductions from within New York. These findings demonstrate that partnering with health care facilities and developing the systems needed for rapid implementation of sentinel surveillance, coupled with capacity for genetic sequencing before an outbreak, can help inform timely containment and mitigation strategies., Competing Interests: All authors have completed and submitted the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors form for disclosure of potential conflicts of interest. Wendy Szymczak reports personal fees from Qiagen, outside the submitted work. Lars Westblade reports grants from Accelerate Diagnostics, Inc., Affinity Biosensors, LLC, BioFire Diagnostics, LLC, and Hardy Diagnostics; grants and personal fees from Roche Molecular Systems, Inc.; and personal fees from Shionogi, Inc. No other potential conflicts of interest were disclosed.