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The REL Mid-Atlantic Webinar discussed the elements in a positive school climate and shared different methods for assessing school data, including the Comprehensive School Climate Inventory. The Q&A presented in this document address the questions participants had for Dr. Cohen following the webinar. The webinar recording and PowerPoint presentation are also available online. Links are provided in the document.

Based on over half a century's personal experience with the Australian community's poor understanding of art, this paper concludes that exposing thousands of secondary students to the subject "Art" over this period has had little or no effect on competency. Instances are documented. Possible reasons explored include: the common methodology dubbed "the bootstraps theory of art education" (encouraging self-expression together with avoidance of inculcation) while the commercial and entertainment worlds adopt the opposite methodology; the related misunderstanding of the principles of Modernism; and teachers' inability to distinguish among the principles of "art,""design," and "craft." These three terms are analyzed. (Author/BT)

Although by no means universally so, urban graffiti is commonly regarded as vandalism. It costs authorities in Australia hundreds of thousands of dollars to remove each year, and it offends many adults as callow effusions of the territorial markings of "human tomcats." Authorities are mounting campaigns to catch the offenders in the act and punish them severely. But the offenders mostly maintain that they are making "art"--a positive act, not vandalism--and improving the environment. This paper views this response as stemming from an inadequate and even totally wrong conception of what art really is. The paper locates graffiti conceptually within "design," but finds that even so it cannot be justified. The paper suggests a national regimen of teaching art in all schools. It is highly likely that the creative energy, a natural and laudable aspect of growing children, would be channeled into socially acceptable forms of expression, without repression. (BT)

Describes advances in and advantages of computer simulation in education and industry. Gives examples from health care and waste handling industries and technology education classrooms. (SK)

The United Kingdom's technology education curriculum was distorted by political imperatives and a philosophy that has no empirical verification. Top-down implementation has led to a random approach, inflated claims for technology education, and neglect of a deeper understanding of technology. (SK)

Although the technology as applied science perspective is being challenged, newer models obscure the real relationship between science and technology. The role of technology education should be to broaden understanding of technology and the role of science in its development. (SK)

The impact that color-copying technology and digital imaging have had on art, photography, and design are explored. Color copiers have provided new opportunities for direct and spontaneous image making an the potential for new transformations in art. The current generation of digital color copiers permits new directions in imaging, but the manipulations possible with digital images create ethical quandaries that are not yet fully realized. Digital imagery also diminishes the distinction between originals and multiples. Appropriation of an original is quick and effortless, and can be seen as either a concern or an opportunity. The wizardry of digital color copiers and related computer technologies is reminiscent of the magical quality attributed to photography in its early years. The potential for new constructs offered by digital imaging can be seen as both opportunity and concern. (Contains 5 references.) (SLD)

This report is one of seven that identify major new and emerging technological advances expected to influence major vocational education program areas and to describe the programmatic implications in terms of skill-knowledge requirements, occupations most directly affected, and the anticipated diffusion rate. Chapter 1 considers technology as process, the relation of technology and productivity, and technology as the arbitrator of work. The first of three sections in chapter 2 presents the procedures used to identify and clarify the most innovative, new, and emerging technologies with implications for vocational education. Brief descriptions of the technologies expected to affect technical occupations are included in section 2. Section 3 contains nine essays describing these new and emerging technologies with implications for technical occupations: process control, microelectronic monitors and controls, computer-based design and manufacture, robotics, software, optical data transmission, automotive services, renewable energy technologies, and microcomputers and microprocessors. Chapter 3 is an annotated bibliography with citations descriptive of new or emerging technologies, their diffusion, or insights as to their vocational implications. (YLB)

The use of metaphor offers considerable promise within scientific disciplines for encouraging creative thinking, drawing attention to important concepts or principles in a discipline, and developing new methodologies. Ferguson's description of architectural practice as a metaphor for the development of social programs is used to demonstrate these uses of metaphor through a comparison of architecture to the development of culturally adapted minority education programs. Architecture's design process, which seeks to understand context through analysis and to create a form appropriate to that context through synthesis, parallels educational program development. Judging the success of the design process through the analysis of fit between the form and its context, extends the metaphor to program evaluation. Like architecture, educational programs have functional-practical, milieu-creating and symbolic purpose. As in architectural building tasks, minority educational program development must analyze the cultural contexts, seek solutions to a series of functional or psychological needs, view the resulting form as one solution among many, and evaluate the fit. (BS)

The Society of Automotive Engineers is involved in developing middle school curriculum for technology education based on authentic engineering design challenges. The design brief model fits real-world practices and integrates science, math, and technology. (SK)

Reports that technical communicators face ethical questions at almost every step when working with graphics and illustrations. Presents examples of ethical conflicts, describes some of the prominent visual rhetorics, and discusses ethical issues that need to be addressed. Suggests some steps for improving ethical awareness related to graphics and illustrations. (PA)

States that in "The New Typography," Jan Tschichold explicates a functionalist and information-based theory of typographic design and demonstrates its application in numerous typographic examples of varied genres. Outlines Tschichold's typographic position; analyzes his style of visual communication; and considers subsequent developments in terms of the modernist commitment to functionalism and the changing roles of information. (PA)

Finite element analysis (FEA) enables industrial designers to analyze complex components by dividing them into smaller elements, then assessing stress and strain characteristics. Traditionally mainframe based, FEA is being increasingly used in microcomputers. (SK)

In a role-playing approach to an information systems analysis and design course, students are familiarized with the needs of designers, decision makers, and system users by assuming these roles. The approach increases awareness of process, is flexible, and exposes students to the team approach. (SK)

Lists 15 principles for working safely with equipment. Describes phases of an ergonomic hazards program to identify and prevent problems and causes of cumulative trauma disorders in the workplace. (SK)

Presents the principles of a development methodology for software design based on a nonlinear, product-driven approach that integrates quality aspects. Two examples are given to show that the flexibility needed for building high quality systems leads to integrated development environments in which methodology, product, and tools are closely attuned. (Contains 23 references.) (KRN)

Offers a sketch of a concept called the "liminal state" that may represent a central element of designing and a condition that facilitates the best design products and processes. A definition of "liminal state," some contexts in which it may occur, and some areas where liminal states might improve performance are given. (Contains 34 references.) (KRN)

Argues that a process orientation, rather than a focus on inputs and outputs, offers performance technologists a more direct way of contributing to the realization of key business goals and more effectively focuses training and development on performance issues. Process redesign is a key strategy in the realization of these two goals. (Contains 15 references.) (KRN)

Since instructional design is a kind of skilled professional behavior, the education of other skilled professionals is examined, and suggestions are made for analogous instructional techniques in any field. The question of how instructional designers should be educated is related to the larger question of how to teach people to design in general. (Contains 35 references.) (KRN)

Introduces design, integrated with systems thinking, as a necessary if not sufficient means for meeting the challenge of how to create or recreate organizations and institutions. The limits of problem-solving strategies when applied to complex organizational change, the designer's role, and the creative process of design are discussed. (Contains eight references.) (KRN)

Argues that the shared use of artifacts is supported by latent border resources that lie beyond the canonical artifact. Designers must understand the role border resources play and work more directly to help users develop them. This will require designers to change their understanding of artifacts and users. (Contains 69 references.) (KRN)

Introduces and discusses briefly 10 multimedia products that are fun, useful, and that can teach a lot about communicating technical and business information. Discusses seven things that designers can learn from such examples. (SR)

Special issue includes "Creativity at the Workplace" (Donnelly); "Creativity Revisited" (Iandoli); interviews with 16 people who work in or teach industrial engineering, software, and graphic design; "On Creativity and Schooling" (Coppola, Iandoli); and "End Notes: What I Learned" (Iandoli). (SK)

Criticizes an article in an earlier issue of this journal concerning Otto Neurath. Argues against the notion that Neurath was a communist and an agent of Soviet propaganda. Suggests that the previous article's dichotomy that graphic information is either hard science or pure art prevents an understanding of the subject. (RS)

Considers what constitutes a system for design learning (SDL) based on activities of the International Systems Institute and on designing and implementing SDL in a master's program in marriage and family therapy. Establishing a design culture by creating a design community and learning from anxiety are also discussed. (Contains 11 references.) (LRW)

Discusses the development of "smart" or advanced materials such as ceramics, metals, composites, and polymers. Provides a design brief, a student learning activity with outcomes, quiz, and resources. (SK)

Presents an interpolation methodology that duplicates and improves the results of mathematical functional relationships useful for designing business enterprise simulations and argues that interpolation is effective over the entire range of production and sales activity. (six references) (EA)

One elementary school program approaches technology activities involving design and construction that enables students to premodel designs using a commercial instructional package produced by LEGO. (JOW)

Discusses research supporting the introduction of technology to 3- to 6-year olds. Presents a lesson and activity outline with technology target skills, links to children's literature, and integration with curriculum objectives, as well as an example of a design brief. (JOW)

Suggests that engaging students in designing and making play spaces for younger children makes meaningful learning fun and instills values of community service. (JOW)

Sketches and drawings are a means of communicating ideas in the design process. Students need help in overcoming the conditioned response of producing finished, polished work and in learning efficient and effective ways of communicating ideas through images. (SK)

Teaching the design process is fundamental to math, science, and technology. Technology education can have a stronger presence in reform efforts aimed at integrating curricula through the teaching of design. (SK)

Discusses the history and types of high school magazines. Offers community coverage ideas for these magazines. Discusses trends and design of magazines. (SR)

Considers Edward Tufte's nine principles for design in terms of scientific illustration. (SR)

Discussion of change and its perceived threats focuses on the concept of design and how it could positively alter the perception of change. Three approaches to change are examined, including improvement, planning, and design; and design is highlighted as offering the greatest range of possibilities. (LRW)

Since designers and artists use stochastic processes in making aesthetic decisions, computers operating in a random generate-and-test mode may be useful to simulate and enhance human creative endeavor. (RM)

Papers on art libraries and information services for the arts, which were presented at the 1983 International Federation of Library Associations (IFLA) conference, include: (1) "'I See All': Information Technology and the Universal Availability of Images" by Philip Pacey (United Kingdom); (2) "Online Databases in the Fine Arts" by Michael Rinehart (United States); (3) "State of Automation in Swiss Art Libraries: The General Situation" by Karl Jost (Switzerland); (4) "Computerisation in Swiss Art Libraries: State of the Art" by Jean-Pierre Dubouloz (Switzerland) (English translation by Morag Morton); (5) "Computer Applications to Slide Collections" by A. Zelda Richardson (United States); (6) "ARLIS/ANZ (Art Libraries Society/Australia New Zealand) and Art Libraries in the Antipodes" by Valerie Richards (New Zealand); (7) "The Art and Architecture Thesaurus Project" by Pat Molholt (United States); (8) "Information Technology & Visual Images: Some Trends & Developments" by Patrick Purcell and Henry Okun (United States); (9) "The Development, Management, and Preservation of Art and Architectural Microform Collections" by Paula Chiarmonte (United States); (10) "Online Databases for Architects and Designers" by Valerie J. Bradfield (United Kingdom); (11) "CeCILE: A Bibliographic Database for Design at the Pompidou Centre" by C. Mihailovic (France) (English translation by Ian Sheridan); (12) "Systeme Descriptif des Representations (A System for Describing Representational Art)" by Francois Garnier (France--paper in French); (13) "Universal Accessibility of Art Images and Information Technology" by Sven Sandstrom (Sweden); (14) "Art Libraries in the Federal Republic of Germany" by Thomas Lersch (West Germany); and (15) "Videodiscs and Art Documentation" by Janice Sorkow (United States). (ESR)

There are several reasons why the Open University (Great Britain) should define the teaching objectives of their text editors and designers--and how they can best be achieved--including the wide range of student abilities and the allocation of resources. A model of the functions of textbook design and editing would help provide a basis for an editorial house-style more suited to the university's special problems. Such a model would consider three basic areas: the enabling function--the physical and psychological features of the volume itself; the aesthetic function--features such as illustrations, color, quality paper, and durable binding; and the access function--the organization or structure of the information that allows retrieval and helps form an effective reading strategy. The need for access structure is often ignored, but research evidence in the areas of learning styles, the way efficient readers read, and student workload favors the selective reading such a structure allows. Most of the university's texts are too long for students to read in the time allowed. The access structure provides a way for students to allocate their time efficiently. An access structure that truly reflects the content, structure, and purpose of the text would be the product of textbook editing and design based on the university's teaching objectives. (HTH)

When dealing with strategy for curriculum development or instruction in education, there are three possible approaches that the implementors can use to achieve desired goals. These three are the administrative approach, the research approach, and the design approach. The administrative approach relies on power as its authority and coercion to integrate its power network and control its functioning. The research approach uses knowledge as its source of power and relies on communication processes for integration and control. The design approach is based on rights of individuals and conformity as integrating and controlling processes. Teachers must be learners and be willing to use when appropriate any of the three approaches in their teaching strategy. Teachers need to be able to recognize the approach that is being used and see how the approach fits the goals of the curriculum. A good teacher uses all three approaches, selecting the appropriate time to use each approach and to know the reason for that particular choice. (Author/NE)

Technology education programs must not be so restricted as to be primarily concerned with sets of facts. They must realize the unique responsibility of fostering philosophic critics and designers of technology. They should also strive to help students with their future needs. (Author/JOW)