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Educational reform legislations passed by the Congress include the Goals 2000: Educate America Act that involves an expenditure of about $1 billion over three years to fund new programs, and the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. The legislation will affect everybody involved in education. The reform strategies are based on five guidelines that include standards, transitions, flexibility, focus and targeted aid.

The minimum dissipative rate (MDR) method for deriving a coronal non-force-free magnetic field solution is partially evaluated. These magnetic field solutions employ a combination of three linear (constant- α) force-free-field solutions with one being a potential field ( i.e., α=0). The particular case of the solutions where the other two α’s are of equal magnitude but of opposite sign is examined. This is motivated by studying the SOLIS (Synoptic Optical Long-term Investigation of the Sun (SOLIS), a National Solar Observatory facility) vector magnetograms of AR 10987, which show a global α value consistent with an α=0 value as evaluated by ( ∇× B) z/ B z over the region. Typical of the current state of the observing technology, there is no definitive twist for input into the general MDR method. This suggests that the special α case, of two α’s with equal magnitudes and opposite signs, is appropriate given the data. Only for an extensively twisted active region does a dominant, nonzero α normally emerge from a distribution of local values. For a special set of conditions, is it found that (i) the resulting magnetic field is a vertically inflated magnetic field resulting from the electric currents being parallel to the photosphere, similar to the results of Gary and Alexander (Solar Phys. 186:123, ), and (ii) for α≈( αmax /2), the Lorentz force per unit volume normalized by the square of the magnetic field is on the order of 1.4×10−10 cm−1. The Lorentz force ( FL) is a factor of ten higher than that of the magnetic force d( B2/8 π)/d z, a component of FL. The calculated photospheric electric current densities are an order of magnitude smaller than the maximum observed in all active regions. Hence both the Lorentz force density and the generated electric current density seem to be physically consistent with possible solar dynamics. The results imply that the field could be inflated with an overpressure along the neutral line. However, the implementation of this or any other extrapolation method using the electric current density as a lower boundary condition must be done cautiously, with the current magnetography. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Science education The 101st Congress placed science education high on its agenda. More than fifty bills and resolutions were introduced, and much of this activity came barely six months after [...]