For what purpose the arts? An analysis of the mission statements of urban arts high schools in Canada and the United States

While general arts programs have declined in many schools across the United States and Canada, the number of specialized art programs in public secondary schools has swelled since the 1980s. While this increase is often celebrated by arts educators, questions about the justification of specialized arts programs are rarely raised, and their value is often taken for granted. In this article, we examine the mission statements of eighty-four specialized arts programs across two countries to examine the ideas, values, and commitments that are expressed in these public statements. In addition to a close thematic analysis, we describe how these mission statements reflect different conceptions of the role of the arts in education and consider the ways in which arguments that seek to broaden access to the arts are combined with the goal of serving a narrow subset of the student population. We argue that analyzing mission statements provides a clearer picture of the ideas that shape these programs, and that in order to foster an informed public conversation about the purpose and value of an education in the arts, educators committed to the arts must engage in this serious discussion.     

Evaluating outcomes of restoration ecology projects on limited budgets: assessment of variation in sampling intensity and sampling frequency for four habitat types

While best practices for evaluating restoration ecology projects are emerging rapidly, budget constraints often limit postrestoration monitoring, which emphasizes the need for practical and efficient monitoring strategies. We examined the postrestoration outcome for an ENGO (Nature Conservancy of Canada) project, to assess retroactively how variation in intensity and frequency of sampling would have affected estimates of plant species composition, diversity, and richness over time. The project restored four habitat types (mesic forest, oak woodland, wet meadow, and sand barren) using sculptured seeding of tallgrass prairie and woody species. Species‐level plant cover was monitored annually for 10 years in 168 2 × 2–m quadrats. We performed randomization tests to examine estimates of species diversity and richness as a function of the number of quadrats sampled, and assessed the necessity of annual sampling for describing changes in species composition and successional trajectories. The randomization tests revealed that sampling 10–17 quadrats, depending on habitat type, was sufficient to obtain estimates of species diversity that were at least 95% of values obtained from the whole dataset. Species richness as a function of number of quadrats sampled did not plateau, which suggests that rather than increasing the number of sampling quadrats, richness could be estimated more efficiently using nonquadrat based sampling techniques. Nonmetric multidimensional scaling analysis revealed that plant species composition largely stabilized by 3–5 years postrestoration depending on habitat type. By that time, native, seeded species dominated the restoration, and the benefits of annual sampling for tracking changes in species composition diminished.     

Blockade of TrkB but not p75NTR activates a subpopulation of quiescent neural precursor cells and enhances neurogenesis in the adult mouse hippocampus

Brain‐derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) signaling plays a major role in the regulation of hippocampal neurogenesis in the adult brain. While the majority of studies suggest that this is due to its effect on the survival and differentiation of newborn neurons, it remains unclear whether this signaling directly regulates neural precursor cell (NPC) activity and which of its two receptors, TrkB or the p75 neurotrophin receptor (p75^NTR) mediates this effect. Here, we examined both the RNA and protein expression of these receptors and found that TrkB but not p75^NTR receptors are expressed by hippocampal NPCs in the adult mouse brain. Using a clonal neurosphere assay, we demonstrate that pharmacological blockade of TrkB receptors directly activates a distinct subpopulation of NPCs. Moreover, we show that administration of ANA‐12, a TrkB‐selective antagonist, in vivo either by systemic intraperitoneal injection or by direct infusion within the hippocampus leads to an increase in the production of new neurons. In contrast, we found that NPC‐specific knockout of p75^NTR had no effect on the proliferation of NPCs and did not alter neurogenesis in the adult hippocampus. Collectively, these results demonstrate a novel role of TrkB receptors in directly regulating the activity of a subset of hippocampal NPCs and suggest that the transient blockade of these receptors could be used to enhance adult hippocampal neurogenesis.     

Augmented Reticular Thalamic Bursting and Seizures in Scn1a-Dravet Syndrome

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Mafb and c-Maf Have Prenatal Compensatory and Postnatal Antagonistic Roles in Cortical Interneuron Fate and Function

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