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Physical Fitness and the Police: The Case for Unisex Testing
No full textMany jurisdictions require applicants for police jobs to take physical fitness tests, many of which have easier passing requirements for women than for men. While the goal of increasing women’s representation among police is laudable, this Article argues that the use of gendered cutoff scores violates Title VII for two distinct reasons: not only does it constitute disparate treatment under the core provision of the statute, but it also violates a separate Section that expressly bars the use of different cutoff scores by gender. (Surprisingly, the very few cases to have considered these issues have wrongly concluded that gendered cutoff scores are permissible.) If a unisex passing score is required by statute, the easiest way to increase women’s representation in policing is to make physical fitness tests easier for everyone to pass. Using a statistical model, I evaluate the consequences of relaxing the cutoff score on running tests. I find that doing so would allow more women to pass, would not dramatically worsen the average fitness of those (men and women) who do pass, and would likely have other beneficial consequences such as reductions in excessive force and fewer incidents of violent crimes against women. But relaxing the passing score would not completely forestall disparate impact liability: no matter how easy the cutoff, too many men will likely pass relative to women. Policy makers thus face real tradeoffs between fitness and other goals, but this Article can help them assess how to strike that balance
Persuasion as a Function of Celebrity, Argument Complexity, and Need for Cognition
No full textWith advertising commanding so much money as an industry, it is critical to determine what people like or do not with ads. Our focus was on three main factors within advertising, two dimensions within how the advertisement is presented, one based on the person reading the ad. The two dimensions based on presentation were the complexity of the ad, done the first time by omitting letters from the ad and the second time by swapping letters within words, and celebrity endorsement, comparing popstar Taylor Swift’s to Alicia Steele, an AI-generated celebrity. We also measured Need for Cognition (NFC), the level at which a person enjoys using thought to complete tasks. Participants from the University of Connecticut’s participant pool were given messages in a 2 × 2 factorial design with celebrity and complexity as the manipulated factors. No hypotheses was supported. Instead, results showed that simple ads were significantly preferred to complex ones; celebrity status did not matter significantly. NFC negatively impacted impressions when complexity was manipulated using swapped letters. In conclusion, the best advertisements are simple. Celebrity endorsements are probably not worthwhile unless the population can be segmented into groups where celebrity preference can be known beforehand
La Experiencia Universitaria - Asset-based Community Needs Assessment for UConn Waterbury’s Hispanic Community
No full textAn asset-based community needs assessment for the Hispanic community of the University of Connecticut’s Waterbury campus was conducted. The community needs assessment uncovered assets that support students, as well as the need for additional resources to promote success in higher education. Information was gathered from the campus community regarding current documented practices such as informal or formal support to aid Hispanic students in their college experience relating to their wellbeing, academic success, and career development. A town hall meeting for the community of students on campus was conducted to impart the information gathered and gather further feedback from students. The findings suggest that the Hispanic community at the Waterbury campus feels supported in the areas previously discussed, namely well-being, academic success, and career development. One of the areas identified that can strengthen the experience of students would be to increase the racial and ethnic representation among staff and faculty in order to better reflect the student body
Intuition in Modal Epistemology: Concept-Based or Imagination-Based?
No full textIn both George Bealer’s moderate modal rationalism (MMR) and Peter Kung’s modal evidence from imagination (MEI) intuition plays an indispensable role in modal knowledge. However, these modal epistemologies differ in whether modal knowledge is based on intuitions yielded by concepts or by imaginations. Both MMR and MEI take intuitions to be sui generis propositional attitudes, basic epistemic units, reasons for belief, and sources of evidence. However, MEI holds that sensory and intellectual content can prompt a rational intuitions. On the other hand, MMR is restricted to intuitions yielded by non-sensory content. According to MMR, intellectual intuitions about privileged concepts give us modal knowledge, whereas in MEI, intuitions generated by sensory imagination provide evidence for modal knowledge. There are a good reasons to believe that MEI is preferable as an intuition-based modal epistemology. Arguments against MMR, such as that necessary a posteriori propositions are semantically stable, that contrary to MMR’s claims, nonrational intuitions can contribute to a priori modal knowledge, and that concepts do not provide modal structure, if successful, weaken or rebut MMR. On the other hand, many criticisms of MEI fail, as one can give an account of modal evidence from narratives, knowledge of necessity and impossibility out of imagination, and the relationship between MEI and a priority. If successful, the arguments presented against MMR show it to be false, and the concept-based approach to modal knowledge questionable. If the defense of MEI is successful, it has been shown to withstand considerable criticism
Regarding the Gender Gap: Interrogating McArthur’s Hypothesis on Dyslexia, Anxiety, and Inattention
No full textThis study interrogated the pervasive gender gap in dyslexia diagnosis. In order to do so, we analyzed Dr. Genevieve McArthur’s recent hypothesis that poor reading is linked to poor self-concept, anxiety, and inattention, which begins the cycle once again. Using a subset of data from the Child Mind Institute’s Healthy Brain Network biobank (children aged 7-11, n=1,725), we evaluated McArthur’s proposed relationships, and possible gendered differences within those relationships through probing which factors were important predictors of if a child did or did not receive a dyslexia diagnosis. We looked at word reading, biological sex, anxiety and inattention as possible predictors of dyslexia diagnosis and each of these (minus word reading) as predictors of word reading performance. Initial hypotheses were as follows: 1) Dyslexia diagnosis rates will be predicted by sex, with more male than female participants having a formal diagnosis. 2) Students with high anxiety scores will be more likely to have a dyslexia diagnosis, and worse reading performance. 3) Students with high Inattention scores will be more likely to have a dyslexia diagnosis, and worse reading performance. Word reading alone was found to predict dyslexia diagnosis, whereas sex, phonological processing, and inattention were found to predict word reading scores
Gender and Participation in Popular Music Ensembles: Perspectives of Modern Band Teachers
No full textThis article explores gender dynamics in popular music education, focusing on the perspectives of modern band teachers across the United States. Drawing from existing literature and a survey of 390 modern band educators, the study examines the extent to which modern band teachers perceive their own gender identities influence student participation and enrollment in elective modern band classes. While the majority of respondents believed their gender does not significantly impact enrollment, female teachers were more likely to indicate that they felt that their gender had an impact on student enrollment compared to their male counterparts. Additionally, the study uncovers challenges female teachers face in proving their competency on traditionally male-dominated instruments. The study highlights the need for further research and emphasizes the importance of accessible student-level demographic data to better understand the impact of gender on music education. The findings of this paper offer insight into the nuanced intersections of gender, identity, and participation in popular music ensembles
Haaland v. Brackeen—A Window into Presenting Tribal Cases to the Court
No full textIn this Essay, as I did at the Connecticut Law Review’s Symposium, I draw on my experience representing Tribes in Haaland v. Brackeen to discuss more broadly the effective presentation of tribal arguments to the Court. I touch briefly on four main topics. First, I discuss how we collaborated with amici to ensure that the Court would have the full context as it considered the issues in Brackeen. Second, I discuss how we thought about preparing for the argument and the particular importance of understanding the practical operation of the Indian Child Welfare Act. Third, I offer a few observations on the oral argument itself, focusing on how the structure of the argument influences the substance of the argument. And fourth, I step back and discuss why this is a particularly interesting and challenging time to argue Indian law cases before the Supreme Court