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We develop a dynamic model of corporate investment and financing, in which shocks to the value of collateralizable assets generate variation in firms' debt capacity. We show that the degree of similarity among firms' financial flexibility forecasts cross-sectional variation in return correlation. We test the implications of the model with firm-level data in two empirical analyses using i) an instrumental variable approach based on shocks to the value of collateralizable corporate assets and ii) the outbreak of the COVID-19 crisis as an event study. We find that firms in the same percentile of the cross-sectional distribution of financial flexibility have 62% higher correlation in stock-return residuals than firms 50 percentiles apart.
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The first contact of freshmen students with computer thinking and programming languages is not an easy task. There are several strategies that can be used before, during and after face-to-face classes. Flipped classes are a way to save time in activities that can be better done in the form of previous work - guided by the teacher. A n d the time gained in person can be used in tasks that are much more productive than traditional lectures. This study is based on an introductory programming semester of post lockdown COVID-19, initially with 101 students, with the strategy of providing study materials for students to work on before class (as in flipped classes). We use attendance in classes, acce ss-work MOODLE, the two grades obtained during the semester, as well as some information about the student (age, course, gender, previous knowledge of programming languages), and the level that the students think it was their presence in classes and on MOODLE in the middle and at the end of the semester to measure the success of the experiment. It seems that this type of strategy can be excellent for students who attend classes weekly and do their homework, but it can be a cause of dropout if taken to the extreme. © 2022 IEEE.
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The COVID-19 pandemic has brought about a profound transformation in the educational landscape in recent months. Educators worldwide have been challenged to tackle academic issues they could never have imagined. Among the most stressful situations faced by students and teachers is implementing online assessments. This paper proposes a system that includes exam prototypes for computer architecture modules at the higher education level. This system generates a wide range of questions and variations on the server side, supported by a set of simulators, resulting in many unique examination proposals. This system streamlines the monitoring process for the teacher, as it eliminates the possibility of two students receiving similar exams and reduces student stress by allowing them to practice with a limitless number of exam samples. This paper also highlights several indicators that demonstrate the advantages of this framework. © 2023 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
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The article reveals the features of smart education as a leading concept in the development of professional training of future teachers. The main components of smart education, such as a smart student, smart pedagogy and smart environment were characterized. The main principles of smart education and the ideas that formed the basis of this concept of education (mobile access, formation of new knowledge, creation of a smart environment) were defined. The features of smart education were substantiated. The peculiarities of the implementation of smart education in the conditions of the COVID-19 pandemic and military events in Ukraine were revealed. The functions of the smart system (site management system) in the process of studying the disciplines of the pedagogical cycle, its content and technological components, and facilities of the smart complexes for students and teachers in the process of training future teachers were defined. The criteria of smart complexes (automation, sequencing, assessment, data collection in real time, self-organisation) were singled out. The distance learning systems for creating smart complexes in the process of training prospective teachers were considered. The results of students' survey as for using smart complexes in the educational process were analyzed. Due to the results, the advantages and disadvantages of using smart technologies in educational process were determined. The ways of further research work regarding the introduction of smart education into the educational process were outlined. © 2023 Copyright for this paper by its authors.
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BACKGROUND: The Fundamentals of Laparoscopic Surgery (FLS) is an internationally recognized educational and certification program designed to teach the knowledge and skills required for basic laparoscopic surgery. Previously, our institution has organized an FLS boot-camp to teach PGY1 residents the FLS manual skills. During the COVID-19 pandemic, in-person sessions were not possible. The purpose of this study was to utilize telesimulation as an education solution for teaching FLS technical skills to PGY1 residents during the COVID-19 pandemic. METHODS: A virtual FLS program was established. A complete, easily portable FLS kit was distributed to participants and instructors to set up an FLS box and connect remotely using telesimulation. The program was delivered by three senior residents using the Zoom™ platform. Participants were split into groups of 3-4 individuals, each receiving three 1-h sessions. Sessions were structured with initial demonstration of tasks followed by individual coaching of participants in 'break-out' rooms. The official FLS exam was administered in-person on the 4th week. Pre- and post-course surveys were administered to participants gauging self-reported proficiency with FLS tasks and overall course feedback. Anonymized FLS exam results were collected. RESULTS: A total of 14 residents participated, and 11 responded to the survey. Participants reported that their overall FLS skills proficiency significantly improved on a 5-point likert scale from 1.5 ± 0.5 pre-course to 4.0 ± 0.5 post-course (mean ± SD). Participants unanimously stated that having the FLS box at home was valuable and enabled them to practice more. On the FLS exam, 13 of 14 participants passed the manual skills component. CONCLUSIONS: We developed a telesimulation hands-on FLS course as an alternative to in-person training. The course was practical and effective and was preferred to traditional methods by participants. With ever-expanding technological solutions, virtual telesimulation education is an attractive and underutilized tool, not only in the setting of COVID-19, but also more broadly across current educational programs.
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COVID-19 , Internship and Residency , Laparoscopy , Humans , Pandemics , Clinical Competence , COVID-19/epidemiology , Laparoscopy/educationABSTRACT
Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) have experienced wild market fluctuation during the past years, which leads to the high volatility of NFT's daily price. This paper examines two potential volatility drivers of NFTs: macroeconomic fundamentals and investor attention. We employ the global and local economic policy uncertainty (EPU) indices as the economic fundamentals' proxies. The investor attention is represented by the Google search volumes (GSV) or NFTs attention index. Based on the empirical results of a modified generalized autoregressive conditional heteroskedasticity –mixed-data sampling (G-M) model, we find that either economic fundamentals or investor attention can increase the volatility of NFTs significantly. The monthly global EPU index adjusted by the current GDP and weekly GSV contain complementary information. Macroeconomic fundamentals and investor attention can jointly model the volatility of NFTs better than considering only one explanatory variable, as suggested by the G-M model with two explanatory variables. The results remain robust to alternative Twitter-based EPU indices and the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic period. © 2023 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
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AIMS: This discursive paper draws on three key leadership theories with the aim of outlining how styles of leadership impact the provision of fundamentals of care. DESIGN: Discussion paper. DATA SOURCES: key leadership theories, leadership and fundamentals of care literature. IMPLICATIONS FOR NURSING: The conceptualization of fundamentals of care is viewed through the lens of nursing leadership, and collective, compassionate and transformational leadership theory. The cognitive dissonance that nursing leaders encounter when trying to reconcile organizational, patient and nurses' needs is considered, and the pressure to deliver high-quality fundamentals of care presents a challenge to nurse leaders. CONCLUSION: Leaders must align nursing and patient outcome data to drive forward and prioritize fundamental care. Focusing on key elements of relational leadership styles will ensure a workforce fit to provide fundamental care, which in the current climate must be an organizational and global nursing priority. IMPACT: This discussion attempts to draw together overlapping leadership theories, emphasizes the importance of relational leadership in ensuring the provision of the fundamentals of care and acknowledged the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on nurses and nursing care, with leadership implications outlined, such as a need for role-modelling, understanding shared values and giving nurses a voice. It will have an impact on nurse leaders, but also on those nurses providing direct care by issuing a challenge for them to confront their own nurse leaders, and to ask that they better resolve competing needs of both the nursing workforce and patients.
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This paper presents reflections on the fundamentals of Environmental Education when dealing with the urgency of learning the lessons from the pandemic crisis period of the Coronavirus. For this, from a transdisciplinary approach, crossing and seeking to go beyond different disciplines, some of the chal lenges that were intensified with the pandemic are contextualized, with the support of authors from sociology (Boaventura de Sousa Santos) and philosophy (Edgar Morin), in dialogue with authors who discuss in the field of education (Balduíno Andreola;Paulo Freire), as wel l as the inspiration of literature (Ernesto Sabato). As a convergence point of the reflections there is the investigative treatment about the concept of consciousness in different perspectives and how we can articulate criticality and transdisciplinarity the urgencies in learning process on Environmental Education. Among these socio-environmental urgencies that appear is the need to pedagogical ly approach the complexity of the concept of life and the inequalities that mark the pandemic period. © 2023 by the authors.
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BACKGROUND: The outbreak of COVID-19 changed many studies' teaching mode in higher education profoundly, including nursing. This study evaluated the impact of distance education on the course performance of nursing students in a nursing fundamentals course during the epidemic of COVID-19. METHODS: This is a comparative prospective and retrospective quasi-experimental study. Nursing students in a Sino-foreign cooperative program were allocated to either an intervention group (distance education, n = 48) or control group (face-to-face teaching, n = 36). A self-efficacy questionnaire, an academic engagement scale and grades of the final written examination were used to evaluate the students' self-efficacy, academic engagement and academic performance, respectively. The data in this study were analyzed by two independent sample t-tests and the Chi-square test. Students experiencing distance teaching had worse academic performance (p = 0.001) and lower levels of learning behavior self-efficacy (p<0.05). The total score of academic engagement (p = 0.04) for students experiencing distance teaching were significantly lower than the scores of those students in the control group. CONCLUSIONS: In the context of COVID-19, nursing students conducted using distance education had poor course performance.
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While the economy slid into a recession since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the house prices in many markets have reached historical highs. This research aims to examine how much the recent large increases in the prices can be explained by bubbles and whether the overvaluation is due to momentum or intrinsic bubbles. A present value model is constructed to estimate real estate bubbles with one dynamic and three assumed net rental yields. The empirical focus is on Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane, the three largest residential property markets in Australia, that have experienced a rapid growth in house prices since the outbreak of coronavirus. The finding demonstrates the evidence of bubbles in all three markets during the study period but the degree of overvaluation varies. We also discover that momentum bubbles exist in these markets but the overvaluation is mainly explained by intrinsic bubbles.
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The paper aims to examine the ability of a global fear index (GFI) based on the COVID-19 pandemic and government policy responses as a measure of uncertainty in predicting eight Indian rupee-based exchange rate return series: the Australian dollar, the Canadian dollar, the Swiss franc, the US dollar, the euro, the British pound sterling, the New Zealand dollar, and the Japanese yen. The predictability of the daily Indian rupee-based exchange rate return series is tested using the recently developed wild bootstrap likelihood ratio test of Kim and Shamsuddin for the period 2 October 2020 to 8 March 2021. Both symmetric and asymmetric tests revealed GFI as an insignificant determinant of the Indian rupee-based exchange rate return series. However, government policy responses are a significant determinant of the rupee-dollar exchange rate return series.
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During the period of COVID-19, the national universities support the policy of "continuing teaching and learning while stopping the class", and fully apply the teaching advantage of "Internet +"to conduct the online teaching activity. "Technical Fundamentals of Web Front-end", as the main course of the major of financial science and technology, plays a significant role in cultivating professionals and improving the core competitiveness of students. During the epidemic period, the online teaching mode based on SPOC and WeChat, which coordinates the pre-class guidance, in-class research, after-class supervision and development, has been applied to complete the online teaching of 2019 and 2020 students. This paper not only shares the online teaching experience of the course, but also summarizes and discusses the advantages and disadvantages of online education, in order to provide reference for improving the quality of online teaching of financial technology courses. © 2022 ACM.
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Purpose>The study aims to analyze and compare the influence of country-specific fundamentals and global conditions on sovereign risk of Sri Lanka within the sample period of 2006–2019 while employing Treasury bond rates as proxy for sovereign risk.Design/methodology/approach>The determinant powers of the variables are assessed using the auto regressive distributed lag (ARDL) model to verify both short- and long-run effects on sovereign spreads.Findings>The study finds that Sri Lanka's sovereign spreads are shaped by both country fundamentals and global factors, though local determinants tend to have greater influence when the directions of coefficients are ignored. While the impact of most variables was in line with the researchers' expectations, fiscal deficit was found to have an unconventional negative coefficient which may be explained by investors' optimistic take on Government's involvement in post-war economic development drive during the sample period, enabling Sri Lanka to attract low-cost funding.Research limitations/implications>The study excludes of impact of the ongoing coronavirus disease-2019 ( COVID-19) health crisis which may unduly distort the data. Further, the research does not capture the impact of change in sentiment owing to market information, debt dynamics and policy changes in Sri Lanka.Practical implications>The study reveals that a sound monetary policy directed at preserving both the internal and external value of currency as well as a disciplined fiscal policy are imperative to manage Sri Lanka's sovereign risk, particularly in the face of global uncertainties.Originality/value>The study adds to the literature by investigating the timely importance of a country's internal fundamentals against the global events. Furthermore, the research would complement the scarcity of research regarding that subject focused on the Sri Lankan economy, capturing the rapid variations in the fundamentals that the country has undergone since the end of the civil war while recognizing the growing influence of globalization over the recent years.
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Public Health Emergencies provides a current overview of public health emergency preparedness and response principles with case studies highlighting lessons learned from recent natural and man-made disasters and emergencies. Designed for graduate and advanced undergraduate public health students, this book utilizes the 10 essential services of public health as performance standards and foundational competencies from the Council on Education for Public Health to assess public health systems. It emphasizes the roles and responsibilities of public health careers in state and local health departments as well as other institutions and clarifies their importance during health-related emergencies in the community. Written by prominent experts, including health professionals and leaders on the frontlines, this textbook provides the framework and lessons for understanding the public health implications of disasters, emergencies, and other catastrophic events, stressing applied understanding for students interested in pursuing public health preparedness roles. Practical in its approach, Part One begins with an introduction to the fundamentals of public health emergency preparedness with chapters on community readiness, all-hazards preparedness design, disaster risk assessments, and emergency operation plans. Part Two covers a range of public health emergency events, including hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, disease outbreaks and pandemics, accidents and chemical contamination, nuclear and radiological hazards, extreme heat events, and water supply hazards. The final part addresses special considerations, such as how the law serves as a foundation to public health actions;preparedness considerations for persons with disabilities, access, and functional needs;children and disasters;and a chapter evaluating emerging and evolving threats. Throughout, chapters convey the roles of front-line, supervisory, and leadership personnel of the many stakeholders involved in preparedness, response, and recovery efforts to demonstrate decision-making in action. © 2022 Springer Publishing Company, LLC.
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Undergraduate students from courses related to Computer Programming often face barriers such as insufficient prerequisites for difficult subjects and lack of motivation. Completing tasks such as logical reasoning, algorithm design, and programming is often more difficult than usual. On the other hand, these young students are very attracted to video games, especially in social distance protocols as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and can spend many hours playing video games. Thus, educators can try to use video games as educational tools in an attempt to motivate and engage the study in a more playful way and closer to the interactivity of games that most students are already used to. In this sense, the purpose of this article is to present the reuse of a conventional open source 2D Point Click game, aimed at entertainment, in an educational RPG game to teach the fundamentals of Computer Programming that can be used on a Web-based platform and incorporated into parts of the Emergency Remote Education classes. An alpha version of the educational game was delivered, in Portuguese, and a subjective experiment was carried out with a sample of 14 IT students and the results of the article show that the reuse of the game was made directly and can be redistributed as an open educational resource form. © 2021 IEEE.
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This paper examines a broad range of driving factors of credit expansion using long-term cross-country panel data from 1994 to 2018 and the System GMM method. We discuss the role of macroeconomic fundamentals in explaining credit expansion by examining five categories of explanatory variables. Some structural patterns of weak linkages of credit expansion with macroeconomic fundamentals are identified. We further explore the possible causes that follow the theoretical logic of risk-taking in the private and public sectors. Controlling for the influence of macroeconomic fundamentals, we find the effects of various financial system characteristics, such as institutional features of the financial system, financial institutions' performance, asset markets booms, and macroeconomic and financial regulatory environment, on inducing credit expansion over the needs supported by macroeconomic fundamentals. Our study provides strong implications on regulatory policies on the rising credit during the COVID-19 Pandemic.
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The study empirically examines the impact of monetary fundamentals along with global oil prices on the Pak-rupee exchange rate using the monthly data over 2001-2020. Employing the cointegrating vector autoregressive with exogenous variables (VARX) and vector error correction model with exogenous variables (VECMX), the study analyzes the impact of domestic monetary fundamentals while considering the foreign variables as weakly exogenous. In order to account for the structural breaks in the data, the Lagrange multiplier (LM) unit root test with two structural breaks has been used (Lee & Strazicich, 2003). The empirical results reveal that the domestic and foreign monetary variables significantly explain the exchange rate movements in Pakistan both in the long run and in the short run. The dynamic properties of the monetary model of exchange rate have been analyzed using the persistence profile analysis and generalized impulse response functions (GIRFs). The results reveal that the responses of shocks to domestic monetary fundamentals are consistent with the predictions of the monetary model of the exchange rate. Furthermore, being a net oil importer, a rise in global oil prices significantly depreciated the Pak-rupee exchange rate over the period of study. The global financial crisis (GFC) and pandemic (COVID-19) were also found to cause the Pak-rupee exchange rate depreciation.
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The subject of this research is the performance of the S&P 500 index during the last decade, including in the context of the 2020 Covid pandemic. The main issue of interest is whether the index price levels are supported by fundamentals, or there is a bubble on the US stock market. The study is based on the use of the price-earnings ratios (PE) and price-to-book ratios (PBV) of the index during this period. The 2020 PE and PBV of the index are compared with historical market PE and PBV ratios. Another aspect of the analysis also involves fundamental PE and PBV ratios of the S&P 500 index, which are derived from the fundamentals, determining the value of stocks in the index. The results of the analysis do not confirm the validity of the high current PE and PBV ratios and do not justify the high stock price levels of the S&P 500 during most of 2020. © J-BPE.
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OBJECTIVE: To design a low cost ($40), realistic and fluoroscopy-free percutaneous Kirschner wire hand fracture fixation training instrument kit for home-based skill acquisition during the COVID-19 pandemic. DESIGN: A 3D-printed hand was designed from a computed tomography scan of a healthy hand. These data were used to create replaceable hand and wrist bones and reusable silicone molds for a replica of the soft tissue envelope. The model is currently being integrated into the simulation curriculum at 2 integrated plastic surgery residency programs for training in percutaneous wire fixation of hand fractures. SETTING: Brown University, Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University. Department of Surgery, Division of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery. Large academic quaternary referral institution. Yale University, Yale School of Medicine. Department of Surgery, Division of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery. Large academic quaternary referral institution. PARTICIPANTS: PGY 1-4 plastic surgery residents preparing to meet ACGME Accreditation for Graduate Medical Education hand surgery specific milestones. RESULTS: A realistic and durable 3D model with interchangeable bones allows trainees to practice the key motor skills necessary for successful fixation of hand and wrist fractures with K-wires in a home-based setting. CONCLUSIONS: A low cost, realistic and durable 3D hand model with interchangeable bones allows easy integration into any home-based hand surgery curriculum. With 3D printers and programming becoming more prevalent and affordable, such models offer a means of low-cost and safe instruction of residents in fracture fixation with no harm to patients.