Journal Entry, July 2020: Affirmation, Inclusion, Equity and Everyone

When we reflect on 2020, especially in the United States, the divides in society amplified by the pandemic and laid bare for all to see following the murder of George Floyd in Minnesota in May, 2020 will most likely be the top of mind. We could all see this nation’s history and current complicity for racism, both the systematic and systemic. The moment was not unfamiliar, but markedly different. Initially, we wrote this piece in the summer of 2020, in response to our professional organization’s delay and hesitancy to affirm Black lives, Black students, Black engineers and Black faculty. Many of us were crying out. Allies with commitment to action showed up for and with us -- no questions asked, to ensure that what we felt was at least heard. In nearly a year since our original effort to write this piece together, some things have changed for the better. We saw our professional organization affirm Black lives. We saw some of our colleagues take action, change course and use their influence to make the community better. Some learned, listened and tried to do something new. Others, either remained silent, hopefully in contemplation, but some with a silence that convinces us that they are simply not on the same side. We composed the below entries in the summer of 2020, amid national turbulence and internal reflection. Below we provide four personal stories and some specific calls to action situated in the summer of 2020, but these remain our aspirations and hopes for the field of engineering education.

Main Challenges of Teaching the Chinese Particle了 to Russian-speaking Students at Elementary Level

The particle 了 is a commonly used word in the Chinese language. Since the particle 了 is a structure word, it does not carry any semantic meaning, but it has many grammatical meanings and is used in a variety of ways. Due to the large number of its grammatical meanings and complexity of its grammatical functions, it poses certain challenges for both teachers when explaining the material and students when using it. This especially concerns Russian-speaking students due to significant differences in the grammar of Russian and Chinese. This article examines several classifications of the particle 了, described in Chinese and Russian textbooks and focuses on grammatical features of the particle 了 depending on its position in the middle and at the end of the sentence, as well as its simultaneous use of both in the middle and at the end of the sentence. The article also describes the particle’s main grammatical meanings, such as: completeness of an action, change of an action or a situation, emphasis on something, duration of an action, a way of expressing tact, and a few others. The authors analyze the most common mistakes made by Russian-speaking elementary level students when using the particle, basing their analysis on many years of their teaching experience. Among the mistakes, they highlight such as excessive use, insufficient use, and use of the particle 了 in the wrong place. Excessive use includes mistakes such using the particle 了 in negative sentences with the adverb 没, in an objective description of past events, facts, or in characteristic judgments and descriptions; with verbs followed by a predicative object; after the first verb in a sequential sentence; with verbs showing an action of a constant or repetitive nature, as well as in various constructions which exclude its use. Insufficient use includes mistakes when learners construct incomplete sentences without the 了 particle in cases where its use is required for correct meaning or for a grammatically correct construction. Mistakes where the particle 了 is used in the wrong place occur if students do not understand the specifics of verb connections in the sentence.

Optimized control over modes of hydraulic percussion cutting heads of mining machines

The main cause of the disagreement between the actual and calculated output data of hydraulic percussion mining machines is the erroneous feed of manipulation signals by the control units. For the maximal fitting of the calculated and actual figures, the continuous method of control action using the third time derivative of the law of motion of the main function element is accepted, namely, the accuracy. The mathematical models of control using displacement, velocity and acceleration are developed. The service factors of mining machines are found. Based on the theory of control and the mathematical logic theory, the logical circuits of formation of manipulation signals in each phase of the working cycle are developed. The main elements are converters, integrators and accumulators ensuring decomposition of elements of the logical circuits and further generation of appropriate control action. It is found that the simplest way is to generate the control action for acceleration of the key function element. For the developed circuits, it is recommended to use general charts of the control action change, implementable for a certain design of hydraulic percussion cutting heads in certain operating conditions.

Refleksi Nalar Budaya Pendidikan Islam dan dampaknya dalam Perilaku Sosial Keagamaan

Islamic education approaches religion as a social framework by carrying out critical reflections on social problems faced by society, both macro and micro, then building a change strategy (theory) that is practised in the form of action change (practice). In praxis, education builds a character's culture of educational behaviour as values ​​and behavioural characters. This study discusses the important role of Islamic educational institutions as agents of the development of science that have an impact on cultural social religious behavior. The results of this study indicate education in the formation of culture is an indoctrination as a process that is carried out based on a value system to instil certain ideas, attitudes, systems of thought, behaviour and beliefs. This practice is often distinguished from education because, in this act, an indoctrinated person is expected not to question or critically test the doctrine that has been learned.

Governance Beyond the Rhetoric: Organizational Action, Change, and Illusion in the Italian Local Welfare System

In this article, we offer a critical analysis of governance arrangements looking at the evolution of the Italian local welfare system over a time period of more than 40 years. The broad idea of a shift “from government to governance” is questioned. The nonprofit organizations had a vital role in the foundation of the Italian local welfare system. However, their participation in the governance arenas of today is often illusionary. This has practical consequences, as innovation in the welfare domain needs authentic public–private partnerships, and genuine participation of the nonprofits at all levels of social and political action.

Midfrontal neural dynamics distinguish between general control and inhibition-specific processes in the stopping of motor actions

Action inhibition, the suppression of action impulses, is crucial for goal-directed behaviour. In order to dissociate neural mechanisms specific to motor stopping from general control processes which are also relevant for other types of conflict adjustments, we compared midfrontal oscillatory activity in human volunteers via EEG between action inhibition and two other types of motor conflicts, unexpected action activation and unexpected action change. Error rates indicated that action activation was significantly easier than the other two equally demanding tasks. Midfrontal brain oscillations were significantly stronger for inhibition than for both other conflict types. This was driven by increases in the delta range (2–3 Hz), which were higher for inhibition than activation and action change. Increases in the theta range (4–7 Hz) were equally high for inhibition and change, but lower for action activation. These findings suggest that inhibition is facilitated by neural mechanisms specific to motor-stopping, with midfrontal delta being a potentially selective marker of motor inhibition.