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Last week, we discussed a new study of injuries in physical education classes in American schools. The number of students taken to hospitals increased one and a half times from nineteen ninety-seven to two thousand seven. Few injuries were serious. Then why treat them at emergency rooms? One possible reason: a shortage of school nurses. Amy Garcia agrees with that. She is the executive director of the National Association of School Nurses. She says federal guidelines call for one nurse for every seven hundred fifty healthy students. In reality, she says, the number is more like one for every... 

Too much eating. Too many unhealthy foods. Too many advertisements for food. Too little activity. Different explanations are offered for America's weight problem a problem increasingly shared by other countries. Almost one-fifth of American children and teenagers are overweight. Schools have been urged to increase physical education, an important tool for public health. And many have. Yet now comes a study showing an increase in the number of injuries in «phys ed» class. Injuries increased one hundred fifty percent between nineteen ninety-seven and two thousand seven. The study... 

The United States has lost almost seven million jobs since the recession began in December of two thousand seven. The good news: the central bank says economic activity appears to be «leveling out.» The bad news: no one knows when the job market will recover. These days, if a job is available, young people often have to compete with more experienced workers. The situation is worst for those with the least education. About thirty percent of workers age sixteen to twenty-four with less than a high school diploma were unemployed in July. That was more than three times the national unemployment... 

California has a new program called the Digital Textbook Initiative. In June, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said: «Starting this fall with high school math and science, we will be the first state in the nation to provide schools with a state-approved list of digital textbooks.» He talked about his effort to get schools to use materials available free online. He listed reasons why he thinks digital textbooks make sense. California approves traditional textbooks in six-year cycles. Digital ones can offer the latest information. They lighten the load of school bags. They save... 

The average college student in America spent an estimated seven hundred dollars on textbooks last year. The National Association of College Stores reported more than five billion dollars in sales of textbooks and course materials. Association spokesman Charles Schmidt says electronic textbooks now represent just two to three percent of sales. But he says that is expected to reach ten to fifteen percent by two thousand twelve. Online versions are now available for many of the most popular college textbooks. E-textbooks can cost half the price of a new print textbook. But students usually lose access... 

Fewer than sixty percent of students now entering four-year American colleges are likely to graduate. The completion rate is lower than for almost any other wealthy country. Poor and minority students have the worst graduation rate. A new book about America's public universities explores the complex causes of the high dropout rate. The book is called «Crossing the Finish Line.» President Obama wants the United States to again have the world's highest percentage of college graduates by two thousand twenty. But to finish college, children first have to reach the starting line... 

Here is a question for a college admissions test. Who was Stanley Kaplan? Did he A) start a test preparation company, B) start the test preparation industry, or C) die in August at age ninety? The correct answer is D) all of the above. Stanley Kaplan was an educator and private tutor. In the nineteen forties, he began preparing students for the Scholastic Aptitude Test, now just called the SAT. His parents were European immigrants who did not go to college, and he himself was rejected from medical school. He thought all Americans should have an equal chance at the best colleges, not just children... 

The Ford Foundation in the United States is a charitable organization that calls itself «a partner for social change.» It has a study program currently available to college graduates in twenty-two countries and territories in Asia, Africa and Latin America. The Ford Foundation International Fellowships Program offers graduates a chance to continue their studies. The aim is to help them learn ways to solve problems in their own countries. Joan Dassin is the executive director of the program. She said: «Let's say you have an undergraduate law degree. But you really want to... 

Medical journals are an important part of continuing education for doctors and other health providers. Journals say they do their best to publish high quality studies by trusted authors. The International Committee of Medical Journal Editors says: "An 'author' is generally considered to be someone who has made substantive intellectual contributions to a published study ... " In other words, someone who did much of the work. Credit is to be based on three conditions. The first involves designing the study and gathering and analyzing the data. The second involves preparing the article.... 

Last week, we discussed one problem for medical journals: the question of authorship. You would think that all the scientists who took part in a research study would be listed as authors. But that is not always the case. Sometimes there are honorary authors and ghost authors. Honorary authors, also called guest authors, receive credit in a published study but had little to do with designing it or writing the article. Ghost authors work on studies but are not credited. Sometimes they are paid by drug companies to place articles in journals to support the companys products. One example was described... 

The American biotechnology industry recently did a study of bioscience education across the country. The biosciences are biology and other sciences that deal with living organisms. Paul Hanle is president of the Biotechnology Institute, one of the groups that did the study. He says international tests show that the United States is performing twenty-fifth out of thirty developed countries in science education.So the new findings may be no surprise. The study found that many schools are not doing enough to get students interested in bioscience or to prepare them to study it in college. But the... 

A new college guide in the United States compares educational requirements in seven subjects. These include math, science, writing and United States history or government. The other subjects are economics, foreign language and literature. The free online guide is from the American Council of Trustees and Alumni. The council is a nonprofit group that supports liberal arts education. Its president, Anne Neal, says these areas of knowledge are needed to succeed in a twenty-first century society and an increasingly connected world. Yet she told VOA's Faiza Elmasry it was surprising how many... 

Do American children still learn handwriting in school? In this age of the keyboard, some people seem to think handwriting lessons are on the way out. We asked a literacy professor at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee. Steve Graham says he has been hearing about the death of handwriting for the past fifteen years. So is it still being taught? He said: «If the results of a survey we had published this year are accurate, it is being taught by about ninety percent of teachers in grades one to three.» Ninety percent of teachers also say they are required to teach handwriting....