Books by WMU Authors from 2010-2014

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  Tools for Improving Principals' Work

  Jianping Shen

  The vital role of principalship in improving schools in general and enhancing student achievement in particular has been well documented. Given its importance, there is a need for tools to improve principalship, particularly ones emphasizing those dimensions associated with student achievement. Given the accountability movement, with its particular focus on student achievement and the advent of the evaluation era (including the evaluation of principals), the need for tools is even more urgent. This edited volume presents those tools with the aim of improving learning-centered principalship. The book is useful for researchers and policy makers as well as principals.

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  A Resource Book for Improving Principals' Learning-Centered Leadership

  Jianping Shen and Van E. Cooley

  This book focuses on seven important dimensions of principalship: data-informed decision-making; safe and orderly school operation; high, cohesive, and culturally relevant expectations for students; distributive and empowering leadership; coherent curriculum; real-time and embedded instructional assessment; and commitment and passion for school renewal. For each dimension, it provides a research base, best practices, and relevant tools. The book is particularly useful for researchers, policy makers, and educational leadership faculty members as well as, of course, principals.

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  Quality Rating and Improvement System for Early Care and Education: Development, Implementation, Evaluation and Learning

  Jianping Shen and Xin Ma

  Quality Rating Improvement System (QRIS) has gained national momentum. The authors first present a national scene of QRIS and then use Children's Services Council of Palm Beach County as a case study to illustrate a number of things. First, they look at the logic model behind the QRIS. Next, they review the design and implementation of the QRIS in the context of partnership and systems thinking. Finally, they provide an evaluation design and findings. The book is useful for policy makers, administrators of early and education at various levels, researchers, and others who seek to improve early care and education.

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  Manifesto of the Critical Theory of Society and Religion: The Wholly Other, Liberation, Happiness and the Rescue of the Hopeless

  Rudolf Siebert

  The Manifesto develops further the Critical Theory of Religion intrinsic to the Critical Theory of Society of the Frankfurt School into a new paradigm of the Psychology, Sociology, Philosophy and Theology of Religion. Its central theme is the theodicy problem. The Manifesto approaches this theme in the framework of comparative religion and critical political theology in a narrative and discursive fashion. In search of a solution to the theodicy problem, the Manifesto explores , trends in civil society toward Alternative Future I (the Totally Administered Society), Alternative Future II (the Militarized Society), and Alternative Future III (the Reconciled Society) in the horizon of the longing for the Wholly Other as perfect justice and unconditional love. Toward that goal it relies on both the critical theory of society as developed by Max Horkheimer, Ernst Bloch, Walter Benjamin, Theodor W. Adorno, and others, and on the new political theology of Johannes B. Metz, Helmut Peukert, and Edmund Arens.

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  The Development of Moral Consciousness Toward a Global Ethos

  Rudolf Siebert

  The book traces the evolution of the ethical or moral consciousness through the different world-religions, as well as through the secular modern enlightenment movements and humanisms. (From the book distributor.)

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  The Evolution of the Religious Consciousness Toward Alternative Futures

  Rudolf Siebert

  The book traces the development of the world-religions in the context of the timeline of human evolution.

  Source: Bookadda.com

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  Toward a Radical Interpretation of the Abrahamic Religions : in Search for the Wholly Other

  Rudolf Siebert

  This book deals with the disharmony, which broke into the religious community through the bourgeois, Marxian, and Freudian enlightenment, as well as with the possibility of a new Post-Modern harmony. After the bourgeois enlightenment and revolution the religious community differentiated itself into three groups: 1.The simple and naive believers; 2. the so called educated or enlightened people, characterized by analytical understanding and reflection; 3. the dialectical philosophers, for whom faith and reason had been reconciled by the power of the dialectical notion: the self-particularization and self-estrangement as well as the self-singularization and self-reconciliation of the Universal. While for the dialectical philosophers harmony has returned between religious revelation and autonomous reason, this has not yet happened for the masses of the people living in modern civil society. There exists the knowledge in the public sphere, which something is missing in the secular world- the longed for, imageless, and nameless utterly Other than the horror and terror of nature and history. The comparative, dialectical religiology presented in this book constitutes the attempt, to promote, universalize, and globalize a new synthesis of the modern antithesis between the religious and the secular, through a radical naturalistic and humanistic interpretation, translation, and inversion of the sacred texts particularly of the Abrahamic religions.

  (from publisher)

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  The World Religions in the Global Public Sphere: Towards Concrete Freedom and Material Democracy

  Rudolf Siebert, Michael Ott, and Karen Shoup-Pilarski

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  The Windows of Kanley Memorial Chapel

  Sherwood Snyder

  An alumnus of Western Michigan University who in 1957 designed one of Kanley Memorial Chapel’s 72 student-designed stained glass windows embarked on a project last year to identify all the artists who created them so many years ago.

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  Le (Néo)Colonialisme Littéraire : Quatre Romans Africains Face à l'Institution Littéraire Parisienne (1950-1970)

  Vivan I.P. Steemers

  Le texte littéraire ne naît pas en apesanteur, selon Edward Saïd. Il se présente dans un contexte historique et social et dépend pour son existence d'instances de pouvoir spécifiques : maisons d'édition, presse, critique, comités de prix littéraires. Ce constat s'impose avec encore plus de force lorsque l'on considère la situation des auteurs africains francophones qui sont presque entièrement tributaires de l'infrastructure éditoriale parisienne et des autres instances légitimantes du pays (anciennement) colonisateur. Cette étude présente le discours éditorial et critique de la première édition de quatre romans africains francophones publiés en métropole pendant les années 1950-1970. En dépit d'un climat politico-social plutôt favorable aux écrivains africains au début des années 1950, la politisation croissante des maisons d'édition au cours de la deuxième moitié de cette décennie n'a pas manqué d'avoir une forte incidence sur la réception des romans de l'époque. Ainsi, le sort du Pauvre Christ de Bomba, roman férocement anticolonial de Mongo Beti, sera très différent, par exemple, de celui de L'Enfant noir de Camant Laye, dont le texte brosse un tableau idyllique de la vie des Guinéens sous la colonisation. De même, deux romans qui voient le jour pendant la première décennie post-indépendance; Les Soleils des indépendances d'Ahmadou Kourouma et Le Devoir de violence de Yamho Ouologuem, se voient réserver des sorts très divergents. La théorie de la production culturelle de Pierre Bourdieu et celle sur l'esthétique de la réception de Hans Robert Jauss fournissent les outils de l'analyse de la réception de ces quatre romans, qui font désormais partie des classiques de la littérature africaine francophone.

  (Description from Google Books)

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  21st Century Geography : a Reference Handbook

  Joseph P. Stoltman

  Via approximately 80 entries, the SAGE 21st Century Reference Series volumes on geography highlights the most important topics, issues, questions and debates any student obtaining a degree in this field need to have mastered for effectiveness in the 21st century. The purpose is to provide undergraduate majors with an authoritative reference source that will serve their research needs with more detailed information than encyclopedia entries but not so much jargon, detail, or density as a journal article or a research handbook chapter.

  Key features:

  - Curricular-driven to provide students with initial footholds on topics of interest in writing essays and dissertations, in consulting to determine directions to take in pursuing a senior thesis, graduate degree and so on

  - Comprehensive to offer full coverage of major subthemes and subfields within the discipline of geography, including regional geography, physical geography, global change, human and cultural geography, economic geography and locational analysis, political geography, geospatial technology, cartography, spatial thinking, research methodology, geographical education and more.

  - Uniform in chapter structure to make it easy for students to locate key information, with a more-or-less common chapter format of Introduction, Theory, Methods, Applications, Comparison, Future Directions, Summary, Bibliography and Suggestions for Further Reading, and Cross References.

  - Available in print and electronic formats to provide students with convenient, easy access.

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  Modern Classical Homotopy Theory

  Jeffrey Strom

  The core of classical homotopy theory is a body of ideas and theorems that emerged in the 1950s and was later largely codified in the notion of a model category. This core includes the notions of fibration and cofibration; CW complexes; long fiber and cofiber sequences; loop spaces and suspensions; and so on. Brown's representability theorems show that homology and cohomology are also contained in classical homotopy theory. This text develops classical homotopy theory from a modern point of view, meaning that the exposition is informed by the theory of model categories and that homotopy limits and colimits play central roles. The exposition is guided by the principle that it is generally preferable to prove topological results using topology (rather than algebra). The language and basic theory of homotopy limits and colimits make it possible to penetrate deep into the subject with just the rudiments of algebra. The text does reach advanced territory, including the Steenrod algebra, Bott periodicity, localization, the Exponent Theorem of Cohen, Moore, and Neisendorfer, and Miller's Theorem on the Sullivan Conjecture. Thus the reader is given the tools needed to understand and participate in research at (part of) the current frontier of homotopy theory. Proofs are not provided outright. Rather, they are presented in the form of directed problem sets. To the expert, these read as terse proofs; to novices they are challenges that draw them in and help them to thoroughly understand the arguments.

  From Amazon.com

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  Evaluation Theory, Models, and Applications

  Daniel Stufflebeam and Chris L. S. Coryn

  Now in its second edition, Evaluation Theory, Models, and Applications is the vital text on evaluation models, perfect for classroom use as a textbook, and as a professional evaluation reference. The book begins with an overview of the evaluation field and program evaluation standards, and proceeds to cover the most widely used evaluation approaches. With new evaluation designs and the inclusion of the latest literature from the field, this Second Edition is an essential update for professionals and students who want to stay current. Understanding and choosing evaluation approaches is critical to many professions, and Evaluation Theory, Models, and Applications, Second Edition is the benchmark evaluation guide.

  Authors Daniel L. Stufflebeam and Chris L. S. Coryn, widely considered experts in the evaluation field, introduce and describe 23 program evaluation approaches, including, new to this edition, transformative evaluation, participatory evaluation, consumer feedback, and meta-analysis. Evaluation Theory, Models, and Applications, Second Edition facilitates the process of planning, conducting, and assessing program evaluations. The highlighted evaluation approaches include:

  • Experimental and quasi-experimental design evaluations
  • Daniel L. Stufflebeam's CIPP Model
  • Michael Scriven's Consumer-Oriented Evaluation
  • Michael Patton's Utilization-Focused Evaluation
  • Robert Stake's Responsive/Stakeholder-Centered Evaluation
  • Case Study Evaluation

  Key readings listed at the end of each chapter direct readers to the most important references for each topic. Learning objectives, review questions, student exercises, and instructor support materials complete the collection of tools. Choosing from evaluation approaches can be an overwhelming process, but Evaluation Theory, Models, and Applications, Second Edition updates the core evaluation concepts with the latest research, making this complex field accessible in just one book.

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  UFOs and Government : a Historical Inquiry

  Michael D. Swords and Robert Powell

  Governments around the world have had to deal with the UFO phenomenon for a good part of a century. How and why they did so is the subject of UFOs and Government, a history that for the first time tells the story from the perspective of the governments themselves. It's a perspective that reveals a great deal about what we citizens have seen, and puzzled over, from the outside for so many years. The story, which is unmasked by the government's own documents, explains much that is new, or at least not commonly known, about the seriousness with which the military and intelligence communities approached the UFO problem internally. Those approaches were not taken lightly. In fact, they were considered matters of national security. At the same time, the story reveals how a subject with such apparent depth of experience and interest became treated as if it were a triviality. And it explains why one government, the United States government, deemed it wise, and perhaps even necessary, to treat it so. Though the book focuses primarily on the U. S. government's response to the UFO phenomenon, also included is the treatment of the subject by the governments of Sweden, Australia, France, Spain, and other countries.This book is the result of a team effort that called itself the UFO History Group, a collection of veteran UFO historians and researchers who spent more than four years researching, consulting, writing, and editing to present a work of historical scholarship on government response to the UFO phenomenon.

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  箱字宙を讃えて : ジョゼフ・コーネル / Hako ji chū o tataete: Joseph Cornell

  Mutsuo Takahashi, Kawamura Kinen Bijutsukan, and Jeffrey Angles

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  Pediatric Psychodermatology: A Clinical Manual of Child and Adolescent Psychocutaneous Disorders

  Ruqiya Shama Tareen, Donald E. Greydanus, Mohammad Jafferany, and Dilip R. Patel

  Psychodermatologic disorders comprise for up to one third of dermatologic conditions in different clinical settings. By virtue of their complex nature these disorders can be very difficult to treat and adversely impact long term outcomes. This book examines the bidirectional relationship between psychiatry and dermatology in children and adolescents. The information is represented in an easy to follow format to be used as a clinical reference by physicians and paramedical staff in various fields of medicine including pediatrics, primary care, internal medicine, psychiatry and dermatology.

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  Harnessing the Power of Wisdom from Data to Wisdom

  Andrew Targowski

  This book is the first of its kind which defines wisdom as information and the highest level of the cognition units set, composed of data, information, concept, knowledge and wisdom. The author has founded his theory of wisdom on the following assumptions: Any sane person can make wise decisions throughout their lifetime, from childhood to old age; Wise decisions need not be expert in nature; Wisdom ought to be defined in such terms as to be understood not only by experts but by an average man; Wisdom is not synonymous to intelligence; The wisdom of a given human being decides between two systems controlling man: the biological evolution (by the cross-generational chain of genes) and spirituality, whose acquired system of virtues and values influences the actions of man; Wisdom has a range of bandwidth and properties; Knowledge on what constitutes wisdom is not the same as the process of becoming a wise man. Without good life practices, one cannot be a truly wise man; Wisdom ought to be taught in schools and at colleges, since if one waits until old age to become wise, it is commonly too late to redirect ones unwise behaviour into a wise life; Wisdom is a certain kind of information; Wisdom is the most important civilisational resource and should be monitored in a way that is similar or even better than the way you monitor the use of energy, the development of population or other resources. The book is full of examples taken from real cases of applied wisdom by famous people. The review of applied wisdom is provided in the historic context as well in the interdisciplinary approach. Every person who would like to be not only informed and knowledgeable but wise should read this book and applied its recommendations.

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  Wisdom: HNRS 4900-Spring 2012

  Andrew Targowski

  Wisdom: HNRS 4900-Spring 2012 by Andrew Targowski and Students is based on a course taught by Targowski at Western Michigan University’s Lee Honors College and Haworth College of Business. It investigates the differences between knowledge and wisdom and attempts to answer the question: Is wisdom investigated enough in education and practice? And if not, what is wisdom? The work evaluates wisdom from an interdisciplinary perspective and questions the absence of courses on interdisciplinary wisdom in higher education. The book also features content from the course, as well as the projects of some of the students who were willing to share their work. Student work includes reports on the wisdom of specific wise people and reports on the wisdom of social entities or issues of the day.

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  Deadly Effect of Informatics on the Holocaust: How the Policies of IBM and its Machines Helped the Germans to Kill 4 Million More People During WWII

  Andrew S. Targowski

  Andrew Targowski believes that the Holocaust could have been avoided or at least largely limited in scale. The mere use of the well preserved IBM punched-card machines contributed to the extermination of an "excessive" 4 million people. Before World War II, there were hardly any politicians who could have successfully opposed Hitler and Stalin. Poland, considered to be a small country among the European superpowers of those days, had a chance to manage its policies in such ways as to limit the scale of the Holocaust, and the losses of other nations could have been lower, as well. Alas, the then Polish leaders who - as the author proves in this work - held the trump cards in their hands did not live up to the task. They were guided by emotions and an ill-conceived idea of honor. The supreme driving factor, though, was the notion of Poland as a perpetual victim of history, an idea which was then dominant in the mentality of politicians and intellectuals. This was manifested in the fact that alongside Yugoslavia (and then the USSR too) the country conducted the most intensive guerrilla warfare in Europe, causing vast and unwarranted human losses. The story of how IBM business policies and its computing machines - the forerunners of today's computers - assisted the Holocaust in 1939-1945 ought to influence contemporary IT engineers, business people, and politicians in such ways as to prevent today's IT systems and telecommunications networks from being used to inflict similar multi-million human losses. An Internet-accelerated expansion of the Global Economy inexorably leads to an accelerated expansion of global resources, which will lead to wars for those resources that still remain on our small planet. In these wars, personal data will certainly prove central.

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  Global Civilization in the 21st Century

  Andrew S. Targowski

  The purpose of this book is to evaluate the question: What does the New World Order (NWO) mean in the 21st century? After the Polish Revolution in 1989 and the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the Soviet Union in 1991, many people expected better times than those during the Cold War between the West and East. Since Communism lost to Capitalism, can the latter promote freedom and happiness for all of us everywhere? However, this dream did not happen, vice versa we face now so called liquid times, times of instability and chaos. Therefore, this book is written for those who would like to know why the supposedly ideal economic solution known as Capitalism cannot bring happiness to all of us as it is promised by its promoters. This means that the book should be interesting for all kinds of readers and could be potentially read by millions. The book discusses Hegelian dialectics under the form of competition among ideas that have been neglected in the NOW-21st century and unopposed Capitalism has been transformed into Turbo-Capitalism, also known as Undemocratic Capitalism. This process is supported by additive waves of globalization taking place in the last 500+ years. Eventually in the 21st century humanity is facing the resulted transformation of western civilization into global civilization. The book analyzes this transformational process and its positive and negative repercussions for humanity.

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  Cognitive Informatics and Wisdom Development : Interdisciplinary Approaches

  Andrew S. Targowski

  Since wisdom is the ultimate human virtue, its application is important for humans and civilization. Cognitive Informatics and Wisdom Development: Interdisciplinary Approaches argues that wise civilization cannot function without wise people and vice versa, that wise people cannot function without positive conditions for the development of wise civilization. Using the cognitive informatics approach as a basis for the investigation of wisdom, this book offers solutions on how to study and evaluate the state of wisdom in 21st century society and the requirements for wise civilization and its monitoring systems.

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  The Deadly Effect of Informatics on the Holocaust

  Andrew S. Targowski

  The story of how IBM business policies and its computing machines-the forerunners of today's computers-assisted the Holocaust in 1939-1945 ought to influence contemporary IT engineers, business people, and politicians in such ways as to prevent today's IT systems and telecommunications networks from being used to inflict similar multi-million human losses. An Internet-accelerated expansion of the Global Economy inexorably leads to an accelerated expansion of global resources, which will lead to wars for those resources that still remain on our small planet. In these wars, personal data will certainly prove central.

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  Spirituality and Civilization Sustainability in the 21st Century

  Andrew S. Targowski and Marek J. Celinski

  This book investigates the state of civilization in the 21st century, which is characterized by the transformation of Western Civilization into Global Civilization and the resulting Great Recession, triggered by the financial crisis in the United States in 2008. Since the state of former Western Civilization is steadily worsening, the question is rising whether civilization is sustainable at all. To answer this question, 20 authors, members of the International Society for the Comparative Study of Civilizations (from several countries and continents) investigate the aspect of human spirituality, and whether its actual level of development is able to steer the sustainable development of civilization? The authors investigate the complexity of the current state of world civilization and the Planet, concluding that western societies entered the Second Great Crisis of Civilization, and reminding that the First Great Crisis took place after the fall of Rome I in 476 CE, and lasted till the Italian Renaissance, which means almost 1000 years. This book offers spirituality 2.0 as a possible tool for people to behave wisely in order to sustain our civilization. This new spirituality 2.0 contains a set of complementary best values of current eight civilizations, which should lead to tolerant (less-conflict driven) human behavior and wise decision-making. The book finally defines Wise Civilization and paths of its implementation, under the condition that people will be not only knowledgeable, but wise and inspired mainly by right spirituality.

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  Chinese Civilization in the 21st Century

  Andrew S. Targowski and Bernard T. Han

  The authors of this book believe that the 5,000 year-long-history of Chinese Civilization is the main factor in the re-emergence of China in the 21st century. It is a well-known fact that the Chinese economy became the second largest economy in the world in 2014. With some predictions, in the near future perhaps China will surpass the United States. The main media interprets this progress as the result of a Western Civilization strategy, which forced manufacturing to be outsourced to China and made it become the World Factory. Certainly, outsourcing was the trigger and an important factor at the end of the 20th century. However, today, China and its diaspora (Chinese Civilization) are decisively moving from the "robot" of the West to a master in economy and politics. This book, primarily focused on analyzing Chinese accomplishments nowadays, is not confined only to the economic dimension; it also takes into account the legacy and practice of the Chinese, i.e., its society, culture, religion, and infrastructure - the main components of any civilization. China had 24 dynasties and elaborated administrative systems (run by Mandarins) that contributed to the Chinese receptive subordination to political power. The Mandarins' management of knowledge, wisdom, and skills were supported by Confucianism - an ethical and philosophical system based on the teachings of the Chinese philosopher Confucius. Also, family is most important to the Chinese. There is a special relationship within the family-based complex system that is hinged on Chinese kinships and clans.

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  Civilizational Futures: Proceedings of the 40th International Conference of the International Society for the Comparative Study of Civilizations (ISCSC)

  Andrew S. Targowski and Connie Lamb

  Civilizational Futures2010 International Society for the Comparative Studyof Civilizations (ISCSC) 40th International ConferenceBrigham Young University Provo, UtahJune 15-17, 2010 Edited byConnie Lamb (Brigham Young University) Andrew Targowski (Western Michigan University) Program Committee Michael Andregg - Chairperson Ricardo Duchesne, Laina Farhat-Holzman, Hue-Ying Kuo, Connie Lamb Anthony Stevens-Arroyo, Andrew Targowski, David Wilkinson