Wested

Abstract Since the Convention on Biological Diversity (1992), international frameworks have emphasized benefit-sharing and private-sector engagement in conservation, a call reinforced by the Kunming–Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (2022). Yet biodiversity continues to decline, highlighting the need for funding models that effectively link commerce with conservation. Here, we examine how the fragrance industry—a sector deeply dependent on plant diversity and cultural value chains—can contribute more meaningfully to global plant conservation. Drawing on international policy frameworks, published literature, and illustrative conservation–industry partnerships, we assess mechanisms through which fragrance-related initiatives support biodiversity protection, accountability, and culturally grounded conservation narratives. We then examine The Red List Project as a conservation-first model that integrates biodiversity objectives directly into fragranced product development, using scent inspiration rather than wild harvesting. We argue that scaling such approaches could reposition the fragrance industry as an active partner in safeguarding plant diversity, biocultural heritage, and equitable benefit-sharing.

Research has shown that factors such as teaching confidence and a sense of belonging influence an educator's classroom practice and motivation to remain in the profession. Although professional learning programs focused on CS content and pedagogy abound, opportunities to develop these affective components are often scarce for K-12 teachers. This is particularly true for those who are the sole CS educators at their school or are thrust into CS teaching with minimal preparation. To address this gap in support, we developed a peer mentoring program for high school teachers, featuring one-on-one mentoring focused on goals aligned with the Computer Science Teachers Association (CSTA) Standards for CS Teachers, a monthly community of practice for mentors to enhance their mentoring skills to better support their mentees, and numerous opportunities for community building among all participants. Drawing on four years of experience partnering with three CS teacher communities and analyzing evidence of growth from survey and interview data, we illustrate how we designed a program that fosters the professional development of both mentors and mentees, while incorporating a focus on equitable CS teaching. As more stakeholders create programs to support in-service and pre-service teachers transitioning to CS education, the insights shared in this experience report can provide guidance on developing initiatives that holistically support educators and contribute to a more sustained and well-prepared K-12 CS teaching workforce.

The opioid epidemic has created challenges in treating patients who inject drugs or those who are at risk of overdose due to psychiatric illnesses. Patients who self-inject into their vascular access devices (SIVADs) are at risk of infection, prolonged hospitalization, suboptimal care, overdose, or death. In response to incidents where patients have overdosed by SIVAD, the intravenous (IV) CareLock™ device was developed to prevent patients from accessing their IVs while still allowing providers to administer medications. We engaged a multidisciplinary team to analyze mitigation methods and perform a gap analysis to create a comprehensive protocol to reduce SIVAD. A multidisciplinary protocol identified patients at risk of SIVAD to guide the use of our IV CareLock™ device. This protocol prevented SIVAD while allowing providers to continue using the IV. Our novel device and protocol allowed providers to safely care for at-risk patients, reducing the potential for adverse outcomes.

Abstract The twenty-first-century economy has created an increasing demand for STEM education to prepare students for STEM careers. An emerging example is selective STEM high schools – institutions primarily focused on recruiting high-achieving students interested in pursuing and persisting in STEM fields. While theories of identity development have helped explain how students identify with STEM and how institutional factors relate to this process, further analysis is needed to understand the different contexts within which students who identify with and persist in STEM operate. This study analyzes how twenty-eight students who applied to selective STEM high schools conceptualized and identified with STEM in their first year of postsecondary education in the United States. Interviews were conducted with students who attended selective STEM-focused high schools and those who did not attend or had discontinued attending such schools. Using a phenomenological approach, we examined how students’ self-reported high school experiences relate to their conceptualization and perceptions of interest, recognition, participation, and competence in what it means to be a STEM person. Findings suggest that selective STEM-focused high school experiences gave students a more nuanced understanding of STEM fields. However, students also shared perceptions of incongruence with their interests perceived as unrelated to STEM, continuous stress and mental overload, and antipathy toward mathematics.

The passing of Dr. David C. Berliner, Professor Emeritus at Arizona State University and member of the National Academy of Education, in September 2025, reverberated across the educational landscape. To so many who knew him or were influenced by him, his passing marked the loss of one of the most vocal, passionate defenders of public education we have seen. The goals of this essay are to reopen and reflect on one of Berliner’s most cited contributions to the field and to pay homage to the man, the scholar, the mentor, and friend.

Despite the promise of reflective consultation and the beneficial impacts it may have on enhancing early childhood educator social-emotional well-being and competence, there is limited research on reflective consultation with early childhood educators. The current project, Escúchanos, examined how English-speaking and bilingual Spanish-English early childhood educators (n =16, 6 White, 9 Latina, 1 Asian/Pacific Islander) in the United States experienced reflective consultation at their child care centers. Semi-structured interviews were conducted in the participant's preferred language to provide a better understanding of the perceived benefits and suggested improvements for delivering reflective consultation in early childhood and education settings. Early childhood educators in the study were provided with reflective consultation sessions over 7 months offered by trained mental health consultants in a linguistically responsive manner. Given the cultural and linguistic diversity of the early childhood workforce, this study contributes to the practice of providing culturally and linguistically responsive reflective consultation. Findings from this study suggest that reflective consultation offered early childhood educators with the: space to express feelings; time to take a pause; opportunities to work as a team; and an enhanced awareness of self and others.

ABSTRACT In this study, using statewide data of immigrant EL-classified students who arrived in Oregon in grades 6–12, I explore which students participate in newcomer programs and whether placement in a newcomer program leads to fuller or more constricted core content access in secondary school. I find a larger percentage of students who participate in newcomer programs are Hispanic/Latinx and Black, as well as Spanish-speakers. Students in newcomer programs tend to be more likely to be eligible for free/reduced price lunch and have the lowest initial English language proficiency level. Using matched samples generated through coarsened exact matching, I find that students who participate in newcomer programs are less likely to be enrolled in an English language arts class in their first year than their peers who do not participate in newcomer programs, as well as less likely to be enrolled in a social studies class in their third year. The relationship between newcomer program participation and enrollment in other core subjects and in other years is not consistently significant in other model specifications. Implications for policy and practice focus on ensuring course access is prioritized alongside the important services newcomer programs likely provide.

CiteSaga, a serious game designed for academic integrity education, immerses students in interactive citationchallenges. This pedagogical approach offers an engaging alternative to traditional methods in higher education. Thedevelopment revealed key insights: the necessity of substantial institutional support, interdisciplinary collaboration(including library services for resources), and the persistent resource demands of serious game creation despite AIadvancements. While AI can empower smaller teams for narrative richness, faculty engagement differed from students,necessitating targeted training. Prioritizing player engagement, community, and interactive playtesting, drawing from UGCand indie game strategies, proved essential. Moreover, modular design and creative funding addressed budget constraints.CiteSaga demonstrates the potential of serious games for academic integrity, underscoring the need for institutionalalignment, stakeholder buy-in, and interactive design. Future research should explore longitudinal impacts, facultyonboarding, and curricular integration.

Children's early numerical abilities shape their trajectories for math learning throughout schooling, and task quantity representation (e.g., nonsymbolic vs. symbolic) affects their reasoning about numerical concepts. The role of quantity representation in early numerical ability has typically been studied using variable-centered approaches. The present study builds on past work by using latent profile analysis as a person-centered approach to investigate heterogeneity in U.S. preschoolers' (N = 200, Mage = 4 years, 6 months) numerical abilities across nonsymbolic, verbal symbolic, and written symbolic representation types. The aim was to determine whether numerical ability indicators across the three representation types would result in empirically distinct ability profiles and whether preschool ability profile would predict variance on a standardized assessment of math achievement a year later, in kindergarten. We found evidence of four distinct preschool number ability profiles: (a) consistently low; (b) consistently high; (c) intermediate, with an advantage on nonsymbolic items; and (d) intermediate, with an advantage on verbal symbolic items. Although children in the consistently low and consistently high profiles performed reliably lower and higher, respectively, on the assessment of kindergarten math achievement, the two intermediate profiles performed similarly. The results reveal heterogeneity in preschool numerical ability across quantity representations and suggest that proficiency with either nonsymbolic or verbal representations may be a helpful foundation for building future math achievement. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).

Across these inquiries, time and again we recognized the importance of empowering young children to take risks. We also observed the extent to which the adults in their lives are most empowered to foster these dispositions. Feng & Wang revealed that key aspects of the approach to learning include competence, motivation, creativity, and persistence. These aspects require children's agency to take risks and make mistakes, as well as adults' comfort with children's autonomy in learning and play. In Stamatis et al., the parents' appetite for or tolerance of risk shaped the role they assumed with their child during play. While families supported and made space for children to take small risks, the researchers observed a range of approaches across caregivers and situations. In Donaldson, children were inevitably afforded differing levels of autonomy depending on how much support the teacher offered. In essence, the teacher curated the level of autonomy extended to different children based on perceptions of their needs and temperament. Baker et al. highlighted how naturalistic play has many opportunities for problemsolving and autonomy when time allows and when it is prioritized and supported by the adults in a child's life.Three studies in the Research Topic offered insights into what happens during adult-child interactions in a risky moment or in response to a mistake. Baker et al., Donaldson, and Stamatis et al. provided textured descriptions of how children and adults interact in the face of risks they encountered during learning and play. In the results sections, the authors offered richly told stories and vignettes as evidence to illustrate the broad categories identified, thereby bringing the findings to life. By presenting detailed descriptions, the authors offer readers a window into how these moments are negotiated between adults and children. At the same time, they show how the interventions of adults and the responses from children affect how children ultimately react to and learn from their own risk-taking and mistakes.All of the articles illustrate the extent to which situational and contextual factors shape responses to mistakes and willingness to take risks. For instance, in Baker et al. and Stamatis et al., parents and caregivers supported children differently across various play experiences, some feeling more open to supporting children's risk-taking and autonomy, while others more heavily weighed the potential risks. Donaldson observed how a veteran teacher offered each child different responses to mistakes, even within a single classroom context. And in Feng & Wang, the authors worked to develop an instrument that could reliably measure the extent to which children remain engaged in learning activities, taking into account differences in parents' and teachers' perceptions across home and early learning contexts.As all of the studies in this Research Topic are anchored in both child-adult relationships and learning in context, they collectively illustrate the power of closely attending to small daily interactions. Looking forward, we encourage researchers to further expand the array of contexts in which risk-taking and making mistakes are studied. We hope to expand the conceptions of risk-taking, mistakes, and corrective feedback and position them as areas of learning and possibility, while advocating for the use of a variety of approaches to tease apart the nuance of real-world experiences. There are rich opportunities to develop findings into usable knowledge that adults-including teachers and parents-can use to intentionally create environments that enhance children's experiences with mistakes and risk-taking. And finally, all too often, adults shy away from mistakes, electing to mitigate both physical and emotional risks in an effort to protect children. We hope that this work inspires them to focus on developing a greater tolerance for mistakes made in learning and more support for appropriate risk-taking in their classrooms, play spaces, and beyond. By providing much needed feedback even for developmentallyappropriate mistakes, adults have the power to cultivate a positive error climate that can support rich and joyful learning for young children.