Based on an unbalanced panel of all Bavarian cooperative banks for the years of 1989-97 which includes information on 283 mergers, we analyze motives and cost effects of small-scale mergers in German banking. Estimating a frontier cost function with a timevariable stochastic efficiency term we show that positive scale and scope effects from a merger arise only if the merged unit closes part of ...

This study presents preliminary findings on the relationship between beginning teacher’s scores on the Performance Assessment for California Teachers (PACT), a preservice performance assessment of a wide range of teaching skills, and their subsequent teaching effectiveness measured by students’ value-added achievement gains in English Language Arts (ELA). Linking PACT scores and four separate v...

We propose an enhanced multiple branch predictor using per-primary address branch histories. Using this scheme, the interferences among diierent branches are reduced, enhancing the average prediction accuracy. Also, since the branches predicted each cycle do not suuer from successive dependencies, predictions are generated in parallel. This scheme results in higher average branch prediction acc...

Branch roads, which are densely distributed in cities, allow for the flow of local traffic and provide connections between the city and outlying areas. Branch roads are typically narrow, and two-way traffic flows on branch roads are thus affected when vehicles traveling in opposite directions meet. This study investigates the changes in the velocities of vehicles when they meet on two-way branc...