Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

2008 Nebraska Population Report, David J. Drozd, Jerry Deichert

Archived Publications

This report shows annual estimates of the population for Nebraska and its counties and cities. Demographic patterns and trends, including changes in the components of population change, are illustrated. As the passage of time takes us further from Census 2000 and closer to the 2010 Census, it is important to see how official estimates show the specific changes that have been occurring at both the state and local level.

2008 Nebraska Population Report, David Drozd

Archived Publications

This report shows annual estimates of the population for Nebraska and its counties and cities. Demographic patterns and trends, including changes in the components of population change, are illustrated. As the passage of time takes us further from Census 2000 and closer to the 2010 Census, it is important to see how official estimates show the specific changes that have been occurring at both the state and local level.

The Hidden Costs Of Cause Marketing, Angela M. Eikenberry

Public Administration Faculty Publications

From pink ribbons to Product Red, cause marketing adroitly serves two masters, earning profits for corporations while raising funds for charities. Yet the short-term benefits of cause marketing—also known as consumption philanthropy—belie its long-term costs. These hidden costs include individualizing solutions to collective problems; replacing virtuous action with mindless buying; and hiding how markets create many social problems in the first place. Consumption philanthropy is therefore unsuited to create real social change.

Riding Obama's Coattails: The Democrats Finally Take The Ohio 1st, Randall E. Adkins, Gregory A. Petrow

Political Science Faculty Publications

In 2006 the Democratic Party swept both houses of Congress. It was a tidal wave. For the first time since 1994, both branches of the legislature were under Democratic Party control. While many of his Republican colleagues lost in 2006, Steve Chabot survived by narrowly defeating Cin-cinnati City Council member John Cranley by roughly 9,000 votes. The political environment favored the Democrats again in 2008, and this year the Democrats believed that Steve Driehaus, the Minority Whip in the Ohio state legislature, was the person to unseat Chabot.

Euthanasia-Related Strain And Coping Strategies In Animal Shelter Employees, Benjamin E. Baran, Joseph A. Allen, Steven G. Rogelberg, Christiane Spitzmüller, Natalie A. Digiacomo, Jennifer B. Webb, Nathan T. Carter, Olga L. Clark, Lisa A. Teeter, Alan G. Walker

Psychology Faculty Publications

Objective—To identify and evaluate coping strategies advocated by experienced animal shelter workers who directly engaged in euthanizing animals.

Design—Cross-sectional study.

Sample Population—Animal shelters across the United States in which euthanasia was conducted (5 to 100 employees/shelter).

Procedures—With the assistance of experts associated with the Humane Society of the United States, the authors identified 88 animal shelters throughout the United States in which animal euthanasia was actively conducted and for which contact information regarding the shelter director was available. Staff at 62 animal shelters agreed to participate in the survey. Survey packets were mailed to the 62 …

Native American Healthcare Needs Assessment: Omaha And Lincoln, Nebraska, Final Report, R. K. Piper, Donna Polk-Primm, Boris Morozov, Loren Ditsch, Jerry Deichert

Archived Publications

This executive summary of the final report documents the major findings of an assessment of needs conducted for the Nebraska Urban Indian Health Coalition (NUIHC). The purpose of the study is to provide a comprehensive analysis of the problems and unmet healthcare needs of Native American populations in Nebraska’s Douglas and Lancaster counties (approximately 3,700 persons) using a community-based model and innovative data-gathering technology.

An extensive social and health needs questionnaire was developed and delivered to targeted samples of adult, urban Native American populations at least 19 years of age, at community meetings held in Omaha and Lincoln during October-December …

Climatic Cataclysm: The Foreign Policy And National Security Implications Of Climate Change – Edited By Kurt M. Campbell, Elizabeth L. Chalecki

Political Science Faculty Publications

Climatic Cataclysm: The Foreign Policy and National Security Implications of Climate Change . Washington, DC : Brookings Institution Press . 237 pages. ISBN 978‐0‐8157‐1332‐6 , $28.95 cloth. Edited by Kurt M. Campbell . 2008 .

Awkward title notwithstanding, Climatic Cataclysm is the first attempt at a systematic generation of future climate scenarios and their possible security and foreign policy impacts, and as such is sorely overdue in the field of environmental security. Much of the scholarly literature in this field is devoted to statistical models and general theories; what is lacking is serious national security consideration of the best climate …

The Effects Of Portfolio Size On International Equity Home Bias Puzzle, Jinlan Ni

Economics Faculty Publications

This paper investigates a new explanation for the international equity home bias puzzle based on an endogenous asymmetric information model. Using a cross-sectional mutual fund data set, it is found that the degrees of home bias across fund managers are negatively correlated to the asset sizes under their management. This result is consistent with the theoretical prediction in the endogenous asymmetric information model—the portfolio managers with the larger assets tend to acquire more information regarding foreign equity and, hence, hold more foreign equity holdings.

Using Robotics To Equip K-12 Teachers: Silicon Prairie Initiative For Robotics In Information Technology (Spirit), Alisa Gilmore, Bing Chen, Neal Grandgenett

Teacher Education Faculty Proceedings & Presentations

The Silicon Prairie Initiative for Robotics in Information Technology (SPIRIT) is a unique collaborative effort between the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL) College of Engineering, the University of Nebraska at Omaha (UNO) College of Education, and the local Omaha Public Schools (OPS) system. With funding from an NSF ITEST grant, from 2006 – 2008 the initiative recruited and trained 97 math and science middle school teachers through summer workshops and follow-up sessions during the school year, with the goal of equipping teachers in hands-on engineering design principles and providing curriculum development support for STEM instruction. The centerpiece of the training was …

Go The Extra Mile — It’S Never Crowded, Heidi Blackburn

Criss Library Faculty Publications

My daytime alias is Reference and Instruction Librarian, but my real title is Master of Library Science. I am a newly minted MLS graduate (May 2008) and have worked full-time at Kansas State University at Salina for almost a year. As a type A personality, I had my midlife crisis early: the summer before I was to graduate with a BA in business administration. After I’d stubbornly pursued the business world since high school, I decided that corporate America held no interest for me. My family asked what I planned to do after graduation and I announced I would attend …

The Impact Of Giving Together: Giving Circles’ Influence On Members’ Philanthropic And Civic Behaviors, Knowledge And Attitudes, Angela M. Eikenberry, Jessica Bearman, Hao Han, Melissa Brown, Courtney Jensen

Public Administration Faculty Publications

Giving circles are made up of individuals who pool their resources and then decide together where these should be distributed. They also include social, educational, and engagement components that seem to engage participants in their communities and increase members’ understanding of philanthropy and community issues.

This study examines if and how participation in a giving circle has changed members’ behavior related to giving, volunteering, and civic engagement. In addition, we asked if and how participation in a giving circle has changed members’ awareness or knowledge about philanthropy, nonprofit organizations, and community issues. Finally, we wanted to know if and how …

Snapshot: The Impact Of Giving Together, Angela M. Eikenberry, Jessica Bearman, Hao Han, Melissa Brown, Courtney Jensen

Public Administration Faculty Publications

Donors in giving circles give more, give more strategically, and are more engaged in their communities, according to a new study by Dr. Angela Eikenberry and Jessica Bearman with research assistance from Melissa Brown, Hao Han, and Courtney Jensen. ever since giving circles—groups of individual donors who pool their money and other resources and decide together where these should be distributed—emerged as a philanthropic trend, we have speculated about their impact. Do donors give more or give differently because they are involved in a giving circle? Do they become more engaged and active in their communities? Are they more politically …

Creativity And Domain Specificity: The Effect Of Task Type On Multiple Indexes Of Creative Problem-Solving, Roni Reiter-Palmon, Marcy Young Illies, Toleo, Infousa, Oriental Trading Co.

Psychology Faculty Publications

The study addresses the issue of domain specificity within creativity by understanding the characteristics of creative tasks and how participants react to the task. One hundred and eighty seven participants were given one of three realistic everyday problems to solve. The problems differed in terms of complexity, involvement, and problem-based efficacy. Problem solutions were evaluated on several measures of creativity. Results indicate that creativity was influenced by the type of problem solved and the measure of creativity used to evaluate the solution. Further, these results were obtained after controlling for the effect of ability. Results imply that not all real-world …

Review Of Creative Leadership: Skills That Drive Change, Greg C. Ashley, Roni Reiter-Palmon

Psychology Faculty Publications

Reviews the book, "Creative leadership: Skills that drive change" by Gerard J. Puccio, Mary C. Murdock, and Marie Mance (2007). The introduction and opening chapter provide the overarching theme of the book, which is to connect the constructs of creativity and leadership and to make a case why the two go hand-in-hand. Both constructs involve dealing with change. The main focus of the book is the creative problem solving (CPS) approach to generating optimal problem solutions. Much of the book is spent illustrating the benefits of applying divergent and convergent thinking skills to each of the six process steps in …

Editors’ Note: Media And Information Literacy In Theory And Practice, Jeremy Harris Lipschultz, Michael L. Hilt

Communication Faculty Publications

Studies in Media & Information Literacy Education (SIMILE) has published a wide-range of international articles from across the disciplines. As a collection, they represent the growing influence and importance of media and information literacy.

Obama's Budget Offers Smart Shift, Angela M. Eikenberry

Public Administration Faculty Publications

Beginning in 2011, President Barack Obama's proposed budget plan would reduce the value of charitable tax deductions for wealthy Americans (families with more than $250,000 in income, 1.2 percent of households) to 28 cents on the dollar.

At the same time, the president's budget also would increase taxes for this group (from 33 percent and 35 percent to 36 percent and 39.6 percent of their income) to help pay for reshaping the nation's health care system. The tax deduction changes would not affect foundations or Americans making less than $250,000 a year.

Some in the philanthropic community argue that this …

Defining Family: Naming, Orientation, And Redemption In The Case Of Terri Schiavo, M. Chad Mcbride, Karen L. Taas, Paige W. Toller

Communication Faculty Publications

This paper undertakes a detailed analysis of the Terri Schiavo case as it was covered in popular media. Drawing on Burkean theory, we argue a critical issue in the case was a struggle between Terri's parents and husband to be seen as the more legitimate family in order to determine the duration and extent of Terri 's medical care. We discuss how the private debate over Terri's health and the decision to remove her feeding tube entered into the public scenes of legal and political action. This shift to the public scene represented problems for the parties directly involved in …

A New Model Of 4-H Volunteer Development In Science, Engineering, And Technology Programs, Bradley S. Barker, Neal Grandgenett, Gwen Nugent

Teacher Education Faculty Publications

New initiatives centered on science, engineering, and technology (SET) in 4-H may be moving away from the long-established adult volunteer delivery model. This shift in delivery may be due to a lack of availability of adult volunteers who possess the necessary SET competencies to effectively lead 4-H clubs. One way to offset this trend may be to blend traditional face-to-face training with continuous training efforts that include asynchronous on-line training modules, synchronous Web-based meetings, and self-directed learning. This new 4-H SET Volunteer Competencies Training Model is being tested in the Nebraska 4-H Robotics and GPS/GIS program.

Re-Kindling Interlibrary Loan, Joyce Neujahr

Criss Library Faculty Proceedings & Presentations

Amazon's Kindle device allows libraries to acquire new titles in three minutes or less. This presentation explores how this capability can be used in two important ways. First, providing an "instant interlibrary loan", by using Amazon's 225,000 available Kindle titles. Loan requests can be filled on-the-spot by downloading a book and lending the Kindle to the patron. Second, patrons gain immediate access to bestsellers, fiction, and new releases that would ordinarily require days or weeks to provide. The presentation details an actual implementation of "Kindle Loan" services. Both the concept of how wireless readers change library services, and the practical …

Census 2000 Mail Response Rate: Nebraska Counties, David J. Drozd

Archived Publications

Maps of Nebraska Counties' response rate via mail to the Census 2000

Problem Identification And Construction: What Do We Know, What Is The Future?, Roni Reiter-Palmon, Erika J. Robinson

Psychology Faculty Publications

Many cognitive process theories of creativity include an initial process of problem identification, definition, and construction. Previous research suggests that problem identification and construction is related to creativity, and that creative individuals and experts tend to engage in problem identification and construction. Finally, previous research suggests that inducing active engagement in problem identification and construction, through instructions or training, facilitates creativity. In this paper we further offer our views regarding important future direction for researchers in this area. Specifically, issues regarding methodology, the relationship between personality and values and how problems are constructed, and problem identification and construction in teams …

Editors’ Note: Defining Media And Information Literacy Amid Change, Jeremy Harris Lipschultz, Michael L. Hilt

Communication Faculty Publications

Recent articles in Studies in Media & Information Literacy Education (SIMILE) highlight definitional challenges and opportunities.

Comparison Of Hispanic Poverty Rates And Rankings For States: 2000 Census Vs. 2009-13 American Community Survey, David Drozd, Jerry Deichert

Archived Publications

Sources: Table P159H, 2000 Census (SF3); Table B17001I, 2009-13 ACS; U.S. Census Bureau

Convocation Address: "101 Years: Writing The Next Chapter", Uno Office Of The Chancellor

Chancellor’s Speeches

Good morning and welcome to UNO's 2009 Fall Convocation. My sincere thanks to all attending today; and please know it is a privilege to stand before you as Chancellor of this great university and share this annual progress update.

By any standard of measurement, 2009, UNO's Centennial, was an extraordinary year for our campus. It began with the Fall Convocation, and the announcement that Senator Chuck Hagel, a UNO alum, would be locating his Congressional Archives in the Criss Library. This was followed by the dedication of the newly renovated home for the College of Public Affairs and Community Service, …

Indian Education For All: Your Guide To Understanding And Enjoying Pow Wows, Murton Mccluskey

Tribal Nations Documents

The following pages include a collection of information which is intended to help the reader better understand and enjoy the events and activities which occur at many of the plains area pow wows and celebrations. Because the customs, rules and regulations may vary from one celebration to another, the booklet should serve only as a basic guide and not as an authoritative directory. It is merely designed as a resource to help the reader to be more knowledgeable and better able to understand and enjoy the history, events, activities and planning of a pow wow. Comments and suggestions are welcomed …

Learning To Serve, Serving To Learn: Grant Portfolio 2008-2009, Evans School

School K-12

Evans High School Grant Proposal (2008-2009)

Service-Learning In Community-Based Organizations: A Practical Guide To Starting And Sustaining High-Quality Programs, Eugene C. Roehlkepartain

Service Learning, General

Whether you’re new to service-learning or have been doing it for years, this guide gives you and your organization the tips, tools, and techniques you need to start making a positive difference in many people’s lives by providing high-quality opportunities for youth to serve and learn.

20 Exemplary Service-Learning Projects, Chicago Public Schools Service-Learning Initiative

Project Summaries

In 1998, Chicago Public Schools became the largest school district in the country to require that students do service to their community as a graduation requirement. Since that time, hundreds of thousands of students have provided millions of hours of service to Chicago's neighborhoods and communities.

Learn And Serve America Year (3 Progress Report For Period Of September 6,2008 - June 30, 2009), Learn And Serve America

Project Summaries

At the end of Year 3, there were a total of 1,748 economically disadvantaged youth beneficiaries and 502 college students who were served through the LSA supported activities as reported through our LASSIE data. These figures both exceed our annual targets. Our cumulative figures to date are as follows: Disadvantaged youth beneficiaries, Year 1: 1334 and Year 2: 1775 and Year 3: 1748 for a total of 4857.

Educating Citizens Building Communities: Annual Membership Survey Results - Executive Summary, Campus Compact

Higher Education

Campus Compact conducts an annual survey of its member colleges and universities to—among other things—gauge student and faculty involvement in service and service-learning, assess institutional support and culture for service and service-learning, identify the types of courses and programs offered as well as the issues being addressed through service, and identify the nature of campus-community partnerships. This publication provides an executive summary of our major findings in 2009.