Gifted Education Commons^™

Educating The Outsiders: The Importance Of Social Support In The Success Of Latino Undocumented Students, Emily Adkins

UReCA: The NCHC Journal of Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity

It takes a village to raise a child. This traditional proverb points to the importance of community and cooperation in ensuring children’s needs are met and exposing them to a wide variety of resources that could provide assistance if necessary. This concept of community support is widely heralded, and for many students in the United States, this saying is vital. Their villages are complete with parents, teachers, and administrators that support them and believe in their potential for success. But who forms the support system for children who are on America’s social fringes? For students who seem to be outsiders, …

Non-Suicidal Self-Injury On Youtube: A Content And Comment Analysis, Nathan Lowry, Carol Ewert

UReCA: The NCHC Journal of Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity

Non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) is a prevalent public health issue that affects millions of teenagers and young adults each year. With the ever-increasing use of social media among youth, it is important to understand how NSSI is represented online. The goal of the current study was to update the research of Lewis and colleagues (2010) to examine how NSSI is represented on YouTube via a content analysis. We also examined whether certain types of NSSI related videos may encourage or trigger viewers to engage in NSSI themselves by coding comments posted in response to videos. For this study, we searched “self-harm” …

Evolutionary Explanation For Invasive Abilities Of Centaurea Stoebe (Spotted Knapweed) In Introduced Areas Invasion And Its Effects On Biodiversity In Native Areas, Erin Koren

UReCA: The NCHC Journal of Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity

Exotic species are those which have been dispersed, either by chance or human action, to an environment outside of their native range. Only a small portion of these exotics are able to become well established in the invaded population and even expand beyond it. The ones that can are termed invasive species (Muller-Scharer, Schaffner & Steinger, 2004; Bais et al., 2003). Broz et al. (2007) estimates that 25,000 species of invasive plants are in the U.S. invading 700,000 hectares of United States wildlife habitat per year and tallies the economic burden of invasive plant species to be around $35 billion …

The Physics Behind Garage Door Springs, Tal Joseph

UReCA: The NCHC Journal of Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity

Pushing a button to open your garage door before going to work seems trivial until the motor fails to lift the door. There are various explanations for a garage door malfunction, but this paper will focus on the most common of them all—a broken spring. Inspired by the fact that garage door technicians must match the right spring to the appropriate garage doors, this project produced a spring conversion calculator. This paper provides a preface and comprehensive explanation of the mechanisms of overhead garage doors. Initially, it introduces the garage door and its components, then provides a detailed explanation of …

"My Paintings Would Be No Different Than A Picture In A Biology Textbook", Andi Kur

UReCA: The NCHC Journal of Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity

I find that there are innate balances in life, universal dichotomies that permeate our understanding of the world. My paintings are about a duality such as this that exists between art and science. We are told from youth that these subjects are poles in constant strain, as miscible as oil in water. I spent thirteen years in school believing that I must choose between the two, that it is unnecessary to carry both with me. Drawn between a distinct love of each, I realized how vehemently I disagreed. Everything: every rock to every tree to every person is suspended between …

A Sliding Scale: Nuclear Proliferation Among States, Jessica Lui

UReCA: The NCHC Journal of Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity

Why do states engage in nuclear proliferation? Nuclear proliferation is a major security issue affecting the international arena. Existing studies debate both the strength and direction of determinants of nuclear proliferation and the effect of domestic and international circumstances on proliferation. A clear understanding of why states choose to pursue nuclear arms is critical to promoting and maintaining international security. By analyzing what factors may make a state less prone to proliferation, the international community may incentivize disarmament. My research question considers membership in the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) as a potential correlate of nuclear proliferation. Are countries that …

Jargons And Pidgins And Creoles, Oh My!, Emily Gray

UReCA: The NCHC Journal of Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity

Linguistics, as defined by the Oxford English Dictionary, is “the science of studying language, including phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, pragmatics, and historical linguistics” (OED.com). Within this field, the study of pidgin and creole languages is the source of much controversy and disagreement. Due to their divergence from typical linguistic features and development patterns, pidgins and creoles have long been ignored by the linguistics community. Considered by many to be “inferior, haphazard, broken” versions of “older, more established languages,” these so-called “bastard tongues” were written off as unworthy of study (Todd 1). Only recently have these forms of language garnered …

Symptoms Of The Virus By Dr. Henry Esquire Iii Md Chronological Order, Emily Haase

UReCA: The NCHC Journal of Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity

1. Severe hunger, often voicing their distress.

2. Chronic moodiness, confusion, sullenness.

3. Irritability, otherwise emotionally unstable. Paranoia.

4. Homicidal tendencies – full takeover of the disease. Handle with caution.

I was pondering whether scratching five (zombification?) or perhaps a two-and-a-half (insomnia, only affecting a portion of those affected?) into the dirt was necessary before Travis made my decision. He didn’t mean to do it, of course, but he stomped across the list anyway, destroying it. He didn’t even stop to say sorry, so he must not even have noticed.

Temporary Meddlers: Friars In Measure For Measure And Romeo And Juliet, Sarah Friedman

UReCA: The NCHC Journal of Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity

Shakespeare wrote during a time of intense religious controversy, as Protestants, Catholics, and Puritans vied for spiritual authority in England. Although Henry VIII broke from the Catholic Church in the 1530s, Shakespeare’s work seems to still have been heavily influenced by Roman Catholic traditions. Both Measure for Measure and Romeo and Juliet are set in Catholic places and Catholic friars manipulate the outcomes in both plays. The portrayal of these characters offers insight into how Shakespeare may have viewed Catholics, as he did not leave behind clear evidence of his own religious convictions. The friars in Measure for Measure and …

Aluminum Analysis Of Water At Columbia College, Dung Golden

UReCA: The NCHC Journal of Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity

Water contamination from trace metals can pose severe threats to human and environmental health. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) classifies aluminum as a secondary contaminant, for which it provides non-mandatory secondary maximum contaminant levels (SCML) because such contaminants are not considered to present a risk to the public. The SMCL for aluminum is between 0.05 and 0.2 mg/L or part per million (ppm). Tap water from different sources on the Columbia College campus were analyzed for aluminum content by fluorometry and visible spectrometry. The results from the fluorometry method indicated that samples from two locations on campus were higher than …

A Cultural, Economic, And Industrial Analysis Of The Republic Of Poland And Its Financial Services Industry, Jeremy Eberly

UReCA: The NCHC Journal of Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity

Through its thousand-year existence, the state of Poland has been a continental anomaly. The very existence of the state was questioned, challenged, and influenced by foreign powers intent on empire. At the end of World War II, the then-communist Polish state remained tightly under the influence of the Soviet Union. After years of underlying dissatisfaction with the pitiful performance of a centrally planned economy, the Poles, through “Solidarity,” forced democratic reforms in the late 1980s and capitalism was formally embraced. Explaining why the Poles rejected communism, French anthropologist and renowned political scientist Emmanuel Todd suggests that the roots of the …

The Use Of Simpson’S Diversity Index To Develop A Diverse Community For The Enrichment Of Experiential Learning, Quinn Nguyen

UReCA: The NCHC Journal of Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity

Diversity is a buzz-word in our society, and within an academic institution, it plays the role as a tacit of what an institution is able to offer its students to better themselves and contribute to more knowledgeable citizens. While many programs and institutions promise diversity, some of these entities lack the requisite of diversity through their broad, loose definition. In this study, the Simpson’s Diversity Index (SDI) is introduced as a possible quantitative method for eradicating the loose definition of diversity. With that, 103 institutions were randomly sampled from a list of 1500 institutions to create a normal distribution curve. …

Connexin-43 And Traumatic Brain Injury: A Potential Target For Therapeutic Intervention, Lauren R. Moore

UReCA: The NCHC Journal of Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity

Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) is a widespread, degenerative affliction with no current therapeutic interventions. The long-­‐term degradation caused by TBI results from secondary injury cascades that are initiated by primary injury. An early and important step in the damage process is reactive astrogliosis in astrocytes. Astrocytes communicate through gap junctions, which are composed of two connexon hemichannels from the two communicating cells and these connexons themselves are composed of six connexin protein subunits. Connexin 43 (Cx43) is a particularly important connexin to gap junctional communication and could act either to preserve the astrocytes from oxidative stress, or to propagate the …

Ureca, The Nchc Web Journal Of Undergraduate Research And Creative Activity, Kaycee Anderson, Mikayla Conway, Mackenzie Cope, Caleb Deane, Leah Koch, Ryan Schlom, Rebekah Assid, Olivia George, Josh Freeman, Grace Mcpherson, Kate Mobley, Zeke Starr, Russell Helms, Johnny Maclean, Brian White

UReCA: The NCHC Journal of Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity

Our vision is an academic community without borders, a connected network of aspirational students committed to the advancement of knowledge and appreciation of the arts. UReCA fosters the exchange of intellectual and creative work between undergraduate students, providing a platform where students can engage with and contribute to the advancement of their individual fields.

UReCA was first conceived by Johnny MacLean (Southern Utah University) and Brian White (Graceland University) at an annual NCHC conference in Phoenix, Arizona. MacLean and White noticed that while several academic outlets existed for honors faculty and administrators, there was an absence of student-focused publications within …

Secret-Keeper, Cassandra Zimmerman

UReCA: The NCHC Journal of Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity

Playing with the neighbor’s boy Sam wasn’t always Eliza’s favorite pastime. Each Saturday they’d sit in front of his house, searching for caterpillars between the slick, green blades and dried husks of weeds. The sun watched them as intently as they did the grass, or perhaps it was looking for caterpillars too. The real fun, however, didn’t start until Sam brought out the toys: a combat jeep, as small and shiny as a beetle; a plastic shooter that was always slick with bubble soap; fistfuls of dinosaurs, some forever frozen in a hungry roar, others in a panicked stare; and, …

Confronting Internalized Transphobia My Own And Society's, Kaci Sullivan

UReCA: The NCHC Journal of Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity

This series emphatically insists on spectrums in a binary world. While I consciously know there isn’t anything wrong with being transgender—that there’s absolutely no shame in it, this knowledge hasn’t protected me from internalizing all the transphobic messages integrated into every aspect of our "progressive" society. Glittering glass slivers, they dig in deep, prepared to stay a lifetime. So I decided to sit with myself. Naked. In front of a mirror and canvas. I would paint my body until it became one grounded, plein-air-inspired stroke after another. Until I accepted that it’s a perfectly valid body. This journey isn’t mine …

Mixed Media Collection, Jacob Smith

UReCA: The NCHC Journal of Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity

This body of work reflects on the two-dimensionality of visual art, specifically in the realm of illustration, painting, and digital art. The pieces address the increasingly strict guidelines imposed on the artistic community, what it means to be an artist, and how we define art. Furthermore, the body of work questions the temporality of visual art, specifically in a physical form. The work is very important to me as it illustrates much of my world view: people and places exist as different from one another, but have the ability and propensity to blend, interact, and harmonize.

Equitable Identification Of Frl-Eligible Gifted And Talented Students, Leann Pickerill

Murray State Theses and Dissertations

The focus of this research study was the equitable identification of Kentucky students in the general intellectual gifted and talented category. A quantitative study was used to identify relationships between a student’s socioeconomic status and identification. Statistical methods were used to examine statistical relationships between identification methods and socioeconomic status. A policy review was completed to determine if policies of highly equitable districts were comparable to low-equity districts.

Ua64/2 The Challenge: Magazine For The Center For Gifted Studies (No. 41, Winter 2017), Center For Gifted Studies, Tracy Inman Editor

Gifted Studies Publications

No abstract provided.

Ua35/7/1 Gatton Academy Of Mathematics & Science In Kentucky Publications, Wku Archives

WKU Archives Collection Inventories

Publications by and about Gatton Academy of Mathematics & Science in Kentucky.