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What Do Programme Chairs Think About The Integration Of Sd In Their Programmes?, Iacovos Nicolaou, Eddie Conlon

Conference papers

This paper presents the findings of interviews with six engineering programme chairs regarding their views about the level of integration of SD in their programmes. They are part of a wider study which is examining the integration of SD in engineering programmes across three Irish Higher Education Institutions. Previous stages of the study have determined that students’ knowledge and understanding about SD is inadequate due to the lack of a holistic integration of SD competencies and the focus on skills development in their programmes. The paper will explore the apparent contradiction in that most programme chairs believe that SD is …

The Impact Of A Strong Local Supply Chain On Regional Economic Impacts Of Mining, Meiyu Xing

Masters Theses

"With growing social conflicts due to social and environmental concerns mines need to be able to create shared value for all stakeholder in their quest to promote sustainable development. Given the sensitivity of a mine's regional economy contribution to its supply chains, any improvement in supply chains strategy will be beneficial for mines and their stakeholders. The objectives of this work were to: (i) test the hypothesis that supply chain management strategy, by mines in a region, significantly affects regional economy; and (ii) develop a methodology to identify the critical backward commodities of a regional mining sector.

Valid methods have …

Comparing Mode Shares For Non-Residential Destinations In Urban And Suburban Environments, Tasnia Subrin

Civil and Environmental Engineering Master's Project Reports

To ensure facility for multimodal transportation is one of the most important concerns in today's transportation sector, with initiatives being taken to make multimodal transportation popular. The built environment variables have a strong relationship with transportation mode choice, but whether that relationship holds true in urban and suburban neighborhoods in the same manner has not been considered. Using data for three non-residential land uses, this research explores whether the built environment variables in suburban areas influences mode share like it does in urban areas. We used survey data conducted at the establishments regarding respondents' travel characteristics from a previous study, …

Insights From A Global Engineering Outreach Course, Randy S. Lewis

Faculty Publications

A two-semester multi-disciplinary Global Engineering Outreach (GEO) course was initiated in 2007 to provide an opportunity for junior and senior-level engineering and technology students to design and implement humanitarian-based engineering projects in developing communities. Recently, the course was integrated with a sociology course to enhance the educational opportunities between social scientists and engineers. During the GEO course, students work on small-scale projects that are selected in conjunction with members of the developing communities. Students regularly interact with community members during project development. Following the GEO course, students participate in a two-week implementation trip. Learning outcomes associated with the course are …

University Professors’ Perceptions About The Impact Of Integrating Google Applications On Students’ Communication And Collaboration Skills, Jacqueline L. Cahill

Journal of Research Initiatives

A qualitative research study was conducted and data were collected by interviewing university professors on their perceptions about the impact of integrating Google Apps, as a means of classroom instructional delivery, on students’ communication and collaboration skills. The participants consisted of eight university professors from a major university, who integrate, or had previously integrated at least two Google Apps Education Edition collaborative tools into their instructional strategies. The result of this study has the potential to benefit universities that are debating on whether utilizing teaching collaborative technology skills, as an instruction tool, would engage students and enhance their communication skills. …

Faculty Research Interest Database, David Owerbach

Office of Research Institutional Research and Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Energy Conversion Playground (Ecp) Design Task: Assessing How Students Think About Technical And Non-Technical Considerations In Sustainable Community Development, Andrea Mazzurco Ph.D., James L. Huff Ph.D., Brent K. Jesiek Ph.D.

Faculty Research and Publications

Students in global service-learning and similar programs frequently encounter substantial social, cultural, political, and ethical differences when working with project partners in different countries and regions. Neglecting such differences can lead to project failures and/or disempowered communities. In response to these challenges, educational resources have been developed to teach students to think about how the people, social structures, and other contextual factors associated with projects can affect, and be affected by, students’ designs. Yet, there remains a scarcity of valid and reliable instruments to evaluate the effectiveness of such interventions. The purpose of this study is create a theoretically and …

Exploring Pedestrian Responsive Traffic Signal Timing Strategies In Urban Areas, Sirisha Murthy Kothuri

Dissertations and Theses

The role of walking in the development of healthy, livable communities is being increasingly recognized. In urban areas, intersections represent locations where different modes converge, and are often viewed as deterrents to walking. This is due to the unwarranted and often unnecessary delays imposed by signal timing policies for pedestrians and increased potential for conflicts. Traditional signal timing design prioritizes vehicles over pedestrians leading to undesirable consequences such as large delays and risky pedestrian behaviors. Pedestrians are accommodated in a manner that is designed to cause least interruption to the flow of motor vehicles. This lack of pedestrian accommodation at …

Cooperative Construction In Schools In California, John Mauck Donley

Master's Theses

Cooperative Construction in Schools in California

John M. Donley

The construction industry has lost efficiency since 1964, while becoming increasingly more litigious. Schools in California can ill afford the time to allow the construction industry time to fully evolve. It may take years or decades to fully improve the efficiency of, and reduce the conflict within the construction industry.

At the same time, the construction industry has developed new processes to improve efficiency and reduce conflict. These processes are beginning to be broadly embraced by the industry. They all contain cooperative elements. Taken together they represent a new organizing principle …

Approach To Flood Mitigation - A Post Sandy Study In New Jersey Meadowlands Area, Banshari Datta

Theses

In the last decade the continuous change in the climate has resulted in an increased frequency of natural catastrophic events and the magnitude of their impact. The immense damage caused by such events brought to light the vulnerabilities of the impacted communities. Coastal communities are alarmingly vulnerable due to flood and storm surge impacts such as those caused by super storm Sandy in 2012. In order to mitigate this risk, the communities need to look beyond the short term recovery measures, and build a sustainable community by implementing long term mitigation measures. The objective of this thesis is to investigate …

Volunteered Geographical Information: An Alternative Solution For Overcoming The Chasm Between Stormwater Management And Community Participation, Yanfu Zhou

Community and Regional Planning Program: Theses

It is a dramatic challenge to promote public engagement in stormwater management and green infrastructure initiatives. When traditional outreach approaches made important influence on public engagement, their limitations are also obvious. With the development of Web 2.0 technology, Volunteered Geographic Information (VGI) has been emerging as one of the most important user-generated geographic contents. The crowdsourcing data that generated by volunteers through geo-web, smartphones, and other geo-devices provides invaluable mass data for decision-making. VGI can provide a better understanding of planning issues and other challenges. The research aims to develop a mobile information platform to allow citizens to report the …

Integrated Sustainability Decision-Making Framework, Michael Paul Cole

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The Integrated Sustainability Decision-Making Framework (ISDMF) is an 'ideal case' framework developed at the University of Texas El Paso (UTEP) from 2012 to present to provide the most comprehensive and concise sustainability strategy and decision-making template available.

Sustainable decision-making improves community Quality of Life, but is often beyond the reach of the majority. A framework that is most approachable, actionable, and adoptable can accelerate convergence on and continued operation of a sustainable solution. Research confirms that published frameworks continuously emerge, and are infinite in number. Iterations benefit from prior work, and contribution occurs when an 'ideal case' is envisioned, best …

Identifying And Overcoming The Barriers To Sustainable Construction, Cristin Szydlik

Doctoral Dissertations

"Sustainable construction has become increasingly more prevalent over the last decade. All federal and most state government buildings are mandated to achieve Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification (at the silver level at a minimum). Although sustainable construction is increasingly more common, there are still barriers to the successful completion of a sustainable project, specifically with regards to projects achieving LEED certification. There are still holes in the guidance on how to successfully achieve LEED certification. Even though government agencies have mandated LEED certification, the existing barriers are preventing buildings from achieving certification, which can delay the building …

Scholarly Collaboration In Engineering Education: From Big-Data Scientometrics To User-Centered Software Design, Hanjun Xian

Open Access Dissertations

Engineering education research has grown into a flourishing community with an-ever increasing number of publications and scholars. However, recent studies show that a significant amount of engineering education knowledge retains a clear disciplinary orientation. If the gaps in scholarly collaboration continue to be prevalent within the entire community, it will become increasingly difficult to sustain community memory. This will eventually inhibit the propagation of innovations and slow the movement of research findings into practice.

This dissertation studies scholarly collaboration in the engineering education research community. It provides a clear characterization of collaboration problems and proposes potential solutions. The dissertation is …

Issue Brief: Saving By Mitigating, University Of Louisville, New England Environmental Finance Center

Sustainable Communities Capacity Building

Natural disasters can cause loss of life, inflict damage to buildings and infrastructure, and have devastating consequences for a community’s economic, social, and environmental well-being. Hazard mitigation means reducing damages from disasters.

Local governments have the responsibility to protect the health, safety, and welfare of their citizens. Proactive mitigation policies and actions help reduce risk and create safer, more disaster-resilient communities. Mitigation is an investment in your community’s future safety, equity, and sustainability.

Social Capital And Walkability As Social Aspects Of Sustainability, Shannon H. Rogers, Kevin H. Gardner, Cynthia H. Carlson

Civil & Environmental Engineering

The concepts of sustainability and sustainable development are frequently described as having three main components, sometimes referred to as the three pillars or the triple bottom line: environmental, economic, and social. Because of an historical focus in the sustainability field on correcting environmental problems, much consideration has been given to environmental issues, especially how they interface with economic ones. Frequently mentioned but rarely examined, the social aspects of sustainability have been considered the weakest and least described pillar. After a brief review of existing concepts and theories, this paper uses a case study approach to examine the third pillar more …

Social Capital And Walkability As Social Aspects Of Sustainability, Shannon Rogers, Kevin Gardner, Cynthia Carlson

Civil Engineering Faculty Publications

The concepts of sustainability and sustainable development are frequently described as having three main components, sometimes referred to as the three pillars or the triple bottom line: environmental, economic, and social. Because of an historical focus in the sustainability field on correcting environmental problems, much consideration has been given to environmental issues, especially how they interface with economic ones. Frequently mentioned but rarely examined, the social aspects of sustainability have been considered the weakest and least described pillar. After a brief review of existing concepts and theories, this paper uses a case study approach to examine the third pillar more …

The Bridge Newsletter Spring 2013, Missouri University Of Science And Technology

The Bridge Newsletter

-Bringing unique research capabilities to campus
-From trash into treasure
-Improving wellness
-Raising the roof

Reliance: Herreshoff Marine Museum, Arnold Robinson, George Dalton, Sean Damico, Eric Doremus, Brian Fortier, Jeffrey Goncalo, Arthur Lee

Engineering and Construction Management

The Roger Williams University Reliance team is working in cooperation with the Herreshoff Marine Museum in Bristol, RI to create a 1/6th scale model of the 1901 Americas Cup defender, the Reliance. The project can be broken up into two sub-projects. The first, to design a museum-quality cradle to hold the 24ft fully rigged model at a 15O angle. The second sub-project is to perform full strength/structural analysis of all the critical components on the model to ensure that their strength is great enough to withstand the applied forces. This second sub-project is going to be the focus of the …

Community And Household Management Strategies For Water Supply And Treatment In Rural And Peri-Urban Areas In The Developing World, Ryan William Schweitzer

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Eighty percent of the 780 million people worldwide that access water from an unimproved source live in rural areas. In rural areas, water systems are often managed by community based organizations and many of these systems do not provide service at the designed levels. The Sustainability Analysis Tool developed in Chapter 2 can inform decision making, characterize specific needs of rural communities in the management of their water systems, and identify weaknesses in training regimes or support mechanisms. The framework was tested on 61 statistically representative geographically stratified sample communities with rural water systems in the Dominican Republic. The results …

Exploring Travel And Activity Behavior In Transit-Oriented Developments: Insights Into Transportation Benefits And Travel Demand Modelling, Sanghoon Son

Civil & Environmental Engineering Theses & Dissertations

As a sustainable urban development and transportation planning strategy, researchers and planners are increasingly interested in transit-oriented development (TOD). By integrating transit system and neighborhood design, TOD aims to provide a livable environment that is alternative mode friendly, higher density, and mixed-use to residents and workers in the vicinity of transit stations. Despite the recent growing interest in TOE), however, transportation benefits of TOD are not well quantified and characteristics of TOD are not adequately reflected in travel demand models.

This dissertation contributes to understanding of the travel and activity behavior by comprehensively exploring them in the context of TOD. …

The Bridge Newsletter Winter 2012, Missouri University Of Science And Technology

The Bridge Newsletter

-Creating bridge beams that will last 100 years
-Great school, great price
-Recruiting technical minds
-Combatting obesity, diabetes

Rfid Check-In System For Safe Routes To School At Hawthorne Elementary, Paul Banel

Electrical Engineering

The system uses a low frequency Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) reader and passive RFID tags to help the Safe Routes to School program at Hawthorne Elementary in San Luis Obispo track the number of children who participate in the program. Children will carry passive RFID tags and scan them at the reader each morning that they walk or bike to school. The system tracks the total number of students that walk and bike each day, as well as the number of times each individual child participates over the course of many days. The Safe Routes program hopes to use this …

3d Digital Modeling For Urban Design + Planning, Emmanuel Velazco

City and Regional Planning

Cities throughout the country face a number of challenges in dealing with the changing development needs of the 21st century. In urban planning, the fusion of social, environmental, political, economic, and functional considerations are required. Today, local, state, and federal governments are experiencing an economic downturn, making resources scarce to plan for smarter development, attain greater public interest, and economic revival.

The primary objective of this project is to provide innovative solutions in city and regional planning using software applications, such as Google SketchUp, that enable assessment of various urban design projects. A second objective was to create a 3D …

A Method For Assessing The Sustainability Of Design In Developing World Projects, Adam Andersen

Master’s Theses

Projects for the developing world usually find themselves at the bottom of an engineer’s priority list. There is often very little engineering effort placed on creating new products for the poorest people in the world. This trend is beginning to change now as people begin to recognize the potential for these projects. Engineers are beginning to try and solve some of the direst issues in the developing world and many are having positive impacts. However, the conditions needed to support these projects can only be maintained in the short term. There is now a need for greater sustainability.

Sustainability has …

Session 1b, Kentucky Water Resources Research Institute, University Of Kentucky

Kentucky Water Resources Annual Symposium

• University – Habitat for Humanity Green Infrastructure Demonstration Project, Nancy Givens and Terry Wilson, WKU Center for Environmental Education and Sustainability, Bowling Green, KY
• Effectiveness of Pollutant Removal in the McConnell Springs Stormwater Quality Wetland Pond and the Gainesway Pond Retrofit Project, Year Two, David J. Price and Susan L. Plueger, Lexington-Fayette Urban County Government
• Coca-Cola Stormwater Replenish Project, Eric Dawalt and Russ Turpin, Ridegewater, LLC and EcoGro, Lexington, KY
• ITEST and LFUCG Stormwater Professional Development, Brian Radcliffe and Carol D. Hanley, Tracy Farmer Institute for Sustainability and the Environment, UK

Proceedings Of 2012 Kentucky Water Resources Annual Symposium, Kentucky Water Resources Research Institute, University Of Kentucky

Kentucky Water Resources Annual Symposium

This symposium was planned and conducted as a part of the state water resources research institute annual program that is supported by Grant/Cooperative Agreement Number G11AP20081 from the United States Geological Survey. The contents of this proceedings document and the views and conclusions presented at the symposium are solely the responsibility of the individual authors and presenters and do not necessarily represent the official views of the USGS or of the symposium organizers and sponsors. This publication is produced with the understanding that the United States Government is authorized to reproduce and distribute reprints for government purposes.

Geospatial Assessment Of Sustainable Built Infrastructure Assets And Flood Disaster Protection, Alper Durmus

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This research was initiated with a review and synthesis of infrastructure related to city and urban growth, built infrastructure to meet transportation needs and travel demand, and role of mass transit in reducing adverse impacts on the environment and greenhouse gas emissions. Floods are the most frequently occurring natural disaster in the world, which so far claimed millions of lives and resulted in billion-dollar economic costs. Built infrastructure assets in urban and rural areas are not spared from floods' aftermath. A major motivation for this thesis was the 2011 megaflood disaster of Thailand which devastated the green campus of Asian …

Assessment Of Transit Oriented Development Impacts, Md Shah Imran

All ETDs from UAB

The recent interest in smart growth, livable communities, and sustainability creates new opportunities for the adoption, expansion, and enhancement of transit services in communities across the U.S. Given that promoting livability and alternative modes is a key priority in the U.S. DOT's agenda, research on economic impacts from integration of transit is both timely and essential. This is important as many of the possible gains from such integration are not fully understood and properly measured to date, such as the related health and quality of life benefits. This thesis analyzes the economic impacts from the implementation of a transit improvement …

Smart Growth In Dumb Places: Sustainability, Disaster, And The Future Of The American City, Lisa Grow Sun

BYU Law Review

One of the many lessons of the recent earthquake and tsunami in Japan is that we cannot mitigate disaster risk through building codes and other structural solutions alone. Location is key to a community’s natural hazard vulnerability. Consequently, the most far-reaching and important question for disaster mitigation today is where we will channel the growth that will be needed to accommodate our expanding population. Yet, both environmental scholars and policymakers are promoting sustainability initiatives that will channel our country’s future growth into existing urban areas that are already extremely vulnerable to disaster. Indeed, many of these policies - and the …