Digital Commons Network^™

There’S Nowhere To Hide: Artificial Intelligence And Privacy In The Fourth Industrial Revolution, Sarah Denton, Eleonore Pauwels, Yujia He, Walter G. Johnson

Patterson School of Diplomacy and International Commerce Faculty Publications

At its core, artificial intelligence (AI) optimizes data. Machine-learning algorithms, one component of AI, are trained using massive datasets curated by humans to predict various aspects of our daily lives. Such predictive intelligence could be a positive force amplified by continued decentralization of the technology. Or, ubiquitous cognition and surveillance could be a disruptive force amplified by the unregulated proliferation of AI technologies. Yet, though we will certainly see more and more AI systems being integrated into every facet of our infrastructures, homes, and bodies, the proliferation of AI technology isn’t the problem. A privacy-security quagmire arises from the interconnectivity …

Human Development And Subnationalism: A Disaggregated Analysis Of Indian States: Kerala And Uttar Pradesh, Manika Garg

CMC Senior Theses

This thesis investigates achievements in human development outcomes on health, education, and poverty indicators across Indian states, in order to discern what factors might influence a state’s better orientation toward social policies. After conducting data analysis, the study explains differences in outcomes, as achieved by Kerala and Uttar Pradesh, by building an argument of subnational solidarity and its impact on determining the state’s policy agendas.

Paid Parental Leave In The United States: Reconciling Competing Demands, Sydney Joseph

CMC Senior Theses

The United States is the only developed nation that fails to provide its citizens with paid parental leave. The lack of parental benefit provision operates to the detriment of individuals and society as a whole by contributing to inequity across gender, race, socioeconomic status, and sexual orientation. As the demographics of the American workforce have changed, public policy has not kept pace. Paid parental leave is associated a number of health, economic, and social benefits. However, the greatest barrier to legislating paid parental leave is the philosophical underpinnings of American politics, specifically the strong current of liberal individualism and absence …

The Politics Of U.S. Food Policy, Evan Murphy

CMC Senior Theses

Throughout the 20th century, American farmlands, agricultural policy, and diets have seen dramatic transformations. The number of farms in America has decreased, but the average size of farms has increased. These larger farms are increasingly more industrialized and produce a short list of profitable, subsidized commodity crops. Similarly, changes in the American diet throughout the 20th and 21st centuries have reflected these shifts in the landscape of American farmland. Simultaneous to the evolution of American farms was an increase in federal involvement in American agriculture through policy that seems to encourage these trends. Although separating out the causes from the …

Children And Adolescents At Risk Of Drug Addiction, Doreen Nambafu, Mahmoud Sabry, Maha Tantawy

Papers, Posters, and Presentations

This paper was commissioned to examine the reasons beyond the increasing rate of drug abuse and addiction among children and adolescents in Egypt since 2004 and to recommend policy alternatives to tackle the problem.

A Policy Feedback Theory Approach To Food Assistance Program Distribution Mechanisms, Ahmad Sabbagh

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Many families that experience hunger in the United States rely on Food Assistance Programs to meet their daily nutrition needs. However, these programs do not always meet the needs of these individuals, as has been the case for individuals living under higher than expected levels of poverty in the Great Lakes region of the United States. Using policy feedback theory (PFT), the purpose of this case study was to explore the experiences of individuals from a county in the Great Lakes region of the United States, who depend on the federal Food Assistance Program, with particular attention given to evaluate …

Shared Interest: How Usaid Enhances U.S. Economic Growth, United States Agency For International Development

Global CWD Repository

The primary objective of United States Government (USG) foreign assistance is to promote U.S. and international security and prosperity by bolstering economic and political stability and self-reliance in developing countries. There is no doubt that investing in global development progress is vital to U.S. national security. However, USG foreign assistance through the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) also benefits the U.S. economy and U.S. workers. As one of the most internationally competitive economies in the world, the U.S. is a major exporter of goods and services, and our exports are in demand the world over. As countries get richer, …

Apopo Annual Report 2018, Apopo

Global CWD Repository

APOPO is a non-profit organization with roots in Belgium. For 20 years we have trained African giant pouched rats to detect landmines and tuberculosis around the world. APOPO trains the ‘HeroRATs’ using positive reinforcement – they receive tasty treats when they identify a target scent. HeroRATs are at the core of the organization and this is reflected in the way we protect them and provide loving care and attention.

The main hub of the organization, the Training and R&D center, is located in Tanzania, where all the HeroRATs are trained before being sent to global operations. This is where all …

Hb 69 Grocery Investment Program And Fund, The Grace E. Harris Leadership Institute At Virginia Commonwealth University, Taryn Anthony, Tracey Dunn, Stephen Miller-Pitts, Grant Rissler, Barbara Williams-Lewis

The Grace E. Harris Leadership Institute Publications

In the 2018 session of the Virginia General Assembly, multiple pieces of legislation were brought to committee, proposing the creation of a fund to catalyze public-private partnerships to expand access to Virginians residing in food deserts. Through the creation of the fund, underserved communities would see the construction, rehabilitation and expansion of food retailers in their communities ameliorate food desserts.

The Influence Of School Discipline Approaches On Suspension Rates, Donna Christy

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

A free and appropriate public education is promised to every child in the United States. However, zero tolerance school discipline policies have broken that promise, pushing students out of the classroom and into the school-to-prison pipeline. Despite the growing body of research demonstrating negative social and economic impacts of exclusionary discipline, public school administrators have been slow to adopt innovative policies that provide rehabilitative alternatives. The purpose of this study was to compare, using the consequences of innovations application of Rogers's diffusion of innovations theory, the impact of various school district approaches to school discipline on suspension rates while controlling …

Regression Analysis Of Young Elderly Americans' Needs To Alleviate Poverty, Barbara Ann Parker

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Demographics are changing for the young elderly population in America, and poverty is a growing concern among this population. The purpose of this correlational study was to examine the relationship between young elderly demographics and income level, and between government programs and economic status. Rawls's theory of justice was useful to examine the relationship between predictor variables and the outcome variable. Secondary data came from the U.S. Census Bureau's Current Population Survey from March 2016. The results of multiple and logistic regressions indicated no statistically significant linear correlation. There was no statistical linear correlation between income level and region, race, …

Making Medicaid Work In The Mountain State? An Assessment Of The Effect Of Work Requirements For Medicaid Beneficiaries In West Virginia, Simon F. Haeder

Faculty & Staff Scholarship

West Virginia is one of the poorest states in the nation, and West Virginians face some of the highest rates of illness and disability. One of the few bright spots for the health of West Virginians have been government-funded programs like Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP). The Affordable Care Act (ACA), including the expansion of Medicaid under Governor Tomblin in 2014, has brought health coverage and access to care to hundreds of thousands of West Virginians. Today, about a third of West Virginians rely on Medicaid, and the program has become the backbone of the state’s health …

Aging On Nantucket: A Community Needs Assessment, Caitlin Coyle, Jan Mutchler

Center for Social and Demographic Research on Aging Publications

This report describes efforts undertaken by the Nantucket Center for Elder Affairs, Inc. (NCEA), in partnership with the Center for Social & Demographic Research on Aging within the Gerontology Institute at the University of Massachusetts Boston. The purpose of these efforts was to investigate the needs, interests, preferences, and opinions of Nantucket’s older residents. The focus of this report is on the cohort of Nantucket’s residents age 60 and older. The contents of this report are intended to inform NCEA, the Saltmarsh Senior Center, the Council on Aging, the Town of Nantucket, and organizations that provide services to older residents, …

Schools Uniting Neighborhoods: Sustainability And Racial Equity In A Community Schools Initiative, Rachel Geller

Scripps Senior Theses

Schools Uniting Neighborhoods (SUN), a collaborative initiative in Multnomah County, Oregon, combines the increasingly popular community school model with an innovative organizational structure to further two key goals: sustainability as an initiative and furthering racial equity. This thesis situates SUN within the context of American public education reform and existing literature on the positive outcomes, organizational structures, and leadership components of community schools. Building on past reviews of SUN and its outcomes, I use results from qualitative interviews with key stakeholders to provide insight into how its organizational structure contributes to the goals of sustainability and racial equity. I discuss …

Elevating People: Planning For Equitable Travel To Marquam Hill, Reed Broderson, Jennifer Davidson, Madison Levy, Stephanie Lonsdale, Maria Sipin, Rob Zoeller

Master of Urban and Regional Planning Workshop Projects

Plan581, a team of urban planning graduate students at Portland State University, presents the Elevating People plan and its Transportation Equity Lens to help guide OHSU’s future transportation investments. Together, the plan and lens are aimed at improving travel to Marquam Hill by identifying Priority Communities and advancing transportation equity through internal and regional efforts.

Queets Village Relocation Vision: A Community Vision For A Safe Future Queets, Sachi Arakawa, Ayano Healy, Steve Rosen, Thomas Scharff, Victor Tran, Nate White

Master of Urban and Regional Planning Workshop Projects

This document constitutes the Queets Village Relocation Vision. It is a community-informed vision plan for the relocation of the Lower Village of Queets, WA, a part of the Quinault Indian Nation. The Lower Village is to be relocated out of the tsunami inundation zone. The vision plan addresses the adaptations and changes needed for the safe and culturally appropriate development of housing, infrastructure, and community buildings outside of the tsunami inundation zone.

A Multidimensional Poverty Index For The United States, Nate Kratzer

Theses and Dissertations--Public Policy and Administration

A multidimensional poverty index for the United States is designed, evaluated, and defended as a useful measurement tool for policymakers to evaluate poverty. Chapter 1 presents a normative case for the index. Chapter 2 reviews the literature on poverty measures. Chapter 3 constructs the proposed index. Chapter 4 is a statistical examination of the internal structure of the index. Chapter 5 explores the index across states, over time, and among population subgroups, as well as presenting policy applications.

Three Essays On Financial Collaboration In The Government And Nonprofit Sectors, Saerim Kim

Theses and Dissertations--Public Policy and Administration

The primary objective of this dissertation is to study the management of public and nonprofit resources and financial risk. Governments will be able to use its findings to continue to provide public services in collaboration with other sectors, including the nonprofit sector. Nonprofit financial self-sufficiency and sub-award grant mechanisms between the government and nonprofit sectors are two primary areas to be examined. This dissertation consists of three essays. The first investigates how the diversification of nonprofit revenue portfolios influences extreme revenue risks; the results show that the chance of extreme revenue loss increases when revenue sources are highly correlated to …

2018 Community-Based Care: Resident And Community Characteristics Report On Assisted Living, Residential Care, Memory Care, Paula C. Carder, Ozcan Tunalilar, Sheryl Dejoy Elliott, Sarah Dys

Institute on Aging Publications

This report is the fourth in a series prepared by the Institute on Aging to describe Oregon’s assisted living, residential care and memory care service sectors which are referred to by Oregon Department of Human Services as community-based care (CBC) settings. These settings may also be referred to as Home and Community Based Services (HCBS).

Community-based care settings provide a variety of services, including daily meals, housekeeping and laundry, assistance with personal care needs, medication administration, evaluation, coordination, and monitoring of health conditions, communication with residents’ health care providers, and social and recreational activities. As the population of Oregonians aged …

Can The Vaquita Be Saved From Extinction?, Gerardo Rodríguez-Quiroz, Wenceslao Valenzuela-Quiñonez, Héctor A. González-Ocampo, Alfredo Ortega-Rubio

Human–Wildlife Interactions

The vaquita (Phocoena sinus) is considered the world’s most endangered marine mammal. It is the smallest member of the porpoise family endemic to the upper part of the Gulf of California. The current population is estimated at less than 30 individuals. The primary reasons for the species decline includes limited habitat and incidental mortalities associated with illegal gillnet fishing activities. Since 2008, the Mexican government has taken environmental and economic actions to protect the vaquita’s focusing in reducing by-catch deaths to zero. In 2015, a federal Agreement decreed by the Secretaría de Agricultura, Ganadería, Desarrollo Rural, Pesca y …

The Effect Of Registered Nurse Supply On Population Health Outcomes: A Distributed Lag Model Approach, Carla Jackie Sampson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Registered nurses (RNs) are essential to providing care in the healthcare system. To date, research on the relationship between healthcare provider supply and population health has focused on physician supply. This study explored the effect of RN supply on population health outcomes in the U.S. This is a retrospective, cross-sectional study of U.S. counties and county equivalents using national data. Seven population health outcomes (total and disease specific mortalities and low infant birth weight rate) were the response variables. The predictor variable, RN supply, and some control variables were anticipated to have an asynchronous effect on the seven outcome variables …

Religion, Nationality, And Empathetic Responses To Refugees, Reed Rasband

Sigma: Journal of Political and International Studies

No abstract provided.

Community Public-Private Partnership Leadership Synergy In Tanzania, Hawa Yatera Mshana

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Although the public-private partnership (PPP) concept in health and social health has been politically accepted as the best pathway to improving health outcomes in many developing nations, implementation lacks leadership synergy. Lack of awareness and engagement of community leaders about PPP interventions and their benefits affect accountability and ownership of health and social care interventions. The purpose of this study was to better understand factors that could promote partnership leadership synergy to enhance ownership and accountability for community health and social welfare initiatives in Tanzania. A qualitative empirical case study design was used; diffusion of innovation and the public-private integrated …

Kenya's Constituency Development Fund, Free Secondary Education Policy, And Access To Secondary Education, Charles Kyalo Nzuki

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The effects of the Constituency Development Fund (CDF) and the Free Secondary Education Policy (FSEP) on access to secondary school education in Kenya's Yatta sub-county have not been adequately explored in available public policy literature. Hence, this qualitative multiple-case study was designed to understand the effects of the 2 policies on both enrollment and dropout among secondary school age children in Yatta. The study was conducted in 1 mixed-boarding secondary school and 1 secondary day school in Yatta. The study was built on an adapted Huisman and Smits' theoretical model on dropout among students in developing countries. The data were …

Healthcare Certificates Of Need In Mississippi: Policy Review And Recommendation, Seth Dickinson

Honors Theses

Healthcare Certificates of Need, often abbreviated as CON, are public policies implemented across America with many intentions but the primary purpose of engaging the healthcare marketplace in a way that allows for government regulation and monitoring. Over time, states have created their own types of certificate of need policies while others have abandoned these types of policies all together. Mississippi is a member of the former group that has crafted its own type of policies geared towards enabling Certificates of Need. As the healthcare marketplace shifts across America, this research delves into the certificate of need policies of states with …

معالجة التقزم وفقر الدم في مصر, Abeer Alanwar, Hend Ahmed, Sabreen Mahmoud, Wessam Adly

Papers, Posters, and Presentations

Stunting and anemia rates in children between the age of 0-24 months (0-2 years) have been two of the most persistent public health problems facing the Egyptian society and government. Based on the researchers' analysis of the problem, current policies, and on the opportunities Egypt has, this policy paper targets the Egyptian Ministry of Health and Population and recommends reformulating a specific nutrition policy to tackle stunting and anemia as well providing awareness and education about the appropriate IYCF and to give high priority to strengthening the health provision of the required micronutrients in family care units (FCU), as well …

“We’Re Being Left To Blight”: Green Urban Development And Racialized Space In Kansas City, Chhaya Kolavalli

Theses and Dissertations--Anthropology

In this dissertation, I explore ‘green’ urban development and urban agriculture projects from the perspective of residents of an African American majority neighborhood in Kansas City—who reside in an area referred to as a ‘blighted food desert’ by local policy makers. In Kansas City, extensive city government support exists for urban agricultural projects, which are touted not just as a solution to poverty associated issues such food insecurity and obesity, but also as a remedy for ‘blight,’ violence and crime, and vacant urban land. Specific narratives of Kansas City’s past are used to prop up and legitimate these future visions …

Association Of Insurance And Provider Type With Patients’ Perceived Cost And Ease Of Access To Healthcare Services Among Medicare Beneficiaries Diagnosed With Diabetes, Metria Harris

Theses and Dissertations

Medicare beneficiaries diagnosed with diabetes are likely to have health complications or episodes associated with diabetes, resulting in higher health care utilization and costs. Andersen’s Health Care Utilization Behavior Model (HCBM) includes predisposing, enabling, and need factors, but it excludes perception. Ajzen’s Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) shows that perception influences health service use. This study was performed using a real-world model integrating Andersen’s HCBM and Ajzen’s TPB to determine whether there was an association between insurance type (Medicare Part D versus non-Part D) and perceived ease of access or cost among Medicare beneficiaries with diabetes. The second objective was …

Exploring Peace Education For Consensual Peace Building In Nigeria, Agada John Elachi

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Violence, insurgency, and terrorism have been a recurring problem in Nigeria. Efforts to address these challenges through the use of force have proved ineffective. The purpose of this study was to explore the application of peace education in the educational curriculum with a view to promoting consensual peace building in Kafanchan Town, Jema'a Local Government Area of Kaduna State, Nigeria. Although peace education has been applied in some countries, this approach has not been applied to these challenges plaguing Nigeria. This study adopts the survey research method and utilizes the tripodal theoretical framework of ethnic conflict theory, enemy system theory, …

United States-Mexico Dual Resident's Perceptions Of Heritage And Acculturation, Alisia N. Muir

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

United States' policy makers have been challenged creating understandable nutrition labels and effective healthy food campaigns for consumers of mixed heritage. Previous studies explored the sociocultural factors that influence Hispanics' abilities to navigate consumer food education programs, but little was known about how Mexican culture impacts those programs. The purpose of this study was to better understand those factors. Research questions focused on the experiences of residents of a west Texas town regarding their food decision-making process about food choices and their understanding of food education information. The purpose of this phenomenological research was to explore how Mexican culture effected …