Digital Commons Network^™

An Exploration Of Refugee Policy Using Social Construction Theory & The Narrative Policy Framework, Daniel S. Amoruso

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

Social Construction Theory and Narrative Policy Framework are cohesive products to assess policymaking by examining social construction variables and the formation of narratives. Although I use each independently and together, using them in conjunction helps to ascertain the difference between what someone does and says. Often, there is a substantive disconnect between the two. As with many policy arenas, interest in refugee policy has ebbed and flowed over the past ten years as the United States fluctuates from Democrat to Republican and back to Democrat administrations. Various administrations, media outlets, and separate communities often portray refugees differently; some favorably toward …

Procedural Justice And Therapeutic Jurisprudence In Idaho Drug Treatment Courts, Norma Dianne Jaeger

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

This qualitative multi-case study of the operations of Idaho drug treatment courts explores the application of two theoretical frameworks: therapeutic jurisprudence and procedural justice. Semi-structured interviews, based on a phronetic iterative approach and analysis, were conducted with 20 enrolled participants and 10 judges from courts and communities of varying sizes, located in four geographic areas of Idaho. Responses suggest that these courts operate from a foundation of therapeutic jurisprudence and effectively apply procedural justice practices: respectful treatment, trust, and participant voice. The study identifies participants’ multiple life changes, including addiction recovery, as important elements of the courts’ outcomes and validates …

Social Network Analysis: How Social Media Groups Can Influence Policies Among Hispanic Families, Valeria Gurr

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020 impacted the entire world in various ways. On March 15, 2020, education in Nevada was significantly impacted when the Governor announced the closure of public schools due to the pandemic. When the schools were closed, students were forced to stay home and receive their education through virtual instruction. This transition to distance education affected the Hispanic/Latino(a) communities in pronounced ways and highlighted issues such as limited access to the Internet, technology, lack of hardware devices, as well as language barriers and more. This study uses social networking analysis techniques to examine the nature of …

Barriers In Reporting Sexual Violence On College Campuses, Amber Hartman

Honors Theses

This thesis is designed to examine the underreporting of sexual violence on college campuses by exploring the systemic, cultural, and logistical barriers that hinder victims from disclosing their assault. Using both qualitative and quantitative methodologies, the research identifies three overarching influences for non-reporting. Fear, shame, and lack of resources are presented as the basis of the decision that victims make to not report. Meta-analysis of the research concludes that there is a profound impact of internalized victim-blaming narratives, fear of repercussions and institutional deficiencies in providing accessible support. Recommendations for solutions emphasize creating trauma-informed policies, improving communication and accessibility of …

Racial Disparities In Domestic Violence: Analyzing The Intersection Of Race And Gender, Nia Grace Sharp

Honors Theses

This research explores the intersection of race, gender, and the litigation of domestic violence cases in Memphis, Tennessee. This is explored through qualitative research that combines a theoretical framework with structured interviews of criminal defense attorneys. Utilizing a sample of 5 attorneys with recent exposure to domestic violence cases, this study aims to reveal whether or not intimate partner violence is litigated differently across racial lines. This is done through analysis of the treatment of victims depending on race, sentencing rates, and perceptions of credibility within the justice system. The methodology involves five key steps: conducting a literature review to …

When Is It Convenient For Indigenous Women To Influence State Policies?, Alaide Vences Estudillo, Norma Don Juan Pérez, Patricia Torres Sandoval, Fabiola Del Jurado Mendoza

Peace and Conflict Studies

This paper examines the difficulties that a network of Indigenous women in Mexico deal with when they seek peace for their people under a hybrid political structure. This paper discusses some distinctive aspects of the politics that these women engage in, how they conceive their political ideas, and how they use these ideas to structurally transform the colonial relationship that the liberal state maintains toward their people. They devise various strategies to influence state policies and to withstand the discrimination they face whenever they participate in democratic affairs.

Mobilizing For Peace: Civil Society’S Influence On The Peace Process Between The Colombian Government And The National Liberation Army (Eln) (2010-2021), Cécile Mouly, Esperanza Hernández Delgado

Peace and Conflict Studies

This article analyzes how different civil society actors in Colombia used civil resistance to influence the peace process between the government and the National Liberation Army (ELN) between 2010 and 2021, thereby contributing to a recent research agenda on civil resistance and peace processes. Drawing on interviews and documentary analysis, we examine how social actors employed nonviolent resistance tactics to: (i) get the parties to the negotiating table, (ii) carve themselves a space to participate in the process and influence it, (iii) press the parties to take measures to alleviate civilians’ suffering, (iv) help the parties overcome hurdles at the …

Planning For The Future Of The Easthampton Council On Aging, Caitlin E. Coyle, Sue Berger

Center for Social and Demographic Research on Aging Publications

This report describes an assessment undertaken by the Center for Social & Demographic Research on Aging (CSDRA) within the Gerontology Institute at the University of Massachusetts Boston, on behalf of the ad hoc Senior Center Building Committee. The goals of this project were to document the features of other communities building processes, engage residents in preliminary conversation about their needs and preferences as they consider aging in Easthampton. Results of that work are described in this report and recommendations to the ad hoc building committee are provided. These recommendations are meant to provide an objective description of this preliminary community …

Enhanced Care Management, James Love

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

Santa Cruz County’s Enhanced Care Management (ECM) program assists Medi-Cal recipients who are unhoused, have substance use disorders/serious mental illness, or are high utilizers of medical services, obtain and maintain medical care coordination services. This population faces many challenges living in Santa Cruz, and the ECM team needs additional resources to continue the supportive work the care management program provides.

The needs assessment documents the ECM team’s desired physical and emotional resources to support their health and identifies the current barriers to supporting clients. The ECM team responded to a Google form survey and the responses were analyzed for common …

Obesity: Influencing Behavioral Consumption Through Meal Kit Distribution, Alejandro Hernandez

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

Founded in 2002, Everyone’s Harvest is a grassroots nonprofit dedicated to providing access to healthy, affordable fruits and vegetables through certified farmers markets and community food programs. Its key initiatives—Fresh Rx, Market Match, Edible Education and Farms Together —focus on alleviating nutrition insecurity and combating diet-related health conditions by providing vulnerable populations the resources to purchase, or receive, fresh produce and gain nutritional knowledge. This study explores a new intervention: the distribution of farmers' market meal kits as a complementary strategy to the current Edible Education program. These meal kits, which feature seasonally available produce and pre-measured ingredients, aim to …

Affordable Housing Solutions: Navigating The Cienega Heights Application Process, Valerie Solorzano

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

The lack of affordable housing and widespread knowledge about the eligibility and application process in Santa Cruz County has created significant challenges for the community. This project focuses on addressing these issues by increasing public awareness of affordable housing opportunities and providing guidance on the application process. MidPen Housing, a nonprofit organization specializing in affordable housing, serves as a key example of efforts to meet this need. Their development in Watsonville provides housing for low-income and farmworker families.

A key component of this project involves conducting a public educational outreach event to inform the local community about qualifying for Cienega …

An International Review Of Skin Conditions In Incarcerated Persons, Madison Ferris, Rahib K. Islam, Thy N. Huynh, Robert E. Davis, Mirna Becevic, Saurabh Chandra, Ross L. Pearlman, Jeremy J. Jackson, Robert T. Brodell, Shari R. Lipner, Vinayak K. Nahar

Health, Human Performance and Recreation Faculty Publications and Presentations

Introduction

Methods

Results

Practice Unveils Weaknesses: Analysing The Implementation Of Regulations On Seafarers’ Work/Rest Hours, Bikram S. Bhatia

World Maritime University Ph.D. Dissertations

Seafarers’ fatigue risk management is rooted in regulations on manning and work/rest hours. These regulations establish a minimum fatigue management standard achieved through work/rest hours compliance. Seafarers must maintain daily records of their work/rest hours and report any non-compliance to their company. However, adjustments to these records have been reported in the literature. Such malpractice obscures instances of non- compliance and hinders the feedback necessary for resolving these issues, including flag State review and amendments to minimum safe manning documents. It compromises the integrity of fatigue risk management and underscores the need for further research.

This study examined the implementation …

Uniting Science And Society: The Role Of Leadership Studies, Scientific, And Political Leaders In Combating Science Polarization, Kathryn E. Reda

Interdisciplinary Journal of Leadership Studies

This commentary discusses the recent political polarization of scientific research and how this polarization threatens the neutrality of science in American society. It contends further that leadership studies, along with scientific studies, have become a contentious battleground themselves, particularly on topics like climate change, energy policy, and the COVID-19 pandemic. This is exacerbated by mass media misinformation and declining public trust. Science polarization poses a significant challenge for leadership as it erodes informed decision making, making it crucial for leaders to bridge rather than deepen ideological divides. Leadership studies as a discipline has a responsibility to explore the causes of …

Establishing A Robust Decision Framework To Support Transportation Planning Decisions And Accommodate Connected And Autonomous Transportation Alternatives, Bobby Cottam

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Transportation planning involves complex decisions to provide high-quality transportation systems involving multiple stakeholders with numerous competing interests, on top of that they are trying to improve the quality and reliability of those systems on shrinking budgets. This decision is further complicated by the advent of new transportation methods e.g., ride-hailing and the promise of connected and autonomous vehicles (CAVs). While the actual short-term impact of these technologies is uncertain, they will most certainly have a significant impact within the 20-year planning horizon that transportation planners typically consider. These technologies are also blurring the lines between traditionally separate modes of transportation; …

Introducing A Practitioner's Framework For Mobilizing Collective Action, Matthew Paul Bond

Graduate Doctoral Dissertations

INTRODUCING A PRACTITIONER’S FRAMEWORK FOR MOBILIZING COLLECTIVE ACTION December, 2024 Matthew P. Bond, B.A. University of North Carolina Greensboro, M.S., University of Massachusetts Boston, M.P.A., Suffolk University, Ph.D., University of Massachusetts Boston Directed by Christian Weller Social dilemmas are situations in which individual and collective incentives are at odds, leading to suboptimal collective outcomes that make all individuals worse off. Modeling policy problems stuck in stasis as social dilemmas reveals new solution pathways that promise progressive change. The solution to a social dilemma is collective action, yet since the introduction of the collective action problem in the 1960’s, a solution …

An Aggregate Matching And Pick-Up Model For Mobility-On-Demand Services, Xinwei Li, Jintao Ke, Hai Yang, Hai Wang, Yaqian Zhou

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

This paper presents an Aggregate Matching and Pick-up (AMP) model to delineate the matching and pick-up processes in mobility-on-demand (MoD) service markets by explicitly considering the matching mechanisms in terms of matching intervals and matching radii. With passenger demand rate, vehicle fleet size and matching strategies as inputs, the AMP model can well approximate drivers’ idle time and passengers’ waiting time for matching and pick-up by considering batch matching in a stationary state. Properties of the AMP model are then analyzed, including the relationship between passengers’ waiting time and drivers’ idle time, and their changes with market thickness, which is …

Modeling And Regulating A Ride-Sourcing Market Integrated With Vehicle Rental Services, Dong Mo, Hai Wang, Zeen Cai, W. Y. Szeto, Xiqun (Michael) Chen

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

With the popularity of on-demand ride services worldwide, ride-sourcing platforms must maintain an adequate fleet size and cope with growing travel demand. Recently, platforms have attempted to provide vehicle rental services to drivers who do not own cars, then recruited them to provide on demand ride services. This helps lower the entry barrier for drivers and offers another profitable business for platforms. From the government's perspective, however, it is challenging to coordinately regulate a ride-sourcing business and vehicle rental business. This paper proposes a bi-level optimization model to investigate how the government regulates the ride-sourcing market integrated with vehicle rental …

Examining Key Predictors Of Enrollment At A Regional, Open-Access Research University On The U.S. - Mexico Border, Marcus Gay

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Each year, approximately 64% of admitted students do not enroll at the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP). This is particularly concerning given the projected decline in regional high school graduates beginning in the 2025-2026 academic year. The El Paso region is also predominantly composed of groups who have been historically underrepresented in higher education, including Hispanic or Latino students, individuals from low socio-economic backgrounds, and first-generation college students. Using logistic regression analysis, this quantitative study investigates how seven key factors impact the likelihood of enrollment among admitted UTEP applicants. The study utilized admissions data provided by UTEP’s Texas …

Critical Analysis Of Archival Data: The Alvarado V. Episd Case, Mauro Alfredo Hinojosa

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This research analyses the Alvarado vs. El Paso Independent School District legal files, housed at the Sonnichsen Special Collections Department, The University of Texas at El Paso Library. This dissertation explored the following questions: Research question 1 (RQ1): What are the political and social-cultural contexts of the Alvarado case based on the Archives?; and Research Question 2 (RQ2): impact on school education, to include themes in policy and leadership. A qualitative research approach framed through Latino Critical Race Theory exposes how the U.S. education system has historically reinforced White perspectives and marginalized Latino groups, specifically focusing on Mexican-American students in …

Investigating A Study Abroad Program As A Reflective Development Of Intercultural Competence For Students In A Hispanic-Serving University, Akindele Ogunleye

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This dissertation project investigates the broad problem of evaluation and effectiveness that have diminished the opportunities that study abroad can potentially offer as part of higher education in the U.S. The research aim was to develop a reflective plan of implementing study abroad to achieve the transformation of intercultural competence of students of higher education in a Hispanic university. The research questions were deduced from a combination of views from literature since the 1920s affirming study abroad as elitist endeavor, female, liberal arts and academically weak. Using a quantitative data methodology, the study were collected data from students who participated …

School Personnel Perceptions Of Working In A Public School District Under State Authority, Dennis Ray Felton Jr.

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This qualitative study investigates the perceptions of teachers and principals within a K-12 public school district in the state of Arkansas currently operating under state authority. The Bolman and Deal's Four Frame Model is used in this study as a guiding framework. The insights of this study not only contribute to the academic discourse on state intervention in education but also offer practical implications for policymakers and school stakeholders. The research seeks to answer two primary questions: 1) How do teachers and principals perceive the working conditions in a school district under state authority? 2) What are the teachers and …

Assessing Kulpmont Borough's Greenhouse Gas Inventory, Zane Hensal

Student Project Reports

No abstract provided.

Paraverse: Co-Design Of A Parachute Rehearsal And Training Virtual-Reality Enhanced Simulator For The Australian Defence Force: Combining A Generative Co-Design Framework And An Agile Approach To Development, Brennen Mills, Martin Masek, Julie Boston, Wyatt De Souza, Jake Snell, Stuart Bender, Matthew Thompson, Billy Sung, Sara Hansen

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

While co-design methods are crucial for developing digital educational interventions that are user-centred, contextually relevant, inclusive, and effective in meeting the diverse needs of learners and educators, little attention has been paid to the potential value of co-design processes for digital application development in the Defence context. This research gauged the efficacy of combining a generative co-design framework making use of agile and iterative co-design principles in an applied research and development project. The project produced an immersive virtual reality based digital solution in collaboration with the Australian Defence Force Special Operations Command (SOCOMD) Army. Specifically, the ParaVerse project sought …

The Sexuality Of Technology: Memories Of Existing In Techno-Societies, Mardiya Vip Lab Fellow

Kroc IPJ Research and Resources

Sexuality of Technology is a research-based-fiction that puts together accounts of queer Ghanaians navigating threats and anxieties in a digital society. It examines technology-facilitated surveillance as violence and power that creates inequalities in motion illustrated through the lens of three friends navigating the intricate relations of power. The project grounds pain, rage and practices of survival of queer people, moving away from the ‘acceptance’ narrative to highlight that for many queer people in Ghana, violence and power is messy, unspectacular, and embedded in their every day existence within techno-societies.

The Disappearing Fishermen, Areli Palomo Contreras

Kroc IPJ Research and Resources

The Disappearing Fishermen is one of a series of ethnographic journalism stories about the violence embedded in the web of power structures shaping our global market system. In the Honduran wetlands of the Central American Gulf of Fonseca, these structures result in multiple forms of harm and damage to artisanal fishing communities. During the eighties and the nineties, the shrimp farming industry that settled in these wetlands was conceived to meet the Global North’s “need” for shrimp. Powerful international institutions including the World Bank and development agencies such as USAID provided loans to private companies, while the Honduran government enabled …

Code Blue: How Police And Health Care Providers Disrupt Healing For Violently Injured Black Men, Cherrell Green

Kroc IPJ Research and Resources

While Black males are disproportionately impacted by gun homicide, they are also grossly impacted by non-fatal shootings. The impact of gun violence extends far beyond the immediate physical harm inflicted by bullets; this harm can permeate and disrupt personal relationships, create lasting psychological distress, and undermine a sense of safety within communities. However, the needs of injured Black men are often overlooked in public discourse. Despite the prevalence of these traumatic experiences in the lives of low-income Black men, their response to trauma is often treated as pathology, with fewer resources devoted to addressing the adverse consequences associated with these …

California Threats And Harassment Initiative: A Literature Review Contextualizing The Environment Of Threats And Harassment Of Local Elected Officials In The United States Between 2013 And 2024, Ioli Filmeridis, Rachel Hodel, Thomas Oliver

Kroc IPJ Research and Resources

Given the attention dedicated to violence targeted against national figures and representatives, this literature review focuses on the less prominent, but nonetheless critical, issue of threats and harassment directed at locally elected officials. In particular, it considers school board officials, members of city councils, community college boards, elected sheriffs, city and district attorneys and mayors in Southern California as well as across the United States. It draws on traditional media coverage, academic and think tank discussions of the scope of threats and harassment faced by local officials, the drivers of threatening and harassing behavior, and their impact on local officials …

Beyond Borders: Confronting Transnational Violence Against Black Migrants, Nana Afua Yeboaa Brantuo

Kroc IPJ Research and Resources

Beyond Borders: Confronting Transnational Violence Against Black Migrants explores the systemic violence and exclusion faced by Black migrants throughout their migration journey, with a focus on the U.S. immigration system. Synthesizing literature, data, and expert interviews, the paper highlights the intersecting forms of violence—political, community, racial, and gender-based—that Black migrants experience before, during, and after migration. The paper emphasizes how structural racism, anti-Blackness, and inadequate legal protections contribute to the compounded vulnerabilities of Black migrants. It calls for comprehensive policy interventions, including trauma-informed care, policy and legal system transformations, and community-based support, to address these multifaceted challenges and promote a …

Discrimination Against Wayuu Women As A System Of Collective Violence Against The Wayuu Indigenous People In Venezuela And Colombia / Errata Wayuumuin Sumuin Tu’ Wayuu Jiertkaa Jutuma’A Milia’An Jauhtu’U Jumaika’A Heka Jumana’A Tuu Wuomain Eh Venezuerraka Musia Colompianaka, Dayanna Palmar Uriana

Kroc IPJ Research and Resources

I wanted to shed light on the situation of Indigenous women in Colombia and Venezuela, focusing specifically on the situation of Wayuu women living in the northern border of both countries. The identity of an Indigenous woman carries a dual burden—defined by both gender and ethnicity—that determines living conditions and access to rights within a worldview rooted in a collective sense of belonging to an Indigenous people. As a Wayuu Indigenous woman and a human rights researcher, my objective was to identify forms of discrimination by listening to Wayuu women in the territories of both countries. This approach allowed us …