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Becoming A Sister: The Socialization Of Women Into A Sorority, Kathleen Hughes

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

Adult peer groups have become more and more a topic for sociological study. It is a phenomenon that is starting to gain interest. This research focuses on one sorority on the campus of a Midwestern university and how this sorority manages to incorporate the women that they pledge through formal recruitment into the sorority and how these women fully socialize themselves into this group of women who already have bonded with each other. A synthesis of symbolic interactionism and social exchange theory helps to break down the socialization process and shows how the new members move through the stages of …

Salvadorans, Guatemalans, Hondurans, And Colombians: A Scan Of Needs Of Recent Latin American Immigrants To The Boston Area, Miren Uriarte, Phillip Granberry, Megan Halloran, Susan Kelly, Rob Kramer, Sandra Winkler, Jennifer Murillo, Udaya Wagle, Randall Wilson

Gastón Institute Publications

The 2000 U.S. Census brought confirmation of the increase of the Latino population and of the growing diversity of Latino national groups that now make this region their home. Latinos now number 428,729, a 55% increase over their numbers in 1990. In 30 years, the Latino population has increased six-fold, and from its initial concentrations in Springfield, Holyoke, and Boston its presence is now a fact across the Commonwealth.

Massachusetts Latinos are also showing increasing diversity, matching that of the Northeast region and exceeding that of the nation. At the national level, Mexicans have a dominance that dwarfs all other …

Culture And The Effectiveness Of Supplier Diversity Programs: A Test Of Predictors, Gwendolyn Whitfield

Dissertations

Increased globalization and diversity has brought with it unique interdependencies. As we experience demographical shifts unlike any other in U.S. history, the growth rate of minority-owned businesses may represent unprecedented opportunity for corporate buyers to partner with minority suppliers. According to the Minority Business Development Agency, the minority population will represent 37.4 percent of the total U.S. population by the year 2020, and will yield purchasing power of $3 trillion. Moreover, it is estimated that between the years 2000 and 2050 the majority of new business starts will originate in the minority business community (U.S. Small Business Administration 1994). Minority-owned …

Social Disorganization, Disorder, Social Cohesion, Informal Controls, And Crime: A Reformulation And Test Of Systemic Social Disorganization Theory, Gayle M. Rhineberger

Dissertations

The primary purpose of this dissertation is to modify and test the systemic social disorganization models of crime proposed by Bursik and Grasmick (1993) and Sampson, Raudenbush, and Earls (1997), and offer an empirical test of my hypothesized model. Specifically, the model includes traditional indicators of social disorganization (racial/ethnic heterogeneity, socioeconomic status, family disruption, residential stability) as exogenous variables; social and physical disorder, social cohesion, and three levels of informal social control (private, parochial, and public) as intervening mechanisms; and official crime counts and crime victimization as dependent variables.

The data used in this study come from the Project on …

Real Middle School Teachers, Rhoda C. Sommers

The Qualitative Report

Effective middle school teachers are more than the sum total of their educational beliefs and practices. They are whole persons whose lives reflect receptivity to growth, treasured relationships, and the intertwining of their personal and professional lives. This article uses the children’s classic, The Velveteen Rabbit, as a metaphor to describe effective middle school teachers.

Joint Stories And Layered Tales: Support, Contradiction And Me Aning Construction In Focus Group Research, Agnieszka Kosny

The Qualitative Report

This paper uses focus group data about women’s work experiences gathered in five Canadian east coast communities to examine some of the strengths and weakness associated with focus group research. I explore the case made against the use of focus group methods and the basis for some of the critiques aimed at focus group research. By examining the evolving discussions between focus group members, it is possible to understand some of the benefits of group-talk, including the creation of a unique opportunity for interaction, joint meaning creation and contradiction.

Meta-Inquiry: An Approach To Interview Success, Nancy M. Carlson, Mark Mccaslin

The Qualitative Report

Developing an effective interview strategy presents unique challenges for the novice and master researcher for if the questions one asks are not crucial, then differences in responses are not crucial either (Creswell, 1998, p. 335). To focus qualitative research in the human ecology of the study, our strategy uses an initial interview protocol and preanalysis process, called meta-inquiry, prior to developing our formal interview protocol. Meta-inquiry of initial interview data, obtained in dialogue with key informants in the researched culture, provides us with an inductive tool to assess, modify, enhance, and focus the formal interview protocol. Thus, preparing for the …

Indicators Of Resiliency Among Urban Elementary School Students At-Risk, John L. Rausch, Cheryl R. Lovett, Christopher O. Walker

The Qualitative Report

This study was designed to investigate the phenomenon of resiliency among urban elementary school students in an at-risk environment. In contrast with previous studies narrowly focused upon the identification of risk factors, this study utilized a phenomenological qualitative approach to investigate indicators of resiliency from both individual and contextual perspectives. The narrative descriptions of 25 elementary school students in an at-risk environment were analyzed. The results indicated that the participants had strong individual and contextual resiliency indicators through the fifth grade despite being educated in a school district with almost a 60% drop-out rate before high school graduation.

Understanding Reliability And Validity In Qualitative Research, Nahid Golafshani

The Qualitative Report

The use of reliability and validity are common in quantitative research and now it is reconsidered in the qualitative research paradigm. Since reliability and validity are rooted in positivist perspective then they should be redefined for their use in a naturalistic approach. Like reliability and validity as used in quantitative research are providing springboard to examine what these two terms mean in the qualitative research paradigm, triangulation as used in quantitative research to test the reliability and validity can also illuminate some ways to test or maximize the validity and reliability of a qualitative study. Therefore, reliability, validity and triangulation, …

Memories In Context Via Cyber Reminiscing: The Case Of Marilyn Monroe, Kelvin Eng Yong Low

The Qualitative Report

This paper attempts to extend the various existing lieux de memoire available hitherto in the perpetuation and (re)construction of social memory by looking at the cyber landscape. Marilyn Monroe as an icon of American popular culture and thus of popular memory in this context, is explored, by looking at various select websites designed in commemoration of her stardom. Within this investigation, I also invoke the link between the production of social memory, with frames of remembrance and collective memory that therefore indicates memory as indubitably, a social phenomenon. The value of cyber reminiscing is also addressed briefly, by exploring how …

Power Games Between The Researcher And The Participant In The Social Inquiry, Ana Bravo-Moreno

The Qualitative Report

This article will deal with the different power relationships that are in play during the interview process in ethnographic research. It explores how interviewees are agents in the creation of their own positions during the interview process and how they shift positions in interaction with the researcher and with the questions posed to them.

Practice Approaches And The Ethnography Of Communication: Investigating For The Possibility Of A Mutually Beneficial Relationship, Keith Berry

The Qualitative Report

In this essay, I explore the areas of accord and discord between two efficacious modes of research: practice approaches and the Ethnography of Communication (EOC). As an interpersonal and intercultural scholar, I carefully analyze these approaches in order to find innovative ways to describe the diversity that I see in modern social interaction. Working against paradigms that suggest using either one approach or another, I engage this project hoping (expecting?) to find and/both alternatives for communication study. I argue that, in spite of their differences, practice and EOC traditions co-exist in a mutually beneficial relationship for the study of communication …

The Impact Of Devolution On Organizational Effectiveness: An Exploratory Case Study Of Faith-Based Child Care, Javier Stanziola, Tania Schmitz

The Qualitative Report

Although the foundations of President Bush’s faith-based initiative could be traced back at least to Colonial times, the re-packaging of this idea has raised concerns about the role of the federal government in the affairs of faith based organizations, the professionalization of social services, rent seeking, and the crowding out of private funding. This paper aims to examine the local implications of decentralizing the provision of social services in Lee County, Florida. More specifically, we will identify how devolution has affected the organizational effectiveness of faith-based organizations in the day care sector. For this paper, organizational effectiveness was defined in …

Autoethnographic Verse: Nickys Boy: A Life In Two Worlds, Ronald J. Ricci

The Qualitative Report

This autoethnographic verse is about my childhood experience of two distinct and ethnically representative family cultures. Poetry and qualitative research share in their goals of providing meaning, density, aestheticism, and reflexivity They are also evocative I selected verse as a means to express my experience, and to invite the readers reflections on this experience for themselves and others.

Toxic Communities: Examining The Relationship Between Race, Market Forces, And Environmental Hazards Using Elementary Schools As Community Locus, Stephanie Joy Gonzales

Doctoral Dissertations

The purpose of this study is to examine the complex relationship between race, pollution, and market forces using elementary school zones as community locus within California. This analysis examines the relationship between race and toxic facility sites using the Toxic Release Inventory (TRI), census data, and California school data. This research improves on past research in several important ways. First, the community is defined by giving attention to literature on environmental grassroots movements and the formation of informal social networks using local elementary schools as an organizational locus. Second, the migration of Black, Hispanic, and White populations away from and …

"Fine Designs" From Italy: Montessori Education And The Reggio Approach, Carolyn P. Edwards

Department of Child, Youth, and Family Studies: Faculty Publications

Italy is not a huge country, nor one that dominates research in scientific areas like biotechnology or computer science; but in the particular field of early childhood, it can be described as a kind of gifted, creative giant. Italians have always revered beauty, architecture, painting, cuisine, and creative design. In a similar fusion of art and science, they have produced two of the 20th century's most innovative and influential leaders in early education, along with their methods of pedagogy and philosophies of education. The two figures were Maria Montessori (1 870-1952) and Loris Malaguzzi (1920-1994).

Both Montessori education and the …

The Political And Social Activities Of Mainline Protestant Clergy In The Election Of 2000:, Corwin |Smidt, Sue Crawford, Laura Olson, Melissa Deckman, Donald Gray, Dan Hofrenning, Sherrie Steiner, Beau Weston

Sherrie M Steiner

This study examines clergy across six mainline Protestant denominations in terms of their social characteristics, their theological positions, and their political attitudes and behavior. The analysis is based on data collected through random surveys of clergy in each denomination conducted in 2001 using the same instrument. The predominant focus of the article is on the nature and level of political activities exhibited by mainline Protestant clergy in the election year of 2000. The analysis revealed that mainline Protestant clergy are indeed relatively active politically, but that, despite their commonality of belonging to the same broad religious tradition, the nature and …

Review Of "Trustees Of Culture: Power, Wealth, And Status On Elite Arts Boards" By Francie Ostrower, Marilyn Rueschemeyer

Marilyn Rueschemeyer

No abstract provided.

Review Of "Trustees Of Culture: Power, Wealth, And Status On Elite Arts Boards" By Francie Ostrower, Marilyn Rueschemeyer

Marilyn Rueschemeyer

No abstract provided.

Larger Issues At Stake In Unnatural Sex Debate, Seow Hon Tan

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

The recent debate about the criminal prohibition of oral sex provides an occasion for considering larger, related issues. However prevalent the practice of oral sex and however archaic Section 377 of the Penal Code seems to those pushing for its repeal, the arguments offered have tended to take a piecemeal approach and display an ignorance of or disregard for the larger interests at stake.

Ua12/2/1 Ballin': Hilltopper Basketball 2003, Wku Student Affairs

WKU Archives Records

Special edition of the College Heights Herald regarding basketball.

• Buckman, Josh. Road to NCAA Filled with Challenges
• Schoenbaechler, Danny. Paul Sanderford Returning to Bench
• Casagrande, Michael. Camryn Whitaker, Todor Pandov Return After ACL Rehab Sessions
• Casagrande, Michael. Post Players Don’t Stand Tall
• Wilberding, Beth. After Three Years of Change, Seniors Ready to Lead by Example
• Buckman, Josh. Women’s Schedule Dotted with Southeastern Conference Foes
• North, Amber. Towering True Centers Give Foes Reason for Concern
• Schoenbaechler, Danny. The Chosen One – Darrin Horn

Ua12/2/1 College Heights Herald, Vol. 79, No. 27, Wku Student Affairs

WKU Archives Records

WKU campus newspaper reporting campus, athletic and Bowling Green, Kentucky news.

• Hoang, Mai. Tuition Assistance Approved
• Reed, Lindsey. Plus/Minus Proposal Tabled
• Reed, Lindsey. Student Rally Protests Grading Change
• Hoang, Mai. Hilltop Wiring Replaced
• Coffman, Josh. Shuttle Bus System May Get Boost from Congress
• Hopkins, Shawntaye. Dorms to Get Themed Living Options in Fall Semester – Housing & Residence Life
• Hightower, Kyle. Leave Worries Out of Holiday Season
• Lamar, Mike. Editorial Cartoon re: Class Cancellations
• Student Government Association Right on the Money – Class Cancellations
• Fisher, Lee. Turkey Day Not Complete Without This Special List of Ingredients – Thanksgiving
• Clark, Ashlee. …

Ua12/2/1 College Heights Herald, Vol. 79, No. 26, Wku Student Affairs

WKU Archives Records

WKU campus newspaper reporting campus, athletic and Bowling Green, Kentucky news.

• Reed, Lindsey. University Senate Expected to Vote on Plus/Minus Today
• Hopkins, Shawntaye. Staff Seeks Sick Pay
• Clark, Ashlee. Native Song – Larry Yazzie, Native Americans
• Hopkins, Shawntaye. Dorms Get New Prefix – Telephones
• Hoang, Mai. Log Cabin to House Cultural Program – Folk Studies & Anthropology
• Lamar, Mike. Editorial Cartoon re: Online Advising
• Fisher, Lee. Loss of Familiar Friends Makes Area Bare, Drab – Landscaping
• New Online System Will Aid Students – Online Advising
• Reed, Lindsey. Resolution Asks for Notification – Student Government Association, Class Cancellations
• Sainlar, Lindsay. Event …

Ua12/2/1 College Heights Herald, Vol. 79, No. 25, Wku Student Affairs

WKU Archives Records

WKU campus newspaper reporting campus, athletic and Bowling Green, Kentucky news.

• Hopkins, Shawntaye. Full Power Expected to Be Restored Sunday
• Reed, Lindsey. Advising Tool Being Created
• Hoang, Mai. Western, Bowling Green Technical College Create Partnership
• Toone, Stephanie. Student Takes Hard Road Back – Christopher Cherry
• Hopkins, Shawntaye. Students Win Science Awards – Kentucky Academy of Science
• Lamar, Mike. Editorial Cartoon re: Power Outage
• Blackout Brought to Light Glitches in the System
• Balze, John. The Other Side of This Debate – Plus/Minus Grading
• Hoang, Mai. State Farm Makes $76,000 Donation – Gordon Ford College of Business
• Brueggemann, Marlene. Jean Kilbourne Warns …

Ua12/2/1 College Heights Herald, Vol. 79, No. 24, Wku Student Affairs

WKU Archives Records

WKU campus newspaper reporting campus, athletic and Bowling Green, Kentucky news.

• Hoang, Mai. Power Failure Knocks Out Lights, Classes
• Reed, Lindsey. Plus/Minus Hits, Misses Across State
• Hopkins, Shawntaye. Taste of Salsa – Bethany McGuffey, Ines Salvador
• Coffman, Josh. I-66 Debate Grows After Road Show
• Casagrande, Michael. Bowl Championship Series System Not Good Thing for Football
• Lamar, Mike. Editorial Cartoon re: Power Outage
• Wijenayake, Wimal. Review of Local Restaurant Missed the Mark – Figaro’s Pizza & Pub
• Fox, Donald. Bottom Line: The System Just Isn’t Broken – Plus/Minus Grading
• Warren, Brandy. Small Gestures Don’t Capture the Gifts Given by This Beloved …

Ua3/9/5 Veterans Day Rotc Ceremony, Wku President's Office

WKU Archives Records

Speech delivered by WKU president Gary Ransdell at the 2003 WKU Veterans Day ROTC ceremony.

Ua12/2/1 College Heights Herald, Vol. 79, No. 23, Wku Student Affairs

WKU Archives Records

WKU campus newspaper reporting campus, athletic and Bowling Green, Kentucky news.

• Hoang, Mai. Western Among First to Seek Bucks for Brains
• Hopkins, Shawntaye. Energy Use Causes Penalty
• Sainlar, Lindsay. Dream Makers – Theatre & Dance
• Hopkins, Shawntaye. Dorm Renovations Continue – Housing & Residence Life
• Hoang, Mai. Increase Hits Bowling Green Community College – Tuition
• Bill Not at All a Problem-solver – Credit Cards, Legislation
• Lamar, Mike. Editorial Cartoon re: Credit Card Legislation
• Martin, Ty. Thank You for Being a Friend – Regents, Tuition
• Edge, Crystal. Warm Temps = Cold Treatment – Weather
• Smith, Shaun. Gypped Out of Spaces – …

Ua12/2/1 College Heights Herald, Vol. 79, No. 22, Wku Student Affairs

WKU Archives Records

WKU campus newspaper reporting campus, athletic and Bowling Green, Kentucky news.

• Hopkins, Shawntaye. Ernie Fletcher Elected as Kentucky’s Next Governor
• Coffman, Josh. Credit Card Restrictions Proposed
• Green, Tavia. Buggin’ Out – Ladybugs
• Sainlar, Lindsay. Scot Directs Play on Hill – John Doyle
• Glorioso, Shelly. Aftermath of War Leaves Many Questions – Iraq
• Lamar, Mike. Editorial Cartoon re: Budget
• It’s Truly Time for Change – Budget
• Pike, Daniel. Columnist Spends Halloween with Family, Ridicules Small Children
• Casagrande, Michael. Western Must Win to Keep Playoff Hopes Alive – Football
• North, Amber. Lady Tops Need Two to Clinch – Volleyball
• Wilberding, Beth. Betsy …

The Effects Of Subsidized Childcare On Student Parents' Access To Higher Education At Portland State University, Elizabeth Dawn Creach

Dissertations and Theses

The purpose of this study was to identify critical childcare resources that student parents utilize that allow them to access higher education at varying levels, but also to make assumptions about parents unable to enroll due to barriers and/or lack of resources. This study sought to answer the following questions: 1) To what extent does subsidized childcare facilitate student parents' access to higher education? Is subsidized childcare a more important resource for some groups of students than for others?, and 2) Are student parents making childcare-enrollment trade-offs in order to pursue higher education? Are certain groups of students more vulnerable …

Ua12/2/1 College Heights Herald, Vol. 79, No. 21, Wku Student Affairs

WKU Archives Records

WKU campus newspaper reporting campus, athletic and Bowling Green, Kentucky news.

• Hoang, Mai. Regents Approve Spring Tuition Increase
• Hardin, Adriane. Step Into the Light – Ersa Austin, Alpha Kappa Alpha
• Hoang, Mai. Council on Postsecondary Education Proposes Budget
• Hopkins, Shawntaye. Lawyers Ask for Dismissal – Katie Autry
• Plus/Minus System Would Equal Big Problems for Bowling Green Community College
• It’s Never Too Late to Go Vote
• Lamar, Mike. Editorial Cartoon re: Plus/Minus Grading
• Angel, Chad. Discontented with Dining Services
• Wicker, Misti. There Is a Price for Love – Tuition
• Ingersoll, Whitney. Food Options Slim for Students Who Brave Campus Life on …