Digital Commons Network^™

Exploration Of Semi-Supervised Learning For Convolutional Neural Networks, Nicholas Sheffler

Master's Theses

Training a neural network requires a large amount of labeled data that has to be created by either human annotation or by very specifically created methods. Currently, there is a vast abundance of unlabeled data that is neglected sitting on servers, hard drives, websites, etc. These untapped data sources serve as the inspiration for this paper.

The goal of this thesis is to explore and test various methods of semi-supervised learning (SSL) for convolutional neural networks (CNN). These methods will be analyzed and evaluated based on their accuracy on a test set of data. Since this particular neural network will …

Psf Sampling In Fluorescence Image Deconvolution, Eric A. Inman

Master's Theses

All microscope imaging is largely affected by inherent resolution limitations because of out-of-focus light and diffraction effects. The traditional approach to restoring the image resolution is to use a deconvolution algorithm to “invert” the effect of convolving the volume with the point spread function. However, these algorithms fall short in several areas such as noise amplification and stopping criterion. In this paper, we try to reconstruct an explicit volumetric representation of the fluorescence density in the sample and fit a neural network to the target z-stack to properly minimize a reconstruction cost function for an optimal result. Additionally, we do …

Analysis And Usage Of Natural Language Features In Success Prediction Of Legislative Testimonies, Marine Cossoul

Master's Theses

Committee meetings are a fundamental part of the legislative process in which
constituents, lobbyists, and legislators alike can speak on proposed bills at the
local and state level. Oftentimes, unspoken “rules” or standards are at play in
political processes that can influence the trajectory of a bill, leaving constituents
without a political background at an inherent disadvantage when engaging with
the legislative process. The work done in this thesis aims to explore the extent to
which the language and phraseology of a general public testimony can influence a
vote, and examine how this information can be used to promote civic …

Trajectory-Tracking Control Of The Ball-And-Plate System, Dominic E. Riccoboni

Master's Theses

The Mechatronics group in the Mechanical Engineering department of Cal Poly is interested in creating a demonstration of a ball-and-plate trajectory tracking controller on hardware. The display piece will serve to inspire engineering students to pursue Mechatronics and control theory as an area of study. The ball-and-plate system is open-loop unstable, underactuated, and has complicated, nonlinear equations of motion. These features present substantial challenges for control - especially if the objective is trajectory tracking. Because the system is underactuated, common nonlinear trajectory tracking control techniques are ineffective. This thesis lays out a theoretical foundation for controlling the hardware.

Several important …

Simple Open-Source Formal Verification Of Industrial Programs, Christopher Disney Peterson

Master's Theses

Industrial programs written on Programmable Logic Controllers (PLCs) have become an essential component of many modern industries, including automotive, aerospace, manufacturing, infrastructure, and even amusement parks. As these safety-critical systems become larger and more complex, ensuring their continuous error-free operation has become a significant and important challenge. Formal methods are a potential solution to this issue but have traditionally required substantial time and expertise to deploy. This usability issue is compounded by the fact that PLCs are highly proprietary and have substantial licensing costs, making it difficult to learn about or deploy formal methods on them.

This thesis presents the …

The Vertic Clay Flora Of The San Joaquin Desert: Niche, Competition & Floral Mosaics On A Novel Substrate, Emma R. Fryer

Master's Theses

Plant communities that occur on edaphically heterogeneous landscapes are ideal systems for exploring questions of niche and community assembly. Species with affinity for harsh substrates often have well-defined edaphic niches and are ideal models for testing ecological and evolutionary theory. While plants on substrates such as serpentine and gypsum have received much attention, those on other harsh substrates, including on vertic clay soils, have gone unstudied. Vertic clay soils are both chemically and physically challenging to plant establishment and productivity. Plant communities associated with vertic clay soils of the San Joaquin Desert appear to have a distinctive mosaic pattern of …

Structural Design, Modeling, And Analysis Of The Wing For A World Speed Record-Breaking Turbo-Prop Racing Airplane, Joseph C. Hammond

Master's Theses

The Cal Poly SLO Turbo-Prop Racer (TP Racer) is a vehicle in development with the goal to break the world record for fastest turbo-prop aircraft measured over a 3-kilometer strip. This thesis presents the structural design, modeling, and analysis of the wing of Cal Poly SLO TP Racer. Methodology behind analyzing the wing is presented through finite element modeling elements and a mesh study. This is followed by development of structure through geometry and laminate estimations. The wing structure estimates and loading conditions are then modeled in FEMAP. Initial estimates are analyzed and reviewed – overbuilt, underbuilt, and incorrectly modeled …

Let's Talk Body: An Applied Senior Project On Social Media Body Image, Katherine R. Tonges, Lindsey J. Dwyer

Communication Studies

This paper discusses the overwhelming presence of social media platforms like Instagram and TikTok in the recent generation's (Gen-Z) daily lives. Influencers have become the new celebrities by creating a “relatable and desirable” lifestyle that users aspire to gain. However, the pressure to conform to unrealistic beauty standards and buy promoted products can lead to negative effects on users' mental health and self-esteem. The authors of this paper (Tonges and Dwyer) have created a podcast and Instagram account to encourage an honest conversation about the impact of social media on one’s actions, emotions, and brain chemistry. By analyzing social media …

Analytical Methods For Determining Connectivity Leakage In Collaboration With Meissner Filtration Products, Ennis Cuhadaroglu, Finn Mccarthy, Alvin Ng

Biomedical Engineering

The scope of our project involved choosing existing testing procedures and determining a viable sample size to determine an accurate leakage rate of single-use system connections (SUS). Another goal was to assess the effects of gamma irradiation on the material integrity of the hose barb to tubing connections.

Our key customer requirements included: being able to determine an overall leakage rate and making a repeatable testing process. The importance of these requirements was determined through our house of quality and Pugh charts. To achieve the requirements, we tested the leakage in low-pressure and high-pressure scenarios with a large enough sample …

Academic Senate - Minutes, 2/28/2023, Academic Senate

Academic Senate Minutes

No abstract provided.

Academic Senate - Agenda, 2/28/2023, Academic Senate

Academic Senate Agendas

No abstract provided.

Loving Blackness: A Sense Experience, Ricardo J. Millhouse

Feminist Pedagogy

The late bell hooks framed feminist pedagogies as a set of practices and systems that provide a description of feminism, a feminist learning environment, and ways to cultivate a community that is ready for feminist instruction. Using intersectionality, hooks (1992) discussed “loving blackness” as a representational and destabilizing practice to de-center whiteness. hooks (1992, 20) writes, “loving blackness as a political resistance transforms our ways of looking and being, and thus creates conditions necessary for us to move against the forces of domination and death and reclaim black life.” I propose a black feminist praxis teaching tool, “a sense experience,” …

Academic Spaces Of Possibility? A Proleptic Dialogue With Blackfeminism At The Center, Liliana Herakova, Lauren O. Babb, Kevin Roberge

Feminist Pedagogy

This critical commentary engages our experiences as co-educators in a “Black Feminist Thought and Expression” (BFTE) course, first-of-its-kind at our predominantly white institution in the U.S.. We imagine and provoke redefinitions of “classrooms” and “students” toward the liberatory dialogic learning bell hooks continues to inspire. We reflect on the potentials and perils of BFTE as pedagogical moves toward 1) becoming learners over and over again and 2) creating multiple different learning spaces, not confined to the physical classroom or to texts-as-usual. By bringing our beings together in both this essay and in BFTE, we re-member the dialogic pedagogy of love-as-action …

‘Reading The Cultural Landscape’ In The ‘Birthplace’ Of Modern Race/Racism: Using Hooks To Invite Students In As Critical Knowledge Producers & Co-Conspirators, Danielle Docka-Filipek

Feminist Pedagogy

No abstract provided.

Black Feminist Pedagogy In White Southern Spaces, Frances B. Henderson

Feminist Pedagogy

In Teaching to Transgress, bell hooks situates the classroom as “the most radical space of opportunity in academia” (hooks 1994,), as it is within this space that we might challenge and transcend ways of knowing centered in patriarchy, sexism and racism. But what happens when the classroom is located in spaces loyal to the historical frameworks that buttress white supremacist heteropatriarchy? This article examines my twelve years of experience in teaching undergraduate courses in political science at a small liberal arts college in the mid-South. At its center are critical reflections on attempts to formulate and employ a black feminist …

Ungrading As Feminist Praxis, Jessica L. Furgerson

Feminist Pedagogy

No abstract provided.

How I Learned To Love Teaching: Bell Hooks And The Possibilities Of The Feminist Classroom, Patti Duncan

Feminist Pedagogy

In this critical commentary, I describe the influence bell hooks has had on my pedagogy since first reading her book, Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom, when I was a graduate student in Women’s and Gender Studies in the 1990s. The profound influence hooks’ work had on me, as a first generation, woman of color scholar from a working-class background, cannot be overstated. Her words helped me name and begin to critique and resist the isolation, alienation, and oppressive systems that had, up to that point, shaped my experience and the experience of many women of color …

Editor’S Introduction – Getting The Language, Tools, And Love Of Bell Hooks, Qiana Cutts

Feminist Pedagogy

No abstract provided.

Engaged Pedagogy And Journaling: A Pathway To Self-Transformation, Maria Guajardo

Feminist Pedagogy

Journaling, a reflective teaching activity, is an approach for engaged learning that allows students to find one’s voice, reexamine one’s identity, and create a deeper understanding of self, identity, and agency. Central to bell hooks’ feminist pedagogy is engaged teaching and learning, a pathway that allows learner and teacher to actively question what is and what must be (hooks, 1994). This learning-teaching space examined the intersecting topics of gender, culture, and leadership by unlearning, learning, and relearning one’s understanding and experience of these three identities. The main learning objectives of this teaching activity were to 1) engage in critical inquiry; …

Playing With Privilege: A Creative Way For Students To Unpack Privilege, Ashley D. Garcia

Feminist Pedagogy

Although privilege is a foundational concept in many courses, students often have only a vague notion of it, which hinders discussion and analysis. This activity/assignment, grounded in bell hooks' engaged pedagogy, tasks students with visually representing and explaining a concrete instance of privilege to their peers. Through creating comic strips, students must interrogate their assumptions of privilege and begin to encounter its intersectional structure. Creating comic strips that depict privilege helps students grasp the concept and apply it in their self-reflection. Moreover, this establishes a foundation from which students can interrogate the positions of privilege that structure their social realities.

Bell Hooks Feminist Pedagogy In The Library Classroom, Melissa Chomintra

Feminist Pedagogy

An abstract (separate from the article body; optional)

Locations Of Possibility: Reengaging Embodied Pedagogy As An Act Of Resistance, Molly Wiant Cummins

Feminist Pedagogy

No abstract provided.

Resisting Burnout: Bell Hooks’ Pedagogy Of Hope And Teaching Antiracist Feminism Online At The University Of Wyoming During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Samantha L. Vandermeade

Feminist Pedagogy

After earning a PhD in Women’s Studies from an urban, multicultural, R1 university in 2020, I accepted a teaching position at the University of Wyoming, where I was hired primarily to teach feminist and critical race-focused courses. When an in-person position suddenly moved entirely online, I found myself facing not only the culture shock of teaching at a rural, primarily White institution whose state legislature and general populace are largely hostile to antiracist feminism, but also the myriad daily challenges of teaching online during a global pandemic. I had felt personally prepared--as a White lesbian raised in a rural environment, …

Covid’S ‘New Normal:’ Teaching Community Through Depression And Despair, Kelly L. Opdycke

Feminist Pedagogy

No abstract provided.

Editor's Introduction: Honoring The Immeasurable: Bell Hooks’ Feminist Pedagogy In Teaching, Kristin Comeforo

Feminist Pedagogy

No abstract provided.

Teaching Language For Possibility, Not Assimilation: Using Bell Hooks In The English As A Second Language Classroom, Laura T. Irwin, Laura E. Prado, Regina Y. Lee

Feminist Pedagogy

No abstract provided.

Executive Committee - Minutes, 2/21/2023, Academic Senate

Academic Senate Minutes

No abstract provided.

Executive Committee - Agenda 2/21/2023, Academic Senate

Academic Senate Agendas

No abstract provided.

Recurring Errors In Studies Of Gender Differences In Variability, Theodore P. Hill

Research Scholars in Residence

The past quarter century has seen a resurgence of research on the controversial topic of gender differences in variability, in part because of its potential implications for the issue of under- and over-representation of various subpopulations of our society, with respect to different traits. Unfortunately, several basic statistical, inferential, and logical errors are being propagated in studies on this highly publicized topic. These errors include conflicting interpretations of the numerical significance of actual variance ratio values; a mistaken claim about variance ratios in mixtures of distributions; incorrect inferences from variance ratio values regarding the relative roles of sociocultural and biological …

As-961-23 Resolution On Ufpp 12.3 Assigned Time For Exceptional Service To Students, Academic Senate Faculty Affairs Committee

Academic Senate Resolutions

Updates section 12.3 of the UFPP to reflect the revisions in the attached report, which revises the criteria and policy of the ATESS program.