Digital Commons Network^™

Focused Group Meetings To Promote Job Satisfaction For Emergency Department Advanced Providers, Kendra Osei-Wusu

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

Objective: Over the last few years, the pattern of increased burnout, operating under adverse environments, and being under- appreciated as led to a decrease in job satisfaction among emergency room providers(physicians, advanced practicing nurses, and physician assistants). Therefore, this scholarly project examined if small focused group discussions among emergency room providers will help combat poor job satisfaction scores and increase the well-being of the practitioners that keep the emergency room functioning. Methods: Using a quasi-experimental design, 10 providers that work in the emergency department at Lifebridge Health were randomly selected. Baseline well-being and job satisfaction rates were measured prior to …

“We Fought For The Right Reasons And God Was On Our Side”: Combat, Faith, And Perseverance During The 28th Infantry Division's Engagement At The Battle Of The Bulge, Walter S. Zapotoczny Jr

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

In December 1944, Hitler’s Germany was besieged on every front. Germany was working on super weapons and needed to buy some time to fight off the Red Army and the Allies. Until his super weapons could turn the tide, Hitler opted for a major counteroffensive in the west to split the Allies. Hitler would launch his last military reserves in a desperate gamble aimed at driving to the port of Antwerp through Luxembourg and Belgium. Such a blow, Hitler believed, would wreck the Allied Coalition. One of the divisions facing the main German offensive was the American 28th Infantry Division, …

Deployment Separation Impact On Military Spouse Well-Being, Cinthia Joas

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

Military spouses are confronted with multiple responsibilities daily. These demands intensify when their spouses deploy. By extension, military families respond differently and adapt to these stressors differently than civilian families. This necessitates coping with dynamic changes described as adequate or maladaptive. The deployment of one's spouse is also affiliated with mixed feelings such as anger, fear, joy, loneliness, anticipation, and relief. While the active-duty spouse is deployed, communication with the family allows a more significant emotional balance for the military member, the spouse, and the children to obtain a more favorable performance in their functions. Without proper and consistent communication, …

A Phenomenological Study Of Pastoral Leadership Development Behaviors In The Revitalization Of Small Evangelical Churches, Bart Lee Denny

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

Church revitalization has received renewed interest in the last several years. Rainer (2014) says that a congregation’s failure to develop and empower next-generation leaders is one of the leading contributors to church closure. Likewise, Clifton (2016) and Stetzer (2007) highlight the importance of developing next-generation leaders during church revitalization. The purpose of this phenomenological study was to understand the leadership development behaviors of senior or solo pastors who successfully led revitalization in a small evangelical church. This study defined a small church as one averaging 65 or fewer in attendance at the beginning of the pastor participant’s tenure (Rainer, 2022). …

An Examination Of The Influence Of Attitudes Toward Linguistic Diversity And Immigration Status On The Pastor’S Engagement In Multicultural Ministry, Juan Antonio Seda

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

With the growth in cultural diversity comes the opportunity to reach and minister to people from different cultural backgrounds. This diversity also highlights the challenges pastors and ministry leaders face in implementing efforts to reach people from diverse ethnic, linguistic, and cultural backgrounds. Additionally, the pastor and ministry leader must understand how socio-political, theological, and biblical factors influence opinion and interaction with culturally diverse people. This cultural and linguistic interaction requires cultural humility, “a process of reflection and lifelong inquiry, involves self-awareness of personal and cultural biases as well as awareness and sensitivity to significant cultural issues of others. Core …

Addressing The Impact Of Adverse Childhood Experiences Of Adults Through The Pastoral Counseling Ministry Of Victory Church, Joseph Randall Tapp

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

Dr. Vincent Filetti's landmark 1998 study exposed the impact of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) on children and adults. His analysis determined that childhood traumatic experiences could strongly correlate to serious health issues in adults. Exposure to childhood adversity has been shown to correlate not only with mental health issues such as depression, suicide, and substance abuse but also with chronic, life-threatening health issues such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes, cancer, and immune system issues. This DMin study aims to address the impact of ACEs on adult clients of the pastoral counseling ministry of Victory Church, a large non-denominational Christian church located …

Implicit Bias In The U.S. Air Force Criminal Justice System And The Excessive Punishment Of Black Airmen, Brandon Lanier Dinkins

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this hermeneutic phenomenological study was to understand whether implicit bias influenced disproportionate commander-imposed punishment of junior ranking Black Airmen from grades E1–E4 who previously served on active duty in the U.S. Air Force. The theory guiding this study is the implicit bias theory introduced by psychologists Mahzarin Banaji and Anthony Greenwald in 1995. This theory identifies that attitudes, perceptions, and stereotypes shape specific groups' associations and qualities, which can influence decisions. This qualitative study employed a hermeneutic phenomenology research design. This study used snowballing and purposeful sampling methods to recruit 16 participants. Data within this study was …

Preexilic Traits Of The Israelian Prophetic Material In The Book Of Kings, Erik Kirk Divietro

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

There are three primary objections to accepting the prophetic materials of the Book of Kings as historically contemporary with the events they purport to record. First, there is a theological bias against the supernatural character of the materials. These supernatural passages are categorized as folklore and legend. Many critics reject the historicity of supernatural events for a variety of reasons. The second objection is that the linguistic profile of the materials is late, dating from a period long after the events recorded and therefore has, at the least, been through so many redactions and emendations as to be unreliable. Third, …

Comparing The Academic Growth Among Black Students In Philadelphia’S Black-Operated Charter Schools, Non-Black Operated Charter Schools, And Traditional Public Schools., Cherryann M. Joseph

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

This ex post facto, causal-comparative quantitative study assessed the math and English language arts (ELA) 7th to 8th-grade academic growth among Black students enrolled in Philadelphia’s black-operated public charter schools, non-black operated charter schools, and traditional public schools while controlling for 6th-grade exam scores. Over 65 years after Brown versus Board of Education disallowed public school segregation, the academic achievement gap between Black and white students persists. Various parental and educational stakeholders have considered charter public schools as suitable educational alternatives for narrowing this academic gap. This condition along with an assertion by some community activists that Black leaders are …

A Hermeneutic Phenomenological Study: Perspectives On The Parental Engagement Strategies Of Rural African American Parents Of Middle School Students, Barbara Ragin Champagne

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this hermeneutic phenomenological study was to explore and ascribe meaning to African American parents' lived experiences in the education of their middle school students in rural east-central South Carolina. Two theoretical frameworks guided this study as they related to the levels and the effect of parental self-efficacy on parental engagement: Hoover-Dempsey and Sandler's revised model of parental involvement and Bandura's self-efficacy theory. The central research question for this study was "What are the perceptions and lived experiences of rural African American middle-school parents and their involvement in parental engagement activities?" Three subsequent sub-questions on parental self-efficacy, role …

Should I Stay Or Should I Go? Exploring The Crisis Of Faith Process Of Former Members Of The Cjlds Within The United States, Kent Taylor Critchlow

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

Christians are experiencing a crisis of religious faith throughout the United States at an alarming rate, especially among millennials. For members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, there were 20 primary and secondary reasons that created a crisis of religious faith and there were 13 reasons that motivated each participant to eventually abandon their Church membership. Over 80% of the reasons why the participants left the Church were directly and indirectly tied to the Prophet Joseph Smith and to the authenticity of the Book of Mormon. The use of the Internet played a significant role in expediting …

Childhood Food Insecurity In Rural America: Raising Awareness And Inspiring Action Through Art And Design, Julie Hansen Olson

Masters Theses

Children go hungry in America every day, particularly in rural communities, where statistics show food insecurity to be as high as 17%. This means one in six children in rural communities lacks nutritionally adequate food or the ability to acquire it on a daily basis. In one of the wealthiest countries in the world, this appalling statistic is unacceptable. But how do we mitigate food insecurity for children and its resulting effects on a child’s physical, mental, and social development? This project proposes to educate, raise awareness, and inspire and/or enable action by all stakeholders to reduce food insecurity, specifically …

How Police Chaplains Can Facilitate Building And Maintaining Trust With Law Enforcement: Through The Ministry Of Presence, Marjorie Abrahams Dent

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

CPP Chaplaincy Corps is a ministry that provides spiritual, emotional, and mental support to its law enforcement personnel. Their function is to enhance the well-being and quality of life of the police officers as they serve and protect the citizens of their city, by offering a listening ear, a supportive presence, and providing individual pastoral care. This project seeks to determine if the newly organized CPP Chaplaincy Corps can be successful in facilitating the process of building trust with law enforcement through the Ministry of Presence and Pastoral Care. It also documents the progress and changes that have been made …

Older Adults And Digital Technology For Worship Service During A Pandemic At Saint Paul's Baptist Church In Richmond, Virginia, Donnie Lewis Smith

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused the church to move from in-person worship to digital, online, and virtual worship services. This thesis project aims to determine if going to an alternative worship platform has presented problems for the elderly and senior Saint Paul’s Baptist Church members. Because of the large number of seniors at Saint Paul’s, the church’s leadership must be ready to help in any way to ensure that all members can participate in worship services during these unprecedented times. Since there is no projected timetable for when and if the church will return to worship services as we know …

The Relationship Between Rightness, Religiosity, And Marital Satisfaction Among Christian Spouses In The United States, Juan Arturo Paulino

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

Marital satisfaction is paramount to a loving and long-lasting married life. The absence of marital satisfaction can lead to poor health, relational stress, and, eventually, divorce. This predictive, correlational study sought to research the relationship between the adoption of a position of rightness, the practice of extrinsic religiosity, and how these factors influence the levels of marital satisfaction among Christian spouses in the United States of America. The researcher used the Brief Version of the Religious Orientation Scale- Revised (ROS-R) to assess the level of intrinsic and extrinsic religious activity of the sample population. To measure the independent variable of …

Characteristics That Make An Excellent Worship Leader According To The Perspectives Of Baptist Congregants In North Texas, Carlos Jerome Benson

Masters Theses

Despite many Baptists Churches in North Texas, most church congregants vary significantly in how they characterize an excellent worship leader. These congregants often rely on trial and error to establish characteristic traits that are acceptable for the whole of a particular church. There is a gap in the research study of characteristics that make an excellent worship leader according to the perspectives of Baptist congregants in North Texas. This study will find which attributes of worship leadership are most desirable according to the views of North Texas Baptist congregants. These literary examples do not specifically name what characteristics North Texas …

Beyond The Call Of Duty: Supererogation Towards An Apologetic Approach In The Us Navy, Donald Anthony Baker Iii

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

Members of the US Navy subscribe to common values outlined in the Sailor’s Creed, a shared dictum of foundational ideals that burdens all persons within the organization to follow. Honor, courage, commitment, excellence, and fairness are explicit organizational values written therein that codify the standard values expected of all Sailors regardless of rank or other designators. For Christians serving in the US Navy, how can they present the tenets of the Gospel in a manner appropriate, and legal, for a professional, secular work environment such as the military but are consistent with the biblical imperative to give a defense of …

A Study On Why People Lack Dedication And Focus During Church Worship And Service Time, Maxine Head White

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The researcher chose the topic of this thesis because members of Last Days Ministries (LDM) lacked dedication and focus during church worship and service. The project aimed to discover what caused LDM members to lack commitment and focus during worship and service time and to find a way to alleviate the problem among LDM members. This thesis project includes four themes from doing this project, of which three concern distractions. Those distractions came from cell phones, spontaneous distractions, and satanic distractions. Cell phone distraction was at the top of the list of distractions that disrupted the church and kept LDM …

Technology Acceptance Model (Tam) And Use And Adoption Of Technology By Small Business Owners In Queens, Ny, Gavin Singh

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

Many small businesses today experience apprehension or anxiety when adopting new and emerging technologies in their place of business. Though we live in a time of unparalleled access to technology, many businesses still avoid adopting technology or upgrading to the latest version. Despite knowing the advantages of using technology to conduct business (in-person or on the Internet), some businesses purposely choose to not use technology. The purpose of this phenomenological qualitative case study was to understand why these businesses choose to do so, and to learn what can be done to help them overcome these barriers to technological adoption. The …

Exploring The Impact Of Generational Trauma On Mother-Daughter Relationships With An Emphasis On The African American Community, Bernadette Denise Ward

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

In many communities the mother-daughter relationship is not only vital in the younger years but also in the teen and young adult years. Several studies have explored a mother’s influence on her daughter’s views of the self, others, and the world in general. The mother-daughter relationship does not only impact personal morals and values but also the types of relationships the daughters gravitate to. In the African American community, many of the mother-daughter relationships are known to be similar in nature and/or dynamics throughout generations. Relationships that are tainted or known as toxic also seem to cycle throughout several generations. …

Vbc Young Families Initiative, Andrew Ryan Scoggins

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

This research project is designed for Victory Baptist Church in Weatherford, Texas, to reach young families. The purpose is to design and implement a plan that educates, equips, and engages individual church members to evangelize young families in Weatherford. The necessity of this research is evident in the face of consequences surrounding the past three years involving the pandemic and a leadership change at VBC. The intervention is mobilizing the members of VBC to reach young families. This mobilization centers around training the membership to reach young families. Using surveys and questionnaires with the membership reveals what are the thoughts …

Worried Sick: Understanding The Implications Of Stress On A Physiological Level, Julia Saia

Senior Honors Theses

Stress is prevalent among many individuals in today’s society. A literature review was conducted to investigate the physiological effects of stress, including the biomarkers of stress and how these interact with various body systems. The stress response is a protective mechanism to prepare the body to adequately respond to a perceived threat. However, when this response is prolonged, it begins to have a maladaptive effect on the body and can cause more harm than good. This literature review sought to compile what is known regarding the general effects of chronic stress and its impact on the nervous, immune, digestive, and …

The Greatest Teacher: Modeling Jesus In Urban Education, Harley Rusk

Senior Honors Theses

Several key best practices from urban education research are reflected in the pedagogy of Jesus Christ, providing a practical foundation for Christian educators in urban schools. Related to the prevalence of poverty and trauma are the practices of learning students’ backgrounds to better interpret behavior, which Jesus reflects by healing before teaching, and holding high standards, demonstrated in Jesus’ interaction with the rich man and the Sermon on the Mount. Related to racial diversity are the practices of addressing implicit bias, a crucial part of being Christlike, and connecting instruction to students’ culture, like Jesus did through parables. Christians can …

A Strategic Social Media Marketing Plan To Launch A New Tabletop Role-Playing Game, Josiah Mork

Senior Honors Theses

The boardgame industry is thriving through independent (“indie”) publishers crowdfunding on platforms such as Kickstarter. However, the tabletop role-playing game (TTRPG) fanbase is resistant to digital media. Indie publishers are then in a dilemma. They lack money to gather supporters through traditional media and cannot crowdfund the money without supporters.

Free social media platforms are natural solutions, if indie creators can circumnavigate fans’ reluctance to engage digital media. Therefore, a strategic social media plan is required to market new TTRPGs successfully. By compiling research on industry and audience, this thesis proposes key observations for indie TTRPG publishers and an example …

The Development Of Cultural Intelligence (Cq) In The Secondary Social Studies Classroom, Asha Gillette

Senior Honors Theses

Cultural competence is an important skill in our globalized world. Cultural Intelligence (CQ) is a good metric for cultural competence. CQ is used by businesses to improve cultural competence of their employees. There has been a lot of research on the development of CQ in undergraduate business students. Experiential teaching methods are the most effective in improving students’ CQ. CQ is a valuable skill for high school students to learn. The subject most appropriate to include training in CQ is social studies, and specifically World Geography. Pedagogical methods such as cultural interviews used in undergraduate business courses can also be …

The Debate On Social Media Ethicality: How Social Media Affects Consumers And Marketing, Who Is Responsible For Malpractice, And How To Approach The Social Media Dilemma, Caroline Kolter

Senior Honors Theses

This research project will study social media usage and its positive and negative aspects, considering how social media positively impacts businesses and how it negatively impacts consumers. This approaches the ethicality of social media marketing and attempts to determine if using and taking information from users is ethical using personal experience to test whether social media strategies work. This study will weigh the pros and cons of social media, testing to find the best way to use social media to amplify its positives and mitigate its negatives, and concluding who is responsible for the damage done by malpractice.

Community In Culture: The Role Of Multicultural Education In Elementary School, Michaela Novack

Senior Honors Theses

Racism, bias, and discrimination plagues all areas of society, including the school systems. With the wrong perspective, diversity causes division, and it is impacting students, even in elementary schools. This thesis will examine research about the issue of racism and bias in elementary schools and suggest the solution of cultural integration experiences with practical strategies. It will demonstrate how cultural diversity in instruction encourages students to identify stereotypes, readjust their perspectives of culture, and identify and appreciate their cultural differences. This instruction can be achieved through a variety of methods including virtual field trips, diverse literature, and class activities. The …

The Impact Of Digital Media In Real Estate, Carley Dehnisch

Senior Honors Theses

For decades, the real estate industry has relied heavily on traditional marketing methods such as print advertising and cold calling. Although these traditional methods are still used within the industry today, the expansion of the internet over the past few decades has resulted in agents shifting away from older school marketing techniques to digital methods of marketing. This thesis will examine several digital methods of advertising such as social media marketing, email marketing campaigns, web design, and video production. In addition, this thesis will explain why these are the most effective marketing tools and necessary for real estate agents to …

Historical Revisionism: Revising Or Rewriting, Tyce Shank

Senior Honors Theses

Historical revisionism has long been a part of effective academic historiography. A constant re-analysis of the past and how previous historians came to their conclusions about it enable corrections to be made and new findings to be incorporated into modern and future historical metanarratives. While plentiful positive examples of this practice exist, in part because of an understanding of history as a discipline and how it is correctly and incorrectly represented in adaptations, notable poor and inappropriate examples of revisionism also exist. These rewrites are usually political and are often contested by political opponents and academics, but nevertheless persist. Understanding …

The Intersection Of Digital Communication & Non-Profit Organizations, Aliyah Burton

Senior Honors Theses

Non-profit organizations are actively addressing prevalent issues in society, seeking to benefit the public and those in need through various forms of intervention and programming. Non-profits have unique leadership and culture, requiring models of communication that fit these unique qualities. Communication is vital to the success of non-profits, particularly in a digital age. This thesis synthesizes the current research on non-profit culture and leadership with data on donor trends, online giving, social media practices, and more points of interest for non-profits when it comes to digital communication. Additionally, a connection is made between strong digital communication strategies and ongoing donor …