Digital Commons Network^™

The Developmental Experiences Of Exemplary Statistics Teachers, Douglas Whitaker

Northwest Journal of Teacher Education

There has been a trend of increased statistical expectations for students and calls for increased statistical preparation for their teachers in recent years, but preparation has not yet reached recommended levels. A similar preparation gap existed at the inception of the Advanced Placement Statistics program, and this study examines a group of statistics teachers identified as exemplary by experts in the field to determine what challenges they faced and how they overcame them. Semi-structured interviews using a Communities of Practice framework (Wenger, 1998) were conducted. The challenges and responses to those challenges are identified, and these have implications for supporting …

Reflections From A Graduate Student: Adapting Trauma-Sensitive Pedagogy In The Time Of A Pandemic, Dianne T. Wellington

Northwest Journal of Teacher Education

During COVID-19, being a graduate student has been difficult. There are challenges in building and sustaining communities in digital spaces and other unforeseen difficulties. In these difficulties, we have students experiencing issues in addition to the pandemic and consequences of the underlying systemic problems that have worsened for marginalized groups and the systemic inequity inherent in the graduate education system. In any case, this paper is a mission from me, the graduate student, to articulate a few suggestions professors could add to the practice to center both student lives and academics through trauma-sensitive pedagogy.

Teaching Content Methods In A High School Pds: Navigating Curricular Tensions, Richard Chant, Brian P. Zoellner

Northwest Journal of Teacher Education

As secondary methods instructors, we seek to integrate our courses within the context of our partner high school and to engage its staff in helping prepare our students. State and district mandates, however, often conflict with the pedagogy and content that guides our methods courses. In short, these mandates, whose ultimate goals are to increase student scores on high-stakes tests (especially at Title I schools), frequently do not align with the best practices described in contemporary educational research. In this article, we examine a highly rated unit plan developed by one teacher education candidate within a PDS-based methods course in …

It's A Mean, Mean World: Social Media And Mean World Syndrome, Samantha Kemp

University Honors Theses

Born from cultivation theory, which suggests that media has a profound effect on viewers' perceptions of the world around them, Mean World Syndrome is a psychosocial phenomenon that describes increased levels of fear, anxiety, and pessimism, as well as an overall perception of the world as "meaner" than it actually is, as a result of heavy viewership of violence-related mass media. Mean World Syndrome has primarily been associated with television consumption, but a major societal shift towards consumption of social media instead of television over the last two decades necessitates investigation into how social media affects its users. Through an …

On Occupying: Women's Representation In The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, Emma Hillstead

University Honors Theses

Scholars of peace and conflict studies have begun to investigate the impact the inclusion of women has on the success of peace talks that seek to resolve violent conflict. Many of these scholars have found that when women are included at the negotiating table, the likelihood for the conflict to come to a peaceful conclusion increases. With the historical, religious, and cultural nuances, this paper seeks to apply the existing research on this subject to that of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. This paper first analyzes the positionality of women within the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, specifically looking at access to power, then applies …

2023 Commencement Program, Commencement

Commencement Archives 2020-29

The complete program for Portland State University's Spring 2023 Commencement ceremonies:

College of the Arts: June 16, 2023, PSU Viking Pavilion

College of Urban and Public Affairs, Maseeh College of Engineering and Computer Science, OHSU-PSU School of Public Health, School of Social Work, and the School of Business: June 18, 2023, Moda Center, Portland, Oregon

College of Education and College of Liberal Arts and Sciences: June 18, 2023, Moda Center, Portland, Oregon

The Association Of Patient-Provider Language Concordance With Healthcare Comprehension Among Latino/As In Oregon, Grace Parra

University Honors Theses

Background: The purpose of this study is to describe the need and preferences among Mexican-origin Latinos in Oregon for language-concordant healthcare providers. We hypothesize that the presence of a language concordant provider is associated with greater health care comprehension.

Methods: This is a cross sectional study in collaboration with the General Consulate of Mexico. We developed a 20-item survey that includes questions about socio-demographics, a validated language-based acculturation scale, and questions regarding language concordant care experience and preferences used in previous studies. We are recruiting at the Mexican Consulate 500 Latino/as ages 18 or older who had a healthcare visit …

Business Analysis And Recommendations For Timber, Jared Alexander

University Honors Theses

To close out my PSU school of business experience, I've been placed on a team with five other classmates in the School of Business honors program cohort to help a business owner with some hurdles they are facing in their ventures. Throughout the last nine weeks, my teammates and I conducted a lot of research, and gave four presentations to the business owner. Our final presentation highlighted our final recommendations. The name of the business owner and company have been anonymized for confidentiality. All images featuring the name or logo of the company have been covered.

In this capstone review, …

Reclaiming Public Space: How Black Portlanders Transformed Irving Park, 1960s-1980s, Ana Bane

University Honors Theses

Although we often take their existence for granted, public parks are imperative for the vitality of a functioning democratic society. Parks are more than just sites for recreation–an important arena for community building in its own right; occupying public space is an inherently political act that takes on new dimensions in resistance movements. This project explores the role that public space played in the history of Black community organizing and resistance in Portland. Irving Park is a sixteen acre park in the heart of the Albina district, Portland’s historic African American neighborhood. Though the area is now heavily gentrified, from …

Let Kids Sleep: The Role Of Interdisciplinary Neuroscience Outreach In Stimulating Brains And Developing Research-Informed Approaches To Community Concerns, Marc Chenard

University Honors Theses

Northwest Noggin (NW Noggin), an all-volunteer neuroscience education outreach non-profit, serves its community by bringing students, artists, scientists and other participants together for artistic collaboration and learning. The outreach takes place in K-12 schools and other institutions (such as museums, coffee shops and correctional facilities) all over the Pacific Northwest. Neuroscience education outreach generates discourse surrounding community concerns through illuminating the brain-centric qualities of issues and by drawing on neuroscience research to create solutions. The neuroscience research-informed perspectives on these concerns stimulate awareness, create momentum towards evidence-based reform, and can result in policy interventions. This thesis details how NW Noggin …

Microplastics Presence In Rhizophora Mangle Roots Throughout Fishponds And Open Coasts In Moloka'i, Hawaii, Mia Hackett

University Honors Theses

Microplastics (MP) are an emerging global contaminant that has drawn the attention of many researchers in the last few decades due to their growing environmental threats. Pieces of plastic smaller than 5 mm, they are specifically a high cause for concern in marine environments as their small size allows them to flow from inland into the ocean. Through this movement, MPs have been found in all marine ecosystems and ingested by hundreds of marine species often mistaking them for food. Labeled as one of the most threatened ecosystems, mangrove forests are already a large sink for a variety of contaminants …

The Objectives Of The Literary Translator: Translating A Science Fiction Nouvelle, Aishwarya Marathe

University Honors Theses

Language cannot be separated from its sociocultural context, given that it is a foundational tool with which humans communicate, understand, and connect with one another. This complicates the act of translating literary works from one language to another because the translator is translating more than words, she is transposing a cultural context into another. In addition, literary translators are faced with editorial expectations, the target language audience, and the demands of the source text itself, factors that are not always in agreement and can pose challenges during the translation process. In this paper, I present my original English translation of …

The Power Of (Virtual) Convergence: The Unrealized Potential Of Pair Programming And Remote Work, Mikayla Maki

University Honors Theses

Remote work is expensive. It can lead to isolation, miscommunications, and ossified organizations. These problems occur because of a synchronicity mismatch between how we need to communicate as humans, and what today's tools are capable of. This mismatch can be solved by the adoption of remote pair programming, as exemplified by the authors work at a startup (Zed). Pair programming provides the organic, synchronous, reciprocal interaction necessary to develop the sorts of relationships that remote firms currently lack.

Latinx Students Higher Educational Trajectory Post Covid, Jonathan Felix-Martinez

University Honors Theses

COVID-19 caused many universities to go fully remote during the pandemic. Many Latinx students did not know how to navigate online learning. This paper examines the experiences of Latinx students in their university experiences while online to determine if their higher educational trajectory changed as a result of the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. This qualitative project gathered data from 9 Latinx students using in-depth, in-person interviews. Recommendations are presented to help the university create resources that will help improve Latinx students' experiences within the context of online learning and the effects of the recent pandemic.

The Evolution Of Leadership During The Covid-19 Pandemic: An Analysis Of The Research, Luca Patrick Thierry Gregston

University Honors Theses

This paper's research question, "How has the COVID-19 pandemic changed the concept and practice of leadership? In the end much of the empirical evidence for what COVID-19 did or didn't change in leadership practices is still relatively ambiguous. So it is too early to say that "business as usual" is gone for good. And COVID furthered and deepened long term trends, accelerating the great resignation and a dramatic revaluation of intangible assets like reputation, intellectual property and human capital. In response, there is a clear need for a new leadership mindset for the 21st century after the COVID pandemic.

Network Tango: Examining State Dispositions Toward Attribution In International Cyber Conflict, Robert Riley Turner

University Honors Theses

Cyberspace is an environment of international conflict often sought out due to its ability to create significant effects at little cost, and obfuscating the ready attribution of hostility. One avenue toward streamlining the attribution of hostile actions in cyberspace is the introduction of a due diligence of data transparency amongst states. This level of data transparency must somehow be incentivized. The following study surveys the geopolitical dispositions of three major powers that utilize cyberspace as a venue of conflict: The United States, China, and Russia; in order to determine how each nation might interact with an international due diligence of …

Tattoos And Trauma: Are Tattoos Healing For Trauma?, Krystal Bell

University Honors Theses

Prior research and literature reviews suggest that there is medicinal value in tattooing for the healing of trauma. However, tattooing is still a burgeoning topic in academic studies and still mostly taboo as a western societal practice, so there are gaps in qualitative and quantitative data that could further validate the healing benefits of tattoos for trauma. This literature review analyzed 30 peer reviewed articles that focus on "contemporary tattoo data," "indigenous traditions and practices," "tattoos and trauma," and other alternative healing such as "MDMA, psilocybin, EMDR" to establish a well-rounded investigation into tattoos as an alternative healing option. The …

Social Media And Society: An Investigation Of How Female Athletes Use Instagram, Kathleen Amore

University Honors Theses

Athletes increasingly leverage social media so they can share experiences first-hand, sell products, and promote their personal ideas and skills. Female athletes can become empowered through Instagram's ability to give a 'voice' to the object through captions, as well as its' ability to generate revenue through endorsements. Female athletes who find the most success on Instagram often post content that highlights their sexuality and personal life over their sport. Their success is found through a form of 'self-objectification', which can be seen as empowering and/or regressive to women’s sports. To explore this tension, my research project focused on the intentions …

Medicalizing Homelessness: Narratives Of Individualization And Systemic Critique On Homeless Shelter Websites, Ella Mae Sowards

University Honors Theses

The medicalization of homelessness distracts from the systemic drivers of poverty and housing insecurity in favor of treating supposed psychological deviance within unhoused individuals. This article describes a mixed-methods content analysis of 35 Oregon homeless service organization websites investigating how the medicalization of homelessness is perpetuated in homeless service organizations' public-facing materials. Narratives that associate homelessness with mental illness and addiction and encourage self-reform among unhoused clients are identified as key drivers of the medicalization of homelessness on organization websites. Moreover, expressions of neoliberal ideology are found to coincide with medicalizing narratives, shedding further light on medicalization's ties to the …

Sound-Category Learning And Memory Skills In Neurotypical Adults And Adults With Language-Learning Disabilities, Allison Fulcher

University Honors Theses

This study evaluates the impact of memory skills (procedural, declarative, and working) and sound discrimination abilities, on the ability of adults with and without Language Learning Disability (LLD) to learn two sound-category structures, one designed to be learned implicitly and the other designed to be learned explicitly. This design tests a theorized etiology for LLD, the Procedural Deficit Hypothesis (PDH), which posits that LLD is caused by selective impairments to procedural memory and implicit learning. It also serves to evaluate factors and conditions that contribute to success in second-language learning for adults, who are less neurologically suited to the task …

Exiles: Trauma, Art & Design, Edwin Lew-Højbak Paquette

University Honors Theses

A BFA thesis about the researching, writing, illustrating, and printing of a graphic novel. The story, an auto-biographical exploration of trauma using magical realism, is based on the Jungian psychology concept of shadow work and Internal Family Systems (IFS).

Working Paper No. 83, The New Focus On Mexico, Maria Zavala

Working Papers in Economics

This inquiry seeks to establish that China’s falling into unfavorable relations with Washington has contributed to a new focus on Mexico. China’s aggressively competing with America for technological supremacy has indeed elicited a U.S. response. Over recent years and months, the U.S. has implemented a host of measures intended to mitigate China’s competition. Along with disruptions to the supply chain and growing political concerns, company leaders have found it increasingly difficult to continue manufacturing in China. Relatedly, investment flows are streaming towards Mexico in what is now termed as “nearshoring.” This tendency comes with a set of workable challenges. With …

Job Management Portal Software Review, Ruchir Elukurthy

University Honors Theses

This essay provides an overview of a computer science capstone project focused on developing a website for Abilities At Work, a non-profit organization. The website aims to assist employment specialists in managing clients' information and tracking their job application in finding meaningful employment. The essay highlights the various stages of the project, understanding requirements, selecting tools and technologies, creating an application architecture, and writing code. Also, this essay focuses on the challenges encountered during the project, along with the valuable lessons learned. This essay emphasizes how the project closely resembles real-world software development, offering insights for prospective students and professionals. …

Functional And Non-Functional Harmonic Devices In The Music Of Wayne Shorter From The 1960'S: Analysis And Application, Max Reynolds

University Honors Theses

During the 1960's, composers within the jazz genre began to expand their harmonic palette, diverging aesthetically from the compositional tendencies of music from the Great American Songbook and the Bebop repertoire. Of the people making these developments, Wayne Shorter was among the pioneers and is one of the most widely influential composers in jazz from the mid 20th century. My project has identified a selection of techniques that he used to explore new harmonic territory and applied them within an original body of work.

Scaffolding The Open: Transforming An International Studies Course Using Open Pedagogy, Hilary Bussell, Amanda Larson

Communications in Information Literacy

This case study describes how two librarians transformed an international information literacy course by creating a scaffolded open pedagogy experience for students to build transferable skills while exploring how information is produced, disseminated, and interpreted across the world. The authors discuss how we collaborated on the project to incorporate open pedagogy, tools, and strategies to enhance learning. The result was a scaffolded course using open pedagogy to help students engage with global information issues. Using Pressbooks, students published multimedia content exploring topics including global news media, censorship, misinformation, and digital divides. Then students chose to either openly license their work, …

Review Of Using Open Educational Resources To Promote Social Justice, Hali Black

Communications in Information Literacy

Review of Ivory, C.J. & Pashia, A. (Eds.). (2022). Using open educational resources to promote social justice. Association of College and Research Libraries.

Review Of Intersections Of Open Educational Resources And Information Literacy, Laura M. Bernhardt

Communications in Information Literacy

Review of Cullen, M. A., & Dill, E. (Eds.). (2022). Intersections of open educational resources and information literacy. Association of College and Research Libraries.

Working Paper No. 84, Designing The Future: The Influence Of Lloyd J. Reynolds On American Product Innovation, Bander Qadan

Working Papers in Economics

This research inquiry shall explore how critical advances in American design products and consumerism can be traced back to the late Lloyd J. Reynolds and the silent yet powerful influence he has had on a generation of students, such as the innovative pioneer, Steve Jobs. Lloyd J. Reynolds was a renowned calligrapher and teacher at Reed College. The inquiry is structured chronologically, leading to Apple's 2022 valuation of about two trillion dollars. Four significant areas shall be examined to trace this trajectory. Firstly, the paper examines the effects of calligraphy/typography on Lloyd J. Reynolds. Secondly, it delves into Steve Jobs’ …

Final (Year 2) Report To Oha On Sogi Demographic Standards For Minors, Martin Arrigotti, Nell Carpenter, Kieran Chase, Alysia Cox, Itai Jeffries, Alexis Dinno

OHSU-PSU School of Public Health Faculty Publications and Presentations

Executive Summary

The report synthesizes thoughtful recommendations of the authors to the Oregon Health Authority (OHA) about routine data collection of SOGI† (sex, sexual orientation, and gender) demographic data in minors for clinical and reporting purposes. We see five primary motivations to routinely collect SOGI data, including to:

1. create an inclusive practice in order to welcome and make space for people from historically excluded genders, sexes, and sexual orientations,
2. promote health equity between minority and majority SOGI identities,
3. direct group-specific services towards those who need them,
4. represent the actual diversity of Oregon, and its communities, and
5. shift normative expectations about …

Librarians At The Intersection Of Information Literacy And Open Educational Practices In Higher Education, Merinda Mclure

Communications in Information Literacy

Merinda McLure, Innovative Practices Section Co-Editor, introduces a special theme issue of the journal that explores intersections between information literacy and open educational practices.