Digital Commons Network^™

Learning From Culturally Specific Programs And Their Impact On Latino Parent Engagement, Analucia Lopezrevoredo

Dissertations and Theses

Latinos are the largest and fastest growing ethnic minority group in the United States. Academically, they are significantly trailing their non-Latino peers in graduation and overall educational attainment. Among many socioeconomic factors, parent engagement has been identified as being a defining indicator of student success. Reflective of racial and class disparities, this study explored with the use of critical race and intersectionality theory, that low Latino parent engagement is a result of the historical devaluing and omission of Latino culture, history and language from formal academic settings, and compounding social factors that make engagement complex for Latino immigrants in America …

Memcapacitive Reservoir Computing Architectures, Dat Tien Tran

Dissertations and Theses

In this thesis, I propose novel brain-inspired and energy-efficient computing systems. Designing such systems has been the forefront goal of neuromorphic scientists over the last few decades. The results from my research show that it is possible to design such systems with emerging nanoscale memcapacitive devices.

Technological development has advanced greatly over the years with the conventional von Neumann architecture. The current architectures and materials, however, will inevitably reach their physical limitations. While conventional computing systems have achieved great performances in general tasks, they are often not power-efficient in performing tasks with large input data, such as natural image recognition …

Making Imaginaries: Identity, Value, And Place In The Maker Movement In Detroit And Portland, Stephen Joseph Marotta

Dissertations and Theses

This dissertation explores the maker economy and culture in Detroit, MI and Portland, OR and queries the "Made in Place" branding strategy that relies so heavily on a shared imagination of cities, identities, and values. Bridging the gap between urban economic development, political economy, and affect theory, this dissertation is centrally concerned with how imagination works as a commons and how such "imaginaries" shape each city's milieu of small, entrepreneurial, artisanal producers ("makers"). The constituent elements of "Made in" branding "made" and "place" suggest common understandings of each; this sense of coherence is critical for how value is added to …

Closing The Loop: The Capacities And Constraints Of Information And Communication Technologies For Development (Ict4d), Phillip Nicholas Turman-Bryant

Dissertations and Theses

As a mechanism for collecting and sharing information, information and communications technologies (ICT) hold immense potential for individuals and institutions in low- and middle-income countries. Currently the distribution and adoption of ICTs--particularly mobile devices--has far outpaced the provision of other household services like clean water, sanitation, hygiene, or energy services. At the same time, the development and deployment of Internet of Things (IoT) devices including cellular- and satellite-connected sensors is facilitating more rapid feedback from remote regions where basic services are most limited. When used in conjunction with economic development or public health interventions, these devices and the feedback they …

The Pacific Sentinel, June 2019, Portland State University. Student Publications Board

The Pacific Sentinel

Editor: Jake Johnson

Articles in this issue include:

• Richard Barry: Chronicle of a Death as Told
• Students Rally Against Tuition Increase
• Portland's Heritage Trees
• Portland Clean Energy Initiative
• Did You Know Sunscreen is Controversial?
• SMSU's Quiet Study Lounge is Leaving
• Resource Centers Reunited
• Campus Accessibility: Room for Improvement
• What Stonewall Means to Me
• The Policeman's Tale
• Honey to Die for
• Shoureshi's Cross-Disciplinary Internship Program Revealed as a Cover for Secret Escape Plan
• Artists on Campus: PSU Artists of Color Collective

Simulation Of Human Balance Control Using An Inverted Pendulum Model, Joshua E. Caneer

Maseeh Summer Undergraduate Research Experience

The nervous system that human beings use to control balance is remarkably adaptable to a wide variety of environments and conditions. This neural system is likely a combination of many inputs and feedback control loops working together. The ability to emulate this system of balance could be of great value in understanding and developing solutions to proprioceptive disorders and other diseases that affect the human balance control system. Additionally, the process of emulating the human balance system may also have widespread applications to the locomotion capabilities of many types of robots, in both bipedal and non-bipedal configurations.

The goal of …

Women And Corrections: A Review Of Oregon Prisoners' Perspectives On Procedural Justice, Kelci J. Mueller

University Honors Theses

This paper examines the perceptions of women prisoners in Oregon on procedurally just treatment and their attitudes of legitimacy towards agents of the criminal justice system. It argues that women in an Oregon prison perceived unjust treatment from criminal justice officials which leads to feelings of illegitimacy. 142 women from minimum and medium security at Coffee Creek Correctional Facility (CCCF) were surveyed about their interactions with police, defense attorneys, prosecutors, and judges. The research team analyzed survey responses to theoretically relevant questions such as when they were arrested, questioned by police, communicated with their defense attorney, plea bargain agreement, and …

Empirically-Informed Agent Based Modeling Of Incentivized Forest Conservation - June 2019, Amare Teklay Hailu

Forest Collaborative Research

Presentation focuses on payment for ecosystem services (PES) and framed field experiment (FFE).

Aligning Endangered Species Management With Fire-Dependent Ecosystem Restoration: Manager Perspectives On Red-Cockaded Woodpecker And Longleaf Pine Management Actions, Shelby A. Weiss, Eric L. Toman, R. Gregory Corace Iii

Geography Faculty Publications and Presentations

Background: Endangered species management has been criticized as emphasizing a single-species approach to conservation and, in some cases, diverting resources from broad-based, land management objectives important for overall biodiversity maintenance. Herein we examine perceptions on management for an endangered species whose habitat requirements largely depend on frequent fire, the red-cockaded woodpecker (Leuconotopicus borealis Vieillot). In doing so, we consider the alignment between species-specific population recovery actions and broader ecosystem restoration goals. Through semi-structured interviews with natural resource professionals (n = 32) in the Southeast Coastal Plain of the United States, we examined manager perspectives on the evolution of recovery …

The Nonprofit Nerd (June 2019), The Nonprofit Institute At Portland State University

The Nonprofit Institute Newsletter

This month’s topic is evaluation with immigrant communities.

For years, immigration and immigrant communities have been at the center of a national and international conversation about nationhood, global dynamics, and human rights. Despite the enormity of this complex conversation, the below interview with Nelda Reyes, principal at AB Cultural Drivers, highlights the possibilities evaluators and researchers have working with these populations.

We hope that through reading this edition, our readers feel prepared to “be of service,” as Nelda puts it, when researching or evaluating with diverse and multi-dimensional immigrant communities.

Let the resources and insights we share in The Nonprofit …

Living Streets: A Pathway Toward Inclusive, Equitable, And Accessible Pedestrian Streets, Eavan Moore, Kevin Tracy, Jason Nolin, Zoie Wesenberg, Oscar Saucedo-Andrade, Kate Wihtol

Master of Urban and Regional Planning Workshop Projects

Since 2009, the Portland Bureau of Transportation (PBOT) has aimed to prioritize pedestrians above all other transportation modes. By putting pedestrians first, cities can improve outcomes for communities and transform streets into welcoming public spaces. Pedestrian streets help achieve this goal by reallocating space that was once dedicated to the movement and storage of cars to spaces for people to interact, socialize, and recreate. By developing a typology and an evaluation framework for pedestrian streets, this document attempts to answer the question, what could pedestrian streets look like in Portland’s Central City?

Gathering Space, Building Community: Cultural Resource Centers In Higher Education, Cynthia Carmina Gomez

University Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

The presentation focuses on the Multicultural Student Center at Portland State University

Small Towns With Big City Problems: Mobility Challenges And Solutions In Our Natural Areas, Danya Rumore, Philip Stoker, Zacharia Levine, Lindsey Romaniello

TREC Project Briefs

Western North America boasts an abundance of scenic mountains, ski areas, stunning desert landscapes and national parks. Living near these natural amenities are small communities, many of which are becoming increasingly popular places to live and visit. The influx of visitors creates unique transportation and mobility challenges for these small towns and cities, such as seasonal spikes in severe roadway congestion and a desire for e-bike share programs in communities of less than 1,000 people. These challenges often in turn affect community character and wellbeing.

Given their proximity to these impacted communities, NITC researchers Danya Rumore of the University of …

Development Of The Aaspire Web Accessibility Guidelines For Autistic Web Users, Dora Raymaker, Steven K. Kapp, Katherine E. Mcdonald, Michael Weiner, Elesia Ashkenazy, Christina Nicolaidis

OHSU-PSU School of Public Health Faculty Publications and Presentations

Websites figure predominantly in everyday life. However, many websites remain inaccessible to autistic people, and existing efforts to improve accessibility are in early stages, do not directly include autistic users in their development, or have not been empirically evaluated. The Academic Autism Spectrum Partnership in Research and Education (AASPIRE) used a community-based participatory research approach to create a website to improve health care access for autistic adults. We used the creation of that website as a “living laboratory” to develop the AASPIRE Web Accessibility Guidelines for Autistic Web Users. Our guidelines are grounded in accessibility theory, had autistic end-user involvement …

Why Do Adults Read Young Adult Books?, Monica Hay

Book Publishing Final Research Papers

Young adult books are widely read by adults. Through interviews with publishing professionals and a survey of 2,139 participants, several reasons were discovered regarding why adults read young adult literature. In the research, the most common reasons were the influence of Harry Potter and Twilight, the relatability for millennials, the social media presence of YA online, and the success of women writers in the category. Survey participants had more to add. The survey themes were nostalgia, "less pretentious," "faster reads," diversity, escapism, "less graphic," and perhaps most importantly, hopeful.

A Cover Is Worth 1000 Words: Visibility And Racial Diversity In Young Adult Cover Design, Jenny Kimura

Book Publishing Final Research Papers

Diversity in young adult literature has been a hot topic in the publishing industry for many years now, and calls for diversity from the YA community, librarians, authors, and publishing professionals have garnered nationwide attention. But while the conversation around diverse content is well documented, few have considered how young adult cover design might have an impact on how diversity, especially in terms of race/ethnicity, is represented visually.

The research detailed in this paper compiles and analyzes data from 700 covers each from 2014 and 2018 respectively (1400 book covers total). In my quantitative analysis, I wanted to know whether …

Confronting Gentrification: Can Creative Interventions Help People Keep More Than Just Their Homes?, Amie Thurber, Janine Christiano

School of Social Work Faculty Publications and Presentations

Gentrification is changing the landscape of many American cities. As land values rise, people may lose their homes, neighbors, and sites of significance, along with their sense of place, community, and history. There is a critical need to build and preserve affordable housing, yet housing alone will not address the more than material losses. What role can the arts play in sustaining place attachments, restoring relationships, and building place knowledge in gentrifying neighborhoods? This paper explores this question through a systematic review of current research. We identify four prominent alternative interventions in gentrifying neighborhoods—creative placemaking, public pedagogy, community organizing, and …

Development Of A Readiness Assessment Model For Evaluating Big Data Projects: Case Study Of Smart City In Oregon, Usa, Husam Ahmad Barham

Dissertations and Theses

The primary goal of this research is to help any organization, which is planning to transform to the big data analytics era, by providing a systematic and comprehensive model that this organization can use to better understand what factors influence big data projects. Also, the organization's current status against those factors. Finally, what enhancements are needed in the organization's current capabilities for optimal management of factors influencing an upcoming big data project. However, big data applications are vast and cover many sectors, and while most of the factors influencing big data projects are common across sectors, there are some factors …

Impact Of Professional Development On Accessible Early Literacy Content For Preschool Children With Disabilities In Public Library Storytime, Melissa Pebly

Dissertations and Theses

Library storytime programs provide opportunities for preschool children to develop readiness skills in early literacy that are linked in research to later success in learning to read and write. Children with disabilities that do not demonstrate school readiness skills upon entry to kindergarten are often placed in self-contained special education settings where opportunities to learn to read and write are diminished. English Language Learners (ELL) who have disabilities face additional challenges in benefiting from the models of language that are optimal for learning literacy when placed in self-contained settings. Despite the critical role that storytime programs play in equalizing the …

Graceful Infrastructure: Harvesting America's Wind Corridor, Samuel Rothacker

University Honors Theses

The central purpose of this thesis was to identify how the choices made by wind farm developers lead to backlash from local community members, focusing primarily on a resistance mentality referred to as NIMBY (Not In My Backyard). The goal of this discussion is to offer wind farm developers a medium by which to understand the causes and concerns of the NIMBY movement, as well as what steps can be taken to address or prevent these issues. Research was pursued by selecting a number of wind farms and searching for correlations between technical specifications and political backlash. By first collecting …

Adolescent Executive Dysfunction And Distant Parental Relationships: Influences On Tobacco Use In Youth Under The Age Of 18, Aaron M. Eisen

University Honors Theses

Substance use such as tobacco is common during the adolescent stage of development. Cigarette use has been associated with a wide range of health complications and is listed as one of the most preventable causes of disease in the United States with 480,000 smoking-related deaths per year. Further research on the underlying factors that predict cigarette use could support the development of new evidence-based preventative treatment interventions.

The goal of this study was to investigate the relationship between executive dysfunction measured by the Behavioral Rating Inventory of Executive Functions (BRIEF-2), distant parental relationships including parental support, monitoring, decision influence, and …

Seeking Creative Control: Musical Decisions & Activist Aspirations, Cecelia E. Monroe

University Honors Theses

Classical music academia is built upon a competitive, isolationist and judgmental framework. Despite the progressive attitudes, aspirations and actions of Portland State University, the foundations and structures of white supremacy, misogyny, patriarchy and capitalism are alive and thriving in the walls of classrooms, practice rooms and higher education. These systems oppress individuals, and in my mind, oppress and constrain the art they create. These conversations along with my queer politics, my love for music and my concerns for the future and contemporary state of academic musicianship and pedagogy lead me to develop this event: Seeking Creative Control. I have attempted …

Gentrification And Aging-In-Place: Examinations Of The Older African American Population In Portland, Or, Chanelle P. Parris

University Honors Theses

Older African Americans and Black adults are nearly twice as likely to develop Alzheimer's disease and related dementias compared to their non-Hispanic White counterparts. The SHARP Program (Sharing Histories through Active Reminiscence and Photo-Imagery) aims at addressing this growing health disparity that exists between Black and White populations. The study's goal is to increase the physical and social activity of our participants in order to maintain and improve cognitive health through cultural relevancy. However, the current and on-going neighborhood change that occurs in the research area of interest presents complications to this group. This study worked to conceptualize the ways …

Exo-Genres: Case Study Of Oregon State’S ‘Stage-Gate’ It Review Process, Henry Covey

Technical and Professional Writing Graduate Student Papers

This is a preliminary case study of exogenres, specifically superimposed genre exosystems, i.e., genre frameworks that are prescribed (genre exosystems) which are “laid upon” (superimposed on) writing scenes from outside oversight entity/ies.

This case study gathered and analyzed artifacts, data, and information from a relatively new exosystem in the Oregon state government: the IT project approval process called “Stage Gate,” a mandated regulatory reporting documentation process in effect in Oregon since 2015. The exogenres in Stage Gate were created out of a social action to superimpose IT governance and industry frameworks on state government agencies who build enterprise …

Imprisoned Within The National Narrative: A Case Study Of The Modern Chinese Move Toward Pragmatic Nationalism, Madeline C. Michalk

University Honors Theses

This paper explains how the traumatic history narrative put forth through the Lüshun Russo-Japanese Prison Museum has proven itself useful to the Chinese Communist Party in creating a narrative that not only fosters a sense of loyalty to the state, but can also be used as a political ace card. After closely examining the Lüshun Russo-Japanese Prison Museum it has become evident that the Chinese push for pragmatic nationalism, which began in 1994 and continues to this day, coupled with a flamed fire against "Japanese aggression" are the most active ingredients in the museum as a "National Defense Education Demonstration …

A Drop In The Bucket: Evaluating Modern Print News Coverage Of Drought In The U.S., Jessica Pollard

University Honors Theses

How the media portrays environmental issues related to climate change can affect public opinion and influence policy making. This paper seeks to explore the media’s portrayal of climate change through the lens of drought, using the drought which took place in California between 2011 and 2017, as a case study. The study finds that while the press gives drought space in newspapers across the country, it infrequently connects the weather event to anthropological climate change. Articles pertaining to the drought in California frequently rely on the expertise of politicians over scientists.

Working Paper No. 12, Technological Convergence And Institutional Evolution In The Energy Sector, James Bennett

Working Papers in Economics

Over a span of more than a hundred years, fossil fuel production could be considered as a long-standing ceremonial technology in the Veblenian sense. However in recent times, due to rapid innovation through technological convergence, renewable energy is becoming just as cost effective and threatens to replace fossil fuels. Robert McCullough observes this change in renewable energy costs, in his report “The End of Big Iron”. Thorsten Veblen’s dichotomy between ceremonial and instrumental technologies, and his thoughts on institutional change can also aide in explaining this recent struggle between “ceremonial” fossil fuels and “instrumental” renewable energy technologies. Nathan Rosenberg should …

Cycles Of Displacement: The Experience Of Immigrants And Refugees From East Africa In Northeast Portland, Julianna I. Robidoux

University Honors Theses

Cultural displacement is an effect of gentrification taking place in Northeast Portland, Oregon. The work of Hyra (2015) and Abrahamson (2005) is applied to the Eastern African enclave in Northeast Portland, which has worked to maintain attachments to their home countries and culture and recreate places of community they had in their homeland. I used qualitative research to collect data in the form of interviews with members of this enclave to highlight the negative consequences of displacement within a community. I also interviewed employees at housing organizations who work with immigrants and refugees, a documentary filmmaker who focuses on issues …

Architectural Stewardship: Exploring Interpretation Architecture Through The Lens Of The Visitor, Graham A. Oden

University Honors Theses

This undergraduate thesis investigates the experiential impact of interpretation architecture in the natural setting, specifically through the lens of its users. The need for this study arose when visitors were not approached or included to be part of the design process or studies in the renovation of Great Sand Dunes National Park & Preserve's Visitor Center. The only visitor related information used by the contracted firm was ten year old demographic and quantitative studies provided by the NPS. This gap of knowledge was then addressed by the proactive engagement of visitors in a design workshop ranger program at the park. …

Medicaid Patients' Use Of Dental Benefits, Merit Roshdy

University Honors Theses

Oregon Health Plan patients experienced reduction to their dental coverage in 2003. This study explores Medicaid patients’ use of those dental services that are still offered to them and the effect of their use on self-assessment of their oral health. A phone survey was conducted in 2017 and collected a sample of 293 Medicaid patients in Oregon. Only two thirds of participants reported that they have a regular dentist. Participants were more likely to rate their overall health as Excellent/Good when also rating their gum health as Excellent/Good. Low English Proficiency (LEP) patients were NOT less likely to visit their …