Digital Commons Network^™

What’S Missing In Theories Of The Residential Energy User, Mithra Moezzi, Loren Lutzenhiser

Center for Urban Studies Publications and Reports

Residential energy use has been envisioned in varied ways, each highlighting different factors and capturing a partial truth. This paper outlines assumptions of core theories about household energy use. It gives an abbreviated list of major empirical findings framed by these theories. It then identifies a new set of "blind spots" created by overly-simple reliance on models and by data shortcomings that in combination may block development of a more sophisticated understanding of energy use. Policies and program strategies, in turn, can become oriented toward simplistic approaches to change. We point to the need for improved interpretation and elaboration of …

Sticky Points In Modeling Household Energy Consumption, Loren Lutzenhiser, Mithra Moezzi, David Hungerford, Rafael Friedmann

Center for Urban Studies Publications and Reports

A variety of approaches have been proposed to explaining individual household energy consumption, its variation, and its potential reduction. Some focus on technology, some on costs, and some on a combination of behaviors, attitudes, intentions, and norms. All try to make sense of a problem that, from a modeling perspective, involves hundreds of potentially important factors, yet is supported by highly inadequate or at best selective data. While there is value in "doing the best one can" with the resources at hand, building a defensible science requires a cold hard look at the quality of theory, research and data. This …

A Community Of Scholars Educating For Political Engagement, David M. Donahue, Christine M. Cress

Educational Leadership and Policy Faculty Publications and Presentations

California Campus Compact (CACC) and the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching first conceived the Service Learning for Political Engagement Faculty Fellows Program in the autumn of 2006. The idea was to bring together a diverse group of faculty, eventually 23, from across California representing disciplines from engineering and English to agriculture and Asian American studies, from small and large colleges, as well as public, private, and faith-based institutions. These faculty, starting in the summer of 2007, would participate in a two-year effort to define political engagement, explore what their definitions meant for planning service learning projects, and assess …

A Transnational Comparison Of Leadership Development: Pedagogical Implications, Christine M. Cress, Miki Yamashita, Rebecca Duarte, Heather Burns

Educational Leadership and Policy Faculty Publications and Presentations

Purpose – This investigation sought to identify learning outcomes for undergraduate students at a US college enrolled in community-based learning courses. Specifically, the purpose of this paper is to examine the similarities and differences between American students' and international students' development of leadership skills through senior level service-learning (SL) courses and analyzed the role of teaching methods on those outcomes. Design/methodology/approach – Over 150 SL courses from students representing 30 countries were examined at a major university in the USA. US and non-US student leadership and learning outcomes were cross-tabulated with instructional techniques to analyze for statistically significant differences. Findings …

A Mindfulness To Transcend Pre-Service Lip-Service A Call For K-12 Schools To Invest In Social Justice Education, Olivia Jo Murray

Curriculum and Instruction Faculty Publications and Presentations

In her book, "Other People's Children," Lisa Delpit (1995) criticizes the deficits of teacher education programs that avoid and repress the multicultural voices found in American classrooms today. This author supports Delpit's argument to reform teacher preparation programs, but for the purpose of this article she will explore the responsibility of individual schools that presently ignore and deny the multicultural facets of a typically diverse classroom. In doing so, the author plans to expose three main features of promoting social justice that she suggests individual schools be held accountable for in order to move toward the full inclusion of all …

Participatory Action Research With Dignity Village: An Action Tool For Empowerment Within A Homeless Community, Heather Irene Mosher

Dissertations and Theses

With homelessness continuing to rise over the past two decades, disenfranchised unhoused people have sparked a national movement to build for themselves democratically governed communities of affordable housing. Dignity Village, in Portland Oregon, is one of the longest running and most organized self-help housing communities in the nation. This paper presents a theoretical systems-based model of a developmental pathway out of homelessness in the U.S. that has as one of its key steps membership and participation in humane and dignified "self-help micro-housing"; communities such as Dignity Village.

This research involved working collaboratively with Dignity Village on a participatory action research …

Local Food And Land-Use In Washington County, Oregon, Joshua James Cousins

Dissertations and Theses

Local food networks are often defined as presenting a variety of alternative food production, consumption, and distribution practices to the conventional food system such as community-supported-agriculture, farmers markets, and community gardens. Local food initiatives are commonly proposed as a model for the future of sustainable agriculture, and in the region of Portland, Oregon the abundance of such alternative venues results from the area's natural surroundings and smart planning. The region is host to 39 farmers markets and Portland is often hailed as one of the country's most sustainable cities. This study examines the role of local food networks in preserving …

Re-Engagement As A Process Of Everyday Resilience, Jennifer Rose Pitzer

Dissertations and Theses

Grounded in previous research on academic engagement and resilience, this study presents a clear conceptualization of re-engagement, defined as students' ability to bounce back from everyday academic challenges and setbacks, as a process of everyday resilience in school, and examines how teacher support can promote it. Data from 1018 third through sixth grade students and their 53 teachers were used to examine the extent to which teacher autonomy support and involvement (individually and in combination) predicted changes from fall to spring of the same school year in students' re-engagement (behavioral and emotional).

Overall, correlational results provided consistent support for study …

Family Relationship Quality And Acculturation: Examination Of Their Relationship Among Latino Adolescent Sexual Offenders, Lindsey B. Patterson

Dissertations and Theses

Research on child sexual abuse (CSA), from the perspective of the perpetrator, has been conducted to better inform intervention and prevention programs. Although information from perpetrators can be beneficial for these programs, much of the research is limited by the diversity of sample populations of sex offenders. Moreover, potentially distinct variables relevant to specific populations (e.g., Latinos) have not been thoroughly studied in relation to CSA. To better understand the perpetration of CSA on variables that may be of particular concern to Latinos (i.e., relationship quality in familial supervision and acculturation strategies), the purpose of the present study was to …

Review Of Three Recent Randomized Trials Of School-Based Mentoring: Making Sense Of Mixed Findings, Marc E. Wheeler, Thomas E. Keller, David L. Dubois

School of Social Work Faculty Publications and Presentations

Between 2007 and 2009, reports were released on the results of three separate large-scale random assignment studies of the effectiveness of school-based mentoring programs for youth. The studies evaluated programs implemented by Big Brothers Big Sisters of America (BBBSA) affiliates (Herrera et al., 2007), Communities in Schools of San Antonio, Texas (Karcher, 2008), and grantees of the U.S. Department of Education's Student Mentoring Program (Bernstein et al., 2009). Differences in the findings and conclusions of the studies have led to varying responses by those in practice and policy roles. The results of the BBBSA trial led the organization to undertake …

Indigenous And Mestizo Mexican Migrant Farmworkers: A Comparative Mental Health Analysis, William Donlan, Junghee Lee

School of Social Work Faculty Publications and Presentations

Mexican-origin migrant farmworkers using: (a) lifetime prevalence of culture-bound syndromes, (b) self-rated emotional/mental health, (c) depression measured by PHQ-9, (d) stress level. Demographic and psychosocial variables were examined by ethnicity and gender using Chi square and independent t-tests. Logistic and linear regression models were constructed for mental health variables. Indigenous participants reported significantly higher stress compared to mestizos, and indigenous women reported significantly higher stress compared to all groups. Prevalence of culture-bound syndromes and mean PHQ-9 severity score was highest for indigenous females. Mean self-rated emotional/mental health was lowest among indigenous females. Controlling for main effects and other interactions, (a) …

Journeying Toward Humility: Complexities In Advancing Pedagogy For The Privileged, Ann Curry-Stevens

School of Social Work Faculty Publications and Presentations

This narrative describes the author's journey away from a stance of innocence, toward one of humility in her engagement with pedagogy for the privileged. With deep attention to her identity, the contentious dimensions of this pedagogy have compelled her towards a much more troubled relationship with this practice. The following narrative profiles key contributions of pedagogy for the privileged, and articulates the contentions embedded within. It concludes with three essential ingredients to moderate her privilege: practicing from a stance of humility and "not knowing, " advancing research into the practice outcomes of such courses, and accountability structures where communities hold …

Transformative Teacher Evaluation: Self Evaluation For High Performing Teachers, Carla Ann Sosanya-Tellez

Dissertations and Theses

Public schools are in crisis, as educators and legislators seek to provide high quality education to diverse students in a measurement-driven environment. The public educator's moral imperative is to assure that all children are literate when they leave school so they can thrive in our democracy (Dewey, 1944; Freire, 1998a; Giroux & Giroux, 2004). Yet, the achievement gap persists, as poor African-American and Latino students under-perform as compared to white middle-class students (Ladson-Billings & Tate, 1995). Additionally, public school teachers are predominately middle-class and White, while they teach increasingly diverse children of poverty. In legislation, student assessment, teacher licensure, and …

Teacher Evaluation Of Item Formats For An English Language Proficiency Assessment, Jose Luis Perea-Hernandez

Dissertations and Theses

An abstract of the thesis of José Luis Perea-Hernández for the Master of Arts in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages presented February 11, 2010. Title: Teacher Evaluation of Item Formats for an English Language Proficiency Assessment. Language testing plays a significant role in the collection of systematic information about English Language Learners' ability and progress in K-12 public schools in Oregon. Therefore, the following thesis reports on a process of the development of this assessment as I was at some point one of the members in the test development team and then drew upon teachers' opinions and judgments …

The Military Genogram: A Solution-Focused Approach For Resiliency Building In Service Members And Their Families, Eugenia Weiss, Jose Coll, Jennifer Gerbauer, Kate Smiley, Ed Carillo

School of Social Work Faculty Publications and Presentations

In recent decades, it has become evident among mental health practitioners that the military is a unique culture that is comprised of distinct ethics, core values, codes of conduct, and strict hierarchical roles. In light of the war in Afghanistan and the war in Iraq, veterans and their families are seeking mental health services due to a variety of psychosocial issues; however, mental health practitioners are lacking military-specific knowledge in understanding individuals within the military subculture. In addition, they are ill-equipped with interventions aimed at supporting the military family. Historically, the genogram has been an effective tool in delineating intergenerational …

Health-Related Needs Assessment Of Older Residents In Subsidized Housing, Victoria Cotrell, Paula C. Carder

School of Social Work Faculty Publications and Presentations

When a nonprofit organization with nursing-home and assisted-living experience purchased a 30-year-old highrise apartment building in downtown Portland, Oregon, the new owners were faced with how to manage a building that provided housing to more than 200 older residents whom they knew very little about. As long-term care providers, they knew that older people were at risk for developing chronic illnesses, disabilities, and other factors that could result in moves to nursing homes, hospitalizations, and early death. They also knew that older adults in subsidized housing, such as this Section 8 building, have higher levels of disability than their age …

Children/Youth With Disabilities: Their Parents Are Your Employees Training Manual And Workbook, Julie M. Rosenzweig, Anna M. Malsch, Eileen M. Brennan, Kathryn L. Mills, Lisa Maureen Stewart

School of Social Work Faculty Publications and Presentations

The training manual and workbook, including the survey, were originally designed as supplemental materials to a workshop delivered to human resource professionals by the Work-Life Integration Project. Once the materials were compiled and reviewed, we decided to make the document available as a printed resource for a more general audience. While the materials were initially developed for use with human resource professionals, they are readily adaptable for use with other groups of employees, such as supervisors, managers, or teams of co-workers. The manual is also suitable to be used by members of family support organizations and other individuals interested in …

Work-Life Integration And The Path To Social Sustainability, Eileen M. Brennan

School of Social Work Faculty Publications and Presentations

PDF version of a presentation given at Understanding Sustainability: Perspectives from the Humanities - The Second International Conference, Portland, OR, May 2010.

Infusing Culture Into Practice: Developing And Implementing Evidence-Based Mental Health Services For African American Foster Youth, Harold E. Briggs, Bowen Mcbeath

School of Social Work Faculty Publications and Presentations

The lack of culturally appropriate health and mental health care has contributed to the large number of African American youth and families involved in the child welfare system. This article reviews the consequences of the insufficient access to culturally sensitive, evidence-supported interventions for African American foster youth. The authors describe a framework for the development of culturally appropriate mental health interventions responsive to the needs of African Americans.

Investigating Further Preservice Teachers’ Conceptions Of Multidigit Whole Numbers: Refining A Framework, Eva Thanheiser

Mathematics and Statistics Faculty Publications and Presentations

This study was designed to investigate preservice elementary school teachers’ (PSTs’) responses to written standard place-value-operation tasks (addition and subtraction). Previous research established that PSTs can often perform but not explain algorithms and provided a four-category framework for PSTs’ conceptions, two correct and two incorrect. Previous findings are replicated for PSTs toward the end of their college careers, and two conceptions are further analyzed to yield three categories of incorrect views of regrouped digits: (a) consistently as 1 value (all as 1 or all as 10), (b) consistently within but not across contexts (i.e., all as 10 in addition but …

The Portland Spectator, December 2009, Portland State University. Student Publications Board

Portland Spectator

Editor: Joe Wirtheim

Articles in this issue include: One pill makes you smarter; Proudfoot takes a side step; Sustainability keeps on going; More than a student club; Witnessing the purge; and Fueling free speech with FIRE

Creating Insanity In Learning Systems: Addressing Ambiguity Effects Of Predicting Non-Linear Continuous Valued Functions With Reconstructabilty Analysis From Large Categorically Valued Input Data Sets, William D. Eisenhauer

Systems Science Friday Noon Seminar Series

Being told to give two different, and potentially counter, responses to the same stimulus can set up a double bind in humans, leading to a type of insanity. So what how do you deal with it when it comes up quite frequently in modeling through simplification and removal of predictive variables?

In his current dissertation research Ike Eisenhauer is using reconstructability analysis to implement K-System, U-System, and B-System approaches to predict a continuously valued function through discrete categorically valued input variables [e.g. textual data]. One of the key issues is how to address the inability of K-Systems and U-Systems to …

Advancing The Promotion Of Information Literacy Through Peer-Led Learning, Tamsin Bolton, Tina Pugliese, Jill Singleton-Jackson

Communications in Information Literacy

Two new courses at the University of Windsor are opening the door to thinking about information literacy and curricular integration in very different ways. The courses, Ways of Knowing and Mentorship & Learning, were originally designed to help with retention and transition issues. They were also founded on the concept of peer-led learning at the university level. In this model students are able to connect with their peers in an organic way that is not always possible with faculty and librarians. It did not take long to see the potential in using peer mentors as potential conduits in the transfer …

Information Literacy In Writing Tutor Training At A Liberal Arts College, Kelly Cannon, Jennifer Jarson

Communications in Information Literacy

Academic librarians have long understood the importance of, and argued for, the curricular integration of information literacy. The literature shows strong evidence of librarians collaborating with faculty, peer tutors, and other on-campus constituencies in an effort to facilitate discussion and acquisition of information literacy skills and concepts. The literature points to a likely collaboration, that of libraries and writing centers, in light of their corresponding missions and endeavors. This paper details how two academic librarians partnered with teaching faculty who oversee the campus writing center to infuse information literacy skills and concepts into the training of writing tutors. The authors …

Computer-Aided Assessment Of Diagnostic Images For Epidemiological Research, Alison G. Abraham, Donald D. Duncan, Stephen J. Gange, Sheila West

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

Background: Diagnostic images are often assessed for clinical outcomes using subjective methods, which are limited by the skill of the reviewer. Computer-aided diagnosis (CAD) algorithms that assist reviewers in their decisions concerning outcomes have been developed to increase sensitivity and specificity in the clinical setting. However, these systems have not been well utilized in research settings to improve the measurement of clinical endpoints. Reductions in bias through their use could have important implications for etiologic research. Methods: Using the example of cortical cataract detection, we developed an algorithm for assisting a reviewer in evaluating digital images for the presence and …

Relevance And Simulation In Metaphor, L. David Ritchie

Communication Faculty Publications and Presentations

Recent writings have done much to develop and extend Relevance Theory as an account of metaphors and other "loose" language use. However, it is argued in this essay that Relevance Theory still leaves important gaps in its explanation and does not adequately address the "circularity" issue that has been raised. It is proposed that Perceptual Simulation Theory usefully extends Relevance Theory by providing a detailed cognitive mechanism for the "broadening" and "narrowing" specified by Relevance Theory. Extending Relevance Theory to include the cognitive mechanisms posited by Perceptual Simulation Theory also extends the reach of Relevance theory and enhances its ability …

From "Thank You For Your Support", Brian Russell Hauser

Harlot: A Revealing Look at the Arts of Persuasion

This excerpt from the first chapter of a memoir-in-progress is an attempt to capture my thoughts and emotions at the moment I realized I was being called to war. I left the U.S. Army to attend graduate school in 1999 only to be involuntarily called back into active military service one year into the War on Terror. Instead of painting a static picture of what I must have felt like when I received the news, I use my mobilization orders (the document itself) as the focus of a sort of running rhetorical critique that allows those thoughts and feelings to …

How Does A Visual Monitoring System Foster Sustainable Behavior?, Melissa Haeffner, Federico Casalegno

Environmental Science and Management Faculty Publications and Presentations

Americans spend upwards of 90% of each day in buildings that account for two-thirds of electricity usage. Because the supply of smart buildings will take time to catch up with demand, efforts are sought to develop informed and educated people to live and work in these “dumb” buildings. Additionally, energy efficiency alone may be inadequate to achieve major reduction in carbon emissions (Darby, 2006). Finding ways to intentionally change the lifestyle behavior in a household should have significant implications in reducing environmental impacts as fossil energy use in resident homes is directly related to the exploitation of natural resources and …

The Diagram Of The Supreme Pole And The Kabbalistic Tree: On The Similarity Of Two Symbolic Structures, Martin Zwick

Complex Systems Faculty Publications and Presentations

This paper discusses similarities of both form and meaning between two symbolic structures: the Diagram of the Supreme Pole of Song Neo-Confucianism and the Kabbalistic Tree of medieval Jewish mysticism. These similarities are remarkable in the light of the many differences that exist between Chinese and Judaic thought, which also manifest in the two symbols. Intercultural influence might account for the similarities, but there is no historical evidence for such influence. An alternative explanation would attribute the similarities to the ubiquitousness of religious-philosophical ideas about hierarchy, polarity, and macrocosm-microcosm parallelism, but this does not adequately account for the similar overall …

Center For Academic Excellence: Annual Report 2008-2009, Patrice Hudson, Leslie G. Mcbride, Kevin Kecskes, Amy Spring, Janelle De Carrico Voegele, Michael Chamberlain, Vincent Schreck

Community Health Faculty Publications and Presentations

Since its inception in 1994, the Center for Academic Excellence (CAE) has provided a comprehensive array of cross-disciplinary and discipline-specific development activities in support of the educational function of the university. The Center has a dual mission of faculty development in teaching, learning, and assessment and in the development of community-university partnerships. Th e Center is a place of innovation, a gathering place for idea generation and testing, and a place where faculty may turn for individual consultation and professional advice. Increasingly, CAE supports faculty interested in community-engaged research.

We are proud to present the 2008-2009 Annual Report of the …