Digital Commons Network^™

"All About Africa Club", Laetitia Igiraneza Sinyigenga

Honors Program: Expanded Learning Clubs

This afterschool club introduces students in fourth and fifth grade to Africa. By using hand-on activities and PowerPoint Presentations, students will develop a better understanding of the map of Africa as well as cultural awareness.

Schoolgirl Embroideries & Black Girlhood In Antebellum Philadelphia, Kelli Racine Coles

Textile Society of America: Symposium Proceedings

Embroideries stitched by girls at schools for Black children in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries are rare finds in the antiques world. The few embroideries likely stitched by Black schoolgirls that do survive often offer historical evidence in the form of the names of their makers’ schools stitched onto their embroideries. Yet there is little scholarship on these embroideries or the education these schoolgirls were pursuing while creating their samplers. In scholarship using material culture as primary evidence, these embroideries provide valuable clues about the lives of Black girls in northern cities during the antebellum period. My work examines the …

The Current State Of Assessing Historical Thinking: A Literature Analysis, Taylor S. Hamblin

The Nebraska Educator: A Student-Led Journal

In American schools since the mid 2000’s, social studies departments and state departments of education have created goals and updated standards prioritizing critical thinking engagement. Promotion of critical thinking has created a wealth of scholarship on developing a specific type of critical thinking, or cognition, called historical thinking. Imperative to the promotion of teaching historical thinking is in how teachers can assess the inquiries that make it up. Unfortunately, standardized social studies assessments have failed to measure the acquisition of the new historical thinking standards. In order to improve the assessment practices of history teachers, I wish to do two …

New Records Document Cystiphora Sonchi (Vallot) (Diptera: Cecidomyiidae) And Associated Parasitoids (Hymenoptera) In The Continental United States, Louis S. Hesler, Michael W. Gates, Eric A. Beckendorf

Insecta Mundi

A gall midge, Cystiphora sonchi (Vallot, 1827) (Diptera: Cecidomyiidae), is reported for the first time in the continental United States of America from the states of Minnesota, North Dakota, and South Dakota. The gall midge is an obligate parasite of Sonchus L., including perennial sowthistle, Sonchus arvensis L., a weed that was the impetus for earlier releases of C. sonchi as a biological control in Canada. Patches of S. arvensis were commonly infested with C. sonchi, and often leaves were densely galled. Dissections of galled leaves led to the novel finding of multiple C. sonchi larvae in some individual …

Unl Emeriti And Retirees Association Newsletter, Fall 2020

UNL Emeriti and Retirees Association: Newsletters and Other Materials

University of Nebraska-Lincoln Emeriti and Retirees Association Newsletter, Fall 2020

Hidden Stories/Human Lives: Proceedings Of The Textile Society Of America 17th Biennial Symposium, October 15-17, 2020--Full Program With Abstracts & Bios

Textile Society of America: Symposium Proceedings

The theme Hidden Stories/Human Lives presents opportunities to reveal complex and hidden stories of global textile making and coincides with the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment to the United States Constitution. Yet, just as the voices of women of color, marginalized by the suffrage movement, are only now being recognized, the stories of the many human lives that have contributed—directly and indirectly—to textile making, including enslaved people, immigrant entrepreneurs, and industrial laborers, remain untold. With this symposium, we hope to get “behind the curtain” to explore the wider human network engaged in textile production, bringing to light hidden stories …

Droughtscape, Fall 2020, National Drought Mitigation Center

DroughtScape: Quarterly Newsletter of the National Drought Mitigation Center (2007–2023)

DroughtScape, Fall 2020

Estimating School-Level Achievement In Belize, Betty Jean Usher-Tate

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This dissertation consists of five chapters: introduction, literature review, methodology, results, and discussion with final thoughts. The research design of this dissertation study attended to structures, cultures, and characteristics associated with, and specific to, the Belize education system. The processes for data collection and types of analyses were appropriate, yielded meaningful results, and served as a segue for national application. The Belize Educator Survey was developed to capture the educators’ voices and illuminate their relationship to educational achievement in Belize. The Belize Educator Survey was piloted and revised with direct input from educators and experts who work in the Belize …

Heat Stored In The Earth System: Where Does The Energy Go?, Karina Von Schuckmann, Lijing Cheng, Matthew D. Palmer, James Hansen, Caterina Tassone, Valentin Aich, Susheel Adusumilli, Hugo Beltrami, Tim Boyer, Francisco José Cuesta-Valero, Damien Desbruyères, Catia Domingues, Almudena García-García, Pierre Gentine, John Gilson, Maximillian Gorfer, Leopold Haimberger, Masayoshi Ishii, Gregory C. Johnson, Rachel Killick, Brian A. King, Gottfried Kirchengast, Nicolas Kolodziejczyk, John Lyman, Ben Marzeion, Michael Mayer, Maeva Monier, Didier Paolo Monselesan, Sarah Purkey, Dean Roemmich, Axel Schweiger, Sonia I. Seneviratne, Andrew Shepherd, Donald A. Slater, Andrea K. Steiner, Fiammetta Straneo, Mary-Louise Timmermans, Susan E. Wijffels

United States Department of Commerce: Staff Publications

Human-induced atmospheric composition changes cause a radiative imbalance at the top of the atmosphere which is driving global warming. This Earth energy imbalance (EEI) is the most critical number defining the prospects for continued global warming and climate change. Understanding the heat gain of the Earth system—and particularly how much and where the heat is distributed—is fundamental to understanding how this affects warming ocean, atmosphere and land; rising surface temperature; sea level; and loss of grounded and floating ice, which are fundamental concerns for society. This study is a Global Climate Observing System (GCOS) concerted international effort to update the …

Agate Fossil Beds National Monument, Paleontological Resources Management Plan (Public Version), Scott Kottkamp, Vincent L. Santucci, Justin S. Tweet, Jessica De Smet, Ellen Stark

United States National Park Service: Publications

Executive Summary

Since Agate Springs Ranch was founded by James H. Cook in 1887, exquisite examples of transitional Miocene mammalian fauna have been found along this stretch of the Niobrara River valley. Collectively these paleontological discoveries, along with the existing archeological and historical Native American collection, were the basis for establishing Agate Fossil Beds National Monument (AGFO) as a unit of the National Park System (NPS). The fossil remains from the Harrison and Anderson Ranch formations span a short, but important, time period within the Miocene Epoch. AGFO has provided science with an intimate look into North American mammalian evolution …

Research 4.0: Research In The Age Of Automation, Rob Procter, Ben Glover, Elliot Jones

Copyright, Fair Use, Scholarly Communication, etc.

Executive Summary

There is a growing consensus that we are at the start of a fourth industrial revolution, driven by developments in Artificial Intelligence, machine learning, robotics, the Internet of Things, 3-D printing, nanotechnology, biotechnology, 5G, new forms of energy storage and quantum computing. This wave of technical innovations is already having a significant impact on how research is conducted, with dramatic change across research methods in recent years within some disciplines, as this project’s interim report set out.

Whilst there are a wide range of technologies associated with the fourth industrial revolution, this report primarily seeks to understand what …

Challenging The Wallacean Shortfall: A Total Assessment Of Insect Diversity On Guadeloupe (French West Indies), A Checklist And Bibliography, François Meurgey, Thibault Ramage

Insecta Mundi

This work is the first attempt to integrate into one list and quantify all the known species of Guade­loupean insects. It includes all the species known to us to be reported for the island of Guadeloupe until the 31^st of December 2019. A total of 3097 valid species are listed, of which the largest component is the beetles (1447 species). Preliminarily, 632 species (20%) are considered to be strictly endemic to Guadeloupe, and 250 species are recognized as adventive or introduced. The bibliography complements the taxonomic information and includes over 350 titles. Brief annotations are also given on the …

Contextualizando Una Colección Maya Olvidada Proveniente De Chich’En, Cobán, Alta Verapaz, Guatemala, Julia Montoya

Congreso internacional sobre iconografía precolombina, Barcelona, 2019. Actas.

La colección maya de la Universidad de Gante, Bélgica, cuenta con 130 piezas de cerámica y 84 piezas de lítica, entre ellas, jadeíta, piedra serpentina, obsidiana, sílex y cuarzo. El estudio se inició en 2016 con la identificación y localización del sitio de proveniencia, el cual se visitó en 2017. Las fases de documentación y registro fotográfico de las piezas han sido realizadas. En este artículo se hace una breve descripción del sitio arqueológico Chich’en y se analizan aspectos del contexto geográfico, histórico y religioso que determinaron su relevancia desde el período Clásico hasta el Posclásico Tardío. El estudio está …

Growing Season Air Mass Equivalent Temperature (TE) In The East Central Usa, Dolly Na-Yemeh, Rezaul Mahmood, Gregory Goodrich, Keri Younger, Kevin Cary, Joshua D. Durkee

School of Natural Resources: Faculty Publications

Equivalent temperature (T_E), which incorporates both dry (surface air temperature, T) and moist heat content associated with atmospheric moisture, is a better indicator of overall atmospheric heat content compared to T alone. This paper investigates the impacts of different types of air masses on T_E during the growing season (April–September). The study used data from the Kentucky Mesonet for this purpose. The growing season was divided into early (April–May), mid (June–July), and late (August–September). Analysis suggests that T_E for moist tropical (MT) air mass was as high as 61 and 81 °C for the early and …

Progress In Activities Of Wds-China Data Centers, Juanle Wang, Kun Bu, Yanjie Wang, Yating Shao

Copyright, Fair Use, Scholarly Communication, etc.

The World Data System (WDS) plays an important role in promoting global scientific data management, exchange, and sharing. There are 8 WDS data centers in mainland China including study areas of astronomy, space science, global change, renewable resources and environmental, cold and dry regions, microbiology, geophysics, and the ocean. This paper summarizes the current status of the WDS China data centers, along with their major progress in recent years. This progress includes a clearinghouse for metadata exchange, research data archival, historical data saving, international data exchange, data publishing models, CoreTrustSeal certification, open repositories for the scientific community, science popularization services, …

Estimation Of Wildlife Damage From Federal Crop Insurance Data, Sophie Mckee, Stephanie A. Shwiff, Aaron M. Anderson

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

BACKGROUND: Wildlife damage to crops is a persistent and costly problem for many farmers in the USA. Most existing estimates of crop damage have relied on direct assessment methods such as field studies conducted by trained biologists or surveys distributed to farmers. In this paper, we describe a new method of estimating wildlife damage that exploits federal crop insurance data. We focused our study on four crops: corn, soybean, wheat, and cotton, chosen because of their economic importance and their vulnerability to wildlife damage.

RESULTS: We determined crop-raiding hot spots across the USA over the 2015–2019 period and identified the …

Eat My Quartz, Neil Celani-Morrell

School of Art, Art History, and Design: Theses and Student Creative Work

Pottery has a remarkable ability to tap into the human collective experience, so it is no surprise I express my own understanding of the world by working within the boundaries of “the pot”. With the capacity to communicate conceptual meaning and to serve as objects of utility, pottery not only dances in the notorious territory between art and craft, it embodies the human spirit.

My pots are totems of my existence and this work is an authentic representation of my creative journey. They are an homage to the key influences in my life which have informed and encouraged my creativity …

Magnetic Water Treamtment For Scale Prevention On Water Heater Elements, Fatma Al-Sharji

Department of Environmental Engineering: Theses and Other Student Research

Calcium carbonates is one of the main components of scale that is commonly found in industrial equipment such as hot water systems. Scale formation on heater elements may lead to reduce heat efficiency and shorten the heat service life. Ion exchange softened water are used to reduce the scale formation, but excess salt during regeneration discharged to the wastewater stream, limits the reuse of wastewater for industrial purposes. As a result, non-salt alternative devices would provide consumers with the ability to reduce the impacts of ion exchange softened water without creating negative salinity impacts on wastewater stream. Magnetic water treatment …

His And Hers: Gender-Specific Design In Mid-Twentieth Century North America Through Film And Television, Morgan O'Shaughnessy

Architecture Masters of Science Program: Theses

The built environment exists as a variety of ‘spaces’ which are constructed by, and for, the people who occupy them. What is the relationship between social constructs of gender and our built environment in the 20^th century? How does film and television representing the mid-20^th century exemplify this relationship? The overall theme of this topic will include a positive relationship between social gender constructs and our built environment. Through the exploration of select film and television, this study attempts to answer the question of how gender-focused design reinforces traditional gender roles in North American society in mid-20^{th …}

Soil-Test Biological Activity With The Flush Of Co2: Viii. Soil Type And Management Diversity, Alan J. Franzluebbers, Mary R. Pershing

United States Department of Agriculture-Agricultural Research Service / University of Nebraska-Lincoln: Faculty Publications

Soil-test biological activity (STBA) is a key indicator describing the functions of soil to catabolize organic amendments, promote soil organic C sequestration, and cycle nutrients. We explored how climatic zone, land use, and physiographic region affected the relationship of STBA with several soil fertility properties and processes. Soils from Georgia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Virginia (wet climate) were Aquults, Fluvents, Udalfs, Udepts, and Udults and soils from Nebraska and Oklahoma (dry climate) were Udolls and Ustolls. Annual cropland and perennial pasture were the land uses. The Prairie region had silt loam and silty clay loams, the Ridge–Valley region had silt …

Legacy And Current Pesticide Residues In Syr Darya, Kazakhstan: Contamination Status, Seasonal Variation And Preliminary Ecological Risk Assessment, Daniel D. Snow, P. Chakraborty, B. Uralbekov, B. Satybaldiev, J. Brett Sallach, L. M. Thornton Hampton, M. Jeffries, A. S. Kolok, Shannon L. Bartelt-Hunt

Nebraska Water Center: Faculty Publications

The Syr Darya is one of two major rivers in Central Asia supplying critical fresh water to the Aral Sea. In spite of the river’s importance and agriculturally-intensive history, few studies have provided a modern evaluation of and the occurrence of pesticide residues potential effects to aquatic life. The primary goal of this investigation was to determine seasonal variations in ambient concentrations of modern and legacy pesticides in bottom sediment and water of the Syr Darya in Kazakhstan (KZ) downstream from an agriculturally-intensive watershed in Uzbekistan. Grab samples and passive samplers were used at five remote sampling stations during June …

Playing Well With Others: A Case Study Of Collective Impact In The Early Care And Education Policy Arena, Sarah J. Zuckerman, Amanda L. Garrett, Susan Sarver, Catherine Huddleston-Casas

Department of Educational Administration: Faculty Publications

The quality and quantity of early childhood care and education services have risen as a key reform area for influencing educational and economic outcomes. However, changes in this policy arena are stymied by the fragmentation of this policy arena. Collaborative approaches have been proposed to create systems-level change. Collective impact is one such approach; however, few examples exist in the early childhood care and education literature, especially at the state level. This ethnographic case study conceptualizes collective impact as a policy network capable of change in a fractured policy arena and reports the results from the first year of a …

“Why Can’T This Work Here?”: Social Innovation And Collective Impact In A Micropolitan Community, Sarah J. Zuckerman

Department of Educational Administration: Faculty Publications

Cross-sector partnerships, and collective impact, in particular, have gained increased attention as community-level strategies for tackling wicked, complex, social challenges such as child maltreatment. To date, there has been limited independent research on collective impact, especially in non-metropolitan areas with limited capacity. This case study examines the conditions that supported the development of a collective impact effort in a non-metropolitan community to address child wellbeing. It finds that small communities offer strengths that support collective impact as a social innovation as well as challenges that create vulnerabilities to outside influence that may stymie the development of locally developed social innovations.

The Gut Microbiome And Xenobiotics: Identifying Knowledge Gaps, Vicki L. Sutherland, Charlene A. Mcqueen, Donna Mendrick, Donna Gulezian, Carl Cerniglia, Steven Foley, Sam Forry, Sangeeta Khare, Xue Liang, Jose E. Manautou, Donald Tweedie, Howard A. Young, Alexander V. Alekseyenko, Frank Burns, Rod Dietert, Alan Wilson, Connie Chen

United States Public Health Resources

There is an increasing awareness that the gut microbiome plays a critical role in human health and disease, but mechanistic insights are often lacking. In June 2018, the Health and Environmental Sciences Institute (HESI) held a workshop, "The Gut Microbiome: Markers of Human Health, Drug Efficacy and Xenobiotic Toxicity" (https://hesiglobal.org/event/the-gut-microbiome-workshop) to identify data gaps in determining how gut microbiome alterations may affect human health. Speakers and stakeholders from academia, government, and industry addressed multiple topics including the current science on the gut microbiome, endogenous and exogenous metabolites, biomarkers, and model systems. The workshop presentations and breakout group discussions formed the …

Applying Settlement Scaling At Copán: Furthering Exploration Into Ancient Maya Urban Dynamics, Ellis Owen Arnold Codd

Department of Anthropology: Theses and Student Research

For decades, many archaeologists did not consider ancient Maya centers such as Tikal, Palenque, and Copán to be cities. While today most archaeologists would agree that large Maya centers were cities, the nature of Maya urbanism is still little understood. Maya cities seem different, and in attempt to explain these differences, they have been termed “garden cities” and “low-density agrarian-based cities.” In this thesis, I apply Settlement Scaling Theory (SST) — a quantitative framework for examining the mathematical relationships between human population, social connectivity, and other socioeconomic urban properties — to examine the quantitative relationship between population and area for …

Post-Program English Language Learners: Successful Learners Or Struggling Learners?, Tianna Bankhead

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Theses and Other Student Research

As an educator in the field of English Language Development, I have chosen to explore the experience of four participants that have exited their ELL program within the last 1 - 2 years in Lincoln Public Schools. I wanted to capture the first-hand experience of secondary students by exploring where they are finding successes since being formally considered proficient in English and where they are struggling. I interviewed these students and explored their academic world as well as the social world within the school setting. At the conclusion of the study, I found that students are academically achieving success in …

Water Current, Volume 52, No. 2, Summer 2020

Water Current Newsletter

Thirty Years on the Cutting Edge of University of Nebraska Research

Where Are They Now?

Building the Future of Nebraska’s Water Management

Blanket Statements, Issue 144, Summer 2020

Blanket Statements: News Publication of the American Quilt Study Group

Blanket Statements, Issue 144, Summer 2020

The Consequences And Correlates Of Racial Identity Discordance: An Explication Of The Social Construction Of Race, Eli X. Ornelas

Department of Sociology: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The current study analyzes the rates at which different racial groups experience identity discordance, or the phenomenon of one’s self-ascribed racial identity not being commensurate with external perceptions of one’s race. While previous research has documented the possibility of discrepancy between self-ascribed and external classifications of racial identities, few empirical studies have sought to determine which racial groups are most susceptible to experiencing identity discordance or investigated specific mechanisms that may contribute to that discordance. Utilizing the 2006 wave of the Portraits of American Life Study (PALS), the current study investigates the rate of identity discordance for Whites, Blacks, Hispanics, …

Influences Of The Timing Of Extreme Precipitation On Floods In Poyang Lake, China, Xianghu Li, Qi Hu, Rong Wang, Dan Zhang, Qi Zhang

School of Natural Resources: Faculty Publications

Changes in the timing of extreme precipitation have important ramifications for public safety and storm water management, but it has not received much attention in relation to flooding. This study analyzed the changes in the timing of extreme precipitation in the Poyang Lake basin and projected its future changes for the period 2020–2099. The study also quantified the influences of changes in the timing of peak flows on lake floods based on a hydrodynamic model. The results showed that peak rainfall in the Poyang Lake basin had occurred on later dates during the period 1960–2012, and it is this change …