Digital Commons Network^™

Assessing Community Attitudes Towards Homelessness And Services, Sarah Makar, Chris Runhaar, Dorothy Wallis

Utah Conference on Community Engagement

A collaborative, community-engaged research project was done to better understand Utah communities' attitudes and beliefs towards homelessness and evaluate for needed services for homeless individuals across Cache, Carbon, Utah, and Uintah counties. Through comprehensive data collection and analysis, this project will help identify community perceptions, challenges, and gaps in services, enabling providers to better tailor their efforts to meet the unique needs of homeless individuals within these counties. Ultimately, the research will foster more informed, responsive, and compassionate support systems for homeless populations across these diverse regions.

Sevier County Adventures - Poster Presentation, Jori Kloosterman, Anna Gilliam

Utah Conference on Community Engagement

"The Sevier County Adventures is a community engagement series of events that are fun for all and center on 4 community-identified needs; mental health, substance abuse, suicide, and parenting/family relationships. Once a quarter in 2025, the USU Sevier County Extension Office and the Central Utah Health Department, in conjunction with other entities, will hold community events to provide resources and information that highlight a specific need from the 4 community-identified needs. 1-Mental Health Game Night – Participants will be given a resource packet with information on local providers and teams will play an escape room game box. 2-Home Run for …

Guidance And Lessons Learned For Instructors Seeking To Add Video Creation To Their Skill Set, Wendy A. Swenson Roth

Journal on Empowering Teaching Excellence

Access the online Pressbooks version of this introduction here.

Videos have entered the classroom, whether for online asynchronous courses or as supplementary information in synchronous classes. COVID-19 accelerated the pace of online and video learning but left instructors with little time to explore the optimal use of this technology. Nonetheless, videos are here to stay, raising questions about what unique choices faculty must make when implementing them and what new skills are required as videos become additional content delivery sources. The following article provides implementation guidance and lessons learned for instructors seeking to add video creation to their skill set.

Design, Implementation, And Reflection From An Interdisciplinary Course In Museum Studies, Brenna L. Decker

Journal on Empowering Teaching Excellence

Access the online Pressbooks version of this introduction here.

In Spring of 2023, I developed a special topics course titled Collection Material Handling to introduce students to museum management using Utah State University collections on the Logan, UT campus. The cross-listed upper-level course brought 16 USU students together from two disciplines: anthropology and natural sciences. The publication details how I used various learning theories to guide the creation of course content and how I structured and implemented activities in the classroom and in the collections. Examples of worksheets, activities, student feedback, and recommended improvements to assignments are provided. I encourage …

Learning A Little Bit Harder: The Intersecting Experiences Of First-Generation And Single-Mother College Students, Natalie Lecy, Elizabeth Hendrix, Brian A. Droubay

Journal on Empowering Teaching Excellence

Access the online Pressbooks version of this introduction here.

This study examines the experiences of nine first-generation, single-mother college students, focusing on these intersecting, double-jeopardy identities. Participants’ difficulty navigating college varied; contributing factors included family background, social capital, the type of college attended, and whether they established a mentor. The following themes were established: 1) realizing college is an option, 2) caught between two worlds, 3) college wasn’t designed for us, 4) economic barriers, and 5) disparities in social capital. Our findings indicate colleges were unprepared to meet the unique challenges faced by this group. We present recommendations for the …

The Role And Influence Of Faculty As Predictors For Retention And Satisfaction Among Generation Z, Katelyn Romsa, Stephani Jarecke, Jessie H. Hendricks, Bryan Romsa

Journal on Empowering Teaching Excellence

Access the online Pressbooks version of this introduction here.

While previous research has established that faculty and their interactions with students have had the greatest impact on student retention and satisfaction for centuries, limited studies have been done to understand how faculty are influencing Generation Z, our newest generation of students in higher education. This study examined how the quantity of faculty interactions is impacting student retention and satisfaction among 342 Generation Z first-year college students at a public land-grant institution in the Midwest using the National Survey of Student Engagement instrument. In a Mann-Whitney U test, significant difference was …

Full Issue: Journal On Empowering Teaching Excellence, Volume 9, Issue 1, Spring 2025

Journal on Empowering Teaching Excellence

The full-length Spring 2025 issue (Volume 9, Issue 1) of the Journal on Empowering Teaching Excellence

Access the online Pressbooks version (with downloadable EPUB format) here.

The issue includes five articles addressing challenges in higher education: faculty-student interactions with Generation Z students, experiences of first-generation single-mother college students, implementation of an interdisciplinary museum studies course, guidance for creating educational videos, and a book review on resistance to change in higher education. The journal emphasizes practical strategies for effective teaching, inclusivity, and innovative approaches to pedagogy across various educational contexts.

Evaluating A Proprietary Tannin-Blend Product As An Alternative To Monensin And Tylosin Phosphate In Feedlot Cattle Diets, Luana D. Felizari, Luke K. Fuerniss, Jonathon L. Beckett, David S. Secrist, Guy D. Hufstedler, Bradley J. Johnson

Animal, Dairy, and Veterinary Science Faculty Publications

This study evaluates the effects of a proprietary tannin blend (BX), supplemented with or without sodium monensin (MON), on beef cattle performance, carcass traits, and health. Steers (n = 2986; initial shrunk body weight (SBW) 254 ± 9.2 kg) were allocated into 48 pens (61–62 steers/pen; 12 pens/treatment) fed for 230 d. Treatments included (1) no feed additives (CTL); (2) BX (7.95 g/animal daily); (3) MON + Tylosin phosphate (TYL; 437.52 mg MON/animal daily + 80 mg TYL/animal daily); or (4) MON+BX (437.52 mg MON/animal daily + 7.95 g BX/animal daily). Data were analyzed in R 4.2.1 using a …

Mapping And Examining Recreation In Indian Creek, Bears Ears National Monument, Elisabeth Currit, Neil Hansen, Brigham Daniels, Alex Long, Katy Merritt, Mary Proteau, Sam Spackman

Utah Space Grant Consortium

Recreation is growing in desert areas of the western United States, and mapping the expansion of these activities is vital to management and conservation efforts. Desert ecosystems provide many critical ecosystem services, including carbon storage, and the growing popularity of outdoor recreation in Western US desert regions poses a threat to these ecosystems. Unregulated recreational activities can harm desert plant and soil health, including the functioning of biological soil crusts. This research project focuses on mapping several types of popular recreational activities in order to monitor and evaluate the impact of these activities within the Indian Creek areas of Bears …

From Forest Floor To Future Food: Cultivating And Engineering Lion's Mane Mushrooms, Chris Morris, Lane Law

Utah Space Grant Consortium

We intend to create a vegan meat alternative by genetically modifying Hericium erinaceus (Lion's Mane mushroom) to express the soy leghemoglobin gene. This gene, commonly used in plant-based meats, contributes both color and umami flavor reminiscent of animal-derived hemoglobin. Our approach involves extracting and sequencing Lion's Mane DNA, identifying viable genomic insertion sites, and applying CRISPR-Cas9 to insert the leghemoglobin gene. Concurrently, we are optimizing lab-based cultivation methods to ensure reliable growth and propagation of both wild-type and genetically modified strains. This project integrates fungal biotechnology, genetic engineering, and sustainable food innovation.

Cracking The Code For Pcb Cleanup: Pcr Optimization Meets Synthetic Biology, Leptzy Romero, Lane Law

Utah Space Grant Consortium

This study focuses on the construction of a plasmid harboring biphenyl (BPH) genes, with the aim of enabling potential degradation of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs). Optimization experiments were conducted to enhance PCR amplification and assembly efficiency. PCR conditions were refined using a primer concentration gradient and by varying magnesium chloride levels through adjustments in reaction buffer volume, resulting in improved specificity and yield. Six BPH gene fragments were successfully litigated into the pSHDY vector using Gibson Assembly, alongside a GA+ positive control. The resulting construct represents a foundational step toward engineering organisms capable of PCB biodegradation.

Nitrogen Form Determines Lettuce Yield In Continually Replanted Systems, Noah J. Langenfeld, Bruce Bugbee

Utah Space Grant Consortium

Nitrogen (N) recycling is essential in closed root-zones for bioregenerative life support in crewed missions. Microorganisms recycle organic N forms from human waste into ammonium and nitrate for plant growth. We used lettuce as a model crop to examine yield under multiple N sources modelled from N recycling. Plants were grown in peat moss media adjusted to pH 6 or 7 for five repeated plantings in the same containers without replacing the media. A nutrient solution was used for both studies that contained N as either ammonium nitrate, ammonium, nitrate, urea, or microbial biomass from the N-fixing microorganism Azotobacter vinelandii …

A Simple Sonication Method For Generating Monodispersed Nanoparticles Of Hydrophobic Antioxidants, Kyle Jackson, David Britt, Yu Huang

Utah Space Grant Consortium

Various hydrophobic antioxidants remain unexplored for the treatment of space radiation and oxidative stress due to their inability to enter the cell without a drug delivery vehicle as their surface properties cause them to suffer from a poor solubility. In this paper you will find a recent breakthrough of a new method to create neat antioxidant nanoparticles free of any surfactant whatsoever vastly improving inherent solubility. These nanoparticles are synthesized monodispersed with a low polydispersity. This is even more suitable for astronauts then other generation methods, as the cocktail is without any solvent or surfactant which can have unknown effects …

Building Books: The Evolution Of Early English Block Prints, Lucy Peterson

Curiosity

In this paper I explore the relationship between the art in early printed books and their spiritual significance. I take my examples from Art of the Good Lyvyng and Good Deyng translated by Thomas Lewing published in 1503 and The Festial of John Mirk published in 1528. These books contain examples of architectural elements used as frames for illustrations depicting scenes related to the devotional subjects discussed by both texts. The use of the architecture is imaginative in nature and can be characterized as micro-architecture as defined by François Bucher: “A definition of the ideal Gothic structure through the use …

Cultivating Confidence, Curiosity, And Motivation In The Second Language Classroom, Janelle Carter

All Graduate Reports and Creative Projects, Fall 2023 to Present

This portfolio documents the author's journey through the Master of Second Language Teaching (MSLT) program at Utah State University, highlighting the evolution of their teaching philosophy and pedagogical practices through theoretical exploration, hands-on classroom experiences, and reflective practice. It details the integration of current research, collaborative learning, and innovative assessment strategies, such as self-created rubrics, to foster student engagement and agency in teaching German as a second language. Additionally, the portfolio includes a co-authored research study that examines the motivational factors influencing university students’ decisions to continue learning Arabic, French, and German. This study explores how personal, academic, and social …

Russia And Climate Change: A Comparative Analysis Of Climate Change Framing In Russian News Media, Kaylee Anthon

Curiosity

This study conducted a comparative analysis of how climate change is framed in state owned versus independent news media in Russia, focusing on the state source RT International and the independent news source The Moscow Times. The findings revealed that RT International portrays climate change as primarily non-local, emphasizing temperature increases and vague natural disasters, while the Moscow Times presents it as a global issue with statistically significant consequences. Both sources employ framing techniques to either support or criticize varying governments.

Women And Finances − What Utahns Need To Know: A 2025 Update, Robyn C. Blackburn, Susan R. Madsen

Marketing and Strategy Faculty Publications

The history of Utah women and finances shows how various policies, societal beliefs, and behaviors impact the financial standing of women in the state. Upon the arrival of pioneers from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to the Salt Lake Valley in the 19th century, 41 women were allocated lots during the initial distribution of the land, including single, widowed, and “head of household” women whose husbands were away.¹ Interestingly, around the same time, the Oregon Donation Act of 1850 incentivized female migration to the West by allowing women land ownership rights. Additional federal land laws, such …

Tremblings, May 2025, Western Aspen Alliance

Tremblings

Aspen, Fire, and People: Then and Now

Eva Strand. Professor of Rangeland Ecology, University of Idaho

People living and working in the Great Basin, USA, are observing changing fire conditions. Larger and more frequent fires across the West are well-documented, but less is known about how these changes manifest across Great Basin ecosystems, including in quaking aspen. In our recent Ecosphere paper, mean fire return interval (mFRI) changes across major Great Basin vegetation types between 1961–1990 and 1991–2020, were compared with LANDFIRE’s historical (pre-1900) estimates. For those not familiar with mFRI, it is the average number of years between successive …

"Once Our Land Is Gone, It's Gone": Farmer Perspectives On Growth, Embeddedness, And The Future Of Food In The Great Salt Lake Basin, Bryn Noelle Watkins

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Fall 2023 to Present

The Great Salt Lake Basin hosts a knot of intensifying pressures on agriculturalists—including economic constraints, as even arable land is increasingly valuable for development, and ecological constraints, as aridification and climate change affect the conditions in which food can grow. Given the unique relationship farmers have with the land as its modern-day stewards, their perspectives on the nature and consequences of these pressures offer profound insights into how the region might responsibly navigate its resource management and food systems moving through the future. In the first paper, I draw upon 15 interviews with commodity farmers to understand their experiences with …

Observing Mesospheric Gravity Waves With Nasa's Awe Mission And Correlating To Gnss Tec Maps, Jaime Aguilar Guerrero, Björn Bergsson, Sehin Mesfin, Pavel Inchin, Matthew Zettergren, Ludger Scherliess, Yucheng Zhao, Dominique Pautet

Space Dynamics Laboratory Publications

The Atmosphere Waves Experiment (AWE) is a NASA mission launched on November 9, 2023, and installed on the International Space Station (ISS). Its primary goal is to detect and characterize atmospheric gravity waves (AGWs) by measuring Earth’s mesospheric hydroxyl (OH) airglow with its key instrument, the Advanced Mesospheric Temperature Mapper (AMTM). Since its deployment, AWE has been quantifying the seasonal and regional variability of AGWs, investigating their occurrence and potential sources, and enabling the assessment of their broader impact on the atmosphere by comparing measurements at different altitudes by other instruments. AWE has collected extensive imagery and temperature data capturing …

Impacts Of Reef Fish Length On Foraging Radius: Exploring Behavioral Patterns Within A Patch Reef Ecosystem, Kilia Brawand

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

Reef fish exhibit various behaviors upon the Great Barrier Reef. One of these behaviors includes that of limiting their grazing distances from a patch reef refuge to a certain maximum distance in order to avoid predators. This is defined as a ‘foraging radius’ or ‘margin of safety’. This ‘foraging radius’ varies among fish due to many factors- including species, morphology, ontogenesis, habitat complexity, and importantly: speed. Quicker fish can outswim predators to safety more efficiently than slower fish, and can therefore afford to travel farther distances to forage. Speed varies among fish for a number of reasons, including fish size …

Engineering Planktonic And Biofilm Microalgae Systems For Productivity, Power Requirements, Cost, And Scalability, Dallin Chugg

All Graduate Reports and Creative Projects, Fall 2023 to Present

Microalgae cultivation offers dual benefits as an effective wastewater treatment method and a sustainable source of valuable bioproducts, such as biofuels, bioplastics, and feedstocks. This approach supports sustainability by transforming waste into high-value products while minimizing environmental impact. However, scaling microalgae cultivation to industrial levels presents significant challenges, particularly in optimizing harvesting efficiency, reducing mixing and transport costs, and managing large water requirements.

This report compares the productivity, scalability, cost, and energy requirements of two primary cultivation systems: planktonic and biofilm. Planktonic systems, such as open raceway ponds (ORPs), excel in light distribution and nutrient uptake due to continuous mixing, …

How Does Fiscal Decentralization Shape Corruption?, Sharandy G. Appiah

All Graduate Reports and Creative Projects, Fall 2023 to Present

In this paper, I offer a comprehensive review of the impact of fiscal decentralization on corruption. Corruption has been a big hindrance to development, it undermines the inflow of foreign direct investment and even affects education. The literature on fiscal decentralization and corruption has conventionally argued that fiscal autonomy for local officials lowers corruption whereas most recent papers have found that fiscal decentralization increases corruption. I identify four possible pathways through which fiscal decentralization affects corruption and address possible reasons for the difference in findings in the literature. Understanding the mechanisms through which fiscal decentralization shapes corruption at the national …

“Gang, We Have A Mystery On Our Hands!”: A Folkloristic Approach To Conspiracy Thinking In Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated, Sydney K. Brooks

All Graduate Reports and Creative Projects, Fall 2023 to Present

In this thesis I examined how the 2010 children’s television show Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated both utilizes and critiques conspiracy, embedded within its mystery-solving structure. Through a close analysis of the members of the gang—Fred, Daphne, Velma, Shaggy, and Scooby-Doo—I broke down their individual behaviors, interactions, and contributions to conspiratorial belief. I then transitioned into a case study of the episode “Where Stalks the Scarebear,” showcasing its connection to larger real-world conspiracy narratives, particularly those related to corporate and environmental cover-ups. Finally, I examined the show as a complete narrative, reflecting on its complex, serial exploration of conspiracy through the framework …

Building Bridges And Breaking Barriers: Instructional Videos For Intercultural Communication, Morgan M. Lankford

All Graduate Reports and Creative Projects, Fall 2023 to Present

I've created instructional YouTube videos focusing on Intercultural Communication. My goal was to make academic material/learning accessible to the general public. I have completed the background research, the script writing and editing, the filming and video editing, and it has been a learning curve. However, I’ve been able to translate academic information in such a way that more people can understand it and learn from it. As people watch these academic videos, they will not only learn facts and terms about intercultural communication, but more importantly they will learn how to be more understanding people. They will learn to be …

An Invitation To Language: Fostering Critical Language Awareness Through Assignment Design, Amrutha Smith

All Graduate Reports and Creative Projects, Fall 2023 to Present

First-year composition (FYC) instructors are often required to teach institution-issued course outcomes alongside their personal values. The author proposes a pedagogy to identify how teachers can invite rhetorical and linguistic agency in student writers and teach toward institutional objectives. To do so, the author shares her approach for revising existing and creating new FYC assignments that invite students to use their multiple codes and languagings (ways of communicating) in their writing. The assignments are driven by translanguaging approaches in writing instruction, specifically code-meshing and Critical Language Awareness (CLA), a theoretical framework coined by Shapiro, and integrate three settings in which …

Reflections On Teaching Language And Culture In The French Dual Language Immersion Classroom, Aminata Sylla

All Graduate Reports and Creative Projects, Fall 2023 to Present

This portfolio is representative of the author’s work in the Masters in Second Language Teaching (MSLT) program and classroom experience. The reflection paper explores teaching French in the Dual Language Immersion (DLI) and Bridge secondary education context and evaluates specific examples of innovative teaching. The aims of this reflection are twofold: first, to reflect on how the author improved her teaching effectiveness through this experience and through the USU MSLT program; second, to suggest best practices in the French DLI classroom. Both practical and theoretical, the reflection focuses on the author’s own experiences teaching Bridge program intermediate and advanced-proficiency level …

“Floptok Is Not A Trend. It’S A Lifestyle”: Camp, Performativity, And Community Dynamics In An Adolescent Tiktok Subculture, Drake Hansen

All Graduate Reports and Creative Projects, Fall 2023 to Present

Floptok is an online meme-sharing community or subculture that began to take shape in 2021, united by a particular sensibility and set of memetic materials. To outsiders, Floptok is seen as a loud, brash, and often abrasive community whose memes, characterized by low-quality audio and video, often feature “icons”—a range of invented characters and real people—and audio of pop songs heavily edited to feature hypersexual lyrics from the rapper CupcakKe, as well as portions of the 2019 Chinese pop song “Yěhuāxiāng.” This thesis built on scholarship in digital and young people’s folklore in an ethnographic case study of Floptok’s humor …

“How Can I Make This Real Life?”: Realism, Politics, And Simulational Rhetoric In Video Games, Samuel Rowles

All Graduate Reports and Creative Projects, Fall 2023 to Present

Video games are becoming an increasingly relevant aspect of modern culture, both shaping discourse around topics of labor, play, and art, and being shaped by the society they are created within. Scholars have examined the link between video games and player behavior since the 1990s and found that there is little concrete proof that video games alter behavior on their own and are simply one part of a much larger context. But with video games increasing in complexity and accuracy, it becomes necessary to examine whether video games are capable of convincing players about truths of the real world through …

She: The Shadow Self, Mya Bethers

All Graduate Reports and Creative Projects, Fall 2023 to Present

This multimodal poetry thesis explores the Female Shadow, an adaptation of Carl Jung’s concept of the Shadow that focuses on women’s experiences, through the themes of silence, abuse, and generational trauma. Incorporating multimodal forms such as video poetry and visual poetry alongside traditional print poetry, the collection mirrors the fragmented nature of trauma and the instability of memory. This collection draws from feminist theorists like Hélène Cixous, bell hooks, and Trinh T. Minh-ha, as well as poets engaging with Jungian concepts such as Sylvia Plath, Robert Bly, and Châtillon Coque. This work examines repression, voice, and the unconscious. Formally, it …