Digital Commons Network^™

Polarization And Opinion Analysis In An Online Argumentation System For Collaborative Decision Support, Ravi Santosh Arvapally

Doctoral Dissertations

"Argumentation is an important process in a collaborative decision making environment. Argumentation from a large number of stakeholders often produces a large argumentation tree. It is challenging to comprehend such an argumentation tree without intelligent analysis tools. Also, limited decision support is provided for its analysis by the existing argumentation systems. In an argumentation process, stakeholders tend to polarize on their opinions, and form polarization groups. Each group is usually led by a group leader. Polarization groups often overlap and a stakeholder is a member of multiple polarization groups. Identifying polarization groups and quantifying a stakeholder's degree of membership in …

Educator's Perceptions Of The Implementation And Effectiveness Of Response To Intervention Measures, Sheila Stepp Nugent

Doctoral Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to investigate teachers' and administrators' perceptions of the implementation and effectiveness of Response to Intervention (RTI) strategies in their schools. The study used a mixed-methods research design. Data were collected through multiple-choice and open-ended surveys administered to elementary English language arts general education teachers, special education teachers in Kindergarten through fifth grade, and administrators in seven elementary schools. Quantitative data were analyzed using the Mann-Whitney U and Kruskal-Wallis Analysis of Variance of Ranks. Qualitative data were analyzed by the researcher to determine similarities and differences among the written responses. All data were gathered during …

Principals' Concerns Regarding The Implementation Of Change, Theresa Diana Pelfrey

Doctoral Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to investigate the Stages of Concern (SoC) that school principals have toward change and then report participants' behavior relevant to their Level of Use (LoU) of an innovation. An understanding of principals' concerns regarding change suggested a variety of factors that impede educational leaders' implementation of innovations and change within the school environment.

The researcher studied principals' perspectives regarding change implementation in the course of their daily administrative activities. Although many principals are aware and knowledgeable of the current standards for school leadership, difficulties arise when innovations and change are implemented. This study was …

The Evaluation Of Interhemispheric Transfer Time (Ihtt) In Adults, Katherine Elise Cormier

Doctoral Dissertations

The goal of the present study was to develop an objective technique to measure interhemispheric transfer time (IHTT) of linguistic stimuli using late auditory evoked potentials to develop normative data in adults. Nine participants, five females and four males (M = 25.22) were included in this study. Each participant had their hearing tested and electrodes were placed on the forehead, tip of the nose, below the right eye and several places on the scalp. The results revealed that when comparing electrode sites (CZ, C3, and C4), waves (P1-N1-P2) and ears (right ear and left ear) there was no statistically significant …

Created In The Image Of: Mormonism And The Rhetorical Production Of Identity In Privately-Published Family Histories, Michael K. Peterson

Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation is a qualitative study of seven privately-published family histories written by descendants of Mormon polygamists. Using methods of discourse and rhetorical analysis, these texts and various interviews are analyzed with the contention that identity is a rhetorical production and that the authors (either intentionally or unwittingly) fictionalize each of the identities involved---their own, their readers', and their ancestors'---to bring them together in moments of Burkean identification. These moments of identification are also analyzed in terms of communal and generational memory, temporal proximity, and communal discourses. An important conclusion in this study is that this rhetorical production of identity …

Educative Encounters: An Analysis Of Dewey, Buber And Noddings To Understand The Role Of Encountering Self, Others And The World In Teaching And Learning In Higher Education, Carrie Maureen Nolan

Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation provides a novel conception of educative encounter as a means of providing a pedagogical framework for directing experience in the classroom for the purpose of cultivating growth, and specifically cultivating care (N. Noddings, 2003a). By honing in on encounter as the relational aspect of experience, emphasizing the importance of the relational quality of the learning experience, and articulating a different approach to teaching in higher education, this conception helps educators attend to strengthening learning outcomes oriented towards the growth of students. This serves towards the illumination of learning through and for educative encounter by addressing both the meaning …

Shifting Alliances And Fairweather Friends: Luso-American Relations, 1941--1951, Paula Celeste Gomes Noversa. Rioux

Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation analyzes the diplomatic relations between Portugal and the United States from 1941 to 1951, a decade that resulted in a tremendous and permanent shift in Luso-American relations. It examines the wartime and postwar goals of both Portugal and the United States. It reveals how these two nations overcame their differences during the war and worked towards mutually beneficial ends after the war. Moreover this dissertation asserts that Antonio Salazar, Portugal's Prime Minister, permanently altered Portuguese-American relations and managed to supplant the assurances found in the flagging AngloPortuguese alliance with a series of American initiatives--the European Recovery Program, the …

Empowering Equity In Postsecondary Transition For Marginalized Culturally And Linguistically Diverse Students With Disabilities By Implementing A Culturally Responsive Summary Of Performance Teacher Training And Support Program, Rebekka Joanne Jez

Doctoral Dissertations

Marginalized culturally and linguistically diverse students with special needs often struggle after high school. Many special educators are unaware of legal mandates and best practice in postsecondary transition, especially the intricate needs when working this group. The culturally responsive Summary of Performance (CRSOP) training and support program was designed to inform and support teachers in self-determination and culturally responsive practices while transitioning students from high school. Five teachers and seven students in a large urban district were interviewed and surveyed before and after the CRSOP training and support program to evaluate the effectiveness of the CRSOP teacher training. Teachers reported …

Perceptions Of Bilingualism And Home Language Maintenance And Loss: A Study Of Latino Parents At A San Francisco Bay Area Elementary Charter School, Emily Mccormick Enstice

Doctoral Dissertations

There is limited research that investigates parent perceptions with respect to their early elementary school children's home language use. To fill the gap in research, this study explores the relationship between first generation Latino parent perspectives of bilingualism, home language maintenance and loss, and the intersection of culture and identity in an elementary school community. It also investigates how parents create an additive bilingual environment in the home.

This participatory action research (PAR) study involved group dialogue sessions and individual interviews in order to engage co-researchers and participants. PAR provided this study with the structure and tools to change and …

Sealing The Cracks Of The Educational Pipeline: Counterstories That Reveal Cultural Resiliency And Collective Responsibility In Latinas’ K-16 Success, Angela Shaw

Doctoral Dissertations

The purpose of this qualitative research is to discover and describe the successes and institutional barriers along the educational pipeline for Latinas who are the first in their families to have successfully completed their undergraduate degrees. This research explores the unique elements of gender such as gender role socialization and stereotyping under the context of student retention and successful completion of a baccalaureate degree. This research includes nine counterstories of Latinas who were the first in their families to have successfully completed their undergraduate degrees. The results of this study find that throughout childhood, many participants' parents taught their children …

Latino Immigrant Parents Of English Language Learner Students, School Involvement And The Participation Breach, Jose Vicente Gonzalez

Doctoral Dissertations

The problem addressed in this study was the minimal school involvement by Latino immigrant parents due to the hegemonic practices, cultural misunderstandings and deficit-thinking models adopted by school personnel. The purpose of this Participatory Action Research (PAR) was to investigate the perceptions and benefits of participant and co-researcher parents who collaborated in the creation of an anti-hegemonic culturally sensitive advocacy-training program. The theoretical framework employed was Critical Race Theory because it addressed the issues of institutional racism, challenge to the status quo, social justice leadership and allowed for an interdisciplinary approach in order to utilize the parents' experiential knowledge to …

"This Is A Public Record": Teaching Human Rights Through The Performing Arts, Andrea Mcevoy Spero

Doctoral Dissertations

Urban youth in the United States often experience daily human rights violations such as racism and violence. Therefore, Human Rights Education (HRE) can strengthen their understanding of these issues and unleash their power to act toward positive change. This qualitative study attempted to gain a deeper understanding of the use of performance arts to teach human rights in an urban high school setting.

The following meta-question guided this research: "Is it possible for HRE which integrates the performing arts as a pedagogical tool to provide a transformative educational experience for students?" To address this question, the study explored: 1) how …

The Risk Mitigation Strategy Taxonomy And Generated Risk Event Effect Neutralization Method, Daniel A. Krus

Doctoral Dissertations

"In the design of new products and systems, the mitigation of potential failures is very important. The sooner in a product's design mitigation can be performed, the lower the cost and easier to implement those mitigations become. However, currently, most mitigations strategies rely on the expertise of the engineers designing a product, and while models and for failure modes do exist to help, there are no guidelines for performing product changes to reduce risk. To help alleviate this, the risk mitigation strategy taxonomy is created from an empirical collection of mitigation strategies used in industry for failure mitigation, creating a …

The Effects Of Age, Information, And Personal Contact On Attitudes Toward Individuals With Cleft Lip And Palate, Adam Thomas Blancher

Doctoral Dissertations

The aim of the current study was to examine the effects of information and brief personal contact with individuals with a cleft lip and/or palate (CLP). One hundred and eighty-nine children (n = 78) and young adults (n = 111) participated in the study. A modified version of the Multidimensional Attitudes Scale Toward Persons with Disabilities (MAS) was used to measure the participants attitudes toward individuals with CLP. Using mixed multivariate analysis of covariance (MANCOVA), it was found that children's attitudes were significantly improved by information and contact with individuals with CLP, and these findings supported previous research. …

The Clinical Application Of Progressive Filtering In Normal And Disordered Populations, Sarah M. Johnson

Doctoral Dissertations

The present study examined the effect of progressive filter testing in children with normal auditory processing skills and children with (central) auditory processing disorders [(C)APD]. The primary purpose of this study was to determine if a new screening procedure designed by the investigator called Progressive Filtering would differentiate between a control group (i.e. children with normal auditory processing skills) and an experimental group [children with (C)APD]. Twenty subjects (age 6 to 14 years) participated in the study. All subjects received an audiological examination, an auditory processing test battery, and the Progressive Filtering screening tool. Results indicated that the investigator-designed Progressive …

Preschool Teachers' Beliefs And Practices: Emergent Literacy In Inclusive Preschools, Leigh Rohde

Doctoral Dissertations

This study examines preschool teachers' beliefs and practices related to emergent literacy learning for both children who are typically developing as well as those with identified disabilities. The sixty-eight teachers who worked in preschool programs that enrolled children with and without disabilities were asked to indicate levels of agreement with belief statements about emergent literacy, children with disabilities, and instruction. They were also asked to indicate what specific emergent literacy learning strategies and activities (if any) they used in their classrooms.

A new model of emergent literacy skills and understandings is used as a framework, indicating specific components of emergent …

"The Alien Within": Residual Catholicism And The Emerging National Identity Of Post-Reformation England, Melissa K. Siik (Femino)

Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation contributes to the current critical discourse in Early Modern English Studies on the conceptions and literary representations of national and racial identity in 16th- and 17th-century England. Central to this discourse is an examination of how the English defined themselves in relation to those they deemed as "others": the foreign and marginalized members of society. My study is unique because I look at individual figures of "otherness"---the Irishman, the Turk, and the Jew---in light of their common characteristic: their shared significance as coded figures of Catholicism. Ultimately, my dissertation unifies disparate conversations about race, religion, and politics in …

An Analysis Of Appreciative Inquiry As Organizational Development For An Alternative School, Michael Young

Doctoral Dissertations

Schools and youth development programs are continually under pressure to reform and improve. Recent scholarship in the organizational development field suggests that a post modern approach to such efforts may yield new and generative results. Appreciative Inquiry (AI) is an Action Research methodology used for organizational development that is based on a number of post modern assumptions. Because AI has seen a rapid increase in use, including implementations in educational settings, and because of its potential to offer new insights into organizational development, a further understanding of how it works is warranted.

This interpretive case study, grounded in a social …

Raping The Raced Body: Trauma In Asian North American Women's Literature, Amy Lillian Manning

Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation examines the representation of racial and sexual traumas in short fiction and novels by Asian American women writing post-WWII to the present. The central focus of this project is on Asian American literary representations of the lingering effects of physical, racial, and sexual traumas to Asian American women, specifically the nuances of narrating traumatic experiences. Each chapter explores various literary representations of post-traumatic psychological states of unrest, instability, and incoherence. Most importantly, this study examines the frequently simultaneous narrations of sexual trauma and racial awareness, of how personal narratives of trauma against the physical body become entangled with …

Competing Visions: Women Writers And Male Illustrators In The Golden Age Of Illustration, Jason Richard Williams

Doctoral Dissertations

In "Competing Visions," I examine the works of women writers and male illustrators during what has been termed the "Golden Age of Illustration" (1880--1920). Due to advances in printing technology and the proliferation of mass-market magazines just before the turn-of-the-last century, novels and short stories were often published with images by illustrators like Howard Pyle and N. C. Wyeth, who subsequently gained enormous popularity and developed wide followings. At the same time, women writers enjoyed an unprecedented period of widespread exposure and political influence. Looking closely at the intersection of images and texts from early twentieth century periodical publications reveals …

Proof And Reasoning In An Inquiry-Oriented Class: The Impact Of Classroom Discourse, Susan D. Generazzo

Doctoral Dissertations

Over the past decade, mathematics educators and researchers have become increasingly aware of the impact of social interactions on students' learning (NCTM, 2000; Bowers & Nickerson, 2001; Forman, 2003). Current research indicates that the classroom environment, including the activities and discussions that take place, can have a significant effect on the ways students make sense of mathematical concepts (Yackel, 2001). Understanding mathematics involves knowing how to make sense of key concepts through the processes of reasoning and justification. Educators and researchers agree on the importance of providing students with opportunities in class to explore, conjecture, and prove in order to …

The Role Of Reuniens And Rhomboid Thalamic Nuclei In Spatial Memory, Jacqueline R. Hembrook

Doctoral Dissertations

Spatial working memory is the ability to encode and temporarily store information for future retrieval to guide behavioral responses. Two areas of the brain that are important for this process are prefrontal cortex (PFC) and hippocampus. The hippocampus has strong connections to medial PFC, however there are no direct return projections from medial PFC to hippocampus. The reuniens (Re) and rhomboid (Rh) nuclei of ventral midline thalamus have anatomical connections with PFC and hippocampus. This dissertation sought to provide behavioral evidence for the role of the ventral midline thalamic nuclei in spatial working memory. Four experiments were conducted in rats …

Architecture Value Mapping: Using Fuzzy Cognitive Maps As A Reasoning Mechanism For Multi-Criteria Conceptual Design Evaluation, Atmika Singh

Doctoral Dissertations

"The conceptual design phase is the most critical phase in the systems engineering life cycle. The design concept chosen during this phase determines the structure and behavior of the system, and consequently, its ability to fulfill its intended function. A good conceptual design is the first step in the development of a successful artifact. However, decision-making during conceptual design is inherently challenging and often unreliable. The conceptual design phase is marked by an ambiguous and imprecise set of requirements, and ill-defined system boundaries. A lack of usable data for design evaluation makes the problem worse. In order to assess a …

Factors That Differentiate High-Achieving And Low-Achieving Language Minority Students Enrolled In A Middle-School Spanish Two-Way Immersion Program, Mary Howland

Doctoral Dissertations

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The Effects Of Math Instruction On Fifth Grade Elementary Students' Math Performance Across Four Inclusive General Education Classrooms Infused With The Afrocultural Dimensions Of Communalism, Orality, And Movement, Rosalind J. Simpson

Doctoral Dissertations

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Transcending Borders: The Experience Of Six Undocumented Immigrant Mothers In The United States, Patricia Derobles

Doctoral Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to gain meaningful insights into the experiences of six undocumented immigrant mothers as they settled in the United States while they raise and participate in the educational life of their children. Currently 10 % of California's 6 million students originate from homes where one or two parents are undocumented, poor and have limited English skills. Undocumented immigrants live in constant fear of deportation, live and work in the shadows of mainstream society, are stigmatized by the media, are criminalized by immigration law and exploited by their employers. Historically, children originating from immigrant homes have …

Predictors Of High School Graduation In Foster Youth, Clifford A. Stewart

Doctoral Dissertations

Academic achievement in foster youth can be influenced by factors related to the foster care experience. The purpose of this study was to determine if gender, ethnicity, time in placement, type of placement, number of placements, and special education status could predict high school graduation in foster youth. To conduct the study a group of foster youth that graduated from high school (n=390) was compared to a group of foster youth that did not graduate from high school (n-400). Sample data were fit to a logistic regression prediction model on the independent variables of gender, ethnicity, time in placement, type …

Academic Language Teaching And Learning In The Third Space Classroom: A Preservice Teachers' Perspective, Cinzia Forasiepi

Doctoral Dissertations

The increased percentage of immigrant children in the public school system in the United States has challenged schools to provide adequate academic language instruction to reach the same levels as their monolingual peers. Teachers must demonstrate the ability to support the development of academic language in accordance to both the standards' requirements and the linguistic needs of culturally and linguistically diverse students. It is very important to shed light on teacher preparation programs and how they support their candidates to develop a pedagogy that can best respond to students' needs. This study explore the beliefs and practices of preservice teachers …

Early Education In California : Communicative Action In The Public Sphere, Yolanda Garcia

Doctoral Dissertations

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Text And Mimesis : Reconfiguring Technology And Adult Learning, Nicholas P. Recchia

Doctoral Dissertations

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