Digital Commons Network^™

Counselor Educators’ Perceptions Of Working With Students Who Are Unwilling To Set Aside Their Religious Beliefs When Counseling Clients: A Qualitative Study, Michael G. Saussaye

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore counselor educators’ perceptions of working with students unwilling to set aside their personal religious beliefs while counseling clients. Purposeful sampling was used in a snowball fashion to select participants with a minimum of one year experience as a counselor educator and who are currently working in the field of counselor education.

The participants of this study reported and described perceptions of their lived experiences as counselor educators. The primary research question for my study was what are the perceptions of counselor educators as they relate to working with students who are …

Factors Impacting Principals' Career Decision Making, Wylene M. Sorapuru

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Abstract

Federal legislation and educational programs such as No Child Left Behind (2001) and Race to the Top (2009) identify school leaders as one of the major catalysts to improving academic achievement. Increasing accountability demands call for replacement of the principal when adequate gains in student achievement are not met, yet research indicates that it takes at least five years to affect change (Fullan, 2006). Why then would any principal remain in an appointment as principal in a chronically low-performing school?

New principals generally stay no more than five to ten years in any one position (Dancy, 2007; NAESP, 1998). …

Pattern Recognition Of Power System Voltage Stability Using Statistical And Algorithmic Methods, Varun Togiti

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

In recent years, power demands around the world and particularly in North America increased rapidly due to increase in customer’s demand, while the development in transmission system is rather slow. This stresses the present transmission system and voltage stability becomes an important issue in this regard. Pattern recognition in conjunction with voltage stability analysis could be an effective tool to solve this problem

In this thesis, a methodology to detect the voltage stability ahead of time is presented. Dynamic simulation software PSS/E is used to simulate voltage stable and unstable cases, these cases are used to train and test the …

Perceptions Of The Ordinary, Natalie J. Tobacyk

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

ABSTRACT

This thesis explores the progression of my work through my graduate studies at the University of New Orleans. I examine the central psychological themes of the human experience. Through painting, drawing, printmaking, and sculpture, I investigate various ways of translating personal and universal experiences into open-ended visual allegories. These psychological narratives are intended to function ambiguously- allowing the viewer to develop their own ideas and responses to the work. Using the figure paired with symbols and also using mass-produced common objects to function as the figure; placing them in ambiguous environments, I juxtapose physical and psychological spaces that evoke …

Votary, Mary Bamburg

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.

A Multigroup Analysis Of The Psychological Factors That Contribute To Persisting Working Attention Problems In Mild Traumatic Brain Injury And Chronic Pain, Kelly L. Curtis

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

A significant subset of mild traumatic brain injury (mild TBI) and chronic pain (CP) patients report, and sometimes show objective evidence of, persisting cognitive problems. Despite differences in injury mechanisms, there is considerable overlap in the types of persisting cognitive symptoms that are reported by the two populations. Psychogenic, rather than physiogenic, factors are thought to play an important role in the maintenance of these persisting symptoms. The current investigation examined the contributions somatization, depression, and anxiety had on an objective measure of “working attention.” In order to best elucidate the influences these psychological factors had on attentional performance, only …

Synthesis And Biological Evaluation Of Rigid Analogues Of Methamphetamines, Andrea N. Forsyth

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

A series of rigid azetidenyl-based methamphetamine analogs were synthesized from commercially available N-Boc-azetidinone. The benzylideneazetidine analogs were prepared via a Wittig olefination via the ylides generated from the corresponding triphenylphosphonium benzylhalide salts. The substituted benzylazetidine analogs were synthesized from the corresponding benzylideneazetidienes via hydrogention over palladium and platinum catalysts. The benzylideneazetidine and benzyliazetidine analogs were evaluated at monoamine transporters as a part of preliminary structure-activity study for the development of novel monoamine transporter ligands. The binding affinities of the azetidine analogs were determined at dopamine (DAT) and serotonin (SERT) transporters in rat brain tissue preparations. The preliminary in vitro …

Everyday Rituals, Chen Gu

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This thesis traces the trajectory of Chen Gu’s work over a three year period, looking at major influences such as Bustos and Saville, on her painting and film projects. She explores the concept of childhood, memory, and portraiture.

Software For Estimation Of Human Transcriptome Isoform Expression Using Rna-Seq Data, Kristen Johnson

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

The goal of this thesis research was to develop software to be used with RNA-Seq data for transcriptome quantification that was capable of handling multireads and quantifying isoforms on a more global level. Current software available for these purposes uses various forms of parameter alteration in order to work with multireads. Many still analyze isoforms per gene or per researcher determined clusters as well. By doing so, the effects of multireads are diminished or possibly wrongly represented. To address this issue, two programs, GWIE and ChromIE, were developed based on a simple iterative EM-like algorithm with no parameter manipulation. These …

Traumatic And Healing Memory In Leslie Marmon Silko's Ceremony And Toni Morrison's Song Of Solomon, Ambata K. Kazi-Nance

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

A comparative analysis of Leslie Marmon Silko’s Ceremony and Toni Morrison’s Song of Solomon, with a focus on individual as well as collective memory work in historically marginalized indigenous and African-American communities, respectively. This represents a critical study of how the novels invoke progressive and redemptive models of remembering, as well as foreground the role of spiritual guides in the transformative process from trauma towards healing.

Perceptions Of College Readiness And Social Capital Of Ged Completers In Entry-Level College Courses, Donalyn L. Lott

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Abstract

Examining the efficacy of literacy improvement, general education development (GED) completion, and GED completers’ perceptions of college readiness and social capital was the purpose of this study. The participant sample (n=321), derived from the target population (N=1050), consisted of former participants of Adult Literacy Education (ALE)/GED programs in the Greater New Orleans area (GNO), who have earned the GED credential, and, are currently enrolled in entry-level courses at two community colleges in Southeast Louisiana; specifically, in Orleans and St. Bernard parishes. The study was framed by the social capital theoretical perspective.

The study used quantitative methodology, with …

Rooftop Cities, Tammi L. Mccune

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

N/A

Momentum, Nonlinear Price Discovery And Asymmetric Spillover: Sovereign Credit Risk And Equity Markets Of Emerging Countries And, Geoffrey M. Ngene

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

In Chapter 1, I hypothesize that there is a differential response by agents to changes in sovereign credit or default risk in both quiet (low default risk) and turbulent markets (high default risk). These market conditions create two different states of the market (world) or regimes. Investors and policy makers respond differently in the two regimes but the response in the turbulent market condition is amplified as policy makers attempt to smoothen the fluctuations and uncertainty while investors rebalance their portfolios in an attempt to hedge against downside risk of wealth loss. In the two regimes, the short run and …

The Social Construction Of A Public/Private Neighborhood: Examining Neighbor Interaction And Neighborhood Meaning In A New Orleans Mixed-Income Development, Kelly D. Owens

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

To understand the complexities involved with neighboring in public/private mixed-income communities, I conducted an ethnographic study of a HOPE VI site in a gentrifying neighborhood in New Orleans. Data was collected through 48 interviews, observation, mental maps, and casual encounters with residents living in the predominantly African American redeveloped St. Thomas Housing Development – renamed River Garden. I analyzed residents’ neighboring processes and how they socially constructed space, leading to the identification of several phenomena that shaped neighbor interaction in River Garden. As with previous HOPE VI neighborhood studies, within-group interaction was prevalent while cross-class interaction remained limited. Mechanisms that …

Deep Play, Urban Space, Adolescent Place: A Multi-Sited Study Of The Effects Of Settings On Adolescent Risk/Reward Behavior, Benjamin A. Shirtcliff

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

The extant literature on the play behavior of youth normalizes adolescent behavior in public space as transgressional, resistant, and in need of social control. The dissertation counters this trend by looking to see if physical qualities, peer effects, and neighborhood context of settings play a deeper role in youth behavior. The study documented urban context, peer effects, physical features, and play behavior across 21 urban settings in New Orleans. Unobtrusive observations employed a highly innovative technique based on YouTube videos and analyzed using hierarchical linear modeling. Coded observations of risk-taking and prosocial behavior demonstrated some stability in behavior amongst adolescents—“youth” …

A Mandala Of Hands, John Warner Smith

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Fish Assemblage Dynamics And Red Drum Habitat Selection In Bayou St. John And Associated Urban Waterways Located Within The City Of New Orleans, Louisiana, Patrick W. Smith Mr.

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Bayou St. John (BSJ) and City Park Lakes and Lagoons (CPLL) are urban waterways in New Orleans, Louisiana. I studied habitat selection of red drum in BSJ, and fish assemblage change in BSJ and CPLL over 40 years. Temperature was found to be the best predictor of red drum habitat selection in Bayou St. John, while salinity and change in depth also were found to be good predictors for certain sites. Potential prey item abundance did not appear to influence habitat selection. Using data from 1971 – 2010, nearshore habitats in CPLL were affected by Hurricane Katrina, but have sense …

Examining The Relationship Between Louisiana Principals' Self-Efficacy Beliefs And Student Achievement, Jonathan C. Williams

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between Louisiana Principals’ self-efficacy beliefs and student achievement. This study was grounded in the research of Bandura’s model of triadic reciprocal causation and more recent research on principals’ self-efficacy beliefs. Using the Principals’ Sense of Efficacy Scale (PSES) (Tschannen-Moran & Gareis, 2004) measures of principals’ self-efficacy were collected and analyzed for (1) instructional leadership, (2) management, and (3) moral leadership.

Principals across the state of Louisiana were emailed a link to the PSES and were asked to provide the names of their schools and asked for the number of …

Design And Testing Of The Measuring System For The Characterization Of Magnetoelectric Composites, Thomas S. Ward Iv

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

The goal of this thesis is to design, build and test a new measurement system for comprehensive studies of the magnetoelectric and the converse magnetoelectric effect. The research on multiferroic composites is an emerging field of research and there is no commercially available equipment. The method proposed here for testing magnetoelectric properties of the multiferroics is relatively inexpensive and versatile. The advantage of the new method described below is that the same set of instruments in different configurations enables multiple measurements of various parameters characterizing multiferroic composites.

The system was tested using two samples Fe₇₈Si₁₀B_{12 …}

Synthesis And Characterization Of Sugar Based Low Molecular Weight Gelators, Hao Yang

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Low molecular weight gelators (LMWGs) have gained great attention over the past two decades. These compounds form self-assembled fibrous networks like micelles, cylindrical, sheets, fibers, layers and so on. The fibrous network entraps the solvent and form gel. LMWGs are interesting compounds with many potential applications in material and biomedical sciences.

Many different structures have been found to be good LMWGs. Our interests focus on the carbohydrate based LMWGs. Previously, we have found that several ester derivatives of methyl 4, 6-O-benzylidene-α-D-glucopyranoside are good gelators for organic solvents and aqueous solutions. In this study, in order to understand the …

An Investigation Of Mist/Air Film Cooling With Application To Gas Turbine Airfoils, Lei Zhao

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Film cooling is a cooling technique widely used in high-performance gas turbines

to protect turbine airfoils from being damaged by hot flue gases. Film injection holes are

placed in the body of the airfoil to allow coolant to pass from the internal cavity to the

external surface. The ejection of coolant gas results in a layer or “film” of coolant gas

flowing along the external surface of the airfoil.

In this study, a new cooling scheme, mist/air film cooling is proposed and

investigated through experiments. Small amount of tiny water droplets with an average

diameter about 7 μm (mist) is …

The Effects Of Rhes, A Striatal Specific Protein, On The Expression Of Behavioral And Neuropathological Symptoms In A Transgenic Mouse Model Of Huntington's Disease, Brandon A. Baiamonte

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Huntington's disease (HD) is a neuropsychiatric disorder characterized by choreiform movement of the limbs, cognitive disability, psychosis and dementia. It is untreatable, incurable, and ultimately fatal. HD is invariably associated with an abnormally long CAG expansion within the IT15 gene on human chromosome 4. Although the mutant huntingtin protein (mHtt) is ubiquitously expressed in HD patients, cellular degeneration occurs only in neurons within the striatum and cerebral cortex. The Ras homolog Rhes is expressed very selectively in the precise brain areas affected by HD. Recent work using cultured cells suggests that Rhes may be a co-factor with mHtt in cell …

“All This Was My Life”: Constructing Textual Self-Identity In Diaries, Christie M. Jeansonne

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

The ordering and control of experience through fictive selves, constructed in consideration of an audience of the self and others, is part of the diary’s identity-building and meaning-making function. This thesis analyzes the process by which the diaries of Virginia Woolf, Sylvia Plath, and Janet Schaw construct multiple textual identities and conceptualize their public and private selves. The projection of these multiple selves in the diary text serve to justify the private individual experience as extraordinary and worth telling, as well as to connect with a public community experience, relating the self to a greater socio-cultural context.

Yoshimura's Ghost: Essays On Rural Japan, Jen Cullerton Johnson

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Yoshimura’s Ghost: Essays on Rural Japan is a collection of six essays exploring the cultural phenomena and daily life of rural Japan. The collection represents my experiences of living as an educator, wife, and mother living in a post 9/11 world. Although not chronological, the essays flow episodically and illustrate examples of the social and cultural concepts that struck me as elements of otherness. Some of the essays in this collection examine the parallels between the exclusion and isolation I felt in Japan as compared to other marginalized groups. Several of the essays describe the culture of Japanese schooling, perhaps …

A Comparison Of Profiles And Expenditures Between Volunteer And Leisure Tourists For The New Orleans Metropolitan Statistical Area, Ksenia Kirillova

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This research compared the expenditure patterns, profiles, and trip characteristics of volunteer and leisure tourists in New Orleans. Survey research methods were used to obtain a sample of voluntourists that was compared to a leisure tourist sample obtained from secondary data. Visitors’ expenditures across six types of spending, demographics, and travel information were collected. Data analysis included eight t-tests that revealed that voluntourists’ spending was lower in five out of six categories, total daily expenditures, and total trip spending. Voluntourists spent more on local transportation but preferred cheaper accommodations and dining, seldom gambled, shopped little at the destination, and rarely …

The Damage Done And Other Stories, Jamie Larson

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Codemakers, Dawn Manning

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Codemakers is a book of poems by Dawn Manning divided into three sections: "Topophilia," "Goodwill," and "Women's Work."

Through Other I'S: Las Otras, Brenda Nettles Riojas

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

The “I” speaks in each of the poems presented; but whose I? The collection explores the use of personae, and gives voice to “the other” I’s/las otras, women who came before us and those who walk among us. Sometimes in English, sometimes in Spanish, sometimes the voices cross between languages. Written primarily in free verse, the poems are ordered to allow the mingling of languages from the speakers on the page. Through other eyes, some of the characters revive the past, speak from the grave. They provide a glimpse into what lies beyond the “I.” We hear the …

The Persistence Of Vengeance From Early Modern England To Postmodern New York, Dominic M. Sevieri

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

As a passing glance at the popular texts of any given period reveals, the subject of vengeance is nearly inescapable; on billboards, websites, and year end lists, revenge represents a curious constant even amid disparate media. This study explores the cultural commonalities that align revenge texts of the English Renaissance and exploitation films of late 20th century America. As in-depth inquiry reveals, numerous ideas and narrative tropes popularized during the Early Modern period are pushed to their logical extremes in these films. The central factor that aligns London during the Renaissance and New York at the cusp of the 1990s …

Growing Support: Localism, Nonprofits, And Food Access In Post-Katrina New Orleans, Brent Tranchina

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Problems with food insecurity, such as a lack of access to healthy and affordable food in low-income neighborhoods, has been an ongoing challenge in New Orleans. The damages inflicted by Hurricane Katrina and subsequent citywide flooding on the local food system reduced the numerical count of operational full-service supermarkets and grocery stores throughout the city. The result has been a widespread presence of food deserts and grocery gaps, particularly in low-income neighborhoods. This thesis explores the emergence of food localism practices by food advocacy professionals as a capacity-building tool for New Orleans residents to increase community food security and develop …