Digital Commons Network^™

Teacher Quality And Teacher Preparedness In Public Secondary Schools: Evidence From Sass 1999-2000, Xuejin Lu

Dissertations

In this study, I inquired into the quality of public secondary school teachers by examining what percentages of teachers were highly qualified in the fields of their main teaching assignment and in each specific field they taught. The focus was placed on the core academic fields (English, social studies, math, and science) and the subfields of science (chemistry, physics, earth science, and physical science). I also investigated whether there were possible variations in the distribution o f highly qualified teachers by school locations and by the percentages o f minority student enrollment in schools. Furthermore, I examined the relationship between …

Braveheart Pastors : The Role Of Courage In A Pastor's Ability To Lead The Local Church Effectively, Timothy James Farrell

ATS Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Outcome Of Endoscopic Therapeutic Interventions: Are They Different Among Various Non- Malignant Esophageal Diseases, Rustam Khan, Shahab Abid, Saeed Hamid, Z Abbas, Syed H Shah, Wasim Jafri

Section of Gastroenterology

Background: This study was carried out to evaluate and compare the outcome of various causes of non-malignant lesions of the esophagus after endoscopic therapeutic intervention.

Methods: A cohort of patients with non-malignant dysphagia presenting at Aga Khan University hospital, a tertiary care setting who underwent endoscopic intervention was studied. Response to treatment was evaluated by improvement in dysphagia score on a scale of 0-4 and weight gain.

Results:99 subjects (53 males) were included. Mean age was 48.6 +/- 17.2 years. Dysphagia for solids was present in 48%, for liquids in 3% and for both in 49% patients. Significant weight …

Genetic And Molecular Analysis Of Phytochromes From The Filamentous Fungus Neurospora Crassa, Allan C. Froehlich, Bosl Noh, Richard D. Vierstra, Jennifer Loros, Jay C. Dunlap

Dartmouth Scholarship

Phytochromes (Phys) comprise a superfamily of red-/far-red-light-sensing proteins. Whereas higher-plant Phys that control numerous growth and developmental processes have been well described, the biochemical characteristics and functions of the microbial forms are largely unknown. Here, we describe analyses of the expression, regulation, and activities of two Phys in the filamentous fungus Neurospora crassa. In addition to containing the signature N-terminal domain predicted to covalently associate with a bilin chromophore, PHY-1 and PHY-2 contain C-terminal histidine kinase and response regulator motifs, implying that they function as hybrid two-component sensor kinases activated by light. A bacterially expressed N-terminal fragment of PHY-2 covalently …

Crawdad: A Community Resource For Archiving Wireless Data At Dartmouth, David Kotz, Tristan Henderson

Dartmouth Scholarship

Wireless network researchers are seriously starved for data about how real users, applications, and devices use real networks under real network conditions. CRAWDAD (Community Resource for Archiving Wireless Data at Dartmouth) is a new National Science Foundation-funded project to build a wireless-network data archive for the research community. It will host wireless data and provide tools and documents to make collecting and using the data easy. This resource should help researchers identify and evaluate real and interesting problems in mobile and pervasive computing. To learn more about CRAWDAD and discuss its direction, about 30 interested people gathered at a workshop …

2005 - Boy Gets Girl Program, Neiu Theatre Department

Theatre Production Programs

Boy Gets Girl program

6th Meeting Of The States Parties To The Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention (2005), Apmbc

Global CWD Repository

Sixth Meeting of the States Parties to the Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines and on Their Destruction,

Zagreb, Croatia 28 November – 2 December 2005

External Evaluation Of Unicef Support To Rehabilitation/Reintegration Of Mine/Uxo Victims And Disabled People, Unicef

Global CWD Repository

Support for the rehabilitation and reintegration of mine victims and disabled people provided through the Child Protection Programme is well targeted and guided by an appropriately informed and considered strategy. The choice of projects covers several of the Programme's key focal areas including health and education, policy and mainstreaming of disability into humanitarian responses. Current partners provide the program good geographic coverage, effective use of existing resources and constructive engagement of government and community stakeholders. There is ample evidence that support from UNICEF's Child Protection Programme has played a significant role in reducing discrimination and promoting the full development and …

Equity Vs Excellence : A Preliminary Exploration Of Hong Kong's Education Reform, Anita, Y.K. Poon, Yiu Chung Wong

CAPS Working Paper Series

Although Hong Kong 's education system has long been criticized as lacking in creativity and putting too much emphasis on rote learning, on the whole it has served Hong Kong well in the past in that it has bred outstanding business, academic and po1itical leaders who maintained the competitive edge of Hong Kong. The traditional elite schools played a most important role in the process. The education reform, which is still on going, aims to overhaul the entire system by introducing the “through-road” model through changing the existing admission mechanism of Primary 1 and Secondary 1 students, combining different bandings …

The Gendering Of Modernity : The Colonial Body In Japanese And Taiwanese Literature = 性別與現代性 : 日本臺灣文學中的殖民身體, Faye Kleeman Yuan

Journal of Modern Literature in Chinese 現代中文文學學報

No abstract provided.

School Counselors' Concerns Regarding Effective Crisis Intervention For Students Of Diverse Backgrounds, Michelle Lynn Canada

Theses and Dissertations

Although school counselors routinely provide crisis intervention, minimal research has focused specifically on providing such services in a manner sensitive to multicultural and ethnically diverse students. Responses of a random national sample of school counselors (n = 276, 69% return rate) indicate that approximately half voice some sort of concern related to providing crisis intervention services to students from diverse backgrounds. The purpose of this study is to summarize school counselor's concerns, providing an initial understanding for this aspect of school-based crisis intervention. Additionally, school counselors' comments were further analyzed to examine possible relationships between the type of concern and …

Cornelius P. Lott And His Contribution To The Temporal Salvation Of The Latter-Day Saint Pioneers Through The Care Of Livestock, Gary S. Ford

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis combines two studies: the role of livestock in the temporal salvation of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the Mormon exodus of 1846 and Cornelius P. Lott's contribution in the care of cattle and sheep during that time period. At Winter Quarters, the Church and its members depended in large measure for their survival upon the sizeable cattle herds they had acquired prior to their exodus from Nauvoo and during their trek across Iowa. Church leaders relied on men like Lott, whose expertise in the care of livestock, contributed significantly to the salvation of the …

Saturation, World Ensembles, And Design: Death By A Thousand Multiplications?, Del Ratzsch

Faith and Philosophy: Journal of the Society of Christian Philosophers

No abstract provided.

Physical Cosmology In Relative Units, Victor Pervushin

Faith and Philosophy: Journal of the Society of Christian Philosophers

No abstract provided.

Non-Ideal Iris Recognition, Vivekanand Dorairaj

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Of the many biometrics that exist, iris recognition is finding more attention than any other due to its potential for improved accuracy, permanence, and acceptance. Current iris recognition systems operate on frontal view images of good quality. Due to the small area of the iris, user co-operation is required. In this work, a new system capable of processing iris images which are not necessarily in frontal view is described. This overcomes one of the major hurdles with current iris recognition systems and enhances user convenience and accuracy. The proposed system is designed to operate in two steps: (i) preprocessing and …

Multiagent Autonomous Energy Management, Shilpa B. Ganesh

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

The objective of this thesis is to design distributed software agents for reliable operation of integrated electric power systems of modern electric warships. The automatic reconfiguration of electric shipboard power systems is an important step toward improved fight-through and self-healing capabilities of naval warships. The improvements are conceptualized by redesigning the electric power system and its controls. This research focuses on a new scheme for an energy management system in the form of distributed control/software agents. Multiagent systems provide an ideal level of abstraction for modeling complex applications where distributed and heterogeneous entities need to cooperate to achieve a common …

Image Quality Assessment For Iris Biometric, Nathan D. Kalka

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Iris recognition, the ability to recognize and distinguish individuals by their iris pattern, is the most reliable biometric in terms of recognition and identification performance. However, performance of these systems is affected by poor quality imaging. In this work, we extend previous research efforts on iris quality assessment by analyzing the effect of seven quality factors: defocus blur, motion blur, off-angle, occlusion, specular reflection, lighting, and pixel-counts on the performance of traditional iris recognition system. We have concluded that defocus blur, motion blur, and off-angle are the factors that affect recognition performance the most. We further designed a fully automated …

Computer Aided Detection Of Defects In Frp Bridge Decks Using Infrared Thermography, Gajanan M. Lonkar

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

The objective of this research is to develop a turn-key system that is able to interface with the FLIR ThermaCAM S60 infrared camera and automatically capture and analyze defects in infrared images of FRP bridge decks. Infrared thermography is one of the nondestructive evaluation (NDE) techniques that are being used to locate defects (debonds and delaminations) in bridge components. It is a rapid data collection and interpretation technique having high sensitivity and reliability. Analysis of infrared images by human interpretation is dependent on the users knowledge and hence introduces ambiguity in the defect detection process.;This thesis investigates the use of …

Reconstruction Of Fingerprints From Minutiae Points, Jidnya A. Shah

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Most fingerprint authentication systems utilize minutiae information to compare fingerprint images. During enrollment, the minutiae template of a user's fingerprint is extracted and stored in the database. In this work, we concern ourselves with the amount of fingerprint information that can be elicited from the minutiae template of a user's fingerprint. We demonstrate that minutiae information can reveal substantial details such as the orientation field and class of the (unseen) parent fingerprint that can potentially be used to reconstruct the original fingerprint image.;Given a minutiae template, the proposed method first estimates the orientation map of the parent fingerprint by constructing …

Graphical User Interface For Three-Dimensional Fe Modeling Of Composite Steel Bridges, Aditya Vuchi

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

The goal of bridge engineers has always been to design economical structures that are safe, serviceable and durable. In order to assess the performance and safety of these bridges, one of the analytical methods employed is finite-element (FE) modeling. This method involves breaking down the bridge structure into an assembly of finite-sized elements. The behavior of the elements and the overall structure can be obtained by formulating a series of constitutive relationships and algebraic equations that can be readily solved with computer processors.;Extensive research is being carried out to develop efficient finite element programs for bridge design. As a part …

Real-Time Measurements Of Space Potential In Magnetized Plasma Using A Baffled Langmuir Probe, Sean M. Finnegan

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

An electrostatic probe for real-time measurements of space potential in magnetized plasma is tested in fully ionized, barium, Q-machine plasma. The tungsten wire probe tip, oriented perpendicular to the magnetic field, is partially shielded by ceramic baffles (masks). Rotation of the probe about its cylindrical axis, changes the fraction of electrons that can reach the probe tip along the magnetic field, enabling the ratio between the electron and ion saturation currents to be adjusted without changing the probe bias. When optimally shielded, accurate, real-time measurements of space potential can be acquired.

Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy As A Diagnostic Tool For Coal Fines, I. Andrew Aurelio

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Laser Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS) is a technique that uses a laser, to focus down and atomize a sample of desired material. Focusing of the laser onto the material causes a plasma formation, which the material is broken down into excited ionic and atomic states. The atoms then emit characteristic optical radiation. Collection of the emitted light can be used to provide information on the elemental composition of the material. This research investigates a fundamental study of laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) applied to coal samples, coal fines, and fly ash. During this research, apparatus and methodology were developed to quantify …

Robust Pre-Processing Techniques For Non-Ideal Iris Images, Purva M. Barve

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

The human iris has been demonstrated to be a very accurate, non-invasive and easy-to-use biometric for personal identification. Most of the current state-of-the-art iris recognition systems require the iris acquisition to be ideal. A lot of constraints are hence put on the user and the acquisition process.;Our aim in this research is to relax these conditions and to develop a pre-processing algorithm, which can be used in conjunction with any matching algorithm to handle the so-called non-ideal iris images. In this thesis we present a few robust techniques to process the non-ideal iris images so as to give a segmented …

America And China: Cultural Differences In Online Learning Motivation, Zongxiang Mei

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

There are learning motivation differences among students from different countries. And differences between American and Korean online learners were identified. This study was to identify whether American and Chinese online learners' motivation differed and what were the learner characteristics that affected the motivation of online learners. This study was conducted in May-June, 2005, West Virginia University, the United States of America, and Fudan University, China. Findings revealed that there was a significant difference in learning motivation between the U.S. and Chinese online learners. And there were some learner characteristics affected the learning motivation of online learners as well, such as …

Production Of Conjunctions And T-Units By The Elderly, Benjamin Haymond

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Recent research indicates a change in healthy elderly adult language capabilities. More specifically, Shadden (1997) and Ryan (1996) state that language competence is less affected by the processes of aging than production. The topic of this research examined specifically the production of conjunctions from the perspective of Halliday and Hasan (1976) in procedural and narrative discourse by the elderly. The hypothesis stated that the relationship between age and conjunctions produced would be non-significant. In a cross-sectional study, 17 subjects between the ages of 60-86 were interviewed and the transcripts analyzed.;Results supported the hypothesis of a non-significant relationship between age and …

Automated Dental Identification: A Micro-Macro Decision-Making Approach, Diaa Eldin M. Nassar

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Identification of deceased individuals based on dental characteristics is receiving increased attention, especially with the large volume of victims encountered in mass disasters. In this work we consider three important problems in automated dental identification beyond the basic approach of tooth-to-tooth matching.;The first problem is on automatic classification of teeth into incisors, canines, premolars and molars as part of creating a data structure that guides tooth-to-tooth matching, thus avoiding illogical comparisons that inefficiently consume the limited computational resources and may also mislead the decision-making. We tackle this problem using principal component analysis and string matching techniques. We reconstruct the segmented …

Putting Religious Symbolism In Context: A Linguistic Critique Of The Endorsement Test, B. Jessie Hill

Michigan Law Review

The treatment of Establishment Clause challenges to displays of religious symbolism by the Supreme Court and the lower courts is notoriously unpredictable: a crèche is constitutionally acceptable if it is accompanied by a Santa Claus house and reindeer, a Christmas tree, and various circus figures, but unacceptable if it is accompanied by poinsettias, a "peace tree," or a wreath, a tree, and a plastic Santa Claus. A menorah may be displayed next to a Christmas tree, or next to Kwanzaa symbols, Santa Claus, and Frosty the Snowman, but not next to a crèche and a Christmas tree. A number of …

The Toll For Traveling Students: Durational-Residence Requirements For In-State Tuition After Saenz V. Roe, Douglas R. Chartier

Michigan Law Review

After the excitement of getting into the college of her choice wears off, a student may soon wonder how she will pay for her newfound prize. Though higher education is almost always a sound investment given its potentially tremendous return and importance in getting a good job, the cost is daunting- sometimes even prohibitive-for many students. Public undergraduate and graduate schools are an attractive option for many students because of lower tuitions. Yet state universities deny many students the full measure of this benefit. Public universities usually charge significantly higher tuition rates to out-of-state students than in-state students. A nonresident …

Physis And Nomos In Aristotle's Ethics, Thornton C. Lockwood

The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter

In Nicomachean Ethics V.7, Aristotle claims that political justice (to dikaion politikon) possesses a “natural” (phusikon) pail and a “conventional” (nomikon) part In response to those who separated nature and convention and disparaged the latter because it was different from place to place, Aristotle claims that both nature and convention admit of variation, and his language suggests that the two are ultimately parts which need to be interwoven or combined. Scholars who have struggled with Aristotle’s apparently disparate senses of the idea of nature have assumed that nature is an ethical ideal which can be separated from and serve as …

Modeling, Parameter Identification, And Validation Of Reactant And Water Dynamics For A Fuel Cell Stack, D. A. Mckay, W. T. Ott, A. G. Stefanopoulou

Engineering: Faculty Publications

This paper describes a simple two-phase flow dynamic model that predicts the experimentally observed temporal behavior of a proton exchange membrane fuel cell stack and a methodology to experimentally identify tunable physical parameters. The model equations allow temporal calculation of the species concentrations across the gas diffusion layers, the vapor transport across the membrane, the degree of flooding in the electrodes, and then predict the resulting decay in cell voltage over time. A nonlinear optimization technique is used for the identification of two critical model parameters, namely the membrane water vapor diffusion coefficient and the thickness of the liquid water …