Digital Commons Network^™

American Cultural Icons In Museums, Alana Cole-Faber

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

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Conflict Resolution Challenges In Sudan And India: A Comparative Analysis Of Two Case Studies, Nivah Odwori

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

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A Study Of New Jersey's Assessment And Accountability System For Students With Disabilities And Its Impact On Special Education Services, Julie Moul Gardner

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

Use of high stakes assessment for special needs students is a key element in the current educational reform movement. State assessment systems use these tests to determine and report school accountability scores, distribute school funding, and assess school rewards and sanctions. The impact of including these students' test score on the district accountability reports has not yet been determined. Directors of special services, the primary individuals for supervising or coordinating district special education programs, have an extensive understanding of administrative and functional knowledge of special education services and are therefore able to provide insight concerning the impact of accountability on …

The Importance Of Icons For Corporate Identity For Start-Up Companies, Jillian K. Dunn

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

The objective of this research project is to look at the importance of icons, more specifically logos, for corporate identity in start-up companies, and why these logos are such a significant factor in the marketing of a company to its consumers. A logo's main purpose is to "project the company's intended image" (First Town Company Unlimited, 2000, p.1) and if properly completed then the logo becomes a significant part of the consumer/producer relationship. "The corporate identity dates back to Ancient Greece" and "hundreds of years later, it [ still] remains the vital aspect of any organization's identity; Logos offer a …

A Study Of The Qualities Of Effective Mentor Teachers, Eileen Mooney Cambria

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

A STUDY OF THE QUALITIES OF EFFECTIVE MENTOR TEACHERS The purpose of this study is to identify the attributes of teachers who are master teachers and exemplary mentors. This qualitative inquiry was designed to shed light on the values, attributes, beliefs and practices of these individuals as they relate to the art of teaching and mentoring novice teachers. A stable faculty provides schools with a strong support structure that enables students to achieve high levels of instruction and new teachers the high quality of mentoring needed during the first phase of their careers. Recruiting new teachers to fill the void …

A Study Of The Status Of The Strategic Planning Process As Used By Public School Districts In Six Suburban New York City Counties, Bartholomew Linehan

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

Over the past two decades, strategic planning has emerged as a management tool to assist administrators in leading public school districts forward. If strategic planning is an important administrative tool in moving a school district toward its vision, how and in what form is it being utilized in suburban New York City school districts? The purpose of this study was to understand the utilization of strategic planning in suburban New York City school districts and to understand the constraints, training and technical needs regarding strategic planning. This study also discusses the relationship existing between strategic planning and the key district …

The Creation Of A Communication Guide For The Project Manager Implementing A Student Information System, Kimberly A. Momballou

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

The objective of this research project is to create a communication guide for the project manager responsible for implementing a student information system on a college or university campus. The implementation of a student information system may be among the most difficult challenges that are faced in higher education due to the sensitivity of the data involved, the number of employees that will be involved in the project and the potential impact on the entire campus community. Most implementations take far greater than twelve months to complete and have been known to last for several years causing a substantial strain …

Leadership, Communication & Basketball: A Case Study On The Differences And Similarities In Leadership And Coaching Styles Between A Collegiate Basketball Coach And A Professional Basketball Coach, Matthew G. Rose

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

So you consider yourself a fan of basketball. You have a favorite college team and player as well as a favorite professional team and player. You've been to tons of professional and college basketball games in your lifetime, but have you ever stopped to notice the differences between the two? For example, why do college players foul out of the game after five fouls and pros after six? If a professional player behaves in a negative manner, he gets a fine. If a college player does the same, there's no fine, he gets suspended. Are the punishments equal? If you …

A Validation Study Of The Administrator Data Use Survey, Francis Nicholas Sheboy

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

The purpose of this study was to create an original instrument, the Administrator Data Use Survey (ADUS), to assess practicing school administrators' perceptions of the importance of data to school improvement, the importance of data to their position, and the degree to which they feel their graduate preparation in educational administration adequately prepared them for the data use demands of their position. Validation panels were used to assess construct, content, criterion, and face validity of the ADUS. In addition, factor analysis was utilized for construct validation. The ADUS was sent to a random sampling of practicing administrators from New York …

Being Muslim In 21st Century America: Does Living In America Create An Identity Crisis For The Generation X Muslim Woman?, Laila Uddin

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

Over the years, I've observed South Asian females and males alike struggling to fulfill religious and cultural obligations to their family while fitting in with the norms of society. I also learned of the term "ABCD" which stands for American Born Confused Desi. This refers to people of Desi or South Asian origin living in the United States. "Confused" refers to their confusion regarding their identity from either being born in America or living here since an early age and having been exposed to American culture more than their ancestral culture. That is when I realized that I was not …

The Politics And Economics Of Health: A Cross-National Comparison Of Civic Engagement And Health Status, Suzanne J. Wood

School of Public Service Theses & Dissertations

Over the past two decades, various structural modifications associated with the provision of national health and its systems have been undertaken. The preponderance of liberalization experiences have occurred in the absence of epidemiological, political, or social considerations associated with adoption and implementation. Often, financial and political manipulation by international organizations and powerful foreign governments has served as the impetus for fundamental shifts leading to an asymmetrical distribution of resources by population density, geography, and along various socio-cultural boundaries. Consequently, structural adjustments have resulted in unpredictable and divergent outcomes with regard to health status. The question of whether or not health …

Diverse Effects Of Nanosecond Pulsed Electric Fields On Mammalian Cells, Jody Anne White

Theses and Dissertations in Biomedical Sciences

The continuing effort to manipulate cell-signaling pathways for therapeutic benefit has lead to the exploration of electric field effects on cells. Current electric field applications include electroporation of the plasma membrane for introduction of drugs, genes, or other macromolecules into cells. Modeling of how these pulsed electric fields affect cells depicts the cell as an excitable circuit. In this model, the electric fields, administered in short pulses to a cell, charge the plasma and internal membranes, which act as dielectric layers, and between these the cytoplasm acts as a conductive medium. The pulse lengths of this treatment are traditionally in …

Engineering Education Through Service-Learning In Developing Communities: Two Case Studies, Evan A. Thomas, Andrew Azman

Mechanical and Materials Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

This paper provides case studies of two service learning projects that University of Colorado at Boulder (CU-Boulder) students are integrating into their academic experience. The projects focus on developing communities and are managed under the auspices of Engineers Without Borders-USA (EWB-USA), a group founded by Dr. Bernard Amadei, Professor of Civil Engineering at CU-Boulder. These projects expand students? understanding of the social value of their chosen profession, and expose them to a type of engineering significantly different than what is presented in most of their classes. Specifically, focusing on developing communities provides students with the opportunity to design solutions to …

Buffy Never Goes In Alone: The Rhetorical Construction Of Feminism In Buffy And The Vampire Slayer's Final Season, Susan M. Payne-Mulliken, Valerie R. Renegar

Iowa Journal of Communication

This essay is a rhetorical criticism of the final season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer (BtVS) and examines how metaphor is used to rhetorically construct feminist concepts. The essay specifically analyzes the metaphoric construction of the patriarchy and the feminist concept of sisterhood in the final season of BtVS. A thorough analysis reveals that the above ideas, represented via metaphor, are frequent and crucial components of the final season's plot. By using metaphor as a way to shape reality, BtVS communicates feminist ideals to its audience, thereby contributing to their overall perception of the movement.

Embracing The Imaginary Good Mother: Narratives Of Love And Violence From Women Who Killed Their Children, Barbara Barnett

Iowa Journal of Communication

Western culture positions motherhood as a divine calling, and this construct makes the notion that women would harm her children seem baffling and unnatural. This qualitative analysis of news articles seeks to understand maternal violence by analyzing narratives told by women who killed their children. Findings reveal that women who harmed their children portrayed themselves as loving and protective and dismissed their violent actions as accidents or missteps. Women understood society's expectation that mothers be all-loving and all-knowing, and internalized the good mother myth, constructing stories of themselves as caring and nurturing even when their actions were hurtful and destructive.

The Social Construction Of Wife Beating In Political Discourse, Gretchen Arnold

Iowa Journal of Communication

The issue of wife beating was a common topic of political discourse in 19th century America. After the turn-of-the-century, however, the issue dropped from public view and resurfaced only when contemporary feminists reframed the problem. My paper explains why this issue disappeared from, and then returned to, the political scene. I use contemporary frame analysis to analyze the specific frames to interpret wife beating that appeared in political discourse and tie them to cultural and institutional developments as well as to the work of specific social movements. in particular, I argue that the moral significance each frame gave -or denied- …

Front Matter - Table Of Contents

Iowa Journal of Communication

No abstract provided.

Relation Of Riparian Buffer Strips To In-Stream Habitat, Macroinvertebrates And Fish In A Small Iowa Stream, Jeremy P. Duehr, Michael J. Siepker, Clay L. Pierce, Thomas M. Isenhart

Journal of the Iowa Academy of Science: JIAS

Macroinvertebrate and fish habitat is often degraded as a result of agriculture. Riparian buffer strips are commonly used to counteract the negative effects of agriculture in headwater streams. We assessed the relation of multi-aged riparian buffer strips to in-stream habitat, macroinvertebrate and fish assemblages in an Iowa stream. In-stream habitat, macroinvertebrates, and fish were sampled from two buffered sites and two unbuffered sites, with the greatest substrate, water depth, and velocity heterogeneity occurring in buffered sites. The highest macroinvertebrate richness (11) as well as fish species richness (14), diversity (1.99) and IBI score (3 7) were found in the site …

Research Plan And Preliminary Results - A Field Research Site For Emerging Contaminants In Iowa, Douglas J. Schnoebelen, Dana W. Kolpin, Larry B. Barber, Edward T. Furlong, Michael M. Meyer, Mary Skopec

Journal of the Iowa Academy of Science: JIAS

Research has recently documented the prevalence of a wide variety of pharmaceuticals and other emerging contaminants (ECs) in streams across the United States. Wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) have been found to be an important source and collection point of ECs to streams as many ECs are incompletely removed during treatment. To investigate the complex instream processes (e.g., dilution, sorption, degradation, dispersion, etc.) chat can affect ECs following their input from a WWTP and determining if such input is having an effect on the aquatic ecosystem requires the integration of multi-disciplinary efforts at a carefully selected field site. Preliminary work has …

The Honey Creek Member: A New Holocene Alluvial Stratigraphic Unit In The Midwest, Jeremy S. Dillon, Rolfe D. Mandel

Journal of the Iowa Academy of Science: JIAS

This paper describes the type locality and type section for the Honey Creek Member, a stratigraphic unit first recognized in the Honey Creek drainage in southeastern Nebraska. The alluvial chronology for Honey Creek basin is similar to the regional chronology of streams in the Midwest, and all of the formal members of the DeForest Formation occur in the basin. However, the lithology of one unit, the Honey Creek Member, does not correlate with any of the formally recognized members of the DeForest Formation. The Honey Creek Member is composed of grayish brown silt loam overbank facies coarsening downward to a …

Silicification Of Corals, Stromatoporids, And Brachiopods At The Weathered Surface Within The Devonian-Age Little Cedar Formation (Solon And Rapid Members) In Eastern Iowa, Adam L. Majeski, Paul L. Garvin

Journal of the Iowa Academy of Science: JIAS

Diagenesis of fossils contained in middle-Devonian limestones was studied at the Troy Mills and Robins quarries in Linn County, Iowa and at the Four County and Ernst quarries in Johnson County, Iowa. Fossils located at weathered bedrock surfaces were preferentially silicified, and the silicification affected corals, stromatoporids and, to a limited extent, brachiopods, but not other fossils or the host rock. The siliceous horizon extends no more than a few centimeters below the weathered surfaces, suggesting that silicification was constrained by them. Silica for silicification might have come from a variety of sources, including sponge spicules or radiolarian tests, insoluble …

Relation Of Riparian Buffer Strips To In-Stream Habitat, Macroinvertebrates And Fish In A Small Iowa Stream, Jeremy P. Duehr, Michael J. Siepker, Clay L. Pierce, Thomas M. Isenhart

Journal of the Iowa Academy of Science: JIAS

Macroinvertebrate and fish habitat is often degraded as a result of agriculture. Riparian buffer strips are commonly used to counteract the negative effects of agriculture in headwater streams. We assessed the relation of multi-aged riparian buffer strips to in-stream habitat, macroinvertebrate and fish assemblages in an Iowa stream. In-stream habitat, macroinvertebrates, and fish were sampled from two buffered sites and two unbuffered sites, with the greatest substrate, water depth, and velocity heterogeneity occurring in buffered sites. The highest macroinvertebrate richness (11) as well as fish species richness (14), diversity (1.99) and IBI score (37) were found in the site buffered …

Incorporating Reading Comprehension Tools Into An Anatomy And Physiology Curriculum, Stephanie Monahan

Graduate Research Papers

During the 2003-2004 school year, Hempstead High School in Dubuque, Iowa was one of several schools in the state selected to pilot the Iowa Professional Development Model. The purpose of the Iowa Professional Development Model is to develop a link between professional development and increasing student achievement. A main component of the model plan is the implementation of research-based activities in the professional development plan of a school. Hempstead chose to focus all professional development time on how to produce independent readers/learners by incorporating reading strategies into all curricular areas. Over the course of two school years, a professional by …

2006 Anatomy Of A Panther, Northern University High School

Malcolm Price Laboratory School Yearbooks

The student yearbook of the Northern University High School, part of the Malcolm Price Laboratory School of the University of Northern Iowa.

2006 Anatomy Of A Panther: Northern University Middle School Yearbook, Northern University Middle School

Malcolm Price Laboratory School Yearbooks

The 2006 student yearbook of the Northern University Middle School, part of the Malcolm Price Laboratory School of the University of Northern Iowa.

A Dyadic Composition To Foster Virtual Team Effectiveness: An Experimental Study, Gamze Karayaz

Engineering Management & Systems Engineering Theses & Dissertations

The importance of effectiveness for virtual teamwork continues to gain momentum as technology and globalization of work accelerate. The implementation of virtual teams provides one approach to enhance competitiveness, overcoming the disadvantages of space and time differences through collaborative technologies. The influence of structure to virtual team performance has not been clearly established in the literature. The purpose of this research study was to investigate the effectiveness of a dyad structured approach for virtual teams using a quasi-experimental research design.

This research investigated four questions related to the influence of structure on virtual team effectiveness related to task performance, communication …

Automatic Speech Recognition Using Lp-Dctc/Dcs Analysis Followed By Morphological Filtering, Penny Hix

Electrical & Computer Engineering Theses & Dissertations

Front-end feature extraction techniques have long been a critical component in Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR). Nonlinear filtering techniques are becoming increasingly important in this application, and are often better than linear filters at removing noise without distorting speech features. However, design and analysis of nonlinear filters are more difficult than for linear filters. Mathematical morphology, which creates filters based on shape and size characteristics, is a design structure for nonlinear filters. These filters are limited to minimum and maximum operations that introduce a deterministic bias into filtered signals.

This work develops filtering structures based on a mathematical morphology that utilizes …

An Examination Of Differences Between Occupational-Technical Student And Transfer Student Engagement At Small Community Colleges In Virginia, Janet T. Laughlin

Educational Leadership & Workforce Development Theses & Dissertations

This study examined the differences in levels of student engagement between occupational-technical students and transfer students in an attempt to gain insight into why so many students fail to attain their educational goals. Students' engagement or involvement with their educational institution and program of study is considered a major contributor to persistence and graduation. Research on student engagement as it relates to persisters and leavers includes the five student engagement variables benchmarked by the Community College Survey of Student Engagement (CCSSE): (a) active and collaborative learning, (b) student effort, (c) academic challenge, (d) student-faculty interaction, and (e) support for learners. …

Workforce Investment Act Services: Effect On Dislocated Worker Reemployment, Martha A. Walker

Educational Leadership & Workforce Development Theses & Dissertations

The effect of WIA services on the gainful reemployment of Virginia's dislocated workers was explored using a mixed method, non-experimental, ex post factoresearch design. Analysis of variance with follow-up post hoc tests probed for statistically significant differences in hourly reemployed wage and weeks dislocated determined by (a) WIA service level, (b) impact of training, (c) characteristics of training completers and non-completers, and (d) impact of dislocated worker characteristics. Qualitative methods were used to search for trends and patterns defined by the perceptions of both dislocated workers and employers.

Between 2000 and 2004, Virginia's dislocated workers averaged 1.5 years of …

Structure-Function Studies Of The Camp-Dependent Protein Kinase In Vitro And In Intact Cells, Gary Z. Morris

Theses and Dissertations in Biomedical Sciences

There are 518 protein kinase genes in the human genome; this constitutes about 1.7% of all human genes. The cAMP-dependent protein kinase (PKA) serves as the prototypic model for the study of kinases because it contains a conserved catalytic core shared with all eukaryotic kinases, it is the simplest kinase, and it is one of the best-characterized serine/threonine kinases. PKA is ubiquitous in mammals and regulates multiple physiological mechanisms such as the cell cycle, apoptosis, cell motility, energy metabolism, and gene transcription through a well-defined intracellular signaling pathway. While PKA clearly has a central physiological role it is still unclear …