Digital Commons Network^™

The Relationship Between African American Students' Self-Beliefs And Beliefs About Teachers And Academic Outcomes And Disciplinary Referrals, James Matthew Thompson

Dissertations

This research study addressed a facet of the academic achievement gap regarding students' beliefs. The specific area that was examined is African American students' self-belief and beliefs about their teachers, while Caucasian students were used as a comparative group. The sample consisted of 34 African American and 65 Caucasian fifth-grade students from a southeastern public school district. The purpose of the study was to explore correlations between beliefs and African American students' academic outcomes. The theoretical foundations regarding beliefs, cultural context, and stereotype threat that were explored in this study addressed the variables located in Chapter III: Methodology. Additionally, these …

Factors Associated With Attitudes Toward Learning In An Online Environment: Transactional Distance, Technical Efficacy, And Physical Surroundings, Jodi Elizabeth Pettazzoni

Dissertations

This study examines the relationship between a student's environment in an online course and their academic achievement. This study surveyed students who completed world literature classes in an online format that were part of their universities' general education curricula. Students responded to items assessing several constructs and personal demographic variables that together defined their learning environments: content, delivery, assessment and feedback, technical support, learner experience with technology, learner experience with distance learning, interaction, physical space, support network, characteristics of adult learners, and major. Academic achievement was the dependent variable and was defined as anticipated grade in the course. Using Spearman …

Post-Disaster Effects Of Hurricane Katrina On Significantly Affected College Students Compared To Moderately Affected College Students, Charles Thomas Coleman

Dissertations

This quantitative study used independent t tests to explore the level of significance with four dependent variables of educational effects (grades), financial impact (monetary hardship), physiological effects (aches, pains, or injury), and psychological effects (mental stability or illness) related to significantly affected students and moderately affected students of post- Hurricane Katrina. To determine if there was a significant difference between moderately affected students compared to significantly affected students, a questionnaire specific to the dependent variables was administered to The University of Southern Mississippi (USM) students.

Data gathered in this study suggested the greatest significant difference among significantly affected students and …

Effectiveness Of Before And After-School Tutoring Programs As Measured By The Mississippi Curriculum Test, Patricia Marie Goyette

Dissertations

In the era of high-stakes testing and increased accountability, the state of Mississippi has implemented the Mississippi Curriculum Test (MCT) in alignment with No Child Left Behind. Students scoring basic or minimal on the MCT are considered to be working below grade level. In response, many districts have begun tutoring students before or after school in an attempt to increase student learning. The purpose of this study was to determine if students who participated in out-of-school tutoring programs during one school year exhibited significantly more growth, as defined in the Mississippi Student Achievement Act and the No Child Left Behind …

Knowledge Of Pain Management In Older Adults As A Content Area For Continuing Professional Education For Licensed Nurses, Wanda Cleveland Dubuisson

Dissertations

The research of the last 30 years has revealed the inadequacy of pain management in the older adult. Although evidenced-based clinical practice guidelines exist to direct the management of pain in the older adult, health care providers are either unaware or lack the proper understanding of the guidelines. This study investigated the differences in knowledge of pain management in older adults when examining licensed acute care nurses and extended care nurses. It sampled 118 acute care nurses working in two hospitals in Mississippi and 78 extended care nurses working in six extended care facilities (ECF) in Mississippi.

Based upon the …

Factors Related To Nonacademic Adjustment Of Freshmen Students, Nykela Horne Jackson

Dissertations

Student retention remains a major concern of higher education institutions. With decreasing state funding, higher education institutions have implemented creative strategies and methods to recruit students. Once students are recruited it is critical that they be retained. Research has confirmed that student withdrawals can be attributed to the lack of successful transition and adjustment to the college environment. Numerous studies have focused on how demographic factors (socioeconomic status, race, employment, and parental education level) affect retention with the major focus on academic adjustment. Current research has shown that nonacademic adjustment (social adjustment, personal/emotional adjustment, and institutional attachment) plays a significant …

The Influence Of Verbal Aggressiveness And Verbal Argumentativeness On College Student Leadership Styles, Jane Anne Mattina

Dissertations

The behaviors and styles of leaders have been studied for many years yet, the study of college study leaders has not been as prevalent. This study examined the possible relationships between the levels of verbal aggressiveness and verbal argumentativeness and college student leadership styles as described by the Student Leadership Practices Inventory (Kouzes & Posner 1995).

Using quantitative and qualitative approaches with multiple college student leadership groups at three different universities and community colleges, this study found that college student leaders are less verbally aggressive than student non-leaders, and are more verbally argumentative than student non-leaders. Furthermore, positive and negative …

Online Delivery At Traditional Institutions: Faculty Concerns And Knowledge About Intellectual Property Rights, La Toya Monique Hart

Dissertations

This study was designed to provide information to administrators about concerns faculty might have with online delivery and to assess their overall knowledge about intellectual property rights at traditional institutions. Faculty from the eight institutions under the Mississippi Institutions of Higher Learning were invited to participate in the study regardless of whether they participate in online delivery or not. The results of this study will allow administrators and faculty an opportunity to address concerns and explore putting written policies.

Faculty reported low levels of concerns about legal issues and rewards. Of greatest concern were those issues regarding workload/effort where there …

The Relationship Between The Teacher's Perception Of The Principal's Leadership Style And Personal Motivation, Aletta Marie Price

Dissertations

Educators world wide are shaping the future by the quality of education that they provide to the youth of today. Today's future relies on the impact teachers make on their students. Society, social security, and economic development are all dependent on future generations. Teachers are molding those future generations. It is no secret that if a teacher is motivated to do his/her best at enhancing education, that students have a better chance at being successful. Furthermore, if principals are exhibiting behaviors that improve teacher motivation, the result is not only an increase in student achievement, but a more successful school …

The Perceptions Of Superintendents Regarding The Need For Graduate Business Classes In Educational Leadership, Howard Leland Smith

Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to explore the comprehensiveness of educational leadership programs regarding the extent of appropriate business knowledge attained by public school administrators. Portions of the study included a discussion of current licensing practices, academic governance, basic business requirements for leadership and management, and basic financial literacy. A further purpose was to measure the perception of how the inclusion of specific business-oriented graduate education in the certification process might increase the initial success of administrators.

The literature review supported the concept that superintendents understand change management and fiscal responsibility. Survey respondents supported these concepts by indicating the …

Communication, Crisis, And Identity: Dialectical Tensions In Family Narratives About Hurricane Katrina, Laura Poole Rogers

Dissertations

In this study victims of Hurricane Katrina ordered their experiences with the crisis into meaningful themes which expressed their values, actions, inactions, occupations, needs and losses, and feelings. In interviews participants explained what happened, when it happened, how they responded, how they thought they should have responded, and how they handled situations surrounding the storm. Narratives about situations after the storm revealed descriptions of their and others' relationships in interactions with representatives of larger social units. The dialectical analysis revealed dialectical tensions that emphasized participants' dynamic and changing relationships and identities. Dialectical analysis of narratives about those relationships revealed dialectical …

Homotopy Perturbation Method And Padé Approximants For Solving Flierl-Petviashivili Equation, Syed T. Mohynd-Din, Muhammad A. Noor

Applications and Applied Mathematics: An International Journal (AAM)

In this paper, we present a reliable combination of homotopy perturbation method and Padé approximants to investigate the Flierl-Petviashivili (FP) equation. The approach introduces a new transformation necessary for the conversion of the Flierl-Petviashivili equation to a first order initial value problem and a reliable framework designed to overcome the difficulty of the singular point at x = 0. The proposed homotopy perturbation method is applied to the reformulated first order initial value problem which leads the solution in terms of transformed variable. The desired series solution is obtained by making use of the inverse transformation. The suggested algorithm may …

December 1, 2008, James Madison University

The Breeze, 2000-2009

The Breeze is the student newspaper of James Madison University in Harrisonburg, Virginia.

Northwest Area Water Supply Project Final Environmental Impact Statement On Water Treatment

United States Fish and Wildlife Service: Publications

For many years, residents of northwestern North Dakota have experienced water supply problems. Existing ground water sources are of poor quality and the Souris River is a marginal source from both a quality and quantity standpoint. To resolve these problems, the Northwest Area Water Supply project (Project) is being constructed. This Project is a bulk water supply system that will serve the municipal and rural water needs of the Project area (Figure 1). The planning, design and construction of the Project is a cooperative effort between the Bureau of Reclamation (Reclamation) and the State of North Dakota. Reclamation provides technical …

Mathematical Justification Of Spectral/Covariance Techniques: On The Example Of Arc Detection, Jan Beck, David Nemir, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

Detecting arcing faults is an important but difficult-to-solve practical problem. Many existing methods of arc detection are based upon acquiring a signal that is proportional to current and then making an analysis of the signal's power spectrum (or, equivalently, its covariance function). Since the power spectrum, i.e., the absolute values of the Fourier transform, carries only partial information about the signal, a natural question is: why should we restrict ourselves to the use of this partial information? A related question is caused by the fact that even the most efficient methods still miss some arcing faults and/or lead to false …

Computing With Tensors: Potential Applications Of Physics-Motivated Mathematics To Computer Science, Martine Ceberio, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

In this paper, we explain what are tensors and how tensors can help in computing.

Why Catastrophic Organizational Failures Happen, Michael A. Roberto

Management Department Faculty Journal Articles

Excerpt from the introduction:

"The purpose of this chapter is to examine the major streams of research about catastrophic failures, describing what we have learned about why these failures occur as well as how they can be prevented. The chapter begins by describing the most prominent sociological school of thought with regard to catastrophic failures, namely normal accident theory. That body of thought examines the structure of organizational systems that are most susceptible to catastrophic failures. Then, we turn to several behavioral perspectives on catastrophic failures, assessing a stream of research that has attempted to understand the cognitive, group and …

Partial Automorphism Semigroups, Jennifer Chubb, Valentina Harizanov, Andrei Morozov, Sarah Pingrey, Eric Ufferman

Mathematics

We study the relationship between algebraic structures and their inverse semigroups of partial automorphisms. We consider a variety of classes of natural structures including equivalence structures, orderings, Boolean algebras, and relatively complemented distributive lattices. For certain subsemigroups of these inverse semigroups, isomorphism (elementary equivalence) of the subsemigroups yields isomorphism (elementary equivalence) of the underlying structures. We also prove that for some classes of computable structures, we can reconstruct a computable structure, up to computable isomorphism, from the isomorphism type of its inverse semigroup of computable partial automorphisms.

Fisheries Research Report No. 182 - A Likelihood Analysis Of Non-Indigenous Marine Species Introduction To Fifteen Ports In Western Australia, Justin I. Mcdonald

Fisheries Research Reports

As an island continent, Australia is heavily dependent upon maritime transport with over 95% of its imports and exports transported by ship (Australian State of the Environment Committee, 2001). With about one third of Australia’s coastline, Western Australia ranks fourth of the six states and territory in the number of known non-indigenous marine species.

In this study fifteen ports in Western Australia were assessed on the potential for non-indigenous marine species to become introduced through ballast water and biofouling. The overall vesselmediated incursion risk to Western Australian ports was calculated by summing the relative incursion threat posed by visits to …

After-School Programs And Reading Achievement, Jamie M. Mack

All Graduate Projects

The relationship between participating in an after-school program and accelerating reading levels was studied. Seventy-three fifth-grade students were pre- and posttested using the Gates-MacGinitie Reading Test to determine reading levels. Thirty-six of the 73 students participated in an on-going 21" Century Academic After-School Program. The other 37 did not. The results showed that there was no statistical difference between participating in an after-school program and accelerating reading levels. The study also broke down the data by gender. These results showed that there was no statistical difference between males who participated and males who did not; however, there was a significant …

Biological Responses In A Dynamic Bouyant River Plume, Mark A. Moline, Thomas K. Frazer, Robert Chant, Scott Glenn, Charles A. Jacoby, John R. Reinfelder, Jennifer Yost, Meng Zhou, Oscar Schofield

Biological Sciences

Buoyant river plumes are highly dynamic and often characterized by marked physical and chemical gradients that interact to drive biological responses. For example, interactions among factors resulting in algal growth (e.g., nutrient and light availability) and algal loss (e.g., sinking and zooplankton grazing) vary with spatiotemporal changes in physics and chemistry. The nature of these interactions profoundly influences the transfer and transformation of materials carried by the plume, including nutrients and metals. In April 2005, during the Lagrangian Transport and Transformation Experiment (LaTTE), water from the Hudson River recirculated in a nearshore eddy before moving southward to mix with relatively …

Three-Dimensional Microfluidic Devices Fabricated In Layered Paper And Tape, Andres W. Martinez, Scott T. Phillips, George M. Whitesides

Chemistry and Biochemistry

This article describes a method for fabricating 3D microfluidic devices by stacking layers of patterned paper and double-sided adhesive tape. Paper-based 3D microfluidic devices have capabilities in microfluidics that are difficult to achieve using conventional open-channel microsystems made from glass or polymers. In particular, 3D paper-based devices wick fluids and distribute microliter volumes of samples from single inlet points into arrays of detection zones (with numbers up to thousands). This capability makes it possible to carry out a range of new analytical protocols simply and inexpensively (all on a piece of paper) without external pumps. We demonstrate a prototype 3D …

Untangling The Debate: The Ethics Of Human Enhancement, Patrick Lin, Fritz Allhoff

Philosophy

Human enhancement, in which nanotechnology is expected to play a major role, continues to be a highly contentious ethical debate, with experts on both sides calling it the single most important issue facing science and society in this brave, new century. This paper is a broad introduction to the symposium herein that explores a range of perspectives related to that debate. We will discuss what human enhancement is and its apparent contrast to therapy; and we will begin to tease apart the myriad intertwined issues that arise in the debate: (1) freedom & autonomy, (2) health & safety, (3) fairness …

Tribal Nation Economics: Rebuilding Commercial Prosperity In Spite Of U.S. Trade Restraints - Recommendations For Economic Revitalization In Indian Country, Angelique A. Eaglewoman

Tulsa Law Review

No abstract provided.

Creative Civil Remedies Against Non-Indian Offenders In Indian Country, Hallie Bongar White, Kelly Gaines Stoner, James G. White

Tulsa Law Review

No abstract provided.

Dayton Business Leader, Winter 2008-09, University Of Dayton

Dayton Business Leader

The Dayton Business Leader, published out of the Office of Public Relations, later University Communications, then University Marketing and Communications, provided news from the University of Dayton School of Business Administration to alumni and friends. It was published from the late 1990s to about 2010.

A New Man: Masculine Confusion And Struggle In The Works Of Edith Wharton, Gary L. Crump

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

Edith Wharton’s male characters offer an important commentary on the evolving situation of the man in American society. Wharton did not wish for women to usurp all social positions from men but rather to claim their rightful position alongside them. Characters such as Lawrence Selden in The House of Mirth and Ralph Marvell in The Custom of the Country display the same characteristics of fear, passion, and vulnerability as do many of her primary female figures. Wharton’s societal concerns do not merely extend to that of her own sex but to that of the male in society who struggled with …

Saari’S Homographic Conjecture Of The Three-Body Problem, Florin Diacu, Toshiaki Fujiwara, Ernesto Pérez-Chavela, Manuele Santoprete

Mathematics Faculty Publications

Saari’s homographic conjecture, which extends a classical statement proposed by Donald Saari in 1970, claims that solutions of the Newtonian n-body problem with constant configurational measure are homographic. In other words, if the mutual distances satisfy a certain relationship, the configuration of the particle system may change size and position but not shape. We prove this conjecture for large sets of initial conditions in three-body problems given by homogeneous potentials, including the Newtonian one. Some of our results are true for n ≥ 3.

Determining Deviance: An Examination Of Stress And Antisocial Coping Among College Undergraduates, Julie R. Shelton

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

Stress and strain impact our ability to achieve success in the goals we set. To understand the stress process better, this study uses a survey of undergraduates in order to 1) identify types of stressful experiences, 2) understand the mediating role of negative emotions, 3) evaluate how stress and emotions are related to student involvement in alcohol and drug use and self injury.

In addition to such analyses, the present study investigates the extent to which these pathologies (i.e., from strain to emotions and behaviors) vary by gender. The general strain theory (GST) serves as a theoretical framework for the …

The Application Of Electrical Resistivity And Microgravity To Locate Tunnels Along The U.S.-Mexico Border At Calexico, Gina Lee Cesin

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

No abstract provided.