Digital Commons Network^™

Land Is Life, Land Is Power": Landlessness, Exclusion, And Deprivation In Nepal, Elisabeth Wickeri

Fordham International Law Journal

This Report presents the findings of this research effort. A comprehensive consideration of the many aspects of land ownership in Nepal, including the related issues of agricultural development, the impact of nonstate actors in newly-formed special economic zones, and the claims of landlords returning to land seized during the Maoist conflict is beyond the scope of this project. The Report and study focused on documenting the impact that inadequate access to land has on the human rights of landless people, including rights to housing, food, water, work, and access to justice. The Report consists of four parts. Part I provides …

Message From The Editor, Alexander N. Fondrier

Pepperdine Policy Review

Editor's introduction.

Against Doom And Gloom, Michael Crouch

Pepperdine Policy Review

Popular economic literature has been overcome by competition for trendy titles and unique subject matter. After all, authors dealing with topics other than the current financial crisis must provide publishers a reason to put out the book, and prompt readers to want to look at it. Yet, Matt Ridley seems to rise above it all in his most recent book, The Rational Optimist: How Prosperity Evolves (excepting, perhaps, his provocatively titled prologue). Ridley, a journalist by trade, has previously written about the fields of genetics and evolution and his skills make him a natural at answering two questions: how did …

Book Review: Into The Dark: Seeing The Sacred In The Top Films Of The 21st Century. By Craig Detweiler., Glenn J. Morrison

Theology Papers and Journal Articles

The art of interpretation demands good sense and sensibility before we can arrive at meaning. There are a multitude of choices and methods available. One popular option is to draw together theory and experience. Where we come to the world of theology and ‘top films of the 21^st Century,’ the synthesis of thematisation of ideas and representations of experience is a predictable choice. Following this synthetic approach yet developing it as something that can be recycled anew, the theologian and Hollywood script writer, Craig Detweiler, has produced engaging and often exciting reflections upon many top IMDb ranked films of …

Integration Of Visual Art For Small Worshipping Communities, Angela Mccarthy

Theology Papers and Journal Articles

A difficulty for small worshipping communities is having the resources and personnel to provide suitable enervating opportunities for reflection on the Word during worship that enriches and enlivens their community action. Research has shown that interaction with visual imagery assists contemplation and integration of text and will therefore assist those gathered to consider the Scripture of the day.

Student Ministry: Youth ‘Step Up’ To Lead And Serve, Chris Hackett, Shane D. Lavery

Education Papers and Journal Articles

This article is about student leadership and service in Catholic secondary schools. Initially the concept of leadership through service is explored with particular reference to the educational setting. The concept of “student ministry” is then considered in the light of this leadership and service. The article subsequently reports on an exploratory research study that focused on the experiences and reflections of principals and selected staff from three Catholic secondary schools involved in student ministry. Their experiences and reflections indicate that student ministry has the capacity to offer all students the chance to develop their leadership potential through acts of service, …

The Role Of Preservice Teachers’ Meaning Perspectives And Schemes In A Study Abroad Experience, Stephanie Wessels, Melissa Holmes, Socorro Herrera,

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Faculty Publications

This microethnographic case study focuses on patterns of interpretation and decision making of undergraduate preservice teachers as they participated in observations, co-teaching, and teaching in elementary schools in northern Mexico. At the core, this study explores the deeply embedded assumptions preservice teachers may bring to new cross-cultural interactions. Drawing from participant documents, surveys, and interviews, the study seeks to investigate the meaning perspectives and schemes (Mezirow, 1991) that study abroad participants used to make sense of their experiences. Also explored are ways the study abroad experience may have helped to alter or solidify meaning perspectives. Finally, recommendations based on lessons …

Pathways To Teaching: African American Male Teens Explore Teaching As A Career, Margarita Bianco, Nancy L. Leech, Kara Viesca

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Faculty Publications

The need for African American male teachers is clear ; however their pathway to teaching disrepair. This article shares research findings and a description of a pre-collegiate course designed to encourage high school students of color , including African American males explore teaching. More specifically, drawing from survey and interview data, the researchers examine factors that influence 11th and 12th grade African American males' (N consideration of a teaching career and explore the impact of a pre-collegiate pathway to teaching program. The results of this mixed methods study expose the complexity of effective recruitment while also demonstrating how a successful …

Evolution And Personal Religious Belief: Christian University Biology-Related Majors’ Search For Reconciliation, Mark Winslow, John Staver, Lawrence C. Scharmann

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Faculty Publications

The goal of this study was to explore Christian biology-related majors’ perceptions of conflicts between evolution and their religious beliefs. This naturalistic study utilized a case study design of 15 undergraduate biology-related majors at or recent biology-related graduates from a mid-western Christian university. The broad sources of data were interviews, course documents, and observations. Outcomes indicate that most participants were raised to believe in creationism, but came to accept evolution through evaluating evidence for evolution, negotiating the literalness of Genesis, recognizing evolution as a non-salvation issue, and observing professors as Christian role models who accept evolution. This study lends heuristic …

Developing Pck For Teaching Teachers Through A Mentored Internship In Teacher Professional Development, Deborah L. Hanuscin, Deepika Menon, Eun Ju Lee, Suleyman Cite

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Faculty Publications

Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK), according to Shulman (1987), is what makes possible the transformation of disciplinary content into forms that are accessible and attainable by students. This includes knowledge of how particular subject matter topics, problems, and issues can be organized, represented, and adapted to the diverse interests and abilities of learners and presented for instruction (Magnusson, Krajcik, & Borko, 1999). Recently, researchers have argued that a parallel form of PCK exists for science teacher educators (Abell et al., 2009). Nonetheless, little is known about the process through which teacher educators develop their PCK, and more specifically, how doctoral programs …

Moral Cleansing And Moral Licenses: Experimental Evidence, Pablo Brañas-Garza, Marisa Bucheli, Maria Paz Espinosa, Teresa García-Muñoz

ESI Working Papers

Research on moral cleansing and moral self-licensing has introduced dynamic considerations in the theory of moral behavior. Past bad actions trigger negative feelings that make people more likely to engage in future moral behavior to offset them. Symmetrically, past good deeds favor a positive self-perception that creates licensing effects, leading people to engage in behavior that is less likely to be moral. In short, a deviation from a “normal state of being” is balanced with a subsequent action that compensates the prior behavior. We model the decision of an individual trying to reach the optimal level of moral self-worth over …

(Bad) Luck Or (Lack Of) Effort?: Comparing Social Sharing Norms Between Us And Europe, Pedro Rey-Biel, Roman M. Sheremeta, Neslihan Uler

ESI Working Papers

We compare the determinants of individual giving between two countries, Spain and the US, which differ in their redistribution policies and their beliefs over the causes of poverty. By varying the information about the determinants of income, we find that, although overall giving is similar in both countries when subjects know the actual role of luck and effort, Spanish subjects give more when they are uninformed compared to American subjects. Using elicited beliefs, we find that this is due to Spanish subjects associating poverty with bad luck and Americans believing that low performers did not work hard enough.

Transparency, Efficiency And The Distribution Of Economic Welfare In Pass-Through Investment Trust Games, Thomas A. Rietz, Roman M. Sheremeta, Timothy W. Shields, Vernon Smith

ESI Working Papers

We design an experiment to examine welfare and behavior in a multi-level trust game representing a pass through investment in an intermediated market. In a repeated game, an Investor invests via an Intermediary who lends to a Borrower. A pre-experiment one-shot version of the game serves as a baseline and to type each subject. We alter the transparency of exchanges between non-adjacent parties. We find transparency of the exchanges between the investor and intermediary does not significantly affect welfare. However, transparency regarding exchanges between the intermediary and borrower promotes trust on the part of the investor, increasing welfare. Further, this …

Given The Choice: Family Values In California’S Largest School Districts, Raija Churchill

Pepperdine Policy Review

Through a quantitative analysis of twenty-five school districts, which are among the state’s largest, this research asks what policies school districts choose to implement when California’s Education Code gives them freedom to adopt or ignore policies that impact traditional moral beliefs and parental rights. These beliefs recognize that parents hold primary responsibility—and therefore, primary authority—when it comes to deciding questions such as sexual education.

Hope Worldwide Indonesia Positive Choice Program, Jillian Kissee

Pepperdine Policy Review

This document provides recommendations and guidance for HOPE worldwide Indonesia’s implementation of Positive Choice. It discusses the current HIV situation; obstacles the country faces in implementing a school-based HIV-drug prevention program; criteria for the start-up, approach, and implementation of Positive Choice; and finally recommendations for further action. On the basis of extensive field research, it is recommended that HOPE worldwide institute a curriculum-based HIV-drug prevention pilot program in Jakarta, the province with the third highest rate of HIV infections in the country. This program should be rooted in evidence-based effective practices which incorporate the Abstinence, Be faithful, and Condom use …

Cooperative Problem Solving Against Adversary: Quantified Distributed Constraint Satisfaction Problem, Satomi Baba, Atsushi Iwasaki, Makoto Yokoo, Marius C. Silaghi, Katsutoshi Hirayama, Toshihiro Matsui

Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Faculty Publications

In this paper, we extend the traditional formalization of distributed constraint satisfaction problems (DisCSP) to a quantified DisCSP. A quantified DisCSP includes several universally quantified variables, while all of the variables in a traditional DisCSP are existentially quantified. A universally quantified variable represents a choice of nature or an adversary. A quantified DisCSP formalizes a situation where a team of agents is trying to make a robust plan against nature or an adversary. In this paper, we present the formalization of such a quantified DisCSP and develop an algorithm for solving it by generalizing the asynchronous backtracking algorithm used for …

Towards Productive Reflective Practice In Microteaching, Roisin Donnelly, Marian Fitzmaurice

Journal Articles

This paper details a small-scale, research study into lecturers‟ perceived impact of microteaching within a postgraduate certificate in teaching in higher education in Ireland. Participants engage on the programme for a range of reasons: to broaden expertise and knowledge beyond the disciplinary boundaries within which they primarily operate; to build on and develop their scholarly profiles; and to reflect on their teaching experience to date. Participation in microteaching has provided a sense of validation for much of what these lecturers do and how they do it, which has resulted in ongoing critical reflection and peer discussion. Although initially giving rise …

The Report: Winter 2011, Recreation, Parks, & Tourism Administration California Polytechnic University - San Luis Obispo

The Report

No abstract provided.

Narratives Of Longevity From The Perspective Of Seventh-Day Adventist School Administrators In North America: A Multiple Case Study, Janet Ledesma

Dissertations

Problem. The average length of stay for school principals in the Seventh-day Adventist system of education in North America is 2.5-4.0 years. Elementary principals remain in leadership for 2.5 years, day academy principals stay for 3.6 years, and boarding academy principals stay for 4.0 years. Many studies have identified reasons why school principals leave their jobs. However, few studies have been conducted to understand why principals in the organization stay.

Purpose. The purpose of this study was to describe the experiences of principals who have remained in leadership in the Adventist system of education in North America longer than 10 …

The Relationship Between Community Service Involvement And Student Outcomes In Mexican Higher Learning Institutions, Raul Lozano

Dissertations

Problem. Although Mexican Seventh-day Adventist higher learning institutions involve their students in diverse forms of community service, it is not clear whether involvement in service-related projects in these institutions is producing the desired prosocial, spiritual, and personal development in the students.

Method. A mixed methods design combining qualitative and quantitative research approaches was carried out to understand the way community service is implemented in Mexican Adventist higher education and its impact on students. In the qualitative stage, three cases were studied in which 18 people from three Seventh-day Adventist universities in Mexico participated in interviews and focus groups. Data were …

Beyond The American Dream : Tales Of Hispanic Mutimillionaires Who Rose Above Poverty After Immigrating To The United States, Ricardo Norton

Dissertations

Problem. A review of the literature on Hispanics reveals the absence of academic studies on the conditions and life experiences that helped poor Hispanic immigrants become multimillionaires after arriving to the U.S. at 18 years of age and older and without conversational English. Most Hispanic immigrants live in poverty right after arriving to the U.S. and only a few become multimillionaires. A study on how they rose above poverty has the potential to uncovering useful information for other poor immigrants who are still looking who seek financial success. Such study will also add to the larger body of literature information …

Exploring Teacher Attitudes, Experiences, And Beliefs Of The Development And Implementation Of Faculty Data Teams (Tm) In A Midwestern School District, Bradley William Sheppard

Dissertations

Purpose. The purpose of this study was to describe the development and implementation of Data Teams™ in a Midwestern school district and to explore what influenced teachers to become effective team members. It analyzed the product and process of creating Data Teams™ who competently used data to make academic standards work by identifying power standards, analyzing data, setting goals, implementing research-based effective teaching strategies, and assessing student performance and adult behaviors that had a direct impact on student achievement.

Method. A qualitative case study design was used for this investigation as it explored the narratives of 10 elementary teachers on …

Religious Tolerance And Its Relationship To Spiritual Maturity And Religious Orientation Among Seventh-Day Adventists In Jamaica, Meric Dale Walker

Dissertations

Purpose. Although the Seventh-day Adventist (Adventist) Church promotes love of God and love for fellowmen, there is a perception that its members are generally intolerant of persons who do not hold religious beliefs that are similar to theirs. The purpose of this study was to investigate the extent to which spiritual maturity and religious orientation are related to religious tolerance among Seventh-day Adventists in East Jamaica Conference.

Method. The Jamaican Adventist Religious Life Profile, the questionnaire used to collect data in this study, consists of the Intrinsic/Extrinsic–Revised Religious Orientation Scale; the Spiritual Maturity Index; and the Religious Tolerance …

A Descriptive Case Study Of The Perceptions And Use Of Adventist Edge : An Initiative Developed In Response To The North American Division Of Seventh-Day Adventists' Document, "Journey To Excellence", Pamela C. Forbes

Dissertations

Problem. The Southern Union started the Adventist EDGE initiative as an action plan in response to the North American Division's document, Journey to Excellence . The Adventist EDGE became a comprehensive educational reform initiative. However, there were different ideas on how the innovation should look when inaction in the schools, and these differences became obvious during the initial EDGE school validation visit, resulting in hurt feelings and confusion. Thus, the need for my study to clarify EDGE became critical for the survival of the initiative.

Purpose. The purpose of my study was to develop two operational definitions or …

Anchoring Change In Higher Education : Narratives From Senior Executives At Malcolm Baldrige Award-Winning Institutions, Cheryl H. Kisunzu

Dissertations

Purpose. The purpose of this study is to explore Kotter’s (1996) eighth stage for leading change. Specifically, it is to identify strategies for anchoring planned change in institutions of higher education.

Design. This is a qualitative multiple case study. Each of the participating organizations is an institution of higher education uniquely distinguished as a recipient of the United State’s highest recognition for progressive excellence—the Malcolm Baldrige Award. A narrative design is used to conduct in-depth exploration of leading planned change, specifically anchoring this planned change into the culture of academic institutions of higher learning. Purposeful sampling was used to identify …

The Report: Spring 2011, Recreation, Parks, & Tourism Administration; California Polytechnic University - San Luis Obispo

The Report

No abstract provided.

2d Gaussian Object Motion Detection, Miguel Angel Chaidez

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Dr. John Moya, and associated research assistants, have previously created an image-change recognition algorithm (JESSE) to mark changes within an image. The focus of this thesis is to present a physical application and modification of this algorithm in order to detect a surgeon's hand and verify chip placement on a printed circuit board.

There are different techniques in implementing visual recognition and motion detection with smart systems but the high cost and complicated calibration of these systems make them impractical. The goal was to create a system that is simple, inexpensive and applicable to multiple applications that will allow the …

Sacramento, Marlena Fitzpatrick

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Inspired by entertaining, opinionated voices with debatable, controversial messages I wrote "Sacramento." EVA RIVERA, a 32 year old Honduran poet is captured and incarcerated by the "Maduros Guerrilla" due to her controversial political activism through a network called "Las Hijas Del Maiz." After being held captive, tortured and raped, she miraculously escapes. She manages to return home, gather her belongings and cross the border, all the way to New York via Canada. FATHER MARTIN RODRIGUEZ, a 35 year old Chilean Catholic Priest has disgraced his faith by keeping a promise he made his brother on his death bed: he will …

Era[C]Ing Diversity: A Critical Rhetorical Approach To Race And The New Citizen, Theresa Donovan

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Era[c]ing Diversity is guided by a broad question of inquiry regarding the formation and reformation of subjectivity through the filling out of "blank" forms such as the application for naturalization. This dissertation examines how the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service uses and distributes race, and how subjects participate in the social reproduction of the dominant ideology to create a society where individuals think: I am White; He/she is Black, or Asian, or Native American etc. Era[c]ing Diversity examines how the N-400 constructs the new citizen and the ways that permanent legal residents of Mexican origin disrupt or reify this construct. …

Specification Of Data Properties To Identify Anomalies In Scientific Sensor Data, Irbis Gallegos

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Environmental scientists use advanced sensor technology such as meteorological towers, wireless sensor networks and robotic trams equipped with sensors to perform data collection at remote research sites. Because the amount of environmental sensor data acquired by such instruments is increasing, the ability to evaluate the accuracy of the data at collection time and to check that the instrumentation is operating correctly become critical in order to not lose valuable time and information. The goal of the research is to define a solution, based on software-engineering techniques, to support the scientist's ability to specify data properties that can identify anomalies in …