Digital Commons Network^™

They Had Nothing, Charles Wilkinson

Publications

No abstract provided.

Rethinking School Improvement: The Case For Networked Improvement Communities, Jesse Senechal

MERC Publications

The question of why school improvement efforts have not been as effective as we would hope is a complicated one that could be addressed from a number of perspectives. The purpose of this paper is to explore some of the underlying problems that prevent current school reform effort from achieving sustained impact, and to describe a promising model of school improvement, called the Networked Improvement Community (NIC). The NIC model – which has just started gaining traction in the world of K-12 school reform – establishes small inquiry groups within organizations to engage in cycles of improvement that involve implementing …

Report Of The Special Rapporteur On The Rights Of Indigenous Peoples On The Situation Of Indigenous Peoples In The Republic Of The Congo, S. James Anaya

Publications

No abstract provided.

Report Of The Special Rapporteur On The Rights Of Indigenous Peoples On Extractive Industries And Indigenous Peoples, S. James Anaya

Publications

No abstract provided.

Food Policy And Cognitive Bias, Paul F. Campos

Publications

No abstract provided.

Lawyers And Spoiled Identity, Paul Campos

Publications

No abstract provided.

Bank Regulation And Securitization: How The Law Improved Transmission Lines Between Real Estate And Banking Crises, Erik F. Gerding

Publications

This essay examines how securitization served as a new coupling rod joining cycles in real estate and banking markets and created a new pathway for financial contagion in the “subprime” financial crisis. Legal changes promoted the growth of securitization and improved this crisis transmission line. The essay examines the history of legislative and regulatory changes that facilitated bank participation in the markets for mortgage-backed securities. The essay then explains how securitization failed to mitigate the credit, liquidity, and interest rate risk associated with real estate when losses in residential markets became correlated nationwide. It then discusses how regulation contributed to …

The Risks We Are Willing To Eat: Food Imports And Safety, Alexia Brunet Marks

Publications

Recent efforts to regulate the safety of U.S. food imports have not kept up with the complexity of global trade and the risks that accompany globalization. Congress drafted the Food Safety Modernization Act of 2011 ("FSMA") in response to heightened food safety risks, surging imports, and an outdated food import safety system. While the FSMA provides the Food and Drug Administration ("FDA") additional authority to regulate food facilities, establish standards for safe produce, recall contaminated foods, and oversee imported foods, vulnerabilities still exist.

This article exposes problems with the old system of food import rules and significant challenges facing the …

Toward A Structural Theory Of Implicit Racial And Ethnic Bias In Health Care, Dayna Bowen Matthew

Publications

No abstract provided.

The Government's Lies And The Constitution, Helen Norton

Publications

Governments lie. They do so for many different reasons to a wide range of audiences on a variety of topics. Although courts and commentators have extensively explored whether and when the First Amendment permits the government to regulate lies told by private speakers, relatively little attention has yet been paid to the constitutional implications of the government's intentional falsehoods. This Article helps fill that gap by exploring when, if ever, the Constitution prohibits our government from lying to us.

The government’s lies can be devastating. This is the case, for example, of its lies told to resist legal and political …

Cu Law Library Launches New Resource For Historical Colorado Statutory Research, Robert M. Linz

Publications

No abstract provided.

How The Other Half Banks, Daria Roithmayr

Publications

No abstract provided.

Self-Perception Of Disability And Prospects For Employment Among U.S. Veterans, Christopher L. Griffin Jr., Michael Ashley Stein

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Same-Sex Cynicism And The Self-Defeating Pursuit Of Social Acceptance Through Litigation, James G. Dwyer

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

The Difficulty Accommodating Health Care Workers, Nicole Buonocore Porter

Faculty Publications

I argue that accommodating health care workers is difficult, perhaps more difficult than accommodating other workers, and I explain why. First, in Part II, I will describe the characteristics of health care jobs that make those jobs difficult for individuals with disabilities. These characteristics include: (1) most health care jobs are physically rigorous, often involving heavy lifting, pushing, and walking and standing for long periods of time; (2) most health care jobs involve long hours and/or shift work; and (3) the majority of jobs in the health care industry are safety-sensitive positions, with life or death often hanging in the …

Professional Rights Speech, Timothy Zick

Faculty Publications

Some regulations of professional-client communications raise important, but sofar largely overlooked, constitutional concerns. Three recent examples of professional speech regulation-restrictions on physician inquiries regarding firearms, "reparative" therapy bans, and compelled abortion disclosures-highlight an important intersection between professional speech and constitutional rights. In each of the three examples, state regulations implicate a non-expressive constitutional right--the right to bear arms, equality, and abortion. States are actively, sometimes even aggressively, using their licensing authority to limit and structure conversations between professionals and their clients regarding constitutional rights. The author contends that government regulation of "professional rights speech" should be subjected to heightened First …

Rationalizing Cost Allocation In Civil Discovery, A. Benjamin Spencer

Faculty Publications

A movement is afoot to revise the longstanding presumption that in civil litigation the producing party bears the cost of production in response to discovery requests. An amendment to Rule 26( c )-which took effect in December 2015-makes explicit courts' authority to issue protective orders that shift discovery costs away from producing parties. But this authority is not new; what is new is what may be coming next-an undoing of the producer-pays presumption itself. Thus far, the sentiment to move in this direction has been slightly below the radar, advocated by probusiness interest groups and advocates before the Advisory Committee …

Let The Good Time Roll: Early Release For Good Behavior In Prison, Michael M. O'Hear

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Human Consequences Of Climate Change, Climate Refugees: An Exploratory Essay, Frederick A. Snyder-Manetti

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

While planning my course schedule for the 2009 Spring Semester, I found myself desperately short of elective credits toward my Bachelor of Arts degree in Geography in order to graduate by the end of the 2010 Autumn Semester. From the limited course choices offered for the spring semester, only two worked with the other required courses I needed as well: Cultural & Global Competence and Global Hot Spots. Little did I know at the time, but the latter would prove to be the most stimulating course of my entire undergraduate geography program. Not only did this course forge within me …

Effects Of Academic And Activity Class Participation On Cognition In Young Adults, Emily N. Simpson

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

No abstract provided.

The Thermodynamic Dissection And Design Of High-Affinity Antibodies, Sriram Jakkaraju

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

Antibody fragments are attractive alternatives to conventional antibodies for both therapeutic and diagnostic applications. One example, single-domain VHH antibodies, which are derived from camelid heavy chain-only antibodies, display comparable binding affinity to conventional antibodies despite the significantly reduced binding interface. Here, an anti-RNase A VHH single-domain antibody and its antigen, RNase A, are used as a model antibody-antigen system for the three studies described in this dissertation.

The Workplace Hassles From Interruptions Measure (Whim), Stacy Wilkes

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

The literature indicates that an interrupted work environment may act as a stressor on employees. Yet, systematic measurement and empirical testing of employees' perceptions of workplace interruptions are lacking. Here, I describe a set of studies in which I developed and tested a self-report measure of workplace interruptions: the Workplace Hassles from Interruptions Measure (WHIM). The WHIM is based on a theoretically proposed typology of interruptions that included intrusions, distractions, discrepancy detections, and breaks. I analyzed the resultant scale to determine it is factorially identifiable (N = 317) and confirmed the four-factor structure via confirmatory factor analysis. Finally, I tested …

The Relationship Of Perceived Social Support And The Big Five In Adolescents, Raymond L. Geosling

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

Social support is important for adolescents as it is related to outcomes such as anxiety, depression, and self-esteem. These associations are well established in the literature as known factors related to adolescents' perception of social support from parents, teachers, friends, and classmates. However, it is important for researchers to understand additional factors that are related to perceived social support. One factor that is relevant to all students is personality. This factor has been investigated with adolescents outside of the United States but has not been investigated with adolescents in the United States. The present study sought to investigate the relationship …

Statistical Analysis Of Interval-Censored Failure Time Data, Alicia Worrall

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

In this thesis, we will examine the statistical methods used in survival analysis applied to interval-censored failure time data. Interval-censored data is not widely used due to the fact that it is more difficult to work with. However, the same methods commonly used for random- censoring can be applied to interval-censoring as well. This includes finding the basic quantities, survival curves, regression analysis, Bayesian regression analysis and a comparison between interval-censored data and random-censored data.

Data Analytics For Machinery Vibration, Sunil Sirimalla

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

Production and manufacturing technologies related companies are more and more opting for condition based maintenance of their machines. The condition based maintenance requires a monitoring system which collects the data from the machines through the sensors placed in them. This data can be analyzed for any deterioration of the components of the machine so the maintenance of those components can be done before catastrophic failure. Traditional approach of maintenance based on fixed time intervals may be cost ineffective. It may be noted that the trend of decreasing cost for sensors and data storage led to collection of inordinate amount of …

Design, Synthesis, And Evaluation Of Inhibitors Of Ispd And Ispe As Potential Antibacterial, Antimalarial, And Herbicidal Agents, Michael Philip Thompson

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

The 2-C-methyl-D-erythritol-4-phosphate pathway, or MEP pathway, has recently gained attention as being a prime target for inhibition of many pathogenic species due to the lack of analogous enzymes in humans and many higher eukaryotes that use the mevalonic acid pathway. Either the MEP pathway or mevalonic acid pathway are utilized by all living organisms to generate the molecules isopentenyl diphosphate, IPP, and dimethyallyl diphosphate, DMAPP, which in turn can be used to create a wide variety of necessary cellular components called isoprenoids, such as cholesterol, some vitamins, pigments, etc. The MEP pathway involves seven different enzymes, which are unique in …

Professional Learning Community And Non-Professional Learning Community Schools : A Quantitative Study Of Perceptions Of Teachers On Trust, Professionalism, And Change, Adam W. Zbrozek

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to investigate the perceptions of teachers in Professional Learning Communities (PLC) and Non-PLC schools regarding Trust, Professionalism, and Change. The study included teaching staff of 10 Illinois elementary schools: five PLC schools and five non-PLC schools identified as demonstrating increasing levels of student achievement as measured by the annual state assessment (ISAT). Sampling was stratified in order to limit the population based on specific sets of characteristics. The study was limited to schools with demonstrated growth and success. Additionally, schools implementing PLCs that have been identified by Solution Tree were included in this study …

Helmet With Outside Padding, Kiran Surapaneni

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

Concussions are relatively common in football, due to its nature as a full-contact game. Repeated concussions may increase a person's risk in later life for chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) and mental health issues such as dementia, Parkinson's disease, and depression. Though football helmets are crucial for preventing skull fractures, studies have shown that currently available helmets may not do much to protect players against concussions. This study involved designing a football helmet to reduce the magnitude of concussions occur during a head injury. The helmet was designed by adding extra padding over the outer surface of it. It was tested …

Relations Among Gender Typicality, Anxiety, Depression And Homophobic And Peer Victimization, Caicina Jones

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

Deviation from established gender roles may contribute to the experiences of peer victimization by LGBTQ and heterosexual students. However this assertion has only primarily been explored among adult LGBTQ individuals. Gender nonconforming behavior may contribute to perceptions of LGBTQ status and peer victimization as a result of those perceptions. Prior research indicates that there associations among low gender typicality, peer victimization due to bullying, and negative psychosocial outcomes. It is important to further study these associations among youth populations. The current study examined the relations among Gender Typicality, internalizing distress (Anxiety and Depression), and Victimization (homophobic and general peer). The …

Social Bonds, Cardiovascular Function, And Serotonin : Insights From An Animal Model, Neal Daniel Mcneal

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

Social relationships positively influence psychological and biological function in humans and other mammals. The disruption of an individual's social environment through separation or death often results in social isolation, which can adversely impact mental and cardiovascular health (Frasure-Smith, Lesperance, & Talajic, 1993; Gore, 1978). The general purpose of this experiment is to further investigate neurobiological mechanisms mediating the adverse effects of social stress and focused on the role of serotonin in that relationship. An animal model was used to simulate social stress in humans. Specifically, the goal of this study is to explore the effects of sertraline hydrochloride (Zoloft) on …