Exploring The Content Of Introductory Quantitative Methods Courses For Education Doctoral Students, Samantha Brooke Patterson

Dissertations

Quantitative methods training is an integral part of an Education Doctoral Degree (EdD). Students tend to struggle with the content of these courses and consequently their quantitative proficiency has suffered. Currently, there is no consensus on the learning outcomes of introductory quantitative methods classes, leaving instructors to individually decide the content and teaching methods of their classes. The aim of this study was to capture the content of introductory quantitative methods course and determine their alignment with current best practices in statistics education.

• Q1 What curricular and pedagogical techniques are used in introductory quantitative methods course for EdD students?
• Q2 …

The Inheritance And Breakthrough Of Twentieth-Century Harpsichord Music: Stylistic Analysis And Performance Guide Of Selected Works, Hanguang Wang

Dissertations

The twentieth century saw a notable revival of early music, with the harpsichord, one of the key instruments in this movement, gradually gaining attention as a vehicle for new compositions. However, most research still focuses primarily on early music, leaving the phenomenon and specific works of modern harpsichord music underexplored, despite the substantial body of compositions it has inspired.

This dissertation traces the development of harpsichord music across four historical periods, while also examining the stylistic and technical shifts in compositions from the eighteenth to the twentieth centuries. By analyzing Bohuslav Martinů’s Deux Pièces pour Clavecin, H. 244, and …

Ensuring Successful Bond Referendums In Rural South Carolina School Districts: Key Strategies Employed By Superintendents, David Fallaw

All Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to develop a better understanding of the strategies of superintendents that lead to the successful passage of referendums within small, rural districts in South Carolina. Federal, state and local revenue streams make up the majority of funding for operating expenses for districts in South Carolina. For capital projects, however, the majority of districts must rely on local funding. The primary method to acquire the needed revenue is through a referendum which can be a costly and time-consuming process that moves the focus of school and district leadership from teaching and learning to pursuing funding …

Computational Representation, Analysis And Verification Of Requirements In Engineering Design And Systems Engineering, Chandan Kumar Sahu

All Dissertations

Systems are developed to satisfy a set of requirements derived from stakeholders’ needs, defining the problem space for which the system is created as a feasible solution. The system design process begins with eliciting these requirements and concludes with validating whether the created system meets them. Requirements engineering (RE) encompasses elicitation, representation, analysis, documentation, verification, and validation. However, challenges in RE, such as imprecision in natural language (NL), proprietary restrictions, and a lack of standardized quality metrics, hinder the creation of well-formed and comprehensive requirements. These challenges complicate formalization and analysis of requirements.

This dissertation addresses these challenges by proposing …

Nanostructured Silicon Meta-Waveguides And Surfaces For Enhanced Light-Matter Interaction, Saddam Gafsi

All Dissertations

In this study, we tackle the challenge of light-matter interaction engineering and local field enhancement using various silicon photonic platforms based on three different approaches. (i) The first approach is based on boundary condition engineering where we present and show through simulation and experimental results, a silicon nanodisk “diabolo” configuration able to support significant local field enhancement levels in the range ~102 to 104 in the high index medium through proper structural modifications at the nanoscale. We show that the presented optical behavior is consistent with the anapole modes characterized by the observed near-field enhancement and coinciding with far-field suppression. …

Selective Hydroxyl Functionalization Using Novel Bifunctional Macrocyclic Catalysts And Sufex-Based Methodologies, Austin Seilkop

All Dissertations

The research behind this dissertation explores innovative strategies for the functionalization of alcohols. Alcohols are abundant in biologically relevant molecules and pharmaceutical drugs, so designing new methods for modifying them has gained significant interest over the years. The first and second chapters of this dissertation focus on the selective functionalization of a particular class of alcohols, amino alcohols, a well-represented functional handle in biomolecules. The hydroxyl functionalization of amino alcohols often demands multiple synthetic steps. We developed a new class of macrocyclic catalysts to enable precise and efficient transformations of amino alcohols, advancing the scope and efficiency of amino alcohol …

Foster Care, Substance Use, And Social Determinants Of Health In South Carolina: A Geographic Approach, Patricia Carbajales-Dale

All Dissertations

Foster care is a critical intervention for vulnerable children, with approximately 400,000 children entering the system annually in the United States. Parental substance use, second only to neglect, is now a leading cause of foster care entry. While previous research has explored the relationship between socioeconomic factors and foster care, few studies have incorporated spatial approaches at the neighborhood level to understand how factors such as economic inequality, healthcare disparities, and substance use influence foster care entries. This study addresses that gap by integrating spatial analysis and machine learning techniques to examine the geographic and social dynamics underlying foster care …

Optimization Of Polymeric Micelles As A Delivery System For Crispr/Cas9 Ribonucleoprotein, Lucian Williams

All Dissertations

Clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR) is an adaptive immune system in bacteria that has been harnessed to perform precise genetic modifications in mammalian cells. Among CRISPR-associated (Cas) proteins, Cas9 has emerged as a transformative tool in gene editing due to its simplicity, high specificity, and versatility compared to the other Cas proteins and gene-editing technologies. Despite its potential to cure genetic disorders, the clinical application of Cas9 has been hindered by challenges such as immunogenicity, off-target effects, and low delivery efficiency. To address these issues, this dissertation explores using polymeric nanoparticle systems to encapsulate and protect Cas9 and …

Protocol Transformations Across Osi Network Stack Layers For Attack, Evasion, And Defense, Nathan Tusing

All Dissertations

Network endpoints frequently contend with errors and deviations within protocols. Many factors account for these deviations including noise, tampering, and algorithm implementations. Intermediate nodes are expected to modify instantiated protocols and not guarantee correctness. This ability to modify traffic enables all sides of network security to alter security and performance properties of protocols, and we define this intermediary modification of an instantiated protocol as a transformation. Protocol transformations traverse layers of the OSI reference model and changes a protocol's time series byte sequence. Within this thesis, we show that this framework applies to multiple domains and protocols. Common examples of …

Barriers To Postsecondary Education Of Latinx Students Using Future Time Perspective Theory, Clayton Porter

All Dissertations

The purpose of this qualitative study is to investigate how future time perspective influences high school Latinx’ seniors’ beliefs and access to postsecondary education through a case study approach. Future time perspective, the extent to which individuals anticipate and plan for the future, is examined in relation to the students’ educational aspirations and barriers. This study used a combination of surveys and semi-structured interviews to collect data from Latinx high school seniors. Interviews were conducted with eight high school seniors who identified as Latinx, and also were actively working towards graduation and application to a postsecondary institution. The data from …

Leveraging High-Frequency Water Quality Data And Machine Learning For Monitoring Harmful Algal Blooms, Ibrahim Busari

All Dissertations

Freshwater management is one of the most critical resources on the earth due to the plethora of water use and its limited availability. Increased algae proliferation is one of the significant problems of freshwater bodies that is triggered by nutrient enrichment and enabling conditions such as light and warm temperatures. This algal proliferation is toxic to the ecosystem through their biomass and potential toxin production that can cause hypoxic conditions and is often referred to as Harmful Algal Blooms (HABs). Current monitoring approaches include laboratory analysis of water samples to observe algal cells, monitoring of water quality parameters using water …

Academic Vocabulary Acquisition In A 3rd Grade Science Classroom: A Mixed-Methods Embedded Study, Nicole Langenhuizen

All Dissertations

With the acceptance of the Next Generation Science Standards, elementary-aged students are encouraged to develop the skills needed to communicate their thinking in science efficiently and effectively (NGSS, 2013). Since implementing these new standards in 2013, South Carolina has seen a decline in science standardized testing scores for grades 3-5. These results show that science and engineering skills support 67% of U.S. jobs today (National Science Foundation, 2021), and the current trend is that science and engineering skills are essential to students today and provide a rationale for exploring how teachers can help students develop the vocabulary necessary to communicate …

An Efficient Computational Frameworks For Design And Analysis Of Metamaterials, Raj Pradip Khawale

All Dissertations

Advancement in additive manufacturing helps in building artificial lattice structures with unique properties that are not available in naturally occurring materials or in continuum structures. Specifically, beam-based lattices are well known for producing lightweight structures with very high strength, auxetic behavior, and energy absorption capabilities. In recent years, numerous research studies have been conducted on generating algorithms and frameworks to obtain unusual properties based on the variation in the cell geometry and material properties. However, the exploration of the full design space is hampered in practice primarily due to restrictions on cell tiling variation. Additionally, the lattices are very intricate, …

Advancing Substance Use Disorder Treatment Using Genomics And Metabolomics, Lindsey Contella

All Dissertations

Advancing our understanding of genetic, metabolic, and environmental factors in substance use disorder (SUD) could lead to more effective therapies. In 2022, 16.5% of the U.S. population was diagnosed with SUD, yet current treatments lack efficacy for all patients, making a precision medicine approach crucial. This dissertation explores SUD's relationship with tryptophan (TRP) metabolism through the kynurenine pathway (KP) as a potential therapeutic target. Chapter I reviews current knowledge on SUD and KP. Chapter II identifies how SUD alters KP metabolite concentrations, identifying a reduced concentration of the neuroprotective metabolite, kynurenic acid (KA) and elevated concentrations of the neurotoxic metabolite, …

Quantifying Effects Of Partial Genetic Backgrounds To Decode Genetic Drivers Of Clinical Phenotypes, Rini Pauly

All Dissertations

Understanding partial genetic backgrounds illuminates the genetic architecture of complex traits and diseases, revealing how diverse genetic backgrounds contribute to phenotypic diversity. With this approach we could advance personalized medicine by identifying population-specific variants affecting drug metabolism, tailoring medical treatments to individual genetic profiles. Additionally, it offers evolutionary insights into human history, shedding light on past migrations and the spread of genetic traits. This research leverages cutting-edge statistical genetics techniques and novel machine learning approaches to efficiently analyze extensive population genomic datasets, distilling complex admixture signals into meaningful genetic markers.

The study introduces Admix-AI, an innovative convolutional neural network-based tool …

Biogeochemical Controls Of Cesium-137 Migration In Surface Waters And Near Surface Sediments At The Usdoe Savannah River Site, Reid Williams

All Dissertations

Considerable concentrations of cesium-137 (¹³⁷Cs) and other anthropogenic radionuclides have been released into the environment at the Savannah River Site (SRS). Additionally, cesium-containing radioactive waste will be stored onsite for the foreseeable future. Therefore, the goal of this work was to identify mechanisms controlling cesium transport in surface waters and near surface sediments at SRS to further the understanding of ¹³⁷Cs migration in the vadose zone and reservoirs. It was hypothesized that a multitude of factors impact the mobility of ¹³⁷Cs at the SRS, but that the clay sediment fraction provides an important contribution in limiting …

Concert Tickets, Party Matching, Sleeping Barbers, And Single Lane Bridges: Characterizing Student Reasoning About Concurrency, Aubrey Lawson

All Dissertations

Programming with concurrency is challenging both to learn and to teach. A concurrent program has multiple computations happening “at the same time” either simultaneously or in an interleaved manner. It is non-deterministic, imposing only a partial ordering on its decomposed parts. Advantages of concurrency include the potential for increased program throughput, high responsiveness and reduced complexity of program structure. But a concurrent program can be more complex to reason about than a sequential program, in part because the conditions of correctness must hold for all possible execution sequences and also because programmers must implement and reason about synchronization constructs that …

A Replication Study — Suicidal Thoughts And Behaviors Among High School Students — Youth Risk Behavior Survey, United States, 2021, Mallory Hays

Capstone Experience: Master of Public Health

Suicidal thoughts and behaviors among adolescents are critical public health concerns in the United States, with suicide being the third leading cause of death among high school-aged youths (14-18 years). This study replicates and extends the findings of the 2021 Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS) conducted by Gaylor et al., which analyzed data from 13,677 students in 2019 and 17,232 students in 2021. The original study revealed alarming increases in suicidal ideation and behaviors, particularly among female students, and highlighted disparities across demographic groups. Using raw YRBS datasets, this replication involved a pure replication of the original findings, followed by …

Promoting Adolescent Mental And Physical Health: Initiatives Focused On Connecting Public Health And Social Services To The Health Sector In Nebraska, Theresa Nguyen

Capstone Experience: Master of Public Health

This capstone focuses on the second recommendation of improving access to comprehensive, coordinated health services from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine report The Promise of Adolescence: Realizing Opportunity for All Youth (2019). This proposal uses secondary data from the research project, Moving Evidence-Based Recommendations to Practice to Strengthen the Health Care System in Nebraska. Key stakeholders (n=28) were interviewed from the health care, public health, social services, and policy sectors. Each subject was asked to participate in a semi-structured interview by a trained interviewer. The interview was 1 hour long and conducted via phone call or Zoom. …

The Association Between Systolic Blood Pressure And Coronary Heart Disease In The Framingham Heart Study: A Long-Term Prospective Cohort Study, Alexandrea M. Welch

Capstone Experience: Master of Public Health

Coronary heart disease (CHD) is a leading cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide, with systolic blood pressure (SBP) as a critical risk factor. This study utilized data from the Framingham Heart Study to assess the association between SBP and CHD among participants. Univariate, bivariate, and multivariable logistic regression was used to explore this association as well as the association with other key covariates. We found a significant positive association between elevated SBP and the risk of CHD (adjusted OR: 1.69, 95% CI: 1.41-2.01, p < 0.0001). Age, sex, current blood pressure medication use, and body mass index (BMI) were significantly associated with CHD. Our findings support the need for blood pressure management to prevent cardiac events and reduce CHD burden.

Cybersecurity Vulnerabilities And Considerations In U.S. Healthcare Facilities: A Scoping Review, Rebecca J. Campbell

Capstone Experience: Master of Public Health

Robust cybersecurity measures are essential for business continuity of U.S. healthcare institutions which is to maintain care standards for all patients. Hackers seek to disrupt healthcare delivery for financial and political means, to disrupt services in retaliation, or simply for malicious intent (Wasserman & Wasserman, 2022). The COVID-19 pandemic further accelerated innovation and digitization in healthcare, including wearable and implanted medical devices, telehealth care delivery options, artificial intelligence, and cloud-based data management (Kioskli, Fotis, & Mouratidis, 2021). This progress in innovation continues today but also brings new vulnerabilities and challenges to stay ahead of cybersecurity threats.

Given that cyberattacks have …

A Cohort Study Examining The Risk Of Smoking On The Likelihood Of Developing Angina Among Women Under Age 65, Sarah Ward

Capstone Experience: Master of Public Health

Objective:

To determine if current smoking status is a risk factor for angina among women under the age of 65.

Methods:

A subset of participants from the Framingham Heart Studywere used to complete a cohort study. The analyses evaluated population means and characteristics, followed by bivariate and multivariable logistic regression, to determine the association of smoking and other key factors with angina.

Results:

Smoking status had a significant association to angina(OR 0.67, 95% CI: 0.52, 0.86, p-value= 0.0015). Age as a categorical variable had a significant relationship with angina (OR 0.97, 95% CI: 0.617, 1.520, p-value=

Conclusions:

Smoking had a …

Disability Discrimination By Clinical Algorithm, Elizabeth Pendo, Jennifer D. Oliva

Articles

In response to America’s escalating drug poisoning crisis, the federal government has funded, incentivized, and mandated that states adopt and implement prescription drug monitoring programs (“PDMPs”) to electronically surveil controlled substances and other “drugs of concern.” State PDMPs utilize proprietary, predictive software platforms that deploy algorithms to determine whether a patient is at risk for drug misuse, drug diversion, doctor shopping, or substance use disorder. PDMPs have never been validated by a federal agency or peer review, yet states have mandated their use throughout the health care delivery system.

Research demonstrates that clinical overreliance on the risk scores generated by …

Defining Law But Not Justice, Franciska Coleman

Chicago-Kent Law Review

No abstract provided.

Will The Supreme Court Ever Help Victims Of Workplace Sexual Harassment Again? Why Adopting A Uniform Reasonableness Standard May Resolve A 20+ Year Circuit Split, Allyson Buchanan

Chicago-Kent Law Review

No abstract provided.

Consumer Protection Rights Lost In The Undergrowth Of The Amazon: Amazon’S Policies Quietly Facilityating An Anticompetitive E-Commerce Enviornment, Stephen Cruz

Chicago-Kent Law Review

No abstract provided.

Lithotomy And Sitting Positioning: An Objective Structured Clinical Examination, Randall Reece, Jordan Alleman

Doctoral Projects

A foundational skill for anesthesia providers is the ability to safely position surgical patients in a wide variety of surgical positions. Two commonly used surgical positions are the lithotomy and sitting positions. These positions have potential complications that include loss of control of the airway, accidental removal of invasive lines, physiological derangements, soft tissue injury, and nerve injury (Barash et al., 2017). Chui et al. (2018) identified that peripheral nerve injury accounted for 12% of closed claims relating to procedures done under general anesthesia and the most common identifiable event is positioning. The median payout for a peripheral nerve injury …

Discrimination In Contractual Performance: Theory, Evidence, And Preliminary Policy Prescriptions, Meirav Furth-Matzkin

Washington Law Review

This Article examines the often-overlooked practice of “selective performance” of standard form consumer contracts—where sellers permit employees to exercise discretion by waiving or modifying contractual terms to maintain customer satisfaction. While such flexibility can benefit consumers, it raises serious concerns about discrimination. Through both theoretical analysis and empirical evidence, this Article demonstrates that discretionary performance can disproportionately favor certain consumer groups, particularly along racial and gender lines, leading to biased and inequitable outcomes. Drawing on examples from diverse sectors, including retail, insurance, and mortgage services, the Article highlights how marginalized communities, especially Black consumers, frequently face harsher treatment and greater …

The Integration Of Environmental Concerns And Philosophy Into Business Strategies, Johann Thorne

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

My thesis focuses on how a business can better integrate environmental philosophies and principles into their business model without detracting from the business's primary objectives, specifically that of generating profit. However, this thesis also seeks to extend the business's objectives to include the environment using these environmental philosophies, arguing that the business should have some obligation to the environment in terms of morality, as well as social obligations. This is an evolution of some common ethical theories used within the business world, but I argue they do not suffice to protect the environment. Instead, I develop an ethical pluralist framework …

Between Hope And Despair: The Misery Of International Law – Confrontations With Injustice In The Global Economy, Kanad Bagchi

Indian Journal of International Economic Law

No abstract provided.