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Reading Cache Valley Rhetorics: Towards A Composition Pedagogy Of Place, Dax Gove

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Fall 2023 to Present

“Reading Cache Valley Rhetorics: Towards a Composition Pedagogy of Place” proposes that place—one’s immediate locale—is an essential element of ecocritical writing pedagogy. There are constant interacting rhetorical constructions of meaning within any given place across texts from the different groups who have lived there. In these local texts, the evidence of a rhetorically mediated reality is evident in the stark differences between natures and cultures—meaning is rhetorically constructed, down to the meaning of place and people. This project reads texts local to the author’s immediate locale, Cache Valley, Utah, from white LDS settler and Indigenous Shoshone rhetors in order to …

An Alternative Representation For Temporal Json, Bishal Sarkar

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Fall 2023 to Present

JavaScript Object Notation (JSON) is a common format for representing and exchanging data on the web. Most systems only keep the current version of a JSON document, even though, in many situations, it is also important to know how that document changed over time. For example, an application might need to answer questions such as “What did this record look like last week?” or “How has this list grown over the past year?” A simple way to keep this history is to store a full copy of the document every time it changes, but this quickly becomes wasteful, most of …

Exploring The Training Experiences Of Adult Taekwondo Practitioners: A Case Study Of A Martial Arts Program In The Southern United States, Nicholas Daniel Ryburn

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Taekwondo has gained increasing prominence among adult practitioners in the United States, offering both physical and psychological benefits. However, despite its popularity, research on Taekwondo has predominantly emphasized youth populations, competitive contexts, or injury epidemiology, with limited attention to the lived experiences of adult practitioners. Adults present distinct needs and challenges in martial arts training, including variability in physical conditioning, age-related health considerations, and constraints associated with family and professional responsibilities. A deeper understanding of these factors is crucial for developing training programs that are both effective and sustainable for adult populations. This dissertation employs a qualitative case study design …

Impaired Tunability Of Brain State And Motor Dysfunction In A Mouse Model Of Rett Syndrome, Victoria Kindler Norman

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Rett syndrome (RTT) is a rare neurological disorder, caused by disrupted function of the MECP2 gene, resulting in impaired cognitive and motor functions. Previous studies suggest that although MECP2 has important functions throughout the body, the etiological origins of RTT-related dysfunction should be sought within the brain. However, it remains a mystery how neural population dynamics are altered in the RTT brain and how these alterations relate to motor dysfunction. Previous studies using an RTT mouse model point to abnormal correlations among firing rates of neurons. Here we hypothesize that such disrupted neural activity correlation could be caused by abnormal …

Connecting Work And Family Life: The Effects Of Family-Related Moderators On Idiosyncratic Deals Of Employees And Work Outcomes., Tanushree Chatterjee

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Idiosyncratic deals (i-deals), which are customized work arrangements negotiated between employees and their organizations, have been increasingly recognized as a strategic mechanism for addressing the heterogeneous needs of today's diverse workforce. However, existing research has largely overlooked the role of employees' family backgrounds as a moderating context that shapes their effectiveness. Drawing on work-life border theory (Clark, 2000) and conservation of resources theory (Hobfoll, 1989), the study tests whether work-family conflict and work-family enrichment mediate the downstream effects of i-deals on turnover intentions and job performance through the moderation of four family-related characteristics (parent status, number of children, family support, …

How To Make Tamales: Stories, Jeanette Colby

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

In all its intersectionality, I see my thesis as a female journey of identity and maturation. A common theme in my writing always leads back to my upbringing in some way; my history, memories, and beliefs inevitably plague the storytelling animal that lives within me. These different kinds of narratives represent all the parts of my identity. At the same time, the fictional scenes allow me to dramatize and interpret specific life events, while the mythic narratives provide a symbolic framework for exploring psychological and spiritual truths that might transcend conventional logic. Almost all of these pieces reflect various aspects …

Spike-Sorting Algorithm For Neuropixel Probes, Luis David Davila

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Modern extracellular neural probes like Neuropixels, allow for high-density extracellular neural probes to record terabytes of electrophysiological brain data. Spike sorting is the process of isolating individual neurons on this data through various clustering and filtering techniques. Modern spike sorting algorithms are held back by their need for human intervention to separate high-quality from low quality clusters, due to the volume of data that can be collected a completely automated approach is required. To address this requirement, we have developed a framework to preprocess, cluster, grade, and separate high/low quality clustering results using custom models trained on the grades. To …

Health Disparities In El Paso's Low-Income Hispanic Communities: A Mixed-Methods Analysis Of Acculturation, Obesity Metrics, And Socio-Cultural Determinants, Karen Del Rio

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Health disparities among low-income Hispanic immigrants in the United States are shaped by complex interactions between acculturation, structural inequality, and socio-cultural determinants that behavioral and epidemiological models have not fully explained. This dissertation examines the relationship between acculturation and obesity-related outcomes among uninsured and low-income Hispanic adults of Mexican descent in El Paso, Texas, using a three-article, sequential, explanatory, mixed-methods design grounded in Latina/o Critical Race Theory (LatCrit).Article 1 presents a systematic review of 20 peer-reviewed studies examining acculturation and obesity among Mexican Americans, finding consistent evidence that longer U.S. residence is associated with increased BMI and obesity prevalence, mediated …

Lena's Shadow, Rebecca Lynn Dolloff

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Horror as a History and as a Comfort to preface Lena's Shadow.

How Do Students Experience And Make Meaning Of Their Participation In A Community-Engaged Work-Study Internship At A Border Hsi?, Heriberto Jose Garcia

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

At Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs), students often juggle financial need, job obligations, family duties, and academic persistence. In these settings, access to meaningful and equitable experiential learning opportunities is critical for student development, belonging, and professional growth. This qualitative study examines how undergraduate students experience and interpret their participation in a community-engaged work-study internship program at an HSI on the U.S.-Mexico border. The study is guided by the research question: How do students experience and make meaning of their participation in a community-engaged work-study internship at a border HSI? It explores how students interpret their experiences within institutional and community contexts …

Development Of A High-Throughput Framework For Studying Choice-Movement Dynamics In Freely Moving Rats Across Motivational And Pharmacological States, Atanu Giri

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This thesis develops and applies high-throughput behavioral assays and analysis pipelines to study how external contingencies and internal state shape rodent decision-making. First, it introduces RECORD (Reward-Cost in Rodent Decision-making), a modular platform that combines 3D-printed arenas, microcontroller-based control, and closed-loop trial structure to deliver graded rewards and costs in a foraging-like environment. RECORD supports scalable data collection across multiple arenas and a software stack for parsing, databasing, and extracting spatiotemporal behavioral features and psychometric choice functions. Using this framework, the thesis quantifies how animals integrate sucrose reward magnitude with aversive light cost, revealing structured individual differences and sex-dependent movement …

College Administrative Officers' Lived Experiences Navigating Financial Crises At A Research-Intensive Hsi, Brianna Ashley Licerio

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This qualitative hermeneutic phenomenological study examined how College Administrative Officers (CAOs) at a research-intensive Hispanic-Serving Institution (HSI) on the U.S.-Mexico border make sense of and respond to federally induced financial disruptions. Guided by adaptive leadership and informed by sensemaking, the study explored how CAOs interpret funding instability while working to sustain institutional operations, institutional trust, and commitments to servingness. The central research question was: How do CAOs describe their role in maintaining financial stability during federal funding disruptions at a research-intensive HSI on the U.S.-Mexico border? Data were collected through in-depth, semi-structured interviews with five CAOs representing academic colleges at …

Human Papillomavirus (Hpv) Vaccine Acceptance: A Mixed-Methods Study And Randomized Controlled Trial Examining Messengers Of Hpv Vaccine Information Among Hispanic Parents, Alyssa Andrea Martinez

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Hispanics make up 19.5% of the U.S. population, making them the nation's largest ethnic minority. Hispanics are disproportionately impacted by health outcomes, including many different types of cancers that are caused by the Human Papillomavirus (HPV). An HPV vaccine is available that can prevent 90% of HPV associated cancers. The purpose of this mixed-methods study and randomized experiment is to develop and test data-driven digital health messages to promote the HPV vaccine in Hispanic parents. Four specific aims were conducted among three major studies. Aim 1 (Study 1): A cross-sectional survey was conducted to obtain preliminary evidence on trusted messengers …

Adverse Childhood Experiences, Resilience, And Adaptive Functioning Among Student Veterans With Disabilities. A Resilience Portfolio Model Perspective, Donyeill Mozer

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) are associated with long-term psychological, physical, and behavioral outcomes; however, limited research has examined their relationship with multidimensional college adjustment among student veterans with disabilities, particularly those attending Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs). Guided by the Resilience Portfolio Model, this study examined associations among ACEs, perceived resilience, and multidimensional college adjustment within an understudied population of student veterans with disabilities enrolled at an HSI. Using a cross-sectional secondary analysis of survey data, the analytic sample consisted of 129 student veterans. ACEs were measured using the Adverse Childhood Experiences Questionnaire, perceived resilience was measured using the Brief Resilience Scale, …

Quantifying Spatiotemporal Ev In-Motion Load Dynamics For Flexible Distribution Grid Operations, Travis Newbolt

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The emergence of novel in-motion Electric Vehicle (EV) charging through Dynamic Wireless Power Transfer (DWPT) technology is enabling the transformation of traditional roadway infrastructures into fully integrated Electrified Transportation Networks (ETNs) by the direct coupling of roadways with electric power grids. This paradigm has the potential to improve charging safety, extend driving ranges, reduce EV manufacturing costs through smaller battery sizes, and shift EV charging demand to periods when Distributed Energy Resources (DERs) are more readily available. In addition, the transition to ETNs can improve air quality and reduce noise pollution by displacing fossil fuel consumption from vehicles to centralized …

Three Essays On Workplace Ethics And Ai: Conceptualizing, Scale Development, And Validation Of Self-Value Actualization, And Ai-Enabled High-Performance Work Systems, Mansura Nusrat

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This dissertation advances understanding of workplace ethics and responsible AI integration across three interconnected essays unified by social cognitive theory. My first essay introduces self-value actualization (SVA), a novel construct defined as the dynamic, integrated psychological process through which individuals continually strive to align and fulfill their core moral values through observable professional behavior. Drawing on social cognitive theory and emotional intelligence theory, I conceptualize SVA as a higher-order self-regulatory orientation comprising three mutually reinforcing processes: value congruence, moral reflection, and adaptive morality. I developed and validated a 9-item SVA scale across four studies using expert panels, exploratory factor analysis, …

Implementing Mtss In Hispanic Serving Middle Schools From The Concept Of Rurality: A Qualitative Case Study On School Mental Health And The Role Of Social Work, Rosario Elena Olivera

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine the implementation of Multi-Tiered Systems of Support (MTSS) and the integration of mental health services within two middle schools in a suburban-rural mix, predominantly Hispanic school district in Southwest Texas, referred to as Desert View Independent School District. The study explored how educators and school-based mental health professionals perceive, interpret, and operationalize MTSS within their school contexts. Methods: The study employed a qualitative case study design grounded in implementation science and ecological systems theory. Data were collected through purposive sampling and included semi-structured interviews with teachers, counselors, and a district-level school …

Understanding Machine Learning Model Behavior Under Fairness And Privacy Constraints, David Anthony Sanchez

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Machine learning systems deployed in high-stakes domains are increasingly expected to satisfy demands beyond predictive accuracy-including fairness across demographic groups, protection of sensitive information, and explanations that human stakeholders can inspect and trust. This thesis investigates how those demands can be met through learning frameworks that explicitly govern the relationship between data and models, arguing that trustworthiness is a design problem rather than a post hoc correction. The thesis is organized around three studies, each targeting a distinct point of data-facing control. The first develops CondFairGen, a fairness-aware conditional generator for tabular data that improves subgroup equity by dynamically reweighting …

Eocene To Oligocene Continental Arc Migration In Ecuador And The Origin Of Spatiotemporal Trends In Zircon Lu-Hf Radiogenic Isotopes, Muriel M. Sandoval Vazquez

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The modern continental arc system in Ecuador is well understood but less is known about arc systems in the past, hindering our understanding of the tectonic evolution of the northern Andes. The Macuchi arc, located in the Western Cordillera of Ecuador, was thought to be the main continental arc system during the Eocene, but new zircon U-Pb LA-ICPMS dates from intrusive arc rocks in central Ecuador indicate a more complex history. During the mid-Eocene, the footprint of arc magmatism broadened and expanded into the Inter-Andean Valley and Eastern Cordillera. During the late Eocene to Oligocene, the arc migrated back toward …

Breaking The Silence: Lifting The Voices Of Special Education Teachers In Co-Teaching Partnerships - A Study On The Impact Of Collaborative Practices And The Common Challenges Faced In An Inclusive Classroom, Marta Bronislawa Santiago

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Inclusive education increasingly positions co-teaching as a key model for supporting students with disabilities in general education classrooms. Although co-teaching is widely promoted as a way to improve access and participation, its effectiveness is shaped by how special education teachers experience collaboration, role clarity, and administrative support in practice. This qualitative study explored how special education teachers perceived their roles in co-teaching partnerships and the conditions that influenced their ability to collaborate effectively. Guided by a constructivist epistemological framework, this qualitative study explored the experiences of special education teachers working in co-teaching settings. Through semi-structured interviews, participants described how their …

Understanding The Role Of The School Librarian: Insights From Principals And Librarians, Ruby Shivery

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This study examines how principals and school librarians understand and define the role of the school librarian with the K-12 school system. Guided by Role Conflict Theory, the study explores how differing expectations regarding instructional support, leadership, collaboration, and library management contribute to role ambiguity and professional tension. As the responsibilities of the school librarian continue to expand, inconsistencies in how the role is perceived may influence both professional relationships and the effectiveness of the library programs themselves. Using semi-structured interviews with both principals and school librarians, the study investigates areas of alignment and conflict in participants' perceptions of the …

Centering Latinx Perspectives And Cultural Identification In Music Listening: Examining Musical Consumption Behaviors And Choices Among Latinx Adults, Javier Alejandro Silerio

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Music is a critical cultural activity and resource for people all over the world, often used for communication, recreation, identity formation, social bonding, and many other aspects of our daily lives. Moreover, this has been reported across many cultures and is not unique to a single group. Despite this, there is currently limited information and research around Latinx American music consumption and this population's overall relationship with music. Because of this, the purpose of this study is to examine music consumption behaviors among Latinx Americans, as well as possible relationships between their Latinx cultural identification and said music consumption behaviors. …

Salience Network Circuit Dynamics In Distress Tolerance And Drug-Seeking Vulnerability, Marina Alicia Smoak

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The psychological distress experienced during drug withdrawal can lead individuals with substance use disorder to abandon their goal of abstinence. Numerous human studies demonstrate that an inability to persist in challenging, goal-directed behavior while experiencing psychological distress is associated with multiple stages of substance use, including relapse. This behavioral construct is referred to as low distress tolerance (DT). Rodent models of DT similarly show that low DT predicts elevated cocaine relapse, particularly when DT is assessed following extended abstinence. This abstinence period corresponds with the incubation of craving, a phenomenon characterized by progressively increased cocaine-seeking over time. Importantly, relapse vulnerability …

High-Resolution Mapping Of Brainstem Feeding Circuits: A Framework For Targeted Neuroscience Tools, Geronimo Tapia

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The neural control of energy balance is mediated in part by distributed brainstem circuits that integrate metabolic, visceral, and hormonal signals to coordinate appropriate motivated behaviors and autonomic responses. Despite extensive study, the precise neuroanatomical architecture regulating metabolism remains incompletely defined within standardized atlas frameworks. This work addresses that gap through complementary studies examining an acute glycemic challenge methodology known to stimulate feeding, the acute delivery of an anorexigenic-associated neurohormone, and the chemoarchitecture of a major feeding-related region, the parabrachial nucleus. First, utilizing 2-deoxy-D-glucose (2-DG) induced glucoprivation, we map the rapid response of dorsal medullary neuronal populations with high spatial …

Lay Perceptions Of Alternative Dispute Resolution In Civil Legal Disputes, Ashley Gale Vaughan

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This thesis examined how laypeople evaluate alternative dispute resolution (ADR) procedures in civil legal disputes, focusing on outcome favorability, procedural format, and procedural choice. Drawing on procedural justice theory, two vignette-based studies tested whether mediation would be evaluated more favorably than arbitration and whether allowing participants to choose the ADR process would improve satisfaction and perceptions of procedural justice. Study 1 used a 2 x 2 between-subjects design with undergraduate participants (N = 140) and manipulated ADR process (mediation vs. arbitration) and outcome (favorable vs. unfavorable). Study 2 extended this design by adding a choice condition in a community adult …

Asunto Familiar, Paolo Velazquez Angeles

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Asunto Familiar is a project told through short stories. Set in the El Paso/Ciudad Juarez community, it tells the story of one family and their ever-changing lives after a death derails their entire trajectory. Informed by queer perseverance in the bilingual communities of the Chihuahuan Desert, Asunto Familiar aims at exploring the subtle ways family can inflict violence on each other, specifically on their queer members. This in turn, revealing the transitional power of queerness, allowing the characters to uphold love and move away from their predetermined societal roles.

Unveiling The Longitudinal Dynamics Of Discrimination, Identity, And Mental Health Over Time Within U.S. Muslims Among On-Going Palestine Genocide, Manal Aboargob

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Discrimination is a pervasive stressor that shapes mental health through both direct experiences and indirect, or vicarious, exposure. In contemporary contexts marked by global media saturation, individuals may repeatedly witness discrimination and violence directed toward their social group, amplifying psychological burden. The present longitudinal study examined how direct and vicarious discrimination were associated with affective well-being among U.S. Muslims during the ongoing genocide in Palestine, and whether religious identity and religious coping moderated these associations over time. Participants (N = 103) completed a baseline survey and up to 11 weekly surveys over a three-month period. Multilevel mixed-effects growth models were …

Riemannian Manifold-Coupled Joint Sparse Graphical Models For Spatially Structured Precision Matrix Estimation, Abdul Rahman Adam

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This thesis introduces a novel geometry-aware framework for joint precision matrix estimation in spatially structured data. Unlike existing joint Gaussian graphical model estimators that rely on Euclidean coupling mechanisms such as fused or group graphical lasso, our approach incorporates intrinsic Riemannian geometry through geodesic distance penalties on the symmetric positive definite manifold.

The method measures similarity between precision matrices of adjacent spatial regions using the affine-invariant Riemannian distance, capturing deformations of concentration ellipsoids rather than entrywise differences. This is particularly suited for spatial transcriptomics, where regions may share dependence structures despite differences in scale or composition.

An efficient Alternating Direction …

Adjunct Faculty Onboarding Experiences At A Hispanic-Serving Community College In The U.S.-Mexico Border Region: Faculty Perspectives Of Integration And Effectiveness, Melissa Ann Aguilera

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Since the 1970s, adjunct faculty have become the majority of higher education instructors, yet institutional onboarding practices for adjuncts remain inadequate and are inconsistently studied. Using a basic interpretive qualitative approach, the study explored how adjunct faculty at a Hispanic-serving community college in the U.S.-Mexico border region experienced and perceived their onboarding process. Four adjunct faculty members participated in semi-structured interviews, and data was analyzed using thematic analysis. Findings were interpreted through the Kirkpatrick Model of Training Evaluation and Organizational Socialization Theory. Three themes emerged from the data: the absence of structured onboarding, leaving participants to independently seek institutional knowledge, …

Environmental Movements In El Paso And Ciudad Juarez: Possibilities And Limitations Of Cross-Border Organization At The U.S.-Mexico Border, Vanessa Maria Almada

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

At the U.S.-Mexico border, the anthropogenic and nationalistic construction of the landscape has accelerated urbanization and unequal development without establishing effective binational institutions for governance over a shared commons. Borderlanders, then, contest unsustainable development with the added complexity of navigating a barrier which creates diverse socioeconomic and political realities that challenge cross-border cooperation. This qualitative research analyzes environmental organizations in El Paso and Ciudad Juarez. Through ethnographic study of mobilization in response to environmental legislation and administrative action in each city, the immediate barriers to cross-border cooperation and limitations of nationalistic institutions in the borderlands can be better understood.