Digital Commons Network^™

Simplisite: Simplifying Website Management And Bookings For Small Businesses, Daniel Le

Theses & ETDs

Small businesses often face barriers when trying to establish an effective online presence. Many business owners lack the time, technical knowledge, or resources to manage a professional website, and existing platforms like Wix or Shopify often overwhelm them with features they don’t need, or hide essential tools behind expensive plans. SimpliSite was created to simplify the website-building experience for service-based businesses such as salons and barber shops. This project focuses on delivering a platform that not only helps users design and manage their websites without needing to code, but also supports essential business operations such as appointment scheduling, staff assignments, …

Humanities In The Biology Classroom: Cultivating Their Connection To Spanish-Speaking Students, Betzy Lopez

Theses & ETDs

With the increase in the Hispanic population, there has also been an increase in Hispanic students enrolled in school. Within this population of enrolled Hispanic students, some are considered English Language Learners (ELLs). Hispanic and ELL students in high school in Manatee County, Florida, United States, have low results in their science assessments, including the Biology 1 End of Course exams required to take to graduate high school in Florida. To help students engage and connect during their biology courses, this thesis provides four lesson plans with grading rubrics about infectious diseases and the immune system. In these lesson plans, …

Defending Zine Culture: Kathleen Hanna, Grrrl Punk And Collapsing The Private/Public Divide, Sarah Malickson

Theses & ETDs

Kathleen Hanna is an American singer, songwriter, artist, and activist who found herself at the forefront of the 1990’s punk feminist scene known as the Riot Grrrl Movement. Hanna is remarked as one of the founders of the movement. The movement (1989-1996), taking place during the third wave of feminism, inspired many young women, including Hanna herself, to retreat to their bedrooms to produce music, zines, and poetry to express political, societal, and emotional feelings and concerns. Through the lens of Hanna’s work, this study seeks to understand how women show up in both public and private political spheres and …

Epilepsy Causes, Diagnosis, And Treatment, With A Special Focus On Lgi1-Related Conditions And Possible Use Of Ketogenic Diet As An Adjuvant Therapy, Adriana Mateo-Lopez

Theses & ETDs

Epilepsy is a condition with excessive neuronal firing in the brain leading to seizures. While various genetic mutations and treatment approaches are relevant to epilepsy, particular attention is given to how dysfunction of the gene Leucine-rich gliomainactivated protein 1 affects neural communication and promotes epileptic activity. Pharmacological approaches to treatments are analyzed. The ketogenic diet, a high-fat, low-carbohydrate dietary intervention, is also explored for its potential therapeutic role. Although further investigation is necessary, current insights suggest the ketogenic diet may significantly reduce seizure frequency, offering a promising direction for future treatment strategies, especially in patients who do not respond well …

Final Internship Report, Landen Morrison

Theses & ETDs

This report presents an account of an internship completed at Williams Wealth Management Group (WWMG), a fiduciary financial advisory firm located in Bradenton, Florida. It opens with a thorough analysis of the wealth management industry, outlining its historical development, major regulatory changes, and evolving client expectations shaped by technological advances and shifting market dynamics. A variety of tasks, including retirement planning, managing required minimum distributions (RMDs), supporting profit-sharing strategies, and assisting with operational processes were completed during the internship. These experiences provided exposure to industry-standard financial tools and client service practices. The internship underscored the importance of regulatory compliance, personalized …

Anxious Flesh, Divine Machines The Body As A Canvas For Technology, Hanh Nguyen

Theses & ETDs

What remains of humans when we merge with machines? What is lost—and what is gained? I will examine the intersection between human and modern technology through a series of figurative paintings, prints and collages. Inspired by the critiques of Byung-Chul Han and the fiction of J.G. Ballard, the themes of alienation, hyper-connectivity, and the erosion of human agency are at the core of my works, I look at how technology has reprogrammed us, our bodies, or actions, our feelings and how this paradigm shift has influenced my artworks. Visually, I am interested in distorted depictions of human bodies; I draw …

Blue Ink: A Literary Arts Journal 2025 - 2026, Department Of Languages, Literature, And Philosophy, Tennessee State University

Blue Ink Student Literary Journal

No abstract provided.

Full Issue

Quidditas

No abstract provided.

Centering Maternal Breastfeeding In The Old English Metrical Charm 6, Kierra E. Burns

Quidditas

This article examines female authority and self-determination in relation to maternal lactation during early medieval England. While breastfeeding has always been essential to infant survival, its cultural significance extends beyond nourishment alone, reflecting broader social values and assumptions about gender and motherhood. Within this context, early English texts reveal that lactating mothers were regarded as natural authorities in the processes of childbearing and nourishing their infants. Through analysis of historical and literary evidence, this article argues that maternal breastfeeding was viewed in inherently positive and empowering terms with maternal self-determination and authority at the heart of that positivity. The article …

Impact Of Communication Disability On Student Engagement, Emmanuel Kwaku Addo

Research Days Posters 2025

Student engagement supports learning, development, and persistence, but students with communication disabilities may struggle due to inadequate accommodations. Their engagement strategies remain under-researched. This study aims to understand whether the engagement strategies employed by students with communication disabilities (CD) vary from those in the general population (GP) in navigating the college campus environment. Data from the 2021 National Survey of Student Engagement Administration, which included students with CD (n = 367) and GP (n = 125,955), were analyzed to examine differences across four constructs of Student Engagement. Significant differences with small effect sizes were found in Student-Faculty Interaction, Quality of …

Sea Dragons: Special Operations And Chinese Military Strategy, John Chen, Joel Wuthnow

CMSI Red Books

As China continues to rise as a global sea power, its maritime strategy continues to evolve. Among these critical evolutions is one of the People’s Liberation Army’s naval special operations forces’ most elite units: the Sea Dragons. A small yet highly specialized unit, the Sea Dragons entered the global spotlight and international consciousness with the 2018 film Operation Red Sea, raising several questions for Chinese naval experts. What does Chinese military strategy and doctrine require of special forces, and specifically naval SOF, to be able to accomplish the mission, particularly along the Taiwan Strait and in the South China …

2025 - University Council Membership, University Council, East Tennessee State University

University Council Agendas and Minutes

No abstract provided.

Grand Challenge In The Archives: Exploring Bias Through Experiential Learning, Karen W. Morse

Technical Services Faculty Publications

Considerations of diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility can inform and enhance all aspects of archival work, even and especially our most challenging. When tasked with creating a new course for the University of Rhode Island’s General Education Program, I focused on how to engage students from various disciplinary backgrounds with archives on a deeper level. The result is Bias: Interrogating the Archive (LTI 350G), which debuted in fall 2021. While based on my ongoing work on bias and silences in the documentary record, the course highlights the wider real-world implications of bias. A successful example of incremental growth, LTI 350G …

Finding Evidence For Understanding The Level Of Technology Integration By Teacher Candidates: A Mixed Methods Analysis To Support Caep Standards, Jennifer R. Jackson

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

Accrediting bodies, such as the Council for the Accreditation of Educator Preparation (CAEP), are increasingly focused on how teacher preparation programs integrate technology. As part of the Teacher Performance Assessment (TPA) teacher candidates demonstrate essential classroom skills through submission of teaching videos, lesson plans, and reflections. This study examined which of these three document types provides the strongest evidence of technology use among teacher candidates. Using a technology integration model, the Technology Integration Matrix (TIM), this study quantitatively assessed the levels of technology integration and characteristics of the learning environment visible in a stratified random sample of 150 submitted documents. …

Factors That Impact Customer Loyalty As Examined In Integrated Marketing Communications Agencies, Terry L. Hapney Jr.

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) agencies report high customer turnover, making it difficult for them to retain customers in the B2B realm. Relationship Marketing Theory informs this study, which centers on IMC firm growth from market share. Market share is a result of customer loyalty. There are factors that IMC agency leaders, such as CEOs and CMOs, can leverage to strengthen customer loyalty, including satisfaction, trust, quality, value, habit, engagement, attachment, image, and reputation. This study examines these concepts collectively for the first time in any context; it also examines them specifically in the IMC agency context for the first time. …

The Power Of Pets: Navigating Infancy, Early Development, And Eventual Loss/ Exploring The Mutual Human-Animal Bond Through Children’S Board And Picture Books With Critical Anthropomorphism, Mary Teresa Woodcock

Children's Book Writing and Illustrating (MFA) Theses

Pets are powerful elements of picture books. Alongside our animal companions, we navigate infancy, early childhood and adulthood, and better understand our relationships and life itself. Critical anthropomorphism allows us to represent our relationship to our animal companions ethically in the written and illustrated text. This paper acknowledges an array of primary and scholarly texts about animals and their roles in human experience as a foundation for my three book projects “A Colorful Night for Cat,” “Grandma, Sam, and Me,” and “Tired Old Socks.” I work to portray animal companions authentically, showing how both humans and animal companions benefit from …

Demand Characterization For Real-Time Cyber-Physical Systems: Algorithms, Analysis, And Applications To Control Systems, Aaron Thomas Willcock

Wayne State University Dissertations

This work adds novel co-design, demand characterization, and utilization bounding tools to the real-time community toolbox for the effective deployment of real-time, safety-critical cyber-physical systems. Specifically, this work exploits system dynamics for improved real-time analysis in: software-based short circuit detection, intelligent power distribution systems (IPDSes), robotic arm motion, and internal combustion engines (ICEs). In short detection, inductor sub-saturation back-EMF is exploited to link circuit size and task utilization. In the IPDS, sub-maximal loading is used to bound system utilization for variable-frequency current monitoring tasks. For the robotic arm, repeated motion and error-dependent worst-case execution time are leveraged for faster schedulability …

A Metadata Analysis Of Unionid Mussels Of The Greenup Pool Of The Ohio River Using Occupancy Modeling And Species Area Curves, Tyler Mitchell Annarino

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

Although North America contains the largest diversity of freshwater mussels in the world, only ~24% of species in the United States and Canada have stable populations. This group provides unique hurdles for surveying, and current unionid survey protocols include neither longitudinal studies nor randomization of sites. This project conducts a metadata analysis of freshwater mussels in the Greenup Pool of the Ohio River (GPOR) to answer three questions: 1. Does a combination of longitudinal scope, randomization of sites, and historic methodology of surveying result in useful occupancy/detection models (ODMs) of unionids in large streams at the family level? 2. Does …

Uncovering New Perspectives On Job Performance In Diverse Work Settings: A Job Demand-Resource Theoretical Approach, Myesha P. Holmes

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

The aim of this study was to integrate the agility literature within the theoretical framework of the Job Demand-Resource (JD-R) Theory to examine and validate whether employee agility (job resources) and work overload (job demands) influence the relationship between subjective wellbeing, work engagement, and job performance among remote, hybrid, and onsite workers. Data was collected through a Qualtrics Online panel, utilizing five standardized and validated scales, from a sample of 504 full-time employed respondents across the United States. The data was analyzed using Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) and Analysis of Variance (ANOVA). The results indicated a significant relationship between employee …

Modeling Oct3-Mediated Buprenorphine Transport As A Mechanism For Salivary Accumulation And Oral Toxicity, Veda Pesala, Laasya Vemparala, Mehtab Singh, Sydni Gunpath, Emily Schmitt Lavin, Arthur Sikora

Protein Modeling Reports

In this study we prepared a 3D printed model to better understand OCT3-mediated buprenorphine transport. Buprenorphine is a high affinity partial agonist at the mu-opioid receptor (μ-OR) and main component of Suboxone. It has a unique pharmacological profile that makes it effective for treating both pain and opioid use disorder (OUD) but has been linked to oral health issues such as dry mouth and tooth decay. The exceptionally tight binding of suboxone to μ-OR allows for sustained receptor occupancy and reduced opioid misuse potential by patients. Activation of μ-ORs can inhibit the release of acetylcholine. This neurotransmitter found in many …

Insights From The Second Scarborough Charter Inter-Institutional Forum: Attendee Demographics And Program Perceptions, E. J. Hennessey, C. Wilson, J. Thompson, Y. Wallace, S. Brown, M. Tetui, R. Costa, K. Hogarth, V. Oliver, T. Kayode, J. Wilson, H. Mistry

Scarborough Charter Inter-Institutional Forum

The Scarborough Charter (2022) on Anti-Black racism and Black inclusion in Canadian Higher Education steering committee invited signatories to attend a two-day inter-institutional forum hosted in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada in May of 2024.

The Scarborough Charter Inter-institutional Forum was organized under the theme ‘Bridging Black,’ emphasizing the need to bridge the gaps in both learning and action and to build better connections between senior administration, faculty, staff, students, and Black communities at higher education institutions.

This gathering was the second forum in the series, and the first to conduct an evaluation of organizers and attendees.

The feedback garnered from surveys …

Exploring Educator Perceptions Of The Impact Of Career And Technical Education On Student Outcomes, Michael J. Mosca

Selected Full Text Dissertations, 2011-

This qualitative study demonstrated the benefits of Career and Technical Education (CTE) over the traditional educational system and identified key components necessary to implement CTE programs in smaller-sized secondary schools, like those found in the Long Island Region of New York. Although an abundance of research existed on the benefits of CTE, these studies focused on programs in large school districts with high student enrollment and, most often, multiple high schools. Long Island consisted of school districts that are unique from other geographical locations in that its school districts are community based and 87% contain a single high school with …

The Safe Steps Project: Fall Prevention Amongst Older Adults In A Skilled Nursing Facility, Maiana Cabrera, Nicole Le, Yen Tran, Madeline Turcotte

ELMSN E-Portfolio. A collection of Scholarly and Creative Works

BACKGROUND: The Safe Steps Project aimed to reduce falls at Pine Creek Care Center, a skilled nursing facility located in Roseville, CA. Before this intervention, the fall rate at Pine Creek Care Center had been rising above their 15% goal in the first few months of 2025. Through an in-service education, this project has helped educate and increase nursing staff knowledge on fall prevention, such as intentional rounding with the 4 Ps (pain, position, potty, and possessions).

AIM: The Safe Steps Project addresses a major cause of injury in older adults, falls. The aim of this project was to improve …

Front Matter

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Seed Of The Serpent And The Seed Of The Woman In The Standard Works, Noel Hudson

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

The curse of the serpent in Genesis 3:15 is presented as an archetype for the battle between good and evil. An ancient Hebrew literary form that ties together multiple stories through a common set of images, situations, repeated words, and phrases, is termed a leitmotif. A biblical leitmotif based on the curse of the serpent in Genesis 3 and the curse of Cain in Genesis 4 is found throughout both the Old and New Testaments and is referred to as the seed of the serpent leitmotif. Hebrew prophets, early Christians, and protestant reformers all found the seed of …

Birth And Rebirth: The Fish In Mesoamerican Art And Its Implication On Stela 5, Izapa, Chiapas, Mexico, Diane E. Wirth

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

A revealing analysis of fish iconography in Mesoamerica, in relation to the ancestral couple on Stela 5, Izapa, Chiapas, Mexico, holds an unforeseen element that may reveal a key to the Tree of Life referred to in the Book of Mormon. This key is supported by Mesoamerican, Hebrew, and Egyptian traditions.

Through A Glass Darkly: Restoring Translation To The Restoration?, Jeff Lindsay

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

In By Means of the Urim & Thummim, James Lucas and Jonathan Neville valiantly seek to defend Joseph Smith’s role as the divinely inspired translator, a role that they argue is incompatible with using any tool other than the Nephite “intepreters,” later called the Urim and Thummim. They offer a unique theory to account for the statements of witnesses about Joseph using a seer stone in a hat, arguing that it was a fake demonstration using memorized passages to satisfy onlooker curiosity about the translation process. They propose a translation model in which Joseph did more than just get …

State Plan On Aging, Tennessee. Department Of Disability And Aging

State Plan on Aging

This document includes plans to be conducted by the Tennessee Department of Disability and Aging under the provisions of the Older Americans Act from the period of October 1, 2025 through September 30, 2027.

Gastronomy At The Heart Of Communication: A Locus Of Human Conviviality, Victoria M. O’Keefe

Theses and Dissertations

The significance of food over time is central to humanity and can aid in making people humane in a myriad of ways. This study seeks to (a) define the role of food in communication across sectors of global society and in the media realm (b) by analyzing a data set of all food related publications of the flagship magazine of UNESCO, The Courier, (c) through ethnographic study and inductive coding, I draw themes and trends that alter food communication from a multinational organization and pass the content through a theoretical lens and Large Language Model tool, to (d) illuminate implications …

Expression And Function Of Floral Symmetry Genes In The Regulation Of Flower Shape In Fedia Graciliflora, Theresa A. Mustacchio

Theses and Dissertations

Shifts between radial symmetry (actinomorphy) and bilateral symmetry (zygomorphy) in flowers have occurred multiple times independently within angiosperms (flowering plants). Evidence across angiosperms indicate the transcription factors RADIALIS (RAD), DIVARICATA (DIV), and CYCLOIDEA (CYC) play a major role in regulating floral symmetry and morphology. The CYC-like genes have been shown to shift their expression dorsally independently in nearly all shifts to bilaterally symmetrical flowers examined. Three core eudicot clades of CYC-like genes have been identified: CYC1, CYC2 and CYC3, with only CYC2 genes being shown to have a role in floral symmetry. We use the non-model plant, Fedia graciliflora (Caprifoliaceae) …