Digital Commons Network^™

Evert J. Blekkink: Defender Of Civil Discourse; Collections Highlight: Vienna Summer School, Charlotte Ulloa, Charles Harris

Archives and Special Collections Quarterly

Evert J. Blekkink: Defender of Civil Discourse

Column: From the Director of Archives and Special Collections

Collections Highlight: Vienna Summer School

News From Hope College, Volume 57.3: Spring 2026, Hope College

News from Hope College

No abstract provided.

When Performance Is Not Enough: Managing Ngos In An Age Of Digital Mistrust, Christianna Sirindah Parr

Asian Management Insights

As NGOs lack formal authority, their influence depends on legitimacy, which can be contested at scale online. Leaders must treat social media as a governance decision, with clear scope, speaking authority and response protocols.

Space-Time Analysis Of Burgeoning Us Atrial Septal Defect Rates Driven By Cannabis, Albert Stuart Reece, Kenneth Hulse

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Atrial septal defect (ASD) has become increasingly common in the USA and now affects 1 in 11.3 children in some places, but space–time analysis has not been applied to this emerging trend. ASD rate (ASDR) data were obtained from the National Birth Defects Prevention Network 2003–2020. Substance (cigarettes, alcohol, cannabis, analgesics, cocaine) use data were obtained from the National Survey of Drug Use and Health. Income data were obtained from the US Census. Analysis was limited to the Non-Hispanic White population by technical factors. Time-sequential univariate and bivariate maps were prepared for both covariates and outcomes and their combinations. Spatial …

Is Tax “Law”?, Luís C. Calderón Gómez

Articles

Although taxation remains a hotly contested issue in debates by both politicians and political theorists—over the optimal size of government, distributive (and sometimes corrective) justice, or even the legitimacy of current private property arrangements—taxation has been largely ignored by legal theorists, to the detriment of both tax law and legal theory.  This Article argues that tax law, driven by its battle against tax evasion, is in deep conflict with widely accepted conceptions of “legality”—that is, the qualities that make a rule distinctively and normatively “law.”  This matters because legality is a key buttress in jurisprudential and political theory accounts that …

Llm-Driven Mission Control And Autonomous Planning For Search-And-Rescue Uavs: A Simulation-Based Evaluation, Naser Bader Alsaedi

Theses

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are increasingly used in search‑and‑rescue (SAR) missions, yet many systems still rely on fragmented software where mission design, perception, and flight control are configured separately. This thesis examines whether a unified AI‑driven framework can reduce configuration effort and operator workload in UAV‑based SAR operations. The proposed system integrates natural‑language mission specification using a large language model (LLM) (LLaMA 3.1), autonomous coverage planning, YOLOv8‑based victim detection, and PX4/MAVSDK control within a single architecture. Operators describe missions through free‑form text or a graphical interface; the model converts these descriptions into structured mission parameters that are automatically planned and …

Analysis Of A Coaxial Transmission Line Filled With An Orthorhombic Dielectric-Magnetic Medium, Fathima Manikunnath Abdul Akbar

Theses

Coaxial transmission lines are fundamental means for Transverse Electromagnetic (TEM) wave propagation in RF, microwave and high-speed electronic systems. The study of transmission lines is often familiar when they are filled with isotropic materials; however modern engineered direction dependent materials reshape field distributions. In this thesis, we consider a coaxial transmission line of an inner radius and outer radius b filled with an orthorhombic dielectric-magnetic material, which is described by two anisotropy parameters αx and αy. The potential and field distributions are studied in relation to the ratio b/a as well as the anisotropy parameters αx and αy. Due to …

Efficient Fpga Implementation Of A 1 Million-Point Fft, Jwaher Abdulqader Al Tamimi

Theses

The one-million-point Fast Fourier Transform is implemented using a radix-2 single-path delay feedback pipeline architecture. To minimize the computational overhead, twiddle factors were pre-computed and stored in memory. The design uses a fixed-point representation with two integer bits and seven fractional bits, achieving a measured signal-to-noise ratio of 37.98. Given the substantial memory requirements, a memory partitioning approach was used. It mapped the delay buffers in each stage lookup table memory, block random-access memory, or ultra random-access memory, based on word width and memory depth.

The implementation operates successfully at 100 megahertz on a mid-scale field-programmable gate array. Post-implementation reported …

Study Of The Effect Of Biodiesel Derived From Jojoba Oil With Alcohols Blends On Diesel Engine Performance, Exhaust Emissions, Vibration, And Noise, Yassir Abdelrahman Elbashier

Theses

This study presents a mutual investigation on the properties of the fuels and the performance of an engine using biofuels from mixtures of jojoba oil biodiesel with alcohols. The work consists of mainly two phases, examining the properties of the jojoba biodiesel-alcohols mixtures and the performance and emission behavior in a single piston diesel engine. A base mixture of 50% jojoba biodiesel and 50% diesel produced, and this was fractionally mixed with 5, 10, and 20% methanol and with 5, 10, and 20% diethyl ether (DEE). The rheological properties namely viscosity and shear stresses of all biodiesel blend mixtures were …

Law, Conflict, And Hybrid Warfare: A Teaching Imperative For A Changing World, Cynthia Alkon, Andrea K. Schneider

Articles

Lawyers increasingly find themselves at the frontlines of the battlefield, just not in the traditional sense. Hybrid warfare is a conflict form that combines traditional military offensive measures with nontraditional methods, including the harnessing of legal systems to achieve strategic goals. Lawyers have always been at the frontline of typical legal risk assessment, thinking about a client’s risk of liability or regulation costs generally. Now, lawyers must stand at the ready for a lot more: lawyers must be prepared for cyber-attacks, disinformation campaigns using artificial intelligence, the use of court systems to suppress reporting or shield bad actors, and so …

Rethinking Behavior - Spring 2026, Midwest Symposium For Leadership In Behavior Disorders

ReThinking Behavior Magazine

A magazine for professionals serving children and youth with behavioral needs.

Spring 2026, Volume 9, Issue 3

Reducing Computed Tomography Delay In A High-Volume Emergency Department, Sarah Ouedraogo

All Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) Scholarly Projects

Problem:

Delays in computed tomography (CT) imaging contribute to prolonged emergency department (ED) length of stay and delayed clinical decision-making. At the project site, baseline data demonstrated an average ASAP CT order-to-scan time of approximately 116 minutes for non-critical ED patients, with CT readiness compliance rates of 0%. Gap analysis identified inconsistent patient preparation and fragmented communication between ED nursing and radiology as key contributors to avoidable delays. PICOT question: In non-emergent emergency department (ED) patients (P), how does the use of a CT readiness checklist by ED nurses (I), compared with no standardized readiness checklist (C), affect patient readiness …

A Comprehensive Calibration Framework For The Northwest River Forecast Center, Geoffrey Walters, Cameron Bracken, Brad Gillies, Leah Pope, Henry Pai, Sonali Chokshi, Victor Stegemiller, Stephen King, Julie Bracken, Taylor Dixon, Multiple Additional Authors

Mathematics and Statistics Faculty Publications and Presentations

We present a comprehensive framework developed by the Northwest River Forecast Center for calibrating hydrologically diverse basins. The framework includes models for snow, soil moisture, routing, channel loss, and consumptive use. Data inputs include a wide range of open-access datasets for meteorology, land use, topography, and land cover. The framework uses conceptual hydrologic models to handle basins with various hydrologic regimes including rain-driven and snowmelt-dominated basins. We also develop a flexible automatic calibration system that can handle numerous unobservable model parameters in a computationally efficient manner. A single-basin automatic calibration run can typically be completed on a modern laptop in …

How The Economic Mindset Impedes The Faithful Practice Of The Missional Call A Case Study Of The Ethiopian Evangelical Church Mekane Yesus Global Mission Endeavors, Wondimu M. Game

Doctor of Philosophy Dissertation

Wondimu M. Game, “How the Economic Mindset Impedes the Faithful Practice of the Missional Call: A Case Study of the Ethiopian Evangelical Church Mekane Yesus Global Mission Endeavors,” PhD Dissertation, Concordia Seminary, 2026, 278 pp.

This study examines the theological and missiological foundations of the indigenous church in light of the Venn–Anderson three-self principles of self-governance, self-support, and self-propagation. While these principles have shaped Protestant mission practice, their application has often become structural and economic rather than ecclesial and theological, In some contexts, this has contributed to patterns of financial dependency and weakened local initiative due to an impoverished economic …

Endocrine Roles Of Vitamin D In Female Reproduction: Mechanisms And Clinical Implications, Azza Alsuwaidi, Fatme Alanouti, Dimitrios Papandreou

All Works

Vitamin D a fat-soluble steroid hormone signals through Vitamin D Receptors (VDRs) located throughout the ovaries, uterus, placenta, hypothalamus, and pituitary gland, influencing immune regulation and female reproductive physiology. This review of studies from 2013-2025 found consistent associations between low vitamin D status and various disorders in women of childbearing age. In Premenstrual Syndrome (PMS), deficiency correlates with higher symptom severity, and evidence shows that supplementation significantly reduces total PMS scores, particularly improving mood-related domains. For uterine pathologies such as fibroids, endometriosis, and adenomyosis, low vitamin D status is linked to increased risk and severity. Repletion trials suggest antifibrotic and …

Artificial Intelligence For Better Inclusive Higher Education: A Study Of A Private University In Cairo, Shereen Ismail

Theses and Dissertations

This study explores how artificial intelligence (AI) tools relate to accessibility for visually impaired students in Egyptian higher education, focusing on University Y in Cairo. Grounded in the Social Model of Disability and Universal Design for Learning, it examines visually impaired students’ lived experiences of AI mediated access and the institutional conditions that shape these experiences. A qualitative phenomenological design was used, with semi-structured interviews conducted with visually impaired undergraduate students and key staff involved in assistive technology, teaching and learning, and student wellbeing; data were analyzed thematically. The findings indicate that participants experience AI tools (e.g., chatbots, transcription and …

Transforming Wood, Transforming Bodies: Craft Work, Addiction Recovery, And Regional History At An Appalachian Guitar Factory, Eva Murillo , ‘26

Senior Theses, Projects, and Awards

No abstract provided.

Modeling And Constraining Beyond Standard Model Neutrino Self-Interactions, Sabrina Hanning , ‘26

Senior Theses, Projects, and Awards

Neutrinos are the ideal subject for theories of Beyond Standard Model (BSM) physics. This is because small neutrino interaction cross-sections make them incredibly difficult to detect and result in many open questions regarding neutrino properties, particularly those that do not fit nicely into the Standard Model of particle physics, such as the existence of neutrino masses. BSM neutrino self-interactions are an interesting possibility with connections to dark matter candidates, neutrino mass generation, and in general any measurement that relies on accurate modeling of incident astrophysical neutrino flux.

These self-interactions may take various forms, with different mediator particles; we present a …

Optimization Of Pumping Kite Wind Energy Conversion System, Jamie Pickar , ‘26, Sam Peterson , ‘26, Luke Magnuson , ‘26

Senior Theses, Projects, and Awards

Airborne wind energy systems (AWES) promise access to higher-altitude wind resources at lower capital cost than conventional turbines. This thesis presents a rigid-wing, ground-generation AWES prototype developed across two coupled subsystems: a kite designed for harnessing wind energy and a generator station designed for efficient pumping-cycle operation.

The kite subsystem progressed through three design generations. We replaced ball-joint wing mounts with fixed joints, derived a tail design using tail volume coefficients, and validated the tail through fusion 360 stress testing and Unity game engine simulation. The final prototype of the kite demonstrated approximately 25 seconds of passive transient flight stability …

Trash Bot!, Owen Hoffman , ‘26, Ryder Maston , ‘26, Jack Nicholson , ‘26

Senior Theses, Projects, and Awards

Trash Bot! is the prototype of a smart and mobile waste receptacle for Swarthmore’s waste management system. With Swarthmore College committing to embed zero waste into campus culture and achieve a 90% diversion rate by 2035, flexible waste systems must be developed and improved. Trash Bot! seeks to improve the diversion rate and sort accuracy on campus by reducing the human error present in the current waste sorting process. Trash Bot! was also designed to seamlessly integrate with a classroom environment, maintaining safety standards and avoiding collisions. Trash Bot! uses computer vision coupled with a trained classifier algorithm to achieve …

Monitoring Terrestrial Ecosystem Productivity Using Hyperspectral Satellite Data, Serge Tuyambaze

School of Natural Resources: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Accurate estimation of terrestrial Gross Primary Productivity (GPP) is critical for quantifying global carbon sequestration and understanding the terrestrial carbon cycle. While eddy covariance (EC) towers provide standard flux measurements, upscaling these measurements to continuous global coverage remains challenging due to the sparse distribution of flux towers and their small footprints. Remote sensing (RS), especially coupled with eddy covariance data, has been used to estimate GPP at the global scale. Different RS derived productivity models have been developed, including vegetation indices, light use efficiency (LUE) models, solar-induced fluorescence (SIF), dynamic global vegetation models (DGVM), and machine learning. One widely adapted …

We Are Each One Second Away From Being Someone Else's Patient, Paul B. Freeman Od

Optometric Clinical Practice

Editorial

A Case Of Adolescent Papilledema Secondary To Oral Hormonal Contraceptives, John D. Tassinari Od, Phil Kwok Od

Optometric Clinical Practice

Background: Papilledema, optic disc swelling secondary to elevated intracranial pressure (ICP), is a medical emergency given the gravity of possible disease etiologies, including but not limited to intracranial mass.

Case Report: A 12-year-old female with normal body mass index developed marked headaches and subsequently manifested bilateral swelling of the optic discs and retinal folds. Scanning laser ophthalmoscopy, particularly in the fundus autofluorescence mode, provided a striking image of the retinal folds. The posterior segment abnormalities were accompanied by reduced visual acuity and corresponding visual field defects. The edema of the optic nerve and retinal fluid were worse in her left …

Impact Of In Situ Observations From Three Torus Cases On Model Analyses And Forecasts Of Severe Convection, Robert M. Szot

Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The quality of forecasts of severe deep convection in high-resolution numerical weather prediction is dependent on the representativeness of the model initial conditions. This representativeness may be negatively impacted by limited observation availability and by the presence of mesoscale heterogeneities that were not detected by conventional observations assimilated into convection-allowing models. By assimilating storm-scale observations from the Targeted Observation by Radars and Uncrewed Aircraft Systems (UAS) of Supercells (TORUS) campaign into an ensemble styled after the Warn-on-Forecast System, this study aims to investigate if data from field work platforms can improve the quality of initial conditions in the ensemble, potentially …

Socio-Informed Policing: Applying Bourdieu To Mandatory Police Reform Training, Neil T. Shelton El

Theses and Dissertations from DePaul University

Contemporary U.S. police reform policies rely on officer training as a primary mechanism to address issues of law enforcement legitimacy and accountability. Yet, despite legitimacy-based curricula such as procedural justice, research indicates that this training struggles to produce durable changes in police practice. This qualitative study used a phenomenological approach to examine officers’ perceptions of mandated reform-oriented training. Drawing on Bourdieu’s theory of practice, the study conceptualized police training as a sociological process shaped by habitus, forms of capital, and the policing field. Data were collected from six officers in a large urban police department to examine how they internalize, …

Edu 26 Human Relations In Urban Schools, Elise Langan

Open Educational Resources

The syllabus for EDU 26 contains a course description, course objectives, course readings divided by week and a links to ZTC resources.

Not Just A Castle In The Sky: A Legal Remedy For Race-Based Takings In Virginia, Michaela R. Hill

William & Mary Law Review

Part I will address federal and state statutes and case law surrounding physical takings and the eminent domain power. Part I will also discuss Virginia’s history of racial discrimination in housing, the Shoe Lane Community in Newport News, and CNU’s expansion into the neighborhood for the elimination of blight. Part II will present the first prong of this Note’s three-pronged approach to correcting Virginia’s abuse of its eminent domain power to take residential properties: adopting stricter statutory blight standards. Part III will present the second prong: a new formula for calculating increased just compensation. Part IV will outline the third …

Hlt 101 Introduction To Public Health, Elyse Gruttadauria

Open Educational Resources

The syllabus, created by Professor Elyse Gruttadauria as part of the CUNY OER Initiatives for HLT 101 contains a course description, course objectives, course readings divided by week and a link to four OER textbooks.

Edu 40 Field Work Seminar, Tonya L. Johnson

Open Educational Resources

The syllabus for EDU 30 contains a course description, course objectives, course readings divided by week and links to OER textbooks and ZTC readings.

Salvation From The Purgatory Between Personhood And Property: Disinterring Evidence For Property Rights In Human Remains, Harris J. Burton

William & Mary Law Review

This Note argues that next of kin have property rights in the remains of decedents, as opposed to a quasi-property right in their burial. Changing this distinction will allow courts to address wrongs committed against human remains through remedies traditionally available for harms to property, thereby incentivizing institutions, such as prisons, to exercise care and transparency in dealing with human remains. Treating human remains as property will result in courts applying concrete tests, rather than assessing the infringement of a vague quasi-property right, in cases involving human remains. If courts apply a property standard, next of kin will have …