Digital Commons Network^™

Noem V. Vazquez Perdomo And Plenary Authority: A Look At What Is Happening To U.S. Citizens, Jose Juan Solis

Florida Atlantic University Undergraduate Law Journal

On September 8th, 2025, the Supreme Court ruled in Noem v. Vasquez Perdomo, and that ruling led to the Trump administration allowing immigration officers to detain Hispanic people based on four factors. These factors include race and ethnicity, speaking Spanish or having an accent when speaking English, being present at a particular location, or having a particular job.1 This ruling is very controversial because it gives immigration officers the right to use racial profiling to justify their arrests. This type of precedent has not been seen and sets a very dangerous situation, not only for undocumented civilians but also for …

Aging On The Fringes: Understanding Inequities Among Older Adults Impacted By Poverty, Mental Health Challenges, And Drug Use, William O’Leary, David Howson-Jan, Marjorie Knight, Soo Chan Carusone

Lyle S. Hallman Social Work Faculty Publications

This report provides an overview of government reports and academic literature examining aging and its intersection with poverty, homelessness, drug use, and mental health challenges. It pairs national and Ontario trends with data from Waterloo Region to illustrate how aging on the fringes is unfolding locally.

Throughout the report, “Local Lens: Waterloo Region” callouts highlight key regional indicators and their implications for programs and policy. The purpose of this report is to support discussion and action to advance equity-informed research and advocacy for people aging on the fringes. It is written for community members, service providers, and organizations seeking to …

The Love We Draw, Caleb Van Cleave

English Honors Papers

This thesis contains a completed story about navigating how to continue loving someone after one’s understanding of their being has changed in a way that makes them suddenly unfamiliar. It is a story that asks its characters if they are willing to adjust their perceptions of one another in order to remain connected or if they would rather sacrifice that growth in favor of chasing prior ideals. It is a story about seeking affection but no longer feeling certain of where to find it.

My goal for this thesis was to focus on fragmentation within a family dynamic, specifically during …

“But I’M Glad I’M Not A Hog!”: The Pig, The Laborer & “Humanity” In Animal Farm (1945) & The Jungle (1905), Madelyn Bell

English Honors Papers

This thesis places The Jungle and Animal Farm in conversation with one another to examine how each text engages, reframes, and complicates Marxist conceptions of labor, class, and (de)individuality through the figure of the pig. Beginning from the pig’s marked similarity to humans – its intelligence, sociality, and symbolic proximity – the analysis considers how this likeness makes the pig a particularly charged symbol for negotiating the moral and conceptual boundary between human and animal, inviting a reading in which human structures are reflected back through the animal form. Attending each novel’s distinct concern with socialism – Sinclair’s investment in …

Portal To The Possible: Naming The Liberatory Classroom Applications Within Afrofuturist And Queer-Futurist Ya Literature, Westley Wrenn Cardani

English Honors Papers

This thesis is an intertwining of disciplines and chronologies. Using English and educational theories, I employ thematic literary analysis, close readings, and lesson plan design to answer the following question: How do works of Afrofuturist and queer-futurist Young Adult literature present us with liberatory possibilities, and how can those stories be effectively pedagogically employed in classrooms to cultivate ‘future imaginings’? In this work, although it pertains to all students, I am especially concerned with the capacity of Black, Brown, queer, and trans* students to dream and construct futures given the operations of systems of oppression which attempt to tell them …

Reimagining Castañeda To Analyze How Districts Use Esser Funds To Support Latinx Spanish-Speaking Multilinguals: A Multiple Case Study, Mariano Lozano-Soto

CGU Theses & Dissertations

This study applies a reimagined Castañeda framework grounded in intersectionality theory to examine how California K–12 districts used Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) funds to support Latinx Spanish-speaking multilingual learners (MLs) during the pandemic. The research design for this study was a qualitative multiple-case study (n=6) using multiple data sources, including semi structured interviews and public-district documents. Data analysis consisted of deductive, descriptive, and theoretical coding to analyze a district’s ESSER allocation practices through the lens of the reimagined Castañeda framework. The findings reveal that the Castañeda standard guided districts’ use of ESSER funds to support Latinx Spanish-speaking …

The Myth Of The Second Amendment, Laura Muna-Landa

CGU Theses & Dissertations

This dissertation traces the evolution of the United States Supreme Court’s interpretation of the Second Amendment, which shifted from a constitutional provision grounded in collective security and concerns about tyranny to a modern doctrine emphasizing an individual right to possess firearms. It contends that post-Heller (District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) decisions do not simply “apply” founding-era intent to modern circumstances but instead reflect a significant doctrinal reconstruction that now shapes both gun policy and public perceptions of constitutional meaning. This research first reconstructs the founding-era context, then tests explanations of judicial behavior, and finally applies that framework to Heller, …

When Hearts Beat In Two Languages: Enabling Access To Biliteracy Pathway Recognitions For Latine Linguistically Expanding Learners (Lexls) In K-8 Schools Across A Southern California School District, Mayra C. Orozco

CGU Theses & Dissertations

This qualitative nested case study examined how Biliteracy Pathway Recognitions (BPRs) are implemented and accessed for Latine Linguistically Expanding Learners (LExLs) in one Southern California school district. Although California has expanded opportunities for students to earn recognitions that value bilingualism and biliteracy, little research has examined how these policies are implemented at the elementary and middle school level and how families navigate access to these opportunities. Guided by Honig’s (2006) policy implementation framework of policy, people, and places and Yosso’s (2005) Community Cultural Wealth (CCW) model, this study explored how district and school personnel implemented BPR policies and how families …

Blazing Turquoise And Coral Light Jewels Of Veiled Empowerment: Buddha Ye Shes Mtsho Rgyal (ཡེ་ཤེས་མཚོ་རྒྱལ) And Saint Hildegard Von Bingen In The Lotus Of Ever-Excellent Feminist Dialogue, Janice Leigh Poss

CGU Theses & Dissertations

This Women's and Gender Studies in Religion dissertation seeks to restore awareness of women's religious leadership using the actual embodied experience of Yeshe Tsogyal and Hildegard von Bingen embedded in the philosophical terms Erlebnis (German), Padartha/Bhava (Sanskrit), and srid pa (Tibetan). Brief definitions are: Erlebnis as enthusiastic, lived experience and awareness, Padarthas as categories of real things or actualities, Bhava as the act of emotional or spiritual feeling, and Srid pa as becoming in possibility. Drawing on the above four terms encapsulated in a feminist transnational and intersectional methodological framework, this project reinforces women’s authority and influence in religion as …

John: A Samaritan Gospel, John Colin Stringfellow

CGU Theses & Dissertations

The Gospel of John is enigmatic; scholars have sought to identify its distinctive features. Is it influenced by Hellenistic culture, Gnosticism, Dositheism, or is it an editorial compilation? These distinct characteristics have led scholars to speculate about the intended recipients of the Fourth Gospel. Identifying the audience is crucial in deciphering these distinct characteristics. Why did the author(s) use specific literary techniques and devices? Why were particular stories selected? This dissertation does not seek to dismiss the existing scholarly analyses that have identified the recurring themes and structure of the Gospel of John; instead, it prompts the question, "Why?" Understanding …

Chicano Studies Courses: Latina/O Student Engagement In Community Colleges, Marisol Celeste Madrigal Uribe

CGU Theses & Dissertations

Community colleges play a vital role in expanding access to higher education for historically marginalized students, particularly Latina/o and first-generation college students. However, many students arrive carrying the effects of cultural erasure, racial marginalization, and deficit-based schooling experiences that shape their academic engagement, sense of belonging, and future aspirations. This qualitative study examines how Chicana/o Studies courses foster student engagement, identity development, belonging, and future orientation within the community college context. Guided by Critical Race Theory (CRT) and the concept of racial microaffirmations, the study conceptualizes Chicana/o Studies as a transformational educational space that affirms students’ lived experiences, challenges Eurocentric …

Reading The Birds: Critical, Multimodal, And Queer Meaning-Making In Literacy Teacher Education, Kris Benefield

CGU Theses & Dissertations

This qualitative dissertation explores critical, multimodal, and queer literacies and related pedagogies in teacher education. In it, I engage in both critical analysis and theorizing at the intersection of teacher education, literacy, and pedagogy, producing insights and tools that may be of use to teachers, teacher-educators, and researchers interested in resisting oppression in and through literacy and composition education. The findings contribute to the research on literacy teacher education by detailing the situated processes involved in both critical meaning-making and pedagogical enactment among a group of K-12 teachers in and beyond two literacy methods courses. I draw on thematic analysis …

Catalog Of The Music Of Nick Strimple (B. 1946), Ruth Ballenger

CGU Theses & Dissertations

This dissertation provides a rich primary source for future scholars interested in the music of American composer Dr. Nick Strimple. A complete catalog of Dr. Strimple’s works and more than thirty transcribed interviews with the composer offer broad insight into Dr. Strimple’s motivations, inspirations, and sources for his own compositions. Primary sources – that is, firsthand evidence created in real time by a participant or observer – offer what musicologists might colloquially describe as the “gold standard” for citation and understanding of their musical subjects. As the field of musicology evolved, primary sources have come to be highly valued as …

Shared Words, Divided Worlds: Moral Language And The Struggle For Meaning At The Claremont Colleges During The Vietnam War, 1965-1969, Haley Freeth

CGU Theses & Dissertations

This thesis examines the Vietnam War-era campus conflicts at the Claremont Colleges as a profound struggle over the meaning and ownership of moral and political language. Rather than interpreting antiwar and prowar activism as expressions of fundamentally opposed value systems, this study argues that students and administrators alike engaged in an ongoing contest to define ideals such as democracy, responsibility, and conscience. Through a micro-historical lens, the project analyzes how these contested vocabularies were invoked, reinterpreted, and performed in protests, counter-protests, and administrative policies. Drawing from a wide array of archival sources—including student newspapers, protest ephemera, administrative records, and visual …

Exploring The School-Family-Community Partnership: How Do Parents Perceive Its Influence On The Reclassification Of Long-Term English Learners In Middle School?, Luis Enrique Galván

CGU Theses & Dissertations

This qualitative study explored middle school parents’ perceptions of school-family-community partnerships and their influence on reclassifying long-term English learners (LTELs). LTELs often face limited access to the full curriculum, increasing risks of dropout and reduced college-prep opportunities. The California Department of Education (2023a) reported that English learners graduate at significantly lower rates than non-EL peers. While parent involvement is widely linked to academic success (Heymann & Earle, 2000; London, 2018; Norris, 2018; Panferov, 2019; Walker, 2012; Wei & Zhou, 2012), little research has addressed LTELs in middle school, particularly regarding reclassification. To address this gap, the researcher conducted semi-structured Zoom …

Beyond Access: Black Women Alumnae’S Perspectives On Navigating Russell Group Universities As Undergraduates In The United Kingdom, Varaidzo Felistus Kativhu

CGU Theses & Dissertations

This qualitative study examines the lived experiences of Black British women who attended Russell Group universities, investigating how they navigated identity, belonging, racism, and institutional support within elite higher education. The study was guided by three research questions: how Black women experienced identity and belonging in these environments; what survival and resistance strategies they developed in response; and what institutional changes they recommend to better support Black women students. Drawing on Black Feminist Thought (Collins, 2000), Strayhorn’s (2018) sense of belonging framework, and Tuck’s (2009) desire-based research framework, the study employed a phenomenological methodology adapted from Seidman (2019). The research …

A Narrative Inquiry Of Early-Career Women Of Color In Student Affairs, Nora Anitzya Jin-Leyva

CGU Theses & Dissertations

At the time of this study, data revealed student affairs professionals were exiting the profession at high rates (Chamberlain et al., 2022). This rate was higher among new student affairs professionals (Buchanan & Shupp, 2015). Professionals in the field face common challenges including low job satisfaction and high levels of burnout (Aros, 2022; Chamberlain et al., 2022; Quaye et al., 2024) and a lack of appropriate supervision (Shupp & Arminio, 2012) and mentoring opportunities (Aros, 2022; Maramba, 2011). However, people of color and women in the profession face additional challenges, including racial battle fatigue (Quaye et al., 2024), racism and …

Middle School Girls' Math Self-Concepts In Japan And The United States: A Socio-Ecological Approach, Kimberly A. Megyesi-Brem

CGU Theses & Dissertations

In Japan and the United States, women’s underrepresentation in STEM fields in tertiary education limits opportunities for social mobility and economic stability. Efforts to address this issue need to consider the role played by the intractable girls’ inferiority in math (GIM) myth that contributes to girls’ lower engagement in math through lower math self-concepts. Prior research shows that perceived teacher support through is one area where the GIM myth relates to girls’ math self-concepts through teacher bias about girls’ math competence. However, research has predominantly been focused at the individual level, including studies that conclude that girls’ lower math self-concepts …

Process Failures, Unremedied Harms, And Students With Disabilities, Claire Raj

Emory Law Journal

Although the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (“IDEA”) has long aimed to extend what it calls a “free appropriate public education” to all students with disabilities, one demographic group—students from lower-income homes—has consistently been left behind. Securing a remedy under the IDEA’s highly technical rules and impermeable evidentiary standards increasingly requires the assistance of both lawyers and experts, neither of whom are easily accessible to lower-income families. This inaccessibility subverts Congress’s original intent. Congress infused the IDEA with robust procedures to ensure two equally important substantive ends. First, procedures were meant to ensure meaningful parent participation and provide parents with …

Moderating Role Of Perceived Staff-Replacement Likelihood On Self-Ordering Kiosk Adoption: Evidence From The Restaurant Industry, Wanmo Koo, Archana Kumar

Department of Marketing Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

The restaurant industry widely employs self-ordering kiosks (SOKs). However, the increased use of automation in restaurants is causing job displacement, raising concerns about the lack of sufficient human support in restaurants. The study examined variables influencing customer willingness to use SOKs while considering how staff replacement perceptions alter these effects. Partial least squares structural equation modeling reveals that performance expectancy, effort expectancy, social influence, and perceived security significantly influence behavioral intention to use SOKs, and behavioral intention strongly predicts actual kiosk usage behavior. Among the moderating effects, only perceived staff replacement likelihood significantly influences the relationship between perceived security and …

The Dunning-Kruger Effect In Sixth Grade Adolescents: Improving Metacognition For Self-Regulated Learning, Julie H. Chen

Scripps Senior Theses

The Dunning-Kruger (DK) effect is a cognitive bias where low-performing individuals overestimate their own abilities, and top-performing individuals underestimate their own abilities relative to their peers. The purpose of this proposed study is to investigate the DK effect in sixth grade adolescents and to use metacognition as an intervention to improve self-assessment calibrations. This study will investigate adolescents in Piaget’s formal operational stage, aiming to improve metacognition levels. The study will occur over 12 weeks, and participants will be given a preparation handbook with or without metacognition activities for the purpose of preparing for the California Assessment of Student Performance …

The Impact Of Import Tariffs On Patenting: Evidence From Us Manufacturing Firms’ Response To Nafta, Norah L. Shipley

CMC Senior Theses

There has been substantial debate within the economics profession on the impact of tariffs and free-trade agreements on productivity and innovation. I add to this debate by exploring how import tariff reductions after the signing of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) in 1994 impacted US manufacturers’ patenting behavior. Using data on import tariffs from 1989 to 1999 and US manufacturing firm-level data, I construct a panel data set with 2,681 unique firms. I run OLS, Poisson, and Negative Binomial Models of patent counts on tariff rates while including firm and year fixed effects. In the full sample, I …

Social Justice In The Linguistics Classroom, Reed Blaylock, Miranda Mccarvel, James A. Berry, Evan D. Bradley, Emily Graham, Jill Hallett, Sarah E. Hercula, Lisa Morgan Johnson, Kahdeidra Monét Martin, Ebi Poweigha, Md. Abusalah Sakender, Allison Taylor-Adams

Education and Child Study: Faculty Publications

In the current political and social climate, diversity, equity, inclusion, and justice initiatives in higher education face pushback and at times abolition. Educators within the field of linguistics face a paradox: vulnerability of the classroom versus the fundamental duty to promote linguistic and social justice. This organized session aimed to support community and coalition building, helping linguists build capacity to engage in the work of linguistic and social justice through their teaching. The session was structured into four areas: diversity and inclusion, justice and equity, resistance and response, and lifelong learning and engagement. The first session introduced strategies for decentering …

Shifting Tide: A Comparative Analysis Of News Coverage Of The Israeli–Palestinian Conflict, Devon Skufca, Gloria S. Vaquera

2026 Faculty Bibliography

Internationally, the ongoing conflict between Israel and Palestine has been widely reported for years in mass media. Most recently, the attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, again focused international attention on this region. Examining how this conflict has been reported starting October 2023 and for the subsequent eight months provides an opportunity to examine the framing of these events. This comparative study examines two newspapers of record, one from the United States (a known ally of Israel) and the other from Ireland, often seen as more sympathetic toward Palestinian statehood. A total of 179 articles from the New York …

The Red Hands Of Ulster, Philip Metres

2026 Faculty Bibliography

No abstract provided.

Bundle Of Bytes: The Legal And Ethical Considerations For The Transfer, Ownership, And Disposition Of Digital Assets, Wendy Donelan Madsen

South Dakota Law Review

The right to transfer, own, and dispose of one’s assets after death is one of Americans’ most cherished rights. For most of the last century, Americans primarily held tangible assets, which were sufficiently managed through estate administration laws. Some key rights, such as transferring, owning, and disposing of tangible assets, are well understood by the bundle of sticks analogy common in property law. However, in the twenty-first century, Americans have accumulated significant digital assets that also require transfer, ownership, and disposition. Yet the current laws governing intangible assets do not adequately address these needs. Therefore, the bundle of bytes offers …

From Sorochyntsi To St. Petersburg: National Identity In The Works Of Nikolai Gogol, Gary Jay Kogoy Jr.

Honors Theses

Nikolai Gogol's extant works depict a man torn between his birthplace of Ukraine and the nineteenth-century milieu of Imperial Russia. Notably, he did not reveal his name for some time after publishing his first story collection Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka; as a result, readers attributed the tales of Ukrainian life within not to Gogol, but to the charming "Ukrainian jester" persona of Rudy Panko. Even after revealing his identity and garnering respect in the St. Petersburg literary scene, his contemporaries often viewed him as sly and suspicious because of his ancestry. Perhaps due to external doubts regarding …

"It's A Dance": Examining Midwives As Choreographers Of Reproduction In Maine, Annie Goldstein

Honors Theses

This thesis examines the contemporary work of community-based Maine midwives through the theoretical framework of choreography. In the context of this work, choreography can be understood as the well-thought-out, purposeful undertaking of a process during which negotiation, coordination, and improvisation are required to adapt to constantly changing circumstances. Using choreography, this thesis attempts to understand how Maine midwives navigate global market processes and practice under authoritative forms of biomedicine, ultimately linking them to other midwives across various global sites. Situated within Maine’s maternal health landscape that is characterized by the ongoing closure of labor and delivery units and rural hospitals, …

Racial Capitalism And Black Maritime Geography In 19th Century Portland, Maine, Jeremy Harrison

Honors Theses

Portland, Maine, is located on the rocky shores of the Atlantic Ocean and has served as home to a diverse population that has benefited from the economic and social aspects of the shipping and trading industry. This port city in one of the northernmost regions of the United States was one of the last stops for ships carrying goods before reaching the city centers of the Americas and Europe. As a result, during the late 18th and early to mid-19th centuries, skilled and unskilled Black laborers from somewhat fringe regions within the Atlantic migrated to Portland in search of not …

A Regime Of Fear: Barriers To Healthcare Access In Times Of Intensifying Anti-Immigrant Rhetoric And Immigration Enforcement, Kathryn F. Masetti

Honors Theses

The U.S. immigration regime produces the conditions that deny immigrants equitable access to healthcare. The Trump administration’s second term, characterized by aggressive immigration enforcement and anti-immigrant rhetoric, continued to intensify these conditions, contributing to a widespread decline in healthcare utilization by immigrant patients throughout the United States. This thesis investigates how policies and rhetoric from the Trump Administration, including immigration enforcement, shape the barriers that immigrants with and without status encounter when accessing healthcare services in Maine, and how the fear of surveillance, detention, or deportation influences how immigrant communities perceive and utilize healthcare services. Two in-depth semi-structured qualitative interviews …