Digital Commons Network^™

Perceptions And Visual Awareness Of Urban Karst Flooding To Inform Preparedness Planning And Management Actions, Grace Hermann

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

Awareness and perception of flooding can heavily affect how an individual or community prepares for flooding. Flood awareness can be affected by factors like past flood experience and demographics. Flood experience and demographics can affect flood awareness differently based on factors including the types and cause of flooding. Flooding in karst landscapes can vary from other types of flooding and neither perception nor awareness of karst flooding has been directly studied before. This study explored both expert and non-expert flood awareness and perception and flood policies in a karst landscape through interviews with experts, surveys, and cognitive mapping activities. The …

Assessing Regional Responsibility Of Plecoptera (Stoneflies) Across Two U.S. Fish And Wildlife Service Regions, Josie Griffith

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

Developing an objective metric to designate taxa that are the responsibility of the region is imperative for the proper allocation of conservation funding. This project focused on stoneflies (Order Plecoptera), an imperiled group of aquatic insects at the global scale, in two U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service regions. At the regional scale, a baseline designation of Regional Species of Greatest Conservation Need (RSGCN) was applied to each species where their range included at least 75% of states within either the Midwestern or Northeastern regions. Two sets of data were accumulated for each RSGCN. One, distributional information was collected from valid …

No. 26: Pandemic Precarities And Remittance Narratives In The Global South, Jonathan Crush, Sujata Ramachandran

Migration and Food Security (MiFOOD) Network

The COVID-19 pandemic has been referred to as a great disruptor of global migration leading to a crisis of immobility caused by public health lockdowns, closed borders, and the suspension of visa processing. Layoffs and retrenchments of migrant workers led to widespread hardship and an intensification of pre-pandemic precarity, as well as disrupted remittance channels and flows. Against this backdrop, the paper provides an overview of current debates about the relationship between COVID-19 and international migration in the context of South-South migration. We assess how pre-pandemic South-South migration flows were disrupted by the pandemic and the evidence for a crisis …

Diseases Of Cannabis Sativa And The Epidemiology And Molecular Diversity Of Neofusicoccum Parvum, Hannah V. Zima

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Cannabis sativa has been an underutilized agricultural resource in the United States, largely due to federal regulations distinguishing marijuana from hemp. In 2018, Congress passed a Farm Bill, which defined hemp as C. sativa containing a tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) level of no more than 0.3%. As a result, commercial hemp production began in most states in 2019, including Arkansas, and was accompanied by numerous challenges like diseases and pests. The research on the epidemiology of diseases affecting C. sativa is limited, and understanding the pathogens is in its early stages in the U.S. For this study, an initial disease survey was …

Ecopedagogy In Action: The Landfill Project, Marriah Geels

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This is an art education action research project that analyzes how an interdisciplinary ecopedagogical curriculum experience may impact student perspectives on waste (specifically trash) and the human impact on the environment. The four-week curriculum incorporated choice-based art education, place-based education, and slow pedagogy to better understand how students’ perspectives changed or remained constant throughout. This curriculum was taught to four class periods in a high school setting with about 34 students in 9-12th grade. Qualitative data collection included a pre and post-survey, visual journals, classroom observations, artist statements, and artwork. Through the analysis of Pre/Post Surveys by utilizing hybrid coding …

How Can Event Attribution Science Underpin Financial Decisions On Loss And Damage?, Dim Coumou, Paola A. Arias, Ana Bastos, Charlotte Kendra Z. Gotangco Gonzales, Gabriele C. Hegerl, Pandora Hope, Christopher Jack, Friederike Otto, Fahad Saeed, Olivia Serdeczny, Theodore G. Shepherd, Robert Vautard

Environmental Science Faculty Publications

With climate extremes hitting nations across the globe, disproportionately burdening vulnerable developing countries, the prompt operation of the Loss and Damage fund is of paramount importance. As decisions on resource disbursement at the international level, and investment strategies at the national level, loom, the climate science community’s role in providing fair and effective evidence is crucial. Attribution science can provide useful information for decision makers, but both ethical implications and deep uncertainty cannot be ignored. Considering these aspects, we articulate a vision that integrates established attribution methods and multiple lines of evidence within a coherent logical framework.

Drought As An Emergent Driver Of Ecological Transformation In The Twenty-First Century, Wynne E. Moss, Shelley D. Crausbay, Imtiaz Rangwala, Jay W. Wason, Clay Trauernicht, Camille S. Stevens-Rumann, Anna Sala, Caitlin M. Rottler, Gregory T. Pederson, Brian W. Miller, Dawn R. Magness, Jeremy S. Littell, Lee E. Frelich, Abby Frazier, Kimberly T. Davis, Jonathan D. Coop, Jennifer M. Cartwright, Robert K. Booth

Geography

Under climate change, ecosystems are experiencing novel drought regimes, often in combination with stressors that reduce resilience and amplify drought's impacts. Consequently, drought appears increasingly likely to push systems beyond important physiological and ecological thresholds, resulting in substantial changes in ecosystem characteristics persisting long after drought ends (i.e., ecological transformation). In the present article, we clarify how drought can lead to transformation across a wide variety of ecosystems including forests, woodlands, and grasslands. Specifically, we describe how climate change alters drought regimes and how this translates to impacts on plant population growth, either directly or through drought's interactions with factors …

Ten Years As Boundary Object: The Search For Identity And Belonging As 'Hongkongers', John Lowe, Darlene Machell Espena, George Wong

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

This article examines the complex process of symbolic boundary-making of ‘Hongkonger’ cultural identities through the lens of the controversial 2015 film Ten Years, which is a celebrated omnibus production comprised of five short segments that picture a dystopic end to Hong Kong’s cherished way of life in the year 2025. The article is premised on an interdisciplinary approach engaging with cultural studies and film studies. On one hand, it explores how Ten Years functioned as a boundary object, a vast terrain within which cultural identities of what it means to be a Hongkonger are constructed, banished, imagined, and performed under …

Is Parking Cash-Out Worth It? Comparing Cost-Effectiveness And Climate And Equity Benefits In The Bay Area And South Coast Air Quality Management Districts, Fynnwin Prager, Tianjun Lu, Ashley Membere, Parveen Chhetri

Mineta Transportation Institute

This research explores the potential impacts of California parking cash-out policy changes on the Bay Area and LA County. Parking cash-out—a California law since 1992—requires that certain qualifying employers who subsidize employee parking offer employees the option to give up their parking space and receive cash instead. Studies show parking cash-out substantially reduces VMT and emissions, yet enforcement remains voluntary. Current policy covers few firms (<1%) and employees (around 11%) in the study regions. Policy reform to include companies with 20+ employees could increase this to 18%. Our experimental-design survey (n=963) explores behavioral changes in response to multiple policy variables and finds that 76.9% of employees would accept cash-out if offered, and that participants who had to pay the market rate for parking and were full-time commuters were more likely to switch to using public transportation at lower cash minimums. VMT related to employees covered by parking cash-out are substantial (5.6 million in the Bay Area; 5.7 million in LA County), and account for a combined 6,593 daily tons of GHG. As even limited adoption could have significant environmental benefits, parking cash-out would be a more cost-effective approach to reducing VMT than traditional TDM programs such as trip-reduction programs, workplace parking taxation, or transit subsidies and road diets, though further evidence on the direct influence of parking cash-out on commuter behavior is needed.

Vertical Expansion In The Making: Planning Against Deindustrialization By Promoting "Industry's Going Upstairs" In Shenzhen, Qianqian Wei, Yong Zhang

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

In recent years, industrial metropolises in China have experienced a surge in proactive planning initiatives aimed at developing high-rise industrial structures, commonly known as “Industry’s Going Upstairs (IGU).” This study argues that the IGU represents a distinct form of urban verticality that is neither motivated by capitalist speculation nor sustainability prompts but rather by local states’ intervention to ensure economic resilience and enhance innovation capabilities. This study presents the case of Shenzhen to demonstrate how the adoption of the IGU initiative is catalyzed by concerns over manufacturing sectors’ out-migration and the effects of volatile US-China relations on the city’s competitiveness. …

Leavers And Movers: Turnover Of Music Teachers In Nebraska, Christian G. Schuerman

Glenn Korff School of Music: Dissertations, Theses, Student Creative Work, and Performances

The purpose of this study was to determine if the rates of music teachers leaving the teaching profession and changing schools were significantly different than those of teachers of other content areas in the state of Nebraska. This study used data from the previous nine years of the Nebraska Department of Education’s Education Directory in order to find results for the entire population. Results indicated that music teachers leave the profession at similar rates as teachers of other content areas, but move schools at significantly higher rates.

Advisor: Robert H. Woody

Understanding The Internationalization Of Higher Education In The Context Of The War In Ukraine: Critical Conversations From Kazakhstan

Journal of Comparative & International Higher Education

Special Issue

Venturing In Limbo: Entrepreneurial Resourcefulness By The Forcibly Displaced., Sadek Showkat

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Entrepreneurial resourcefulness is an overarching concept in the entrepreneurial process that has gained momentum among theorists and practitioners. Traditionally, entrepreneurial resourcefulness is theorized as a state—a behavior or trait—rather than a process. However, our understanding of this concept changes significantly when viewed through the lens of the lived experiences of forcibly displaced individuals. This dissertation presents a theoretical and empirical investigation of how these entrepreneurs pursue entrepreneurial resourcefulness through three interrelated essays. The first essay provides a problematizing review and introduces a novel typology (exogenous vs. endogenous) that captures the heterogeneity of the construction of entrepreneurial resourcefulness across …

Associations Of Natural Vegetation In Relation To Colorectal Cancer Hotspots And Colorectal Cancer Survival., Johnnie Newton

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Background: Across Kentucky, county-level geographic disparities in colorectal cancer (CRC) incidence and outcomes exist. Given the heterogeneity of lifestyle, socioeconomic (SES), and environmental factors within a county, more granular approaches should be used to identify local areas with a high CRC burden and identify the area-level factors that may contribute to geographic disparities. Studies reported that living in greener areas is associated with beneficial health outcomes, including lower mortality. Despite growing evidence that natural vegetation (greenness) exposure is associated with increased physical activity and obesity, two well-known CRC risk factors, epidemiological studies investigating the association of residential greenness exposure with …

Coproduction Revisited: From Theory To Practice., Brenton Clarke Hereford

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Coproduction, or the interaction of citizens with their public service provider, has been used in policy responses to a myriad of service delivery problems, especially policing. This dissertation uses a three-manuscript approach to revisit coproduction both as a theory and a practice. The first manuscript tracks the evolution of coproduction as a theory from three different disciplines: economics, urban theory, and public administration. In addressing the three disciplines, the manuscript explains what broadly united the coproduction literature and the differences that hindered the early development of the concept. It concludes with how the concept is used today, and how future …

Land-Use Change As A Major Driver For Mid-20th-Century Flood Intensity Reduction In The Southeastern Us, Zhixiong Shen, Nicholas Conway, Shaowu Bao, Samuel Muñoz, Andreas Lang

Marine Science

Land-use changes affect hydrologic processes, but their impact on flooding remains obscure amid increasingly heavy precipitation. Instrumental records are short relative to land-use change history and inadequate for flood attribution studies. Here we integrate a high-resolution paleodischarge record spanning the past ∼200 years from the largest basin in the Southeastern United States with instrumental data and hydrological modeling. We find that the 100 yr flood magnitude for large regional rivers exhibits 50%–75% reductions in the mid-20th century. We attribute at least 50% of the reductions to a regional shift from widespread agricultural land to conservation and reforestation and the rest …

2024 Annual Report Of The Nominating Committee, University Of Northern Iowa. Faculty Senate.

Documents - Faculty Senate

University Nominating Committee report including committee memberships, produced by the Faculty Senate of the University of Northern Iowa.

Anti-Bias Strategies For Equitable Faculty Grading, Mary J. Lomax-Ghirarduzzi

Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Webinar Recordings and Conversations

No abstract provided.

A Wee Bit Of Cleanup: Updating Scottish Locality Pages On The Familysearch Research Wiki, Garrett Mast

Undergraduate Honors Theses

While the FamilySearch Research Wiki provides a valuable resource for genealogical references for countries across the globe, its potential is bottlenecked by having a small pool of editors compared to sites like Wikipedia. The webpages for each Scottish parish have fallen by the wayside, with most not receiving any material update in a decade. This project reflection highlights the choices made and processes taken in order to revitalize the Scottish locality pages of the Research Wiki following the verification of civil, ecclesiastical, and probate jurisdictions for each parish in Scotland. This included making an interactive jurisdiction map in ArcGIS …

Arab Citizens’ Contributions To Investigative Reporting: An Examination Of Arabs' Awareness, Willingness, And Satisfaction Toward Citizen Investigative Reporting, Ahmed Makharesh

Dissertations

This dissertation aims to measure Arabs' understanding of investigative reporting and willingness to engage in investigative reporting practices through a survey of 421 Arab citizens from countries that include the Eastern African, Northern African, Arabian Peninsula, and Fertile Crescent regions. It also aims to measure Arabs' understanding of gatekeeping and their willingness to serve as gatekeepers. Further, this dissertation emphasizes various hypotheses, including that increased investigative reporting would benefit the region's citizens and increase the quality of journalistic work. The gatekeeping theory fits into this dissertation because of the significant development of the news delivery process on social media in …

The Destructive Work Of Restoration: Fishing Communities Facing Territorialization In Turag River, Efadul Huq, Mohammad Azaz

Environmental Science and Policy: Faculty Publications

Urban river restoration efforts are growing worldwide. Along with restoring and conserving rivers, riverside land is slated for public recreation, property development, and infrastructure for adaptation to climate change. Riverine landscapes, embedded in larger watershed ecosystems and claimed by multiple communities, are sites of contested planning in contemporary cities. In this paper, we advance the scholarship on contestation over control and access of urban rivers and floodplains by analyzing the role of river restorative legislation and water-centered planning in managing Turag, an urban river in Bangladesh. While river degradation in urbanizing regions is often ascribed to lack of regulatory controls …

The Role Of Elevation In The Migration, Physiology, And Genomic Diversification Of Birds, Jessie L. Williamson

Biology ETDs

Elevational gradients cause profound eco-climatic variation across short distances. Partial pressure of oxygen (PO₂) is a severe challenge that organisms face at high elevations; due partly to specialization on PO₂, most Neotropical bird species have narrow elevational ranges. However, a small fraction are elevational generalists that span sea level to high elevations, and a subset undertake extreme migratory journeys from low to high elevations biannually. My dissertation combines diverse approaches across levels of biological organization to understand how elevation impacts the ecology, evolution, physiology, and migration of montane birds. I examined ‘extreme’ elevational …

Developing Recommendations For More Inclusive Academic Librarian On-Site Interviews, Christina M. Miskey, Kathryn M. Houk, Jason Aubin

Library Faculty Research

This chapter will discuss the work of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV), library faculty Ad Hoc Committee for Diverse Recruitment and Retention: Campus Visits and Interviews (hereafter referred to as the campus visits committee), which was formed by the library faculty in 2020 to recommend ways for the faculty interview process to be more inclusive and to allow candidates from diverse backgrounds to excel during their interview process. The culmination of the committee’s work was the internal report for library faculty, Recommendations for Hosting UNLV Library Faculty Candidates, which is in the process of being implemented for …

Engaging Telepsychology As A Culturally Appropriate Communicative Approach For Mental Health Intervention For Women In Ondo State, Nigeria, Toyosi Motilola Olola

Theses and Dissertations

Background: Assessing the mental health issues among Nigerian women is complex due to cultural norms, stigmatization, and traditional beliefs, which often lead to the concealment of mental health problems. Mental health issues are frequently seen through a spiritual or supernatural lens, exacerbating stigma and preventing proper medical care. There is also a lack of comprehensive data on help-seeking behaviors, with many women relying on religious leaders and traditional healers for support. Telepsychology can solve these communication challenges by offering a confidential and accessible platform that bridges traditional beliefs and modern mental health care. This study explores cultural influences on help-seeking …

Mobilizing Online, Marching Offline: Familias Unidas Por Nuestros Desaparecidos’ Strategic Use Of Social Media, Iara Gonzalez Ascencio

International Studies (MA) Theses

How do civilian women strategically steer their nonviolent social movements in reaction to the terrifying phenomena of forced disappearances under narco-violence? As a form of resistance, civilian women in Mexico have organized and joined groups to locate their missing family members and friends in response to risks posed by the pervasiveness of drug-related violence and the absence of official security services. Existing studies explore the role of women in peacebuilding initiatives to resist violence and obtain social change in Latin American countries. Still, there is limited research on the role of digital feminism in marginalized local collective groups, particularly under …

A Cross-Country Analysis Of China’S Belt And Road Initiative, Leah Shoff

International Studies (MA) Theses

China established The Belt and Road Initiative in 2013 to unite the global economy as well as bolter their own political and economic interests. Though the initiative is relatively new, it is important to understand how the Belt and Road Initiative could impact the global economy. This program is open to any country in the world that seeks to improve its infrastructure. However, critics of China’s proposal have questioned whether countries participating in the program gain economically. Through evaluating the relationship between GDP, time, and other significant data provided by the IMF, a cross-country comparison between Pakistan and the Philippines …

Analyzing Anuran Diversity In Urban And Rural Wetlands Using Frog Call Citizen Science Data, Jeremiah Rhodes

Masters Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

Amphibians are currently experiencing a crisis of high extinction rates because of habitat destruction, and climate change. Citizen science, the incorporation of citizens in data collection or management of scientific research, has become necessary to monitor populations widely. The Tennessee Amphibian Monitoring Program is a citizen science program, at the state-level that conducts manual calling surveys in Tennessee. The TAMP dataset was analyzed to see if there was a difference in diversity and abundance of anurans in urban wetlands compared to rural wetlands in the Ridge and Valley ecoregion. A Hutchenson’s t-test and a Mann-Whitney U test found that the …

Urban Mobility: An Understanding Of Critical Success Factors Of Multimodal Passenger Transport In India And Research Implications, Murari Srinivasa, Rajluxmi V Murthy

Working Papers

Cities matter. They are the engine of the global economy and are already home to more than half the world’s population. Passenger mobility in cities is now an important area of research in Decision Sciences and Analytics. For the urban passenger, the connectivity at the last mile with the dominant public transit system in a city has assumed critical significance. This paper aims to identify key issues related to adoption and usage of modern public transport systems in urban India. We see significant opportunities in building on from existing frameworks for solving well-known problems in shared mobility, to use a …

Promoting Athletic Training Careers Among American Indian And Alaska Native Communities, Wyatt Whitegoat

Theses and Dissertations

Athletic training, recognized for its role in providing specialized healthcare services focused on prevention, assessment, treatment, and rehabilitation of injuries for the athletic population, represents a growing profession within the healthcare field. As the need and value of athletic training services continues to grow, it is imperative for academic and Federal institutions to adapt programs and policies that reflect the diversity of the communities they serve.

Despite ongoing efforts, which should not be minimized, to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion in the athletic training profession, significant progress remains limited, particularly in increasing representation of American Indian and Alaska Natives (AIANs). …

2024-2025 Lindenwood University Undergraduate Course Catalog, Lindenwood University

Course Catalogs

Lindenwood University Undergraduate Course Catalog