Digital Commons Network^™

Carson V. Makin: Public Funding For Private Religious Schools And The Continued Erosion Of The Religion Clauses, Alyssa Schwartz

Denver Law Review Forum

​Alyssa Schwartz examines Carson v. Makin and argues that the Court’s decision disregards precedent and attempts to rewrite history to diminish the seperation of church and state as a bedrock principle of our nation, and rules in favor of religion which erodes the Court’s constitutional neutrality.​

Hist 213 - 101, 003, 105: The Twentieth-Century World, Ilektra Kostopoulou

History Syllabi

No abstract provided.

Hss 404 - 003: History Seminar: Movement Of Migrants And Refugees In The Eastern Mediterranean, Ilektra Kostopoulou

History Syllabi

No abstract provided.

Incorporating Social Justice And Environmental Sustainability Into Estate Planning Through Conservation Easements, Trace Brooks

ACTEC Law Journal

As climate change and social inequalities become increasingly pressing issues, estate planning has emerged as a powerful tool for promoting both social justice and environmental sustainability. This article explores the intersection of estate planning, private land conservation, social justice, and environmental sustainability.

Buffalo Reading List, Madison Stevens, Elizabeth Lunstrum, Jamie Faselt, Brent L. Brock, Kyran E. Kunkel, Jake Rayapati, Chamois Andersen, Jeff Martin, Jordan Kennedy, Forrest Hisey, Andrea Olive, Matt Williamson

Environmental Studies Program Faculty Publications and Presentations

This reading list gathers together literature focused on buffalo (also known as bison) to support ongoing efforts to restore this iconic species to its keystone cultural and ecological role. The books and articles compiled here are grounded in a wide range of academic disciplines and approaches, representing many distinct ways of thinking about buffalo within the realm of Western sciences. This is not intended to be an exhaustive account of what is known about buffalo, much of which is held in Indigenous knowledge systems and communities. This academic list is designed as a resource for those working towards buffalo restoration, …

Osher Map Library And Smith Center For Cartographic Education: A Five-Year Retrospective Impact Report, Elora Way, Emma Schwartz, Madison Burke, Becky Wurwarg

Publications

Since 1994, the Osher Map Library and Smith Center for Cartographic Education (OML) has been located within the Glickman Family Library on the Portland campus of the University of Southern Maine (USM). From its inception, the OML has been charged with not only expanding and preserving its collections, but with operating in the spirit of lifelong learning and a deep commitment to engaging scholars, students (Kindergarten through higher education), educators, community partners, and the public. OML meets this charge through various strategies and activities that include: educational outreach with Kindergarten (K) through 12th grade students and university students; professional development …

Is Macroporosity Controlled By Complexed Clay And Soil Organic Carbon?, Aaron N. Koop, Daniel R. Hirmas, Sharon A. Billings, Li Li, Alejandro Cueva, Xi Zhang, Hang Wen, Attila Nemes, Lígia F. T. Souza, Hoori Ajami, Alejandro N. Flores, Aoesta K. Rudick, Annalise Guthrie, Lola M. Klamm, Micah Unruh, Pamela L. Sullivan

Geosciences Faculty Publications and Presentations

Multi-scale evidence of rapid, climate-induced soil structural changes occurring at yearly to decadal timescales is mounting. As a result, it has become increasingly important to identify the properties and mechanisms controlling the development and maintenance of soil structure and associated macroporosity. This is especially relevant since macroporosity has disproportionate effects on saturated hydraulic conductivity (K_sat) which strongly influences water storage and flux, thus, affecting the water cycle. In this study, we use decision trees and piecewise linear regression to assess the influence of soil and climate properties on effective porosity (EP; a proxy of macroporosity) in both …

U-Pb Zircon Dates From North American And British Avalonia Bracket The Lower–Middle Cambrian Boundary Interval, With Evaluation Of The Miaolingian Series As A Global Unit, Ed Landing, Mark D. Schmitz, Stephen R. Westrop, Gerd Geyer

Geosciences Faculty Publications and Presentations

High-precision U-Pb zircon ages on SE Newfoundland tuffs now bracket the Avalonian Lower–Middle Cambrian boundary. Upper Lower Cambrian Brigus Formation tuffs yield depositional ages of 507.91 ± 0.07 Ma (Callavia broeggeri Zone) and 507.67 ± 0.08 Ma and 507.21 ± 0.13 Ma (Morocconus-Condylopyge eli Assemblage interval). Lower Middle Cambrian Chamberlain’s Brook Formation tuffs have depositional ages of 506.34 ± 0.21 Ma (Kiskinella cristata Zone) and 506.25 ± 0.07 Ma (Eccaparadoxides bennetti Zone). The composite unconformity separating the Brigus and Chamberlain’s Brook formations is constrained between these ages. An Avalonian Lower–Middle Cambrian boundary between 507.2 ± 0.1 …

New Frontiers In The Measurement Of Energy Metabolism, Alexandra Niclou, Philippe St-Martin, Leanne M. Redman, Audrey Bergouignan

Clinical Research Faculty Publications

This perspective highlights three key areas of current and future energy metabolism research: intergenerational health, climate change, and interplanetary exploration. We describe the recent advances in determining estimated energy requirements for a large subset of the general population using the gold standard method for free-living total daily energy expenditure estimates, the doubly labeled water method. The global rise in overweight and obesity demands particular attention to energy requirements in pregnancy and early life, as accumulating evidence contributes to our understanding of intergenerational health transmission and the potential for epigenetic programming in utero. We also acknowledge some gaps in necessary guidelines …

Artificial Intelligence Regulation, Minimum Viable Products, And Partitive Innovation, Matthew R. Gaske

Emory Law Journal Online

This Essay identifies entrepreneurs’ experimentation with minimum viable products (“MVPs”) as a means for proposed AI-specific regulation to constrain innovation in other markets. To that end, the Essay coins the term “partitive innovation” to describe a business’s perspective when it uses a domain-agnostic, highly generalizable technology to introduce a product to a particular market, thereby eliciting overbroad domain-specific regulations that impair alternative innovative uses of the underlying technology. This process is unfolding with AI, as broadly constructed proposed regulation can restrict innovation in adjacent fields by shifting software MVPs’ mainly ex post regulatory regime to one with recurring duties or …

The World's 100 Worst Invasive Alien Insect Species Differ In Their Characteristics From Related Non-Invasive Species, Zihua Zhao, Cang Hui, Shuo Peng, Shanqing Yi, Zhihong Li, Gadi V.P. Reddy, Mark Van Kleunen

Faculty Publications

While there has been great interest in species characteristics that promote invasiveness, still little is known about the characteristics that distinguish invasive from non-invasive insects. Using a database on the naturalised distributions of alien insects and expert opinions about their impacts, we identified the world's 100 worst invasive insect species. By comparing species characteristics reported in the literature using a meta-analysis, between the 100 worst invasive species and related non-invasive species, we found that invasive insects overall have more pathways of introduction, occur in more habitats, have higher fecundities, higher voltinism, more genes, shorted lifespans and faster development from egg …

Providing Risk Of The Environment’S Changing Climate Threats For Galleries, Libraries, Archives, & Museums (Protecct-Glam) Data File, Edward Benoit Iii, Jill Trepanier, Jennifer Vanos, Haley Moore, Kaitlyn Bailey, Emily Fisher, Annie Waddell, Mandy Hatman, Mary Sidwell, Symonne Russell, Virginia Seger, Paige Boutte, Amanda Latta, Zoe Mohammad, Kyriel Felton, Erin Deliman, Breanna Benson-Pearce, Wendy Johnson, Allyson Russell, Baillie Pretzer, Christopher Reeder, Melissa Mcconnell, Lisa Dahlke, Kaitlynn Melear, Lillian Bodi, Savannah T. Lyle, Zach Lannes, Gwen L. Wells, Benjamin A. Teincuff, Jason M. Straight, Tiffany Rockwell, Shane T. Manthei, Jennifer L. Benner, Jane Fiegel, Amanda Lima, Elizabeth Rininger, Caroline Melinger, Deborah Metz-Andrews, Meryl Roepke, Karen Isaac, Mallory Collins

School of Information Studies Datasets

The data file was created as part of the IMLS-funded project, PROTECCT-GLAM: Risk of The Environment’s Changing Climate Threats for Galleries, Libraries, Archives, and Museums in an effort to gather the identities and georeferences of all galleries, libraries, archives, and museums located within the United States.

The data file includes 22,388 archives, 21,189 libraries, and 29,781 museums.

Where Is Illinois Now And Where Is It Going?, Rob Paral

The Simon Review (Occasional Papers of the Paul Simon Public Policy Institute)

Granted statehood in 1818, Illinois is slightly over two centuries old. During that time, in approximately fifty-year segments, our state has embodied trends that defined our nation. The early 1880s brought westward expansion by European migrants and the taking of natives’ land. The second half of that century saw a population explosion and rapid urbanization. In the first part of the twentieth century, Illinois industrialization was essential to helping our nation win two world wars and establishing the United States as the pre-eminent world power.

Most recently, a new half-century period can be identified. One of profound social and economic …

Report: Oral Health In North Dakota: Opportunities And Need To Promote Oral Health Equity, Tonya Connor, Shawnda Schroeder, Anastasia Stepanov, Olivia Persinger

Indigenous Health Faculty Publications

THIS BOOKLET DESCRIBES THE CURRENT OPPORTUNITIES TO ADDRESS AND PROMOTE GOOD ORAL HEALTH IN NORTH DAKOTA Research and funding agencies stress the importance of using data to guide, develop, and implement effective and targeted activities to promote health equity. The data presented in this resource can aid decision makers, program developers, health professionals, dental teams, state agencies, and others when responding to the needs of North Dakota communities. USING THIS BOOKLET Countless providers, dental teams, local public health units, clinicians, agencies, and programs in the state are doing amazing work to ensure a healthy North Dakota. However, there are still …

Expanding The Role Of The Temporal Dimension In Ecological Niche Models: A Study On Mexican Montane Small Mammals, Gonzalo E. Pinilla Buitrago

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Ecological niche models (ENMs) are commonly used to estimate the potential geographic distributions of species and have various uses, such as predicting invasive species' potential distribution, assessing vulnerability to climate change, or estimating paleodistributions. However, ENM developments have primarily focused on solving spatially related issues, underemphasizing the temporal dimensionality of occurrence and environmental data collected over the last century. One limitation of ENMs is the common practice of using recent environmental averages that fail to capture the gradual environmental change over the time span of the occurrence records and can hide trends in environmental variables, a critical piece of information …

Freedom Song: Uncovering A Politics Of Dignity In Black Feminist Thought And Praxis, Abegail M. Dobson

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This master's thesis delves into Intersectionality as an organizing framework and critical social theory, emphasizing the significance of Black feminist thought to social justice initiatives that challenge prevailing intersectional violence. The central inquiry of this project is uncovering a Black feminist conceptualization of dignity as articulated in foundational texts. I scrutinize the essence of dignity within Black feminist theory and praxis, particularly addressing the question: How valuable is a "right" when societal experiences consistently undermine one's basic needs and protections required to live a dignified life beyond survival?

Black feminist thought, encompassing praxis, is posited as a profound space for …

Affective Domain Development In Virtual Education: Visual Thinking Strategies And Art Pedagogy, Jayne Josephsen

Nursing Faculty Publications and Presentations

Development of the affective domain is linked to increasing self-awareness of internal dialogue, such as biases and assumptions, which can affect the ability of nurses to engage in person-centered care and meet the identified patient outcomes. Through visual thinking strategies (VTS) paired with art-based pedagogy to examine grief, loss, and bereavement concepts in a hospice and palliative care nursing virtual education course, affective domain development was advanced. Foundational to this virtual educational intervention was using the VTS framework of questions and pairing them with art-based pedagogy promoting open-ended interpretation and response to the art presented. This assisted the students in …

Local Law Enforcement And The Human Right To Housing, Sophia Vander Kooy

Denver Journal of International Law & Policy

The homelessness crisis stands at a point of overflowing, affecting the world’s capacity to continue ignoring the problem. As the world globalized, vagrancy laws and pervasive stigmatization of the homeless community persisted, leaving modern-day social services with a failing ability to enact change. The United Nations first recognized the human right to adequate housing in the mid-twentieth century but has tried to strengthen this right over the past two decades. Law enforcement officers around the world interact regularly with individuals experiencing homelessness and are arguably tasked with being the front-line enforcers of the right to adequate housing. However, often, these …

Yolov4_Cspbi: Enhanced Land Target Detection Model, Lirong Yin, Lei Wang, Jianqiang Li, Siyu Lu, Jiawei Tian, Zhengtong Yin, Shan Liu, Wenfeng Zheng

Faculty Publications

The identification of small land targets in remote sensing imagery has emerged as a significant research objective. Despite significant advancements in object detection strategies based on deep learning for visible remote sensing images, the performance of detecting a small and densely distributed number of small targets remains suboptimal. To address this issue, this study introduces an improved model named YOLOV4_CPSBi, based on the YOLOV4 architecture, specifically designed to enhance the detection capability of small land targets in remote sensing imagery. The proposed model enhances the traditional CSPNet by redefining its channel partitioning and integrating this enhanced structure into the neck …

Working Across Boundaries: School Leaders Redefining Communities Of Practice Through Twitter, Jennifer Bailey, Forrest Kaiser, Ron Rhone, Stephanie Atchley

Education Faculty Publications and Presentations

Attrition rates among school leaders have risen in recent years, and scholars cite a lack of meaningful connections and responsive professional learning as leading reasons why they are leaving the field. School leaders are called to navigate unfamiliar and complex challenges, often working in isolation with limited opportunities for collaboration and professional growth. Social media forums, like Twitter, have potential to support a Community of Practice to facilitate learning around school leadership; however, there is a lack of scholarship exploring how school leaders use social media to support their needs. This mixed-methods study used sentiment and content analysis along with …

Evaluating The Impact Of Trees On Residential Thermal Conditions In Los Angeles Using Community Science, Edith B. De Guzman

Cities and the Environment (CATE)

As the planet warms, heat-vulnerable communities in cities face increased heat-related risks including lost productivity, reduced learning outcomes, illness, and death. Despite the growing threat of heat, effective approaches to alleviate urban heat are available. Tree planting has received investment in a growing number of cities around the world, but there are significant gaps in our understanding of the cooling potential of trees in the urban context, particularly the impacts on indoor spaces where urban dwellers spend most of their time. Our study engaged community scientists in Los Angeles County, USA to collect data on the impacts of trees on …

Reed Bamboos Drive Skull Shape Evolution In Bush Frogs Of The Western Ghats, Peninsular India, Kalpana Das, Mark-Oliver Rödel, Edward Stanley, Achyuthan N. Srikanthan, Kartik Shanker, Seenapuram Palaniswamy Vijayakumar

Student Publications [Scholarly]

Reed bamboo is a major ecological and economic resource for many animals, including humans. Nonetheless, the influence of this plant's evolutionary role on the morphology of animal species remains unexplored. Here, we investigated the significance of bamboo habitats as ecological opportunities in shaping the skull morphology of bush frogs (Raorchestes) from the Western Ghats, Peninsular India. We applied a three-dimensional (3D) geometric morphometric approach to capture the skull shape of 55 species of bush frogs. We visualized the skull shape variables in phylomorphospace with principal component analysis and performed phylogenetic generalized least-squares analysis to assess the impact of cranial size …

Summary Report. Being And Becoming Global Citizens: Measuring Progress Toward Sdg 4.7. Phase I: Monitoring Teacher And School Readiness To Enact Global Citizenship In The Asia-Pacific Region, Rachel Parker, Jennie Chainey, Payal Goundar, Sarah Richardson, Anna Dabrowski, Amy Berry, Claire Scoular

Global education monitoring

The relationship between global citizenship and education quality was established almost a decade ago, when it was described as a target under United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 4.7 – to ‘ensure all learners acquire knowledge and skills needed to promote sustainable development.’ Despite efforts to define and frame global citizenship education (GCED), systems continue to grapple with understanding, enacting, and measuring it in ways that reflect changing local and global conditions for students, teachers and schools. This study responds to an identified need for tools and resources for systems to enact, monitor and evaluate GCED, particularly in primary school …

Meritocracy: A Remedy To Addressing Social Injustices In Selecting Students To Public Higher Education In Malawi?, Mastano N. Dzimbiri, Joel R. Malin

Journal of Comparative & International Higher Education

No abstract provided.

Nevada Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention Program: 2023 Blood Lead Testing And Response Plan, Erika R. Marquez, Natascha Kotte, Amanda Louise Haboush, Jelsy A. Cadenas-Santos

Nevada Institute for Children's Research and Policy Reports

Childhood lead poisoning is one of the most preventable environmental health hazards in history. While childhood lead poisoning rates have decreased substantially since the 1970s, mounting evidence suggests that chronic, low-level exposure in early childhood can have long-lasting impacts on children. In Nevada, there are over 218,000 children under the age of 6 but only 3% are tested for lead – making Nevada one of the lowest testing states in the United States (U.S.).

The Nevada Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention Program (NvCLPPP) staff and Advisory Committee hope that stakeholders use this blood lead testing plan as guidance to prevent and …

Homesteading In Maine: Motivations And Current Trends, Alexandrea Merchant

Master's Theses and Capstones

People in the United States who practice the alternative lifestyle of “homesteading” seek to live self-sufficient lives by growing food, building dwellings, and living with resolute autonomy. Great variation exists in the degree of self-sufficiency attained and desired by individuals engaged in homesteading. It was the purpose of this study to illuminate the motivations underlying adopting and engagement in this lifestyle in Maine homesteaders. Through interviews with 10 homesteaders in Maine and participant observation, I documented the narratives and elucidated the motivations of this under researched group. Common themes emerged. Participants expressed concerns about personal health, the environment, and institutions. …

Biol 376-001: Geographic Information Systems, Xiaonan Tai

Biology Syllabi

No abstract provided.

Castor Canadensis Fall 2023, Jedediah Smith Society

Castor Canadensis - Jedediah Smith Society

Newsletter of the Jedediah Smith Society

Effect Of Bovine Respiratory Disease On The Respiratory Microbiome: A Meta-Analysis, Samantha Howe, Beth Kegley, Jeremy Powell, Sicheng Chen, Jiangchao Zhao

Animal Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

Background: Bovine respiratory disease (BRD) is the most devastating disease affecting beef and dairy cattle producers in North America. An emerging area of interest is the respiratory microbiome’s relationship with BRD. However, results regarding the effect of BRD on respiratory microbiome diversity are conflicting.

Results: To examine the effect of BRD on the alpha diversity of the respiratory microbiome, a meta-analysis analyzing the relationship between the standardized mean difference (SMD) of three alpha diversity metrics (Shannon’s Diversity Index (Shannon), Chao1, and Observed features (OTUs, ASVs, species, and reads) and BRD was conducted. Our multi-level model found no difference in Chao1 …

Association Of Reproductive Autonomy And Rates Of State-Level Racialized Disparities In Preterm Birth And Low Birthweight, Andrew S. Bossick, Emily C. Williams, Ian Painter, Jodie G. Katon

Public Health Sciences Articles

INTRODUCTION: Reproductive policies' impact on disparities in neonatal outcomes is understudied. Thus, we aimed to assess whether an index of reproductive autonomy is associated with black-white disparities in preterm birth (PTB) and low birthweight (LBW).

METHODS: We used publicly available state-level PTB and LBW data for all live-births among persons aged 15-44 from January 1, 2016, to December 31, 2018. The independent measure was an index of state laws characterizing each state's reproductive autonomy, ranging from 5 (most restrictive) to 43 (most enabling), used continuously and as quartiles. Linear regression was performed to evaluate the association between both the index …