Digital Commons Network^™

The Integration Of Movement And Technology In Elementary Schools: Enhancing Student Learning, Emily Hillis

School of Education and Leadership Student Capstone Projects

Following the COVID-19 pandemic, the use of technology has increased within elementary classrooms. Research shows that there are many advantages and disadvantages to students having these technology tools during the school day. Movement-based learning has since taken a decline in elementary classrooms since the pandemic. Research suggests that movement is impactful to students retention, engagement, and mood. This encouraged the idea of How can educators combine technology and movement activities to enhance learning outcomes for elementary students? The literature review explores the different sides of technology and movement-based learning. It examines the advantages and disadvantages, challenges, and the impact that …

Centering Adult Basic Education Students As Learners And Creators With Class Websites, Kristy Cannon

School of Education and Leadership Student Capstone Projects

An adult basic education (ABE) class website can integrate educational theories and technology to center students as learners and creators. This research explored educational theories that include andragogy, other adult-specific learning theories, heutagogy, constructivism, culturally relevant theories, and traditional teacher-centered learning models and methods. This project integrated those learning theories with the online modality of a tool-rich class website to promote digital literacy and center students as learners and creators actively participating in their own learning. The project is a Google Sites class website that can be used as a model or template for ABE teachers to copy, modify, and …

Social Emotional Development In Spanish Debate: Curriculum For New Debaters, Caden Salo

School of Education and Leadership Student Capstone Projects

Social emotional learning (SEL) is a critical aspect of ensuring growth and development of the whole student, especially in Dual Language (DL) programming. After-school programs provide a unique environment for fostering social emotional growth on top of academic and behavioral goals. Namely, Spanish debate is an academic after-school program that requires considerable self-management and relationship skills for student success, providing an opportunity for SEL. Thus, through an Understanding by Design (UdB) unit of Spanish debate and extensive literature review, this capstone project aims to answer the following research question: How can effective debate curriculum effectuate belonging and social emotional learning …

The Literary Games We Play: Science Fiction In The Teaching Of Secondary Science, Luiza Roos

School of Education and Leadership Student Capstone Projects

This project responds to a need for interdisciplinary approaches that merge literacy development with scientific inquiry, recognizing the challenges of engaging diverse learners in complex ecological and evolutionary content. Drawing from research in fiction-based learning (Wong et al., 2024), science fiction and science pedagogy (Bixler, 2007), role-playing games in education (Cheville, 2016), and culturally responsive teaching (Rodriguez & Morrison, 2019), the project aims to make science more accessible, inclusive, and relevant to students’ lived experiences. This capstone explores how science fiction novels, specifically The Kaiju Preservation Society by John Scalzi, can be effectively integrated into a secondary science curriculum to …

Against The Phrase "Aggressive Care", Trevor M Bibler

Center for Medical Ethics and Health Policy Staff Publications

Language is the primary technology clinical ethicists use as they offer guidance about norms. Like any other piece of technology, to use the technology well requires attention, intention, skill, and knowledge. Word choice becomes a matter of professional practice. The Brief Report offers clinical ethicists several reasons for rejecting the phrase "aggressive care." Instead, ethicists should consider replacing "aggressive care" with the adjacent concept of a "recovery-focused path." The virtues of this neologism include: the opportunity to set aside the emotion of "aggression," the phrase's accuracy when capturing the intention of the patient or their representative, and an unappreciated rhetorical …

Using Fables To Enhance Social Emotional Learning, Eric Albers

School of Education and Leadership Student Capstone Projects

The research question guiding this project is: How can we use fables to strengthen SEL connections with our students and families while enhancing the relationship between character development and life skills? The project addresses growing concerns about student anxiety, depression, and social disconnection while recognizing schools' expanding role in mental health. This work builds upon literature on home-school partnerships, bibliotherapy, and culturally responsive pedagogy, including research on fable comprehension, CASEL's SEL framework, and "funds of knowledge" that honor diverse cultural perspectives.The methodology involved developing a curriculum unit that integrates fables into the existing CharacterStrong SEL program through a Universal Design …

Developing Growth Mindsets In The Math Classroom, James Logan

School of Education and Leadership Student Capstone Projects

This capstone seeks to answer the question, How can students develop growth mindsets while learning math? The research was inspired by the belief that learning mathematics could help students develop a growth mindset, which could have a positive impact on both their academic achievement and their overall well-being outside of school. A literature review was conducted focusing on the value of a growth mindset, specific strategies for its development, and the effects of a growth mindset on underrepresented populations. The research confirmed the importance of growth mindsets, identifying both academic and social-emotional benefits. Additionally, multiple strategies for developing growth mindsets …

Not Lost In Translation: Bridging Life Science And Language Acquisition For El Learners, Marlene Gutierrez Becerra

School of Education and Leadership Student Capstone Projects

This project seeks to answer the question: How can science educators meet the demands of English language (EL) learners by pairing science instruction with language learning strategies? This project was developed out of the author’s own experience working with EL populations in a science setting and with the goal to provide multilingual students with language learning opportunities that also challenge them and guide them to achieving the MN State Science Standards. The author consulted research that focused on language learning strategies, culturally relevant teaching, and storytelling - based units. Using the information gathered, a website was created containing an introductory …

The Unappreciated Role Of Intent In Algorithmic Moderation Of Abusive Content On Social Media, Xinyu Wang, Sai Koneru, Pranav Narayanan Venkit, Brett Frischmann, Sarah Rajtmajer

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

The Methane Clumped Isotope Signatures Of The Acetoclastic And Methylotrophic Methanogenesis Pathways, Mia L. Thompson

Dartmouth College Master’s Theses

Methane is a potent greenhouse gas and critical energy source for the global economy. Atmospheric methane concentrations play a critical role in global warming, while mitigating methane emissions may provide route to short-term reduction of warming effects. In order to track rates and sources of emissions, it is first necessary to understand the sources and sinks of methane; yet, there are challenges in distinguishing abiotic (water/rock), thermogenic, and biogenic methane. Traditional approaches of using the bulk isotopes of carbon (δ¹³C) and hydrogen (δD) of methane have limitations due to overlapping signatures and sensitivity to substrate isotope composition. In …

The Ghannouchi Test: The Compatibility Of Religious Ideas And Secular Democracy, Andrew P. Sheppe

Dartmouth College Master’s Theses

Secular, democratic societies and governments evolved out of religious societies and defined themselves partially in opposition to religious authority. This historical relationship has led to a debate about the compatibility between religious ideas and modern, secular society. Ernst-Wolfgang Böckenförde posited that secular, democratic societies still depend on religious foundations. Jürgen Habermas disagrees, claiming that processes of rational dialogue can provide sufficient support.

Two prominent twentieth century theologians, Reinhold Niebuhr and Abraham Joshua Heschel demonstrate that democratic systems are enriched and protected by theistic ideas, thus supporting Böckenförde’s dictum. However, they both recognize the importance of epistemic humility and a …

A Phase 2 Trial Of Short-Term Intravenous N-Acetylcysteine In Biliary Atresia After Kasai Portoenterostomy, Sanjiv Harpavat, Kristin A Borovsky, Michael E Scheurer, Laurel Cavallo, Franca E Erhiawarie, Sanjeev Vasudevan, Adam M Vogel, Dana Cerminara, Elizabeth M Tessier, Kalyani R Patel, Sridevi Devaraj, Benjamin L Shneider

Center for Medical Ethics and Health Policy Staff Publications

Background: For infants with biliary atresia, the only treatment that can establish bile flow and delay need for liver transplant is the Kasai portoenterostomy (KP). Unfortunately, the KP has variable success. In this study, we hypothesized that intravenous N-acetylcysteine (IV NAC) treatment following KP would improve bile flow.

Methods: This was a phase 2 study following the two-stage "minimax" trial design. Participants received IV NAC (150 mg/kg/day) for 7 days after KP, and the primary endpoint was achieving total serum bile acids (TSBA) ≤10 μmol/L within 24 weeks of KP. Secondary endpoints were clinical markers and the occurrence of sentinel …

Quantifying Marine Carbon Dioxide Removal Via Alkalinity Enhancement Across Circulation Regimes Using Ecco-Darwin And 1d Models, Kay Suselj, Dustin Carroll, Daniel Whitt, Bridget Samuels, Dimitris Menemenlis, Hong Zhang, Nate Beatty, Anna Savage

Faculty Research, Scholarly, and Creative Activity

Ocean Alkalinity Enhancement (OAE) is emerging as a viable method for removing anthropogenic (Formula presented.) emissions from the atmosphere to mitigate climate change. To achieve substantial carbon reductions, OAE would need to be deployed at scale across the global ocean. Hence, there is a need to quantify how the efficiency of OAE varies globally across a range of space-time scales in preparation for field deployments. Here we develop a marine carbon dioxide removal (mCDR) efficiency evaluation framework based on the data-assimilative ECCO-Darwin ocean biogeochemistry model, which separates and quantifies two key factors over seasonal to multi-annual timescales: (a) mCDR potential, …

Dissections Of Lacunary Eta Quotients And Identically Vanishing Coefficients, Timothy Huber, James Mclaughlin, Dongxi Ye

School of Mathematical & Statistical Sciences Faculty Publications

For any function A(q)=∑∞n=0anqn defineA(0):={n∈N:an=0}.Now suppose C(q) and D(q) are two functions whose m-dissections are given byC(q)=c0G0(qm)+c1qG1(qm)+…+cm−1qm−1Gm−1(qm),D(q)=d0G0(qm)+d1qG1(qm)+…+dm−1qm−1Gm−1(qm).If it is the case that ci=0⟺di=0, i=0,1,…,m−1, then we say that C(q) and D(q) have similar m-dissections, and then it is also clear that C(0)=D(0), in which case we say that C(q) and D(q) have identically vanishing coefficients. In the present paper some new 4-dissections of particular eta quotients are developed. These are used in conjunction with known 2- and 3-dissections to prove many results on the identical vanishing of coefficients of various eta quotients, results which were found experimentally …

Insight Into The Orientation Needs For A Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, From The Preceptor’S Perspective, Angela Cyr, Megan Flynn

MaineHealth Maine Medical Center

This project aimed to explore the perspectives of NICU preceptors to identify key factors that impact the orientation process and uncover potential areas for improvement.

Property Values: Accounting For Racial Valorization And Stigmatization In Development, Audrey G. Mcfarlane

Articles

No abstract provided.

An Originalist Case For Birthright Citizenship Of Unlawful Immigrants' Children: Anti-Gypsy And Anti-Chinese Restrictions As Context, Jed Handelsman Shugerman

Faculty Scholarship

The Trump administration and other opponents of birthright citizenship for the children of “unlawful immigrants” make the following originalist claim about the Fourteenth Amendment: Even if the clause meant birthright citizenship, it applies today only to “lawful immigrants,” because the category of “unlawful immigrant” or “illegal immigrant” did not exist in the 1860s, when the clause was written and ratified. Opponents also argue that the Fourteenth Amendment’s citizenship clause originally implied a “loyalty” or “allegiance” requirement.

These assertions are historically inaccurate.

To the contrary, the concept of “unlawful immigrants” existed in the 1850s-60s, and Americans ratified birthright citizenship without indicating …

Chapter 3. Moroccan Arabic-Spanish Bilinguals’ Linguistic Profile And Their Perspectives And Experiences On Learning Standard Arabic, Ramsés Ortín, Pilar Garrido

Writing and Language Studies Faculty Publications

We surveyed a group of Moroccan Arabic-Spanish speakers in the Region of Murcia, Spain, to examine their linguistic profiles, their attitudes towards their native Arabic dialect, their motivations to learn Standard Arabic and their learning experience with Standard Arabic. We found varying degrees of dominance in this group along with fluctuating patterns of dominance, proficiency and language use according to age and onset of acquisition of Spanish. This group displayed generally positive attitudes towards their own dialect and their motivation to learn Arabic was related to their religious and cultural connections. Most of them indicated that they had engaged in …

Boundary-Setting And Choice-Making With No "Adult" In The Room: Professional Identity Formation Opportunities For 1ls In The Transactional Context, Marni Goldstein Caputo, Kathleen Luz

Faculty Scholarship

Law schools are now required by the American Bar Association’s Standard 303(b)(3) to provide students with opportunities for professional identity formation throughout their legal education. It is critical that those opportunities be well-balanced and tied to the realities of practice. Yet until recently, we, as 1L lawyering skills professors at Boston University School of Law, only provided those opportunities in the litigation context. Further, our 1L lawyering skills curriculum was, since its inception, almost entirely steeped in litigation. This litigation focus matches neither the career trajectory nor the upper-level experiential opportunities of the majority of our students. In fact, transactional …

Civilian Enforcers, Karen Pita Loor

Faculty Scholarship

This Article analyzes the largely unexplored phenomenon of militant civilians engaged in efforts to police and silence activism that challenges entrenched American power systems and economic distributions placing whites atop the social hierarchy in the United States. I argue that this civilian enforcement is an unregulated vessel for state-sponsored violence meant to silence the contestation of the existing racial hierarchy. While scholars, myself included, have written about the many ways police confront and silence racial justice activists on the streets at least since the beginning of the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement, the role law enforcement plays in silencing racial …

Exploring The Clinical Utility Of Neurofilament Light Chain Assays In Multiple Sclerosis Management., Amit Bar-Or, Jacqueline Nicholas, Jenny Feng, Francesca Sorrell, Mark Cascione

Neuroscience Articles

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a chronic neuroinflammatory and neurodegenerative disease that affects nearly 1 million adults in the United States. Owing to its unpredictable disease course, diverse phenotypes, and an array of currently available disease-modifying therapies, a personalized approach to MS management is required. There is an unmet need to identify, validate, and incorporate prognostic, monitoring, and predictive biomarkers into routine clinical practice for MS. A mounting body of evidence supports the use of blood biomarkers, such as neurofilament light chain (NfL), in predicting disease activity and monitoring treatment response. Previous hurdles for the widespread use of NfL in the …

Designing A Portable And Accessible Diffuse Reflectance Spectroscopy System For Real-Time Detection Of Cervical Intraepithelial Neoplasia, Allison Scarbrough, Diana Moses, Tongtong Lu, Bing Yu

Biomedical Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

Significance: Over 80% of cervical cancer cases occur in lower-to-middle income countries (LMIC’s). This is partly because current screening techniques lack affordability, accessibility, and/or reliability for use in LMIC’s.

Aim: To develop an optical technique for cervical cancer screening that is affordable, accessible, and reliable for use in LMIC’s.

Approach: We developed a portable diffuse reflectance spectroscopy (DRS) system, which costs < $2500 USD to manufacture, and employs a Raspberry Pi to extract the absorption (μ_a) and reduced scattering (μ'_s) coefficients of biological tissue. The system was subject to travel and intentional rough handling. It was further used to capture 320 DRS spectra taken from 64 tissue-mimicking phantoms. Two …

A Descriptive Bibliometric Study Of Cera Publication Dissemination, Authorship, And Citation Rates., Bryce A Ringwald, Jennifer L Middleton

Medical Education Articles

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Barriers to performing family medicine research include funding, infrastructure, and mentorship shortages. The Council of Academic Family Medicine Educational Research Alliance (CERA) was created in 2011 to address these issues. This study explores the scope and impact of CERA-related publications in family medicine.

METHODS: We performed a descriptive bibliometric study of CERA-related publications from 2011 to 2023. Articles were sourced from Medline (PubMed), SCOPUS, and the CERA website. Data analysis focused on publication type, authors, CERA survey type, and citation rates.

RESULTS: From a total of 231 articles retrieved via initial searches and 166 from the CERA …

Search For Extremely-High-Energy Neutrinos And First Constraints On The Ultrahigh-Energy Cosmic-Ray Proton Fraction With Icecube, Karen Andeen

Physics Faculty Research and Publications

We present a search for the diffuse extremely-high-energy neutrino flux using 12.6 years of IceCube data. The nonobservation of neutrinos with energies well above 10 PeV constrains the all-flavor neutrino flux at 1018  eV to a level of 𝐸2⁢Φ𝜈𝑒+𝜈𝜇+𝜈𝜏≃10−8  GeV cm−2 s−1 sr−1, the most stringent limit to date. Using these data, we constrain the proton fraction of ultrahigh-energy cosmic rays (UHECRs) above ≃30  EeV to be  ≲70% (at 90% CL) if the cosmological evolution of the sources is comparable to or stronger than the star formation rate. This is the first result to disfavor the “proton-only” hypothesis for UHECR …

Rattler Python, Samer Jabor

Systems Manuals - 2026

The Rattler Python project is an interactive game-based learning system that intends to teach the basic concepts of Python programming through guided instruction, gameplay challenges, and review-based assessments. The document contains a proposal for this system consisting of problem definition, background research, existing solutions, and the proposed product, together with the system scope, assumptions, and the organization of the remainder of this document.

Garage Sale Web-Based Information System, Sonachi Mogbogu

Systems Manuals - 2026

The Garage Sale web application is in response to a business need of an online interactive system. This system will support the interaction between owners and shoppers of garage sale event. The online information system is a great idea to implement because it will help create sales awareness which will lead to increase in the customer base, and increased sales for event organizers. People are used to the traditional approaches, advertising events through word-of-mouth and posting signs alongside roads, however, having an online information system will be more effective in reaching a wider market of buyers. The traditional approaches do …

When Colleges Drop Out Of The Economy, Kristen A. Blazek

All Maxine Goodman Levin School of Urban Affairs Publications

We explore the profound economic impact of small liberal arts colleges faltering and failing in various countries. These institutions have long been the backbone of their communities, providing stability and growth. However, due to declining birth rates, pandemic recovery, high costs, cultural shifts, and waning confidence, many are struggling. Our research investigates the economic consequences of this large-scale rightsizing of the university system across five continents, highlighting differences in higher education supply chains and interconnectedness. We'll delve into the specifics of enrollment trends, closures, and financial challenges in the U.S., Chile, England, South Korea, and Egypt, and analyze the ripple …

Affordability: Practitioner Definitions And Perspectives From The Field, Molly Schnoke, Kristen A. Blazek

All Maxine Goodman Levin School of Urban Affairs Publications

What does Affordability mean when it comes to housing? The Center for Economic Development utilized housing data and stakeholder interviews to assess the county's housing needs. The study addresses challenges such as mismatched housing stock, an aging population, affordability issues, and programming difficulties.

Shared Genetic Architecture Of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder With Cardiovascular Imaging, Risk, And Diagnoses, Jie Shen, Wander Valentim, Eleni Friligkou, Cassie Overstreet, Karmel W. Choi, Dora Koller, Christopher J. O’Donnell, Murray B. Stein, Joel Gelernter, Haitao Lv, Ling Sun, Guido J. Falcone, Renato Polimanti, Gita A. Pathak, Edward Trapido, Ariane Rung, Et Al.

School of Public Health Faculty Publications

Patients with post-traumatic stress disorder face increased cardiovascular risk. This study examines shared genetic regions between post-traumatic stress disorder and 246 cardiovascular conditions across electronic health records, 82 cardiac imaging, and health behaviors defined by Life’s Essential 8. Post-traumatic stress disorder is genetically correlated with cardiovascular diagnoses in 33 regions, imaging traits in 4 regions, and health behaviors in 44 regions. Potentially shared causal variants between post-traumatic stress disorder and 17 cardiovascular conditions were observed in 11 regions. Subsequent observational analysis in AllofUS cohort showed post-traumatic stress disorder is associated with 13 diagnoses even after accounting for socioeconomic factors and …

Evolving Ontology And The Case Against Predictive Algorithms In The U.S. Justice System, Eryn Reyes Leong

Say Something Theological: The Student Journal of Theological Studies

In the United States today, predictive algorithms, a particular form of artificial intelligence (AI), permeate all segments of society, including the criminal justice system. With the help of AI, judges are able to “plug” defendants into algorithms and generate outputs that produce a deterministic and homogenous view of defendants. Proponents of predictive algorithms cite accuracy, neutrality, fairness, and efficiency, but what is missing from their calculus is the human person, the central figure who shapes and is shaped by algorithms. Using the story of defendant Darnell Gates as a case study, this article seeks to contribute to the development of …