Digital Commons Network^™

The Kihm-9: A Novel Self-Deploying Picosat Antenna Design For Reflectarray Antennas, Nathan Coleman, Mitchel Skinner, Collin Ynchausti, Spencer Magleby, Larry Howell, Akash Biswas

Small Satellite Conference

Reflectarray antennas are popular on satellites for their ability to achieve similar performance to parabolic antennas in a more compact volume. This project shows how integrating novel technologies achieves the benefits of larger antennas while maintaining the advantages of small satellites. The objective of this research is to create a reflectarray antenna for a holographic metasurface that utilizes the volume surrounding a CubeSat when stowed, incorporates a novel pin-less hinge, includes a self-deploying and stabilizing joint, and is manufactured out of space-grade materials. By using hinges embedded with membranes and magnets, issues with lubrication and outgassing may be avoided, and …

Burnout And Job Satisfaction Of Behavior Technicians Working In Public Schools: A Quantitative Correlational Study, Sara B. Dougherty

Doctor of Education Program Dissertations

The purpose of this quantitative correlational study was to determine if the characteristics of burnout predict job satisfaction of behavior technicians in public schools. There was a need to examine if the high levels of burnout and low job satisfaction experienced by teachers and paraprofessionals that have resulted in high rates of attrition also impact behavior technicians in public school settings (Madigan & Kim, 2021; NCES, 2022; Sims, 2020; Skaalvik & Skaalvik, 2020). An online survey was created using REDCap consisting of the Maslach Burnout Inventory-Educators Survey (Maslach et al., 1996), the Minnesota Satisfaction Questionnaire short form (Weiss et al., …

Minutes, August 2023, University Of Dayton. College Of Arts And Sciences

Documents of the College of Arts and Sciences Academic Affairs Committee

Minutes from organizational meeting for Academic Affairs Committee

Focus On Party Decision-Making, John M. Lande

Faculty Blogs

A major motivation in the modern dispute resolution movement has been to increase and improve parties’ decision-making in their legal disputes. Parties can participate more effectively in negotiation and mediation if they engage in decision-making early in disputes. This suggests the importance of good preparation before negotiation and mediation sessions. When parties are well-prepared in advance, they are as knowledgeable, confident, and assertive as possible in making decisions in their cases

Online Midsummer Seminar (Oms #2) "Fantasy Goes To Hell", The Mythopoeic Society

Mythcon Programs

FANTASY GOES TO HELL was originally intended to be our 2023 Midwinter Seminar, but our plans for an in-person Mythcon in 2023 fell through, and the topic proved to be so popular it strained the resources we had available for a seminar. Hence we proposed that we expand the seminar into what we have previously called a “Halfling Mythcon”—a virtual Mythcon taking the place of an in-person one.

FANTASY GOES TO HELL will run in parallel with general virtual conference tracks devoted to other topics in Mythopoeic Fantasy, such as presentations by award nominees and traditional after-hours programming. The 2023 …

Orpheus And Eurydice, Emma Wilson-Kanamori

The Mythic Circle

No abstract provided.

Mara, Christian Dickinson

The Mythic Circle

No abstract provided.

Gene Expression Genetics Of The Striatum Of Diversity Outbred Mice., Vivek M. Philip, Hao He, Michael C Saul, Price E Dickson, Jason A. Bubier, Elissa J Chesler

Faculty Research 2023

Brain transcriptional variation is a heritable trait that mediates complex behaviors, including addiction. Expression quantitative trait locus (eQTL) mapping reveals genomic regions harboring genetic variants that influence transcript abundance. In this study, we profiled transcript abundance in the striatum of 386 Diversity Outbred (J:DO) mice of both sexes using RNA-Seq. All mice were characterized using a behavioral battery of widely-used exploratory and risk-taking assays prior to transcriptional profiling. We performed eQTL mapping, incorporated the results into a browser-based eQTL viewer, and deposited co-expression network members in GeneWeaver. The eQTL viewer allows researchers to query specific genes to obtain allelic effect …

Commencement Convocation Program, Usf, August 8, 2023, University Of South Florida

USF Graduation and Convocation Programs

King O'Neal Scholars - Emma Grace Atherton, Alisa Bakieva, Ginelle Renae Lauryn Brown, Tatyana Soribel Butler, Carter E. Casko, Carli Lilibeth Cohoon, Sarah Lou Shalom Dasent Shuler, Carlos Manuel Figueroa Palomino, Lanette Gonzalez-Lewis, Grace Angelique Heeke, Daniel Thomas Kortenhaus, Emily Margaret Logan, Makayla Long, Abigail Clariece McCurter, Elijah Callaway Mceuen, Sofia Elizabeth Mejia-Naccarato, Rachel Yvonne Stanton, Edward B. Williams, and Parisa Yazdankhah Kenary; Global Citizens Award - Sarah Bagnasco, Sydney Black, Carly Burton, Gladys D. Cantu, Sara Chaj, Lauren Flannery, Emily Hernandez, Anagha Hesaraghatta, Faith Pinamang, Katie Sarnelli, Natalie Spanhake, Kenya A. Sanchez Torres, and Neha Vemuri

A Guide For The Treatment Of Tendonitis, Dominic Montalto

Department of Occupational Therapy Entry-Level Capstone Projects

No abstract provided.

Exploring The Role Of Mentorship In Occupational Therapy Home Health, Lauren E. Coutinho

Department of Occupational Therapy Entry-Level Capstone Projects

This capstone project explored the role of mentorship in occupational therapy (OT) home health through the focus areas of administration and program development. The capstone site was Embrace Rehab Healthcare, a private outpatient rehabilitation home health company that recently launched services. The population served was adults and older adults and services offered were occupational, physical, and speech therapies. While the main focus area was administration and assisting with various administrative tasks that beginning a new healthcare company entails, my project for this capstone experience was developing a mentorship toolkit for clinicians who are new to working in this setting, as …

Exploring The Needs Of Military Children In Public Schools: What School Psychologists Need To Know, Hannah A. Delmonte

Educational Specialist, 2020-current

Although research has been published documenting the increased risk for negative social, emotional, behavioral, and academic outcomes of military-connected students, no research prior to this study has given voice to these students and explored their experiences and needs. Five military-connected high school students participated in a focus group exploring what their lived experiences are in the context of living in a military-connected home and what they wish their schools knew to better support them. A thematic analysis was used to analyze the qualitative data and six themes emerged from the discussion: the emotional burden these students carry, distance they feel …

The Impact Of Repeated Reading Intervention On Oral Reading Fluency For Students With Autism Spectrum Disorder (Asd) In Saudi Arabia, Ahmed Al Naji

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The prevalence rate of learners with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) has risen concurrently with their inclusion into public schools in Saudi Arabia. Being in schools, they face academic challenges, particularly in reading. This increased rate evokes the importance of implementing valuable strategies to keep up the academic skills of those students. These students require Evidence-Based Practices (EBPs), which have been demonstrated crucial for their reading development. Nevertheless, limited research has been done on examining the efficacy of EBPs used to enhance the reading skills of learners with ASD, especially their Oral Reading Fluency (ORF). This study used an effective approach …

The Impact Of The Social Story Intervention On Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder (Asd) In Saudi Arabia, Marwan Alkhudhayri

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is on the rise in Saudi Arabia, and the field of Special Education is currently working to expand awareness about ASD as well as evidence-based intervention availability in the country. The Social Stories Intervention has been shown to have positive results in work with children with ASD in other countries, however its effectiveness in Saudi Arabia had not thoroughly been examined. The Social Stories Intervention provides an important tool for practitioners to use with children with ASD in order to help improve their social skills development. The current study utilizes a single-subject design to assess the …

Examining The Usefulness Of Interprofessional Education (Ipe) For Legal, Social Work, & School Psychology Student Training To Support Justice Involved Youth, Mary Comis

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The school-to-prison pipeline is defined as a set of policies that contribute to the removal of students from the school environment and into the justice system (Justice Policy Institute, 2011). These students have unique and complex needs that include educational needs, legal needs, and community needs; however, these students often lack the support necessary to assist them when navigating the complexities of the educational and legal system. As a result, the complexity of the challenges these students face can be provided through a holistic legal representation team, where a school psychologist, social worker, and lawyer, can coordinate their efforts to …

Proposing A Measure Of Ethicality For Humans And Ai, Alejandro Jorge Napolitano Jawerbaum

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Smarter people or intelligent machines are able to make more accurate inferences about their environment and other agents more efficiently than less intelligent agents. Formally: ‘Intelligence measures an agent’s ability to achieve goals in a wide range of environments.’ (Legg, 2008)

In this dissertation we extend this definition to include ethical behaviour and we will offer a mathematical formalism and a way to estimate how ethical an action is or will be, both for a human and for a computer, by calculating the expected values of random variables. Formally, we propose the following measure of ethicality, which is computable, or …

Isolation And Total Synthesis Of Sigma-2 Ligands From Marine Cyanobacteria, Andrea Hough

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Cyanobacteria have been studied for over 50 years as a source of new antibiotics, antiviral, and anticancer drugs. The research described in this dissertation investigates marine cyanobacteria as a source of natural products with activity within the central nervous system and with cytotoxicity against breast cancer cells. Barbamide (1) is a known cyanobacterial metabolite that has been re-isolated from a variety of species and collection sites suggesting broad utility as a signaling molecule. Utilizing the psychoactive drug screening program, we screened barbamide for CNS activity and found that barbamide exhibited affinity for the kappa opioid receptor (KOR) and …

Analyzing Pseudomonas Aeruginosa With Bacteriophage Tags Using Photoacoustic Flow Cytometry, Jennifer C. Schinke

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The number of daily bacterial infections is climbing and the CDC explains that this is due to the antibiotic-resistant threat in the United States. Finding a faster way of bacterial identification is necessary as it currently takes 1-4 days for a medical lab to culture and identify bacteria. Photoacoustic flow cytometry (PAFC) can be used as an alternative method resulting in swift identification within an hour (Edgar, 2019). Pseudomonas aeruginosa, cell line PA01, will be coated in up to a few hundred red dyed phages making it detectible by the photoacoustic flow cytometry system. Bacteriophages (phages) are viruses that …

Conceptions Of Rurality: Examining Beliefs And Their Impact On Teacher Efficacy In A Small Appalachian School, Lori Wickham

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The current literature documents the historical peripheralization of rural communities and the deficit narratives often imposed upon their schools, students and families. Research further suggests this history of peripheralization is often internalized by those identifying with these communities and that this internalization of deficit orientations may be impacting perceptions of possibility in educational practice. This mixed-methods study investigates more thoroughly if and how these core-periphery dynamics manifest in a small Appalachian school by examining possible connections between educators’ beliefs regarding rurality and their sense of teacher and collective efficacy. The research was guided by the following question:

How do rural …

Assessing School Psychologists’ Perspective Of Students Entering A School District From Juvenile Detention Facilities, Emily Wuenschell

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Adolescents who are involved with the juvenile justice system encounter setbacks, stigma, and other increased risk factors that negatively impact their future life outcomes. Schools, and in turn school psychologists, are in the unique position of being able to provide effective services for these adolescents. Previous research has identified many practices that schools can implement to improve the academic, social, and vocational prospects of adolescents entering their districts from a juvenile justice placement. This study sought to understand the role of school psychologists in this transition by assessing their recommendations for and opinions of students involved with juvenile justice. Results …

Hoping As A Transformational Imperative In Puerto Rico: A Phenomenological And Grounded Theory Study Within Colonized Space, José Luiggi-Hernández

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

As the United States continues to restrict Puerto Rico’s self-determination and imposes oppressive institutions such as the Oversight Board, the people of the archipelago live in precarity and hopelessness. Limited psychological research on colonialism has focused on the detrimental impact of oppression and its influence on the development of fatalism and the inferiority complex. On the other hand, existing psychological theories of hope fail to describe how it is lived within the post-colonial context and to explain the ways in which this psychological phenomenon arises even in the face of systematic dehumanization. As Puerto Ricans show evident signs of hope …

Glycerophosphocholine Is Used For Lipid And Phosphate Metabolism By Candida Albicans, Will King

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The metabolism of phosphatidylcholine (PC), a major eukaryotic membrane lipid, has been shown to be an important aspect of pathogenesis in Candida albicans. Of note, PC turnover product, glycerophosphocholine (GPC), is abundant renal metabolite available within the host. GPC is readily imported by C. albicans, and deletion of the major GPC transporter, Git3, leads to decreased virulence in a bloodstream infection model. Here I have characterized two potential metabolic fates of internalized GPC. The first metabolic fate explored is internalized GPC can be hydrolyzed to release P_i. To determine if GPC import and subsequent metabolism impact phosphate …

Investigating The Impact On Private Water Supply Of Hydraulic Fracturing Communication With An Abandoned Conventional Gas Well In New Freeport, Pa, Kiley Miller

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In June of 2022 a “frac out” occurred in New Freeport, PA when an unconventional gas well under development by hydraulic fracturing, communicated with an abandoned gas well to the surface. An initial “zone of impact” encompassed much of the town’s main thoroughfare. Water samples were obtained from 17 private water wells, 5 springs and 1 pond (31 total samples) and analyzed for cations, anions, and light hydrocarbons. Methane was found in 18 of the samples, both located within and outside of the “zone of impact”. Mass ratio analyses indicated contamination from both unconventional and conventional wells. Interferometric Synthetic Aperture …

“One University’S Covid-19 Pandemic Mitigation Response And Anxiety Construct: A Summative Program Evaluation”, Ann Hodgin

Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) Manuscripts

Abstract

The effects of the COVID-19 pandemic continue to ripple through everyday life. In December 2019, an outbreak occurred in China. Subsequently, the World Health Organization identified SARS-CoV-2 as a new type of coronavirus that quickly spread around the globe (Nazario, 2022). As of May 31, 2023, there were 6,938,353 confirmed deaths worldwide from COVID-19 (WHO, 2023).

A needs assessment completed by the University identified that a program evaluation of the university’s COVID-19 response was warranted. Therefore, this program evaluation was conducted to assess the effectiveness of the policies and protocols implemented at a Catholic University in Southwestern Pennsylvania to …

Effectiveness Of A New Graduate Nurse Residency Program: A Program Evaluation, Christine Meyer

Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) Manuscripts

Healthcare organizations continue to face challenges in the retention of new graduate registered nurses (NGRNs) within the first year of hire. Accredited nurse residency programs are designed to provide support to NGRNs and help make the transition from student to graduate nurse by developing their knowledge and skills. This project evaluates a nurse residency program at a rural, community hospital. The project aims to analyze both qualitative and quantitative data to evaluate the program outcomes as it relates to nurse retention, turnover, and job satisfaction. The sample includes 94 new graduate registered nurses that were part of the yearlong residency …

Improving Ostomy Patient’S Self-Efficacy And Quality Of Living Through Prehabilitation And Prevention Of Complications Using Telehealth Visits: A Quality Improvement Project, Shabnam Pratik Bagh

Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) Manuscripts

Due to the rise in colorectal cancer and diverticular diseases in the United States, approximately 100,000 to 150,000 intestinal stomas (fecal diversions) are created annually. With approximately 80% of readmissions experiencing post-discharge complications (Agri et al., 2020), quality improvement (QI) initiatives to increase ostomy patient’s self-efficacy and quality of living (QOL) are needed. The purpose of this QI project was to enhance the current continuum of care for ostomy patients by adding a Prehabilitation Session prior to surgery followed up with 24-hour Telehealth visits after discharge from the hospital to support their living with an ostomy. The resulting Comprehensive Ostomy …

Evaluating Outcomes Of An Integrated Medical Care Model In An Acute Care Hospital: A Program Evaluation, Erin Flanagan

Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) Manuscripts

Background: Increased awareness of disparities for people with co-occurring medical and behavioral health disorders identified a gap in their individualized health care plan. This gap provides opportunities for hospitals and acute care centers to evaluate current care models for this specific patient population. Problem: Hospitals are challenged to meet the growing needs of patients while working to decrease operational costs. Patients with behavioral health disorders also have significantly greater spending for general medical conditions than patients without a behavioral health disorder (Chu et al., 2019). Methods: Hospitals are attempting to address this gap in care through interdisciplinary or collaborative care …

A Program Evaluation Of An Internship Program And Its Effectiveness On Retention During The First Year Of Professional Practice, Jamie Kilpatrick

Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) Manuscripts

Background and Significance: The registered nurse is an essential component of the healthcare team. Successful efforts have occurred worldwide for recruitment to the nursing profession. However, vacancy plagues the nursing profession through turnover, with the new graduate registered nurse remaining the most vulnerable with the highest rate of turnover. This program evaluation will review one organization’s retention project to support the senior nursing student with a paid clinical internship, and additional support through the vulnerable first year of practice within the chosen care setting. Methods: This summative program evaluation will utilize a systems-oriented approach and quasi-experimental methodology with quantitative data …

Implementation Of A Structured Hybrid Training Program To Improve Clinical Skills And Staff Confidence In The Care Of Maternal And Neonatal Patients In The Emergency Department: A Quality Improvement Project, Melissa Hewitt

Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) Manuscripts

Caring for a pregnant woman or compromised newborn is often a stressful situation for all healthcare workers regardless of their experience or expertise. This stress is only heightened when the patient presents to a unit that may not be comfortable with the situation such as the Emergency Department (ED). Often units such as the ED do not receive adequate training in caring for maternal and neonatal patients. The infrequency of patient interactions coupled with their lack of knowledge can leave staff with decreased levels of confidence. Various research articles recommend that hospitals provide interdisciplinary team training for high acuity low …

Implementation Of A Nursing Peer Mentorship Program To Improve Nursing Retention And Job Satisfaction In An Acute Care Hospital: A Quality Improvement Project, Rebecca Cassel

Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) Manuscripts

Background and Significance: Currently staffing shortages are impacting patients and communities nationwide. This problem has been on the rise since the before the pandemic. COVID-19 has certainly increased the rate of nursing turnover, and vacancy, especially in acute care (Krofft & Stewart, 2021). Many factors contribute to nursing turnover, including nursing satisfaction, interprofessional relationships, and organizational support, and it is apparent that swift and effective action is needed, to ensure that safe, skilled nursing professionals are available to provide the necessary treatment that those seeking healthcare need. Nursing Mentorship programs have been shown to improve retention of nursing staff, …