Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

A Comparison Of Information Security Curricula In China And The Usa, Huaying Chen, Sean B. Maynard, Atif Ahmad

Australian Information Security Management Conference

Information Security (InfoSec) education varies in its content, focus and level of technicality across the world. In this paper we investigate the differences between graduate InfoSec programs in top universities in China and in the United States of America (USA). In China, curriculum emphasises Telecommunication, Computer Science and InfoSec Technology, whilst in the USA in addition to Computer Science and InfoSec Technology the curriculum also emphasises Enterprise‐level Security Strategy and Policy, InfoSec Management, and Cyber Law. The differences are significant and will have a profound impact on both the perceptions and capabilities of future generations of information security professionals on …

Roofsat: Teaching Students Skills For Software Development For Gis Data Collection And Other Activities, Jeremy Straub, Ronald Marsh, Donovan Torgerson, Christoffer Korvald

Jeremy Straub

Small Spacecraft provide an excellent platform for the collection of geospatial data. In order to enable the low-cost creation of small remote sensing space-craft in a university environment, a training pathway for students is required. The Realistic Operational Ob-ject for Facilitating Software Assessment and Testing (RoofSat) serves to provide students with experience developing software for a small satellite platform typi-cal of those used for remote sensing missions. It al-lows software to be tested with hardware that re-sponds in a similar manner to that found on the satel-lite for a fraction of the cost of development. This poster details the goals …

Environmental Literacy Of Sixth Grade Students In Arkansas: Implications For Environmental Education Reform, Lisa Suzanne Wood

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Environmental education must be better integrated into K-12 curriculum to advance environmental literacy. Producing a citizenry that can understand and address the complex environmental issues facing the world today and in the future is essential to sustainable life on this planet.

Using the Middle School Environmental Literacy Survey, 6th grade students across Arkansas were surveyed to obtain a baseline measure of environmental literacy based on the four domains of environmental literacy included in the survey; ecological knowledge, environmental affect, cognitive skills, and behavior. Individual domain scores were combined into a composite environmental literacy score. Results were then compared to the …

Workforce Preparedness Of Information Systems Students: Perceptions Of Students, Alumni, And Employers, Susan Bristow

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Employers of newly hired higher education graduates report their new workforce is not prepared. Further research was required to discover insights to the workforce readiness gap. This concurrent mixed methods study explored what competencies influenced employer's perceptions of the work-readiness of Information Systems (ISYS) undergraduate students and discovered ISYS graduates' and current ISYS students' perceptions of their work-readiness. Participants consisted of a convenience sample including 69 ISYS program upperclassmen, 20 ISYS program alumni, and 8 employers of the ISYS program graduates. ISYS program alumni completed an online Qualtrics survey to measure the participants' perception of their workforce preparedness. ISYS program …

Mathematicians Playing A Role In Math Education: What We Learned At The Ime/Mime Workshop, Anna Bargagliotti, Rama Chidambaram, Gizem Karaali

Anna Bargagliotti

In Hollywood, some actors are regularly cast as mean, others as sweet and endearing, and some typically play innocent big-eyed youths who inevitably succeed after awakening to the particular facts of life that their producer wants them to awaken to. It is unusual and difficult for actors to cross the bridge between different types on a regular basis. However, there are always exceptions to the rule. In the seemingly unrelated world of academics, mathematics faculty may find themselves playing different roles. People with different skills and interests strive to balance their careers in ways that will be uniquely fulfilling to …

Exploring The Effects Of Conversational Repair As A Scaffolding Strategy To Promote Mathematics Explanations Of Students With Learning Disabilities, Jia Liu

Open Access Dissertations

Conversational repair often occurs in conversations when people attempt to address communicative breakdowns or inaccuracy by way of repeating what have been said or putting them in another way. The review of literature on conversational repair revealed that as an important concept in pragmatic aspect of language, it is an effective strategy to improve communication of different populations with disabilities. However, it is rarely studied in the domain of mathematics and with the population with learning disabilities/difficulties (LD). In current reform-based, discourse-oriented mathematics classrooms, students with LD encounter difficulties articulating or explaining well their reasoning processes due to the mathematical …

Scholarly Collaboration In Engineering Education: From Big-Data Scientometrics To User-Centered Software Design, Hanjun Xian

Open Access Dissertations

Engineering education research has grown into a flourishing community with an-ever increasing number of publications and scholars. However, recent studies show that a significant amount of engineering education knowledge retains a clear disciplinary orientation. If the gaps in scholarly collaboration continue to be prevalent within the entire community, it will become increasingly difficult to sustain community memory. This will eventually inhibit the propagation of innovations and slow the movement of research findings into practice.

This dissertation studies scholarly collaboration in the engineering education research community. It provides a clear characterization of collaboration problems and proposes potential solutions. The dissertation is …

Women And Power In The United States: A Geographic Analysis Of Government, Work, And Economic Status, Kylie Stackis

Earth and Environmental Sciences Presentations

This geographic analysis investigates the different ways that women hold power across the United States, primarily through government, work, and economic status. Political power is in this case represented through government representation at the national and state level. Economic power considers employment, income, occupation (specifically traditionally male fields of business and science), hours worked, and Forbes lists of the richest 400 people in the United States as well as the 500 CEOs of influential companies. Education was a third variable in the analysis since it exemplifies the power of knowledge and lends itself to the potential for political and economic …

Implementation Of A Research-Based Lab Module In A High School Chemistry Curriculum: A Study Of Classroom Dynamics, Matthew Pilarz

Open Access Dissertations

Pilarz, Matthew. Ph.D., Purdue University, December 2013. Implementation of a Research-Based Lab Module in a High School Chemistry Curriculum: A Study of Classroom Dynamics. Major Professor: Gabriela C. Weaver.

For this study, a research-based lab module was implemented in two high school chemistry classes for the purpose of examining classroom dynamics throughout the process of students completing the module. A research-based lab module developed for use in undergraduate laboratories by the Center for Authentic Science Practice in Education (CASPiE) was modified and implemented in two high school settings. This module consisted of four phases: Skill Building, Experimental Design, Independent Research, …

Adaptive Gameplay For Programming Practice, Chris Boesch, Sandra Boesch

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Over the past four years, we have collaborated to develop a set of online games to enable users to practice software languages in a self-directed manner and as part of a class. Recently we introduced a new adaptive difficulty feature that enables players to self-regulate the difficulty of the games they are playing to practice. These new features also provide additional information to further adapt the problem content to better meet the needs of the users.

Integrated Mathematica™-Based Physical Chemistry Curriculum: Bringing The Science To The Forefront, Kevin Ausman

Kevin D. Ausman

Undergraduate- and graduate-level physical chemistry classes are often so mathematically intensive that they often (a) dissuade qualified students from pursuing the field, (b) require more homework, testing, and grading time be devoted to tracking down hidden mathematical errors than is devoted to working with the subject matter, and (c) limit the complexity, and therefore real-world applicability, of assigned problems. In this talk, the integration of the general-purpose mathematical tool MathematicaTM throughout the second semester of undergraduate physical chemistry will be discussed. Examples provided will demonstrate the feasibility of introducing the MathematicaTM language gradually over the course of the semester, allowing …

Using Scala Strategically Across The Undergraduate Curriculum, Mark Lewis, Konstantin Läufer, George Thiruvathukal

George K. Thiruvathukal

Various hybrid-paradigm languages, designed to balance compile-time error detection, conciseness, and performance, have emerged. Scala, e.g., is interoperable with Java and has become an early leader in adoption, especially in the start-up and open-source spaces. Workshop participants experience Scala’s value as a teaching language in the CS curriculum through four lecture-lab modules: In CS1, the read-eval-print loop and simple, uniform syntax aid programming in the small. In CS2, higher-order methods allow concise, efficient manipulation of collections. Advanced topics include domain-specific languages, concurrency, web apps/services, and mobile apps. Laptop recommended with Scala installed.

The Education Issue, George Thiruvathukal

George K. Thiruvathukal

This article is focused on computing education for the 21st Century and how a renewed focus on education is needed to ensure that our discipline remains vibrant and relevant to all students, regardless of whether they are CS majors or not. After all, many graduates end up in a computer science-related job (e.g. information technology, programming, networking/security, etc.) The article specifically focuses on education-related articles that have appeared within the last year or so in the IEEE Computer Society.

National Infrastructure Protection Priorities For Nuclear Electromagnetic Pulse (Emp) And Solar Storm Geomagnetic Disturbance Catastrophes, George H. Baker Iii

George H Baker

The Commission to Assess the Threat to the United States from Electromagnetic Pulse Attack has provided a compelling case for protecting civilian infrastructure against the effects of EMP and geomagnetic disturbances (GMD) caused by severe solar storms. Similar to protecting critical infrastructure against any hazard, it will be important to take a risk-based priority approach for these two electromagnetic threats, recognizing that it will be fiscally impracticable to protect everything. In this regard, EMP and GMD are particularly challenging in that they interfere with electrical and electronic data, control, transmission, and communication systems organic to nearly all critical infrastructures, simultaneously, …

The Secret Of The World Environment Day, Sultan Alam

Professional Development Centre, Gilgit

No abstract provided.

A Review Of Online Collaboration Tools Used By The Und Openorbiter Program, Jeremy Straub, Christoffer Korvald

Jeremy Straub

The OpenOrbiter program at the University of North Dakota is a student-initiated, student-run effort to design, develop, test, launch and operate a CubeSat-class spacecraft to validate the designs of the Open Prototype for Educational NanoSatellites (a framework that will be made publically-available to allow faster and lower-cost missions at other educational institutions worldwide). OpenOrbiter involves (at various participation levels) over 200 faculty and students spanning five colleges and ten departments. To coordinate this large group of participants who comprise over seventeen teams and work at disjoint hours in a plethora of locations, online project management, software source control and hardware …

Adaptation Of Regional Representative Soil Project And Soil Judging For Cameroon, Celestine Che

All Dissertations

Representative regional soils have agricultural, cultural, economic, environmental, and historical importance to Cameroon. Twenty seven regional representative soils have been identified in Cameroon. A set of laboratory exercises, assignments and exam questions have been developed utilizing the Regional Representative Soil Project (RRSP) that gives students an opportunity to practice interpretation of soil series descriptions, taxonomic classes, soil forming factors, and soil physical and chemical properties. The RRSP can be further enhanced and complemented with Soil Judging. Conventional soil judging as practiced in the United States has been adapted for Cameroon by a graduate student from that country using an undergraduate-level …

Student Motivation For Pursuing A Minor In Environmental Sustainability, Luanne Woods Lewis

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Environmental sustainability dominates the global conversation seeking to increase awareness and change the culture of thinking concerning the relationship between humans and the Earth. Because many universities offer programs relative to environmental sustainability, a need exists to understand why students pursue these programs. This study examined student motivation for pursuing an environmental sustainability minor in one institution of higher education. Career, learning, monetary, and Social responsibility were the motivational factors considered in this study. The results of this study indicated significant differences among the motivational factors for pursuing a minor in sustainability among those students surveyed. Significant differences existed for …

Comparing The Impact Of Traditional And Modeling College Algebra Courses On Student Performance In Survey Of Calculus, Jerry West

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Students in higher education deserve opportunities to succeed and learning environments which maximize success. Mathematics courses can create a barrier for success for some students. College algebra is a course that serves as a gateway to required courses in many bachelor's degree programs. The content in college algebra should serve to maximize students' potential in utilizing mathematics and gaining skills required in subsequent math-based courses when necessary. The Committee for Undergraduate Programs in Mathematics has gone through extensive work to help mathematics departments reform their college algebra courses in order to help students gain interest in the utilization of mathematics …

Does The Sat Predict Academic Achievement And Academic Choices At Macalester College?, Jing Wen

Mathematics, Statistics, and Computer Science Honors Projects

This paper examines the predictive power of the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) for Macalester students’ college success and academic choices. We use linear regression to study whether the SAT can predict students’ first year or four-year grades. Using Kullback-Leibler divergence and classification trees, we also examine the SAT’s predictive ability for other aspects of students’ academic experience, for example, major selection, or academic division of study. After controlling for major and course level, we find that the SAT does not explain a large proportion of the variability in Macalester students’ college success. However, the SAT does provide some useful information …

The “Green Eating” Project: A Pilot Intervention To Promote Sustainable And Healthy Eating In College Students, Kelleigh E. Eastman

Geoffrey Greene

The “Green Eating” Project: A Pilot Intervention to Promote Sustainable and Healthy Eating in College Students Kelleigh Eastman Sponsor: Geoffrey Greene, Nutrition and Dietetics A topic of interest that is growing in the general population is the idea of being sustainable, or “green”, and there is a rising awareness in sustainable practices involving food and the environment. Some of the “green” eating behaviors identified through my research included eating a plant-based (i.e. vegetarian or semi-vegetarian) diet, eating locally grown foods, eating organically grown foods, and eating foods that are labeled fair-trade. Frequently, these “green” eating behaviors are healthful eating behaviors …

The Living Labs: Nantucket Island, Anamarija Frankic, Robyn Hannigan, Sarah Oktay

Office of Community Partnerships Posters

The Living Labs are a practical response to growing environmental challenges, including habitat degradation, loss of biodiversity, and global climate change. Nantucket Living Labs develops and implements holistic solutions to environmental challenges right here and now. The School for the Environment (SFE) established this concept in Conjunction with the Nantucket Field Station, Nantucket Conservation Foundation and ReMain Nantucket, a nonprofit dedicated to supporting a year-round community in the town center.

Umass Boston School For The Environment: Educating The Next Generation Of Environmental Problem Solvers, Robyn Hannigan, Anamarija Frankic

Office of Community Partnerships Posters

Environmental challenges do not recognize disciplinary, socio-economic, or geographic boundaries. To support the development of environmental problem-solvers we deeply engage undergraduate and graduate students in solving real-world environmental problems through innovation and sustainability-focused courses and research experiences. These experiences directly engage local communities in the development and implementation of environmental solutions.

A Comparative Study Of Exact Versus Propensity Matching Techniques Using Monte Carlo Simulation, Mukaria J. J. Itang'ata

Dissertations

Often researchers face situations where comparative studies between two or more programs are necessary to make causal inferences for informed policy decision-making. Experimental designs employing randomization provide the strongest evidence for causal inferences. However, many pragmatic and ethical challenges may preclude the use of randomized designs. In such situations, subject matching provides an alternative design approach for conducting causal inference studies. This study examined various design conditions hypothesized to affect matching procedures’ bias recovery ability.

See attachment for full abstract.

The Place Of Education In Building Disaster Resilience: A Strategic Examination, Neil Dufty

Neil Dufty

No abstract provided.

Towards A “Cloud Curriculum” In Art And Science?, Roger Malina

The STEAM Journal

Recently an email hit my desk from Paul Thomas in Australia with a proposal to work together on a “Cloud Curriculum for Art and Science”. I immediately agreed to collaborate. I don’t yet have a clue of what a cloud curriculum is, but what I do know is that we are ‘backing into the future’ in educational institutions and we desperately need a ‘cloud curriculum.’ We need to look over the ten year horizon. And in the emerging art-science field I doubt that the usual approach to curriculum development will work.

Steam...Now!, John Eger

The STEAM Journal

With America slowly awakening to the need to turn out creative and innovative workers who can join the 21^st century (its already 2012) workplace -- because they have the new thinking skills --we have to change the current emphasis on STEM, for Science, Technology, Engineering and Math to STEAM, by insuring that the whole brain is nurtured through the arts: thus STEAM.

I2StemE - What, Who, Where?, Kania Greer, Bob Mayes

Interdisciplinary STEM Teaching & Learning Conference (2012-2019)

I²STEM^e is a new Institute on the campus of GSU whose focus is to increase opportunities for K-20 students, teachers, and businesses to partner together to improve STEM Education in Georgia around the tenets of place-based learning, problem based learning and teaching for understanding.

Improving Webide Through Delightful Design And Gamification, Michael Hilton

Master's Theses

WebIDE is a web-based online learning environment. WebIDE has been used

successfully to teach CS0 and CS1 students Java and C concepts and software

engineering best practices, specically Test Driven Development. Previous Web-

IDE development has concentrated on developing functionality. The main goal

of this eort is to improve two non-functional aspects of WebIDE. The rst is to

design a more delightful user interface. The second is to add a scoring mecha-

nism that encourages students to develop best practices. The scoring mechanism

rewards students who answer the question correctly on the rst attempt, dis-

couraging them from spamming the …

The International Trafficking In Arms Regulations: Precluding Innovation In Academic Spacecraft Engineering — Or Are They?, Jeremy Straub, Joe Vacek

Jeremy Straub

Government regulations and uncertainty about their enforcement can be a significant barrier to innovation. In business, it is undesirable to consume time and other resources developing a product that cannot be sold or which requires navigating significant bureaucracy for each sale. In academ-ia, where limited funding is available prior to the submission of a grant pro-posal and receipt of an award, proposal-stage compliance costs can derail a project long before it begins. This paper reviews the International Traffick-ing in Arms Regulations (ITAR) and their impact on spacecraft research in academia, private research labs and industry. It reviews the exemptions available, …