University of Southern Mississippi
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THE EFFECTS OF COVID-19 ON EDUCATORS IN SOUTH MISSISSIPPI
Get PDFThis study was focused on discovering what may have caused educators in kindergarten through 8th grade classrooms in mid-south Mississippi to leave or consider leaving the profession as it relates to the COVID-19 pandemic within different content areas. Participants identified issues within the system that diminished their abilities to educate their students effectively and this diminishment was related to the pandemic. Research from “Mississippi Teachers Are Eyeing the Exit” (Ballard, 2023) and “Teachers’ Dissatisfaction during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Factors Contributing to a Desire to Leave the Profession” (Gillani, 2022) showed that teachers were having strong difficulties during the pandemic which led to many leaving the profession. Research also proved that, throughout all areas of Mississippi, teacher retention was reaching an all-time low. Administration may have neglected their educators during some of the most challenging times of their careers, and, as a result, the teacher shortage is now at critical levels (Wright & Betz, 2019). A lack of support by the administration could have caused an uptick in the number of educators considering leaving their jobs or leaving the profession all together. Participants conveyed feelings of being overworked, with limited resources and support from their administrators or district. This study demonstrated how varying content areas struggled more than others. A survey was given, and through the use of descriptive statistics and qualitative measures the research showed that educators now, more than ever, are struggling to find a purpose in the classroom and they feel as though they no longer have a healthy balance of home and work life (Brouwers, 2020)
American Girl(hood): Gender Performance, Tween Media, and Social Media Content
Get PDFThe American Girl brand of eighteen-inch dolls presents narratives of young girls throughout historical and contemporary settings, as well as manufacturing a line of dolls designed to look “just like you.” Despite the company’s commitment to female empowerment, these narratives still fall into certain tropes of societal expectations for women and are not inclusive of all girls’ experiences. Young American Girl fans and teen collectors on YouTube then take these narratives to create their own original video content, often in stop-motion animated format. These animations typically consist of original stories and characters, which both reinforce the narratives presented by the doll brand and expand on what the brand does not usually represent.
This research project consists of a short content analysis of five stop-motion animations created by teen fans of the doll brand, which then influenced the creation of an original stop-motion animation. Drawing from gender schema theory, the looking-glass self, impression management, and dramaturgy, this thesis applies the common narratives found in American Girl’s primary texts and fan-made creations online to create a new stop-motion film that challenges what it means to be an American girl. This short film, titled American Girlhood, follows a transgender high schooler running for prom queen, examining the concept of gender as a performance and challenging the lack of positive representation of transgender people in both American Girl media and popular media overall
Objective Structured Clinical Examination (OSCE) for Interscalene Brachial Plexus Block Utilizing Ultrasound Guidance and Landmark Technique
No full textThe purpose of this doctoral project was to create learning and evaluation tools for interscalene brachial plexus blocks (ISBPB) to be used by certified registered nurse anesthetists (CRNAs) and students in the Nurse Anesthesia Program (NAP) at The University of Southern Mississippi (USM). ISBPB is a regional anesthesia technique used to provide anesthesia for procedures of the shoulder and upper arm. CRNAs and students can use these tools to refresh their current knowledge and enhance their regional anesthesia skills.
The objective structured clinical examination (OSCE) and cognitive aid for ISBPB utilizing landmark and ultrasound-guided techniques were evaluated by the USM NAP faculty and currently practicing CRNAs. The OSCE template and cognitive aid, which included procedural steps, educational resources, and equipment needed to perform an ISBPB, were provided to participants. Participants were sent a link to Qualtrics©, an online survey tool that contained all the documents including the survey, and were asked to review the informed consent form, OSCE template, and cognitive aid before completing the survey. The quantitative and qualitative data collected from the 10 responses concluded that all participants agreed that the OSCE and cognitive aid were clinically relevant and improved their confidence in their ability to perform an ISBPB
An Objective Structured Clinical Examination (OSCE) for Axillary Nerve Blocks Using Ultrasound-Guidance and Landmark Techniques
No full textThe purpose of this doctoral project was to create an informative educational and evaluation tool on axillary brachial plexus nerve blocks using ultrasound-guided and landmark techniques for Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetists (CRNAs). CRNAs can use this in the clinical setting to help improve understanding and performance of axillary brachial plexus blocks. Axillary brachial plexus blocks are beneficial in providing analgesia throughout the perioperative period while minimizing risks associated with general anesthesia. Additionally, axillary blocks have a more desirable safety profile than other peripheral nerve blocks, such as supraclavicular nerve blocks. Local anesthetic systemic toxicity (LAST), due to accidental vascular puncture, is one of the most notable complications of axillary nerve blocks.
After developing an Objective Structured Clinical Examination (OSCE) for axillary blocks, the OSCE was proposed and approved by the doctoral project chair and committee member prior to approval by the Institutional Review Board (IRB) at The University of Southern Mississippi (USM). The IRB approved the doctoral project following the committee\u27s approval. After IRB approval, the recruitment e-mail, consent, OSCE template, demonstration video, and survey questionnaire were sent to USM NAP faculty and local CRNAs.
After IRB approval and sharing with USM NAP faculty and local CRNAs, participants’ responses were collected via a Qualtrics© survey. The online platform Qualtrics© was used to develop an online survey to evaluate the effectiveness of the doctoral project. Local CRNAs and NAP faculty were asked eight questions that assessed the effectiveness of the OSCE as an adequate evaluation tool. The survey questions gathered qualitative and quantitative data. Qualitative data included consent to participate, participant demographics, and open-ended feedback. Quantitative data was collected via five questions with answer choices based on the Likert scale. The survey results indicated that 82% of the participants agreed that implementation of this OSCE would be beneficial to CRNAs in the clinical setting when performing axillary brachial plexus blocks
A Mixed Methods Study of the Process of Commissioning New Music for Choirs
Get PDFThis study provided an in-depth look at the commissioning process for choral music. The pursuit of new music has a storied tradition in western culture, deeply connected with the Catholic church, starting in the medieval era. In modern times, there is a substantial amount of research on commissioning new music. However, most of the existing research is focused on band and orchestra ensembles, with very few exploring choral music commissions. Using a mixed methods design, this study identified a process for pursuing new music for choral ensembles and measured attitudes and perceptions of the director and composer during the commissioning process. Surveys were distributed to educators, directors, and composers who had previously participated in a commission project. Concurrently, an autoethnographic model was employed that allowed for the researcher to provide more insight into the relationship between composer and conductor during the commissioning process. The results indicated that the majority of K-12 educators and church directors did not have a clear understanding of how to pursue new music for their ensembles. Further, the autoethnographic results provided valuable insight into the working relationship between composer and director during the commissioning process. The findings of this study suggested that future research could expound upon the process of seeking new music and provide further data that is more generalizable
Exploring Factors Influencing Noncredit Workforce Training Program Selection
No full textThis study explores the factors influencing noncredit workforce training program selection. The United States increasingly lacks the skilled workers or human capital required to satisfy business demands, drive innovation, and maintain a healthy economy (Stockard, 2019). Within the stratified U.S. workforce system, community colleges serve as primary providers for training the skilled technical workforce (O’Banion, 2019). Tasked with the goal of aligning worker skills with market needs, workforce development practitioners lack useful insight for engaging potential students (Bonvillian & Sarma, 2021b; Hong et al., 2023). To use limited funding efficiently, workforce development practitioners require an increased understanding of the motivational factors for noncredit workforce training program selection as key leverage points for transformational change in the workforce system (Grubb et al., 2003; Stockard, 2019; Xu & Ran, 2020).
This study used a qualitative research design to explore themes emerging from semi-structured interviews with students enrolled in community college noncredit workforce training programs. Participant interviews revealed a complex interplay between multiple influential factors (including familial influence) for noncredit workforce training program selection. Central to the results, participants held clear occupational goals and tended to select programs that aligned with personal interests and high performance expectations. Findings resulting from this study could advise workforce development policymakers, designers, and practitioners on how to maximize strategic outreach efforts and system supports, enriching program designs to attract those who will most benefit from noncredit workforce training
Federal Telework Intensity, Perceived Organizational Support, and Perceived Supervisor Support as Predictors of Affective Commitment in a Post-Pandemic Environment
Get PDFThe COVID-19 pandemic forced many governments to transition to non-traditional work such as telework (Lunde et al., 2022). However, in a post-pandemic environment, federal agencies required their employees to return to the offices (Office of Management and Budget, 2021), which led employees to agency hop, looking for more accommodating work arrangements (The Committee on Oversight and Accountability, 2022). Therefore, the researcher sought to determine if telework intensity (TI), perceived organizational support (POS), and perceived supervisor support (PSS) predicted employee organizational commitment (OC). The researcher used a quantitative correlational cross-sectional survey to assess 202 federal employees from two Department of Defense organizations. The survey included demographic questions, an item assessing employees’ TI, and POS, PSS, and OC scales. The researcher evaluated the demographic items using descriptive statistics and correlational and regression analysis for the POS, PSS, and OC items. The results indicated no correlation between TI and POS, PSS, or OC. However, significant positive correlations were found between POS, PSS, and OC. Additionally, POS significantly positively predicted OC. The results also show that teleworking individuals demonstrated higher mean OC scores than non-teleworking co-workers. In this regard, organizational leaders and human capital development practitioners should endeavor to increase employees’ POS and PSS through targeted, structured initiatives as they can contribute to higher OC.
Keywords: telework intensity, organizational commitment, perceived organizational commitment, perceived supervisor commitmen
Secure and Privacy-Aware Traffic Management Services via Autonomous Vehicles
No full textAdvancements in technology have accelerated the development of smart cities, with the Internet of Vehicles (IoV) playing a crucial role in integrating urban infrastructure and vehicles to enhance transportation safety and efficiency. This integration enables wireless communication and the exchange of critical traffic data. However, it also introduces significant security and privacy concerns, as unauthorized access has become a primary threat. Hackers can exploit system vulnerabilities to compromise the integrity and confidentiality of sensitive data, while privacy risks such as unauthorized tracking, identity exposure, data misuse, and information leakage pose serious challenges. This thesis addresses these concerns and proposes secure and privacy-preserving schemes specifically designed for autonomous vehicles (AVs) in the IoV and Traffic Management Systems (TMS) ecosystems, focusing on secure authentication and encrypted route reporting. To mitigate these security and privacy risks, the proposed approaches ensure the utilization of AVs in the TMS. This is achieved through a two-step process. The first step involves securely collecting AVs’ routing data through an authentication scheme that employs a privacy-preserving authentication mechanism based on the k-Nearest Neighbors (KNN) encryption technique. This method is further reinforced by incorporating a Physical Unclonable Functions (PUFs) design to generate random cryptographic keys, providing robust protection against cyber threats such as identity fraud and man-in-the-middle attacks. Given the extensive data processing demands associated with authentication, the scheme is implemented with hardware acceleration on an FPGA board, ensuring reduced computational burden and optimized resource utilization compared to existing methods. The second step focuses on aggregating encrypted data securely using KNN and bilinear pairing, enabling privacy-preserving AV route reporting for traffic management without exposing the individual AV’s routing data. This approach employs an aggregation-over-encrypted-data technique, where AV data is securely collected through authentication and aggregated using KNN and bilinear pairing techniques. A KNN-based aggregation scheme over encrypted data is introduced to minimize communication and computation overhead compared with other aggregation schemes. Also, group signatures have been utilized to allow AV membership verification while maintaining anonymity. Additionally, a secure aggregation scheme leveraging bilinear pairing techniques is incorporated to enhance privacy, making it particularly effective for small urban environments to overcome the shortcomings of the kNN-based aggregation scheme. The main design objectives of these schemes are to ensure scalability, efficiency, and strong privacy guarantees by maintaining data confidentiality for AVs. Security and privacy analyses confirm the effectiveness of the proposed methods, while performance evaluations highlight minimal communication and computational overhead alongside optimized hardware resource utilization compared with other existing schemes. These advanced privacy-preserving techniques contribute to the realization of intelligent urban management, strengthening transportation safety and efficiency in the IoV while safeguarding user privacy
Unraveling the Antiviral Mechanisms of Bat Cells: Processing of Genomic RNAs by Dicer in Bat Cells Limits Sars-Cov-2 Replication
Get PDFBats are reservoirs for numerous viruses that cause serious diseases in other animals and humans. Several mechanisms are proposed to contribute to the tolerance of bats to these pathogens. This study investigates the response of bat cells to double-stranded RNA generated by SARS-CoV-2 replication. Here, we found the involvement of Dicer in the processing of viral genomic RNAs during SARS-CoV-2 infection. Examining RNA sequencing of infected cells, small-interfering RNA (siRNA)-like fragments were found derived from viral RNAs. Depletion of Dicer showed a reduction in these RNAs and an increase in viral loads suggesting unlike other mammals, bats may use Dicer to limit viral replication. This prompted the exploration of key dsRNA sensors in bat cells. Our analysis showed significant upregulation of OAS1 and MX1 in response to dsRNA, while PKR levels remained low, suggesting alternative dsRNA-response mechanisms are present that eschew the common PKR-based system. These results further show how bats employ distinct strategies for antiviral defense that may contribute to tolerating viral infections. They suggest the involvement of Dicer in antiviral mechanisms in bats, a function not observed in other mammals. This highlights a mechanism for bat-originating viruses to evolve features that in other animals could cause extreme antiviral responses such as is seen with SARS-CoV-2
Between a Rock and a Better Place
No full textBetween a Rock and a Better Place pairs a critical preface on the role of worldbuilding in my fiction and fiction by authors I have learned from, including Ling Ma, Samuel Beckett, and J.R.R. Tolkien, with original stories. The characters in these stories grapple with Biblical plagues, health insurance conspiracies, and the undead, as well as addiction, forgiveness, and redemption. As a collection, Between a Rock and a Better Place explores absurd and satirical solutions to glaring issues of inequity in society, emphasizing the corruption in institutions like organized religion and the American health care system.
The critical preface to Between a Rock and a Better Place considers the role of worldbuilding in how this critical commentary is performed through my creative work. This essay analyzes scholarship on worldbuilding to understand not only how it functions within fiction, but also to explore how fiction may be used as a means of reflecting upon reality, ideally with the outcome of gaining a new understanding of the world. Additionally, the introduction to this collection considers the advantages of worldbuilding through expository passages in comparison to worldbuilding through inferences