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Textbook Content Analysis for Statistical Content Standards for 8th-Grade Math: Commercial Publishers, Curriculum Software Supplement, and an Open Educational Resource
No full textThis dissertation examined the vertical and horizontal content analysis of statistical content within current 8th-grade mathematics instructional materials to determine the extent to which students are provided with opportunity to learn high cognitive instances and the usage of the four phases of statistical problem-solving across two commercial publishers, one open educational resource, and one curriculum software supplement. All previous analyses of statistics education content textbooks have only examined textbooks from commercial publishers or those published by national governments. The horizontal content textbook analysis investigated the textbook\u27s background information and overall structure. The vertical content textbook analysis examined the cognitive level of demand and the statistical problem-solving process phases for 8th-grade statistical instances. Two coders and I implemented Schreier’s eight Steps in Qualitative Content Analysis. The percentage of instances coded for analyzing data and interpreting data ranged from 87.6% for Bootstrap to 98.3% for Tuva. The percentage of instances coded for formulating a question and collecting data ranged from 1.3% for HMH (Into Math) to 12.5% for Bootstrap. Fewer statistical instances provided students the Opportunity to Learn from higher-level cognitively demanding tasks (e.g., procedures with connections and doing mathematics, 17.0% for Bootstrap, and 39.2% for Savvas (enVision Mathematics). The two commercial publishers provided more cognitively demanding instances than other K-8 statistics textbook content analysis studies. Recommendations for future research include standard domain breakdown for each cognitive level of demand, incorporating vertical and horizontal analysis with future content textbook analysis, and integrating statistical software into instructional materials
Personal Perspectives of Political Action: A Case Study of How Women Discuss the Black Panther Party’s Free Breakfast for Schoolchildren Program
No full textThe purpose of this project is to investigate the impact ideology has on social movement actors. I do this by conducting a case study on the influence of Marxist feminist ideologies on the Black Panther Party’s (BPP) Free Breakfast for Schoolchildren Program (FBP). Within this case study, I narrow my focus to Marxist feminism, rather than Marxism more broadly, to choose a theoretical framework that aligns with my subject while ensuring gender is considered as a critical axis for examination. This research is situated at the intersection of feminisms and social movements, drawing from both social movement scholarship and Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies scholarship. I aim to identify naturally arising themes that reflect the presence of Marxist feminist ideology in how women Panthers discuss their organizing. My research question asks how does the ideology of Marxist feminism affect the perspectives of women Panthers who worked in the FBP? I answer this question through a feminist close reading of personal narratives of working-class Black women who served in the FBP selected from Comrade Sisters by Erika Huggins, as well as excerpts from the autobiography from A Taste of Power by Elaine Brown, the woman who rose to the highest ranks within the BPP. I argue that the BPP used militarized language to describe traditionally feminized labor and claimed ownership of the means of liberation, which parallels the Marxist idea of owning the means of production. These specific insights about the BPP, an organization with well documented and consistent ideology, contributes to conversations about how ideology impacts social movement actors and their understanding of their organizing practices. The presence of Marxist feminism in the narratives of women Panthers, written in many cases decades after their experiences in the BPP, point to the lasting impact of ideology on social movement actors. These findings also illustrate how ideology helps to transform individual social movement actors into a collective with a shared understanding of their work and their goals. Additionally, the findings of this study suggest that future scholarship on the BPP should recognize feminism as a central ideology of the organization, alongside Marxism and Black Power
Springscape: The Nature Coast and the Making of Modern Florida, 1820s-present
No full textAccording to an oft-repeated tale, the Florida we know today emerged as a dreamscape of tourism, retirement, and suburbanization during the second half of the twentieth century. Growth victimized nature. This dissertation deeply unsettles that story. The history of the Nature Coast exposes not just nature’s agency but its primacy in the development of modern Florida.
Using surveys, maps, census data, personal correspondence, government documents, business records, timber reports, advertising materials, and hydrological research, this dissertation follows time and water across landscapes, into the Upper Floridan Aquifer, and back out again. Each chapter explores a single landscape within the Nature Coast. Officially, the region came into being with a state resolution; unofficially, the Nature Coast was born in the earliest years of Florida’s territorial history. Starting in the 1820s, nature shaped the timing, direction, character, and extent of the region’s growth. Federal legislation, state and federal officials, locals, northern capital, global consumers, progressives, and back-to-nature retirees all wanted nature. But their demands were neither consistent nor simply extractive. Conservation was as much a product of their demands as Big Hammock harvests, red cedars pencil slats, hard rock phosphate fertilizer, limerock, or tidewater cypress timber. Like so much of Florida, the Nature Coast has grown because of nature, not simply in spite of it. This dissertation challenges current framings of modern Florida history, but it also demands a rethinking of Florida regionalism.
Much more than a dreamscape, west-central Florida has long been an unacknowledged springscape, binding together nature and people, water flows and water use. By tracing both water and time, hydrology and history, we see that Tampa Bay and the Nature Coast share both a legacy and a set of possibilities. Far more than just Tampa Bay’s hinterland, the Nature Coast has long been one of its primary water sources. In an era of increasingly polarized positions on growth and nature, this project dismantles the terms of the debate. Many of us want to find common ground—the west-central Florida springscape shows us where to find it
Essays on Policy Initiatives for Equitable and Fair Distribution of Benefits of Information Technology
No full textThe impact of Information technology on human lives is beyond measure. Information technology has become so integral to our human lives that we can no longer undermine its societal impact. While there is ample evidence for the societal gains from digital technologies, there is evidence for the inequitable distribution of such gains across society. For example, accelerated digitization of economy has left the digital haven-nots with limited access to education, health care and employment opportunities further deepening the already existing social inequities. Furthermore, increasing implementation of algorithms has created the problem of algorithmic bias across multiple domains including hiring. Though it was expected that the lack of human intervention in the sourcing phase of algorithmic hiring would eliminate discrimination against protected population groups, recent research has shown evidence for algorithmic bias in the sourcing phase of algorithmic hiring. Thus, it is evident that the gains from advancements in Information systems such as Information and Communication Technologies and Artificial Intelligence have not reached certain sections of society. These inequities in the distribution of benefits of Information Systems can be resolved with government intervention in the form of subsidies and regulations. The goal of this dissertation is the investigation of policy initiatives in technology as an approach to address these issues using game theoretical approach. The first chapter focuses on optimal subsidy policy to bridge the digital divide gap in the presence of digital literacy training investments by digital platforms. The second chapter focuses on the optimal regulation policy to mitigate sourcing bias in job-matching platforms. The third chapter focuses on the optimal government mechanism to procure social goods in the presence of demand uncertainty
The Asset Management Optimization Engine: An AI and Machine Learning Model Approach to Pavement Asset Management
No full textWhile state Departments of Transportation (DOT) face major funding challenges, the need to find optimal ways to preserve and maintain pavement assets remains. Asset management employs a lowest cost lifecycle method to analyze asset costs and determine the best investment strategies to preserve it throughout its lifecycle. As new technology emerges, so do opportunities to leverage it. DOTs collect a significant amount of performance data on pavement and use it to decide how to keep it in a state of good repair. The literature in this area focuses on engineering techniques applied to treatment strategies. This dissertation research focuses on how practitioners can apply machine learning to pavement asset management and use it to make decisions. The research explores the development of machine learning models to identify factors affecting pavement performance from the pavement management system and use the models to augment investment need identification and recommend investment strategies. Using Action Design Research and data from the Washington State DOT, the research introduces three models to answer each of the research questions—two regression models and an artificial neural network paired with computer vision to analyze pavement cracking. The results demonstrate statistical significance, suggesting the right data is in place to optimize decision making through machine learning. Factors such as rutting, days since rehab, percentage of trucks, and roughness index can be used to predict pavement condition. Cost factors, including replacement costs, Equivalent Uniform Annual Costs (EUAC), and lifecycle, can predict how much is needed to invest to keep the pavement in a state of good repair. It also provides a path for practitioners to use machine learning through low code and no code tools that non-data scientists can employ. The value of the models is the ability to predict the impact to structural condition and overall spending by a change in the variables
Imperial Crosshairs: Grand Marronage at Negro Fort Along the Apalachicola River
No full textGrand marronage describes the process whereby Africans sought to liberate themselves from enslavement through means of escape to establish permanent communities and create a truly free society. The Southeastern region of the modern United States was once a geopolitical arena where European and Euro-American empires sought to spread their power and influence over both the Indigenous and African inhabitants. Following the American Revolution was the War of 1812, fought between the former colonial master and the recently formed United States. Commonly referred to as the Second War of American Independence, and infamously known for the burning of the White House. During the war, along the Gulf Coast of Florida, the British constructed a military installation along the Apalachicola River. From here they would recruit local Indigenous warriors and African Maroons to fight alongside them. At the end of the war, these African Maroons would be given possession of the fort, where they would defend their freedom from American imperial expansion
Movements by an Adult Male Magnificent Frigatebird \u3cem\u3eFregata magnificens\u3c/em\u3e Connect Protected Areas in Waters off Northeastern South America
No full textPopulation Survey of Southern Buller’s Albatross \u3cem\u3eThalassarche bulleri bulleri\u3c/em\u3e on the Solander Islands / Hautere, March 2024
No full textAn aerial photographic survey of the Southern Buller\u27s Albatross Thalassarche bulleri bulleri population breeding on the Solander Islands / Hautere was undertaken on 09 March 2024, mid-way through the birds\u27 incubation period. Overall, 6,761 individuals were counted: 6,215 (92%) on Great Solander and 546 (8%) on Little Solander. Of these, 4,213 were sitting on nests, 368 were partners to sitting birds, 573 were standing near empty nests, and 145 were apparently loafing. The status of the remaining 1,462 individuals (22% of the total) was uncertain. Assuming that their status was in the same proportions to those of the clearly observed birds, 1,164 were judged to be sitting on nests, giving an overall estimate of 5,377 occupied nests. This is 4% fewer birds at nests than recorded during the last survey in 2016, when 5,620 apparently breeding pairs were reported in a combined aerial survey and ground count of sitting birds. During the 2024 survey, a check of 54 occupied nests along seven short non-random transects found only 33 nests (62%) contained eggs. The remainder (21 nests, 38%) comprised birds sitting on empty nests. The status of these latter birds is unclear. They could be pre-breeders occupying sites prior to nesting for the first time; recent failed breeders that have not yet abandoned their nest; or established breeders forgoing breeding for some reason but still occupying their nest site. Overall, the numbers of apparently occupied nests suggest a decline in the number of nesting Southern Buller\u27s Albatross since 2016. This conclusion is tentative, however, given the many uncertainties surrounding counts and their interpretation
Common Gallinule Banding in Ontario
No full textBetween 2012 and 2017, we conducted a Common Gallinule banding study to determine the feasibility of catching and banding gallinule with an airboat in Ontario, estimate how many birds could potentially be banded and subsequently encountered, calculate an index of productivity and assess whether enough data could be obtained to inform management decisions and conservation planning. We captured gallinules using dip nets and spotlights at night from an airboat. In total, we banded 440 (approximately 28%) of the 1,564 gallinules that have ever been banded in Ontario. Five of our banded birds were subsequently encountered, four within Ontario and one in Texas. We compared our data to historical banding and encounter data for gal linules in the Americas. There have been 212 encounters of banded gallinules in the Americas; 53 were banded in On tario. Thirty-seven of the encounters occurred within Ontario. The number of band encounters for gallinules is very low com pared to other gamebirds and we conclude that studies will need to integrate multiple components, such as transmitters or surveys, into their design to obtain the best available information to inform gallinule conservation and management in North America
Loafing and Sleeping Behaviour of Trumpeter Swans
No full textAn observational study of loafing and sleeping behaviour of Trumpeter Swans was conducted in southern Ontario throughout the year in 2018 and 2019. Like other birds, these swans have the ability to close down one brain hemisphere at a time during rest, which is indicated by eye closure. We quantified rates of closure of eyes during sleeping bouts for both breeding and non-breeding swans. Single eye closure varied in frequency, duration and in terms of which hemisphere was shut down. Increasing duration of eye closure over time indicated an increased sense of security with surrounding in one mated pair. Proportion of time with both eyes closed during sleep differed significantly between breeding and non-breeding swans, which may reflect security related to social status. Unlike ducks, which peek during sleeping, Trumpeters raised their head briefly during sleep bouts, likely in response to auditory stimuli. Both “peeking” (precautionary vigilance) and “head up” behaviour (reactionary vigilance) are adaptations to predation risk. There is much still to be learned about sleep behaviour in swans and other birds