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AN EXAMINATION OF BACKGROUND, PERSONALITY, AND JOB-RELATED CHARACTERISTICS AMONG TRADITIONALLY, ALTERNATIVELY, AND EMERGENCY CERTIFIED NOVICE TEACHERS IN OKLAHOMA
Get PDFOnly a few studies have compared traditionally and nontraditionally certified teachers. This exploratory study examined the differences among emergency, alternative, and traditionally trained teachers who were new to an urban Midwestern school district. Hiring alternative and emergency certified teachers has become a standard solution for districts and school leaders in all 50 states to address significant teacher shortages. The purpose of this study was to investigate differences in background, personality, and job-related characteristics such as teaching knowledge, grit, self-efficacy, and job satisfaction by certification type, as well as the moderation of the relationship between these characteristics and job satisfaction by certification type. Following approval from the Institutional Review Board (IRB), a survey was distributed to the email addresses of 58,733 certified teachers employed in public schools within Oklahoma. After removing duplicates and excluding responses from non-teachers and those with more than three years of experience, the final data set comprised 556 responses from teachers with one to three years of classroom experience, gathered in the summer of 2022. Many of the participants began their careers in the Fall of 2019, with many most likely having spent their first two years teaching during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Analysis revealed that emergency and alternative certification pathways showed significant moderation of the relationship of job satisfaction with teaching knowledge, with emergency pathways being highly significant (p < .01) and alternative pathways moderately significant (p < .05). Job satisfaction for alternatively certified teachers was significantly lower than the other two certification types (p < .05). Grit was significantly higher for alternatively certified teachers (p < .05). At the same time, Big 5 Emotional Stability demonstrated a highly significant positive connection for emergency certified teachers (p < .01).
Self-efficacy in student engagement showed a positive correlation for alternatively certified teachers (p < .01). In contrast, self-efficacy in classroom management was positively correlated for both traditionally (p < .05) and alternatively (p < .01) trained teachers. FIT-Choice Perceived Ability and Job Transferability showed positive correlations for traditionally trained teachers (p < .05 and p < .01, respectively). FIT-Choice Social Equity and Job Transferability showed positive connections for alternatively trained teachers (p < .05 and p < .01, respectively). FIT-Choice Fallback Career had a negative correlation for emergency certified teachers (p < .05). One of the most intriguing findings was the relationship between job satisfaction and familial obligations, such as parenting or caregiving. This study's findings offer numerous paths for further research into the factors influencing teacher job satisfaction and effectiveness based on certification pathways
Bowing Drills: Highly Adaptable Exercises for All Ages
Get PDFIn the orchestral string world, the left-hand is primarily responsible for pitch while the right-hand is accountable for much of the remaining elements of music including tone, dynamics, articulations, and phrasing. While many orchestral string methods focus primarily on pitch and reading music, tone production is often neglected. Few resources address the use of the right-hand isolated from the left-hand. Those resources that are available address only one instrument at a time, so classroom use is impractical. Furthermore, many students in the United States only receive instruction from their public school teachers, who often do not have extensive experience on a student’s particular instrument. The result is dominated materials and students lacking a beautiful, resonate, stylistically appropriate sound quality.
The method introduced in this document—Bowing Drills: Highly Adaptable Exercises for All Ages—develops bowing technique to the equivalent proficiency of string players’ left-hand skills. By isolating the bow with several exercises, teachers can quickly improve their students’ tone, timing, clarity, and ensemble playing. This method focuses on bowing through string crossings aimed at helping beginners who cannot read music to advanced students who are perfecting their tone. Five basic bowing patterns that isolate string crossings on adjacent strings, skipping strings, and double stops are used to improve bowing performance at increasing tempi. The patterns are highly adaptable and can be used for individual or group warm-ups and practice exercises, or to improve basic to complex orchestral bowing passages. Variations are limitless and easily adaptable. By using the concepts found in Bowing Drills, teachers can create their own exercises to address any bowing, articulation, dynamic, style, adding in the left-hand and more.
Additionally, the traditional orchestra educational system in the United States is filled with barriers, including the prohibitive costs of instruments, materials, and private lessons, as well as the background knowledge needed to understand technical concepts found in many methods. Bowing Drills is a free-use resource suitable for school orchestras, private lessons, collegiate applied lessons, and more. Because there is no cost, students only need to know their open strings to play. Financial and knowledge-based barriers are removed from the method.
In this document I cover the need for a new method and existing materials that can be supplemented with Bowing Drills. I will also teach the five basic bowing patterns of the method, how to adapt the patterns for your individual teaching needs, and how to isolate learned skills and scaffold in new concepts through easily memorizable exercises. Additionally, this document contains double bass-specific bowing patterns and I apply the concepts to standard double bass literature
Numerate people benefit more from regular science reporting: The critical role of scientific reasoning and causal misunderstanding
Get PDFNumerate people tend to make more informed judgments and decisions because they are more risk literate (i.e., better able to evaluate and understand risk). Do numeracy skills also help people understand regular science reporting from mainstream news sources? To address this question, we investigated responses to regular science reports (e.g., excerpts from CNN health), testing a cognitive model linking numeracy, scientific reasoning, judgment biases, and casual theory errors (i.e., misinterpreting correlational information as causal; Seifert et al., 2022). In Study 1 (n=200), structural equation modeling indicated that numerate people were less likely to exhibit judgment biases because they were better at scientific reasoning, which helped them avoid causal misinterpretations. Study 2 (n=342) cross-validated findings from Study 1, indicating that the link between numeracy and scientific reasoning was also associated with improved cognitive self-assessment (e.g., reduced overconfidence on comprehension judgments). Results suggest numerate people may generally be less likely to confuse correlation and causation in regular science reporting. Results also suggest that numerate people are more likely to have acquired scientific reasoning skills that more generally support risk literacy and knowledge acquisition, consistent with the Knowledge is Power account of Skilled Decision Theory (Cokely et al., 2018). Discussion focuses on implications for risk literacy theory and training, and includes a Risk Literacy Difficulty Analysis indicating that nearly half of the US adult population may be likely to misunderstand common types of regular science reports
A Pedagogical Approach to George Antheil’s La Femme 100 Têtes For Solo Piano
Get PDFThis document provides a pedagogical analysis of 24 late-intermediate to early-advanced preludes from La Femme 100 Têtes, a work for solo piano by George Antheil, emphasizing the brevity and usefulness of these preludes in the private piano studio. This analysis provides a historical overview, in addition to a compositional and pedagogical analysis of 24 of the 45 preludes from La Femme. A biography of George Antheil, a guided progressive leveling, and suggested groupings for the preludes are also included.
Chapter One defines the purpose, need, limitations, organization of the study, and provides a summary of literature related to George Antheil’s La Femme 100 Têtes. Chapter Two provides a biographical sketch of George Antheil, detailing his musical aesthetics. Chapter Three provides historical context related to La Femme. Chapters Four and Five contain an analysis of each of the 9 late-intermediate and the 15 early-advanced preludes from La Femme, respectively, including compositional and pedagogical analysis. Chapter Six serves as a conclusion to this study. This study offers pianists and teachers a practical guide for teaching La Femme 100 Têtes, highlighting George Antheil’s contributions to the piano’s pedagogical literature
Intersecting the parallel world: A generic qualitative study of low nature use teachers’ experiences and perceptions on the implementation of nature-based learning for early elementary students with extensive support needs
Get PDFThis generic qualitative dissertation strives to explore the experiences and perceptions of low nature use teachers through their portrayals of nature-based learning for early childhood-school age students with extensive support needs. By aligning and amplifying the collective stories of these teachers and highlighting patterns in how they understand their experiences, this research seeks to reveal the practical insights of teachers as they describe their perspectives on the benefits and barriers to nature-based learning. Employing a pragmatic perspective and the use of a recruitment questionnaire / semi-structured interview sequence of data collection and theoretical thematic analysis, this study generated a framework of themes describing the mechanisms that generate a disparity between a value in nature-based learning and actually using nature-based learning. Benefits for nature-based learning are characterized by (a) Outcomes: connection, knowledge and skills, well-being and (b) Experiences: captivating engagement, creative exploration, practical experience. Barriers for nature-based learning are characterized by: (a) Nature not considered, (b) Constraints of time and expectations, (c) Preparation, resources, and support, (d) Confidence, (e) Outdoor spaces and safety, (f) Student behavior and readiness, and (g) Educational climate. These patterns of understanding offer valuable insights for practitioners, policymakers, researchers, or any other gatekeepers of educational experience interested in the advancement of inclusive nature-based leaning in public education settings. These results can serve as fertile soil for the growth of more frequent intersections of nature-rich educational experiences and all learners
Compact Antenna Test Range for mmWave Metrology Applications
Get PDFWith finite supply and increasing demand, the RF frequency spectrum is highly saturated with signals. There is an urgent need to design and implement antennas that operate at higher frequencies for applications such as 5G and 6G. The push to the frontier of higher frequencies demands the ability to efficiently and accurately characterize mmWave antennas. Compact antenna test ranges (CATRs) offer the unique ability to minimize the often-large distance needed to measure antennas in the far field by mimicking the planar waves seen in the far field using a parabolic reflector. Previous studies have produced reflector designs for compact ranges intended to operate well below the mmWave spectrum, however, very few works have studied the design and implementation of reflectors for the mmWave spectrum. This work describes the development of a CATR consisting of an offset parabolic reflector and studies the mathematical theory behind the reflector, the design process with reflector simulations, the roughness and manufacturing of the reflector, and
the implementation of the reflector with a probe, AUT, and system to measure mmWave antennas effectively. This work demonstrates the feasibility of using additive manufacturing processes to develop reflectors for CATRs as an accessible solution to easily and economically measure mmWave antennas
IMPROVEMENT OF SYNGAS PRODUCTION FROM WASTE RESOURCES THROUGH CHEMICAL LOOPING REFORMING USING DUAL PHASE MFe2O4-Ca2Fe2O5 CATALYST
No full textWorld consumption has demanded human beings to look for new alternatives to fossil fuel to reduce greenhouse gases effects. To supply those needs hydrogen has been studied to decrease the effect of greenhouse gases and reduce the use of fossil fuels needs. The energy sources for hydrogen production different from fossil fuels are clean, and friendly sources of energy such as biomass, wind, solar, nuclear, water. However, fossil fuels are still the main source of hydrogen production. Pyrolysis is thermochemical decomposition where biomass is decomposed into valued added materials at high temperatures in absence of oxygen. On the other hand, gasification appears to be a technique more efficient than pyrolysis; by adding gasifier agents such as steam, air, or pure oxygen where it is visible the increase on yield and quality of the bio-products. Biomass defined by any organic material prevenient from plants and animals is used on these methods due to their ecofriendly properties. On this process it is produced three different bio-products bio-oil, biochar, and syngas. Syngas is a mixture of different gases carbon dioxide (CO2), carbon monoxide (CO), methane (CH4), and hydrogen H2. Hydrogen must be purified and separated from the rest of the syngas components and CO2 captured and stored. There is a need on these hydrogen methods to add a CO2 capture unit for hydrogen purification. This need makes a huge drawback on these technologies. Chemical looping technologies have this advantage. On a chemical looping reforming, pure CO2 can be captured and pure H2 produced due to the concept of two different reactors. This concept has also been applied with gasification. On the chemical looping gasification, an oxygen carrier is chosen to higher the process performance and go under many redox cycles without deactivation. A catalytic material is added to the process to accelerate the chemical reactions and increase the yield of products without being consumed during the process
Social Dominance Orientation & Climate Change Belief
Get PDFSocial dominance orientation (SDO) has consistently been linked to climate change denial and opposition to pro-environmental policies. However, recent research suggests that the subdimensions of SDO, namely SDO-D (dominance) and SDO-E (anti-egalitarianism), may have differential associations with climate change attitudes. This study aims to investigate the unique contributions of SDO-D and SDO-E to climate change beliefs while controlling for a wide range of socioeconomic and demographic variables. Utilizing data from an online survey, we find that SDO-E is a stronger predictor of climate
change denial than SDO-D. This report highlights the importance of considering the multidimensional nature of SDO in understanding environmental attitudes.N
An integrative investigation of the mechanisms shaping host-associated microbial community assemblage
No full textA critical goal of biologists is to describe the diversity of organisms on the planet and to illuminate the evolutionary processes that have shaped the global biodiversity we observe today. This is often accomplished by exploring diversity at a single scale such as the diversity of microorganisms within a soil sample or the number of plant species within an area of grassland. However, integrating across biological scales can generate a more comprehensive understanding of our planet’s biodiversity. My research employs a holistic approach to investigate how differences at the organismal, community, and landscape levels drive variation at the microscopic level. This is made possible through the use of genomic approaches. Genomics is the study of an organism’s genes (i.e., DNA) and, using genomic methods, I isolated the genetic material of microorganisms found within different areas of the focal vertebrate host organisms, specifically reptiles and amphibians. These communities of microorganisms are referred to as microbiomes and they serve fundamental roles in numerous processes that benefit their hosts, including digestion, metabolism, and immunity. Given the critical roles that microbiomes play in modulating host health and persistence, understanding the environmental and evolutionary processes that shape host-associated microbial communities remains critical as the planet’s biodiversity continues to face threats posed by rapid environmental change, habitat modification, and emerging infectious diseases. Through three chapters, my dissertation research investigates if factors such as host evolutionary history, host ecology, pathogen presence, geographic location, and island size contribute to variation in vertebrate microbiome diversity, applying fundamental theories in ecology, evolutionary biology, and biogeography to further explore the mechanisms that shape host-associated microbiomes. To date, most vertebrate microbiome research has focused on humans and other mammals; however, increased availability and utilization of genomic techniques has expanded our knowledge of the diversity, structure, and functional capabilities of these microbial communities and has increased the taxonomic scope of microbiome studies to include more vertebrate taxa such as birds, fishes, amphibians, and reptiles. Despite these advances, large gaps remain in our understanding of the non-mammalian vertebrate microbiome, specifically among wild reptiles and amphibians. Amphibians (anurans, salamanders, caecilians) and reptiles (lizards, snakes, crocodilians, turtles, tuataras) represent two of the five major clades of terrestrial vertebrates on the planet, and they display an astonishing diversity of life history traits. Their reproductive diversity and specialized body form adaptations have enabled them to diversify across a near complete spectrum of environments on the planet, including subterranean, ground-level, above-ground, and aquatic habitats. Amphibians and reptiles have been instrumental in addressing many questions in ecology and evolutionary biology such as phenotypic evolution, reproductive diversity, and adaptive radiation. Despite such a rich history of foundational research on these groups, we continue to have a limited understanding of the mechanisms that drive the assemblage of symbiotic microbial communities associated with amphibian and reptilian hosts. To address this shortfall, my dissertation research utilizes genomic methods to understand the environmental and evolutionary processes that shape amphibian and reptile microbiomes. Chapter one investigates how host ecology and host species differences correlate with distinct oral and gut microbiomes among three venomous snake species from the Philippines. The focal species occupy three disparate habitat types: marine, semi-arboreal, and arboreal, and our results suggest that the diversity of snake mouth and gut microbial communities correlate with differences in both host ecology and phylogeny. Most research on snake mouth and gut microbiota are limited to studies of a single species or captive-bred individuals; therefore, results from this comparative study contribute profoundly to our understanding of reptilian microbiomes, providing a foundation from which researchers can begin addressing broader questions concerning the evolution of host-microbe interactions. Chapter two combines existing frog disease data with skin microbiome data to elucidate the roles that geographic location, host evolutionary history, host ecology, and pathogen presence play in the microbial community assemblage of five co-distributed frog host species in Oklahoma. These focal species possess distinct ecological preferences: aquatic, semi-aquatic, and arboreal, and our results indicate that host ecology is the primary driver of frog skin microbial community structure. Results from this integrative study contribute to our growing understanding of the environmental and host- associated drivers of skin microbial community assemblage and represents one of the first studies on landscape-level variation in skin microbial communities among North American frogs. Chapter three provides the first assessment of variation in gut microbiomes among vertebrate species spanning true islands, applying theories of island biogeography to further investigate the mechanisms that shape the vertebrate gut microbiome. We sampled the microbial communities of ecologically diverse reptilian hosts from four islands in the Philippines to investigate the roles that host evolutionary history, host ecology, host microhabitat, geographic location, and island size play in reptilian gut microbiome assembly. Our results indicated that island size and host ecology were the primary contributors to gut microbial community differences observed among our focal samples. Results from this integrative study contribute to our growing understanding of the environmental, host-associated, and biogeographic processes that drive patterns of vertebrate gut microbiome diversity and assemblage among host communities inhabiting true islands. My dissertation research integrates across numerous biological scales—microscopic, organismal, community, landscape—to understand how variation at any of these levels drives differences within another in order to address fundamental questions in evolutionary biology and ecology. Given that microbiomes are critical for promoting host health and persistence by aiding in digestion, nutrient acquisition, pathogen defense, and immune system function, investigations of the processes that shape host-associated microbiome community composition and assembly remain critical as the planet’s biodiversity continues to face threats posed by rapid environmental change, habitat modification, and emerging infectious diseases
Illusions of Progress and Decline in Colonial India: Evolution and degeneration in the works of Pramatha Nath Bose, c. 1910-1930
Get PDFIn this thesis, I consider the views of Pramatha Nath Bose (1855-1934) as an example of Hindu revivalist appropriations of evolutionary ideas and degeneration to advance anticolonial, socially conservative politics in early twentieth century colonial India. I show that Bose drew from metropolitan evolutionary thinkers such as Thomas Henry Huxley, Herbert Spencer, and Alfred Russel Wallace, amongst others, to present a model of social evolution that proclaimed the superiority of Hindu civilization and thus challenged the racial and civilizational hierarchy underpinning colonial rule. I further contextualize his views in relation to contemporary debates about social reform to argue that the evolutionary discourse equipped him to defend Hindu customs, practices, and institutions from reformist criticisms. Similarly, I examine his appropriation of the trope of evolutionary degeneration to present degeneration as a condition inherent to the contemporary West and in India only as a result of colonial rule and the deviation of middle-class Indians from the organically evolved Hindu way of life. Additionally, I argue that Bose’s organicist conception of society and Lamarckian explanation of degeneration enabled him to defend aspects of Hindu society that were increasingly coming under attack from progressive sections of the nationalist movement such as the practice of early marriage and the caste system. Therefore, I show that evolutionary and degeneracy theories were put to work to perform a dual function in the Hindu revivalist movement by presenting both the inferiority of Western civilization and the futility and dangers of Western-oriented social reforms — thus, combining ideas of natural evolutionary processes with anticolonialism and social conservatism