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Backpack Funding: What Happens When Dollars Follow the Student?
No full textA growing movement in the United States in recent years, accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic, has brought a wave of school choice policies, which allow students to opt into an educational arrangement outside of their zoned traditional public schools (TPS) using public funds. Critics frequently express concern that these policies place an undue financial burden on both taxpayers and school districts. States adopting such policies may take on the additional financial responsibility of educating students who would otherwise privately finance their education, posing an additional cost to the state. When students do leave TPS to participate in private school choice programs or charter schools, this attrition decreases funding to their zoned school districts, which have some fixed costs (costs which do not decrease proportionally with decreases in enrollment). However, as supporters point out, school choice also has the potential to save taxpayers money by lowering the costs to the state of educating these students. School vouchers and similar programs may cost less to the state than educating program participants in TPS would cost. In the case of charter schools, proponents assert, charter schools receive less funding to do the same job as a TPS. Additionally, school choice supporters argue that students leaving TPS also represent reduced costs to public school districts. Some researchers have posed these questions and have investigated them with data. However, there are significant limitations to precisely studying the fiscal impacts and implications of school choice. Because the funding mechanisms and functions of TPS and charter schools differ, simply comparing funding per pupil between the two sectors does not provide an apples-to-apples comparison. In the case of private school choice programs, understanding the fiscal impacts to the state and school districts requires a proxy for the counterfactual—the schooling decisions families would make in the hypothetical world in which the program does not exist. In this dissertation, I summarize best practices for attempting to overcome these limitations and apply these best practices to national charter school data and private school choice data from Arkansas, bringing evidence to bear on questions of the fiscal impacts and implications of school choice. In Chapter One, I define school choice, describe the landscape of school choice in the United States, and explain the history of school finance and administration in the United States. In Chapter Two, I describe the literature comparing TPS and charter school funding and summarize best practices from this literature. In Chapter Three, I apply these best practices to the School District Finance Survey (F-33) from the National Center for Education Statistics and provide results for 17 major U.S. cities. In Chapter Four, I use data from the Arkansas Department of Education to study the fiscal impacts of the Arkansas Education Freedom Accounts Program on the state and public school districts. Finally, in Chapter Five, I summarize the findings of all three studies and provide overall implications for policy and research in my conclusion
The Upcoming Moral Crisis in Primitive Artificial Intelligence
No full textAs we continue to develop artificially intelligent systems, there is an increasingly high chance that we will develop a system that is both conscious and capable of suffering. Furthermore, it is likely that the development of this conscious machine will be entirely unintentional. While this machine will have moral status, identifying it will be extremely difficult, leading to it being treated the same as its inert predecessors. For these reasons I believe that a crisis in ethics is looming. This paper aims to argue that it is possible for a machine to have moral status, that the first such machine will likely be produced unintentionally, and that identifying this machine will involve significant difficulties
Pricing the unknown: An Analysis of Expected Value of Young Horses and Price-Determining Factors
No full textFrom a seller’s point of view in a market, it is crucial to plan the pricing strategies based on perceptions of buyer preferences and their willingness to purchase to ensure market success in selling and pricing. Applying this to the equine industry, this paper studies the factors determining the price of young horses (age ≤ 2 years) in digital auction platforms. Using data from Professional Horse Services, LLC (2012–2023), a Heckman’s two-step approach was employed, which involves a probit model as the first step and a hedonic price model as the second, aiming to correct for sample selection bias in the data. The first step evaluates the probability of sale of a young horse, and the results indicate that variables of breed category, veterinary information, and auction season significantly impact the sale probability of a horse. The second step evaluates the determinants of the final bid price of a horse based on observed sales, where the model’s key findings show that the final bid price is impacted by season of the auction, breed type, health and veterinary information, and discipline specialization. A comprehensive understanding of the findings reveals that various attributes influence the sale and final bid price of a young horse, providing buyers and sellers with better information to inform their bidding decisions and pricing strategies on digital auction platforms, respectively
“Are We There Yet?”: The Long Journey to Defining Motor Home Protections Under the Fourth Amendment
Get PDFFrom the time of the Revolutionary War, United States citizens have prioritized one thing over almost everything else: that “a man’s house is his castle.” This is immortalized in the Fourth Amendment’s prohibition against unreasonable and warrantless searches. The protections granted by the Fourth Amendment are not centered around the rights a person has in their property. Instead, “the principal object of the Fourth Amendment is the protection of privacy rather than property.” This protection is so important that the Supreme Court has been explicitly clear that warrantless searches should only be permitted in the most “exceptional” of circumstances. One way in which Fourth Amendment protections have been diminished is through the broad application of the “vehicle exception” to warrant requirements. At its inception, the vehicle exception applied only to traditional vehicles. However, as time went on, states did not uniformly apply the vehicle exception and were specifically divided regarding whether the exception should apply to motor homes. In order to resolve the disparate application, the Supreme Court stepped in with its decision in California v. Carney in 1985. The Court held in this case that any home that has wheels could be considered a vehicle under this exception. The only real check on this rule is that the Court instructed lower courts to only apply this rule in cases where the motor home functioned more like an automobile than a residence. Unfortunately, this standard is very confusing in application and does not consider motor homes that are equal parts automobile and residence.
This Note will describe the Court’s relevant decisions regarding the Fourth Amendment, leading to the decision to apply the vehicle exception to motor homes in California v. Carney. It will also suggest factors the Court should adopt to determine whether a motor home is considered a residence or a vehicle, in lieu of Carney’s confusing precedent. Necessarily, Part II will cover the general principles of the Fourth Amendment, the vehicle exception, and its application to motor homes through Carney. Part III will explain the modern-day reasons that the Carney decision should be revisited, including informal housing, the #VanLife practice of living in a van as one’s residence as well as their vehicle, and other non-traditional housing in a modern setting. Part III will also introduce the list of possible factors this Note suggests should replace the Carney decision
Board-Head Relationships: The Role of Relational Trust and Intentional Care in Fostering Head of School Well-Being
Get PDFGiven the challenges of school leadership and high rates of school leader attrition, scholars have increasingly given attention to the wellbeing of heads of schools. However, that research has not considered the way governing boards potentially influence head of school wellbeing. We fill this gap by examining how relational dynamics between heads of school and governing boards are associated with head of school wellbeing. Using data from about 140 heads of schools who participated in the Society for Classical Learning’s 2023 Thriving Schools Survey, we find that (a) relational trust between heads and boards and (b) care of the head by the board are associated with multiple indicators of head of school wellbeing
Wayne E. Sabbe Arkansas Soil Fertility Studies 2024
Get PDFRapid technological changes in crop management and production require that the research efforts be presented in an expeditious manner. The contributions of soil fertility and fertilizers are major production factors in all Arkansas crops. The studies described within will allow producers to compare their practices with the university’s research efforts. Additionally, soil-test data and fertilizer sales are presented to allow comparisons among years, crops, and other areas within Arkansas
The Switch: Determinants of family school modality choices during the COVID-19 pandemic
Get PDFThe K-12 system in the United States experienced substantial challenges during the COVID-19 pandemic. This study aims to give an overview of public, private, and homeschooling enrollment decisions during the pandemic, the changes families made between types of schooling and identify familial characteristics associated with the probability of switching in and out of public education. Knowing more about the groups exiting and returning to the public school system can help public school districts better tailor policies to attract and retain their students. Socioeconomic factors influencing a change could be signs of increasing segregation. Using a discrete choice duration model, a multinomial logistic model and random forest machine learning algorithms, we find that education, income, and trust in Fox News were among the most important characteristics related to school type decisions throughout the pandemic. We attempt to capture the changes in the importance of these factors through the pandemic
Utilizing 16s Ribosomal RNA Sequencing to Identify Bacterial Species Colonizing Lame Birds with Bacterial Chondronecrosis with Osteomyelitis
Get PDFBroiler chicken lameness has become prevalent in recent years due to high growth rates in broilerchickens. Bacterial chondronecrosis with osteomyelitis (BCO), the main cause of lameness, is characterized by necrosis of femoral and tibial heads in affected birds. Heavier birds are more susceptible to mechanical stress in these regions, which results in microfractures, leading to lameness. BCO lameness poses huge financial pressure to the poultry industry, as 14-50% of flocks can become affected during outbreaks. The purpose of this experiment was to identify bacterial species present in birds with BCO lameness. A total of 1,560 chicks were randomly distributed into 26 pens, 2 with wire floors and 24 with litter floors. The wire-flooring acted as a positive control to spread the lameness-causing bacteria through aerosol to birds raised on litter floor pens for feed treatments. During this study, birds that were unable to walk when prompted were diagnosed as lame and culled. All lame birds were necropsied, and bacteria were isolated from the blood and bone lesions found on the femoral and tibial heads. Once bacteria were grown on agar plates, individual colonies were re-cultured for further species identification using 16s ribosomal RNA sequencing. The results showed that the main bacterial species causing lameness in this research trial were Staphylococcus spp., Enterococcus spp., and Escherichia coli. Identifying the bacterial species causing lameness is crucial to help develop mitigation measures to reduce lameness in broiler chickens. Thus, this experiment is anticipated to help develop BCO treatments that strengthen the bone and improve the immune response against distinct bacteria. More research is needed to study the virulence of Staphylococcus spp., Enterococcus spp., and Escherichia coli to reduce lameness caused by bacterial infection
Electrochemically Precipitated Struvite Effects on Extractable Soil Nutrients
Get PDFStruvite recovery from wastewater streams may provide an alternative to traditional fertilizer-phosphorus (P) sources, while also providing the benefit of reducing nitrogen and P loads in wastewater effluent and reducing effects of eutrophication in surface waters. Limited research has been conducted to assess the effects of struvite fertilization on concentrations of soil micronutrients and potassium (K) compared to other traditional fertilizer-P sources in historically agricultural soils. The objective of this study was to assess the effects of fertilizer-P source (i.e., synthetically produced electrochemically precipitated struvite [ECST], chemically precipitated struvite [CPST], monoammonium phosphate [MAP], diammonium phosphate [DAP], triple superphosphate [TSP], rock phosphate [RP], and an unamended control [UC]) on water-soluble (WS) and Mehlich-3 (M3)-extractable soil nutrients (i.e., K, S, Na, Mn, Zn, Cu, and B) periodically over a 9-month period (i.e., 0.5, 1, 2, 4, 6, and 9 months) in multiple soil textures (i.e., loam, silty clay loam, and silt loam). All WS and M3 nutrients were affected by a combination of soil, fertilizer treatment and/or sampling time. The increase in M3-Na concentrations from the initial in the silty clay loam and both silt loams were similar and less than in the loam, which increased the most from the initial (8.15 mg kg-1). Both WS- and M3-S concentrations increased from the initial for all fertilizer treatments, but the increase was greatest with DAP (26.3 mg kg-1 and 23.4 mg kg-1, respectively), which differed from MAP and TSP that had increases that were intermediate and were greater than for ECST, CPST, and the UC. Mehlich-3-Na concentrations increased from the initial after 0.5 months before decreasing from the initial after 1 month and steadily increasing until 9 months, at which point M3-Na concentrations had increased the most from the initial (12.26 mg kg-1). Changes in WS and M3 4 nutrients were often similar among ECST, CPST, MAP, DAP, TSP, and RP, supporting the potential for struvite to be an effective alternative fertilizer-P source
