77,619 research outputs found
Determinants of Student Debt in New England
This paper examines the determinants of average student debt in New England based on financial, institutional and demographic variables. The dataset is derived from CollegeInsight and measures 15 variables across 71 institutions during the 2011-2014 academic school years. Between 2011 and 2014, average student debt increased 7%, tuition and room and board increased 10%, the percentage of Hispanic students increased 20% and the percentage of international students increased 26%. The estimated model, ln(AVDEBT) = 7.401 – 0.090ln(TUITION) – 0.042ln(BOOKS) + 0.433ln(ROOMBOARD) + 0.07ln(ENROLLMENT) – 0.200PUBLIC – 4.106ASIAN – 1.992AFAMERICAN + 0.254HISPANIC + 0.007WHITE + 0.641INTERNATIONAL – 0.676PERCENTFEDDEBT + 1.018PERCENTPELL, indicates that the primary determinants of average student debt in the region are: room and board costs, enrollment, public vs. private classification, the percentage of Asian, African American and international students, the percentage of student debt that comes from federal loans and the percentage of Pell Grant recipients. Other regions in the country could leverage a similar study to understand where the student debt burden is most likely coming from. The resulting information can stir policy discussions amongst institutions and governmental organizations to decrease the burden and ease the so-called student debt crisis
Brands Take a Stand for Good: The Effect of Brand Activism on Social Media Engagement
Brands are entering an era where brand activism and corporate social responsibility strategies are holding a large influence on consumer purchase decision making, rather than the traditional brand product marketing. A major distribution outlet for the rising brand activism strategy is through social media, where users can directly interact with brands and other users surrounding major issues. Higher engagement with such activism campaigns suggests more consumer support for the brand, leading to higher sales performance potential. This study examines the influence of brand activism campaign qualities on social media engagement, specifically on the Twitter platform. Tweets for 8 different brands – Nike, Reebok, Under Armour, Puma, Always, Yoplait, Procter & Gamble, and Airbnb – were collected using RStudio and Twitter APIs and dissected based on their association to the brand’s activism campaign. A survey was also distributed to gather data on several characteristics for each campaign. A Poisson regression was used to analyze the relationship between social media engagement metrics – favorites and retweets – and the characteristics of tweets and campaigns. Brands that are looking to contribute to the activism space, particularly on Twitter, should produce content that is geared towards individuals, rather than society as a whole. Higher engagement will be generated by campaigns that focus on causes with longer-term impact, in addition to campaigns that target both genders rather than being gender specific
Boiler for generating high quality vapor Patent
Vapor generating boiler system for turbine moto
Radiation Transfer in the Cavity and Shell of Planetary Nebulae
We develop an approximate analytical solution for the transfer of
line-averaged radiation in the hydrogen recombination lines for the ionized
cavity and molecular shell of a spherically symmetric planetary nebula. The
scattering problem is treated as a perturbation, using a mean intensity derived
from a scattering-free solution. The analytical function was fitted to Halpha
and Hbeta data from the planetary nebula NGC6537. The position of the maximum
in the intensity profile produced consistent values for the radius of the
cavity as a fraction of the radius of the dusty nebula: 0.21 for Halpha and
0.20 for Hbeta. Recovered optical depths were broadly consistent with observed
optical extinction in the nebula, but the range of fit parameters in this case
is evidence for a clumpy distribution of dust.Comment: MNRAS accepted; 10 Fig
Gravitational instantons, extra dimensions and form fields
A broad class of higher dimensional instanton solutions are found for a
theory which contains gravity, a scalar field and antisymmetric tensor fields
of arbitrary rank. The metric used, a warp product of an arbitrary number of
any compact Einstein manifolds, includes many of great interest in particle
physics and cosmology. For example 4D FRW universes with additional dimensions
compactified on a Calabi-Yau three fold, a torus, a compact hyperbolic manifold
or a sphere are all included. It is shown that the solution of this form which
dominates the Hartle Hawking path integral is always a higher dimensional
generalisation of a Hawking Turok instanton when the potential of the scalar
field is such that these instantons can exist. On continuation to Lorentzian
signature such instantons give rise to a spacetime in which all of the spatial
dimensions are of equal size and where the spatial topology is that of a
sphere. The extra dimensions are thus not hidden. In the case where the
potential for the scalar field is generated solely by a dilatonic coupling to
the form fields we find no integrable instantons at all. In particular we find
no integrable solutions of the type under consideration for the supergravity
theories which are the low energy effective field theories of superstrings.Comment: 11 pages, 4 figure
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