The Decline of Western Civilization: How Value Relativism caused the Erosion of Western Philosophical Activity and Cultural Identity

A thesis presented to the faculty of the College of Business and Public Affairs at Morehead State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Public Administration by Michael D. Alley on April 18, 2010

The Magnitude and Timing of Rail Abandonment Impacts on Selected Economic Variables for Rural South Dakota Communities

This study examines the economic impacts of past branchline abandonments on rural South Dakota communities. In this chapter the factors and conditions leading to the abandonment of the branchlines are examined first. Then a section discussing the perspectives of the people and entities involved in the abandonment is presented. This is followed by the reasons for undertaking the study and the study objectives. Finally an overview of the remaining chapters is presented

Board 57: Identifying and Disseminating Transformative Professional Development of STEM Undergraduates Who Perform Outreach: Progress in Year 1

To teach STEM content to K-12 students and to recruit talented and diverse K-12 students into STEM, many outreach programs at universities in the United States rely on STEM undergraduates. While the design of such outreach typically focuses on the K-12 students who are taught or recruited, an important but often overlooked consideration is the effect of the outreach on the professional development of the STEM undergraduates themselves. This proposed EAGER project seeks to determine which outreach programs in the United States provided the most transformative professional development of the participating STEM undergraduates. This project then seeks to capture the essence what practices in those programs provided transformative professional development. Next, the project seeks to disseminate these practices to a network of institutions doing outreach. Supporting this project is the NSF EArly-concept Grant for Exploratory Research (EAGER) program. In this first year of the project, we performed a systematic review of literature and university websites with follow-up survey data to identify outreach programs that may be transformative for STEM undergraduates. This review yielded a matrix of about 100 college-based outreach programs. We then invited these programs to attend one of the following workshops: a March workshop held at Tufts University in Boston or an April workshop held at the University of Nebraska in Lincoln. Nine institutions sent representatives to the Boston workshop, and five institutions sent representatives to the Lincoln workshop. In addition, we held conference calls to gather information from an additional six institutions. The purpose of the workshops and conference calls was two-fold: (1) determine best practices for outreach that used STEM undergraduates, and (2) determine what in those programs provided the most transformative development of the participating STEM undergraduates. This paper presents preliminary results from these workshops and conference calls

Branchline Abandonment: A study of the Impact on Selected Communities in Rural South Dakota

Several factors are responsible for the increased rate of railroad branchline abandonment in South Dakota in recent years. The construction of a statewide highway system paved the way for a trucking industry in South Dakota which today threatens the economic viability of the once-monopolistic rail industry. Some regulations and other factors inherent to South Dakota’s rail and truck industries are also responsible for increasing prominence of the trucking industry. The movement of unprocessed agricultural commodities by truck is not subject to rate or route regulation by the ICC. There are no institutional barriers to industry exit or entry. By contrast, railroad entry and exist is subject to regulation and large investment. Other factors which help explain the rate of branchline abandonment are drought, inflation, subsidization of competing transportation modes, and increased on-farm storage

Board 57: Identifying and Disseminating Transformative Professional Development of STEM Undergraduates Who Perform Outreach: Progress in Year 1

To teach STEM content to K-12 students and to recruit talented and diverse K-12 students into STEM, many outreach programs at universities in the United States rely on STEM undergraduates. While the design of such outreach typically focuses on the K-12 students who are taught or recruited, an important but often overlooked consideration is the effect of the outreach on the professional development of the STEM undergraduates themselves. This proposed EAGER project seeks to determine which outreach programs in the United States provided the most transformative professional development of the participating STEM undergraduates. This project then seeks to capture the essence what practices in those programs provided transformative professional development. Next, the project seeks to disseminate these practices to a network of institutions doing outreach. Supporting this project is the NSF EArly-concept Grant for Exploratory Research (EAGER) program. In this first year of the project, we performed a systematic review of literature and university websites with follow-up survey data to identify outreach programs that may be transformative for STEM undergraduates. This review yielded a matrix of about 100 college-based outreach programs. We then invited these programs to attend one of the following workshops: a March workshop held at Tufts University in Boston or an April workshop held at the University of Nebraska in Lincoln. Nine institutions sent representatives to the Boston workshop, and five institutions sent representatives to the Lincoln workshop. In addition, we held conference calls to gather information from an additional six institutions. The purpose of the workshops and conference calls was two-fold: (1) determine best practices for outreach that used STEM undergraduates, and (2) determine what in those programs provided the most transformative development of the participating STEM undergraduates. This paper presents preliminary results from these workshops and conference calls

Teaching Learning Disabled Junior High Students to Use Visual Imagery as a Strategy for Facilitating Recall of Reading Passages

This research was published by the KU Center for Research on Learning, formerly known as the University of Kansas Institute for Research in Learning Disabilities.)his study investigated whether recall of prose passages by LD students could be improved by training those students to use visual imagery when they read. Students in an imagery-training group received 30 minutes of instruction in the use of visual imagery while students in a paraphrase-recall practice group received 30 minutes of practice in reading passages and telling, in their own words, the content of those passages. Students trained to use visual imagery did not exhibit improved paraphrase-recall relative to the practice group. However, trends within the data suggested that imagery training with LD students should be investigated further

Conformational Preferences of 3-(Dimethylazinoyl)propanoic Acid as a Function of pH and Solvent; Intermolecular versus Intramolecular Hydrogen Bonding

The conformational equilibrium of 3-(dimethylazinoyl)propanoic acid (DMAPA, azinoyl = N^+(O^−) has a weak pH-dependence in D_2O, with a slight preference for trans in alkaline solutions. The acid ionization constants of the protonated amine oxide and carboxylic functional groups as determined by NMR spectroscopy were 7.9 × 10^(−4) and 6.3 × 10^(−6), respectively. The corresponding value of K_1/K_2 of 1.3 × 10^2 is not deemed large enough to provide experimental NMR evidence for a significant degree of intramolecular hydrogen bonding in D_2O. Conformational preferences of DMAPA are mostly close to statistical (gauche/trans = 2/1) in other protic solvents, e.g., alcohols. However, the un-ionized form of DMAPA appears to be strongly intramolecularly hydrogen-bonded and gauche in aprotic solvents

Identification of Learning Disabled Adolescents: A Bayesian Approach

This research was published by the KU Center for Research on Learning, formerly known as the University of Kansas Institute for Research in Learning Disabilities.The identification of learning disabled adolescents for program placement is a major concern of school personnel. The identification model discussed in this article addresses an array of problems associated with identification of LD populations. The Bayesian approach is an alternative to traditional methods that rely primarily on psychometric data or classroom/clinical observation for identification decisions