Resilient Lives: A Critical Narrative Inquiry into the Triumphs and Struggles of Five African-American Women with Doctoral Degrees

This inquiry explored the triumphs and trials of five African American women with doctoral degrees in the field of Education. The project is a storytelling and questioning inquiry that is woven around themes of race, gender, spirituality, and family channels through which academia and the world were explored. Although the study focused on the experiences of five African American women, their stories provided the space to identify events, experiences, people, and circumstances that helped to empower them. Realizing everyone has unique perspectives to contribute, these stories offer support for others faced with obstacles to understand that overt and covert adversities will appear; nevertheless, they can be overcome. As life learners and educators of others, we ought to remain cognizant of the needs of students. This exploration provides positive support to counteract the negative media stereotypes and images that bombard our everyday lives. Despite double marginalization because of gender and race, these women that participated in the study excelled and became successful. With their diverse experiences, these women developed strategies to survive, overcome, and achieve. The findings from this study suggest that the experiences of the African American women were connected with and influenced by their relationships with family and others in a mentorship role. I propose that higher education holds a transforming power for African American women as well as others. These stories and strategies should be shared with others as they were shared with the researcher to provide positive encouragement and support as they begin their academic journeys

High resolution near-infrared imaging of submillimeter galaxies

We present F110W (~J) and F160W (~H) observations of ten submillimeter galaxies (SMGs) obtained with the Hubble Space Telescope's (HST's) NICMOS camera. Our targets have optical redshifts in the range 2.20<z<2.81 confirmed by millimeter CO or mid-IR spectroscopy, guaranteeing that the two bands sample the rest-frame optical with the Balmer break falling between them. Eight of ten are detected in both bands, while two are detected in F160W only. We study their F160W morphologies, applying a maximum-deblending detection algorithm to distinguish multiple- from single-component configurations, leading to reassessments for several objects. Based on our NICMOS imaging and/or previous dynamical evidence we identify five SMGs as multiple sources, which we interpret as merging systems. Additionally, we calculate morphological parameters asymmetry (A) and Gini coefficient (G); thanks to our sample's limited redshift range we recover the trend that multiple-component, merger-like morphologies are reflected in higher asymmetries. We analyze the stellar populations of nine objects with F110W/F160W photometry, using archival HST optical data when available. For multiple systems, we are able to model the individual components that build up an SMG. With the available data we cannot discriminate among star formation histories, but we constrain stellar masses and mass ratios for merger-like SMG systems, obtaining a mean log(M_*/M_sun)=10.9+/-0.2 for our full sample, with individual values log(M_*/M_sun)~9.6-11.8. The morphologies and mass ratios of the least and most massive systems match the predictions of the major-merger and cold accretion SMG formation scenarios, respectively, suggesting that both channels may have a role in the population's origin.Comment: 41 pages preprint, 3 figures, published in ApJ on 2013 May 1

The influence of subglacial hydrology on the flow of West Antarctic ice streams

Subglacial hydrology is known to influence the flow of ice. However, difficulty in accessing the base of large ice sheets has made determining the interaction between ice streams, basal sediment and water difficult to discern. The aim of this thesis is to determine the influence of subglacial hydrology on the flow of the West Antarctic ice streams. This is achieved through development of a numerical flowline model, the Hydrology, Ice and Till (HIT) model. Ice thermodynamics are coupled to a till layer of Coulomb plastic rheology. The porosity of the till changes with basal melt and freeze and can be augmented by water transported through a subglacial conduit system. Water availability strongly affects ice flow, as till porosity influences the till failure strength and thereby the basal resistance of the ice. The model was developed in four stages and a number of sensitivity tests were performed. It was then applied to Kamb Ice Stream (Ice Stream C) and Whillians Ice Stream (Ice Stream B), West Antarctica. Results confirm that ice streams are capable of oscillating between fast and slow velocity states. Cycles are generated at the grounding line of an ice stream and the speed of the transition from slow to fast flow is governed by water availability. The period of oscillation of the cycles for the West Antarctic ice streams was found to be several hundred years, which is in line with observations of stagnation and reactivation of these ice streams. This shows that subglacial hydrology has a role in modulating the flow variability of ice streams and that rather large changes in the flow of the West Antarctic ice streams are likely to occur this century.Cambridge Commonwealth Trust, Trinity College Cambridg

What can management theories offer evidence-based practice? A comparative analysis of measurement tools for organisational context

Background: Given the current emphasis on networks as vehicles for innovation and change in health service delivery, the ability to conceptualise and measure organisational enablers for the social construction of knowledge merits attention. This study aimed to develop a composite tool to measure the organisational context for evidence-based practice (EBP) in healthcare. Methods: A structured search of the major healthcare and management databases for measurement tools from four domains: research utilisation (RU), research activity (RA), knowledge management (KM), and organisational learning (OL). Included studies were reports of the development or use of measurement tools that included organisational factors. Tools were appraised for face and content validity, plus development and testing methods. Measurement tool items were extracted, merged across the four domains, and categorised within a constructed framework describing the absorptive and receptive capacities of organisations. Results: Thirty measurement tools were identified and appraised. Eighteen tools from the four domains were selected for item extraction and analysis. The constructed framework consists of seven categories relating to three core organisational attributes of vision, leadership, and a learning culture, and four stages of knowledge need, acquisition of new knowledge, knowledge sharing, and knowledge use. Measurement tools from RA or RU domains had more items relating to the categories of leadership, and acquisition of new knowledge; while tools from KM or learning organisation domains had more items relating to vision, learning culture, knowledge need, and knowledge sharing. There was equal emphasis on knowledge use in the different domains. Conclusion: If the translation of evidence into knowledge is viewed as socially mediated, tools to measure the organisational context of EBP in healthcare could be enhanced by consideration of related concepts from the organisational and management sciences. Comparison of measurement tools across domains suggests that there is scope within EBP for supplementing the current emphasis on human and technical resources to support information uptake and use by individuals. Consideration of measurement tools from the fields of KM and OL shows more content related to social mechanisms to facilitate knowledge recognition, translation, and transfer between individuals and groups

Narratives on Culturally Relevant Pedagogy: Personal Responses to the Standardized Curriculum

As curriculum objectives become more standardized, pedagogical strategies that reach diverse populations become more important, not less as some practitioners might be prone to believe. Through the use of narratives, we have found that students achieve greater understandings of curriculum as well as find culturally relevant ways of applying curriculum to previous knowledge. Using the same line of thinking, stories of successful pedagogical practice help to reinforce the ideas behind culturally relevant pedagogy as it translates from theory into practice. Classroom narratives from students and teachers where culturally relevant pedagogical practices have been implemented are the focus of this article

The Official Information Act: Maori with Lived Experience of Disability, and New Zealand Disability Data: a case study

This article presents a case study of the use of the Official Information Act 1982 (OIA), for research commissioned by the Waitangi Tribunal in 2018 into disability-related issues for Mäori. The responses of Crown organisations to OIA requests examined in this research highlight both issues with inconsistent application of the OIA, and limited access to information held and made available by Crown agencies for Mäori with lived experience of disability.1 The statutory time frame for responses to OIA requests was rarely met. Organisations also resisted providing information, while crucial information for ensuring equity for Mäori with lived experience of disability was often not able to be released because it was not collected at all. The impact of these limitations is discussed, particularly pertaining to core government roles of performance monitoring and ensuring accountability. In addition to querying who benefits from, and is privileged by, the OIA and its application, questions are raised around the necessary components of a legislation rewrite in order to deliver on a modern approach to official information that ensures equitable, high-performing and truly democratic public administration

Binding of Chlorinated Phenylacrylonitriles to the Aryl Hydrocarbon Receptor: Computational Docking and Molecular Dynamics Simulations

The development of ligands capable of binding to the aryl hydrocarbon receptor (AhR) and hijacking its signaling pathway is of potential use for the design of novel agents against breast cancer. To guide the synthesis of new compounds and characterize their binding to the AhR, we employed homology modeling, ligand docking, and molecular dynamics simulations. As there is currently no crystallographic information available for the structure of the AhR’s ligand-binding PAS-B domain, a homology model was developed. The location of the binding site was identified by scanning the model for concave areas and comparing them to known ligand-binding sites in proteins related to the AhR, such as the CLOCK:BMAL1 transcriptional activator complex and the hypoxia-inducible factor-2α (HIF-2α). Docking of several chlorinated phenylacrylonitriles was performed with the modeling suite MOE, identifying π-π stacking, hydrophobic, and van der Waals interactions as the driving forces for binding, an observation consistent with the hydrophobic nature of the site. Molecular dynamics simulations with one of the compounds for 100 ns verified the overall stability of a docking-predicted pose and revealed the presence of interacting water molecules in the vicinity of the ligand. Given the buried location of the ligand in the core of the receptor, this observation was somewhat unexpected, but it explained a slight shift of the ligand pose seen during the simulation