Step It Up Macks Creek, MO: A Community Walking Program

An Abstract of the Scholarly Project by Amy Renee Butler, MSN, FNP-C Physical inactivity is a major risk factor for chronic disease. Despite goals, guidelines and interventions physical inactivity continues to rise. Rural residents are at even higher risks of sedentary lifestyles highlighting the need for research and interventions focusing on this particular population. The purpose of this study was to develop a community walking program to create an environment of favorable health resources in a rural area of mid-Missouri. The walking program provided residents with an educational meeting followed by a five week walking intervention that evaluated participants step counts to determine if the community walking program increased physical activity of the participants. A demographic questionnaire, step count log and program evaluation from fifteen community members was analyzed. The results found a statistical difference in the average step count during the intervention when compared to baseline. Furthermore, participants provided positive feedback in the program evaluation survey. The research results suggest community walking programs can provide rural residents with knowledge and a tool to increase physical activity

No Room at the Inn: How We Dealt with Reallocation of Library Spaces

As part of his vision for a more student-oriented campus, in Fall 2017, our new provost began projects to reallocate some of the square footage in the library for classrooms, student services such as the writing center, and a café. To make way for this reallocation, the project also included the closure of the curriculum library housed in another building. These projects coupled with a relatively short time frame created an interesting set of challenges for the library administration and staff, including rethinking collections and work spaces for the library. As leaders in this effort, the presenters will discuss how we faced these challenges and freed the space to implement these projects

Implementing Discovery at the University of North Alabama

Collier Library, the main library at the University of North Alabama (UNA), provides the campus community with access to over 150 electronic resources. With so many available options, our students often overlook valuable databases. Analysis of usage statistics had shown that some of our most expensive databases had the highest cost per retrieval. Therefore, finding a product that would encourage users to utilize the full range of available databases became a top priority. In the summer of 2010, the Collier Library staff began to seriously investigate the discovery tool marketplace. We felt that the “single search box” concept of discovery tools and their ability to allow users to seamlessly search multiple databases would be the ideal way to expose students to the range of available databases. We believed that this exposure would increase database use and thus decrease the cost per use. Following discussion and review, the library licensed EBSCO’s Discovery Service (EDS) in late 2010. After months of preparation, setup, and testing, the library launched EDS in spring 2011

Archeological Survey Of Proposed VA Outpatient Clinic In The City Of Lubbock, Lubbock County, Texas

This report documents the results of an intensive archeological survey carried out in advance of construction of a proposed U.S. Veterans Affairs (VA) outpatient clinic on 14 acres owned by Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center in Lubbock, Texas. The survey was conducted in compliance with the Antiquities Code of Texas under Permit No. 8415. Archeologists from AmaTerra Environmental, Inc. (AmaTerra) visually inspected the entire Area of Potential Effects (APE) and excavated 7 shovel tests in support of the survey. No new archeological sites were discovered as a result of the survey and no artifacts were observed within the APE. No artifacts were collected during this survey, but a field records and photographs were made during investigations. These records and photographs are to be permanently housed at the Texas Archeological Research Laboratory (TARL) in Austin. AmaTerra recommends that no further archeological work is warranted prior to construction

How GTL Can Kill You

Buff muscles, fitted shirts, rigidly-sculpted hair, perfect tans — what’s not to love about these party-hardy boys featured on MTV’s hit show “Jersey Shore”? It’d sure be a wake up call to see them in even 10 years. If everyone lived like they do, everyone would die. Well maybe not die, but their lifestyle definitely does some irreversible damage stemming from their daily routine of GTL, which stands for gym, tanning, laundry. As ridiculous as this may seem, a lot of college students are following on the trail blazed by Ronnie, The Situation, Pauly D and Vinny

El Niño, La Niña, and Stratospheric Sudden Warmings: A Reevaluation in Light of the Observational Record

Recent studies have suggested that El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) may have a considerable impact on Northern Hemisphere wintertime stratospheric conditions. Notably, during El Niño the stratosphere is warmer than during ENSO-neutral winters, and the polar vortex is weaker. Opposite-signed anomalies have been reported during La Niña, but are considerably smaller in amplitude than during El Niño. This has led to the perception that El Niño is able to substantially affect stratospheric conditions, but La Niña is of secondary importance. Here we revisit this issue, but focus on the extreme events that couple the troposphere to the stratosphere: major, mid-winter stratospheric sudden warmings (SSWs). We examine 53 years of reanalysis data and find, as expected, that SSWs are nearly twice as frequent during ENSO winters as during non-ENSO winters. Surprisingly, however, we also find that SSWs occur with equal probability during El Niño and La Niña winters. These findings corroborate the impact of ENSO on stratospheric variability, and highlight that both phases of ENSO are important in enhancing stratosphere-troposphere dynamical coupling via an increased frequency of SSWs

An investigation into the occurrence of hedgehog (Erinaceus europaeus) on Irish roads

Hedgehogs are one of the most common mammalian road fatalities in Europe. Between April 2008 and November 2010, two stretches of road measuring 227 km (Cork City to Caherlistrane, Co. Galway) and 32.5 km (Cork City to Bandon, Co. Cork) respectively were surveyed for hedgehog road kill. In addition to the sightings of road kill on the two stretches of road, a further 135 carcasses were collected over the study period from throughout Ireland and the sex and age group were recorded. Over the three years, a total of 50 430 km were surveyed and 133 hedgehog fatalities were observed between the two surveyed roads. The number of hedgehog road kill per km in the current study was low when compared to countries such as Belgium, Poland and New Zealand. It is suggested that this may be a consequence of hedgehogs having a greater opportunity to encounter larger busier roads in other countries. Over the three years, the majority of the 133 carcasses sighted were located beside pasture, which was the most prominent habitat along both routes. Arable land was the only habitat used in a greater proportion than what was available. K-function analysis detected clustering along the surveyed roads, with fatalities clustering annually at several locations. This would suggest that hedgehogs may use specific crossing points which would be important for the implementation of management strategies and underpass construction. Of the 135 hedgehog carcasses collected from throughout Ireland there was significantly more males than females collected, with peaks in male deaths occurring in May and June. Female deaths only outnumbered males in August, with further peaks in female deaths observed in June and July. It is suggested that these peaks are related to the breeding season (adults) and dispersal/ exploration following independence (juveniles)

An investigation into the techniques for detecting hedgehogs in a rural landscape

Various techniques and devices have been developed for the purpose of detecting wildlife but many only provide optimum results in particular habitats, for certain species or under ideal weather conditions. It is therefore advantageous to understand the efficiency and suitability of techniques under different scenarios. The effectiveness of methods for detecting rural Irish hedgehogs was investigated as part of a larger study in April 2008. Road kill sightings and questionnaires were employed to locate possible hedgehog sites. Six sites were subsequently selected, and in these areas trapping, spotlighting and foot print tunnels were employed to investigate whether hedgehogs were indeed in the surrounding landscape. Infrared thermal imagery was examined as a detection device. Trapping and infrared imagery failed to detect hedgehogs in areas where they had previously been recorded. Footprint tunnels proved to be unsuccessful in providing absolute proof of hedgehogs in an area. No single method of detection technique could be relied upon to conclude the presence of hedgehogs in an area. A combination of methods is therefore recommended. However, spotlighting was the most effective method, taking a mean of 4 nights to detect a hedgehog, in comparison to 48 nights if footprint tunnels were used as a sole method of detection. This was also suggested by rarefaction curves of these two detection techniques, where over a 48 night period hedgehogs were expected to be recorded 27 times through spotlighting and just 5 times in an equivalent period of footprint tunnel nights

Habitat selection, philopatry and spatial segregation in rural Irish hedgehogs (Erinaceus europaeus)

As a non-territorial species with no known dispersal period, there are no obvious factors that regulate hedgehog numbers in an area. This study aimed to examine these factors and involved the radio-tracking of rural hedgehogs over a 3-year period. Males had a significantly larger mean annual home range (56 ha) than females (16.5 ha), which was at its maximum during the breeding season. Outside of the breeding season, the home range was relatively small (4-5 ha) in both sexes. The home ranges of males completely overlapped both each other and all of the females. In contrast, females occupied more exclusive areas with little overlap between one another. On a nightly basis, both sexes occupied spatially independent areas with little overlap. Compositional analysis of the data showed that habitats were not used in proportion to their availability but were selected, and this changed seasonally, with the highest preference being for garden and arable land. Hedgehogs tagged for consecutive years exhibited site philopatry and followed the same pattern of habitat selection annually. It is suggested that the spatial separation observed amongst individual hedgehogs could restrict numbers in an area and that female numbers reach a carrying capacity before that of males