The Influence Of Teacher Schema On Educational Outcomes For Students Of Color: A Critical Analysis Of Racial Inequalities In American Schools

As the American student demographic continues to grow increasingly diverse, racial disparities in student outcomes indicate that public schools and White teachers across the country are struggling to provide quality education to students of color. A critical analysis of the widely recognized “achievement gap” and discipline gap reveals White educators socialized within a white supremacist society often adopt dominant deficit perspective schemas about people of color which inhibit teachers’ abilities to provide effective, equitable educational opportunities to students of color. The dominant deficit schemas prevalent among predominantly White educators and administrators serve to obscure systemic racism, deny systemic and individual responsibility for perpetuating inequalities, and justify racial disparities as “natural”. This thesis employs a critical analysis to explore the historical, social, and political constructs of race, historical and contemporary oppression of people of color and racialized educational opportunity gaps, the impact of socialization within a white supremacist society on teacher schema, the impact of teacher schema on the educational outcomes of students of color, and the role that critical consciousness and culturally relevant pedagogy can play in effectively addressing the learning potential of students of color

Intervention Methods for Spurring Emergent Literacy in Children Who Are Deaf or Hard Of Hearing By Hearing Parents: A Literature Review

This thesis focuses on the methods hearing parents may employ to spur emergent literacy in their children who are deaf or hard of hearing. Children who are deaf or hard of hearing are naturally at risk for language and literacy delays. Children with hearing loss typically develop emergent literacy skills at a slower rate than their peers, and can fail to master these important skills. This may be due to communication barriers within the home. A full understanding of emergent literacy is critical for mastering reading and academic success. Since parents play an influential role in the development of emergent literacy and spend the majority of time with their young children, they are the key to a high-impact successful intervention with long-term monitoring and support. With training, parents can provide daily emergent literacy intervention for their children at a young age and alter the academic path of their children who are deaf or hard of hearing

Energy Efficiency in The Kingsport Housing Redevelopment Authority (Khra) Riverview Place: Actual Vs. Predicted

Annual energy costs are rising and threatening the affordability of public housing and are subsequently increasing subsidy payments from the government. Action needs to be taken to reduce energy consumption and to improve the energy efficiency of low-income housing. This is the case with the Kingsport Housing and Redevelopment Authority (KHRA) in Kingsport, Tennessee. In 2010, KHRA completed construction at Riverview Place of 38 energy-efficient housing units. Although designed for energy efficient operation, energy use in some of the units far exceeds projections and results in utility bills for tenants that are much higher than their subsidies cover. The purpose of this study was to determine the underlying factors related to energy consumption in the Riverview Place development. With spending decisions based on grant money received, city financial support, and annual operating and upkeep costs of the development, this study sought to provide recommendations addressing cost-saving energy efficiency measures and programs. To do this, a survey was distributed to the primary tenant of each of the 38 units. The 2013 monthly and annual energy consumption data for each home within Riverview Place was used to choose six units for building performance testing. These six units were subjected to air leakage testing, including a blower door and duct blaster test. In order to better explain why such a large percentage of tenants exceeded utility allowances in Riverview Place, this study highlighted two major points. First, KHRA should allot utility subsidies that reflect actual tenant behavior; specifically, use of air conditioning in summer months. Second, KHRA should implement education programs for tenants regarding energy efficiency and the need to follow certain energy-efficiency strategies

Range delimitation of a North Carolina endemic salamander, the Blue Ridge Gray-Cheeked Salamander, Plethodon amplus

The Southern Appalachian Mountains are a global hotspot for salamander biodiversity including many endemic species. These endemic montane salamanders have limited ranges and are vulnerable to anthropogenically induced habitat shifts. Plethodon amplus (the Blue Ridge Gray-Cheeked Salamander) is a North Carolina endemic salamander whose current published range is likely inaccurate due to data deficiencies. Plethodon amplus is visually indistinguishable from other Gray-Cheeked Salamanders which occupy adjacent mountain ranges, making it difficult to locate exact boundary lines between species. To re-delineate the range of P. amplus, I collected tissue samples from Gray-Cheeked Salamanders from sites surrounding and within the known range of P. amplus. I extracted DNA from each tissue sample then amplified and sequenced mt DNA using primers for three protein-coding regions. This study found evidence that current published boundary lines for two of the Gray-Cheeked Salamander species (P. amplus and P. meridianus) are larger than currently accepted. The results did not indicate clear species boundaries and suggested that there was likely genetic exchange between species in their past evolutionary history which led to mitochondrial capture. Future studies using next-generation sequencing techniques will be necessary to draw accurate boundary lines between species of Gray-Cheeked Salamander

Molecular Diversity of Bacteria from Three Distinct Ecosystems within Great Smoky Mountains National Park

The number of microbial species in nature may be in the millions, but most have never been observed or detected (Hong et al. 2006). For over 100 years, studies have focused primarily on culturing species from environmental samples in order to examine diversity of the community. With advancements in molecular techniques, a shift has occurred in both the approaches used to create community profiles and to explain what these profiles look like. This knowledge of microbial diversity is crucial for our understanding of the structure, function, and evolution of biological communities.The biodiversity of several thousand organisms has been catalogued throughout Great Smoky Mountains National Park (GSMNP) as part of a long term study call ed the All Taxa Biodiversity Inventory (ATBI). Recently, prokaryotes have become important within this study as well, and early work was focused on collecting data through culture dependent techniques.Here, I implemented a protocol, based completely on molecular techniques to create a library of species in order to describe the community of bacteria within ATBI plots. Through the use of Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR), molecular cloning, Restriction Fragment Length Polymorphism (RFLP), and DNA sequencing I have been able to compare the diversity o f bacteria among three different ATBI plots.Identifications were made for 177 bacterial species representing eleven different phylum including Acidobocteria, Firmicutes, Actinobacteria, Bacteroidetes, Verrucomicrobia,Planctomycetes, Alphaproteobacteria, Betaproteobacteria, Deltaproteobacteria,Gammaproteobacteria, and OP1O. The community profiles detected via these methods provided a new outlook on what bacterial species were dominating these three plots compared to what the previous culture-dependent methods had suggested. Overall , the Acidobacteria and Fimricutes divisions dominated the entire community profile.Albright Grove had nine different divisions represented with the Acidobacteria dominating this site. Cataloochee and Purchase Knob both had eight different divisions represented with the Acidobacteria dominating at Cataloochee and the Proteobacteria dominating at Purchase Knob.Microorganisms are extremely important and essential for all ecosystems; yet prokaryotes are the least understood of all organisms and the least defined taxonomically.Analyzing, comparing, and identifying these different bacterial species in GSMNP provides a better understanding of microbial distribution in soil environments. This allows for a better development of bacterial taxonomy and ultimately will help in understanding bacterial niches

College females' decisions to stay or leave an abusive relationship: a test of the investment model

The study tested the investment model as a predictor of college women's likelihood of staying with or leaving a romantic partner. Physical and sexual abuse measures were used to determine the frequency of abuse in dating relationships. Specifically, it was hypothesized that women who have high levels of commitment will be more likely to stay in a relationship with their boyfriend than women with low levels of commitment. Furthermore it was hypothesized that physical and sexual abuse by a partner would be associated with lower commitment, thus women with an abuse history would be more likely to leave the relationship.The results suggest that abuse did not affect commitment. Women who experienced abuse were no different than women who had not experienced abuse in satisfaction, quality of alternatives or subjective norms. Women who were abused had higher levels of investment than women who had never experienced abuse. Commitment was negatively correlated with stay-leave decision. Women who scored high on commitment were more likely to stay in the relationship than women who had low commitment scores

The power of true connection: connecting students and educators for student success

High school dropouts continue to be a documented problem in the United States and more specifically in North Carolina. Nationally, there were over 2.5 million dropouts reported for the 2012 school year. In North Carolina, 10,889 dropouts were reported for the 2015-16 school year, which was a 4.2 % decrease from the previous school year. Robbins County Schools reported a dropout rate of 3.67%, which was an increase from the preceding school year’s rate. Tillman County Schools reported a rate of 1.83%, a substantial improvement from the preceding school year’s rate. These districts identified that reducing the dropout rate was a high priority for both districts and would be the focus of improvement science efforts. These efforts incorporated methodology that used short cycles for evaluating change that guided revision and development of the improvement initiative. Considering the strong impact of teacher-student relationships on student success, the study focused on developing a comprehensive mentoring program for enhancing student belongingness in school by pairing teachers with students at-risk of dropping out. This was accomplished by establishing methods for identifying potential dropouts and by designing and implementing a teacher-student mentor program. Program evaluation measures included student attendance, discipline incidents, academic performance, extracurricular participation, and school connectedness. This program was implemented in one traditional high school in each district with a sample size of 18 students during the fall semester of 2017. The findings reveal that the school-based mentoring program resulted in improvements for the measures of school connectedness, grades, attendance, discipline incidents, and extracurricular participation

The Black God trope: toward a history of Black Nationalist religious rhetoric

This project theorizes the Black God trope as a rhetorical strategy used by many African-American rhetors across the history of African-American letters. The Black God trope is a linguistic, imagistic, and embodied rendering of religious concepts, such as God is Black, to create associations of meaning that foreground racial uplift. The Black God trope is a rhetorically constituted phenomenon created through resistance strategies that target African-American audience members, but are also accessed by anyone culturally rooted in the terms of the conversation. First, I demonstrate how Black rhetors writing about a Black God creates a language system that reflects African-Americans’ shifting subjectivity within the American experience. Offering examples from Ethiopianism to rap music, I focus on the Black God trope from the 1950s to the 1990s. Across these examples, I provide evidence of linguistic, imagistic, and embodied rhetorical resistance to white western patriarchy. Finally, I examine the Black God trope as a gendered critique of white and Black western patriarchy to demonstrate how an ideology like womanism is voiced by authors using the Black God trope as a means of public address. This work is the beginning of a rhetorical history that understands a Black God and Black Nationalist religious rhetoric as central to conducting scholarship on the African-American experience. The project offers a pathway to new and creative teaching and research methods that engage diversity and multivocality

The impact of California table grapes on intestinal inflammation and microbiota in mice fed an american type diet

Obesity is a growing health concern in the United States and worldwide. The chronic, low grade inflammation associated with increased white adipose tissue mass has been linked to chronic metabolic disorders such as insulin resistance, hypertension, and hyperlipidemia. Consumption of high fat diets leads to intestinal disorders such as microbial dysbiosis and gut barrier dysfunction that can adversely impact systemic metabolism. One potential dietary strategy to alleviate the high fat-induced chronic inflammation is increased consumption of fruits and vegetables rich in polyphenols due to their antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties. Notably, several studies have demonstrated that supplementation with grape products or anthocyanins found in grapes reduced inflammation systemically and increased the abundance of beneficial bacteria such as Lactobacillus, and Bifidobacterium in culture. However, the beneficial properties of whole grape powder and one or more of its fractions on intestinal inflammation, microbial populations, and barrier function in mice fed an American type diet rich in saturated fat are unclear. Therefore, the specific aims of this research were to; (i) determine the impact of consuming California table grapes on intestinal health in mice fed an American type diet rich in one type of saturated fat (Aim 1), and (ii) identify a key fraction (i.e., extractable polyphenol (EP) or non-extractable polyphenol (NEP) fractions) of California table grapes that improves markers of intestinal inflammation in mice fed an American type diet rich in four types of saturated fats (Aim 2). In Aim 1, consumption of at least one of the powder grape diets; (i) reduced body fat percentage, the total weight of all four fat depots, and inguinal fat depot weight, (ii) increased localization of a tight junction protein linked to improved barrier function, (iii) reduced the abundance of a deleterious sulfidogenic bacteria, and (iv) increased the abundance of beneficial bacteria (e.g., Akkermansia muciniphila, Bifidobacterium, and Lactobacillus), compared to high fat controls. However, the high fat diet did not significantly increase the abundance of inflammatory markers in the intestine nor did the powdered grapes significantly decrease their abundance. Taken together, these data acquired in Aim 1 demonstrate that whole powdered California table grapes improved a marker of gut barrier function and a metabolic profile that was positively correlated with changes in microbiota in mice fed a butter-rich diet. In Aim 2, the polyphenol-rich EP fraction alone or in combination with NEP (EP+NEP), but not powdered grapes; (i) decreased body fat percentage, body fat depot weights, and liver triglyceride levels, (ii) improved insulin sensitivity and glucose disposal, (iii) decreased the mRNA levels of several inflammatory genes in WAT, (iv) decreased the expression of the proinflammatory gene Cluster of differentiation 68 in the colon, and (v) increased expression of G-protein receptor 43 in the ileum compared to high fat controls. Taken together, these data demonstrate that the; (i) potential health benefits of consuming grape powder are dependent on the type and amount of fat in the diet, and (ii) extraction of polyphenols from powdered grapes results in improved metabolic profile and decreased systemic inflammation in conjunction with consuming a rich in saturated fats. Collectively, these findings are expected to contribute insight for the development of dietary strategies using table grapes for decreasing obesity and some of its metabolic complications, possibly by altering populations of gut microbes. However, clinical trials are needed to determine the extent to which these findings are applicable to humans

What's good for the goose is good for the gander: Implementing the SIOP model into an urban elementary classroom of African American students

Research points to many factors that contribute to the achievement gap between white and minority students however; one important issue that is often overlooked is the academic language status of the student. Knowing that lack of familiarity and proficiency in academic English severely limits an individual’s chances at academic success (Mace- Matluck, Alexander-Kasparik, & Queen, 1998), purposefully teaching the skills associated with academic English proficiency is of the utmost importance. While the use of the Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol (SIOP) has shown to positively impact the academic English language proficiency levels of English language learners, little research exists as to its impact on the proficiency levels of urban students who are not fully proficient in academic English. Employing an action research methodology, this study examined the journey experienced by a teacher and her students when the Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol (SIOP) was implemented into an urban classroom of academic English language learners (AELL). The main findings of this qualitative study are: 1) The implementation of the SIOP model in any classroom should be accompanied by thorough training and on- going support; 2) The SIOP model has a positive effect on student interactions in the classroom; 3) For the implementation of the SIOP model to be successful issues of ‘control’ must be addressed; 4) There was a positive impact of the SIOP model on the academic language skills of students