Brodack, Jason

Jason Brodak is a 44 year old man of Polish heritage, currently working at the University of Southern Maine and living in Bath, Maine, with his husband. Brodak discusses living in Detroit Michigan, Chicago Illinois, and New York. He attended Michigan State University and later received his bachelor\u27s degree in Interior Design from an arts school in Chicago. He discusses his childhood, coming out, briefly joining the Navy, the role of gay bars and gay chatrooms in his life, gay marriage, and the HIV AIDS epidemic.https://digitalcommons.usm.maine.edu/querying_ohproject/1109/thumbnail.jp

A Place for Everyone: Assessing Recreational Opportunities for Children in Urban, Suburban, and Rural Communities Across the United States

Despite an increased need to remain physically active, data suggest that fitness levels decrease across childhood and adolescence (Cooper, 2010). While anecdotal reports often blame this phenomenon on a normalized increase in meal portion size and adolescents\u27 inclination toward screen time (e.g., gaming, media, entertainment), researchers are beginning to investigate the community and family level barriers that may limit or prevent structured and unstructured physical activity among children and adolescents. In line with these efforts, the present research was designed to address the potential link of community infrastructure and youth well-being across a range of communities in the United States. One hundred forty-six parents (Mage = 42.15; SDage = 8.18) of children aged 6 to 18 (M = 11.39; SD = 3.25) who were registered in one or more recreational sports at the community level responded to an online survey assessing their community\u27s recreational infrastructure and their children\u27s physical and psychological well-being. Participants were drawn from nine partner communities in rural, suburban, and urban areas of Mississippi, Nevada, and New York. Two regression analyses were conducted to assess the impact of community infrastructure on children\u27s physical and psychological well-being, respectively. Results from the full sample of nine communities suggest that community infrastructure is significantly associated with children\u27s physical and psychological well-being. Results shed light on the role of community infrastructure in predicting children\u27s physical and psychological outcomes, and could therefore inform the future improvement of programs, facilities, and/or initiatives in these and other communities

Evaluating the Impact of two Contrasting Tillage Practices on Soil Properties in Central Kentucky

Farming practices such as no tillage and plowing can institute change on soil physical and chemical characteristics. In this research, the effects of long-term conventional and no-tillage systems on the selected soil properties were determined in a continuous corn system on a farm with Maury silt loam soil. These samples were taken from University of Kentucky\u27s Research Farm (Spindletop Farm). The field used was tilled in 1969 from bluegrass sod and the first time research was conduced was in 1970. Each plot is 20 ft. by 40 ft. and for many years each plot was split with winter cover crop planted to rye or hairy vetch. The vetch is not used the whole time but the rye is continued to be used. The rye is killed with herbicides in the No-Till plots and plowed every spring in the conventional plots creating different soil conditions. This research has been conducted for over 48 years of continuous no till agriculture under continuous corn. Every time the experiment was conducted, the soil contained four rates of nitrogen applied every spring at 0, 84, 168, and 336 kg/ha. In this research, the soil samples were collected from the conventional tillage no till on June 26, 2017 at 0 and 168 kg/ha of N at the depth of 0 to 7.5 cm and 7.5 to 15 cm. The samples were analyzed for soil organic carbon (SOC), soil aggregates, C in macroaggregates, soil pH, particulate organic matter (POM), and soil porosity. These results will indicate that tillage practice and soil depth are two important factors affecting the soil properties, and conservation tillage practices improve both physical and chemical properties of soil

Evaluating Opinions of Kentucky’s Agri-Science Educators on Climate Change

Climate Change is the significant long term changes in the weather and temperatures on a large scale and is seen globally. Scientists have been studying the effects of Climate Change on the planet for decades; foreseeing problems of the future. Global Warming has been escalating over the past hundred years with the amount of Carbon Dioxide gases rising into to atmosphere at an alarming rate. Agri-Science Educators across Kentucky are teaching the topics of Climate Change and Global Warming and this research intends to find the truth and variances in their knowledge. Twenty educators from across the state of Kentucky were chosen at random to be elevated over the topic of Global Warming and Climate Change. These interviews consisted of ten open ended questions intended to excite opinions about the topics at hand. All of these educators are Agri-science teachers working with students of all ages. These interviews are intended to be elevated and searched for common trends about the topics. The results show variations in all responses with differences in opinions. Educators from similar locations tended to follow the same viewpoints on many of the questions but variances were common. Gender and age were also taken into consideration while evaluating the educators. Gaps in age show great differences in opinion as well as the gender differences. Female educators tend to have more soft spoken advocates for the subjects at hand, while male educators were very passionate and strong about viewpoints. These interviews were recorded to ensure quality responses and honesty amongst the interviewees. For confidentiality, the age and gender will not be revealed but discussed as an overview. This study indicates that the educator’s opinions are being utilized to teach to the youth in agriculture classes today

Soil Responses to 48 years of Continuous No Till and Conventional Till Corn in Central Kentucky, USA

Cropping systems, fertilizer applications and tillage practices influence soil physical and chemical characteristics. In this study, the impact of long-term conventional and no-tillage systems on selected soil properties were evaluated in a continuous corn system on a Maury silt loam soil. This field for the study is located on the University of Kentucky\u27s Research Farm (Spindletop Farm). The field was tilled in 1969 from bluegrass sod and the first year\u27s data was in 1970. Each plot is 20 ft. by 40 ft. and for many years each plot was split with winter cover crop planted to rye or hairy vetch. The vetch is no long sowed but the rye is continued to be used. The rye is plowed under every spring in the conventional plots and killed with herbicides in the No-Till plots. This research field represents 48 years. of continuous no till agriculture under continuous corn. Each replication contains four rates of nitrogen applied every spring at 0, 84, 168, and 336 kg/ha. In this experiment, the soil samples were collected from the no till and conventional tillage at 0 and 168 kg/ha of N at the depth of 0 to 7.5 cm and 7.5 to 15 cm on June 26, 2017. The soil samples were analyzed for organic carbon (SOC), aggregates, C in macroaggregates, pH, particulate organic matter (POM), water retention and porosity. The results indicate that the soil surface changed significantly after 48 years of no till and conventional till practices, but the magnitudes of the change varied among the properties

Parenting Style as a Moderator between Maternal Trauma Symptoms and Child Psychological Distress

Current research suggests parents who experience symptoms of trauma transfer distress to their children. The purpose of this study was to understand the possible moderating effect of mothers' parenting style on this relationship. The level of maternal trauma, use of parenting styles, and child psychological distress was examined for a clinical sample (n=113) of mother and child dyads. Results indicated that mothers who experience high levels of trauma symptoms are more likely to parent using authoritarian or permissive behaviors. Mothers experiencing high levels of trauma symptoms who parent with a high use of authoritarian behaviors have children who experience more depression than those whose mothers use fewer authoritarian behaviors. However, mothers experiencing high levels of trauma symptoms who parent with a high use of permissive behaviors have children who experience less depression than those whose mothers use fewer permissive behaviors. The empirical and clinical implications of these findings are discussed

an etymology of desire: de sidere, from the stars

This poem attempts to explore the dynamics between time, desire, and our capacity to dream, and how that in turn impacts our perceptions of ourselves

How the Meaning of Incorporation Over Time Lends Support for Corporate Free Exercise Rights

Incorporated churches, mosques, synagogues, and the like enjoy the same protection as individuals under the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment. What about corporationsthat strive to follow religiousprinciples while earning profits? Do these corporations possess free exercise rights? This question has surfaced in response to a provision in the Affordable Care Act requiring employment- based group health plans to provide health insurance coverage for certain FDA-approved contraceptive methods. Numerous for-profit corporations that adhere to religious faiths that consider these contraceptive methods sinful have challenged the ACA provision as an undue burden on their free exercise because it forces them to provide medical products and services that are antithetical to their religious commitments. These challenges beg the question: Are for- profit corporations entitled to protection under the Free Exercise Clause to begin with? This Note considers how the meaning of incorporation over time demonstrates that modern for-profit corporations merit free exercise protection. In considering the issue, this Note sets forth an interpretive method labeled functional constructionism. Functional constructionism posits that as societal changes spur novel questions of constitutional meaning, these questions should be resolved by considering traditional understanding, relevant constitutional precedent, and most importantly, modern realities. Applying this method, this Note examines how the historical development of corporations from the adoption of the Bill of Rights to the present, and key Supreme Court precedent elevating the stature of corporations under the Constitution over the same span of time, depict the modern corporation as an entity worthy of free exercise protection

Legacies of Matter: The Reception and Remediation of Material Traditions in Roman Sculpture

Roman sculpture of the late republic and empire is characterized by wide-ranging practices of formal imitation and replication of earlier figurative traditions, particularly those of the Hellenized Eastern Mediterranean. Works that exhibit this retrospective character may be replicas of famous statues, adaptations of familiar compositions, or inventive creations based on established styles and features. The links of subject and style that these works created in the Roman context engendered systems of mutual reference and evaluation that helped articulate the socio-political, ideological, religious, and other aims of the representations. As sculptural types or even loosely related images were produced in a rich variety of materials, their proliferation enmeshed bronze, marble, colored stones, terracotta, and plaster into formal, technical, visual, and historical relationships. This dissertation investigates the materials of Roman sculpture as both agents and products of a transformative reception of earlier local and foreign traditions. The inquiry focuses on the nexus of Roman formal replication and material manipulation, investigating diverse choices of material and technique against the common background of a type’s subject, style, composition, and deployment in the Roman world. The project’s focus is circumscribed around sculptural types whose large-scale replicas are extant in more than one material; the survey in Chapter 2 is intentionally broad and includes replicas of famous Greek works, Idealplastik, and works related to Egyptian archetypes, as well as the large-scale, positive plaster casts from Baia. In this way, it sets out on a broad investigation of the nature of the reception of media practices in Roman sculpture, studying technical processes as much as formal connections and treating the reproductive interest in Greek, Egyptian, and even recently invented forms as complementary parts of a single retrospective approach to sculpture. This project proposes a methodology for investigating historically contextualized materialities that marries the approaches of historical reception, reception aesthetics, and remediation. The case studies apply this methodology in a four-part examination of Roman contexts of material reception, including production, display, and recontextualization. These chapters articulate the impact of techniques of formal reproduction on material selection and manipulation, assess the relevance of the medium of the formal archetype, demonstrate the plurality of contextualized material relationships that constitute materiality, clarify the nature of material mimesis as a selective and partial illusion, account for changing tastes in material decorum, and highlight ongoing engagement with the materiality of physically present antiques. The project illustrates that the Roman material context within which the selection, manipulation, and evaluation of sculptural materials must be situated is predicated upon both simple and sophisticated engagements with historical material traditions, both local and exotic. It shows that investigating the ways in which material traditions were available for reception in the Roman world – by the dissemination of plaster casts or by the importation of antiques, whose surfaces might be altered by age or later intervention – can reveal scholarly misconceptions and can realign modern interpretations with ancient practices. Engaging with the multiple, co-existing relationships that define a work’s materiality, this dissertation suggests that this plurality of references could be valued in much the same way that the recombination of distinct period styles could articulate new meanings in a Roman context. In the process of tracing these numerous material relationships, this dissertation’s analyses point to further avenues of research, indicating the relevance of Egyptian and North African material traditions for Roman uses of colored stones, calling attention to sophisticated engagements with issues of representation, and demonstrating that lack of coherence (in material references and in display) could be exploited as a means of enriching artworks that were conservative in their form and subject matter