Writing and fisheries and wildlife management: Cross-disciplinary collaborations

Often students disassociate courses which are in their core university requirements- such as writing- from the courses they take for their major. Yet, increasing demands within resource management professions require graduates competent in writing and in using Internet technologies for research and publishing. Thus, there is the need for cross-disciplinary collaboration between the university units responsible for teaching writing and the units providing education for resource professionals. With this need in mind, a unique partnership was formed at Michigan State University between the Department of Fisheries and Wildlife (FW) and American Thought and Language (ATL)- the unit charged with teaching a variety of content-based writing courses for new students. We worked together to enhance the design of FW 100- An Introduction to FW and two sections of ATL 150; course content and readings focused on conservation history, and assignments developed writing skills. Additional learning activities enhanced Internet skills, provided outside-of-class experiential opportunities, and helped students develop critical thinking abilities. In-class assessments showed that most students noted how the assignments and approaches used engaged them in learning course content and the value of writing. Future plans are to continue this collaboration, with more students cross-enrolled in the two complementary courses. The anticipated benefits of this collaboration reach beyond those obtained by students. We have found creative ways in which to integrate writing and communications with FW education, while contributing to scholarly applications of writing across the curriculum (WAC) within natural resources fields

Unanswered Prayers: A Study of Apologia for God in the Matter of Prayer

Many Christian writers and thinkers take up the vexing issue of unanswered prayer and thereby use various rhetorical strategies to address the intersection of pertinent teaching about prayer, and the disjunctive, problematic life experiences concerning the experience of unanswered prayer. Our investigation uses the ancient rhetorical genre of apologia as a lens to better understand the tactics and stances taken up by those who seek to guide members of faith communities toward reconciliation between perceived biblical teaching and actual life experiences concerning unanswered prayer. Our study incorporates an analysis of both the formal and conceptual strategies utilized by rhetors who seek to repair, or account for, breaches in lived-faith and understood teaching by religious communities through investigation of representative contemporary rhetors who address prayer

Learning and living : Connecting graduate education in natrual resources with the scholarship of engaged learning institutions and the outreach mission of land-grant universities

The future will involve a lifetime of learning for those who intend to work or live meaningful, productive lives, especially in the fields of natural resources management. Land-grant universities always have recognized this need for lifelong learning of both professionals and citizens. In order for land-grant universities to reach their full potential as learning institutions engaged with communities, they will need to initiate new forms of leadership within an expanded paradigm that maintains core values while altering the way they serve their students and public. New educational models are needed at the graduate level in natural resources. These new models should be designed to meet growing demand among learners for direct application of content to work settings, and for greater understanding of the dynamic complexity and often-interdisciplinary nature of knowledge. There is also the need to develop capacities among our graduate students for partnership building and leadership for change

Unanswered Prayers: A Study of Apologia for God in the Matter of Prayer

Many Christian writers and thinkers take up the vexing issue of unanswered prayer and thereby use various rhetorical strategies to address the intersection of pertinent teaching about prayer, and the disjunctive, problematic life experiences concerning the experience of unanswered pray-er. Our investigation uses the ancient rhetorical genre of apologia as a lens to better understand the tactics and stances taken up by those who seek to guide members of faith communities toward reconciliation between perceived biblical teaching and actual life experiences concerning unan-swered prayer. Our study incorporates an analysis of both the formal and conceptual strategies utilized by rhetors who seek to repair, or account for, breaches in lived-faith and understood teaching by religious communities through investigation of representative contemporary rhetors who address prayer

Evaluation of an Adult Extension Education Initiative: The Michigan Conservation Stewards Program

The Michigan Conservation Stewards Program (CSP), coordinated by Michigan State University Extension, convened a unique group of partners for a new statewide Master Naturalist™ effort. Partners designed a curriculum, implemented a pilot program, and evaluated program processes and impacts. Extension staff used pre- and post-program questionnaires, achieving a 97% program retention rate and an 85% response rate. The CSP attracted a new Extension audience, increased learners\u27 ecosystem knowledge, improved attitudes toward resource management, and fostered skills for accessing ecological information. The CSP achieved its goal of assisting adult learners in gaining skills necessary to complete conservation management volunteer activities

Waddling on the Dark Side: Ambient Light Affects Attendance Behavior of Little Penguins

Visible light on Earth largely comes from the sun, including light reflected from the moon. Predation risk is strongly determined by light conditions, and some animals are nocturnal to reduce predation. Artificial lights and its consequent light pollution may disrupt this natural behavior. Here, we used 13 years of attendance data to study the effects of sun, moon, and artificial light on the attendance pattern of a nocturnal seabird, the little penguin Eudyptula minor at Phillip Island, Australia. The little penguin is the smallest and the only penguin species whose activity on land is strictly nocturnal. Automated monitoring systems recorded individually marked penguins every time they arrived (after sunset) at or departed (before sunrise) from 2 colonies under different lighting conditions: natural night skylight and artificial lights (around 3 lux) used to enhance penguin viewing for ecotourism around sunset. Sunlight had a strong effect on attendance as penguins arrived on average around 81 min after sunset and departed around 92 min before sunrise. The effect of moonlight was also strong, varying according to moon phase. Fewer penguins came ashore during full moon nights. Moon phase effect was stronger on departure than arrival times. Thus, during nights between full moon and last quarter, arrival times (after sunset) were delayed, even though moonlight levels were low, while departure times (before sunrise) were earlier, coinciding with high moonlight levels. Cyclic patterns of moon effect were slightly out of phase but significantly between 2 colonies, which could be due to site-specific differences or presence/absence of artificial lights. Moonlight could be overridden by artificial light at our artificially lit colony, but the similar amplitude of attendance patterns between colonies suggests that artificial light did not mask the moonlight effect. Further research is indeed necessary to understand how seabirds respond to the increasing artificial night light levels.Peer reviewe

Large-area submillimeter resolution CdZnTe strip detector for astronomy

We report the first performance measurements of a sub-millimeter CdZnTe strip detector developed as a prototype for space-borne astronomical instruments. Strip detector arrays can be used to provide two-dimensional position resolution with fewer electronic channels than pixellated arrays. Arrays of this type and other candidate technologies are under investigation for the position-sensitive backplane detector for a coded-aperture telescope operating in the range of 30 - 300 keV. The prototype is a 1.4 mm thick, 64 multiplied by 64 stripe CdZnTe array of 0.375 mm pitch in both dimensions, approximately one square inch of sensitive area. Pulse height spectra in both single and orthogonal stripe coincidence mode were recorded at several energies. The results are compared to slab- and pixel-geometry detector spectra. The room-temperature energy resolution is less than 10 keV (FWHM) for 122 keV photons with a peak-to-valley ratio greater than 5:1. The response to photons with energies up to 662 keV appears to be considerably improved relative to that of previously reported slab and pixel detectors. We also show that strip detectors can yield spatial and energy resolutions similar to those of pixellated arrays with the same dimensions. Electrostatic effects on the pulse heights, read-out circuit complexity, and issues related to design of space borne instruments are also discussed

Content Analysis of Tweets by People with Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI): Implications for Rehabilitation and Social Media Goals

In this Twitter research, 6874 tweets of six adults with traumatic brain injury (TBI) were analyzed qualitatively and quantitatively using content classification [1], inductive coding of content themes, socio-linguistic analysis, and computational analysis in KH Coder. The results reflected that participants used Twitter for: (i) supporting others, including people with TBI; (ii) discussing society and culture, popular issues, news, and personal interests; (iii) connecting with others; (iv) sharing their experiences of life after TBI; (v) knowledge via exchanging information; and (vii) advocacy. ‘Emotional expression’, and ‘connection’ were common threads running across themes. Attending to the expressions of people with TBI on Twitter provides important insights into their lived experiences and could inform the development of user-centered cognitive-communication and social participation goals for people with TBI

Tattooed female bodies: Considerations from the literature

In this article, we present an overview of literature that explores tattooed female bodies. Focusing particularly on literature on femininities and embodiment, we consider how tattooed women’s bodies are read culturally, and the implications of this reading for our further understanding of the social construction of femininities. We explore how hegemonic notions of femininities and embodiment intersect in our cultural reading of women’s tattooed bodies. To conclude, we look at how femininities and embodiment are important in under- standing how femininity is constituted, how women experience their tattooed bodies differently, and what this means in terms of how the body is read culturally