Desirable budget making procedures for elementary school districts in Marin County having over six hundred A.D.A.

This study represents a survey of the budgetary procedures of selected elementary school districts in Marin County which recorded an average daily attendance over six hundred in the school year 1955-56. The problem for this study may be stated as a question: What are desirable budgetary procedures for elementary school districts in Marin County having over six hundred average daily attendance. The problem emanates from the pertinent literature in this area which is summarized by the statement appearing in the New York State Budget Handbook wherein it states that budget development is not a simple process. There is the somewhat complicated problem of translating aims and objectives into numbers of personnel and supplies in addition to the pressing problem of the “tax consciousness” at the local level. More specifically, the first purpose of the study was to determine the budgetary procedures which were currently practiced by the selected districts. The aforementioned questionnaire was developed which set forth a comprehensive list of desirable procedures as derived from the pertinent literature and consultation with business officials in the county. The tabulation of responses to this questionnaire made possible an evaluation of these procedures in terms of usage which satisfied the second purpose. This tabulation aided in the third purpose which was to formulate a guide to budgetary procedures for use by the selected districts as well as others in Marin County

Identifying Communication Gaps in Ohio's Beef Supply Chain

Ohio has a unique infrastructure: a large urban-rural interface, active beef industry, and several small meat processing facilities, which provide opportunities for food animal producers to engage in value-added marketing strategies. Information regarding where discrepancies lie between the various links of the beef production chain and market drivers of locally produced beef will help producers and processors make more informed decisions on production and marketing strategies and thus, enhance their economic sustainability and success. Producers, especially, could benefit from increased revenues, which may help Ohio retain its number of small family farms. A series of surveys conducted in association with previous market research projects and feasibility studies in Ohio were used to compare responses regarding market drivers and perceived priorities of beef characteristics that were important to consumers by each of the various segments of the supply chain (consumer – processor – producer). Similar questions were identified among the surveys and were evaluated to recognize trends among responses. In regard to the attributes consumers find most important in beef purchases, processor awareness was hypothesized to be greater than producer awareness due to closer proximity to the consumer in the production chain. Results indicate that consumers rank freshness as the greatest priority in making purchasing decisions of locally produced beef while processors and producers ranked taste as the greatest priority. Across all three groups, tenderness and price ranked second and third, respectively. This study indicates that Ohio producers and processors have a different perception of important features for locally produced beef than consumers. Thus, there is opportunity to realign and improve awareness of Ohio consumers' primary focus areas concerning beef products, as well as the potential to adjust marketing strategies to improve sales for locally produced beef in Ohio.No embargoAcademic Major: Animal Science

Bipartisanship Through the Eyes of the Supreme Court

My project has produced the first act of a written play examining the concept of judicial lockjaw and bipartisanship’s positive and negative effects on the Supreme Court. My work contributes to the genres of “Theatre of the Real” or “Documentary Theatre” and will expand upon the practice of examining political decisions and law practices through performance. Theatre, more than other mediums, has the power to use multiple forms of media and style to compare and contrast individual justices, ways of speaking, opinions, and cases. This allows performance to submerge an audience in an issue or debate, rather than needing to focus on one way of presenting information. Performance can connect the effects of past decisions and philosophies to their effects today in a way that makes an audience reflect on their own relationship with law and bipartisanship, as well as develop their own opinion

Psychometrics of the Missouri Student Survey: Examining Validity, Reliability and Consent

Risk and protective factors for adolescent drug and alcohol abuse have gained prominence in the prevention field as a framework for prevention. Communities that Care® is the original survey that collected data on risk and protective factors in the adolescent community. The Missouri Student Survey is based upon the Communities that Care® survey and is administered to students across the state of Missouri every two years. This study examines the reliability and validity of the Missouri Student Survey in a sample of 126,923 students from across the state of Missouri. In addition, this study also considers the question of active versus passive consent and its influence on the generalizability of the data. Examining these issues will help illuminate the strengths and weaknesses of the survey as well as present some options for increasing the data quality in subsequent administrations. A confirmatory factor analysis revealed problems with the assumed factor structure of the survey (as shown in Appendix 1) so an exploratory factor analysis was performed to assess the possibility of an alternate factor structure. However, most of the original risk and protective factor scales demonstrated strong reliability and criterion-related predictive validity. An item analysis determined that students were less likely to complete the questions in the second half of the survey and a secondary analysis established that certain school districts were driving this pattern. Finally, an examination of the issue of active versus passive consent showed that passive consent indeed increased the participation rates as well as decreased the rates of students reporting using a fake drug. Evaluation of the effect of active or passive consent revealed mixed results for the number of risk factors reported. Implications of these findings are that the underlying factor structure should be re-examined with the 2010 data set before reports are generated. However, passive consent appears to be worthwhile and should be continued. Future directions and limitations of this study are discussed

Predictive Analytics to Explain Resident Grade Point Average

Predictive analytics have traditionally been used to anticipate academic standing in college students using variables such as the American College Test (ACT) scores and/or School and College Ability Test (SAT) scores, high-school rank, gender, ethnicity, social cognitive factors, etc. While the use of predictive analytics in higher education has expanded to include variables of identity, such as gender and socioeconomic status, and social and emotional factors, these elements have seldom been explored in the context of housing and residential environment and their impact on academic performance. This study addresses this gap by recommending the inclusion of enrollment level and credit hours to aid in predicting academic performance on-campus

Significant personality variables involved in noetic problems

The purpose of the study reported here is to examine further the nature of noogenic neurosis, and to attempt to determine what personality variables might be related to it and its development. This will be done by administering the PIL and a number of personality scales to samples of male college students and inpatient neurotics. From the resulting data it will be possible to teat the following hypotheses: (1) that the male college students will have a significantly higher mean PIL score than the inpatient neurotics; and (2) that significant correlat­ions will appear among the relationships between PIL scores and measures of personality variables

Designing A Low Cost Prosthetic Arm Device

The goal of the project is to build a functional low-cost prosthetic arm that is easily maintained. The focus is on prostheses that attach to the forearm. This design must perform daily life tasks such as picking up, holding and carrying objects while playing and working. To begin the design, a mechanical finger was built with wooden tongue depressors as bone material; rubber bands, string, and drinking straws as muscle material; and masking tape as ligament and tendon material. The length of each joint was set to the golden ratio. Using this method, a basic hand was created that could be used to grip objects. The second step was to determine the amount of surface area needed to impart appropriate pressure for gripping objects without causing damaging. This was measured using an olive as a model. The pressure required to puncture the skin of an olive with an object of known surface area was determined. Newton\u27s first law was used to derive the graph of Force vs. Area of the finger tip. Each fingertip should have a surface area of at least 3.67 mm2 to prevent damage to objects encountered in daily life. The significance of the project is to develop an effective low-cost, easily maintained prosthetic arm that could benefit people with disabilities in developing nations or who are living below the poverty line