Federal Policy and Latinos in Higher Education

Describes federal legislation and programs that support higher education and assesses Latino participation in these programs. Provides a statistical review of Latino achievement in higher education, including college enrollment and completion rates

Profiles and Trends in Catholic Interfaith Marriages in Utah

The purpose of this study was to investigate the phenomenon of interfaith marriage. It is a comparative study using archival data. Utah Catholic interfaith marriage trends over 31 years were compared with three other Catholic dioceses in the United States similar in size or in other demographic characteristics. Results indicate that Utah is not atypical in its intermarriage patterns. In addition, a micro-level analysis of Catholic interfaith marriages at three points in time was conducted for the Diocese of Salt Lake alone. Statistical analysis employed primarily measures of central tendency. Results indicate that Catholics intermarrying in Utah are older than the national median, that Catholic women marry out almost twice as frequently as Catholic men, that over time Catholics in Utah intermarry most often with Mormons, and that most Catholic intermarriage takes place in the Salt Lake metroplex, an urban rather than rural area

Essays on Smallholder Farmers in Jamaica: Context-specific Evidence for Food Security Policymaking

This dissertation is comprised of three essays that examined the experiences and welfare of traditional food crop farmers in Western Jamaica. It systematically analyses the interplay between smallholder farmers and often overlooked variables in society. The study used qualitative interviewing, field observations and discourse analysis techniques to generate context-specific evidence for food security policymaking. The first essay examined smallholder farmers\u27 motives for farming. This formed the basis for a farmer typology that provides a portrait of the participants, and was used to inform findings in subsequent essays in this dissertation. The theory of planned behavior provided the conceptual grounding and contributed to an understanding of the heterogeneity identified among the smallholder farming population. The farmer typology, which could be instrumental for bottom-up policymaking and the efficient allocation of resources, can also aid extension services providers and development practitioners to identify a cadre of farmers sufficiently experienced and motivated to participate in national food security outcomes. Using the typology developed in the previous essay, the second essay explored smallholder farmers\u27 use of information and communication technologies (ICTs) and levels of social capital. The findings showed that mobile phones and radios were used extensively for information and the maintenance of high bonding social capital. However, smallholder farmers lacked proficiency with, and access to internet-based devices. These limitations were reflected in the paucity of wide economic and social networks among farmers in the study area. The third essay traced the connections between smallholder farmers and the political economy through government discourse. This critical discourse analysis used texts from annual budget presentations to Parliament (2003- 2013) for a longitudinal study, to identify how smallholder farmers were constructed by policymakers and the extent to which policy initiatives targeted their specific needs. The results showed that agricultural programs and food security policy initiatives, toward smallholder farmers in Jamaica, were erratic. The paper also identified pertinent topics missing from the discourse and concluded that the agenda needs to be broadened to address current and potentially impactful problems that have implications for food security outcomes

Lack of imagination can bias our view of animal sentience

How an animal reacts to a sensory stimulus is often used to assess whether that animal can experience feelings such as pain and pleasure. This behavioural path is typically complemented with reference to how a human would normally respond to and experience an analogous stimulus. Together, these approaches can lead to a “hard to imagine otherwise” argument for feelings. It is time to go beyond these qualitative assessments and to now determine whether a nervous system can execute the neural functions necessary for sentience

Design of lamella separators. Part 2

A method has been developed to predict the minimum angle at which solids will flow down the lower inclined surface of a lamella separator. It is based on a frictional analysis and requires experimental data from a simple batch rig. This method should help to eliminate problems with sludge build-up in lamella separators. The minimum angle was dependent on particle size, shape and surface texture, liquid viscosity and surface tension and the type of settler material. The degree of variation in the underflow solids concentration with time was also examined. It was found to be dependent on settler length, angle and a well-established flow regime. The mode of sludge flow and the mode of settler operation had no effect. [Continues.