Margaret Chase Smith Library 2016 High School Essay Contest: The Ideal Prospective President

Each year the Margaret Chase Smith Library sponsors an essay contest for high school seniors. As it was a presidential election year, the 2016 essay prompt asked students to reflect on their ideal candidate for president

The Teaching of Written Composition in the Grammar Grades

No civilization at all could exist unless people had some means of making known their thoughts and getting others to work and act with them. Man is a social being and commu­nication with others is an imperative need. Expression of some kind is natural and necessary in order to carry on intercourse with others. Language is the great means of communication. It is the channel through which thought and. feeling flow. Thought and language are interdependent. Clear thinking is almost as dependent on correct words as exact words are on clear thinking

Algebraic Systems Biology: A Case Study for the Wnt Pathway

Steady state analysis of dynamical systems for biological networks give rise to algebraic varieties in high-dimensional spaces whose study is of interest in their own right. We demonstrate this for the shuttle model of the Wnt signaling pathway. Here the variety is described by a polynomial system in 19 unknowns and 36 parameters. Current methods from computational algebraic geometry and combinatorics are applied to analyze this model.Comment: 24 pages, 2 figure

To Vote or Not to Vote: The New Challenge to Mexican Democracy

Mexico is country which has successfully transitioned from authoritarianism to a functioning young democracy. Yet the democratic stability of Mexico is already at risk due to a trend of declining voter turnout. Despite the most competitive elections in modem Mexican history, voter participation in 2006 was only 58%, down nearly 20% from 1994. Though a variety of reasons contribute to decreasing voter turnout, the predominant factor in Mexico is disillusionment, which manifests itself in the Mexican population because of four principal causes: widespread cormption, government inefficiency, election fraud, and a lack of change in the daily lives of the people. To support my argument, I use data from Transparency International,the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA), the National Institute for Geographic and Informational Statistics (INEGI), and the World Bank. I also address alternative hypotheses, as well as compare Mexico to its Latin American neighbors. Voter turnout is a measure of how strongly citizens believe in the integrity of their government and in democracy overall. Declining voter turnout threatens the future of democracy in Mexico because decreased citizen participation reduces the legitimacy of the government. Large numbers of non-voting Mexicans indicate the populace does not approve of the government’s trajectory and/or performance. Because universal participation is at the heart of a democracy, situations where large numbers of citizens abstain from voting pose a danger to the continuance of democracy. Mexico must address the main causes of voter abstention and work to reverse the trend of declining voter turnout in order to preserve its newly created democracy

Joining and decomposing reaction networks

In systems and synthetic biology, much research has focused on the behavior and design of single pathways, while, more recently, experimental efforts have focused on how cross-talk (coupling two or more pathways) or inhibiting molecular function (isolating one part of the pathway) affects systems-level behavior. However, the theory for tackling these larger systems in general has lagged behind. Here, we analyze how joining networks (e.g., cross-talk) or decomposing networks (e.g., inhibition or knock-outs) affects three properties that reaction networks may possess---identifiability (recoverability of parameter values from data), steady-state invariants (relationships among species concentrations at steady state, used in model selection), and multistationarity (capacity for multiple steady states, which correspond to multiple cell decisions). Specifically, we prove results that clarify, for a network obtained by joining two smaller networks, how properties of the smaller networks can be inferred from or can imply similar properties of the original network. Our proofs use techniques from computational algebraic geometry, including elimination theory and differential algebra.Comment: 44 pages; extensive revision in response to referee comment

Age Estimation from Children's Faces

In this thesis, we addressed the question of whether or not people could estimate age from children’s faces 7 to 11 years of age. We found that undergraduates were able to make accurate relative age judgments for males and females, even in faces as little as two years apart, and that their performance improved as the age differences between the faces being compared increased. They were also able to make accurate absolute age judgments that increased with increasing face age for both genders. We also looked at estimate bias and while estimates were generally low in bias, the bias was in direction of the mean age of the stimuli. Additionally, we found that there is generally an advantage for male faces presented in frontal view. Finally, we looked at one possible factor influencing age estimates– facial expression. It was unlikely that facial expression was a primary cue informing age estimates

The Effects of Expressive Writing on Emotional Intelligence in College Undergraduates

Attending college is often so stressful that as many as 40% of students leave without earning a degree. Many students desert during their first and second years of study. Emotional intelligence has been associated with effective coping skills, student achievement, and psychological well-being. The act of expressing emotions through writing has been shown to engage many capabilities associated with emotional intelligence. Few studies have examined the effects of expressive writing on emotional intelligence. The theory of emotion regulation provided theoretical framework. The purpose of this quantitative experimental study was to examine the effects of expressive writing on emotional intelligence and perceived stress. A sample of 58 first and second year of college students participated in the study. Data were analyzed using paired t-test. Differences in emotional intelligence and perceived stress scores were not significant after 4 weeks of expressive writing sessions. However, at one-month follow-up, emotional intelligence scores were significantly higher for those who engaged in expressive writing. Given that emotional intelligence increased after an extended period of time, expressive writing could be easily implemented by students to improve coping skills and achieve academic goals