Gaming Capitalism in the Service of a People: A multidisciplinary Study of the Chickasaw Nation

The story of the emergence and growth of contemporary economic development for Native American tribes and particularly those in the gaming industry, is an intriguing one. It is a story that spans more than three decades. It essentially, for many tribes, changes their position from that of an impoverished people to utilizing this industry, to build their identity and strength. However, the story of one of those Indian Nations, the Chickasaw Nation, and their emergence to become such a big player in the gaming industry in Oklahoma and ultimately a major economic engine in the State of Oklahoma, is a particularly intriguing one. The Chickasaw Nation is the 13th largest federally recognized tribe in the United States and has more than 73,000 tribal citizens. They pump $2.4 billion into the state economy and have 16,000 wage earners benefitting from employment. Their success exceeds that of many Native American tribes. And, while gaming is their predominant revenue stream for the Nation, they diversify and generate other revenue streams which contribute to the local and state economy as well as engage in philanthropic efforts within their jurisdictional boundaries and across the state. Their revenue generation has allowed them to build their social capital in programs and services by giving back to their tribal citizens to further their mission “to enhance the overall quality of life for the Chickasaw people.” In summary, the history of the Chickasaw people is intriguing as well as is their ability to navigate and negotiate with both the federal and state governments. They possess a strong three-branch government (executive, legislative, and judicial), uphold their constitution, sustain continuous strategic leadership, and ultimately protect their sovereignty. It would appear those tools have positioned the Chickasaw Nation to sustain and grow in their economic success, make a significant contribution to their people, the state in which they reside as well as poise themselves for future challenges

Statistical Removal of Shadow for Applications to Gait Recognition

The purpose of this thesis is to mathematically remove the shadow of an individual on video. The removal of the shadow will aid in the rendering of higher quality binary silhouettes than previously allowed. These silhouettes will allow researchers studying gait recognition to work with silhouettes unhindered by unrelated data. The thesis begins with the analysis of videos of solid colored backgrounds. A formulation of the effect of shadow on specified colors will aid in the derivation of a hypothesis test to remove an individual’s shadow. Video of an individual walking normally, perpendicular to the camera will be utilized to test the algorithm. First, the algorithm replaces shaded pixels, pixel values determined to be shadows, with corresponding pixels of an average background. A hypothesis test will be employed to determine if a pixel value is a shaded pixel. The rejection region for the hypothesis test will be determined from the pixel values of the frames containing a subject. Once the shaded pixels are replaced, the resulting frames will then be run through a background subtraction algorithm and filtered, resulting in a series of binary silhouettes. Researchers can then utilize the series of binary silhouettes to accomplish a gait recognition algorithm

Comprehensive Sexuality Education in Kentucky

Discussions of sex education of any kind can be controversial in a given setting. Traditional approaches to sex education prompt debate regarding effectiveness. Key indicators central to the effectiveness of sex education continue to be rates of teen pregnancy and transmission of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs). With discontentment surrounding the effectiveness of “traditional approaches,” a more wide-ranging method is worthy of being explored. The curriculum approach of Comprehensive Sexuality Education (CSE) includes six key concepts, and subsequent sub-concepts, intended to provide a broad and even all-inclusive range of topics for a similarly broad and even all-inclusive range of ages of youth. When considering utilizing CSE in a community one must consider the influence community leaders have in success of implementation. This qualitative study seeks to explore how community leaders in one Kentucky community respond to six key concepts of CSE and its possible delivery. Utilizing snowball sampling in one Kentucky County with low teen birth rates, ten community leaders were interviewed. Results of this study show openness to the topics included in CSE but reveal a need for parent education as it relates to communication within the family as well as the topics of each key concept of CSE

Experimental and Computational Investigation of Snow Melting on Heated Horizontal Surfaces

I wish to thank Dr. Jeff Spitler for his guidance and trust, allowing me the creative freedom to make key decisions on the format and features. I wish to also thank Dr. Simon Rees for his help and my committee members for their time and patience. Dr. Samuel Colbeck of the Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory also provided several papers and direction during the early stages and I would like to thank him. Perhaps the greatest importance has been the love, support, and patience of my family. I would like to thank my parents Benny and Lenita Hockersmith for their continued support and patience throughout my life that has enable me to be where I am today. Finally, I wish to thank all the faculty members and staff of the School o

Do intracoelomic telemetry transmitters alter the post-release behaviour of migratory fish?

Electronic tags have become a common tool in fish research, enhancing our understanding of how fish interact with their environment and move among different habitats, for estimating mortality and recording internal physiological states. An often-untested assumption of electronic tagging studies is that tagged fish are representative of untagged conspecifics and thus show ‘normal’ behaviour (e.g. movement rates, swimming activity, feeding). Here, we use a unique data set for potamadromous walleye (Sander vitreus) in Lake Huron and Lake Erie tributaries to assess whether the lack of appropriate controls in electronic tagging could seriously affect behavioural data. We used fish tagged in previous years and compared their migratory behaviour during the spawning season to fish tagged in a current year at the same location. The objective of the study was to determine whether intracoelomic acoustic tag implantation altered downstream movement of walleye after spawning. Fish tagged in a given season travelled slower downstream from two river spawning sites than fish tagged in previous years. Fish tagged one or two years earlier showed no differences between each other in downstream travel time, in contrast to fish tagged in a given year. Our results support notions that standard collection and intracoelomic tagging procedures can alter short-term behaviour (i.e. days, weeks, months), and as such, researchers should use caution when interpreting data collected over such time periods. Further, whenever possible, researchers should also explicitly evaluate post-tagging effects on behaviour as part of their experimental objectives

Thinking like a fish: a key ingredient for development of effective fish passage facilities at river obstructions

Worldwide, obstructions on watercourses have interfered with migratory pathways of fish species, reducing life‐cycle success and often eliminating diadromous fish species altogether from river basins. Over the last century, efforts to mitigate these effects were initially directed at developing fishways for upstream, high‐value migrant adult salmon. In more recent years, efforts have turned to developing fishways for other species. Results of past research suggest that the development of effective fishways requires biological knowledge of fish behaviour when encountering variable flows, velocity and turbulence, combined with hydraulic and civil engineering knowledge and expertise to develop facilities that provide ppropriate hydraulic conditions that fish will exploit. Further, it often requires substantial financial resources for biological and hydraulic testing as well as engineering design, particularly where prior knowledge of the behaviour of target fish species does not exist. Where biological or engineering knowledge (or both) is absent, development of effective passage facilities must take on a trial and error approach that will almost certainly require years to attain success. Evaluations of existing adult and juvenile fish passage facilities, where they have been carried out, suggest that migrant fish reject areas with hydraulic conditions they determine unsuitable. Even well designed fish ladders or nature‐like bypass channels for upstream migrants, even those with good attraction flows, will fail if incorrectly sited. Although progress has been made, developing successful installations for downstream migrants remains much more difficult, probably because downstream fish move with the flow and have less time to assess cues at entrances to any bypasses that they encounter

An Investigation into the Poor Survival of an Endangered Coho Salmon Population

To investigate reasons for the decline of an endangered population of coho salmon (O. kisutch), 190 smolts were acoustically tagged during three consecutive years and their movements and survival were estimated using the Pacific Ocean Shelf Tracking project (POST) array. Median travel times of the Thompson River coho salmon smolts to the lower Fraser River sub-array were 16, 12 and 10 days during 2004, 2005 and 2006, respectively. Few smolts were recorded on marine arrays. Freshwater survival rates of the tagged smolts during their downstream migration were 0.0–5.6% (0.0–9.0% s.e.) in 2004, 7.0% (6.2% s.e.) in 2005, and 50.9% (18.6% s.e.) in 2006. Overall smolt-to-adult return rates exhibited a similar pattern, which suggests that low freshwater survival rates of out-migrating smolts may be a primary reason for the poor conservation status of this endangered coho salmon population

Yakima River Radio-Telemetry Study: Steelhead, 1989-1993.

A 4-year radio-telemetry study was made of steelhead in the Yakima River basin, with the objectives of determining the run timing, passage patterns at irrigation diversion dams, and morphometric characteristics of different Yakima basin steelhead substocks and determining where and when the substocks become separated; evaluating adult steelhead passage at Yakima River basin diversion dams; determining steelhead migration , temporal distribution, and habitat utilization in the Yakima River basin; identifying spawning distribution and timing of steelhead; and determining the amount and cause of pre-spawning mortality of radio-tagged steelhead. Recommendations are given