Hearing the Voices of African American Educational Lobbyists and Their Role in Lobbying for Education

The purpose of this study is to hear the voices, life experiences and lobbying practices of four African American educational lobbyists and their role in lobbying for education. There is a void where the voices of African American educational lobbyists are limited. They are almost non-existent due to past practices in the nation’s history that ensured African Americans would have no representation at the decision making table. As a result, we have not heard the voices of African American educational lobbyists in the 21st century, nor do we know how they feel about their ability or inability to influence and impact educational decisions. This study provides a snapshot of how African American educational lobbyists describe their personal characteristics; how African American educational lobbyists exercise and interpret their acts of lobbying; and how these African American educational lobbyists describe their influence or impact on education. Findings from the study reveal that African American educational lobbyists believe that they can influence and impact educational policy despite unique challenges they face. New findings from the voices of the African American educational lobbyists reveal that they benefit from a reaper, are immersed in a dual credibility standard and utilize reverse interest convergence as they Navigate the System. In order to be effective, have the ability to impact and influence and focus on African American achievement, there are avoidance factors in lobbying that should be employed in order to establish a New Lobby

The Disestablishment of African American Male Compliant Ambiguity: A Prison Pipeline Essay

There is an apex to each day, a climax, where a decision is made, and a falling action is the result of that decision. Recommendations to combat the never-ending struggle of my invisibility are derived from culturally relevant and culturally responsive frameworks, resiliency frameworks, and ethical caring frameworks. Without systemic reform in local educational settings that includes local teachers, administrators, parents, and students providing new conceptual frameworks for learner and teacher efficacy, the African American male learner will persistently encounter crucial conflicts throughout the School to Prison pipeline while entering a space that has been rendered invisible due to the focus on policy that perpetuates the pipeline. This essay shows that every day when African American boys enter the pipeline, we are faced with two distinct conflicts—Man vs. Man and Man vs. Self—as we navigate an invisible space, compliant ambiguity

The Role of Individual Behavior Type in Mediating Indirect Interactions

Trait-mediated indirect interactions (TMII) play an important role in structuring natural communities, and numerous studies have experimentally demonstrated their presence in a variety of systems. However, these studies have largely examined the presence or absence of traits that are responsible for these interactions, without considering natural variation between individuals in the extent to which these traits are manifested. We used a well-documented TMII to investigate the importance of individual behavior type for determining the strength of the TMII. The toadfish Opsanus tau has an indirect positive influence on bivalve survival because the mud crab Panopeus herbstii, a consumer of bivalves, reduces foraging effort in the presence of toadfish. We quantified variation in the strength of persistent individual mud crab responses to toadfish and resulting variation in the strength of TMII. We demonstrate that the strength of this TMII is strongly influenced by mud crab size and behavior type, strengthening with the intensity of response of individual mud crabs to toadfish predator cues. Further, we demonstrate that the spatial distribution within intertidal oyster reefs of crabs with different behavior types is not random; mud crabs inhabiting subtidal areas, where predator cues are more persistent, are significantly less responsive to toadfish cues than mud crabs from intertidal areas. This spatial behavioral structure should lead to spatial variation in the strength of TMII. Given the widespread importance of TMII and the broad occurrence of individual personality or behavior types across numerous taxa, these results should be generally applicable. The distribution of behavior types within a population may therefore be a useful metric for improving our ability to predict the strength of TMII

Hearing the Voices of African American Educational Lobbyists and Their Role in Lobbying for Education

The purpose of this study is to hear the voices, life experiences and lobbying practices of four African American educational lobbyists and their role in lobbying for education. There is a void where the voices of African American educational lobbyists are limited. They are almost non-existent due to past practices in the nation’s history that ensured African Americans would have no representation at the decision making table. As a result, we have not heard the voices of African American educational lobbyists in the 21st century, nor do we know how they feel about their ability or inability to influence and impact educational decisions. This study provides a snapshot of how African American educational lobbyists describe their personal characteristics; how African American educational lobbyists exercise and interpret their acts of lobbying; and how these African American educational lobbyists describe their influence or impact on education. Findings from the study reveal that African American educational lobbyists believe that they can influence and impact educational policy despite unique challenges they face. New findings from the voices of the African American educational lobbyists reveal that they benefit from a reaper, are immersed in a dual credibility standard and utilize reverse interest convergence as they Navigate the System. In order to be effective, have the ability to impact and influence and focus on African American achievement, there are avoidance factors in lobbying that should be employed in order to establish a New Lobby

An Artificial Habitat Increases the Reproductive Fitness of a Range-shifting Species within a Newly Colonized Ecosystem

When a range-shifting species colonizes an ecosystem it has not previously inhabited, it may experience suboptimal conditions that challenge its continued persistence and expansion. Some impacts may be partially mitigated by artificial habitat analogues: artificial habitats that more closely resemble a species\u27 historic ecosystem than the surrounding habitat. If conditions provided by such habitats increase reproductive success, they could be vital to the expansion and persistence of range-shifting species. We investigated the reproduction of the mangrove tree crab Aratus pisonii in its historic mangrove habitat, the suboptimal colonized salt marsh ecosystem, and on docks within the marsh, an artificial mangrove analogue. Crabs were assessed for offspring production and quality, as well as measures of maternal investment and egg quality. Aratus pisonii found on docks produced more eggs, more eggs per unit energy investment, and higher quality larvae than conspecifics in the surrounding salt marsh. Yet, crabs in the mangrove produced the highest quality larvae. Egg lipids suggest these different reproductive outcomes result from disparities in the quality of diet-driven maternal investments, particularly key fatty acids. This study suggests habitat analogues may increase the reproductive fitness of range-shifting species allowing more rapid expansion into, and better persistence in, colonized ecosystems

Multicolor photometry of the galaxies in the central region of Abell 2634

An optical photometric observation with the BATC multicolor system is carried out for the central 56' x 56' region of the nearby cluster of galaxies, Abell 2634. We achieved the spectral energy distributions (SEDs) of 5572 sources detected down to $V \sim 20$ mag, including 178 previously known galaxies, with fourteen filters covering a wavelength range from 3600 \AA\ to 10000 \AA. After excluding the foreground and background galaxies, a sample of 124 known members is formed for an investigation of the SED properties. Based on the knowledge of SED properties of member galaxies, we performed the selection of faint galaxies belonging to Abell 2634. The color-color diagrams are powerful in the star/galaxy separation, and 359 faint galaxies are selected by their color features. The technique of photometric redshift and color-magnitude correlation for the early-type galaxies are applied for these faint galaxies, and a list of 74 faint member galaxies is achieved. Basis on the enlarged sample of member galaxies, the spatial distribution and color-magnitude relation of the galaxies in core region of Abell 2634 are discussed. We find a tendency that the color index dispersion of the early-type members is larger for the outer region, which might reflect some clues about the environmental effect on the evolution of galaxies in a cluster.Comment: 35 pages, 21 Postscript figures and tables, LaTeX, using aasms4.st