School Choice, Opportunity and Access: A Geographic Analysis of Public School Enrollment in New Orleans

The primary objective of the study is to identify the extent to which the current school choice policy in New Orleans has afforded students in underserved neighborhoods or city planning districts the opportunity to attend quality schools elsewhere in the city. Though all students in New Orleans have access to schools outside their neighborhood, more than two-thirds (68%) of public school students attended a school within their planning district or in the adjacent planning district in the 2011-12 school year. In staying close to home, just one-fifth (22 percent) of students attended a quality school. A clear relationship existed between a planning district’s service level and its socio-economic and racial make-up as well as the performance level of its students’ schools. The results of this analysis suggest that the lack of quality schools in low-income and minority areas significantly limits those families’ access to quality schools even under New Orleans’ far-reaching school choice policy

Forcing Freedom: Applying Mill\u27s Principles of Liberty in an International Society

The author extends Mill’s liberty theory to contemporary international politics, specifically in relation to liberal intervention theory. The author tries to interpret Mill in the spirit of some popular liberal theories, but argues for why such an interpretation, which draws an analogy between the role of an individual and the role of a state’s government, would not be supported by Mill himself. For Mill, the individual is the central moral force, which is not simply in an appeal to prevent against harm toward a particular entity (as with looking-out for one particular nation among many in the international community). Even factoring in Mill’s argument about the Mormon community does not keep Mill from having a relatively wide theory for the acceptability of foreign intervention

Evaluating a Summer Undergraduate Research Program: Measuring Student Outcomes and Program Impact

At SUNY-Buffalo State we have undertaken a multi-year effort aimed at developing and field-testing an evaluation methodology for measuring student learning and related outcomes in our summer undergraduate research program. Our goal was to extend the findings of the many valuable studies that had already been done on the impact of undergraduate research on participating students (Gregerman et al. 1998; Alexander et al. 2000; Merkel 2001; Bauer and Bennett 2003; Seymour et al. 2004; Lopatto 2004; and Hunter et al. 2007). As described in Singer and Weiler (2009), our aim was to obtain reliable independent assessments of program impact without creating a measurement burden, and at the same time provide information to participating students that could help them gain new insights into their academic strengths and weaknesses. We also were interested in obtaining information from faculty mentors on how the summer undergraduate research program influenced their teaching

The advantage of the extremes: tree seedlings at intermediate abundance in a tropical forest have the highest richness of above-ground enemies and suffer the most damage

1. Tropical forest tree diversity has been hypothesized to be maintained via the attraction of density responsive and species-specific enemies. Tests of this hypothesis usually assume a linear relationship between enemy pressure (amount of damage and enemy richness) and seedling or tree density. However, enemy pressure is likely to change nonlinearly with local seedling abundance and community scale tree abundance if enemies are characterized by nonlinear functional responses. 2. We examined the abiotic and biotic factors associated with richness of above-ground enemies and foliar damage found in tree seedlings in a tropical forest in Puerto Rico. Rather than identify specific enemies targeting these seedlings, we used damage morphotypes, a paleo-ecological method, to derive a proxy for enemy species richness. 3. We found that the relationships between local and (conspecific seedling density) community scale (conspecific basal area of adult trees) abundance and both richness of above-ground enemies and foliar damage were hump-shaped. Seedlings of tree species existing at intermediate levels of abundance, at both local and community scales, suffered more damage and experienced pressure from a greater diversity of enemies than those existing at high or low densities. 4. We hypothesized that greater damage at intermediate abundance level could arise from a rich mixture of generalist and specialist enemies targeting seedlings of intermediate abundance tree species. Consistent with this hypothesis, we found that generalist enemies were more diverse on species at rare or intermediate abundance relative to common tree species. However, specialist enemies showed no significant trend across tree species abundance at either the local or community scales. 5. Synthesis. Our results suggest that interspecific variation in tree species abundance leads to differences in the magnitude and type of damage tropical tree seedlings suffer. This variation leads to a nonlinear, hump-shaped relationship between species abundance and enemy damage, highlighting fruitful directions for further development of species coexistence theory

Linking spatial patterns of leaf litterfall and soil nutrients in a tropical forest: a neighborhood approach

Leaf litter represents an important link between tree community composition, forest productivity and biomass, and ecosystem processes. In forests, the spatial distribution of trees and species-specific differences in leaf litter production and quality are likely to cause spatial heterogeneity in nutrient returns to the forest floor and, therefore, in the redistribution of soil nutrients. Using mapped trees and leaf litter data for 12 tree species in a subtropical forest with a well-documented history of land use, we: (1) parameterized spatially explicit models of leaf litter biomass and nutrient deposition; (2) assessed variation in leaf litter inputs across forest areas with different land use legacies; and (3) determined the degree to which the quantity and quality of leaf litter inputs and soil physical characteristics are associated with spatial heterogeneity in soil nutrient ratios (C:N and N:P). The models captured the effects of tree size and location on spatial variation in leaf litterfall (R2 = 0.31–0.79). For all 12 focal species, most of the leaf litter fell less than 5 m away from the source trees, generating fine-scale spatial heterogeneity in leaf litter inputs. Secondary forest species, which dominate areas in earlier successional stages, had lower leaf litter C:N ratios and produced less litter biomass than old-growth specialists. In contrast, P content and N:P ratios did not vary consistently among successional groups. Interspecific variation in leaf litter quality translated into differences in the quantity and quality (C:N) of total leaf litter biomass inputs and among areas with different land use histories. Spatial variation in leaf litter C:N inputs was the major factor associated with heterogeneity in soil C:N ratios relative to soil physical characteristics. In contrast, spatial variation soil N:P was more strongly associated with spatial variation in topography than heterogeneity in leaf litter inputs. The modeling approach presented here can be used to generate prediction surfaces for leaf litter deposition and quality onto the forest floor, a useful tool for understanding soil–vegetation feedbacks. A better understanding of the role of leaf litter inputs from secondary vegetation in restoring soil nutrient stocks will also assist in managing expanding secondary forests in tropical regions

A Neighborhood Analysis of Tree Growth and Survival in a Hurricane-Driven Tropical Forest

We present a likelihood-based regression method that was developed to analyze the effects of neighborhood competitive interactions and hurricane damage on tree growth and survival. The purpose of the method is to provide robust parameter estimates for a spatially explicit forest simulator and to gain insight into the processes that drive the patterns of species abundance in tropical forests. We test the method using census data from the 16-ha Luquillo Forest Dynamics Plot in Puerto Rico and describe effects of the spatial configuration, sizes, and species of neighboring trees on the growth and survival of 12 dominant tree species representing a variety of life history strategies. Variation in size-dependent growth and mortality suggests a complex relationship between size, growth, and survival under different regimes of light availability. Crowding effects on growth and survival appear to be idiosyncratic to each individual species, and with the exception of pioneers, there is little commonality among species that share similar life histories. We also explain the implications of differential susceptibility to hurricane damage on species' growth and survival and on their ability to respond to damage to neighboring trees. Tree species in the Luquillo Forest Dynamics Plot differ strikingly in both their susceptibility to hurricane disturbance and the nature of their recovery from wind disturbance, through response of both adult plants and juveniles to enhanced resource availability. At the stand level, intense competitive thinning of densely packed saplings that grew after hurricane damage accounted for the majority of post-hurricane mortality, particularly for shade-intolerant species. At the individual species level, effects of previous hurricane damage on growth and survival depended primarily on variation in the quantity and quality of hurricane damage sustained by target species and their interaction with life history characteristics of these individual species. Finally, we compare models that make different assumptions about the effects of competing species on tree growth and survival (e.g., equivalence of competitors vs. distinct species-specific effects). Size effects alone could not account for growth and survival for the majority of target species. Our results also demonstrate that competing species have distinct per capita effects on growth of dominant target species. In contrast, we found moderate support for a model that assumed functional equivalence of competitors on survival

Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungal diversity and natural enemies promote coexistence of tropical tree species

Negative population feedbacks mediated by natural enemies can promote species coexistence at the community scale through disproportionate mortality of numerically dominant (common) tree species. Simultaneously, associations with arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) can result in positive effects on tree populations. Coupling data on seedling foliar damage from herbivores and pathogens and DNA sequencing of soil AMF diversity, we assessed the effects of these factors on tree seedling mortality at local (1 m2) and community (16 ha plot) scales in a tropical rainforest in Puerto Rico. At the local scale, AMF diversity in soil counteracted negative effects from foliar damage on seedling mortality. At the community scale, mortality of seedlings of common tree species increased with foliar damage while rare tree species benefited from soil AMF diversity. Together, the effects of foliar damage and soil AMF diversity on seedling mortality might foster tree species coexistence in this forest

Assessment in Undergraduate Research

This chapter focuses on assessment as an integral element of the continued success and sustainability of undergraduate research (UR) and describes the EvaluateUR method, a proven approach to assessing the skills and competencies of UR students, which also contributes directly to student learning. The chapter concludes with brief remarks on the assessment of course-based UR and two projects now in progress that are adapting the EvaluateUR method to these assessments

The interaction of land-use legacies and hurricane disturbance in subtropical wet forest: twenty-one years of change

Disturbance shapes plant communities over a wide variety of spatial and temporal scales. How natural and anthropogenic disturbance interact to shape ecological communities is highly variable and begs a greater understanding. We used five censuses spanning the years 1990–2011 from the 16-ha Luquillo Forest Dynamics Plot (LFDP) in northeast Puerto Rico to investigate the interplay of human land-use legacies dating to the early 20th century and two recent hurricanes (Hugo, 1989 and Georges, 1998). The LFDP is a landscape mosaic comprised of an area of mature subtropical wet forest and three areas of secondary forest with differing past land-use intensities. We examined the degree to which hurricane disturbance–effect and subsequent community recovery varied across past land-use classes. We expected areas with greater intensity of human land use to be more affected by hurricane disturbance therefore exhibiting greater initial damage and longer successional recovery times. Structurally, areas of secondary forest contained smaller trees than old-growth areas; hurricanes caused widespread recruitment of shrubs and saplings that thinned with time since the first hurricane. Species richness of the plot declined over time, mostly due to the loss of rare species, but also due to the loss of some heliophilic, pioneer species that became abundant after the first hurricane. Species composition differed strongly between areas of secondary and mature forest, and these differences were largely constant over time, except for an increase in compositional differences following the second hurricane. An indicator species analysis attributed this pattern to the longer persistence of pioneer species in areas of greater past land-use intensity, likely due to the more open canopy in secondary forest. When secondary forest areas of differing past land-use intensity were considered separately, few species of low community rank were found as indicators. When these areas were combined, more and higher-ranked species emerged as indicators, creating ecologically meaningful indicator species combinations that better captured the broad-scale plant community response to past land use. Our findings support the idea that effects of past land use can persist for decades to centuries following land-use abandonment, illustrating the importance of land-use legacies in shaping regenerating tropical secondary forests