11,738 research outputs found
Interpreting the Life and Times of Maggie Walker
As a part of my orientation as an intern at Maggie L. Walker National Historic Site, I was told that 90% of visitors who come into the site have a very limited knowledge of who Maggie L. Walker was and what she had accomplished in her 70 years of life. Equipped with that information I felt a heightened sense of responsibility for the overall quality and accuracy of my tour of her home. In my opinion, Mrs. Walker is one of the most extraordinary people in history, a big claim to make, but this claim speaks for itself even in the smallest of details within her home. Mrs. Walker once fell down the stairs and broken her kneecap, a very painful injury with a drawn-out healing process. To prevent future injury, she had a skylight added to the stairwell to illuminate the staircase for safer travel. While this is a comparatively small change to her home, I think it speaks volumes about who she is and how she addressed obstacles in her life. Mrs. Walker lived in Richmond, Virginia during the height of the Jim Crow era. Mrs. Walker faced laws and restrictions that limited her not only as an African American, but as a woman. She didnât just fight these laws; rather she sought creative solutions to benefit herself and others
The Letters of Stewart Winfield Herman Jr. An American Pastor in Berlin, 1936-1941
This paper provides an analysis of the experiences of Stewart Herman Winfield Jr based on a collection of his letters on loan to Gettysburg College from the Gettysburg Lutheran Seminary. This paper discusses Hermanâs experiences as a student in Strasburg and Gottingen, and as the pastor of the American church of Berlin from 1936 â 1941. Born in Harrisburg, Herman attended Gettysburg College, and the Gettysburg Lutheran Seminary. Hermanâs letters provide both a pastoral and an American perspective on the start of WWII and Nazism in Germany. Herman traveled frequently and witnessed the changes that Berlin faced during World War II. He also records perspectives of the many different people he meets while abroad. His letters were sent to his family in Pennsylvania. An appendix to this paper includes a transcription of a letter Herman wrote to his parents while traveling through Bamberg in February of 1936
A spot check of the status of music education of grades four, five and six in the elementary schools of Massachusetts as of the year 1956-57.
Thesis (Ed.M.)--Boston Universit
My word is my bond ; reputation as collateral in nineteenth century English provincial banking
There are few real-world economic transactions that do not involve an element of trust, yet in textbook economics trust is not prominently discussed. In that world, perfectly informed and computationally endowed agents reach optimal, enforceable decisions in continuously harmonizing exchanges. Trust is therefore linked to deviations from the textbook ideal: incomplete information, costly enforcement, and computational limitations faced by agents. Trust can then be thought of as an algorithm, in other words, a way of resolving uncertainty in a complex world. In this sense trust may be seen as a form of expectation concerning the behavior of other agents whose actions and intentions cannot be (fully) observed. This paper pursues this approach by ârunning the algorithm backwardsâ and trying to establish what factors led a 19th century provincial English bank to trust different loan applicants. Using a data-set of some 200 loan decisions, and knowing the size of collateral (if any) requested, we develop a method to estimate the probability that the bank attached to each borrowerâs promise to repay (i.e., the trust the bank had towards the borrower), adjusting for stages in the business cycle. We then regress this estimated probability on a variety of observable borrower characteristics. We find that trust is not correlated with a priori expected variables, such as borrowerâs assets or frequency of interaction. This suggests that trust was built up in other interactions, possibly through social or religious networks, and that the banking relationship reflected information available to bank directors other than what was purely pertinent to the borrowersâ economic conditions. This has strong implications for the allocation of credit to industry in 19th century England.
Psychological Climate and Work Attitudes: The Importance of Telling the Right Story
In this field study, the authors explore how choosing one context over another influences both research results and implications. Using both quantitative and qualitative data, the authors examine context from both an organizational and a business-unit perspective by studying relationships between five psychological climate variables and outcomes of job satisfaction, affective commitment, and intent to leave. Results show different contextual influences between the organization and two business units, suggesting that different bundles of psychological climate variables yield similar outcomes depending on the context studied. These results bolster the contention that researchers need to identify the right context in field research
The Context of Sexual Risk among African-American Female College Students
Objective: To assess the sexually transmitted infection (STI) awareness, sexual risk behaviors, and related contextual factors of African-American female college students.
Participants: Eighty-nine African-American first year female students attending a majority public four-year college in the southern U.S. participated in the study in Spring, 2006.
Methods: Participants completed an anonymous self-administered paper-and-pencil survey and received a $15 cash incentive.
Results: Participants were highly knowledgeable and aware about STIs and their consequences. While this awareness translated into low levels of risk for many, still others engaged in behaviors and maintained beliefs that could potentially put them at high risk for contracting STIs.
Conclusions: Given the disproportionate rates of STIs among young African-American females, researchers must not ignore the non-behavioral factors (i.e. beliefs and perceptions) that may influence sexual risk behaviors to help in determining optimal methods for intervention and prevention among young African-American females
Modelling the X-ray spectra of high velocity outflows from quasars
High velocity outflows from supermassive black holes have been invoked to
explain the recent identification of strong absorption features in the hard
X-ray spectra of several quasars. Here, Monte Carlo radiative transfer
calculations are performed to synthesise X-ray spectra from models of such
flows. It is found that simple, parametric bi-conical outflow models with
plausible choices for the wind parameters predict spectra that are in good
qualitative agreement with observations in the 2 - 10 keV band. The influence
on the spectrum of both the mass-loss rate and opening angle of the flow are
considered: the latter is important since photon leakage plays a significant
role in establishing an ionization gradient within the flow, a useful
discriminant between spherical and conical outflow for this and other
applications. Particular attention is given to the bright quasar PG1211+143 for
which constraints on the outflow geometry and mass-loss rate are discussed
subject to the limitations of the currently available observational data.Comment: 15 pages, 8 figures. Accepted for publication by MNRA
Use of the STAR PROCESS for Children with Sensory Processing Challenges
Background: This study examined the effectiveness of the STAR PROCESS, an intensive, short-term intervention that combines principles of sensory integration, relationship-based therapy, and parental-therapist collaboration for children with sensory processing challenges.
Method: A nonconcurrent multiple baseline, repeated measures design was used. Four boys, aged 5 years 0 months to 7 years 9 months, participated in this study. The mean length of intervention was 22 sessions delivered 3 to 5 times per week. A behavioral coding system was used to measure change in four areas: play level, positive affect, joint attention, and novel use of equipment. The theory of change reflects the use of multisensory experiences in combination with parent participation to impact outcomes.
Results: Improvement was noted in play level in all of the participants. Multisensory experiences and parent participation were associated with these changes in two participants.
Discussion: The study results suggest a feasible methodology to study occupational therapy interventions. The behavioral coding system was sensitive to change. Play abilities changed in all four children. Preliminary support was provided for the theory of change combining multisensory experiences with parent participation.
Conclusion: A targeted treatment approach that emphasizes parents as play partners in a multisensory environment shows promise in remediating these deficits
Spurious Eccentricities of Distorted Binary Components
I discuss the effect of physical distortion on the velocities of close binary
components and how we may use the resulting distortion of velocity curves to
constrain some properties of binary systems, such as inclination and mass
ratio. Precise new velocities for 5 Cet convincingly detect these distortions
with their theoretically predicted phase dependence. We can even use such
distortions of velocity curves to test Lucy's theory of convective gravity
darkening. The observed distortions for TT Hya and 5 Cet require the contact
components of those systems to be gravity darkened, probably somewhat more than
predicted by Lucy's theory but clearly not as much as expected for a radiative
star. These results imply there is no credible evidence for eccentric orbits in
binaries with contact components. I also present some speculative analyses of
the observed properties of a binary encased in a non-rotating common envelope,
if such an object could actually exist, and discuss how the limb darkening of
some recently calculated model atmospheres for giant stars may bias my resuts
for velocity-curve distortions, as well as other results from a wide range of
analyses of binary stars.Comment: 14 pp, 2 tables, 12 fig; under review by Ap
- âŠ