Life Insurance Access and Financial Resilience: Fostering Sustainable and Inclusive Growth in Latin America

Existing literature has documented an increasing focus on financial resilience to better address the issue of multidimensional poverty in developing regions. The move to financial resilience is a part of a long process that has examined the relationship between poverty and financial access. Yet because financial resilience is a relatively new topic, the specifics of how financial resilience can be fostered using specific financial products has yet to be substantiated. Thus, this study offers an examination of the relationship between life insurance access and financial resilience in a sample of 16 middle-income Latin American countries, the first study of its kind. The objective of the research is to analyze the contribution of life insurance on supporting the development of financial resilience to strengthen the emergent middle-class to continue sustainable and inclusive growth in middle-income Latin America. This study reveals that life insurance access contributes positively and significantly to increasing financial resilience in middle-income Latin America with potentially significant effects on middle class resilience and sustained poverty alleviation

Sit, Stay, LEARN: Agricultural Education- An SAE Manual for Dog Obedience Training

Canine Obedience training is a bountiful career path that allows students to work with animals to work with both people and their pets. Being a dog trainer is just as much an animal job as it is a people job and experience in training and working with customers is the best way to get a company position. This manual aims to provide an all-encompassing resource for Novice, Intermediate, and Advance FFA members looking to explore an SAE in Canine training. This manual serves the purpose of guiding members in starting a project. This guide is for students who have an interest in an animal project and should increase students\u27 ability to obtain an SAE whether they have land/resources for livestock. Upon completing this project, students should have recorded hours and experience of dog training that could be used to fulfill experience hours for certifications in canine training. FFA provides students the ability to explore their interests in numerous agricultural fields. This manual will serve the purpose as a guide and resource compilation for students looking to gain knowledge and skills in a small animal field of canine obedience training. This manual will specialize in commands that can be used in entrepreneurship and placement projects for students looking to train dogs for basic obedience at home or in someone else\u27s home. This manual will guide students on training tips, styles, and requirements as well as provide resource links for students to expand their knowledge further

Electrochemical Treatment of Mining and Oilfield Wastewater Using Recycled Titanium Alloy Electrodes

This thesis explores the integration of circular economy principles into wastewater treatment through the innovative use of recycled Ti-6Al-4V titanium alloy electrodes. By repurposing titanium alloys from metal additive manufacturing (AM) waste, the research aims to address the treatment of acidic and oil-contaminated industrial wastewater in a sustainable manner. The recycled electrodes demonstrate notable stability and fouling resistance in challenging acidic conditions, attributed to their unique surface porosity and conductive properties. Electrochemical processes, including hydrogen evolution at the cathode, facilitate metal ion precipitation and destabilize surfactant-stabilized oil droplets. Cyclic voltammetry and long-term stability tests highlight the electrodes’ resilience, providing an effective alternative to conventional materials. A key discovery is the role of the electric double layer (EDL) surrounding hydrogen bubbles in neutralizing charged contaminants. Sodium ions within the EDL enhance charge screening, enabling efficient aggregation and removal of contaminants. Additionally, the effect of varying electrolyte compositions on EDL stability was investigated to optimize treatment conditions. These findings support the potential for recycled titanium electrodes to serve as cost-effective and scalable alternatives to conventional materials in industrial water remediation. By bridging waste generation in the metal AM industry with the needs of wastewater treatment, this work underscores the transformative potential of cross-sector synergy within a circular economy. Future research will focus on molecular modeling of the EDL to deepen understanding of ion interactions and further refine the electrochemical processes. Advisor: Li Ta

Documenting meme culture and preserving ephemera through digital display

ESPN College GameDay came to the James Madison University campus in 2015 and 2017, and functions as a live broadcast, pre-football game event that draws huge crowds. Students bring hand-made signs and posters to the broadcast, and these posters feature prominently in the background of the televised event. When it was announced that the program would come to JMU, Special Collections put out a call on social media to collect student-created GameDay posters, to document the historic athletics event, as well as the student experience around College GameDay. A total of 16 posters were donated, and the collection was formally arranged, described, and digitized for online access in 2022. The poster, and two presenters from JMU, will discuss the unique challenges of documenting and describing meme culture, and how the ephemeral relevancy of memes required item-level description in order to preserve original meaning and intent. Additionally, the poster and presenters will show how the inherent instability of the medium–cardboard, glue, glitter, markers and tape–of handmade posters made digitization for online access a necessity to preserve the look and meaning behind the rapidly deteriorating physical objects. Presenters will also discuss technologies used to support description and access to the collection, including ArchivesSpace and Artstor, and key takeaways learned from the project, from acquisition to online display

Effect of postactivation potentiation on fifty-meter freestyle in national swimmers

Effect of postactivation potentiation (PAP) on fifty meters freestyle in national swimmers. 2013.- The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of PAP on 50m freestyle in national-level swimmers. Four warm-ups were compared: A traditional race-specific warm-up (RSWU), upper body PAP (UBPAP), lower body PAP (LBPAP) and combined PAP warm-up (CPAP). Eighteen (10 men, 8 women) national-level swimmers participated in this study, which included seven separate testing sessions. Participants' 3 repetition maximum (3RM) of the pull-up (PU) was established in session 1. In session 2, rest periods for muscle enhancement of the upper body were determined using a medicine-ballthrow test 4, 8 and 12 minutes post UBPAP stimulus (1 x 3RM of the PU). In session 3, swimmers performed a counter movement jump 4, 8 and 12 minutes post LBPAP stimulus (1x5 jumps to a box whilst carrying 10% of the participants' body weight). The 50m freestyle tests were performed on sessions 4 to 7, preceded by each warm-up protocol and corresponding rest periods. A repeated measures ANOVA (p<0.05) and Bonferroni post hoc test revealed that RSWU elicited faster swimming times than UBPAP (29.00 ± 2.05 vs. 29.36 ± 1.88s p=0.046). Additionally, when data were split into gender, in the male group the UBPAP elicited significantly slower times than RSWU (27.51 ± 1.06 vs. 28.01 ± 1.17s p=0.047) and CPAP (27.49 ± 1.12 vs. 28.01 ± 1.17s p=0.02). These findings suggest individualized PAP warm-up may be a valuable tool to enhance performance in sprint events, particularly in male swimmers. However, the PU may not be an appropriate PAP stimulus on its own

Hole concentration and phonon renormalization in Ca-doped YBa_2Cu_3O_y (6.76 < y < 7.00)

In order to access the overdoped regime of the YBa_2Cu_3O_y phase diagram, 2% Ca is substituted for Y in YBa_2Cu_3O_y (y = 7.00,6.93,6.88,6.76). Raman scattering studies have been carried out on these four single crystals. Measurements of the superconductivity-induced renormalization in frequency (Delta \omega) and linewidth (\Delta 2\gamma) of the 340 cm^{-1} B_{1g} phonon demonstrate that the magnitude of the renormalization is directly related to the hole concentration (p), and not simply the oxygen content. The changes in \Delta \omega with p imply that the superconducting gap (\Delta_{max}) decreases monotonically with increasing hole concentration in the overdoped regime, and \Delta \omega falls to zero in the underdoped regime. The linewidth renormalization \Delta 2\gamma is negative in the underdoped regime, crossing over at optimal doping to a positive value in the overdoped state.Comment: 18 pages; 5 figures; submitted to Phys. Rev. B Oct. 24, 2002 (BX8292

Observational Constraints on the Angular and Spectral Distributions of Photons in Gamma-Ray Burst Sources

The typical spectra of gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) are discussed in the context of the compactness problem for GRB sources and how it is resolved in the popular fireball model. In particular, observational (model-independent) constraints on the collimation of the gamma-rays and the dependence of the collimation angle on the photon energy are considered. The fact that the threshold for the creation of $e^{-}e^{+}$ pairs depends on the angle between the momenta of the annihilating photons in the GRB source provides an alternative solution to the compactness problem. A new approach to explaining GRBs, taking into account the angular dependence for pair creation, is proposed, and the main features of a scenario describing a GRB source with a total (photon) energy smaller or of the order of $10^{49}$ erg are laid out. Thus, we are dealing with an alternative to an ultra-relativistic fireball, if it turns out (as follows from observations) that all "long" GRBs are associated with normal (not peculiar) core-collapse supernovae. The effects of radiation pressure and the formation of jets as a consequence of even a small amount of anisotropy in the total radiation field in a (compact) GRB source are examined in this alternative model. Possible energy release mechanisms acting in regions smaller or of the order of $10^{8}$ cm in size (a compact model for a GRB) are discussed. New observational evidence for such compact energy release in the burst source is considered.Comment: 15 pages, no figures, no table

The Role of the Literacy Coach: The Challenge of Change

The process of change in education requires effective leadership along with professional development and on-site support. Fear of change and risk-taking may result in some teachers resisting change. Literacy coaches can provide the needed follow-up training and support for professional development that assists teachers to successfully implement new strategies and methods of instruction. Michael Fullan\u27s ideas on the change process serve as the foundation for this article. The author incorporates the perspectives of researchers and leaders in the field of change with her own experiences to discuss the importance of understanding change, the factors affecting its initiation, and the role of professional development when implementing educational change. She attempts to assist others to better understand the coaching role by sharing information about the qualities, duties, and responsibilities of a literacy coach ~long with the need for a system support system to assist coaches in their efforts

Métodos de clusterização para apoio à classificação estética de documentos

Neste trabalho serão abordados estudos referentes à classificação de grande quantidade de documentos de conteúdo variável. Em tal processo quando um grande número de documentos é gerado, existe a necessidade de um usuário verificá-los um a um com a intenção de separá-los em bons (com pouco ou nenhum problema estrutural) ou ruins (que possuem problemas estruturais), processo este considerado lento e oneroso. Considerando este problema, neste trabalho foi desenvolvida uma ferramenta de classificação estética de documentos que visa reduzir esta intervenção humana. A ferramenta desenvolvida é baseada em métricas que avaliam o quanto um documento automaticamente gerado difere de seu template, criando para cada um destes documentos uma assinatura baseada nas técnicas de fingerprint, objetivando primeiramente distingui-los entre si para então utilizar técnicas de clusterização criando grupos de documentos com características semelhantes. O algoritmo K-Medóides é usado para fazer tal agrupamento, tal algoritmo funciona criando grupos de objetos considerando um destes como base para a criação de cada cluster. A idéia deste trabalho é reduzir a intervenção humana fazendo com que um usuário classifique em bom ou ruim apenas determinados documentos de cada grupo formado pelo algoritmo de clusterização. São também apresentados resultados de quatro experimentos realizados com esta ferramenta avaliando as contribuições para diminuir a intervenção humana no processo de classificação de documentos.This work presents a study about classifying a large amount of variable data printing documents. At such process when a large number of documents is generated there is the need for a user to classify then one by one with the goal to separate then in good (those with none or few structural problem) or bad (those with several structural problems), a process that is considered very slow. Considering this problem, in this work we build a tool for aesthetical document classification, winch has the goal to reduce such human intervention. The developed tool is based on metrics that determines how different are the documents that was automatic generated to their respective template, creating for each one of those documents a signature based in the fingerprinting techniques. After that, clustering techniques are used to create groups which the documents that have similar characteristics. The K-Medoids algorithm is used to create those groups. Such algorithm works creating groups of objects considering one of then as a base for each created cluster. The main idea is to reduce the human intervention by asking for a user to classify in good or bad specific documents on each cluster. It is also presented the results of four experiments that was realized with this tool, evaluating the contributions to reduce the human intervention in the document classification process

O efeito dos apoios elasticos em barras longas de seção delgada aberta

Orientador: Leandro Palermo JuniorDissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Faculdade de Engenharia CivilResumo: Apresenta-se neste trabalho a formulação energética para o estudo de barras de seção delgada aberta com influência de vinculação elástica contínua ou discreta. A utilização do método dos elementos finitos levou à elaboração de um programa computacional que permite o estudo das barras para diversas condições de carregamento, vinculação e forma de aplicação da vinculação elástica. Tem-se a possibilidade de determinar cargas críticas com seus modos de flambagem, no caso de problemas de 1.1Abstract: Thin walled open beams with open cross sections are studied taking into account the influence of continuous and/or discrete elastic supports. The finite element method was used in the development of a computer code which allows the stability analysis for different loadings and rigid or elastic supports. Critical loads and corresponding buckling modes, displacements and forces maybe computed in problems with geometric non-linearities. The classical vetorial iteration method is used to determine the least eigenvalues (criticalloads) and corresponding eigenvectors (buckling modes). The other eigenvalues and eigenvectors may also be obtained. Examples are presented for models with different loading and support conditions, discussing the effects on the beams behaviourMestradoEstruturasMestre em Engenharia Civi