Another Summer

Escapism is a common defense mechanism, especially for people who are coming of age. Humans run when they feel they cannot handle the weight of their struggle, when the sting of their internalized emotions builds dangerously high and they are left to choose fight or to choose flight. Non-confrontational people will almost always choose the latter. The consequences of facing a problem directly may feel enormous, even world ending, to a young mind with little to no experience navigating adulthood. Through the lens of young adults who flee to summer camp to hide from their strenuous home lives this creative thesis aims to assess what happens after a person chooses flight over fight. These characters must learn that escape is not really possible. Memory will haunt. Internalized emotions will push at the mind and heart mercilessly, painfully, until the person loses control over them. Other conflicts, some bigger than they have ever had to face before, will arise and threaten their hopes and dreams. While these camp counselors may find solace and comfort at their home away from home, it cannot provide the total diversion they seek. I chose to tell this story in the form of a rock musical because it is the only world in which these characters can exist. These young adults leave for camp in order to flee from pain that boils inside of them, pain that they can never truly get away from. In need of an outlet for emotions that are impossible to understand, they are able only to express themselves through song. Music only is capable of building to the same burning intensity as their feelings. Music is able to punch, to kick, to hug, and to kiss, at the intensity that these characters need it to. Music is their release. Additionally, music is used in this show to unite characters through repetition of melody and lyrics, proving that even those who feel like outcasts are not as alone as they may think. Music is also used to carry the plot in a unique and captivating way, so that the importance of certain moments or feelings is obvious and unforgettable. Another Summer is a rock musical that tells the story of lost teenagers who want more than anything to gain a sense of control

Engaging Business Students with “Low-Code” Model Driven Development: Self-Efficacy Beliefs in an Introductory MIS Course

“Low-code/no-code” (LC/NC) platforms are designed to empower non-IT business professionals to use model driven development to rapidly create sophisticated applications. Organizations are increasingly adding LC/NC platforms to their IT software portfolios. Thus, it is likely that current business students will encounter such tools and be expected to be able to use them. This research assesses the implementation of a low-code app development case within a business management information systems (MIS) course with the aim of identifying whether it promotes student self-efficacy of learning complex technology topics and how this relates to interest in further LC/NC skill development and interest in the MIS major

Reconciling surveillance systems with limited resources: an evaluation of passive surveillance for rabies in an endemic setting

Surveillance systems for rabies in endemic regions are often subject to severe constraints in terms of resources. The World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) and the World Health Organisation (WHO) propose the use of an active surveillance system to substantiate claims of disease freedom, including rabies. However, many countries do not have the resources to establish active surveillance systems for rabies and the testing of dead dogs poses logistical challenges. This paper explores the potential of using a scenario tree model parameterised with data collected via questionnaires and interviews to estimate the sensitivity of passive surveillance, assessing its potential as a viable low-cost alternative to active surveillance systems. The results of this explorative study illustrated that given a large enough sample size, in this case the entire population of Colombo City, the sensitivity of passive surveillance can be 100% even at a low disease prevalence (0.1%), despite the low sensitivity of individual surveillance components (mean values in the range 4.077×10(-5)-1.834×10(-3) at 1% prevalence). In addition, logistic regression was used to identify factors associated with increased recognition of rabies in dogs and reporting of rabies suspect dogs. Increased recognition was observed amongst dog owners (OR 3.8 (CI, 1.3-10.8)), people previously bitten by dogs (OR 5.9 (CI, 2.2-15.9)) and people who believed they had seen suspect dogs in the past (OR 4.7 (CI, 1.8-12.9)). Increased likelihood of reporting suspect dogs was observed amongst dog owners (OR 5.3 (CI, 1.1-25)). Further work is required to validate the data collection tool and the assumptions made in the model with respect to sample size in order to develop a robust methodology for evaluating passive rabies surveillance

Spatial Scaling of Prevalence and Population Variation in Three Grassland Sparrows

This is the publisher's version, also available electronically from http://www.bioone.org/doi/abs/10.1525/cond.2013.120055Henslow's Sparrows (Ammodramus henslowii) are distributed in tallgrass prairies in central North America; however, this species is restricted further to specific habitats within these prairies—large expanses with relatively little woody vegetation but an accumulation of standing grasses and forbs, conditions that result from infrequent disturbances by fire, mowing, or grazing. Henslow's Sparrows have been documented to be unpredictable at breeding sites from year to year, but studies to date have considered only local spatial scales. We compared resettlement behavior (prevalence of occurrence and variation in abundance) of Henslow's Sparrows to that of two other grassland sparrows, Grasshopper Sparrows (A. savannarum) and Savannah Sparrows (Passerculus sandwichensis), across multiple spatial resolutions. In Henslow's Sparrows, prevalence was lower and variation in abundance was greater than in the other two species. Indeed, Henslow's Sparrows do not occur consistently at extents of less than 120 000 km2, suggesting nomadic characteristics of where they breed from year to year. We suggest that these patterns reflect Henslow's Sparrows' responses to frequently changing habitat, such that this species is tracking spatiotemporal changes in optimal habitat that result from disturbances broadly across regional landscapes

Solvable Lie Algebras in Type IIA, Type IIB and M Theories

We study some applications of solvable Lie algebras in type IIA, type IIB and M theories. RR and NS generators find a natural geometric interpretation in this framework. Special emphasis is given to the counting of the abelian nilpotent ideals (translational symmetries of the scalar manifolds) in arbitrary D dimensions. These are seen to be related, using Dynkin diagram techniques, to one-form counting in D+1 dimensions. A recipy for gauging isometries in this framework is also presented. In particular, we list the gauge groups both for compact and translational isometries. The former agree with some results already existing in gauged supergravity. The latter should be possibly related to the study of partial supersymmetry breaking, as suggested by a similar role played by solvable Lie algebras in N=2 gauged supergravity.Comment: 31 pages, 1 Tex, 4 eps-figure

Improving the quality of reproductive health care: How much does it cost?

Quality care for clients should be the focus of a family planning and reproductive health program, but can programs afford it? There is no simple answer. The multiple dimensions of quality of care make it more difficult to identify and measure affordable improvements in service delivery. Calculating program costs is challenging, and different methods can lead to widely varying estimates. Determining how much quality costs is a challenge, but it is both possible and important for programs’ sustainability. This brief focuses on various aspects of costs and examines information about the cost of improving quality (as opposed to the cost of quality of care in general), then outlines ways to improve quality while containing costs. Ideally, decisions about quality should be the result of a dialogue among policymakers, providers, and clients. Each program has to decide what standard of quality is appropriate to apply considering its situation, its resources, and the needs of the population it is meant to serve. This policy brief uses the framework developed by the U.S. Agency for International Development’s Maximizing Access and Quality initiative

Mothers Reveal More of Their Vocal Identity When Talking to Infants

Voice timbre – the unique acoustic information in a voice by which its speaker can be recognized – is particularly critical in mother-infant interaction. Correct identification of vocal timbre is necessary in order for infants to recognize their mothers as familiar both before and after birth, providing a basis for social bonding between infant and mother. The exact mechanisms underlying infant voice recognition remain ambiguous and have predominantly been studied in terms of cognitive voice recognition abilities of the infant. Here, we show – for the first time – that caregivers actively maximize their chances of being correctly recognized by presenting more details of their vocal timbre through adjustments to their voices known as infant-directed speech (IDS) or baby talk, a vocal register which is wide-spread through most of the world’s cultures. Using acoustic modelling (k-means clustering of Mel Frequency Cepstral Coefficients) of IDS in comparison with adult-directed speech (ADS), we found in two cohorts of speakers - US English and Swiss German mothers - that voice timbre clusters of in IDS are significantly larger to comparable clusters in ADS. This effect leads to a more detailed representation of timbre in IDS with subsequent benefits for recognition. Critically, an automatic speaker identification using a Gaussian-mixture model based on Mel Frequency Cepstral Coefficients showed significantly better performance in two experiments when trained with IDS as opposed to ADS. We argue that IDS has evolved as part of an adaptive set of evolutionary strategies that serve to promote indexical signalling by caregivers to their offspring which thereby promote social bonding via voice and acquiring linguistic systems