Integrating service-learning into the curriculum at Appalachian State University : a case study

Service-learning is an innovative strategy for collaboration between academic affairs and student affairs. While several studies have documented the success of service-learning, few have discussed the development and first year integration of service-learning. The purpose of this study was to document the ways in which one public institution made the initial transition from co-curricular to curricular service. Using case study methodology, data was collected through the review of documents, interviews, and observations. The documents included the ASU general bulletin, faculty and student newspaper articles, the service-leaming resource guide for faculty, the service opportunities directory, faculty syllabi, and other brochures, forms, surveys, and evaluations utilized by the service-leaming office. The following fourteen people were interviewed: four faculty members, five students, three administrators, and two staff members. Observations were recorded at the first service-leaming workshop at ASU, at a statewide service-leaming conference, and during each visit to campus. Qualitative and quantitative analysis was conducted on the data. The interview tapes were transcribed verbatim and coded by hand. Cross tabulation and chi-square analysis was used on the service-leaming course evaluations, which were completed by faculty and students at the end of each semester. The findings include the strategies, implementation, and evaluation of the service-leaming program at ASU. There are also recommendations for the development of a service-leaming program from a volunteer center

Dietary Supplement Use and Beliefs among College Students Enrolled in an Introductory Nutrition Course

The purpose of this study was to assess differences in the use of dietary supplements and beliefs related to their use based on college major, physical activity frequency, and weight status among college students enrolled in an introductory nutrition class. A secondary database consisting of introductory nutrition students at University of Tennessee, Knoxville during spring semester 2008 was used and contained a sample of 306 participants. Data were taken from results of a two part survey. The first section asked participants to respond about their use of dietary supplements and the second section asked participants to respond to their beliefs statements about supplements. Dietary supplements were assessed in 3 categories: vitamin and minerals, herbals, and ergogenic aids. Results showed that the most commonly used dietary supplements were vitamins and minerals with 228 (74.5%) of respondents reporting that they consumed at least 1 vitamin or mineral supplement in the last 12 months. While only 23 (7.5%) respondents reported using ergogenic aids, the use of this supplement category varied the most based upon major, weight status, and physical activity. Non-health-related majors (19.6% versus 9.0% of Health-related majors, p\u3c0.01), overweight and obese individuals (26.7% versus 8.2% of normal and underweight respondents, p\u3c0.001), and those who exercised daily (21.7% compared to 8.2% who exercised weekly or less, p\u3c0.001) were more likely to take them. Major played no role in health beliefs scores, but individuals that exercised daily and those who were overweight or obese had higher mean beliefs scores, showing stronger health beliefs related to dietary supplements. Use of ergogenic aids varied the most based upon study variables. Therefore, future research should focus on determining reasons for this

Juvenile alewife (Alosa pseudoharengus) feeding habits, movement and residency in a northern temperate estuary

River herring is a term applied collectively to both alewife, Alosa pseudoharengus, and blueback herring, A. aestivalis, anadromous fish that spend most of their life in the ocean and migrate upriver to freshwater to spawn each spring (NEFSC 2006). Juveniles spend their first summer in freshwater and are thought to migrate to the ocean in fall, where they remain until they are sexually mature and ready to spawn (three to five years; ASMFC 2012)

Linkage, association, and haplotype analysis: A spectrum of approaches to elucidate the genetic influences of complex human traits

The goal of human genetics is to identify genetic variants that influence a certain trait with the intent to provide a better understanding of the biology behind that trait. As technologies and statistical methods towards this goal have developed, there has been a change in the approaches to identify trait-causing variants. The three projects reported here cover a range of approaches. Early studies focused on family-based data, using linkage analysis to find regions of the genome shared by members with similar trait values. This approach was used to confirm the involvement of CYP2E1 with the level of response to alcohol in sibling pairs with an alcoholic parent. With the advent of high through-put genotyping panels, the field of human genetics has shifted to population-based association studies that seek to find variants that correlate with a trait. This approach was used to search for regions of the genome that infer risk for Pick's disease, a spectrum of heterogeneous dementia diseases, and to reproduce the association with MAPT, a gene with known disease-causing mutations. Haplotype based analysis approaches have emerged to improve the analysis of genomic data. A novel algorithm for haplotype based analysis was developed to identify long haplotypes shared in a population based on genotypes from genome-wide association data and was found to be very accurate when predicting haplotypes within the shared regions. Together, these three projects represent the past, present, and future of the study of human genetics

Parental Child Feeding Practices: How Do Perceptions Of Mother, Father, Sibling, And Self Vary?

Mothers are important contributors to the development of eating behavior in children, but less is known about the in?uence of fathers. The purpose of this study was to investigate family perceptions of parental child feeding practices. Seventy two-parent American families including a mother, father, and two bio-logically related children participated in the study. Participants completed parent and child versions of the Child Feeding Questionnaire that assessed perceptions of parental control in child feeding. Most family member reports were positively correlated, indicating agreement about the use of the examined parental feeding practices; however, some salient differences between the reported behaviors of mothers and fathers were uncovered. Mothers reported using higher levels of monitoring and responsibility than fathers. In addition, fathers and children reported higher levels of paternal pressure related to feeding com-pared with mothers. Mothers and fathers used more pressure and felt more responsible for feeding younger children compared with older children. One interaction revealed that older male siblings reported the highest level of pressure from fathers. Reported differences in parents’ use of child feeding practices suggest that mothers and fathers may have distinct interactions with their children regarding food. Paternal feeding practices are likely to have unique implications for understanding the development of children’s eating behavior

Using Electrochemical Oxidation to Remove PFAS in Simulated Investigation-DerivedWaste (IDW): Laboratory and Pilot-Scale Experiments

Repeated use of aqueous firefighting foams at military aircraft training centers has contaminated groundwater with per and polyfluorinated alkyl substances (PFAS). To delineate the extent of PFAS contamination, numerous site investigations have occurred, which have generated large quantities of investigation-derived wastes (IDW). The commonly used treatment of incinerating PFAS-tainted IDW is costly, and was recently suspended by the Department of Defense. Given long-term IDW storage in warehouses is not sustainable, our objective was to use electrochemical oxidation to degrade PFAS in contaminated water and then scale the technology toward IDW treatment. This was accomplished by conducting a series of laboratory and pilot-scale experiments that electrochemically oxidized PFAS using direct current with boron-doped diamond (BDD) electrodes. To improve destruction efficiency, and understand factors influencing degradation rates, we quantified the treatment effects of current density, pH, electrolyte and PFAS chain length. By using 14C-labeled perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and tracking temporal changes in both 14C-activity and fluoride concentrations, we showed that oxidation of the carboxylic head (-14COOH ! 14CO2) was possible and up to 60% of the bonded fluorine was released into solution. We also reported the efficacy of a low-cost, 3D printed, four-electrode BDD reactor that was used to treat 189 L of PFOA and PFOS-contaminated water (Co ≤ 10 µg L-1). Temporal monitoring of PFAS with LC/MS/MS in this pilot study showed that PFOS concentrations decreased from 9.62 µg L-1 to non-detectable (\u3c0.05 µg L-1) while PFOA dropped from a concentration of 8.16 to 0.114 µg L-1. Efforts to improve reaction kinetics are ongoing, but current laboratory and pilot-scale results support electrochemical oxidation with BDD electrodes as a potential treatment for PFAS-tainted IDW