CARVING CANAAN FROM EGYPT’S LAND: FREE PEOPLE OF COLOR IN KENTUCKY’S OHIO RIVER VALLEY, 1795-1860

Over the course of the nineteenth century, Southerners of color flocked to northern free soil by the droves. Seeking refuge from a slaveholding society intent on subordinating those of African descent, many established new homes in Ohio, Indiana, Michigan and places north. Many others, however, carved their own lands of freedom within the slaveholding South. This study explores the free Southerners of color who maintained communities in Kentucky’s borderland, occupying a purgatorial position between freedom and slavery. Maneuvering the anti-black laws and sentiments of their society, the individuals in this study remained rooted in a slaveholding society, despite relative proximity to northern free soil, and made their own freedom in an unfree region. The freedom that they made for themselves was in fact freer than anything the North had to offer. They conscientiously determined that the freedom provided by their own local community and social capital was more valuable than any freedom law could provide elsewhere. In effect, free Kentuckians of color in the Ohio River Valley forged their own free soil from the very land of their bondage

There\u27s Something About Iceland

Despite a recent murder of a 20-year-old girl, an event that was an intense shock to the entire nation, Iceland is thought of as one of the safest countries on the planet due to a combination of worldwide reporting on the infrequency of violence in the peaceful country as well as a certain air about Iceland making it seem just as safe as it is said to be. This project explores the reasons behind an extremely low violent crime rate in Iceland and evaluates the effects that tourism and immigration are having on the crime rates. There has been very little research on the subject of crime in Iceland. The reasons for a low crime rate and effects of tourism and immigration were researched in Iceland through interviews, media publications, observation and even a few museum placards. It was found that the low crime rate in Iceland is largely due to a culture of nonviolence in Iceland itself as well as a nearly homogeneous population and other unique factors. This research could be further developed to further understand the scope of factors that contribute to violent crimes as well as factors that reduce the chances of violent crime

The Effects of Combining Looping, Cognitively Guided Instruction, and Ethnicity: How They Can Collectively Improve Academic Achievement

The purpose of this quantitative study is to gain an understanding of the powerful instructional potential of combining the practice of looping, Cognitively Guided Instruction (CGI) professional development strategies, and the impact these practices have in addition to ethnicity in elementary education. The study focused on research questions pertaining to student\u27s Measure of Academic Progress (MAP) scores and the implementation of looping, CGI strategies, and how ethnicity impacted student achievement. This study emphasizes two types of statistical tests to determine how significant CGI and looping practices impacted growth in mathematics on the MAP test for different ethnic groups. A Chi-Square statistic was used not to support that the hypothesis is correct, but rather to determine if there is an association between the different groups from each variable category (e.g., looping, CGI training, and ethnicity). A logistic regression was used to determine the odds ratio (or probability) of the response variable (MAP growth) occurring with a combination of explanatory variables (e.g. looping, CGI training, and ethnicity). The population established in this study was all students in grades K - 5 that were representative of a stable history in the school district. A sample of the population was finalized at 1,103 students, and this number of K - 5 students represented a consistent and stable presence in the school district over the past three years. The results of the statistical analysis suggest CGI is significant with helping students achieve growth in mathematics on the MAP test--especially with Hispanic students

Geographic Information Systems, Evacuation Planning and Execution

Evacuation planning has for decades relied on the results derived from mathematical modeling and scenario development. While there exist many mathematical and simulation models dealing with evacuation planning most lack one or more critical components needed by the individuals or agencies responsible for removing people from harm’s way. Those critical components are real-time access to and representation of data to establish appropriate evacuation strategies. All the pieces for a real-time centralized evacuation system exist but have yet to be integrated as a single point system. The focus of this chapter is the underutilization of geographic information systems (GIS)