The Effect of Low-cost Incentives on Active Transportation to School Rates among Elementary School Students

This study assessed the effectiveness of a school-based active transportation to school (ATS) encouragement program for elementary school students. ATS shows promise for increasing physical activity and preventing excessive weight gain in children. ATS rates were assessed through frequency counts at the control school (N=697) and intervention school (N=693). The intervention encouraged ATS through the distribution of low-cost incentives on one weekday each week. It also required helmet use for participation and included a Walking School Bus component. Findings from this study suggest that the intervention effectively increased ATS on both intervention and non-intervention days

JLFT 009 Geraldine Clark 10-31-1996

Acc #: 328; JLFT 009 In this recording, Geraldine Clark is interviewed by John Beebee about John LeFlore and the Civil Rights Movement in Mobile, Alabama. Ms. Clark begins the interview describing her experiences at a test-in at a Woolworth’s lunch counter, and her additional work helping Mr. LeFlore to test equality in hiring practices at other locations in Mobile. Ms. Clark also describes some of the work she did with the Mobile Beacon. She shares her memories of the complex relationship between Dr. Martin Luther King and Mobile during the Movement. She also describes the aftermath of the bombing of Mr. LeFlore’s house. Ms. Clark concludes with remarks on the legacy of Mr. LeFlore

The Impact of Pedestrian Crossing Flags on Driver Yielding Behavior in Las Vegas, NV

Walking is the most affordable, accessible, and environmentally friendly method of transportation. However, the risk of pedestrian injury or death from motor vehicle crashes is significant, particularly in sprawling metropolitan areas. The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of pedestrian crossing flags (PCFs) on driver yielding behaviors. Participants crossed a marked, midblock crosswalk on a multilane road in Las Vegas, Nevada, with and without PCFs, to determine if there were differences in driver yielding behaviors (n = 160 crossings). Trained observers recorded (1) the number of vehicles that passed in the nearest lane without yielding while the pedestrian waited at the curb and (2) the number of vehicles that passed through the crosswalk while the pedestrian was in the same half of the roadway. ANOVA revealed that drivers were significantly less likely to pass through the crosswalk with the pedestrian in the roadway when they were carrying a PCF (M = 0.20; M = 0.06); drivers were more likely to yield to the pedestrian waiting to enter the roadway when they were carrying a PCF (M = 1.38; M = 0.95). Pedestrian crossing flags are a low-tech, low-cost intervention that may improve pedestrian safety at marked mid-block crosswalks. Future research should examine driver fade-out effects and more advanced pedestrian safety alternatives

The Benefits of Breastfeeding: An introduction for Health Educators

Currently 16% of Americans breastfeed their children for at least 12 months as recommended by the AAP, which is well below the HP 2010 goal of 25%. Breastfed infants receive benefits that can improve their health throughout their lives. The benefits of breastfeeding for children include increased resistance to infectious diseases, such as gastroenteritis, respiratory tract infections, and ear infections. Breastfed children also display lower rates of chronic diseases including diabetes, obesity, asthma, and leukemia. The choice to breastfeed results in economic benefits from lower health care costs and from reduced spending on infant formula. The Healthy People 2010 targets are reviewed along with several studies of interventions to increase breastfeeding rates. Health educators must work to increase breastfeeding rates

Crack in the Mirror

August 199

The design and prototyping of innovative sustainable material solutions for automotive interiors

This research explores the potential for using sustainable materials, in closed-loop systems applied to aspects of an automotive interior. I approached this by using materials in separate recovery streams: biological for industrial composting, and technical for recycling. The thesis sets out the challenges I faced when dealing with the messy reality of real-world designing. These were: working within established industrial systems, complex global supply chains, the marketing of materials and perceived expectations of how automotive products should look. The thesis explores how, as the research progressed, my thinking about the research question shifted, as the problem and solution spaces were further explored. Changing one material element in a vehicle has a cascade effect: this is because each component is interdependent on another product within the vehicle. The car is a complex mix of industrially manufactured parts with established systems producing vast volumes of products for the automotive industry, making them difficult to change. Remanufacturing of parts, recovery for industrial composting and recycling requires systems to be created, as described by a circular economy. These are challenges I faced in making the prototype textiles and interior panels: first, as the work I made was only one component in a product, how would it be recovered from the other materials it was connected with, and second, what systems are in place for recovery as a circular economy proposes? Design for disassembly would partially resolve this issue, but this would involve a complete redesign of the seat and door, which would impact on the whole vehicle architecture. Another challenge was in the transparency of material supply chains and finding information on the true environmental impact of materials. The prototypes were created using craft-processes and industrial manufacturing, the distinction between the two being that the hand-made pieces are imperfect due to the process and materials used in their fabrication, whereas the industrial recycled product is identical both technically and visually to a virgin product. This made me question expectations and perceived expectations of the automotive industry and their customers regarding material performance and an ‘always new’ look. These questions arose through making and reflecting on the practical work, which suggests that there is an opportunity for a new form language for using sustainable materials in large-scale industrial design applications. The thesis includes discussion of the practical projects and reflections on the broader systemic questions that the projects raise, including the nature of practice-based research

Something Missing

August 198

Comparison of single-layer and double-layer anti-reflection coatings using laser-induced damage threshold and photothermal common-path interferometry

The dielectric thin-film coating on high-power optical components is often the weakest region and will fail at elevated optical fluences. A comparison of single-layer coatings of ZrO2, LiF, Ta2O5, SiN, and SiO2 along with anti-reflection (AR) coatings optimized at 1064 nm comprised of ZrO2 and Ta2O5 was made, and the results of photothermal common-path interferometry (PCI) and a laser-induced damage threshold (LIDT) are presented here. The coatings were grown by radio frequency (RF) sputtering, pulsed direct-current (DC) sputtering, ion-assisted electron beam evaporation (IAD), and thermal evaporation. Test regimes for LIDT used pulse durations of 9.6 ns at 100 Hz for 1000-on-1 and 1-on-1 regimes at 1064 nm for single-layer and AR coatings, and 20 ns at 20 Hz for a 200-on-1 regime to compare the //ZrO2/SiO2 AR coating