Theses and Dissertations

In the past decade, a significant shift has emerged around immigration policy, as advocates and policymakers have made various efforts to pass state and local policies related to immigrant integration or restrictions. This thesis offers original insights into current dynamics in immigration federalism through interviews with lawmakers and community activists in Arizona, a leading state when it comes to restricting the lives of undocumented immigrants. Advancing a new framework that connects the lived experience of officials and activists to partisanship, policy, key events, demographics, and racializing events, this thesis bridges isolated bodies of scholarship on immigration and seeks to demonstrate how every person (not just immigrant) are part of America’s current challenges to become a more inclusive nation of immigrants.

This research analyzes lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer/ questioning (LGBTQ) students’ experiences with sex education in Arizona. This research is a grey literature review of Arizona’s previous state policies, current state sex education curricula law, and legislative proposals within the past few years. Analysis focuses on changes after the repeal of the “no promo homo” law in 2019. Through defining the differences between abstinence only and comprehensive sex education (CSE), this will provide a framework to better understand approaches to sex education. As of now, Arizona stresses abstinence-based education. Delving into LGBTQ students’ general experiences in schools provides a foundation to better understand why these students especially benefit from CSE. Since LGBTQ students are disproportionately affected by bullying and are at increased sexual health risks, it is important to address misperceptions surrounding the LGBTQ community. The purpose of this research is to push for more LGBTQ inclusive sex education curricula in Arizona.

As much as SARS-CoV-2 has altered the way humans live since the beginning of 2020,<br/>this virus's deadly nature has required clinical testing to meet 2020's demands of higher<br/>throughput, higher accuracy and higher efficiency. Information technology has allowed<br/>institutions, like Arizona State University (ASU), to make strategic and operational changes to<br/>combat the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. At ASU, information technology was one of the six facets<br/>identified in the ongoing review of the ASU Biodesign Clinical Testing Laboratory (ABCTL)<br/>among business, communications, management/training, law, and clinical analysis. The first<br/>chapter of this manuscript covers the background of clinical laboratory automation and details<br/>the automated laboratory workflow to perform ABCTL’s COVID-19 diagnostic testing. The<br/>second chapter discusses the usability and efficiency of key information technology systems of<br/>the ABCTL. The third chapter explains the role of quality control and data management within<br/>ABCTL’s use of information technology. The fourth chapter highlights the importance of data<br/>modeling and 10 best practices when responding to future public health emergencies.

The privatization of prisons within Arizona has been a hot button issue and needs to be further analyzed to determine their benefits and expenses. To begin this investigation into the effectiveness of private prisons within Arizona and possible steps that need to be taken for its rehabilitation certain definitions and prior research need to be understood. Following this explanation, areas such as costs analysis across different types of prisons, liability rates across differing types of prison guards, and the differing psychology of different types of prisons can be examined to gain an overall assessment of the current performance of privatized prisons within Arizona. After this in-depth analysis of the current private prison system within Arizona, the flaws of the system will become abundantly clear and the solutions that should be implemented to alleviate these problems will be discussed.