The purpose of this study is to examine how community-based youth theater ensembles create conditions for youth to practice cultural agency and to develop a sense of themselves as valuable resources in a broader community development process. The researcher employed a qualitative methodology, using a critical and interpretive case study approach which enabled her to document and analyze three community-based youth theaters in New York City: Find Your Light, a playwriting/performance program for youth associated with the NYC shelter system; viBeStages, an all-girl youth ensemble (part of viBe Theater Experience or "viBe"); and Ifetayo Youth Ensemble (IYE), a multi-age ensemble for youth of African descent living in Flatbush and its surrounding neighborhoods (part of Ifetayo Cultural Arts Academy). All three programs are youth-based performing arts ensembles with a mission-driven focus on positive youth development and community building; they are long-term engagements, active in their communities for at least three years; and they are all part of arts organizations that value artistry as their principle means of impacting communities. All of the young artists involved in these programs participated in a sustained process of creating original performance pieces based on stories relevant to their lives and/or the lives of their communities. This dissertation examines how, through their playmaking processes, they began to identify, critique and experiment with commonly held beliefs about human agency and interaction, to activate and embellish the symbolic systems and repertoires that make up their communities, and to practice new ways of coming together. Through their use of artistic practices, the youth developed a sense of themselves as viable shapers of their communities and, in varying degrees, also used other aspects of culture (values, rituals, traditions, aspirations and the arts) to make meaning, contribute, and shape their cultural locations, offering new forms, symbols, structural models and imaginings.

Ethernet switching is provided to interconnect multiple Ethernets for the exchange of Ethernet data frames. Most Ethernet switches require data buffering and Ethernet signal regeneration at the switch which incur the problems of substantial signal processing, power consumption, and transmission delay. To solve these problems, a cross bar architecture switching system for 10GBASE-T Ethernet is proposed in this thesis. The switching system is considered as the first step of implementing a multi-stage interconnection network to achieve Terabit or Petabit switching. By routing customized headers in capsulated Ethernet frames in an out-of-band control method, the proposed switching system would transmit the original Ethernet frames with little processing, thereby makes the system appear as a simple physical medium for different hosts. The switching system is designed and performed by using CMOS technology.

This study investigated the effect of two different preparation methods on hitting performance in a high&ndashfidelity; baseball batting simulation. Novice and expert players participated in one of three conditions: observation (viewing a video of the goal action), visualization (hearing a script of the goal action), or a no&ndashpreparation; control group. Each participant completed three different hitting tasks: pull hit, opposite&ndashfield; hit, and sacrifice fly. Experts had more successful hits, overall, than novices. The number of successful hits was significantly higher for both the observation and visualization conditions than for the control. In most cases, performance was best in the observation condition. Experts demonstrated greater effects from the mental preparation techniques compared to novices. However, these effects were mediated by task difficulty. The difference between experts and novices, as well as the difference between the observation and visualization conditions was greater for the more difficult hitting task (opposite&ndashfield; hitting) than for the easier hitting task (sacrifice fly). These effects of mental preparation were associated with significant changes in batting kinematics (e.g., changes in point of bat/ball contact and swing direction). The results indicate that mental preparation can improve directional hitting ability in baseball with the optimal preparation methods depending on skill&ndashlevel; and task difficulty.

Since the 1920's, the school musical has been an important event in American high schools and in the lives of students. This study begins with a condensed history of the American musical theatre, into focus on selected shows' value as potential high school repertoire. Review of literature included studies of high school musical theatre, production guides and related materials, and writings both against and in favor of musicals at the high school level. The school musical is usually undertaken as an extra-curricular activity led by performing arts faculty. This study focuses on the preparation, responsibilities, and attitudes of high school music educators toward musical theatre direction. Musical direction is defined as teaching the vocal music, and teaching and leading the instrumental music of the production where applicable. A researcher-designed survey was distributed to Arizona music educators in schools that included grade 12. The response rate was 71%. Questions included items designed to assess the pervasiveness of musical theatre productions, the roles and responsibilities of music educators, and their preparation for those roles. Additional Likert-type questions comprised an inventory measuring attitudes toward musical theatre productions. Results of the survey showed that musicals are produced in 80% of Arizona high schools, and music faculty are expected to lead at least the musical aspects of these productions. Although 62% report that they learned about teaching musical theatre on the job, and that they received no other preparation, 70% report a large amount of personal enjoyment and fulfillment from their work in musical theatre. The mean attitude score for positive feelings about work in musical theatre was found to be significantly higher for choral teachers than instrumental teachers. The primary implications of the study are the need for better preparation and in-service opportunities for music educators in musical theatre pedagogy.

Urban ecosystems cover less than 3% of the Earth's land surface, yet more than half of the human population lives in urban areas. The process of urbanization stresses biodiversity and other ecosystem functions within and far beyond the city. To understand the mechanisms underlying observed changes in biodiversity patterns, several observational and experimental studies were performed in the metropolitan area of Phoenix, Arizona, and the surrounding Sonoran Desert. The first study was comprised of seven years of arthropod monitoring using pitfall traps in common urban land-use types. This study revealed differences in community structure, diversity and abundance over time and between urban and wildland habitats. Urban habitats with high productivity had higher abundances of arthropods, but lower diversity compared to wildland habitats. Arthropod abundance in less-productive urban habitats was positively correlated with precipitation, but abundance in high-productivity urban habitats was completely decoupled from annual fluctuations in precipitation. This study showed the buffering capacity and the habitat heterogeneity of urban areas. To test the mechanisms controlling community diversity and structure in urban areas, a major field experiment was initiated. Productivity of the native shrub Encelia farinosa and bird predation of associated arthropods were manipulated to test whether bottom-up or top-down forces were more important in urban habitats compared to wildland habitats. Abundance, richness and similarity were monitored, revealing clear differences between urban and wildland habitats. An unusually cold and dry first season had a negative effect on plant growth and arthropod abundance. Plants in urban habitats were relatively unaffected by the low temperature. An increase in arthropod abundance with water availability indicated bottom-up forces in wildland habitats, whereas results from bird exclusions suggested that bird predation may not be as prominent in cities as previously thought. In contrast to the pitfall study, arthropod abundance was lower in urban habitats. A second field experiment testing the sheltering effect of urban structures demonstrated that reduced wind speed is an important factor facilitating plant growth in urban areas. A mathematical model incorporating wind, water and temperature demonstrated that urban habitats may be more robust than wildland habitats, supporting the empirical results.

Public health surveillance is a special case of the general problem where counts (or rates) of events are monitored for changes. Modern data complements event counts with many additional measurements (such as geographic, demographic, and others) that comprise high-dimensional covariates. This leads to an important challenge to detect a change that only occurs within a region, initially unspecified, defined by these covariates. Current methods are typically limited to spatial and/or temporal covariate information and often fail to use all the information available in modern data that can be paramount in unveiling these subtle changes. Additional complexities associated with modern health data that are often not accounted for by traditional methods include: covariates of mixed type, missing values, and high-order interactions among covariates. This work proposes a transform of public health surveillance to supervised learning, so that an appropriate learner can inherently address all the complexities described previously. At the same time, quantitative measures from the learner can be used to define signal criteria to detect changes in rates of events. A Feature Selection (FS) method is used to identify covariates that contribute to a model and to generate a signal. A measure of statistical significance is included to control false alarms. An alternative Percentile method identifies the specific cases that lead to changes using class probability estimates from tree-based ensembles. This second method is intended to be less computationally intensive and significantly simpler to implement. Finally, a third method labeled Rule-Based Feature Value Selection (RBFVS) is proposed for identifying the specific regions in high-dimensional space where the changes are occurring. Results on simulated examples are used to compare the FS method and the Percentile method. Note this work emphasizes the application of the proposed methods on public health surveillance. Nonetheless, these methods can easily be extended to a variety of applications where counts (or rates) of events are monitored for changes. Such problems commonly occur in domains such as manufacturing, economics, environmental systems, engineering, as well as in public health.

The construction industry is becoming more aware of its impact on the environment. It has become more sensitive to how it operates and how it can reduce the carbon footprint of the construction process. This research identifies the source of and quantities of the carbon emissions created by an operating modular home fabrication plant in producing, transporting and installing modular structures. This study demonstrates how to measure the carbon footprint created in the production of a modular home. It quantifies and reports the results on a home, on a single module and on a per square foot basis. The primary conclusions of this study are: a) electricity was found to be the largest energy source used in this fabrication process; b) the modular fabrication process consumes a significant amount of electrical energy per month; c) production volume has a bearing on the carbon footprint of each home since the carbon footprint for each period is allocated to every home produced in that period; and d) transportation of fabricated modules and set-up add to the carbon footprint. Further, a carbon calculator was produced and is included with the study. The tool calculates the impact of energy consumption on the carbon footprint of a modular factory or a modular home. It may be expanded to other process driven fabrication entities. This research is valuable to developers and builders who wish to measure the carbon impact of a modular new home delivery system. The study also provides a methodology for modular home fabricators to measure the carbon footprint of their factories and factory production.

ABSTRACT This thesis analyzes the discourse surrounding proposed solutions to the immigration phenomenon in the United States. I conducted two qualitative media analyses on the rhetoric and conceptual frames found in mass media newscasts reporting on the immigration debate. The first analysis covered the general immigration debate and the second covered the appearance of American southwest ranchers. Specifically the analyses contrasted the media's coverage of root economic causes to the immigration phenomenon in comparison to reactionary solutions as proposed by leading immigrant attrition organizations such as the immigration think tank, Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) and Republican linguist, Frank Luntz. The main argument of this thesis is based on an analysis of how the media has used southwestern ranchers as expert witnesses for reactionary solutions on a national level. An acute qualitative media analysis was used to compare the rhetoric found in the media coverage of southwestern ranchers versus the rhetoric found in 12 in-depth interviews I conducted with ranchers in the American southwest. This thesis contends that the media has successfully turned southwestern ranchers into spokespersons for border security rhetoric, furthering the binary debates on border security and immigration reform and thus obscuring the conditions which force migrants to leave their home countries. The grounding theoretical framework for this thesis is based on David Altheide's qualitative media analysis which identifies how certain frames and common narratives ultimately construct a way of discussing the problem or the kind of discourse that will follow. This was structured on Atheide's qualitative media analysis protocols to dissect mass media newscasts covering the immigration debate and more specifically the mass media's coverage of southwestern ranchers. The qualitative media analyses were employed to determine whether the discourse found in nightly newscasts falls in line with root causes of immigration or FAIR's concern with reactionary solutions. To further assess the media's ability to shape discourse, and ultimately policy, these qualitative analyses were compared with in-depth interviews of the ranchers.

Amine-modified solid sorbents and membrane separation are promising technologies for separation and capture of carbon dioxide (CO2) from combustion flue gas. Amine absorption processes are mature, but still have room for improvement. This work focused on the synthesis of amine-modified aerogels and metal-organic framework-5 (MOF-5) membranes for CO2 separation. A series of solid sorbents were synthesized by functionalizing amines on the surface of silica aerogels. This was done by three coating methods: physical adsorption, magnetically assisted impact coating (MAIC) and atomic layer deposition (ALD). CO2 adsorption capacity of the sorbents was measured at room temperature in a Cahn microbalance. The sorbents synthesized by physical adsorption show the largest CO2 adsorption capacity (1.43-1.63 mmol CO2/g). An additional sorbent synthesized by ALD on hydrophilic aerogels at atmospheric pressures shows an adsorption capacity of 1.23 mmol CO2/g. Studies on one amine-modified sorbent show that the powder is of agglomerate bubbling fluidization (ABF) type. The powder is difficult to fluidize and has limited bed expansion. The ultimate goal is to configure the amine-modified sorbents in a micro-jet assisted gas fluidized bed to conduct adsorption studies. MOF-5 membranes were synthesized on α-alumina supports by two methods: in situ synthesis and secondary growth synthesis. Characterization by scanning electron microscope (SEM) imaging and X-ray diffraction (XRD) show that the membranes prepared by both methods have a thickness of 14-16 μm, and a MOF-5 crystal size of 15-25 μm with no apparent orientation. Single gas permeation results indicate that the gas transport through both membranes is determined by a combination of Knudsen diffusion and viscous flow. The contribution of viscous flow indicates that the membranes have defects.

An advantage of doubly fed induction generators (DFIGs) as compared to conventional fixed speed wind turbine generators is higher efficiency. This higher efficiency is achieved due to the ability of the DFIG to operate near its optimal turbine efficiency over a wider range of wind speeds through variable speed operation. This is achieved through the application of a back-to-back converter that tightly controls the rotor current and allows for asynchronous operation. In doing so, however, the power electronic converter effectively decouples the inertia of the turbine from the system. Hence, with the increase in penetration of DFIG based wind farms, the effective inertia of the system will be reduced. With this assertion, the present study is aimed at identifying the systematic approach to pinpoint the impact of increased penetration of DFIGs on a large realistic system. The techniques proposed in this work are tested on a large test system representing the Midwestern portion of the U.S. Interconnection. The electromechanical modes that are both detrimentally and beneficially affected by the change in inertia are identified. The combination of small-signal stability analysis coupled with the large disturbance analysis of exciting the mode identified is found to provide a detailed picture of the impact on the system. The work is extended to develop suitable control strategies to mitigate the impact of significant DFIG penetration on a large power system. Supplementary control is developed for the DFIG power converters such that the effective inertia contributed by these wind generators to the system is increased. Results obtained on the large realistic power system indicate that the frequency nadir following a large power impact is effectively improved with the proposed control strategy. The proposed control is also validated against sudden wind speed changes in the form of wind gusts and wind ramps. The beneficial impact in terms of damping power system oscillations is observed, which is validated by eigenvalue analysis. Another control mechanism is developed aiming at designing the power system stabilizer (PSS) for a DFIG similar to the PSS of synchronous machines. Although both the supplementary control strategies serve the purpose of improving the damping of the mode with detrimental impact, better damping performance is observed when the DFIG is equipped with both the controllers.