Games have traditionally had a high barrier to entry because they necessitate unique input devices, fast reaction times, high motor skills, and more. There has recently been a push to change the design process of these games to include people with disabilities so they can interact with the medium of games as well. This thesis examines the current guiding principles of accessible design, who they are being developed by, and how they might help guide future accessible design and development. Additionally, it will look at modern games with accessibility features and classify them in terms of the Game Accessibility Guidelines. Then, using an interview with a lead developer at a game studio as aid, there will be an examination into modern game industry practices and what might be holding developers or studios back when it comes to accessible design. Finally, further suggestions for these developers and studios will be made in order to help them and others improve in making their games more accessible to people with disabilities.

There is a serious lack of local news in Arizona, the American Southwest, and the United States at-large. Arizonans are craving quality, factual, no-holds-barred journalism that is easy-to-read, and upfront. Quality, local news that covers the ins and outs of politics, culture, and community has an opportunity to not only enhance civic life, promote community healing, and expand knowledge made available to the general public (thus serving the communities it calls home), but to also generate revenue. Further, independent and center-right leaning voters in the state of Arizona — be reminded that independents make up the second largest voting bloc among Arizonans — are often crowded out in a media environment that consists of far-left nonprofit-funded news sites like the Arizona Mirror, formerly reputable papers that have bled readership as they veer further left like the Arizona Republic, and far-right online blogs that reach a very limited audience. The Western Tribune is an Arizona-based journalistic publication. This institution is dedicated to providing high-quality, well-sourced news and commentary on statewide, regional, national, and international current affairs through the lens of good government and free enterprise — as well as Southwestern values. We are a free institution that believes in free institutions. We cover stories that go uncovered because of the corporate media’s blind spots (and they’ve got many — they’re a result of news deserts and out-of-touch coastal attitudes) with the stable support of a robust institution dedicated to Truth-seeking behind them. Our storytellers are not just good writers. We seek to recruit and form critical thinkers with skills that span trades, disciplines, and educational backgrounds. We are building an institution committed to excellence.

For my senior undergraduate thesis, I created a self-exploration project to understand stress management. The Alexander Technique, created by F.M. Alexander, is an educational “hands-on” awareness practice that has spurred variations since its inception (Gelb, 2003). Primal AlexanderTM (PATM), a variation of the Alexander technique developed by Mio Morales, is taught on online platforms, chiefly Zoom and other equivalent video communication. PATM shares with the traditional teachings of the Alexander Technique that learning the practice has many benefits – one of these benefits being effective internal stress management. After being introduced to Primal AlexanderTM by Faculty Honors Advisor Robert Kaplan of Arizona State University, I began researching stress management while also practicing Primal AlexanderTM. Considering that nearly half of U.S adults report that stress has a negative effect on their health, it is fair to assume that properly managing stress in individuals continues to be a major obstacle in healthcare (SingleCare, 2022). My personal afflictions that were a result of stress were beginning to affect my mental, emotional, and physical states of health. Learning PATM inspired my support for clinical application of the practice as a stress management technique as I recognized changes within my body that suggested effective, internal stress management.

In recent years, biological research and clinical healthcare has been disrupted by the ability to retrieve vast amounts of information pertaining to an organism’s health and biological systems. From increasingly accessible wearables collecting realtime biometric data to cutting-edge high throughput biological sequencing methodologies providing snapshots of an organism’s molecular profile, biological data is rapidly increasing in its prevalence. As more biological data continues to be harvested, artificial intelligence and machine learning are well positioned to aid in leveraging this big data for breakthrough scientific outcomes and revolutionized medical care. <br/><br/>The coming decade’s intersection between biology and computational science will be ripe with opportunities to utilize biological big data to advance human health and mitigate disease. Standardization, aggregation and centralization of this biological data will be critical to drawing novel scientific insights that will lead to a more robust understanding of disease etiology and therapeutic avenues. Future development of cheaper, more accessible molecular sensing technology, in conjunction with the emergence of more precise wearables, will pave the road to a truly personalized and preventative healthcare system. However, with these vast opportunities come significant threats. As biological big data advances, privacy and security concerns may hinder society's adoption of these technologies and subsequently dampen the positive impacts this information can have on society. Moreover, the openness of biological data serves as a national security threat given that this data can be used to identify medical vulnerabilities in a population, highlighting the dual-use implications of biological big data. <br/><br/>Additional factors to be considered by academia, private industry, and defense include the ongoing relationship between science and society at-large, as well as the political and social dimensions surrounding the public’s trust in science. Organizations that seek to contribute to the future of biological big data must also remain vigilant to equity, representation and bias in their data sets and data processing techniques. Finally, the positive impacts of biological big data lie on the foundation of responsible innovation, as these emerging technologies do not operate in standalone fashion but rather form a complex ecosystem.

With the accelerated emergence of telehealth systems being deployed with promises to access unreachable populations in today’s socially distant environment, it is increasingly important to understand the barriers that underprivileged populations face when trying to access healthcare through digital platforms. This research investigates the use of telehealth in social and cultural sub-populations, focusing on how the diverse student population at Arizona State University (ASU) use the recently-launched ASU Telehealth system. Statistical analysis of demographic factors spanning the five categories of social determinants of health were coupled with population studies of the ASU student body to evaluate the reach of services and patient diversity across telehealth and in person health platforms. Results show that insurance, racial and international student identity influence the percentage of students within these demographic categories Also, though the ASU Telehealth patient body reflects ASU’s general student population, the platform did not increase the reach of Health Services and the magnitude of students served. using ASU Telehealth. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it is difficult to determine the validity and reliability of these findings. However, the findings and background research point to targeted marketing campaigns, intentional policy decision-making, post-pandemic telehealth resilience, and the continuation of quantitative and qualitative data collection as means to expand the impact and equity of ASU Telehealth into future iterations of the platform. Outputs of this study include web communication materials and qualitative data collection mechanisms for future use and implementation by ASU Health Services.

Universal Basic Income is a proposed policy where the government would regularly pay all citizens in cash. The idea of a Universal Basic Income (UBI) has had a resurgence in recent years because of popular figures like Andrew Yang and Elon Musk, but its history and potential implications go deep into the structure of human society. This thesis delves into how a basic income would transform social concepts of work and disrupt the personal economic model. With the bargaining power and freedom granted by a basic income, workers would find themselves in a position of work freedom and choice that has never existed in human history. With new freedom to do as they wish, the place of work in people’s lives needs to be reimagined as a source of fulfillment instead of an unlikeable but necessary part of everyday life. Workers will be given the choice to leave unfair or unfulfilling work and decide for themselves how they want to contribute within society. From increasing mental and economic well-being for most Americans to serving as a response to unemployment trends in the automated future, to encouraging greater business innovation, there are myriad ways in which basic incomes have the potential to benefit society. Framed by Martin Luther King Jr. and Franklin Delano Roosevelt as the only policy capable of abolishing poverty forever, Universal Basic income will be an important feature of transformative innovative policy advocacy until it is adopted by a major world government at which point the effects in practice will become clear.