MA, Kent State University, 2021, College of Arts and Sciences / Department of History

In response to his father's dying wish, Stephen Austin took up the responsibility of being the first empresario of Texas with the job of bringing Americans into the region. The arrival of American settlers over fifteen years drastically shifted the population of Texas as more Americans moved into the region. The events of fifteen years of mistrust between the Mexican government and its new citizens came to an end when in 1836, Texas declared independence and became the Republic of Texas. The events of Texas were recorded and lived by Austin as he remained one of the most influential figures in Texas, acting as a bridge between the Anglo settlers and the Mexicans. This thesis uses Austin to study and understand how the free nation of Texas was not inevitable, and Texas could have remained a state in Mexico. I present several arguments throughout this thesis. First, while other historical works give the idea of inevitability, I argue that an examination of Austin shows how a free Texas was not inevitable. The question of loyalty of the Anglos, as seen by Austin, clashes against the idea that the Americans who emigrated did so planning to free Texas from Mexico. Second, that the Texas Revolution should be examined as two separate wars. When Texas declared war in 1835, they joined the already existing Civil War between the liberal and conservative parties. This war was not for independence or against all of Mexico but was against the centralist party that led Mexico and aimed to remove the Constitution of 1824. The second war would not happen until 1836, when the Texans decided to declare independence, and the war moved to being against all of Mexico. Breaking the revolution up also supports the argument that Austin and the colonists were loyal to the Constitution and their oaths to Mexico. I argue that pressures outside of Texas caused them to declare independence. I believe it is essential to distinguish these two events from each other as they each posed different fu (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Kim Gruenwald (Advisor) Subjects: History

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2014, Art Education

The University Interscholastic League (UIL) One-Act Play contest in Texas is the largest interschool theatre competition in the world. Over 1300 high schools compete in this statewide theatre competition each year. This study investigates the ways Texas theatre teachers view the contest, and how the contest influences the curricula in their classrooms. Six teachers were interviewed on their classroom practice and their curricula, specifically on the curricula's learner-centeredness, social responsibility, and comprehensiveness in theatrical disciplines as well as their attitudes toward competition and the One-Act Play contest. Interviews took place over the phone and Skype and were approximately an hour long. Through the interviews conducted, teachers revealed that their curricula are not limited by the UIL One-Act Play contest. The curricula described by the theatre teachers were widely varied, and each teacher valued learner-centered practice, social responsibility, and comprehensive theatre education to different degrees. According to the results of the study most teachers are not hindered by the UIL when developing their curricula in these three areas and students' experience in the UIL One-Act Play contest can be equally or more active and authentic as in other productions.

Committee: Sydney Walker (Advisor); Shari Savage (Committee Member) Subjects: Art Education; Curricula; Education; Theater; Theater Studies

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 1969, Graduate School

Committee: Not Provided (Other) Subjects:

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Ohio University, 2024, English (Arts and Sciences)

In 1972, a distracted nurse accidentally switches two newborn baby girls on Long Island. The sharp financial, class, and ethnic disparities of these families offer both protection and disadvantages to each daughter. When the truth is discovered over twenty years later, the young women and their birth families must reckon with all that connects and divides them—and what choices and commitments to make (and not make) in the aftermath.

Committee: Patrick O'Keeffe (Advisor) Subjects: Glbt Studies; Literature; Modern Literature; Womens Studies

Master of Science (MS), Bowling Green State University, 2023, Applied Geospatial Science

Food is essential to human survival. Therefore, one of the first things immigrants look for when they move to a new city or country is the availability of their native food. For instance, Nigerians in the diaspora appreciate seeing their native cuisines in their new foreign home cities or countries. This study is, therefore, specifically focused on the successes, challenges, and limitations of Nigerian immigrant restaurants in the US. This study utilized primary data from open-ended oral interviews and online surveys as well as secondary data from the US Census, Google, and ESRI Business Analyst. After finding that Houston has the highest metropolitan concentrations of Nigerian immigrants and restaurants in the US, the study proceeded to use Houston as a case study for in-depth exploration of the state of these restaurants. It found that Nigerians in Houston run a variety of restaurant businesses as a source of extra income that supplements income from their professional jobs. It also found that the major challenges facing Nigerian restaurants in Houston, if not the US, are lack of finances for operations and expansion and the high cost of Nigerian food ingredients in the US. Moreover, the growth of Nigerian restaurants in the US is limited because Nigerian food is still a niche product in the US.

Committee: Kefa Otiso Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Apollos Nwauwa Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: African Studies; Economics; Environmental Health; Geographic Information Science; Geography; Urban Planning

Master of Arts, University of Toledo, 2021, Geography

This study seeks to analyze the potential compounding effects of two voter suppression tactics, gerrymandering and the closing of polling locations, when both are used simultaneously in a given geographic space. Specifically, this study argues that gerrymandering and the closing of polling stations can be used as political weapons to suppress voting access. In addition, because both of these practices are spatial in nature, they can be used to impact certain voters clustered in a particular geographic spaces. As a case study to illustrate the geography of voter suppression tactics, this thesis looks at the 2020 primary elections in Texas, which were some of the most affected by the SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19, “coronavirus”) pandemic. Because many polling stations were closed because of the pandemic and Texas has gerrymandered districts, it provides a window into the compounding effect on votes geographically and illustrates the two-factor obstacle of voter suppression. This study utilizes polling location data for two elections in Texas, the March primary and its July runoff election, in four particular districts in the Dallas-Fort Worth Metropolitan area. The analysis includes spatial assessment of whether or not polling stations closed between the two elections and whether or not these closures were more to close in gerrymandered districts. The results show that polling stations were closed at high rates across all four focus area districts, but most closures occurred in the district least gerrymandered of the four. Polling stations closures may have impacted at least one of the primary elections during the 2020 election cycle.

Committee: Beth Schlemper (Committee Chair); Dan Hammel (Committee Member); Sujata Shetty (Committee Member) Subjects: Geography

Master of Science in Renewable and Clean Energy Engineering (MSRCE), Wright State University, 2020, Renewable and Clean Energy

At the present time, using wind and solar energy for producing electricity in the United States is becoming cost competitive. According to Lazard's 2019 [36] levelized cost of energy (LCOE) analysis of a number of energy sources used for producing electricity in the United States, wind and solar are cheaper than natural gas and coal. While capital, maintenance, operation, and fuel costs are included in LCOE numbers, energy source intermittency is not. Intermittency is an important issue with wind and solar energy sources, but not with natural gas or coal energy sources. Combining wind and solar energy sources into one electrical generating station, is one means by which the intermittency of the electricity provided by wind alone and solar alone can be reduced. The combination of wind turbines and solar photovoltaic panels into a wind-solar farm can produce electricity over a greater fraction of the day or year than wind or solar alone. Predicting the energy output of different combinations of wind turbines and solar panels in a wind-solar farm is an objective of this work. While yearly electricity production rates are an important and necessary part of this work, this quantity does not provide a means to compare the wind-solar farms to each other, to a pure wind farm, to a pure solar farm, or to meeting a given electrical demand by purchasing all electricity from the local electrical grid. An economic analysis has to be performed to do this. This is the ultimate objective of this work. The economic analysis done in this work determines the net present cost of providing a specified electricity demand by a wind-solar farm with grid backup. Including grid purchased electricity to meet demand that cannot be met by the wind-solar farm is essential in this economic analysis. This sets the net present cost of providing all the electricity demand by grid purchased electricity as the cost that must be beat by a wind-solar farm with grid backup. Using grid (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: James Menart Ph.D. (Advisor); Rory Roberts Ph.D. (Committee Member); Mitch Wolff Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Alternative Energy; Engineering; Environmental Education; Environmental Engineering; Mechanical Engineering; Sustainability; Systems Design

Master of Fine Arts, The Ohio State University, 2018, English

The following collection of stories takes place, for the most part, in the border region of South Texas known as the Rio Grande Valley. In these stories, I explore how one comes to faith—specifically, Catholicism as practiced by Mexican-Americans in this region—in childhood, and how, in adulthood, this faith is tried, how it is manifested in everyday life, and how, as a result of these trials, it inevitably strengthens, evolves or dies away. These characters, then, are at various points on the path to believing and, as such, wrestle with an understanding of grace as set forth by the examples of their mothers and other believers around them.

Committee: William White (Advisor); Lee Martin (Committee Member) Subjects: Fine Arts; Hispanic American Studies; Hispanic Americans; Latin American Literature; Literature; Religion

PhD, University of Cincinnati, 2017, Education, Criminal Justice, and Human Services: Criminal Justice

Over the past half-century, the United States has embarked on an unprecedented prison-building endeavor. Motivated by historical context, political gamesmanship, and rising crime rates, voters in the late 1960s began to reward politically “tough-on-crime” candidates—that is, those who promised to combat crime and other social problems through increasingly punitive sanctions. To accommodate this shift in public policy, the nation embarked on a sustained mass imprisonment movement, constructing .3 million new prison beds by 2009. Initially championed by conservative Republicans and later adopted by Democrats, it seemed as if this policy choice became an irreversible preference of the American electorate. Nowhere were the practical and political effects of “tough-on-crime” policy more apparent than in the State of Texas. With the state prison population increasing 1,522 percent from 1960 to 2009, Texas's criminal justice system was seen as the archetypal punitive system, featuring revocation-prone terms of probation, long sentences, and the prolific use of capital punishment. However, after decades of prison construction, Texas's politicians began to balk at perpetuating the status quo. Tom Craddick, the Speaker of the Texas House of Representatives, appointed a reform-minded chairperson of the Corrections Committee in 2005, and in 2007 the state passed a monumental reform package that continues to be emulated in other states. This legislation was pushed in large part by conservative activist Marc Levin, the director of the Texas Public Policy Foundation's Center for Effective Justice. After the success experienced in Texas, Levin formalized the reform effort as “Right on Crime,” the conservative criminal justice reform campaign. Levin's campaign has grown from a one-man operation focused on Texas sentencing policy to a multistate, 14-person endeavor addressing all aspects of state and federal criminal justice policy. More importantly, Right on Crime has (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: John Wright Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Francis Cullen Ph.D. (Committee Member); Edward Latessa Ph.D. (Committee Member); Cheryl Lero Jonson Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Criminology

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 1983, Graduate School

Committee: Not Provided (Other) Subjects: Transportation

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 1980, Graduate School

Committee: Not Provided (Other) Subjects: Education

Master of Science, The Ohio State University, 2016, Atmospheric Sciences

Utilization and understanding of risk assessments in disastrous hurricane events aids in the preparation of and recovery from the event; an especially helpful tool to the residents of Gulf of Mexico coastal counties. This hurricane specific analysis consists of variables that make counties along the gulf coast of the United States more vulnerable or resilient to damage from hurricanes and the hypothetical ability to recover in the aftermath. The analysis included social vulnerability based on the demographics of the county, physical data from ten different hurricanes, and the resilience opportunities available to the residents of these counties. Analyses of the specified variables resulted in a correlation between high initial vulnerabilities and high hurricane hazards with respect to higher risks. However, a stronger correlation occurred between the resiliency of the county and the overall risk associated with each hurricane. Counties with larger overall vulnerabilities only received high risks if the county was not equipped with the necessary resiliency factors. Hancock County, while having lower vulnerabilities than other counties and not always acquiring the largest hurricane parameters, was consistently the county with the highest risk in relevant hurricane cases due to its extremely low resiliency. This low resiliency was based on the county's population of over 2 million and its deficiency in emergency services available to the community.

Committee: Jay Hobgood (Advisor); Jialin Lin (Committee Member) Subjects: Atmosphere; Atmospheric Sciences; Demographics; Environmental Economics; Environmental Health; Meteorology

Psy. D., Antioch University, 2014, Antioch New England: Clinical Psychology

In 2009, Gawande published an article in The New Yorker that put the unknown mid-sized South Texas city of McAllen on the map. The article stated that McAllen was one of the most expensive health care markets in the country; it caused such media-frenzy that in a few days President Barack Obama (2009) began citing McAllen in his speeches for health care reform. Gawande concluded that overspending in the area was due to overutilization of medical services. The present study examined whether mental health services are overutilized based on archival data on McAllen's mental health services collected from Medicaid, Tropical Texas Behavioral Health (a McAllen area community mental health center [CMHC]), and The Behavioral Center at Doctors Hospital at Renaissance (a McAllen area private hospital). Findings yielded that diagnostic-related groups significantly impacted the average length of stay, as well as total costs for psychiatric inpatient treatment in McAllen, TX. Schizophrenia spectrum disorders required more days of treatment within the hospital than Bipolar disorders and further more days than Depressive disorders. Correspondingly, inpatient treatment of Schizophrenia spectrum disorders cost an additional $5,554.80 when compared to Bipolar disorders and $9,095.16 more than for Depressive disorders. Additionally, the readmission rate at Doctors Hospital was 26.72%, with nearly 1/4 of patients being readmitted at least once, and nearly 7% had 4 or more psychiatric hospitalizations within a one-year period. This readmission rate was higher than the national average perhaps because of inadequate after-care outpatient treatment in McAllen. Medicaid data showed that Texas consistently failed to contribute any state moneys to mental health spending; and that Massachusetts saw a considerably smaller increase in mental health expenditures over a 10-year period for both inpatient and outpatient services when compared to the United States as a whole (i.e., 26% vs. 260% for (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Gargi Roysircar Ph.D. (Committee Chair); David Hamolsky Psy.D. (Committee Member); Carlotta Willis Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Clinical Psychology

Master of Fine Arts (MFA), Bowling Green State University, 2014, Creative Writing/Poetry

Assume Deer Dead is a collection of original poetry that investigates what it means to exist in a specific time and place, and how to navigate the inherent violence of that space. In these poems, Justin Carter presents the reader with portraits of the stark Texas landscape and the troubled but ultimately good intentioned people that inhabit it. He creates a landscape filled with ghosts, danger, and nostalgia, and a speaker who has to fight to understand the land and his relationship to it. Arranged in three sections, the poems and speakers in Assume Deer Dead build upon each other to reach a kind of enlightenment by the end of the collection, a new way of looking at an old world.

Committee: Larissa Szporluk (Advisor); F. Daniel Rzicznek (Committee Member); Sharona Muir (Committee Member) Subjects: Literature

Master of Arts (MA), Bowling Green State University, 2013, History

The purpose of this thesis is to analyze the transformation of U.S.-Mexican relations throughout the nineteenth century and its impact on the border during the administrations of James K. Polk and Rutherford B. Hayes. This transformation is exemplified by the movement away from hostile interactions during Polk's presidency to the cooperative nature that arose between Hayes and, then President of Mexico, Porfirio Diaz. In addition, another aim was to place the importance of the public sphere in framing the policy making of the United States and Mexican governments. The thesis focused upon the research surrounding Polk, Hayes, and their interactions with Mexico during their terms as president. The secondary materials were supplemented with corresponding primary source material from the presidents as well as their close advisors such as newspaper articles, correspondences, and speeches from both the United States and Mexico. The conclusion of the work demonstrates that the transformation in the border, first, the United States to become the dominant power on the continent, ending its rivalry with Mexico. Second, the ability of Porfirio Diaz to bring some stability to the Mexican political structure that permitted him to work in conjunction with the United States to control the border in exchange for recognition. Third, the increase in economic ties of the United States and Mexico that made war an unprofitable and dangerous outcome for both countries. Last, the difference in the president's personalities, Polk being ambitious, while Hayes following a cautious policy, as well as the fading of American expansionism and the concept of "manifest destiny."

Committee: Amilcar Challu Dr. (Advisor); Scott Martin Dr. (Committee Member); Rebecca Mancuso Dr. (Committee Member) Subjects: History; Latin American History

MS, University of Cincinnati, 2003, Arts and Sciences : Geology

This study recognizes and describes four bentonite beds in the Manzanita Member of the Permian Cherry Canyon Formation, west Texas, providing the first detailed examination of these potentially important stratigraphic markers. The physical and chemical properties of these beds are analyzed to asses the potential for employment as isochrons in high resolution stratigraphic correlation. Samples taken from different beds are shown to be chemically distinct by discriminant function analysis, allowing for the chemostratigraphic correlation of the bentonites. The tectonomagmatic setting and potential source area for the ash is also examined. Major and trace element data identify the Manzanita ash as being derived from a calc-alkaline series magma in a volcanic arc setting, with a potential source being the Las Delicias continental volcanic arc of northeastern Mexico.

Committee: Dr. Warren D. Huff (Advisor) Subjects: Geology

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2007, History

Texas participated in the bracero program until 1943, when the Mexican government instituted a labor embargo against the state because of numerous reports of racial discrimination there. For the next several years, Texas officials worked to convince Mexican leaders to rescind the embargo through a wide variety of policies including investigating cases of discrimination, reforming aspects of the state education system, negotiating directly with Mexican officials, enlisting the cooperation of the U.S. federal government, and working to improve the image of Texas among the Mexican public. Texas created new government bureaucracies to coordinate these efforts, including the Inter-Agency Committee, the Council on Human Relations, and most importantly, the Good Neighbor Commission. Collectively, these efforts represent a striking effort by Texas leaders and private citizens to influence the foreign policy between their state, and sometimes their individual community, and the Mexican government. Despite these efforts, the embargo dragged on for years. This dissertation argues that the slow resolution of the labor embargo was due less to the intransigence of the Mexican government than to the inability of Texas leaders to effect the kinds of changes within Texas society, such as passing legislation to punish acts of discrimination, which would have convinced the Mexican government that their embargo was no longer necessary. First, the existence of the Jim Crow system in Texas was a constant brake on the nature of programs that could be considered by Texas. Texans were also quite conservative. Their view of government's appropriate role in society left them with the feeling that educating, investigating, and persuading marked the extent of their reach. Other key lessons to be drawn from this study include the intractable nature of illegal immigration across the U.S.-Mexican border. This study also reveals something about how the Truman administration approached foreign relat (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Peter Hahn (Advisor) Subjects:

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2004, Teaching and Learning

This was a qualitative study to learn the attitudes and beliefs of parents of middle school children about calculator use in school mathematics. A survey found that the parents were mostly neutral about the use of calculators in school mathematics, although there were some who very positive and others who were quite negative. The survey was followed by focus group interviews to learn why they held these attitudes and beliefs. Focus group interviews revealed that among other concerns most parents thought children would not learn operational mathematics if they were using a calculator or that it would become a crutch and they thought there is benefit from doing mathematics by hand. Many of the parents saw advantages to using a calculator, such as calculator use can be quicker and more efficient and that children would learn real life experiences using a calculator in their mathematics classes. An intervention was conducted, including a newsletter and a mathematics lesson. The newsletter informed the parents about the project and included information about research on the use of calculators as a pedagogical tool in mathematics. The lesson showed parents one way the calculator could be used as a learning and teaching tool by leading them through a discovery lesson. The parents used the calculator to learn or relearn how to multiply fractions by looking for patterns using a calculator. The intervention was followed by individual interviews with the parents to learn their attitudes and beliefs and to learn if they became more positive about calculators in school mathematics. Most of the parents in this study were more positive about calculator use in school mathematics after the intervention. They had several reasons for becoming more positive, but most of the reasons could be categorized as the parents not realizing the calculator could be used as a discovery tool and not only for computation. Most parents became positive after experiencing the calculator as a pedagogica (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Douglas Owens (Advisor) Subjects:

Master of Science (MS), Ohio University, 1999, Electrical Engineering & Computer Science (Engineering and Technology)

Least mean square algorithm implementation using the texas instrument digital signal processing board

Committee: Dill Jeff (Advisor) Subjects:

BA, Oberlin College, 2011, Politics

My goal is to look at four Supreme Court cases- DeShaney v. Winnebago County (1989), Michael H. v. Gerald D. (1989), Roe v. Wade (1973), and Lawrence v. Texas (2003)- to see how the differences in the levels of generality between liberal and conservative justices actually manifest themselves in their respective opinions. I focus on methodological patterns in the liberal opinions in search of a more coherent liberal jurisprudence. This stems from establishing more definitive guidelines for how best find the level of generality that will maximize the ability to legally justify rights expansion. I end my discussion by applying my conjecture of the most appropriate level of generality in liberal jurisprudence to the future of same-sex marriage. This practical application of how to further the liberal jurisprudential agenda is put to the test when viewed in light of one of the most timely rights-based issues today. After a basic introduction in Part I, Part IIA begins by grounding my analysis within a theoretical discussion of the respective liberal and conservative assumptions behind their methodologies in due process cases involving substantive individual rights. I provide a basic overview of the fundamental constitutional theories that define liberal and conservative jurisprudence. These theories include originalism, textualism, history and tradition, and the moral reading. Since the justices use these theories in different ways to derive both narrow and broad interpretations of the Constitution's authority, it is necessary to understand what they entail at their cores. Part IIB narrows the discussion to understanding these theories in relation to the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, as it is drawn upon in individual rights cases. I provide an overview of how the Court's interpretation of the Due Process Clause is unique in nature with regard to its high level of ambiguity. As such, the conservatives are able to defend their overly narrow methodologies, (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Harry Hirsch (Advisor) Subjects: Law; Legal Studies