Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2007, Graduate School

Committee: Not Provided (Other) Subjects:

Master of Computer and Information Science, Cleveland State University, 2024, Washkewicz College of Engineering

In an increasingly interconnected world, cybersecurity plays a pivotal role in safeguarding organizations and individuals from cyber threats. This research paper aims to create a comprehensive curriculum that bridges the gap between technical and non-technical students, fostering cross-disciplinary expertise. The curriculum is specifically designed to assist small and medium-sized businesses (SMB's) in addressing their unique challenges and constraints related to securing digital assets and infrastructure. The objectives of this research are four-fold. First, it identifies the most reported threats targeting SMB's. The research found that the critical attack vectors for SMB's include malware, web-based attacks, and phishing/social engineering. Second, the curriculum along with technical skills also provides students with essential legal insights, integrating both areas into the curriculum. Understanding the legal aspects of cybersecurity incidents is crucial for effective incident response and for managing attacks within legal boundaries. The NIST's National Initiative for Cybersecurity Education Workforce Framework for Cybersecurity (NICE Framework) guided the development of the necessary Knowledge, Skills, Abilities, and Tasks (KSATs) to protect SMB's against targeted threats. Third, the research develops a scenario-based curriculum. By immersing learners in realistic cyber threat scenarios, their practical understanding and preparedness in responding to cybersecurity incidents encountered by SMB's are enhanced. Fourth,this thesis integrates practical experience and real-life skill development into the curriculum. Students will have the opportunity to practice both attacking and defending in a simulated environment, thereby strengthening their ability to identify, mitigate, and respond to cyber threats effectively. In summary, this research contributes to a curriculum that prepares students regardless of their academic background—to navigate the complex fiel (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Chansu Yu Dr (Advisor); Zicheng Chi Dr (Committee Member); Satish Kumar Dr (Committee Member) Subjects: Computer Science; Curriculum Development

PHD, Kent State University, 0, College of Arts and Sciences / Department of Computer Science

The rapid expansion of cloud computing has led to a surge in the requirement for effective resource management and strong security protocols in data centers. This dissertation presents three related research projects that together create a broad framework intended to improve many facets of cloud data center management. The framework initially suggests a comprehensive strategy for enhancing scheduling methods, which are essential for figuring out how well an application performs. This strategy entails creating a distributed scheduling plan that assigns jobs in a methodical manner according to predicted response times. A Truncated-Exponentially-Weighted-Moving-Average-based technique is also introduced by the framework. The mechanism is engineered to adjust to sudden influxes of tasks, leading to a significant decrease in response time distribution tails and an overall improvement in performance. Furthermore, the framework also tackles the problem of precisely forecasting response times in cloud data centers. It introduces SpearRidge, a machine learning model that makes use of sophisticated hybrid regularization technique along with Spearman Rank Correlation. SpearRidge's high accuracy and robustness are achieved through cross-validation tuning, which also improves response time prediction for more effective task assignment and optimized data center performance. The framework also integrates security measures to mitigate potential threats. It suggests a hybrid intrusion detection system (IDS) that combines artificial neural networks and the Gradient Boosting technique. By detecting subtle anomalies and adjusting to changing threats, the proposed strategy can improve cloud data center security by predicting and recognizing temporal trends in network traffic.

Committee: Hassan Peyravi Prof. (Advisor) Subjects: Computer Science

Doctor of Education (Ed.D.), Bowling Green State University, 2023, Leadership Studies

This correlational study examined the competency of crisis readiness and leadership of ice arena managers using a cross-sectional survey. The target audience was ice arena owners, managers, and operators of ice arenas in the United States and Canada. The researcher examined which factors (ice arena characteristics) best predict ice arena managers' Crisis Readiness as well as group differences in Crisis Readiness. The Crisis Readiness Survey, which consisted of 61 items, was emailed and/or posted to participants. Twelve questions gleaned demographical information, while the remaining items generated nine subscales: Emergency Evacuation Planning, Agency Calibration, Spectator Control, Policies and Procedures, Liability, Emergency/Crisis Management, Credential Control, Perimeter Control, and Crisis Leadership. The subscales were measured using a 5-point scale from 1 (very low capability) to 5 (very high capability). Subscales were calculated as the mean of respective items. The mean of 42 items generated the variable Overall Crisis Readiness. The data indicated statistically significant differences in Crisis Readiness by Participation in Training. The more training ice industry professionals obtain, the better prepared they will be to manage a crisis and lead their staff through it. Whereas Education Levels, Years of Experience, and Job Title did not generate statistically significant differences in Crisis Readiness subscales and overall. Participation in Training was found to be the best predictor of Overall Crisis Readiness, based on the predictive model Y = 2.43X + 2.59. However, Participation in Training only accounted for 5% variance in Overall Crisis Readiness. When comparing the United States and Canada, Canadian ice arena managers reported significantly higher competency in Evacuation Planning.

Committee: Rachel Vannatta Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Janet Hartley Ph.D. (Committee Member); Monica Moll Ph.D. (Committee Member); Kristina LaVenia Ph.D. (Committee Member); Paul Johnson Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Educational Leadership; Management

PhD, University of Cincinnati, 2023, Business: Business Administration

In this study, I examined the effect of exogenous ‘shocks' on role identity, by analyzing the experiences of teachers during the COVID 19 pandemic. Using grounded theory, I conducted and analyzed 52 one-on-one interviews with teachers in multiple settings to understand the lived experiences of individuals directly affected by the event. Through my findings, I introduce the idea of a relational web to illustrate the relational co-construction of a role identity and how it contributes to its maintenance. The findings show how the disruption of identity-sustaining relationships could lead to “identity instability”, a construct that represents the state where the meanings ascribed to an identity by the identity holder are no longer verified through reflective appraisals from society. I also highlight how identity instability can trigger a process of appraisal, and how extended exposure to the precipitating event can affect the consistency of said appraisals.

Committee: Elaine Hollensbe Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Heather Vough Ph.D. (Committee Member); Linda Plevyak Ph.D. (Committee Member); Eli Awtrey (Committee Member) Subjects: Management

Ph.D., Antioch University, 2020, Leadership and Change

This dissertation concerns how Jewish-Muslim and Israel-Palestine grassroots activism can persist in the face of threats to the safety, freedom, lives, or even simply the income and employment of those engaged in acts of sustained resistance. At the heart of the study are the experiences of participants in the Hashlamah Project, an inter-religious collaboration project, involving Jews and Muslims. Across chapters and even nations, chapters of this organization faced similar threats and found universally-applicable solutions emerging for confronting those threats and persisting in the face of them. This raised the question of whether revolutionaries and activists in general can persevere with such work in the face of this sort of menacing. The study found answers to this in determining what methods were most widely employed and which had the best results. The results of the study showed an array of widely-employed methods for navigating threats in high risk activism, and persevering with such work in the face of these threats. This dissertation is available in open access at AURA: Antioch University Repository and Archive, http://aura.antioch.edu/ and OhioLINK ETD Center, https://etd.ohiolink.edu/.

Committee: Philomena Essed (Committee Chair); Jon Wergin (Committee Member); Anne de Jong (Committee Member) Subjects: Ethnic Studies; History; Holocaust Studies; International Law; International Relations; Islamic Studies; Middle Eastern History; Middle Eastern Studies; Multicultural Education; Near Eastern Studies; Peace Studies; Religion; Religious History; Social Psychology; Sociology

Master of Arts (MA), Wright State University, 2017, International and Comparative Politics

This research contributes to the debates on the efficacy of economic sanctions as a tool of international diplomacy. It focuses on corruption, one of the potential unintended consequences of sanctions. Using multiple regression on a custom cross-sectional time series dataset of more than a thousand observations, this research finds the correlation between threats of sanctions and level of corruption statistically significant. The model suggests each new round of threats translates into a 1.25% increase in corruption for relatively clean states and a 5% increase for already corrupt states. The resulting policy implications are examined in this thesis.

Committee: Liam Anderson Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Carlos Costa Ph.D. (Committee Member); December Green Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: International Relations; Political Science