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- Creator:
- Brundle, Shannon M.
- Description:
- This master’s project investigates the feasibility of establishing a composting facility for greenwaste diversion on Vashon Island, WA. The composting facility would serve to compliment waste reduction efforts already in place on the island. The benefits from this project would include reducing greenhouse gas emissions, costs savings and creating a local product. I conducted a survey of the public schools and local restaurants to determine potential feedstock for the composting facility. In addition to the survey, results from a statewide waste characterization study were used as a guide for estimating the potential greenwaste available from residential households. The analysis indicates that approximately 3,100 tons of greenwaste are potentially available for diversion annually, largely from residential and landscaping debris sources. The survey results suggest that there is little interest in participating in a composting project by schools and restaurants, but that these organizations do not generate significant quantities of divertable greenwaste. Overall $25,620 could be saved in annual ferry and fuel expenses if 100% of the food waste and green debris currently going to the landfill were diverted to an on island composting facility. This number is likely to increase in time as nearby landfill options decrease and waste hauling costs increase. Currently, King County is reviewing the results from their island wide survey administered last spring to island residents regarding interest in a residential curbside pickup program for greenwaste. Once the results have been considered, King County will offer a public comment event on Vashon to hear directly from the citizenry. The analysis in this master’s project will inform the decision making process; it suggests that greenwaste diversion may be feasible provided that residential greenwaste diversion rates are sufficiently high and the facility can be constructed at the existing transfer station at a reasonable cost.
- Resource Type:
- Masters Thesis
- Campus Tesim:
- Humboldt
- Department:
- Environmental Systems
- Creator:
- Houle, Caroline Louise
- Description:
- Annie Smith Peck, a scholar, explorer and Pan-Americanist, educated the general public and businessmen about geography, especially Latin American geography. Peck wrote and lectured to Americans about tourist sights, archeology, exploration, mountaineering, and Latin America- including travel, industry, and trade. Peck also educated Latin Americans about the United States. This was significant because, as is the case today, the American public was geographically illiterate. The Pan-American movement, the idea of peace between North and South America, was in full force at the time, and thus Peck was one of the movers and shakers in the movement. Peck believed education was the most important means of freedom for the impoverished- in both North and South America. Methodologies include: letters to the editor by Peck, newspaper articles about her, and correspondence between her and other explorers and diplomats. I also read Pecks writings, including her four books and many of her newspaper and magazine articles. I reviewed numerous articles and books about South American politics and diplomacy in the early 1900s. Historical organizations, corporations, colleges, and other groups she had contact with, such as the Wisconsin State Historical Society, and Smith College, provided materials about Peck. Information about other explorers of her time, Pecks friends, and diplomatic acquaintances also yielded much primary biographical knowledge. I conclude that Peck contributed to the geographic education of North and South Americans as a mover and shaker in the Pan-American movement. In doing so, she attempted to promote peace and understanding between the Americas.
- Resource Type:
- Masters Thesis
- Campus Tesim:
- Humboldt
- Department:
- Geography
3. An exploratory study of cyberbullying among Native American students at Humboldt State University
- Creator:
- Samulski, Emerson T.
- Description:
- This study explores the prevalence and the relationship of cyberbullying among Native American students at Humboldt State University. Cyberbullying defined in brief is the repetitive use of technology to harm an individual. Cyberbullying is a widely studied issue that has gained International media attention with the tragic deaths of several youths and students resulting from having been cyberbullied. A host of debatable issues have emerged from the International research involving cyberbullying including age-specificity of the term, applicability, overlapping, and competing legislation of non-cyber crimes with the expanding cyber-issues, problems associated with varied instruments and inconsistent operationalization and measurement of constructs, and as school budgets are increasingly restricted debate about how best to use funds in the crafting of bullying prevention policies for schools. Trends in cyberbullying research also emerging from the literature include age, gender, ethnicity and cultural effects on prevalence rates, types of forums and technologies used, and the affect and motivations of victims and perpetrators. The present study used a modified version of an 81 item instrument but whose current convenience sample included 272 University students, with an overrepresentation of Native American students (n=58) at 21% of the sample representing 23 US Federally recognized tribes, anonymously surveyed in the Spring and Fall of the 2013-2014 academic year. The exploratory study produced robust data including demographic distinctions for comparison of gender, ethnicity, and adherence to tribal traditions for Native American respondents. Also reported on are, the identity of the perpetrator -addressing the role of anonymity, the frequency of daily Internet and cell phone use, for cyberbullying victimization and perpetration the frequency of occurrence and type of forums used and the resulting affect of victimization and motivation of perpetration. The major research question centered on the potential effect adherence to tribal traditions had for Native American respondents on the rates of perpetration and victimization. Major results include significantly higher rates of cyberbullying victimization and perpetration for Native American respondents that adhered to their tribal traditions and values relating to bullying compared to respondents not Native American. Also statistically significant was the finding of relational aggression as the primary motivation for cyberbullying perpetration among Native American respondents adhering to their tribal traditions compared to respondents not Native American, and Native American respondents that reported not adhereing to their tribal traditions. Relational Aggression is defined here as aggressive behavior with the intent to attack relationships and was operationalized by two questions addressing weakness and exclusion of the victim. Conclusions include the validity in considering effects for gender, ethnicity, and culture on rates of cyberbullying perpetration and victimization when prevention policy is being created, and as response by future research to the current dearth addressing these potential effects in the literature. Cyberharassment is the intentional use of information and communication technologies to distress an individual, and it is occasionally used interchangeably in the literature with cyberbullying. Cyberharassment is distinguishable in some State legislation from cyberbullying in that the victim of technology-based harassment is often categorized as an adult, whereas in cyberbullying legislation the victim is often distinguished as children and adolescence. Cyberstalking is generally used to describe computer-mediated acts or communications deemed as being associated with either an implied or a credible threat of violence to an undistinguished aged victim.
- Resource Type:
- Masters Thesis
- Campus Tesim:
- Humboldt
- Department:
- Education
- Creator:
- Gill, William
- Description:
- Field data collected from the consumption of organic forest soil (duff) by smoldering combustion are analyzed to determine the spatial patterns as input for a smoldering combustion model. Moisture, organic, and inorganic contents were measured at longleaf pines to detect patterns that could be used to explain the spatial patterns in post-burn consumption. The model takes these environmental predictors as input values and then outputs spatial consumption patterns. Methods are also developed to describe the two-dimensional spatial patterns of consumption created by the smoldering combustion. The spatial patterns revealed that smoldering combustion occurs most often at the base of a tree stem at the reintroduction of wildland fire in long-unburned forest. The data from the organic soil pa- rameters were unable to completely predict this behavior, indicating that other factors might be involved. Duff depth was noted as being significantly higher at the areas of smoldering initiation indicating that understanding the soil characteristics of these deep duff mounds at the tree base will help predict smoldering patterns, and therefore deserve further research.
- Resource Type:
- Masters Thesis
- Campus Tesim:
- Humboldt
- Department:
- Mathematical Modeling
- Creator:
- Reneski, Melissa R.
- Description:
- The primary evolutionary goal of many hatchery supplementation programs is to minimize genetic change and fitness loss associated with captive breeding. The objective of this study was to assess the genetic stability of a hatchery steelhead (Oncorhynchus mykiss) population from the Mad River (California, USA) over 35 years of captive breeding. The genetic population structure of historical (1974-1975) and contemporary (2000-2010) hatchery and wild stocks were compared using 14 microsatellite loci. Contributions from four non-indigenous populations transplanted to the Mad River were also assessed. The founding steelhead population artificially propagated at Mad River Hatchery was resolved as genetically similar to wild steelhead from natural areas in the Mad River and those from the Eel River. From this starting point, the captive population diverged over 35 years while the wild population retained the historical condition but was also highly admixed (17-44%) with the newly formed hatchery population. Analyses indicated that contributions from non-local populations were not responsible for divergence of the hatchery population. Instead a lower effective population size in the hatchery (Ne=246-285) in comparison to the wild (Ne=1,935-4,356) and closure of the hatchery population to immigration from the wild suggests drift in isolation is responsible for divergence. The small number of spawners used in many years at the hatchery along with variance in reproductive success likely explains the observed level of drift. The evolutionary potential of both hatchery and wild populations may be constrained unless efforts are implemented to reduce divergence among them and mitigate for the deleterious effects of genetic drift in the hatchery population.
- Resource Type:
- Masters Thesis
- Campus Tesim:
- Humboldt
- Department:
- Fisheries
- Creator:
- Banks, Eric
- Description:
- Studies that examine family violence assert that many abusive behaviors are transmitted intergenerationally. Investigations of intergenerational transmissions of family violence it is important to acknowledge that childhood traumatization has a significant role. This study surveyed clients of a court-ordered Batterer Intervention Program to investigate whether these clients had witnessed or experienced family violence in during childhood. The survey collected information on whether the clients’ abuse was part of an intergenerational cycle, whether clients’ children were exposed to abuse, and the effects of abuse behaviors witnessed and/or experienced as children on the abuse perpetrated as adults. Half of the clients surveyed indicated that they had been abused as children. Additionally, strong relationships were found between experiencing and witnessing abuse as children and the perpetration of abuse as adults. Intergenerational cycles were determined to be a factor among that affect men’s and women’s perpetration of family violence.
- Resource Type:
- Masters Thesis
- Campus Tesim:
- Humboldt
- Department:
- Social Work
- Creator:
- Hill, Margaret A.
- Description:
- A sample of sixteen homicides occurring in Humboldt County, California was used to compare the Times-Standard’s treatment of homicides in 1982, 1995, and 2009. The sample examined eight homicide cases involving a Native American victim or suspect and eight cases which did not involve a Native American victim or suspect. Through the use of the qualitative research method, ethnographic content analysis, three protocols were developed for the process of analyzing the sample. Protocol I found articles without Native American Identifier (NAI) had more pictures than articles with NAI. Protocol II focused on use of kill words in the articles. The word killer was most frequently applied to articles without NAI. Protocol III looked at descriptions of victims and suspects through the lens of victimized, eulogized, criticized, authorized, and criminalized language in the Times-Standard. Victims without NAI were more frequently eulogized and less likely to be criticized or criminalized. Victims with NAI were more frequently criticized, authorized, or criminalized for their deaths. Suspects with and without NAI were equally criminalized and criticized. When a homicide involved a victim with NAI and a suspect without, it was more common for the suspect to be authorized for their actions, than when the victim and suspect did not have NAI. Suspects with NAI were less likely to be victimized compared to suspects without NAI.
- Resource Type:
- Masters Thesis
- Campus Tesim:
- Humboldt
- Department:
- Social Work
- Creator:
- Succuro, Jerry S.
- Description:
- In this study, two ways of accumulating Pb were investigated: natural accumulation and chemically enhanced accumulation with the chelating agent ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid (EDTA). Young cattails (Typha latifolia) were removed from the Arcata Community Pond in Northern California and transplanted into two-quart mason jars containing four different levels of Pb contamination: 0, 2000, 4000, and 6000 mg Pb/kg soil. Three cattails per jar were grown for a three-week period with half of the plants receiving 10 mmol EDTA on the 15th day of the experiment and allowed to continue growth for the remaining 6 days of treatment. Cattails were harvested, separated into shoots, rhizomes and roots, and then analyzed for Pb concentration in these tissues using Atomic Absorption Spectrophotometry (AAS). For the natural accumulation of Pb, no significant differences among the 2000, 4000, and 6000 mg Pb/kg groups for shoots (p = 0.1063), rhizomes (p = 0.1096) or roots (p = 0.2526) were detected. When EDTA was added to the soil, there was a significant difference among the various levels of soil contamination (p = 0.0002). In this particular case, the largest accumulation of Pb occurred at the 4000 mg Pb/kg soil contamination level with shoots accumulating a combined average of 4744.03 mg Pb/kg. These results show that three cattails can remove Pb from the environment in larger quantities if a chelating agent is present in a short period of time. In addition, it appears that the 6000 mg Pb/kg soil contamination is a threshold of toxicity as all aspects of the experiment showed a decrease in the health, natural accumulation of Pb, and the accumulation of Pb with the addition of EDTA. Typha latifolia has a wide tolerance to many different environments and produces a large amount of biomass, which make it a good candidate for use in phytoremediation. Further research should consider increasing the quantity of cattails to optimize Pb removal from the soil.
- Resource Type:
- Masters Thesis
- Campus Tesim:
- Humboldt
- Department:
- Biology
- Creator:
- Mertz, Karly Quinn
- Description:
- The purpose of this study was to examine mental health factors including substance use, depression, caretaker bonding, and social self-efficacy in individuals who were previously placed in foster care. This study sought to compare outcomes in those former foster care recipients who experienced relative and non-relative adoption. A total of 185 former foster care recipients participated in the current study. Results indicated that individuals who experienced adoption out of foster care by a relative have lower depression levels and higher ratings of social self-efficacy than those who were adopted by a non-relative and those who were never adopted out of care. The present study found results in low levels of substance use which were relatively equal among these three groups. Additionally, this study found the highest levels of female caretaker bonding in those foster care recipients who had been adopted by a relative as compared to individuals who were adopted by a non-relative and those who were never adopted, however no significant difference was found in the ratings of male caretaker bonding between groups. Data were collected through the use of The Substance Use Inventory, the Hamilton Depression Inventory, the Parental Bonding Instrument-Foster Care, the Social Self-Efficacy Subscale of the Sherer’s perceived Self-Efficacy Scale, and a brief demographic questionnaire.
- Resource Type:
- Masters Thesis
- Campus Tesim:
- Humboldt
- Department:
- Psychology
- Creator:
- Popham, Gail P.
- Description:
- I studied sage grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus) nesting habitat from mid-March through mid-August of 1998-2000 in eastern Lassen County, California. I located nest sites of forty-five radio-marked hens. To evaluate habitat selection I measured vegetation at each nest site and at random sites. Sage grouse avoided low sagebrush (Artemisia arbuscula) cover type for nesting. They used big sagebrush (Artemisia tridentata) cover type and mixed shrub cover type in proportion to their availability. In addition, grouse used diverse sites for nesting as indicated by among nest site variation being similar to variation between nest and random site variables. Likewise, there were habitat differences between successful nests and unsuccessful nests. Mean nest-lek distance was greater for successful nests (x̄=3588 m, SE=811, n=20, P=0.06) than the nest-lek distance for unsuccessful nests (x̄=1964 m, SE=386, n=20). Rock cover was greater at successful nests (x̄=27.67%, SE=4.6%, P=0.04) than at unsuccessful nests (x̄=14.49%, SE=3.04%). Total shrub height was greater at successful nests (x̄=65.5 cm, SE=4.7, P<0.01) than unsuccessful nests (x̄=49.2 cm, SE=1.7). The height of visual obstruction was greater at successful nests (x̄=40.2 cm, SE=2.6, P=0.02) than at unsuccessful nests (x̄=32.5 cm, SE=2.0). Greater distance from the lek, total shrub height, rock cover, and visual obstruction appeared to characterize successful nests compared to unsuccessful nests. My results suggest that rangeland managers should strive for both landscape and microsite heterogeneity.
- Resource Type:
- Masters Thesis
- Campus Tesim:
- Humboldt
- Department:
- Wildlife Management