More than 700 students submitted over 300 individual and team research projects to present at the annual Stander Symposium on April 22, 2021. Students chose to share their research in a variety of ways: downloadable posters and papers; live presentations on Zoom; recorded presentations; and safe-distance live presentations from front porches and other locations on campus. Browse the gallery below or search for specific research projects using the search function at the top left of the screen.
This gallery contains projects from the 2021 Stander Symposium that address issues raised in the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
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Effects of Cold Pressor Test on Cerebral Blood Flow and Motor Control
Sarah M. Collins, Kiersten Michelle Duffy
Motor control can be divided between gross and fine motor skills, which are impacted by environmental and genetic influences. Although the population of interest was pilots, the subjects involved in the study were male and female college students. The aim of the study was to explore the impact of stress on motor control, and gain helpful physiological information to improve the performance of pilots. Both men and women were selected for the study, then completed three phases: familiarization, control, and experimental. The experimental trial included a cold pressor test (CPT). A CPT involves a participant placing their limb in a container of ice water, which acts as an acute physiological stress and activator for the sympathetic nervous system (SNS). The results between the three trials were measured and compared to determine a relationship between motor control and physiological stress.
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Effects of Health and Sports Science Classes on the Students’ Body Image Perception and Behaviors
Emily Frances Harnen, Allison J. Ladd, Emilia Jelski Porter
There are a number of individual and personal factors that contribute to poor body image and corresponding health-related behaviors. The influence of social media and Western culture on body image has been well examined; however, less is known about how the study of behavioral, dietary, and medical health interventions affects body image perception in health professionals. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to investigate the correlation between taking health-related classes and personal behavior and body image perception among students at a 4-year university. We will recruit both male and female participants of sophomore standing or higher at the University of Dayton who were enrolled as full-time students taking undergraduate classes. First year and graduate students will be excluded from the study. This cross-sectional study will be conducted using a self-administered survey sent to undergraduate students via google forms. We referenced the previously validated Body Dysmorphic Disorder Questionnaire (BDDQ), Muscle Dysmorphic Disorder Inventory (MDDI), and Body Image Avoidance Questionnaire (BIA-Q) in order to generate original questions for the study. The results from our questions will yield a body image score for each participant. This score will be used to run an independent t-test to compare body image perceptions between health majors and non-health majors.
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Empirical Research Presentations in Economics
Thomas Abrams, Brandon D. Adams, Brian Patrick Allspaw, Carleigh Joy Baum, Gavin Alexander Bicknell, Christopher J. Birck, Ethan M. Bogan, Benjamin Bussen, Antonio J. Concha, Natalie M. Coppolino, Michael Anthony Cortese, Kyle Joseph DeSantis, Allison Ann Edwards, Mitchell Scott Erickson, Michael Andrew Fields, Hunter R. Folan, Michael E. Francis, Kaitlyn M. Fullenkamp, Benjamin Romohr Furash, Nicholas William Garth, Joseph W. Guehring, Tia Anastasia Hachwa, Maeve Murnane Harrington, Allison Rose Keith, Maximilian B. Kirk, Bridget Bozena Krysztopa, Benjamin F. Lally, Amira Elizabeth Learst-Ahmed, Ethan Thomas Letsch, Lauren E. Luechtefeld, John Kameron Milliken, Matthew F. Mittelstaedt, Jacob Robert Pieniazek, Dillon J. Pietrangelo, Hamza Nasser Majid Mansoor Rumhi, Danielle M. Savovich, Matthew Brian Shea, Madison Sinclair Sheets, William Henry Sloyan, Conrad Harrison Tubbs, Adam L. Uhlenbrock, Mitchell Alexander Walsh, Osa M. Wheeler, Lauren P. Williams, Nolan Patrick Yager
Four years of coursework culminate in a written and oral presentation of an empirical research project during the senior capstone course. Students apply economic theory and econometric techniques to analyze data in order to answer an original research question.
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Environmental Racism, Urban Ecosystems, and the Pursuit of Solutions that Enfranchise Communities of Color
Niani Brown
Environmental justice is a social justice issue concerned with equity of protection, involvement, and consideration of all people and communities regarding environmental regulation from development to enforcement. Environmental racism, then, is the idea that historical discrimination has limited access to environmental benefits for some members of the population based on race. This includes access to healthy food options, disaster protection, relief, and greenspace--issues that disproportionately affect marginalized communities. This study focuses on greenspace access, in particular, using the City of Dayton and surrounding areas as a model. I looked at previous research that focused on the uneven distribution in poor and minority communities as a whole and compared this to what is seen in the model system as well as the ways in which access to greenspace benefits the community and the environment. I focused the latter part of the study on community involvement and engagement. This project specifically focused on how environmental injustice has impacted residents in North and West Dayton and the ways that environmental justice initiatives can engage the community and work alongside other social justice initiatives to bring about positive change.
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Experiential Learning Reflections From Human Rights Students
Katelyn Hallie Barnes, Anna Elizabeth Beebe, Bailee K. Boland, Liliana Melissa Busic, Grace Elizabeth Cannon, Morgan Morgan Cox, Lydia Rita Fatime Diabate-Tonne, Grace Elaine Gibson, Hannah Elizabeth Gibson, Bridget Therese Graham, Tongyu Guo, Lauren Marie Higgins, Laura Ann Hughes, Aileen Marisa Hull, Kate Mulvihill Jones, Kelsey Marie Kamil, Samuel S. Laird, Maya Rose Leibold, Kaitlin B. Lewis, Brandy Megan Lynch, Anna Mumma, Cameron Cristina Nowlin, Meredith N. Robinson, Steven Stalnaker Shamblen, Jennifer Ann Sobnosky, Lauren Elizabeth Tobal, Nicole Ann Vanvoorhis, Angela Kay Weiland
This course involves an experiential learning project with two NGO partners, Counterpart International and Miss Able-Humura. Students, working in teams of 4-5, are engaged in a range of projects from social media and marketing to strategic visioning and fundraising to programming and alumni networking. For this Stander Presentation, students will present their work and will reflect on the challenges and opportunities of partnering with NGOs in the context of a course, particularly one focused on human rights.
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Experimental Validation of Low Temperature Viscosity Predictions for Sustainable Aviation Fuel Blends
Franchesca Rose Hauck
With the rise of focus and funding in sustainable initiatives, the transportation sector has identified Sustainable Aviation Fuels (SAFs) as a response to reduce carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas outputs into the atmosphere. Before SAFs can be used by airlines, they have to pass an approval process to make sure fuels operate within industry standards. The approval processes is very time and material expensive. To lower overall costs to this process, a pre-screening process has been developed to predict physical and chemical properties of the prospective fuels. Viscosity has been identified as one of the key properties as it lends itself to is ignition probability prediction.The focus of this study is to validate different viscosity extrapolation and blending models at low temperatures. The blends tested are ternary blends of current fuels and key molecules found within approved SAFs. Four different sets of blends were tested to see how other physical or chemical properties affect the viscosity when blended and measured at -40°C and -20°C. Of the six models tested, the Arrhenius Blending Model results in the least amount of error compared to experimental values. As molecules were introduced into the blend sets, errors increased. Overall low error suggests the utility of this blend model in property prediction. To further lower error, future work can investigate the effects of molecular size and interactions within blends.
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Explainable Deep Learning for Construction Site Safety
Ishan Vijay Ghutake
The construction industry is going through a huge shift toward automation, with safety being one of the major challenges. We always want to take measures through which more accidents resulting serious injuries and deaths could be avoided. Indeed the construction sites are bound with several safety rules, one of the most important is having required personal protective equipment (PPE) based on the worker working environment. The presence of the monitoring camera at construction site provides an opportunity to enforce these safety rules by applying computer vision techniques and algorithms. This study shows capability of the Deep Learning model to classify worker as safe and unsafe and provides logical explanation to strengthen the prediction result. Here we exemplified classification of worker by using five convolutional neural network models with various layer structures. We collect a dataset of construction site scenes and annotate each image scene as safe and unsafe according to the workers working environment. The state-of-the-art neural networks successfully perform the binary classification with up to 90% accuracy. Furthermore, feature visualizations, such as Guided Back Propagation, Grad-CAM and different variants of LRP which is successful in showing which pixel in the original image contribute to the diagnosis and to what extent.
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Exploration of Correlations in Fitness and Injury Screening Clinic
Luke Kelly Knapke, Julianna D. Leonard, Will Stephen Majercak, Abigail R. Shahady, Ciara Ann White
The Department of Health and Sport Science has recently piloted a Nutrition, Fitness, and Injury Screening clinic to provide an experiential-learning opportunity for our student practitioners as well as important health-related data to the campus community. Within this program, clients are able to complete one or more of the following: nutritional consultations, health and skill related fitness testing, and injury screening. Here, we examine a variety of potential relationships between the numerous assessments that were performed. Specifically, we have explored questions both within each aspect of the clinic and several cross-disciplinary queries. Within the fitness testing protocols, we compared the multiple body composition and resting energy expenditure estimations and measurements that were made. Within the injury screening task, we assessed multiple measures of lower body coordination. With an interest in understanding how fitness measures may relate to and/or predict injury-risk, we also examined the relationship between: 1) balance and body composition; and, 2) lower body power and high-risk lower body coordination patterns. Our combined oral presentation will highlight our procedures and findings, as well as potential future investigations we are interested in pursuing.
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Exploring Dynamic Viscosity with Self-Assembly Systems Outside of Equilibrium
Andrew Peter Lingafelter, Jack Brian Mclean
All fluids have a characteristic viscosity and fluids commonly studied exist in an equilibrium state. However, some exist outside of equilibrium. These fluids are known as non-Newtonian fluids. Non-Newtonian fluids have a dynamic viscosity, which means that the coefficient of viscosity is dependent on the pressure of the system as well as temperature. Systems that have the ability to self-assemble from surfactant molecules also can express this dynamic viscosity, and achieve a state outside of equilibrium. The making and characteristics of such a system were explored. Copious amounts of energy are wasted in the form of heat ejected into the atmosphere from general to industrial processes. Future applications of self-assembly systems could include harnessing and reutilizing this wasted energy.
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Exploring the Relationship Between Parental Warmth and Delinquency Among Youthful Offenders
Sean Joseph Stull
The focus of the current paper is to examine the link between parental warmth and delinquency. The specific focus was looking at how both parents’ parental warmth levels impact the adolescents in the study in relation to aggressive crimes. The research question for this paper is, "How does the level of parental warmth from both parents contribute to the possibility of the child becoming aggressively delinquent?” Research was done first to see what past studies and data was found on the subject. Some of the research done was finding out the definition of parental warmth and similar experiments done, all of which will be covered in the paper. The Pathway to Desistance data was used to test the aforementioned research question. The Pathways to Desistance is, a study conducted in Pennsylvania and Arizona that examined 1,354 serious juvenile offenders to assess the factors and experiences linked to their desistance from delinquency as they age out of adolescence. The sample is 86.4% males, 14.6% females, 20.2% white, 41.4% black, 33.5% Hispanic, and 4.5% Other. The educational level of the sample was 87.9% of the juveniles are either in school or skipped the question while 12% dropped out. Results from the study determined there is no correlation between parental warmth and aggressive offending, but the mother variable was close to correlation and could have correlation in other future studies. The policy implication will be discussed in the symposium.
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Fantasies of TikTok: The Limits of Social Media and Holocaust Advocacy
Katharine Louise Schreyer
Over the past decade, Holocaust scholars and museum professionals have debated the value of social media for teaching and commemorating the Shoah. Whether user-generated or created by institutions, native social media content is marginal in at least two senses. First, such content circulates outside the academic and professional venues in which Holocaust history and pedagogy are traditionally discussed. Second, such content is highly ephemeral - subject to sudden removal or alteration by creators or platform-owners.This paper advances these debates by analyzing a recent, and controversial, form of social media engagement with the Shoah: user-generated videos circulated on TikTok. Since TikTok is a fairly new platform populated mostly by young people, it is not seen as a venue for serious education or outreach. News of user-generated videos purporting to take the perspective of Holocaust victims, survivors, or witnesses sparked public outrage and spurred swift removal in the fall of 2020, demonstrating just how marginal such content is. However, the lines between such point-of-view (POV) videos and the multi-modal educational experiences offered by Holocaust museums or sites of destruction are not entirely clear. The first aim of this paper is to identify what features these practices have in common and consider which are distinctive - and distinctively worrying about - TikTok. The second aim of the paper is to ask what legitimate uses TikTok videos might have for increasing public awareness of the Holocaust and aiding human rights advocacy. A comparison between inherently short-form TikTok videos and longer-format digital content (such as podcasts or audio-visual testimonies) shows that TikTok is not an appropriate venue for crafting oral histories or recording the testimony of survivors. But TikTok’s heavy reliance on montage, capabilities for layering text and visuals, and proprietary modes for “stitching” content from multiple users offer potentially valuable resources for advocacy campaigns.
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Finding the Way: Identifying the Fine Line between Indoctrination and Education through the Sentiments of Students, Faculty, and Staff at Two Catholic Universities
Tahreem Fayiz
When students are in the college search process, they look to many different resources to help them find the best fit, and for some, that includes prioritizing the campus’ faith traditions. For students who prioritize their Catholic faith, the seek to find a campus that fulfill that promise of cultivating the person to live life following the way of Christ and His teachings. Students, however, are not the only ones who become community members at Catholic institutions. Faculty and staff may also consider the faith identity of an institution when seeking employment to find what is best for themselves. In this research, students, faculty, and staff members across two institutions were interviewed in order to understand how the perceive the Catholic identity of their institutions. The findings from this study will contribute towards gaining a better understanding of Catholic identity at nominally Catholic higher education institutions. This study will likely encourage more discussion among various Catholic higher education actors.
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Flexibility, Creativity, and Adaptability in the Sunshine State: A Local Study of Nonprofit Organizations During the COVID-19 Pandemic
Lauren Elizabeth Tobal
Nonprofit organizations are integral parts of communities across the world and often serve as safety nets for vulnerable populations. From healthcare to housing, nonprofits have the ability to make tremendous differences in people’s lives. This research, examined through the lens of civil society, helps to understand the ways in which nonprofit organizations contribute to society in unprecedented times. This study examines the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on nonprofit organizations through in-depth interviews with leaders of four local nonprofits in Naples, FL. The organizations interviewed vary by the services they provide, but each support at-risk populations in a variety of ways. Participants were chosen based on convenience sampling and recommendations from other interviewees. Results from this research show increases in the number of individuals and families the nonprofits served, increases in the amount of collaboration between local nonprofit organizations, as well as some interesting positives that arose from the COVID-19 pandemic. From these findings, I conclude that nonprofit organizations are an integral part of supporting local communities, especially in times of crisis.
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Florida Tile
Abigail M. Bitto, Stephen V. Gerace, Nick Charles Rutledge, Danielle M. Savovich
Corporate Hqt & Branch Inventory Rationalization/Management
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Frequently Used Nutritional Strategies for Muscle Recovery in Active College Students
Richard E. Holzheimer, Angelina Mae Loriso, Keiran Dolan Marvin, Makenna Delaney Ramsey
The use of different supplements to aid in recovery is widespread throughout the physically active collegiate population. While it is evident that collegiate athletes and active individuals often use various supplements to aid in recovery, it is still unclear what supplements are being used most often and are perceived as most beneficial. The purpose of this study is to look at the most common nutritional recovery strategies being used by collegiate athletes and active individuals. This research will be conducted using a cross-sectional study survey design. The participants of this study are University of Dayton students, ages 18-23, that participate in any of the division 1, club, or intramural sports, as well as individuals that exercise at least 3 times a week. In order to collect and measure data, a survey will be disseminated to UD athletes and active individuals to assess their current supplement intake in regard to recovery. The data will then be further examined using both a descriptive and chi-squared analysis to examine recovery to reasoning and recovery to effectiveness. Results will be presented during the presentation.
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From Ballers To Bosses: How Sports Can Change Lives For Youth
Nicole E. Rabas
Sports are important to many families and children. They help kids stay physically active, develop cognitively, showcase teamwork and leadership skills. These skills relate to how these children interact with schools. They have positive and negative experiences with coaches and new experiences just like they do in classrooms. Through this research, the connection is made between the impact of sports on youth development, their experiences in school, and the best way teachers can handle this information.
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From Prop to Partner: the Evolution of Female Roles in American Opera
Mariah Joanna Berryman
For many years, women in opera have been in service to their plots. They have always been present, but have either been relegated to passive roles in their own stories or actively considered societal outcasts. They were dramatically stereotyped as either air-heads or witches, mothers or daughters, love interests or foes to be conquered. And, along with the character stereotypes came typically associated vocal stereotypes. Lighter and higher voices were assigned to roles that portrayed virtue, innocence, and other general characteristics of the “feminine ideal.” Conversely, lower voices were assigned to sinful, outcast, “fallen women.” These vocal stereotypes are especially prevalent for the women condemned to the fringes of society, the othered “them” in contrast to the idealized “us.” Examination of opera plots in contrast to historical documents and artifacts through time reveals an important movement towards more accurate dramatic and musical characterization of women in American opera.
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General Dynamics
Amber Y. Blazek, Lillian Margaret Dickman, Grace C. Durbin, Kelly Elizabeth Howard
Material Flow Improvement
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Genetic interaction between the axial patterning gene, dve, and Dpp signaling in the developing Drosophila eye
Anuradha Chimata Venkatakrishnan, Neha Gogia, Katie Marie Perry, Akanksha Raj
An interesting question in developmental biology is how any three-dimensional organ develops from a single monolayer of cells. In multicellular organisms, delineation of Antero-Posterior (AP), Dorso-Ventral (DV), and Proximo-Distal (PD) axes are crucial for organ development. Drosophila melanogaster is an ideal model organism as the genes and pathways are highly conserved between Drosophila and humans. During eye development, DV axis formation marks the first lineage restriction event, and deviation in this process results in birth defects in the eye. Previously, we identified defective proventriculus (dve) as a new dorsal eye fate selector or patterning gene. dve regulates eye development by regulating wg, a negative regulator of eye development. Apart from wg, there are several other morphogens which havean important role during eye growth and development. Dpp signaling is one such pathway important for retinal differentiation. We hypothesize that dve, a transcription factor, regulates the Decapentaplegic (Dpp) signaling pathway, which is comparable to bone morphogenetic protein (BMP) signaling in mammals, during dorsal eye development. We will investigate the role of dve in the dorsal eye andwhether dve requires Dpp signaling to specify eye and head fate to form an organ of balanced size and shape. We utilized the GAL4-UAS system to modulate Dpp signaling in the dve domain. Thus far in our research, we have found that upregulation of Dpp in the dve expression domain results in an enlarged eye phenotype, while downregulation of Dpp in the dve domain results in a small eye phenotype. We havetested retinal determination genes to explore cell specific fate and further support the genetic interaction between dve and Dpp signaling. We are currently testing their interaction using clonal strategies to understand how dve regulates dpp in the developing eye. This study may have a significant bearing on growth, signaling and patterning defects and help in understanding the etiology behind genetic birth defects in the eye.
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Global Religion: Approaches to Climate Change and Sustainability
Hannah Ellen Bean, Hannah Rose Kessler, Aaron D. Tilton
We performed a literature analysis of research pertaining to how different religions approached climate change and sustainability. Our aim was to learn what different approaches, if any, world religions take to addressing climate change and sustainability. Learning what motivates action, or lack thereof, can help future leaders inspire their constituents to take positive action on climate change. We learned that different world religions have different approaches to sustainability, but usually have some sort of belief regarding environmental protection. Through our research, we learned that often, religious groups create climate action groups in order to put into action their beliefs about sustainability. The ways they approach this action is different, but climate action groups in general seem to be common amongst religious groups. Climate change is on the forefront of religious leaders' minds and there has been much more recent discussion about it and what actions we need to take than there has been in the past. As climate change becomes more of a pressing issue, it has become a focus of much religious teaching.
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Graphene Development for Removal of Bisphenol-S from Water
Ismail Salem Alibrahim
Bisphenol-A (BPA) and its analogues (BPs) are diphenylmethane derivatives with two hydroxyl groups on aromatic rings. About 3.5 million tons of BPA is produced annually for its usage in many applications such as a monomer primarily to synthesis polycarbonate plastic and epoxy resins and in the thermal receipt papers. BPs can be transported to water bodies through several routes such as degradable plastics, products manufactured with BPs, and after wastewater treatment. For example, the BPA levels in sewage sludge was found to measure between 0.5 and 5.1 mg/mL after wastewater treatment. BPs act as endocrine-disrupting chemical (EDC). United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) banned the use of BPA in baby bottles in 2012. One feasible replacement of BPA is Bisphenol S (BPS). BPS, 4,4’-sulphonyl diphenol, was found to have a lesser impact on the endocrine activities and poses lower aquatic toxicity than BPA. Since the substitution of BPS for BPA in products and materials is a recent occurrence, there are still only a few studies investigating the impact of BPS on human health. However, some studies already suggested that BPS poses a human health and environmental contamination risk as well. Since concern has started to grow, methods of water treatment for BPs, such as adsorption processes, have been developed. This study investigated the performance Graphene oxide (GO) and reduced graphene oxide (rGO) to adsorb BPS from water at low concentration (~10 PPM). The GO synthesized by different methods (GO prepared by Hummer method and by newly developed method) shows a maximum percentage removal of BPS from water between 30% to 60%. On the other hand, reducing the GO by ascorbic acid increases the sorption capacity of the rGO to up to
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Here comes the sun: The effect of a solar panel prairie on a dragonfly and damselfly community
Emily L. Ott
The order Odonata that includes dragonflies and damselfies are a widespread and important insect group as predators, particularly in riparian areas. Their polarotactic capabilities provide them with an attraction to polarized light that is emitted from water which allows them to navigate their way to a water source to lay their eggs. These tendencies could also make them fall prey to an ecological trap: solar panels emit the same polarized light, potentially fooling the Odonates into laying their eggs on the panels instead of in water. The University of Dayton installed a solar array in 2018, and put a prairie underneath of this solar array to attract native insects. During the Summer and Fall months of July through October, I surveyed Odonate abundance and behavior in a prairie both underneath and outside of a solar panel array to determine if these species were using the prairie and determine if the solar panels were causing an ecological trap for this species. Odonates were most abundant in the prairie outside of the solar array, with almost no individuals seen perching underneath of the solar panels. Also, I observed no egg laying behavior on the panels. The lack of this ecological trap could be due to the inclusion of white grids on the solar panels that breaks up the polarized light and lessens the degree of attraction Odonates experience. The research shows that these native insects do use this constructed prairie, but avoid the shaded area underneath the solar array. This work has implications for how these solar arrays are installed and maintained: based on this research, I recommend using solar panels with these white grids to avoid ecological traps for polarotactic insect species.
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How Schools Can Help Students Who Experience Systemic Oppression be Successful in Achieving Their Dreams
Mary E. Horvath
Research shows that many students who experience poverty and systemic oppression also experience an opportunity gap in schools. Families are stuck in a cycle in which they do not obtain as many educational opportunities in school, therefore do not receive as many job opportunities, and then their children go through the same thing. Every child has big dreams so how can schools help those who are stuck in this cycle achieve them? One important factor is the teachers. Teachers who bear high expectations, obtain a close connection with their students, and have cultural knowledge can all greatly impact the students’ outcomes. Other significant factors include access to high-level courses, extracurriculars, integrated classrooms, and stability.
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Human Behavioral Analysis: Intruder Detection in Videos
Manish Pavan Beesetti
This research aims to develop an intruder detection system based on human behavior via front door surveillance. This is similar to the classic action recognition and scene recognition problems which are currently hot topics in the field of computer vision. To this end, we have collected YouTube videos and then annotate them as anomaly or normal labels. We then train a C3D model by considering a sequence of frames as an input. The experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of our system.
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Indium
Bradley Russell Gottemoeller, Colleen Elizabeth Jutte, Samuel Edward Reardon, Colin Douglas Wuebker
Improve Processes to optimize business workflows