Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Predicting Academic Achievement From Extracurricular Engagement And Sense Of Belonging, Nathan Corum

Master of Science in Mathematics

This research study examined the relationships between extracurricular activity engagement, a student’s sense of belonging to school and academic achievement. Research was conducted at a suburban high school in Ohio, with data being collected from student surveys and district provided informational data. The goal was to see if there were positive connections between these items to better help the district in determining further programs to improve student achievement. Findings indicated that sense of belonging was a significant predictor of academic achievement for the sample. However, extracurricular engagement was not found to be a significant predictor of academic achievement. Further, there …

Cognitive Processes, Self-Efficacy, And Environment: A Comprehensive Study Of Mathematics Achievement In A Private International School In China, Alexandra Bumbles, Abreu Carvalho

Master of Science in Mathematics

The purpose of this study was to investigate the complex interplay between cognitive processes, self-efficacy, and environmental factors on academic achievement in mathematics within a private international school in China. Utilizing the Social Cognitive Theory as a theoretical framework, this research aimed to elucidate the extent to which these factors serve as significant predictors of mathematics achievement. The study involved a sample of 410 students from Years 6 to 12, with data collected through While the study provides substantial insights, several limitations were noted, including the restricted generalizability due to the specific sample, potential biases from self-reported data, and the …

The Influence Of Early Introduction To Algebra On Mathematics Achievement In A Rural School District In Ohio, Brittany Burns

Master of Science in Mathematics

Algebra I is a foundation for mathematical learning. The timing of enrollment is arguably a massive factor in mathematical success. The timing in which a student enrolls in Algebra I could shape their future in education and their career. This thesis examines the effects of 8^th grade Algebra I enrollment versus 9th-grade Algebra enrollment regarding standardized test scores. The research finds that students perform higher on standardized test scores when they enroll in Algebra I in the 8th grade in comparison to students who enroll in Algebra I in the 9th grade. This finding is beneficial for the ultimate …

Gridiron Insights: Predicting Gameday Outcomes Through Regression Analysis In College Football, Ethan Reyes, Justin Beal

Master of Science in Mathematics

This research investigates the predictive power of the changes in spread, over/under betting lines, and home field advantage in determining whether the favored team in a college football betting market will cover the spread. The study examines three key factors: the change in the betting spread, the change in the over/under line, and the home-field advantage of the favored team. Using a comprehensive dataset of betting data from Draft Kings and Bovada, the study uses logistical regression techniques to analyze the relationship between these variables and the favored team’s performance against the spread. Our findings indicate that fluctuations in the …

The Influence Of Teacher Experience On Project Lead The Way Test Scores, Emily Schmitz

Master of Science in Mathematics

roject Lead the Way (PLTW) is an organization that develops engineering curriculum for all grade levels. Research has been conducted on the curriculum and other STEM curriculum to determine student achievement levels and the factors that affect student achievement. These factors include teacher retention, teacher years of experience, student demographics, etc. Investigating how a teacher impacts their students learning can help schools understand the value of a seasoned teacher. With PLTW training having high costs it can make teacher retention a bigger concern. The Highland Prep Academies utilize PLTW curriculum and have about ten trained teachers across the three schools. …

Empirically Comparing The Performance Of Lda And Qda When Classifying Customer Sales Data With Different Properties Of Normality And Equality Of Covariance Matrices, Ayuk Egbe Bate-Eya

Master of Science in Mathematics

Discriminant analysis is a statistical technique used to classify data into different classes. Many studies have compared different methods used to classify data as regards their performance. This study compares Linear Discriminant Analysis and Quadratic Discriminant Analysis under varying conditions of normality and the equality of covariance matrices. More precisely, this study seeks to determine which of the two techniques is better when classifying datasets with different properties of normality and equality of covariance matrices and aims to determine whether normality and equality of covariance matrices influence the prediction performance of each method. This study processes online stores’ customer sales …

Analyzing Significant Predictors Of Graduation Rates At A Four- Year University, Charles Barrier Jr.

Master of Science in Mathematics

The subject of graduation rates is important for both students and educational institutions alike. Students want to attend a university where they are most likely to graduate, and institutions want to provide a learning environment that is best suited for retention and graduation. This study analyzes the data of 2139 students from Shawnee State University in Portsmouth, Ohio to determine if there exist any significant predictors of graduation likelihood amongst demographic, situational, and academic predictors. A logistic regression approach is utilized to identify significant variables, and in short, high school GPA rises to the top as a predictor. This implies …

The Influence Of Wealth On Academic Performance In Secondary Schools, Dean Banziger

Master of Science in Mathematics

The purpose of this study was to determine if wealth and financial investment in public education within communities plays a significant role in the academic performance of students in West Virginia secondary schools. West Virginia is an interesting example of academic success relative to the wealth of the state. The state of West Virginia has the third highest poverty rate (17.9%) and the second lowest Gross Domestic Product per capita of all fifty states and the District of Columbia (World Population Review, 2022). West Virginia ranks dead last in average SAT scores (College Board, 2022). This study seeks to determine …

Transport And Fate Of Nitrate In A Saturated Buffer Zone As Assessed With A Chloride Tracer Test, Alhassan Sahad, Eric W. Peterson

Faculty Publications-- Geography, Geology, and the Environment

The Upper Mississippi Basin, which includes Illinois, has highly fertile soils and experiences intensive agricultural practices. Although fertile, the soils do not drain well, resulting in the installation of tile-drainage systems. The practices of tile systems coupled with the application of nitrogen-rich fertilizers have led to the excessive export of nitrate from the agricultural fields into surface waters, contributing to eutrophication and the development of hypoxic zones in aquatic environments. Saturated riparian buffer zones (SRBs) have been proposed as a means to reduce the amount of nitrate discharged from tile-drained waters into streams. Previous works show a reduction in the …

Beyond The Cage: A Story Book For Children, Seemi Batool, Fozia Parveen

IED, P Non-Scholarly Publications

This is an open and free resources created for parents and teachers to use in homes and classrooms. Please do not hesitate to reach out to us if you have any comments. fozia.parveen@aku.edu
seemi.batool02@gmail.com

Nwac Snow School Intern, Sorelle Sumner Thompson

College of the Environment Internship Reports

The Mt. Baker Snow School internship opportunity with Western Washington University and the Northwest Avalanche Center (NWAC) allows students to help educate middle schoolers in the Skagit and Whatcom school districts on snow science. Every Friday in March, I supported snow professionals and biologists by teaching kids about snowpack analysis, snow algae sampling, snow water equivalency, snow crystal observations, etc. The internship is also coupled with NWAC program outreach to help educate the public on recreating outside responsibly. The program outreach was two weekend days in March that consisted of setting up an NWAC tent and reaching out to backcountry …

Institute For Watershed Studies Lake Whatcom Project Intern, Joey (Christopher Adam) Lane

College of the Environment Internship Reports

Over the course of my internship at the WWU Institute for Watershed Studies I worked on the Lake Whatcom project, a long-term water quality monitoring program for the City of Bellingham. We focused on the Lake Whatcom watershed, sampling the lake and tributaries monthly and analyzing water samples to determine seasonal and long-term water chemistry and biological changes. My role as a research assistant included collecting water samples from the lake and tributaries, performing extensive laboratory analysis to generate water quality data, conducting hydrological monitoring, and maintaining lab safety and functionality through weekly chores.

Qcd Analysis Of Flavor-Nonchanging Hadronic Weak Processes Through Next-To-Leading Order, Girish Lingadahalli Muralidhara

Theses and Dissertations--Physics and Astronomy

Studies in quantum chromodynamics (QCD), the fundamental theory of the strong interactions, of low-energy hadronic weak processes utilize an effective Hamiltonian framework. Below the weak-mass scale, an effective Hamiltonian contains a series of Wilson coefficients and four-quark operators that come from the operator product expansion in the Standard Model. The effective hadronic Hamiltonian pertinent to a weak process is then obtained via a renormalization group analysis in QCD from the weak-mass scale to the low-energy scale of O(2 GeV). In this thesis, the construction and phenomenological implications of such an effective Hamiltonian for flavor-conserving, parity-violating quark processes in the Standard …

Antibiotic Resistance In A Coastal River In Mississippi, Usa – Potential Drivers, Shuo Shen, Wei Wu, Eric A. Saillant, Darrell Jay Grimes

Gulf and Caribbean Research

Wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) are major sources of antibiotic resistant bacteria (ARB) and antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs) in water bodies. Most studies on the impact of WWTPs on antibiotic resistance have focused on freshwater systems, with little information on coastal and estuarine waters with variable salinity. This study monitored seasonal levels of ARGs at the effluent and downstream of the Pascagoula— Moss Point WWTP in the lower Pascagoula River, a coastal river in southeastern Mississippi, USA. Surface water samples were collected seasonally at upstream, outflow, and 3 downstream sites from February to November 2016. Bacterial resistance to sulfamethazine, tetracycline, and …

Using Environmental Dna Methods For Estimating Juvenile Chinook Salmon Abundance, Jacqueline Marie Bridegum

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

In the Central Valley of California, stocks of Chinook Salmon are declining, and two out of the four ecotypes of Chinook Salmon within the Sacramento River system are federally listed. A monitoring network has been developed to estimate the abundances of downstream migrating Chinook Salmon smolts, but there is high uncertainty in these estimates due to low catch rates. Environmental DNA (eDNA) monitoring, which involves capture of genetic material that organisms release into their surrounding environment, has shown promise for estimating abundance of salmonids and could complement existing monitoring efforts and potentially reduce uncertainty in abundance estimates. This research project …

Eluquant: Event-Level Uncertainty Quantification In Deep Inelastic Scattering, Cristiano Fanelli, James Giroux

Arts & Sciences Articles

We introduce a physics-informed Bayesian neural network with flow-approximated posteriors using multiplicative normalizing flows for detailed uncertainty quantification (UQ) at the physics event-level. Our method is capable of identifying both heteroskedastic aleatoric and epistemic uncertainties, providing granular physical insights. Applied to deep inelastic scattering (DIS) events, our model effectively extracts the kinematic variables x, Q2, and y, matching the performance of recent deep learning regression techniques but with the critical enhancement of event-level UQ. This detailed description of the underlying uncertainty proves invaluable for decision-making, especially in tasks like event filtering. It also allows for the reduction of true inaccuracies …

Synthesis Of N-Heterocyclic Carbene Complexes Of Coinage Metals And Their Application In The Activation Of Hydrogen, Maryam Akramova

Honors Projects

The main cause of the ongoing global climate crisis is the emission of greenhouse gases, and current climate reports emphasize the need to transition to low-emission renewable energy sources. Urgently needed are methods for storing renewable energy, such as synthetic fuels like hydrogen (H₂) gas; however, a challenge to the widespread implementation of hydrogen fuel is its low volumetric energy density. This thesis describes an effort to synthesize a catalyst that takes advantage of hard-soft acid-base (HSAB) mismatches to activate H₂ and facilitate its reaction with CO₂ to form hydrocarbon fuels, thereby providing a sustainable means …

Modeling The Development & Expression Of Political Opinion: A Zallerian Approach, Avery C. Ellis

Honors Projects

Research focused on John Zaller's famous RAS model of political opinion formation and change from "The Nature and Origins of Mass Opinion" (1992). Analyzed the mathematical and psychological underpinnings of the model, the first paper to do so in over fifteen years and the first to do so through an analysis of motivated reasoning and Bayesian reasoning. Synthesized existing critiques of Zaller's model and other literature to suggest ways to build on Zaller, utilizing fundamental reunderstandings of opinions and messages from political and mathematical perspectives. Found verification for Zaller's model, confirming its value, but also found support for the proposed …

The Future Of International Climate Change Litigation, Heloise S. Evins-Mackenzie

Honors Theses

Small Island Developing States (SIDS) are increasingly seeking justice from international courts to address their significant climate change impacts, which are disproportionate to their minimal historical emissions. The Commission of Small Island States on Climate Change and International Law (COSIS), an internationally recognized legal body, has requested an advisory opinion on the obligations of all member states to protect and preserve the marine environment and prevent pollution related to climate change and its impacts. The present study aims to predict the future landscape of climate litigation if the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (ITLOS) specifies that states’ …

Investigating The Effects Of Three Trace Metals On The Viability, Embryonic Development, And Locomotor Behavior Of The Seminole Ramshorn Snail At Environmentally Relevant Concentrations, Talia Tanner, Leanna Giancarlo, Tyler Frankel

Earth and Environmental Sciences

Trace metal contamination is a widespread issue due to its many natural and anthropogenic sources and known carcinogenic, teratogenic, and reproductive effects. As previous invertebrate trace metal research has primarily focused on model species (Daphnia magna, Chironomidae, etc.), our understanding of effects on non-model invertebrate species remains relatively poor. As such, this study assessed the exposure effects of cadmium, arsenic, and lead on viability, locomotor behavior, and embryonic development of the Seminole ramshorn snail (Planorbella duryi). Exposure treatments of CdCl₂, Na₂HAsO₄ • 7H₂O, or Pb (NO₃)_{2 …}

Cover And Content

Turkish Journal of Physics

No abstract provided.

Lithography-Free Highly Sensitive Detection Of Glucose Based On Colloidal Spheres, Habibe Durmaz

Turkish Journal of Physics

Diabetes has emerged as a global health crisis, with a substantial increase in prevalence and associated healthcare costs. The urgency for early diagnosis to prevent complications has fueled research into advanced biosensing technologies. Plasmonic sensors, leveraging localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR), have gained prominence for their sensitivity. This study explores a metamaterial-based sensor platform comprising nanospheres fabricated through colloidal lithography. A comprehensive numerical and experimental analysis of the designed metamaterial-based perfect absorber is presented, focusing on the spectral response at the resonance frequency of 525 nm. Finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) simulations reveal the field and charge distributions, enabling a systematic exploration …

Creative Technologies: A Conversation With Roy Magnuson, Roy Magnuson, Maureen Russell

Faculty Publications - Music

[In lieu of an abstract, the introduction is provided.] Today I am speaking with Roy Magnuson, Associate Professor Creative Technologies in the School of Music at Illinois State University (ISU). (see Figure 1) His music has been performed throughout the United States and Europe at venues such as the World Saxophone Congress, WASBE, CBDNA, the RED NOTE New Music Festival, and the Robb Composers’ Symposium. Magnuson is also the creator of the virtual reality composition software solsticeVR and the conducting software RibbonsVR. He is a member of ASCAP, and his music is recorded on Albany Records and NAXOS.

Symmetry Analysis Of The Canonical Connection On Lie Groups:Co-Dimension Two Abelian Nilradical With Abelian And Non Abelian Complement, Nouf Alrubea Almutiben

Theses and Dissertations

We consider the symmetry algebra of the geodesic equations of the canonical
connection on a Lie groups. We mainly consider the solvable indecomposable four,
five and six-dimensional Lie algebras with co-dimension two abelian nilradical, that
have an abelian and not abelian complement. In this particular case, we have only
one algebra in dimension four namely; A4,12 , and three algebras in dimension five
namely; A5,33, A5,34, and A5,35 In dimension six, based on the list of Lie algebras in
Turkowski’s list, there are nineteen such algebras namely; A6,1- A6,19 that have an
abelian complement, and there are eight algebras that …

Groundwater Vulnerability Assessment And Dye Trace Of War Fork River In Daniel Boone National Forest, Will Hemenover

Mahurin Honors College Capstone Experience/Thesis Projects

Daniel Boone National Forest plays a key role in preserving much of Kentucky’s karst regions, natural resources including timber, mineral deposits, and biodiversity, including over 300 species of concern. The health of these environments is determined by surface and groundwater streams in the forest, and karst systems are an integral environment where these systems are active. War Fork, a tributary to the Kentucky River in Jackson County, Kentucky, is a remote and understudied hydrologic system in the Daniel Boone National Forest that contains recreational and logging land uses. Due to karst areas being susceptible to contamination because of rapid water …

Formulating An Efficient Statistical Test Using The Goodness Of Fit Approach With Applications To Real-Life Data, S. A. Qaid, S. E. Abo Youssef Prof., Mahmoud Mansour

Basic Science Engineering

Statistical tests are very important for researchers to make decisions. In particular, when the tests are non-parametric, they are of greater importance because they can be applied to a wide range of data sets regardless of knowing the distribution of these data. Researchers are therefore racing to obtain efficient tests for making good decisions based on the results of these tests. In this study, NBU (2)L was used based on the goodness of fit approach to present an efficient statistical test. The efficiency of the proposed test was computed, and the results were compared to those of other tests. Critical …

Implementing Interdisciplinary Sustainability Education With The Food-Energy-Water (Few) Nexus, C. B. Romulo, S. Venkataraman, S. Caplow, S. Ajgaonkar, C. R. Allen, A. Anandhi, S. W. Anderson, C. B. Azzarello, K. Brundiers, E. Blavascunas, J. M. Dauer, D. L. Druckenbrod, E. Fairchild, L. R. Horne, K. Lee, M. Mwale, J. Mischler, E. Pappo, N. S. Patel, N. D. Sintov, C. S. Ramsdell, S. G. Vincent

School of Natural Resources: Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Imputation Strategies For Different Categories Of Missing Data, Karthik Chalumuri

Honors Theses and Capstones

Addressing missing data in research is crucial for ensuring the reliability and validity of study findings, yet it remains a significant challenge. This study investigates the impact of missing data on research outcomes and explores the underutilization of existing tools for managing missingness, potentially leading to gaps in critical information with tangible implications for decision-making processes (Dziura et al.).

Focusing on the different categories of missing data—Missing Completely At Random (MCAR), Missing At Random (MAR), and Missing Not At Random (MNAR)—this research examines various imputation strategies tailored to each category. Specifically, we compare the efficacy of several model-based imputation methods, …

Defensive Impact Wins: Developing A New Method To Rate Individual Defense In Nba Games, Dylan J. Stiles

Honors Theses and Capstones

With the analytics revolution in sports in the past 20 years, it seems that everything that can be quantified is. In basketball though, trying to break the game down into a set of numbers comes with a unique problem. While we've come up with a good set of advanced numbers to measure offensive efficiency, defense is fundamentally harder to quantify. The game is played five on five, but it has often been popular or convenient to model defense as a set of five one on one games. As defenses became more complex into the 2010s, this methodology became more insignificant. …

Cataloging And Locating Icequakes On The Ross Ice Shelf, Antarctica To Determine Long Term Rift Behavior, Simon F. Eisl

Honors Theses and Capstones

This report provides an introduction to the ARROW project and seismic behavior on ice shelves. We catalogged icequakes using seismic analysis code (SAC) and located prominent icequakes using WAVES from a seismic dataset collected from December 2nd, 2023 and January 5th, 2024. The analysis of this dataset will be used to model similar deformation systems found in icy ocean worlds in the outer Solar System like the Tiger Stripe rifts found on Enceladus. We looked into the deformation of rift zone WR4, why and how these icequakes occur along WR4, and the rift's interior material make up. Particular hotspots of …