VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
Is this My Home?: How White Ethnic Organizations Shape Latinx Communities
Keywords: Immigration
White ethnicity
Neighborhood change
Latinx
Stanford
Urban Studies
Sociology
Ethnic Studies
Thesis

Historically, academic themes of urban settlement have focused on topics such as white flight. Yet there exists scarce literature that considers the interplay of the history of white ethnic abandonment of urban communities and its effects today given new patterns of spatial settlement. This research aims to revisit the history of mass urban demographic shifts in an effort to understand the long-term implications of the history of white flight for new waves of racialized immigrants. Because formal organizations are indicative of the existing social structures within a community, this research focuses on the role that white ethnic organizations play in ethnically transitioned neighborhoods. This study is based on semi-structured interviews with eight individuals within the working-class communities of Berwyn and Cicero, IL in suburban Chicago. These individuals are all affiliated with Czech organizations based in these now predominantly Latinx communities. This research shows that white ethnic organizations capitalize on collective memory to maintain involvement in the community and influence ongoing cultural exchange between current and previous populations. This points to the importance of the reevaluation of spatial patterns in accordance with the differing settlement practices of new immigrants.
Is You Woke? Examining the Impact of Schools on the Racial-Ethnic Identity Development of Black Multiracial Students
Keywords: Graduate School of Education
Black identity
Multiracial
ethnic identity development
schools
racial awakening
Thesis

This study aims to discover if and how secondary schools are impacting the racial-ethnic identity development of students in the US. Students spend the majority of their time with their families growing, the latter having a major influence on how students see themselves and think about their identity. It is important to identify what role students view their schools supporting their racial-ethnic identity development as schools should be fostering personal development through both formal and hidden curriculum. An understanding of the schools' role in this context could be used to ensure bridging of cultural development between school and home. Data were collected through semi-structured in-person interviews with fifteen Stanford affiliates who self-identified with at least two distinct racial or ethnic groups, Black and another “non-white” Multiracial identifying individuals age eighteen to twenty-three. One participant identified as Black and White. Participants believed that their schools made little to no effort to support their racial-ethnic identity as there were very few teachers of color, no formalized classes such as Ethnic Studies, and peers either dismissed or inappropriately addressed issues of race and identity. It was also found that these Black Multiracial students were having these conversations in their homes with their parents mostly but were not continuing these conversations at school. Therefore, this study found that the messages students were receiving from school were more
academic focused as opposed to culturally and the role their schools played was more passive in terms of their racial-ethnic identity development.
Israel’s Founding in Words: Israeli Speeches at the UN and the Palestinian Refugee Crisis
Keywords:  Program in International Relations
Program in International Relations
Collective Memory
Abba Eban
Golda Meir
Thesis

The state of Israel was founded on May 14, 1948. For those who had fought for the creation of a Jewish state, 1948 represented a triumph after centuries of Jewish experiences of oppression, displacement, and most recently, genocide. However, in most Palestinian narratives, Israel’s founding is called the Nakba, or ‘catastrophe,’ due to the resulting displacement of around 700,000 Palestinians and the creation of an ongoing refugee issue. This thesis seeks to understand how the Israeli collective memory of 1948 was communicated politically in the early years of Israeli statehood. In particular, the thesis examines how Israeli leaders portrayed the refugee crisis to the international community through speeches to United Nations General Assembly. I examine the speeches of Golda Meir and Abba Eban, two important orators and politicians in Israel’s early history. In doing so, this thesis will examine the formation of narratives to describe the outset of the Palestinian refugee crisis still in use today.
Journalism and Crowdfunding: A close look at Kickstarter’s website. How has the presence of journalism projects evolved on crowdfunding websites such as Kickstarter, since those websites launched in the late 2000s?
Keywords:  Department of Communication
journalism
crowdfunding
Kickstarter
Thesis

This research paper will analyze the presence of journalism projects on crowdfunding websites such as Kickstarter, and explore how this presence has evolved since those crowdfunding websites emerged.
Kant's idea of a critique of practical reason
Keywords: Philosophy.

"Kant's idea of a critique of practical reason" presents a novel and sympathetic treatment of Kant's method, anti-skeptical aspirations, and metaphysics in the Critique of Practical Reason. Some of Kant's most sympathetic readers have found the Critique's account of the foundations of morality both methodologically obscure and metaphysically extravagant. I venture a reading according to which the Critique's moral metaphysics emerges in the course of Kant's rich and surprising moral psychological explanation of the possibility of moral obligation. The resulting account of the practical side of human experience is, I argue, fully in line with the metaphysically anodyne approach to its theoretical side he takes in the Critique of Pure Reason.
Know History, Know Self, Know Mental Health: Using a Decolonization Framework to Educate Filipino-American High School Students About Mental Health
Keywords: Filipino-American adolescents
mental health
ethnic identity development
colonial mentality
decolonization
Graduate School of Education
Thesis

This study examines the use of a decolonization framework to educate Filipino-American high school students about mental health in an educational workshop. Mental health issues disproportionately affect Filipino-American youth. This health disparity may be linked to the centuries of colonialism in the Philippines, which is seen through the phenomenon of colonial mentality (CM). Scholars argue that Filipino-Americans may better understand their own mental health with knowledge of the history of colonialism in the Philippines. The current study employs a triangulation mixed methods research design to investigate how Filipino-American high school students talk about their identity, culture, and mental health and apply the decolonization framework after participation in the mental health educational workshop. Data were collected through the use of pre- and post-intervention surveys and a final sample population of 15 high school students, all of whom self-identified as Filipino-American, were analyzed. Thematic analysis revealed the emergence of three primary outcomes after participation in the intervention: increased awareness, evidence of decolonization, and connecting the history of colonization, ethnic identity, and mental health. I found that Filipino-American high school students are not only talking about their identity, culture, and mental health in isolation, but rather their influence on one another. In addition, although the intervention impacted the students to varying degrees, students were able to apply the decolonization framework to their own experiences and even beyond the workshop content. These findings are aimed towards educators and clinicians to consider the sociopolitical contexts for mental health interventions.
Laborers becoming agriculturalists : counter-trajectories of development on a Sumatran Volcano
Keywords: Anthropology.

On the Aren Volcano in the Sumatran uplands lies the town of Casiavera, where twenty years ago a group of agricultural laborers reclaimed their land from a plantation company. Since then, they have gone on to create new forms of agriculture and livelihood. In place of working for a wage on the industrial plantation, Casiavera's rural workers established their own claims to the land, and then chose to cultivate diverse agricultural forests as basis for their emergent smallholder economy. Along the way, Casiavera's agriculturalists joined up with both national and global rural workers' political movements to work together to occupy and reclaim the land, and rehabilitate the damage done to it by almost a century of industrial abuse. In search of more autonomous livelihood, Casiavera's agriculturalists acknowledged industrial agriculture's many problems, but also moved beyond them with their own forms of rural nature, work, and politics. This study draws on ethnography and oral histories, archival documents and maps, and satellite photography covering a fifty year time series. Taken together, these sources offer an account of the agrarian changes that have unfolded in Casiavera. I find that that this collection of transformations, of Casiavera's agricultural laborers becoming smallholder agriculturalists, and the ruined, industrial plantation becoming agroforest, represent an especially modern elaboration of politics and ecology. With agroecology and political mobilization, agriculturalists reclaimed the land from an industrial agriculture to create a landscape of lively, collectivist agroecology, and political mobilization. They are a counter-trajectory of development, a form of eco-social change through time that challenges normative practices and values of rural industrialization.
Lady Hero: Teaching Models of Empowerment in Young Adult Fantasy Literature
Keywords:  Department of English
young adult
fantasy
feminist theory
Tamora Pierce
Robin McKinley
Alanna the Lioness
Keladry of Mindelan
Aerin Dragon-Killer
Harry Crewe
Empowerment
The Hero and the Crown
The Blue Sword
Thesis

This paper illustrates the diversity and complexity of empowerment models through exploring Tamora Pierce and Robin McKinley’s lady heroes. I first discuss how fantasy has historically been a hostile space for female empowerment, in part due to magic being used as an excuse for a lady hero’s success. I also give a brief overview of feminist history and main feminist theories to establish a working definition of empowerment through agency and identify four main models used to gain that agency: individual action, collective action, traditionally male characteristics, and traditionally female characteristics.
Through four character studies, I then illustrate how Pierce and McKinley put pressure on each of these empowerment models. From each author, I focus on two female characters and their mentorship relationship, arguing that each pair has an intentional order in which they “read” each other, either actively improving on or misunderstanding empowerment models. In Song of the Lioness and The Protector of the Small series, Pierce explores the pitfalls of gaining empowerment through individual and traditionally gendered characteristics, prescribing more collective and androgynous strategies. In The Hero and the Crown and The Blue Sword, McKinley builds a more complex empowerment model designed for older readers. Through her characters’ struggle to understand and explain where their own power comes from, she redefines the definition of agency. That is, she suggests that perceived effort by both the character and the reader is required to achieve true empowerment.
Pierce and McKinley demonstrate how they are committed to providing pragmatic models of empowerment for young readers. Furthermore, they show how the Young Adult genre can circumvent the problematic aspects of the fantasy genre: they repurpose the issues of agency and power inherent in fantasy for their feminist mission rather than casting the genre aside entirely.
LDT MA Project Final Paper - PeerHouse
Keywords: Early childhood education
social emotional learning
design thinking
bedtime routine
parent-child communication
prototyping
needfinding
child development
imaginative play
Thesis

Sleep is a universal human need. For adults, it helps the brain to process information and transfer short-term memory to long-term memory. For children, it not only acts as a processor but also as an enforcer of executive functions including focusing attention and emotional management in the face of obstacles. Therefore, sleep is important both for health and learning.
Young children ages 3-5 need to sleep 11-13 hours each day. In addition, the adults – the parents – need 7-9 hours of sleep each day. Routine is a mechanism that parents use to balance all of the obligations in a day to ensure the important activities including meals and sleep get done. For instance, a typical evening routine consists of dinner, bath, and bedtime story. However, two main issues make enforcing routines difficult in practice. First, children tend to resist transitions from one activity to another. Second, parents struggle to implement routines with consistency.
PeerHouse is a solution that addresses the aforementioned issues. Children learn and practice following routines through modeling the behavior of a character programmed to mirror the family’s routines. The character signals transitions in the routines through auditory and visual cues to remind and gently nudge parents and children to follow their routines. The initial user tests show that children can form strong emotional bonds with the character and understand that the character has a routine. Future learner studies will assess the long-term impact of the intervention including children’s sustained interest after the novelty effect wears off, and lasting behavior change in consistency.
Leaked emails and American political knowledge
Keywords:  Fisher Family Honors Program in Democracy
leaked emails
disinformation
wikileaks
hack
democracy
political knowledge
podesta emails
misinformation
political communication
center for democracy development and the rule of law
cddrl
fisher honors program
Thesis

In academia and in popular discourse, leaks have long been associated with transparency, while their potential as a source for disinformation has gone largely unexamined. The turmoil of the 2016 U.S. presidential election cast doubt on this association by demonstrating the potentially disorienting impact of leaked emails on political knowledge. Nonetheless, the dynamics of this disruption remain little understood. Through an online experiment, I find that individuals perceive leaked emails as generally more credible than other forms of anonymously sourced political information. I contextualize this finding within the general understanding that leaks are just as pliable to the spread of doubt and misinformation as they are to the cause of transparency. Looking ahead, disclosures similar to the 2016 leaks are likely to figure prominently in American politics, particularly in the context of future elections. Whether these future leaks are committed in the name of transparency or disinformation, their impact on democratic practice will ultimately be determined by the reaction of their audience — journalists, politicians, and voters — who must decide whether or to what extent their contents can be trusted.
Learning disjunction
Keywords: Linguistics.

To understand language, we rely on mental representations of words and their meanings. What constitutes these representations? How are they learned? To address these questions, I investigate how children learn and interpret the disjunction word "or". The highly abstract and context-dependent interpretation of or challenges word learning theories and provides an exceptional opportunity to better understand how words are associated with their meanings. "Or" has several interpretations, including exclusive and inclusive disjunction. Inclusive disjunction holds when A is true, B is true, or both. For example, a waiter may ask if you would like something to eat or drink, not excluding the possibility that you choose both. Exclusive disjunction is true when only A is true, or only B is true, but not both. If the waiter later asks whether you would like to see the dessert menu or have the check, his "or" is most likely interpreted as exclusive. He is suggesting that you should choose one or the other. Given these complexities in the interpretation of "or", how do children learn it? A previous study has shown that when parents talk to their children, the majority of "or"-examples they use are exclusive. I present an annotation study on parents' speech to children that replicated this finding. Nevertheless, comprehension studies have found that preschool children understand the inclusive interpretation of disjunction around four years of age. In an experimental study with a novel paradigm, I replicated this finding in simple existential sentences. These two findings lead to a puzzle in the literature: How can children learn the inclusive interpretation of "or" if they rarely hear it? I argue that this puzzle arises in models of word learning that directly map words to their meanings, thereby ignoring accompanying linguistic and conceptual cues. I present an in-depth annotation study demonstrating that exclusive interpretations correlate with contextual cues (such as intonation and the semantic relation of the alternatives "or" combines with) in children's input. Applying supervised learning techniques to the annotated data, I found that a learner who makes use of these contextual cues can learn the inclusive as well as exclusive interpretation of disjunction from the language heard. These findings indicate that the representation of a word like "or" cannot be isolated from the linguistic and conceptual environment in which it appears. The linguistic and conceptual aspects of "or"'s environment can act as cues that aid its acquisition and interpretation. Together, these studies show that learning a function word like "or" requires richer lexical representations than are currently assumed by our theories of word learning.
Learning from professional race car drivers to make automated vehicles safer
Keywords: Mechanical Engineering.

Autonomous vehicles have the potential to eliminate the vast number of motor-vehicle accidents that occur each year. However, as the burgeoning technology becomes more publicly available, self-driving cars will continue to encounter emergency situations. To maximize the vehicle's ability to navigate these situations safely, autonomous driving technology needs to be able to use all of the vehicle's performance capability. Race car drivers can inspire autonomous systems with full authority over a vehicle's capabilities because they routinely drive at or near the limits of handling without losing control. This dissertation aims to advance the understanding of how highly skilled human drivers operate vehicles at the limits by analyzing their trajectories, steering behavior, and stability characteristics observed while maximizing vehicle performance. First, a sensor suite and related methods are used to acquire research-quality, multimedia data from vintage race cars during real-world race events. The resulting publicly available database not only further documents and characterizes select, historically significant automobiles, but also provides open access to vehicle dynamics data recorded while expert drivers operated at the friction limits. To investigate the extent to which highly skilled drivers follow a theoretically ideal trajectory when maximizing vehicle performance, a statistical analysis quantifies the dispersion of paths driven by professional race car drivers during live races. The method reveals that two drivers operating the same vehicle followed measurably dissimilar trajectories, yet achieved similar overall results as measured by lap time. A state-of-the-art autonomous race car, which applies racing theory in the real world, is used to explore whether the variance observed in the human driver data is a result of error, which would imply following an optimal trajectory leads to greater performance, or whether the observed variance is a consequence of purposeful behavior essential to fully utilizing a vehicle's capabilities. The autonomous race car is as fast as a skilled, proficient driver, but currently not as fast as an expert driver. Using a quasi-steady-state model as a baseline, an analysis of each driver's steering behavior shows that the human drivers purposely operate around the handling limits, including beyond the limits, while the autonomous race car's design leads to operation up to the handling limits. Furthermore, a phase portrait analysis illustrates that the human drivers consistently operate the vehicle closer to, and sometimes beyond, the boundaries separating inherently stable and unstable vehicle states, whereas the autonomous race car's trajectories always remain within the stable region. This information can help design algorithms that operate over the full range of vehicle performance, to maximize the vehicle's ability to operate not only at speed during racing maneuvers but also safely during emergency maneuvers.
Leaving lessons : learning from the exit of experienced teachers
Keywords: Education.

Teacher attrition has increased significantly over the last thirty years. Most public school teachers in the United States now leave the career early, before reaching retirement. Research on teacher attrition has tended to focus on novice teachers, using human capital or organizational theories to understand trends in teacher exit. This qualitative study takes another path, considering the accounts of certified, experienced teachers who left teaching after making significant investments in the career. The accounts of these invested leavers are examined through a lens of resistance, illuminating issues of power as well as the idea(l)s of teaching that may be expressed through the decision to leave.
Leveraging Kindergarten and First-Grade Literacy Behaviors to Predict Third-Grade Reading Failure
Keywords: Informal Reading Inventories
Fountas and Pinnell Benchmark Assessment System
Statistical Learning Models
Diagnostic Accuracy
Phonemic Awareness
Letter Knowledge
Graduate School of Education
Stanford
Thesis

Early identification of students at-risk is an essential component of effective reading interventions. While Informal Reading Inventories (IRI) are used in districts across the country to identify students who need additional support, they have been shown to have poor psychometric properties and low diagnostic accuracy. The current longitudinal study serves as a “proof of concept” to show that utilizing more data-driven classification measures can significantly increase the accuracy of IRIs. Classification accuracies from three statistical learning models trained on Reading Inventory data were compared to the accuracy of classifications based on predefined cut-off scores for 1,928 students attending public schools in a large metropolitan district. Using binary classifiers significantly improved the overall accuracy of predicting third grade Reading achievement based on first grade Reading Levels, with an average increase of 27%. Results indicated that incorporating kindergarten Reading Skills (i.e. phonemic awareness, letter knowledge, etc.) to the training data significantly increased classification accuracy for the Logistic Regression Model and Support Vector Machine, but not for the Random Forest Classifier. The findings also showed that letter knowledge variables were more important than phonemic awareness skills in predicting third grade reading outcomes. Implications for practice and future research are discussed.