cometadata/datacite-titles-descriptions-related-identifiers huggingface dataset:
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c40-345470
title: A case study of an urban school that is narrowing the achievement gap

description: Undoubtedly and throughout history, certain groups have continuously outperformed others in schools all over the country. The ongoing disparity between minorities and nonminorities has been of great concern, not only for policymakers, politicians, and educators but also for parents and students. The literature continually indicates that the gap is most prevalent in African American and Latino students, English language learners, foster youth, and students who receive special education services. However, there are some urban schools that have made progress in narrowing the achievement gap. ❧ This study examined practices contributing to narrowing the achievement gap in one outperforming urban school. In this qualitative study, data was gathered through document analysis, survey, interviews, and observations during a 3-month period. The study focused on resource allocations, staff capacity, and programs as they relate to student achievement. The findings not only support the impact of resource allocation, programs, and staff capacity on student achievement but offer the following as additional contributing factors: collaborative efforts, teacher leaders, and student accountability. If the United States is to continue as a nation of opportunity and prosperity, a concerted effort must be made to improve its educational system, and this effort must address the academic challenges of all students, especially those of underrepresented youth.
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c40-359241
title: African American male students in outperforming urban schools: a case study of an urban high school

description: African American males’ tribulations in the American public education system are well documented. At all levels of educational attainment, African American males consistently present the lowest performance when compared to the other subgroups (Schott Foundation, 2010). African American males’ lack of academic success in public schools should be addressed due to the link between low educational attainment and incarceration (Maurer & King, 2004) and the impact on this low educational attainment on the American economy as a result of the shift in skills needed to become a productive participant in the global economy (Green, 2004). The goals of this study were to identify and describe instructional practices, programs, and leadership provided in high-achieving urban schools that successfully support African American male students. By identifying the practices and characteristics of successful schools, this study aims to contribute to the body of literature strategies that can further narrow this achievement gap. Using an ethnographic design, the research addressed three questions: ❧ 1. What instructional practices exist in outperforming schools with high-achieving African American males? ❧ 2.What programs exist in outperforming schools with high-achieving African American males? ❧ 3. How does the leadership in outperforming schools create and foster a climate of high achievement for African American male students? ❧ The mixed-methods research study used semi structured interviews, site observations, data collection, and analysis that yield themes that include a deliberate approach to address the needs of African American boys through programs, practices, and leadership. ❧ To understand the impact instructional practices, programs, and leadership have on African American male students’ performance, the researcher conducted a case study at an all-boys’ school site located in Chicago, Illinois—UP High. Despite the fact that UP High experiences the common challenges facing many urban schools in impoverished inner city communities, the students and teachers persist because they are bound and motivated by the rich school culture. The strength of the school culture prevents the existence of insufficient resources and opportunities, achievement gaps, and mistrust from impeding the school’s mission and vision. Through the triangulation of surveys, interviews, observations, and document reviews, three overarching themes were identified: rituals, relationships, and high expectations. The presence of rituals—Community, tie ceremonies, creed recital, etc.—creates a code of expectations that inform the students’ behavior, sense of responsibility, and academic commitment. These ritualistic practices also forge strong relationships that aim to heal the traumas a number of the UP High students have encountered in both their formative education and personal lives. Finally, from UP High’s commitment to rituals and relationships, high expectations are birthed and encouraged by all stakeholders.
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c40-361557
title: Supporting online learners in higher education: the role of academic advising and student development in the new frontier of online learning − the professionals' perspective

description: This dissertation investigated the influence of online learning on academic advising and student affairs practice in higher education. In addition, this dissertation explored the extent to which the online learning environment has shaped these student support services professionals’ conceptualization of the advising and support roles in higher education. The researcher also examined the extent to which student support services departments in higher education have developed and implemented support services on their campuses specifically for their online learner student populations, and the ways in which these efforts changed advising and student affairs practice. The participants of this qualitative multi-case study were student support services professionals at 4-year universities who work directly with online learners. ❧ Academic and student development support services are critical components in student success, retention, and persistence in higher education, particularly for the current population of online learners, which currently exceeds 20 million undergraduate and graduate students. This number will continue to increase as more institutions begin to offer online, non-traditional, channels to education. The results will contribute to the fields of online learning and student support services in higher education, respectively, by highlighting the ways in which online learning has reshaped student support services, as well as the student support services role. It is the belief of the author that online learning will continue to have an impact on academic advising practice and student development programs on university campuses, and it is through research and examination of the fields of online learning and student support services that increased understanding and improved practice can occur.
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c40-377162
title: Environmental determinants of externalizing psychopathologies

description: Genetic factors are an important cause of externalizing psychopathologies, but environment also accounts for half of its total variance. Previous studies in urban-dwelling populations have primarily focused on the social environmental aspects linked to externalizing psychopathologies, but the potential contribution of the physical environment has been largely overlooked. My dissertation aimed to address this critical knowledge gap in the field of environmental neurosciences in order to better understand the role of the physical environment in the development of externalizing psychopathologies, primarily aggressive behavior. In this dissertation, I present the first epidemiologic evidence supporting the benefits of neighborhood greenspace in reducing aggressive behavior in urban-dwelling adolescents and the adverse long-term temperature effects on aggressive behavior. Additionally, I provide some evidence supporting the recently proposed argument that previous research looking at the effects of prenatal environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) on externalizing psychopathologies may have been based on spurious effects. More specifically, results suggest that the association between prenatal ETS exposure and aggressive behavior may be explained by maternal antisocial behavior. Furthermore, I identified a possible indirect effect of prenatal ETS on conduct disorder via maternal antisocial behavior. Future environmental epidemiology studies investigating externalizing psychopathologies will need to address the potential confounding by neighborhood greenspace, ambient temperature, and maternal behavioral problems.
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c40-43358
title: Males in middle life: A study of middle managers
DOI: 10.25549/prim-c46-6030
title: The Japanese strategic and operational approaches to World War II : lecture by Philip A. Crowl, 1987
DOI: 10.25549/sal-c78-45
title: Ruben Salazar receives army education certificate, 1951

description: Ruben Salazar received his Army Education Program Certificate for completing courses in Military Correspondence and also for Army Typewriting during his time in the U.S. Army, 1951 December 21.
DOI: 10.25549/sal-c78-49
title: Ruben Salazar's family donates his papers to USC, Los Angeles, CA, 2011

description: Photograph of Barbara Robinson, USC Boeckmann Special Collections Librarian, as she looks through the Ruben Salazar archives. The collection was a gift from Salazar’s children, Lisa Salazar Johnson, Stephanie Salazar Cook, and John Salazar. Housed at the Doheny Memorial Library, the archive includes  personal and professional artifacts that document the late journalist’s life from his birth in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, in 1928, to his 1970 death in Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, 2011 April 19.
DOI: 10.25549/sal-c78-50
title: "Ruben Salazar: Border Correspondent", 1955

description: The front cover of "Ruben Salazar: Border Correspondent," an anthology of Ruben Salazar's writings from 1955-1970 with an introduction by Mario T. Garcia, the editor of the book, Berkeley, California, 1995.
DOI: 10.25549/sal-c78-57
title: Puckett, letter. 1953-6-26, to Salazar

description: Charles Alexander Puckett (Texas Western College--later re-named University of Texas), El Paso, Texas, letter, 1952 June 26, to Ruben Salazar, 804 Arizona Street, El Paso, Texas. "Your name is included in the Honors List..." -- first line. Re Salazar being placed on the Honors List for the Spring Semester.
DOI: 10.25549/sal-c78-64
title: Ruben Salazar's reading course certificate, El Paso, TX, 1939

description: After he satisfactorily read 20 books in the city and state reading course, Ruben Salazar received the Reading Course Certificate for elementary schools in El Paso, Texas, 1939 May 27.
DOI: 10.25549/sal-c78-75
title: Ruben Salazar's first communion, El Paso, TX, 1935

description: The program from Ruben Salazar's first communion. At the age of 7, Ruben Salazar received his First Communion at the Sacred Heart Church in El Paso, Texas, 1935 October 27.
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c40-117791
title: LSD users and religiosity
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c40-135300
title: Exploratory study: Adolescent perceptions of drug abuse in their community
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c40-146668
title: The Health Maintenance Organization: The development of a national health care delivery system
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c40-159432
title: The Incidence and Characteristics of Sibling Separation in Foster Home Placement
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c40-311637
title: The role of secondary mathematics teachers in fostering the Algebra 1 success of African American males

description: This study examines the experiences of mathematically successful African American males in secondary Algebra 1 courses through the lens of critical race theory (CRT). The purpose of this study was to contribute to the knowledge of how to promote their success in mathematics, particularly Algebra1, when there are structures in place that impede their mathematics success. Further, this study aims to determine how teachers’ pedagogy may or may not have contributed to African American males’ Algebra 1 success. Qualitative methods were used to collect data from the interviews and classroom observations of 10 participants. The 10 participants include six African American males and four high school Algebra 1 teachers. The data was then transcribed and coded for analyzing in relationship to the following research questions: (1) What pedagogical content knowledge do secondary math teachers believe is necessary for teaching Algebra 1 to African American males? (2) How can Algebra 1 teachers’ pedagogy support African American males in developing a positive mathematics identity? ❧ Findings from this study suggest that teachers’ math content knowledge for teaching Algebra 1 be beyond that of Algebra 2 with some knowledge of calculus. In addition, Algebra 1 teachers should be able to foster a growth mindset for African American males who have not developed a positive mathematics identity, and they should be able to create an interactive classroom environment for teaching and learning Algebra 1. Further, Algebra 1 teachers should be able to provide Algebra 1 instruction that is relevant to African American males’ daily lives and culture, provide opportunities for students to practice skills and develop strong factual knowledge, and create a classroom environment that is inviting of student-teacher interaction as well as student interaction with their peers. ❧ The implications of this study is that teacher education programs as well as in-service professional development should prepare teachers for teaching math by equipping them with the proper content knowledge and monitoring them to ensure that they maintain the level of content knowledge. In addition, teacher education programs as well as in-service professional development should teach cultural and social perspectives of math, including Algebra 1, and reinforce this knowledge as part of an ongoing teacher development process. Finally, schools should implement small-group settings or Algebra 1 support courses into the school curriculum to supplement Algebra 1 content learning and help negate African American males’ reliance on tutoring in order to benefit from their Algebra 1 instruction.
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c40-327361
title: Program evaluation of an alternative school: increasing program effectiveness for opportunity youth

description: The objective of this study was to evaluate the quality of Operation New Hope’s (ONH) program and the impact it was having on the opportunity youth ages 16 to 24 academic performance, attitudes and behaviors. Additionally, to assess if ONH was meeting the students’ cognitive, emotional, and behavioral engagement needs. This study consisted of a review of school documents and observations of classroom interaction and discourse as well as of interviews with school personnel and students. Additionally, the student engagement survey (SES) was administered to gather data on how well ONH meets engagement needs. ONH student enrollment had a total of 56 students of which 26 were 11th graders and 30 were 12th graders. However, only 27 students participated in the study. The evaluation found that (a) ONH achieved its program objectives in terms of student development through its ability to create a welcoming and family-oriented environment where each student felt support and respected, (b) the students’ attitudes and behaviors shifted due to the school leaders and teachers’ ability to be student-centered, (c) the outcomes in the survey indicate there are levels of cognitive, emotional, and behavioral engagement present at ONH. The results of this evaluation demonstrate to opportunity youth funders, community, and local school districts that alternative schools are viable solutions. The study also provides ONH with an assessment tool for program improvement and effectiveness.
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c40-357223
title: Student engagement and social capital in an outperforming urban high school career academy model

description: The purpose of this study was to examine the perceived factors that contribute to academic achievement and student engagement in an outperforming urban high school with a career academy model of high school reform. The study was designed to determine the combined effect of emotional, behavioral, and cognitive student engagement while also assessing the influence of social capital on academic achievement. ❧ The academic outcomes of the nation’s students are marked by a significant and persistent achievement gap closely aligned to students’ race. Nevertheless, certain urban schools have successfully diminished the achievement gap and have outperformed their counterparts across the country. Although some research has been conducted that examines achievement in smaller, career-themed learning communities, few have focused on the integrated effects of student engagement and transmission of social capital on student performance. ❧ This case study focused on an outperforming urban high school in the Trojan Union High School District. The Los Angeles Career Academy High School met the multiple criteria defining an urban school as well as the measures used to indicate that it was outperforming its state counterparts. A qualitative analysis was applied to uncover patterns and themes that emerged from the triangulated data. The data that was collected consisted of student and teacher interviews, student and teacher surveys, observations, and document analysis. The factors influencing student engagement and academic achievement existed within a system of layered contexts of the students’ school culture. The contributive factors were found to include a school culture that promoted academic achievement through student connectivity. In addition to the culture, the structure of the school day supported achievement by maximizing student connections to campus adults and their peers. On the level of the smaller, career-themed learning community, the factors influencing engagement and achievement revolved around clearly communicated school-to-career connections, opportunities for collaborative learning and leadership, and the deliberate and systematic transmission of social capital through nested layers of support and mentorship.
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c40-360997
title: Nucleic acid-dependent conformational changes in CRISPR−Cas9 revealed by site-directed spin labeling

description: An adaptive and heritable immune prokaryotic system is based on a region of DNA called Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats (CRISPR). CRISPR targets DNA or RNA as a way of protecting against foreign genetic elements. One specific type of CRISPR “type II” produces RNA derived from the CRISPR locus, which in complex with the CRISPR-associated (Cas) protein Cas9, forms an RNA-guided nuclease that cleaves double-stranded DNAs at specific sites. In recent years, the CRISPR-Cas9 system has been successfully adapted for genome engineering in a wide range of organisms. While studies have indicated that a series of conformational changes in Cas9 involving the RNA and the target DNA direct the protein into its active conformation, the details and the roles are unclear. Here, site-directed spin labeling (SDSL) is used to investigate the nucleic-acid dependent conformational changes in Streptococcus pyogenes Cas9 (SpyCas9). SpyCa9 was labeled with Nitroxide spins attached at the Cysteines without interfering with the protein function. X-band continuous-wave electron paramagnetic resonance spectra of the attached nitroxides revealed conformational changes of SpyCas9 that are consistent with a large scale domain rearrangement upon binding to its RNA partner. The results demonstrate that SDSL can be used to monitor the dynamics of CRISPR-Cas9. This will potentially provide key information for understanding the mechanism of CRISPR function.
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c40-371230
title: Growth hacking: public relations for the internet era

description: Growth hacking is the process of expanding a product’s user base through a mix of coding and marketing/communications. The practice as we know it today was born in Silicon Valley’s tech sector startups as a result of the lean-growth culture that is prominent throughout these organizations. The entire premise of growth hacking is that through a process of testing, measurement, and iteration, a growth hacker comes to understand what users want from a product and uses that information in collaboration with other teams to reach an optimal state known as Product Market Fit. ❧ Growth hacking is in essence a rejection of traditional functions like marketing and public relations, which are seen by growth hackers as wasteful practices. Growth hackers attempt to increase awareness of their product and guide audiences through the sales funnel with as little spending as possible and in highly scalable ways. ❧ This paper argues that growth hacking, through its nature of engaging with users and audiences in order to get information, and through its executions which make heavy use of communications tactics, is actually a modern variant of public relations. It outlines the different similarities between the two functions and posits that growth hacking is simply a version of public relations that is adapted to startups and the internet-fueled communications landscape. This paper also discusses prominent growth hacking cases and highlights the specific public relations characteristics of each. Lastly, a set of recommendations is made for more traditional public relations professionals who want to modernize their practices and processes.