Current reforms emphasize the development of scientific literacy as the
principal goal of science education. The nature of science is considered a critical
component of scientific literacy and is assumed to be an important factor in decision
making on science and technology based issues. However, little research exists that
delineates...
This dissertation consists of a set of three manuscripts exploring features of effective professional development (PD) for science teacher educators. Literature about context-specific PD for science teacher educators is sparse. The first manuscript, a literature review, outlines theoretical lenses through which PD can be understood, the features of effective PD,...
Recent state and national standards have increased the interest in engineering at the K-12 level. Science standards, in particular, have begun to make the case for including engineering throughout the K-12 scope of study. Despite the increased attention to engineering, the characteristics and uniqueness of the field of engineering are...
The primary goal of the study was to determine if and
how baseball players discriminate the rotational direction
of an approaching pitch during the first 200 milliseconds
of the flight of the ball. In addition, college-level
baseball coaches were surveyed to assess the level of
agreement between coaches relative to...
Research has been completed that evaluates two methods for the
extraction of polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons (PNAH) from water.
The two methods compared were EPA Method 610, a liquid-liquid
extraction method, and a method involving PNAH adsorption on
commercially available short C₁₈ bonded phase columns, Sep-Paks,
in series with glass microfiber...
Many miles of roads are built in the Pacific Northwest Forests to provide access for logging and fire protection. Logging roads often cross steep mountainous terrain. Logging roads and the associated cut and fill slopes represent a discontinuity in the natural stress state in the soil mantle. These conditions result...
As the volume of genetic sequence data increases due to improved sequencing techniques and increased interest, the computational tools available to analyze the data are becoming inadequate. This thesis seeks to improve a few of the computational methods available to access and analyze data in the genetic sequence databases. The...
The objective of this thesis is to provide an initial demonstration of the feasibility of constructing highly transparent active electronic devices. Such a demonstration is successfully achieved in the fabrication of ZnO-based thin film transistors (TFTs) exhibiting transparency greater than ~90% in the visible portion of the electromagnetic spectrum and...