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While women have attained higher-level roles and greater representation in higher education administrator roles, the concept of the higher, the fewer (Nidiffer, 2002) represents the “gendered prestige hierarchies” (Allan, 2011, p. 58) that limit women’s representation at more prestigious institutions while bolstering representation at institutions of greater access. In student affairs, women represent a majority of all professionals in the field, though representation in senior student affairs officer roles has not increased significantly since the 1980s (Blackhurst, 2000), with women more likely to advance at institutions with fewer than 1,000 students (Rickard, 1985a). While extensive research exists that illustrates the disparities for women in higher education and academic affairs, little comparable research exists for women in student affairs.
This qualitative study sought to understand how women in senior-level student affairs positions have navigated their experiences and career paths in order to advance to their current roles. Using critical and post-structural feminist perspectives of power, the researcher utilized a critical phenomenological approach to consider how nine women in senior-level student affairs positions in large, public institutions understood their career advancement. Participants completed two semi-structured interviews. The resulting themes include an encompassing theme of genderization, as well as four embedded themes: the person on the path, achieving through and with others, conflicting messages of competence and value, and overtasked and alone. Implications of the study require that policy, practice, and research all examine the ways that genderization perpetuates masculine-centered norms and power dynamics that penalize women for deviating from those norms. For current or aspiring student affairs leaders, organizational constructs must be dismantled in order to disrupt internalized genderization by women.
While women have attained higher-level roles and greater representation in higher education administrator roles, the concept of the higher, the fewer (Nidiffer, 2002) represents the “gendered prestige hierarchies” (Allan, 2011, p. 58) that limit women’s representation at more prestigious institutions while bolstering representation at institutions of greater access. In student affairs, women represent a majority of all professionals in the field, though representation in senior student affairs officer roles has not increased significantly since the 1980s (Blackhurst, 2000), with women more likely to advance at institutions with fewer than 1,000 students (Rickard, 1985a). While extensive research exists that illustrates the disparities for women in higher education and academic affairs, little comparable research exists for women in student affairs.
This qualitative study sought to understand how women in senior-level student affairs positions have navigated their experiences and career paths in order to advance to their current roles. Using critical and post-structural feminist perspectives of power, the researcher utilized a critical phenomenological approach to consider how nine women in senior-level student affairs positions in large, public institutions understood their career advancement. Participants completed two semi-structured interviews. The resulting themes include an encompassing theme of genderization, as well as four embedded themes: the person on the path, achieving through and with others, conflicting messages of competence and value, and overtasked and alone. Implications of the study require that policy, practice, and research all examine the ways that genderization perpetuates masculine-centered norms and power dynamics that penalize women for deviating from those norms. For current or aspiring student affairs leaders, organizational constructs must be dismantled in order to disrupt internalized genderization by women.
Among white people, there is a pervasive mentality that color-evasiveness (Bonilla-Silva, 2003) is an ideal approach to racial equity, meaning many white student affairs professionals may equate refusing to see race as synonymous with being anti-racist. The narrative that white people do not see color is problematic and inaccurate when, in actuality, it serves to maintains white dominance and white supremacy. In order to promote racial equity on college campuses, race needs to be illuminated, recognized, and reckoned with by white people to counter this ideology. The purpose of this qualitative study is to understand how white student affairs administrators describe being white and how whiteness impacts their work in student affairs. Utilizing ontological expansiveness, a critical phenomenological methodology, the researcher interviewed nine white student affairs administrators at a historically white university in the Southeast region of the United States. This university has established diversity and inclusion as one of its top values. All nine participants completed two semi-structured interviews. Data analysis methods included several line-by-line readings and the development of a code-book utilizing the conceptual framework of whiteness and essential concepts from the literature. As a result, six themes with corresponding sub-themes emerged: distance and proximity: the other side of the tracks, navigating judgement, values of whiteness, performative commitment, racism (in)action, and student affairs indoctrination. This study exemplified the ways whiteness permeated the division of student affairs, allowing for an in-depth understanding of the need for political and structural change, as well the need for genuine and authentic commitment by student affairs towards anti-racism.
One of the questions in algebraic groups is about the asymptotic behavior of the probability of return of a random walk, which closely related on the growth rate of a group. Upper-triangular matrices form a group. Solvable groups have an exponential growth rate and it was shown that the asymptotic behavior of the probability of return on these groups has a fractional-exponential decal. The results in the paper by Molchanov and others, are different from the previous finding. They showed that in the case of solvable groups of upper-triangular 2x2 matrices the return probability of the Brownian motions has a polynomial decay. In this dissertation, we extended this research to the case of solvable groups of upper-triangular 3x3 matrices. The elements in the 3x3 matrices that define a Brownian motion on these groups contain integrals of geometric Brownian motions. These integrals have an important role in Asian and Asian-Basket options. We proved some properties of these integrals and showed that certain cases of geometric Asian-basket call options with two assets have a higher risk that the same type of put options. Which implies that some trading strategies might benefit from a reevaluation using a new risk assessment of geometric Asian-Basket.
The dissertation consists of three essays. The first essay examines how a tournament among CEOs to progress within the CEO labor market changes their tendency toward corporate hedging policies. We exploit the textual analysis of 10-Ks to generate corporate hedging proxies. We find that the likelihood and intensity to hedge increases as the CEO labor market tournament prizes augment. We explore the mitigating impacts of corporate hedging on the adverse effects of risk-inducing industry tournament incentives (ITIs) on the cost of debt and stock price crash risk, which could be the possible reasons for the relation. Also, the relation between ITIs and corporate hedging is less pronounced for firms that demonstrate more financial distress and when CEOs are the founders or of retirement age. We identify a causal relation between ITIs and corporate hedging by using an instrumental variable approach and an exogenous shock sourced by the changes in the enforceability of non-competition agreements across states.
In the second essay, the effects of internal tournament incentives (ITTIs) on reserve management, performance and risk-taking in property-liability insurance firms are studied. We find that a positive relation between ITTIs and reserve errors, implying that a higher tournament prize is associated with more conservative loss reserve management. Unlike the literature on non-financial firms, we do not find a positive relation between ITTIs and risk-taking behavior or performance. The overall evidence indicates that VPs in tournaments focus on the strong financial health, not performance. Moreover, we find the positive impact of ITTIs on conservative reserve management is more pronounced for larger, financially weaker and more geographically focused firms, and is mitigated for insurers with a higher percentage of claim loss reserve over total liability. Our results also suggest that the Sarbanes Oxley Act does not significantly impact reserve behaviors of executives. Finally, we find that insurers with more independent board members are likely to have more conservative reserve behavior in internal tournaments.
In the third essay, we investigate the relation between executive pay duration and the cost of debt. We find a positive relation between equity-based pay duration (Equity PD) and loan spread, implying that loan spread is increasing in a larger Equity PD. However, we explore a negative relation between equity&debt-based pay duration (Whole PD) and loan spread, which shows that debt-like compensation contributes to the agency conflict between managers and creditors not only through their sizes but also through their durations. Also, we illustrate that the executive labor market is a channel that drives the relations of both Equity PD and Whole PD with the cost of debt. Risk and information asymmetry channels are the other channels through which Equity PD impacts the cost of debt. Lastly, we show the association between Whole PD and borrowing costs is more pronounced for firms with better corporate governance and past performance.
The student teaching experience is one that is typically filled with a wide range of
triumphs and challenges, and novice student teachers (STs) tend to rely heavily on their
Cooperating Teachers (CTs) to help navigate the experience. CTs have a strong
influence on the development of STs; however, far too often CTs are under-prepared to
carry out the many duties required of them. Without adequate support and training for
CTs, STs may not receive the level of support needed to properly equip them with the
skills needed for the challenging first years of teaching. This study investigated the
training and support provided to CTs, and examined the challenges CTs faced during the
student teaching experience. This study also investigated two levels of training for CTs -
those who participated in the standard training provided by the Educator Preparation
Program (EPP) and those who completed additional training provided by the EPP through
the Teacher Education Institute (TEI), a multi-day summer institute. A total of 361 CTs
participated in this quantitative study and completed a survey about the training and
support received from the EPP, as well as challenges they encountered while supervising
STs. Results showed very few differences between TEI and non-TEI trained CTs; both
groups had mostly positive experiences and were mostly satisfied with the training and
support provided. CTs in both groups reported similar challenges related to preparation
areas such as edTPA, having difficult conversations with STs, and providing
feedback/coaching to them, suggesting that these areas may require additional support
and training prior to and during the student teaching experience.
Connected and autonomous vehicle (CAV) technologies are known as an effective way to improve safety and mobility of the transportation system. As a combination technology of connected vehicle and autonomous vehicle, CAVs share real time traffic data with each other, such as position, speed, and acceleration. CAV only needs a smaller lane width and headway which will lead to a higher roadway capacity. CAVs may have coordinated weaving maneuvers which will increase weaving section capacities. Also, CAVs enable the communication between vehicles and traffic signals. The coordinated operation among CAVs and the communication between CAVs and traffic signals will improve the throughput at signalized intersections and lead to a higher intersection capacity. To quantify the impact of CAVs on freeway capacity and intersection mobility, new guideline should be established in order to be suitable for use in conducting various types of analyses involving CAV strategies. The impact of different CAV penetration rates in the highway system on various facilities under different scenarios should be examined. The results of this research could lead to a better understanding of how CAVs will improve mobility on the highway systems.
This dissertation comprises a series of authored papers, delineated by Chapter, which include advanced manufacturing, both techniques and processes, throughout the design processes for the future development of high quality reflective optics. The dissertation includes a novel kinematic mount design used for manufacturing and metrology of a freeform optic, an experimental study on additively manufactured silicon carbide for optical applications, and a new design methodology for higher efficiency lightweight mirrors considering additive manufacturing as the main process chain. Freeform optics, additive manufacturing, and silicon carbide mirrors are disruptive technologies independently. The work described in this dissertation merges these disruptive technologies into a systematic framework that has the potential to revolutionize both the manufacturing process chain and the mechanical design of lightweight mirrors. The combination of the three papers of this dissertation lays foundational work in reflective optics for overcoming manufacturing challenges, and for advancing mechanical design in consideration of advanced manufacturing. The result is a significant advancement in the state of the art for the creation of silicon carbide, additively manufactured, high efficiency, freeform reflective optics.
This dissertation comprises a series of authored papers, delineated by Chapter, which include advanced manufacturing, both techniques and processes, throughout the design processes for the future development of high quality reflective optics. The dissertation includes a novel kinematic mount design used for manufacturing and metrology of a freeform optic, an experimental study on additively manufactured silicon carbide for optical applications, and a new design methodology for higher efficiency lightweight mirrors considering additive manufacturing as the main process chain. Freeform optics, additive manufacturing, and silicon carbide mirrors are disruptive technologies independently. The work described in this dissertation merges these disruptive technologies into a systematic framework that has the potential to revolutionize both the manufacturing process chain and the mechanical design of lightweight mirrors. The combination of the three papers of this dissertation lays foundational work in reflective optics for overcoming manufacturing challenges, and for advancing mechanical design in consideration of advanced manufacturing. The result is a significant advancement in the state of the art for the creation of silicon carbide, additively manufactured, high efficiency, freeform reflective optics.
Please Email nhorvat1@uncc.edu with subject line "Dissertation Defense" for the Teams information.
Annotating all cis-regulatory modules (CRMs) and constituent transcription factor (TF) binding sites (TFBSs) in genomes is essential to understand genome functions, however, the task remains highly challenging. Here, we developed a new algorithm dePCRM2 for predicting CRMs and TFBSs by integrating numerous TF ChIP-seq datasets. We predicted 1,404,973 CRMCs. And dePCRM2 largely outperforms existing methods. Epigenomic marks play complex roles in cell fate determination. However, little is known about the sequence determinants defining them, we showed two types of convolutional neural networks (CNNs) for cell types and for histone marks are good strategies to uncover the sequence determinants and their importance and interactions. After developed pipeline for predicting the map of CMRs, and a strategy to pinpoint the importance of the motifs in the epigenetic marks in the CRMs, then a complete categorization of cis-regulatory modules (CRMs) and constituent TFBSs in the human and model organismes can facilitate characterizing functions of regulatory sequences in the organisms.To aid the use of these predicted CRMs and TFBSs by the research community, we developed an online database PCRMS (predicted CRMs).The PCRMS database can be a useful resource for the research community to characterize functions of regulatory genomes in important organisms.
