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Ecological Association Between the Red-Cockaded Woodpecker and Southern Pine Beetle in the Homochitto National Forest: a Geographic Information System Approach
Since the introduction of management practices by the Forest Service to stabilize red-cockaded woodpecker (RCW) populations, the number of cavity trees killed by southern pine beetles (SPB) has increased. A model of the landscape ecology of RCW and SPB in the Homochitto National Forest was created using data collected from the Forest Service and Global Atmospherics. The conclusions of the study were that the RCW and SPB utilize the same type of habitat and the stand hazard maps are an accurate means of determining the locations of SPB infestations. The functional heterogeneity maps created for the SPB and RCW would be useful predictors of future occurrences of either species if complete data were obtained.
Medgar Evers (1925-1963) and the Mississippi Press
Medgar Evers was gunned down in front of his home in June 1963, a murder that went unpunished for almost thirty years. Assassinated at the height of the civil rights movement, Evers is a relatively untreated figure in either popular or academic writing. This dissertation includes three themes. Evers's death defined his life, particularly his public role. The other two themes define his relationship with the press in Mississippi (and its structure), and his relationship to the various civil rights organizations, including his employer, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. Was the newspaper press, both state and national, fair in its treatment of Evers? Did the press use Evers to further the civil rights agenda or to retard that movement, and was Evers able to employ the press as a public relations tool in promoting the NAACP agenda? The obvious answers have been that the Mississippi press editors and publishers defended segregation and that Evers played a minor role in the civil rights movement. Most newspaper publishers and editorial writers slanted the news to promote segregation but not all newspapers editors. The Carters of Greenville, J. Oliver Emmerich of McComb and weekly editors Ira Harkey and Hazel Brannon Smith denounced the segregationist groups. Evers, too, is not easily defined. His life's work produced few results but his mere presence in the most racist state in the country provided other civil rights organizers with an example of personal strength and fortitude unmatched in the late 1950s and early 1960s. The dissertation reviewed the existing primary and secondary source material, and included personal interviews with primary participants in the Jackson boycotts of 1963. Evers compares with Abraham Lincoln in that both received little credit for their accomplishments until more than thirty years after their assassinations. Both represented the democratic …
Attitudes of Faculty Members Toward the Integration of Faith and Discipline at Selected Southern Baptist Colleges and Universities
The attitudes toward the integration of faith and discipline of full-time faculty members at five selected Southern Baptist colleges and universities which are members of the Christian College Coalition were explored for this study. The integration of faith and discipline is a concept unique to Southern Baptist higher education. Arthur Walker, Jr., of the Education Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention defines the concept as referring to the mission of the institution, the personal faith of faculty members, and the professional involvement and interaction of faculty members with their students, regardless of disciplines. Since little information exists on faculty attitudes toward this concept, data were collected through a survey instrument on three dimensions of integration: professorial integration in the classroom, professorial integration in and out of the classroom, and institutional integration of faith and discipline.
The Positions, Roles, and Perceptions of Black Elected Public School Board Members in Mississippi
The problem of this study is that of discerning the board positions, the roles, and the perceptions of Black elected public school board members in Mississippi as perceptions relate to racial discrimination, interpersonal relationships, and primary education interests. Major problems in education as perceived ranged from "racism" to "finances." Major contributions to education in Mississippi in the last five years as perceived ranged from "court decisions" to "election of Blacks to education positions." General conclusions are that less racial discrimination exists in school systems with Blacks represented on school boards; however, some racism is still perceived by Black board members.
Factors Related to Mississippi School Library Media Centers in Multitype Cooperation
The main purpose of this study was to identify the major obstacles to cooperation as perceived by school library media specialists in the state of Mississippi and to determine if members of the Coastal Mississippi Library Cooperative (CMLC) believe that there are fewer obstacles to cooperation than do non-members. The secondary purpose was to evaluate the CMLC to some extent to determine if success was achieved through organization when defined by the variables, planning, governance, funding, communication, administration, and evaluation. The population of the study was all of the librarians (academic, public, school, and special) in the six-county area which comprises the CMLC, and a random sample of public school librarians throughout the remainder of the state. All of the school librarians were sent a questionnaire that requested their responses to statements of barriers to cooperation. All of the librarians in the CMLC region were sent a questionnaire to obtain their perceptions of participation in the CMLC. Pour librarians, members of the CMLC, were Interviewed to obtain information on the organizational factors of the CMLC. Data received from school library media specialists were submitted to various statistical tests. The Chi-Square statistic was used on the demographic portion of the questionnaire, which revealed that four of the variables and the dependent variable, membership in the CMLC, were significantly different. A t-test performed on the barriers to cooperation section produced no significant differences between the member and non-member responses. The perceptions of participation in the CMLC data revealed that there were differences among the four library systems (academic, public, school, and special) involved, but most of the respondents considered the CMLC to be successful. Data from the interview also revealed that the CMLC was successful in its organization. Due to the overall low response to the survey, the stated hypotheses could not …
Music Preferences 1980 Versus 1989 and Their Relationship With Selected Environment and Listener Variables
The purpose of this study was to determine differences between the same subjects' music preferences at the elementary and high school levels, and the relationship between these findings and the following variables: peer preferences, musical training, excerpt familiarity, grade, gender, and race.
Ordinal Position, Family Size, and Diagnosis in a Psychiatric Hospital Population
The purpose of this study is to investigate the relationships between ordinal birth position, family size, and psychiatric diagnosis, in patients at a state-mental hospital.
An Analysis of the Objectives and Suggested or Illustrative Methods and Materials on the Subject of Reading in the Elementary Schools as Found in Seven State Courses of Study
The problem of this study was to analyze the objectives and methods for teaching reading in the elementary grades as they appeared in the latest available courses of study in certain states for the purpose of determining their uniformity or lack of uniformity. An effort was made to compile data on teaching reading in order to determine certain modern trends as supplementary material for the writer's teaching aids.
Immunity for New Mexico Public School Districts and the 1978 Tort Claims Act
In a 3-year timeframe, nearly 800 student negligence suits were filed, and most involved some claim of personal injury. Despite heightened public attention of negligence lawsuits against school districts and their employees, an empirical study of court decisions revealed that the volume of litigation against school districts remained steady from 1990 to 2005, the majority of cases were ruled in favor of the school district employees, and government and official immunity were most often the basis for these rulings. Researchers have concluded that immunity laws are strong in the United States, although they vary by state in their application. However, a primary recommendation was that, because of the misconception of a lack of immunity for public school employees, a comprehensive study on governmental and official immunity is needed. This dissertation employed legal research, analysis, and methodology to engage in a comprehensive investigation of teacher immunity in the four southern states of Texas, Oklahoma, Mississippi, and New Mexico. Of central concern to this dissertation was the Tort Claims Act of 1978 from the State of New Mexico. The Tort Claims Act is the vehicle by which immunity is granted to public school employees. Court findings over the last 35 years point to three primary domains under which cases pertaining to immunity fall: negligence (62.5%), evaluation and supervision (16.7%), and student discipline (8.3%). Immunity appears strong across all three domains; however, only future studies on cases by state will determine whether states in the southwest United States are the norm or an anomaly.
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