Using a basic qualitative approach, interviews were conducted with five agents in North Dakota with a range of experiences and lengths of service to evaluate the effectiveness and implementation of Common Measures, a set of survey instruments designed to assess the impact of the 4-H program. The study addresses the culture of North Dakota Extension’s views on evaluation and the implementation of Common Measures. The use of a state-wide reporting tool to assess the 4-H program in North Dakota was perceived as necessary, however, many agents felt Common Measures, missed the mark and did not meet the North Dakota reporting. The ability to tell the story of the 4-H program and the long-term impact it has on youth is necessary to the success of any state-wide reporting venture. Additional training on how alternative forms of data collection can be used to tell the story of their program is needed.

After the fire accident, KTH school of architecture is no longer in its best performance. The school indeed need an extension. However, through out this thesis project, I attempt to take one step further. It is not only to construct a functional school, but reconsider the meaning of architectural education. I am interested in three aspects, which all of them has being driving forces to this project. Firstly, I was interested in memory of the old architecture school in Stockholm, which was accommodated in a 19th centry wooden building. It was old and small, but students loved it. One’s memory of certain places would shape his thinking and values as an architect. Therefore, my design attempts to bring back such a memory by study some of the details in the old building and bring them back into the new extension with a twist. Secondly, in terms of working method I am very much resisted to ‘Graphic Architecture’, models always come together with rending images. They are offered to read side by side. The rending images are not trying to present the final products but also used as a development tool. Overall this project was developed from the inside towards the outside. The aim was to make an ordinary building with some thoughtful touches.

Mississippi residents were surveyed to determine how The Food Factor and Extension brands were impacting their intent to change behavior. The Food Factor is a weekly Extension mass media program that communicates research-based information about food, nutrition, diet, and healthy lifestyles. The respondents were split into viewer and non-viewer categories. Viewers were asked about their perceptions of the show and their nutrition-related behaviors. Non-viewers were assigned to a branded or non-branded episode of The Food Factorto determine their perceptions and to see if branding was having an impact on their behavior. The study found that although The Food Factor was perceived positively, it was uncertain if the brand was having meaningful effects on its viewers. Recommendations include future studies surrounding the use of branding in social marketing programs, studying other mass media programs in other states, and further evaluation of The Food Factor brand.

När man arbetar så blir det lätt att man faller in i rutiner. Dessa rutiner kan göra detsvårt att se att ens uppgifter kan ses som repetitiva. Det är också svårt för någon utom-stående att se dessa repetitiva mönster. Målet med detta arbete är att kunna visa för enanvändare vilka delar av dennes arbete som skulle kunna automatiseras. Detta uppnåsmed hjälp av två verktyg som vi utvecklat; en Chrome-extension som loggar vad enanvändare gör under arbetsdagen, samt ett analysverktyg i Python som analyserar datanfrån extensionen och visar möjliga repetitiva moment.Chrome-extensionen loggar varje gång användaren interagerar med ett element påen hemsida till en händelselogg. Denna händelselogg kan sedan exporteras som enJSON-fil och matas in i ett Python-skript för att analyseras och hitta repetitiva mönsteroch arbetsmoment.Efter att ha testat processen på två testfall kom vi fram till att den inte fungerar heltsom planerat, då extensionen behöver samla in mer data och analysen behöver leta eftermönster som är snarlika, inte bara identiska. Verktyget har potential att användas inomfaktiskt verksamhet men då skulle det krävas en vidareutveckling av både Chrome-extensionen samt analys-skriptet.

Suppose K is a fibered knot with bi-orderable knot group. We perform a topological winding operation to half-twist bands in a free incompressible Seifert surface Σ of K. This results in a Seifert surface Σ' with boundary that is a non-fibered knot K'. We call K a fibered base of K'. A fibered base exists for a large class of non-fibered knots. We prove K' has a bi-orderable knot group if Σ' is obtained from applying the winding operation to only one half-twist band of Σ. Utilizing a Seifert surface gluing technique, we obtain HNN extension group presentations for both knot groups that differ by only one relation. To show the knot group of K' is bi-orderable, we apply the following: Let G be a bi-ordered free group with order preserving automorphism ɑ. It is well known that the semidirect product ℤ ×ɑG is a bi-orderable group. If X is a basis of G, a presentation of ℤ ×ɑG is ⟨ t,X | R ⟩, where the relations are R = {txt-1}ɑ(x)-1 : x ∈ X}. If R' is any subset of R, we prove that the group H =⟨ t,X | R' ⟩ is bi-orderable. H is a special case of an HNN extension of G. Finally, we add new relations to the group presentation of H such that bi-orderability is preserved.

There is always a strong character of OKU( which means depth) inside the traditional Japanese wood construction, which fascinating me a lot. My thesis is about study the structure and spatial language and translating traditional language to formulate a space with that quality of depth/ oku.Site is been choose in far east museum in Skeppsholmen, and my the- sis is working on an addition to the original far east museum. As it was ropewalk manufactory early days, long and narrow, it doesn’t have its own identification, that’s why nowadays it’s more like a belonging facility attached to modern museum and being ignored by most citizens.

The latest edition of the Food and Drug Administration's Model Food Code provides the definition of an acceptable donated food item but does not specify any safe storage or handling standards for these items. Virginia has not adopted this edition, but its own food handling regulations provide liability protections to food donors and exempt food pantries from any relevant retail food handling regulations. This means that food pantries must provide their own oversight over implementation of safe food handling requirements. Some pantries only accept nonperishables, but others accept both perishable and nonperishable food, or prepare/repurpose food on site. Therefore, pantries have varying needs in terms of safe food handling and preparation oversight and guidance. This project aims to observe food safety practices at food pantries within Virginia, and to establish a set of recommendations based on these observations for food pantries to consider implementing. Twenty pantries throughout the Commonwealth of Virginia were observed when distributing food using a standardized rubric. This rubric allowed the observer to collect detail on food storage, handling, and preparation at the pantry. Each pantry was visited once and observed for about two hours. The manager of the pantry completed a survey to determine basic food safety knowledge. Generally, pantries successfully followed basic food safety guidelines, however there were some clear risky practices observed. These included improper handwashing, improper storage of perishable items, and improper volunteer personal hygiene. There were only two handwashing attempts observed between all 20 pantries and neither of these attempts was correct. In addition, 8 of 20 (40%) of the pantries did not keep up to date records of their refrigerator and freezer temperatures. Lack of personal hygiene, especially the use of personal items while handling food and lack of glove usage, was a concern. 9 of 20 (45%) of pantries had someone on site using a personal item while handling food, and 4 of 6 (67%) of pantries that prepared or cooked food on site had volunteers improperly wearing gloves during these activities. Managers at seventeen of twenty (85%) pantries reported completing some type of food safety training while only volunteers at six of twenty (30%) pantries reported the same. This demonstrates gaps in knowledge between volunteers and managers. The results of this study demonstrate the need for standard operating procedures (SOPs) to be made available for food pantries, as well as a food safety training created specifically for food pantry volunteers that is applicable to their scope of work. / Master of Science in Life Sciences / The latest edition of the Food and Drug Administration's Model Food Code provides the definition of an acceptable donated food item but does not specify any safe storage or handling standards for these items. Virginia has not adopted this edition, but its own food handling regulations provide liability to food donors and exempt food pantries from any relevant retail food handling regulations. This means that food pantries must provide their own oversight over implementation of safe food handling requirements. Some pantries only accept nonperishable food items, but others accept both perishable and nonperishable food, or prepare/repurpose food on site. Therefore, pantries have varying needs in terms of safe food handling and preparation oversight and guidance. This project aims to observe food safety practices at food pantries within Virginia, and to establish a set of recommendations based on these observations for food pantries to consider. Twenty pantries throughout the state of Virginia were observed during distribution using a standardized rubric. This rubric allowed the observer to collect detail on food storage, handling, and preparation at the pantry. Each pantry was visited once and observed for two hours. The manager of the pantry completed a survey on general basic food safety knowledge. Generally, pantries successfully followed basic food safety guidelines, however there were some clear risky practices observed. Consistently, these included risky practices around handwashing, proper storage of perishable items, and personal hygiene of volunteers. The results of this study show a pointed need for standard operating procedures (SOPs) to be created for food pantries, as well as a food safety training created specifically for food pantry volunteers that is applicable to their scope of work.

Members of People Unlimited Inc, maintain that they are proof that physical immortality is possible, despite the death of their founder. In this dissertation, I address the paradox of immortalist lifeworlds: how can members of People Unlimited maintain that they are immortal, yet also claim that members are still susceptible to death? This dissertation is about how imagined futures make up the present for radical life extension (RLE) activists, who form part of an emergent immortalist biosocial landscape where anticipation acts as a way of recognizing the future as a model for the present. Understanding how immortalists can claim to be physically immortal in the present, yet always working toward immortality, requires consideration of the cultures and communities within the broader RLE movement, human relationships to finitude, relationships between science and religion, and biomedical imaginaries. Since little ethnographic data exists on these communities, the goal of my research is to provide a general overview of the contemporary social phenomena of immortality, with an ethnographic focus on People Unlimited and Alcor Life Extension, both in Scottsdale, Arizona, and the broader RLE community that attends the yearly Revolution Against Aging and Death Festival (RAADfest) in Las Vegas, Nevada. The dissertation argues that RLE is an emergent form of biosocial citizenship among healthy individuals, whose present biological limitations are overcome by an orientation towards the future. / Dissertation / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) / Members of People Unlimited Inc, maintain that they are proof that physical immortality is possible, despite the death of their founder. In this dissertation, I address the paradox of immortalist lifeworlds: how can members of People Unlimited maintain that they are immortal, yet also claim that members are still susceptible to death? I argue that for many immortalists, anticipation acts as a way of recognizing the future as a model for the present. I explore how radical life extension activists, including immortalists, transhumanist, cryonicists, and others, create immortal futures through self-care regimens in the present. I connect their future and present by examining the promissory and hopeful discourses of modern bioeconomies, and the forms of affect used in the creation of immortal biosocial worlds.

As universities enhance their civic engagement and build connections between campus and communities across the state, the county extension office and local staff have an opportunity to broker resources between the two entities. The question is not ‘if’ this needs to happen, but specifically what role Extension should play. County Extension Coordinators in Alabama have differing opinions about the role of their office and the value of specific engagement activities to the community. These differing opinions may make it difficult to achieve uniformity in what faculty can expect of a county extension office. Three different opinion groups were identified in this study. One group of County Extension Coordinators felt that engagement activities should focus on issues affecting local economic impact. Another group chose activities that would avoid potential problems due to interagency conflict and local politics. The third group saw the civic engagement of their land-grant university as an opportunity to make Extension look good in their county. Group membership could be explained by tenure of the County Extension Coordinator and their subject matter expertise. Given the results of this study and engagement scholarship, strategic areas for Extension to explore include (1) the activities of the county extension office as influenced by local advisory groups, opinions of the County Extension Coordinator, and needs of the Land-Grant University; (2) the role of the County Extension Coordinator in facilitating university-wide outreach; and (3) the need for County Extension Coordinators to have extensive networks and networking skills in order to embrace the breadth of opportunities to facilitate the civic engagement of a Land-Grant University.

No description available.