Master of Arts / Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Social Work / Kevin Steinmetz / At year end 2016 over 3.7 million Americans were under probationary supervision. In response to institutional overcrowding, the U.S. has been increasingly reliant on community corrections. Though there has been extensive research into various aspects of the criminal justice system, the area of community corrections, specifically probation, has seen relatively little scrutiny. Through quantitative analysis of probationary data, this study examined a Midwestern population of closed probationary cases. Through a framework of intersectionality, various intersectional identities are examined for likelihood of failure. Focusing on the prevalence of negative outcomes for not only racial and ethnic minorities, but also intersections of race, ethnicity, and gender. Utilizing logistic regression analysis, each model examines race, ethnicity, and sex against probation failure. After an initial baseline model, intersections of race/ethnicity were run. Using probation success as a control outcome in each of the models. Across all models, race and ethnicity were found to be significantly and positively associated with probation failure. Additionally, standardized coefficients indicate Black and Black/Hispanic categories to represent strong effect on negative probation outcome. Of note, sex though unreliable in numerous models, was found only to be a significant and strong predictor in the model examining Black probationers. Possible explanations, study limitation, future research, and policy implication are offered in the discussion and conclusion section.

The aim of this work is to identify socio-economic disparities between villages of four municipalities of the South Bohemia and to suggest some ways of reducing the founded differences. Two villages of the Prachatice district and two villages of the Strakonic district were selected for the analyse

This focus of following thesis is the question of disparity in regions. It contents analysis of inequalities in regions of level NUTS III in Czech Republic. The atention head for three areas:living enviroment, unemployment, public health. Analysis is realized by comparsion of most important indicators between the years 2000 and 2009. All indicators are expressed in numerical form in synoptic tables, graphic data and copmleted with annotations and comments. Mathematical and statistical data were used in form of such called points method of evaluation to complete the sequence of regions.

Around 20% of America’s population lives in rural communities; however, only 9% of all physicians practice within these rural areas. Consequently, there is a consistent shortage of healthcare resources for these populations.1 To help this shortage, medical institutions should reach out to their local youth because a majority of the physicians who practice medicine in rural areas experienced their childhood in similar communities.2,3 The simulated Medicine in Action camp at Quillen College of Medicine provided an opportunity for local, rural high school students to learn more about the healthcare field in the hopes of eventually playing a role in alleviating the rural healthcare deficiencies. Twenty-one high school students from rural Appalachia with an interest in the healthcare field were recruited by the Simulated Medicine in Action camp to participate in a five-day medical simulation experience developed by the Quillen College of Medicine Center for Experiential Learning. The program employed interactive simulation platforms to provide education to students about various aspects of patient centered care, including communication skills, physical exam skills, technical skills, and integrative clinical reasoning skills. Through a lecture followed by simulation format, students exercised real world medical skills to assess, diagnose, and treat their “patients” in clinical scenarios. This format challenged the students to work as a team and provided students with the opportunity to experience the role of medical professionals. The curriculum also provided students with the opportunity to listen to a panel of physicians as well as a panel of other healthcare professionals to provide exposure to the breadth of the healthcare. Participants completed two surveys using the Likert scale: an entrance survey on the first day of camp and an exit survey on the final day. The likert scoring scale is as follows: 5=strongly agree, 4=agree, 3=neutral, 2=disagree, and 1=strongly disagree. Students responded to the following prompts in both of the entrance survey and the exit survey: (1) I have had enough exposure to the medical field to know that I am interested or not interested in the field; (2) If I decide that I want to be a physician, I believe that I am capable of achieving that goal; (3) If I decide I want to be a physician, I think I know enough about the educational process to pursue that career. Entrance survey had an average of 3.8, 4.5, and 3.7 respectfully. Exit survey had an average of 4.2, 4.7, 4.2 respectfully. Students also responded to the following prompts exclusively in the exit survey with the respected results: The Simulated Medicine in Action Camp improved my desire to pursue a career in healthcare (4.8); The Simulated Medicine in Action Camp improved my desire to become a physician (4.5); The Simulated Medicine in Action Camp improved my desire to pursue further education (4.7). Due to the upward trend and the high Likert scores in the exit survey, we conclude that using medical simulation experience with hands on opportunities and exposure to healthcare providers both clarifies and increases interest among high school students in regards to entering the healthcare field. We hope that this interest propels them into their careers where they may potentially serve their local rural community. References: 1Rosenblatt, R. A., & Hart, L. G. (2000). Physicians and rural America. The Western journal of medicine, 173(5), 348–351. doi:10.1136/ewjm.173.5.348 2Easterbrook, M., Godwin, M., Wilson, R., Hodgetts, G., Brown, G., Pong, R. and Najgebauer, E. (2019). Rural background and clinical rural rotations during medical training: effect on practice location. [online] CMAJ. Available at: http://www.cmaj.ca/content/160/8/1159.short [Accessed 18 Sep. 2019]. 3Feldman, Kymm, et al. "The difference between medical students interested in rural family medicine versus urban family or specialty medicine." Canadian Journal of Rural Medicine, vol. 13, no. 2, 2008, p. 73+. Gale Academic Onefile, Accessed 18 Sept. 2019.

For a long time, autism spectrum disorder has been considered a predominantly male condition. However, emerging literature suggests that this imbalance is not due solely to etiological differences but rather to other factors. Disparity in diagnosis, because of biases, co-occurring psychiatric disorders, and limited understanding of autism manifestation in females, causes these individuals to be diagnosed with autism significantly later than their male counterparts, if at all. The delayed diagnoses or misdiagnoses of females contribute to later and lesser treatment and worsened outcomes. Furthermore, certain traits of autism in women, such as camouflage and a tendency toward internalized symptomology, exacerbate this effect. Unfortunately, this becomes a self-perpetuating issue: the reduction in the number of diagnosed females results in an underrepresentation of the sex in subsequent autism studies, and this, in turn, contributes to the misrepresentation of the female gender in autism. Thus, in addressing this complex issue, clinicians, researchers, and communities target these many intertwined challenges. Modifications and new initiatives continue to be developed to better accommodate autistic females and make strides to bridge the gender/sex gap.

This thesis deals with regional disparities of youth unemployment in the Visegrad Group countries. The aim of this work is to seize the development of youth unemployment in the Visegrad Four regions and to find out which determinants, whether economic, demographic or social, influence the differences in youth unemployment among individual regions. The work is based on data available on the website of the European Statistical Office. The analytical part examines the relationship between the youth unemployment rate (at the level of NUTS 2 regions) and the level of education, GDP per capita and the rate of general unemployment. The thesis uses the method of correlation analysis of dependence between individual determinants and the method of trend analysis of unemployment development

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This dissertation consists of three essays in Applied Econometrics that seek a better understanding of different aspects of risk and risk management tools. The first essay is about mortality risk in Virginia coal regions. With a focus on the mortality of non-malignant respiratory diseases (NMRD), I estimate the impact of living in a coal county and find that coal-mining county residency significantly increases the probability of dying from NMRD. This statistical association is accentuated by surface coal mining, high smoking rates, lower health insurance coverage, and a shortage of doctors. The second essay evaluates the cost of a price risk management tool called futures hedging. A variety of measures illustrate considerable changes in hedging costs over time. Quantile regression results show that substantial price volatility and high margin requirements are the main factors driving high hedging costs from 2007 to 2013. The third paper investigates a health risk management tool, a public health insurance program in China called New Cooperative Medical Scheme (NCMS). I apply contract theory to characterize local governments' selective incentives in NCMS benefit designs. Empirical analysis of China Health and Nutrition Survey data indicate challenges of financial sustainability of this scheme in poor regions. The NCMS plan tends to under-cover the services that are moderately predictable and negatively correlated with plan profits, such as outpatient treatments. Preventive services are generally over-provided, perhaps due to the incentive to attract healthy participants. / Doctor of Philosophy / This dissertation uses quantitative analysis to investigate three economic problems related to different aspects of risk. The first question is, what affects the respiratory health of Virginia coal mining counties' residents? Using respiratory mortality as the variable of interest, this paper finds that surface coal mining, high smoking rates, and lack of health access jointly contribute to the elevated risk of dying from respiratory diseases in our study area. The second research problem is about a price risk management tool called "hedging": purchasing contracts in the futures market to offset price movements in the cash markets. Based on historical data of corn and soybeans, I simulate the cost of hedging and find this risk management tool is not cheap, especially in 2007 to 2013. The high cost is mainly due to substantial price fluctuations in the recent decade. As a health risk management tool, health insurance is the focus of my third study. In China rural areas, a public health scheme aimed to reduce a resident's risk of suffering medical impoverishment by spreading the risk over residents in a county. County governments were relatively free to design the implementation and benefit plans. This study reveals that most New Cooperative Medical Scheme (NCMS) benefit plans are not efficient to achieve the scheme's objective. Facing high risk of fund deficits, local insurance programs in poor regions are likely to under-cover health services, such as outpatient treatments. If this scheme were allowed to charge higher prices from high-risk enrollees instead of a flat-rate premium, its efficiency might be improved.