<p> In response to social and environmental concerns, a new type of entrepreneur has recently entered the research literature on sustainable development in business (Hall, Daneke, &amp; Lenox, 2010). Sustainability entrepreneurs are guided by a strong set of values that place environmental and social well-being before materialistic growth (Abrahamsson, 2007; Choi &amp; Gray, 2008; Parrish &amp; Foxon, 2009; Schaltegger &amp; Wagner, 2011; Young &amp; Tilley, 2006). For them, business success is about maintaining financial stability, while enhancing community and improving the health of our planet. This is reflected in their business design, processes, and work culture. Sustainability entrepreneurs are committed to making business decisions that reduce their carbon footprint, promote local or fair trade, support employee wellness, and give back to the community. </p><p> This social phenomenological study explores the lifeworld structures of six women in Calgary who are running small businesses based on sustainability principles. Drawing on the work of Alfred Sch&uuml;tz (1967, 1970a, 1970b; Sch&uuml;tz &amp; Luckmann, 1973), it examines their typifications, stocks of knowledge, and motives, as well as notions of intersubjectivity and spatiality or lived space. From the findings, three Sch&uuml;tzian puppets or personal ideal types are constructed to personify values of community, quality, connection, and environmental preservation. Ms. A.L.L. Green, Ms. Carin Relationships, and Ms. I.N. Tentional characterize aspects of the female sustainability entrepreneur that were identified by participants as central to their motives and actions. Together, they form a new general ideal type called the integrative entrepreneur. The integrative entrepreneur personifies the unique contributions of the women interviewed, and extends our understanding of sustainability entrepreneurship in meaningful ways.</p>

<p> To increase the number of male teachers at the elementary level in public education, the use of recruitment strategies is necessary. The problem is a lack of literature concerning recruitment strategies for male educators in elementary education. The purpose of this qualitative phenomenological study was to understand the perceptions of male teachers and district recruiters to identify common themes of recruitment used in school districts in Texas to procure more males at the elementary public education level. This study was framed through theories of social cognition and self-efficacy. A sample of 23 male teachers from elementary and secondary public education provided responses to 16 openended survey questions. Using Nvivo10, four major themes were identified based on keyword weighted percentage: recruited and applied, viewed as masculine, elementary men are stereotyped as feminine, and recruit using males in current positions of employment. The findings revealed recruitment strategies identified by male teachers that could influence more males to teach at the elementary level as well as factors that influence males to work at this education level. This study authenticates recruitment strategies to employ more males at the elementary level in public education.</p>

<p> Prejudice and discrimination based on gender occurs within the referral and assessment process of students' social, emotional, and behavioral functioning. Gender disproportionality has received little attention in special education research (Sullivan &amp; Bal, 2013), yet researchers have found that males are more likely than females to be identified as having learning disability, cognitive disability, emotional disability, other health impairment, speech-language impairment, and low-incident disability (Coutinho &amp; Oswald, 2005). Gender is often discussed as a risk factor for several mental health disorders and gender differences in the experience and prevalence of disorders are emphasized in the Diagnostic and <i>Statistical Manual, 5^th edition</i> (DSM-5) (American Psychiatric Association, 2013). The purpose of this study was to examine student, parent, and teacher ratings on a behavioral rating scale, the <i>Behavioral Assessment System for Children, 2^nd edition</i> (BASC-2), for similarity based on the gender of students. The normative data from the BASC-2 rating scale were examined for similarities through independent <i>t</i>- tests of equivalence. </p><p> Results indicated that the genders were similarly rated on the majority of the subscales on the BASC-2. Correlations and coefficients of determination were weak and did not demonstrate substantive strength between the BASC rating scales subscales and gender. At the large effect size 100% equivalence was found, at the moderate effect size 86% equivalence was found, and at the small effect size 16% equivalence was found.</p>

<p> In the United States, workplace discrimination against African-Americans and women has been a primary focus of Industrial/Organizational psychology research (Ruggs, Law, Cox, Roehling, Wiener, Hebl, &amp; Barron, 2013). I hope to broaden our understanding of discrimination by examining lesbians and gay men in the workplace. In this 2 (gender) by 2 (sexual orientation) design, lesbians and gay men received the same hiring ratings and salary appointments as heterosexual applicants for a male-oriented job. There were, however, significant differences in agency with lesbians receiving the highest ratings. Results showed that applicants may want to consider the perceptions of agency for a male-oriented job instead of focusing on sexual orientation or gender in the initial hiring process. Implications, limitations, and directions for future research are discussed.</p>

<p> The purpose of the study was to understand, analyze, and interpret the defining factors that attributed to the decision strategy of highly educated successful career women to stay home upon the birth of a child. As well, the study ascertained the impact on the women&rsquo;s lives once they stayed home full-time. This research study utilized the qualitative methodology based on a case study approach. The individual interview yielded complex dimensions according to the decision strategies the women employed. As a result of staying home, these women encountered internal and external changes. Additionally, their cultural upbringing influenced their style of mothering. The demographic questionnaire captured their individual profile. Discussion of the study and recommendations for future research were also explored.</p>

<p> The purpose of the current study was to understand if there are any longitudinal behavioral or academic effects for boys who are the youngest in their class, who have birthdays near or at the cutoff date for starting school and enter school at the beginning of the succeeding semester. The current study compares retention rates, behavioral records, and grade averages of boys who were born in the months of June, July, or August and are the youngest in their class in a state where the cutoff date for school enrollment is September first to those same variables in boys whose birthdates are in all other months of the year. The current study addresses whether boys who began school at a younger age ultimately struggle with academics or behavior once they are in high school, ninth through twelfth grade. The current study adds to the body of knowledge that currently exists regarding the practice of holding students back a year, known as academic redshirting. The current study employed non-experimental quantitative research methods using <i>ex post facto </i> analysis of existing data. The results of the current study show no significant longitudinal behavioral effects for boys who are the youngest in their class; however, there may be longitudinal academic effects for boys who are the youngest in their class. The results of the current study show non-summer born boys had a statistically significantly higher mean overall grade average than the summer born boys. Since the academic effects found in the current study were slight, the results of the current study support the argument that the phenomenon known as academic redshirting is not necessarily a useful practice when the decision to hold the child back is based solely on the student's summer birthdate.</p>

<p> The gender gap issue is a complex, systemic problem emerging from the interrelation of multiple variables. This study sought to identify the primary, interrelated, and mutually influential variables that contribute to the C-suite gender gap phenomenon using Moustakas' transcendental phenomenological research methodology. Seven female vice president level executives who work in a male-dominated private sector industries in a major metropolitan area were interviewed. Common themes emerged around the significant impact of culture and upbringing and experiences with subtle or overt second-generation gender bias. Five women had some experience of the double bind, although not all of them seemed to perceive the experience that way. All participants discounted the concept of the "glass ceiling." All except one credited strong mentors who provided advice, guidance, and support and who also acted as advocates in helping to advance their careers. All participants demonstrated strong self-confidence, although two noted their confidence was low during their early career and grew through positive, reinforcing experiences. All participants discussed work-life balance and many tempered their career ambition with a similarly strong value for creating and maintaining work-life balance. Only one experienced career limitations by downgrading her work schedule to accommodate childcare needs. Each of their stories, though unique, illustrated how the variables of personality, leadership style, levels of ambition and confidence, upbringing, organizational culture, societal culture, how others interact with them, work-life balance, and mentors created a systemic "whole" that brought them to their current level of success in their careers. It is in the context of describing and seeing the systemic complexity of the issue that recommendations for a comprehensive strategy for action were presented.</p>

<p> Aspects of modernity in Western culture that act to limit conceptions of diversity, such as binary, hierarchical oppositions and the privileging of discursive, analytic knowledge over intuitive and receptive ways of knowing, have played a significant role in both the denigration and erasure of people who have transgender and gender nonconforming identities and experiences. As these elements of modernity are subjected to scrutiny by transgender and cisgender peoples, new knowledge is produced that allows for an increase in transgender visibility. This visibility then works back upon culture to further erode the constraining effects of modernity in the culture at large. Four myths from Ovid's <i>Metamorphoses</i> are discussed to illustrate gender diversity and this spiraling process.</p><p> Ovid's powerful and timely myths help to capture the present moment when the lives and voices of transgender and gender nonconforming peoples are destabilizing old stories and creating new gender myths, new lenses through which to view and understand gender. "Salmacis and Hermaphroditus" is a vehicle for reflecting on modernity, its limitations, and the gender transformation currently taking place in culture. "Iphis and Ianthe" offers an opportunity to consider issues of embodiment and the importance of family and community support for people who are gender diverse. "Caenis/Caenus" is the brave warrior without and within. He faces the challenging confrontations with the cultural status quo and the deep intrapsychic movement that gender diversity can initiate. Finally, "Tiresias" ushers in a meditation on ways of knowing, healing, and the privileged positions gender diverse peoples have held in cultures with more inclusive gender systems. </p><p> The production portion of this dissertation was a public dialogue event for transgender and gender diverse community members and allies in Los Angeles entitled TranSolidarity World Caf&eacute;. Through an organic process of emergence and with the help of public dialogue experts and many volunteers, a gathering for 160 people was hosted. A record of the event was captured in the drawings and graphic recordings of those who participated.</p>

<p><i>Bone Garden</i> is a collection of poetry that inspects interpersonal communication and an often misguided sense of connection with others. Through investigations of memory, disaster, aging, and gender, the collection depicts a world in which many of us fruitlessly search for empathy and a sense of solidarity. Leading this investigation is a narrator whose frustrations with isolation often result in passive aggressive behavior or violence that furthers her separation from others. <i>Bone Garden</i> proposes solidarity as a salted plot and despair as the bitter fruit harvested by those who believe in it. </p>

<p> An essential aspect of discerning how men can become effective partners in reaching gender equity in the U.S., is to understand how men perceive their own masculinity. In consensus with Wanger (2011), I believe that promoting men's' healthy masculinity development is a feminist act and an act of social justice. Within the scope of social science research it is of extreme significance to study men as men as they were often "everybody" and effectually "nobody" (Kimmel &amp; Davis, 2011). This study adds to and highlights importance of research on men and masculinities. Selecting an often privileged and significant subculture of men, this case study surveyed 27 White evangelical college-aged men (WECM) of whom five participated in an in-depth semi-structure phenomenological-based interview at a single faith-based university. Based on the Subjective Masculine Experiences model (Wong et al., 2011) the researcher focused on how these men made "sense of their masculinity by connecting their life experiences [to dimensions] of masculine norms and ideology" (Wong et al., 2011, p. 238). The participants were asked to attribute levels of psychological stress to each dimension. Data gathered clustered into seven salient dimensions for this population: Responsibility, Family, Family- Provider, Faith and Religion, Emotional Toughness, Physical Body and Resistance. Analysis revealed that stress was associated with all of the dimensions, especially with Family-Provider. This paper provides the context for this study, its philosophical framework, and discussions on its limitations and implications for practice and future action.</p><p> <i>Keywords:</i> masculinity; White evangelical, college-aged, men (WECM); phenomenology; critical social constructivism; mindful inquiry </p>