Background: The firm’s choice of the optimal financial structure remains an unsolved problem within finance. The reasoning behind family firms’ specific financial structure differs within various research. The GGVV-region is composed of four small municipalities: Gnosjö, Gislaved, Värnamo, and Vaggeryd. This region is seen as the best dynamic counties in all of Sweden, it is also considered the most successful area of the countryside in terms of its economic contribution. Because of these aspects, it is therefore of great importance to investigate the difference of the financial structure within generations of family firms. Purpose: This paper studies whether there is a correlation between the generation in charge of family businesses within the GGVV-region and the financial structure of the businesses. Aim: The aspiration is that this research will be a good addition to the understanding of family businesses in the GGVV-region along their financial policies within different generations running the firm. Method: This study will contain 42 family firms within the GGVV-region defined as family firms through a questionnaire. The financial structure of the first-generation and non-first-generation family firm will be investigated using their debt ratios throughout the years 2015-2019. The testing is performed through Panel Data Model using Random Effects Model, along with descriptive statistics of the data and a Difference-in-Difference test. Conclusion: No significant difference can be found at any level between the 1GFF and the Non-1GFF when it comes to their financial structure.

Sialidosis is caused by the accumulation of the ganglioside GM3 and other sialoglycoproteins within the cells of the liver, kidney and brain. Currently there is no treatment for sialidosis, while other lysosomal storage disorders are being treated through enzyme replacement therapy or bone marrow transplantation. The helper-dependent, or "gutless" adenovirus system (HD) has recently been improved upon with reportedly less immunogenicity than its first-generation (FG) predecessor and lifelong transgene expression produced in its hosts. To this end, the complete mouse lysosomal sialidase gene was cloned into a HD-vector (AdmsialHD) and a FG-vector (AdmsialFG) in an attempt to rescue the sialidase deficiency and associated phenotype in B6.SM fibroblasts and in the SM/J mouse. Lysosomal sialidase levels were increased to normal levels in vitro following both AdmsialHD and AdmsialFG infections while SM/J mouse infections at doses of 5 x 10^9 particles/mouse did not yield any increase in lysosomal sialidase activity or correct the associated phenotype. Interestingly, AdmsialHD only up-regulated sialidase to high levels in sialidase-null cells whereas AdmsialFG up-regulated sialidase significantly in all cell lines tested. Together, these data suggest that the therapeutic dose for both AdmsialFG and AdmsialHD should be elevated at least 10-fold in order to achieve phenotypic rescue and that FG-vectors possess some viral property, perhaps the E4 gene products, enabling them to attain greater transgene expression relative to HD-vectors. / Thesis / Master of Science (MSc)

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This qualitative research project focused on the interviews of 27 low socio-economic students at a research university in the southwestern United States. The students had already withdrawn from the university or were in the process of withdrawing. The study seeks to provide increased understanding of how students negotiate the decision-making process to withdraw from the first university they attended after high school. The theoretical lenses of student departure theories (Astin, 1993; Bean, 1983; Tierney, 1992; and Tinto, 1993) and decision-making theories (Becker, 1976; Frank, 1987; Kahneman, 2003; March, 1994; Scott, 2000) were combined. The Decision-Making Process Model of Student Departure is offered as a new theoretical framework that combines decision-making theories and student retention theories. This conceptualization is unlike other student departure models because it includes the proposition that forces push at the student from within the institution and forces pull them from outside the institution. In addition, it is different from other student departure models because it includes the discussion about how students think about their process to withdraw - it is not meant to describe their behaviors. Financial, academic and psychological stresses (from both within and outside the institution) influenced how the students negotiated the decision-making process to leave the institution. The students did not seek out institutional agents (advisors or faculty members) for advice when they were struggling academically. They developed their own strategies or went to their family members for advice, many of whom had never been to college.

This thesis is a socio-cultural study of the development of female stand-up comedy in the first decade of the twenty-first century within a multi-racial and multi-cultural Britain. It also engages with the theory and practice of performance and asks the question: ‘In what ways can it be said that female stand-up comics perform the comic side of bodily abjection?’ This question is applied to three groups of female case-studies which include: those who came into stand-up comedy in the 1980s; second-generation transnationals who became established at the end of the twentieth century; and twenty-first century newcomers to stand-up comedy. This third group also includes the author of this thesis who uses her own embodied experience as research, and Lynne Parker whose Funny Women organization was set up in 2002 to facilitate female entry into stand-up comedy. Alongside these three groups the subject of females as audience of female stand-up comedy is also explored. The issue of bodily abjection is explored in relation to seminal works on abjection by Julia Kristeva (1982) and Mary Douglas (1966) and regarding theories of the grotesque as posited by Mikhail Bakhtin (1984) and Mary Russo (1995). These texts are used in this thesis to argue that abjection is a significant aspect of both the context and content of contemporary female stand-up comedy and that the orifices, surfaces and processes of the body are still pertinent to twenty-first century female stand-up comedy.

This study is a predictive model to ascertain whether various factors such as income, educational attainment, and ethnic background could predict the on students participating in TRIO programs at the University of New Orleans. President Lyndon B. Johnson’s administration identified low-income and first-generation students as the most under-served population needing attention as well as those most “at-risk.” Educational Talent Search programs were founded in 1965 as outreach programs to provide services and activities to the “at-risk” population to promote high school retention and graduation rates. The University of New Orleans has three Educational Talent Search programs serving Jefferson, Orleans, and St. Tammany Parishes. The demographic data from 1770 participants were collected and a study conducted to determine whether there would be a correlation among the following factors: (1.) ethnic background, (2.) income, (3.) educational attainment, and (4.) geography.

This research examines the involvement of the parents of secondary school children in career education and guidance (CEG). It is based on a secondary analysis of existing data from a research project I was involved in. This initial research evaluated the impact of a parent-involved career intervention, 'Parents Turn', in which six career teachers delivered four successive sessions to parent(s) accompanied by their child in the third or fifth year of their secondary school (HAVO) in the Netherlands. The study is important both to the field and to practitioners. Examples of parentinvolved career intervention in CEG are limited, scantily researched, and most were not sustained, which may explain why knowledge on involving parents in CEG is underdeveloped. I discuss these gaps in the evidence by providing an overview on the literature on parental influences and roles in their child's career development, an international inventory of and taxonomy for parent-involved, school-based career interventions, and providing relevant knowledge on parental-involvement in education in general. I then present new analysis of data collected by an earlier evaluation of the 'Parents' Turn' intervention. My secondary analysis approaches this data with new research questions, in-depth analyses and a non-parametric methodology. I integrated the quantitative and qualitative results to understand who was involved in the intervention, why, and whether the impact differed for the learning of parents with and without higher education (HE) qualifications. I also sought to understand the role of the school in the intervention. The findings suggest that a school-initiated career intervention involving parents, in the form of family learning and community interaction, can build and enhance parents' capacity to be involved in and support the career development of their child: their knowledge and skills, parental self-efficacy and parental role-definition. However, the career intervention works differently for parents who have different levels of HE level attainment. Lower-educated parents seem less aware of the consequences of early educational decisions in their child's career and also have different needs for being involved in the career intervention compared to highereducated parents. Despite the impact of the career intervention on their parental capacity, lower-educated parents remain unsure as a parent of how to make use of gained information, guidance and support tools. Third-year (14-16-year-olds) parents' information and support needs are the greatest and they are open to changing their attitude to grant their child autonomy in managing their own career development. The study also finds that features of the present school system are major barriers to sustaining the intervention. Recommendations for policies and practice at school level are offered. A more focused public policy for parental involvement in career education and guidance in secondary schools could both improve the efficiency of the education system and combat social injustice.

First generation college students, defined as students whose parents did not attend or complete education after high school, currently make up about one in three college undergraduates. First generation students often face difficulties adapting to the college environment and find their identities challenged in efforts to find success. Much research about first generation students positions students as having “risk factors” due to their backgrounds rather than the institution as inadequate to meet their needs. In order to explore how a four-year institution was and was not meeting the needs of some first generation students, I conducted an analysis of White and Latinx-identifying students’ experience of mattering and marginality using Critical Discourse Analysis as my method. The purpose of this study is to understand how first generation student represent their sense of belonging through language use. Based on qualitative analyses of focus group comments, students described mattering and marginality as occurring within multiple areas of the college experience. Throughout these areas, or “spheres,” participants described the roles of interpersonal and institutional communication that positioned them to feel a sense of belonging or marginality. Students reported experiencing marginality because of 1) issues of money, 2) not knowing things they might be expected to know, and 3) others not understanding their experiences and identities. Students experienced mattering with 1) community and 2) administrators. They also described feeling mattering and marginality simultaneously in some situations. Furthermore, students experienced campus differently based on their racial and ethnoracial identities. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed to better serve the needs of first generation students.

This study offers recommendations for community college personnel in assisting first-generation Mexican American male college students access and properly utilize college agents and services to succeed and transfer to a four-year institution. Students must recognize that colleges have many programs and services designed to help them become successful, but they need to be open to the idea of asking for assistance and honest with themselves about the assistance they need.

Often considered the gateway to the middle class in the United States, community colleges are struggling to find ways to support all students in career planning and preparation. Unfortunately, increasing numbers of first generation students who enter community colleges through the door of open access, place into developmental education (remedial) courses and must satisfactorily complete this often-rigid sequence before beginning college level classes. For many first-generation, under-prepared, underresourced students, this is a frustrating and often insurmountable barrier, causing many students to abort their postsecondary training. Creating intentional conditions and instructional strategies that support student learning is essential in increasing the number of first-generation, under-prepared and under-resourced students who enter and complete postsecondary training and degrees. Advancement via Individual Determination Higher Education (AVID HE) is one identified holistic support strategy showing positive trends in supporting this student population on one community college campus. This study used a mixed methods approach which included both a statistical analysis of a treatment group in a combined reading/writing course called WR91 Mt Hood Community College AVID HE Learning Communities and two stand-alone reading/writing courses called RD90/WR90 courses, along with a case study qualitative methodology to investigate how AVID HE supports pre-college developmental education students to develop sufficient social capital to transition from non-credit (pre-college) to credited courses and programs.