To further the understanding of respiration processes of northern peatlands, the relative importance of each type of belowground respiration was determined at Mer Bleue, a northern peatland located near Ottawa, Ontario, from June to November, 2003. Direct measurements of total, soil organic matter (SOM) and root respiration were made, with rhizosphere respiration determined by residual. Although an aboveground source, determination of live Sphagnum respiration was also attempted in the field. To identify changes in CO2 fluxes with environmental conditions, peat temperature and water table levels were monitored throughout the study period. / SOM respiration was higher than hypothesized at 63% while root and rhizosphere respiration were lower than hypothesized at 21% and 16%, respectively, of total belowground respiration. As the field experiment for determining live Sphagnum respiration was unsuccessful, it was determined by calculation to be 18% of total respiration, slightly higher than hypothesized. Opposite of hypothesized, air temperatures, peat temperatures and water table levels generally had weak and insignificant relationships when linearly regressed with total respiration.

Social work is a profession that espouses respect for the value of diversity. However, diversity is limited in social work programs as these programs focus primarily on the teaching of verbal methods of connection for social workers to engage with clients. Non verbal methods of communication are limited in social work programs. This inhibits diversity as research has demonstrated that many clients for various reasons are unable to communicate through verbal dialogue. This present study explored social workers attitudes towards the use of art in their therapy. Six social workers from a children's mental health agency were interviewed and the results indicated that social workers used art in their work and found it beneficial for their clients. The social workers limited education in non-verbal modalities of communication however, prevented them from using the art effectively. The study recommends that social work programs include nonverbal methods of communication to ensure diversity and best practice for the profession of social work.

To examine bat - habitat relationships, ultrasonic detectors were used to sample bat activity among: old-growth white pine (Pinus strobus ), mature white pine, boreal mixedwood, and selectively-cut white pine stands in central Ontario. Within the stands, bats were sampled in the canopy, the understory layer, and within canopy gaps. Forest structure was measured within each of the stands. The activity of bats was compared among forest stand types, within the stands, and in relation to forest structure. Also, maintaining forest wildlife populations requires data on the use of snags (i.e. dead trees). To provide further resolution of the habitat requirements of forest-dwelling bats, radio telemetry and exit counts were used to investigate the roosting ecology of mouse-eared bats (Myotis lucifugus and M. septentrionalis). Characteristics of snags used by mouse-eared bats were compared with randomly located snags and random geographic points, at three spatial scales (focal tree, surrounding forest, and landscape). (Abstract shortened by UMI.)

Note: / AIDS Service Organizations (ASOs) have a central role in providing HIV/AIDS related services to rural communities in Ontario, Canada. To date, very little information has been published on the experience of people employed by ASOs who work in rural Canadian communities. In an effort to learn more about this important topic, this research explored the challenges, risks and benefits people in the field associate to their work. Using A. Giorgi (1985) and B. Giorgi (2006) phenomenological method a purposive sample of three participants were interviewed on two separate occasions. From 179 significant statements, 23 themes emerged to be part of three categories that included: Rural Communities, AIDS Service Organizations, and Workers' Experiences. Through the unfolding of the participants' experiences it became apparent that HIV / AIDS remains a complex phenomenon that is influenced by the structural aspects of Society. / Les organismes offrant des services dans le domaine du VIH/SIDA jouent un rôle central dans l'offre de services en matière de VIH/SIDA auprès des communautés rurales de l'Ontario, au Canada. Jusqu'à présent, très peu d'infonnation a été publiée sur l'expérience vécue par les gens employés par ces organismes dans les communautés rurales canadiennes. Afin d'en apprendre davantage sur ce sujet d'un grand intérêt, la présente recherche a pour but d'explorer les défis, les risques et les bénéfices que ces gens perçoivent dans leur travail. En se basant sur une méthode phénoménologique de A. Giorgi (1985) et de B. Giorgi (2006), un échantillon de trois participants a été ciblé. Pour ce qui est des entrevues, elles ont été conduites auprès de chaque participant à deux occasions différentes. Les 179 commentaires des participants qui étaient pertinents ont pennis d'identifier 23 thèmes qui ont été divisés en trois catégories: les communautés rurales, les organismes offrant des services dans le domaine du VIH/SIDA et l'expérience vécue par les gens employés par ces organismes. En parcourant l'expérience décrite par les participants, il est apparu évident que le VIH/SIDA demeure un phénomène complexe qui est grandement influencé par les structures et les caractéristiques de la société.

Alvars are naturally open habitats which are found in the Great Lakes region in North America and in Scandinavia. The insect fauna of four types of alvars (grassland, grassland savanna, shrubland and pavement) was sampled in the summer of 1996 on Manitoulin Island, Ontario. A total of 9791 specimens from four target insect groups (Coleoptera: Carabidae, Homoptera: Auchenorrhyncha, Hymenoptera: Symphyta and Lepidoptera: Papilionoidea and Hesperioidea) was identified. Results showed that the grassland savanna and grassland alvars supported the highest number of insect specimens whereas the pavement alvar supported the highest number of species. The origin of the fauna differed between the taxa depending on their closer association with specific microclimatic conditions (Carabidae) or on the presence of host plants (Auchenorrhynca). This first inventory of alvar insects in North America revealed the presence of a high number of species of interest to conservation (rare, disjunct or restricted species).

The aim of my research was examine the impact of race, class and gender in Ottawa's educational system. I sought to find out if these factors played a role in the streaming of Black youths in basic or vocational programs and, if so, to what degree. While looking at the issue, I examined the narratives of both middle-class and working-class students and parents. / The study found that a student's socio-economic background largely determine her/his educational stream, be it basic, general or advanced. For example, all the participants in the vocational stream were working-class students while the participants that were streamed into the university bound program were from middle-class families. Teachers within the system also treated the parents differently. Middle-class parents had a greater degree of reciprocity between themselves and teachers compared to working-class parents.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Toronto, 2005.

Steele, Bonis, and Scapa townships, in the District of Cochrane, Ontario, are underlain by a steeply inclined Precambrian metavolcanic-metasediment assemblage that is intruded by sills, dikes, stocks, and batholiths. The metamorphosed Bonis volcanics and Steele Lake volcanics are chiefly intermediate to basic lavas. The Scapa and Steele metasediments are composed mainly of metamorphosed greywacke, calc-silicate rocks, and iron-formation. Metamorphosed ultrabasic and basic intrusions occur in the Bonis volcanics and Scapa metasediments. The metasediments and Steele Lake volcanics show a regional metamorphic zoning relative to the Case batholith on the north margin of the area. Chlorite, biotite, garnet, and staurolite zones are distinguished over an area up to eight miles wide south of the batholith. The regional metamorphic zoning is attributed to intrusion of the Case batholith. The Bonis volcanics have been metamorphosed at their contact with the Sargeant batholith that underlies the southeast part of the area. The Bonis volcanics have acted as a "resistor" in protecting the metasediments from metamorphism by the Sargeant batholith. A narrow contact aureole occurs in the Scapa metasediments adjacent to the Scapa stock. Potash metasomatism and high water pressures have prevented the formation of alumina-rich minerals within the aureole. Diabase dikes of two ages cut all other rocks in the area. The easterly trending rocks of the metavolcanic-metasediment assemblage are locally deflected around the western end of the concordant Sargeant batholith. A spodumene-bearing pegmatite dike found in the Case batholith is of economic interest. / Science, Faculty of / Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences, Department of / Graduate

The purpose of this study is to understand why and how media education became legitimate in the Ontario educational system in the 1980s. The theoretical focus is on how a new social movement (the new social movement in Ontario) led to the legitimation of a new social curriculum (the media education program). This study on media education in Ontario is contextualized in the epochal shift to the information society. Adopting the approach of historical sociology, it documents the influence of those social forces which gave rise to media education and investigates how key individuals brought media education into schools. In the 1970s and 1980s, the societal shift brought with it rapid development in media technologies and induced new social tensions. This study finds that the conceptualization of the mass media as "invisible curriculum," the ideology of techno-cultural nationalism and the moral controversy over media sex and violence directed public attention to the importance of media literacy. The media literacy movement in Ontario subsequently placed media education in the formal school curriculum. Legitimating media education can be regarded as a social and educational response to the technological changes in the information age. This study also indicates that less powerful groups in the community and the educational field were able to put a body of low-status knowledge into the formal school curriculum. In order to analyze the process from social movement to subject formation, a theoretical framework is put forward identifying strong justification, effective lobbying, proper positioning and unofficial support for curriculum-building as the four key elements for legitimating a new social curriculum. Instead of justifying media education in terms of utilitarian and academic values, the advocates emphasized the pragmatic solution provided by the new curriculum to social problems. The manipulation of public support by creating a "climate of opinion" was vital to the success of lobbying. "Subject inhabitancy" was an effective way to find a curricular niche for a new social curriculum. Finally, the advocates' support for the curriculum development and implementation played an important role in strengthening the government's confidence in mandating a new program. / Education, Faculty of / Graduate

This thesis is concerned with the relationship between creditor/debtor law and broader political, economic, and social relations in Upper Canada before 1812. The research reviews the history of credit relations in early Upper Canada through a critical reassessment of both the historiographic debates and available primary legal and archival sources. Recent historical writing, in seeking out the community based nature of creditor/debtor relations has often tended to overlook the extent to which social, political, and economic conflicts were also played out in the arena of credit and debt. In early Upper Canada, matters relating to credit and debt were not infrequently the focus of conflicts about constitutionalism and the rights of colonial subjects. The thesis argues for a re-framing of the study of creditor/debtor relations to take account of the overall context of economic inequality. Feminist historical and theoretical work is drawn upon to expand conventional understandings of the economic, and to argue that local or communal based relations are not always consensual. The thesis draws a connection between social inequality, political repression, constitutional politics and the private law of property, credit, and debt. It asserts that early Upper Canadian creditor/ debtor relations were expressive of the struggle over the kinds of institutions that would represent the new polity, and of a sensibility among at least some portion of the population that the rule of law should apply to a wider range of people than those who made up the elite. It is found that the role of certain financial instruments and the contents of certain court records has been misunderstood. These findings change our understanding of the 1794 court reforms in Upper Canada, which established an English-style Court of King's Bench. It is also found that debtor/creditor law, in particular the seizure of land for debt in Upper Canada (a remedy that was not available in England) impacted upon the constitutional politics of the time. / Law, Peter A. Allard School of / Graduate