This thesis evaluated a program of the Lutheran Community Services of Oregon, an English as a Second Language training program for Somali refugee women. This study examined the English test results and questionnaires of 28 pairs of Somali women and North American volunteers involved in tutoring. The evaluation included communicating with the Somali women, North American tutors, and Lutheran Community Services staff. The researcher created a literacy test, piloted it, and created questionnaires with the assistance of the staff. Before the tutoring began, the researcher created a needs assessment for the Somali participants and visited each Somali woman's home with a Somali interpreter to administer the initial student questionnaire, B.E.S.T. Test, Written Form Test, and needs assessment. The researcher administrated the initial questionnaire to the tutors. Next, the researcher observed the literacy and cultural trainings for the tutors and observed three pairs of tutors and students during tutoring sessions at the students' homes. The researcher attended an informal party for tutors and staff during the middle of the program and administrated the mid-term questionnaire at the party and over the phone. The evaluator discussed the program with the staff every couple months. The final step was going to each Somali woman's home to conduct the final student questionnaire, B.E.S.T. Test, Written Form Test. The final tutor questionnaire was completed over the phone. The researcher and Lutheran Community Services staff presented the findings at the 2000 Oregon Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages (ORTESOL) Conference. Some of the more significant findings about creating effective programs are that programs for pre-literate refugees should use quantitative and qualitative methods of evaluation and should offer a non-threatening atmosphere for pre-literate adult refugees. Arranging for students to study in their own homes with tutors has positive as well as negative points. The views and languages all of the stakeholders during an evaluation should be considered. It is recommended that programs make materials specifically for their participants, create and offer literacy training specifically made to help tutors teach the targeted populations, and include cultural training for the students and tutors.

Within the past decade the emphasis in school finance research has been toward formulating financing models to solve the inequities in educational opportunity. School finance research has concentrated, generally, on structuring school finance alternatives based on school district fiscal behavior. However, these studies did not analyze in detail the school finance alternatives' impacts on the individual taxpayers. The problem remains that, while various school finance alternatives may attain equal educational opportunity by equalizing the level of expenditures among school districts, they could expand the tax burden distribution inequities. Policy analysis allows one to develop a rational policy procedure on empirical evaluation of policy alternatives designed to achieve a set of objectives. The analytical methods employed by policy analysis procedures are the foundation of this research's conceptual framework. This research is oriented toward decision-making and intends to be a guide to policy action. Policy suggestions for reform concentrate on three crucial areas: (1) to change the content and the elements of the equalization formulas; (2) to increase the level of state support; (3) to adopt a full state assumption of public education finance. These policy suggestions focus on the revenue formation and revenue distribution functions. This dissertation analyzes the operating school finance system from a school district fiscal profile perspective. It also constructs an analytical model and tests the school finance alternatives' impacts on the individual taxpayer-voter from a tax burden redistribution perspective. The fifteen unified school districts in the Portland metropolitan area of Oregon were chosen as the test ground for this research. The procedures for this policy research study are as follows: (1) the social objectives, equal opportunity and equity in tax burden distribution are defined as the basis by which the school finance policy alternatives are analyzed; (2) alternative school finance policies are identified and selected according to a criterion of political feasibility; (3) the necessary data is collected and simulated according to the specifications of the policy alternatives; (4) the resultant tax burden redistribution of policy alternatives are identified; (5) results are analyzed to determine the comparative advantages of alternative school finance policies. Analysis of the school district fiscal profiles under the 1975-1976 school finance system indicates considerable differences in school district fiscal capacities. Moreover, state aid distribution based on the property wealth of school districts is not sufficient to equalize these differences. It is evident that the state of Oregon's share in financing public schools is insufficient to override the horizontal and vertical burden distribution inequities. This research indicates that, changing the state aid distribution formulas without increasing the level of state support, may reduce disparities in fiscal capacities among school districts. However, it is evident that such reform alternatives are not effective measures to reduce the existing tax burden distribution inequities among individual taxpayers. This study concludes that centralization of revenue formation functions, by, increasing the level of state support to public schools, will reduce the existing inequalities in tax burden distribution.

At the beginning of the twentieth century, transient laborers in Portland, Oregon faced marginalization and exploitation at the hands of the classes that relied on them for their own prosperity. Portland at this time was poised to flourish as a major population and industrial center of the American West. The industries that fueled the city's growth were dependent on cheap and mobile manual labor made available by the expansion of the nation's railroads. As the city prospered and grew, the elite of the city created and promoted an image of Portland as an Eden of material abundance where industriousness and virtue would lead inevitably to prosperity. There was no room in Portland's booster image for unemployed but otherwise able-bodied men that fueled this prosperity but saw no benefit from it. Their very existence challenged both the image of the city itself, and broader and deeper pillars of American identity. The response to the presence of this mobile, underemployed and largely white male labor class by Portland citizens and institutions was driven by, and in turn helped shape, competing mythologies of both the American West and American masculinity at a time when the country was struggling to define and redefine these constructs. Examining these floating men through their portrayal in popular culture, laws, and charitable efforts of the time exposes a deep anxiety about the notions of worth, gender, and American virtue.

Environmental service-learning is an intentional educational experience(s) wherein learners engage in meaningful activities designed to serve the environment. Environmental service-learning activities vary according to their learning and service goals and include ecomanagement, persuasion, legal action, economic action and political action. The purpose of this mixed methods research was to explore the ecological and educational impacts of grades 6-12 environmental education, with special attention to environmental service-learning throughout Portland, Oregon. Ecological impacts considered restoration and conservation outcomes of several environmental service-learning programs including plant communities, soils, litter removal and trail maintenance. Educational outcomes considered aspects of environmental literacy including locus of control, environmental sensitivity, indicated environmentally responsible behaviors, investigating environmental issues and knowledge of physical systems. The relative influence of some significant life experiences on youths' response to environmental education, including environmental service-learning, was also considered. Telephone surveys were used to gather data from 22 Portland metropolitan area environmental education programs. Data included 2014 annual biophysical impacts (e.g., area of invasive species removed, pounds of litter removed) and information on programming (e.g., length of program, % time outside). Eleven programs administered a 33-question environmental literacy assessment to participants of their programs (n=393). The assessment included the New Environmental Paradigm, the Inclusion of Nature in Self, questions from Environmental Identity Scale and self-constructed questions. One 8th grade program was identified for a detailed case study. In this 8th grade programs, slight variations in educational activities occurred among three treatment groups which varied the amount of time youth spent engaged in ecomanagement. Youth from the three treatment groups and a control group were administered the environmental literacy assessment at the beginning and end of the program. Qualitative data for the youth in the treatment groups were gathered to further consider how environmental literacy was impacted by participation in the program. Stronger associational correlations to environmental literacy occurred for the percentage of time an environmental education program spent outdoors rather than the percentage of time an environmental education program engaged in environmental service-learning (e.g., "With other people, I can work to make a positive impact on the environment." rho: .276 vs. "I have the skills necessary to make a positive impact on the environment" rho: .176). Random forests indicated that environmental education program features and some significant life experiences could predict collapsed environmental literacy variables (locus of control, environmental sensitivity and environmentally responsible behaviors). 22.4% of the variance in a collapsed environmental sensitivity variable was explained by nine predictor variables; those variables with the strongest influence were youth response to "Before this program, how frequently did you spend time in the outdoors," age and the presence of a positive adult role model who cares for the environment. Youth participating in environmental education programs showed higher environmental literacy than control groups (e.g., "I feel an important part of my life would be missing if I couldn't get out and enjoy nature from time to time" U: 3642.500, p: 0.025). Youth with significant formative life experiences (e.g., those indicating previous environmental education or a positive adult role model that cares for the environment) responded better (higher environmental literacy) to environmental education than those youth without ("I pay special attention to things outdoors" chi 10.633, p: 0.031). This research provides insight on the efficacy of environmental service-learning. Environmental service-learning positively affected environmental literacy, but outdoor environmental education was more effective in terms of environmental literacy. Results corroborate the body of literature regarding significant life experiences. Further, results suggest that significant life experiences are a critical development milestone necessary for youth to respond to environmental education on a developmental trajectory to empowered environmentally literate citizens.

This mixed methods study identifies perceived causes of and solutions to the attrition of special education teachers. Researchers have documented that special education teaching positions encounter higher attrition rates than their general education peers (Katsiyannis, Zhang, & Conroy in Olivarez & Arnold, 2006; Mitchell & Arnold, 2004; Otto & Arnold, 2005; Stempien & Loeb, 2002). More than 66 administrators and 200 special education teachers/Teachers on Special Assignment (TOSAs) employed in the Portland, Oregon metro area (Washington, Clackamas, and Multnomah counties) completed a survey on special education teacher attrition and retention and identified what they believed are the causes of high special education teacher attrition rates and what interventions would increase rates of special education teacher retention. The results of the surveys from the two sub-groups were compared and contrasted and it was determined administrators and special education teachers share similar perceptions of the causes of high special education teacher attrition rates and similar perceptions of interventions to increase retention rates. The results were also analyzed to determine if administrators and special education teachers and TOSAs identify the same causes of special education teacher attrition and interventions to increase retention rates.

Following the Civil War, the American government greatly expanded the opportunities available for private businessmen and investors in an effort to rapidly colonize the West. This expansion of private commerce led to the second industrial revolution in which railroads and the corporation became the symbols and tools of a rapidly modernizing nation. It was also during this period that the responsibility of food distribution was released from municipal accountability and institutions like public markets began to fade from the American urbanscape. While the proliferation of private grocers greatly aided many metropolises' rapid growth, they did little to secure a sustainable and desirable form of food distribution. During the decades before and after the turn of the century, public market campaigns began to develop in response to the widespread abandonment of municipal food distribution. Like many western cities, Portland, Oregon matured during the second half of the nineteenth century and lacked the historical and social precedent for the construction of a public market. Between 1851 and 1914, residents of Portland and its agricultural hinterland fought for the construction of a municipally-owned public market rallying against the perceived harmful and growing influences of middlemen. As a result of their efforts, the Carroll Public Market was founded on the curbsides of Yamhill Street in downtown Portland. While success encouraged multiple expansions and an increasingly supportive consumer base, a growing commitment to modernist planning among city officials and the spread of automobile ownership determined the market to be incompatible with the commercial future of Portland. In an effort to acknowledge and capitalize on the Carroll Public Market's community, a group of investors, incorporated as the Portland Market Company, worked with city officials between 1926 and 1934 to create the largest public market in the United States, the Portland Public Market. As the first building of the newly constructed waterfront development, many believed the massive institution would reinvigorate nearby businesses and ultimately influence the potential of the downtown business district. The Portland Public Market was decidedly distinct from the market along Yamhill and the promoters cast it as such. By utilizing the most modern technologies and promises of convenience there was little that the two organizations shared in common. In the end, the potential of the waterfront market was never fulfilled and amidst legal scandals, an ongoing struggle to meet operating costs, and the success of a rebellious Farmers Cooperative, it shut down after nine years. This thesis discusses these two public markets during a period of changing consumer interests and the rise of modernist planning in Portland, Oregon. Ultimately, the Carroll Public Market was torn down for reasons beyond its own control despite the comfortable profit it enjoyed each year. Many city officials refused to support the institution as they increasingly supported the values of modernism and urban planning. The Portland Public Market fit perfectly with many city planners' and private investors' intents for the future. This essay seeks to offer a unique glimpse of how commercial communities form and how commercial environments evolve through the politics of food distribution, consumerism, and producer-to-consumer relationships.

The public focus on domestic violence has been one of the most successful campaigns of the modern women's movement. This success was achieved in part through the creation of strategic alliances among agencies and organizations responding to partner violence. One of the most contested of these alliances involved partnering with the criminal justice system. While representing an advance in holding police accountable in protecting all citizens (Coker, 2006), this alliance has had problematic consequences, particularly as it has extended state power into the lives of women of color (e.g. Richie, 2005). This problem is exacerbated by new collaborations between law enforcement and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Federal mandates like the Secure Communities program bring together local law enforcement and ICE throughout the United States, to increase deportation rates (Immigration and Customs Enforcement, 2009). As a result, many recommendations by domestic violence advocates to survivors now potentially include the presence of ICE in that referral. This dissertation explores how domestic violence advocates within the tri-county area of Portland, Oregon are responding to law enforcement-ICE partnerships. Advocates remain understudied in the domestic violence literature, in spite of the complexity of their roles. This dissertation fills this research gap in examining the processes advocates employ in responding to dilemmas faced by marginalized survivors. A total of twenty-five advocates from three separate agencies participated in the study, which centered on focus groups carried out in the agency settings. The dissertation pursues three research questions: 1) How do advocates work through a key dilemma that has emerged in their practice? 2) What are the discursive strategies enlisted by advocates in addressing a dilemma at the border of domestic violence and immigration politics? 3) What is the relationship between each group's proximity to working with undocumented survivors and their decision-making process? A case study methodology was used to evaluate proximity to work with undocumented survivors and the organizations' general orientation to domestic violence work. Transcripts of the focus groups were analyzed using a discursive method centered on identifying how the groups worked through a set of dilemmas presented in the focus groups, which involved a crisis call scenario involving an undocumented woman and an agency practice common to many domestic violence service providers. In the analysis of discursive strategies of the groups, a key finding centered on the groups' use of a decision-tree heuristic to work through dilemmas of practice presented in the two scenarios. This discursive strategy facilitated the process of group decision-making at points where the actions required were clear and concrete. However, as more complexity, ambiguity or ambivalence were introduced, the limitations of the decision-tree strategy become more apparent. Findings related to the agency's proximity to undocumented workers suggest that this affinity was less important than was the agency's working relationship to the Criminal Justice System (CJS). Closeness to the CJS was associated with reliance on a discourse that places the police at the center of services for all survivors of domestic violence, regardless of documentation status, and a heightened focus on the risk of lethality to rationalize the risks associated with referrals involving law enforcement-ICE collaborations.

The local food movement in the Portland Metro Region of Oregon is as prevalent as anywhere in the Country. To a large degree this is driven by the Portland Metro area food culture and the diverse agricultural landscape present in the Willamette Valley and throughout the State. Portlanders demand local food and thus far the rural periphery has been able to provide it; driving a new food economy that has economic implications throughout the region. As this regional food economy emerges much attention has been focused on harnessing its power for economic development perpetuated by the belief that there exists an opportunity to foster a cluster of economic activity pertaining to the production, processing, distribution and sale of regional foods that might generate economic opportunities throughout the value chain. The research presented here constitutes an attempt to characterize the local and regional food system that currently exists in the Portland Metro Region and to bring to light the opportunities present at the regional scale that link the agricultural periphery to the urban core. I present two different definitions of local and regional food systems and show how these different conceptions have very different implications for economic development. Once defined, I test for differences between local and regional food systems and the export-oriented, agro-food sector by analyzing aspects of geographic space and processes of knowledge accumulation and innovation in the context of aspects of regional economic development such as agglomeration economies, knowledge spillovers, business life cycle and industrial location. My analysis showed that there are significant differences between local and regional food systems and the export-oriented agro-food industry specific to supply chains, actors and products of the different systems. Furthermore, through spatial analysis, I found that there are differences in terms of the spatial structure and distribution between producers who participate in the different systems. Local and regional producers tend to cluster closer together at smaller scales, are smaller in size and are found to be closer to the urban core. Through a qualitative inquiry I found that this clustering facilitates forces of agglomeration economies specific to food producers who participate in local and regional supply chains, particularly non-pecuniary effects of knowledge accumulation. This underlying structure has significant effects on economic outcomes and as such has implications in terms of regional economic development when local and regional food systems are considered in terms of the city-region.

The subject of Jews in sports is often times perceived as an oxymoronic research topic given the ethnic stereotypes that Jews are physically weak, unfit, and more focused on intellectual pursuits. However, Jews have had a long history and in-depth interaction with sports that is important to understand, not only to expand our perception of the Jewish people, but also to realize the important role sports play in social historiography. While the Jewish population of East Coast America and their involvement in athletics has been studied to some extent, the West Coast population, in particular, the Northwest, has been sorely neglected. This thesis examines the lives of immigrant Jews on the West Coast, specifically Portland, OR and their interaction with sports compared to the experiences of immigrant Jews on the East Coast from 1900 to 1940. An overall examination and comparison of the Jewish immigrant experience in the West is presented along with an evaluation of the establishment of the Portland Jewish community and their coinciding athletic community. The experiences of the Jews in Western America is compared to the immigrants of the East Coast and how these differing involvements shaped the development of Jewish sporting facilities. The thesis then expands on how the Portland Jews grew their athletic facilities and overall involvement in athletics, related to the experience of East Coast Jews. The growth of the Jewish Zionist movement is examined along with how Jewish involvement fit more seamlessly into certain sports than others. The thesis also takes a closer look at Jewish women and their specific experiences in athletics compared to their East Coast counterparts and the experience of Jewish men in Portland. The role of philanthropic organizations as a means of greater involvement in athletics is assessed, along with how the experiences of Western European versus Eastern European immigrants played into their varying involvements with sports. Finally, the conclusion discusses the importance of scholarly sports inquiry as it plays to the relevance of a greater social history and for immigrants in particular, their assimilation and acculturation into American society.

Until recently, few have questioned the notion that the separation of uses in land use zoning is inherently correct. Many observers of the city are now suggesting that zoning, as it has been practiced in this country over the last 80 years, has created cities that are fractured and function poorly. Others propose that zoning should be reconsidered as a remedy for urban dysfunction. They suggest that the whole notion of zoning be rethought. The purpose of this study is to uncover some of the underlying rationales and methodologies that set the model for zoning. This study examines the rationales behind the classification and location of land use zones in a fast-growing area of Portland, Oregon, for its first zoning ordinance through history, culture, and geography. Between 1919 and 1924, two ordinances were prepared using two very different methodologies. The first of these was designed by nationally known consultant, Charles H. Cheney, using the latest scientific methods. After its rejection in the polls, a second ordinance was developed by a prominent group of realtors in conjunction with the city planning commission using more intuitive methods. This “realtors’ code” (MacColl 1979) was approved by the Portland electorate in 1924. Some fifty years later, the Portland planning commission would identify zoning as having played a significant role in the deterioration of the Buckman neighborhood in the study area. The comparison of the rationales and methods behind the locations of zone boundaries in both ordinances against the locations of actual uses in the study area, reveals the powerful influences of social Darwinism, laissez-faire attitudes, and newly developing social science methods on the association of zoning with the separation of uses and the land use patterns that were created.