This qualitative study explores the experiences of women who are welfare recipients attending a community college under the auspices of a new program, Washington State's WorkFirst/Work Study program. The study, conducted over two academic quarters, includes in-depth interviews with WorkFirst/Work Study students, observations in a weekly seminar, and interviews with community college staff who work in the program. The overarching research question is: "What are the challenges and the transition issues confronted by women who are living in poverty and participating in a community college program?" The research elicits responses about the women's expectations and fears about education, their aspirations for themselves and their children, what they hope to gain from the college experience and what barriers may interfere. The study identifies five contextual issues in the women's lives: family background and history, relationships, physical and psychological health, housing, and finances. And the study explores the participants' experience with and attitudes toward four thematic areas: parenting, welfare, work and school. A major goal was to give voice to these women. Underlying assumptions are that community college administrators and faculty want to improve access, success and satisfaction with the college for poor women; that learning about how poor women experience the community college gives college personnel valuable information; that Washington community colleges have an interest in working with WorkFirst; and that better understanding of WorkFirst/Work Study participants' experiences is valuable to the colleges and benefits low-income students. The women interviewed are highly motivated and believe that an education is key to a better life for them and their children. Some of the barriers they face are embedded in the restrictions and requirements of the WorkFirst program. Nevertheless, these women say they are better off on welfare, working and going to school than they were when they were among the working poor. The study questions the value of some vocational education and suggests that more low-income women could be recruited to community college earlier in their lives. / Graduation date: 2001

This paper uses data envelopment analysis (DEA) to examine the relative technical efficiency of the Washington State Ferry (WSF) routes operating in Puget Sound. This is the largest ferry system in the country. It is publicly operated and does not face direct competition from any other agency, public or private. Therefore whether or not the ferry routes operate efficiently is a natural question. DEA is being used increasingly for measuring technical efficiency in non-profit settings such as health care and education, where prices of inputs and outputs may either be unavailable or artificially set. Because DEA does not require prices to measure efficiency, the technique has an advantage in these arenas. This paper first uses DEA to measure the relative technical efficiency of each WSF route using two different comparison sets. Returns to scale are then evaluated for each route in three successive years (1995-1997). Finally, a Malmquist productivity index is calculated in order to evaluate total factor productivity over the three-year period. For further evaluation this index is then divided into two components: technical change and efficiency change. Overall, the findings show that most of the ferry routes operate in an efficient manner. The results do, however, show routes where there may be room for improvement and they provide a means to pinpointing areas where WSF may want to focus attention when making management decisions. / Graduation date: 2000

The long-toed salamander (Ambystoma macrodactylum) is the top vertebrate predator in fishless high-elevation lakes in North Cascades National Park Service Complex (NOCA), Washington. The purpose of this research was to determine the effects of physico-chemical factors and introduced trout on abundance and behavior of A. macrodactylum larvae. Although high-elevation lakes in NOCA were naturally fishless, trout were stocked in many lakes during this century to provide recreational angling opportunity. Twenty fishless lakes and 25 lakes with fish were sampled from 1990 to 1994. Larval salamander density and behavior were assessed by snorkeling lake perimeters and searching through nearshore substrate material and aquatic vegetation. In fishless lakes, larval salamander densities were positively related to total Kjeldahl-N concentration (TKN) and negatively related to lake elevation. Based on analysis of salamander stomach contents, crustacean zooplankton, especially cladocerans, were important food resources for larval A. macrodactylum. Total crustacean zooplankton, as well as cladoceran densities, were positively related to TKN concentration, suggesting that increased zooplankton food resources contributed to increased densities of A. macrodactylum. The effects of fish introductions on larval salamander densities depended on TKN concentration and whether or not trout had established reproducing populations. Mean larval salamander densities for fishless lakes with TKN<0.05 mg/l, generated from a linear regression equation with TKN and lake elevation as independent variables, were not significantly different from mean larval densities in lakes with either reproducing trout or in lakes with non-reproducing trout. However, in fishless lakes with TKN���0.05 mg/l, mean larval densities were significantly higher than in lakes with reproducing fish where trout reached high densities. In fishless lakes with TKN���0.095 mg/l, mean larval densities were significantly higher than in lakes with non-reproducing fish where trout fry were periodically stocked at low densities. Reduced larval salamander densities in lakes with trout likely was a consequence of trout predation. Although most larvae were associated with boulder, cobble, and woody debris substrates in nearshore areas of NOCA lakes, differences in the proportion of larvae hidden in benthic substrates between lakes with fish and without fish were not statistically significant. / Graduation date: 1997

The purpose of the investigation was to develop a profile of characteristics, perceptions and expectations of high school students involved in the Washington Tech Prep in Agriculture Statewide Articulation Program (TPAG). The investigation involved nine individual interviews, the responses of 165 students to a forced response survey instrument, and a concluding group interview of a group of students who had previously responded to the survey instrument. The criterion for inclusion in the study was involvement with the Tech Prep in Agriculture Articulation program. Thus, participation was purposeful. The subject students, who were involved in a career cluster-specific program, displayed a rich range of career aspirations and educational characteristics. Career aspirations were not limited to the agricultural career cluster and ranged from accountant to x-ray technician. The subject students came from all four quartiles of the high school population and their future educational aspirations included apprenticeship, community/technical college, four year college, and post-graduate programs. Most students aspired to post-secondary education at a community, technical, or four year college. Of those aspiring to a post-secondary education, most aspired to a community/technical college education. Surveyed students rated the importance of 24 skills. Workplace skills such as working with others, communications, and the ability to learn rated highest. Foundation skills such as basic mathematics, creativity, and computer usage rated well. Skills related to specific careers fell lower on the composite ratings. Rated lowest were the appreciation of art, music, literature, plays, movies, and TV. Students rated parents, high school teachers, and young people working in the student's area of career interest the highest as providers of information on education and careers. Individuals such as media journalists and politicians whom society might consider good advisors were not trusted by nearly one of three studied students. The investigation led to almost immediate improvements in the TPAG Program, including modification of a core course to better reflect student career interests, publication of program literature in Spanish, and gender balancing of images used in brochures. Recommendations for further research into student characteristics, the dynamics of student career selection, and high school career cluster educational models were presented. / Graduation date: 1996

Leaving Silence: Queer Asian and Pacific Islander Oral History Exhibit (October 1996) is both a community project and an educational campaign, that was conceived and executed in Seattle, Washington. The 12-panel exhibit is composed of 13 narratives and 34 black-and-white photographs, and its theme is "coming out." The narrators and those who appear in the photographs identify as queer and as Asian and Pacific Islander. The project involved the collaboration of four community-based organizations: the Asian Lesbian and Bisexual Alliance, the Asian Pacific AIDS Council, the Asian Pacific Islander Homosexuality/Homophobia Education Project, and Queer & Asian. In this thesis I analyze this exhibit and demonstrate its relevance to critical pedagogy and to all those movements interested in the establishment of social justice.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 1996. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves [381]-407).

Lummi and Eliza Islands form the northeast part of the San Juan Island group in northwest Washington. Lummi is a long, narrow island characterized by a rocky, mountainous southern half and a low, northern half. Eliza is a small T-shaped island southeast of Lummi Island. Lummi Island is underlain by igneous, metamorphic, and sedimentary rocks of Paleozoic to Lower Cenozoic age. The oldest rocks are believed to be those of the Lummi Island Metamorphic and Igneous Complex which form a small, isolated knob in the middle of the island. These are hornblendic rocks, intruded by quartz-albite rocks and cut by numerous aplite and lamprophyric dikes. The age and origin of these rocks is unknown but they may be older "basement" rocks brought to their present position through faulting. Shale, graywacke and granule conglomerate of the Carter Point formation (Paleozoic or Mesozoic) underly most of southern Lummi Island. These rocks show all the characteristics of the typical "graywacke suite" such as great thickness, clastic character, rhythmic bedding, and graded bedding. The only fossils found were a few carbonized plant stems imbedded in fine-grained graywacke. The rocks forming the bedrock of Eliza Island may be a more metamorphosed equivalent of these. Overlying the Carter Point formation on the southeast side of Lummi Island and directly underlying the sandstone at the northern end are the Reil Harbor volcanics. Although they occur in five isolated outcrops these rocks are grouped together on the basis of lithology and outcrop features. In contrast to an earlier intrusive interpretation these occur as submarine (pillow) lavas and interbedded breccia with tuffaceous - argillaceous rocks rather than as dikes or sills. The lavas of some of the outcrops are spilitic and in most cases are extremely altered. The breccias are dominantly volcanic - clastic types which show some reworking. The age of the volcanics and underlying Carter Point formation is unknown; however, interbedded sedimentary rocks contain radiolarian tests suggestive of Mesozoic age. Northern Lummi Island is underlain by plant-bearing lithic-feldspathic arenites and conglomerates of the Chuckanut formation (Paleocene). These are believed to have a continental fluviatile origin on the basis of: absence of marine fossils; conspicuous amounts of hematite imbedded in the sandstone; moderate sorting and rounding; apparent large-scale heterogeneity evidenced by internal structures such as prominant cross bedding and cut - fill structures, and the dominance of sandstone and conglomerate facies. The Carter Point formation and the overlying volcanics on the southeast side of Lummi Island strike N 40 W and dip 45 degrees NW. Drag folds suggest that southern Lummi Island represents the eastern limb of a northwest plunging anticline. The Chuckanut formation and the underlying Reil Harbor vol-canics at the north end of the island have been folded into three synclines which strike northwest-southeast and plunge gently northwest. During the Pleistocene, northern Lummi Island was blanketed with glacial drift while the higher knobs here and the rocks of southern Lummi were grooved, polished or eroded by the glaciers. / Science, Faculty of / Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences, Department of / Graduate

Leaving Silence: Queer Asian and Pacific Islander Oral History Exhibit (October 1996) is both a community project and an educational campaign, that was conceived and executed in Seattle, Washington. The 12-panel exhibit is composed of 13 narratives and 34 black-and-white photographs, and its theme is "coming out." The narrators and those who appear in the photographs identify as queer and as Asian and Pacific Islander. The project involved the collaboration of four community-based organizations: the Asian Lesbian and Bisexual Alliance, the Asian Pacific AIDS Council, the Asian Pacific Islander Homosexuality/Homophobia Education Project, and Queer & Asian. In this thesis I analyze this exhibit and demonstrate its relevance to critical pedagogy and to all those movements interested in the establishment of social justice. / Education, Faculty of / Educational Studies (EDST), Department of / Graduate

The present study examined the implementation of a Washington state policy which requires that school administrators give their subordinates the opportunity to appraise their performance. The importance of this topic is suggested by research findings that indicate appraisals of principals by teachers yield information to assess and improve the administrative skills of principals. Research questions sought information on activities at the state level which served to promote implementation of the state policy. Other research questions sought information on the extent and impact of local school district policies and practices that were consistent with the state policy. The methodology for the study combined survey research and interviews. The interview methodology was used to collect qualitative information on the efforts of officials at the state level to promote local implementation of the state policy. Mailed surveys were used to collect data on the extent and impact of local school district policies and practices consistent with the state policy. The results of this study showed that none of the officials interviewed cited any activities at the state level, which promoted the implementation of the state policy. Results of the mailed surveys indicated that only 7% of local school districts had adopted policies on appraisal by subordinates that included the requirements of the state policy. Moreover, only 22% to 29% of school administrators were found to have complied with the requirements of the state policy by giving their subordinates the opportunity to appraise their performance. School personnel in a position to evaluate the effects of appraisal strategies reported that these strategies were beneficial for assessing administrator performance. Some school personnel also reported improvements in administrator performance and the school program, as a result of these appraisal activities. However, elements of the strategy described in state policy neither ensure changes in administrative behavior, nor protect subordinates against reprisals for making the appraisal.

This study examined what Washington high school principals perceive to be the most effective dropout prevention policies and programs. The population included all public high schools in the State of Washington. Five questions were posed: 1. (a) What preventative measures, intervention programs or student services designed to enhance environmental and personal factors are perceived to have reduced dropout rates? (b) Does the availability of those services and programs account for a significant difference in the actual dropout rates? 2. (a) What personal/psychological factors characterize potential dropouts? (b) Do these identifying characteristics account for a significant variance in the actual dropout rates? 3. (a) What environmental factors influence dropout rates in the schools? (b) Do these factors account for a significant variance in the actual dropout rates? 4. What intervention programs or student services are available in the sample? 5. What demographic factors in the sample schools significantly affect dropout rates? The study incorporated both quantitative and qualitative methodology. Ninety six questionnaires were returned for a response rate of 64 percent. The survey gathered information about each school's demographics, opinions about potential dropouts' identifying characteristics, opinions about the school environment availability of services and programs in each building and district, and which programs they felt to be the most effective, ranking the top ten from a list of twenty possible programs, policies, or services. Six schools were visited and their principals were interviewed to get additional information about their programs and effectiveness. Data was statistically analyzed using ANOVA, multiple regression, and paired comparisons. The policies, services, and programs felt to be most effective were: In-house progressive discipline, vocational programs, a written building attendance policy, out-of-building alternative programs, cooperative work programs, freshman bonding programs, small group advisories, in-building alternative programs, a written district attendance policy, a required life skills class, honors courses, and alcohol/drug-related programs. Available programs accounting for a variance in actual dropout rates were: Monetary incentives, child care facilities, English taught as a second language, honors courses, and parent effectiveness programs. Identified personal characteristics accounting for a variance in actual dropout rates were: Working full-time, low self-esteem, parents' background, low grades, teen pregnancy, and being of a racial minority. Environmental factors accounting for a variance in actual dropout rates were: High parent and community involvement with the school, self-esteem classes and small-group advisories, and the Excellence reform. Demographic factors accounting for a variance in actual dropout rates were: economic stability, gender of principal, and use of free school lunch. The research suggests that those programs and practices accounting for a variance in actual dropout rates should be examined for their interaction of involved factors. If the discussed personal and environmental factors are present, those effective interactive practices should be implemented in order to reduce dropout rates.