English Abstract Drawing on agency theory and the institutional perspective, this paper aims to examine the relationship between corporate governance and cash holdings for the business group-affiliated firms listed on the Taiwan Stock Exchange and in the Over-The-Counter market. The empirical results reveal that the group-affiliated firms hold more cash than non-affiliated firms. The findings show that the entrenched business group effects dominate the institutional network group¡¦s effects and indicate that the presence of a pyramidal group ownership structure in the group-affiliated firms leads to a principal-principal conflict and therefore an increase in agency problems. To avoid the confounding effect by which the different corporate governance mechanisms would lead to different predictions regarding corporate governance effectiveness, this paper constructs a corporate governance index by aggregating the six characteristics related to corporate governance effectiveness: the cash flow rights, the control-cash flow rights deviation, the control-affiliated directors, the control-affiliated supervisors, board independence, and the ITDRS rankings. The results show that good governance mechanisms are effective in mitigating the principal-principal agency costs and moderating the effect of group affiliation in affiliated firms¡¦ cash holdings. Keywords: Business Group-Affiliated Firms, Cash Holdings, Corporate Governance, Board Structure, Group Diversity

Abstract The purpose of this study was to analyze the idea of ¡§professional development schools (PDSs)¡¨ which was a new school setting and one of collaborative models with universities developed in the past decade in USA. The researcher inquired into PDS¡¦s goals, functions, operations, major influential factors, and ¡§PDS Standards¡¨ in depth, and aimed to explore the collaborative models and the developing stages of Taiwan¡¦s PDSs according to the five standards, which was the key concept of PDS model and was designated by National Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education. These five standards are ¡§learning community¡¨, ¡§accountability and quality assurance¡¨, ¡§collaboration¡¨, ¡§equity and diversity¡¨, and ¡§structures, resources and roles¡¨. The researcher selected six staffs as the participants from each partnership of university/affiliated high school and used qualitative research methods to collect research data, including documentary reviews and semi-structured interviews. After careful examination and analyses of the data collected, the following conclusions are reached: 1. About professional development schools: (1) PDSs are innovative school settings and establishments which were initiated and refined progressively along the educational reform movements. (2) PDSs are not only the ¡§learning communities¡¨; but also the settings for the professional development of participants. (3) The establishment of PDSs needs support in terms of structure and system building from both sides of the partnership. They also need more resources to be invested in. (4) ¡§PDS Standards¡¨ are both guidelines and criterion for the assessment of the PDSs. 2. About the collaborative models between universities and affiliated high schools: (1) The cases actually demonstrate the function of ¡§learning community¡¨, but the degree of ¡§collaboration¡¨ is not close enough. (2) The standard of ¡§accountability and quality¡¨ for the collaborative models can¡¦t be presented due to lack of evaluation measures for the partnership. (3) Two case high schools have developed some supportive activities for low-achievement students by their own. The involvements of two universities on this aspect are apparently not enough. (4) Two cases need to enhance their support for the partnership in terms of structure and system building. (5) According to the ¡§PDS Standards¡¨, the developing stages of two cases are between beginning level and developing level. (6) The collaborative models between universities and affiliated high schools are influenced by internal and external factors. According to the conclusions of this study and the related problems encountered, suggestions to government, two case partnerships, universities, high schools and future researchers have been proposed.

Project (D. Min.)--New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, 2008. / Abstract and vita. Includes final project proposal. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 160-164, 43-44).

Thesis (D. Min.)--New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, 2000. / Includes abstract and vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 115-120).

Thesis (D. Min.)--New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, 2007. / Abstract and vita. Includes final project proposal. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 94-101, 118-122, 53-56).

Thesis (D. Min.)--New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, 2002. / Abstract and vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 108-113).

Thesis (D. Min.)--New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, 2003. / Includes abstract and vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 146-149).

Thesis (D. Min.)--Trinity International University, 2002. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 114-116).

In response to the recent delisting of the bald eagle as an endangered species, the Three Affiliated Tribes of the Fort Berthold Indian Reservation, the University of Arizona, and the National Park Service undertook this collaborative study to identify continuities and discontinuities in eagle knowledge and acquisition and use of eagle parts by members of the Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara Nation (MHA), and to document cultural resources associated with eagles in three North Dakota national parks. Interviews with tribal consultants who possess eagle rights were integrated with ethnographic, archaeological, and archival data. This research finds that although there have been major changes in how MHA people acquire eagles for personal and religious use since the early 20`" century, beliefs and practices associated with eagle demonstrate cultural continuity. There remains a strict adherence to protocols regarding the handling of eagles and the possession and transfer of eagle knowledge, and there is a persistent belief in the eagle's ability to animate people, objects, and places. The eagle feather remains an indicator of social status, spiritual power, and identity, and eagle parts continue to be crucial elements in the performance of major religious ceremonies. Several site types associated with eagles and eagle trapping were identified, and all three parks either contain eagle resources, or are associated with parts of the eagle landscape. While trapping pits and trapping lodges are no longer used for taking eagles, they retain significance as sources of supernatural power and spiritual knowledge. These sites are spiritually active, and are important places for conducting fasts, seeking visions, and making religious offerings. Tribal consultants believe that the power imbued in these sites is attributed to their past role in the establishment and perpetuation of relationships between their ancestors and the spiritual world during annual trapping expeditions. Both site types are culturally significant in their familial and clan associations, their reflection of traditional land uses unique to the Missouri River environs, and their role in the transformative religious experiences of ancestors. There is a desire within the tribal community to preserve eagle trapping pit sites and, even more so, trapping lodge sites. In order to maintain the sites' spiritual integrity, consultants prefer that they not be accessible to the general public.

This dissertation develops Bayesian methods to analyze data from auctions and produce policy recommendations for auction design. The essay, "Auction Design Using Bayesian Methods," proposes a decision theoretic method to choose a reserve price in an auction using data from past auctions. Our method formally incorporates parameter uncertainty and the payoff structure into the decision procedure. When the sample size is modest, it produces higher expected revenue than the plug-in methods. Monte Carlo evidence for this is provided. The second essay, "Flexible Bayesian Analysis of First Price Auctions Using Simulated Likelihood," develops an empirical framework that fully exploits all the shape restrictions arising from economic theory: bidding monotonicity and density affiliation. We directly model the valuation density so that bidding monotonicity is automatically satisfied, and restrict the parameter space to rule out all the nonaffiliated densities. Our method uses a simulated likelihood to allow for a very exible specification, but the posterior analysis is exact for the chosen likelihood. Our method controls the smoothness and tail behavior of the valuation density and provides a decision theoretic framework for auction design. We reanalyze a dataset of auctions for drilling rights in the Outer Continental Shelf that has been widely used in past studies. Our approach gives significantly different policy prescriptions on the choice of reserve price than previous methods, suggesting the importance of the theoretical shape restrictions. Lastly, in the essay, "Simple Approximation Methods for Bayesian Auction Design," we propose simple approximation methods for Bayesian decision making in auction design problems. Asymptotic posterior distributions replace the true posteriors in the Bayesian decision framework, which are typically a Gaussian model (second price auction) or a shifted exponential model (first price auction). Our method first approximates the posterior payoff using the limiting models and then maximizes the approximate posterior payoff. Both the approximate and exact Bayes rules converge to the true revenue maximizing reserve price under certain conditions. Monte Carlo studies show that my method closely approximates the exact procedure even for fairly small samples.