Master of Landscape Architecture / Landscape Architecture/Regional and Community Planning / Howard D. Hahn / Landscape architecture education in schools have been focused primarily on elementary and secondary Common Core courses. In many states, career-oriented programs such as agricultural education serve as a platform to teach necessary skills to be successful in all aspects of the agricultural industry. With the shift in lifestyles and technology, agricultural education (Ag-Ed) today has branched out from the traditional farm management courses to food science, natural resources, and landscaping design as well as many others. At schools like Lennox High School in Lennox, South Dakota, students learn plant identification, fundamentals of landscape design, and design graphics. How comprehensive are students' awareness of the landscape architecture profession before, during, and after taking a landscaping course? What are the possibilities of reinforcing foundational skills learned in the landscaping coursework through an outdoor learning environment similar to practical application of other vocational-type courses? How could students be presented a snapshot of the landscape architecture profession that connects the current and future curriculum taught in the Ag-Ed classroom? In order to better understand the landscape architectural aspects of current Ag-Ed, a mixed methods approach was used. First, national, state, and local Ag-Ed curricula standards were reviewed to track how Ag-Ed courses and priorities have changed over time. Next, Ag-Ed students were surveyed before, during, and after taking the Landscaping and Horticultural course offered at Lennox High School to assess potential changes in awareness. Lastly, students currently taking the landscaping course participated in a three-day workshop where they developed ideas for their outdoor learning environment to support current and future Ag-Ed courses and landscape architecture. After the workshop, these students took a post-survey to evaluate ideas produced in the workshop, the future implementation of the workshop, and their level of awareness of the landscape architecture profession. Results from the surveys and workshop show a refinement and increase in landscape architecture awareness, a desire for more hands-on learning conducted outside, and an enthusiasm for using their creativity to design a project for future Ag-Ed students. In subsequent years, future iterations of the workshop will advance planning and design proposals toward implementation.

The current body of knowledge concerning Agricultural Education quality in regards to its three components is not consistent and total program quality has not been defined scientifically. The purpose of this study was to determine quality indicators for instruction, SAE, and FFA according to experts (agricultural education teacher educators, state instructional staff, and high school teachers) across the United States. The conceptual framework for this study was the three circle model consisting of the three integral, intra-curricular components of Instruction, FFA, and SAE. This national study was descriptive in nature and utilized the Delphi technique to gather responses from an expert panel and combine the responses into one useful statement (Stitt-Gohdes andamp; Crews, 2004). The initial questionnaire consisted of three open-ended questions and was developed by the researcher while subsequent questionnaires were developed from the experts responses. The expert panel agreed upon 37 quality indicators for Instruction, 19 quality indicators for FFA, and 6 quality indicators for SAE.

Experimental results indicated that dolomite dissolution rates increased in all the acid solutions as the disk rotational speeds increased at 150, 200, and 250˚F. The dissolution of dolomite in 0.886 M GLDA was found to be surface-reaction limited at lower temperatures and mass-transfer limited at highest temperature. GLDA with the lowest reaction rates and relative diffusion coefficient demonstrated retardation before spending with deeper penetration capability for productivity and injectivity improvement. The purpose of this study was to analyze the Texas Quality Counts Verification Exam for junior and senior aged 4-H and FFA members. The Texas Quality Counts program was developed due to a need for teaching livestock ethics and care to the youth of Texas and it strives to teach youth how to produce a safe and wholesome livestock product for the consumer. An analysis of youth scores between 2011 and 2012 was done to determine how well youth were scoring on the Texas Quality Counts Verification Exam. Out of the 91,733 attempts, 18,204 were taken by juniors and 73,572 were taken by seniors. Junior level attempts show a fairly even spread among self-identified membership in 4-H and FFA, while senior level attempts saw a much greater spread in membership, with 73% of attempts taken by youth who identified themselves as a member in FFA. Overall, 78% of junior level youth were able to pass the exam on their first attempt, and showed a range of mean attempts between 1.13 and 1.47 based on age. Senior level youth, on the other hand, had only 47% pass on their first attempt and had a range of mean attempts between 2.21 and 2.54 based on age. The means of scores on the exam were calculated for juniors and seniors, with 0.85 and 0.71 respectively. To determine if there were any differences in scores between self-identified membership in 4-H, FFA, or both 4-H and FFA, a oneway ANOVA for junior and senior members was conducted. Both junior and senior age groups showed a significant difference between the three membership categories (p=0.001).

Aim The aim of this study was to establish a method to create a difference between groups in muscle glycogen content as well as to investigate the effect of training in low muscle glycogen state on metabolic and physiological parameters. Method During two trials, a subject group of ten highly trained male road or mountain bike cyclists ((mean±SD) age, hight, body weight, VO2max, and VO2max·kg-1 was 28±5 years, 74.7±6.3 kg, 183±6 cm, 4876±332 mL min-1, 64.4±2.8 mL·kg-1 min-1), performed a glycogen depletion exercise followed by a night’s rest and a second exercise session. In the study, which was a crossover design, the subjects were randomly chosen to perform the first trial on a carbohydrate rich diet or a diet with no of carbohydrates. All the testing was performed on a Monark 839E ergometer bike and muscle biopsy sampling was collected before depletion exercise, before the exercise the following day and three hours post exercise. Plasma FFA and glucose was analyzed from venous blood collected at rest. Results Muscle glycogen pre depletion exercise was 623±180 and 645±133 mmol·kg dw-1 glycosyl units for non-CHO and CHO trials respectively. The depletion exercise followed by 13 hours of rest resulted in a significant decrease in muscle glycogen in the non-CHO (p<0.0001), and CHO trials (p<0.01) to 166±71 and 478±111 mmol·kg dw-1 respectively. In the non-CHO trial net glycogen depletion correlated positively with pre depletion glycogen storage.  After the completion of exercise 2 and the following three hour rest period, glycogen content in non-CHO and CHO-trial was 130±52 and477±97 mmol·kg dw-1, respectively. In low glycogen state, the non-CHO trial resulted in an increase in FFA measured in blood plasma at rest and in an increase in Borg rating of perceived exertion (RPE) as well as a reduction in blood glucose during exercise.  Conclusion The protocol used in the present study was successful in creating a difference in muscle glycogen storage and training in low glycogen state was associated with an increase of several physiological parameters indicating a possible impairment of endurance exercise performance. / Syfte Syftet med denna studie var att skapa en metod för att åstadkomma skillnader i muskelglykogen samt observera den akuta effekten av träning med låga muskelglykogennivåer på metabola och fysiologiska parametrar. Metod Vid två tillfällen fick tio vältränade mountainbike- eller landsvägscyklister ((medel±SD) ålder, längd, kroppsvikt, VO2max och VO2max·kg-1 var 28±5 years, 74,7±6,3 kg, 183±6 cm, 4876±332 mL min-1, 64,4±2,8 mL·kg min-1) genomföra ett träningspass i syfte att tömma muskelglykogendepåerna följt av en natts vila och sedan ett andra träningspass. Studien följde ett randomiserat crossover-upplägg och det ena försökstillfället genomfördes med en diet hög på kolhydrater och det andra tillfället med en diet utan kolhydrater (CHO). All testning genomfördes på en Monark 839E ergometer och muskelbiopsier togs före tömningspass, efter en natts vila före det andra träningspasset och tre timmar efter det andra träningspasset. Venösa blodprov togs i vila före biopsitagning för analys av plasma FFA och glukos. Resultat Koncentrationen av muskelglykogen före tömningspasset var 623±180 and 645±133 mmol·kg dw-1 vid försök utan respektive med CHO. Tömningspasset och 13  timmars vila resulterade i en signifikant minskning av muskelglykogen vid försök utan CHO (p<0.0001), och med CHO (p<0.01) till 166±71 och 478±111 mmol·kg dw-1. Nettominskningen av muskelglykogen vid tömningspasset utan CHO korrelerade positivt med glykogenkoncentration före tömning Efter genomförande av det andra träningspasset och tre timmars efterföljande vila var muskelglykogenmängden vid försöken utan CHO och med CHO 130±52 och477±97 mmol·kg dw-1. Vid träning med lågt muskelglykogen fanns det en kraftig ökning av fria fettsyror i blod vid vila och under arbete noterades en ökning skattning av Borg subjektivt skattad ansträngning (RPE) samt en sänkning av blodglukos. Slutsats Protokollet som användes i denna studie skapade framgångsrikt en minskning av muskelglykogen och träning med låga glykogennivåer kunde sammankopplas med flera fysiologiska parametrar som indikerar en möjlig sänkning av prestationsförmåga under uthållighetsarbete.

This master´s thesis deals with optimization and validation of method for determination of free fatty acids. The theoretical part is focused on possibilities of extraction, extract separation, esterification, gas chromatography determination and brief description of the most important validation parameters. All with main emphasis on applying on free fatty acids. The experimental part describes the selection and procedure of optimizing individual steps of the method. Extraction of lipids was performed by solvent mixture (diethylether/petroleumether), based on the standard ČSN EN ISO 1735, for the extraction of free fatty acid solid phase extraction was tested. The acid catalyzed esterification based on ČSN EN ISO 5509 using methanolic solution BF3 was used for derivatization of free fatty acids and a gas chromatograph with a flame ionization detector was used for their determination. Subsequently, selected validation parameters of the method were verified: repeatability, reproducibility, linearity, limits of detection and quantitation. Sunflower oil and emmental type cheese, bought in common food market, were used as model samples for selection and optimatization of the method.

This thesis deals with the determination of free fatty acids in natural and processed cheese. In the theoretical part the possibilities of extraction, fractionation and determination of lipid fractions, characterization of fatty acids and various methods of their determination are described, including the determination of free fatty acids. In the experimental part the selected method for determination of free fatty acids was optimized and partly validated; this method was then applied to samples of processed cheese analogues and natural Gouda type cheese. For extraction of lipids from the sample the method according to ČSN 0107 was selected, solid phase extraction (SPE) was used for separation of free fatty acids. The method according to ČSN EN ISO 5509, using methanol solution of potassium hydroxide, was applied for esterification, fatty acids methyl esters were determined by gas chromatography with FID detection.

The objective of this present thesis was to determine whether GEV (Generalized Extreme Value) itself can be a more conservative distribution than LP3 (Log Pearson III) associated with other methods, such as the B17B weighting procedure with Single Grubbs-Beck (SGB) for low outliers, when determining the projected floods in a flood frequency analysis (FFA) for Santa Ana and San Gabriel regions and other urbanized stream gages present in California. In this work, USGS PeakFQ was utilized. From the results obtained, it was possible to state that GEV fitting results were directly affected by the length of the data. When the length of the record is short, it is not accurate to use a projection of 100-year return period, for example, to represent future projection. Comparing the LP3 and GEV CDFs, for the majority of the stream gages analyzed in this project, GEV proves to be the most conservative method, with smaller return periods.

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The purpose of this study was to assess the perceptions of CTE administrators in Alabama and Georgia on how agricultural education teachers were integrating STEM and employability skills. The population of this study consisted of CTE administrators in Alabama (N = 137) and Georgia (N = 178) with 315 surveys being distributed and 129, or 41%, completing the survey. This descriptive study utilized a static group comparison pre-experimental research design. Means were used to determine how strongly the respondents value employability skills and STEM skills. Standard deviations helped understand how responses varied. Frequencies and percentages were used to determine the number and proportion of the respondents. The demographics portion of this study found that the average CTE administrator in Alabama and Georgia was a white female with a specialist or doctoral degree and no educational background in CTE. In addition, the average CTE administrator was employed in a county school system that offered agricultural education and had less than 15,000 students. Furthermore, the average CTE administrator has 13.05 years of teaching experience and 23.25 years of total experience in education. On average, CTE encompassed the majority of their duties and they were not an administrator in a charter school. The findings of this study presented evidence that CTE administrators in Alabama and Georgia do value the integration of employability skills and STEM skills into agricultural education differently. Moreover, participating CTE administrators perceived all employability and STEM skill categories to be "very important" or "Extremely Important" based on a Likert-type scale of 1 = Not Important to 5 = Extremely Important. Furthermore, the most valued Employability Skills include Critical Thinking Skills, Personal Qualities, and Communication Skills. The STEM Pathways that CTE administrators valued the most include the Plant Systems Pathway, Animal Science Pathway, and the Food, Products, and Processing Pathway.