This work addresses hurricane preparedness in Escambia County, Florida. It explores preparing for hurricanes as an informal learning process occurring within personal networks and embedded in beliefs, values, and attitudes. Findings reveal that participants learned to prepare from their parents in childhood and improved upon that knowledge through direct experience in adulthood. Later, they passed this knowledge on to their children as well as co-workers. These preparations are embedded in beliefs of self-determination and attitudes of endurance. However, this body of knowledge and their respective practices are not equally accessible to all. Recommendations are provided so local organizations can incorporate local knowledge and practices with preparedness improvement efforts and foster social cohesion as well.

This article describes the testing of a model that proposes that people's beliefs regarding the effectiveness of hazard preparedness interact with social context factors (community participation, collective efficacy, empowerment and trust) to influence levels of hazard preparedness. Using data obtained from people living in coastal communities in Alaska and Oregon that are susceptible to experiencing tsunami, structural equation modelling analyses confirmed the ability of the model to help account for differences in levels of tsunami preparedness. Analysis revealed that community members and civic agencies influence preparedness in ways that are independent of the information provided per se. The model suggests that, to encourage people to prepare, outreach strategies must (a) encourage community members to discuss tsunami hazard issues and to identify the resources and information they need to deal with the consequences a tsunami would pose for them and (b) ensure that the community-agency relationship is complementary and empowering.

A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree PhD (Community Psychology) in the Department of Psychology Faculty of Arts University of Zululand, South Africa, 2012. / The aim of this study was to investigate the level of preparedness of educators from the Mthatha District to implement inclusive education. A qualitative design was adopted for this study. A random sample of 100 educators was selected from the junior secondary schools that have been converted to full service schools under the Department of Education in the Mthatha District. A pre-designed, structured questionnaire was used to collect data. Data was analysed qualitatively through thematic analysis and quantitatively through the use of the Statistical Package for the Social Scientists (SPSS). The aim of the study was to determine how well the educators were prepared for inclusive education. The findings revealed that sixty percent of the participants were comfortable with inclusive education because of previous training and experience. However, they felt that more could be done by government to support them so that inclusive education can be implemented successfully. The perception was that inclusive education was simply added to the existing workload. Educators felt that relief from their routine method of facilitating learning was limited. Forty percent of the participants were not ready for inclusive education due owing to the following factors: lack of training, lack of resources, and insufficient information on inclusive education. Based on the findings of this study, it is recommended that there should be ongoing support and educator training in order to equip educators with skills for successful implementation of inclusive education. A multi-disciplinary team approach is also recommended where educational psychologists or registered counsellors will form an integral part of the team.

Submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree Master of Education in the Department of Educational Psychology and Special Education of the Faculty of Education at the University of Zululand, 2008. / The aim of this investigation was to establish educators' preparedness for inclusive education: Educators seem to embrace the human rights philosophy underpinning the introduction of inclusive education. However the implementation of inclusive education is not easy as it signals a dramatic paradigm shift for mainstream educators. It involves a new way of thinking and behaving. Many experienced educators have found that they are no longer experts in their field and are concerned that they are novices regarding inclusive education. The success of inclusive education hinges on the effective preparedness of educators. The level of preparedness of educators will determine their degree of acceptance and their efficiency in the implementation of inclusive education. The first phase of this study comprised a comprehensive overview of the literature on educators' preparedness for inclusive education. The second phase involved research by means of a questionnaire. The questionnaire was administered to a stratified random sample of 120 primary and secondary school educators in the Umdoni Ward of the Scottburgh circuit, KwaZulu Natal. The results of this questionnaire provided evidence that educators are not adequately prepared for inclusive education. The literature review indicated that educators in mainstream schools are generally not prepared to include LSEN in the mainstream class for the following reasons: ■ Large class sizes. ■ Lack of support. ■ Lack of knowledge. ■ Lack of skills and competencies. ■ Lack of resources ■ High stress level. ■ Time constraints. For the purpose of the empirical investigation a self- structured questionnaire was utilized. The data from the questionnaires completed by educators from primary and secondary schools was processed and analysed by means of descriptive statistics. From the findings of the research, the following recommendations were made: ■ The Department of Education must provide adequate support to educators concerning all aspects of inclusive education. ■ In-service training regarding inclusive education must be available to mainstream educators.

The objective of this study is to determine the potential association between teaching state, subject taught, perceived preparation given by teacher preparedness programs, and perceived support from administration and colleagues, and overall happiness of teachers and their satisfaction with the university education program they attended. We use generalized Fisher’s exact tests, two-sample t-tests, linear regression, logistic regression to accomplish this objective. State and subject have very little effect on teacher satisfaction. Teacher support systems are associated with both the way a teacher perceives they were prepared, as well as the satisfaction they experience in their career. How well a teacher feels they were is also associated with teacher satisfaction.

Theoretical and empirical evidence suggests that peoples' perceptions of household seismic adjustments, in addition to their perceptions of earthquakes themselves, should predict the likelihood that seismic adjustments are performed. However, little research has been done to address this issue. While recent research has found peoples' perceptions of the effectiveness of household adjustments to influence adjustment levels, people's perceptions of inconvenience of household seismic adjustments - namely the cost, time effort, required cooperation and required knowledge involved in making these adjustments - have been found to not influence seismic adjustment. However, this study did find that the higher the perceived inconveniences of an adjustment, the less likely people are to perform those adjustments. As a second area of investigation, a survey was given to subjects in an understudied risk population (residents living along the Wasatch Fault Line that runs through the state of Utah) to compare Utahns to Washingtonians and Californians. The survey revealed that although California residents have the highest risk perceptions and the most previous earthquake experience, they rank lower than Washington and Utah residents in terms of how much they think, talk, and gather information about earthquakes. Implications of both areas of research are discussed.

Emergency preparedness typically involves the preparation of detailed plans that can be implemented in response to a variety of possible emergencies or disruptions to the transportation system. One shortcoming of past response plans was that they were based on only rudimentary traffic analysis or in many cases none at all. With the advances in traffic simulation during the last decade, it is now possible to model many traffic problems, such as emergency management, signal control and testing of Intelligent Transportation System technologies. These problems are difficult to solve using the traditional tools, which are based on analytical methods. Therefore, emergency preparedness planning can greatly benefit from the use of micro-simulation models to evaluate the impacts of natural and man-made incidents and assess the effectiveness of various responses. This simulation based study assessed hypothetical emergency preparedness plans and what geometric and/or operational improvements need to be done in response to emergency incidents. A detailed framework outlining the model building, calibration and validation of the model using microscopic traffic simulation model WATSim (academic version) is provided. The Roadway network data consists of geometric layout of the network, number of lanes, intersection description which include the turning bays, signal timings, phasing sequence, turning movement information etc. The network in and around the OIA region is coded into WATSim with 3 main signalized intersections, 180 nodes and 235 links. The travel demand data includes the vehicle counts in each link of the network and was modeled as percentage turning count movements. After the OIA network was coded into WATSim, the road network was calibrated and validated for the peak hour mostly obtained from ADT with 8% K factor by comparing the simulated and actual link counts at 15 different key locations in the network and visual verification done. Ranges of scenarios were tested that includes security checkpoint, route diversion incase of incident in or near the airport and increasing demand on the network. Travel time, maximum queue length and delay were used as measures of effectiveness and the results tabulated. This research demonstrates the potential benefits of using microscopic simulation models when developing emergency preparedness strategies. In all 4 main Events were modeled and analyzed. In Event 1, occurrence of 15 minutes traffic incident on a section of South Access road was simulated and its impact on the network operations was studied. The averaged travel time under the incident duration to Side A was more than doubled (29 minutes, more than a 100% increase) compared to the base case and similarly that of Side B two and a half times more (23 minutes, also more than a 100% increase). The overall network performance in terms of delay was found to be 231.09 sec/veh. and baseline 198.9 sec/veh. In Event 2, two cases with and without traffic diversions were assumed and evaluated under 15 minutes traffic incident modeled at the same link and spot as in Event 1. It was assumed that information about the traffic incident was disseminated upstream of the incident 2 minutes after the incident had occurred. This scenario study demonstrated that on the average, 17% (4 minutes) to 41% (12 minutes) per vehicle of travel time savings are achieved when real-time traffic information was provided to 26% percent of the drivers diverted. The overall network performance in delay for this event was also found to improve significantly (166.92 sec/veh). These findings led to the conclusion that investment in ITS technologies that support dissemination of traffic information (such as Changeable Message Signs, Highway Advisory Radio, etc) would provide a great advantage in traffic management under emergency situations and road diversion strategies. Event 3 simulated a Security Check point. It was observed that on the average, travel times to Sides A and B was 3 and 5 minutes more respectively compared to its baseline. Averaged queue length of 650 feet and 890 feet worst case was observed. Event 4 determined when and where the network breaks down when loaded. Among 10 sets of demand created, the network appeared to be breaking down at 30% increase based on the network-wide delay and at 15% based on Level of Service (LOS). The 90% increase appeared to have the most effect on the network with a total network-wide delay close to 620 seconds per vehicle which is 3 and a half times compared to the baseline. Conclusions and future scope were provided to ensure continued safe and efficient traffic operations inside and outside the Orlando International Airport region and to support efficient and informed decision making in the face of emergency situations.

The current study investigates the effects of preparing learners for an online debate through a worked example in terms of student perception, participation, level of cognitive skill, and electronic interaction patterns. There has been a change in the focus of distance learning research from comparative media studies to the means to improve the quality of distance education. One of the key elements in this changing impetus are strategies to promote interaction such as the introduction of structure or scaffolding argumentation (McIsaac & Blocher, 1998). One such strategy is the online debate in which students are organized into teams to take a position on an issue and argue on its behalf (Jeong, 2004). The debate is constrained through the addition of rules and specific message headers. Well-designed quality interaction holds the potential to create more satisfied learners and higher quality learning outcomes (Muirhead, 2002), but in the absence of quality, interaction has been found to actually lead to a decrease in satisfaction, participation, and performance (Joung & Keller, 2004; Kreijns, Kirschner, & Jochems, 2002). One way to ensure quality within interactive exercises such as online debate is to prepare students through a worked example. A worked example models an expert’s work and demonstrates desired behaviors for the learner to study (Atkinson, Derry, Renkl, & Wortham, 2000). Students were randomly assigned to teams to participate in an online debate with half being given access to a worked example before participating. In order to examine the effects of the worked example on students’ perceived satisfaction and level of preparedness, a survey was administered at various points throughout the semester. Additionally, debate transcripts were analyzed for participation, cognitive skill, and interaction patterns. The results demonstrate that students prepared through a worked example participated more frequently, wrote more words or phrases that encouraged the participation of others, and used higher-order thinking skills. The conclusion was that worked examples can be used to model behaviors for students to emulate. The implication being that instructors should consider providing worked examples before engaging students in online debate and future research should examine the efficacy of a worked example in preparing learners for other types of interactive activities.

The world is an extraordinarily dangerous place with an array of escalating threats. Reports of terrorism, natural disasters, and political unrest are stark reminders of the dangerous context in which businesses must perform. To learn more about what firms can do to perform despite these dangers, we conduct two studies about the relationship between organizational preparedness and performance. The research question addressed by our first study is whether international businesses somehow convert previous terrorism exposures and/or experience operating in high-risk locations into an ability to bounce back quickly from future terrorist attacks. Our second study looks within the firm to see whether efforts to ensure workplace safety translate into performance. Our research addresses gaps in the literature concerning how firms maintain performance in a dangerous, uncertain world, and specifically into what organizational preparedness efforts help firms maintain performance despite unexpected disruptions. Our research contributes to a theory of organizational resilience and suggests to managers that business continuity planning and safety preparedness enhance resilience and performance in a dangerous world. / Business Administration/Strategic Management

Family/friend caregivers of persons with dementia often do not feel prepared for end-of-life, which contributes to high rates of complicated grief, depression and anxiety in bereavement. This mixed methods study used an exploratory sequential design to explore the core concepts and indicators of preparedness, develop and evaluate a multidimensional questionnaire aimed at measuring caregiver preparedness for end-of-life for persons with dementia. In Phase 1, a qualitative study with an interpretive descriptive design was used to explore the core concepts and indicators of preparedness with 16 bereaved family caregivers recruited from six long-term care homes located in Ontario, Canada. In Phase 2, a quantitative, cross-sectional Delphi-survey was conducted with 5 caregivers and 12 diverse professional experts to select preparedness indicators/items and develop the Caring Ahead questionnaire. Lastly in Phase 3, the self-report, paper format questionnaire was evaluated for evidence of validity and reliability using a quantitative cross-sectional design. In this final phase, the questionnaire was completed through the postal mail by 134 caregivers from over 50 long-term care homes/residential care facilities, primarily in Ontario, Canada. Evidence for internal structure and concurrent validity was generated along with reliability coefficients suggesting internal consistency and stability in a test-retest. Findings from this study contributed to the conceptualization and operationalization of preparedness and produced the new, multidimensional questionnaire titled Caring Ahead: Preparing for End-of-Life with Dementia with preliminary evidence for validity and reliability. This questionnaire aims to fill an existing gap expressed by researchers who aim to design and evaluate interventions promoting preparedness through a palliative approach. In addition, policy-makers should benefit from introduction of the Caring Ahead questionnaire as an outcome measure to monitor and evaluate the effectiveness of policies surrounding a palliative approach. / Thesis / Candidate in Philosophy / Providing care to a family member or friend with dementia can be very challenging and different than caring for persons with other disorders. Healthcare providers should provide a palliative approach to care which focuses on quality-of-life and helping family caregivers prepare for end-of-life. However, many family caregivers do not feel prepared for death and this can lead to serious mental health problems in bereavement. This thesis explores what feeling prepared for death means and describes the development and testing of a questionnaire to assess how prepared family caregivers feel for the end-of-life of someone with dementia. Through interviews and surveys with caregivers and professional experts, we developed and tested the Caring Ahead: Preparing for End-of-Life with Dementia questionnaire. Use of the new Caring Ahead questionnaire aims to help us understand how prepared family caregivers are feeling for end-of-life and what supports are needed.