In New Zealand the development and promotion of sporting events is becoming increasingly popular, due in part to the role of sport in building the nation's identity, the economic benefits, and a growing awareness of the importance of health and fitness within the community. Given this increased popularity it is important that the impacts of these events upon the local 'host' communities be understood. Social impacts have been given more and more attention in recent years by event researchers, due to the recognition that the long term sustainability of such events can only be achieved with the approval and participation of residents. This research addresses these issues in the context of Taupo, New Zealand using the case of Ironman New Zealand.This thesis adopts a mixed method approach using interviews (n=7), participant observation, and a web-survey (n=111). The findings confirm that it is vital to investigate and understand impacts of events on host communities. The findings are also consistent with theories identified in the literature in terms of the nature of social impacts on host communities. The overall results indicate that residents are aware of both the positive and negative impacts of Ironman New Zealand. Respondents highlight positive impacts such as economic benefits, exposure of Taupo, community togetherness, and the encouragement of sports, yet they also recognize negative impacts such as inconvenience from traffic congestion, and road closures. Accordingly, the community was grouped into three distinct clusters with positive, negative and ambivalent perceptions, and were labelled 'Lovers', 'Pessimists' and 'Realists'. The findings further suggest that the use of web-surveying for community research is still in its infancy and needs further development enabling it to be used as an effective tool. Finally it is proposed that small to medium scale sporting event hosted in regional communities may contribute to a sense of community and to the creation of social capital. Further research is needed to confirm this proposition.

Thesis (M.A.)--Ohio State University, 2008. / Title from first page of PDF file. Includes bibliographical references (p. 77-80).

Thesis (M.S.)--Eastern Illinois University, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 39-41).

No description available.

Harvest Hope Park is a brownfield redevelopment project for the University Area Community Development Corporation (University Area CDC), a nonprofit organization dedicated to the sustainable redevelopment of north Tampa neighborhoods. While the project is still in progress, the University Area CDC has noted a lack of community engagement by local residents. The neighborhood, sometimes referred to as “suitcase city” because of the presumed transient nature of the population, has been plagued with poverty, blight, decay, high crime rates, and a lack of basic resources for decades (32 percent of the population in this area lives below the 2016 national poverty line). This project examines the importance of community engagement and capacity building through the environmental redevelopment of brownfield sites while enhancing human-environmental health. The methods used in this research consist of participant observation during University Area CDC events, semi-structured interviews with residents and University Area CDC staff, and analysis of available University Area CDC documents and data. This research identifies the environmental, health, and social impacts of the redevelopment of Harvest Hope Park. Results of the research support the hypothesis that engagement of residents in brownfield redevelopment projects supports building the foundation for the skills, abilities, and resources to advocate for change in their community.

Abstract The objective of this study is to examine and shed light on the process of developing Finnish multi-story timber apartment buildings. It deals with the basic problems and technical solutions related to multi-story timber apartment buildings. The study also examines the background, principles, objectives and fundamentals of Finnish multi-story timber apartment building construction and describes the main questions, activities and events related to the development of Finnish timber construction, especially from the 1990s to the beginning of the new millennium. This study provides a general idea of the present situation and future challenges in the development of the Finnish multi-story timber apartment building. The results of the study that are given the most emphasis are multi-story timber apartment building fire safety, the space cost factor and feedback from residents. The study also presents Finland's first multi-story timber apartment building sites and their technical designs. Ten multi-story timber apartment buildings containing 338 apartments were constructed in Finland in 1995–2001. The next two sites will be completed in 2002. The national publicity and feedback of the multi-story timber apartment buildings has primarily been positive. Multi-story timber apart-ment buildings have not, however, made an actual break-through in Finland. Multi-story timber apartment building construction has been hindered by many biases and the impression that the con-struction is experimental and expensive. Many of these doubts and biases have been exaggerated. The period of experimental construction of multi-story timber apartment buildings in Finland has indicated that technical issues, such as construction techniques, issues related to heating, sound, fire, water and moisture insulation, and HVAC installation, are manageable. A survey of residents indicates that they have a positive attitude toward multi-story timber apartment buildings, and residents hope wood will be used more in Finland. Multi-story timber apartment buildings are felt to be cosy and pleasant, they have a good indoor climate, they are functional, architecturally successful, fire-safe and well insulated against airborne sounds. On the basis of the survey of residents, special attention should be given to impact sound insulation in the intermediate floors. The residents would like to see more wood used in the stairways and interior facing. Space cost is an important factor from the standpoint of the competitiveness of multi-story timber apartment building construction. According to the currently used definition of permitted building volume based on gross floor area, the space cost of a multi-story timber apartment building constructed using current frame designs, which utilise load-bearing inner walls and short spans, is less advantageous than that of concrete frame buildings, which utilise long slab intermediate floors. Construction methods that utilise different construction materials and frame designs would be more on par if the concept of permitted building volume were based on net floor area. The fire code of multi-story timber apartment buildings still requires revising. For example, the Finnish fire code recommends visible protruding fire stops on high wooden façades. Nevertheless, these fire stops do not function as intended, and in some cases they even contribute to the spreading of a façade fire. Instead of using visible protruding fire stops, the spreading of a small façade fire can be effectively limited by partitioning the air space behind the facing in the horizontal direction and by using horizontal structures in the air space that choke the spreading of a fire in the air space. Based on housing statistics, there is a potential market in Finland for multi-story timber apartment buildings: 43,7 % of Finns live in a multi-story apartment building, and 75 % of all multi-story apartment buildings have less than five stories, which according to current regulations means they could be constructed out of wood. In order to make multi-story timber apartment buildings competitive, their construction should be continuous, experience in their construction should be accumulated and their technical designs should become established procedure. The ecology and market value of the life cycle of timber construction should be exploited more than is presently done. Developers and residents have a central role in making multi-story timber apartment buildings more common. / Tiivistelmä Tutkimuksen tavoitteena on selvittää ja valottaa suomalaisen puukerrostalon kehittämisprosessia käymällä läpi ongelmakeskeisesti puukerrostalojen peruskysymyksiä ja teknisiä ratkaisuja. Tutkimuksessa tarkastellaan maamme puukerrostalorakentamisen taustoja, lähtökohtia, tavoitteita ja perusteita sekä kuvataan niitä keskeisiä kysymyksiä, toimenpiteitä ja tapahtumia, mitä suomalaisen puurakentamisen kehitystyössä on tehty ja kohdattu erityisesti 1990-luvulta uuden vuosituhannen alkuun. Tutkimuksen perusteella muodostetaan yleiskäsitys suomalaisen puukerrostalon kehitystyön nykytilanteesta ja tulevaisuuden haasteista. Tutkimustuloksista keskeiselle sijalle on asetettu puukerrostalojen paloturvallisuus, tilakustannustekijä ja asukaspalaute. Tutkimuksessa esitellään myös maamme ensimmäiset puukerrostalokohteet teknisine ratkaisuineen. Vuosina 1995–2001 Suomeen on rakennettu kymmenen puukerrostalokohdetta, yhteensä 338 asuntoa. Kaksi seuraavaa kohdetta valmistuvat vuonna 2002. Puukerrostalojen valtakunnallinen julkisuus ja palaute on ollut pääasiassa myönteistä. Puukerrostalot eivät ole kuitenkaan tehneet varsinaista läpimurtoa Suomessa. Puukerrostalorakentamista ovat rasittaneet useat ennakkoasenteet sekä koerakentamisen ja kalliin rakentamisen leima. Monet näistä epäilyistä ja ennakkoluuloista ovat olleet liioiteltuja. Suomalaisten puukerrostalojen koerakentamisaika on osoittanut, että puukerrostalojen tekniset kysymykset, kuten rakentamistekniikka, lämmön-, äänen-, palon-, veden- ja kosteudeneristyskysymykset sekä LVIS-asennustekniikkaan liittyvät asiat pystytään hallitsemaan. Asukaskyselytutkimuksessa asukkaat suhtautuivat puukerrostaloihin myönteisesti, ja puurakentamista ja puun käyttöä toivottiin lisättävän maassamme. Puukerrostaloja pidettiin yleisesti kodikkaina, viihtyisinä, sisäilmastoltaan hyvinä, toimivina, arkkitehtuuriltaan onnistuneina, paloturvallisina ja ilmaääneneristykseltään hyvinä. Asukaskyselyn perusteella puukerrostalojen keveiden välipohjien askelääneneristävyyteen on kiinnitettävä erityistä huomiota. Asukkaat toivoivat puuta käytettävän tähänastista enemmän porrashuoneiden ja asuntojen sisäpintaverhouksissa. Tilakustannus on keskeinen tekijä puukerrostalorakentamisen kilpailukyvyn kannalta. Tähänastisilla teknisillä ratkaisuilla ja kantaviin väliseiniin ja lyhyihin jänneväleihin perustuvalla runkojärjestelmällä rakennettu puukerrostalo on tilakustannuksiltaan tavanomaista pitkälaattavälipohjaista betonirunkokerrostaloa epäedullisempi nykyisen kerrosalaan perustuvan rakennusoikeuden määritelmän mukaan. Eri rakennusmateriaaleilla ja runkojärjestelmillä toteutettavat rakentamistavat tulisivat nykyistä tasa-arvoisemmiksi, jos rakennusoikeuden käsite muutettaisiin nettoalaan perustuvaksi. Puukerrostalojen palosäädökset kaipaavat tarkentamista. Esimerkiksi Suomen palosäädöksissä suositeltavat korkeiden puujulkisivujen näkyvät palokatkoulokkeet eivät käytännössä toimi toivotulla tavalla, ja joissakin tapauksissa ne jopa edistävät julkisivupalon leviämistä. Näkyvien palokatkoulokkeiden sijasta pienehkön julkisivupalon leviämistä voidaan rajoittaa tehokkaasti kaistoittamalla julkisivun taustan tuuletusrakoa sivuttaissuunnassa ja käyttämällä tuuletusraossa vaakasuuntaisia rakenteita, joilla tukahdutetaan palon leviäminen tuuletusraossa. Asumistilastojen valossa suomalaisille puukerrostaloille voisi olla potentiaaliset markkinat: 43,7 % suomalaisista asuu kerrostalossa, ja 75 % kaikista kerrostaloista on alle 5-kerroksisia, eli ne voitaisiin nykymääräysten mukaan toteuttaa puisina. Jotta puukerrostalojen kilpailukyky paranisi, tarvitaan niiden rakentamisessa jatkuvuutta ja harjaantumista sekä teknisten ratkaisujen vakiinnuttamista. Puurakentamisen ekologisuutta ja elinkaarimarkkina-arvoa tulisi hyödyntää tähänastista enemmän. Rakennuttajat ja asukkaat ovat keskeisessä roolissa puukerrostalojen yleistymisessä.

Effective communication is an important concern when working with individuals with hearing loss. This concern is apparent in the long-term elder care setting, where caregivers communicate with older adult patients every day, many of whom have hearing loss. However, there is limited training available to these caregivers working with residents with hearing loss. The purpose of this project is to establish the need and context for the development of an educational program for caregivers working with these residents with hearing loss. A total of 38 caregivers employed by three elder care facilities in Tucson, Arizona were surveyed. Results from this survey demonstrated that caregiver respondents felt they are knowledgeable and comfortable working with residents with hearing loss. However, there was an apparent gap as caregivers also reported that the presence of hearing loss among residents makes their jobs more difficult and stressful. Furthermore, they reported feeling that hearing loss impacts communication with residents and negatively effects the quality of care. Based on the findings of this survey, there is a need identified for educational opportunities for caregivers working with residents with hearing loss. The findings from this survey provide a foundation for the establishment of hearing health continuing education programs for caregivers working in long term elder care facilities. Specific recommendations regarding potential content of training programs are offered based on the survey findings. Implementation of caregiver trainings may ultimately lead to improved caregiver-resident communication and positively impact the quality of life for residents with hearing loss.

In an attempt to improve the quality of lives of its citizens, the South African government has introduced low-cost housing projects through the Reconstruction and Development Programme. This is supported by the relevant policy framework and the Constitution. Many historically disadvantaged communities in the urban areas have benefitted from the low-cost housing programmes initiated by government. The community of Joe Slovo, which has houses which were built between 2008 and 2010, in the Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality is one of them. However, concerns about the poor quality of some of the houses delivered through government’s low-cost housing programmes have been expressed. These concerns were attributed to the defects which tend to show up in some of the houses, shortly after they have been built. In view of such concerns and the importance of the optimal utilization of the country’s limited resources, the author decided to undertake this study. In this study he focused on the perceptions of the beneficiaries of the houses delivered through the Joe Slovo housing project in the Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality. The main focus was on the perceptions about the quality of the recently acquired houses. The study revealed that not all beneficiaries were satisfied with the quality of their houses. Hence recommendations for addressing this scenario are made.

This thesis “Inherently Hybrid: Contestations and Renegotiations of Prescribed Identities in Contemporary Sri Lankan English Writing” examines work by Nihal de Silva, David Blacker and Vivimarie VanderPoorten to analyse their negotiation of identity, belonging and citizenship within contemporary Sri Lankan English Writing. This negotiation of identity is then placed in relation to the Eelam Wars as well as hybridity and cosmopolitanism, which have become a part of Sri Lankan identity because of the nation’s postcolonial past. Genre and form are employed as ways into exploring the tensions within Sri Lankan English writing, especially because they prescribe on the texts selected a specific way of approaching and presenting the ethnic conflict that is a widespread theme in much of contemporary Sri Lankan writing. The first chapter looks at De Silva’s adventure romance The Road From Elephant Pass. It examines how the novel engenders a renegotiation of identities through the effects of the ethnic conflict upon the attitudes, behaviours and ideologies of the island’s populations, symbolically represented through the narrator, who is a Sinhalese Buddhist officer in the Sri Lankan Army and his eventual lover, who is a rebel fighting for the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. I analyse the arguments presented in the text around identity, belonging and patriotism and focus on the representations of ethnic and racial identity that ultimately expose the constructedness of these various positions, revealing the unacknowledged but real hybridity of the Sri Lankan peoples. I look at markers of cultural capital and tease out how class identities rely on cosmopolitanism, characterised by a knowledge of English, and how that further reveals the performativity of identity. The second chapter examines Blacker’s political thriller A Cause Untrue. Here I explore how the use of detail and description provides an appearance of imparting a complete and realistic perspective on the war. I demonstrate how the novel, through the calculated use of what I will characterise as a ‘reality effect’, takes on the manifestation of being an authority on the war. Blacker’s use of recognisable historical events allows him to create an alternative narrative of history, one that has all the hallmarks of being a true retelling even as it is apparent that his text utilises the ‘reality effect’ to imagine Sri Lanka creatively. This demonstrates how the selection of the thriller genre provides Blacker with a specific way of representing the nation and its diasporas’ in relation to the Eelam Wars. The third chapter focuses on VanderPoorten’s collection of poetry nothing prepares you. Here I investigate how the concepts of hybridity and cosmopolitanism are located within the language used to construct her poetry. I explore how this hybridity and cosmopolitanism of language works together with the form and content of her poems to provide a disquieting of fixed notions of identity, citizenship and belonging. The conclusion to the study revisits the issues that my three chapters deal with, bringing together an overall account of hybridity, cosmopolitanism and identity. I look at the constructedness and performance of identity with the aim of providing a nuanced reading of the renegotiations of identity and citizenship that are taking place because of the ethnic conflict. By summing up the different manifestations of the various gendered, ethnic and class identities represented and presented in the texts that I explore, I illustrate the wider implications of the points of connection between identity and power on the one hand and nationalism, dogma and political rhetoric on the other. Identities within the Sri Lankan nation blur the distinctions between alien and citizen, between one who belongs and subscribes to set expectations, norms and practices and one who challenges these markers of identity.

Lung cancer is the second most prevalent cancer in men and women in the United States and the overall leading cause of cancer-related deaths. Due to this high prevalence, lung cancer screening is a critical procedure in all Family Medicine practices. However, screening is particularly important in rural Appalachian clinics, as this area experiences especially high rates of mortality due to lung cancer. The United States Preventive Services Task Force recommends annual low-dose computed tomography (LDCT) lung cancer screening in adults aged 55 to 80 years who have a 30 pack-year smoking history and currently smoke or have quit within the past 15 years. The goal of this project is assess readiness of clinical providers of the risks and benefits of lung cancer screening, to encourage screening when appropriate, and ultimately increase then number of LDCT annual screenings. Provider knowledge was assessing using a lung cancer screening knowledge and practice survey. Participants then attended an educational sessions that provided information on the importance of screening and when it is appropriate to administer LDCT. Finally, a second survey was administered, again to assess knowledge and practice. Data analysis is currently in process. A t-test will be executed to determine if there is a statistically significant difference between survey scores before and after the educational session. It is expected that the educational program will lead to increases in provider knowledge and more appropriate screenings. The results of this study have important ramifications for this area; because Appalachia has disproportionately high mortality due to lung cancer, it is imperative that the disease be identified as early as possible to ensure the most effective treatment. This project illustrates a method to increase screenings.