Nine universities in the United States with the greatest number of international students and having an accredited music program through the National Association of Schools of Music (NASM) were selected. Survey research methodologies were used to identify the status of the international music students from East Asia in U.S. higher education institutions and to determine their attitudes toward their schools. Among East Asian international music students at US higher education institutions, the results indicated that the professor's reputation, scholarships, and the program's reputation were perceived as the most influential factors impacting the program choice; a good relationship with professors, good feedback from professors, and emotional stability were perceived as the most influential factors impacting academic success; and the professor's teaching, the professor's expertise, and the improvement of musical skills were perceived as the most influential factors impacting students' satisfaction level. The most problematic issues reported were the language barrier and the cultural differences between their host and own countries. In addition, many of the East international music students in this study noted financial difficulties.

This study examined the effects of premarital counseling on newlywed communication. It was predicted that individuals who had participated in premarital counseling would have lower levels of demand/withdrawal communication and higher levels of spousal support. The effects of the format of the counseling were also examined. Individuals who had been married less than two years completed a survey measuring their marital satisfaction, levels of demand/withdraw, and perceived spousal support. Social learning theory was used as a theoretical lens. Results suggested that participating in premarital counseling has no affect on newlywed communication. Newlyweds who had been exposed to a group format during their counseling had higher marital satisfaction than those who had just participated in a one-on-one format with a counselor.

The first purpose of this study was to describe collegiate band members' preferred teacher interpersonal behaviors and perceptions of self-efficacy based on the gender, year in college, instrument, and major. The second purpose of the study was to measure the relationship between preferences of interpersonal teacher behavior and self-efficacy scores. The non-probability purposive sample (N = 1020) was composed of band members representing 12 universities from different regions of the United States. There were 4 large public, 4 small public, and 4 private universities that participated in the study. Participants completed 2 questionnaires, the Teacher Interaction Preference Questionnaire (TIPQ) and the Self-Efficacy Questionnaire (SEQ). Descriptive statistics were calculated for each of the questionnaires. Results for the TIPQ showed that all sub-groups most preferred the dominant-cooperative behaviors, followed by submissive-cooperative behaviors, and least preferred the dominant-oppositional behaviors. Results for the SEQ showed subtle variations for all subgroups. Three Pearson product-moment correlation coefficients were calculated to measure the relationship between the three teacher interaction styles (dominant-cooperative, submissive-cooperative, dominant-oppositional) and students' perceived self-efficacy. Due to the possible over-use of the data with multiple correlations, a Bonferroni adjustment was made to avoid a Type I error (.05/3 = .016). A significant positive relationship was …

Biweekly, comprehensive compilation of decisions, reports, public notices, and other documents of the U.S. Federal Communications Commission.

Biweekly, comprehensive compilation of decisions, reports, public notices, and other documents of the U.S. Federal Communications Commission.

In 1955, barely ten years after the end of the most devastating war in Modern German history, a new German military was established in the Federal Republic, the Bundeswehr. In order properly fill the ranks of this new military the government, under the leadership of Konrad Adenauer, believed that it would have to draft men from the West German population into military service. For the government in Bonn conscription was a double-edged sword, it would not only ensure that the Bundeswehr would receive the required number of recruits but it was also believed that conscription would guarantee that the Bundeswehr would be more democratic and therefore in tune with the policies of the new West German state. What this study seeks to explore is what the West German population thought of conscription. It will investigate who was for or against the draft and seek to determine the various socioeconomic factors that contributed to these decisions. Furthermore this study will examine the effect that the public opinion had on federal policy.

The number of adults in the United States who are age 65 or older is rapidly increasing. With longer lifespan comes an increase in chronic diseases such as dementia, diabetes, and depression. This study used archival data from a larger study conducted at the Memory Clinic at John Peter Smith County Hospital in Ft. Worth, Texas to examine several hypotheses and research questions related to the influence of type of dementia, presence of Type II diabetes, and presence of depression on neuropsychological test performance. First, this study attempted to identify specific patterns of performance on neuropsychological measures for those with Alzheimer's dementia (AD), vascular dementia (VaD), or mild cognitive impairment (MCI). The results indicated that those with MCI perform better than those with AD or VaD on all neuropsychological measures, and that those with VaD perform better than those with AD on a measure of verbal memory. Another purpose of the study was to determine how the presence of Type II diabetes affects this pattern of functioning; the overall finding in this study was that the presence or absence of diabetes did not affect performance on measures of cognitive functioning. Additionally, the study attempted to add to literature examining the …

Biannual publication "devoted to the rich history of Dallas and North Central Texas" as a way to "examine the many historical legacies--social, ethnic, cultural, political--which have shaped the modern city of Dallas and the region around it." This issue focuses on "Enduring Legacies."

In Vienna from about 1918 until the 1930s, contemporaries perceived a high point in the music-historical significance of Mahler's works, with regard to both the history of compositional style and the social history of music. The ideas and meanings that became attached to Mahler's works in this milieu are tied inextricably to the city's political and cultural life. Although the performances of Mahler's works under the auspices of Vienna's Social Democrats are sometimes construed today as mere acts of political appropriation, David Josef Bach's writings suggest that the innovative and controversial aspects of Mahler's works held social value in line with the ideal of Arbeiterbildung. Richard Specht, Arnold Schoenberg, and Theodor Adorno embraced oft-criticized features in Mahler's music, regarding the composer as a prophetic artist whose compositional style was the epitome of faithful adherence to one's inner artistic vision, regardless of its popularity. While all three critics addressed the relationship between detail and whole in Mahler's music, Adorno construed it as an act of subversion. Mahler's popularity also affected Viennese composers during this time in obvious and subtle ways. The formal structure and thematic construction of Berg's Chamber Concerto suggest a compositional approach close to what his student Adorno described …

Although governments try to create strict policies and regulations to prevent abuses, use of excessive force is still a problem for almost every country including Turkey. This study is intended to help Turkish National Police administrators to understand and prevent police use of excessive force. Studies on police brutality categorize three factors that explain why police officers use excessive force; these are individual, situational and organizational. In addition to brutality theories, job satisfaction literature is examined in this study to understand the use of excessive force. Job satisfaction is found to be related with burnout, turnover, stress, commitment, and performance. The impact of officers' attitude toward the criminal justice system and/or laws has not been tested widely. Police officers attitudes toward human rights laws are examined in this study to measure its impact on attitude toward use of excessive force. A secondary data collected in Turkey are analyzed by structural equation modeling which provides confirmatory factor analysis, path analysis, and causal relationships between variables. It is found that police officers' attitude toward human rights laws is a significant predictor of their attitudes toward use of excessive force. Job satisfaction and education level are the other significant variables affecting attitude toward …

A comparative evaluation framework of instructional interventions for implementation of online training for public library staff would enable a better understanding of how to improve the effectiveness, efficiency and efficacy of training in certain training environments. This dissertation describes a quasi-experimental study of a two-week, asynchronous online training course that was provided at four levels of instructional intervention to public library staff in the United States. The course content addressed the complex issues of difficult patron policy development and situational coping techniques. The objective of the study was to develop and demonstrate a theoretically grounded, evidence-based impact evaluation framework. The framework was used to assess the relative impact of an online course for public librarians at four levels of instructional intervention. The researcher investigated the relationships between the type of e-Training instructional interventions and the short- and long-term impacts on participants' knowledge, self-efficacy, and workplace performance. The study used a longitudinal, quasi-experimental design that included a pretest, posttest and three-month delayed posttest with follow-up survey. 194 participants completed all three phases of the study. The evaluation tools measured course content related knowledge and self-efficacy at all three phases (pretest, posttest, and delayed posttest) and assessed workplace application of training at …

This report discusses the current U.S.-Puerto Rico relationship, the history of said relationship, and the current political state of Puerto Rico, as well as relevant pieces of U.S. Congressional legislation concerning Puerto Rico.

Biweekly, comprehensive compilation of decisions, reports, public notices, and other documents of the U.S. Federal Communications Commission.

Biweekly, comprehensive compilation of decisions, reports, public notices, and other documents of the U.S. Federal Communications Commission.

As the current body of instructional communication research focuses primarily on the relationship between teacher and learner, three studies investigating the relationship between learners were completed in order to better understand how student motivation and learning are influenced by learner-to-learner immediacy behaviors within the college classroom environment. Study I resulted in an extensive list of both positive and negative verbal and nonverbal immediacy behaviors commonly used by learners. Study II required the comparison of the behaviors identified in study one to existing measures of teacher to learner immediacy behaviors, producing a new measure focusing on learner-to-learner immediacy. Following a pilot survey, the reliability of this new measure was determined through face validity and factor analysis, producing the Learner-to-Learner Immediacy Behavior Scale. In Study III, the Learner-to-Learner Immediacy Behavior Scale was combined with Christophel's 1990 Immediacy Behavior Scale, Cognitive Learning Scale, Affective Learning Scale, and Trait and State Motivation Scales and administered to 273 undergraduate students to test the affects of common learner-to-learner immediacy behaviors on student state motivation, affective learning, and perceptions of cognitive learning loss. Multiple regression analyses indicated learner-to-learner immediacy as functioning similarly to teacher-to-student immediacy when mediated through state motivation in its influence on student affective learning …

This study modeled changes in pre-service teacher efficacy in mathematics and science over the course of the final year of teacher preparation using latent transition analysis (LTA), a longitudinal form of analysis that builds on two modeling traditions (latent class analysis (LCA) and auto-regressive modeling). Data were collected using the STEBI-B, MTEBI-r, and the ABNTMS instruments. The findings suggest that LTA is a viable technique for use in teacher efficacy research. Teacher efficacy is modeled as a construct with two dimensions: personal teaching efficacy (PTE) and outcome expectancy (OE). Findings suggest that the mathematics and science teaching efficacy (PTE) of pre-service teachers is a multi-class phenomena. The analyses revealed a four-class model of PTE at the beginning and end of the final year of teacher training. Results indicate that when pre-service teachers transition between classes, they tend to move from a lower efficacy class into a higher efficacy class. In addition, the findings suggest that time-varying variables (attitudes and beliefs) and time-invariant variables (previous coursework, previous experiences, and teacher perceptions) are statistically significant predictors of efficacy class membership. Further, analyses suggest that the measures used to assess outcome expectancy are not suitable for LCA and LTA procedures.

Weekly newspaper from Rusk, Texas that includes local, state and national news along with extensive advertising.

Weekly newspaper from Rusk, Texas that includes local, state and national news along with extensive advertising.

This report discusses the questionnaire for the IOGENE Project. From September 26, 2008 through June 26, 2009, an online survey questionnaire captured both demographic data from Portal visitors as well as their opinions regarding the utility of the Portal and their satisfaction with it. The objective of this data collection effort was twofold: to characterize Portal users and to establish baseline measurements for user satisfaction. The survey will be repeated following each of two planned releases of the redesigned Portal, one in the summer of 2009 and the second in the fall of 2009. Comparison of future survey results to the baseline results reported in this paper will be one gauge of the success of the IOGENE project.

This bibliography lists citations of English-language articles, books and other printed and electronic sources that are useful in understanding scholarly electronic publishing efforts on the Internet. Most sources have been published from 1990 through 2008; however, a limited number of key sources published prior to 1990 are also included.

The North Texan includes articles and notes about University of North Texas students, faculty, and alumni activities.

Semi-weekly newspaper from Bastrop, Texas that includes local, state and national news along with advertising.

Semi-weekly newspaper from Bastrop, Texas that includes local, state and national news along with advertising.

Catalog describes the governance, admission requirements, course offerings, and campus life in the Division of Graduate Studies at Hardin-Simmons University in Abilene, Texas. Index begins on page 156.