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Mending Broken Hearts: Contributions of Attachment Style, Decentering, and Meaning Making for Breakup Adjustment during Emerging Adulthood (open access)

Mending Broken Hearts: Contributions of Attachment Style, Decentering, and Meaning Making for Breakup Adjustment during Emerging Adulthood

Breakups within emerging adulthood (EA) are associated with heightened distress because of individuals' tendency to be preoccupied by and prioritize romantic relationships. Global narrative scoring systems, such as Boals et al.'s meaning making (MM) and Feffer et al.'s interpersonal decentering, can be a useful for analyzing the activated cognitive processing in narratives about stressful events and have been linked to positive adjustment from those events. Attachment may moderate the benefits of processing a breakup. While avoidantly-attached people report lower breakup distress because of their tendency to suppress attachment-related thoughts and emotions, anxiously-attached individuals report prolonged distress due to their tendency to ruminate about the past relationship and to experience continued attachment to their ex-partner. The current study assessed the cross-sectional effects of MM and decentering on depression and breakup non-acceptance, as well as how attachment moderates the relationship between decentering and breakup adjustment. Results found higher MM was associated with higher depression and non-acceptance. More mature decentering was related to lower non-acceptance, but was unrelated to depression. Initial MM efforts may evoke more distress as individuals focus on distressing thoughts or emotions previously avoided. Initial decentering maturity may help with breakup adjustment as one effectively reflects on their own and …
Date: December 2022
Creator: Straup, Madison L.
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library
Migration Tracking, Survival, and Pairing Behavior of American Kestrels Wintering in North Central Texas (open access)

Migration Tracking, Survival, and Pairing Behavior of American Kestrels Wintering in North Central Texas

The American Kestrel (Falco sparverius) is the smallest and most abundant falcon in North America with a wide geographic range. Unfortunately, surveys have suggested that some kestrel populations have been in decline since the 1950s, though the nominal causes of this decline are unknown. Migratory movement patterns and connectivity have yet to be established for any population of migratory kestrels. In Chapter 2, I investigated methods for attaching migration trackers to kestrels. Specifically, I showed that leg-loop style harnesses may have negatively affected return rates whereas backpack harnesses did not. Based on these results, I recommend that backpack-style Teflon harnesses is the safest and most effective method for attaching tracking devices to small raptors. In Chapter 3, I quantified survivorship for kestrels wintering in north Texas to identify the timing of kestrel mortality. Notably, I found that juvenile kestrels had similar annual survival rates as adults (81.6% versus 79.5%). High overwintering survival in north Texas indicated that once kestrels arrived on their wintering grounds, they were highly likely to survive to spring migration. In Chapter 4, I investigated pairing behaviors previously undocumented in wintering kestrels. I found that winter pairing was relatively common, but more prevalent in urban environments than …
Date: December 2022
Creator: Biles, Kelsey S
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library
Modern Chinese Opera: A Performance Guide to Six Tenor and Baritone Arias from Selected Operas by Lei Lei and Guangnan Shi (open access)

Modern Chinese Opera: A Performance Guide to Six Tenor and Baritone Arias from Selected Operas by Lei Lei and Guangnan Shi

With the emergence and development of Chinese opera market, a large number of excellent composers and original Chinese operas have emerged. Responding to the market demand for opera singers, many jobs came into being. The dissertation is used for western male singer who wants to get job opportunities to perform in China. The dissertation discusses three original Chinese operas, each of which features one tenor aria and one baritone aria. The research results in a performance guide for these six Chinese opera arias, in addition to providing detailed pronunciation rules of the Chinese alphabet along with an IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) guide, a word-for-word translation of each aria, an analysis of vocal skills and difficulties, and some of the physical requirements of the staging.
Date: December 2022
Creator: Hu, Hao
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library

A Multi-Level Model for Perception Affect Asymmetry: Individual, Dyadic, and Group Affect Dynamics

In collective affect research, an assumption is often made that through processes such as emotional contagion and attraction-selection-attrition members will converge unto a shared group affective tone. While this assumption is not without warrant, a limitation of previous work on interpersonal emotional processes of individuals, individuals within dyadic relationships, or members within teams is the lack of examination into the varying perceptions individuals may form regarding these affective experiences. To examine the development and influence of these affective perceptions, we extend recent works from work group conflict literature to examine the influence of perception asymmetry when applied to affective interactions. Wherein, we describe a novel construct of Perception Asymmetry of Affect (PAA). PAA refers to the congruence (e.g.; low level of PAA) or incongruence (e.g.; high level) of perceptions of positive and negative affective experiences between two or more individuals. This paper explores the following questions: 1) does perception asymmetry of affect exist; 2) if so, what causes perception asymmetry between individuals and their groups, within dyads, and within groups. This article contributes to literature on collective affect by offering a detailed framework for an understudied phenomenon of diverging or asymmetric perceptions.
Date: December 2022
Creator: Antwiler, Brandon
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library
Multiple Case Study Examining the Perceptions of Teacher, Planning, Use, and Implementation of the Constructivist Learning Theory in a Suburban School District (open access)

Multiple Case Study Examining the Perceptions of Teacher, Planning, Use, and Implementation of the Constructivist Learning Theory in a Suburban School District

This qualitative multiple case study aims to identify and describe the perceptions and experiences of kindergarten through twelfth grade teachers in a small suburban public school district. Through a demographic survey and semi-structured interviews, seven teachers shared their lesson design experiences. This study identified how teachers understand the constructivist learning theory. Three research questions guided the study, with three themes responsive to inquiries used to describe how teachers use guiding documents to design lessons for their technology-infused classrooms. The study findings were discussed, and suggestions were made to inform school district officials of possible professional development opportunities. Recommendations for future research specific to the constructivist learning theory and lesson design are discussed.
Date: December 2022
Creator: Lamb, Heather Ann
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library

Nanofluidic Membrane Based on Covalent Organic Framework: Design Strategies and Applications

Nanofluidic is an emerging field of applying fluid properties in nanochannels or nanostructures. The nanoporous channel with a pore size of less than 100 nm will strongly affect the motion of the fluid. Meanwhile, the pore environment, such as hydrophilic and hydrophobic properties, charge density, and host-guest recognition would be crucial for the transportation of molecules and ions in the pore. This thesis is focused on the synthesis, characterization of nanofluidic membranes and their applications to reverse electrodialysis. Chapter 1 focuses on the importance and objective of this work. Chapter 2 gives an overview of nanofluidic and classical nanofluidic structure–covalent organic frameworks (COFs). In Chapter 3, a series of COFs membranes with different surface charge densities were designed by employing a multivariate (MTV) strategy. A volcano-like relationship between the surface charge density and output power density was observed when the membranes were applied for osmotic energy harvesting. Chapter 4 integrates the temperature gradient to the covalent organic frameworks nanofluidic system to further explain the thermophoretic mobility of ions. The recorded osmotic energy production density was obtained while ion concentration polarization was alleviated with increasing hydrodynamic convection effects. In Chapter 5, a coupled photon-electron-ion transport behavior across ionic covalent organic framework …
Date: December 2022
Creator: Zhu, Changjia
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library

Narrative Solutions to Climate Change

Climate change is one of the preeminent problems facing humanity today. It has the potential to cause incalculable damages, loss of life and property, and can create an almost unlivable habitat for humans on this planet. Governments need to act in order to stop future climate harms, but the electorate must be literate in the subject in order to do so. One of the jobs of the media is to inform the public, and so it is imperative that the media find a way to accurately inform the U.S. electorate about the changing climate in order to stimulate pro-environmental behavior and voting. It was hypothesized in this thesis that journalists should utilize narrative instead of simply relaying statistics and fact-based information to better engage the electorate and that it would prove a better way to educate them about science topics such as the climate. However, the politicization of such topics could not be ignored and so needed to be accounted for. A 2x2 factorial analysis was done using narrative versus fact-based stories with either conservative or liberal news outlet headers. These were then tested against three covariates: political ideology, narrative transportation, and locus of control. This research found that political …
Date: December 2022
Creator: Pezzulli, Katherine Keller
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library
"The Opposite of Addiction is Connection": Next-of-Kin Narratives in Overdose Fatality Reviews (open access)

"The Opposite of Addiction is Connection": Next-of-Kin Narratives in Overdose Fatality Reviews

This study used ethnographic and qualitative research methods to provide data-driven support for the use of next-of-kin interviews to enhance overdose fatality review (OFR) datasets. This study's community of practice is a group of substance-use professionals that use OFRs to share confidential data and monitor Lucas County, Ohio substance use trends. To analyze OFR data collection, un-silo information, and understand how to include next-of-kin (NOK) interviews in the dataset, this study used rapid analysis, semi-structured interviews, and virtual participant observation methods. Rapid analysis showed current methods sufficiently collected demographic, vital statistics, and postmortem data from coroner reports; however, NOK interviews supplied narrative-derived information often missing or inconsistent in the dataset. Interviews with the community of practice and decedents' NOK showed dissonance between the two's perceptions of overdoses in Lucas County. Participants discussed themes, e.g., stigma, burnout, strained resources, and increasing fentanyl contamination-related overdoses. NOK needed accessible web-based resource options, linkages to current programs or services, stigma-free harm reduction education, and opportunities to form connections. Professionals explained the impact of widespread mental health problems, extreme social isolation, and economic pressures on overdose prevention during COVID-19. Potentially contaminated illicit substance use increased during the pandemic, overburdening the community of practice and straining …
Date: December 2022
Creator: Fournier, Lindsay Olivia-Rose
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library
Optical Control of Coherent Quantum Systems (open access)

Optical Control of Coherent Quantum Systems

Optical control of coherent quantum systems has many methods and applications. In this defense we will discuss the effects of an electric field interacting with molecules with dipole moments. The theoretical study of such molecules will consist of two-level atom and a three-level atom in the λ configuration. The methods that will be discussed are population trapping using both bright and dark starts obtained by both STIRAP and CHIRAP pulses. The application to be discussed is how to create a room temperature maser.
Date: December 2022
Creator: Roy, Colin Dean
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library

An Optimized Control System for the Independent Control of the Inputs of Doherty Power Amplifier

This thesis presents an optimized drive signal control system for a 2.5 GHz Doherty power amplifier (PA). The designed system enables independent control of the amplitudes and phases of the drive signals fed to the inputs of two parallel PAs. This control system is demonstrated here for Doherty PA architecture with a combiner network which is used as an impedance inversion between the path of two parallel connected PAs. Independent control of the inputs is achieved by incorporating a variable attenuator (VA) and a variable phase shifter (VPS) in each of the two parallel paths. Integrating VA and VPS allows driving varying power levels with an arbitrary phase difference between the individual parallel PAs. A Combiner network consists of a quarter-wave transmission line at the output of the main power amplifier, which is used to invert the impedance between the main and peaking transistor. The specific VA (Qorvo QPC6614) and VPS (Qorvo QPC2108) components that are used for the test system provide an amplitude attenuation range from 0.5 dB to 31.5 dB with a step size of 0.5 dB and a phase range from 0◦ to 360◦ for a step size of 5.6◦at the intended operating frequency of 2.5 GHz, …
Date: December 2022
Creator: Sah, Pallav Kumar
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library

Parameterization of Ionic Liquids and Applications in Various Chemical Systems

In this work, the development of parameters for a series of imidazolium-based ionic liquids molecules, now included in the AMOEBA force field, is discussed. The quality of obtained parameters is tested in a variety of calculations to reproduce structural, thermodynamic, and transport properties. First, it is proposed a novel method to parameterize in a faster, and more efficient way parameters for the AMOEBA force field that can be applied to any imidazolim-based cation. Second, AMOEBA-IL polarizable force field is applied to study the N-tert-butyloxycarbonylation of aniline reaction mechanism in water/[EMIM][BF4] solvent via QM/MM approach and compared with the reaction carried out in gas-phase and implicit solvent media. Third, AMOEBA-IL force field is applied in alchemical calculations. Free energies of solvation for selected solutes solvated in [EMIm][OTf] are calculated via BAR method implemented in TINKER considering the effect of polarization as well as the methodology to perform the sampling of the alchemical process. Finally, QM/MM calculations using AMOEBA to get more insights into the catalytic reaction mechanism of horseradish peroxidase enzyme, particularly the structures involved in the transition from Cp I to Cp II.
Date: December 2022
Creator: Vazquez Cervantes, Jose Enrique
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library
Partisan Media Coverage of Abortion Policy (open access)

Partisan Media Coverage of Abortion Policy

Public opinion on salient issues and elite's knowledge of the public are both reliant on framed information, as they often depend on the media as a communication tool. Media tone also influences political behavior by affecting the perceptions that the public has on issues and events. In this study I examine the tone and framing of abortion media coverage by three different media outlets each with a different ideology leaning. I test assumptions made by cascade activation model and the economic theory of news making by answering the question how does partisan media report the issue of abortion? I answer this question by analyzing the tone and framing of 45 abortion articles from Politico, a Liberal leaning news outlet, 65 news articles from The Daily Caller, a Conservative news outlet, and 45 news articles from the NY Times, one that is considered independent. Results found that in accordance with what cascading and economic theory of news would predict, the news outlets are likely to prioritize their audience's ideology in their content by keeping it in line with the continually pushed abortion frames that each side identified with.
Date: December 2022
Creator: Graciano, Jennifer
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library
A Pedagogical Guide to "Distant Voices" (1999) by Ping Gao (b. 1970) (open access)

A Pedagogical Guide to "Distant Voices" (1999) by Ping Gao (b. 1970)

Ping Gao is a composer-pianist in China. The purpose of this research is to provide a pedagogical analysis of Ping Gao's solo piano suite Distant Voices (1999), with intent to introduce Chinese folk music and contemporary characteristics in the twentieth century to early advanced piano students. After an introduction, chapter 2 presents an overview of Ping Gao's biographical information and his compositional style. Chapter 3 provides resources and information of folk music tradition related to this selected work. Chapter 4 analyzes Distant Voices with respect to the Chinese folk idioms, including folk songs, the sound of the folk instruments, and pentatonic modes and scales. Chapter 5 then analyzes the work with respect to its contemporary characteristics, including non-traditional harmony (secundal, quartal, and quintal chords) and contemporary rhythm and meter (shifted accents, asymmetric meters, and mixed meter). Chapter 6 examines some further technical challenges in performing the work. This work can be considered a helpful source for piano teachers to incorporate folk music styles from different regions of the world into their teaching, cultivating students' appreciation for other cultures and music styles.
Date: December 2022
Creator: Wang, Yiting
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library
A Pedagogical Guide to Henglu Yao's "Mikrokosmos from Chinese Nationalities" and Its Parallels with Béla Bartók's "Mikrokosmos" (open access)

A Pedagogical Guide to Henglu Yao's "Mikrokosmos from Chinese Nationalities" and Its Parallels with Béla Bartók's "Mikrokosmos"

Henglu Yao is a contemporary Chinese composer who has composed a large number of intermediate piano works using a blend of traditional Chinese musical elements and modern Western compositional techniques. This dissertation uses Yao's Mikrokosmos from Chinese Nationalities, composed in 2017, to conduct a comparative study with last three volumes of Bartók's Mikrokosmos, exploring the folk music characteristics of the two composers' respective nationalities. Furthermore, this dissertation observes the musical and technical similarities and differences in modern piano teaching repertoire, especially those that are influenced by their respective national musical traditions. The comparison and elaboration of the two composers' use of modern harmony, modern rhythms, imitation of folk instruments, and application of mathematical concepts are detailed in the text. In addition, I provide pedagogical suggestions on the challenges of practicing the contemporary music in Yao's Mikrokosmos, including aural training, asymmetrical rhythmic training, and phrasing practice. Lastly, I provide detailed suggestions for certain pedaling and fingering aspects with which students may struggle.
Date: December 2022
Creator: Zhao, Han
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library
Performing Translations: Rethinking Christian Wolff's Alternative Notation (1960-1968) in the Context of His Creative Communities (open access)

Performing Translations: Rethinking Christian Wolff's Alternative Notation (1960-1968) in the Context of His Creative Communities

Christian Wolff's alternatively notated scores grant the performer several interpretive choices. These pieces feature symbols (known as "coordination neumes") that instruct performers when to begin and end a sound event in relation to the sounds being made around them, thereby generating a reactive improvisation between the musicians. Among these scores are five compositions that form the basis of this project: For 5 or 10 People (1962), In Between Pieces (1963), For 1, 2, or 3 People (1964), Septet (1964), and Edges (1968). Focusing on these pieces specifically, this dissertation explores the unique performance practices required by Wolff's indeterminate music and contextualizes that music within his career in classics and comparative literature, particularly with regard to the concept of translation, and within his creative communities. These creative communities include his fellow New York School composers, New York's wider downtown artistic scenes in the 1950s and 60s, and the experimental music scenes at Cologne and Darmstadt. While scholars such as David Behrman, Thomas DeLio, and Mark Nelson have addressed the interactive quality of Wolff's notation and the technical skills needed to execute his pieces, I argue that there are deeper processes at work in these compositions that go beyond typical discussions of …
Date: December 2022
Creator: Stearns, Jessica
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library

Personalized Recommendation Using Aspect-Aware Knowledge Graph Learning

This study aims to apply user reviews and numerical ratings toward items to create an aspect-aware high-order representation for a recommendation system. We propose a novel aspect-aware knowledge graph recommendation model (AKGR) with the deep learning method to predict users' ratings on non-interacted items, from which more personalized recommendations can be made. First, we create a sequence-to-sequence encoder and decoder model by exploiting contextual and syntactic information in user reviews to extract aspects critical to items. Then we utilize the principal component analysis (PCA) and the K-means clustering to analyze the extracted aspects for category classification. Based on the aspects, we construct a graph structure to connect users and items which share the same aspect-based opinions for mining user preferences and item attributes. Finally, we combine the user and item latent features from the reviews and the user-item rating matrix to complete the rating prediction task by applying the factorization machine model. We conducted experiments on three aspect extraction datasets and five rating prediction datasets. To verify the effectiveness of the proposed aspect extraction model and rating prediction model, comparison experiments were made with some state-of-the-art baseline models, such as double embeddings convolutional neural network (DE-CNN) and dual graph convolutional …
Date: December 2022
Creator: Zhou, Jinfeng
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library
Playing with Expectations: Marianna Martines (1744-1812), Brilliance, and the Harpsichord Sonata in G (open access)

Playing with Expectations: Marianna Martines (1744-1812), Brilliance, and the Harpsichord Sonata in G

Marianna Martines (1744-1812) was a highly celebrated composer, singer, and keyboardist during her lifetime in Vienna, praised by such dignitaries as Dr. Charles Burney, and achieving the honor of being the first woman composer to be admitted to the Accademia Filarmonica di Bologna in 1773. She composed both large-scale and smaller works, including masses, oratorios, keyboard sonatas and concerti, cantatas, and arias. Yet today, despite a revival of interest in this important composer, she remains largely unknown and her nearly 70 surviving works remain all too underperformed. The purpose of this dissertation is to add to the existing scholarship by exploring the first movement of her Harpsichord Sonata in G Major, the last of her three extant sonatas, which is marked Allegro brillante, and is indeed a work of technical brilliance and difficulty, through various theoretical frameworks. This study demonstrates the extraordinary nature of this work by invoking classical formal theory, topic theory, with particular emphasis on the "brilliant" and "singing" styles, and the more recent feminist studies illuminating gender-coding in music. This theoretical analysis is considered against the backdrop of sociological studies examining the gender politics of Vienna and other parts of Europe during this time period. This study …
Date: December 2022
Creator: Soree, Nadia Bohachewsky
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library

Porous Materials as Drug Delivery Systems

The porous materials discussed in this dissertation are metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) and porous liquids. Due to their high surface areas, tunable structures, and controllable porosities, MOFs have been explored for a wide variety of drug delivery applications. In chapter 2, MOFs have been used as magnetothermal-triggered release carriers through spatially distributed iron oxide nanoparticles within MOF matrix as a magnetic heating mediator and surface-grafted thermal-responsive nanocap as an alternating magnetic field (AMF)-responsive gatekeepers, achieving monitoring of drug release via external AMF by a conformational change of nanocap. In chapter 3, MOF, as a non-toxic loading carrier, encapsulate naringin, a natural product to serve as a multifunctional bio-platform capable of treating Gram-positive bacteria and certain cancers by slowly and progressively releasing the encapsulated naringin as well as improving and modulating immune system functions through the synergies between naringin and MOF. In chapter 4, porous liquid with unique solvent-free fluidity properties as a drug delivery platform for the first time. The interaction between hollow silica nanoparticle and polymerized ionic liquid, followed by ionic grafting brush of poly (ethylene glycol) telomer, makes this designed porous liquid responsible for high drug-loading and pH-responsive drug-releasing abilities along with slow degradation behavior. In addition to their …
Date: December 2022
Creator: Ge, Xueying
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library
Posthuman Art Conservation Curriculum (open access)

Posthuman Art Conservation Curriculum

At least half of the art objects in the public trust are currently in need of conservation today. In consideration of this crisis, a posthuman version of art conservation curriculum is proposed to transgress current limitations of the field. Through applying Michel Foucault's genealogy and archaeology to art conservation and its education, Anthropocentric motivations undergirding conservation are revealed. Foucault's death meditation inspires my narrativization of a fire event that incites a re-visioning of my over 25 years of conservation and teaching experience. By re-contextualizing theorist Ted Aoki's works, art conservation curriculum becomes a reflective and affective site for reciprocal healing of self and other, incorporating the lives of conservation students and art objects. Reconsidering art conservation curriculum in light of Aokian notions of curriculum as plan and curriculum as lived, provokes the curricular potentialities of new materialism, along with quantum physics' entanglement, intra-agency and intra-activity for the field. Art conservation and its curriculum are radically reimagined as indwelling between humanist priorities of the Anthropocene and posthumanist possibilities towards more caring, ethical and sustainable futures for both human and nonhumans' coexistence on this planet.
Date: December 2022
Creator: Peck, Scott Joseph
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library
Pre-Service Elementary Teachers' Core Science Teaching Practices to Develop Scientific Literacy: A Disciplinary Literacy Framework Analysis (open access)

Pre-Service Elementary Teachers' Core Science Teaching Practices to Develop Scientific Literacy: A Disciplinary Literacy Framework Analysis

Every citizen has the right to be equipped with scientific literacy to understand and make informed decisions within the discipline of science. Educators can utilize core science teaching practices (CSTPs) to develop scientific literacy. In response, this study identified the CSTPs utilized by preservice elementary teachers (PSETs) to develop scientific literacy during their spring 2022 student teaching semester. Furthermore, this study identified contextual constructs that led to the utilization of the CSTPs to develop scientific literacy. The study used a qualitative exploratory case study using semi-structured interviews as the primary data. Surveys and artifacts were used as supporting secondary data. The identification of CSTPs and their contextual constructs were conducted using inductive content analysis. Afterward, the identified CSTPs and their contextual constructs were deconstructed, interpreted, and synthesized through the critical theoretical framework of disciplinary literacy. Relationships, time, school structure, and community were contextual constructs that enabled and disabled PSETs' utilization of CSTPs to develop scientific literacy. The contextual constructs are represented using the Framework to Develop Scientific Literacy (FDSL). The FDSL contain contextual constructs that enabled PSETs to utilize CSTPs through the sharing of power between the PSET and their cooperating teacher, school district, community, or teacher education programs. In …
Date: December 2022
Creator: Ham, Chris D.
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library
Preparation to Teach in Technology-Rich K-12 Classroom Environments (open access)

Preparation to Teach in Technology-Rich K-12 Classroom Environments

In today's schools, the ability to integrate technology into the teaching and learning environment is a necessary and crucial skill. Many K-12 classroom environments are technology-rich, with 1:1 devices, blended learning, and even distance instruction taking place. However, new teachers often enter the classroom unprepared to successfully utilize educational technology and navigate the technology-rich classroom environment. This research study examined the preparation of preservice teachers to teach with technology in today's classrooms, and explored the gap between the preparation teachers received in their teacher education program and what they needed to be able to be successful as classroom teachers. The primary goal was to explain how teachers are currently being prepared to teach with educational technology and compare that preparation to the skills they found they needed when they began teaching. This study was an exploratory qualitative study that employed survey and interview research approaches to establish a baseline of how technology skills are being addressed in educator preparation programs and how new teachers are utilizing technology in their classrooms. The survey questions consisted of structured and open-ended questions, and the interviews were semi-structured interviews. Results of this research study provide information for future research in the area of teacher …
Date: December 2022
Creator: Conan, Jenna Marie
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library
Process Planning for Hybrid Manufacturing with Directed Energy Deposition and Machining Processing (open access)

Process Planning for Hybrid Manufacturing with Directed Energy Deposition and Machining Processing

This thesis details the creation and application of a generalized process plan for the hybrid manufacturing of AISI 316L stainless steel, using direct energy deposition (DED) and ball-nose end-mill machining, that includes the inspection and measurement of objects created by that hybrid manufacturing process plan. The proposed process plan progresses through the selection of substrate thickness, single-track, multi-track, and multi-layer depositions, then on to machining processing. A manufacturers' recommended set and range of DED parameters were used to create a designed experiment that aided in the analysis of objects created in each of the DED process planning steps; those objects were then machined in the same enclosure using a set of machining parameters screened from industry recommendations for ball-nose milling of stainless steel, after which measurements were taken for surface roughness, some material characteristics, and for tool deterioration. The results, analyses, and discussions collected herein show that the proposed process plan can provide models for geometrical outputs for each step in the plan, some improvements in substrate stability, surface roughness, tool deterioration, and material porosity due to voids. Current research in hybrid manufacturing does not show generalized process planning influences. The process plan as demonstrated by the work in this …
Date: December 2022
Creator: Hughes, Zane Weldon
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library

Processing and Shape-Setting of Shape Memory Alloys for Small Satellite Antennas

In this study, four different NiTi-based shape memory alloys (SMAs) compositions were processed, shape-set, and characterized to evaluate their effectiveness as SMA actuation component for satellite antennas. Three of the compositions were commercially available NiTi wires (90°C Flexinol® actuator NiTi wire and Confluent ADB SE508 NiTi wire), NiTi SM495 plates (ATI Specialty Alloys and Components) and the other composition was in house lab-produced NiTiCu plate. Different shape-setting techniques were performed such as pin and plate, fixtures and dies, and finally a sandwich fixture. The two most promising outcomes were the SE NiTi 508 wire and the NiTiCu plate. A SE NiTi 508 wire was first heat-treated at 550 °C for 3 hours and then it was shape-set at 450 °C for 30 min using a Cu tube which was previously deformed to the desired deployment curvature and fixed on a steel rig. The wire was kept inside the Cu tube during the shape-setting process to obtain the desired curvature. After shape-setting, the wire was thermally cycled multiple times. The results showed that the SE NiTi 508 wire was able to retain its deployment shape successfully after each thermal cycle. Furthermore, a NiTiCu plate was sandwiched between two steel sheets which …
Date: December 2022
Creator: Al Jabri, Nehal Ahmed Mubarak
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library
Professor Carl A. Helmecke and Nazism: A Case Study of German-American Assimilation (open access)

Professor Carl A. Helmecke and Nazism: A Case Study of German-American Assimilation

Carl A. Helmecke, like many German Americans marginalized by the anti-Germanism of the First World War and interwar period, believed that democracy had failed him. A professor with a doctoral degree in social philosophy, he regularly wrote newsletter columns declaring that the emphasis on individualism in the United States had allowed antidemocratic forces to corrupt the government, oppress citizens, and politicize schools and institutions for propaganda purposes. Moreover, widespread hunger and unemployment during the Great Depression added to the long list of failures attributable to democracy. What the United States needed, Helmecke thought, was political change, and he believed that the Nazi regime in his homeland, albeit flawed, had much to offer. In 1937, he went on a teaching sabbatical to Nazi Germany to study the Third Reich's education and social programs. When he returned to the United States, he began promoting Nazi ideals about education and labor camps. Although Hitler's 1939 invasion of Poland, followed by the United States entry into World War II, brought his fascist illusions for political change in the United States to an abrupt end, his belief in the correctness of an autocratic system of governance for Germany rather than that of the western democracies …
Date: December 2022
Creator: Collins, Steven Morris
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library