The Child Care Self-Sufficiency Scale: Measuring child care funding and policy generosity across states

Tvedt, Karen Portland State University 2009 해외공개박사

Against the backdrop of welfare reform, this study examined the generosity of state child care programs with generosity being defined as the extent to which state funding and policies promote child care availability, affordability, and health and safety for low-income families. Despite variations in Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF) implementation, no internally-consistent measure has existed that permits comparisons across the range of funding and policy indicators. This study addressed that gap by constructing a composite scale comprised of 12 indicators that were identified based on existing research and expert opinion to reflect key areas of state funding and policy discretion. Indicators were developed using 2004 expenditure, policy, and service-delivery data provided by the 50 states. The 12 indicators include: (1) five items measuring funding and availability; (2) three items measuring affordability; and (3) four items measuring health and safety. The result, the Child Care Self-Sufficiency Scale (CCSSS), provides a reliable, unified measure of state generosity (alpha=.755). The CCSSS measures the extent to which states promote self-sufficiency through adequate child care funding and policies. The validity of CCSSS was tested by examining the relationship between state generosity, as measured by CCSSS, state characteristics including the political and economic environment, and patterns of CCDF service delivery. The results confirm the validity of CCSSS and suggest that wealthier, more liberal states, with greater proportions of Democrats in state leadership, have more generous programs. Consistent with existing literature, larger percentages of African-Americans in state population and CCDF caseloads were associated with lower levels of generosity. CCSSS also predicted the income of families served through CCDF, suggesting that greater generosity is associated with serving families as they progress toward self-sufficiency. The study findings raise questions about the implications of welfare reform for how we understand justice and our social responsibilities as individuals, communities, and a nation. Included are questions about conditioning basic income supports on employment, inequality of opportunities across states, and the possibility that rather than breaking the cycle of poverty, welfare reform simply moved many families from the welfare rolls to the ranks of the working poor.

State-based systems modeling: Theory, implementation and applications

Johnson, Michael Stephen Portland State University 2005 해외박사(DDOD)

Established methods for modeling multivariate systems described by categorical data include variable-based reconstructability analysis and log linear analysis. These methods are variable-based in the sense that the system constraint is described in terms of the variables comprising the system and any interactions among those variables. State-based modeling extends these established methods by permitting models defined in terms of system states, i.e., combinations of categories for subsets of the variables comprising the system. If the constraint associated with a multivariate interaction is localized to just a few constituent cells, a state-based model can more precisely describe the nature of that constraint while using fewer parameters than a variable-based model. For confirmatory modeling this results in more powerful hypothesis tests. In the context of exploratory modeling, state-based modeling greatly expands the lattice of possible system models both vertically, by enabling more granular changes in model complexity, and horizontally, by increasing the number of possible models at each level of complexity. Consequently, investigators have a much richer set of candidate models to consider, but also face challenges with respect to searching the model lattice efficiently and distinguishing real system structure from sampling artifacts. This research establishes a conceptual framework for state-based reconstructability analysis, and provides computer software to support specification, fitting, and testing of state-based models. Problems of model estimation and the determination of model complexity are addressed. Simulation is used to compare state- and variable-based modeling with respect to sensitivity and specificity across a range of sample and effect sizes in a confirmatory analysis of an example system. State-based modeling can also be applied in non-statistical settings. For example, in decision analysis, state-based modeling comprises an alternate technique for sensitivity analysis and, in some cases, simplification of event trees in which a utility measure is associated with each path. The results of such an analysis can provide a decision maker with insights regarding risk and opportunity that are not obtainable using variable-based techniques alone.

Constructing public dialogue: A critical discourse analysis of the public discourse practices that shape civic engagement in Portland, Oregon's neighborhood association program

Odell, Julie Beth Portland State University 2005 해외박사(DDOD)

Deliberative democracy and civic renewal movement theorists claim that the basis of renewal for a declining and disempowered public sphere is new ways of understanding citizenship and governance structures that embrace participatory practices. They argue that public dialogue is a key form of social action through which participatory practices are engaged. While current practices of public dialogue are criticized, some scholars claim that democratic deliberative practices are emerging through locally based neighborhood associations. They identify Portland, Oregon's neighborhood association program as one exemplary model. This research examines public dialogue in nine workshops at Portland's 2002 Neighborhood Association Summit. It finds the regular practice of ten normative features of democratic deliberative public dialogue across the workshops. It demonstrates that the features were not practiced as individual, neutral civic skills and processes, but that they were practiced in five clusters that performed social and political work. Employing Fairclough's method of critical discourse analysis, this study compares patterns of discourse across the clusters to the discourses of the Portland Way, the dominant ideology that shapes civic engagement in this community. It examines how the patterns worked to transmit, maintain, resist, and/or transform the dominant ideology. The findings demonstrate that: (1) the orientation of the workshop presenters to the discourses of the Portland Way was a key indicator of whether the dominant practices were transmitted, maintained, resisted, and/or transformed; (2) emancipatory dialogue emerged in all of the clusters except practices of civic engagement; and (3) empowering dialogue was minimal in which the activities of neighborhood association activists were linked to political organizing and public policy development, despite regular resistance. The study concludes that the presence of model forms of deliberative and emancipatory dialogue does not necessarily achieve empowerment for civic activists, and that power relationships embedded in the hegemonic discourses of a dominant ideology must be accounted for in creating participatory practices of civic engagement. It demonstrates the constructive force of language; the role of ideological relations of power in everyday political discourses; the construction through dialogue of practices of civic engagement; and the Summit as a model for participatory forms of civic engagement.

Placing equity on the regional agenda in Portland, Oregon

Provo, John Portland State University 2005 해외박사(DDOD)

This dissertation focuses on a study that examines the Regional Affordable Housing Strategy (RAHS) of Metro, Metropolitan Portland's elected regional government, adopted in 2000, for what it tells us about regional governance institutions in Portland and their operation within the policy domain of housing. The author describes the RAHS as an attempt to incorporate equity into a regional planning framework built primarily on environmental and economic objectives, asking how stakeholders define affordable housing problems and present solutions. Looking at an illustration of New Regionalism in a leading case, the dissertation assesses a central tenet of that approach: its capacity to address inequities fostered by the absence of metropolitan authority in a time of spatial and economic restructuring. This study will provide advocates and critics of New Regionalism, whether academics or practitioners, with insights into the opportunities and the challenges confronting that movement that relate to its aspirations with respect to equity.

Unpacking the Process and Outcomes of Ethical Markets: A Focus on Certified B Corporations

Curtis, Renee Bogin Portland State University ProQuest Dissertations & 2020 해외박사(DDOD)

The growth in conscious consumption presents an opportunity to 1) better understand the potential outcomes of ethical market practices as a community-advocacy tool and 2) to consider potential policy considerations. The marketplace has increasingly become an arena for social action. This leads to the question of how can markets facilitate ethical business practices and community benefits? The recent rise of social benefit corporations warrants an evaluation of the outcomes of ethically-driven markets. Using a comparative research design and qualitative interview methods, this study examines certified Benefit Corporations (B Corps) in two selected cities: Philadelphia and Portland. Through interviews with B Corps and Key Informants in the targeted cities, the research investigates how place-based factors support or impede both the certification process and the adoption of ethical market practices, and evaluates participant perceptions about the impacts of becoming a B Corp. Ultimately the research identifies contextual factors which contribute to why and how firms become B Corps and demonstrates how place can limit or enable local ethical markets. The findings suggest ways contextual location-based factors of culture, institutions and relationships in a climate of supporting motivations, can lead to a potentially impactful cluster of ethical market practices. Theoretical considerations include political consumerism/ ethical markets, social entrepreneurship, clustering and agglomeration economies, and community-led social change. The findings may guide policymakers, community advocates or activists, and scholars to better understand the role of place in the adoption of emergent ethical market practices, and to promote enabling legislation and other supportive factors.

The invisible intellectuals: Perceptions of students labeled with learning disabilities (learning differences) in higher education

Black, Rebecca Hazel Portland State University 2005 해외박사(DDOD)

This phenomenological study investigated what students labeled with learning disabilities (LD; also called learning differences) view as barriers to their access of higher education and what they see as their accommodation needs for full participation in education. Eleven college students labeled with LD engaged in long interviews utilizing the voice of those labeled with LD as the primary data. Findings were interpreted through emerging theories in the new field of disability studies. Findings indicated barriers to education were seen as socially imposed rather than emanating from individual pathology. Informants indicated they were blocked from moving effectively through higher education by: (a) being misunderstood and misrepresented by their institutions, (b) feeling reluctant to use accommodations for fear of invoking stigma, (c) devaluing their work accomplished with accommodations, (d) needing to work significantly longer hours on homework than their non-labeled counterparts, (e) feeling their extraordinary workload was unrecognized by faculty, (f) finding their hard work did not produce a product commensurate with their efforts (leading them to believe faculty doubted their work effort) and, (g) not being consulted by clinicians in determining their accommodation needs. Strategies used by some of these informants to overcome these barriers included: (a) rejecting the disability label, (b) establishing interpersonal relationships with their professors in order for professors to see past the stereotype of LD and recognize the capacity of the individual within, (c) having the assistance of an LD Specialist who advocated for informants with faculty and bureaucracies, and (d) establishing empowerment communities with others labeled with LD. Data strongly points to the need for faculty diversity training on LD issues to be implemented by universities. This study also offers an insider's view of how findings in medical research map to the context of everyday life, classroom learning, and social interaction. Informants describe how difficulties with visual, phonemic, semantic, memory, and kinesthetic functioning appear and disappear in the context of social situations. This study recommends colleges provide for social and political empowerment of those labeled with LD by recognition of an autonomous LD community on campuses similar to minority student groups.

Transplants in the West: A study of settlement and adjustment issues among Nigerian immigrants in Portland, Oregon

Ette, Ezekiel Umo Portland State University 2005 해외박사(DDOD)

Though the number of Nigerian immigrants in the United States has increased since 1965, the literature on transnational communities has been selective in its examination of this population. The present study examines the adjustment and settlement issues of Nigerian immigrants in Portland, Oregon. The focus is on barriers, challenges and struggles that this group encountered as they settled in the area. The study examined the meaning of the experience of immigration for a group of twelve immigrants. Since the study sought to describe the immigration experience from the individuals' perspective, the method of study was phenomenology. The focus of the study, therefore, became the description of the phenomenon (immigration), the individual experiences of arrival, settlement and adjustment and the relationships and differences in these experiences. These individual experiences were then taken together and conclusions and lessons were drawn. The goal was exploratory with a view to stimulating interest among researchers in this particular population. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 12 Nigerian immigrants, with an equal number of males and females, who lived in the Portland metropolitan area stretching from Multnomah County, in Oregon to Clark County, Washington. The stories collected were analyzed using themes that emerged and organized into an interpretive framework that included: reasons for coming to the United States, reasons for staying in the Northwest, barriers/challenges/struggles encountered, practical coping strategies, cognitive coping strategies, interpretation, and meaning imposition on the experience. Participants had different reasons for coming to and settling in the Northwest. Education played a large role both in the impetus to emigrate as well as in the coping process in the settlement phase. The participants reported lack of familiarity with formal networks and heavy reliance on informal networks. Social workers must pay attention to these concerns and issues of racism and culture raised in this study and employ appropriate practice skills in working with this population.

Aerosol optical extinction measurements in the exhaust plume of diesel vehicles using a pulsed laser cavity-ring down transmissometer

Bazargan, Mohammad Hossein Portland State University 2005 해외박사(DDOD)

Airborne particulate matter (PM) comes from both natural and anthropogenic sources. The impact of PM on the atmosphere includes environmental issues affecting human health, visibility, and climate. Although interest in the role of PM in the atmosphere has grown, real-time measurements of PM optical properties have been an ongoing challenge. A recently developed portable instrument, the pulsed cavity ring-down transmissometer/nephelometer tandem (CRDT/N), is used to directly determine the optical extinction and scattering of the atmospheric PM. The results of laboratory and field studies of PM optical extinction, scattering, and single scattering albedo are presented. Validation studies of the instrument for controlled PM types and concentrations were carried out in our laboratory. The CRDT/N measures the optical extinction at the parts-per-million level corresponding to an extinction coefficient (bext) of ∼1 Mm-1. It provides the single scattering albedo (o0) with an accuracy of 1 to 5 percent and a precision of absorption measurement around 1 percent. The extinction coefficients at two different wavelengths (532 nm/1064 nm) measured by the instrument and calculated from Mie theory for uniform polystyrene spheres (0.5 mum diameter) agree to within 4 percent. Measurements taken at a location, 100 m from the highway are in close agreement with the reported o0 value for black particles, which is 0.31. As black particles travel, their optical properties can change causing an increase in o0. This expected increase was represented by the CRDT/N measurements from a separate location, 1 km from the highway, where the o0 was 0.49. In addition to monitoring the optical properties of ambient PM, the concentration of O3, NO, and NO2, and environmental conditions were also measured during the field studies. The correlation between absorption of PM and these factors was then investigated. At the first location during rush hour ∼68 percent of the CRDT/N PM absorption measurements correlate with [NO] in combination with less strongly correlated environmental factors. A weaker correlation (∼33%) was observed at the second location. The field studies show that the CRDT/N instrument will give much needed insight into the penetration of diesel exhaust into neighborhoods near highways.

Food security and hunger among low income US households: Relations to federal food assistance program participation

Sanders, Rebecca Elizabeth Portland State University 2007 해외공개박사

This dissertation describes the conceptual and empirical framework that guides the definition of food insecurity and hunger, the present status of federal programmatic responses, and the status of current research on the topic. It also examines relations between hunger and federal food assistance program participation. Logistic regression is utilized to build two predictor models. Model 1 predicts federal food assistance program participation from household structure, income, community characteristics, and demographics. Model 2 predicts food insecurity/hunger from household structure, income, community characteristics, demographics, and federal food assistance program participation. Results are based on 2004 Current Population Survey data from low income households. Model 1 performed better than a constant only model, and reliably distinguished between federal food assistance program participating and non-participating households. As a whole, Model 1 explained approximately 30 percent of the variance in program participation. Household size was the strongest predictor of federal food assistance program participation. Model 2 also performed better than a constant only model, and reliably distinguished between food secure and food insecure/hungry households. As a whole, Model 2 explained less than 10 percent of the variance in food insecurity. Household earnings were the strongest predictor of food insecurity. The odds of food insecurity for households that participated in federal food assistance programs were higher than for households that did not participate. Methodological, philosophical, and policy implications of these findings are discussed. Particular emphasis is placed on the relevance of findings for the field of social work. Suggestions for future research are also provided.

Family-friendly workplace culture, flexibility, and workplace support for dependent care: The perspectives of human resource professionals

Huffstutter, Katherine June Portland State University 2007 해외공개박사

Integration of family responsibilities and employment demands is challenging for all families, but particularly for those families with extraordinary care requirements of children with mental health disabilities. Utilization of workplace supports, such as flexible work arrangements, has been identified in the work-family literature as an important indicator of organizational responsiveness to employee's family needs (Allen, 2001; Eaton, 2003; Hammer, Neal, Newsom, Brockwood, & Colton, 2005; Secret, 2000). A better understanding of which organizational conditions may improve utilization of available family-friendly supports by employees caring for children with mental health disorders can improve work-life integration for these families. This study examines how factors such as workplace culture, and Human Resource (HR) policies and practices affect accessibility of supports in the workplace for workers with dependent care responsibilities. The exploratory study uses a series of six regression models to identify organizational conditions indicative of a family-friendly workplace culture. Human resource professionals, organizations' primary gatekeepers of workplace policies and practices, were surveyed. The Work-Life Flexibility & Dependent Care Survey was completed by 550 members of WorldatWork, an international HR professional association with approximately 25,000 members. The typical respondent was female (76.9%), highly educated (38% of respondents reported that they had a master's degree), and worked in the U.S. (87%) in an organization with between 100 and 999 employees in manufacturing (16%), or finance and insurance (16%). Key results of the study suggest that organizations with a formal policy on flexible work arrangements create an important pathway for availability and utilization of workplace supports. Workplace culture was identified as an important predictor of the likelihood that HR professionals would grant an employee's request for flexible work arrangements for dependent care needs, including those for mental health care reasons. The need for content on work and family to be incorporated within social work curriculum is discussed as well as implications for social work practitioners. Suggestions for HR organizational policy and practice and directions for future research are presented.