The Texas experiment on the border: Analysis of student access and success of Borderland top 10% students at borderland and top tier public universities

Rodriguez, Cristobal The University of Texas at Austin 2009 해외박사(DDOD)

This study analyzed trends in access and success of students admitted through the Top 10% admissions policy. The study employs an comparative analysis between public universities from the Borderland region and the two top-tier public universities in Texas. This Texas admissions policy provides students in the top 10% of their graduating high school class admission to any state 4-year public university. Therefore, this policy implies that being a top 10% student equates to being college ready for any public university in Texas, regardless of selectivity or top tier status. Research on the Texas Top 10% policy has focused on its success in improving diversity and student performance at the two top-tier public universities in Texas, The University of Texas at Austin and Texas A&M University. However, enrollment disparity continues at these elite institutions between Whites, Latina/os and Blacks. Additionally, the Texas Borderland region is an intersection of large Latina/o demographics; distance from top-tier institutions; and great disparities in economic development, health, and education. Combining the aforementioned conditions, we know little about the access and success of Borderland top 10% students, particularly in comparing the two public top tier universities in Texas to the alternative choice of their local Borderland university. This study used mixed methods to compare the trends in access and success of Borderland students admitted under the Top 10% admissions policy at Borderland universities and at top-tier public universities, and additionally controlled for student characteristics in explaining student persistence and graduation. The quantitative analysis used student-level descriptive and inferential statistics with data facilitated by Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board. The qualitative section of this dissertation used focus-group interviews with 36 students at 5 Borderland universities and 1 top-tier university to explain their success. This study applies Bourdieu's theoretical framework of social and cultural capitals and habitus to interpret the findings. Results indicated student differentiation between institutions in access, success, and explanations. Ethnicity, gender, family income, and college generation status influence differences in enrollment between institutions, in which all together influenced differences in graduation and persistence. On the other hand, the interviews revealed that personal effort and institutional resources also explained differences in student success. This study provides implications for further research and policy considerations.

The relationship between factors that influence college choice and persistence in Longhorn Opportunity Scholarship recipients at the University of Texas at Austin

Bhagat, Geeta Srinivasan The University of Texas at Austin 2004 해외박사(DDOD)

Although students choose their colleges for a variety of reasons, low-income, first-generation, and minority students are often limited in their choices. Furthermore, even when those students do attend college, their persistence rates are generally lower than those of traditional students. This study examines the relationship between factors that influence choice and persistence in recipients of the Longhorn Opportunity Scholarship (LOS), a scholarship given to students from Texas high schools that are under-represented at the University of Texas at Austin (U.T. Austin), the flagship university of the University of Texas System. LOS students are usually low-income, thus, the scholarship offers these students an opportunity to attend a university they otherwise might not be able to attend. Furthermore, the academic and social support offered by U.T. Austin's Longhorn Scholars Program increases the likelihood these students will graduate. In this study, a qualitative methodology called Interactive Qualitative Analysis (IQA), developed by Norvell Northcutt at U.T. Austin, was used to study the relationship between choice and persistence in LOS recipients. One focus group of LOS freshmen addressed the question of why they chose U.T. Austin, while another focus group of LOS seniors addressed the question of what factors helped them persist. Understanding the relationship between choice and persistence for these students should assist university administrators in understanding what qualities attract talented low-income, first-generation and/or minority students to an institution, and if those same factors or others play a role in their persistence. If the students' pre-matriculation expectations are met by the university and these choice factors are similar to those factors that ensure persistence, then administrators can assume that programs such as the Longhorn Scholars Program are instrumental in the persistence of quality low-income, first-generation, and/or minority students.

The politics of supporting diversity in higher education: Texas Legislature's enactment of House Bill 588

Munoz, Evangelina The University of Texas at Austin 2004 해외박사(DDOD)

House Bill 588 was enacted by the 75th Legislature in 1997. This bill was a response to the Hopwood v. State of Texas, 78 F.3d 932, 962 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 518 U.S. 1033 (1996) ruling that banned the use of affirmative action policies at The University of Texas School of Law. It was an alternative to the traditional use of race in university admissions decisions and guarantees automatic admission to the top 10 percent of each high school graduating class in the state. This study focused on the deliberations and actions of 75th Legislature in Texas. It was guided by Meranto's (1967) input-output model designed to show how environmental factors enter a legislative system as inputs, which are then altered within the system to produce a new output. The study addressed four questions: (1) How did members of the Texas Legislature perceive the Hopwood ruling? (2) What influence did the implementation of the Hopwood ruling have on the policymaking process of the 75th Legislative Session? (3) What conditions within the Texas Legislature favored the final construction of House Bill 588, and what were the final provisions of the legislative policy addressing minority representation in higher education? and (4) What key strategies did the author of House Bill 588 implement to facilitate the development and passage of the bill?. Findings of the study include: (a) minority legislators anticipated that the Hopwood ruling would have an adverse affect on minority representation in higher education and sought a legislative response; (b) House Bill 588 was enacted in response to the ruling; (c) three conditions within the system were instrumental in the passage of this bill; and (d) five key strategic maneuvers further secured the bill's success. The study provides other states and policy analysts factors that can be used in place of race in admissions criteria. The study also provides insight into how support was built to enact legislation dealing with the issue of minority under-representation in higher education.

"In the middle of an orange grove, across the street from the tortilla factory": The Science Academy of South Texas

Canter, Anna Rudolph The University of Texas at Austin 2004 해외박사(DDOD)

The Science Academy of South Texas, one of four magnet schools in The South Texas Independent School District (STISD), opened in 1989 to bring educational opportunities in mathematics and science to students in the Rio Grande Valley of South Texas. STISD serves three counties and offers enrollment to any student who applies from any of the twenty-eight feeder districts. The Science Academy is the only mathematics and science magnet school in the Rio Grande Valley. Over years, Science Academy has developed partnerships with major colleges and universities in Houston, Texas and the Rio Grande Valley. University partnerships have provided funding for programs at the school and have created continuing summer study programs for Science Academy students. Graduates have been accepted to and/or attended some of the most prestigious colleges and universities across the United States, despite personal challenges including low socioeconomic status, English as their second language, and being the first in their family to attend college. This historical study seeks to answer two basic questions. How has the Science Academy faced its academic, political, and social challenges over the years? What factors appear to have contributed to its establishment, survival, and success?. Chapter One, "Significance of the Study and Research Methods" describes the study's significance within the scholarly literature and the research methods used for this study. Chapter Two, "The Science Academy of South Texas" presents the history of STISD and the events which precipitated Science Academy's establishment. Chapter Three, "The Administration, Faculty and Staff of Science Academy," discusses administration and faculty of the Science Academy. Its focus is Science Academy teachers and their educational beliefs as well as the administrators and staff and their beliefs. Chapter Four, "Curriculum Continuity and Change at the Science Academy," focuses on the curriculum history of Science Academy and the changes faculty members and administrators have made over time. Chapter Five, "The Students of the Science Academy of South Texas," focuses on the students at the Science Academy, who administrators and teachers describe as "the whole reason we are here." Chapter Six offers concluding thoughts and ideas for future research.

Neutrino heating and baryon inhomogeneity in Big Bang nucleosynthesis

Lara, Juan Felipe The University of Texas at Austin 2000 해외박사(DDOD)

In 1993 this author began work on updating and revising the Big Bang Nucleosynthesis code used by Tony Rothman and Richard Matzner of the University of Texas at Austin for a series of articles in the 1980's. In a temperature range around one GK free neutrons and protons combine to form heavier and heavier nuclei via nuclear reactions and β-decays, with around 25% of the nucleons forming <super>4</super>He nuclei. The Texas code originally had a reaction network that could produce abundances Y(<italic> i</italic>) of nine isotopes, <super>7</super>Be and lighter. The reaction network was expanded such that the code could then calculate abundances for 68 isotopes. The results were compared with results from the Thomas et al, code, used by David Thomas of the University of Chicago and collaborators for several articles in the 1990's. The codes' calculations of <italic>dY </italic>(<italic>i</italic>)/<italic>dt</italic> and of timesteps were changed so that the mass fractions of <super>4</super>He agreed to within 10<super> −4</super>. This author then determined which reactions for each isotope were significant in creating and destroying the isotope, showing which of the heavier isotopes were more significantly produced. Electrons and positrons transfer energy to neutrinos via annihilation and scattering reactions. This author replaced the Texas code's method of calculating this neutrino heating effect with a method that solves the Boltzmann Transport Equation for the neutrino distribution functions <italic>f</italic>_ν(<italic>p</italic>). The method showed that heating primarily came from e<super>−</super>e<super>+</super> annihilation into ν<italic>_e</italic><overline>ν</overline><italic>_e</italic> pairs and got distributed to μ and τ neutrinos through ν<italic>_i</italic>ν<italic>_j</italic> reactions, and that<italic> f</italic>_ν(<italic>p</italic>) for higher energy, more tightly coupled neutrinos had the largest percent increases. Increased <italic>f</italic>_ν(<italic>p</italic>) leads to greater conversion of neutrons to protons before nucleosynthesis, but a decrease in electromagnetic plasma temperature <italic> T</italic> leads to nucleosynthesis occuring earlier and thus with fewer neutrons decayed. The latter effect causes an increase in the mass fraction of <super> 4</super>He by around 1.6 × 10<super>−4</super> for η₁₀ = 3.0. The Texas code was for a homogeneous model of the universe. From it this author constructed a code with a spherically symmetric inhomogeneous baryon distribution. Baryon-to-photon ratio η and the model's radius <italic> r_i</italic> at the initial temperature <italic>T</italic> = 100 GK were varied. Neutrons diffuse from high density regions to low density regions until they are homogeneously distributed. The neutrons then back diffuse when nucleosynthesis depletes neutrons in the high density regions earlier than in the low density regions. How the diffusion rate compared with the neutron-proton conversion rates and the time when nucleosynthesis occurred determined the final mass fractions calculated. The inhomogeneous code also included the neutrino heating effect. The change in <super>4</super>He's mass fraction remained in the range of 1.1–2 × 10<super>−4</super> for the whole range of η and <italic>r_i</italic> tested. The effect led to a shift in neutron diffusion to a slightly earlier time that occured in all regions. The heating effect also changed log(<italic>Y</italic>(d)/<italic> Y</italic>(p)] by an order of magnitude of 10<super>−3</super>, an order less than the change it would have by shifting η to raise <italic>X</italic>_{<super> 4</super>He}. Heating in fact increased deuterium production for the largest values of <italic>r</italic>(<italic>i</italic>).

Development and implementation of a mechanistic-empirical design procedure for a post-tensioned prestressed concrete pavement (PCP)

Medina Chavez, Cesar Ivan The University of Texas at Austin 2003 해외박사(DDOD)

Prestressed Concrete Pavement (PCP) has been around for almost 60 years. Its application started in Europe in the 1940s, and since has been applied with fair success in other countries, including the United States. Domestic application of this technology has been limited for different reasons, mainly due to the lack of well defined or standard design and construction procedures. In the United States, PCPs have been constructed in Pennsylvania, Mississippi, Arizona, Illinois, and Texas. In 1985, the Center for Transportation Research (CTR) at the University of Texas at Austin designed and constructed a one-mile PCP section that, after more than 17 years of service under heavy traffic loads, is still in very good condition. Although the overall performance of the PCP constructed in Texas has surpassed expectations, there are still design and construction flaws that need to be corrected. In 1999, the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) funded a research project that required the design and construction of a new improved PCP section in Texas. The work presented herein attempts to provide a design methodology and preliminary construction guidelines and specifications for a generic PCP. Additionally, the study implements the design procedure for a PCP to be constructed on Highway IH35 in Hillsboro, Texas. It is believed that this investigation will provide valuable information and a positive step towards the standardization of the PCP application. The results from the study show that PCP construction is very promising and provides long-term low-maintenance pavements at a competitive life cycle cost. During the last few years, there has been an embracing trend for this paving technology and it is hoped that the outstanding performance of several previous projects and lessons learned from the not-so-successful projects will lead to new improvements to PCP methods of design and construction that will produce high performance pavements.

Leaving Latinos out: The teaching of United States history in Texas

Noboa, Julio The University of Texas at Austin 2003 해외박사(DDOD)

The primary purpose of this investigation was to explore the factors that influence content choices made by U.S. history teachers in Texas public schools. The ultimate objective was to gain understanding of how these factors affect the extent to which Latinos, in comparison with African Americans and American Indians, are integrated into the historical narrative taught in the classroom. Qualitative methods were primarily used including personal interviews and a focus group with U.S. history teachers in San Antonio. These were combined with other methods including participant observation and content analyses of textbooks, curriculum standards, and course content surveys related to the teaching of U.S. history. Relevant findings from component studies were integrated to provide a more holistic documentation of the representation of Latinos in the teaching of U.S. history in Texas. The areas of investigation included: (a) perspectives and practices of teachers, (b) current and recently adopted textbooks, (c) textbook adoption testimony, and (d) the curriculum standards, Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS). These various studies functioned as constituent components which were integrated into the overall design of the larger investigation and the analysis of its data. Though each component study had a purpose specific to its particular focus, each contributed towards constructing a larger mosaic of interrelated parts which taken together achieved the ultimate objectives of this overall investigation. What makes this effort unique is the intent to conduct a comprehensive review of the standards, textbooks, and classroom practices used in the teaching of U.S. history in order to determine the status of Latino representation. Its significance is underscored by the growing size and historical importance of the Latino population in Texas and the nation, and by the influential role Texas has played at the national level in the selection of history textbooks and in the establishment of social studies curriculum standards. All the findings from this investigation consistently revealed that Latinos are indeed underrepresented in the teaching of U.S. history in Texas. Policy recommendations to remedy this problem are suggested and addressed to key educational actors including classroom teachers and the Texas Education Agency.

China's higher education excellence in the context of globalization: The world-class university

Ho, Chiung-Yao The University of Texas at Austin 2006 해외박사(DDOD)

Higher education systems worldwide are undergoing major restructuring to enhance their competitiveness on a global level. China, Britain, and Germany have announced major reforms to build elite universities in order to stay ahead in today's knowledge economy. China, in particular, has invested billions of yuan to build world-class universities as a national strategy to meet the challenges of global competition. While the intention to pursue excellence is unambiguously clear, the definition of a world-class university is very vague and subject to various interpretations. Therefore, this study examines the major elements of excellence as perceived by China and scrutinizes the impact of globalization on the interpretation of the world-class university. The study describes and connects two different yet related phenomena, i.e., China's world-class university aspiration and globalization. One part of the study describes the efforts and results of the 985 Project, which aims to build world-class universities in China. Specifically, the study examines Peking University and Tsinghua University, the two key universities which have received major government grants to enhance their quality. The other part of the study presents scholarly interpretations of globalization pertaining to higher education. In-depth analyses of the two systems reveal how globalization frames and shapes China's interpretation of excellence. Using a modified version of Interactive Qualitative Analysis (IQA), this study relied on qualitative data collected from literature and documents. The researcher analyzed approximately 162 documents. Eleven key elements of a world-class university were identified, and an interpretation system, visualized in a mindmap, was constructed based on the relationships between the elements. To determine the impact of globalization on the idea of a world-class university, five key elements of globalization of higher education were identified, and a mindmap was built accordingly. Comparisons of the mindmaps yield underlying threads across the two systems. Findings of the study shed light on the meaning of excellence in a contemporary and broader context and reveal the approach China has taken to enhance national competitiveness. The implications of globalization on worldwide higher education are also examined.

Biogenic hydrocarbons in Texas: Source characterization and chemistry

Wiedinmyer, Christine The University of Texas at Austin 1999 해외박사(DDOD)

Natural sources, particularly vegetation, emit significant quantities of hydrocarbons to the atmosphere. These biogenic hydrocarbons have short atmospheric lifetimes and can participate in the atmospheric reactions that produce ozone and particulate matter. To better understand, and eventually control the formation of ozone and atmospheric particulate matter, it is important to understand the emissions and chemistry of biogenic hydrocarbons. Biogenic hydrocarbons are expected to be significant in Texas; yet, little effort has previously been spent to characterize the emissions and chemistry of biogenic hydrocarbons there. Several unresolved issues associated with biogenic hydrocarbon emissions within Texas are addressed in this dissertation. The first sections of this dissertation reports methods that have been developed to create new land use databases within Texas that are used to create new biogenic emissions inventories. The compiled land use mapping described here contains specific vegetation data for Texas and has better spatial resolution than land use data previously used to create biogenic emissions inventories. The new biogenic emission inventories produced with the land cover data predict increases for much of the state, and the spatial allocation of the emissions is different than previous inventories. The next portion of this dissertation describes a field study of biogenic: emissions performed in central Texas. The purpose of this study was to examine the concentrations and chemistry of isoprene in Texas. A box model approach is described and used to estimate isoprene flux from vegetation. These results are compared to biogenic emissions estimates in the region. The final sections of this thesis address the importance of land use data in areas other than biogenic emissions. This is accomplished by evaluating the sensitivity of predicted ozone concentrations to land use data with the use of a regional photochemical grid model.

Academics and economics: The Yin and Yang of for-profit higher education. A case study of the University of Phoenix (Arizona)

Rutherford, Gregory Franklin The University of Texas at Austin 2002 해외박사(DDOD)

The purpose of this study was to investigate how the University of Phoenix defines and implements a balance of academics and economics in curriculum and operations. The University of Phoenix is organized as a for-profit institution and has the largest enrollment of any university in the United States. Tremendous growth has occurred in large proprietary colleges in recent years. According to the literature, for-profit higher education is an understudied area of which knowledge could be useful. The University of Phoenix has been the most successful of the for-profits in recruiting students and generating revenue. As the growth of for-profit education continues, so does the controversy in academic, governing, and accrediting bodies concerning the legitimacy of for-profit colleges. The common points of contention pointed out by critics include: predominant use of adjunct faculty, acceptance of work experience for credit, lack of library resources, high relative tuition, management of financial aid, recruiting techniques, use of distance-learning methods, study groups, and the profit motive. Central to the controversy is a philosophical debate concerning the business orientation versus the virtues of education. Qualitative research methods were used to collect data. The primary source of data came from twenty-one semi-structured interviews with University of Phoenix stakeholders. Another significant source of data was documentation related to the history and operation of the University. Three major themes were found in the research: (1) a desire to accrue value to the consumer, primarily students and their employers, termed Consumer Stakeholder Value; (2) a desire to improve business value which is referred to as Business Stakeholder Value; and (3) an acknowledged tension that exists between the extremes found in the values of academics and economics, referred to as The Tension. Throughout this research, a sense of complimentary opposites influenced the researcher to develop a theoretical model of how the University of Phoenix defines balance. This was done using the Tai Chi symbol representing Yin and Yang.