Theses and Dissertations from UMD
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Item EQUITY ISSUES IN ELECTRIC VEHICLE ADOPTION AND PLANNING FOR CHARGING INFRASTRUCTURE(2024) Ugwu, Nneoma; Niemeier, Deb; Civil Engineering; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Electric Vehicles (EVs) offer a sustainable solution to fossil fuel dependency and environmentalpollution from conventional vehicles, crucial for mitigating climate change. However, low market penetration among minority and low-income communities raises equity and environmental justice concerns. This dissertation examines EV adoption and charging station access disparities in Maryland, focusing on sociodemographic factors such as race and income. To address the lack of minority representation in existing EV research surveys, we conducted anonline survey targeting people of color (POC) and low-to-moderate-income households. We received 542 complete responses. Ordinal regression models were used to analyze factors influencing EV interest. We then performed a cumulative accessibility study of EV infrastructure in Maryland. Pearson correlation analysis was used to show the relationship between charging station accessibility and sociodemographics. Population density showed a strong positive correlation (0.87) with charging deployment. We found that Baltimore City, had the highest population density and the highest concentration of EV charging in Maryland. We conducted a case study of Baltimore City’s EV infrastructure investments and policy efforts. Charging stations were categorized based on speed, network, access, and facility type. Spatial analysis andZero-Inflated Poisson (ZIP) regression models at the block group level were employed to investigate the disparities in EV charging infrastructure distribution within the City across minority and non-minority communities. Our findings show substantial disparities in EV perceptions between POC and Whitecommunities. The survey revealed that POC were more than twice more likely than White respondents to indicate that the availability of charging stations affects their interest in EV adoption, while the case studies revealed that POC populations are less likely to have access to EV infrastructure, necessitating targeted investment in charging options and subsidies in these communities. Our study also found the need for policies fostering residential charging station deployment, particularly in minority communities. To ensure equitable EV adoption, strategic investments in economically disadvantaged and rural areas beyond centralized regions are vital. This study informs evidence-based policies prioritizing accessibility, equity, and inclusivity in promoting a cleaner and sustainable transportation landscape.Item ADDRESSING THE DISPROPORTIONALITY OF BLACK/AFRICAN AMERICAN STUDENTS IN ADVANCED PLACEMENT (AP) CLASSES(2022) DiFato, John Paul; Imig, David; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Data at the national, state, and local levels all indicate disproportionately low enrollment of Black/African American students in Advanced Placement (AP) classes at the high school level. Black/African American students are missing out on educational opportunities and access to an equitable education by not participating in AP classes in high school. One method for high schools to address this issue is to explore the processes in place for recommending/selecting students for AP classes. The purpose of this study was to develop and pilot a talent-spotting tool using student data for teachers and school counselors to use in the AP course recommendation process. Specifically, this protocol was developed to identify more students, especially Black/African American students, whose data indicated that they might be ready for AP coursework. The researcher developed the talent-spotting tool, and the algorithm used to process the data, and tested its effectiveness in identifying students who should be recommended for AP classes. The researcher employed the following methodology for the study: (a) developed a data-based talent-spotting tool protocol draft; (b) obtained input from potential users regarding current course recommendation practices (including the use of AP Potential) and their perceptions of the talent-spotting tool and its potential usefulness via an anonymous, web-based survey; and (c) piloted the talent-spotting tool and compared the results with course recommendations based on SY1819 AP Potential data and with the SY1819 actual course recommendations. Based on survey responses from potential users, the majority indicated they want a process that is simple to use and can be a portion of the course recommendation process, but not the entire process. Participants appreciated the objectivity that the talent-spotting tool brought to the course recommendation process, but many were not ready to completely give up on the subjective human factors that are involved with course recommendations. Furthermore, the talent-spotting tool accurately identified students who were recommended for AP courses. But, more importantly, the talent-spotting tool identified more students who were not recommended for AP courses but who have the aptitude to succeed in those courses. In fact, the talent-spotting tool identified a higher proportion of Black/African American students than white students. The adoption of this talent-spotting tool as part of the course recommendation process has the potential to directly impact the disproportionate representation of Black/African American students in AP courses.Item Techquity in the Classroom: Designing to Include Equity and Social Justice Impacts in Computing Lessons(2022) Coenraad, Merijke; Weintrop, David; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Technology is ubiquitous in modern society. It affects our daily activities and exists in every household and on every street corner. Yet, research has shown that both the process of creating technologies and the technologies themselves are biased. New technologies are based on datasets, algorithms, and designs that encode developer and data biases. As youth increasingly use technologies in their daily lives, experience the effects of technologies and algorithms, and learn to be technology creators, it is important for them to critically explore and understand the ways that technology introduces and perpetuates inequities. In this three-article dissertation, I present a design study on the development and implementation of materials specifically designed to teach about Threats to Techquity. Threats to Techquity are aspects of computing and technologies that cause or could cause inequalities, especially inequalities based on marginalized identities (e.g., inequalities due to race, immigration status, gender, sexual orientation, ability). To understand how to bring Techquity into the classroom, I partnered with youth and teachers using participatory design to develop the “Talking Techquity” curriculum for middle grades (5th through 8th grade) students. Findings from this work revealed: (1) youth initially named and identified examples of visible Threats to Techquity, but as they learned more about these threats, they uncovered and discussed invisible Threats to Techquity more frequently and identified these threats as topics to be taught to peers; (2) youth and teacher designers had similar instructional priorities and utilized similar pedagogical strategies when designing and critiquing learning experiences about online data collection and data use, but had contrasting ways of discussing examples and different learning goals; and (3) when implementing “Talking Techquity,” teachers who helped co-design the curriculum made adaptations to content and project requirements to provide more scaffolding and ensure students experienced success based on teachers’ perceptions of student needs and other factors. This research encourages researchers, curriculum designers, educators, and students themselves to consider how to teach and learn about the Threats to Techquity affecting youth’s daily lives and demonstrates how participatory design methods can help uncover key conceptualizations and instructional priorities that make this possible.Item THE IMPACT of PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT ON DEMOCRATIC VALUES: EVIDENCE FROM US EDUCATION(2022) Han, Xu; Egan, Toby M; Public Policy; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Although performance management is supposed to be a generic, values-neutral tool that can be adapted for any purpose, it has been criticized for ignoring important democratic values. Critics claim that violating these democratic values makes performance management counterproductive to the stated aim of restoring public trust in government through improved outcomes. This dissertation comprehensively examines the impact of performance management on equity and civic engagement in U.S public high schools. Performance management may incentivize prioritizing high-value students who are more likely to contribute to school performance ranking at the expense of others, creating an inequity problem. However, it can also promote the well-being of disadvantaged groups by providing incentives and information on improvement in disaggregated performance. Performance management may draw resources and attention to activities aiming to improve students’ academic performance in high-stakes subjects (reading, math, and science) at the expense of other important activities where students develop skills in and interests for civic engagement. However, activities aiming to improve students' academic performance also prepare students to perform tasks such as reading, writing, speaking, and quantitative reasoning, integral parts of civic engagement. To conduct the analysis, the dissertation draws on a nationally representative survey of administrators and students at public high schools. As students’ academic performance is the result of collaborative efforts among students and staff (teachers and principals), performance management is operationalized for students and staff respectively. The student component includes established student performance standards, frequency of standardized testing, and imposed consequences. The staff component includes principals’ managerial autonomy, teachers’ evaluation, and imposed consequences. Through a multilevel analysis of how performance management influences students, especially for racial minorities’ standardized test scores in math, findings point to an unfilled promise regarding equity. Performance management components for students and staff are each associated with increased average student test scores, but do not shrink the gap between advantaged and disadvantaged student subgroups. Still, not all aspects of performance management perpetuate inequity. Of the two performance management components focusing on staff and students, the staff component is associated with lower test scores for struggling students while the student component increases struggling student performance. By simultaneously analyzing the indirect effects of performance management on volunteering behaviors through cognitive abilities, civic skills, and civic norms in structural equation modeling, the dissertation finds mixed effects of performance management on civic engagement. On the one hand, the student component has a positive but small indirect effect on civic participation by improving students’ cognitive abilities. On the other hand, the staff component has a negative but small indirect effect by reducing students’ participation in extracurricular activities where they develop civic skills. However, the student component does not negatively affect civic engagement. Overall, the findings suggest that despite the negative effects of performance management on equity and civic engagement, performance management can be used to mitigate inequity and reverse the recent decline in civic engagement.Item Food Insecurity in the District of Columbia: Do Community Gardens Help?(2021) Sodergren, Cassandra; Roby, Dylan; Wilson, Sacoby; Health Services Administration; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)More than 10% of the District of Columbia’s residents have difficulty accessing affordable and healthy food, a number that is now projected to be over 16% because of COVID-19 (Sustainable DC, 2019; Food Security Report, 2020). Wards 7 and 8 experience the highest levels of food insecurity, with one grocery store per 60,000 residents versus other wards with one grocery store per 10,000 residents (Sustainable DC, 2019). Community gardens are sometimes referred to as part of the solution to food insecurity. This study explored if there was an intersection between community gardens and food security in Washington, DC. Through qualitative interviews and an inductive thematic analysis this study concludes that community gardens have a role in food security for those who experience food insecurity. The three core themes that emerged from studying community gardens were food security, relationships, and quality of life.Item EQUITABLE AND PROGRESSIVE DISTANCE-BASED USER CHARGE: DESIGN AND EVALUATION OF INCOME-BASED MILEAGE FEES IN MARYLAND(2014) Yang, Di; Zhang, Lei; Civil Engineering; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Due to the declining purchasing power of fuel tax revenue, the Highway Trust Fund is insufficient to operate and maintain the surface transportation system in the U.S. Alternative sources of revenue, other than the fuel tax, should be considered to address the insolvency of the funding system. Mileage fees and value pricing have long been attractive options to researchers and decision-makers, but they often raise equity concerns. This paper aims to design and evaluate equitable and progressive distance-based user charge policies, and focuses specifically on income-based fee rate structures. Three variable-rate vehicle-miles traveled (VMT) fee scenarios with respect to income are introduced and all policy scenarios are tested with a statewide transportation model in Maryland. Results show that income-based VMT fees can well protect lower-income households while generating more revenue. However, a standard fee structure based on Ramsey pricing does not work as well as the fixed-percentage incremental fee structure. The latter is progressive across all income groups while ensuring that equity and revenue goals are met.Item WHO GETS WHAT: A WITHIN-SCHOOL EQUITY ANALYSIS OF RESOURCE ALLOCATION(2014) Wolf, Rebecca; Davis, Thomas E; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This study analyzes resource allocation within schools, and it is one of the first in the literature to analyze the equity of monetary resources at the individual student level. The study calculates teacher resource expenditures (TREs) per pupil by allocating teacher salaries to individual students for each high school student in a large urban public school district. Next, the study compares the degree of within-school variation in per-pupil TREs to the variation between schools and concludes that the variation within schools is much larger than the variation between schools. The study then uses Berne and Stiefel's (1984) equity evaluation framework and develops an analytic approach that is appropriate for conducting a within-school equity analysis of per-pupil TREs. The findings indicate that inequities in the allocation of teacher salaries at the student level do exist. Specifically, the study finds violations of horizontal equity, vertical equity for low-income students, and equal opportunity for students of differing achievement levels. These findings also suggest that district leaders may be unaware of how resources are ultimately allocated to students.This study also evaluates the equity of the within-school allocation of specific resources to identify if resources are equitably allocated in academic courses that are critical for academic success. This study evaluates the equity of the allocation of class size, teacher experience, and social capital in students' English and math courses only as well as the number of advanced placement (AP) courses taken by students, which indicates access to rigorous curricula. In analyzing the equity of these specific resources within each school in the district, this study determines if multiple resource advantages or disadvantages exist for some students.
Findings indicate that multiple resource inequities may exist for low-performing, low-income, and minority students. Further, the study finds that schools with greater socioeconomic and racial diversity have more occurrences of within-school resource inequities for low-income and minority students than schools with homogeneous student populations. The study is among the first to analyze the equity of the within-school allocation of multiple resources simultaneously to gain a better understanding of whether students in the same school receive equitable resources.
Item (Im)Mobilizing Community College Youths' Digital Culture: Theorizing the Implications of Everyday Digital Practices, Perceptions, and Differences among Frederick Community College Youths(2014) Trigger, Kelly Lynn; Struna, Nancy L; American Studies; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This study complicates American youths' digital culture by analyzing the digital practices, perceptions, and experiences of students, ages 18 to 24, attending Frederick Community College in Frederick, Maryland, through an interdisciplinary lens that infuses intersectional theory with Bourdieu's triad of habitus, field, and capital. Mixed methods research combining data from the FCC Digital Practices Survey and focus group interviews indicated that community college youths engaged in a spectrum of practices to socialize and communicate, engage in entertainment and creative practices, and manage everyday life, information, school, and work. Community college youths actively participated in digital culture through social networking, listening to music, watching television, playing videogames, and engaging with other technology. Not only did they feel pressured to adapt digitally, they also intentionally disengaged from technology, managed their lives using digital tools, resolved communication conflicts, monitored their online identities and privacy, developed various forms of digital expertise, and observed the impacts of adults' struggles with technology at home and in the classroom. Data patterns, including differences between males and females, and among youths with different racial and ethnic identities, revealed contradictions among their everyday digital practices, their confidence with performing these practices, and their perceptions of practices' importance in college and in their future everyday lives and work. This study theorizes the impacts of these contradictions, proposing that as youths encounter shifts in the symbolic value of digital practices between their everyday digital culture and the field of education, they experience what Clarke et al. (2009) termed "digital dissonance," conflicts between their everyday digital practices and their digital engagement in education. Impacts of digital dissonance, which range from resolution and circumnavigation, to digital stagnation and immobilization, affect the uneven positions youths take up within the field of community college education and potentially result in the unintended reproduction of social inequity. To disrupt the reproduction of inequity, this study considers the material consequences of digital immobilization for community college youths and advocates for intentional reform and research that mobilizes their digital practices.Item ANTECEDENTS AND CONSEQUENCES OF INSIDERS' EQUITY SHARE SELLING AT IPO: THREE ESSAYS(2013) Li, Qiang; Goldfarb, Brent; Business and Management: Management & Organization; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Secondary share sales at IPO by insiders happen frequently and on a large scale. Current literature offers mixed explanations. For example, signaling theory (Leland & Pyle, 1977) suggests that secondary share sales at IPO by insiders signal poor quality of the IPO firm. The premise is that insiders have more private information about the firm than outsiders. Therefore, insider sales should be indicative of trouble in the firm. This implies that insiders' secondary share sales will be associated with poor pre- and post-IPO performance. Agency theory (Jensen & Meckling, 1976) suggests that insiders will lower their commitment to the firm after they sell part of their shares; after such sales, managerial and firm interests are more poorly aligned. This theory suggests that poor post-IPO performance is causally associated with insiders' secondary share sales at IPO. Finally, risk aversion may drive insiders to diversify their risk away from the focal firm by selling secondary shares at IPO. This would suggest that sales have nothing to do with firm quality or managerial commitment. Although the above theories provide different implications for practice, the mixed nature of their explanations prevent us from having a clear understanding of the phenomenon. Additionally, prior studies have been unable to tease them apart. To address this issue, this dissertation investigates the following related questions: what factors predict insiders' secondary share sales at IPO and how do such sales affect various firm performances. Only by looking at the antecedents and consequences of insiders' share sales at IPO, as well as finding exogenous variation that affects secondary share sales and is unrelated to the characteristics of the firm can we see if the sales are associated with firm quality or risk aversion or if insiders lower their commitment after sales. The answers to these questions are investigated in three essays. In Essay 1, I ask which CEOs sell shares at IPO and under what conditions? Using a sample of 651 U.S. software IPOs from 1990 to 2011, I find that when more of the CEO's wealth is tied up in the firm, they are more likely to sell. The effect is especially strong for CEO founders. Interestingly, when board members also engage in equity share sales at IPO, CEOs are more likely to sell. This latter result suggests weakened board oversight of the CEO. Using an instrumental variable approach, I tease apart cotemporaneous selling due to poor firm quality and selling that only occurs with the reduction of oversight. In Essay 2, I ask when equity share sales at IPO influence IPO underpricing. Through an analysis of 633 IPOs in the U.S. computer software industry, I find that the equity share sales by outside directors (VCs and other institutional investors) are associated with upward offer price revision pre-IPO and lower IPO underpricing. The interpretation is that outside directors may be able to bargain for a higher offer price when they attempt to sell part of their equity shares at IPO. As such, the upward offer price revision pre-IPO results from outsiders' bargaining leads to lower IPO underpricing. These results are robust to a Heckman two-stage approach that addresses potential selection bias. In Essay 3, I examine whether insiders' secondary share sales at IPO impacts a variety of performance measures post-IPO and the contingencies under which any impact may vary. Through the analysis of 500 IPOs of the U.S. computer software industry, in general, I find that insiders' secondary share sales at IPO are not associated with sales or sales growth. Rather, they are only associated with slower R&D growth in the year post-IPO. This effect is less negative for large firms. The results are robust to an instrumental variable approach to address the potential endogeneity issues. Taken together, this dissertation finds that insiders' secondary share sales are not significantly associated with post-IPO firm performances, providing no support to signaling theory or agency theory. The findings are more consistent with risk aversion theory and imply that insiders' secondary share sales at IPO are not a significant negative signal and traditional wisdom may overreact to the sales.Item What Can I Do? Preservice Elementary Teachers Developing Understandings of Self as Mathematics Teacher and Teaching in Context(2012) Neumayer DePiper, Jill; Edwards, Ann R; Curriculum and Instruction; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)In order to prepare preservice teachers (PSTs) to enact teaching practices that best support all students in learning mathematics, elementary mathematics teacher education must prepare PSTs to navigate the many social, political, and institutional dynamics in today's classrooms. In this research, I theorized that successful negotiation of these dynamics requires that teachers have an understanding of themselves as mathematics teachers, including an examined vision of their goals of mathematics teaching, the social and political contexts of schooling, and the realities of their school contexts. In this study, I explored how PSTs understood themselves as mathematics teachers and teaching through participation in a seminar designed to support critical examination of themselves as mathematics teachers, particularly as within complex realities of schooling and attention to equity and access. The theoretical perspective of performativity (Butler, 1999) was used to understand and support PST identity work and specifically guided the design of the seminar and the case analysis. Each of the four cases offers a unique perspective on how PSTs understood themselves as mathematics teachers and mathematics teaching and how these understandings shifted. The first of three findings across the cases was that PSTs understood themselves and their teaching differently. Specifically, as articulated in the second finding, they understood teaching for equity differently and in relation to their own self-understandings. The third finding is that PSTs' understandings of themselves as mathematics teachers and mathematics teaching shifted. Thus, understanding PSTs' mathematics teacher identities through a theoretical premise of performativity and supporting PSTs in deconstructing these contexts, expectations, and constraints supported some PSTs in repositioning themselves in relation to dominant discourses that framed their understandings of mathematics teaching and in problematizing mathematics teaching. These findings have implications for mathematics teacher education, offering new tools and specific concrete resources to support mathematics teacher critical self-examination. Findings also suggest the need for PSTs to engage in continued identity work and in facilitated opportunities to work at the intersections of mathematics teaching with issues of race, class, and institutional discourses of testing. Further research on operationalizing a critical pedagogy in mathematics teacher education is also needed.